a blanket to cover it, and thirty minutes later an ambulance took the thing to the city mortuary on Jocelyn Square by the Salt Market. There other hands would strip off the rest of the clothing—shoes, socks, trousers, underpants, belt, and wristwatch—each item to be bagged and tagged for collection by investigating officers.
Inside the hospital there were more forms to fill out—the admission forms were kept as evidence, although now useless for practical purposes—and the two police constables bagged and tagged the rest of the dead man’s possessions. They were listed as: anorak, 1; turtleneck pullover, 1; canvas gunnysack, 1; thick-knit sweater (rolled), 1; and round tobacco tin, 1.
Before they were finished, about fifteen minutes after Craig’s call, an inspector and a sergeant, both uniformed, had arrived from Division. They were loaned an empty administrator’s office and began to take statements from the two constables. After ten minutes the inspector sent the sergeant to his car to call in the duty chief superintendent. It was then four in the morning of Thursday, April 9, but in Moscow it was eight o’clock.
General Yevgeni Karpov waited until they were out of the main traffic of southern Moscow and on the open road to Yasyenevo before he started to converse with Gregoriev. Apparently the thirty-year-old driver knew he had been singled out by the general and was eager to please him.
“How do you like driving for us?”
“Very much, sir.”
“Well, it gets you out and about, I suppose. Better than a stuffy desk job.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Been driving for my friend Colonel Philby recently, I hear.”
A slight pause. Damn, he’s been told not to mention it, thought Karpov.
“Er ... yes, sir.”
“Used to drive himself until he had his stroke.”
“So he told me, sir.”
Better get on with it. “Whereabouts did you drive him?”
A longer pause. Karpov could see the driver’s face in the mirror. He was disturbed, in a quandary.
“Oh, just around Moscow, sir.”
“Anywhere specific around Moscow, Gregoriev?”
“No, sir. Just around.”
“Pull over, Gregoriev.”
The Chaika pulled out of the privileged center lane, through the southbound traffic, and onto a shoulder.
Karpov leaned forward. “You know who I am, Gregoriev?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you know my rank in the KGB?”
“Yes, sir. Lieutenant general.”
“Then don’t play games with me, young man. Where, exactly, did you drive him?”
Gregoriev swallowed. Karpov could see he was wrestling with himself. The question was: Who had told him to stay silent as to where he had driven Philby? If it was Philby himself, Karpov outranked him. But if it was someone higher ... In fact, it had been Major Pavlov, and he had frightened Gregoriev badly. He was only a major, but to a Russian the people from the First Chief Directorate are an unknown quantity, whereas a major of the Kremlin Guards ... Still, a general was a general.
“Mostly to a series of conferences, Comrade General. Some at central Moscow apartments, but I never went inside, so I never saw which exact apartment he went to.”
“Some in central Moscow ... And the others?”
“Mainly—no sir, always, I think—at a dacha out at Zhukovka.”
Central Committee country, thought Karpov. Or Supreme Soviet. “Do you know whose?”