Even as it tracked Rabinowitz's route away from the parapsychology village, the inquiry revealed a problem that should have been worked out.
The officer assigned personally to Rabinowitz, who knew his life was at stake, explained it.
"When he wanted women, we gave him women. We gave him blond women and dark-eyed women. We gave him African women and South American women. We gave him women from the Middle East and women from the Middle West. Kurds and Koreans did we supply," came the statement.
"And what was his reaction?"
"He said we never came up with the right one."
"And who was the right one?"
"The one we hadn't come up with."
Rabinowitz had been given a catalog from Neiman-Marcus, a great American department store, and told to mark off the items he wanted and they would be delivered. Exotic foodstuffs, hams and smoked salmon and tropical fruits by the barrel, rotted in his basement. Military priority for any item destined for Rabinowitz had been declared in four major defense command zones. In a world of luxury, Rabinowitz had lived in the highest luxury.
Every morning, noon, and evening someone from the KGB command came to his home or laboratory to ask him what he wanted. And when they weren't doing that, generals and commissars were phoning him personally to ask if they could do favors for him. He had lots of friends in high places, people who needed him and would not take his loss lightly.
Even though the KGB commandant of that village could prove beyond any doubt he had given Rabinowitz everything a human being could want, someone was going to have to pay. And the price would be death.
In growing horror, Moscow command tracked the route of the strange incidents, from east to west.
A conductor on a train headed west through Kazan, south of Moscow, was demanding a traveling pass when he realized he was talking to his pet dog. He reported this strange incident when he got home to Kuybyshev because there he found his pet had been at home all the time. Therefore he was suffering some form of mental breakdown; therefore he was due a vacation. The conductor was surprised that it was not the hospital board that examined him but the KGB.
In Kiev, an Aeroflot stewardess confessed she had allowed her favorite uncle onto the airplane without a ticket. She confessed her deed because she was sure she was going crazy; she had seated the favorite uncle twice on the same flight, both in the luxurious rear cabin and in the crammed front seats. She had walked back and forth three times to confirm that he was sitting in both seats.
The uncle who got off in Warsaw was the one she would have bet was the real one. But when the one she thought was the impostor went to bed with her aunt, she was sure she was going crazy.
And then from a bus in Prague, the Rabinowitz desk got their first breakthrough.
A passenger was asking questions about Berlin. This was not unusual, except a fight occurred on the bus where several people tried to take care of him, thinking he was a close relative. Then the bus driver suffered a migraine headache. He told all the passengers they would have to wait half an hour or so while he wished he were dead; then the migraine would pass.
But the passenger with the multiple family ties went to the front of the bus, spoke to the driver, and the driver drove off singing, his headache gone. Of course the driver changed his route to drive further west, closer to Berlin. But no one minded. After all, who would deny such a small thing to his closest relative?
By the time Rabinowitz reached Berlin, the city with the wall to keep in all the people of the East who might want to leave the liberated and progressive countries for the decadent West, fourteen specially selected KGB units were waiting for him. The East German guards were dismissed from their posts and Russians stood five deep, guns at the ready.
But these were not just any Russians or any KGB officers. Every one of them had been carefully selected to be willing to shoot his closest relative if that relative tried to make it to the West.
"Let us warn you, you will only think you are shooting your mother and your brother and your favorite pet. Your mind will not be your own. Don't trust it. What you will shoot is the greatest danger that could befall Russia. Of course, if that greatest danger chooses to go back home, give him anything he wants. Anything. If he wants to ride on your back all the way to Moscow, get on your hands and knees."
"Hello, Vassily," said the deputy commander of the KGB at the access point the Americans called Checkpoint Charlie. A tired man of five-foot-seven with sad brown eyes trudged wearily to the last gate to the West. Backing up the deputy commander were enough ruthless, vicious men to clean out half of Berlin. He didn't know if they frightened Rabinowitz but they certainly terrified him.
The deputy commander, Krirnenko, was in his seventies and had risen so high not because of ruthlessness, usually a requirement for the policemen of a police state, but because of his exceptional judgment. Krimenko had been given this job personally by the premier.
"I want him back. And if we don't get him back, no one else can have him. He's got to be with us, or dead."
"I understand. I've used him myself."
"I am not talking about personal things. I am talking about international things. I am talking about our survival as a nation. We cannot let the West get its hands on him."
"I understand that too," Krimenko had said.
And what he wanted now most of all at this bridge between East and West, where exchanges of spies took place, was a little reasoning talk with Vassily Rabinowitz.
And he did something quite shrewd. He pretended a greater weakness than he really had. Because Rabinowitz had no way of knowing his special talents and powers might be of no use at this bridge, that even if he succeeded in what he did so well, he would still be dead if he tried to leave.
"Look, my friend," said Krimenko. "I know I can't stop you. And since I can't stop you, maybe you will tell me something before you leave."
"Will you people never leave me alone?" said Rabirrowitz.
"Certainly. Just tell me, Vassily, if we are ready to give you everything, anything you want, why on earth do you have to leave? What is there to leave for?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"I am not here with an army at my back for my health," said Krimenko. He was careful to show Rabinowiiz he was making no threatening moves. He knew Rabinowitz operated so quickly the average human mind could not keep up with him.
He had first met this wizard of the mind when he had a vicious toothache and was complaining that he did not want to undergo the pain of Russian dentistry so late in his life. A Politburo member had told him about Vassily Rabinowitz. He had flown to the special village in Siberia and had gotten an immediate appointment along with a warning not to bother the hypnotist with questions.
"Is he just a hypnotist? I have been to hypnotists. They don't work with me," Krimenko had said.
"Just go in, state your problem, and leave."
"I am sorry I came so far just for a hypnotist," Krimenko had said.
Rabinowitz was sitting in an armchair by the window, reading a prohibited American magazine. It was one famous for its artistic photographs of nude women. Rabinowitz had a large black crayon. He was checking off the women. He hardly looked up.
"Yes," he called out.
"I have a bad tooth. Incredible pain. It's abscessed and rotting."
"Okay, and I'd like the redhead first, an Oriental maybe at the end of the month. Sometimes I like to stay with the redheads." He handed the magazine to Kimenko and went back to his window.
"What am I supposed to do with this?"
"Hand it to the man at the door. Those are who I want today. "
"But what about my toothache?" asked Krimenko.
"What toothache?" asked Rabinowitz. He was smiling. Krimenko reached for his jaw. Blessedly, it was free of pain. Just like that.
"How did you do it?"
"That's why I'm here. The redhead first, please."
"This is wonderful," said Krimenko.
"You can eat candy on it right away. Won't hurt you. But I'd have it pulled if I were you. The abscess can kill you. Don't worry about Russian dentists. No pain. You won't feel a thing. If you want, I can make you have an orgasm while the dentist is butchering your mouth. Some people like that," Rabinowitz had said.