 
Someone Else's War:

A Novel of Russia and America

Copyright 2013 by Erin Solaro

Smashwords Edition

# COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Published by Erin Solaro at Smashwords. All Rights Reserved under the laws of the United States.

You may quote from this novel for fair use purposes, but please provide the author a copy of the review or paper or anything else you have quoted it in, along with a link to the site, if applicable.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

The cover photo was taken by Mikhail Estafiev and licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license, which allows users to copy, distribute and transmit the work with attribution, provided the author does not imply that Mr. Estafiev approves of the work. (She has not contacted him.)

Although the author has had to work from memory for the following issue, she attributes all quotations by Anna Akhmatova to her greatest English-language translator, Judith Hemschemeyer. Any flaws in the quotes are the failure of the author's memory.

DEDICATION

For good friends in a dark time. And once again and always, for Philip, without whom this book would not exist at all.

And to you also, dear reader.

For this is a work of fiction. The characters and events portrayed are purely imaginary. Any resemblance to real persons or events is coincidental and unintended.

Yet the Russia of this book is real enough. So is the America. If this Russia seems less abhorrent than usual in American eyes, that was my intent. And if this America seems a bit too real for comfort, again in American eyes, that was my intent, also.

Erin Solaro

28 February 2014

# Table of Contents

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

DEDICATION

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

PROLOGUE, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: COVENANT

CHAPTER ONE, WASHINGTON, DC, DECEMBER 1993: GETMANOV

CHAPTER TWO, WASHINGTON, DC, DECEMBER 1993: A NIGHT WALK

CHAPTER THREE, LOS ALAMOS, EARLY SPRING 1994: AMERICA

CHAPTER FOUR, MOSCOW, HOLY WEEK 1994: SUSLOV and REBECCA

CHAPTER FIVE, FOX CHAPEL, PA, SPRING 1994: OSCAR

CHAPTER SIX, MANHATTAN, LATE SPRING 1994: SHOPPING

CHAPTER SEVEN, VIENNA, LATE SPRING 1994: JAY LYONS

CHAPTER EIGHT, MOSCOW AND TVER, EARLY JUNE 1994: PROOF OF CONCEPT

CHAPTER NINE, MOSCOW, JUNE AND SEPTEMBER 1994: BORODKIN, SUSLOVA

CHAPTER TEN, MOSCOW, DECEMBER 1994: MARIA FEDOROVNA

CHAPTER ELEVEN, GROZNY, EARLY 1995: MALINOVSKY

CHAPTER TWELVE, MOSCOW AND GUDERMES, SUMMER 1995: KRISTINICH

CHAPTER THIRTEEN, MOSCOW, EARLY WINTER 1995: TRIMENKO

CHAPTER FOURTEEN, VEDENO GORGE, EARLY WINTER 1996: SIMONOV

CHAPTER FIFTEEN, MOSCOW and GROZNY, SPRING 1996: COMBAT

CHAPTER SIXTEEN, MAY-JUNE 1996, OLD RUSSIA: IN RUSSIA, ALL TRACK IS ROUGH

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN, CARLISLE BARRACKS, PA and MOSCOW, SUMMER 1996: CC COOPER

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN, MOSCOW, FALL 1996: VOROSHILOV

CHAPTER NINETEEN, MOSCOW, CHRISTMAS 1996: AN AMERICAN GUEST

CHAPTER TWENTY, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: SMART COUNTRIES, FOOLISH CHOICES

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE DACHA

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE LUBYANKA

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE MASTER PLANS OF THE MOMENT

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE FORMER WAYS

EPILOGUE: MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: REDEMPTION

AN AUTHOR'S NOTE TO THE READER

My American Vacation: A Novel of Russia and America

# DRAMATIS PERSONAE

The Major Characters Are:

## AMERICANS

Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin (Tolchinskaya), expatriate engineer.

Lavinia Lathrop Tolchin, her mother, deceased, by profession an architect.

Doctor Oscar Tolchin, her father, Hungarian immigrant, retired engineer, now part-time consultant and adjunct professor of engineering.

Colonel CC Cooper, US Army, retired, visiting professor at Voroshilov General Staff Academy.

Maxwell Fajans, CIA Chief of Station, US Embassy, Moscow.

Howie, Chief of the Washington Post Moscow Bureau.

Jay Lyons, CIA Deputy Assistant Chief of Station, US Embassy, Vienna.

Rebecca Taylor, Foreign Service Officer, US Department of State, later Moscow/Chechnya correspondent for the Washington Post.

## RUSSIANS

There are several categories of Russians.

### RUSSIAN ARMY

Colonel (later Major General) Dmitri Borisovich Suslov, Spetsnaz (Special Forces) and Airborne officer. Olivia's lover.

Yuri Mikhailovich Getmanov, cultural attaché, Russian Embassy in Washington, DC, under-cover Major General, Russian Military Intelligence (GRU).

Major (later Lieutenant Colonel) Vladimir Alexandrovich Malinovsky, Suslov's chief of reconnaissance in Chechnya. Olivia's boxing partner and friend: the brother she never had, the sister he always wanted.

Warrant Officer Konstantin Eduardovich Simonov, head of Olivia's personal security detail in Chechnya.

Lieutenant General Anatoly Petrovich Trimenko, Chief of Airborne Forces, Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.

### THE FEDERAL SECURITY SERVICE or FSB

Leonid Pavlovich Borodkin, Olivia's lab administrator and an FSB "minder."

Major Mikhail Yegorevich Kristinich, FSB interrogator assigned to Suslov's Spetsnaz brigade in Chechnya.

Lieutenant Colonel Vladislav Stepanovich Marianenko, Olivia's intake interrogator.

Maria Fedorovna Philipova, Olivia's housekeeper, FSB minder, and a former zek, or political prisoner in the Gulag (the Soviet penal camp system).

Colonel Sergei Lazarevich Raduyev, Olivia's chief interrogator in the Lubyanka.

Lieutenant General Georgii Genrikhovich Schwartz, Director, FSB Counter-Intelligence.

Major (later Lieutenant Colonel) Irina Borisovna Suslova, Dmitri's sister and Olivia's friend.

Colonel Avrum Vissarionovich Zhuralev, personal aide to General Schwartz and Olivia's arresting officer.

Four junior interrogators in the Lubyanka, also known as the Borises.

### OTHER RUSSIANS

Lyudmila Trofimovna Getmanova, wife of General Getmanov.

Alexander Suslov, brother of Dmitri and Irina, killed in action in Afghanistan.

Valentina Suslova, widow of Alexander, now a successful artist, living with Suslova and their four sons by their dead husbands.

# FRONTISPIECE

To live—as if in freedom.

To die—as if at home...

Day of the Declaration of War

21 June 1941

Anna Akhmatova

#  PROLOGUE, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: COVENANT

Dmitri Borisovich Suslov, Major General of Russian Airborne Forces and Spetsnaz, veteran of Afghanistan and Chechnya, drew back the ancient eiderdown comforter and cotton sheets and stared down at his American lover. He saw first, always, muscle from flat, strong shoulders to long, curving calves. Then the scars, where her pelvis and spine had been put back together with steel and titanium. He remembered the first time he had seen those scars and kissed them as if he could take away the memory of the pain. Those fractures had been very bad.

Seeking warmth in the cold morning, Olivia turned over, moved towards him.

He saw a strong, clean neck, hard nipples, small breasts, a deep, sculpted rib cage, and more scars. A body of pain in a world of pain.

He could have wept. He did not.

Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin, or Tolchinskaya, as she'd come to be known in Russia, felt something, perhaps his racing heart, perhaps the tremor in his breathing, because she woke, calmly and completely in the way she had learned in Chechnya, to his stare. His slanting Tartar eyes were dark green holes in a face so pale that his fine, weather-worn skin seemed translucent over the high, proud bones. She saw, again and always, the pain in his soul, as real as the physical torment she lived with.

Suslov opened his mouth to speak. No sound came out as he struggled to form words. Finally, he managed three. "Da ili nyet?"

Yes or no? Once more, yes or no, to confirm their decisions of the night before. Decisions regarding the treachery that she had never committed, for which she must now be imprisoned, perhaps tortured and killed. Decisions regarding the treachery he must now commit to try to save her. They had chosen freely. They had chosen to embark on the only honorable course of action now open to them, other than death, and they would not die merely to spare the evil the inconvenience of killing them. Only the final confirmation was required.

" _Da."_

"Then we shall proceed as we have planned."

The words of a heart breaking. Two hearts.

Olivia knew that somewhere in the room, very close to Dmitri Borisovich's hand, was his loaded pistol. She knew how completely, how terribly, he had fought, perhaps still fought, to keep himself from wanting to use it. Last night, there were moments when she had wanted him to use his pistol. On her, for never telling him the one thing, the one supremely idiotic thing, she feared might someday be found out about her. Then on himself, in expiation for trusting her. But he would not do that, either. She trembled a little, then a little more, at how utterly ashamed she was of her longing for such an end. It was only another burden to lay upon him.

She rose, showered in the simple dacha's little cubicle. She dressed under his silent gaze. He pulled on jeans and a sweater, taking his pistol from his nightstand beside the bed and placing it in a pocket of his coat hanging by the bed. He never spoke a word, not even when she picked up her pistol, the .45 she'd sometimes carried in America. She put it in a pocket of her coat and took up the small valise she'd been instructed the day before to pack for prison. He did not lay a hand upon her, to touch her in kindness or to hurt.

Alone, she stepped out of the shelter of his family's haunted dacha. She felt his eyes upon her from the dacha's window. She nodded to the fate waiting for her in the form of an FSB colonel standing by his car, his driver and guard attentive within, the armed detail that had ringed the dacha since last night invisible. She walked toward him alone.

"Good morning, Colonel Zhuralev. I trust none of your men have frostbite."

"No, Dr. Tolchinskaya. They are fine, but you are kind to ask." And then, "How do you wish to proceed?"

"I will now reach into the pocket of my coat and surrender my pistol."

Zhuralev nodded. In as pure an act of defiance as he had ever seen, she drew out her pistol and handed it over, a weapon that was as much a part of her as her perfume or her knitting. She'd kept all three on the little lamp table on her side of the bed. The perfume was in her valise. The pistol, she knew, ought not to be left with Dmitri Borisovich. Not for him. She wondered briefly if knitting—her work was also in her valise—was permitted in the Lubyanka, at least for prisoners of a certain status. But this was not the time to ask.

She moved to the car door and never looked back. They had made their plans, made them honorably, calmly. Whatever else, they would not submit. Perhaps, she thought, her lover's life was over, as hers might soon also be. And all because, and only because of the last stupid, ludicrous, pointless thing she'd done before coming to Russia. The last part of herself that she'd offered America.

Colonel Zhuralev nodded to his guard, who emerged with handcuffs. Dmitri Borisovich could not bear to watch any longer. He turned away from the window, undressed, and washed himself with frigid water, coarse soap, and a harsh cloth, until his skin was raw. Then he dressed in his uniform and prepared for his day.

They would come for him, but at their leisure. Or maybe not. This was no longer Stalin's time. Or even Brezhnev's. Perhaps Russia was headed in that direction again. Or maybe not. He did not know. Nor did he know whether the two of them would make some sort of difference for the better. All he knew was, whether they came for him or not, he would go on, as before. He would also remain available.

# CHAPTER ONE, WASHINGTON, DC, DECEMBER 1993: GETMANOV

It had started at an arms show, a military-industrial, hyper-globalized extravaganza, back in DC, in the cold and crystalline early December of 1993. A megalithic monster of an arms show, taking over both the Woodley Road Sheraton-Park and the Omni Shoreham just down the street, sponsored by a consortium of corporations and trade associations, with just about every arms maker in the Western World, and some from beyond, setting up booths.

There were no real weapons at the booths, of course. There were just glossy brochures and plastic models and posters touting "Freedom Isn't Free"-type sloganeering and free tote bags with corporate logos, handed out by young women whose honed attractiveness was a weapon in itself. People wandered in and out, some in uniform, some government civilians in the professional attire of their agencies—between the neckwear and shirt collars and degrees of paunch and slouch, you can always tell who works where. Mainstream media betrayed themselves by notebooks and frenetic scribblings, by micro-cassette recorders, and by arrogance. Left-wing types exuded fastidious distaste, ineptly feigned to cover their fascination. Prime contractors seemed indifferently at home. Subcontractors and vendors seemed earnest. Others, Dr. Olivia Lathrop Tolchin among them, came and went nondescriptly. Some of them, you wouldn't look at twice until after you'd looked twice. Some of them mattered.

Those who mattered didn't spend much time in the exhibition halls. The real business occurred in the bars and restaurants, in the hotel hospitality suites, and in other rooms rented for other purposes, among people who, sometimes, would not or could not have met anywhere else. Arms shows specialized in fortuitous encounters, carefully arranged and rehearsed by at least one of the parties involved.

Olivia's primary field, her scientific and engineering passion since graduate school, was sensors. Her fascination was with tactical ground combat sensors, with making them small and rugged and cheap. At least that had been her intellectual love until 1988, when she'd been eased out of her job in a sensor project at the Army's Engineering Center, Fort Belvoir, Virginia, about twenty miles south of the capital, down Interstate-95. No clear reasons had been given, although there were hints of displeasure at the Department of the Army, i.e., the Pentagon level. The dismissal had come with another hint, one designed to head off potential future ugliness such as lawsuits or going to the media. There was an opening for her elsewhere, also working with sensors and at a significant salary increase, should she care to apply. She cared to apply, and had since worked at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, a well-groomed, desolate place that had birthed the atomic bomb but now was given to What's-the-hurry?

Her current project **,** a venerable missile defense affair, legacy of Ronald Reagan's crafty enthusiasms and of other moribund ventures, some dating back to the 1950s, was always six months from some significant breakthrough or other. It was, like most of the rest of the lab, a place that was always going to succeed, but never succeeding. She'd taken it as an interim, as a possible stepping stone to something dynamic. Her hope was to be left more or less alone to accomplish some sort of technological spin-off, military or civilian, that would lead to serious work elsewhere. But in the manner of most American missile defense projects, it had turned out to be a place where real accomplishment was neither required nor welcomed. Young engineers were expected first to accede to and then to develop the bad habits of their elders. In time, this could make you unemployable anywhere else. But it hadn't happened to Olivia yet, and she was determined that it wouldn't.

Three companies had invited her to attend the arms show, one on the basis of a recent journal article she'd published, the other two because they knew of her work and had learned that the first had invited her. She held no great expectations for the trip, but why not? Washington DC, all expenses paid. She'd spent time in the city, but less than she'd hoped for, when she'd been at Belvoir. And nothing was doing at the lab. She wouldn't be missed. Not professionally and not personally.

She'd spent part of the conference in those interviews, coming away unimpressed and wondering if she'd been too open about what she wanted most: a job with the freedom to think and create. But she'd seen enough of the for-profit defense technology world to know that she had no desire to give up the relative placidity of a national lab, which at least never had to worry about quarterly earnings statements, for the world of suborning and being suborned by the Pentagon.

Her interviewers had sensed it. She hadn't been rejected or turned away overtly, just dismissed with a thin smile and a casual "We'll be in touch" that reeked of "Smart, but doesn't understand how these things work. Not a team player." Dismissed three times. But also, she knew, still under consideration. The clowns they sent to do the initial screening had no hiring authority. And those who knew anything at all about where sensor development was going, or should go, knew of her.

Interviews over, she worked at killing time. The exhibition halls were garish, the lectures simplistic, the male clientele on its ludicrous best behavior regarding women. The officers in uniform, especially. Tailhook, the notorious 1991 naval aviators' convention where women by the scores had been harassed and assaulted, was still in deadly legal and political aftermath. The military had instructed its men to avoid anything that might lead to anything that might lead to anything that might be actionable, or give the appearance thereof. Civilian agencies had done the same. The men at the arms show, the American men especially, seemed terrified of her.

Their problem. Not hers.

Late afternoon of the third and final day. Olivia was tired and bored. The touristy things she'd planned hadn't happened. Most notably a trip to the Holocaust Museum. Her father had donated money to it, and some unspecified memento, in memory of his family and in some small tribute to the fact that he'd survived. But Olivia hadn't gone, if only because the trip might have answered some of the questions she'd never dared ask. It was also now too late in the day. She was hungry but unwilling to subject herself to the bars or fight the crowds at the local restaurants for the pleasure of dining alone. Room service depressed her even more, as did the occasional waiter who suggested that if she were in the mood for company...

So she roamed the hospitality suites, not caring whose they were, looking only for a decent glass of wine and something to eat. She found one suite, half-filled with middle-aged men wearing large stomachs, Rolex watches, and expensive suits. She helped herself to wine and a plate, picked up a few things from the buffet, then found a corner seat with a tiny table. The wine she recognized as a passable Washington State merlot. Cheese and crackers, she realized somewhat later, while chewing. It was cheese and crackers. She was wearier than she thought. Some kind of cheese and some kind of crackers.

Olivia let herself stand down, let the wine infuse her with lassitude. The pain from the Cessna crash was still there, would always be there, but she was beginning to realize that it simply was what it was. Abstractly, she realized for the first time that she could, in fact, be OK with the pain. It didn't have to translate to suffering. It was a pleasant realization, she thought as she watched the stout men with the Rolexes or, even worse, preposterously complex watches more useful on a Green Beret mission than at a Beltway sales fest. Several new men, younger and taut, wandered purposefully in. Colonels, still on active duty after the Cold War's demise and the military downsizing, still hoping for jobs in the civilian defense sector. A shrinking sector, Olivia knew. Not good if you're suddenly decreed an excess colonel, still paying child support from the first marriage and wondering how to send the second batch of kids through college. She smiled inwardly, giving silent thanks for all the problems that she didn't have.

She was not expecting the harsh, imperious man who sat down in front of her, across her tiny table. He was older, not tall but massively built, with a body that should have gone to fat but hadn't. His face was granite, with deep brown eyes that were alive and twinkling. It was not an American face. He didn't have to open his mouth for her to know that. His eyes weren't American eyes. Not smooth, not suave, nor glaring as though everything in the world that wasn't his constituted a personal affront. Nor did he seem interested in wine or lassitude or female companionship. He was blunt and commanding and he looked at her very, very steadily for a long time, obviously sizing her up, though for what purpose, she could not tell. She feared neither him nor his purpose, felt only an abstract respect, sensing that, whatever else this man was or turned out to be, he'd earned that respect.

It had been a while since she'd had that response to a man. It was...pleasant.

Olivia was a tall woman, five feet, eight inches. She had the lean, muscular build of a life-long weight-lifter and runner and was very angular, especially in her lower back and pelvis, which since the crash were as much metal as bone. She wore a man's navy pinstripe suit, tailored to fit, over a pale ecru silk blouse. Her hair had once been her mother's sun-through-honey brown, falling in loose waves to her shoulders. Two weeks in the hospital had leached so much color from it that it was now the finest platinum, and there was a hard, worn beauty to her face and eyes. Not bitter, not unkind, not challenging or angry. Just very, very hard. In her own way, she knew, hers was a face as hard as his.

"Have we met before?" she asked courteously, eliding the sir that she knew he was accustomed to and deserved. Then she held his gaze with a waiting patience.

The man knew, too. And a strange feeling returned, from when first his wife had told him about her and he'd read the dossier she'd prepared for him and determined that this meeting would come to pass someday. The strange feeling was sorrow. Sorrow for her. In a just America, she would be loved and respected and loaded with honors. In her world as it was, she was a reasonably well-paid, utterly marginalized pariah, working for a worn-out national lab on a pointless Defense Department project. And yet she bore it with nobility. How she might bear that which his own country might someday inflict upon her, should he succeed with her, he chose for the moment not to consider. He only knew that as soon as he opened his mouth, she would be able to place his accent. And just as clearly, he knew that games, any games, any attempt at Cold War James Bond shaken, not stirred seductive insincerity, would get him a glacial smile and a contemptuous dismissal.

So Yuri Mikhailovich Getmanov simply put his business card, English side up, on the table between them.

Cultural Attaché

Embassy of the Russian Federation

2650 Wisconsin Avenue NW

Washington DC 20007

Phone 202/298-5700

Fax 202/298-5735

She flipped it over. The same thing in Russian. She read it aloud in Russian. He smiled at her American training, awkward accent, and the rhythm that told him she knew the language, but had never really used it in life.

What the card didn't say in either language: Major General, Glavnoye Razvedyvatel'noye Upravleniye, the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, the GRU.

Getmanov could see her considering the missing information. Then he felt her eyes on his face again, eyes the most unfair shade of blue he had ever seen, her grim, sensuous mouth fighting to suppress laughter before she addressed him. "You may be the only man here who is willing to be seen with me in public. Tailhook seems to have inhibited them."

"But you are being courted. By companies looking for engineers. Are they offering you the sun, moon, and stars?"

She paused, astonished that he should know that, yet also not astonished. Astonished that he should be so direct. But also not astonished. Alarmed but also curious, she chose to accept the conversation that had begun, as though it were entirely proper and unexceptional. She would play along. For now. "They're offering nothing at the moment. The initial interviews were a pain. I guess they weren't ready for me. But I suspect they'll be back and the offers will come."

"Offering a lot?"

"A lot more than I'm making now. Probably."

"Including autonomy?"

"Heavens, no," she answered, thinking that this conversation, in some ways so utterly preposterous, also seemed so natural. This had a quality of dignity, of two serious people speaking to each other with genuine respect. How attractive to someone starving for seriousness. Startled by her words, yet no longer surprised, she responded, "This isn't about hiring me to be free to produce. It's about buying me out. It's about they're thinking they'll be able to use me someday to sell to the government for zillions what I would give the government for far less, right now. It's about having me to sit on."

"Sit on?"

Olivia smiled a bit. "Having me in private storage."

"Are you going to let them buy you out?"

"I'm considering it. Easier. More money. Better labs and staff. But as I said, the first contacts weren't exactly according to their script. We'll see."

"And you're considering selling yourself to the highest bidder? I know from your published record that you're well-regarded. Professionally."

She nodded at what he didn't add. Then she chose, no, found herself doing something she almost never did. Talk about herself. "At thirty-three, I have done this work since I first fell in love with sensor science in graduate school, and I have even seen some progress. Unfortunately, government contracts are not always awarded to those who want progress, or who want successes that might endanger other projects. Defense contracts these days are regarded as manna from heaven, and are nearly as rare. If you have one, not succeeding too fast can be worth a lot."

"And you could help them in that endeavor?"

"I could."

"So that's a way of telling me you can almost name your price with any of them."

"Almost. Maybe."

"But a better life than your current employment?"

"I have been with four projects at Los Alamos, one killed, one stillborn, one aborted, and one that refuses to die. I say, 'OK, now what?' They say, 'Don't worry. Now please go back to your office.'"

"And you say?"

"Nothing, usually. Tormenting the weak gives me no pleasure. I just sometimes wish they'd be more honest about it. I'm primarily an engineer, not a basic researcher or theoretician, although I do some of that, too. I just want to look at something real someday and be able to say, I did that, and it mattered. I can see myself becoming a very hard, bitter woman if this goes on too much longer. I don't really care to end up like that."

"Hardness and bitterness are not the same things, Doctor Tolchin. Bitterness, like cruelty, is never a virtue. Hardness, almost always."

The gaze she fixed upon him was so piercingly intense that he found himself blinking. By the standards of his craft, of any initial approach, he had been too forthcoming. He'd revealed something of himself. But so had she. She had told him nothing specific about what she did, only assumed that he had some idea, and then had shown him her morality. For that, he had offered the essence of the morality that had sustained him through thirty-five years' service to his country during the Cold War and its bewildering aftermath, to which he had so far adjusted.

"I didn't say that," he murmured, almost to himself.

"About the differences between hardness and bitterness and cruelty? I am afraid you did. But we will forget that you did."

"Why should we?"

"I could say that we're both getting a bit too open. But let me answer a question with a question. Does your wife know where you are and what you do for a living?"

Getmanov smiled warmly. "Yes, of course she knows what I do. As for where I am, before I came, she made me promise not to dally with such American women as I might by chance encounter."

"This is not a chance encounter."

"No, but the promise still applies. I love my wife very much. I am also afraid of her. However, I repeat myself, as she is a Russian woman, even if somewhat too taken with the American habit of, I believe you call it, shopping. But no matter. She deserves it. As a Russian woman, she is not always given the honor she deserves. Professional as well as personal."

"What does she do?"

"Did. She abandoned a promising career as an aeronautical engineer to follow me into the diplomatic world some years ago. She was also a pilot, a believer that one must experience for oneself that which one creates."

"And she still reads Aviation Week."

"Cover to cover. What makes you ask that?"

"The magazine is a legendary purveyor of sensitive, sometimes highly classified information. Does she send you memos about what she reads?"

Getmanov made his decision. "Not to me personally. I wouldn't understand them. However, her memos do find their way elsewhere." He leaned forward and noted she did not move back. "One of the great advantages of being married to an engineer is that they speak plainly and expect the same. I know your work. You'd be surprised how many people do. Your reputation, as they say, precedes you. You're known for coming in under budget, ahead of schedule, and exceeding the specs. For which you are not always liked. I know that you took Russian to fulfill a language requirement, way back in college, because it was a challenge, in a way French and German no longer were. I know you stayed with it through graduate school and beyond. I know you started reading our technical literature when you could barely master your own and now are very conversant in that aspect of my language. I know you were badly hurt in a small-plane accident. I know you were told you weren't going to walk again and a year after finishing rehab, you're not yet running again but you are hiking. I know you settled out of court for several hundred thousand dollars from the Santa Fe attorney who was your student pilot and who falsified his flight physical by neglecting to mention to you or your Federal Aviation Administration that he was epileptic. You've flown a few times since, just to prove you could, but no more. I also know that your lover of several years left you because of his unwillingness to tolerate the damage caused by the accident. He was a moral coward and you are well rid of him."

She offered him the bright, defensive smile you might offer a somewhat dim child who has said something unexpectedly and painfully astute. "So you read the profile on me in Defense Weekly. Good for you."

"Also the article from which it was plagiarized. The inspirational—pardon the cliché, they meant it as such, no doubt—piece in the Los Alamos National Lab's Connections. The bit about your boyfriend, we surmised from that nasty notation about your being 'newly available.' Tolstoy, I believe, once wrote that every happy family is alike, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Los Alamos seems uniquely unhappy these days."

The only thing that bothered her, she thought with some detachment, was that he knew that she had stopped flying. That hadn't been printed. But that no longer mattered. "Why do you say I've stopped flying?"

"Because you have. Would you also like me to tell you what your present clearances are?"

Olivia showed her teeth a little. It was time to return to reality. "I'm going to assume that if you know my clearances, you also know that I'm legally and morally obligated to report this conversation."

"I also know that, at your level, you're entitled to exercise a certain discretion in taking this conversation where it may go. The better to report it later, of course." He gestured contemptuously at the room. "I could probably find out at least as much about any man here."

"If you wanted to."

"If I needed to. But I don't want to and don't need to. Why bother? Look at the officers who clutter this ridiculous little party. Colonels looking for jobs, trading on their contacts. You know as well as I do, a colonel's contacts are good for about five years. If that. These men get hired, used up, and thrown away because contacts are all they have to offer. Your brain is good for the rest of your lifetime. Most of these colonels know little. You know a great deal."

"I know that, if I chose to be melodramatic, continuing this conversation may change my life." She paused, feeling what she had just said, start to sink in. Then: "What do you want...General?"

Getmanov nodded slightly. "How did you surmise?"

"You look like you should be wearing a uniform."

He nodded again. "Major General Getmanov. By present posting, which shall also be my last before retirement, cultural attaché and, if I may add, graduate of the old Soviet Institute of USA and Canadian Studies. What do I want? Something quite simple, really. The Cold War is over. We Russians are not going to fight you Americans. Perhaps we always knew that it would never come to that. I did. I sometimes think that we had an agreement. Only one side could go crazy at a time. You did in Vietnam. We did in Afghanistan. But our countries have never fought—not seriously—and it is to be hoped, we never do. However..." he paused, "however secure you may feel yourselves to be, now that we've deprived you of your most beloved enemy, we are not secure. We are far from secure. We are, indeed, in great and serious trouble. We need people to help us rebuild the military that we will never use against you or your friends. We are decades behind you in miniaturization and precision guidance, not to mention sensor capabilities. Items our military now desperately needs. That means, we need persons such as yourself. Desperately."

"And why?" Olivia asked in a low, deliberate voice, "should I wish to respond to your desperation?"

"Because we have enemies in common. You'll realize they're enemies only on the day they force you to it. We haven't any such luxury."

Getmanov took out a fountain pen, bulky yet elegant, wrote a number on his card, then pushed it towards her. "I say again. We're no longer enemies. We're not yet friends. I hope to God that someday we are. That's my cell number. I live in Chevy Chase, but I've taken a room here for the night. My wife knows I won't betray her. Call me if you want your work to matter."

Olivia said nothing. Getmanov nodded courteously to her, rose, and walked away.

# CHAPTER TWO, WASHINGTON, DC, DECEMBER 1993: A NIGHT WALK

Later that night, toward eleven, Getmanov lay on his hotel bed, talking on the room phone to his wife. The cell phone on the bed beside him rang. A woman's voice. "I am sleepless. Come walk and talk with me. Perhaps we can get a glass of wine somewhere."

"I will. Give me a moment to ring off with my wife. I am learning about her purchases of the day and that can be a time-consuming affair. Are you here at the Sheraton?"

"I am."

"Go out to Connecticut Avenue, turn right and walk down to the traffic signal at the first intersection. Turn left onto Calvert Street. In about a hundred meters, you'll come to a bridge. Cross it. Immediately on the left you'll see a restaurant, the Mount of Olives Café. Walk past it. You will then pass a short row of town homes, new construction, and reach a large access driveway to parking behind the houses. Step into the driveway. I'll meet you there in half an hour."

She followed his instructions, walking purposefully, noting the four cars with diplomatic license plates parked around the restaurant, including one on the sidewalk. The drivers, dark men with darting eyes and folded arms, lounged by their cars, smoked, and assessed her. She did not feel the need to walk more quickly. As she turned into the driveway, she saw a fenced-in playground, heard noises of basketballs and gangs, and slipped a hand into the pocket of her overcoat. She saw Getmanov peek about from the rear of the house, his onyx eyes glittering as he walked towards her.

"Games," he said happily. "Games for children and for American fans of bad spy cinema. But sometimes with adult consequences. I took a taxi to beat you here, just in case anyone might have been following you. Or me. Not to mention that little group outside the restaurant."

"Friends of yours?"

"Occasionally. More often, enemies. Or to borrow and adapt an Arab proverb, sometimes they're the friends of my country's enemies. Shall we keep walking? It's a pleasant neighborhood, this Adams-Morgan. Busy at night. Many excellent restaurants. Multi-ethnic, as they say. Diversity is celebrated here. Not so much during the day, when it's the retail struggle of all-against-all. But at night when the—how do you call them?—Yuppies arrive to disport themselves, sneer at each other, and hope to encounter the diverse. Especially those of the opposite sex. Perhaps. What you Americans call singles life, it has sometimes seemed to me that the purpose is to humiliate others, not seduce them, and that the risk of humiliation is part of the price of admission to the scene. Or perhaps I am thinking of the discos of the 1970s."

"You are a superb cultural attaché. You know us too well."

"Perhaps. But enough sociological insight. Let us consider us. First, visibility. If you're going to hide, it's best to do so out in the open. So let us hide."

They continued along Calvert Street toward Columbia Road.

"A good neighborhood for walking," Getmanov observed. "So long as you stay with the crowds and avoid places like that playground. Safe even for women. Provided, of course, they don't stay out too late."

Olivia offered him a cold sidelong glance. "It was said of the Mongol Empire in the time of Genghis Khan that a virgin could walk from one end to the other alone with a bag of gold, and arrive with both her gold and her virginity. America's empire is not that civilized. However, General, I am."

"How so?"

"In my pocket. A .45 automatic."

"Illegal to carry in your nation's capital. Or even possess."

"I know. I used to live in Virginia and came here often enough to make carrying a habit. If I'm ever arrested, I'll explain to them that the Second Amendment establishes, constitutionally, the unorganized or universal militia. The Founders considered every free white male between eighteen and forty-five, not in the active forces or a member of an organized militia unit, a member of that unorganized militia. The descendant of that law, minus the free and the white, is still on the books, incidentally, although few Americans know it. The District of Columbia cannot lawfully disarm me. It's an unconstitutional violation of the Founders' original intent, as codified in the Bill of Rights."

"But you're not male."

"Agreed. But the Fourteenth Amendment means that I and all other women are the legal peers of men, whether lesser laws say we are or not."

"What precisely does this Fourteenth Amendment of yours offer you?"

"Equality. In a way nothing else in our Constitution does."

"I will tell my wife about it. She's something of a, how do you say it, a free spirit. She also carries, from time to time."

"If she's arrested, tell her to get a good lawyer and don't count on diplomatic immunity. Your country might waive it."

They came to a garish intersection. Knots and waves of people, not all of them well dressed or sober, some ostentatious in their ugliness, buffeted them as they waited for the light to change.

"We might well waive it. We no longer invoke immunity the way we used to. In truth, she's been arrested before."

"In the United States?"

"And elsewhere. She also has a magnificent collection of unpaid parking tickets."

"Perhaps an unwise choice of wife for a senior officer of the FSB."

Getmanov looked at her calmly. "Perhaps. GRU, by the way. Military intelligence. Major general, as I believe I've mentioned. As for my wife," he said quietly, uncomfortably, "she is the wife of my youth and as our homeland has changed..." deep pain in his voice, "so has she. But she is still young and comely, and better than so many of my countrymen, who now seem to care for nothing but money, money, money, and all the cheap and vulgar things it buys."

"Does she still love you?" Olivia asked. No need to ask whether he still loved her.

"Oh, yes," Getmanov answered as the "Walk" sign came on and they moved forward with the rest. "I am worth it. But we were born into one world and now find ourselves living in another." Then, to change the subject: "You know, all through the Cold War, in countries where there was blood war, whether you Americans won or lost or just watched it on TV, you always took in refugees afterwards. Your cuisine has benefited immeasurably. Many fine restaurants in this area, you would not have had otherwise. Korean. Cuban. Vietnamese. Ethiopian..."

"Afghan," Olivia interrupted. "Also Russian. I'm sorry, but you were beginning to sound bitter and I think we agree about the vulgarity of bitterness. So which of these establishments shall we visit?"

"None," he replied, recovering. Then he went on equably, "For my refusal, there are three reasons."

"Go on."

"The first. If you are wearing a wire, listening and recording devices work less well outdoors, in crowds, in the noisy street, and as we're moving. The second. Neither of us should wish to be seen with the other sitting together, not in this block of many different restaurants patronized by persons of many different loyalties and professions. Too obvious. As I said, if you wish to hide something, keep it out in the open. Unless someone is following us, we're hardly noticeable. And if someone notices, he would have to follow us very closely to learn anything."

"And you do not think your cell phone is tapped?"

"I doubt it. We're just not that important anymore. And even if some recording device is listening in, nobody will ever review it. Your FBI, CIA, and NSA people are, one hopes, deploying their limited resources against the terrorists."

"I see. The third reason?"

He shook his head. "My expense allowance is not what it was. And I fear that soon enough I may have to pay a lot of parking tickets, if I wish to keep my wife out of jail. In this city, such infractions are a significant source of revenue and are priced accordingly, and my embassy no longer claims diplomatic immunity for its personnel in that regard. Something of a New Good Neighbor Policy." Then he smiled, bitterly and openly. "You know, Doctor Tolchin, for me, it was never about...what was to be obtained. It was never about, as you Americans put it, getting and spending. For me, it was never about shopping and hard currency and the other privileges..."

"I know that, Yuri Mikhailovich," she said quietly, wondering why she'd suddenly chosen to address him by his first name and patronymic, not wondering how he judged her indiscretion. His eyes, as they closed upon hers, told her of pained and taut acceptance. They walked in silence down Columbia Road. She wanted to take his arm, not erotically, but out of a strange sense of sudden kinship. He turned his head slightly to look at her, and it seemed that he wanted to offer her his arm. As a gentleman would.

"You are of great interest to us," he said finally.

"Why?"

"We know of your work. Especially your Army work when you were at Belvoir. It is elegant. It is never more complex than it has to be. We also know that the real challenge in military sensor technology today is not Star Wars buffoonery. It is in tactical sensors, which your country has been developing and using since Vietnam but seems in no great rush to perfect. We know that Army project you were on. It had such potential, except that it didn't cost nearly enough to make it worth anybody's while to protect it. You were eased out because, to say it frankly, you were enthralled with developing an acoustic/infrared ground sensor, an item so simple that even a Russian conscript could use it. Throw it around the corner or into a building or a room, listen and look on your little hand-held terminal for what might be there, waiting for you. The sensor could give you a yes or no, and that could make all the difference. Invaluable in urban combat. Street fighting. House-to-house. But your project superiors did not want such a device because it conflicted with the desires and priorities of their superiors. Nor did any commercial vendors see the potential. Not complex or expensive enough, even though, if you'd completed your work, they could have been manufactured by the tens of thousands and the contractors grown rich from low mark-up but high-volume production. Nor did the Army project manager, a colonel close to retirement, much care for your design philosophy. Nor did he care to have you constantly begging for field time with the troops to test this, that, and the other."

"To do this kind of work, one needs to understand the client's needs and see how it works under field conditions. See with one's own eyes."

"That's why you failed. The troops were not your clients. Two bureaucracies were. The governmental and the corporate. You failed and you paid for your failure with..." an ironic smile crossed his lips briefly, "a kind of internal exile. You were too serious and you paid for that, too."

Olivia showed her teeth once again. "Yes, I'm serious. I'm an engineer who loves sensor design, and the military was where the action was supposed to be. I've never been a soldier, never wanted to be one. But I'm an American. To me, this was about war. This was about body bags. American body bags that we wouldn't have to fill."

"Now you know why we never approached you during the Cold War."

They stopped. Getmanov took her elbow and guided her to a small space by a shuttered shop window. The flow of pedestrians guaranteed that no one could linger close to them without being noticed.

"Yes. I do," said Olivia, realizing with a sense of violation that she had been of interest to him, to them, longer than he had admitted. Then the sense faded into an eerie wonder, the frightened yet calm acceptance of what she was about to hear, of knowing what he was going to say and knowing he meant it.

"You are a patriot, Doctor, in a country that reduces patriotism to bumper stickers, mutilating your impossible national anthem at sporting events, and proclaiming to the world..." he raised a mocking finger, "'We're Number One.' You're a silent patriot who takes your citizenship seriously and your country at her word when your country proclaims her deepest values. Even five years ago, had I said what I'm going to say, you probably would have brought out your pistol. But that was then. This is about the fact that your nation and mine have enemies in common."

"Go on."

"Our present enemies are not to the West. Our enemies are no longer the West at all. Nor are our present enemies to the East, no matter how irritating our Chinese comrades can become. Our current enemies are within, and to the South. They do not threaten us with their armies. They threaten us with their religion and their ideology and their willingness to resort to terror to advance them. They cannot defeat us openly. But they can cause us to disintegrate."

"They are attempting to disintegrate you in Chechnya."

"So they are. The question is, can they defeat us enough to cause us to disintegrate?"

"Go on."

Getmanov looked toward the street. "You Americans," he mused, "still have no idea what your Civil War was really about. Not even your President Lincoln could say it openly. The purists among you, the abolitionists so-called, their slogan back then was, if I recall, Erring brethren, go in peace. But Lincoln couldn't let them go. To save the Union, he had to keep them in. Otherwise..."

"Otherwise," Olivia interrupted, "anyone who wanted to could leave."

"That is correct," Getmanov nodded, still looking away. "Of course, no one else was interested in leaving, so the argument leaves something out. Namely—the West. The South would never have been content, harvesting cotton and tobacco year after year and keeping down the slaves, while the North grew ever larger and more powerful, admitting all those Western territories to the Union as states. The South had to extend slavery and compete for all those lands. If the South had survived, it would have meant constant insurrection, terrorism, war. Bleeding Kansas would have become the Bleeding West. We have our own Bleeding Kansas, you know."

"Chechnya."

He turned to face her. "Indeed. If we let Chechnya, our Bleeding Kansas, go, our Caucasus and Central Asian lands become our Bleeding West. And those who would do this to us, and those who would help them, mean you evil as well."

Olivia nodded. Getmanov went on in the manner of a marksman, knowing his bullets were striking where and as intended. "Were America not so obsessed with sex and scandals, scandals and sex, SUVs and football, you would notice that some of those whom you trained and armed against us in Afghanistan are now using that training and those arms against you. Not on your homeland. Not yet. But that day will come. So I ask you, Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin..." He faced her directly. "What do you want to do with your life?"

"I'm missing the connection." Her voice was glacial and yearning.

