Michael Gresham (Book 5): Sakharov the Bear Read online

  "Thank you, Van. Ah, one question. What is your normal area of law practice?"

  He smiles. "Zoning appeals."

  "As in real estate?"

  "As in real estate."

  "Have you ever defended a criminal case in Russian court?"

  "No, but neither have you. We will be limited only by our imaginations. So get ready to soar, comrade. The sky is ours!"

  As I'm making my way back beyond the filing cabinets to the door, I'm only wondering one thing: What the hell have I gotten myself into? And, by implication, what have I gotten Russell Xiang into?

  Out on the street it's only five minutes before I flag down a taxi. I give the driver one of the cards Marcel has prepared for me—I'm a stroke victim and cannot speak—and he reads off the address in a thick voice and nods at me in the rearview.

  Then we're off into the dark night, the whizzing traffic of Moscow closing in around us while in my mind's eye I can see the FSB two cars directly behind.

  Or is it three?

  Chapter 15

  M ichael Gresham

  VAN CALLS. Russell has tried to escape and was captured and severely beaten. He is in the City Jail infirmary. The jail called Van because he had sent them notice that he was now counsel of record for Russell. He asks me what do I want to do? I tell him to meet me there in one-half hour.

  It is snowing when I run outside and catch a cab. It is always snowing here. The streets are black with ash, used by the Moscow streets department in lieu of salting the roads.

  I'm dropped in front of the jail and I go bounding up the steps two-at-a-time. Inside, I find Van and he tells me that the infirmary is back outside and down two buildings. So we head out and find the correct building and hustle inside. We feel like time is of the essence, but, in truth, no sooner are we inside and asking at the desk to see Russell than we are told that it will be at least a two hour wait as the infirmary is short on staff to monitor visits. So we take a number, literally, and head for the waiting area.

  A TV is droning about this and that, while around us sit other visitors. Van decides to change the channel and looks around for the remote. It cannot be located, so he goes to the TV and reaches up to the channel button. Immediately a gruff voice calls out to him. Van replies to the man then calls back to me, "He says he wants to keep watching Putin's channel. Can you imagine this stupid hairy oaf?" The man, who Van referred to, then speaks up again as Van makes the change. Then he stands and begins approaching Van from behind. Without another word, Van turns around and faces down the perturbed visitor. His fists clench and remain clenched and the man sees this and stops his approach. Words are exchanged in loud, angry voices, ending up with Van pointing at me and then at the chair where the man was sitting and then the man turning and returning to his seat. He looks around meekly and picks up a discarded newspaper. Van returns to his seat beside mine.

  "What did you tell him?" I ask.

  "I told him you were FSB and you wanted the channel changed to sports."

  I look at the man, then, and narrow my eyes as if in deprecative appraisal. In other words, I'm looking down my nose at him. He looks away, in fear for his safety; he has believed Van's lie.

  I'm unsure I like playing the heavy and whisper to Van that I'd rather not be FSB again. He grins at me and clasps me on the back. "You just have that look," he says, "with the short-clipped hair and the proud posture you always maintain."

  "I do?"

  Just then Van stands. "Come on, Mikhail, they've called our number on the P.A."

  It hasn't been anywhere near two hours, but who's complaining?

  We are taken back to the last bed on the right. The bed is bolted to the floor and the patient is restrained by handcuffs and ankle chains. Russell no longer looks like Russell. His face is beaten to a pulp, both eyes are black, the right arm is in a cast and tubes enter his body from all angles. On the side of the bed there is a urine bottle and it is filling as we approach. The man manages to smile despite his battered face. His front teeth are chipped—they might have been before, though—and when he speaks there's a small whistle on the s's.

  "So, you're my visitors? Mr. Gresham, you found a co-counsel?"

  I take the seat closest to his head. I lay my hand against his hand and say, "I did. His name is Van."

  He eyes Van and looks back at me.

  "This gentleman's suit tells me he's Russian."

  "Good catch," I say. "His name is Ivanovich. Very bright guy."

