The Defector

“We call it fireboard ing.” He looked at Chernov again. “Have you ever seen a man fireboarded before, Vladimir?”
    When Chernov made no response, Gabriel shot a glance at the others. Navot and Yaakov seized hold of the second bodyguard and, still attached to the chair, rammed him face-first into the fire. They left him in no more than ten seconds. Even so, when he emerged his hair was smoking and his face blackened and blistered. He was also screaming in agony.
    They set him directly in front of Chernov, so that the Russian could see the horrible result of his intransigence. Then Gabriel placed the Glock against the back of the bodyguard’s head and ended his suffering. Chernov, now drenched in blood, gazed in horror at the two dead men before him. Mikhail covered his mouth with duct tape and gave him a hard backhand across the cheek. Gabriel placed the photograph in his lap and said he would be back in five minutes.

    HE RETURNED at the fifty-ninth second of the fourth minute and ripped the duct tape from Chernov’s mouth. Then he gave him a stark choice. They could have a pleasant conversation, one professional to another, or Chernov could go into the fire like his now-deceased bodyguard. It wouldn’t be a quick sear, Gabriel warned. It would be a slow roast. One limb at a time. And there would be no bullet to the back of the head to quell the pain.

    GABRIEL DID not have to wait long for his answer. Ten seconds. No more. Chernov said he wanted to talk. Chernov said he was sorry. Chernov said he wanted to help.

47
    HAUTE-SAVOIE, FRANCE
    THEY GAVE him clothing to wear and a dose of alprazolam to take the edge off his anxiety. He was permitted to sit in a proper chair with his hands unrestrained, though the chair was turned in such a way that he could not help but see his two dead employees, grim reminders of the fate that awaited him if he retreated once again into claims of ignorance. Within a few hours, the corpses would vanish from the face of the earth. Vladimir Chernov would vanish with them. Whether he met his death painlessly or with extreme violence depended on one thing: answering each and every one of Gabriel’s questions truthfully.
    The alprazolam had the added benefit of loosening Chernov’s tongue, and it took only the gentlest prodding from Gabriel to get him talking. He began by paying Gabriel a compliment over the operation they had staged on his doorstep. “The KGB could not have done it any better,” he said, without a trace of irony in his voice.
    “You’ll forgive me if I’m not flattered.”
    “You’ve just killed two men in cold blood, Allon. You have no right to quibble about comparisons to my old service.”
    “You know my name.”
    Chernov managed a weak smile. “Would it be possible to have a cigarette?”
    “Cigarettes are bad for your health.”
    “Is it not a tradition to give the condemned a cigarette?”
    “Keep talking, Vladimir, and I’ll let you live.”
    “After what I’ve seen tonight? Do you take me for a fool, Allon?”
    “Not a fool, Vladimir—just an ex-KGB hood who somehow managed to claw his way out of the gutter. But let’s keep this civil, shall we? You were just about to tell me when you first met the man in that photograph.” A pause, then, “The man known as Comrade Zhirlov.”
    The cocktail of narcotics coursing through Chernov’s bloodstream left him unable to mount another campaign of denial. Nor was he able to conceal his surprise over the fact that Gabriel knew the code name of one of the KGB’s most secretive black operators.
    “It was ’ninety-five or ’ninety-six. I had a small security company. I didn’t land the likes of Ivan Kharkov and Viktor Orlov, but I was doing quite nicely for myself. Comrade Zhirlov approached me with a lucrative offer. He’d acquired a reputation in Moscow. It was getting much too dangerous for him to be in direct contact with his customers. He needed someone to act as a middleman—a booking agent, if you will. Otherwise, he wasn’t going to live to enjoy the fruits of his labor.”
    “And you volunteered to be that person—for a commission, of course.”
    “Ten percent. When someone needed a job done, they came to me, and I took the proposal to him. If he felt like doing it, he would name a price. Then I would go back to the client and negotiate the final deal. All money flowed through me. I laundered it through my consulting business and paid Comrade Zhirlov a fee for services rendered.