The Prague Ultimatum Page 21

  Myska, of course, took full advantage of the situation, condemning Svobodova for her refusal to accept the incompatibleness of Islam with European tradition, while Stone and Williams conducted several fruitless searches for the individual named by Salam as his ‘spiritual guide’ in their interrogation in the cave. But still more distressing news was to come, which would fill the hearts of all involved with dread.

  It came in the form of an offer, a telephone call to Svobodova from, of all places, Moscow. The call was terse and brief, devoid of small talk or pleasantries of any kind. The President of the Russian Federation, so the caller said, was gravely concerned by the problems its close ally was facing and was determined to ensure the region remained stable and free from the ravages of Far Right extremism. To that end, The President was offering his ‘help’ to support Svobodova in her efforts to contain the threat and restore order to the streets. Military help. And furthermore, in expectation of her acquiescence, the Armed Forces currently engaged in maneuvers in the Ukraine, would henceforth relocate to the Ukraine/Slovak border, in readiness to accept her invitation to cross and support the administration’s fight against extremism. When the call ended, Svobodova was as morose and ashen faced as Stone had, in their short acquaintance, seen her, and she wordlessly dismissed the company from her office to tackle the conundrum in solitude.

  Stone, with the sixth sense of a professional soldier, could smell impending battle in the warm, summer air as he walked the ever bustling ancient, gothic streets, at once despairing and envious of the blissful ignorance with which the tourists continued to mill, as though subconsciously believing themselves wrapped in some impenetrable shell of invulnerability, immunising them from the kind of terror which stalked the rest of the world. Stag groups still staggered from bar to bar, globetrotters still trotted from shop to store, searching for the perfect gift to take home; none acknowledging or even registering the heavily armoured threat currently rumbling towards the border.

  The continued absence of Greyson in all this disturbed him and he set his mind to reaching him through Williams and finding out precisely what effect this new development would have on their agreement, when he was distracted by a message on his phone from Svobodova. No pleasantries, no exposition, just an address and a time, under the header ‘Meeting’.

  Were it not for the presence of Abelard outside the stated address when he approached it some hours later, after negotiating the labyrinthine streets behind the fiercely imposing Church of Our Lady, the Captain would have thought he was in the wrong place.

  “What the hell are we doing here?” Stone asked in incredulity, leaning forward to kiss his lover and accept the de-stressing bliss of her embrace. And he could be forgiven for asking, for it was no office or conference center they stood before; rather the fading yellow walls and battered wooden doors of a music joint, a painted wooden sign proclaiming it to be ‘The Smokin’ Hot Blues Bar and Restaurant’ swinging gently in the slight breeze.

  “Beats me,” shrugged the Professor, “but she’s in there, talking with some big Czech bloke; she looks happier than I’ve ever seen her. Your friend Mr. Williams is there too, although decidedly less impressed looking than Svobodova. Shall we?”

  The pair joined hands and walked through the double doors and into the small but intimate bar area to their right. The place was deserted of customers, though Williams sat scowling at a corner table, nursing a glass of some strangely coloured spirit and a young, pleasant looking man dried glasses behind the well-stocked bar. At a table in the middle of the room, laughing with an abandon which drowned out the slow blues playing over the speakers, sat Svobodova, her clothing as casual as her demeanour and just as unexpected. Across from her, dressed in a once black, now dark grey t-shirt and jeans, a small but noticeable crucifix around his neck, sat a heavy set Czech man with a round, cheery face, who Stone imagined it was impossible not to like.

  All eyes turned to the Captain and Abelard as they entered.

  “Captain Stone, welcome! Please, come in, come in. I’ll be with you all in a moment. And don’t look so scared Captain, all will be revealed.”

  Though he could almost feel the confusion on his face, he acquiesced and moved with Abelard uncertainly to join Williams; the barman immediately bringing over a tray of drinks.

  “Welcome to the briefing,” Williams said, raising what was clearly not his first glass of the evening to the pair in mock salute.

  “What’s going on?” quizzed the Captain.

  “Tonight we are merry,” the spook replied, “for tomorrow we go to war.”