"We—the Russian Federation—want to rip the hearts out of our mutual enemies, the Islamists or mujahidin or jihadi or whatever you care to call them, while minimizing our casualties and those of the innocent as well. That includes our own Muslims, many millions of whom do not share such insane desires. Not so long ago, our motherland was invaded by Germany. We received your aid and became allies for a time. Once before, we carried the burden of resistance until you had no choice but to join us. We bought you time to get ready. Bought it with our blood. So it is again today. And so I ask you again. What do you want to do with your life?"

"I want," she said, feeling no further need to evade, "what I said I wanted. To do one thing in my life that really, really matters."

"Then do it for us. With us. You would not be the first, you know. In the 1930s, an American helped us. He too was an engineer. His name was Walter Christie. You Americans no longer remember him. We do. He had brilliant ideas for the development of tanks. He'd been having them since the First World War. But his own government—your government—cast him aside, over and over again. So he gave his ideas to us and his ideas became the basis of our T-34 tank that ran the Nazis out of our country and gave us an empire in Central Europe."

"For a while."

"Yes, for a while. Frankly, my dear—a cinema cliché, you will forgive me—we're better off without it. The point is, your Mr. Christie, by saving us, helped save his own country and the world. Unintentionally, perhaps. But it still happened that way. We remember. Now we worry about other enemies. But the same principle applies. So I ask you again, Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin, would you consider becoming our new American engineer who brings us gifts that, someday, perhaps, all the civilized world will acknowledge and value? If you wish to do one great thing, I can give you that chance."

They stood a few moments in silence while the crowds, some in fashion, some in rags, swirled and staggered by. Olivia listened to their conversations, the things that mattered to them, looked at them, guessed at their lives and what they wanted of each other, that night and beyond. The revulsion grew unbearable, and she said to Getmanov, "I am a citizen of a country that does not wish me to serve her. These are people with whom I no longer have much in common. Nor do I wish to be around them."

"Or serve them?"

"Or serve them."

"What is your desire?"

Olivia heard her words as from a distance, but knew that they were hers. The most surprising she'd ever uttered. And, in her world as it was, the most logical.

"To do my one great thing to benefit us all. But not here. That would make me a criminal and a spy, to use American facilities in such a manner. I would also get caught and have no desire to spend the rest of my life in prison. I'll do it in Russia. In a properly equipped and funded laboratory, with no interference and a minimal staff, I can give you in a quarter, two at most, a working prototype of a cheap, disposable acoustic/infrared tactical ground sensor. There will be no need for years and years of phony tests and artificial benchmarks. There will be a need for me to test it under realistic conditions as soon as possible and make necessary modifications in the field. That means we skip the intermediate stages and go directly to use in combat. That means Chechnya."

Feeling himself grow faint, Getmanov abandoned all pretense of tradecraft to speak directly to her as a human being. "Do you understand what you are asking, Olivia Lathrop? Beyond leaving your country, probably forever. If your government finds out, they would welcome you home only in chains. Do you understand?"

"I am understanding. And I expect to find myself in Chechnya for operational testing and field development. Within the next year."

Getmanov's gaze now rested upon the passers-by, and he felt about them as Olivia had. He was standing so close to her that he could embrace her, were not physical propriety at that moment of total importance. He felt her eyes lock onto his. He could see the myriad small scars, now that she had washed her face clean of makeup. The mint and salt of her breath, the cedar and violet of her perfume, were also clean. The scent, and the scars that she had a right to wear with more pride than even the most magnificent jewelry, tore through him. He'd spent years, too many years, recruiting foreign nationals to spy on their own countries. Americans, most recently. He'd felt contaminated always, but especially by the current crop of Americans, who cared for nothing but money yet demanded obscenely little of it. Until now, all he'd wanted was information. Stay at your job. Give us what we want. Get caught whenever. We don't care. Never before, never even in his imagination, not even in planning this night, had he ever invited or wanted to invite any traitor to his country. But it was happening now. And he realized that it was happening precisely because she was not a traitor.

Then the thought assailed him. This is too easy. Perhaps he was the one now entrapped. If I ever discover that you're playing me false...

Yuri Mikhailovich Getmanov, declared cultural attaché of the Embassy of the Russian Federation, Major General of the GRU, calmly took her strong, scarred hands in his.

"On behalf of my government and people, I invite you and welcome you to a Russia that needs you." He paused. "So listen carefully, because no one will guide you through the next few weeks.

"Your first step, upon return to Los Alamos, will be for you to resign your position. Tell them you're tired and that, with your present state of health and with the money you've received from your recent lawsuit settlement, you wish to spend some time pondering your future. Given your clearances, your debriefing will take several days, perhaps more. Co-operate fully. Put your affairs in order, though not as someone preparing a permanent departure from her country. Any large bank withdrawals can be done from Vienna. You make, what, $90,000 a year as an exempt civil servant?"

"Eighty-five."

"We will pay you $100,000 a year—in dollars, not rubles, although once the ruble becomes a hard currency, you will be paid the equivalent in rubles. You will be provided with a reasonable flat. You will also be given, in time and as circumstances permit, a house of your own. Retirement pension will be pegged accordingly. The bulk of your savings here you will take out in the following manner. Go shopping, but only as you leave this country, perhaps at Tiffany or Cartier, and keep the receipts. These items you may sell at your discretion when you arrive. Russia is awash in money from organized crime, so you are going to make very happy the mistresses of some Russian Mafiosi while reducing their liquidity to some minor degree.

"Now, the Cold War is over, but because of your background you will still need permission to travel abroad. There will be an aerospace conference in the spring in Vienna. My wife plans to attend. Please arrange to attend as an independent researcher and acquire all necessary permissions and documents. I'll meet you there."

Olivia Tolchin nodded somberly, then withdrew her hands from his. "I'll look forward to meeting her."

"You two will enjoy each other's company. With your common interest in aviation and similar outlooks, I'm sure you'll become good friends."

"I'm sure we will." Then..."Is that all there is to it?"

"What more would you like? A ceremony here in this street?"

Olivia paused, then said, "Yes."

"What do you have in mind?"

Olivia straightened and reached into her pocket. Getmanov flinched, then steadied. "General Getmanov. I am going to Russia as an American, to work against our common enemies. It will not be possible for me to travel armed. Therefore," she drew out her pistol and offered it, "I am surrendering my lawful weapon to you. I ask that you return it to me in Russia."

No one on the street seemed to notice the weapon. Or perhaps no one was surprised to see one appear in such a place. Getmanov accepted the pistol, looked at it briefly, then put it into a pocket of his overcoat.

"Agreed. As you Americans say...done deal."

# CHAPTER THREE, LOS ALAMOS, EARLY SPRING 1994: AMERICA

Los Alamos birthed the atom bomb in three years during World War II. "Now I am become Death, Destroyer of Worlds," thought J. Robert Oppenheimer as he witnessed the first test explosion. From time to time, Olivia had wondered what he might have said about the current lab. She'd long ago concluded that, "So...what have you done lately?" would have been the most polite way he might have expressed his disdain.

She passed the weeks leading up to her exit debriefing from Los Alamos in a slight daze, experimenting with a mixture of pain killers and tranquilizers. A small dose of valium combined with a small dose of codeine, taken as needed, seemed to work best. She knew from experience that seeking to eliminate the pain rendered her ditzy, a word she'd kept from her high school days, even though her work rarely suffered and her colleagues never noticed. But since DC, she had become interested only in distancing herself from the pain when it crossed the threshold into suffering.

Her success in gaining some distance from her pain meant that she had also succeeded in gaining some distance from the world around her, and she was not slow to recognize the benefits when it came to being polygraphed. Having been "polyed" several times in her career, she knew what to expect, including the questions she'd be asked. She also knew her examiner, a brush-cut, bespectacled former Marine and retired FBI agent named Barry O'Dwyer. She was hardly fooled by his mild, professorial demeanor. A polygraph is not an interrogation, but it may lead to one, and while most polygraphists were not skilled interrogators, O'Dwyer had been and still was.

The room was barely furnished with a few nondescript items. Nothing on the walls, not even the official government photos of the whores and hacks and high-level non-entities du jour, from the president on down, who were presiding over the country's slow decay. No distractions. Nothing much to focus on. As she approached the straight-backed government-issue chair, which looked a little like an old-fashioned electric chair with padding, she nodded to him to begin. He nodded back, then went into the prescribed routine. After he hooked her up, he explained, as part of the procedure, how the polygraph could detect a lie. But they both knew that his explanation was meant to inspire fear in her, less the fear of being caught in a lie than the fear that the machine would start registering false positives and become her tormentor—a tormentor with a human attached.

She knew that the control questions he asked were meant to measure her fear level, trigger her sense of scrupulosity, and establish her patterns under stress: patterns that could be compared with previous tests, should the need arise.

Before she went into the interview, Olivia had taken a light mixture of valium and codeine, and had so informed O'Dwyer. The reason was physical. She had great difficulty remaining stationary for any length of time and prolonged sitting was almost intolerable. Of course, the drugs combined with the pain she would experience from sitting motionless for so long would skew her reactions to the whole procedure. Including her reaction to the critical question.

Since your last polygraph, have you been approached by a known agent of a foreign government or organization?

O'Dwyer considered Olivia to be somewhere between curiosity and challenge. He'd polygraphed her before her injury, and even then he had found her hard to read because she was both calm and intense. So he went back to all her tests, including ones that he hadn't done, and reviewed them. One of the polygraphists had deliberately provoked her in an attempt to get a clear read on her. He had succeeded with a few unauthorized questions on what she liked in men. But even clearly very angry, Doctor Tolchin's physiological responses were subdued. She didn't work herself into a sweating lather. Her breathing, heart rate and blood pressure stayed relatively normal. Nothing spiked.

This time, her responses to control and relevant questions, and even when giving answers O'Dwyer knew were factually true or false, were virtually identical. No doubt, a result of the drugs. Still, her readings, while definitely influenced by the drugs, were consistent with her fundamental character.

The control questions had gone smoothly. Is your name Olivia Lathrop Tolchin? Yes. Are you thirty-four years old? Yes. Do you hold a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology? Yes. Have you ever stolen anything?

Yes. That box of pretty plastic paper clips two years ago.

Lie to me, Doctor Tolchin. Have you ever stolen anything?

No. Silly request.

Same readings.

Then on to the questions to determine whether she had become a security risk, vulnerable to blackmail or other pressures, or a loyalty risk: someone who had or might intentionally betray her country for money or other reasons.

Since your last polygraph:

Have you had sex with a woman?

Of course not. Aldrich Ames did that.

O'Dwyer laughed in spite of himself. Just yes or no, please, he reminded her. They grinned at each other a bit, then proceeded.

Are you currently involved in a relationship with a man?

No.

Are you in debt beyond your ability to manage?

No.

Do you drink alcoholic beverages to excess?

No.

Have you taken any drugs not prescribed by a physician?

No.

Do you gamble?

No.

Is there anything in your life that might make you vulnerable to blackmail?

No.

Are you in unauthorized possession of any classified material?

No.

Have you transferred any classified information or material to any unauthorized person?

No.

Have you approached any unauthorized person for the purpose of doing so?

No.

Have you been approached by a known agent of any foreign government or organization?

No.

Is it your intention to travel abroad after leaving Los Alamos?

Yes.

Where?

A conference in Vienna. I have already received permission through the security office here.

Then it was done. Nothing. He signed off on her poly.

***

Olivia looked around the living room of the Santa Fe apartment she'd rented after the accident, thirty-five blessed miles from Los Alamos. It was the kind of place she'd never expected to live in: a stucco midrise allegedly attractive to singles, where each apartment had bland beige-and-white berber carpeting, a stylish but useless glassed-in gas fireplace, a stylish but useless balcony and a "clothing care center," essentially a washer-dryer combo in a closet with an ironing-board hanging on the wall. Her ironing board hung crookedly, and while she'd often thought about fixing it, she never had. It was a place to live in after the break-up, with no memories of "the former." She no longer thought of him by his name. In her few bitter moments, she even conceived that she had taken it from him. But she thought about him less and less now, though she still missed the house in which they'd spent so much time, so much of it happy.

She'd sold some of her furnishings and given away others. What was important to her, what she might someday have shipped to her in Russia, she had sent to her father in Pennsylvania. Her mother's china and silver, her books, extra copies of reprints of her journal articles, a few mementos, some necessary documents, an antique chest of drawers, a Navajo rug. All her government awards and commendations she'd thought of burning in the fireplace. But the glass doors were fixed, so she'd simply torn up the certificates and mingled them with the other trash. No feeling attached to the act, or any other act intended to free her from the material part of her past.

The night before, she had stowed in the trunk of her car, a champagne-colored 1989 Mercedes 560 SL, the small steamer trunk she would take with her to Russia. A carry-on held some spare bras and panties, toiletries, some favorite perfumes, jewelry, and medications. Her laptop held nothing classified. In her mother's black alligator handbag, she carried her current knitting project, a pair of socks for her father, her wallet, her birth certificate and passport, cell phone, lipstick. Nothing more.

Six AM. Santa Fe to Pittsburgh to see her father one last time. Then New York, Vienna, Moscow. Good to go, except for the pain and a hole in her spirit where regret should have been. That, and a question she'd asked herself but had not yet cared to answer.

Why the fuck, in my condition, am I driving halfway across the country when I could fly?

She looked around the apartment one last time. It was empty, except for the futon mattress she'd slept on and the polar fleece blanket she'd slept beneath. She wrapped her bellyband around her waist, then tucked in two spare magazines and her pistol. Not the elegant .45 her father had given her as a parting gift a decade before, when against his advice she'd gone to work for the Department of Defense. That pistol she'd surrendered to Getmanov. This was a plain and sturdy nine millimeter Beretta Cougar, purchased as backup some years ago at some forgotten shop. It held neither meaning nor value, save as a backup. It was that now.

Olivia hauled the futon and blanket outside into the cold morning and left them on the curb with a "Free" sign. She went back into her apartment, donned her black leather car coat, turned down the heat, locked the door behind her, and dropped the keys off in a box outside the manager's office. She got into her car, the lovely extravagance she'd allowed herself after selling her house. She'd purchased the car for a fraction of its value from a rich divorcée who wanted nothing to remind her of her ex. Olivia understood that divorcée.

Why am I doing this?

She drove off.

At 7:00 AM sharp, still not quite functional, she stopped at a highway-exit McDonald's for the facilities and breakfast. Then a sudden awfulness overwhelmed her. She looked at the sloppy, fat patrons. She'd never before really noticed the morbid obesity of so many Americans, but now she did. Recoiling from the ugliness, she ordered a large coffee and some sort of breakfast meal, including two hash browns, which she loved but which did not always love her back. In fact, she'd always considered herself addicted to those hash browns, at least whenever she had the chance. Hash browns to die for, she'd thought when she first accepted her craving, long ago. Or at least to get sick over. Hell, my stomach acts up, it'll be a good excuse for taking more McDonald's rest stops that I normally would. Then she ratified her rationalization, sat down on a plastic seat designed to become uncomfortable after fifteen minutes, and took a large bite of something. She thought of the weapon warm against her body. She had a concealed carry permit for New Mexico and wondered whether anyone in the restaurant would ever suspect that she was carrying. No, she decided. Their interests, their lives, did not seem to extend beyond their own expanding fat, expanding like mud slides of flesh.

She gathered up her breakfast, bought an additional order of hash browns, and left. She picked up US 285 South, bound for Clines Corners, hills of the barren yet vibrant desert she loved rising on either side of the road. It never ceased to fascinate her that a place so seemingly empty could sustain so much life—and how carefully and closely humans had to look to see it.

She had planned her route so that her longest driving day, by about an hour, from Santa Fe, New Mexico to Wichita, Kansas, was the first, when she was freshest.

Six aching hours later, she had driven 376 miles. Another 220 miles, another four hours' driving, and she would be in Wichita. She wondered if she would be able to tolerate the pain, but decided she did not have a choice. She stopped for gas, a snack of overripe fruit and a bottle of warm water. Mastering herself yet fading a little, she folded her body back into her car and stopped at the next McDonald's. She started to get out, then wondered why and headed for the drive-through. She needed to stretch. But the thought of mingling with the other customers nauseated her. It took three attempts—the last one shouted—at the speakerphone for the girl to get her simple order right, and Olivia realized:

These awful, fat, ugly, stupid people. They're what Americans are wanted to be. Them. Not me. It's not just about my job anymore. It's...everything.

And then, in one hideous moment, she accepted why she'd chosen this agony. It was to beg.

Give me a reason to stay, America. Any reason at all. I'm open. I'm looking. Give me a reason to stay.

The Mercedes drifted slowly past the girl who had taken her order, no more than eighteen, the life and intelligence in her eyes already faded. She paid another girl who had the same murdered eyes, then collected her meal from the final window and drove off. Just a Big Mac this time, no fries—the concept of deferred gratification occasionally motivated her; driving doesn't burn a lot of calories—and a tall cup of iced water. Dessert turned out to be a pithy orange from a gas station/food mart she passed. A mid-afternoon snack was French fries—gratification must not be deferred forever—from the McDonald's in Kingman, Kansas, along with an overripe banana, and more water. She couldn't recall eating so much McDonald's in a day, much less with so little exercise. Her stomach had the inevitable, sullen heaviness of, Why have I done this to myself?

It required a conscious act of will to get out of her car and slowly straighten up in the driveway of the Wichita Garden Inn Hilton. Her trunk, she left in her car. Her laptop, purse and carry-on went upstairs with her. A hot soak helped her regain her flexibility, as did the walk around Bradley Fair Lake and through the plaza to the restaurant the Hilton had recommended. She wasn't really hungry, but there was nothing else she cared to do and maybe a decent restaurant would serve decent something-or-other.

Sitting outside, warm in her leather jacket in the fine spring evening, she could not help but overhear the other patrons talk about their stock options and initial public offerings. She consulted the menu, ordered an appetizer of tuna and beef Carpaccio, every bit as much for the salty capers, mellow black olives and peppery, bitter arugula as for the raw, rich meat and fish. She added a salad of spring greens, goat cheese, crisp bacon, and candied walnuts. After the day's diet of manufactured mash, she craved taste. With a half bottle of a pleasant pinot noir and dessert, she could not but help notice that her entire bill would probably come to a fraction of the cost of a single bottle of wine ordered by the men at the next table. Lawyers? No. Listening to their conversation, it seemed they had launched some sort of high-tech start-up and their IPO had netted them $98 a share. What it was they had started seemed unclear, even to them.

Olivia never knew what prompted her to lean towards their table and open her mouth, but lean over and open wide she did. "Excuse me, but I can't help overhearing your conversation. What did you say you made?"

The two trim men, with their white teeth and impeccable grooming, in their business casual attire of expensive polo shirts and expensive pressed chinos, stared at Olivia for a few seconds. Then one of them smiled indulgently at her. "We don't make anything. We work with Chinese manufacturers and American retailers to connect them. Textiles, mainly. Keep down inventory, be responsive to orders, outsource whenever possible for materials, labor, skip the environmental crap. The Chinese work for much less than Americans do, so that means our retailers can make more profit."

"How do you expect Americans to be able to buy what you're selling?"

There was a long pause. Then one man smiled, as though he were talking to an imbecile. "Not our problem. But since you asked—on credit."

"Thank you for answering my questions."

The men, finding her far less interesting than each other, turned back to their wine, now talking a bit more loudly. And the thought came to Olivia again. They are wanted here. Not me.

Olivia slept until she woke without an alarm to jar her back to consciousness: her habit from all the years when getting up meant another full day of life, a habit that not even her time at Los Alamos had changed. She spent half an hour in the shower, systematically stretching, before she went down to a large breakfast of an omelet filled with meat, cheese and vegetables, hash browns—unfortunately, not nearly as good as McDonald's—and plenty of fruit. Since lunch on the road was likely to be more fast food and whatever fruit she could scrounge, she asked the waiter to pack her a box of fruit and crackers to take with her, and then she checked out. She was on the road by eight, running north and east on Interstate 35, through Emporia, Ottawa, Gardner, through Overland Park to Kansas City, which she had learned from her eavesdropping the night before was becoming quite a Mecca of high-tech companies. As she passed through Liberty, just northeast of Kansas City, she found herself wondering how many of those high-tech companies made nothing, served only to import foreign goods and siphon off American money, and how many American paper millionaires they would make. As she filled up at a gas station in Cameron before turning east on US 36, she noticed that her own car was doing a pretty good job of siphoning cash.

I'm leaving. Probably forever. I'm going to Russia so I can use my brain. Russia. I'm leaving because my brain is not wanted here. I'm not wanted here. Wealthy corporations who turn the poor into obese eating machines are wanted here. High-tech millionaires who make nothing and sell us out to the Chinese are wanted here. Not me.

She laughed aloud in a wondering awe at the sheer absurdity of it all. Back on the road, she passed a Ford F-250 with "Sandy the Farrier" painted on its side and a stenciled-on drawing of a horse being shod by a semi-unbuttoned, decidedly buxom female. She waved at the driver, a rugged-looking, very pretty black woman her age, decidedly non-buxom, who waved back. Sandy the Farrier, thought Olivia, looked happy.

It was just after noon and the Missouri farmland was extremely open, the blue sky above her huge and high and hard. If the nights were crisp and the mornings cool, the afternoons were starting to get warm, foretelling a hot summer. Olivia hoped that when it came time to harvest the corn and soybeans and send the hogs and cattle to slaughter, the farmers would get a good price for their efforts. Farmers? No. Agribusiness. Large-scale corporate agriculture that was destroying the food, the people who ate it, maybe eventually the planet.

By the time she drove through Hannibal, she was in real pain, so she pulled off US 36 and onto what turned out to be 3rd Street. Driving slowly, she found Becky Thatcher's Restaurant. Even though it was almost closing time at 3:00 PM—they would reopen for dinner—the waitress seated Olivia at a table beside the window and brought her coffee and a slice of pie, fragrant with peaches and cinnamon with some good vanilla ice cream, both made in the restaurant. Olivia ate standing up to stretch her legs and back, cleaning her plate carefully of every last crumb of pie and dollop of ice cream, draining her cup of coffee and part of a second as she stared out the window, down at the Mississippi.

My God, I'm sitting here in Mark Twain's home town. What would he make of all this?

What would he think of me?

Unable to answer the first question, unwilling to consider the second, Olivia paid her bill and left a handsome tip for the waitress. The chance to stretch out her legs had done her good. Nevertheless, it was with grief that she crossed the wide, slow-moving river. Across the river, she was into Illinois, the Land of Lincoln.

In Springfield, she drove slowly up 6th Street to the red-brick President Abraham Lincoln Hotel. She parked and checked in; a long, hot soak and a lot of stretching greatly revived her. Afterwards, dry and dressed in fresh jeans and polo shirt, she went downstairs to the restaurant for dinner. She'd lunched on crackers and fruit, no longer willing to subject herself to the fast food clientele. Her late afternoon snack of pie and ice cream notwithstanding, she wanted a substantial dinner. A glass of red wine, a marbled steak cooked so that the fat was molten, salad and a baked potato with butter and blue cheese, so pungent it made the roof of her mouth itch—from Nauvoo, just north on the Mississippi, she learned—and turned the red wine shockingly, wonderfully sweet in her mouth. No, thank you, she did not want dessert, but she would like coffee. Regular, please, with just cream and sugar, nothing else, thank you.

A wise decision, when she saw the size of the desserts brought forth to other diners. They were absolutely huge, far beyond an amount that could actually be enjoyed. And then the unbidden thought.

Of course. Food calms us. Whatever else is wrong, we will not starve. Or so we tell ourselves.

By the time she finished, the day was slowly turning to cool dusk, so she went up to her room for her car coat. It required no thought at all to wrap the bellyband around her waist, slip her pistol into it, and cover everything with her polo shirt, concealed so long as she kept her coat closed. Then she began the long walk up Sixth Street to Oak Ridge Cemetery, the grass green, the sky a tender blue. She'd come, for no other reason than an inarticulate, almost involuntary urge, to pay her final respects to Abraham Lincoln.

The cemetery was not quiet, but alive with teenagers playing their boom boxes. It was the standard corporate garbage, gorged on by boys wearing the baggy jeans that had been cribbed from prison culture, their underwear showing, their caps on backwards. The girls seemed heavy enough to be pregnant, although the softness of their bodies proclaimed bulk fat, not new life, in their tight jeans and tighter sweaters that exposed bellies that simply shouldn't have been visible, or there at all.

Olivia walked up the drive, then found herself wandering through the graves of the famous and the anonymous alike. Senators and governors and consuls, with their marble and granite monuments, sometimes with ornate bronze accoutrements. Bishop and Mrs. Rayburn's grave, their obelisk crowned with her figure. Monuments to the dead of World War Two, Korea, in particular the brutal fight for Chosin Reservoir, and Vietnam. Everywhere, graves from the Civil War, indicating its terrible toll, the names on many of them worn by time, the shallow carving indicating the modest means of their survivors.

Finally, she let herself approach Lincoln's tomb. The burial chamber was closed to the public for the night. That was all right. At the entrance, despite a nose rubbed shiny by all who had touched it for luck, the massive bust of Lincoln's face that greeted her showed a man worn by sorrow. His face reflected the stark losses of the war, memorialized by the cavalry, artillery, infantry, and naval sculpture groups cast from old bronze cannon. She climbed the stairs on the exterior of the tomb, carved from Massachusetts granite, lit up against the encroaching night. In front of the tall obelisk, beneath the standing statue of a solitary Lincoln, she found a small, irregular stone. The inscription was in Latin; below it, a carved translation that read, To Abraham Lincoln, President for the second time of the American Republic, citizens of Rome present this stone from the wall of Servius Tullius by which the memory of each of those brave advocates of liberty may be associated. She knew from her long-ago child's illustrated history of Rome, a present from her father who'd tried, not always successfully, to impart to her his love of the classics, that Servius Tullius had been born a slave. He had been manumitted and became a king who gave Roman plebeians the rights of citizens, and treated Rome's conquered enemies with mercy. He paid with his life for his policies. She marveled a bit at her own mind, that it could still carry such memories and include such items.

She was so lost in her own thoughts that she didn't notice the cop walking up behind her. "Ma'am?"

The very blue eyes she turned on him were not what he expected from a woman, alone at night—calm and precise. "May I help you, officer?" Her voice was level, utterly self-possessed.

"Ma'am, the park closes at dark." She thought to reply, then thought again. Carrying a loaded weapon with a concealed carry permit in a state like New Mexico was one thing. Carrying it concealed without a permit was another matter almost anywhere, and Illinois was notoriously stringent. "It's almost dark and it's for your own protection. Bad people come out at night."

And so you think citizens should yield the night to them. Awkwardly, she turned bodily to face him, giving the officer two overwhelming impressions: one of damage, the other of strength. "And you worry about women out alone at night."

"I do. Especially if you can tell they've been hurt. Makes them more vulnerable. Don't you think?"

Bemused, she thought about where she was likely to end up and what could happen to her where she was going. But why take unnecessary risks? She wasn't worried about who else would want to visit the floodlit tomb—no matter what kind of prey they were seeking, the cemetery was still too public, too visible. But she didn't need a police body search that would find her pistol. "All right, son. And I promise to walk straight back to my hotel."

The policeman winced at the familiarity from a woman clearly not old enough to be his mother. "You won't let me drive you, would you, ma'am? Or call you a taxi?"

So earnest. "No, thank you, officer." Her tone was gentle. "I really can take care of myself."

After she returned to the hotel she stayed up a while, working on her father's socks. Knitting had been a way out of the maze of drugs and pain in the immediate aftermath of the crash. Knitting was all about math, and it had to be done right, one stitch at a time, stitch after stitch, for thousands of stitches. She knitted. But her mind was elsewhere.

My poor country. She's not going to ask me to stay.

***

The next day took Olivia from Springfield, east past Decatur and Champaign and Danville almost on the state line, then slightly south, past Crawfordsville and south through Indianapolis, where she stopped for gas and a snack of double hash browns at McDonald's—she hadn't realized how many McDonald's there were in the world. Or was there really only one McDonald's, the same McDonald's and it was leaping invisibly from behind her to ahead of her? Wouldn't that have made a great old Twilight Zone episode?

Would McDonald's follow her all the way to Russia?

East of Indianapolis, the terrain became more rolling and varied and land use became less agricultural. But if she thought the factory farms behind her had been grim, the shuttered factories and mills she saw broke her heart. So did the upscale housing developments, eating away at the farmland.

No reason to stop. She stopped for lunch anyway, and was back on the road by two, when she realized that she was accessing old, long-forgotten memories because she was going home. Home to her father. She'd spent most of the trip tranquillizing herself with food and despising what she saw. Now she no longer wanted anything, except maybe something her father might cook her, one time more before she...

The Mercedes suddenly seemed to go on auto-pilot. Inertial guidance. Internal. You know where you are by keeping track of where you've been. You know how far you still have to go by knowing where you are. Olivia offered a momentary thanks that her car knew more about where she was going than she did. A Mercedes can be a good companion.

She and her car drove through Columbus and crossed Wheeling Island in the middle of the Ohio River. Then through Wheeling, where Joe McCarthy had launched the phony anti-Communist crap that would eventually ruin him, and too many others who didn't need or deserve ruination. The problem with McCarthy, she thought with real irony, was not that he was an anti-Communist, but that he had given responsible anti-Communists a very bad name. Then she remembered where she'd heard that line before. From her father, a Hungarian immigrant who'd survived the Nazis and the Soviets and who very rarely expressed any negative sentiment about America. She shuddered at the realization that she had not yet considered what she was going to tell him, then put the thought aside. No planning for this one. No games. Maybe the Mercedes could come up with something. It was smart.

I'm getting punchy. Long drive, too long. Too much...wrong.

She crossed the rugged neck of West Virginia in about twenty minutes, struck by the evident poverty of people in a state sitting on immense mineral wealth, not so very different from Western Pennsylvania. And then she was, at last, after three long, painful days of driving, heading home through the forested hills running north on 79, past Canonsburg and Bethel Park and Carnegie. She approached twice-blighted Pittsburgh, first by the steel industry that it had cradled and that had polluted so murderously, but also, thanks to a strong and sometimes violent union movement, provided real work at a family wage. Then by the willful self-destruction of that steel industry. Supposedly, something had taken its place. Now high-tech parks stood where mills had been; the downtown skyline gleamed. Or so her father, a retired engineer and professor of engineering who still consulted, had told her without much enthusiasm.

Then she was home.

Olivia pulled into the driveway and walked slowly up the poured concrete steps to the house her parents had built over and alongside a creek, in a nod to Fallingwater, the local Frank Lloyd Wright icon. The design had been her mother's, and some of the manual labor had been as well. Clean-lined and peaceful, rather than austere and harsh, the building had aged gracefully into a modernist gem. Like her father.

No, not like her father. Oscar, a tall man who had once been immensely strong, now worn by age and grief, met her on the wide concrete pad of the front entrance. He stood looking at his daughter for a few seconds as she left the car, one of the alligator bags her mother had indulged such a weakness for, carried in the crook of her arm. "You look very much like your mother when she was your age," he said, speaking softly across the few feet left between them.

Olivia remembered her mother as she had not for many years, looking at her father as his wife would never see him. Lavinia Lathrop had been the daughter of a prominent mainline Philadelphia family. There had never been a Philadelphia without a Lathrop. She had not married until she was nearly forty and established as an architect, at a time when few women did such things. And they certainly didn't convert to Judaism to marry immigrant—Hungarian—junior engineers who were barely citizens. Lavinia and Oscar had their only child when Lavinia was forty-five, years after they had ceased to believe such a thing could happen. Thirteen years later, she was gone in six weeks, when what Lavinia had been told were migraines, supposedly brought on by the stress of finishing a major university commission, turned out to be a brain tumor, by then inoperable. She took a week to order her affairs, then spent the rest with her husband and daughter, until the full hideousness of the tumor began to make itself apparent. Then she chose the time and manner of her departure, in her own home, with her husband administering the lethal dosage and her daughter holding her hand. "My family," were her last smiling words.

Oscar had never remarried. Olivia recalled him once saying that dusk had been her mother's favorite time of the day and he often expected her to come ambling out of the woods as the sun went down.

Shaking off the sense of strangeness, not quite giving in to the fear, Dr. Oscar Tolchin came forward to embrace his daughter. In the driveway, beside her luxurious Mercedes, they held each other for a long time, then went in.

# CHAPTER FOUR, MOSCOW, HOLY WEEK 1994: SUSLOV and REBECCA

Going into the fall of 1993, Colonel Dmitri Borisovich Suslov had feared famine. Unlike most famines in Russia—the old Soviet Union, that he had served and loved and sometimes trusted, was no more— this one would not have been political. It would not be state policy, designed to eliminate entire nationalities or classes. Nor would it be the result of war. It would be, instead, the result of an utterly broken economy and infrastructure. Soviet-style Communism may not have worked very well. But it had worked better than anarchy, especially the never-ending anarchy of trying to impose democracy on a people in no way ready for it or even especially desirous of it. Anarchy was anarchy, even if the Americans thought it was leading to something better. It wasn't.

Suslov was grateful for American humanitarian aid, even if much of it would end up on the black market. Food was food and people would eat it. What he did not care for was the preening, the sense so many Americans seemed to have, that the world was theirs, not so much to dictate to as to play with. At times, he thought, they actually seemed to prefer Russia on the verge of anarchy: hungry, impoverished, beset by organized crime, with wealth going to the most ruthless, not the most productive. At times, they seemed almost pleased that Russia was now an object of their pity, alternately to be succored and scorned.

Suslov spoke more than passable English, acquired during his Spetsnaz training, rarely used but somehow still in his head. He'd known few Americans. Now, however, he suddenly found himself immersed in them and was feeling strangled. Or maybe it was he who wished to do some strangling. The puffed up arrogance so characteristic of Americans who made their careers "helping the less fortunate" now choked him with rage. He was in Moscow, in the old Sovietsky Hotel, not far from Red Square, at the final day of a three-day conference on distribution of humanitarian aid. He was starting to dislike the American species personally, an unusual reaction for a man whose hatreds never applied to groups, only to individuals. So he sat in the seminar room and tried to focus on finding reasons to dislike each American there as a person. The process calmed him a bit. As individuals, he decided after some attempts to the contrary, Americans weren't so bad. Maybe not so good. But at least, not so bad.

Methodically, but now more amiably, he continued his mental inventory of each American's shortcomings. Then he got to the woman sitting beside him. Rebecca Taylor—Miss, or at least she wore no wedding ring—was attractive and attractively dressed, and her perfume was pleasant. He did not find her interesting, which was a relief because he found interesting women extremely desirable, and he did not need such a distraction. Still, he might have enjoyed her company, had she not regarded him with obvious distaste and fear as a Russian soldier, which probably meant to her a man with plenty of blood, especially innocent blood, on his hands. Nevertheless, she'd persisted in sitting beside him, this morning and now unfortunately this afternoon as well. No real conversation, only nods and perfunctory greetings.

But he understood the game she was playing so unwillingly. Make contact. Take it wherever it leads.

Rebecca Taylor, Suslov decided as he completed his assessment, was not unlikeable, merely unimportant in her position, her present task, and her view of things. Neither her disapproval nor her intentions mattered, and he expected her to vanish from his consciousness, his subconscious, his unconscious and everything else by evening. But the man on the podium, Robert Matthews, Ph.D., her boss, was in a different category altogether. He was encouraging Suslov's genuine hate, and now, after an hour of snide, patronizing comments, he finally crossed a personal line. Something about how he hoped that more of the American food went to the black market than to the Soviet, oops, excuse me, Russian Army.

Enough.

Suslov rose slowly, a disciplined, purposeful rage evident. He did not wait to be recognized or even acknowledged, but spoke in a quiet voice, stern with both command and morality, that forced the room to attention. "What have our soldiers done to deserve not being fed?"

At that moment, Rebecca Taylor changed.

Rebecca Taylor was an Indiana farm girl who, the day she realized that honest farming had given way to corrupt agribusiness, decided to get off the farm. She'd gone to the University of Washington because Seattle and Boston seemed about equidistant from the family agribusiness and Seattle had, in her opinion, the better climate. As a freshman she'd taken the standard Western Civ history course, Plato to NATO, and had been instantly transfixed by the professor's offhand remark that the Soviets had deliberately set out to destroy their own agriculture by placing a higher value on collectivization than on productivity. So as a matter of policy, they starved millions of kulaks, their most productive peasants. In a flash of utterly unexpected rage, she'd stood to say, "Yes, but there are many ways to wreck your agriculture. Look at us." The professor had dismissed her with some snide remark about the United States being the most overfed nation on earth, thank you, capitalism. Leaving the lecture hall, she'd determined to learn more about why nations starve and why some choose starvation.

For her major, she'd picked Russian studies. She studied with some of the best Sovietologists in the world. Unfortunately, the best Sovietologists in the world were not only aging as the Cold War settled into its seemingly eternal mature phase, they seemed clearly delighted that they wouldn't have to learn too much new and needn't expect surprises. Nor did they appreciate her questioning of their assertions that life in the Soviet Union just kept getting better. People were eating, they said, and to the average Russian, that was what mattered.

Degrees in Russian studies don't equip you for much. But neither do they make you want to head back to the family agribusiness. Adrift, Rebecca decided to sample Boston's inferior climate. She picked up a fast master's in international relations at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and then, still adrift, entered the State Department's Foreign Service. She had superb Russian, fine recommendations, and few intellectual pretensions beyond a visceral anti-Communism. She was also—a definite plus for State Department types—both pretty and profoundly anti-military. Anti-Soviet military, especially. What Russia had done to the world, she found no different from what Stalin had done to the peasants. Destruction, insane destruction, and destruction only. That Russia was now reduced to accepting American surplus food did not displease her.

But now, at thirty-two, on her second posting to Moscow and still adrift, she found her head snapping up to look in admiration at the Red—Soviet—Russian—Army officer beside whom she had deliberately seated herself. "We know he's an Airborne officer and that's about all," her boss had told her. "Except that he's wearing lots of medals from Afghanistan and on the fast track to general. See what you can learn. If you get a chance to fuck him..." he'd said, only half in jest, "take it."

That wasn't going to happen. She found the quiet, weatherworn, very civil man beside her not at all attractive for the simple reason that he thoroughly intimidated her. His slanting Tartar eyes, startlingly green, high Tartar cheekbones, and the long scar that seamed the left side of his face were quite enough. But they were combined with a physical elegance that derived from his obvious and extreme capability. Slowly, she realized that she did not find him attractive because she was forcing herself not to.

"Colonel Suslov," she heard her boss saying, "I didn't say your soldiers didn't deserve to be fed. I said that I don't think American food should be used for that purpose..." he leered from the podium "when there are so many more deserving civilians to feed."

Suslov's face paled. His ivory skin looked almost translucent next to his hair, a deep red-brown. The old scar on his cheek was suddenly livid. He did not wait for the translator, but spoke in the heavy English of one who knows the language reasonably well but has had little chance to use it. "I repeat the essence of your statement. Better for the food to end up on the black market than to feed _Soviet_ soldiers."

Matthews, startled to be called in his own language and very few words, a liar, snapped back, "There are indeed better uses."

"But that is not the question I asked. I asked, what have Russian soldiers—not Soviet soldiers, the Union is gone, Russian soldiers—conscripts of eighteen and nineteen, done to deserve not being fed?"

There was a long silence in the room. Robert Matthews, Ph.D., glared from the safety of his podium at Colonel Suslov. A man in his fifties, aging poorly, he was balding, which he dealt with by adopting an unconvincing comb-over. He was short and paunchy and slouching and had vapid brown eyes, out of which he looked at most of the world with nearly perpetual alarm. They practically bugged out of his head now. He was a political economist by training, an ideologue of no clear ideology, but a well-developed sense of the authority bestowed upon him by the bureaucracy. Matthews glared down with an expression of, Don't you understand who I work for? "Men with guns always eat first, Colonel. We don't expect it to be any different here in Russia. How you get the food is your affair."

It was a calculated insult, flung at a man who looked like, even if he ate first, his self-respect would prevent him from eating more than his fair share, however little that might be. Why is he doing this? Rebecca wondered. Why is he humiliating and alienating every Russian in the room? She did not allow herself to pursue an obvious thought, that Matthews might be jealous of Suslov as a man. But she muttered it softly to herself.

Taylor didn't realize she'd said something until Suslov, still standing, looked down at her, his green eyes hard and cold and very level. At least he didn't reek of cigarette smoke, she thought miserably.

"Did you say something?" he asked, politely but loud enough for the room to hear.

"No. No. Nothing at all," she answered shakily. On the podium, Matthews smiled smugly at the interruption of the confrontation.

"Perhaps, for the best," Suslov answered calmly. He turned back to Matthews, staring hard at him until the man's smile vanished, then sat down.

