Heads You Win

Polyakov wrote down each name before saying, “Are you going to the match on Saturday?”

“No, sir, it’s sold out, and my father wasn’t able to—”

Like a conjurer, the KGB chief produced a ticket from an inside pocket and handed it to his latest recruit.

* * *

Konstantin closed the bedroom door quietly, not wanting to wake his wife. He took off his heavy boots, undressed, and climbed into bed. If he left early enough in the morning, he wouldn’t have to explain to Elena what he and his disciples had been up to, and even more important, what he had planned for Saturday’s meeting. Better she thought he’d been out drinking, even that there was another woman, than burden her with the truth. He knew she would only try to convince him not to go ahead with the prepared speech.

After all, they didn’t have too bad a life, he could hear her reminding him. They lived in an apartment block that had electricity and running water. She had her job as a cook at the officers’ club, and Alexander was waiting to hear if he’d won a scholarship to the prestigious foreign language school in Moscow. What more could they ask for?

That one day everyone could take such privileges for granted, Konstantin would have told her.

He lay awake, composing a speech in his mind that he couldn’t risk committing to paper. He rose at five thirty, and once again took care not to wake his wife. He doused his face in freezing water, but didn’t shave, then dressed in overalls and a rough, open-neck shirt before finally pulling on his well-worn hobnailed boots. He crept out of the bedroom and collected his lunch box from the kitchen: a sausage, a hard-boiled egg, an onion, and two slices of bread and cheese. Only members of the KGB would eat better.

He closed the front door quietly behind him and made his way down the stone stairs before stepping out onto the empty street. He always walked the six kilometers to work, avoiding the overloaded bus that ferried the workers to and from the docks. If he hoped to survive beyond Saturday, he needed to be fit, like a highly trained soldier in the field.

Whenever he passed a fellow worker in the street, Konstantin always acknowledged him with a mock salute. Some returned his salutation, others nodded, while a few, like bad Samaritans, looked the other way. They may as well have had their party numbers tattooed on their foreheads.

Konstantin arrived outside the dock gates an hour later, and clocked on. As works supervisor, he liked to be the first to arrive and the last to leave. He walked along the dockside while he considered his first assignment of the day. A submarine destined for Odessa on the Black Sea had just berthed at dock 11 to refuel and pick up provisions, before continuing on its way, but that wouldn’t be for at least another hour. Only the most trusted men would be allowed anywhere near dock 11 that morning.

Konstantin’s mind drifted back to the previous night’s meeting. Something hadn’t felt quite right, but he couldn’t put a finger on it. Was it someone and not something, he wondered, as a vast crane at the far end of the dock began to lift its heavy load and swing slowly toward the waiting submarine on dock 11.

The operator seated in the crane’s cab had been chosen carefully. He could unload a tank into a ship’s hold with only inches to spare on either side. But not today. Today he was transferring barrels of oil to a submarine that needed to remain submerged for days at a time, but the task also demanded pinpoint accuracy. One piece of luck—no wind that morning.

Konstantin tried to concentrate as he went over his speech once again. As long as none of his colleagues opened their mouths, he was confident everything would fall neatly into place. He smiled to himself.

The crane operator was satisfied that he had judged it to an inch. The load was perfectly balanced and still. He waited just one more moment before he eased a long heavy lever gently forward. The large clamp sprang open and three barrels of oil were released. They crashed down onto the dockside. Inch perfect. Konstantin Karpenko had looked up, but it was too late. He was killed instantly. A dreadful accident, for which no one was to blame. The man in the cab knew he had to disappear before the early shift clocked on. He swung the crane’s arm back into place, turned off the engine, climbed out of the cab, and began to make his way down the ladder to the ground.

Three fellow workers were waiting for him as he stepped onto the dockside. He smiled at his comrades, not spotting the six-inch serrated blade until it was thrust deep into his stomach and then twisted several times. The other two men held him down until he finally stopped whimpering. They bound his arms and legs together before pushing him over the side of the dock and into the water. He reappeared three times, before finally disappearing below the surface. He hadn’t officially signed on that morning, so it would be some time before anyone noticed he was missing.

* * *

Konstantin Karpenko’s funeral was held at the Church of the Apostle Andrew. The turnout was so large that the congregation spilled out onto the street, long before the choir had entered the nave.

The bishop who delivered the eulogy described Konstantin’s death as a tragic accident. But then, he was probably one of the few people who believed the official communiqué issued by the dock commandant, and only then after it had been sanctioned by Moscow.

Standing near the front were twelve men who knew it wasn’t an accident. They had lost their leader, and the promise of a thorough investigation by the KGB wouldn’t help their cause, because state inquiries usually took at least a couple of years to report their findings, by which time their moment would have passed.

Only family and close friends stood beside the grave to pay their last respects. Elena sprinkled some earth onto the coffin as the body of her husband was lowered slowly into the ground. Alexander forced himself to hold back the tears. She wept but stepped back and held her son’s hand, something she hadn’t done for years. He was suddenly aware that, despite his youth, he was now the head of the family.

He looked up to see Vladimir, whom he hadn’t spoken to since his father’s death, half hidden at the back of the gathering. When their eyes met, his best frien

d quickly looked away. His father’s words reverberated in Alexander’s mind. He’s cunning and ruthless. Believe me, he’d shop his mother for a ticket to the cup final, probably even the semifinal. Vladimir hadn’t been able to resist telling Alexander that he’d got a stand seat for the match on Saturday, although he wouldn’t say who had given it to him, or what he’d had to do to get it.

Alexander could only wonder just how far Vladimir would go to make sure he was recruited by the KGB. He realized in that instant they were no longer friends. After a few minutes Vladimir scurried away, like Judas in the night. He’d done everything except kiss Alexander’s father on the cheek.

Elena and Alexander remained kneeling by the graveside long after everyone else had departed. When she finally rose, Elena couldn’t help wondering what her husband had done to cause such wrath. Only the most brainwashed party member could have accepted the official line that after the tragic accident the crane operator had committed suicide. Even Leonid Brezhnev, the party’s General Secretary, had joined in the deception, with a Kremlin spokesman announcing that Comrade Konstantin Karpenko had been made a Hero of the Soviet Union, and his widow would receive a full state pension.

Elena had already turned her attention to the other man in her life. She had decided she would move to Moscow, find a job, and do everything in her power to advance her son’s career. But after a long discussion with her brother, Kolya, she reluctantly accepted that she would have to remain in Leningrad, and try to carry on as if nothing had happened. She would be lucky even to hold on to her present job, because the KGB had tentacles that stretched far beyond her irrelevant existence.

On Saturday, in the semifinal of the Soviet Cup, Zenit F.C. beat Odessa 2–1, and qualified to play Torpedo Moscow in the final.

Vladimir was already trying to work out what he needed to do to get a ticket.

2

ALEXANDER