The Moscow Cipher

‘Naturally. You will be familiar with your flight crew, I think, from your journey to Africa.’

There weren’t many things Ben wanted to remember from that particular escapade, but he’d never forgotten the stalwart service of Kaprisky’s chief pilot Adrien Leroy and his Number Two, Noël Marchand.

‘Flight time to Moscow will be three hours and eleven minutes,’ Kaprisky said. ‘It will be evening by the time you arrive, and so my chef will be at your disposal to provide whatever you wish to eat. You will land at Vnukovo International Airport, twenty-eight kilometres southwest of the city. Your assistant will be there to meet you on landing, with a car to take you to your hotel. I hope you will be satisfied with the accommodation.’

‘Just the basics, Auguste,’ Ben said.

‘Oh, it is nothing remotely fancy, I assure you. But then, a man of your experience is used to the rougher side of life.’

‘Just a couple of things before I go,’ Ben said. ‘First, I’d like a photo of Valentina.’

Eloise unsnapped the tiny handbag, dug inside and pulled out a glossy print. ‘This one is very recent.’ It showed a pretty dark-haired child with lots of light and joy in her sparkling hazel eyes, pictured by the lake. Eloise said, ‘There are more pictures in her room. Would you like to see it?’

Ben said yes, anything was useful. With her uncle in tow, Eloise led Ben quickly from the salon, through the gleaming labyrinth of marble and priceless rugs and furniture, and up a grand staircase to a bedroom on the first floor. Valentina’s room was the size of a luxury penthouse apartment, with its own bathroom and dressing room and a walk-in wardrobe fit for Marie Antoinette. Everything was pink, from the silk on the walls to the canopy of the Cadillac-sized four-poster bed to the teddy bears clustered on the pillows, and the pillows themselves. There were books everywhere, a precarious stack of them piled on a pink bedside cabinet: Dostoyevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov, a collection of short stories by the same author, Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin and a volume of poetry by Mikhail Lermontov. Ben wondered how many twelve-year-old girls were so heavily into Russian literary classics.

Eloise saw him looking at the books and explained, ‘She adores reading. And her goal is to become completely fluent in Russian before her father’s fortieth birthday next April, so she can surprise him.’ Eloise let out a deep, shuddering sigh and screwed her eyes shut, shaking her head in anguish. ‘What has he done? What has he done?’

‘She’s a clever kid,’ Ben said, to keep it light.

‘A little genius,’ Kaprisky weighed in, voice heavy with emotion. ‘She already speaks Dutch, German and English and has come on greatly with her French since moving here. Naturally, she is also proficient in mathematics, and developing a strong interest in science. She could be anything she wanted. She is such a talented actress, too. She does the most incredible impressions of people.’

‘But most of all she loves animals,’ Eloise said. ‘She wants to be a vet when she grows up.’

Which made sense, judging by the pictures on the walls. Every inch of available space was crammed with framed photographs of a variety of dogs and cats and horses. Kaprisky held back tears as he told Ben what a keen little photographer his grandniece was, among her many talents, constantly snapping shots of animals everywhere she went. Other framed pictures that hadn’t been taken by Valentina featured her hugging various puppies, kittens and ponies, each time with the same dazzling smile on her face.

Eloise couldn’t look at the pictures of her daughter without bursting into tears once again. Wiping her eyes she went to a little pink chair and picked up a little pink gilet jacket that was neatly hung over its back. She caressed the material with a sob. ‘She has another one exactly the same as this, which she was wearing when she left. Tailor-made especially for her. Pink is her favourite colour, as you might have noticed.’

‘That’s all good to know,’ Ben said. ‘What about her father?’

Eloise looked confused. ‘No, he hates pink.’

Kaprisky’s mouth gave a twitch. ‘Please forgive my niece,’ he said in French so that Eloise wouldn’t understand. ‘With such parents I can’t begin to imagine where her daughter gets her intelligence from.’

Ben smiled patiently and said to Eloise, ‘I mean do you have a photo of him?’

Eloise went from confused to blank, then her cheeks flushed. ‘No, but I think Valentina keeps one in her bedside drawer.’

She hurried over to look. While she was rooting through all the usual paraphernalia that twelve-year-old girls keep in their bedside drawers, even academically brilliant multilingual genius ones, Ben added, ‘It’d also be useful to know all you can tell me about your ex-husband.’

Eloise looked up with a frown. ‘Like what?’

‘Like who his friends are, where he hangs out, habits, hobbies and interests. I realise details of current girlfriends might be difficult, but the more information I have, the more it could help provide a clue to his present whereabouts.’

She chewed her lower lip and shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t help you. Even before Yuri moved back to Russia, I couldn’t have given you the name of a single friend, or anyone he kept company with. He has no interests, no hobbies I know of, no activities outside of his work. Only his religion. He’s Catholic, and attends church quite often.’

‘That’s handy information,’ Ben said. As long as he could stake out every Catholic church in Russia on the off-chance of Yuri wandering inside to worship. There couldn’t be more than a few thousand of them. He asked her, ‘Would you happen to have his mobile number? That could be useful to me, as well.’

‘I haven’t spoken to Yuri by phone in a long time,’ Eloise said, still rooting around in the bedside drawers. ‘Not that I would want to, because it would only end in arguments. All I have is an email address. From what Valentina says, he’s changed phones a dozen times since I last had a number for him. Ah, here it is.’ She pulled out the photo she’d been looking for. It was obvious she didn’t want to look at it, and quickly passed it to Ben with barely a glance.