  "Excellent. I'm feeling better already, though I probably don't look like it."

  "Escape attempt, that right?"

  "That's right, I—"

  "Hold that thought, please. We'll talk about that later when we're away from other people and microphones."

  "All right." He moans and tries turning just a bit to better see me. I slide my chair around and now we can watch each other's eyes and faces.

  "So here's the deal. Van tells me the court doesn't even allow bail for cases involving state secrets or murder. These are capital crimes and there's no bail for capital crimes here."

  "Figured. I might as well settle in for a long stay is what you're saying."

  "I don't know how long it will be," Van suddenly pipes up. "You'll be at trial by the end of next month. No later, I can promise."

  "That's seven weeks," Russell says and turns his eyes toward me. "Can we be ready?"

  "We have no choice," I tell him. "Now, we're going to need a method of communication. Are you good with any languages?"

  "I grew up with Mandarin in the house."

  I turn to Van. "Van, do you do Mandarin?"

  "Not hardly. I've got English and Russian. Enough French to get me the disdainful eye of most maître d's in Paris."

  "My wife is fluent in Mandarin. Maybe she could help," Xiang says.

  I look at Van. He shrugs.

  "Let me talk to a friend," I say mysteriously, avoiding the mention of Marcel by name.

  "All right."

  "How about this." I jot down a note on my yellow legal pad. I pass it to him to read: "You write me a phony summary of all that went before that's in any way connected to the criminal charges. Be sure you make it look like you're from China and that you were here checking out investment opportunities. Give me names, dates, places—all made up. Write it in Mandarin and a man from my office will be by to collect it. Does that work, Van?"

  Van is nodding. "The accused definitely has the right to full and unrestricted communication with his lawyer."

  I say, "Which normally is eavesdropped by the jail personnel and fed to the FSB, who turn it over to the prosecution. Actually not all that different from how we do things back in the USSA."

  Russell gets the point, the oblique reference to the Beatles' song. He nods, trying to smile but ending with a grimace as his lips crack and the bleeding starts up again. The nurse comes and applies something that smells pungent, like camphor, to Russell's lips. She speaks to Van in Russian, who explains to me, "Five minutes."

  Then Van draws me aside. "Are you under the impression no one in FSB knows Mandarin Chinese?"

  I smile and he studies my face. "Of course they know Chinese."

  "Then why have him tell you the confidential things in Chinese?"

  "Russell Xiang is Chinese and speaks only Chinese. His father has provided me with an address in China that will confirm Russell lives there with family that never left China. So he's Chinese, as far as the Russians know. That being the case, why would a Chinese visitor suddenly start working for the CIA? It's called plausible deniability. Study Richard Nixon, about 1972, for the whole story."

  "I don't follow."

  "It's an American tradition. Politicians have used it for fifty years. Now we will put it to good use in Russia. It's like this. When we defend criminal cases in the U.S. we begin with the police report. Our opportunity is the stuff between the lines. The stuff the report doesn't address. Many defense lawyers will then create the unsaid portions. That's how a defense is ma
nufactured."

  "Do you do that?"

  I smile. "I do when I'm in Russia in the kangaroo court."

  We are whispering as we speak back and forth. Russell is trying to listen in, but we are too quiet for that. We wouldn't want them to be able to drug him and procure our words from his mouth.

  Finally Van begins nodding, now and then a large smile. "So we're going to deny he's American at all!"

  "Welcome to the rodeo, Van. We just found our defense."

  "What he can plausibly deny."

  "Yes, because we have access to China and our vouchers there through Russell's father. The Russians do not. They are hated and feared there. They can test out nothing we say."

  "I like you, Mikhail," he says, raising his hand and resting it on my shoulder. "You Americans are as amazing as they say."

  "As amazing as who says?"

  He shrugs and blinks. "Everyone says."

  Chapter 16

  M ichael Gresham

  THE VESSEL WAS Norwegian and it sailed into the Port of Long Beach on a Sunday night. The ship was a Panamax class and it carried 4600 TEU’s—containers.

