CHAPTER 84
“WE?” I ASKED.
“I was part of it,” Yenen admitted. “I sat in this very classroom as a child. There were dozens of us. Children from all over Russia, some from other countries. Orphans mainly. All taught to be Americans. Your democracies think short term. A four-year presidency? Ha! What can you achieve in four years? In Russia, a president can enact a plan to train children to infiltrate the highest echelons of American power, and he can still be in office when his plan comes to fruition.”
“Was Karl Parker one of these Bright Star agents?”
Yenen nodded, and I felt numb as the last tattered threads of my relationship with my former instructor were cut away.
“His real name was John Kubu. He was an orphan from Kenya. He assumed Karl Parker’s identity when he was nineteen, just before he joined the Marines.”
I shook my head in disgust. The man who’d trained me, my friend and mentor, was a traitor. I bristled with shame.
“Ernest Fisher and Elizabeth Connor—were they Bright Star too?”
Yenen nodded. “Yes.”
“Why would the SVR kill its own operatives?” Dinara asked. “Veles is SVR, correct?”
“He is.”
“Then why is he killing Russian agents?” Dinara pressed.
“I don’t know,” Yenen replied, “but we’ve lost twelve Bright Star operatives this month.”
“Twelve?” I said.
“Yes, Mr. Morgan. The ones you know about are the high-profile deaths. People Veles couldn’t reach easily. They had to be liquidated in a way that made a lot of noise.”
“Which explains the invention of the Ninety-nine,” I remarked.
“Exactly. A cover designed to throw people off the scent. But there have been many more quiet deaths. Bright Star agents who didn’t climb quite so high in American society.”
“Robert Carlyle?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Why aren’t you in America?” Dinara asked. “If you were part of the program.”
“Not all of us went,” Yenen replied. “I was a graduate of the last year. By then, the program’s resources had been spread thin. Imagine what it takes to set someone up in a new life in America. To give them help along the way. Connections and money to make sure their business thrives and their life is successful. By the time my class graduated, the well had run dry.”
“Do you know how many there are?” I asked.
“The program ran for four years. There were twenty-four children in my class. My contemporaries in the last class didn’t get deployed, so my guess would be seventy-two people at most.”
“Your guess?” I asked.
“We did not know children from other years. We were kept apart to reduce the risk of exposure. I only know about the man you call Karl Parker because he died and a report was made. The same with Robert Carlyle, Ernest Fisher and Elizabeth Connor. The agents who are still alive are invisible. Their identities a secret only one man knows.”
“Who?” I asked.
“Salko,” Yenen replied.
“Salko?”
“Yevgeny Salko,” Dinara explained. “He’s a director of the SVR.”
“Can you take me away from here, Mr. Morgan? I’ve told you everything I know,” Yenen said.