vlad.tribnet.com / Issue #154 / Special reports / Reading article...

When I went to the hospital on a whim to interview Vladivostok’s mayor, who’d recently fallen ill after a court appearance, I expected hospital defenses to be impenetrable. After all, Victor Cherepkov is a man who lives in fear of his own assassination at the hands of arch-enemies in the krai government.

Guards outside the hospital gates posed the first challenge. Ready for action, they interrogated the youngest tots and feeblest pensioners. But apparently it wasn’t worth their time to protect another entrance around back.

Slipping into the hospital, I was next confronted by an endless maze of halls. By all appearances it was just another sleepy afternoon at the Main Naval Hospital.

Slipping into the hospital, I was next confronted by an endless maze of halls.

Cherepkov could have been anywhere. Perhaps he was deep in the bowels of the building. Or locked up in a bomb-proof operation room. Was that him dressed like a little old lady with a heart murmur, pacing around the front desk? The perfect disguise, I thought. Maybe it was all a ruse, and he was now being spirited away in a nuclear submarine for hospital care, in the safest place of all — deep beneath the ocean.

Clearly I would have to blow my cover and squeeze the information out of a passing nurse.

“Psst!” I whispered, hiding in the shadows. “I was wondering...Victor Ivanovich...”

“Down the hall and to the left,” she replied lazily.

Following her indifferent wave, I spotted a diminutive young fellow brandishing a cellular phone. There was no getting around this sharp-eyed bodyguard. No doubt he was a martial arts master, highly skilled at beaning his quarry on the melon with a portable communication device. He had me cornered.

“Can I help you?” he asked cordially.

Mumbling something about belonging to the foreign press, I waved my passport in front of his face.

The gleaming blue document did the trick and I was in, without even being searched, for a private session with the mayor. There he lay, in a “New York” T-shirt and his skivvies. A nurse came in while I sat there and gave him a shot in the tummy.

And when I left, all I got was a cheery handshake from the body guard. The boys out front didn’t even notice me – apparently a couple of cute girls were being held for questioning.