All day long, these elderly ladies sit on the benches that can be found near almost every high-rise apartment block in Moscow, gossiping to each other about this and that. If you are new to an area, you don’t ever have to go to the local information bureau – just ask a babushkawhat’s what. They are the best neighbourhood watch you could ever imagine, and they know everything: who went to the market in the morning and exactly what shopping they came back with; who had a quarrel with their partner or lover or friend; who left the water running and flooded the apartment below; who got engaged to whom; and who is pregnant – frequently before they know it themselves! That is our lovely Russian babushkas for you.

After graduating from Moscow State Linguistic University in the summer of 1998, I had a part-time job as a translator and became acquainted with a former KGB officer by the name of Lev – a very experienced, educated and intelligent man. I must say that to serve and protect the interests of the Soviet Union, the KGB never failed to employ the ‘best of the best’. And these high-ranking KGB officials enjoyed good rewards for their undying and faithful service to the Soviet state – they were often deployed abroad during the Cold War when most of the Soviet citizens never went any further than the Black Sea in the south of the country. These KGB agents were probably some of the very first Russians since 1917, and the beginning of the Soviet Union, allowed to shop at the likes of Marks & Spencer. Lev would later joke that the KGB officials who operated in the UK often referred to Marks & Spencer as ‘Marx & Lenin’. And obviously these KGB officials earned good money compared with the rest of society!

After the Soviet Union collapsed, most ex-KGB employees used their experience, intelligence, connections and knowledge of one or more foreign languages to reinvent themselves as private security consultants. And it wasn’t difficult to see that they quite quickly found a niche in a new Russia entering the capitalist era, which, ironically, they had previously fought against all their lives. Like many ex-KGB officers, Lev also started a private security company, which operated from the office next to where I worked.

Although Lev spoke good English, he would occasionally pop into the offices of the company I worked for and ask me to help out with some administration and translation work. This was normally while he was away from the office, and occasionally the country, on business trips. He would set me certain tasks and translations for when he returned, which I always managed to complete. After carrying out a few tasks for him, he invited me into his office one day, and in a typically abrupt KGB fashion asked me what I intended to do with my life. I must admit that his question took me aback – how can a naive, inexperienced 22 year old, more or less fresh from university, know what she intends to do with her life? I had only just graduated and didn’t know what I was going to do the next day, let alone for the rest of my life. So, I stupidly gave him the only answer I could – I didn’t know.

At the back of my mind, I realised that I had probably blown my chances of a job, as I had deduced that his question had something to do with an offer of employment. He was an old-school army officer and would have probably liked me to have been more ideologically prepared, but he gave me a satisfactory smile and confirmed that he did indeed want to offer me a job. His business was expanding, and it was no longer possible for him to manage it on his own. He needed someone with good language skills to assist him full time with his increasing workload, as he was dealing with Western clients on a more frequent basis.

Despite being fresh from university and totally inexperienced in the security industry, I did have a fairly good command of the English language, as well as a smattering of French, which I also studied at degree level, and sufficient administration skills to run a small office, so I found myself saying ‘yes’ almost immediately. I had read all of Ian Fleming’s James Bond stories and, like most teenagers, had imagined myself as one of the gorgeous Bond girls. ‘Now,’ I thought, ‘I will actually have a chance to be one!’ On my way home that day, I was on cloud nine, and my imagination went wild . . .

And so my career in the security and investigation industry had begun. During my years with the company, we did a lot of private and corporate investigations, as well as many security operations. The first few years of Russia entering the market economy were very difficult, but as the years passed foreign investors started flooding into the country, and they needed everything from preliminary intelligence reports and data collection to interpreting and translation services and personal protection. At that time, Russia was not really safe for most foreigners but many risked their lives and welfare, as they could build enormous wealth in a relatively short period of time if they were brave and clever enough to come and set up business in the country. My boss, using his ex-KGB friends and his vast network of foreign connections, built a sound database of blue-chip foreign clientele who wanted his security and investigation services.

I always craved action, being out in the field, undercover, spying on somebody, like those gorgeous Bond girls, making men weak at the knees with just a flutter of their eyelashes, but sadly I didn’t have very long eyelashes, and I spent the first couple of years mostly doing office work and basic administration, as well as occasionally collecting and analysing data, translating documents for Western clients and typing up report after report. It was not the glamorous, exciting industry that I had anticipated and dreamed of.

