round, dark peasant face was smiling, like that of a frog that has just swallowed an exceptionally tasty fly. The eyes were slitted, squinting into the sun. Despite the smile, the mouth was the cruelest Durell had ever seen.
The official photograph from the ID card was better, but washed out. It was a Tartar’s face. It was the face he had seen dimly through the storm on the trawler off Visby. And this was one of the men he was supposed to work with.
Durell turned to the second dossier. It made him feel a little better, but not much. He knew the second man. Another colonel, but not from KGB’s Blue Section. Vladimir Ivanovich Traskin had a distinguished war record at the Stalingrad front and afterward had taught artillery and missile technique at the Frunze Academy. After the war he had commanded a missile brigade in the Lvov oblast at Shklo Yar, then was posted to the Yauer IRBM firing range with its impact area in Poland. In 1962 he was posted to the nuclear warhead missile troop center in the far North, above the Arctic Circle, at Novaya Zemblya, for six months, and had gone on inspection tours to the other nuclear missile Arctic areas of Franz Josef Island and Vorkuta.
Colonel Traskin was of a different stamp from the Muzhik. He was tall and distinguished, with a professorial air, and a carefully trimmed beard. He was addicted to writing poetry and novellas as a hobby, and had a reputation as a naturalist specializing in Arctic fauna. He was married, with two sons also in the Army, and had kept himself aloof from the bitter internecine official strife among the hierarchy of the CPSU, although he had been a member, after the usual terms in the Komsomol and Party, for seven years. It was somewhat like hitching a lamb to a hyena, Durell thought, for Traskin to be Colonel Smurov’s partner. He knew they would instinctively detest each other; Smurov would have contempt and suspicion for Traskin’s intellect, and Traskin would view with aloof distaste Smurov’s vulgarities. Durell filed away the thought as something that might be useful in the near future.
15
THE WIND still rubbed like a polishing cloth over the hard blue sky above Stockholm as Durell left the hospital and headed for Skansen Park. He phoned for a taxi, and when it came told the driver to cross Staden Island and turn right beyond the National Museum onto the Strandvagen. Overhead, two Swedish Air Force Dragon jets, the most versatile fighter and attack planes in the West, bore across the blue sky. They turned east across the islands toward the resort of Saltsjobaden, and before they were out of sight they swung north again as if to cover the Finnish island of Aland that lay not far off the coast. The wind whipped away the Dragon contrails in seconds.
Some hardy tourists, advised by the TTF, the Tourist information Bureau, were crowded on a little white steamer doing the “Under the Bridges” routine. The boat splashed and struggled against the wind that make cold-looking whitecaps in the harbor. Durell looked across to where the Vesper was due to berth. The schooner hadn’t appeared, and few of the yachts moored there had ventured into the wind.
Skansen Park was a unique outdoor museum on a hilltop overlooking the waterways of Stockholm. It contained restaurants, historical exhibits, a zoo that specialized in Scandinavian fauna such as wolf, bear, hazel hen, reindeer, cranes, and ptarmigan. Near the Norska Museum was the Vasavarvet, where the Royal Flagship Vasa was displayed after having been salvaged from the bottom of the sea, where she had lain in the mud for three hundred years. The wind was bitterly cold. Not many people moved about on the exposed hilltop, although the restaurants and kiosks had a reasonable patronage. Children ran along the paths to the zoo. Durell dismissed his taxi and walked to the shore opposite the Skepps Holmen where the ancient Vasa was displayed.
Flags were streaming, for some reason or other, and the wind was busy
The official photograph from the ID card was better, but washed out. It was a Tartar’s face. It was the face he had seen dimly through the storm on the trawler off Visby. And this was one of the men he was supposed to work with.
Durell turned to the second dossier. It made him feel a little better, but not much. He knew the second man. Another colonel, but not from KGB’s Blue Section. Vladimir Ivanovich Traskin had a distinguished war record at the Stalingrad front and afterward had taught artillery and missile technique at the Frunze Academy. After the war he had commanded a missile brigade in the Lvov oblast at Shklo Yar, then was posted to the Yauer IRBM firing range with its impact area in Poland. In 1962 he was posted to the nuclear warhead missile troop center in the far North, above the Arctic Circle, at Novaya Zemblya, for six months, and had gone on inspection tours to the other nuclear missile Arctic areas of Franz Josef Island and Vorkuta.
Colonel Traskin was of a different stamp from the Muzhik. He was tall and distinguished, with a professorial air, and a carefully trimmed beard. He was addicted to writing poetry and novellas as a hobby, and had a reputation as a naturalist specializing in Arctic fauna. He was married, with two sons also in the Army, and had kept himself aloof from the bitter internecine official strife among the hierarchy of the CPSU, although he had been a member, after the usual terms in the Komsomol and Party, for seven years. It was somewhat like hitching a lamb to a hyena, Durell thought, for Traskin to be Colonel Smurov’s partner. He knew they would instinctively detest each other; Smurov would have contempt and suspicion for Traskin’s intellect, and Traskin would view with aloof distaste Smurov’s vulgarities. Durell filed away the thought as something that might be useful in the near future.
15
THE WIND still rubbed like a polishing cloth over the hard blue sky above Stockholm as Durell left the hospital and headed for Skansen Park. He phoned for a taxi, and when it came told the driver to cross Staden Island and turn right beyond the National Museum onto the Strandvagen. Overhead, two Swedish Air Force Dragon jets, the most versatile fighter and attack planes in the West, bore across the blue sky. They turned east across the islands toward the resort of Saltsjobaden, and before they were out of sight they swung north again as if to cover the Finnish island of Aland that lay not far off the coast. The wind whipped away the Dragon contrails in seconds.
Some hardy tourists, advised by the TTF, the Tourist information Bureau, were crowded on a little white steamer doing the “Under the Bridges” routine. The boat splashed and struggled against the wind that make cold-looking whitecaps in the harbor. Durell looked across to where the Vesper was due to berth. The schooner hadn’t appeared, and few of the yachts moored there had ventured into the wind.
Skansen Park was a unique outdoor museum on a hilltop overlooking the waterways of Stockholm. It contained restaurants, historical exhibits, a zoo that specialized in Scandinavian fauna such as wolf, bear, hazel hen, reindeer, cranes, and ptarmigan. Near the Norska Museum was the Vasavarvet, where the Royal Flagship Vasa was displayed after having been salvaged from the bottom of the sea, where she had lain in the mud for three hundred years. The wind was bitterly cold. Not many people moved about on the exposed hilltop, although the restaurants and kiosks had a reasonable patronage. Children ran along the paths to the zoo. Durell dismissed his taxi and walked to the shore opposite the Skepps Holmen where the ancient Vasa was displayed.
Flags were streaming, for some reason or other, and the wind was busy
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