***

Later that evening in the hotel restaurant, she found a table to eat by herself. She wasn't feeling very friendly towards anyone, particularly men. About herself, she felt like a fraud, especially when Matthews thanked her for, as he put it, "running interference for him" against that overbearing jerk with the medals. "Keep up the good work," he'd said with a noxious wink.

And so she felt trapped when Suslov, whom she'd conscientiously been not noticing, left his table and walked to hers. Most of the men were showing the effects of serious drinking during dinner. He appeared quite sober.

"I know you are being exclusive, but I would like to talk with you, if I may."

"I can't stop you."

He angled the chair before sitting down, in order to be able to look her in the eye while still monitoring the rest of the room. "You need not stop me. If you like, you may tell me to leave and I will."

She decided to confront the issue squarely. "No, don't. You probably can guess that I am expected to chat you up and, pardon the idiocy of what I'm about to say, seduce you. The latter is Doctor Matthews' idea, suggested to me in his usual moronic way of 'I'm maybe joking but I maybe mean it, or do I?' So please stay. This way, I can tell my boss it didn't work, not that I've avoided you."

Suslov's smile was not unkind. "You have not considered that I may be under orders to seduce you and then we do our best to compromise each other. I do not flatter myself on my attractiveness to you. I also do not underestimate how much some people enjoy being cruel to others. Your Doctor Matthews is not a good human being."

"And you are?" She heard what came out of her mouth with astonishment. Between her growing disgust with too many things and her growing inability to hide that disgust, her future as a Foreign Service officer was looking dimmer all the time. Then it hit her. She no longer cared.

He sipped at his tea. "Contrary to what you may have heard, under Communism, we Spetsnaz officers"—he allowed her a second to blanch at the word, then went on—"were not ordered to kill close family members in order to earn our commissions. We are merely advised to, in order to impress the State with our dedication and our instructors with our motivation." A pause. "In comparison, your Marine Corps officers are required to kill their mothers to earn their commissions, or any random female over sixty, if their mothers are unavailable. Or so we were told. We were also told that your Special Forces men have to kill and eat their immediate families. This I choose not to believe. If I did, it might bring me to question the contents of your very kind food packages."

She realized that what she heard in his quiet voice was mischief and she felt herself flooded with both relief and embarrassment. "Thank you for changing the subject. At the moment, I am feeling about as seductive as a wet sheep in a muddy field."

"I understand. I hope you understand that I do not do such things. To women or to sheep." She found herself looking at him, for the first time seeing beyond his uniform and decorations, beyond the scar and the elegance, to his humanity. His eyes were not kind, she realized, but there was a world of kindness in them, and it did not conflict with the rest of him. "It is no part of my profession," he went on, "to help your superiors reduce you to the status of a whore. People meet at conferences to say things privately that cannot be said publicly. These things are not always attractive. Still, the games of nations can be played with at least a little dignity and integrity. So let us find a quiet corner for tea and dessert and conversation."

Suslov beckoned to a waiter and asked him to bring their tea and cakes into the atrium. They left and found two empty chairs with a lamp table between them. When they were settled in with their desserts, Suslov handed Taylor a business card. "Do not believe everything on that card. I am not a staff officer from the Northern Caucasian District. Nevertheless, the contact information is correct."

Taylor put down his card. "Are you authorized to tell me this?"

"Yes, although I find it difficult. I command 22 Brigade. A Spetsnaz unit. In some ways the equivalent of your American Special Forces. In some ways, not." Taylor's eyes widened. Suslov went quietly on. "We rarely announce ourselves. We usually wear the uniforms of the units we support."

"So that much of Suvorov is correct," she said.

Suslov raised an eyebrow. "You've read him?"

"Yes. Prior to my first Russian posting. Required reading. We were expected to know what monsters Spetsnaz were."

"I hope that as a defector, he was well-paid, to write of his former comrades that way. When I finished his book, I was sure I dined regularly on Afghan children after raping their mothers in front of their fathers, then murdering both the parents before the eyes of the children." His voice was tight. Rebecca Taylor could not help but look into his eyes. Even his anger was...humane.

"I've heard that tone before," she found herself saying. "You almost sound like some of the dissidents I've met or heard."

"I am not. Some of our dissidents, our former dissidents, are thoughtful and serious, admirable; others, fools; and a few, mad. Exiles, like Solzhenitsyn or Brodsky, are patriots wronged by their government. Defectors like Nureyev and Baryshnikov fall into another category. I greatly enjoy ballet, but it is not important where they dance, so long as they dance where the world can see them dance. One might say the same about Horowitz and his music, but he left so long ago, that hardly counts. Defectors like Suvorov are traitors and it is an act of mercy and grace that we do not hunt them down and execute them as such."

"You make clear your opinion," Taylor said. "May I ask your current duty station?"

"Chechnya."

"I...see."

Suslov let out his breath in a long sigh. "Do you?"

"I see that you didn't learn your lesson in Afghanistan."

"What lesson was that?"

"Not to get involved in long wars with Muslim fanatics."

"Afghanistan was our Vietnam. Like America in Vietnam, it mattered only because we thought it did. Like America in Vietnam, we did what we did because we could. Like America in Vietnam, when we decided that the country no longer mattered, we left. Then we realized, as did America about Vietnam, that it had never really mattered, except for the suffering and death. Those mattered. Chechnya is different. The Caucasus is part of Russia, Miss Rebecca Taylor. We are staying in Chechnya and we are going to do whatever it takes to restore Federal control over Chechnya. Because if we don't, we encourage more of the same in other places."

"You have been asked to pass this along?"

"No, Miss Taylor. I am under orders to do so. We want your government to know these things. I expect conversations like this are taking place at many levels right now, and will continue as the years and operations progress. My brigade is already operating in Chechnya. I came to Moscow for a commanders' conference that ended early, so my superiors asked me to attend this conference. I would have preferred to return to my duties."

"I believe you. Is there any way Russia will let Chechnya go?"

"None. Regardless of the time and the cost. Quite a few of the former Soviet Socialist Republics, such as Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, have taken as much sovereignty as they could handle, as Yeltsin advised and contrived, and declared independence. But they know that Russia is still and will always be, Russia. Of the former Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics, only Chechnya has declared independence, which cannot be accepted when Dzhokar Dudayev says in public such things as, Yeltsin and his cabinet are dogs wrapped in pork fat. Dudayev is a political corpse and probably a physical one as well. Maskhadov appears sane. For now."

"Will you let them drag your nation into civil war?"

"They are not the issue. What matters is that if Chechnya is allowed to defy central authority, where does it end? Does the whole Caucasus go up in flames? Do we let every nationality who wants to, secede? If their example spreads across the Caucasus, there will be many people killed who do not need to be."

"Go on," Taylor pressed.

"Slav means slave. We have fought for more than a thousand years to liberate and unify Slav lands against endless enemies from the East and the West, so that we might change the meaning of the word Slav. A thousand years, Miss Taylor. Both my parents fought in the Great Patriotic War, which you call World War II, which we understand as only the last of Europe's many attempts to enslave us. My father was one of Marshal Zhukov's good young generals. My mother..." he paused a moment, "was a sniper of considerable accomplishment who accomplished even more as a trainer of snipers. Once again, we are fighting for survival. Russia is weak now but we will not forever tolerate instability on our borders. Or the rule of criminals inside them. We will do what is necessary to become masters in our own home and protect ourselves on our borders. And it is to be hoped that you Americans understand why our success will be to your benefit. We have enemies in common. It was not Sov—Russian special operations personnel who so ineptly tried and failed to bring down the World Trade Center last month by parking a van loaded with explosives in one of the garages. It was not Spetsnaz who blew up your Marines in Beirut or hijacked your airplanes or kidnapped and tortured and killed your military advisers and CIA officers. It will not be us who will do such things...whatever else will happen."

She found his sophistication and dignity so jarring, so utterly unexpected, that she felt well out of her depth, realizing that this man, this soldier, was in no way out of his. This was not how military officers, especially Russians, were supposed to behave. Instinctively, she wanted to restore some sort of balance to their conversation. Instinctively, she reached for one of the standard accusations.

"Afghanistan," she said softly. "What you did came very close to genocide, if only out of stupidity rather than cruelty." And those who fought it were monsters. She did not say, but it showed clearly on her face.

Suslov gave her a sharp look before offering her his gentle, bitter smile, a reflex, she realized, of genuine pain, and speaking in his low, cultured voice. "I served three tours in Afghanistan. I was there as a young Airborne lieutenant right at the beginning at Kabul airport. I left very close to the end. Between, I escorted home the body of my younger brother. I had the misfortune of seeing what the mujahedin had done to him before we sealed the casket. In our Army, as in yours, a sealed casket means that, legally, the family has no right to look inside and may well be punished for so doing. Sometimes there are only rocks or sand bags in the casket because no body, or not enough of a body, can be found. And I assure you, Miss Taylor, the Afghans kill and torture their own, especially women and girls, as least as zestfully as we were reputed to do."

Suslov was silent for a long time, drinking tea. Then, "In Chechnya we are going to kill people, Chechens, who do not need to be killed. Given the state of training and discipline in much of the Russian Army, many more Chechens will die than strictly need be. For this I blame our senior leadership, military and civilian. I will not shock you by describing some of them in words that have no place in civilized conversation. So, as you Americans say, that's the way it is, Miss Taylor. We who are going to carry this burden have no heart for doing so. But we know what is at stake, so we do our duty."

"Why are you telling me this? Why me?"

"Because although you are extremely naïve in an American sort of way, I have come to believe that you are fundamentally a decent and intelligent person. Your Doctor Matthews thinks my country exists to prove the superiority of his country. You are different."

They were sitting in the silence of those last words when a man in civilian clothes, trim and clearly military, came down the corridor and looked anxiously at them.

"Colonel Suslov..." he began.

"Excuse us, Miss Taylor," he said abruptly.

"Of course." She rose, taking her tea with her, to pace at the far end of the atrium while Suslov read the message he had been handed, his face going a ghostly white before the whole man hardened dauntingly. "What happened?" she asked after the messenger departed and she returned to him.

"I've lost people. Unnecessarily and stupidly."

Rebecca Taylor realized she was no longer afraid of him. But she still surprised herself when she put his hand on his shoulder and said words she never expected to say to any Russian officer. "As an officer of the United States Foreign Service, I offer condolences on behalf of my country. Please accept my personal sympathies, also."

Astonished, Suslov looked at her for a long time, then nodded. "Thank you for that. Human kindness that is both spontaneous and dignified is uncommon." He paused. "I hope we will each remember this for the sake of our countries as this war..." He found himself having no words left to say.

After a few seconds, Taylor nodded back, and removed her hand. Then, "Are we friends, Colonel?"

"I do not know. It is certainly an odd idea. Perhaps someday we will be. When our countries become friends. Or perhaps before. Your country places much value on what you call 'people-to-people exchanges.' 'Building bridges,' I believe you also call it. Perhaps there is some value in the attempt. Perhaps it is merely one more American self-delusion, something you indulge because you can afford it."

"Perhaps. But some good may come of it someday."

"Perhaps."

They returned to the dining room, where she had to endure her boss leering at them both. Suslov returned his glance with a contempt that spoke for Taylor also, then left.

Later that evening, dressed in a dark blue track suit, grateful he had skipped the farewell drinking—there needed to be at least one sober man in the hotel—Suslov sat at the desk in his room. He had written one letter. He had two more still to write, plus his contact report on Rebecca Taylor. He decided the report would be less painful and started on that. Then he stopped, realizing that he did not know what to say. There was a knock on his door. He was expecting no one. "Who is it?" he called, silently taking up the pistol he'd placed on his night stand.

"Rebecca Taylor."

He opened the door. "Remember who we are," he warned.

"I do," she said, noticing the pistol pointed downwards. She moved past him into the room.

He yielded to her, avoiding physical contact, as she shut the door behind her. "Sit down, then." He pointed to a chair and she did, abruptly. He returned to his desk, politely placing the pistol in a drawer, and sat. "How did you learn my room number?"

"Bribed the desk clerk."

"Then you know that the FSB will know."

She looked at him, taking in his unnerving steadiness. He was, she realized, younger than she had thought, at most in his late thirties, certainly not forty. "I do." She shrugged. "My boss already thinks I fucked you. Or at least tried."

"Why have you come here?"

"To continue our conversation. It ended too soon."

"So may your career. How much longer will you work for him?"

"Well, I thought about getting him fired for sexual harassment." Suslov's brows arched. "I suppose I could, but it wouldn't matter. There are thousands more just like him. I can do this for thirty years, end up as an ambassador somewhere—not a terribly important somewhere because important positions are reserved for political contributors—and our Foreign Service will still be hopeless."

"Why?"

"Bureaucracy. Politics."

"And because you Americans will not have a serious Foreign Service so long as you think the world is and should be a reflection of yourselves."

"Agreed."

"Wise woman. If you leave, what will you do?"

"In my less lucid moments, I consider journalism. I know several people at the Washington Post who have indicated that they could use me. Female Russian experts, experienced but young and maybe even pretty, are rare. I would fill several quotas at once while giving them very good work. If I want an offer, all I have to do is ask. I think I will, provided the offer includes keeping me in Russia for at least three years."

"What would you do here?"

"Washington Post Moscow bureau. Go to clandestine official receptions, meet with dissidents out in the open, avoid American businessmen whenever possible. Maybe go to..."

"Yes?"

"Chechnya."

Suslov chose to postpone for a moment the obvious next issue. "So," he said slowly, "would I be correct that you were thinking it over when the swine you work for, with apologies to real pigs, helped you make your decision for you today?"

"Yes." She handed him her business card. "The information on the front of my business card may soon be overtaken by events. On the back is my personal contact data, here and in the United States."

He laid it down atop the letter he'd written. "So have you come here as a future journalist? Looking for sources in the military, perhaps? Something to start your new career, as you Americans like to say, with a bang?"

She smiled. "Something like that."

"And you would be interested in covering the fighting in Chechnya, not as part of a shepherded flock of journalists, but a guest of a particular Russian Army unit?"

"Yours?"

He was genuinely amused. "I have no intention of taking glasnost' that far. But I do believe we should stay in touch and if you ask me to help you with such an endeavor at some point in the future, you may find me willing. But you must tell me one thing now. Why would you wish to go to Chechnya? Beyond the obvious aspects, why?"

"Because I would wish to see for myself whether or not you are right."

"And if I am?"

"Then the United States must accept that the Russian future will hold violence without end and we have to find a way to work together to lessen it."

"Or win it?"

"That, too."

"And if I am wrong?"

"Then the United States must accept that the Russian future will hold violence without end and it's none of our business how it plays out."

"I see."

Rebecca Taylor started to say something. Suslov shook his head, a curt, precise gesture. "Good evening, Miss Taylor. We will be in contact. You may tell Doctor Matthews that you slept with me, if you wish, and that I gave you all the strategic plans for our imminent reconquest of Alaska. It was Russian once, you know."

# CHAPTER FIVE, FOX CHAPEL, PA, SPRING 1994: OSCAR

It was a beautiful spring evening, the fading light clear and pleasantly chilled. Olivia lay on a garden lounge on her father's patio. Barney, the large gray tom cat, snuggled on her chest. He'd wandered into Oscar's back yard three years before, his ribs a mess from a prior owner's farewell kick, his coat still decent. He'd spent some time evaluating his prospects. Food came first. He ate the tuna and mackerel Oscar put out, ravenously for a few days, then more calmly. Then, sensing Oscar's loneliness, he consented to stay and be pampered.

That evening, for the first time in weeks, Olivia was feeling no pain, neither mental nor physical, and that had less to do with the medications she was using than with her emotional state. Her anxiety over what she was about to do had simply burnt itself out and her body had responded by relaxing. She had made her separate peace with what her country was becoming, and that was that.

Barney purred soothingly on her, vibrating deep into her lungs and heart.

When Oscar had learned of Olivia's airplane crash, his first response was to get a carrying cage for Barney, then the first available flight. He was halfway to the airport before he realized that he'd forgotten to pack the rest of his luggage and snacks for the cat. That took less than twenty minutes after he got back, with Barney noisily unhappy in his crate. Oscar and Barney flew to Los Alamos, then stayed on to care for Olivia as she went into out-patient rehab. Olivia first met Barney while in a hospital wheel chair, sitting for the first time outside. They'd exchanged a single thought. You know what it means to be hurt. And then, You know what it means to keep going. Barney had become as much a healer to her as to her father. But he did not like her house and in his own way, scenting about, he indicated that he was aware of someone who'd been there before, whom he did not like. The boyfriend who had become the former boyfriend while she was still in the hospital, after a single look at her injuries, her new surgical scars, and her pain. The boyfriend who, as he explained on the phone, gracefully bowed out because her father was there and he didn't want to interrupt their time together.

Oscar, who'd taken a total dislike to the boyfriend in less than one minute of hospital visiting time—the boyfriend had stayed less than ten—had sensed Olivia's uneasiness at remaining in a house that had so many memories in it, of an affair that should have ended more decently. One night he'd told her that staying in the Fox Chapel house after her mother died meant more than continuing to live in her creation. It meant not living in anyone else's. Ever. He considered it less a sacrifice than a sacrament. But she had no reason to stay in her house. Then they'd looked at Barney together, who had mewed in agreement. That settled that.

The three of them had moved her quickly to her Santa Fe apartment. Oscar had done the lifting, the housework, and a lot of ample Hungarian cooking. Barney, perhaps feeling under-appreciated, had taken it upon himself to bring Olivia animals on an almost-daily basis, usually dead but sometimes not quite dead: snakes, mice, moles, prairie dogs, eventually not-so-small leverets. Oscar sternly admonished him that there were no Hungarian recipes of any note for snakes, mice, moles, or prairie dogs. If there was anything for leverets, he wasn't aware of it and had neither the time nor the desire to research the matter. Barney, somewhat miffed at Oscar's limited repertoire, had nonetheless continued to minister to Olivia. Often in the nights, she had woken in pain to find Barney on top of wherever she hurt the worst, purring loudly, as if to proclaim there was nothing so bad that loving him wouldn't make better. He was probably right. It was hard not to be soothed by a cat's purr vibrating through your bones, no matter how much pain you were in, or not to ache for him when you felt his ribs. And it hadn't taken him long to get back in the habit of sleeping on her once she arrived at her father's house. Certainly he had soothed her that first night, perched on her back, rumbling steadily away while she had wept into her pillow. And all the other nights.

Oscar walked out onto the flagstone patio, stepping around the sunken barbecue pit. He carried a platter with a bottle of rosé champagne, two flutes, and a plate of caviar with blini and crème fraîche. Barney seemed unimpressed.

At first, Olivia had been unusually irritable and tense and then, for the past two days, calm. Her serenity reminded Oscar of Lavinia after she had decided to die on her own terms.

Olivia looked up at him. "I didn't know you drank, Papa."

"Not often, but tonight, I thought we might make an exception." He set the tray down beside her, then from the wood stacked neatly beneath the eaves, he built a bonfire in the pit of rough stone. He had a sudden memory, overwhelmingly physical, intensely sensuous, of himself and Lavinia building that pit together, hauling and stacking rocks until their hands bled and their nails were cracked and torn, then mortaring them into place. And after, blood and dirt on their skins, sweating in the cool evening air, Lavinia told him, in defiance of their past experience and evanescing hopes, in defiance of the advice of her doctors that she was almost certain: She was finally pregnant. And then in defiance of all rationality, she uttered the most rational words he had ever heard on the subject of fertility.

Just to make sure, would you please...

My pleasure, Madame.

Olivia had been born nine months and four days later.

On top of the dry wood, Oscar laid green windfalls from the sour cherry trees he had planted the day of his daughter's birth, in her honor and her mother's. The tinder caught quickly. Soon the green branches would release their fragrance. Satisfied, Oscar reclined on his chaise next to his daughter, handed her a glass. "L'Chaim." To life.

She touched the rim of her glass to his and repeated the Hebrew toast. "L'Chaim."

A beautiful champagne, a luminous and pale rose-gold, in which she could smell spices and stones, taste ginger, coffee, the intensity of fig jam, the bitterness of orange peel, the dry, tobacco richness of smoke, winey and silky. The fine bubbles floated calmly in the glass; her blood heat caused the flavors and the scents to blossom in her mouth.

Suspicious, she looked at the bottle. Krug's first rosé, released in 1983. "Papa, how much did you pay for this?"

"A wedding, or even just a wedding dress would have cost me far more."

"Touché."

"It's the custom for fathers to drink with their sons. I do not think mothers teach their daughters how to drink. Do they?"

"I've seen no evidence of that. I think it would save some trouble if they did."

"Your mother and I raised you almost as a son."

"Except that none of us ever seemed in any doubt that I was a girl."

They ate. The blini and crème fraîche, topped with the grey-brown eggs, nutty and creamy, provided a stunning foil to the champagne, which had blossomed into the scent of berries.

"Let's do this again when I get back."

Oscar decided to change the subject. "I am curious about something. Perhaps I shouldn't ask but..."

"But..."

"Do you remember that boy?"

She cocked an eyebrow at her father. "Which boy?"

"There weren't so many."

"When you're the only child of a widower who is also an old-school Hungarian Jewish immigrant, there are more than you let on to your papa."

"Are you telling me you were sneaky?"

"I'm telling you I was very damned sneaky. You and Mama didn't raise no fool." She paused. "I am remembering that boy. Tall, black hair, brown eyes, on the cross country team. About two years older than me. We were both sophomores."

Not that the boy was dumb. She'd been advanced two years, if only because various teachers and principals felt that her combination of excessive achievement and ill-concealed boredom was harmful to the self-esteem of the less gifted. "John Dubinsky. We used to run together. Puke after hill intervals."

"And that was all there was to it?"

"Not exactly."

Oscar stared at her. "You mean you saw him after I forbade you to see him again?"

By normal American standards, it had not been a horrible fight, or even much of a fight. But they had not been normal Americans. Olivia was fourteen and it was near the one-year anniversary of Lavinia's death. As always, before doing anything rebellious, she researched it thoroughly, so as to have a convincing rationale available later. From assorted biology books, she learned that boys reacted to the hormone flux of adolescence by withdrawing and becoming sullen, girls by becoming aggressive. Estrogen, after all, was an anabolic steroid just like testosterone, but had far more powerful effects at far lower blood levels. The typical girl's biological need to seek conflict was all the more powerful because she had no socially sanctioned outlet for aggression and was expected to resist sexual desire, her own as well as that encouraged in boys.

Oscar had been wise enough to give Olivia an outlet for the increased aggression and energy of adolescence, encouraging her to run and to lift seriously. Sex, on the other hand...

I'm disappointed in you, Olivia. For this, for you to maybe get pregnant by some boy. Your mother would even be more disappointed in you.

Papa, I'm not a Hungarian mädel. I'm an American teenager. Deal with it.

He'd wanted to slap her; the sudden tensing of his body communicated that more clearly than words. But educated, aristocratic Jews—and the men of his family had been both for generations, before the Jews had become the scapegoats for Hungary's ills—were not violent. Particularly not when they'd seen and done what Oscar had as a young man in Hungary during World War Two and in the first year of Communist rule.

Olivia had neither flinched from nor challenged him, just remained staring at him fixedly, calm beyond defiance. They'd looked at each other, shocked by their quick descent into emotional manipulation and guilt, teenage brattiness, and the whisper of possible violence, and then carefully began backing away from the abyss that had opened up before them.

Olivia took a swallow of champagne, nerved herself. "Yes, I saw him quite a bit, actually."

"He didn't..." Oscar couldn't bring himself to say the words.

"He did. He was very kind and very sweet and he made damned sure he didn't get me pregnant."

"He was older than you!"

"Thank goodness. Also a natural gentleman."

"About that, I didn't think. You were my little girl and you had no mother and...and my own sister died in childbirth. She was twenty."

Olivia was shocked to her core. "You never told me that."

"My generation didn't really talk of such things. We knew them too well to have to speak of them. Is it better or worse for your generation, daughter?"

"I don't know. I know I'm thirty-four and unmarried."

"By choice," Oscar said quietly. "Choices were not as great back then."

"Except," Olivia answered, "for those who wanted them to be."

Her mother had wanted them to be. During the war, Lavinia Lathrop worked as an architect for a genteel but struggling Philadelphia firm. The partners hadn't wanted her, at first. But with so many men away, and her family's social standing...she was hired for those reasons, paid little, and liked less. She was a "for the duration only" employee. After the war, some worthy young male would take her place; it was his right. She never disputed them, only resolved to stay on until she could leave on her own terms. One day in April 1946, without prior notice, her male replacement arrived and took over her desk. The next day, Lavinia announced that she was leaving to start her own firm. No one wished her well. Lathrop & Associates opened for business in a run-down four-room office suite with no furniture, no associates, and no clients. The clients came quickly. Associates took longer to find; few men were willing to work for a woman. The office never did get fully decorated.

Four years before and a universe away, Oscar was a Hungarian Jew with a brand-new civil engineering degree from the Royal Joseph University. It was 1942, not an auspicious time to for a Jew to start a career in a country so sympathetic to fascism that it had joined the Axis in 1940 and participated in the 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union. The Nazis wouldn't occupy Hungary until 1944, but the persecutions and the killings had started long before that. Ultimately, three out of four Hungarian Jews would be murdered, by Hungarians and Germans. Oscar would not be among them. One of his engineering professors had a brother, a Catholic priest who provided Oscar with false birth and baptismal certificates. The professor found him a job as a draftsman with a small company that did considerable business with Germany. They accepted him, no questions asked. Nor did Oscar's parents ask much about where their only son was going. Just...away.

Oscar spent three years as a junior engineer in a company that numbered the SS among its clients. When not working, he hid in his apartment, mostly reading, taking in an occasional dog or cat whose owners had vanished. He never saw or heard from his family again.

The Soviets replaced the Germans. Oscar stayed in Hungary long enough to learn his family's fate and to appropriately repay a Hungarian he'd known before the war for revealing to the Germans where his family was hiding. Then he fled west to the American-occupied zone of Austria. He found employment as an assistant with a State Department technical team assessing what was left of the country's infrastructure. A year later, after much conniving and with the help of a remorse-stricken, career-terminal State Department official who'd connived on his behalf even more, he found himself in Philadelphia. There, sitting in a small diner, violating what was left of his observant Judaism by eating his first Philadelphia steak and cheese sandwich, then his second, he noticed a newspaper help-wanted notice. Lathrop & Associates was looking for draftsmen. Low starting salary but lots of potential. Since he was penniless and could use some potential, he applied.

A new thing, working for a woman who demanded much but also gave much. Lavinia helped him receive partial university credit for his Hungarian engineering degree, found him scholarship money for a few required courses, then nurtured and cajoled him through his professional exams. Oscar Tolchin was now Oscar Tolchin, P.E. In return, he offered her long hours of unpaid work and total loyalty. For her part, Lavinia kept him in Philadelphia steak and cheese sandwiches, asked him no questions about his past, and trusted him completely.

The firm prospered. They moved to larger offices that also never got fully decorated. Lavinia hired an American draftsman, then promoted Oscar to senior associate and ordered him, finally, to stop addressing her as "Madame" and start calling her Lavinia. As the firm grew larger, their hours together grew fewer, and Oscar began to seek a life of his own. Dating was hard. There was no such practice in Europe and his semi-clandestine status during the war meant that seeking female companionship could be fatal. Now he was thirty and a lot of experiences with women that he should have had, weren't there. Dutifully, he tried dating American Jewish women, then realized in a moment of profound relief that the only woman he truly loved was unattainable. Since he had no interest in spending the rest of his life with a compromise, he no longer had to look for one.

The day came to take his oath of citizenship. He asked Lavinia, who had tutored and quizzed him until he practically knew the Constitution by heart and could sing (more or less) every verse of the Star-Spangled Banner, to accompany him to the ceremony. There were nearly a hundred others in the courtroom, most still far more foreign than he. Looking at them, feeling the distance, he realized that he had indeed become American. This was home now.

There was a reception afterwards.

"Let's skip it," Lavinia suggested. "You will permit me to take you to dinner?"

"Please."

"One condition. You order something besides..."

Oscar Tolchin, P.E., new American citizen, laughed happily. "I will ask you to order for us both."

An hour later, over rosé champagne and caviar, she said quietly, "I know very little about what Jewish people do in certain circumstances."

"Which circumstances?"

Lavinia took his hand. "When a Gentile woman with no attachment to Christianity desires to marry a Jewish man, is it necessary and appropriate for the woman to convert before the wedding?"

Oscar flinched, then enclosed her hand in his and said formally, "If that is your way of suggesting marriage, I was about to mention something on that order myself."

"No, you weren't."

Oscar peered into his glass. "Yes, I was. I wouldn't have, perhaps not this evening. But I was. Or I would have when the..."

"Oscar."

"What?"

"Hush, darling. Just hush."

The conversion process went much faster than normal. They found an immigrant rabbi who needed the money and was happy to keep it simple, light, and fast. He married them in a small ceremony up in a Bucks County inn on the Pennsylvania bank of the Delaware River, not far from where George Washington had crossed with what was left of his army to win the Trenton victory that saved the Revolution. Lavinia's family, who had always regarded her ambition as defiance and her success as insult, and Oscar as the final defiance and insult, did not attend.

"Ours was a different generation, daughter."

"Did you have affairs before I moved out?"

"Me? Never. I wasn't going to bring anyone home while you were still here. And you?"

"The same. My men had to wait until I moved out."

"Your men?"

"Well, more than one, and usually a little older."

Oscar had insisted that she live with him until her junior year at Carnegie-Mellon University. Starting college at sixteen is one thing; moving into a dorm at that age, quite another.

He shrugged, drank some champagne, ate some caviar and blini. "In truth, I had a few women after you left. But never here. This always will be your mother's house. One widow, one divorcée, one or two still single. But too many issues. Too much baggage. And I wasn't going to leave here. Ever."

Olivia calmly helped herself to caviar, this time with a large helping of crème fraîche and refilled their glasses. Barney, still perched on her, sniffed at her mouth, looking for caviar. "Cats do not eat fish eggs. Too expensive." She handed him, instead, a blini smeared with the crème. Purring loudly, he licked the blini clean before eating it.

Oscar looked at his daughter, wondering where a lifetime had gone and what she was going to do next and forever.

He had no regrets, except that it had all gone so fast. A week after their honeymoon, a Caribbean cruise that left them alternately bored to agony with their fellow passengers and amazed that they could wring so much passion out of each other in so many ways, Lathrop & Associates dissolved. The new sign on the door: Tolchin & Tolchin. The firm prospered. Relations with Lavinia's family remained virtually nonexistent. Perhaps a grandchild might have made a difference, but none was immediately forthcoming. After about a year, they began to discuss the possibility of getting out of Philadelphia.

"What about Pittsburgh?" Oscar asked one night in bed.

"I've been there. Fortunately, it was closed."

"I'm serious. They're finally cleaning the city up. There's a whole new downtown under construction and other projects all over the area. The cost of living is less than here. And it would be far enough from your family that we'd only have to see them if you want to."

"We don't want to," Lavinia said tonelessly. "Neither do they."

Six months later, Tolchin & Tolchin moved to Pittsburgh. They built a house of Lavinia's design. No matter how much they worked, it was never quite finished. Oscar realized that his wife had planned it that way. For architects as for other artists, completion is a kind of death.

Olivia, Oscar knew, had none of that about her. She was always finishing something. She'd skipped two years of public school, graduating at sixteen and entering Carnegie-Mellon University two weeks later for the summer session. She graduated in three years. Her final year and a half, she lived in a dorm. Oscar, desperate to see more of her but unwilling to constrict her by admitting it, did the next best thing. He began to taper off his professional work and entered graduate school part-time at Carnegie-Mellon. They got together enough, coffees and lunches mostly, to ease the transition. Olivia graduated in 1979, then headed off to MIT for her doctorate. Oscar, at loose ends, sold the business to some Yuppie types who understood that in a few years, after steel and the other local heavy industries had committed assisted suicide, Pittsburgh would reinvent itself again. They expected to do well, and did. Oscar went into part-time consulting while working on his own Ph.D. Father and daughter competed to see who would finish first. Olivia did. In 1984, Carnegie-Mellon offered him one of those perpetual visiting professorships that sometimes come to older men and women of considerable non-academic accomplishment. Oscar accepted. Between consulting and teaching, he now knew how he would spend the rest of his life.

"So, daughter...tell me about your trip to Europe."

She gave him a long, very steady look over the rim of her flute. "I thought I might start in Vienna with a conference, work my way back west."

"The last time I was in Vienna was in '46. You could still smell the bodies in the rubble. What do you plan to do?"

"Look around. See the Spanish Riding School. Yodel."

"And after that?"

She shrugged. "I have money and a valid passport and for the first time in my adult life, no responsibilities. See Europe. Ponder my future."

Oscar paused. It wasn't that Olivia was being unwise. Nothing could be wiser for her than to take some time off and travel, think about what she wanted to do for the next phase of her working life. It was just utterly out of character for her. She was not the sort of woman to six months wandering around Europe, visiting museums and cafés, and doing little else.

Oscar rose, put more wood on the fire, went back into the kitchen for the second bottle of champagne, and refilled Olivia's glass. She eyed the bottle, also Krug, and shook her head. "Don't worry, last bottle. And remember, a hell of a lot cheaper than a dress." After a while, Oscar spoke again. "What do you plan to do with your car?"

Calmly, half-drunk, she looked at him. It was the test question. Not, what do you plan to do with your life? but What about your car?

"I'd planned to drive it up to New York, sell it to a dealer for whatever I could get. I've decided I don't like the color."

"Perhaps you could sell it to me. I like the color and I'm due for a new car. Newer car."

"Blue book value for excellent condition, then."

"Friend and family discount?" Oscar countered.

"Ten percent."

"Done deal. Would you like me to have my bank transfer the money, or shall I give you a check or get you traveler's checks?"

"Bank will be fine," she said, and poured him out more champagne. Then remembering, "I'll even throw in a pistol. I won't be needing it anymore."

"That .45?"

"No, just a plain old Beretta."

"What happened to the .45?"

"I..." Olivia paused. "It's in safekeeping. Papa...if you don't hear from me for a while, or only once in a while, and I'm vague about what I'm doing...don't worry."

"So," Oscar said slowly, "this is more than just a tourist excursion."

"Papa...I think I'm drunk enough to go to bed. I'm leaving tomorrow and it's another long drive."

She stirred enough to let Barney take the hint and jump off. She kissed her father, then went upstairs.

# CHAPTER SIX, MANHATTAN, LATE SPRING 1994: SHOPPING

Oscar and Olivia spent the next morning in silence, tending to the business of the Mercedes, then to the business of getting her ready to leave. Oscar drove her to a local car rental. The young woman at the counter, tightly dressed and overwrought and waiting to be discovered, although for what Olivia couldn't tell, processed her sullenly. Her voice ratcheted up and down as she went through the intricacies of the one-way/drop-off contract. Then there were keys, then the car, then the final strong embrace and turning-away, and six hours of thoughts of what to do in New York. Things to buy. Knitting materials. Perfume. Expensive jewelry to be sold in Russia for ready cash when needed. And anything else that might strike her as useful in a new life. She noticed neither the lushness of central Pennsylvania nor the squalor of New Jersey's section of the Rust Belt. Her question to America, Can you give me a reason to stay? had been answered. Nor did she expect to find any reasons in the city that, like the capital, was engaged in the ruination of the nation.

She drove the final hour of her trip in somnolent blankness. As she entered the Lincoln Tunnel to Manhattan, she thought of other trips, excursions when the tunnel's foul enclosure promised an explosion of life and perhaps of exaltation at the other end. Now it led only to poseurs and profiteers. She navigated the West Side skillfully and found her hotel, a quietly luxurious building on Central Park South. She checked in without incident, then collapsed into dreamless sleep.

The next day, too much in pain to walk, she drove down Fifth Avenue in order to make the mistresses of some Russian Mafiosi very happy.

What she saw at Bulgari and Cartier stunned her, took her breath away. She bought a couple small items and tucked them into her purse. But it was at Tiffany's, where an older gentleman behind a counter, well-dressed but in no way fashionable, beckoned quite boldly to her, that she fell in love. He did not seem to want to sell her anything. He did not seem to want much of anything, except perhaps to suggest that she might be happier in some other store. But he did not seem in any way discourteous or malign.

"So is it that obvious that I don't really belong here?" she asked in mild challenge.

"You never can tell," he said, his brown eyes twinkling warmly. His elegant gesture let him take her in discreetly, her comfortable black loafers, the trim black tee shirt and neat, dark jeans, windblown hair free of all restraint, or even hairspray. The features of her face, fine and slightly worn, that dispensed with all makeup but a little rose lipstick. The fitted silk jacket that showed off her long, strong waist. No pistol to hide anymore.

"Very attractive," the gentleman answered, "but not at all done here."

"I made the jacket myself."

"Also not done here. Not very much. People prefer that which is for sale, as though beauty followed price. If you will forgive me for saying so, the work on your face was very good, for anywhere but here. In New York, the surgeons would at least try to erase those scars."

"If I told you I wouldn't want to lose them, would you understand?"

His response was to reach into the display case and offer her an iris. Not the cut flower. A confection of gold, the metal engraved to show the carefully enameled veins, paved with tiny, flawlessly cut and color-graduated gemstones: amethysts for the petals, citrines for the beard, tsavorite garnets for the leaves and stem. He gave her a jeweler's loupe to examine the work and she had the sense that he expected a knowing response, if only the knowledge of what it took to craft such an item.

"Did you make this piece?" she asked, realizing what she'd already realized unconsciously. This man was no mere sales clerk.

"Yes," he replied, his voice acknowledging to himself that her question contained far more than idle curiosity. Nor was it prelude to some gushy, vacuous compliment. That mattered, too.

"And others?" He smiled happily and nodded. "I'm an engineer," she said, knowing that he would know why she mentioned it.

"Do you make things?"

Her response came from her heart. "When they let me."

He expressed his sympathy with an offer that creators understood. "Come back to my workbench and I'll show you what I'm making now."

"I would like that very much."

The piece in progress was a collar of diamonds, black onyx, golden and golden-brown topaz, orange and red-orange mandarin garnets, reddish brown citrines, and brilliantly sparkling brown zircon, the plumage of a fantastic hawk designed so that the wings would embrace and frame a woman's collarbones. It was hinged to lie perfectly smooth, just below the line of bone. There was a plaster cast of a woman's neckline for a model.

"She is also a strong woman," the jeweler said. "Ambivalent about that, not pleased to show it. But her husband thinks her neck and shoulders are very erotic and beautiful. He is right. So we, he and I, thought to call attention to that which troubles the lady and flatter it."

"I don't think that I have ever seen jewelry in these colors."

"You're right, it's very rare. Jet was sometimes used in ladies' jewelry, especially mourning jewelry of the Victorian era. Onyx and carnelian were sometimes used together in Art Deco jewelry. Still, these days, the taste is for colder colors, more brilliant, so we do most of our work with those colors. But this is a woman who looks best in warm colors. She is not conventionally pretty, very hawk-faced, with that sort of intelligence. Rather than try to hide her character, her husband thought he should celebrate it. In a few weeks, they will have been together forty years."

"Does she know about this?"

He smiled and shook his head. "Not at all. Her husband hired a sculptor to cast her, so she may be able to make some guesses. But not this."

"It is utterly magnificent."

"And that is the word for her."

And for you, Olivia thought. She faced him, a master jeweler and a happy man, in his conservative suit of good wool, impeccably tailored and cared for, with his neat, clean hands, the nails very short, the skin scarred by old cuts. She smiled. Sharing his pleasure, she let him show her the rest of his works in progress. "When I get tired of working on one," he explained, "I work on another. It keeps me fresher."

"Do you always let people see your unfinished work?"

He shook his head. "No, only people who are genuinely interested. Over the years, I've developed almost a sixth sense as to who is serious and knowing, who not. Whether or not they are buying is, at least right then, less important. Many come back later, as they can. Truly, though, most people don't ask so many questions about technique, materials, and tools. Nor would they understand my answers. So I don't often give them. May I ask what kind of engineering you do?"

It was her turn to smile and shake her head.

He understood. He looked at his watch. "As a senior master craftsman, I am permitted latitudes of various kinds. It is eleven, which for me is more than midday. I get here at six. Let us have a glass of champagne and some fruit, and we will discuss ways and means regarding any purchases you might care to make. Today or," he smiled as if he knew that there was more travel in her future, and that she was no tourist, and that he'd dealt with such persons before and from time to time helped those he respected, "whenever."

She blinked. "I suppose you can tell those who are serious from those who are not."

"I can. But there is more than that. Seriousness about the creation is common enough. Seriousness about creation—that is different. Very few people are really interested in my craft. In my world, most people are interested in beauty as status. A few are interested in beauty for itself, and not the effortless kind. Many people purchase my products. Very few are interested in my skills."

"I am. But I haven't much time, unfortunately."

"Just passing through?"

"Something like that. To be direct, I would like the iris."

