Siro by David Ignatius (short books to read txt) 📕

Anna looked away, certain that her own eyes would betray her, and handed the man her passport and visa. Then she waited. The booth, like so many things in the Soviet Union, had been designed to intimidate the individual. It was lit by an unforgiving neon tube, which made even the most robust person look pale and haunted. Overhead, across from the passport officer, was a long mirror. It was tilted downward so that the officer could observe his supplicants from behind—could see their hands shaking, or their knees quivering, or their feet tapping nervously.

Anna’s hands were at her side, clenched in tight and sweaty fists. The officer was taking his time, examining her passport, then her face, then her visa. She caught his eye again, involuntarily, and she could feel her head twitch, even as she tried to hold it steady. The KGB officer looked at her passport one more time, studied another sheet in front of him, and then rose from his seat.

Oh, dear God, thought Anna. They’ve made me. I’m on a watch list. She felt a sensation of pure terror, and a sudden surge in her metabolism—like a kettle boiling over. Stone had warned her about this moment. There would be no way to know whether the Soviets had identified her as an intelligence officer until she was on their doorstep, standing in the passport line at Sheremetievo Airport. The young, blue-eyed officer returned, accompanied by an older man. He looked at Anna’s visa and passport, then at Anna, and then whispered something. Please, let it all happen quickly, thought Anna. Let the older one tell me in Radio Moscow English: Excuse me, Miss Barnes, would you come with me, please? That way, at least, it would be over.

But it was only beginning. The young clerk fixed his eyes on Anna a final time, closed them like a shutter, and stamped the visa. He handed it back to Anna. His face showed no emotion whatsoever. Anna was relieved, almost giddy, as she walked toward the baggage-claim area. It was only when she had retrieved her suitcase and was heading for customs that she realized her relief was premature. Of course they would clear her through passport control, even if they had a firm identification of her. Now that she was in their country, they owned her.

The first real harbinger of disaster came at the Intourist desk at the airport. Anna was supposed to go there on arrival, to arrange a transfer to Vnukovo Airport for her Aeroflot flight that evening to Yerevan. She handed her book of Intourist vouchers to the woman at the desk, who studied it for a long while, checked a list, and then looked up at her. Why am I on all these lists? wondered Anna. She felt the surge of anxiety welling up again.

“Well, I guess I have good news for you,” said the Intourist lady, in that strange, too colloquial English that is taught in Soviet language schools.

“What’s that?” asked Anna.

“I think you will have an extra night in Moscow, at Intourist Hotel across from Red Square, with no charge.”

“What do you mean?” Anna was numb from fatigue and stress, but she could tell that something bad was happening.

“That was a joke, I guess. What I mean is that we have a problem with your flight from Vnukovo to Yerevan. Flight 837 has been delayed.”

“How long?”

“Until tomorrow.”

Calm down, Anna told herself. Keep cool. “What time tomorrow?”

“Maybe it will be in the morning.”

“What time?”

“Nine, ten, eleven. I don’t know. Maybe it will be in the afternoon.”

“What’s wrong? Isn’t there another flight? I have to get to Yerevan. I’m really looking forward to Yerevan.”

“I am sorry, but it is not convenient.”

“What do you mean, ‘not convenient’? I have a reservation for a flight tonight.”

“That flight has been delayed,” repeated the woman blandly.

“Could I please speak to the manager?”

Anna realized immediately that she had made a mistake. Russians have a huge chip on their shoulder in dealing with Americans, and are just waiting for someone to try to pull rank, demand special privileges, or otherwise embody the Soviet propaganda image of the pushy, grasping American capitalist. It is a losing game. The only thing that makes anyone special in the Soviet Union is the blessing of the Soviet government. And that, Anna certainly did not have.

“Well,” said the offended Intourist lady, “I think probably you can talk to me, because I am the manager. And so I will tell you your program. You are going to Intourist Hotel tonight. Tomorrow morning, an Intourist car will take you to Vnukovo for your flight to Yerevan, which has been delayed. Now an Intourist car will take you to the hotel.” The woman nodded in the direction of a burly driver, who did not offer to carry her bag. Anna realized there was absolutely no point in arguing further. She would leave for Yerevan the next day, November 9.

Anna settled into her room on the seventeenth floor of the Intourist Hotel, overlooking Gorky Street. The desk light didn’t work; the window wouldn’t open; there was a television set, but it was broken. She unpacked her bag and took a long shower. There wasn’t any shower curtain, so the water sprayed all over the floor. Anna dutifully mopped it up. The city was like that; it reduced you to peonage in a few hours’ time. As Stone had once observed, Moscow was a vast Skinner box that had been created to condition behavior—among foreigners and Soviet citizens alike.

Anna wrapped herself in a towel and waited for her hair to dry. She thought seriously of giving up. From the scene at the airport, it seemed possible that her identity had been compromised. A worse problem, in some ways, was the delay in her flight to Yerevan. Unless she arrived in time to find Dr. Antoyan, the whole trip would be useless. She decided to take a walk, to clear her head. It was midafternoon by now, and