  “War?” Abelard’s voice carried every bit of the concern etched onto her face.

  “Aye,” he confirmed, knocking his drink back and reaching for the next one on the tray. “She’s mobilised the troops; the Czechoslovak Armed Forces are presently en route to the Ukrainian border to prevent Mother Russia from entering uninvited. Mother Russia of course, never one to stand on ceremony, will enter regardless and, given their somewhat hefty numerical advantage, will eventually break through the lines and that, my friends, will be check-fucking-mate.”

  “They can’t do that,” Abelard protested, “there’ll be international uproar; the invasion of a sovereign State…”

  Williams took another glass from the tray and handed it to her while interrupting.

  “Yeah, because it’s not like the West haven’t set a precedent for doing that in recent years is it? Any ‘objection’ from anyone involved in any of the Afghan, Iraqi, Libyan or Syrian cock ups will carry all the moral authority of a peadophile history teacher bollocking the sixth form for shagging behind the bike sheds. Relax Professor, it’ll all be over soon. MI6 will forcibly retire me, most likely with their preferred pension plan of a bullet to the skull, the Captain here can skulk back to national ignominy, you can go back to shuffling papers for academics and Svobodova can look forward to her specially arranged ‘disappearance’. Merry fucking Christmas all.”

  Abelard continued to protest but Stone said nothing, turning instead to take in Svobodova, so relaxed here, so happy, despite the enormous burden she carried on her shoulders, just glad to be in the company of her friend. As he watched, the man, whose name Stone quickly learned was Rasti, reached into a pocket of the leather jacket hung over the back of his chair.

  “I found a photograph I wanted to give you.”

  “Of Peter?”

  The hope in her voice was unguarded and impossible to disguise, her optimism apparently dashed a little when her companion briefly exposed the back of a tattered old photo holding it tightly to his chest

  “I need to explain it first,” he said.

  “Well that sounds intriguing…”

  “Did I tell you about the flood?”

  Rasti’s voice was light and typically disarming, though not far from breaking, it seemed to Stone, who twisted his neck sideways to hear the story the big Czech was so obviously desperate to tell.

  “No,” Svobodova grinned, her own voice likewise close to its breaking point.

  Her reassurance seemed to imbibe Rasti with a new confidence and he swallowed the bulk of his pint before continuing, a warm smile upon his lips.

  “Well,” he began loudly, his relishing of his position at centre court exemplified by his continued oration in English, “You remember when the Vltava burst its banks in 2005? The whole of Old Town was completely flooded, everywhere literally knee deep in water. Well mercifully the waters didn’t reach us here on Jakubska, at least not too heavily and as fate turned out, we were the only restaurant in the area who could stay open. Brilliant, you’d think, only I had no staff to cope with the wave of tourists flocking to the only open venue this side of Prague! I was sweating my bollocks off in the kitchen and I had one waitress running around all the tables, with a queue of people at the door and nobody manning the bar. I couldn’t turn people away so I had no choice but to press gang one of the regulars into service.”

  “Let me guess,” Svobodova interrupted,
“Peter?”

  “The man himself,” Rasti grinned, “But the problem was he’d come to the bar straight from work and was so pissed he hadn’t even realised there was a flood, he just thought it had been raining particularly heavily… But I filled him full of coffee and sandwiches and managed to stand him upright at the bar with his best smile and I hoped for the best.”

  “And…?”

  “To begin with it was all going well, he didn’t punch anyone and I’d come to accept that every shot ordered by a customer was accompanied with one for Peter, but by that stage I didn’t care. Anyway, it was soon all over the news that the flood had reached the zoo and animals were being washed out of their paddocks…”

  “Yes, I remember that,” Svobodova replied, “they found some washed up in Austria didn’t they?”

  “They did indeed,” Rasti nodded, “but some stayed a bit more local. It must have been getting on for closing time when I came out to check Peter was ok and see how many customers were left. Then out of the blue we heard this slapping sound coming from the main door.”

  Rasti articulated his tale with a slow, heavy hand slapping down on the table as he spoke.