"I know. And I believe several other pieces as well. There is nothing wrong about wanting beauty for its own sake. Or as a financial investment, so long as you understand that as a financial investment, you would do far better to simply buy gold bullion or," he paused, "the new kinds of securities on offer these days. Derivatives, I believe they're called, although from what they derive, I know not."

"I prefer that which derives from your skill."

"I can argue with neither your logic nor your compliment, Madame." He wrote a figure down for her. "This is acceptable?"

"I thought Tiffany was prix fixe."

"When you are dealing with work and sums like this, it is common to ask us to sharpen our pencil. If you would tell me something, I will do your negotiating for you. With whom do you bank?"

"Bank of America."

"Very easy. They have a branch near here, of course."

"If you give me directions—"

He waved his hand dismissively. "You will do nothing of the sort. We work with all the banks. You will make a phone call and tell them what you want, and they will send a courier here. This is New York, my dear, and even by city standards, you are spending a significant sum. Demand to be treated accordingly."

The man's idea of sharpening his pencil was to add a pair of earrings, the gold also worked into long, stylized plumes, substantial as bones, set with diamonds, sapphires and more green garnets, crowned with the most translucent and luminous moonstones. He recomputed the bill so that the bottom line was unchanged

"We can courier these to your hotel, if you like. But if you are going to be out and about, these purchases would be better in a safe, just in case. You will get tracking forms and signatures and also an insurance valuation and we will arrange insurance for you. This is a secure process." He smiled. "We do this, too, you know."

"I should by now."

"Where else are you going?"

"A yarn shop. A perfume shop. Perhaps..."

"Perhaps where you are going, such treasures are not so readily available as here."

"Yes."

"May I ask where?"

"A place that needs me."

"Are you not needed here?"

"No," she answered firmly. "I am not."

The man refilled their glasses and passed her a small plate of fruit and cheese and crackers.

She touched the rim of her glass to his. "To the first brave souls who suspected that stinking fruit and rotting grain could produce such wonderful drinks. My name is Olivia."

"George. I'm sure you have a busy day ahead of you. Shall we tend to the transaction?"

***

Parking for the knitting shop in Greenwich Village was on the street and it was several blocks before she found a space available amongst the cars, all with New York plates, parked there. She scanned up and down but could find no signs limiting her parking. Sometimes the parking gods were with you.

The small shop was meticulously organized, the walls divided into cubbyholes not much larger than shoe boxes, stocked to the ceilings with wool spun in all weights from lace for the finest, most gossamer shawls to heavy oiled aran for sweaters to prevent hypothermia in the North Atlantic. There was also silk and cashmere, alpaca and cotton, some beautiful synthetics, crisp linen that would nearly cut your hands in the knitting, only to soften miraculously with washing. There was even qiviut, spun from the finest downy shedding of Alaskan musk oxen, soft, strong, warm, and priced by the extravagantly expensive ounce. The colors dazzled and shimmered. There were patterns and technical books for reference.

The rest of the shop was equally wondrous. There were needles, including beautiful walnut straight needles, although Olivia preferred circulars, and buttons. In the back, three women and a man, clearly long-time customers, sat working away on their projects. One woman softly cursed the sheep, the mothers and fathers of the sheep, and all the sisters and brothers of the sheep, who had produced the yarn from which she was carefully tinking back hundreds of tiny stitches from what would be a lace shawl. In the corner, another made soft, soothing sounds. No words, Olivia knew, could reduce the insane fury that having to tink back lace could produce. You either understood or you didn't. And the backdrop to it all was the shop owner, Lois, sitting at a large production wheel that looked like it had come straight from the story of Sleeping Beauty, meticulously spinning by hand a strand from variegated roving that she had dyed herself. When several strands were plied together, they would produce color that was gloriously complex.

A casual observer might conclude that these people knew each other, that they were a bit of a clique and not inclined to interact with strangers. But Olivia knew better. These were people at work and she didn't blame Lois for very courteously making it clear that she didn't care to rise from her work until it was necessary to deal with her. Who could blame her, fiber running through her hands, beginning as shapeless fluff, emerging as a ply of yarn whose colors made Olivia think of caverns older than memory, and the paintings of the first humans on their cave walls, in ash and sienna, ocher and lime.

Olivia bought everything that appealed to her. Lois offered no discounts, only a smiling respect. That was more than sufficient.

On her way back to her car, she contemplated the bags of yarn she was carrying. She would need to purchase another small suitcase for the yarn. But why not? And then she found herself ducking into a perfume shop, a basement shop in a brownstone townhouse, and another world of well-worn flagstones the color of honey and the serene sound of a fountain. The door was open to the late spring afternoon, so a bell, set up on motion sensor, announced her presence by chiming softly and a trim old gentleman, impeccably dressed in pressed khakis and colorfully striped shirt, emerged from the small office behind the cash register. His hair was very white, and his rosy face lined, but the grey eyes were brilliantly alive. "I see you've been with Lois."

Olivia sighed. "Wonderful shop. But it's hard to see how you can make a living from it, even offering classes, even selling handspun."

"She can't. I can't. It's a problem we've discussed. These shops are lucrative hobbies, but in this city, that's all they are. How may I be of service?"

Olivia teased at her memory, wondering what had brought her in. Then: "My mother loved the classic French perfumes—Caron's N'aimez qui moi, Nuit de noël, Or et noir. Chanel's Cuir de russie and Bois des îles, Guerlain's Shalimar. And Mitsouko, of course."

"Of course. You do well to remember the names."

"I grew up knowing the scents. The names came later."

"Memory is a scent bottle, my dear. Your mother's tastes inclined to the quiet and the melancholy, and also the old."

"That was her. Except for the melancholy."

"She may not have been melancholic herself. Perhaps she understood how easily she might have been, had she allowed it, and wore some perfumes to remind her, no."

"Perhaps. If I described a scent, could you tell me what it was?"

"I can try. One of your mother's?"

"Yes."

"Good. That will help, because we know what else she liked. Will you know the notes?"

"No. I remember it as being a beautiful scent, but not at all pretty. This was proud and remote."

He gave her a long, thoughtful look. "Wait here." He ducked into the storeroom and returned with a green leather box. "This is very old. I just purchased several perfumes from an estate sale. It is still sealed, so it's probably still good, but they no longer make it and we don't have samples. There are many beautiful perfumes but very few that may also be described as proud and remote."

"If it is not my mother's scent, I will pay you what you paid for it, plus ten percent. If it is, I will pay you what you think is fair market value."

"You don't know what that might be."

"No more than I now know if it is utterly rancid. Sir, I do not think money matters for something like this."

"You could buy jewelry for less." Olivia recalled her morning purchases and permitted herself a brief smile. "I am not speaking of masterpieces, but simply of gold. So let us say, fair market value is, ounce per ounce, near half of gold. And this is two ounces."

Deliberately, she took it from him, opened the square box to expose a square crystal bottle that said "Djedi". The name meant nothing to her.

He opened a small lockback knife with a flick of his thumb, handed it to her hilt first. After a second, she took it from him, cut the seal, touched the tiniest amount to her wrist. Then she knew as the scent, warmed by her skin, shimmered up, that this was what her mother had worn only very rarely, in a bottle preserved without oxidation after all those decades. The perfume opened with the scent of stones and minerals and smoke, so that Olivia thought of bitter herbs bleaching in the desert sun, or smoke rising into the desert sky. Then it bloomed into rose and iris, vetiver and spice, beautiful and brief, before melding into leather and musk that was both animal and powdery, and the faintest sense of putrefaction. Her mother had worn it on her deathbed.

Olivia had an overwhelming sense of grief.

"Your mother," said the proprietor gently, "seems to have loved Jacques Guerlain's scents the best. Djedi is his masterpiece, his lament for the France that had done Verdun, and would be unable to do it again."

"Who is Djedi? Or what is a Djedi?"

"There is a legend. Djedi was a master magician of ancient Egypt. Pharaoh Khufu, the god-king, brought Djedi to court to entertain his courtiers. It was said that Djedi could rejoin a severed human head to its body and Pharaoh asked him if this was true. Djedi said he could indeed do such a thing, so Pharaoh commanded a prisoner be brought in and decapitated for his amusement. But Djedi refused, saying—I remember the exact words, war will do that to you—saying, 'Do not do this to a human being, my sovereign lord. Surely it is not permitted to do such a thing to one of the noble herd of God.' So Pharaoh had a duck brought in and decapitated instead, and Djedi rejoined its head to its body. Presumably, the duck lived happily ever after. But the moral of the story is, there are some things people should never do to each other. Never."

Olivia blinked back tears. "Why do you say, 'War will do that to you'?"

"North Africa. Sicily. Southern France. Infantry. Based on experience, I agree with Djedi wholeheartedly."

"Do you have more of this?"

"I have a second bottle, also sealed."

"I will take them both."

"We will not open that one. Instead, we will split the difference between what I paid for it, plus 10%, and fair market value."

"That is fair to us both." Olivia counted the price out in hundred dollar bills, tucking the perfume carefully into her purse.

She gathered up her wool and went off to find that her car had been stolen.

Along with every other car on that side of the street.

It was now Olivia's turn to curse, slowly and methodically, both enraged and resigned, until she found an ominous No-Parking sign, well above eye level, hidden under some scaffolding.

A cabbie pulled up and stuck his smiling, know-it-all face out the window. "Looks like your car's been towed, lady."

"Do they do this often?"

"Every night. Alternate-side street parking and they start towing at 3:00 PM. The signs are very hard to find. On purpose. This is why a lot of New Yorkers don't own cars. You can run up a hundred bucks a month in tickets and fines easy, no matter how hard you try to stay clean. Your car isn't your car, it's how the city makes money. Get in. I'll take you to the impound lot. It's part of my daily routine. Yeah, I make money off it, too. But I can't say I like it."

Olivia was grateful that she had taken George's advice to courier her jewelry to the hotel. "No thanks, you can take me back to my hotel."

"You just gonna leave it at the impound lot?"

"It's a rental."

"I don't think they let you do that, lady."

"My name is on that rental agreement. Not yours."

"OK, you wanna go back to your hotel, I'll take you there. It's your money. Hope it's close. I gotta get back here fast for my next fare. It's like a public service, y'know?"

Back at the hotel, she checked to see that her package from Tiffany had arrived. It had, and all the pieces she had purchased were there. She added the contents of her purse and arranged for everything to stay in the hotel safe overnight.

Up in her room, she called the rental car company's customer service and explained the situation to the young woman who, after ten minutes of piped-in bad music and worse exhortations to buy their special insurance or something else, chirpily identified herself as Hi-I'm-Susan-How-May-I-Help-You?

"I'm leaving on an overseas trip tomorrow and I had my car towed here in New York City. I really don't want to spend my last night in New York ransoming my car. If I authorize you to charge the fines and administrative costs, will you pick it up?"

"I'm sorry, ma'am. We have a policy of not letting our customers do that."

"But I'm leaving the country on an extended trip tomorrow and I'm willing to pay for the cost of picking it up."

"Ma'am, I understand, but that's against company policy and I can't change it."

"May I please speak to your supervisor?"

"I'll have to put you on hold."

Five interminable thank-you-for-your-patience minutes later, a male voice came on. "I'm Bill, Susan's supervisor. How may I help?"

Patiently, Olivia repeated herself. "I'm leaving for Europe tomorrow and my rental was just towed here in New York City, along with a whole mess of other cars because there were no visible signs. I don't want to spend my last night in America ransoming the car. If I authorize you to charge the fines and administrative costs to me, will you pick it up for me?"

"No, ma'am. Company policy says that you're responsible for everything that happens to the car between the time you pick it up and the time you drop it off, and we have your signature on the paperwork. We will bill your credit card for all charges until you return it."

Olivia opened her mouth to argue, but what came out was, "Well, you can find it in one of New York City's impound lots." And then she hung up.

Next, she called her credit card company and after authenticating her identity, explained the situation to the customer service representative, also a young woman. "I want to be fair, so I'd like to add in charges for towing, ticket, any storage fees and their costs to retrieve their car."

"Actually, ma'am, since you authorized the rental, they can charge you up to the limit of your card, which is $25,000. If they're not willing to limit their charges to those fees you mentioned, that's between you and the rental company."

"And if I don't pay that charge?"

The woman's voice got soft and worried. "Then we start charging penalties and late fees and really high interest rates, and your credit score goes down."

"Thank you, dear. Your company and the rental company can sort it out then. Just give me my outstanding balance." That balance included what Olivia owed the rental car company and she scheduled a final payment. The hotel, she'd pay for with a traveler's check, then make a final large withdrawal in Vienna. How, she wasn't quite sure. Someone would know.

When she was done, she broke her credit card into small pieces and dropped them into the wastebasket, along with the keys to the rental car.

This is how it ends, America. A lovely day with wonderful old people whose civilization will die with them. Then an evening arguing over rental cars and credit cards.

So this is how it ends, America. Not with a bang, not even a whimper. Just a final spat with Customer Service.

# CHAPTER SEVEN, VIENNA, LATE SPRING 1994: JAY LYONS

Vienna. Capital of Austria, of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire before that, and of much before that. Home of the Hofburg Palace, the State Opera, Sachertorte, the Spanish Riding School, maybe even the Vienna Boys' Choir. One of the few cities that still had a ball season. Home for many years to Karl Lueger, the mayor who discovered how politically useful a certain exuberant anti-Semitism could be. Home also, for a while before Europe tore itself apart in 1914, to a not-so-young, not-so-destitute, vaguely ambitious painter, Adolph Hitler, who would follow Mayor Lueger's example in certain aspects of his own career.

Vienna. Spared the experience of destruction during World War I, as befits a city and a people given to proclaiming, "Germans say the situation is serious but not desperate. Austrians says the situation is desperate but not serious"—a cosmopolitan insouciance that Adolph Hitler never quite shared. Hitler, an Austrian by birth, would join the German Army in 1914. He would visit Vienna once more in 1938, for a parade after annexing Austria to Germany. As the story goes, when Hitler achieved the Anschluss, he rushed out of his office and proclaimed to his secretaries, "Kiss me, girls. I'm the greatest German in history."

An insouciance he may have learned in Vienna, and was capable of indulging on occasion.

It is reported, no doubt incorrectly, that when the Germans entered Austria, Hitler emptied out the small town of his birth and turned it over to the Wehrmacht for artillery practice. Less open to dispute is the effect of Soviet artillery on Vienna. Taken by the Red Army after a two-week siege in April 1945, governed for ten years by a four-power occupation commission of the British, French, Americans, and Soviets, they left the city a hot-bed of intrigue. That went on as Vienna became home to a host of international organizations and regained at least part of its old insouciance. On most any street on most any day, it was possible to see or imagine most anything.

The last time I was in Vienna was in '46. You could still smell the bodies in the rubble.

So had said her father.

Olivia got off a nine-hour flight, overnight, in manageable pain—thank you, morphine—and checked into the Grand Hotel Wien, a majestic artifact of the Belle-Époque era whose ocher and cream façade belied the wars it had survived and the carnage it had witnessed. After securing her jewelry in the hotel safe and learning how to make that final withdrawal—not for everything, that would arouse suspicion; tend to it tomorrow—she ordered a bottle of Riesling sent up to her room. The room itself was inoffensively elegant and pleasant, done in soothing pale yellows and greens, vaguely claustrophobic and definitely overheated. But after the airplane, flying in a business-class section where the only business seemed to be drunk American males engaging each other in ludicrous dominance posturing and occasional contemptuous glances toward her knitting, no problem.

Carefully, deliberately, Olivia ensconced herself in a tub of very hot scented bath water. She held a glass of chilled wine in one hand, the bottle in a sweating ice bucket on the floor beside her. Once or twice she pressed the glass to her forehead and rolled it about, then thought to do the same with the bottle. But she hadn't the energy to do so or even the mental acuity to devise such a procedure. Just filling her glass was difficult enough.

As the ligaments in her back relaxed in the heat, they popped, releasing energy stored as compression. She did not intend to drink the full bottle but was not surprised when she did, and resigned herself to the inevitable self-hatred in the morning: a dim loathing that, she knew, would be compounded by other items and by other affairs, by the morphine she'd taken and by a plan vaguely forming in her mind, forming against her wishes and her rationality, to do one final thing; to give her country one final chance to...

Vienna bothered her. The hedonism concealed the barbarism. She cared for neither. And when the two became indistinguishable, she felt a faint desire to retch.

Olivia sipped her wine, briefly appreciating its floral and mineral beauty, then pursued the appalling thought. Who was she, what was she, what was she really, now that she'd come this far and was about to go much farther? Her mind demanded clarification. Clearly, she was no spy. She would neither have spied for the old Soviet Union nor given them anything. But was she a traitor? She knew that, once in Russia, she would be pressed to reveal details of her previous work and had already decided to refuse and had mentally rehearsed how she would do so. Still...

Before leaving Los Alamos, she'd reread the Constitution. In the Founders' world, treason was such a vague concept, so amenable to oppressive distortion and abuse, that they'd chosen to define it very carefully. It was the only crime enumerated in the Constitution. Now she recited it from memory, taking in the words of strict limitation that, for that very reason, made the crime more heinous.

"Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted."

Legally, that definition did not apply to her. But deep down in her spirit, she knew that it did. Or could be made to apply by a country more and more given to criminalizing differences of opinion. True, the Constitution delimited the legal aspects, but it could not constrain her mind or her heart. She was being—damn you, she suddenly said aloud to herself, say the word.

Unfaithful.

America may have strangled her, but it had never persecuted her and had taken in her father and had given her a life that few of the planet's inhabitants, male or female, would ever experience or enjoy. And now here she was, in this decadent and elegant and barbaric city, waiting to offer herself to the legal and diplomatic heir of the nation that had, for decades, willed America's destruction and meant it. She was going because the heirs of the country that had been America's enemy now offered her a chance to use her brain against their common enemies. But it did not ease the anguish. Perhaps that was the problem. Anguish looking for reasons to call itself guilt.

No, not guilt. Not legal guilt. Infidelity. And even if no legal guilt ever attached, infidelity would be forever, what it was.

She poured herself a final glass of wine, drained the tub partially and refilled it with hot water. Thinking nothing specific, just contemplating that last idea, vaguely marveling at how close it was coming to something like a final, premeditated break with a lover.

Can this relationship be saved?

A lover. An inattentive, passively abusive lover who'd never laid a hand upon her in violence or oppression, only stifled her spirit and her mind, as it was stifling the minds and spirits of millions like her who would never consider leaving.

When her glass was empty, she rose dripping from the tub, wrapped a towel around herself, and went to the desk where she found a notepad, pen and telephone book, as well as the telephone itself. She didn't know her blood alcohol level. She didn't want to know her blood alcohol level, or the precise level of morphine. It had all segued into a wonderful hazy drug interaction that she knew was dangerous, just as she knew what she was about to do was dangerous. But it was also necessary for the cleanliness of her own soul, and that was quite sufficient.

Can this relationship be saved?

I cannot do this just for me. Or for Russia. There must be something for America, too.

She knew that she was very drunk, and that greater sobriety would be needed to do what had occurred to her. So she left the phone book open before taking advantage of the alcohol to enjoy a pain-free nap. When she woke, a glance at the clock showed her that it was past 5:00 PM, which meant after duty hours, so she peeled a sheet of paper off the pad, placed it on the hard desk surface in order to avoid leaving an impression and wrote down the duty officer's number before putting the book away.

Still foggy, yet beginning to clear with a sense of purpose, she dried herself off, dressed, and crossed the sky bridge from the Grand Hotel to the Ringstrassen Galerien. After half an hour's worth of aimless roaming and window shopping, she left the mall and strolled along the Schellinggasse until she found a telephone booth.

"Duty officer, US Embassy, Vienna." A male voice, crisp, authoritative. "This is a non-secure line. May I help you?"

She took in a deep breath, reminded herself not to speak with the peculiar over-articulation of the drunk and drugged, and began.

"Good evening, sir. My name is Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin. I am an American in Vienna. Until recently, I was an employee of our government. I have a matter of some urgency to discuss and don't know who to ask to speak to. Perhaps the press attaché, perhaps the visa attaché or perhaps someone in agriculture, specializing in the importation of wine and horses to the United States. Perhaps one of those who have additional duties. Or perhaps someone else entirely."

There was silence on the other end of the line. Briefly, she wondered if she should have identified herself more explicitly, should have mentioned her former employer, mentioned her clearances by name. Then she decided against it. Revealing too much too soon could easily get her abducted by whomever the embassy might send after her, thrown onto the next plane back to America, then into jail.

Then the male voice came back on, not quite so authoritative, a little surprised, a little excited. "I believe that the person you want to speak to is gone for the evening. However, I'll make sure that this person gets your message. If you would care to call back in the morning, this person will be expecting your call."

Olivia exhaled. She doubted very seriously that "the importation of wine and horses" was a code phrase for "CIA" but it was the best she could think of and the duty officer seemed to know what she wanted.

"I could do that, but an alternative might be simpler, since my time here is short. Perhaps the person I'm calling for should meet me for lunch at 1300 hours at the Café Landtmann."

"That could be arranged. Perhaps. Ma'am, how did you say you spelled your name?"

"T-o-l-c-h-i-n, O-l-i-v-i-a."

"Might I ask where you're staying?"

Olivia paused. An image of very bad things happening in a hotel room flitted through her imagination. "I'm at the Grand Wien. I may be phoned there but I would prefer not to meet with anyone at that place."

"Understood. One question more."

"Yes?"

"What is your business in Vienna?"

"I...I'm attending a scientific conference. I'm..." she trembled at the hint she was about to drop, fearful that more questions would follow. "My former employer has cleared me to be here."

"Please expect to be met as you've requested," the male voice said without any trace of curiosity. "Please tell me how this person might recognize you."

"I'm tall, blonde, with very blue eyes and will be wearing pearls. Good evening, sir."

As she hung up, she glimpsed another image—of a young State Department functionary thinking lewd thoughts. Telepathy, she decided. Or else they really had developed that machine that sticks thoughts in your brain.

On the way back to the hotel, she threw the paper with the phone number away in a waste can. She did not bother to shred it. That would have been truly paranoid.

***

Wine and morphine in the amount she had needed to cope with the pain of a transatlantic flight and its aftermath were a foul, disgusting, evil combination. Or so Olivia thought the next morning, analyzing the problem rather than merely hating herself. At least she had had something decent to eat for dinner last night. Sushi, she thought. Very good sushi _._ There was a sushi restaurant in the hotel. Sushi in Vienna. Viennese sushi. What a world this is. From the state of her head, it seemed she had added sake to the noxious mix of morphine and wine. Ah, well. It could have been worse.

She hauled her sad and sorry carcass out of bed to the mini-bar and checked inside the refrigerator. The bottle of Riesling was there, wedged in carefully and, by all visual indicators, empty. She didn't remember putting it there. There was a little electric tea kettle on top; she filled it with water and turned it on. While she was waiting for the water to boil, she wondered what else she didn't remember. She did remember eating whatever the chef put in front of her, and very good it had been, too. Especially the eel. She did not remember making a fool of herself, nor bringing anyone back to her room. She looked down at her naked thighs and then over at the bed. Apparently, her memory was correct.

Chamomile tea made her feel that she was alive and a long, hot shower, including washing her hair, followed by breakfast with much hot strong coffee, made her feel as if she were approaching human status once again. After breakfast, Olivia tended to her final bank business. Then she walked to the Hofburg Palace and watched the morning performance of the Lipizzaner stallions.

As a girl, she had learned to ride. Group lessons had been distasteful. Too many barely pubescent, endlessly giggling, gushing, nasty girls with names like Lauren and Jennifer: too little care for developing real skill based upon educated understanding. Her father had arranged for private lessons and she learned quickly, both how to ride decently and how to accept that real expertise would always be beyond her. She hadn't ridden seriously in years, but she still loved horses with an inept intensity that said more about her emotional appreciation than her practical skill. She did suspect that if airplanes and gliders hadn't existed, she would have had horses instead.

The Spanish Riding School was a different world. It was flooded by sunlight and echoed with classical music. Its marble pillars were crowned by acanthus leaf capitals, the plaster moldings painted in grays and beiges, and the spectator boxes were draped with red. From above the royal box, a portrait of the school's founder and patron, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI, supervised the stallions and their riders. You would never know how much the impeccably clean and well-groomed pale grey stallions, with their gold-plated double bridles and breastplates and cruppers, their white saddles and red or green shabracks...how much they loved mud. Nor would the uninitiated imagine, from the dark brown tailcoats and bicorn hats, the white deerskin breeches and gloves, and the glossy tall black boots of the riders, how difficult it was to stay clean and neat around a horse. In the center of the arena, with its manicured tanbark, stood the pillars draped with the Austrian flag. The pillars offered a dangerous monument to the supreme art of classical horsemanship: tethered between them, a 500 kg animal would be asked to take momentary flight, then land with the precision of a combat jet on a pitching carrier deck, and more grace.

In the extravagant and precise power of the horses, the tact and sympathy of the riders, their mutual dedication to ephemeral and transcendent beauty, over and over again, Olivia knew she was in one of the world's holy places. As holy as George's workshop or Lois' knitting shop or the perfume store of that wise old man, a soldier once, whose name she'd neglected to ask. This was the holiness she'd worked all those years to defend. This was the holiness she was now leaving America to defend.

But not just for me. Make it not just for me. Find a way. Somehow, find a way.

She arrived at the Café Landtmann first, leaving her name with the waiter, asking him to seat her at a quiet booth. It was not quiet and she spent some dreary minutes listening to a nearby table of Austrians complaining about how the Jews were constantly digging up dirt from the past. They were speaking German, secure in the belief that either Olivia could not understand them or, at least by the standards of her appearance, would sympathize with them. Once or twice, one of the men briefly turned her way, seeking some sort of approval. Olivia stared him down each time.

The waiter led a man to her table. She judged him to be in his mid-thirties and tediously, conventionally handsome, brown eyes, black hair, with tan skin and even teeth. Unscarred. She suspected that beneath his beautiful black cashmere turtleneck, grey wool trousers and fashionable black loafers, he was very fit. But the eyes bothered her. There was simply not a lot of human being home.

Politely, Olivia rose.

"Doctor Tolchin?"

"Yes."

"My name is Jay Lyons. I'm the person who is supposed to meet you here."

They sat. The waiter took their orders, a glass of Grüner Veltliner, smoked salmon and asparagus and Wiener Schnitzel for him, for her steak tartar and pumpkin ravioli with a glass of red wine.

He watched her drink her water and nibble on a breadstick as they awaited their food. She was pale and washed out, the faint tremor in her voice and hands saying she'd over-indulged the night before.

"I take it," he asked finally, slowly, "that you're playing tourist before your conference."

"Yes."

"Might I ask your professional background?"

"Of course. I am an engineer."

"Very well, engineer. What do you want? I assume that your real interest does not lie in shipping wine and horses to America."

She opened her mouth, shut it, stared at him for a moment, then answered him fully. "My name is Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin. From 1983 until 1988, I worked as an engineer for the Department of the Army, specializing in sensor technology. From 1988 until a few weeks ago, I worked at Los Alamos. My clearances are TS/SCI and Q, Dark Purple, Present Powers, Leviathan, and a few others. Do these mean anything to you?"

Lyons paused, in the manner of a gamesman who has just watched someone make a very stupid move. "No, not really. As you probably know, in the compartmented world, the existence of many categories is itself classified. Since I am not part of what you say is, or was, your world, I would have no personal knowledge whether these clearances or real or just some figment of your imagination. The TS/SCI generic is well enough known. So is Q. As for your working at Los Alamos, I would of course need to check that out. Which I can't really do from here. Can I?"

"Would you like my badge number?"

He glared at her as though her offer had ruined a perfectly good monologue. "Your former badge number. Maybe later. As I said, sitting here, I have no way of checking you out, and badge numbers are easily fantasized by those who wish to do so. Now. What do you want?"

"I lied on my exit polygraph."

"Assuming you took one. Assuming it was a big lie."

"It was."

"And the nature of the lie goes beyond how many men and women you've slept with recently."

"How about dead boys?" she murmured into her wine glass.

"I beg your pardon?" Lyons snapped, startled.

Her blue eyes looked hard over the rim. She took her time drinking, realizing that their encounter already lacked one thing she wanted greatly. Dignity. Before long, she suspected, it would lack a great deal more. "I was approached by an agent of a foreign power," she said.

Lyons attempted to look interested. "How much did the Chinese offer you?"

"Nothing. The Chinese don't make quickie offers. They cultivate you for years, until you come to them. Or so I've been told. It was the Russians."

"Oh," he said, now very bored. "Care to be more specific?"

"Last December," she replied, suddenly feeling like she was tossing pearls before swine. Once again. "I was at a trade show in DC. The Russian GRU resident in Washington—Major General, he says, Yuri Mikhailovich Getmanov—offered me a chance to do my work as a ground combat sensor specialist in Russia. He mentioned Walter Christie." Lyons looked at her blankly. "The tank specialist who sold his ideas to the Soviets after our War Department turned him down." The traitor, she almost added, who helped save our world.

"I said that I would do such work for them, provided I was given creative and intellectual freedom. I didn't want American-style pressures, people demanding I spend more money and take more time than necessary to produce something that will never work right. I also told him that I could not and would not do this from the United States. I would have to emigrate to Russia. I told him that I expected to have to do operational testing and development in the field. That means, in Chechnya. I am on my way to live in Russia."

Lyons stared at her, his eyes wide, his mouth open, for some seconds. He had heard what she said, but his brain couldn't process it beyond—This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. The craziest. The stupidest. Americans simply didn't do such things. Sure, fifty, seventy-five years before, a few demented nuts betrayed their country for the sake of Communism. Sure, others sold out for money. But they stayed in America and spied and spent their money until they got caught spending their money. But to go to Russia in search of intellectual freedom and creativity? To live there?

"Let me get this straight," he said slowly, skepticism oozing from every syllable. "You're telling me that Russian Military Intelligence offered you employment developing tactical sensors. And so, having accepted that offer of employment, you're moving to Russia. Assuming you're who you say you are or anything approximating who you say you are, you know you're breaking several laws and several dozen administrative regulations."

"Yes."

"Assuming you're for real, what you've just told me could get you locked up for most of the rest of your life."

"That is correct."

"And you plan to do operational testing and evaluation in Chechnya itself?"

"Yes." Lyons watched Olivia eat her tartar, studying her face with its many fine scars. All things considered, a beautiful and brilliant woman; hard, fragile, and completely and utterly, barking-at-the-moon insane.

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because America and Russia have enemies in common. I tell you honestly that my original plan was simply to go. But you don't leave your country that easily."

"Thank you for saying something that finally makes sense."

"Mr. Lyons," she snapped, "do I really need to point out that this is a serious matter?"

"Please do go on."

"I may be wrong. I may be delusional on this..."

Lyons raised an eyebrow slightly, perhaps in surprise that Olivia should characterize herself so clearly. "But," she went on, "I've come to think that what I'm doing as an individual might be a bridge of some sort between America and Russia."

"A bridge?"

"Yes, Mr. Lyons. A bridge, because a weak and hostile Russia, a Russia disintegrating into fifty different pieces, some of them run by Islamist monsters, is not the in best interests of America, Russia, or our world."

"Lady," he said casually, "I don't know who you think you're talking to. But it ain't the Central Bridge Agency."

She watched his face as it smirked into an expression of self-appreciation. "I expect to spend time with Russian Army units," she added.

Lyons now raised his shoulders a bit. So what? Olivia carefully tried to damp down the rage surging up her spine. Over the years, she had come by her low opinion of the CIA honestly. She'd dealt with them, known them, heard the horror stories, and knew they'd long ago ceased to be whatever they once had been. But she had never before met a CIA officer this crushingly stupid. "Perhaps this might open up a pathway for military-to-military assistance and training programs?"

"I doubt it. Strongly. They have nothing we want. Do the Russians know you're making this offer?"

She shook her head. "No, of course not. In fact, I waited until I left America to raise this with a representative of my country."

"Will you tell them what you've done?"

"No."

"Even if they ask you?"

"That depends. This meeting is mine as an American citizen. It is between my country and myself, and you only as a representative of my country. If my offer is accepted..."

"OK," Lyons said, now easing off a bit. "Before we go any farther, let me clarify one thing. You are not, I say again, not, offering to spy for us."

"Absolutely not."

"You are offering to be some sort of 'bridge' between our respective militaries."

"In essence, yes. Between our countries, if you will."

Lyons exhaled. "Do you know what they will do to you if they learn you've done this?"

Her smile, ghostly as it was, startled him. "I can imagine."

"You might come to wish you'd volunteered to be a spy and not an ambassador of international military-to-military goodwill. Spies have certain options and protections that free-lance military do-gooders do not. Especially since this kind of free-lancing can motivate us to haul you in, lock you up, and forget all about you."

"Mr. Lyons. I am serious. Are you?"

At that response, Lyons wondered. Time was, as a younger and more adventurous officer, he would have jumped all over this. But that was then and this was an out-of-control lunatic whom America might well be happy to be rid of. "Look," he said patiently, "I don't think you know what kind of shape the Russian Army is in today. A troop of Boy Scouts could probably knock off a motorized rifle battalion."

"I do know that."

"Living conditions, by our standards, are extremely harsh. This isn't a hunting trip with all the American comforts you can fit into an RV. In Chechnya—the Chechens will eat them alive. They already are. Frankly, I enjoy watching."

His last words made the bile rise in Olivia's throat and she hastily drank some water to cleanse her mouth of the taste. Lyons seemed not to realize that he was speaking of real deaths and real suffering, not only amongst the Russians but also amongst the Chechens. "That may be, but they are going to pay what they have to, in order to restore Federal control."

"Russia is saying this to us very clearly in back-channel contacts. Certainly, no nation other than Georgia will recognize Chechnya as the independent Islamic Republic of Ichkeria or whatever they call themselves this week, let alone lift a finger to help them. But they're going to pay a heavy price."

"Is there any possibility that what I will do for the Russians would be of use to my country?"

"Not in the slightest. You would be of more value to us, although not much, as a good old-fashioned spy."

"I am not offering to spy or behave treacherously in any way whatsoever, but to be some kind of bridge into the future between Russia and America."

"Even so. In the first place, as a bridge, as if we were the Central Bridge Agency..." he seemed pleased with himself for the image, "you would be subject to pressure to transmit back what the Russians want us to know, true or false. In the second place, we can obtain an enormous amount of high-quality information through technical means, without the worry of human sources who can be exposed, compromised, turned around, or pressured. Then there is the third." He looked at Olivia, not unkindly but condescendingly, a condescension that showed clearly in his eyes and voice. "There's you. You're beautiful and you're probably brilliant. You may even be who and what you say you are. But you're also emotionally unstable. You're clearly hung over. May I ask if you're using anything besides the local varietals?"

"I was nearly crippled in an airplane crash a year and a half ago," she answered, suddenly feeling defiant. "I use codeine and morphine for pain and valium because I need them and they have been prescribed."

"Need and prescribed may be. Are you addicted?"

She looked at him directly. "Addicted? No."

"Dependent?"

"Oh, yes. Especially during trans-Atlantic flights and the stress of the present moment."

Lyons took the opening. "Then I have to conclude, as would anyone, that you're not the most stable person we could deal with. Stability is key in this field."

It was Olivia's turn to stare at him, her mouth open. After a second, she realized it, snapped her mouth shut, and drank her wine. Only when she had control of herself did she speak. "Do you know what and how much most people who suffer injuries like mine take?"

"No, I don't. We don't deal with people who have such habits, whether they acquired them in airplane crashes or frat parties. Alcohol doesn't help. Not that I really blame you for drinking before you called us. You're obviously distraught and you should be. You're in way over your head. But it doesn't help your case. Frankly, beautiful, brilliant blondes with emotional problems and drug dependencies are passé when it comes to everything from espionage to serving, in your terminology, as a bridge between two formerly enemy nations."

"So what are you going to do?"

"Well, I'm not going to have you detained, which believe me, we can do here. That would initiate a long, complicated, involved procedure and, frankly, I don't have the time or the patience for it."

"And frankly..." Olivia paused, "I'm not worth the trouble."

"Frankly, that is true."

Olivia said nothing. Then she smiled. "You know," she said slowly, "Two years ago, I began teaching a man to fly. A man very much like you in certain ways. He'd not considered it important to mention to the FAA when he was applying for his student ticket that he was epileptic. Not worth the trouble. To make a short story even shorter, he suddenly seizured while he was landing us. We crashed and burned. I got out. I saw that he was still in the cockpit, unconscious. I went back into that cockpit to pull him out. Would you like to know why I saved the life of someone whose 'not worth the trouble' attitude nearly got us both burned to death?"

"So you could sue him afterwards?"

Olivia smiled again, and for the first time Jay Lyons had sense enough to fear her. "No. I could have sued his estate just as easily. And in fact I did receive a very handsome settlement out of court. I did it because I would not abandon another human being even though he was shit." Lyons blanched. Olivia concluded, "I did it because...I am civilized. Are you?"

"Look, Olivia..."

"Doctor Tolchin."

"Very well," he said, shakily but recovering, "Doctor Tolchin. I'm not the issue here. Neither is civilization. You're the issue. You and all the trouble you have the potential to cause yourself. I'm advising you to go home and forget about this. Go home, sober up, get off the meds, get a life. There are a million things an engineer can do, if in fact you are an engineer. Building bridges to Russia isn't high on anybody's list. The fact is, as you know, the Russians don't matter anymore. Whatever their intentions, they have no capability. They're broke, they're in chaos, their military is a mess. You think you can somehow help reform it or give them something of value that might also be of value to us. You can't. They have nothing to offer us. Nor will they, even if you succeed in whatever it is you think you're going to do."

Then he saw something, perhaps in the set of her shoulders, perhaps in the way she was refusing to look at him, that made him pause. Then: "Look, you really want to go to Chechnya to help the Russians kill the local crazies, knock yourself out. I'm not going to stop you."

Left unsaid: Whatever risk Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin might pose to American national security, she was likely to be a self-liquidating problem. He softened slightly. "If you want, I'll write a memo about this conversation. You won't go there totally forgotten. Perhaps it might be of value someday."

"Please do," Olivia said. Her voice was utterly emotionless.

"Perhaps someone will be in touch."

"Perhaps," she agreed.

Lyons took the lack of inflection in her voice for a sign of submission. "You know, you really ought to eat more. A little raw meat, some pasta, and bitter roasted greens just aren't enough. The strudel here is excellent. They say you can read love letters through the dough, just as the Emperor Franz Josef's cook said you should. And the Café Landtmann's signature coffee is dessert in a glass."

Lyons seemed suddenly pleased to display his knowledge of food. Olivia understood the evasion and consented to endure him prattling about how strudel dough, high-gluten, very elastic, but containing little butter, was laid out on tea towels, spread with filling and rolled, how Gugelhupf, another traditional Austrian breakfast pastry, of yeast dough with kirschwasser—that would be cherry brandy, Doctor Tolchin—raisins and almonds, but sometimes also other nuts and candied fruit, might be related to the Italian panettone.

How uncivilized.

The thought startled her. So did the subsequent realization that there was a fruit knife near her hand, its slight point and serrated edge quite sufficient, although using it effectively would be a messy, noisy process requiring considerable strength.

Lyons finished his Café Landtmann, generously spiked with brandy and coffee liqueur. He stood, offered her his hand, then said, in the manner of a bested foe trying to reassert his superiority, "Take care of yourself, babe."

Olivia rose, so suddenly and forcefully that Lyons drew back reflexively. "You take care of yourself, too. Gelding."

Lyons looked quizzically at her for a moment. Then sneered, threw down some schilling for his lunch, and walked away.

And there it was, she thought with bitter finality. He was what her nation and her government had decided they wanted, and he did not want what she had to offer. Neither did her government or her nation. She was bereft now, and because of it, free.

***

In her room at the Grand Wien, Olivia found a fresh bottle of Riesling, unordered, on her table. The card said, "Compliments of the house." Rather than take a chance that Jay Lyons had decided to play James Bond and drug her, she stowed it unopened in the refrigerator. Then she changed her mind. Grimly, she opened the bottle and poured it down the bathroom sink. Why let Jay Lyons poison anyone else? Then she called Getmanov's cell phone, not knowing if it even worked in Europe. It took forever to get a connection, but he answered within the first two rings. "Getmanov."

"Good afternoon, sir."

A while to get an answer. "Where are you?"

"Vienna. As promised. Where are you?"

"Vienna also, although the satellite is bouncing us God knows where. And how are you?"

"I fear I've dealt with one American too many."

"Could you explain?" he asked, quite aware of what she might mean but not willing to pursue it as he might, to the point where their arrangement and possibly her existence would be undone.

"Let's just say, he proved I am right."

The pain in her voice made Getmanov gasp. He sensed that she had done what he'd suspected she might: try to get through to her country one final time. He knew she deserved of him to say, Perhaps it would be best for all of us concerned if you did not come to Russia. But his country's needs were too great. And he did not want to let her go.