The company continued to expand, and after two years we were employing two more ex-KGB staff, a part-time accountant and a part-time IT man. Finally, after two years of patience and frustration, my big day of field operations finally came.

One of our clients, the deputy director of a large multinational oil company with an office in the centre of Moscow, contacted us with a suspicion that he was being followed. He was quite frightened. Back in those early days of democracy, it was not unusual for businessmen, entrepreneurs and managers of big companies – both Russian and foreign – to be targeted by the Mafia or other business rivals, with the intention of frightening and extorting money from them or forcing them out of business. There were many cases of kidnapping, torturing and even the assassination of businessmen and members of their family.

One of the more famous cases was that of American hotelier Paul Tatum, who was shot in cold blood with an automatic Kalashnikov in front of several passers-by at around 5 p.m. as he and two of his bodyguards left the Slavyanskaya Hotel and headed towards Kievskaya metro station, where he had arranged to meet somebody. Kievskaya metro is integrated within the mainline railway station and is situated right next to the hotel. In the underground passageway leading through to the mainline station, Tatum’s killer walked up to him and shot him 11 times at point-blank range in full view of everyone passing by. The killer then calmly laid down his gun on the passageway steps and walked away while Tatum’s bodyguards stood silently by. Had they also been paid by the person responsible for the hotelier’s death? The assassination ended Tatum’s long dispute with the Moscow City Government as well as with his so-called business partner, a Chechen who jointly owned the hotel with him. An American–Chechen business partnership was probably doomed to failure from the very start – with the odds considerably stacked against the American.

Apparently, it later transpired that the dispute involved Tatum’s refusal to pay a bribe of $1 million to cover up an original earlier bribe he had made of $500,000. He was being extorted in typical Russian Mafia style: pay a second bigger bribe to cover up the first bribe.

The Mafia’s torture methods were sometimes even more barbaric and horrific than those of the KGB. There was a famous case of the telephone receivers in the office of a wealthy Russian businessman being poisoned – half an hour after he spoke to a colleague on the phone, he died of chemical poisoning, as did his secretary some time later. The girlfriend of another wealthy Russian businessman was tortured when the kidnappers placed an iron on her stomach and slowly cooked her to death by increasing the temperature. Also, the hand of a bank manager who had been kidnapped and held to ransom was sent in an envelope to his wife – the kidnappers promised to send more body parts if she did not raise enough money to pay up.

In most cases, kidnappers initially carry out comprehensive surveillance of their victims, following them everywhere and recording their comings and goings, changes in routines, and how often they use bodyguards and how many, with the fundamental objective of finding a few weak points . . . and then bang! They close in when the victim least expects it.

After the initial briefing from the client, we sat down to work out a plan of action to identify whether or not our client was being followed, and if so, by whom. Because of the sensitivity of the operation, we decided not to involve any outside people and just use those who worked within our company, including me! This was my ‘Moment of Truth’, my ‘Ultimate Test’; if I did well, I knew that this would be the first covert James Bond-like spy mission of many – and I just knew I was going to do a great job!

We worked out a route for our client to take the following day. It was going to be a similar route to that which he would normally take, but with a few slight diversions and alterations. My colleagues and I would be strategically placed along the route. Obviously, we knew the model, colour and number plate of our client’s car, so the only thing we needed to do was to take note of the number plates of all the vehicles that followed our client’s within a few minutes of it passing by. Afterwards, using a method of cross reference, we would quickly establish whether or not our client had been followed. If he had been followed, we would use our connections with the police and security services to identify who it was and have him quickly arrested. It was such a simple plan – what could go wrong?

We could not afford to arouse the suspicion of pedestrians, passers-by or, more importantly, the potential kidnappers, so we had to hide ourselves in such a way that we could clearly see the road and all the cars passing by but nobody could see us. In my new role of covert surveillance operative, I found what I thought was the perfect spot – an enclosed patch of bushy greenery.