  “We couldn’t work out what the fuck it was, so I went to look and opened the inner door, only for the biggest bloody seal you’ve ever seen in your life slide past me like some kind of royalty and hop up to the bar! I just stood there, my mouth on the floor, while Peter, as pissed as the day is long but somehow still standing, just blinked at it, shook his head and said, ‘Looking a bit rough tonight, Rob, usual is it?’”

  Svobodova screamed at the story and laughed loudly until tears began to stream down her face, joined in mirth and pain by the tale’s teller who gave a last loving look to the picture and held it out to her.

  Svobodova looked down at the crumpled photo; a younger and trimmer, if decidedly tired Rasti, looking back at her, joined by a dishevelled and obviously drunk, but happily smiling Peter, a particularly large black seal between them.

  Svobodova reached across the table and stroked Rasti’s hand affectionately.

  “Thank you,” she said, simply and sincerely, taking another loving look at the picture and placing it in the inner pocket of her overcoat. The moment passed, she stood up and called for the others to give her a few moments; the barman lowering the music while she spoke.

  “Thank you for coming,” she said. “As I’m sure Mr. Williams has told you, tomorrow promises to be a momentous day in the history of this country. Russia has made clear its interest in returning our relationship to that of the old days and, after consulting with President Černý today, I have decided that the only way to dissuade a bully from attacking you is to show one’s own strength in return. And so as I speak, our Armed Forces are moving towards the border with the Ukraine, where tomorrow I will join them.”

  “You can’t go the Front!” Stone objected fiercely.

  “I’m afraid Captain that that is the only place I can be,” Svobodova responded, “the President agrees with me that a politician who orders their country’s forces into conflict should be prepared to face those same horrors themselves. Tomorrow morning I shall visit Vyšehrad Cemetery, and from there travel to the border where I have arranged to meet with the Russian Deputy Premier and, together, we shall see what terms we are able to come to. Captain Stone and Mr. Williams, it is now more imperative than ever that Myska not make political Capital out of chaos. I would ask that tomorrow you move to action whatever evidence you may have against him.”

  Both men remained silent, nodding a simple agreement to her request.

  “Thank you,” she responded. “Now as for tonight, I invite you to join me in raising a glass.”

  She lifted her own glass, containing the familiar clear spirit she had introduced them to in her office. Behind her, Rasti stood up, somewhat unsteadily, raising his own beer and even Rado, stoic as ever and loyally in place by the door, broke his position to join the toast. The three at the table followed suit, Stone recognising Svobodova’s gesture as her version of the ancient maritime tradition in which a Captain would tour their ship on the eve of battle.

  “To Czechoslovakia,” Svobodova began, “to Freedom; and whatever fate tomorrow brings us, may we each find our own peace.”

  It was an unusual, almost fatalistic toast, Stone thought, but he nonetheless drank to it and offered the beleaguered Prime Minister the most reassuring of smiles he could muster.

  Her glass drained, Svobodova visibly relaxed, almost flopping back down to the table with Rasti, while the music returned to its previous volume.

  “Well,” Stone said, looking at Williams, “it looks like you’ll get to work your charms on Myska after all.”

  “Aye,” Williams agreed. “At least that means I should be nice and tired by bedtime.”

  Stone grunted a reluctant laugh and turned towards the pale looking Natalie.

  “Hey,” he said gently, placing his hand on her shoulder, “it’ll be ok. We’ll figure something out, Svobodova will work out some kind of Treaty and old misery guts here and me will smooth things over back here.”

  “Sure,” she whispered, unconvinced. “I just hope that by the end of the day the rest of us aren’t joining Svobodova on a trip to the cemetery.”

  Stone frowned a little, his vast experience of steadying troops before a battle of little use when it came to reassuring a civilian, particularly one who had revived the kind of feelings within him that Natalie had. Rather than trying and failing to give a calming word, Stone opted to turn the subject away from the fear of impending battle and he tried as subtly as he could to steer her remark in another direction.

  “Yeah, what was all that about the cemetery, just paying respects?”