The picture was an old family snap of when Eloise and Yuri were still together. Valentina was much younger and smaller, with gaps where her baby teeth had fallen out. Eloise had a different hairstyle, and looked rosy and happy. Yuri Petrov stood with his arm around his wife’s shoulders, smiling broadly. He had lots of shaggy jet black hair, a broad, craggy but not ugly face, a solid jaw and pronounced cheekbones. His eyes were dark and not as stupid-looking as Ben might have expected, given Kaprisky’s account of him.

‘He has a bit more weight around the middle now,’ Eloise said. ‘And Valentina says his hair is longer, and he grew a beard.’

‘What a deadbeat,’ Kaprisky muttered in the background.

‘Can I keep this?’ Ben asked.

She shuddered. ‘Please, take it out of my sight. I don’t want to see his face ever again.’

Chapter 9 (#ulink_1a33ccff-7574-51fc-9217-503dfb3eb36b)

The Kaprisky staffer who drove Ben to the Aéroport Le Mans-Arnage appeared to be an ex-racing driver of some kind, with special dispensation from the French police to deliver his passenger to their destination as fast as possible, irrespective of public safety. By the time the black Mercedes S-Class had screeched to a halt at the private terminal, the Gulfstream G650 had already taxied out of the huge Kaprisky Corp hangar and was on the runway approach, fuelled and prepped for takeoff, its lights twinkling in the falling dusk.

Ben was greeted on the tarmac by a sombre Adrien Leroy and Noël Marchand. ‘Every time we meet,’ Leroy said as he shook Ben’s hand, ‘it’s in unfortunate circumstances. I can’t believe this is happening. Poor kid. Everyone adores her.’

‘How well do you know Petrov?’ Ben asked. With so few clues to go on, he needed to fish for all the scraps he could get.

Leroy shook his head, barely able to contain his anger. ‘I’ve seldom even laid eyes on the bastard. He’s never there to collect her. But I’ll tell you, if I do ever see him again I’ll smash his teeth down his throat.’

So much for fishing. Leroy went off to attend to his pilot duties as Ben boarded the jet.

The plane’s luxurious interior offered a choice of nineteen empty plush leather passenger armchairs, all with marble-topped tables and a thousand gadgets to play with. Waiting for him on one of the seats was a designer travel bag containing his visa documentation and half a million rubles in large denominations, which equated to about six thousand euros for walking-around money. Kaprisky had thought of everything. Ben transferred the cash into his old green haversack and settled in a window seat.

Soon the jet was in the air. A ridiculously pretty Korean flight attendant with a smart uniform and glossy black hair appeared from the galley, sauntered brightly down the aisle towards her sole passenger and asked him in a California accent if he wanted dinner. ‘We have a full à la carte menu. The butter poached lobster, caught fresh this morning, is one of Mr Kaprisky’s favourites.’

‘You can prepare me anything I want?’ Ben said.

She beamed at him. ‘Absolutely whatever you desire. Your wish is my command.’

‘Great. I’ll have a ham sandwich. Thin bread, white or brown, I don’t care, light on the butter, just a smear of mustard. That’s it.’

Her smile wavered. ‘Can I offer you a glass of champagne with that? The Krug Private Cuvée is the finest in the world.’

‘No, but you can bring me a triple measure of single malt scotch, no ice, no water. And an ashtray, please.’

Now she was looking at him as if he’d just run over her cat. ‘I’m sorry, smoking is strictly disallowed on board.’

‘Whatever I desire, eh?’ Ben muttered to himself when she’d stalked off to convey his order to the chef. The whisky and the sandwich duly arrived. The chef hadn’t been able to resist putting on a fancy herb garnish, as though it were beneath him to serve up anything so plain and unadorned. Ben ate quickly, savoured the drink slowly, then set his Omega diver’s watch for the hour’s time difference between France and Russia, closed his eyes and let the plane carry him through the night.

Two hours later, Ben opened his eyes and saw the huge sprawling lit-up expanse of Moscow far below as the Gulfstream overflew the city on its approach to Vnukovo International Airport. Ben gazed down at the glittering lights and wondered where among all that he was going to find little Valentina Petrova and her father.

Kaprisky’s ETA proved startlingly accurate. The jet hit the runway at Vnukovo precisely three hours and eleven minutes after takeoff. Five minutes after that, they’d taxied to the business aviation terminal and the Korean stewardess returned, all smiles again, to say Ben was clear to disembark.

Moments later he was stepping down the gangway into the balmy summer night to set foot, for the first time in his life, on Russian soil. If Ben had stuck coloured pushpins in a world map showing all the places he’d travelled in his time, some countries would have been bristling with them and only a very few untouched. Should this prove to be his one and only visit to the Russian Federation, he could only pray that he would return home successful, and not empty-handed.

Ben walked from the plane with that dark thought in mind and his bag over his shoulder. Kaprisky had said his new assistant would be there to meet him – but nobody seemed to be around. Bright floodlamps lit up the tarmac and probed into the deep shadows between the private aircraft hangars. The screech of a jumbo jet coming in to land pierced his ears; then as the noise died away he heard the rev of an approaching car and turned. Strong headlights dazzled him momentarily, making him narrow his eyes and put up a hand to block out the glare.

The oncoming car veered in front of him and stopped directly in his path with a soft hiss of tyres. It was another black Mercedes S-Class identical to the one that had transported him to Le Mans-Arnage earlier that day. The windows were tinted, so he couldn’t see anyone inside. The rear passenger door swung open and a black high-heeled shoe stepped out, followed by a long, slim but well-muscled leg and then the rest of a woman in a charcoal business suit. Ben didn’t know her, but she seemed to know him.