I got there nice and early, crawled into the bushes and made myself comfortable. I had my sandwich on my knee (after all, a spy can’t go hungry, can she?) and my notebook and pen in hand, and I prepared to wait. Before I got into the bush, I had a good look around to make sure nobody could see me. Apart from ruining the whole operation, it would have been quite embarrassing to hear somebody laugh (or scream) at what they thought was me attempting to have a wee! Muscovites often use these lovely hiding places to do their business, because although there are quite a few public toilets in the city, the state of them is so horrific that going there once is enough to put you off for life. (Public toilets cost five roubles, which you pay to some horrible-looking hag, chain-smoking stale, cheap cigarettes and smelling worse than the loo she supposedly cleans but hasn’t used herself for years.)

Excited about my first big assignment, I made myself snug in the bushes and was all set for the task in hand. If only I had known that in an apartment block not far from my ‘secret’ spot, an elderly woman, whose name I’ll never know, had looked out of her window at precisely the same time as I had slipped between the bushes. From above, she must have seen me crawl into the undergrowth and, as all Russian grandmothers would, thought to herself, ‘What on earth is that pretty young woman wearing a smart office suit doing squatting in the bushes?’ Or something like that, anyway.

I had arrived well in advance of the arranged time to make sure I was not late and that I was well prepared. I had planned to spend about half an hour watching the cars pass by to make sure that I was quick enough to write down the number plates. I started practising, ever so slightly squeezing my head through the thicket at every car that passed, then back in as I frantically scribbled down the number plate, all the while thinking about telling my friends and family about Inna ‘Super-duper Spy’ Bond!

Right in the middle of my daydreaming, I suddenly heard a rustling sound behind me, followed by the angry voice of an elderly woman: ‘Hey you! What are you doing there? Get out immediately. I have been watching you for a while. We have had enough of people pissing in our bushes. You wait. I have called the police already. They are on their way. They will take you to their quarters. You will have to pay a fine for spoiling our park area, and then you’ll have to come back and clean up after yourself!’

I froze with fear and utter embarrassment, and wondered how it was possible to clean up pee from the ground. What could I do? I couldn’t tell her that I was on a covert surveillance operation, but I also couldn’t admit that I was peeing in the bushes! Right at that moment, my eye caught our client’s car passing by. I quickly decided that it was better to lose face than ruin the whole operation and said in a timid voice, ‘Just give me a minute and I’ll be out.’ After that, I started frantically writing down the numbers of the cars that followed the client’s silver Mercedes SLK, as I didn’t really believe that the angry babushka had called the police about someone peeing in the bushes.

A few seconds later, I heard a man’s voice shout, ‘Stand up with your hands in the air!’ This, I must admit, I did not see coming. I automatically put the list in my mouth, chewed it and swallowed, as the last thing I needed was to end up in the police department with a list of number plates in my possession. And anyway, that is what I had read in the James Bond books: if spies were caught red-handed, they ate the evidence.

Swallowing the last remains of the paper, I meekly edged my way out of the bushes, my face scratched by sharp thorns, my legs weak from sitting in one position for such a long time and my whole body shaking with fear. Never in my short life had I been in any kind of trouble with the police, and to find myself in this horrible situation was beyond my wildest imagination. As soon as the policeman saw me and my pitiful appearance, he understood that I was no threat. Standing next to him, shaking her wrinkly old fist at me, was the babushka.

The policeman asked for my passport and demanded an explanation. I needed to find an excuse for why I had been sitting in the bushes. Saying that I had been having a shit was right out of the question, and the only thing I could immediately think of was that on my way to work I had been followed by a stranger. I had been scared and decided to hide in the bushes. I wasn’t sure whether they believed me or not. Frankly, I didn’t care – I just wanted the whole thing to end. After a stern warning, the policeman finally let me go.

When I got home, I kept wondering how I was going to tell everybody at work what had happened and why I had so miserably failed on my very first security operation. I would have to think of something to tell my boss, so I decided to make up car number plates and hope for the best.

The next day, when we all compared our lists, it turned out that the client’s car had not been followed after all . . . or maybe it had been? Thankfully, he went on to spend many more happy years in Russia.

The moral of the story is never to piss or shit in the bushes, as there will always be a babushka on guard! And so much for my covert surveillance skills!

Inna currently provides Russian translation services for the security and investigation industry, and runs the membership section of the British Bodyguard Association. She can be contacted at [email protected]