  The containers lashed atop its long flat deck were of all colors. They were secured on deck in cell guides; there had been no problems with cargo shifting at any point.

  At half-past midnight, the longshoremen were busy moving the containers onto American soil—concrete, actually. By sunup the retrieved containers were piled high and yet the process was still underway. Less than half the load had been swung ashore at that point. Among those already brought to shore were numbers including NB322V-1993x - NB322V-1223x. They were the numbers Russell Xiang had committed to memory and they were the containers the FBI and DHS were frantically scrambling to find. Sitting there on the dock in Long Beach the containers looked no different than the other thousands upon thousands of containers up and down the huge docks and receiving areas. They were just one more shipment of thousands of the fungible units.

  Contained within the “Henrik boxes” were Browning machine guns in .50 caliber, thousands of AK47 assault rifles capable of full auto, F2000 assault rifles, a full container of FIM 92 Stinger missiles, Sarin nerve gas, tens of thousands of rounds of ammunition, M72 rocket launchers, chlorine gas and three thousand M4 rifles with ammunition. These were the items from Henrik's bill of lading. Many of the containers with their nerve gas and ammunition were hazardous materials and volatile and should have been segregated on the trip over but were not, thanks to an exchange of US dollars at different ports of call.

  But there was one minor glitch. The bill of lading for the load was inadvertently erased from the ship's computers. Actually this was an act of sabotage, but the crew was left to think it was just a mistake by one of them. The result? No one came for the shipping containers. So there they sat, in the brilliant Long Beach sunlight in January.

  Couples strolled by on the docks; sightseers walked paths created by the containers. Local kids played hide-and-seek among them. While all along the docks, the FBI and DHS looked for them. Except they had no description and no numbers. It was so much more difficult without the numbers; there were more than a million other containers just like these along the docks.

  Sometimes the best hiding place is the most obvious when you're playing child's games.

  Sometimes it is even for adults, too.

  Chapter 17

  M ichael Gresham

  THE NEXT MORNING I'm up before dawn and headed for the airport. I need to make a phone call—from Zurich.

  Snow blows from all directions and wind gusts threaten to blow our Lada taxi off the side of the road. But my driver persists and takes his time and I'm delivered to the unloading curb at the airport with only my backpack and my laptop. I'm wearing jeans and a wool sweater and my bomber jacket. In the inside pocket is my smartphone. It contains a new contact, the wife of Russell Xiang, with her phone number. Russell tapped it into my phone using just one finger before we left him yesterday. Now I'm ready.

  On the Boeing 777, I'm flying first class. In the back of the seat ahead of mine is a Swiss brochure. I read it and remind myself that I really need to do some sightseeing while I'm in Moscow. The wait staff comes along and offers me champagne. "Mr. Sakharov," she says, "can I interest you in a lovely French champagne before we take off?"

  I tell her no and keep reading the brochure:

  Moscow became the Russian capital in 1480. Like most tourists you should start exploring the city at the Kremlin. St. Basil's Cathedral is surely one of the world's most astonishing pieces of architecture, with its exquisite domes and vivid brickwork standing out as a highlight of the many architectural gems that are located around the world-famous Red Square. The Historic Museum is here, the Lenin Mausoleum right next to the Kremlin Wall and the Spasskaya Tower from the 16th century. The famous gems of the Czars are on display in the Kremlin. But don't forget to visit one of the hundred parks in Moscow, with Gorky Park being the most famous and central. Have a world class evening out and visit the famous Bolshoi Theatre for a ballet performance seen nowhere else.

  "INTERESTING," I mutter to the empty seat next to me, "but I'm leaving Moscow and going to Zurich. Where's the brochure on Zurich?"