"That is of no interest to either of us anymore," he said quietly. He was not a man who considered his word to be revocable, and he considered himself as giving it now. "If you are honest."

"I am." The timbre of her voice was very true.

"Whatever it was...it is over and of no further consequence?"

"Yes. I'm ready to go now, sir. No reason to wait any longer." Her voice was gentle, a neutral statement of fact, not a demand, too proud even to ask. Then she added, "I believe that it might be important that I go now."

"How quickly can you check out?"

She looked around. "Less than half an hour. Now."

"And you wish to leave immediately for Russia? You would not care to accept the hospitality of our embassy for the few days of the conference?"

"Immediately would be best."

"A driver will be there in half an hour."

"Thank you, you are very kind." Her voice was level, calm, polite, her pain ruthlessly mastered, in her own way as superbly disciplined as one of the stallions for which Vienna was famous. "Tell your driver I will be waiting in the lobby."

Olivia called for help with her luggage. A bellcap arrived, looked at the inventory, then summoned another. They brought down her tonnage. She reclaimed her jewelry from the safe and paid the bill, then settled into an armchair near the main entrance.

The driver of a non-descript car took her back to the airport. They did not go to the main terminal, but to what were clearly diplomatic facilities, where they were met by several Russians. General Getmanov, Olivia recognized instantly. After a moment, Olivia realized the woman with him was his wife.

Whom he had described as young and comely.

The woman with him was manifestly not that.

She may have been when younger, but she was now old enough to be Olivia's mother, had she started young, with a figure that could still only be described as luscious, but also old. Her silvering brown hair was piled atop a plain face with a wise, noble brow, dark, brilliant eyes, and a sensuous mouth.

"You are beautiful," she said involuntarily.

You think you are hardened... Lyudmila Trofimovna thought, seeing the pain in the younger woman's eyes, and her goodness. She took Olivia's hands in hers. "Thank you for that, my dear. We will now forget it. Stress makes people offer unwise compliments as well as unwise insults."

With an effort, Olivia wiped the stark admiration off her face. "Will he be angry at me if you tell him what I said?"

"No, of course not." She looked at her husband, fondly and commandingly. "He speaks very well of you, and he is right to." Lyudmila paused. "I'm here to keep you calm, you know. And there are things we need to do. "

"Let me guess. The first thing is to surrender my passport."

Lyudmila took the measure of the tall woman. "Yes." Her voice was reluctant.

"Madame Getmanova, I have chosen this, so it would be undignified not to submit gracefully."

"Carry your cross, don't drag it," the older woman murmured. Olivia looked at her. "I beg your pardon, I know you are Jewish, I meant no insult. But such is a wise Irish proverb I encountered on one of our previous postings. Yes, we Russians are even to be found in Ireland. The proverb has always held meaning for me."

"As it would to any Russian." She opened her handbag, found her passport, ready for this purpose, and gave it to General Getmanov.

His voice was very quiet. "I am sorry to have to do this."

Olivia spoke to him and his wife alone. "I know. Thank you. It has been a hard few hours. You know me now. Please promise me this. If ever I need an advocate and in your eyes I have earned one, be mine."

He understood that she knew he was endangering himself and his wife for her the same way she had endangered herself for her country. He scanned her eyes, listened to her breathing, seeking any sign of treachery or deceit and found only the weary sorrow of a woman who had done all she could to leave America cleanly in order that she might be clean in Russia.

"I will do so."

It was a three hour flight to Moscow aboard an Aeroflot liner that seemed to have no one aboard who was not supposed to be there, no passenger who was not, clearly, someone else. They were seated in first class, Olivia and Madame Getmanova together. When they'd gotten situated, Olivia suddenly remembered a matter that made her blush.

"I'm sorry I've made you miss the conference," she said haltingly. "I know you would have enjoyed it."

"I might have enjoyed one or two of the personal encounters. But I've never lacked for interesting things to do. I understand you knit."

"Yes."

"Shall we?"

The two women brought out their work, Olivia a beautiful wool yarn of burnt orange for a cable yoke cardigan, Lyudmila a long circular needle set with hundreds of stitches in a blend of the finest, most tender violet blend of silk and cashmere. She had already worked an extravagantly elegant border of several hundred rows and was now knitting in the center of a Shetland-style shawl.

Olivia inspected Lyudmila's work. "Madame, may I see the pattern?" In return, Lyudmila handed Olivia a twenty-page booklet. After several minutes, Olivia gave it back with a slightly stunned expression. "Why don't we just build high-performance aircraft out of timber and fabric, powered by hamsters on treadmills and driven by rubber bands?"

"It'd be easier, wouldn't it? But one's son gives one a daughter for the first time, once only."

It was an answer Olivia could not dispute. "When will be the wedding?"

"As soon as he returns from Chechnya."

Sitting across the aisle, his pistol's outline clear against his jacket, was an extremely handsome young security officer, very Slavic. He glowed at Madame Getmanova, who glowed back. Then he looked at General Getmanov, who glowered. He turned away quickly.

Getmanov smiled to himself. It was nice, he concluded, to know his wife still had it.

# CHAPTER EIGHT, MOSCOW AND TVER, EARLY JUNE 1994: PROOF OF CONCEPT

As their plane approached Moscow, a cascade of thoughts panicked Olivia. The first, most whimsical, was that in Vienna she had become part of the Russian diplomatic pouch, which, however metaphoric, was also no less real than if it were a literal pouch. A strange way to travel, but appropriate for a stateless person. And yet, she wasn't stateless. She'd surrendered her passport but had not renounced her citizenship. Still, she could now disappear for the rest of her life, however long or short that might be, and no one would know where or who or when or why. Except for her father, her only link to her country was now a memo that some CIA jerk, if indeed he was even that, might or might not write, and that even if written, might never be read. Then it came to her.

I no longer exist. My country may never have any idea where I've gone and if it ever does, it may not care or want me back. By every civilized standard, I am gone.

That she trusted General Getmanov and Madame Getmanova and she thought the trust might possibly be mutual was a comfort, not a reassurance. The man was not cruel or vindictive. That was very far from nothing, but it also was only what it was. By refusing to question her about one American too many, Getmanov had been kind. He'd been kinder still to give her what she knew was a promise that he intended to keep. He would be her advocate, should she ever need one, but if—and only if—he thought she had earned one. Still, whatever his consideration and his promises, she'd given him something he could pursue and use against her, should that need arise. So, she realized, could others.

And that was the fount of the panic. She did not know, she could not know, whether a document that might never exist might also someday destroy her. She'd made her choices consciously, willfully, soberly, up to that last crazy, wine-and-drug-induced, irrational attempt to salvage some link to her country. She'd been like a woman desperate to hang onto a lover who'd proven his worthlessness over and over, in the forlorn, febrile hope that this time something might be different. Now, she realized, all she'd done was to endanger herself and possibly others; for the first time, she realized that Getmanov, who'd recruited her, might also bear some responsibility for her actions. And then a final thought assailed her. That document, if it ever came to exist and if the Russians ever got hold of it, could endanger people she hadn't even met yet, people with whom she would work and maybe even...love. She cringed at the thought, rather like a pregnant woman whose bad habits might ruin the life of her child, but who had not cared to think that far ahead.

But panic accomplished nothing, so she decided to do what she must: concentrate totally on the present and whatever it might bring. The decision calmed her. By choosing to live more fully than she could in America, she'd placed herself, perhaps, among the missing, perhaps forever. So be it.

Then she realized that she had yet another decision to make. Inevitably, by someone somewhere, she would be asked a simple question. Have you had any contact with the American government since you left Los Alamos? She flinched internally at how she'd phrased the question to herself. No longer, Your government. The American government. The question would require a simple answer, yes or no. She decided on, No. If discovered, the lie would only complicate things. But she had no choice. Then she would say at every appropriate opportunity what she had told Jay Lyons: that she hoped her work would eventually serve as some sort of bridge between Russia and America because a weak and hostile Russia, a shattered Russia, is not in best interests of America, Russia, or the civilized world.

Then Olivia smiled within. Her fear of the moment was a child's fear. It took children many years to realize that their destructive powers weren't nearly as great as their imaginings would have it. But this was Russia, where the destructive powers were great indeed, and even a childish mistake could be fatal.

The plane landed. A limousine with curtained windows met them on the tarmac and took them away. Her new life began.

Their first stop was a small private bank in a small office building that listed no banks on the lobby board. Under the guidance and the eyes of the Getmanovs, Olivia set up two accounts, one in dollars, the other in rubles. Under their eyes, also, in a vault with a guard and a bank executive of some indeterminate authority, she took out a safe deposit box that she filled with her purchases from New York, her own jewelry, her mother's jewelry. She made her list. Nothing would be sold without her authorization. But still, they seemed no longer truly hers.

The executive certified everything, then gave the documents to General Getmanov.

"These will be in the custody to the FSB during your period of in-processing, along with your other papers. We have not discussed this, and I'm sure you had hopes of getting right to work. However, before that happens, as Americans might put it," he glanced at Lyudmila, "we need to get to know each other a little better."

"I understand," she said, then flinched. Nothing in the box could be sold, nor could she access her accounts until such time as the State deemed her worthy and...the thought almost made her sick...loyal. She was no slave. She was an engineer, soon to be set to work on work of value. But she was also, should they ever choose it, their prisoner. It was all so very un-American.

Their next stop was a small hospital, evidently reserved for significant people. Her in-take form took over an hour to complete, including detailed questions about all medications and contraception, if any. Olivia answered that one with a dry, "Hormonal contraception to regulate my periods. Please make a supply available."

After that, various doctors and assistants put her through a complete physical exam. They took a stress EKG and x-rays of her lower back and pelvis. "Lord, have mercy," murmured the nurse when she saw the films and the scars the color of watered wine that circled her back and pelvis like a skein of razor wire.

"May I dress now?" she asked the nurse politely.

"Yes, Doctor."

Afterwards, Olivia and the Getmanovs shared some tea and cakes in a small room that seemed to have no clear purpose. Then they turned her over to a detachment of FSB in the hall. There were no good-byes, no explanations, no promises of, "We will see each other again _._ " Olivia understood. Military Intelligence had done its job. Now it was subordinate to Federal Security. Unless and until the FSB was satisfied with her, she had neither existence nor hope, and the man who'd recruited her could not now show any further concern for her. She had voluntarily placed herself under Russian control. Anything other than graceful acquiescence would be humiliating, degrading, and dangerous.

Olivia shook his hand, kissed Lyudmila, and did not look back.

"What do you think?" Getmanov asked his wife as they waited for the elevator down.

"She's not an easy woman to like. She is certainly not the kind of American that Americans like. She's not nice. But I think she is who she says she is."

"So do I."

"And if she's not?"

"Then we have some choices, do we not, Lyudya? We can run her and see what she transmits. We can attempt to double her back. Or we can treat her as a gift the CIA or some other agency has given us, because they want someone they can trust to be able to talk to us. Although to be honest, I do not believe they hold us in such high esteem anymore."

"Nor do we esteem them so much anymore," she answered firmly.

"True. They are not what they were. However, I do not believe anyone sent her. She'd have had a different career if ever they thought well enough of her for such an assignment. But they don't. They prefer to spend endlessly for expensive toys. That is not our Olivia."

" _Our_ Olivia? You are fond of her."

"I am not. Yet."

"I believe you," she said.

"Are you?"

"No. Not yet. Perhaps never. But I would trust her to pilot me. Or you." Lyudmila Trofimovna thought for a moment. "And I would trust our civilians and conscripts to her."

"Sooner or later, we shall."

***

Five hours later, Olivia found herself sitting at a garden table on the terrace of a dacha somewhere north of Moscow, watching the sun set over the vast openness of the land. She would judge about a hundred miles north and a touch east, based on the driving time and the position of the sun. She was, in fact, outside of Tver, a city on the Moscow-St. Petersburg road that had once contested with Moscow to be the first city of Russia, and then, between 1931 and 1990, was known as Kalinin. After it had been ravaged by fire in 1763, Catherine the Great had rebuilt Tver in the neoclassical style. German occupation for only two months in 1941 had reduced the city to ashes again and cost the Germans 30,000 lives. She was calm.

The guards were very polite to her, addressing her as Doctor, and using the formal form of address with her, as she did with them. They told her that the next morning, a Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko of the FSB and his assistant would be there to talk with her. Talk. Olivia was not deceived. They were armed. She was not. They had their papers, money, transportation. She had nothing. Her luggage had been delivered with her, but not her laptop, which had apparently been taken away for examination. Also missing were a few other things, such as her pocket knife and even some embroidery snips. So after unpacking and consuming a solitary dinner left for her in the dacha's kitchen, she poured herself a single stiff brandy from the utterly astonishing amount of alcohol in the pantry, laid out her knitting, and began to work. She went to bed just after ten, annoyed but not surprised that the bedroom door could not be locked from within. She slept soundly until 6:30 AM.

The first thing Olivia did the next morning was to search her bedroom and bathroom thoroughly for observation devices. She found a small camera mounted just above a highboy dresser, trained on the bed. Oink, she muttered. After she showered and dressed, she went down and discovered another person in the dacha, an old woman, jolly and warm and kind on the surface, watchful and cold and scarred beneath. She was the housekeeper, she explained as they introduced themselves. Everybody called her Aunt Maria. Olivia did, too. They ate breakfast together, talking quietly about the running of the dacha, which turned out to be a nearly self-contained compound, and then, just before 9:00 AM, Olivia took up her knitting and held herself in readiness for Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko.

He did not arrive at nine. Or ten. Or eleven. By noon, Olivia had made measurable progress on the cardigan and permitted herself a smile. OK. Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko and his assistant would show up when they did, whether it was that afternoon or a week thereafter. She might not like the game that was being played, but that didn't mean she hadn't volunteered to play it.

She had a modest lunch and then explored the dacha. For an American, Olivia had led an extremely austere life at her Los Alamos home, the first she'd ever owned. It had been a beautiful house, open to the high, silent desert that she loved, but she had not even had a TV. By her previous standards, the dacha was luxurious. Provincial but luxurious: not a bad combination, she decided. There was a beautiful old Bechstein grand piano in the drawing room and plenty of music, both in sheets and on discs for the new CD player. Lace curtains on the windows spread the sun in wide patterns across the smoothly polished floor boards, and the richly colored oriental carpets were so beautiful she hesitated to walk on them, even barefoot. She wondered if the carpets and the Bechstein were war booty from some splendid German or Austrian estate. She hoped so.

There was a sizable kitchen garden with an herb bed, asparagus, and sour cherry trees, like those her father had planted on the day of her birth, as well as flower gardens surrounding a rear terrace overlooking a birch-lined creek. An enormous pile of cut logs had been delivered recently, fuel for the masonry stove. They needed splitting and stacking. Would they mind if she split? Her guard, a hard-faced, burly man, stared at her for a second, perhaps wondering if she planned to take the axe back to her room, then granted permission. She could not possibly hide anything as large as an axe, so he was safe from accusation of dereliction in that regard. The thought that she might use it on him, did not occur.

Olivia changed into a pair of boots that the guard had borrowed from the housekeeper and got a glass of lemonade from the kitchen. Then she settled into a pleasant, easy rhythm with the axe and the wood. She set piece after piece of wood up on the chopping block, then split them, her feet spread so that if she missed she would probably not chop off a foot. After each swing, she kicked the pieces aside. Soon her tee shirt was soaked with sweat and she'd visibly reduced the pile of logs. While her sweat was drying in the late afternoon sun, she found a file and sharpened the edge.

"I am done for the day," she told the guard. "Stack if you would, please, and I'll split more tomorrow." He glared. Prisoners did not give orders to guards. Not even high-status American prisoners. Olivia looked at him quizzically for a moment, then realized what she'd done. "I'm sorry." The man made no response, except a small wave of his hand that indicated he considered her apology as misguided as her command. Olivia thought for a moment to ask him if his union forbade him stacking wood, then decided against it. She needed no problems with guards.

So she went into the kitchen. "Aunt Maria, do you have plans for that asparagus in the garden?"

"I don't. Unless we eat it all in the next few days, it will go to waste. I preserve and pickle, but I haven't found a recipe that I like for asparagus."

"Well then," Olivia racked her memory. "If you have the canning jars and some white vinegar, there's tarragon in the garden. Do you have garlic?"

"Of course, child. Also vinegars, many kinds, and canning jars. Juniper berries, too."

"An embarrassment of riches. I have a thought about what we might do with that asparagus."

Later in the kitchen, surrounded by canning jars full of asparagus, spiked with tarragon, garlic, juniper berries and shallots, filled with a blend of white vinegar and white wine vinegar, a recipe that Aunt Maria hadn't thought of, the two women snacked on cold _zakuski_ , Russian appetizers, and colder vodka. After they were done, Olivia helped her stack the dishes in the sink, clumsily dropping the glasses. She cursed under her breath, soft and mild. "I beg your pardon. I don't normally drink so much." Swiftly and competently, she gathered up the large shards for the garbage with her bare hands, leaving the housekeeper nothing to do but get the broom and dustpan for the smaller fragments.

Later that night, in her bathroom, she slipped a shard of glass out of her pocket. It was not large, but it would do what she might need it to do, in case only one way out remained to her. Carefully, she wrapped it in tissue, then put it inside her wallet.

The next morning there was still no Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko. Not at nine, not at ten, not at all. Olivia knit until noon, then went out and split more wood. This time, the burly, hard-faced guard joined her in stacking. Olivia said nothing until he spoke. "Splitting is man's work."

"When I lived in the high desert, it was all my work—including hunting."

"You have no man, Doctor?"

As a pick-up line, it wasn't even remotely amusing. But it wasn't a pick-up line. Prison guards do not have sex with prisoners unless... Olivia stared at the guard until he had the decency to blush. After several long seconds, she tossed the axe to him. She took her lemonade down the hill to the creek that was one of the few terrain features she could see, down to the birches with their slender white limbs and trembling green leaves. If anyone wanted her, they would know where to find her. She wondered what kind of perimeter security the place might have. She contemplated the problem presented by a prison without walls. Perhaps she could just walk off. But where would she go? And how far would she get, an American in Russia with nothing but the clothes on her body and a shard of sharpened glass for some final act of submission or defiance, should it come to that? Russia had offered her freedom to create. It might still keep that promise. But she began to realize, it was a promise Russians could break at their leisure, forever or as often as they wanted, for any reason or for none, and she had absolutely no say in the matter. Physical freedom had never been an overt part of the bargain. Hello, Russia.

She came back at dinner time, ate, knit until dark, then took a single glass of wine out onto the terrace and drank it beneath the ripening moon. She watched the tall grasses waving gently in the night breeze, listened to the small sounds of scurrying animals and the beat of the wings of hunting birds in the night air. Then she went to bed, allowing herself a momentary pleasant thought. She knew how to keep busy. She knew how to do things. She knew how to live.

***

Behind the closed doors of the dacha's small library the next morning, FSB Lieutenant Colonel Vladislav Stepanovich Marianenko pondered. He'd been receiving telephone reports on Olivia's behavior from Aunt Maria and the guards. They had found Olivia, so far, both dignified and purposeful. That was positive, insofar as it spoke of a self-disciplined woman. It was not so positive, insofar as it spoke of someone who might have been trained against this eventuality. Still, there was no need to make a decision on that yet. Not before that which he was about to begin, was completed. And he preferred that the decision, when made, be the correct one.

By ethnicity, Marianenko was a Ukrainian who had pledged his allegiance to Russia as heir to the Soviet Union when Boris Yeltsin dissolved it. Marianenko understood that while Ukrainians might enjoy some period of intoxicating freedom, a nasty hangover would follow, then an even nastier sobriety. They would then proceed to fuck up the place as badly as the Russians had done, since they had no other experience to guide them and all those preposterous American-provided economic and political advisers and their models and theories would simply accelerate the implosion. He preferred to stay with Russia. And he had been right to do so, as a matter of self-interest and common sense, and because he understood how little the hare-brained schemes of Americans related to Russian or Ukrainian realities. In the long run, Russia would survive their benevolence better than they were likely to. In any event, Ukraine was not about to invade Russia. If someday Russia regained Ukraine, he wouldn't object.

Still, the matter at hand concerned Americans, not Ukrainians. Marianenko did not dislike Americans, so long as they stayed in their place. Their place was definitely not the Ukraine. Nor was it Russia, although for the present he was prepared to defer judgment in one case.

Marianenko glanced at the two women standing before him, then nodded to one, an FSB major in civilian clothing with the extreme elegance of a rapier, an elegance that was as much internal as external. Irina Borisovna Suslova nodded back, then turned to the housekeeper. "You say she picked up the glass, Comrade. How?"

"Barehanded, Comrade Major."

"What happened to the pieces?"

"She put them in the garbage herself."

"Did you see her do that?"

"No. I had gone to the pantry for a broom and dustpan."

Suslova looked at her strangely. "Did you later check to see if all the pieces were there?"

Both the housekeeper and Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko stared at Suslova. "No Comrade," the housekeeper whispered, now worried. She understood that Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko bore no responsibility for the evil memories he provoked in her and for which she feared and hated him. But Major Suslova, invariably civilized, quiet, courteous—always addressing her as Comrade, as if she had never done time in the camps, where prisoners were addressed as Citizen—terrified her well beyond hate. All dense bone, sinew and compact, whipcord muscle, fine ivory skin, green, slanting Tartar eyes, and deep chestnut hair. She fused exotic beauty with obvious physical strength, an equally obvious capacity for extreme violence, and a complete self-assurance that could be accepted in a man but was deeply disturbing in a woman. "Should I have?"

"Yes, although it is perhaps understandable that you didn't, given the unusual nature of the guest," Major Suslova said gently. "Tell me, what's happened to the rubbish?"

"It was collected this morning," the housekeeper said timidly.

"In the future, Comrade, bear in mind that this woman regards the world as her toolbox, and that we have not yet fully verified her loyalties and intentions. Now, please, take a few minutes to rest and refresh yourself before going back on duty."

She waited until Aunt Maria had left before making tea for Marianenko and herself.

"What you mean is that routine precautions are useless," he said calmly.

"We know what she's done in the past when she sets her mind to it. Intellectually, physically—morally."

"Do we then search her and her room, Major?" He had known Suslova a long time, since Afghanistan, and trusted her absolutely. Debriefing defectors was not her normal line of work. By career choice and assignment, she worked at the nexus between transnational crime and international terrorism, with a particular focus on trying to keep old Soviet nuclear, chemical and biological materials off the black or other markets. But then, debriefing defectors was no one's normal line of work anymore. He himself had not done it in years. Suslova was a skilled interrogator in her own right, in addition to her natural curiosity about the woman, and an additional, personal curiosity she'd explained to him when she requested this assignment. He was very glad to have her as his assistant. The nature of her additional curiosity, after the interrogation period had ended, would not concern him.

"We could. Of course, while we're at it, we'd have to remove the mirrors in the bedroom and bathroom. They're glass. So are the windows. And I don't think we've inventoried the rocks down at the creek, which is deep enough for drowning if you choose to lie face down. We took her embroidery snips from her, but we left the circular needles, some of which are long enough to use as a garrote. Straight needles, even if they are wood or plastic, will get it done if you have a mind to use them so."

"Right," he replied. "We might have avoided all this by simply confining her in the Lubyanka. Comfortably, of course. Of course, that would be no way to elicit her fullest cooperation. Why do you think she would want glass?"

"Two reasons. Perhaps to use against one of us. More likely, a personal way out, should it come to that. She can go nowhere without money and papers. Not to mention that her knowledge of Russian is totally inadequate to the task of escape and evasion."

"As though she had anywhere to go. So if she changes her mind, her only real option is suicide," Marianenko said.

"I am assuming so. Of course, I have broken glasses myself, and also picked up the pieces barehanded. It is not difficult, even drunk."

"It does not seem like her to drink so much, let alone of vodka, and she knows she is being evaluated and observed. Very well. Let's observe her a bit more. Join us for breakfast, then. Once we begin, I want you behind the one-way window."

"Armed?"

"Yes. In an emergency, how long would it take you to unlock the glass and fire?"

"A few seconds. I believe for now you should have a guard in the room."

"Unarmed, in case she panics," Marianenko agreed. They both knew how quickly panicked people could move.

"Make sure there's enough space between you that you can get clear if she does panic and go for you," Suslova said. "I want a clear shot if I absolutely have to take it."

"I do not think it will come to that, but you're right to grant her qualities. None of us have dealt with anyone remotely like this. A bought defector would be easier. You're a woman, so tell me. How much should I pressure her?"

"I think you can pressure her quite a lot, so long as you maintain your dignity."

"And hers."

"Yes. Nothing sexual or physical humiliation. As for verbal, we shall see. Well then." Suslova shrugged. "Let the games begin."

***

If Olivia was surprised to see Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko and Major Suslova at breakfast later that morning, she showed no trace of it. Very politely, he rose and introduced himself. After a second, she realized that she was supposed to offer him her hand and did so. "Good morning, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

That elicited a reaction, her pale brows arching upwards. "Tolchin, Lieutenant Colonel."

"Actually, your father's name was Tolchinsky, which he Anglicized. So, Tolchinskaya it is." He watched her blink, a little startled by his polite brusqueness, before he turned. "Please meet my assistant, Major Suslova."

He watched them shake hands, taking each other's measure, watched Doctor Tolchinskaya's eyes flicker over Suslova's muscular figure, not at all deceived by her linen blouse, with its embroidery and cutwork. Olivia's eyes lingered on Suslova's cabled forearms beneath the elegant, belled lace cuffs, noting the way the blouse flowed over her pistol in front of her left hip. She took in her hair, cropped so short the natural waves were barely in evidence, a severity that should have been masculine but was in fact elegantly feminine. "My pleasure, Major."

"And mine, Doctor."

"Please," Marianenko said, "Sit down."

Olivia did as she was told, reached for tea. "Is it usually so hot so early in the year?"

"The weather seems to be changing. When I was younger, I remember it colder," Suslova said. "Of course, I grew up mostly in the Baltics and Siberia. A bit further north than here."

"I would guess I am about five hundred kilometers from Leningrad."

The two officers exchanged a wry look. "Very good. Petersburg, now. You have never been to what is still, after all it has suffered, our Venice. Would you like to go?"

"Later, perhaps. For now, there is much to be done."

"In due time, all will be done, Doctor. In due time," Marianenko said smoothly.

"Of course."

After breakfast, Olivia followed Marianenko into an office that had been previously locked, trailed by the hard-faced guard who had asked her if she had a man. The room held a desk and three chairs at one end. At the other was a small table with two facing chairs, a laptop and some other office items atop it, and behind it a large opaque window, cut into an interior wall. It was the only thing in the room, in the whole dacha, that seemed out of place. Then she realized what it was and wondered why they hadn't installed an elegant two-way mirror instead of a police standard-issue one-way window. Perhaps to let the dacha's visitors know they were being watched. Marianenko pointed to her chair, facing the opaque window. She sat down. He took his place, the window behind him. Feeling suddenly impish, Olivia looked directly into the mirror and smiled. It was, after all, good to be getting started at last. Suslova could not help smiling back, even if the smiles were unprofessional and hers would not be seen. She had already set up her laptop; the link to Marianenko's was open. It was only necessary to lay her pistol out beside it and check the latch on the window. The latter was easily operated. She chambered a round in the former and settled in.

***

A week later, an endless week of endless sessions later, Olivia quietly placed her hands on the table. She was, as they'd intended, very tired. But she'd also been victorious in two different matters. She'd lied successfully in response to the one question that required a lie. And she was running again. Prolonged sitting tightened her muscles and ligaments; only hard exercise could ease them. Stretching had its uses, but did not begin to alleviate the emotional stress. Hiking was unavailable. So she decided to move on to the next part of her physical rehab. She laid out a hundred meter circular course. At first, she barely hobbled. A week later, she couldn't go very far but she could run herself into exhaustion. Since that was what the moment required, she decided that constituted victory. Marianenko and Suslova, who'd watched her progress, understood. They also understood that keeping her sitting, itself a form of torture, produced no changes in her outward demeanor, gathered no information they couldn't get without depending upon the pain she carried within. So they let her run.

But not today. To Olivia, this latest session was no more a hostile interrogation than the others had been, no more hostile than her polygraph back in Los Alamos. But it was, as always, high-stakes and high-pressure and as always, under observation from behind the opaque window. And she could not escape the sense, at once ominous and happy, that they were approaching some kind of resolution. That belief made her a bit more willing to push.

Olivia looked Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko in his eyes. He was a big, strong, well-proportioned man who carried himself as if he was capable of instant, no-warning violence. She did not doubt he was. He reminded her a great deal of General Getmanov, although without that man's intellectual sophistication. He was neither stupid nor ignorant nor coarse, and both his Russian and English were beautiful, educated, fluid. Perhaps it was just that he'd never traveled. And travel, she'd thought with some amusement when she'd first asked him where he'd been, is so broadening. Marianenko had not answered that question and so she did not ask another. Unlike some interrogators, who sometimes discussed aspects of their own lives as a means of building rapport, he hid himself completely. He was the man inside the uniform, nothing more.

"Russia is preparing to go into Chechnya with main force units," she said wearily, in response to some extraneous question she'd been asked twenty times before. "That was obvious to anybody in America who bothered to read the more serious newspapers, what there are left of them. I don't think anything has changed. Russian soldiers are no doubt already dying there. We've wasted a week when I could have been doing my job."

Behind the window, Major Suslova caught the change in tone. Always before, Doctor Tolchinskaya had been graciously compliant. The dignity was still there, but the compliance was gone. She felt the hair prickling on the back of her neck. After the first day, the guard had been outside the door, not in the room with them; two days later, that measure had been deemed unnecessary. This was different. Tolchinskaya was now attempting to direct the interrogation. She was forcing things. She was demanding her work. She was demanding freedom. At least, freedom sufficient to do her work.

"Doctor," Marianenko said, looking down at his laptop and casually typing. "Please do not remind me why you're here. Please let me remind you that you have no job, no responsibilities, nor much of anything else, until the State decides that you do."

Suslova's eyes flicked down to the laptop screen, to the question that Marianenko had asked.

Press her?

Yes. She hit the send key, then returned to watching Olivia. The woman remained in composed self-control, but once this defiance started, it could well lead to panic or sudden physical assault. Hands kill. Keep your hands visible, Doctor. Suslova's eyes kept flicking back and forth between Olivia, still sitting tall and powerful, and the screen. Face. Screen. Hands. So had it gone for a week. But now it was time for more.

"I stand by my statement, Colonel. Both parts. Your country is at war. And you need me."

"Old Russian proverb, Doctor. 'The cemeteries are filled with indispensable men.' And women, one might add. If being a Russian means anything, it means knowing how to do without."

"Even when you don't have to?"

"Sometimes, especially then." He paused. Then he raised the one matter still standing between Olivia and her freedom and her task. She'd waited for it for a week and when the question came, she responded exactly and automatically as planned.

"Doctor Tolchinskaya, we still have not discussed your work at Los Alamos."

"Nor will we." The words were shocking, even more so when combined with the utterly calm hardness of her voice and bearing, and the complete lack of both compliance and defiance. It was a statement of fact that required no further elaboration.

"I'm afraid you do not understand," said Marianenko, shifting to equal hardness. "You are a bought defector and a traitor, the scum of the world. We can have you imprisoned, we can have you tortured until you tell us anything we want, we can shoot you..."

"I know and acknowledge your power over me," she answered in words that she'd never rehearsed but came as though she had. "But I was not imported for your base pleasures." Her voice was quieter now, but no more yielding. "If you enjoy inflicting suffering, I am sure there are many Russians with whom you may amuse yourself." A shot in the dark, but she saw it hit home. There was the briefest flicker of anger in his eyes, a defensive I am not that kind. Then he went opaque again, as blank as the window behind him. But he'd shown Olivia something she'd sensed with Getmanov: the ability to do terrible things, the living with the fact that he had, but neither savagery nor cruelty. Even in the security services, they're not all alike.

Press back. It's time.

"I think, Colonel, that there are some things you should understand. Since the United States and the Russian Federation are not at war or in any way enemies, I am not a traitor according to the only definition that matters to me—the one written into the Constitution of the United States by men who were only too aware of how the charge of treason could be expanded to include virtually anything. Before I left, I memorized that definition. It comforts me. Would you care to hear it?"

"No. American law has no relevance here."

"It is relevant to me because I am an American, not a Russian or a Russian wannabe."

"Wannabe?"

Olivia smiled. "It's an American thing."

"Do you wish to make any more pronouncements?"

"Yes," she answered firmly. "I am not a traitor. Nor am I bought. No money has changed hands and I expect to earn my salary. As for being scum, I'll ignore that as merely a tactical move because we both know I am not. But if I were, then your country needs all the scum it can get."

For the first time, Marianenko smiled at her. "Well played, Doctor. But it does not change the requirement to discuss your work at Los Alamos."

Press back, she thought. "If you insist, as I suppose you must," said Olivia. "May I tell you a brief story?"

"Related to the matter under discussion?"

"Absolutely. After the recent Gulf War, the Pentagon's press secretary was asked at a news conference about American use of ALCMs..."

"ALCMs?"

"Air-Launched Cruise Missiles. He replied that it was Pentagon policy not to discuss them. When asked to explain why he couldn't discuss it, he replied, 'That would be discussing it.'"

"Your point?"

"I shall not be so strict. I'll be happy to tell you why I won't discuss it. I have three reasons. First, you would not understand it. You would need to bring in some very high-quality officers from your Line X, your technical directorate. You are not Line X. I believe, meaning no disrespect, you have scant scientific or technical background at all."

"How do you know that?"

"Over the last few days, discussing other issues, I've said some things that any technical specialist would have questioned. You accepted them. Then, when I slipped contradictions into my responses to you, you accepted them without even batting an eyelash, although a technical specialist who reads the record will easily see what I did."

"That is a very good point. Others will read my transcripts and reports. An interrogator is only the first link in a long chain of intelligence analysis."

"I know. However, I still contend that you don't know bopkess about technology."

" _Bopkess?"_

"Yiddish for goat shit."

Marianenko laughed. "Yiddish is not a language that will make you many friends in this country. However, I would not dispute your characterization."

Olivia smiled in acknowledgement, then went on. "Shall I tell you my other reasons?"

"You appear to have composed a list. Very well."

"Second." She said the word with emphasis. "What I did at Los Alamos was designed back in the 1980s to help bankrupt you. But it was all a game. President Reagan had no more intention of building Star Wars than of returning to the Democratic Party."

"Reagan was a Democrat once?"

"You've heard of them?"

"Word leaks out. That your Evil Emperor had once been a liberal—that I did not know."

"So this is an informative session, after all."

"In some ways. Go on."

"The purpose of Star Wars was to force you, by which I mean the Soviet Union, to spend money and use technical talent you couldn't afford and didn't possess in countering his imaginary system. He understood that these were your greatest weaknesses—your tottering economy and your desperate shortage of people like me. He was right. We who worked on Star Wars understood that success was neither expected nor sought. That's why I left. That's why so many others stayed on. For an easy sinecure. Unfortunately, the missile defense program that helped bankrupt you is now helping to bankrupt us, along with the rest of our lunatic military spending. As for whatever use you might make of such shards of technical information as I might provide...Comrade, you don't need it. Your immediate needs are so great that no distractions should be tolerated."

"Continue," he said tautly.

"This brings me to my third reason. Strategic sensors are not my primary field. My strength is your greatest immediate need, which is tactical sensors for urban combat. If you want a whore on whom to waste money, I am sure there are thousands in what's left of your own military-industrial complex. But you imported me because I am a master, not a mercenary."

Marianenko nodded.

"As I've stated once," Olivia went on, "I now state again. I am neither a bought defector nor by any moral or American legal definition a traitor, so I shall not behave as if I carry such shame in my soul. I came here to help you fight a common enemy. If you wish my whole-hearted cooperation, you will respect that and treat me as an ally and a human being of considerable value, not a slave. In short, if you, unlike my previous employers, value technical success and the military victories that success can enable, you will behave accordingly and let me get started."

As Olivia spoke, Major Suslova watched the tension drain completely out of her. Back down. She hit Send, then laid her hand on her pistol. She knew that feeling of extreme relaxation and what it could mean. It could mean a beginning or an end.

Marianenko stared at Olivia for a long time, and once again, as she had with General Getmanov, Olivia returned his gaze without fear or challenge, only calm patience. After a few seconds, Marianenko looked away. He had difficulty bearing her hard blue eyes, frank and open as the steppes, and it was not a pleasant sensation. "Give me your requirements to get started."

Graciously averting her eyes, Olivia rose slowly, her body making sounds as it adjusted. "Sitting for prolonged periods is painful. Shall we move this conversation to the terrace?"

Her powerful instinct for mastery, suddenly revealed, startled Marianenko. She had done something he'd never experienced before or even imagined possible. The subject had taken over the interrogation. His interrogation. But Olivia was not the usual subject. And she was right. Russia's need for her was great and growing. This was no time for mere personal assertion.

He closed the cover of his laptop. They went out to a garden table with chairs. Olivia found herself surrounded by the scent of blooming roses, overlooking the birch trees that lined the creek, their green leaves shimmering in the brilliant sun. The year was approaching its longest day. From somewhere, the wind brought her the smoky scent of burning peat; far off on the horizon, she could see a faint smudge, perhaps from the lightning strikes of the night before. Ripening grass—hay soon to be ready for baling—rippled in the wind. But the horizon was blue-grey with rain clouds that almost obscured the smoke and the coming rain would save the hay. This was Russia as she'd imagined it, only not so far away.

Normally, she would have prepared her requirements on a computer spreadsheet, along with a cost estimate of each line item. But the Russians had her laptop, had undoubtedly taken it apart and were still scrutinizing it. She also had no idea what costs were in Russia, or where many items might be obtained. But she had to begin somewhere.

"Colonel, if I can't make use of a computer, mine or somebody's, I'll need paper and pencil."

Marianenko called to a guard within. The items were brought.

"May I ask you to work with me? I know what I need. I don't know how to express it in ways that your government could respond to quickly."

They went to work. Olivia wrote with a fine, even hand, mostly printed, with a few cursive flourishes. Lists of personnel, technical and administrative. Lists of technical equipment. Lists of manufacturing requirements. Marianenko guided her. When he needed to make changes in vocabulary or format, she paced restlessly. At last, she thought, I've got my own lab. But the thought held no pleasure; the cost had been too high. Perhaps someday that particular pleasure would come. But not today, although the pleasure of ending a weeklong interrogation was beginning to sink in. I've got my own lab and I'm free. My own lab in Russia and I'm free...in Russia.

Irony, she concluded, can be pretty ironic.

Olivia heard footsteps on the terrace behind her, one set heavy, the other not. It was Major Suslova, followed by the housekeeper, bearing a tray with glasses and a bottle of wine. Also some piroshky, the asparagus she had pickled more than a week ago, with some mayonnaise. Olivia felt her body straighten in a gesture of instinctive respect.

"That is unnecessary," Suslova said. "But appreciated." She wore a very true carnation scent, its spice enriched by a creamy sweetness of vanilla and brown sugar, barely noticeable except for the quality they added. She took Olivia's arm and moved her a few meters away from the table where Marianenko scribbled and edited.

"I was raised with some very antique manners," Olivia said.

"And emotions."

"Yes."

"I know. It is a lovely courtesy, sitting or standing a bit straighter when another approaches. Emotions can be courtesies, too. Tell me, do you have any?"

"Many and strong."

"They are not obvious."

"You're not the first person to say so. But I find that there's little point in advertising my emotions."

"Except you cannot hide the sorrow."

She shrugged. "I did not make this decision lightly."

"Or without regret."

"Or without regret," she agreed. "Nevertheless, it was, is, and will be a permanent decision. Believing anything else would be lunatic."

"And yet you're not afraid."

"Oh, I am. I never really expected to be seriously abused here. But in such conditions, who can be sure?"

"We had no reason to abuse you, only to stress you for a while. What goes on elsewhere is sometimes something else." And then, suddenly, "You're armed." Suslova's statement did not admit contradiction.

"How do you know?"

"You've acted as though you have an exit, should you need one. A piece of glass, I believe. Give it to me, please. And be slow."

_Hands kill._ Olivia understood that axiom and slowly withdrew the fragment of glass from her wallet. About six centimeters long, with a point. It was the edge that interested Suslova, ground with ridiculously unnecessary care for the sheer pleasure of the craftsmanship into something a surgeon would appreciate. "For whom?"

"For myself, because I shall never become a traitor, neither in one leap nor by centimeters. I have come this far for the best of reasons. I will go no farther for the worst."

Marianenko had said nothing since Suslova's arrival. Now he entered the conversation. "Do you still regard yourself as an American citizen?"

"Of course."

"Do you know what your government will do to you if you ever return to America?"

"Oh, yes, solitary confinement for years and years, if I'm lucky. Maybe one of our cable TV channels will make a movie about me. I wonder who will play me."