  Natalie smiled, acknowledging her man’s distraction technique.

  “Have you ever noticed,” Natalie began, taking a glass of wine from the tray and taking a sip, “how in graveyards, if you look close enough, you’ll sometimes find fresh flowers on old graves, too old you’d think for anyone to be tending them?”

  “I suppose so,” Stone smiled gently back at her, “I’d never really thought about it.”

  “Well then I suppose you’ve also never thought about who leaves them there; the flowers I mean.”

  “No.”

  Natalie’s eyes began to wander, as though her mind were flirting at the edge of age old memories.

  “I have,” she said, “since I was a girl. I used to love walking through cemeteries, everything seemed so peaceful there, serene. I’d see these fresh flowers, sometimes in bouquets, sometimes alone and I’d wonder… did distant descendants put them there, or kindly passers-by, or maybe the fairies?”

  She grinned, as much to herself as to Stone, “But I was wrong. It was people like her,” she nodded over to where Svobodova sat with Rasti, the pair laughing through melancholic tears together.

  “People who’ve lost someone, someone they love and care deeply about, but who have no grave or marker of their own to pay respects by. So, instead, they walk among the headstones, finding one that looks neglected, forgotten, and they lay their flowers there instead.”

  Natalie’s eyes were beginning to dampen and Stone placed his hands over hers, encouraging her to continue.

  “She lost someone, Svobodova, someone very special to her. Jonathan told me.”

  “Who was he?”

  “I don’t know for sure, someone who helped her during the election; a man called Peter something. He worked for this ‘Institute’ and was supposed to kill her, but fell in love with her and vowed to protect her instead.”

  “And what happened to him?”

  “Guess,” she replied darkly, her fears resurfacing. “But since then you can often find her, when the cameras aren’t looking, standing alone in a graveyard, placing a flower on the shrine.”

  The sympathy Stone felt for the Premier increased with Natalie’s words; a sentiment evidently not shared by Williams whose dismissive scowl dug new depths on his face.r />
  “She certainly shared a lot with Greyson,” Stone opined before grimacing in recognition of his own insensitivity.

  “Sorry,” he quickly uttered, only for her to laugh in reply.

  “It’s ok,” she quickly reassured him, “I made my peace with that a long time ago; at least it sounds like they didn’t have boring pillow talk.”

  “Well at least you’ll have something to talk about with the Ex when he gets here,” Williams nonchalantly supposed.

  “Jonathan’s coming? Here?”

  “He just texted me,” said the spy, “he’s on his way.”

  She looked panicked at the news and stood to leave, collecting her phone and purse from the table top and depositing them back inside her bag.

  “Look, don’t go,” pleaded Stone, “you don’t have to go anywhere near him, we can…”

  “I can’t be in the same room as him,” she snapped, her voice flustered, “not right now. Tell him…”

  “Tell him what?” quizzed Stone.

  “Just tell him I’m getting my roots done.”

  She stood quickly and headed for the door, stopped only by Svobodova’s voice as she reached it.

  “Natalie?”

  Stone, behind the Professor, put a hand on her shoulder in support, which the politician noted and smiled gently at.

  “You’re leaving?”

  “Yes,” replied Abelard, “I’ve no wish to be around Jonathan any more than I need to be. I’m sorry.”

  “I understand,” said Svobodova with what looked like regret in her eyes, “but before you go, I just wanted to tell you that it really wasn’t like that at all.”

  She reached forward and took Natalie’s fingers in her own as she spoke.

  “I realise I am not your favourite person,” she began, dismissing Natalie’s half-heartedly shaken head, “and I realise that I spent far too long in your husband’s company than any wife could feel comfortable with. But I assure you, those days, those visits, they were never for anything other than political business. I was the Leader of a newly unified country, Jonathan was trying to forge a path for Britain’s international cooperation after Brexit; we were open to each other, we built strong agreements and we worked well together. I knew that Jonathan came with a reputation and I admit there were occasions when he made clear his willingness to take the relationship in a different direction. I must also admit that there were times Natalie, when I was tempted to accept.”