  I gaze down on Russian farms, forests, rivers and mountains once we are airborne and turning for Switzerland. The air at this level is very smooth as we are far above the clouds and mountains and their fierce weather. Finally, I lean back and dream about my wife and try to remember her last words to me before she died. Dozing and coming to several times along the way, I dream that she is reaching out a hand to me and trying to get my attention. I try to shut out the engine noise and the rattling of silverware as our meal is prepared, just to hear what it is she is trying to tell me. But it is no use. In Danny's place I receive a lemony chicken breast, wild rice, steamed vegetables, and two cups of coffee. I chase it all with several glasses of water and I'm thinking I'm thirsty because of the tears I've cried while alone in my seat, nobody watching, missing my beautiful wife. Then we are touching down and life begins again.

  My return flight is three hours away. Why did I come to Zurich? I came here to make one telephone call. On my cell phone I locate Antonia Xiang's number and tap CALL. The phone does its thing, there's a pause, and then a voice answers.

  "Hello?"

  "Mrs. Xiang, this is Michael Gresham."

  "Who?"

  "I'm the lawyer your father-in-law sent to Russia to meet Russell."

  "Oh, yes! Have you seen my husband? How is he?"

  "I have seen him. He's had a bit of a rough go, but he's going to be okay."

  "Are they treating him horribly?"

  "He tried to escape and was beaten severely. He's now in the jail infirmary where it looks like he's going to make a full recovery."

  "Oh, thank God. When do you think he'll be coming home?"

  I'm sitting in a passenger waiting area that is completely empty as there is no plane outside the window getting ready to take on passengers. Which is why I'm perturbed when an olive-skinned woman wearing a hijab comes into the area and sits down behind me. We are back to back now, the only two people in the entire boarding area. So I stand and move away.

  As I move off I'm stepping backwards, when she suddenly produces a smartphone and begins pointing it at me, obviously taking snaps.

  I'm stunned by her bravado and her utter disregard for me. But why the hijab? Why would a Middle Eastern woman be working for the Russians? Then it comes to me: she's not working for the Russians, she's working for the Americans and they are sending me a message: I'm being watched.

  This is unnerving and I'm not a guy who gets upset easily. But the idea that the CIA is going to harass me because I offer legal services to one of its own agents really pisses me off. The hackles go up on the back of my neck and I'm ready to run at the woman and scare the hell out of her. But I don't.

  Instead, I consider my circumstance. Here I am, taking up the defense of a discarded CIA agent, whose work evidentl
y has the possibility of being hugely embarrassing for the CIA and, indirectly, for the United States. And I couldn't care less. I have little respect for a government that disowns its own agents when it's politically expedient to do so. And right now, disowning Russell is chosen because the U.S. and Russia are engaged in very sensitive arms reduction talks and Russell's alleged murder of an FSB agent's son threatens the whole house of cards.

  The court documents are very clear about this, alleging that Russell murdered Igor Tarayev's son during a home invasion just outside of Moscow. Further, the documents allege that Russell Xiang was working for the CIA when the murder occurred. They also allege that the killing was done at the behest of the American government. It is obvious this is why the CIA and U.S. have abandoned Russell. All because it is politically expedient to do so, they have thrown him to the wolves. Even knowing he could be facing a firing squad, they have turned their backs.

  Now she stands and approaches me. She says, in perfect English, "Would you mind if I snap a selfie of me and you together?"

  I step away. I'm very angry and afraid I might take a swing at her.

  I shout, "Are you out of your mind? Are the Russians this brazen?"

  "Russians? I'm an American. As American as you. I heard you talking on the phone. I'm guessing maybe Indiana or Illinois. Am I anywhere close?"

  "Why do you want my picture?"

  She smiles, then, and laughs in my face. "We're everywhere, Michael."

  Then she turns and begins walking away.

  "Who's everywhere?" I call to her.

  Without a word, she waves over her shoulder to me.

  Then I get back on the phone with Mrs. Xiang.

  "Sorry about that, Mrs. Xiang. I was interrupted."

  "Goodness, that sounded bizarre enough."

  "Russell is looking at a jury trial. I'm told that will occur within about seven weeks. If we're successful, he should be home right after."

  "And if you're not?"

  "Then your husband is going to be staying in Russia for a very long time, Mrs. Xiang. Which is why I'm calling you. Your husband needs your help."