"And yet despite that, you still regard yourself as an American and expect us to trust you with our soldiers and our future."

"Yes. In no small part because I shall never become a traitor to anyone. Look, I am here on my own moral authority as an American citizen. There are things our nations should do together. I hope that what I have done will in time make it possible. I hope to become a bridge over which Americans and Russians may pass. Maybe someday," she smiled briefly, "they'll award me the Order of Reagan."

"Is there such a decoration?" Suslova asked, perplexed.

"No," Marianenko interrupted. "And if there were, it would not be given for international friendship and mutual understanding."

"He understood the Soviet Union very well."

"But he did not understand what would happen after his enemy vanished. What we and the world would have to live with. That is not full understanding. Come to the table, if you would."

Marianenko opened the bottle of wine, poured for them all; Suslova quite deliberately took a healthy swallow. "It's not drugged."

"What it is, is quite a good Georgian white," Marianenko said. "Tell me what you felt, saying these things to my major."

"Surprise."

"Yes, by our standards, you are being very open." His eyes slipped away from her face to Suslova's, handing her back control.

Olivia watched their silent interaction. They had a closeness she had not expected between a Russian man and a woman who were clearly not lovers. "I do not normally talk that way at—back in America."

"No, I imagine not," Suslova agreed.

"Colonel Marianenko is not a technical person. Are you?"

"Not at all."

"So what is your interest in me?"

"My brother commands 22 Brigade, which is a Spetsnaz unit, in the Caucasus and has a number of groups, what your Special Forces might call teams, already in Chechnya. He has a long-standing interest in your field that has intensified greatly of late. When I mentioned to him that an American was coming to help us, he immediately volunteered to host you for experimental purposes. It would be far more useful to you to start out with our elite forces."

"True. They would take better care of my work."

"True. Our conscripts will benefit as soon as they are able to handle it. But I am still uncertain of one thing. What if your work someday requires you to work against the interests of your own country?"

"I will not."

"Someday you may have no choice," Marianenko interjected.

"There are a great many ways to take one's life. It requires only a little imagination and less resolve than you know I have."

"She is being realistic, Comrade Colonel," Suslova added. "Trying to keep someone alive who genuinely wants to die is almost impossible, especially if you also expect them to do anything worthwhile." She turned to Olivia. "How far do your loyalties to America go?"

"Is Russia going to invade Alaska?"

Suslova laughed with genuine delight. "No, I think not."

"Then I see no real conflict between my American loyalties and the new loyalties I am offering you."

Then Marianenko stood above Olivia. "Right now, Doctor Tolchinskaya, fair chance. One more time. We accept that you will neither divulge your previous work nor work against your nation. But...are you an intelligence officer in any of your nation's services, or of any other's? Because if you are, say so now and you will be dealt with as a professional. If it is later learned that you are, we will deal with you as," he paused, "as scum of the world, entitled to nothing." Marianenko's voice was pure silk velvet, in its own way as chilling as Suslova's rapier bearing and the heavy pistol that printed clearly beneath her embroidered blouse.

"Colonel, I am not an officer nor an operative in any American or other military or intelligence service."

Marianenko and Suslova exchanged glances. It was time for the final test.

"Doctor Tolchinskaya," Marianenko said calmly. "I believe you. However, I am sorry to say, my superiors do not. They read my reports. We have spoken several times since your in-processing began. They are not satisfied. I have been directed to begin again, in order to determine to their satisfaction whether you are in fact trustworthy."

For a moment, Olivia felt the same frustrated, resentful rage she always had, whenever a worthwhile project she'd worked on was cancelled, delayed, or deliberately distorted as a prelude to cancellation. Then the rage turned to dread. This was not the United States, where she could always walk away, seek work elsewhere, give up and move on if she chose. This was Russia. They could keep her here literally for the rest of her life, asking the same questions over and over. Had some corrupt potentate of some competing Russian project learned of her and used his influence to wreck her work before it even started? In the end, was it the same game here as in America? If it was, she had no chance. Or perhaps Marianenko was simply playing one last gambit. Whatever the truth, it was time to find out.

"Colonel, as I have said before, I now say again. I am neither a bought defector nor a whore, neither a slave nor an intelligence officer, and I do not betray people. Not Americans, not Russians, not there and not here. If you or your superiors, assuming your superiors have in fact made this decision, are so obsessed with the possibility of some future betrayal at some future date, so obsessed that they're willing to destroy this before it starts, that's your problem. I'm not going anywhere. But if what you want from me is betrayal, giving you things you don't need and can't use instead of what I offer in defense of our mutual civilization, then the Major here or you can join me in the tree line and we can end it decently now because there is no point in going on."

Olivia's voice was very calm, but there was no hiding her passion. Suslova had no trouble holding her gaze, but she was surprised to see Marianenko watching her closely, and, when Olivia turned to him, bear her gaze calmly and with dignity. At last he nodded.

Chastened by their grace and embarrassed by her own intensity, Olivia lowered her eyes for the first time in that week and filled her wine glass. "If you will please excuse me, I will be in the trees, down by the creek. A birch grove is as good a place as any to die. We may proceed in any way you wish."

"Of course," Marianenko said quietly. "Please do nothing rash."

"Have I any need to?"

"No. Not anymore."

Sometime later, Suslova joined her in the cool, damp shade of the birches, noting how full the wine glass still was, and the raw pride that had the American on her feet and facing her directly. "Major."

"Doctor." Suslova studied her thoughtfully. Despite the fear in Tolchinskaya's level blue eyes, as well as a profound distaste for the idea of being killed from behind, she could see no regret for anything said or done. And in that was a freedom Suslova recognized and understood. "Should I ever have to do anything—final—with you, I will do it to your face." She handed Olivia back her embroidery snips and pocket knife.

"Thank you."

"I truly believe you will not need to use it on yourself so I threw away that fragment of glass. You put a fine edge on it. What did you use?"

"A bit of granite down here the night before you arrived. Standard engineer thinking. How can I use what I have to make something I do not have and need? May I make an observation and ask a question?"

"Proceed."

"In America, I often went about armed for reasons of personal security. You strike me as a woman who is always armed. For the same reason?"

"In part. My regular work makes real and ugly enemies. Also, the Afghans made an impression upon me. My brother, my other brother, was taken alive by the mujahidin. My husband was more fortunate. He died quickly. I will never be taken alive by anyone."

"I understand."

"Also, when dealing with you, precautions are reasonable. I would take it hard indeed if you killed my Colonel."

"You have deep history together, I think."

"Afghanistan. One very bad night east of Khost. I was seven months pregnant and newly widowed—my husband was an Airborne officer killed in a helicopter shoot down. One of your Stingers, I believe. No regrets or apologies necessary. Colonel Marianenko and I found ourselves in an overrun situation. I was a junior captain and a woman, and I rode roughshod over everyone but then Major Marianenko to organize and co-ordinate the defense. It was as desperate a thing as I ever hope to experience, much less get people through alive, and it was Marianenko who backed me for my Hero of the Soviet Union."

"That is, I believe, a decoration equivalent to the American Medal of Honor."

"If that is your highest personal decoration, you are correct."

"I understand."

"Yes, I believe you do. But as they say in America, 'Enough about me.' We will be moving you back south to Moscow at the end of the week. You need to set up a lab and find housing. Also, it is time to provide you with a propiska and passbook."

"Propiska?"

"An internal passport. Such things are, I believe, not used in the United States. The passbook will, among other things, grant you admittance to our better shops."

"And my weapon?"

"In due time, but you may be sure that none of us have forgotten about that."

"Myself least of all."

"If you're willing to go into Chechnya when you don't have to and take on the ugly weight of our Caucasian history, believe me, you will have your personal weapon. I believe you've been running this week."

"In very small circles."

"So the guards tell me. The wet shorts and shoes and the sweat are adequate evidence of how much one can accomplish while running in very small circles. I used to cover some country. Would you like to run together? In somewhat larger circles?"

"I would be ashamed for you to see me as I run now."

Irina Borisovna looked at her. "Doctor, like you, I have old injuries, so I am not as fast as you might think. I would be honored if you would accept my offer."

Olivia looked at her. They had taken each other's measure and were well pleased with what they had found in each other, having long ago found it within themselves. "Then Major, I am honored to accept."

"Shall we make it a custom we continue in Moscow?"

"Let's run."

***

Olivia broke down on every single run that first brutal month of working out with Suslova, dreadful, weeping rages of pain and frustration. Suslova said nothing at such times, rarely even looked at her—for she had stripped Olivia of her defenses, laying her wounds raw and open—just quietly laid a hand on her shoulder, letting her purge the bitterness from her soul. Then, when Olivia was able to, they would continue. But there came a day when Olivia didn't break down, not because she had inured herself to the pain and the frustration, but because she was actually able to do what Suslova had set her to. Which was what she had set herself to do. The exhausted, startled look she gave Suslova on that day was pure triumph, exultant and incandescent.

# CHAPTER NINE, MOSCOW, JUNE AND SEPTEMBER 1994: BORODKIN, SUSLOVA

Leonid Pavlovich Borodkin had become a Line X officer in the usual manner. He'd drifted in. He had gotten most of the way through to his Ph.D. in engineering, then collapsed. After a modest recovery, he started out as an honest engineer wanting to do something worthwhile, not quite talented or connected enough to find his way into the important design bureaux or industries, but increasingly disgusted by the shoddy work of so much of late Soviet industry. So he opted for the government, and had come to spend his days in a graceless office with graceless colleagues. His primary task was to analyze American technology and what his government might steal and from whom. It was not a bad job, and in some ways he'd come to appreciate its stolidity. As the Soviet Union crumbled and "privatization" of industries began, he'd thought of jumping to the new private sector. But he was neither a violent nor a crude man and the thuggishness of so many of the new enterprises deterred him. Perhaps later on, when things settled down. For now, he was paid.

He also had hobbies to consider. He ran on occasion and intended to participate in a marathon, should Moscow ever sponsor one. He was also good with languages. English had always been a particular passion; he'd gotten his current job mostly because of his excellent command of technical English. He'd also mentioned, with some pride, his grasp of English literature, especially nineteenth century novels. Perhaps his superiors might keep that in mind, should the need for someone cultured as well as competent ever arise. He did not mention, to them or anyone else, the night he gave up all literature after encountering a Dickens character, or maybe Hawthorne, who was described as "always going to go but never going." It seemed too much a personal indictment to endure from mere fiction. Of late, he'd tried once or twice to get back into it, but found that his conversational English was taking on some of the characteristics of nineteenth century bourgeois discourse. That might get him looked at strangely someday, so he had to be careful. Best not to read anymore.

Leonid Pavlovich Borodkin was neither happy nor unhappy. Thirty-six, unmarried and with no desire to change that status, he was growing a shell of confining contentment, and that wasn't bad. He felt secure.

Then one day he arrived at his office and was told that, based upon both his technical competence and his English skills, he had a new assignment. In the inner office of a suite he'd never been summoned to before, he received a brusque briefing from a man who thoroughly intimidated him. Then they went into a conference room. The man left. The world opened. But not as expected, and the opening quickly proved far from welcome.

A woman was seated at the table. Her platinum hair was neatly braided back from her fine, scarred face, the collar of her silk blouse a startlingly elegant contrast to her navy blue pinstripe suit of foreign design. She wore no makeup beyond a little rose lipstick; the clear, beautiful scent of violets, violet leaves, and white cedar perfume reached him. She rose and offered him her hand. "Mister Borodkin, I am very pleased to meet you. My name is Doctor Tolchinskaya. Back in America, it was Tolchin, Olivia Lathrop Tolchin. But it has been made clear to me that Russianizing my name is a symbolic act of profound importance here. Changing names always is. So I am now Tolchinskaya. You have been briefed on what we are going to do together?"

Borodkin reeled within but remained calm. No one in his memory had ever talked to him about doing anything together. And no one had ever before given him such power as he was now to wield over, and also, he cringed, together with...a woman.

"I am briefed," he said formally. "I have been told that I am to be your minder, your administrator, and your expediter. As your minder, I am required to file periodic independent reports upon your progress. Also, I must report anything unusual that I believe might be of importance to my superiors regarding your activities and attitudes beyond your work." He paused to enjoy a bit of a tingle. "As your administrator, I will handle the routine operations and requirements of your lab. As your expediter," he grimaced a bit, then went on smoothly, "you understand that in Russia, not everything is openly available, even now. Always there are shortages. Sometimes things are unavailable for no good reason, or because others desire them to be so. An expediter makes things available. If there is anything you need that cannot be provided through normal procedures, you will tell me and I will do my best to provide."

"Exactly. Our success or failure is very much up to you. Who else do you report to?"

Borodkin did not reply. It was too sudden.

"I..."

She finished his thought for him. "Very well. I know that you are a Line X officer and you report to Line X for technical matters. I will assume that you report on my reliability to others, whose identity I may not know. I can live with that, especially since I have no choice in the matter." Her Russian was stiff, awkward, and literate, and he thought, with a twinge, that between her Russian and his English...

Olivia went on. "I expect you to be loyal to your superiors and do whatever is required of you. But I also expect you to be loyal to me, which means reporting on me and to me accurately and honestly and letting me know what I need to know. I will never ask you to lie to your superiors for me. What you need to do as an expediter is another matter. I shall not ask what you do, nor how you acquire what you get for the lab, nor blame you for anything I don't know about. If necessary, I shall protect you to the best of my ability. Is this acceptable to you?"

Borodkin gaped a moment, fell into an honest, happy smile, and said in perfect English, "Done deal."

Now it was Olivia's turn to look very startled.

"Or," Borodkin went on, "as they used to say in Victorian novels, we will do with each other as we will. I think we understand each other, Doctor. You must understand, I have become aware of your existence and work only in the last few minutes. I am, to say the least, impressed and a bit overwhelmed. This has been an unexpected morning. Now I must ask. Can you do what they say you can?"

"I don't know. I have no idea about what has been said about me. I know I can do what I say I can. Over the next few months, we will stand up a lab and deliver a prototype of a reliable infrared/acoustic dual sensor, the first of a series, for use in urban warfare in order to locate and pinpoint enemies and civilians and minimize loss of life. Russian life and Chechen life."

"Where do you plan to get your technology?"

"We will start with old Soviet technology, which for what it is, when it works, is often excellent." That startled Borodkin. "You will know out of what closed facilities and cities those programs were run. We are going to loot those warehouses of anything that may possibly be of use to us. What we cannot find here, we will procure from abroad. One way or another."

Stunned, Borodkin found himself staring at her, mouth slightly open. He realized it and closed with an audible click of teeth. Then he felt a shard of spite. This was his country, not hers. He'd been assigned to take orders from an American, a woman...perhaps a Jew. Then he felt a momentary thrill at a word, a defaming word, he'd never used before. A Zhid. Then the pleasant visions of a moment before, dissolved. His power over her, whatever it might amount to, would be sporadic at best, perhaps ultimately nonexistent. Her power over him would be continual and real.

Olivia drew him a glass of tea from the samovar behind her. "Do you take sugar?"

"I do." She added it and handed him the glass in its silvered filigree holder. "Are all Americans this frank?"

"No, especially not with their futures and very possibly their lives on the line. But I try to live as I wish to be. That's why I'm here. Mister Borodkin, I am aware of the stakes involved. For your soldiers and civilians, it's life or death. For us, it's another kind of life or death. Can you work with me under those conditions?"

"Are you asking me to share your fate?"

She shook her head. "Only that you shall say the truth of what you have found, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, without mental reservation or purpose of evasion. Those are words from American oaths. I'm not yet familiar with Russian vows, so I use my own."

Suddenly sickened, Borodkin realized he was afraid of her. She was what she was, fully and defiantly. And she was offering him his own life back. That terrified him more. And it shamed him to realize that she was offering him a lesser life than hers. It would always be a lesser life than hers.

And in that knowledge, he understood another kind of shame. He knew that she was simply offering him life, no "greater" or "lesser" to it, and offering honestly, expecting him to take as much as he could. He knew that although this had been unimaginable an hour before, it now clearly pointed to the life he had wanted and thought he would never have. No. It pointed to the life he had always told himself he wanted and then, comfortably, told himself he would never have. He wondered if she fully understood, or even glimpsed, the terrifying risk she was demanding that he take. He trembled inwardly. Life had finally come to him, in a form utterly different than he had ever expected. But he was no longer certain that, deep down, he really wanted it, or that he could any longer respond. He could not meet her eyes, lest he reveal himself too much, reveal his hesitation, and the reasons for that hesitation.

And he thought of another character, from Dickens or maybe Hawthorne or maybe somebody else, another character whom he'd always considered, in some vague way, an additional personal affront. The man who was always going to go but never going, now seemed of less relevance to him than the man whose standard response to anything was, "I would prefer not to." In that moment, Borodkin realized, as shame penetrated him like a splinter of glass, he had become that man. He was no longer the man who was always going to go, but never going. He was now the man who preferred not to go. He despised himself for it. And now he despised her, too, for making him know it.

"I can work with you on this basis," he said quietly.

***

The long lines of drab, Soviet-era customers that had greeted the initial opening of the Pushkin Square McDonald's were a thing of the past. Those customers, mid-level apparatchiks, had yielded their places to those who were now ostentatiously embarked upon the Russian version of Euro-chic or beyond to American tawdry. It seemed that the female clientele either wore high black heels, black tights, miniskirts, big hair and shimmery makeup, or aspired to grow up to wear them. They might as well have been a different species from the two strong women who ambled in like race horses, their track suits steaming in the cold air of an early September morning. They'd had a hard workout.

"Officially, there are four food groups," Olivia said. "Starches and grains. Meat and fish. Milks and cheeses. Fruits and vegetables. Unofficially, we have what I call the Perfect Foods Group."

"Which includes our favorite foods, such as curries," Irina Borisovna said. "And McDonald's?"

"No, except for their hash browns, which are to die for." She ordered from the girl behind the counter. "Six, please, and are they hot?"

The girl looked her in the eye and smiled, not Muscovite habits. Not Russian habits, and certainly not Soviet. "Yes, ma'am."

Olivia paid for the hash browns, Irina Borisovna for the coffee and strawberry milk shakes. "I think," Irina said as they loaded their trays with napkins and condiments, "that if we're going to be teenagers, we ought to do it wholeheartedly." Nevertheless, she found a booth that put her back to a solid wall, and her eyes never stopped scanning the restaurant.

By unspoken agreement, they wolfed down the hot, crispy hash browns without waiting for them to cool, washing them down with cold water and strawberry milkshakes before lingering over coffee.

"What did you do growing up?"

"There are five years between my surviving brother and myself, but our parents always swore my brothers and I were triplets separated at conception. Russian children grow up very segregated—boys do some things, girls do others—much more than America. But my brothers and I were absolutely inseparable until they left for the Airborne Academy. I ran, I learned to ski and shoot, and took up sambo, which is our martial art, a hybrid of boxing and judo, although I later shifted all the way into judo for intellectual reasons. I fished, I hunted, I rode. We all had strong leanings towards the artistic: my oldest brother loves ballet and still takes lessons when he can, although he also loves boxing. I love dressage and have been able to study it a little."

"Did you date?"

"Date?" Irina Borisovna smiled wryly. "Like all good fathers the world over, mine was very protective of his daughter. Then he found himself having to reassure my suitors because my mother was this very small, very beautiful Tartar woman who looked like she was machined out of tungsten carbide and probably was. Before the war, she had been kidnapped to be 'married' by a man she didn't want. Just another word for rape and slavery, a tradition we've only partially crushed. Without saying or doing anything hostile, she would sit across the table from those boys looking like something out of Genghis Khan's nightmares. She may well have been." She grinned. "My brothers used to run interference for me with her, and I was eventually allowed, say, to have a boy over to study with so long as one of them chaperoned me.

"But did you date?"

Another smile. "Date? Let's put it this way. It was actually my father, not my mother, who had that conversation with the doctor, because my mother could not be rational about her daughter and young men. She didn't want to lock me up, she wanted to kill them. All of them. This she knew was unfair; she was a very loving, very kind woman. By the standards of, how would Americans of our station live, we were poor but it was an outrageously happy childhood. I suppose you would say we didn't know what we were missing."

Olivia shook her head. "I would never say that."

"And how did Olivia, the only child of a widower, behave?"

"I did my share of sneaking out of the house. There was a tree beside my bedroom window. I could get up and down it from the time I was about ten. My father was almost as protective as your mother, not just because he was a widower but also because his younger sister had died in childbirth."

Irina Borisovna let out her breath in an almost shocked expulsion of air. "Yes, that has been the fear of all fathers who are good fathers since time out of mind."

"I guess you could say I lived a very sheltered life. No television, no car, which is practically a rite of passage for American teenagers, no heels, no makeup, and my father strongly preferred me to wear jeans or trousers to skirts. A little perfume was OK. I rode at a show barn where people cared more about the results—the prizes and the money and the status—than the horses, and I think you know how unpleasant that can be if you love the animals. I was a cross-country runner and I had my pilot's license before I got my driver's license. I had cash, a credit card for emergencies, and a pistol, which I shouldn't have had because I was a minor. Who could ask for more? My girlfriends, my classmates really, would ask, 'Do you want to go to the mall and go shopping?' I could only wonder, why? Wouldn't you rather fly?"

"Did you ever ask them that question?"

"Once. They didn't like the question and I sure didn't like the answer."

They watched a young woman flounce down into the booth across from them. Her hair was piled high upon her head in golden curls that were, as could be seen from the roots, natural and she wore an extravagant mink, ridiculously high heels, and a vulgar diamond necklace. She was attended by a thuggish young man in a magnificent black suit who appeared, from the way he looked at her, to genuinely adore her. He also studiously avoided the officer's slanting green eyes. "Don't envy her," Irina Borisovna breathed to Olivia over her coffee.

"Is it so obvious that I need to get laid?" she asked, astonished by the sudden, unwelcome sexual hunger that the couple had occasioned.

"There is no need for vulgarity." Irina Borisovna's voice was not prim but extraordinarily gentle.

"In other words, this would be handled for me as well, like my housekeeper or my lab administrator?"

A graceful shrug. "You're a woman, you have needs, you're not a prisoner, and there are more adult ways to deal with this than you going to some Moscow night club and bringing home God knows what."

"In other words, you would find someone to play the stallion, with tact and discretion and perhaps even tenderness."

"It wouldn't be a matter of giving some poor soul his orders, however welcome he might find them. We are not inhuman."

"I know that. I do know that. But I also don't use people. How do you handle your...situation...as a widow?"

Irina Borisovna held up her hands in caution, then answered, "It's different for me. I have two wonderful sons from my late husband." Then her tone changed and Olivia realized that their friendship either had not matured to the point where Irina could speak freely...or was about to. "I live with my," she paused, "with...my brother's widow...and their two sons."

Olivia had heard the change in tone and suddenly realized that Ira wore two wedding rings, one on her left hand, one on her right. One—she assumed the left, according to Russian custom—was from her dead husband. Well then, the second would be from her brother's widow. And while Olivia wasn't certain if sexual love between women had been a criminal offence under the old Soviet penal code, she knew that women in such relationships had sometimes been forcibly psychiatrically hospitalized, along with dissidents. Olivia pondered the likely sequence of events: two young mothers, newly widowed, helping each other rebuild the wreckage of their lives and plans, choosing to live together with their children for comfort and convenience until they found new mates—and perhaps months or years later, realizing they had found them in each other. Then enduring what they must have endured from those who thought they had a right to an opinion. From colleagues and superiors.

Olivia nodded respectfully. "Is she also in your profession?"

"No, Valentina photographs and paints and draws and sculpts—other people would call her an artist, except that word has been debased. She and our sons are my hostages to fortune."

It was an astonishing remark from someone so self-contained. "If I may ask without asking you to violate any restrictions, here in this place...what do you do?"

Irina Borisovna's voice was so low Olivia felt more than heard her words. "I work against one aspect of organized crime. Our problems with organized crime came about because profit was an illegal concept under Communism. Anyone who did business was de jure and too often de facto a criminal. Many still are, but we have had to make use of them in order to really get our economy going."

"So now you try to rein them in or bring them in?"

"Nothing so simple or so clean. I work at what you might call the intersection of organized crime and international terrorism. It is a broad intersection. Broad enough to move a lot of things from the former Soviet arsenals that no one should ever be permitted."

Olivia felt her spine grow cold with fear and began to glimpse the hideous risks that Irina ran, dealing with such persons. "I understand."

"It would make for a more peaceful life if I spent my time investigating oligarchs."

"So you never know who wants to get close to you or why."

"Exactly; the why is always open to question, even when I know the who. When dealing with people who traffic in such items as we fervently do not want them to have, it is even more difficult. I have no normal social life, and little personal life at all, beyond my family."

Olivia picked her words carefully. "How did your...first marriage come about?"

Suslova's eyes showed her approval. "My first marriage was arranged, in that my oldest brother, Dmitri, sent me a letter one day. He was a fourth-year kursant, an officer candidate at the Airborne Academy at Ryazan. I was in my second year at the Institute of International Relations. He wrote that he had met a young man my age whom he thought might be very special to me, and our parents and my older brother, who had already met the young man, agreed that he was worth my taking the time to meet. Despite my best intentions, they were right, of course. We married after we graduated and we were extremely happy."

"A hard and complicated life. Or is it wrong to say that?"

"It is and it is not. I wouldn't trade my life for anyone's, for all mistrust is the very air I breathe and death a daily risk. Any more than you would, for all pain is your constant companion."

Olivia decided a change of tone was in order. "When I was growing up, my father told this joke about how Soviet men impressed the girls at your seaside resorts."

"Ivan, just put a potato in your swim trunks," Irina Borisovna said, rolling with her change of tone. "But Miklos, make sure you put it in front this time. We told the same jokes about the Hungarians."

Giggling alarmingly, they finished their coffee and swaggered past the other patrons, one of them a very muscular, tanned young man who looked at them with a mixture of alarm, dismay, and desire. "Tell me, Comrade," Olivia could not help but smile suggestively, "Is your potato in front?"

Then she yelped, from surprise rather than pain, as Irina Borisovna quickly and efficiently twisted her arm up between her shoulder blades. "Come along. Soliciting is still against the law here. I beg your pardon, Comrade."

"Wait, wait," he called after them, bewildered and aroused, as the two women, whooping with laughter, seemingly as big and strong as racehorses and just as beautiful, burst out of the warm restaurant into the grey Moscow cold, air bracing as a stream on a muggy summer day. Wild with a suddenly joyous exuberance, Olivia looked at Irina Borisovna out of eyes that were full to overflowing with the sun now fully risen to light the morning. "Let's run." And then she hurled herself forward, stunned, for the first time since her accident, by the old sensation, sudden, still fragile and perhaps fleeting but utterly real, of the earthbound flight that running had been for her.

# CHAPTER TEN, MOSCOW, DECEMBER 1994: MARIA FEDOROVNA

In America, Olivia had grown accustomed to living alone. She'd assumed that she would also live alone in Russia. Her last apartment in America had been little more than a vaguely defined interim, not really hers except for a few treasures she'd shipped to her father and hoped to reunite with someday. She'd assumed she would furnish her Moscow flat when and as she could, or simply move into something already furnished. Perhaps, she'd thought, she might need occasional domestic help.

What she hadn't expected was that she would acquire—involuntarily, courtesy of Russia's Federal Security Service—a one-woman live-in housekeeper, decorator, cook, minder, domestic purchasing agent, colloquial Russian language tutor, increasingly devoted great aunt, occasional nuisance and from time to time, utterly terrifying human being. Nor could she have imagined that Aunt Maria would have requested the assignment, informing her superiors that she was no longer young or agile enough to maintain the entire Tver dacha, keeping to herself the real reason. Olivia, with only her dignity and courage, had bested the State. She would have a minder, no matter what. Why not Aunt Maria?

In the form of Major Suslova, the State had agreed.

Olivia liked Aunt Maria well enough, even though her endless hours at the lab precluded much socializing with her or anyone else. She did not object to Aunt Maria's somewhat subdued décor, her own eye being attuned to the brilliant colors needed to defy the New Mexico sun. The old woman, after all, spent her days there. But there were moments when she glimpsed something in Maria's eyes a quiet sorrow, What these eyes have seen, eyes much like her father's in similar moments. Out of respect and love, she'd never questioned her father. She did not question Maria. But she was beginning to understand how people might turn away from the Oscars and Marias of the world. It wasn't that they didn't want to know, as a matter of respect and love. It was that they didn't want to know, for fear of knowing. Olivia felt a bit of that with Maria, and despised herself for it.

Tonight, however, she was merely irritated. More than usually tired, she wanted solitude. She was not going to get it. But she would try, if only to preserve an exchange that had become something of a ritual. Olivia poured herself a very large measure of brandy, summoned Aunt Maria, and handed her some of the dollars she kept for when rubles would not do. Olivia told her that she would appreciate a few hours alone. Perhaps she would like to go to dinner?

Maria Fedorovna Philipova, from some tiny, brutalized collective farm that she had long ago determined to forget, had no idea of how to amuse herself in a great city at night. Nor did she have any particular desire to do so. She also recognized genuine pain when she saw it and did not run. "No, Doctor. I will be in my room if you need me."

Olivia thanked her for her consideration, then retired to her bedroom, thinking that at that moment, given her druthers, she would prefer a drooling feline to a conscientious babushka. Briefly, she wondered whether the FSB might authorize a four-legged minder. Then she flung back the coverlet over her bed, stripped, and curled up under the down with her brandy. Once she had lived in a house in the high desert of New Mexico and loved it. Here she lived in a newer high rise, a five-room flat on the outskirts of Moscow, a graceless situation that nonetheless produced no rational complaints. The flat was of a class suitable for the manager of a mid-sized factory, in Russia an élite position.

Olivia had no interest in how she might rank in the Russian social hierarchy, no more than she had ever thought about such matters in America. At the moment, she wanted only to enjoy the quiet, the bed, and the brandy. In a few days, she would begin doing without them. For the last time, she let her mind run over the things that she had to do before deploying, before flying south to Mozdok, the big staging base for Chechnya.

Pack. Maria Fedorovna had gotten her everything she needed and didn't have, including sanitary supplies.

Procure a weapon _._ She had been promised three times—by General Getmanov, by Major Suslova and most recently by Leonid Borodkin—that her pistol would be returned to her. So far, it had not been, and she was starting to consider herself as lied to. Some sort of abstract fairness told her that she couldn't really blame the Russians; she wasn't certain that they wanted her armed. But she hated being unarmed, a woman, obviously a foreigner, presumed to have money, in the capital city of a nation whose government was cannibalizing itself through its own monumental greed. She had seriously considered turning to the black market, but she needed contacts for that and those she didn't have yet. That left Chechnya itself. She wondered how hard it would be to procure a weapon there. Probably not at all, if only because in a firefight, there would be casualty surplus very quickly. Getting to it might be a problem. So might keeping it, depending on the policies of the unit she was with and the whims of its commander. She hated having to leave it to that. Still, she'd learned that, in such matters, it was best to decide early. So she determined that if her pistol wasn't returned; that if she wasn't issued a weapon; that if she couldn't beg, buy, or borrow one; she would somehow steal one.

Stealing was preferable to trying to acquire one in the midst of a firefight. And theft did not carry that much opprobrium here.

If Borodkin had failed to arm her, he had delivered on something else. He had done very good work in equipping and running the lab, especially in coming up with electronic parts on scant notice. Increasingly, he anticipated needs, indicating that he understood Olivia's goals. If it was impossible for him to return a foreigner's weapon to her, he was not to blame.

***

It was not that Maria Fedorovna didn't talk. She had an ample selection of horror stories, some from her nation's past, and some she'd heard about the capitalist hell of America and how it warped the people there. She just never mentioned herself. Olivia sensed that she'd never been happy about working for the FSB or its predecessor, the KGB. But jobs were jobs and at her age, without formal education and still to some extent still ostracized by the "decent people" who'd never endured the Gulag, she took what she could get. Olivia, she'd concluded at Tver, would never be rude to her. That mattered. Nor would she, Maria suspected, ever turn away from her personal tales with a look of fastidious distaste and Don't tell me, I don't want to know. But that, Maria determined not to explore. At least, not immediately.

Their first week in Moscow, Olivia had handed Maria Fedorovna a sum in dollars that made the woman's eyes grow round as hen's eggs, although by American standards it was quite modest. "We are going to need furniture, Aunt. Also dishes, towels, et cetera, et cetera. I am working twelve-hour days and weekends are my time to stand down and recharge my brain, so I cannot do this. Understand that you will account to me for expenditures, so pay a fair price and if you want something for yourself, get it. I am grateful that you have cast your lot with me. You are not a guest here, nor my employee. This is your home."

So Aunt Maria went shopping. At first, she'd thought Olivia wanted her to bargain harshly for furniture, and that was how she acquired the big table. She realized that she had done wrong when she told Olivia what she had paid. Olivia turned away to hide a glacial look in her eyes and began to boil water for tea. The Russian way was to brew very strong tea in boiled water, let it cool, and then dilute the concentrate to taste with freshly boiled water. It took a while. Olivia handed her the glass in its silver filigreed holder, ran her hand absently over the smooth wood of the table. It did not look old enough to be war booty. "Would you know the seller if you encountered her again?"

"Yes, Doctor, I would. But I thought you were a capitalist."

"Theoretically, I am although I spent my entire American career working for the government. I am also a Jewess." Maria Fedorovna, not entirely surprised, cast her eyes down on the table. Olivia chose to continue.

"Yes, I know what is said in Russia about that. My father is a Hungarian Jew who came to America after the war. His family had all died. He married a Protestant woman from a very old, established family. She converted to marry him, against the wishes of her family, who then refused to have anything to do with her, although they never said so. I know very little about my faith, beyond what my father told me and what my mother would occasionally mention from her conversion lessons. But I remember a thing or two. The Talmud says that in any fair trade, neither side takes advantage of the other. My father believed this with his whole heart and lived it in his business. From whom did you buy this table?"

"From an old widow."

"What would you consider a fair price?"

Maria named a sum significantly higher than what she'd paid.

"Then please, Aunt Maria, give her that money tomorrow."

Maria was silent for a moment, considering. "Doctor, I see I have been told evil things about Jews that are false."

"Oh, some of them are indeed true about some Jews. Many bad things I heard growing up about Russians, some of them also true about some Russians. Or any other group."

"I agree. Most people are good, a few bad, and the harm the bad do is always greater than their numbers. What do capitalists say about greed?"

"Some say, greed is good. Greed works. But I don't think what we have in America is capitalism anymore. Just greedy people working the system for themselves, taking much, giving back little."

Aunt Maria pondered a moment, then said, "When I was a young girl, they dekulakized our kolkhoz."

" _Kolkhoz? Kulaks?"_

"Our village. Our rich peasants, although God knows that in your country they would be considered far from rich. Our kulaks mostly died in the far north, although we managed to save some of the children. Are most Jews like you?"

Olivia shook her head. "In many things, no. But not everyone is like you."

Maria's face became blank, remote, austere. "So I will go back to the market tomorrow and find this woman. But this is a lot of money. Are you sure you are not giving away what you will need?"

"I am sure that we can pay people what they need."

"We will try. May I ask something?"

"Please."

"If your father's people were all dead and your mother's people wouldn't see you, then..."

"Then what?"

"Then I am perhaps your first real grandmother?"

"Perhaps it would be better to say, first real aunt. Is that your question?"

"No. My question is...you want I should learn to cook Jewish food?"

Olivia laughed. "Cook what you like. I'll like it, too."

Maria smiled in agreement, then shook her head a little to herself. The American's needs were painfully minimal. Maria Fedorovna gained the distinct impression that left to her own devices, Doctor Tolchinskaya would have been content in a simple room with a hot plate, an electric kettle for tea, a bed, a desk, and a bookcase. Many bookcases, actually.

Their rituals evolved. Olivia appreciated tending at the end of the day: a glass of wine and a hot tub before dinner. Tea after, when they discussed what might need to be done the next day. Shopping, for example, or cleaning. What she might like to see on her plate. It turned out that, despite her invitation to Maria to cook anything, Olivia did not much care for a great deal of Russian fried food. So Maria found herself unwillingly forced to adopt some of the American's strange ideas about food: grains, fruits and vegetables, meat more for taste than for quantity. She resented it, until one day she realized she had lost fifteen kilos without ever being really hungry and felt far better than she had since girlhood. Still, she was damned if, at her age, she was going to take up running through the streets of Moscow in those ridiculous costumes that the younger people favored. Secretly, however, she started climbing stairs. That was hard, but it also made her feel even better.

After dinner, Olivia would knit or read. Once or twice, they discussed books. Olivia encouraged her to read. Maria Fedorovna demurred. "Too old to concentrate."

"Aunt Maria...how much weight have you lost without even trying? Just by changing a few habits a little."

"Much weight."

"Do you feel stronger mentally now?"

"Yes..."

"Good night, Aunt Maria."

"Good night, Doctor."

***

A strange woman to work for, Maria Fedorovna concluded again as she prepared to write her latest report to the FSB. Not a bad woman, but infinitely strange. She nervously ran her hands over her grey hair. This report would be like the others. Her spending: ample by Russian standards, although quite modest given her actual salary, and necessary to furnish the flat. Her drinking: temperate even when drinking more than normal. Her sexual and social life: none. Her general behavior: decent and calm. Visitors to her flat: none.

But that would change tomorrow, she thought, although in a typically strange way. Federal Security and Military Intelligence officers were coming to dinner, without Olivia's knowledge or permission. The guest list had been provided for her, and the menu. So she spent the next day cleaning and cooking and wondering. Who ever heard of the State throwing a surprise party for an American about to go off to war in a place like Chechnya? A surprise party that included her recruiter and her former interrogators? But such was the new world, and she could not object.

***

Maria heard Olivia's key in the door, her faintly awkward tread in the foyer as she hung her coat on the tall rack beside the door. "I am home, Aunt." Announcing herself as she always did, after the first time she'd simply walked in, to be met by Maria Fedorovna with a cast iron skillet in a ready position. "I've sent everyone home early, so the ones who are coming with me can be with their families tonight. We might go out for dinner."

Maria looked around nervously, then caught Madame Getmanova's eye, who nodded and called, "I'm in the dining room, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

Suddenly puzzled and fearful, Olivia walked into the dining room, really an extension of the kitchen. With her platinum hair loose to her shoulders and the intricately cabled cardigan of burnt orange that she had knit at Tver, its yoke slightly décolleté, she looked wild and wise and wary, on the verge of flight. The silent, smiling people sitting around the table who had come to see her off made her swallow again and blink furiously. General Getmanov and Madame Getmanova. Lieutenant Colonel Marianenko and Major Suslova. Maria Fedorovna standing back against the wall, a very pale grey Orenburg shawl knit from soft goat down draped over her black dress, looking torn between loyalties and both worried about Olivia's reaction and yet also pleased by the obvious pleasure on the woman's face.

Olivia turned towards her, a rueful, bemused, wry expression on her face, her startlingly blue eyes even brighter than usual. She opened her mouth to say something but found no words. Instead, she simply went around the table, kissing everyone on their cheeks, then quietly poured wine for her guests and her housekeeper. She found herself nearly crying when General Getmanov handed her back her pistol in its holster and even several boxes of ammunition, along with a Russian permit. "I took the liberty of shooting it."

"Of course you did."

"It's a beautiful weapon." Smoothly dehorned so that every plane and angle flowed into another, the slide and hammer had been machined from Damascus steel, patterned like moiré silk. The original grips, which he had replaced with utilitarian micarta, then tucked into the ammo boxes, were lacy ironwood.

"It is, isn't it?" She blew her nose and flashed a grin at Major Suslova, who had taken her to the range more than once. Shooting under her calm instruction had been a miracle and a revelation to Olivia, who'd never been a bad marksman, but was now expert.

"There's a huge open air arms market in Grozny. You'll be able to find all the ammunition you need."

"I'm not going to tell you to keep your head down, because if you do, you won't be able to see who's shooting at you. Just come back in one piece," Colonel Marianenko growled.

When Madame Getmanova handed her a balaclava knit from very soft black wool, and tucked inside it, fingerless gloves in the same black wool, this time worked in a shell stitch into which the thumbs settled neatly, left and right mirror images of each other, Olivia had to choke back tears. "I made them on airplanes of various kinds, going to various places," she said.

General Getmanov stood to offer the first toast. "To our Olivia," he said quietly.

They drank. Then Colonel Marianenko asked quietly, "Is everything ready?"

Olivia nodded. "Ready enough to get started. I have a dozen or so prototypes of hand-held ground sensors and one aerial vehicle I've barely started on. The ground sensors have a thirty-minute life. If they're not turned off in half an hour, an integral acid vial automatically opens and burns them out. Once they're developed and plentiful, I'm sure some will fall into the wrong hands. But not this early."

Colonel Marianenko stood and raised his glass. "To the lives these devices will save."

They drank. Then it was Olivia's turn. "L'Chaim," she said as she raised her glass. "To life."

There was a moment of silence. Then Suslova rose, and after her, all of them. "L'Chaim."

They drank.

"Olivia," Madame Getmanova said quietly. "I should like to ask your permission for something."

"Done deal," Olivia answered with a smile. Then, "What?"

"While you're in Chechnya, I should like to contact your father, discreetly, and tell him that if he agrees to three conditions, he may begin to ship your stored possessions in our diplomatic pouch. It will be a time-consuming process."

"What are the conditions?"

"The first is that he makes no independent effort to communicate with you. For now. That he accepts our explanation that you are alive, well, and happy."

"And the second?"

"That after he learns more and if it should come to such a thing...that he never tells your government what you're doing."

Olivia smiled. "Of course, if he doesn't know what I'm doing..."

"He wilt not tell what he dost not know," General Getmanov interrupted. "Shakespeare, with gender adapted for the occasion. Do you agree?"

"I do."

"And the third?"

"That when it becomes possible for you to communicate with him, you do so only through our embassy."

"I believe he will agree to those conditions."

"Then we shall tend to the necessary arrangements upon our return to your..." Madame Getmanova stopped.

"Yes, Madame," Olivia finished for her. "My country."

The dinner began. Later that night, much later, all guests long gone, Olivia stood on her tiny balcony, four meters by two, watching the snow fall, brilliant in the reflected light of the streets and buildings. Her pistol was a comforting weight in her waistband under her cardigan; a last glass of wine was comfort of another kind. Maria Fedorovna joined her. She had always been surprised by the American's calm and confidence. But armed, she was profoundly different, almost tranquil. Olivia reached out, put her arm around the older woman's shoulders and gently drew her into her side. It was a startling gesture because Olivia tended to shy away from physical contact. Others also avoided casual physical contact with her, finding her strength unsettling. But kindness was tangible in her touch, her strength a threat to no one who did not threaten her. "I know you're a country woman still, Aunt."

"I'll be all right in this city while you're gone. I will miss you, dear child, you know that."

"Thank you."

"Are you afraid? You're young, you should have a family, not be on your way to a war that isn't yours."

"Yet this war will come to America. If not this winter or the next, then soon enough. I'll be alright. I'm not a soldier who has to fight. To some degree, I can pick my risks."

Maria Fedorovna found herself slipping her arm around the younger woman's waist. Her back was straight and oaken from all the lifting she did, though the ligaments felt knotted and warped. The damage was obvious and startling. "Why does that pistol mean so much to you?"

"Many reasons. The greatest is that as a woman I have a right to defend myself that is equal to a man's. If you can defend yourself, if you can trust yourself to defend yourself, many other things become easier."

"You really aren't afraid, are you?"

"Yes and no. I have the normal fears. I also know, so long as I have my pistol, the final decision on whether I live or die is mine. Anyway, who knows? Soldiers are mostly young men. Perhaps I will find one, an officer I hope, drag him back here, make him marry me." She laughed quietly, then bowed down, kissed the older woman's hands. "Go on in, Aunt. It's too cold out here for you. I'll be in shortly."

"Yes, Doctor. May I tell you something before I go in?"

"Certainly."

"Against the power of the State, a pistol isn't much. But I must wonder. What would have happened if every kulak they came for had met them with a pistol in his hand? How long could it have gone on?"

"What would have happened if every Jew the Germans came for had met them with a pistol in her hand?"

"It's the same thing, isn't it?"

"Yes, my dear, it is. For us all."

***

It was colder outside the cramped command track than inside, but the air did not stink of diesel and cigarette smoke, and unwashed men. Hind attack helicopters, ugly with menace, hammered overhead, stark against the Caucasian mountains. Behind Rebecca Taylor, near Davidenko on the main road into Grozny, capital city of Chechnya, stretched a long column of armored vehicles, tanks, and trucks. Just before her stood General Ivan Babichev, a burly, bulky paratrooper. He was confronted by chanting Chechen women, some sitting in the road, others dancing the zikr, or sacred dance. The women were proud and defiant. Some were telling Babichev that he was going to have to drive his tanks over them if he wanted to advance. Others were telling the tankists that they should not be killing women who might have been their own mothers.

There were other voices ringing in Rebecca Taylor's ears. These were the denunciations by Russian officers of President Yeltsin. It had been announced that he had been obliged to enter the hospital for surgery to correct a deviated septum. It was a ludicrous, cowardly, obvious, terrible, disgraceful attempt to evade responsibility for what might happen on this road at any moment. Other officers cursed Defense Minister Pavel Grachev and Minister of Federal Security Sergei Stepashin. Once respected, they had chosen to become thieving whores attempting to divert public attention from their looting of State resources. Perhaps they wanted the massacre that seemed about to happen. They'd certainly ignored those who had told them that restoring federal control over Grozny would require much more time to plan and many more troops to execute.

The officers speaking to Rebecca refused to give her their last names. Other officers refused to speak directly to her, but nevertheless spoke loudly enough for her to overhear. The voices formed a strange, deep chorus of fury and regret. Fury at their leaders, who were not among them. Regret that the next few minutes might find them killing women and children and innocent men. Fury that their soldiers might soon be killed or maimed for those absent leaders, the whores for whom being called whores was better than they deserved. And regret that, no matter how corrupt the leadership, Chechnya had to be taught a lesson.

Rebecca Taylor heard General Babichev say that he would not use the Army to kill his own people. Then she heard him say that he would use the Army because Russia could not let Chechnya go. She wondered how he could reconcile the two. She realized that he could not, that any mental reconciliation would soon enough shatter against the reality. All anyone could do was hope that a far-from-inevitable Russian victory could justify the inevitable slaughter.

General Babichev gave orders to back off and find some other way to enter Grozny. His men understood. So did the Chechens. So did Rebecca Taylor, who returned to her place in the command vehicle and, with the rest of the men, started looking for some other way to enter Grozny.

# CHAPTER ELEVEN, GROZNY, EARLY 1995: MALINOVSKY

Changing careers had not been hard for Rebecca Taylor. She'd let the Washington Post know that, yes, she was interested. They'd responded with an immediate offer. She'd accepted after indicating that she expected to spend the next three years in Russia, based out of Moscow but going wherever she chose and could. Her editors in DC, admiring her brio and probably figuring that the Moscow bureau chief would tend to her tethering, went along. Two months later, after some discreet assistance from a Russian colonel she'd met at a humanitarian aid conference and a let's-have-the-showdown-now confrontation with her bureau chief, she and a few thousand armed Russians found another way into Grozny. It turned out to be the old, old way.

Seven days in combat, Rebecca Taylor learned quickly, is eternity times seven. Reporters, however, had the luxury of taking themselves out of the action in order to write and file their stories, sleep, and eat. Now she sat, filthy and exhausted and unable to remember ever feeling any other way, hoping that the electricity in the command track would remain steady enough to keep her laptop from crashing again. Tents and buildings were available. So were beds. And that was the problem. Anywhere she could lie down, she would. Soon enough, she would. But first, she had to understand enough to write enough to make some preliminary sense of it all. Rebecca Taylor believed that things ought to make sense, that if you just tried hard enough to understand, you would. Even when understanding requires that you empty your mind of all prejudices, all preconceptions, all beliefs, all knowledge and everything you once thought of as knowledge.

Even when understanding requires that you reach conclusions that you may not want to reach.

She stared at her screen, wondering what to tell America, how to find the right level of detail between the obvious and the intimate, between the truths that could no longer be evaded and the truths that had to be, at least for now. She decided to start with a simple matter that everyone understood and whose implications everyone chose to evade. This war was going to be long: long because of the dreadful condition of the Russian Army and the dreadful nature of the enemy. Long because it had been going on for centuries in one form or another, and this was only the latest iteration. Long because it was part of a much larger struggle that would also be long. And long because...

Your Majesty! Your Majesty! The Thirty Years War has begun!

Rebecca Taylor stared down in disbelief at the words she'd typed without realizing it. An idiotic little academic joke from one of her least funny history professors, the one who'd sneered off her protest about American agriculture so many worlds ago. Obviously, the general who approached his sovereign thus in 1618, could not have known that the war would last thirty years. The serious point, according to that professor: understanding the past requires you to suspend your knowledge of the present; demands that you refuse to know how things turned out. Except, of course, when the present is just like the past and the future will be more of the same. Rebecca Taylor deleted that little quip and began again.

Someday, Russians will know what we're doing here as the start of the First Chechen War of the post-Soviet era. How many more there will be is, of course, impossible to tell. But one is a good enough number with which to start. What the rest of the world will call this war, how they will understand it, remain to be determined.

She then accessed the history section she'd written before deploying. Background for the Beltway crowd. Not that it would do much good, but such is formulaic journalism and she was too tired to get creative.

The Groznaya Fortress was founded in 1818 by Terek Cossacks and played a major role in the Caucasian War later that century. Grozny became the center of Russia's, then the Soviet Union's, petroleum industry. After the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, the Cossacks were considered a threat to the new Soviet state and the Soviet leadership encouraged Chechen immigration into Grozny. Later, during World War Two, Josef Stalin deported the Chechens and Ingush, with NKVD troops actively destroying all traces of them from the city, from bookstores to graveyards. What is not commonly known is that some Chechen and Ingush leaders were negotiating with the Germans. In 1957, the Chechens and Ingush were allowed to return home, while many Russians left, especially for the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. After the collapse of central Soviet authority, most of the remaining Russians were expelled by Chechen militants. A separatist government under Dzhokar Dudayev, a former Soviet Air Force general, took power. Russian Defense Minister Pavel Grachev recently predicted that he could topple Dudayev with a single Airborne regiment. The man is not simply greedy and corrupt. He is also stupid.

But stupidity comes in many forms. And now it was necessary to write something about the stupidity of the Russian Army. But this was not, Rebecca Taylor had learned, the simple stupidity of dumb soldiers. It was the criminal stupidity of an institution that abused and squandered its men even when it didn't have to, even when such waste meant defeat.

Training has always been the weakness of the Soviet and now the Russian Army. You hear the horror stories of harassment and abuse of conscripts. You hear stories involving murder and rape. You hear of officers beating the troops, even beating each other. But hard, realistic training? The kind that will keep you alive and maybe even victorious? There's little evidence of that here. This is an army whose soldiers smoke pungent cigarettes while lying in ambush positions. Those who don't, simply snore. This is an army far more likely to rely upon on massive firepower than accuracy, so they carry enormous amounts of ammunition. That degrades their mobility. This is an army that resolutely refuses to practice even the most basic field sanitation, with predictable results. Worst of all, this is an army that appears systemically incapable of thinking.

Rebecca Taylor began to weep for the men who had been so kind and helpful to her, who were now dead. Then she composed herself sufficiently to continue.

The Chechens hold the buildings here. The Russians patrol the streets in their vehicles. Their armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles are routinely disabled by rocket propelled grenades, mines, and other items. The tactic is simple. Knock out the vehicles in the front and rear of the Russian patrols and convoys. The vehicles in the middle can't escape. The Chechens then destroy them one by one, giving the soldiers within them a choice. They can stay inside and burn to death. Or they can get out and take their chances. Usually, they'll be shot as they run. The Chechens are very good at setting up multiple, interlocking ambushes. Over the last week, I have witnessed this scene several times. I have experienced it myself. Twice.

Rebecca Taylor put her head down and continued weeping until she was wept out. Then she finished her article, made sure it got filed through the Russian communications package, and slept. Later, she would check with her bureau chief to see if anything had gotten through and whether the homies had been astute enough not to run the garbage that the censors would occasionally and ineptly insert. As she drifted off, she recalled a word from her early readings about the Soviet Army. Exactingness. The great Communist soldierly virtue of adhering to orders with the utmost literalism and scrupulousness. Perhaps the Russian Army, she concluded, would do well to be a little less exact in following orders and a bit more exact in determining just whom they were killing, and why.

***

From his beginnings as a soldier, Dmitri Borisovich Suslov had believed in two things. One was Communism. That had faded. The other was training. That had not.

As a junior Airborne officer, an elite professional, he'd had such training. He had made sure his troops in Afghanistan got it. He had made certain his troops had had it during the terrible ethnic violence that attended the breakup of the old Soviet Union. It had prevented many needless deaths, military and civilian, Soviet and Afghan and other.

But now? The average conscript barely knew how to fire his weapon. The average officer might not be much better. Neither was likely to know much more about the details of soldiering, the thousand simple and not-so-simple skills that made the way of life bearable and combat more than massacre. As for the sergeants, most officers had long ago given up and did their jobs for them. For their part, the sergeants didn't seem to mind.

Suslov refused to surrender to sloth. In an army where near universal incompetence was the norm, he cross-trained his men. Know your job, know the jobs of others. Be ready to take over if your superior is hit. Don't smoke on patrol or in ambush. Use the latrine. Wash your hands afterwards. Don't fail each other. Don't fail me. And remember—in Afghanistan, I executed men for...

At least, that was the legend. No one was willing to challenge it. And no one wanted to believe that Colonel Suslov wasn't willing to do it again. He was the Kombrig—from comrade Brigade Commander—of 22 Brigade, a venerable informal title that the troops used when their brigade commander was beloved for his competence and courage, for his devotion to his men, and for his ability to back up what he said, with his fists or whatever else might be needed. It was good to serve under such a man, even if you feared him. In Russia, the combination of love and fear could go very far.

"Kombrig?"

"Comrade Sergeant?"

"The American boffin is here. What shall we do?"

"Very good. Have him report to me, then equip him from casualty surplus. Load-bearing equipment, ammo, vest, helmet, and rifle." Suslov's voice was quiet. He wondered why he was having this conversation; the requirements were obvious. But he respected Sergeant Bagramian, his driver, bodyguard and occasional radioman, and sensed that there was more going on than routine.

"Kombrig?"

Suslov looked up from the radio, up from where he was listening, once again, to the motorized rifle conscripts dying in their vehicles. He had none of his Spetsnaz groups with them. These were not his men. This was not his fight. But it was hideous to listen to: hideous and enraging that they would keep on making the same mistakes.

"Comrade Sergeant?" A fine edge to his voice.

Sergeant Bagramian ignored the clear warning and returned his commander's look with a concern that both irritated and moved Suslov. "Comrade Colonel, the American boffin is a woman." Suslov recalled that, yes, his sister had told him months before that she was indeed a woman. A fact he'd promptly forgotten.

"Kombrig, a...beautiful woman."

"Thank you for the warning, Comrade Sergeant, but we take no field wives here. None of us."

"Kom..."

"Comrade Sergeant, have our female American boffin report to me. Then equip her from casualty surplus. Helmet, load bearing equipment, armored vest, rifle, 180 rounds of ammunition, then have her fire for familiarization just as if she were a male boffin. She's not going to be surprised or upset by this. I promise you, she knows she's not here on holiday."

"Very well. Now, we also have prisoners we've taken at the checkpoint. All test positive for gunpowder and explosives residue. All have sniper shoulder." Bruising from the recoil of a high-powered rifle.

"All military age males?"

"Yes."

"I believe that Major Kristinich wants at least one to amuse himself with. A new toy because his old toy, as he put it, failed to survive interrogation." Suslov drew the pistol from the holster at his waist and quite deliberately chambered a round before reholstering it, flap unsecured. A pity, he thought, that Major Kristinich was an officer of the FSB, not the Army. Suslov outranked Kristinich but he did not own him. He did, however, own the prisoners. Kristinich got them only with his approval. Which he never gave if there were a militarily sensible way to avoid it.

"Bring them to me. Summon Major Kristinich, along with Major Malinovsky. Do that first, then the boffin."

Suslov turned off the radio. He didn't need to hear more of what he was hearing. It would weaken his resolve not to give the snipers to Kristinich.

Impassive, he watched the prisoners, blindfolded and handcuffed, led in. Stumbling, terrified, but also reaching for bravado, the strange bravado of Muslims who have done what they thought was the will of Allah, and now must receive the martyrdom they'd been taught to covet by men who were better at urging martyrdom on others than seeking it themselves. Kristinich arrived, a tall, slender, nondescript man with an obscenely avid expression on his face. He was not that good an interrogator, but here in Chechnya he didn't need to be. Behind him came Major Malinovsky, Suslov's chief of reconnaissance, a stocky, balding Jew with a badly broken nose and massive chest. A boxer's face atop a boxer's body. A man who'd started out his military career with something to prove, and had proven it. Suslov and Malinovsky had known each other since Afghanistan. Now Malinovsky stepped between the officers and the prisoners and began.

"Which one of you is the leader?"

Silence from the Chechens. Malinovsky moved behind the group. He and Suslov studied them carefully, one from the front, one from the back, then their eyes met over the head of one of the prisoners. Malinovsky laid a hard hand on the man's shoulder, shoved him forward. Not that roughly, for the man was able to stay on his feet. He straightened and something in his bearing confirmed their estimate. He was their leader and, it appeared, naturally so. Malinovsky came to stand beside his Kombrig.

"My name is Colonel Suslov. I command here. I offer you a choice. You can talk to my chief of reconnaissance here, Major Malinovsky."

"Fucking fags," the Chechen leader began to rant. "He's a fucking Zionist Jew. You're a fucking Russian great power nationalist."

"Perhaps true, but not at all to the point," Malinovsky said in his clear, cold tenor.

The Chechen's bravado amused Suslov. It could be worse. In Afghanistan, the mujahidin were accustomed to treating Soviet prisoners as noisy toys for their knives. So far, the Chechens had not indulged. But it was going to be a very long war and the Chechens doubtless knew the techniques and the precedents.

Suslov took a long moment of silence before invoking something the Chechens also knew: the Russian tradition of torture. "Or," he said, "you can talk to Major Kristinich of the FSB. There are, as you know, many kinds of pain. There is the pain that stops and the pain that continues afterwards. There is also pain that damages and pain that does not. Major Kristinich likes to start by cutting off a finger, because that is a pain that continues and damages and the major collects souvenirs. His collection is already ample. But like all devoted collectors, he is always eager for more."

Suslov's deep voice, quiet and cultured, stopped speaking as though of its own. Suslov's hands then made Malinovsky a cup of tea from the samovar behind him, then another for himself. Then his mind reminded his hands to make a third for Kristinich. It would not do to be a boor, or disrespectful to him.

In the silence of the situation, who speaks first, loses. The Chechen had laid down his defiance. Suslov had countered with his power and his determination. He was now prepared to wait as long as he had to, sipping his tea, listening to the gunfire and the explosions and the screams echoing inside his skull.

"And if we talk to your chief of reconnaissance?" the prisoner said suddenly, his words in the tone of a demand. But everyone knew that the situation was otherwise.

Suslov looked at his watch. About sixty seconds. They had to have been some of the longest in the man's life. "You will tell us what we want to know. If we sense any falsehood or evasion, we will turn you over to Major Kristinich and forget you ever existed, until he puts your remains out for the dogs. If you are honest with us, we will kill you. We will do it quickly and cleanly and we will look you in the eyes while we do it."

"Nothing worse?"

"Nothing worse," Suslov promised. "Your bodies will be returned to your families. We do not sell remains."

"How do you know we will tell you the truth?"

"I have the ability to confirm what you say," Malinovsky said. "Also, consider that if after you are dead, what you gave us turns out to be false, other prisoners may not enjoy your choice. They may be simply given to Major Kristinich. His techniques are already a matter of some local renown." Malinovsky silently sipped his tea, letting the prisoner make his decision. Letting the rest of the Chechens make their decisions.

"We do not make Russian prisoners choose between torture and betraying their comrades."

"We know," Suslov said. "We see the bodies. Your treatment of our prisoners, even when you have killed them out of hand, is so far honorable. This is why I am giving you this choice."

"Why force us to make it at all? We are fighting for our homes, our families, for Allah and for all the Umma, as the world will someday learn. But we would not force you to choose between being tortured to death and betraying your comrades. For that matter, we rarely even kill your soldiers out of hand."

"Unless they are professionals, whom you always kill. But that matters less. You are in rebellion against the Federal government. Your own actions have justified your execution. How you die is entirely your decision. Do not remind me that you consider yourselves holy warriors. Neither Russian law nor the universal law of war recognizes such categories. All we know is that you are in rebellion, that you wear no uniforms, and that you hide among the civilians you claim to protect. For that, I am justified in executing you thrice over."

The Chechen leader pondered a moment. "I...believe you will keep your word."

"I will. Major Malinovsky, take them away."

"A word with you first, Colonel—"

Suslov turned his eyes to Kristinich, fighting the momentary nausea that always preceded his dealings with the man where prisoners were concerned.

"Yes, Major?"

Kristinich approached. He was taller than Suslov. But he was bony and his muscles were formless. When he looked at Suslov, the smaller man simply gazed up at him with a remote contempt. Kristinich had learned not to look down at him.

"Colonel, I must protest. As you know, the FSB requires political intelligence in order to..."

"Tactical intelligence comes first, Major. After the prisoners are dead, you may interrogate them concerning their politics."

"I..."

"Dismissed, Major."

"Colonel, I must report this interference with my duties."

"By all means, do so."

"Colonel, this is not a threat..."

"No, I don't believe it is. However, if it were, I should answer you with a statement I once heard Major Malinovsky offer a drunk man who wanted to fight him. 'If you hit me and I find out about it...'"

Kristinich flushed, then turned and fled, nearly trampling Sergeant Bagramian and the woman with him.

Suslov ran a hand over his hair, a deep chestnut that would have been wavy had he not shorn it nearly to the skull for cleanliness. Bad for discipline to let Bagramian see him talk to another officer like that. But the man made him ill. The man made other FSB officers ill, too. Which said a great deal. "Sergeant?"

"The American boffin, Kombrig. She is here."

"Give us twenty minutes, then get her kitted out."

"Exactly so."

He turned to her and spoke in stiff but educated English. "Shut the door, please. Sit down." Olivia did as she was told.

"How do you take your tea?"

"With sugar, please, Colonel."

Suddenly overwhelmed by the feeling that they were both in a very bad movie, he handed her a mug with a generous heaping of sugar. It was not plain black tea, but spiced, a taste he had acquired in Afghanistan. "I am sorry you saw that."

"He is a monster."

"But useful. If your Russian is good enough, let us speak Russian only."

"I believe so."

He studied her. By the standards of the magazines and discos and those who believed beauty is a thing to be bought, she was not beautiful. But you could call this woman nothing else. Even in her fatigues, she was elegant and powerful. Her eyes on his were tranquil and direct and he found himself bemused. A bit of small talk would be a relief. "Something has changed."

"Colonel?"

"Something has changed in the world when both the GRU and the FSB—including, as I am sure you surmised, my sister—vouch for an American woman who is a former research engineer to the American Defense Department, come to help Russia deal with insurrection."

"Some things. Not all. Plato said that only the dead have seen the end of war. He could have added that only the dead have seen the end of imbeciles proclaiming that perpetual peace is at hand."

"Very true. Do you agree with that imbecile who wrote that the end of the Cold War was the end of history?"

She grinned. "Well now, I'm here, am I not? If I thought there was no purpose to being here, I would have stayed in my comfortable life, or found some other to hide in."

"I know something of you already from my sister. Now you will please tell me. Why are you here?"

"Many reasons. I was bored with working on corrupt projects. I was tired of not being taken seriously. Then the Russian embassy in Washington made me a fascinating offer that I could not refuse."

"They told you that Grozny is beautiful in the winter and the accommodations luxurious," Suslov said dryly.

"Absolutely. I, of course, believed them. They also told me we had enemies in common and the world depended on what we did. So here I am. When does the luxury begin?"

He stared at her for a long moment in time, measuring the woman and her quality. "My sister thinks I can trust you with the lives of my troops, and the lives of those poor boys who are not my soldiers, but who are being fed into this meat grinder. So I will regard you and treat you as a comrade, but for their sakes, I remind you that I am a soldier, not an intelligence officer, and if you break faith with me and with them, I will deal with you as an enemy soldier."

She never looked away from him. "You are more than fair, you are generous."

Suslov knew then, with a sudden unexpected yearning, that he would love her, perhaps even more than the wife who'd left him because she could no longer abide what he did as a Russian soldier in their own land. "I have to trust you for all our sakes. You asked to be sent here, when you did not have to come at all. You've work to do. I will not burden you with my mistrust."

He took her to the maps pinned to the wall beside his desk and explained the situation to her. Where his groups were. Where the motorized rifle units and artillery were. Where they operated. How they operated. Then he finished. "But the real issue is this. The Soviet—Russian—Army has never been particularly careful of civilian casualties. Less even than your Army was in Vietnam. But Vietnam was only your luckless ally. This is our home.

"Cities are always costly to do business in. Fighting people who are defending their own lands and homes is harder. Most of these boys are badly trained draftees. Many are from the Caucasus or Inner Asia. We ethnic Russians won't train them properly because we consider them a threat to Russia. Then we send them to war for us.

"These conscripts do not want to do business with the Chechens. That is understandable. The Chechens, you can see from the maps, hold the high ground, the tall buildings. They use them as sniper nests and as observation posts. They communicate by cell phone and they shoot down our throats every chance they get. This city gives them many chances. We lost a gunship and its crew earlier this week. A little before that, fifty paratroopers surrendered. Airborne surrendering to Muslims! You will know, no desantnik ever surrendered in Afghanistan. Political pressure from the highest levels of the Russian Federation is building to take this city back quickly, before we lose too many troops, and embolden other separatists in other Republics. That means maximum force and maximum casualties. Especially civilian.

"I need to see into those buildings, into their corridors and stairwells and rooms. I need to see over the horizon, down into the streets between the buildings. I need to get information to the Airborne and motorized rifle and other line units in time to do something about the Chechens. More than anything, I need to kill Chechen guerrillas in a way that minimizes civilian casualties." He looked at her directly. "The situation the Russian Federation is in now is so bad that many say it is a good idea to kill a great many people now, no matter how many we have alienated by such stupid violence, so we don't have to kill even more later. There is talk of using rocket artillery and even carpet bombing. But I want it both ways." His eyes bored into hers. "To kill as few civilians now as possible, and yet end this war in a way that means we don't have to repeat the lesson here in Grozny again in five years."

"I can meet your tactical needs. Your strategic and political goals..." She had already surmised that both he and his sister were on the fast track; nevertheless, it was startling to hear him speak so frankly as a man who had chosen to assume all the responsibility he could for his country.

"Are probably impossible. I know that. Nonetheless, you will help me to try. As for more practical matters, you will live and work out of my reconnaissance shop, primarily in support of my chief of reconnaissance, Major Malinovsky. He will give you no trouble, and I do not believe you need to anticipate trouble with any of my other soldiers. Unusually for this type of war, there is as near as I can tell very little rape being committed against Chechen women. However, if trouble develops, don't try to handle it yourself. You can't. Instead, tell me immediately. My sister says you have a personal weapon."

"Yes."

"Wear it openly. Sergeant Bagramian will kit you out. You'll be issued an assault rifle and fire for familiarization. Learn its serial number by heart. Learn how to take it apart and reassemble it quickly, in case something goes wrong at an awkward moment and you have to. I'm certain that will be no great challenge for you."

"I understand."

***

Over the next few days, something of an evening ritual was established between Olivia, Suslov, and Malinovsky. At the end of the day, she was often so tired that speaking coherent Russian was almost impossible for her. Instead, while she worked to repair sensors that were broken or malfunctioning, one man or the other sitting beside her silently might hand her a part or a tool to which she had pointed. It had begun as a vital curiosity about what she was doing and had come to be very peaceful and calming.

Olivia had three types of sensors to test. One, carrying dual infrared/audio capabilities, was meant to be emplaced as a surveillance device, their transmissions monitored over short distances. Two were hand-held, meant to be tossed around corners or into rooms in tactical situations, not carefully emplaced. One was infrared/acoustic, the other audio only. They were not what she wanted, nor what she hoped to be able to deliver in a few months. But they were a start. They were far better than nothing. And they were already saving lives.

Olivia looked up from her improvised work table, took off her magnifying glasses, rose and stretched, her back making awful sounds that Malinovsky noticed. She began to make tea. "Where is the Kombrig this evening?"

"Dealing with deserters."

Olivia handed Malinovsky a mug and muttered, "Conscripts driven to desertion because their officers and sergeants beat them, not train them." She was astonished by the effort it took to speak.

"Not in this brigade," Malinovsky said flatly. "Here, we have real officers and sergeants. But this is not a regular unit, not that the Kombrig would ever tolerate the behavior that is sadly, these years, tolerated even in some Airborne or Spetsnaz units." He did an affectionate impersonation of Suslov. " 'Do not be drunk on duty. Ever. Do not engage in relations not covered by regulations. Ever.' "

Olivia looked a question at him. Malinovsky smiled. " 'Relations not covered by regulations' is a polite way of saying, dyedovshchina. Many militaries use or tolerate hazing, whether ugly or benign, to initiate new recruits or to bully them as a deliberate means of uniting them in hatred of their drill instructors. Dyedovshchina," he sipped his tea, "is neither of those things, but simple, pure abuse. It's common enough in all of Russia, but when you fuse it with military rank and discipline, it is intolerable and destructive. Kombrig will break anyone for being drunk on duty or engaging in relations not covered by regulations. Four months ago, he sent away for ten years to a strict regime labor camp a highly decorated warrant officer. The warrant officer had made the mistake of thinking the Kombrig soft, so he made a draftee give him his pay, and when the draftee did not give all the money the warrant officer wanted, the warrant officer beat the lad. The Kombrig heard the shouting and came running and it took six men to pull him off that warrant officer."

By now, Olivia was staring at him, wondering just what sort of an army she had gotten herself into. Then she sipped her tea and prepared herself for the answers to the question she was going to ask. "What happens to deserters?"

"Usually, if their officers find them, they execute them on the spot, along with any Chechens who have given them shelter. The soldiers, for deserting; the Chechens, usually the entire family, for holding prisoners. That's the way we avoid the truth. If their officers do not find them, well, what the Chechens are doing now is telling their mothers, we have your sons, come get them."

Olivia struggled for coherence. "Russian soldiers desert to the enemy in the middle of a war, and their captors tell their mothers to come get them? And they believe that if they go home, the local authorities will not notice?"

"Sadly these deserters believe just that. But we do not take kindly to misbehavior in the face of the enemy. When the authorities find them, as they always do, they are invariably executed for desertion and treason."

"How will the Kombrig deal with them?"

"Offer them a choice. We need casualty replacements, not meat for the guns. If they refuse to return to the colors, which means in this case, this brigade, not their old units, they will be shot on the spot, along with the male Chechen head of household who has sheltered them. If they accept, they have a chance to redeem themselves and, if they live, an honorable discharge. To the Chechens, Kombrig will give his thanks that in the midst of this terrible war, they showed humanity to a lost and demoralized enemy soldier."

"The Kombrig is an unscrupulous humanist," she muttered. "How many accept his offer?"

"Not all have. Surprisingly. We shot those who didn't. But most do. And most of them make good soldiers. They are not disloyal and they are not cowards, but they do not understand why we are killing our own people. Not that we Russians usually consider the Chechens our people, but they are. And we are not just killing fighters; we are killing innocent people. The Chechens are not some mythical nation in arms. Nor are they all fanatics. They are human and many of them would simply like to live peacefully within the Russian Federation, and we are killing them and Russians, too."

Olivia brushed against her soldering iron and grunted as she realized she had forgotten to turn it off. "We executed only one man during World War Two for desertion. At least, that is the official story."

"Different army. Different culture. We sent survivors of German POW camps to the Gulag. That is our official story." Disgust in Malinovsky's clear tenor voice.

"We did persecute one of our greatest boxers for draft resistance during the Vietnam War. Everyone knew that he would never have been assigned to a combat unit. He would have been sent around on exhibition matches during his Army service, living like royalty and fighting easy bouts. But this was a point of honor for him. Of course, it was not the Gulag or execution that he had to worry about. Just losing his title and the chance to do what he was so good at."

Now Malinovsky was looking at her, intrigued. "He got them back. While keeping his honor. How do you, a lady of your background, know about Muhammad Ali?"

"Everyone in America knows something about Muhammad Ali. I had a special reason. I always wanted to learn to box, but never did. Girls didn't do such things back then. I've lifted and run all my life. I've taken them up again, but it's not the same as it was."

Malinovsky nodded. He could tell from her carriage and movements that she had been badly injured, but it was too much of an intrusion to ask for details. Instead, he let her continue. "Right now, my evening recreation seems to consist of fixing my pets."

"Your pets?"

"So I've come to think of them. The problem pets especially."

"Would you still like to learn to box?"

She looked back at him, seeking a challenge or contempt in his black eyes, and found only a man perplexed by a sincere offer that he had not expected to make but did not regret.

"Yes. Yes, I would. Very much."

"Then we begin."

"Now, Major?"

"Now, Doctor. Now."

***

Later that night, Suslov was feeling pleased with his accomplishments—three very chastened conscripts still alive, bedded down, as it were, under the watchful eye of his best group commander, the well-seasoned Lieutenant Aushan, and no dead Chechen civilians. Then he returned to seek his chief of reconnaissance and found him working out with the American boffin. Whether or not this pleased him, he was not ready to consider. After some minutes, he realized he could no longer evade the question.

Boxing is best described as fighting while dancing. Like Malinovsky, Suslov was a Ryazan graduate, and also like most Ryazan graduates, he'd boxed. He occasionally sparred with Malinovsky, usually to a good-natured no-decision. If he wasn't in the Jew's class as a boxer, very few people were. Suslov knew what he was seeing as he watched them. It was immediately, glaringly obvious that the American boffin—Suslov noted with some amusement that he was deliberately avoiding thinking of Olivia by name—could not dance. She was stiff and awkward, moving as though her lower body had been smashed and then been put back together, badly. This meant that, as strong as she was, she did not have, might never have, the hitting power needed to box well. Certainly, she did not yet have the cardiovascular capacity. The running helped and the kettle bell weights, which built both power and flexibility, helped more. But neither was boxing.

Olivia, sweating and breathing hard, was glaring at the man moving in front of her. A massive bull of a man, Malinovsky was also light on his feet. Very light and very agile. Olivia was an engineer. She knew how to build things. She also knew how to destroy them. She could make one small moving object hit another, barely larger. But she could not figure out how to hit the man in front of her, much less hit him hard enough for him to notice.

They were not even close to sparring yet. Malinovsky was just beginning to teach her the basics of footwork and hitting. Olivia had never felt so outclassed in her life and it was a feeling she instinctively abhorred. And yet she liked what she was doing; it felt profoundly right. She found herself wanting very badly to spar, to learn to take a punch and deliver one.

After an hour of work with her, Malinovsky knew what she needed, where her strengths and weaknesses were. Aggression was not something he would have to teach her. And she was horrifyingly tolerant of pain.

"Not bad for an old woman," he jibed. That was not true at all. Even with all the damage she had clearly sustained, he would have been delighted if most of the soldiers in the brigade were as fit as she was. Age be damned. Sex, also. But he needed to be able to bait her.

"You do know, I have to make you pay for that."

"I hope you do. I mean that." He looked at her steadily. "If you meant what you said, I'll teach you. But you have to be serious. You have been injured, you live with pain."

"True."

"How do you control it?"

"Usually, a mixture of codeine and valium which is very light for this level of pain because what is adequate deadens my brain even more than the pain does. Also exercise."

"Clearly. But now you are looking to take a final step."

"Yes. I thought it would be running again."

"No." The feral smile Malinovsky offered her was also entirely innocent and shockingly sweet. "This is."

Olivia returned his smile exactly. "Yes."

"Well then, if you will not see this through, come what may, I have no time to waste, and neither do you. So do not start. If you start, understand me, I will not let you stop, short of actual physical damage."

"I understand you, Major."

"You are going to hurt very badly for a long time."

"Whatever I do, I hurt. So I would rather my pain accomplish something, that my suffering be conscious and purposeful."

"Then I think at the end you can gain some real relief, both physical and psychological. Although until then, you may hate me."

"I doubt it, but I understand you, Comrade Major."

"Then I will see you at 1800 tomorrow night."

Suslov had kept his distance, watching, listening, saying nothing, until Olivia moved past him, her eyes meeting his. He saw her nostrils flare. She was smelling him, he realized, for the scent of expended ammunition and blood. Not tonight, Doctor. This night has been good to us all, he found himself thinking.

Malinovsky rinsed his mouth out with water.

"Where will you find equipment for her?"

"You might let her use yours."

It was, Suslov realized, a very intimate idea and he knew it showed in his face. "Why mine?"

"You match well for size," Malinovsky responded. "And you are already hers, even if you will not trouble her with that knowledge."

"She carries enough of a burden, without having to worry about what I might want from her as a woman. Are you trying to play matchmaker, Vladimir Alexandrovich?"

"The Shulkhan Arukh says that everyone should be married, unless you are studying Torah, in which case, you can put it off forever. Unless you're a yeshiva bokher who specializes in the wives of lesser Jews."

Malinovsky's recent divorce, Suslov knew, was still a raw wound. People dealt with the shattering of the Soviet world in many ways. His ex-wife, also Jewish by birth, had become increasingly interested in the faith. Malinovsky naively assumed that meant recreational religion classes or, God forbid, folk dancing. Instead, it had meant shaving her head, which he could have gotten used to. After all, his wife was quite pretty and Major Suslova, who was very beautiful, preferred to wear her hair short. But his wife had covered her shaved head, which he had realized was actually quite elegant and was increasingly allowing himself to find erotic, with a wig. To be precise, an ugly wig. Then, at a time when pay was months in arrears and food was closely rationed, she fell into lunacies like separate dishes for meat and milk and a ban on sausages. Then everything had to be strictly Kosher, a financial impossibility even if a Kosher butcher could be found. It seemed they'd all moved to Israel, or at least enough of Russia's Jews had so that Kosher butcher shops were no longer profitable enterprises.

Disgusted, hoping somehow his wife would come to her senses, Malinovsky had packed and moved into the barracks, finding a spare rack and an empty wall locker, that night. The next morning, she'd made it clear to him that the will of HaShem required that he come to his senses. She would lead him, in accordance with the will of HaShem, or file for divorce and move to Israel.

And that is what came to pass, although his wife emigrated in the company of a yeshiva bokher with whom she had—whether before or after the divorce, remained unclear—taken up. Fine by me, Malinovsky had concluded. The Russian Kosher butcher shops are now in Israel. Also the Jewish Russian psychiatrists. May she enjoy patronizing them all.

"What, me, play match-maker?" asked Malinovsky in mock chagrin. "Let us consider the operational aspects. First, she's a Jewess. You were married to a Jewess, I was married to a Jewess. We're both divorced, although only me because my ex-wife is a Jewess. Second, I always wanted a little sister. I have three younger brothers who are all ugly like me. You have a sister. Counting your brother's widow, you have two. Both wonderful women, neither blessedly possessed of any urge to follow the will of HaShem. This one's mine. She's sane. And she's not little. Third, I really don't want to fuck her. I want to hit her, fairly hard and fairly often, to the end of teaching her to hit back, very hard indeed. The idea of hitting a woman I fuck makes me sick, and I doubt I could ever fuck a woman I've hit."

"I am reassured that you like to keep your sex and your violence separate." Suslov's voice was shaking with the effort to contain his laughter. "Don't teach her to box, Vladimir Alexandrovich. Teach her to fight. She knows too well how to bear pain. Teach her to use pain to inflict it. Make her stronger and better than she is now."

"Count on it, my friend."

***

The initial fighting for Grozny lasted into February. Russian military casualties ran into the hundreds, as did Chechen resistance casualties. Both sides committed atrocities and war crimes, the Russians far more than the Chechens. And hundreds of civilians, many of them Russian, died in the fighting. A strange and terrible place to be happy in.

And yet, Olivia was happy. She couldn't have said why. She was cold, the food was bad, the living conditions were harsh, never mind that the filth and squalor normally associated with Russian positions were entirely absent from Suslov's brigade. She'd forgotten what it was to be really warm or clean. Forgotten what it was to really sleep through a night. The violence precluded it.

Nighttime harassment and interdiction fire is rarely fired at anyone in particular. It's meant to curtail the movement of enemy troops, disturb their rest, and lower their morale with the threat of casualties.

Olivia could certainly say that it worked as the first mortar round landed, a dull crump a hundred meters away. Then the second, a bit closer. She shoved her feet into her boots, grabbed her rifle and staggered off to find a bunker, colliding with Suslov on the way. "Excuse me please," she murmured, embarrassed, as he braced her up. "Thank you."

"It's nothing we can't endure for a while." He steered her into the bunker.

"But doesn't your artillery have counter-battery radar?"

"Yes."

"Why aren't we firing back?"

"Perhaps the equipment is down. Perhaps the troops are untrained. Perhaps some liquid in that system can be used for intoxication. Men here sometimes drink brake fluid."

"So that is why I have seen BTRs and BMPs slam into houses with a screech of metal."

He nodded grimly. "It gets filtered through bread. So does mouthwash." In the dim light, he watched her face as another mortar round detonated, this one closer. She no longer flinched at such things. It occurred to him that although she was beautiful, she was not at all pretty. For this he was grateful. It reduced the temptation to folly on the part of some of his soldiers. She was, however, the most interesting woman he'd ever met, and he was even more grateful that at the end of the day, there simply was not enough of him left even to hope he could properly entertain her.

Then he realized, with some amusement, that he knew what she was thinking. "Doctor Tolchinskaya, I appreciate your curiosity, but I do not want you to adopt some orphaned counter-battery radar unit."

By now, more troops had filed in, leaving a prudent space between their colonel and the quiet foreign engineer who was working with them.

"You have people out looking for that mortar team?"

"Amongst other things, yes, and in time, they will find that crew. That reminds me. You are, perhaps, going out on patrols a bit too often? I do not want you captured."

"I always know where the machine gunner's secondary weapon is."

"And you carry a rifle and a pistol. But save those for the enemy."

"I reserve one round for myself. Always."

Suslov nodded. "If such comes about and your pistol fails you...grenades are very certain. Just put the last one inside your vest against your chest and pull the pin. If it all goes to hell—" he was speaking very quietly, "there is a final way out no one can take from you, and that is to bite off your tongue as far back as you can. All you need is a hard surface against which to ram your lower jaw."

"How do you know this?" she heard herself asking, horrified and yet also grateful for the advice.

"When my father was a young tank officer, he fought at a place we call Khalkhin Gol, and the Japanese call Nomonhan, where World War Two really started. Japanese prisoners sometimes committed suicide that way." He paused, breathing deeply and quietly. "He never forgave himself for not telling his children that until after one was captured by the mujahidin in Afghanistan."

They were silent for a while in the bunker, smelling strongly of unwashed bodies, dirty uniforms, oiled, used weapons, old tobacco, and hot tea. Olivia remembered his hand briefly on her shoulders, a calm, steady touch that one could bear up under. She had seen him touch his soldiers that way, especially if it had been a bad day, no matter how bad his own day had been, and she suddenly felt a great desire to touch him that way. But his words were too personal for touch in that place. "In America," she said, "we have what is called a living will. That if you are hurt in certain ways, the doctors are forbidden to keep you alive."

"We are expected to survive and function."

"Some things cannot be repaired."

"If such a thing happens to you, your brigade comrades will take care of you, not let you linger among strangers."

"Will you do so yourself, for me, if you are available?" She knew it was a heavy burden to ask him to take up, and in exchange offered to bear another burden. "And I will do the same for you," she said. She knew, from the way his eyes widened in the dim light of the bunker, that he knew she understood what she had asked, and offered.

"Now, this is interesting." And, sadly, more intimate than sex, yet it was what was possible and he realized that he wanted to accept her gift. "Ira—my sister—and I have such an agreement, but only as a last resort. Such things are best handled at the tactical level, not as a family matter. I have never made such a promise with a woman in a tactical situation. But we will make this promise to each other as...friends, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

She reached out, offered him her hand and he held it for a few seconds, feeling her strength, permitting himself to brace against her. He felt it wrong for a commander to take comfort from his soldiers; he comforted them. But he realized that as she was not one of his soldiers, he might allow himself to draw upon her strength. Satisfied, he released her hand.

Olivia was dozing intermittently between the incoming mortar rounds, when over one of the radios in the bunker there was the hard rattle of AK fire, brief screaming in Chechen and the exultant howls of Russian infantrymen, ended by the individual clarity of insurance shots. "Good," she muttered. "That problem is solved."

Suslov, who envied but did not begrudge his soldiers their satisfaction, permitted himself a wry smile. "For a while."

# CHAPTER TWELVE, MOSCOW AND GUDERMES, SUMMER 1995: KRISTINICH

"Two things I want you to think about while I'm in Chechnya this time, Mister Borodkin," Olivia said. "The first is, how feasible is a new kind of self-destruct mechanism in these sensors, more reliable and safer than acid? The second is silicon-germanium."

"If I understand correctly, that line of semi-conductor research has been abandoned by all the companies that pursued it, including IBM."

"You are correct. However, we shall try. Success never comes easy."

"And yet it seems that is what you have had."

She laughed. "I spent years trying to do this in America. I have those years of failures and false starts and having my projects cancelled or destroyed by others. Good failures, some of them."

"In Soviet engineering, there was no failure. There was sabotage and there were personal shortcomings. But there was no concept of failure as part of creation."

"And many, many American engineers avoid failure. They avoid studying what doesn't work and why it doesn't. My father made sure I never made that mistake."

"Your father was an engineer?"

"Yes. And my mother was an architect. They had their own design bureau. When I was a girl, my father told me about John Roebling, who was an absolute master of the suspension bridge. Roebling preferred to study failed bridges and so the beauty and strength of his work has lasted."

"I understand," Borodkin said bitterly. "We didn't study failures. We stole what worked."

Olivia's eyes softened. "Your country did what it had to, to survive. So are we stealing what works because we can't start from scratch, but we are also going to steal promising failures. That is another thing you should think towards while I am gone. We are going to need more engineers and more technicians and we are going to need some expanded, permanent production facilities."

Borodkin found himself feeling a wave of real pleasure, interrupted by fear and the resentment that fear occasioned. It had become a daily pattern with him. His resentment of Olivia protected him from himself, a resentment that grew ever more complex, nuanced, and serrated. "Yes, Doctor."

"Good." She rose abruptly, awkwardly, catching her right hip bone hard on the edge of the desk.

In the aftermath of the accident, her ligaments, which connect bone to bone, and lie beneath the tendons that connect muscle to bone, had knotted up to support the breaks and fractures. Many of them were still corded, one in her lower right back so much so that it felt like bone, stubbornly resistant to all her attempts to stretch it. With the normal flexion between her pelvis and lower spine greatly reduced, she felt the impact deep in both structures. It seemed that her body was being torn apart and set on fire.

Taken by surprise, without the least opportunity to prepare herself, the pain overwhelmed her in an instant. She found herself choking back vomit until she could locate the wastebasket behind her desk. Olivia knew she would never make it to the bathroom, so she didn't try. She motioned to Borodkin and said, "Water, please. Paper towels." Borodkin complied, his concern for her vanishing into resentment that he should have to do such a thing, then sudden pleasure at her incapacitation. He returned with the items, then looked away as she rinsed out her mouth, spat into the wastebasket, covered the remains of her lunch with the toweling while struggling to gain control over her breathing. She had morphine although she seldom used it, but this pain was as bad as anything since rehab. She thought she could feel, with great precision, the breaks and the metal pins. Her hands were shaking. She reached into her purse and found the vial, shook out two tablets and washed them down with the dregs of her cold tea. After a few moments, she was able to force composure into her voice and manage coherence. "I will be worthless for the rest of the day, so please call a car for me and I will see you in the morning."

Borodkin obeyed with sullen happiness, sullen at having to obey another order, happy that, for the rest of the day, he was free.

The next morning, she began her daily routine of stretching while in bed and continued in the hot shower, a necessity everywhere but in Chechnya. It took at least fifteen minutes and was brutally hard. But she felt she had just the slightest bit more flexion in her lower spine and pelvis. Putting her body away, she dressed and went to work.

***

The boxing ring, such as it was, that she shared with Major Malinovsky was now in Gudermes, Chechnya's second city and the focus of fighting now that Grozny was more or less pacified. But it was such a world to itself that it could have been anywhere. It had four corners, demarcated by buckets. When she stepped into it, when the lesson began and the fear abated, she found herself in a place of floating sensations. When she sparred with him, time did not exist in any ordinary sense. It slowed down at one level, accelerated at another. She saw what they did with great slowness, sometimes watched their combat develop so slowly she was able to understand what he was teaching her. Sometimes she was able to react before she heard his clear, even tenor telling her how and when to hit, telling her what to do with her feet. She had once read a thriller that described boxing not as a sweet science, there was nothing scientific about it, but entirely art—the holy trinity of hitting, timing, and footwork. That writer was correct and wrong. It was a trinity and it was also holy. But it was also a sweet and holy science. Science as knowledge, and knowledge, and the means of acquiring it, as holy.

The simple fact was that Malinovsky liked to hit people, a lot—but only if there were rules and only if they could hit back, hard and effectively. He had never had the slightest interest in hitting people who couldn't hit back. So he had begun very gently, as a man working with a woman, as a teacher working with a new student. He never forgot that he had the advantage of thirty kilos of muscle, a quarter of a century of experience, and no serious injuries over someone who had been horribly hurt and permanently damaged. He had quickly realized that she was far more afraid of hurting him than he was of her. At first he thought it absurd, ridiculous. And then he had realized, seeing her scars, watching her move, how tightly she was braced in her lower spine and pelvis, that she knew more about pain than he could imagine. So he began hitting her sooner and harder than he expected. Still, he pulled his punches; he would never hit her with full force. But he also realized that the only way to get her to hit him with conviction was to hit her hard enough to get her attention, then teach her how to discipline her anger and aggression.

By mutual consent, they refused full-power shots at each other's heads. Olivia avoided low blows, Malinovsky avoided high blows. He had, of course, been worried about her breasts, even though Suslova had helped her find a chest protector in Moscow. Breasts mattered to him. She looked like few women he'd ever seen but she also didn't look like anything else, either. It could be unnerving.

Malinovsky hit low, a body blow, and Olivia deflected it lower. She watched his gloved fist impact her right hip, had a fraction of a second to prepare herself for appalling pain, and instinctively relaxed hard. The sound of her pelvis and lower spine being jarred loose from each other, the sudden impact of the blow breaking the compression of that ligament, was obscenely loud, like a pistol shot. The pain was there and it was intense, but to Olivia's surprise, it wasn't horrible. She could feel the deep heat of blood being able to circulate freely, rather than the sensation of her body being torn apart and set on fire.

For a moment, Malinovsky struggled with the fear that he'd broken bone, possibly even rebroken her hip. Then Olivia backed away, got her right leg under her, feeling the sharp tingles of long-impaired circulation resuming. She let out her breath, circled to the right, then the left. Malinovsky could see the new flexion in her lower back, buttock and upper thigh, could see for the first time the power starting to come up her thighs into her lower back as it should.

"Nice hit," she said, beginning to breathe normally again.

"Continue?" he asked shakily through his mouth guard.

" _Please."_

A few minutes later, Olivia led with her nose into one of Malinovsky's sharper jabs. The result was inevitable, the bleeding profuse. Fortunately, her nose was not broken, merely...rearranged a bit.

***

Alternately murderous and benign, Warrant Officer Konstantin Eduardovich Simonov had a cheerful round face, pug nose, and freckles. Originally from Petersburg, he had become a warrant officer in an unusual way. He'd opted to be drafted, rather than continue to pursue a university education that he knew he wasn't really mature enough to benefit from. He did this much to the disgust of his parents, low-level apparatchiks who had worked very hard to make sure their children would rise higher. The Army was no place to rise higher. Then Gorbachev released all university students from their military obligation, a blatant attempt to curry favor with the intelligentsia, the apparatchiks, and the West. His ugly gesture had tremendously insulted all those who were in service because they wanted to be or felt they were needed. Simonov was one of those who refused to quit the colors. He liked the Airborne, and he ended up liking Spetsnaz more. The training was interesting. And he realized that he liked combat. He had suspected he would like it before he partook, but the actuality of liking it had taken a lot of getting used to. He feared becoming addicted. A very wise officer had sensed it and told him, you just needed to keep that pleasure, like all pleasures, in its particular place. Simonov took the lesson to heart and began to ponder his future as a soldier who wanted more out of soldiering than combat. He didn't care to remain in the enlisted ranks. But he didn't want to become an officer. Too much responsibility, too much hypocrisy, too little pay. Becoming a warrant officer allowed him to be a soldier with some status and pursue what quickly became his second-favorite military pleasure: training other likely lads and turning them into soldiers. Real soldiers.

Of course, real soldiers didn't spend their time providing security details for an American engineer who had once worked for the American Ministry of Defense or whatever they called it. Much less a woman. Let alone a beautiful woman, even if she did have a really excellent mind. Nor did he ever expect to have the experience of said engineer flopping down beside him one day in a ruined building in a secured neighborhood where they were training, and then having her lie back on her rucksack and ask him what he wanted by way of technology.

"You can't be serious, Doctor. People like you don't ask people like me what we need. People like you aren't even supposed to be here. Least of all, women."

Olivia looked into his eyes and felt a sudden playfulness, long suppressed, with this young man. Colonel Suslov had assigned Simonov to run her personal security detail and had told Olivia, sternly and in his presence, that she would obey him immediately and without question whenever danger arose. Since then, Simonov had barely spoken to her, even in the line of duty, except to bark an occasional "Down!" or "Into that building!" or some such. His attitude had clearly been, "You're here. I have my orders. So do you. That's all there is to it."

At first, she'd regarded him as little more than another minder, another Borodkin. But she'd watched him as he'd watched her, and over time they'd acquired a certain abstract respect for each other. Olivia decided she liked him, in the way Americans often liked old-style juvenile delinquents or difficult dogs. You never quite knew whether to beat them or scratch them behind the ears. Today, exhausted but pleased because things were going very well, Olivia decided to do some scratching.

"You're right," she said calmly. "But I have my reasons. I'd heard that Russian soldiers are most excellent in bed, and as a professional woman well over thirty, my chances of marrying an American man are less than my chances of being hit by a meteorite. Or so I was told by all the experts on all the TV shows I never watched and in all the books and magazines I never read. I decided to become, as we say in America, proactive. My way of improving my marriage odds involves hauling around twenty kilos of crap on a wrecked back, being cold, dirty, hungry, and thirsty most of the time, obeying you unquestioningly and unhesitatingly, even when it involves diving into sewers, and shooting at people I can't see, just to keep their heads down. I can't tell you how sexy I find all this to be, so I thought that as an even more exciting form of foreplay I'd ask you what military technology you wanted."

For an instant, Simonov had a sensation of snorting cold water through his nose. Then he started laughing. Olivia joined him and they found themselves trying to stop, looking at each other, then laughing again. After it finally ended, with two sets of ribs hurting, Simonov wiped his sprouting beard. "But you talk to the Kombrig and the chief of reconnaissance about what they need."

"I do. And I talk to people at echelons well above them about what they need. But I also talk to the commander of my security team and his troops about what they need and want."

"Russian boys are stubborn. It takes a while for us to figure some things out."

"Americans, too."

"I believe," he said. "I will think about your question. For now, we need to move on down the street and see how your other toys are doing." They gathered themselves and stepped outside. Fifty meters later, as they approached the door of yet another ruined building, Simonov stopped, then pointed to a wire, nearly invisible amid the junk and garbage on the ground before them. He backed her off two paces, then stopped.

"Do you see the wire, Doctor?"

"Yes."

He pointed to their left, then to their right. "Do you see the secondaries?"

"Yes."

"So do I. Note what they've done. The door is wired. But so are the logical places where you might take cover in event of ambush. There may be more wires behind us. Let's give thanks whoever made this set of traps isn't here to spring the ambush."

"Or doesn't consider us worth the effort."

"Then we'll give thanks for that, too. Now let's turn around and walk back to where we were, one step at a time, eyes on the ground for wires or anything that looks like mines."

Simonov took her wrist.

"No, Warrant Officer. We walk five meters apart."

"Very well, Doctor. But I must tell you. You'll never find a husband like that."

***

Three days later, on a long road trip to visit the detachments outside of Gudermes, they took fire from an ambush. Their Uazik, the tough and reliable Russian idea of a jeep, took some rounds, which infuriated Simonov, who cursed and kept driving. Olivia caught a glimpse of motion at an intersection before them. Time slowed and accelerated as it did when she boxed. Calmly, she put several rounds from her assault rifle into a Chechen man's chest. He dropped his weapon and fell. They didn't stop. Olivia fired randomly in front of them. Suppressive fire forward, eyes on the flanks. What went on behind them, went on.

They got out of the killing zone unharmed. The ambush had been sloppy, inept, or perhaps they were just a passing target of opportunity that had yielded nothing except at least one dead attacker. Simonov slowed the vehicle as, a half kilometer later, their men approached. He told them what had happened. They went into tactical formation and began their slow advance to the ambush site. Simonov then turned to Olivia. He was curious. She was in the midst of realizing what she'd done for the first time: killed another human being who had intended her death. Wait until you learn how much you can really like it, Doctor, he found himself thinking. But that would take a different kind of contact, harder, longer, far more violent. That was an experience it was his job to make sure she didn't have. "Very good shooting, Doctor," he said softly.

"Thank you," she murmured from deep within herself, and he saw within her eyes more than the usual array of emotions. He saw a certainty _._ I have killed. I am still...me. He understood.

Later that evening, he found her leaning up against a remnant wall next to the building that housed the brigade's latest forward headquarters, an abandoned honey factory. It was cool for summer. She watched the sun go down, holding a cup of tea in her hands with those odd fingerless gloves. He took in the elegant profile of her face and the strong line of her neck, the way she leaned back against the wall, one leg tucked up under her, her rifle slung in front of her body, the scent of her arousal liquid and intense.

This was a new experience for her. Olivia had never reacted that way to simple danger, or to hunting animals. This was a reaction to killing her own kind. She'd heard about men needing to change their shorts after successful contact, but never about women needing to do so. She needed to do so.

With a downward rush of blood, Simonov realized that he wanted to rape her about a dozen times. No, not like that at all, that was no joke, just lay her down somewhere clean and soft and warm and quiet and fuck her hard until she was thoroughly satiated. If a woman trusted you enough to let you do that for her, it was extremely satisfying to watch her floating on the sensation. Do it once and you'd wonder why you'd ever wanted to get off fast. Or at all.

He was aware that she was watching him out of one glacial eye, and as if she knew his thoughts, he found himself turning scarlet. "I apolo..."

She raised her hand and lowered it, a small gesture of just a few centimeters that effectively silenced him. She sipped her tea and Simonov took refuge in his own mug. After a while, she spoke, her voice dry, bemused, gentle. "So. Have you given any more thought to your needs?"

Simonov exhaled a great deal of tea all over the sprouting orange tufts of beard that he kept hoping would turn into something terrifying or at least impressive or at least decent or at least inoffensive to the Kombrig, none of which would ever happen. "Doctor?"

"Your technological needs. Obviously."

"Obviously," he laughed. "There is something I must relay to you. This afternoon, our boys went back into where we were...driving. They brought in two prisoners. One seems to be some sort of bomb maker. They call such persons 'engineers.'"

"I did not know that."

"It does seem wrong. It may have been the man who made that trap we found ourselves in."

"What is being done with him?"

"He has been given to Major Kristinich."

Olivia shrugged. "It's getting late. I may as well go to my quarters."

"Very well, Doctor. But I must warn you. It may be that soon enough you'll be hearing noises."

"Noises?"

"Screams. That will be Major Kristinich at work. It can be hard to listen to, the first time."

But Olivia seemed too deep into her own thoughts to answer or to care. The first scream came. Olivia started, then straightened herself.

"I'll walk you back to your quarters," Simonov offered.

The second scream came. Olivia realized that Kristinich did his work near the private room Suslov had assigned her in deference to her sex and her need to think at odd hours. She grimaced a little.

"Thank you, Warrant Officer. I'll be OK."

He wasn't sure.

***

An hour later, wisely clean shaven, Simonov rapped hard on the door of Suslov's quarters, such as they were: just an alcove in what had once been an office. There was room enough for his cot and some shelves, enough empty floor space to stretch out, and a door for privacy.

Suslov lay on his cot, trying to read, occasionally adjusting the purring cat who kept him from reading, and pondering how Olivia had impacted his schedule. He had small groups all over Chechnya, plus Dagestan and Ingushetia. He had noticed that he tended, whenever possible, to coordinate his visits to any given location with Doctor Tolchinskaya. He liked her presence. She was calm. His men were safer for her, and that made her very comforting for him to be around. Now, in addition to her audio/infrared sensors, Doctor Tolchinskaya had begun to develop aerial drones capable of quick-response, small-scale photo reconnaissance. It was crude, still more of what she called a line of thought than any proper research and development effort, but so very much better than what they had. The men had come to think of her as a miracle worker and Suslov had to remind them and himself that some miracles took longer than others.

He liked, whenever he could, to watch Olivia and Malinovsky sparring. An odd sensation, seeing two people for whom he cared very much, hit each other in serious play. Wistfully, not jealously, he envied them the ferocious clarity of their relationship. His own feelings for the woman had become both very simple and, given the present impossibility of any decent way of discovering if she might return them, complex. So he simply enjoyed her presence as he could.

He'd had a long day, most of it taken up by arguing about pay with a higher-echelon finance officer, finally shaking loose some back pay for the men. Food was not such a problem. The brigade usually had it and the men could sell it. This was normally a very bad idea in any unit Suslov commanded. But he understood why it sometimes had to happen. In any event, it wasn't like what the higher-ups did with the brigade's pay: putting it out at interest while inflation soared, making private fortunes, then releasing it to the men after it had lost much of its value. And then the bosses wondered why the soldiers wouldn't fight, as if sane men fought for those who held them in such low regard while profiteering off their misery.

At least I'm not married, he thought. At least I don't have children to worry about. He'd never thought there would come a day when he'd be grateful to be divorced and childless, but that day had come. It was a day due not to American military might, but to American economic advice and to the thuggish Russian understanding of private enterprise. He'd been indoctrinated as a Communist and had been proud to call himself one. He had also been extremely aware of the shortcomings of Communism and like most Airborne officers felt quite free to express his opinions in ways that would have horrified any member of the intelligentsia, conformist or dissident. But he'd come to the conclusion that capitalism, at least as Americans preached for Russians to adopt it, was just another way to impoverish and humiliate his country. What he could not understand was why Russians were participating in it. Especially Russians with more money than they would ever need. Doing so at the expense of Russians struggling to stay alive.

"Kombrig?"

He abandoned his thought, tossed aside the novel and, more gently, the cat. Mashka, a grey and brown tabby female, was a goodly cat. She slept on his pillow when he was gone, and usually beside but sometimes on top of him when he was there. More than once he had woken in the night to hear her purring away, watching him protectively and affectionately. Lately, she had taken to bringing him gifts that he did not eat.

"Good evening, Konstantin Eduardovich."

"Sir." He paused.

Suslov looked at his warrant officer closely. "What troubles you, son?"

"Our American." He paused. "She knows, she has some idea what is being done to the prisoner and it distresses her."

"How do you know this?"

"We were walking back to our quarters when the screams began."

"Has she said anything?"

"Not a word. She has no authority and she knows it. But it is obvious."

"How is it obvious?"

"I escorted her to her room. The screaming was quite audible. I sensed her distress.... Kombrig...we drove through an ambush this morning. She killed a man. Her first. She is still coming to terms with that. This is not helping her."

Now that he paid attention, Suslov could hear the man screaming in the cellar beneath them. How it could be, he wondered with a wonderment that had begun in Afghanistan and would never end, that the really horrible thing about combat was not what you did. Survival was survival and he'd never had much use for the high moral standards of those who risked nothing. The true horror was what you became inured to, and what that coarsening made possible. He'd made his peace with that long ago. Indifference to the sufferings of others could be dealt with by a combination of discipline and pride in themselves and their officers...and by having such as Kristinich available. What the men felt was their own affair. What they did was his affair. But he had no such authority over Olivia. All he had to help her over this moment was himself.

"Thank you, Warrant Officer Simonov. I commend you and your men for protecting Doctor Tolchinskaya."

"She protects us, Kombrig."

"Yes. She does. I will tend to her now."

Ten minutes later, Suslov knocked on the door to Olivia's quarters, a room even smaller than his own that at least afforded her some degree of privacy. The woman who opened the door was drawn, her eyes haunted, and he realized that her privacy had been a mistake. It had imposed upon her a degree of isolation no man in the brigade had to endure. At the beginning, it had been necessary. But no longer.

"I can hear quite clearly," she said at last. "I have been listening for some time."

"I know. Warrant Officer Simonov told me that you are in some distress tonight from recent events as well as," he shrugged. "The present situation."

"It was kind of him to do so."

"He did so because he cares about you," Suslov answered sharply. "Do not blame him. Also, please do not blame me for invading your privacy." Privacy was an American concept that he nevertheless understood. "Under ordinary circumstances, I would ask you if you wished me to leave. But these are not ordinary circumstances, things that can be put off until another day."

"I can hear that."

"Yes. Now you must also see it. Doctor Tolchinskaya, I would like you to witness this interrogation."

"Why?"

The word was a challenge, not a calm and simple question. Suslov suddenly found it hard to speak to her. He was furious with himself for condemning her to isolation, furious with himself for not realizing that all this would inevitably catch up with her and furious with himself for making this plan to deal with it. But none of the words he'd ever used with his soldiers now seemed to avail. He examined her face and eyes closely for defiance. There was none. It was an honest question. But it was still a challenge. "So you know that as bad it is, it is not as bad as you think. You've already learned that lesson once today. I am sorry that you must learn it again so soon. But we do not always have the luxury of setting our own schedules in these matters."

"I do not really have a choice, do I?"

"No. Out of respect for you, I am speaking courteously, but this is actually an order. Please follow me." He did not look back. Underneath the screams, he could hear the faint awkwardness of her stride. They descended into the cellar. It was predictably dank and hideous. She felt as if she were in some awful movie whose awfulness was based on a deliberately inept combination of banality and evil. The banality of evil. She'd encountered that phrase before. Where? Oh, yes. A book she'd read in college. No time to remember the title now. Time to live it.

They walked. Outside another doorway, he halted and turned to her. "You must be silent until we leave." His voice was absolutely level. Out of a sense of mercy, he took her arm just above her elbow in a firm grip. He felt her flinch from his touch, but she did not resist.

They went in quietly and were not noticed. She didn't know what she'd expected. Kristinich, burning holes in people. Kristinich, cutting off the prisoner's fingers one at a time. Last winter, such behavior by the Chechens had been unheard of. But that was no longer the case. She'd personally seen the body of one Russian they'd practiced on. Often, the Russians repaid the debt in full. Any captive would do. Heating bayonets until they glowed, then cutting people open, seemed to be a favorite in the nearby motorized rifle regiment. This, by contrast, was almost decent.

Olivia looked. Across the cellar from them, one man was bound securely to a heavy wooden chair, wired up to an old hand-cranked field telephone, specially adapted for the purpose by the addition of a small transformer. The Chechen was struggling not to scream, then screaming. The conscript medic, whose job it was to work the field telephone while not doing any damage, seemed in almost as much anguish as the prisoner he was condemned to torment, then patch up. Major Malinovsky—Brother Vladimir—was pacing, his skin and uniform barely containing a physical rage that was a terrifying contrast to his meditative peace in the boxing ring. At a nearby desk with a tape recorder, notepad, and reference files, under a bulb rigged to expose the prisoner's face while shadowing the rest of the cellar room, Kristinich slouched in what seemed to be the FSB's uniform of jeans, black sweater, and black leather jacket. After a few seconds, Malinovsky lifted his hand, a signal Kristinich dared not disregard. There was silence, except for the prisoner's panting. In the silence, the same voice Olivia knew from sparring with Malinovsky, the clear, even tenor telling her how to move and how and when to hit, said to the prisoner: "You are very brave and I salute you. But you have no choice. You will not be permitted to die or even lose consciousness."

No answer.

"Major Malinovsky needs to discuss your contacts, money, arms, and weapons caches," Kristinich said from the desk. The Chechen said nothing. "I need to discuss certain political matters."

No answer.

"Increase the voltage, Private."

"Sir, that much voltage and he may tear muscles or break bones."

"Good." A soft, leisurely word.

Instinctively, the young private turned to Malinovsky.

"Danger of a heart attack, Medic?"

"No, Comrade Major," the conscript said angrily. "Not even close."

Electricity was relatively clean. If you were halfway competent, there was little risk of doing serious harm. And when it was over, it was over, which gave the source an enormous incentive to cooperate. Increasing the voltage so that the Chechen actually broke bones against his bonds and the chair—Malinovsky now understood why Kristinich had been so particular about how the man was secured—negated both those advantages.

"Inspect him now."

The medic complied. "No broken bones. No torn muscles."

"Then take him close to it, Private," Kristinich said sharply.

After a few seconds, Malinovsky nodded.

Lack of viciousness did not mean mercy, Medic Tarasov belatedly understood.

It began again. Hideous, Malinovsky thought. Kristinich sensed his disgust and decided to play with it. "We are both majors. Not enough rank to draw too much attention, but enough to have some fun. He will be killed anyway, so what does it matter how he gets there?" A sardonic, seductive voice with its own diseased logic.

Malinovsky was trapped. He had his colonel's orders to keep it from degenerating into pure sadism. He had Kristinich before him, using the Chechen's torment to manipulate and humiliate him. And there was the Chechen in the chair, who had been too pious a Muslim to commit suicide. Russians did that, not Chechens. Any reasonable person would have, but when had anyone ever been able to describe the Chechens as reasonable?

Malinovsky decided to act. He walked to Kristinich, stood behind him, then sank his fingers into Kristinich's shoulder, driving them hard to bone. Kristinich became aware of the pressure, then the pain. Still watching the Chechen, he squirmed in Malinovsky's grip but dared not tell him to stop or turn to confront him. From his breathing, Malinovsky knew he was hurting him without coming anywhere close to tearing skin and muscle. Good. A small taste of what you like to watch.

"Pretend you are a professional," Kristinich sneered, "even if you are a..."

"A Jew?" Malinovsky now began to manipulate the bones. "Indeed I am, Major Kristinich. That is why I am doing this. It's my way of letting you know when you become unprofessional." He relaxed his grasp a moment. Kristinich sagged. "So, Major," Malinovsky went on. "Every time you turn on the voltage, my Jew fingers will dig into your bones. Every time you increase the voltage, my Jew fingers will increase the pressure. If any of the Chechen's bones are broken, well, as the God of the Jews, who is also the God of the Christians, commands us, 'Eye for eye, tooth for tooth...bone for bone.'"

Kristinich shuddered, nauseous from the pain Malinovsky was inflicting. The screaming continued. Malinovsky went on. "Now, Major, should you wish to remove my inconvenience to your activities, you may either confront me physically or you may terminate the electrocution long enough to permit me to ask some questions."

Kristinich signaled to the medic to stop. The Chechen sagged, exhausted and limp in his bonds, breathing hoarsely. Malinovsky released Kristinich and went to the prisoner. "I'm going to give you a minute to rest. Then I'm going to ask you one question. If you answer well, I will ask others. If you do not answer, or answer poorly, this will continue. The choice is yours. We will repeat the procedure, fifteen seconds of electricity, one minute to rest, one question, until we reach whatever ending we reach. You do understand that the rest intervals will simply make the next shocks worse. My first question is simple. What is your name?"

No answer. Malinovsky returned to stand behind Kristinich and placed one hand on his shoulder. "When I squeeze down on your shoulder, Major, you may order the medic to begin. When I release, you may order the medic to stop. The pressure will not be great, unless we find ourselves in some sort of disagreement."

Kristinich nodded. It began. Malinovsky moved a bit to one side so that he could see Kristinich's face. What he saw on it, he had seen before, and Malinovsky wished he could dismiss it as sexual. But it wasn't. It was the emptiness of watching another's suffering, of causing another's sufferings, and feeling nothing oneself, and taking pleasure in that. It was more than impotence taking pleasure in degradation. It was emptiness exalting itself. And Malinovsky understood what a rabbi had once told him. The Jewish Gehenna wasn't the Christian Hell of everlasting physical torment. It was the total absence of God. Malinovsky had no use for a God, any god, who would permit these things to happen, even encourage and demand them. But he'd understood about Gehenna as being thrown into an emptiness that tormented humanity by proclaiming, For you, there is nothing else. Perhaps the god who'd created Gehenna, or who gave Jews to understand that such a place might exist...perhaps that god was some sort of Kristinich himself. Who enjoyed watching.

Malinovsky banished the thought and released his grip. Kristinich signaled the medic to stop, then inspect the prisoner. Then Malinovsky walked to the Chechen.

"Aslambek Baisultanov, you are a bomb maker and a very good one. You have been in and out of Chechnya. Major Kristinich will now recite your recent itinerary."

Kristinich read off a series of names, dates and places. Kizlyar and Makhachkala in bordering Dagestan were frequently mentioned, but so also were Sochi on the Black Sea, Rostov, Novorossiysk and Volgograd, or Stalingrad, all in Russia proper. The Chechen mafia network, linked into Russian organized crime, Malinovsky could guess: a great deal of effort, of real work, had gone into obtaining that information, he knew. "I would like to know more about your caches and contacts."

Silence once more. And once more, it began. Baisultanov shrieked. The medic operated his equipment in a trance. Malinovsky guessed the lad had shut his mind down to the absolute minimum. So had the man he was ordered to torture. As the interval ended, Malinovsky took a cup of tea, crouched down before the Chechen, held the mug to his bloody, bitten lips, let him drink. "I have said before, you are very brave. I say this, one fighting man to another. But courage here is worth nothing but pain."

The Chechen drank. "We would do worse to you, Jew, and much worse to that Russian dog." A whisper now, the defiance almost gone.

"Insha'Allah, I learned in Afghanistan not to be taken prisoner. Give him what he wants and we can end this horror."

"So, will you now discuss caches and contacts with me?" Kristinich's intelligent, interested voice, a voice Malinovsky knew would be in his nightmares until he died, nightmares he knew would make him miss his old, violent dreams from Afghanistan.

Involuntarily, the Chechen looked to Malinovsky's battered boxer's face. Malinovsky nodded. "Yes." A whisper. Then, "Thank you. Jew."

Malinovsky nodded, then stepped away. He heard Kristinich, now all professional, say to the Chechen, "It is important to be accurate and honest."

In the shadows, Suslov could feel Olivia shaking in his grip. Malinovsky and Kristinich noticed their presence. Malinovsky felt an accession of shame. Kristinich observed them for a moment, then turned away, pleased. Olivia trembled with the knowledge that, what he was doing to the Chechen so indifferently, he would have no problem doing to her. The greatest evil, the one that makes the others possible...she put the thought aside. Then it returned to her, unbidden. The evil that makes the others possible is the unendurable knowledge of one's own emptiness, and of the fact that others were not. She wondered briefly whether what was said of greatness was also true of emptiness. Some are born that way. Others aspire to it. Others have emptiness thrust upon them.

Silently, Suslov took Olivia back to his own quarters. He wanted to say something kind to her, to touch her gently. He dared not. He knew that if he now offered her anything remotely romantic, she would never forgive him. She would regard it as an unspeakable betrayal of the thing that was between them, whatever that was, and she would be right.

He poured them both a measure of vodka. Officially, conscripts in the Russian Army were not allowed to drink alcohol. Unofficially, there was endless alcohol. If you were wise, you used it to disinfect yourself internally and ease psychological distress while understanding there was not enough alcohol in the world to numb you out, and that alcohol and weapons were not generally a good combination. "Drink this." She did as she was told, coughing hard as the unaccustomed liquor went down. "You are free to speak."

She shook her head, opened her mouth to speak. She shook her head again, and he realized she was struggling for coherence.

He poured her a second measure of vodka. "Drink this, too."

She took a deep swallow. "Colonel, how can you allow this?" Then she stopped. The vodka was having a mercifully numbing effect.

"Before I answer you, I must ask you a question."

"What is it?"

"What do you think of the actions of Major Malinovsky?"

Carefully, she backed up to a wall and let herself slide down it until she ended up sitting on the floor. She did not, however, spill a drop of what remained in her glass. "I...I honestly do not know what to think. I know all the proper words that some people...I mean the kind who get their moral stature berating others...I mean...I don't know what I mean."

Suslov folded himself up neatly and gracefully to sit on the floor beside her, looked at her out of the corner of his eye, sidelong and wise as a stallion. "I do not want prisoners taken unless they are needed for interrogation. When that is over, we shoot them. I will tell you why." He did not pour a second measure for himself. He needed to be sober as he ticked off the points on his fingers.

"One. I am committed to winning this war. This is why I did not tender my resignation a year ago. Many officers did, including some of my friends. The commander and the entire senior staff of the Northern Caucasus military district were sacked for their opposition to this war, and many officers left quietly on their own. I honestly sympathized with them and respected their choices because this is a filthy war that is already worse, but they were wrong. They abandoned their troops rather than fight a necessary war that Russia has to win. We need the resources, the water access, and the land routes over the Caucasus and into the Middle East under reliable, which is to say Russian, control. And frankly, the Caucasus is Russia, has been for centuries. Do you understand?"

"Yes. I've heard the similar things from officers who stayed in the American Army during Vietnam, though they knew how wrong the war was. I believe they deluded themselves."

"They did. If Vietnam had been one of your states, it would not have been a delusion. This is where we live. We have nowhere else to go. We cannot afford to delude ourselves. My second point. I control how prisoners are treated only while I have physical custody of them. Prisoners are a pain in the ass to handle, but if I knew they would be treated with mercy and dignity after we turned them over, we would take many more than we do. The worst thing you can do for enemy morale is to make sure the enemy knows that they may expect humane and dignified treatment if captured. I see no point in evacuating prisoners to be tortured and raped, and then killed slowly for amusement, or released for money, so they can spend the rest of their lives avenging what was done to them. I certainly will not risk the lives of my soldiers for such an end. Of course, the Russians who are allowed to do such things to other human beings will take their memories home, where they will relieve their distress not on their commanders, who betrayed them by refusing to demand humane and disciplined conduct, but on people who are blameless. So you see, it prevents some very serious problems to simply refuse to take many prisoners, and to quickly kill those we do take when we are done."

Olivia nodded, unwillingly.

"Three. I am responsible for providing accurate, timely information to our main force units. I have the normal responsibilities of any commander to my own soldiers and their families, but I am also responsible to the soldiers and the families of the commanders I support. And to Chechen civilians. If I fail in my responsibilities, innocent people die needlessly. I have no control over Major Kristinich and I find him an abomination, but he has his own mission and his own organization. I can limit him to prisoners who will not talk to my officers or me, even with the assistance of the methods I am willing to apply, although he really does not care whom he tortures. I would probably make him as happy as any Chechen. You certainly would. His real value is in encouraging other prisoners to cooperate. He also provides a splendid warning to my men as to what they'll turn into if they indulge his habits."

The vodka had hit Olivia full force on an empty stomach, taking the anger and the disgust out of her, along with most of what remained of her strength. What was left was simply sorrow and a shaking fear. "Is what I saw really necessary?"

Suslov answered her gently. "I was told you were badly hurt in an airplane crash caused by a student who chose a final approach to give you a demonstration of his epilepsy, which he had not bothered to mention before. Nevertheless, you evacuated him because you did not want him to burn to death. In the process, you did yourself further serious damage. This is correct?" She nodded. "A lifetime of pain, your pain, was the value you assigned to the life of one not particularly good human being. Now, you have been in and out of this brigade for half a year. You owe your life many times over to Warrant Officer Simonov and your security team, and I think no one has insulted or abused you."

"No, I have been treated with nothing but courtesy and even kindness."

"So now let us assume I am a Chechen intelligence officer and you are my prisoner. Are you going to tell me what I want to know, what I need to know to keep my people alive? And if you refuse, the worst I do is shoot you in the head?"

Silent, Olivia finished her vodka. It was rough but it did what it was supposed to. "Did you learn this in Afghanistan?"

He turned directly to her and she met his eyes. Their faces were centimeters apart. He made no attempt to close the gap, mercifully gave no sign of wanting to. She could see the intricate network of fine lines around his eyes, even the pinpoint scars from the stitches where his face had been sewn back together after one of his wounds. She could also see the human pain behind the professional distance. "My younger brother was killed in Afghanistan. He was not certain he wanted to make a career in the Army. He was a fine soldier, but he also loved biology and geology, and he thought he might want to be a scientist, perhaps a geologist, perhaps a naturalist. He was sorting through those ideas when he was captured alive. The grenade he had saved for himself was defective. His captors first flayed him alive, then disemboweled him. I escorted the remains back in a sealed coffin. After I saw his body, I was glad they were required to seal it."

Suslov could not say why, exactly, he had told her about Alexander. It certainly wasn't the vodka talking. He might not drink the way so many Russians did, but he could still drink. Then he realized that in some faint and delicate way, she reminded him of Alexander. He pursued that thought with great care. When Alexander had written of his interests and his ideas, Suslov felt his younger brother could lead him straight into the heart of the world. Doctor Tolchinskaya made him think that he could follow her straight into the workings of the universe. It was no worse a reason—and a far more interesting one—than a large, firm bosom to find a woman intriguing.

Olivia watched him compose himself, regain his distance, and look away. As quickly as it had come, the personal moment was gone and she was grateful.

"Many techniques are actually taught to Spetsnaz. I would think your Army's Special Forces and Rangers, the recon elements of the Marines, teach the same or similar techniques. How much they actually use them..." He shrugged. "We studied your tactics in Vietnam very closely. Individual atrocities were far from the worst of it. You turned your ally of South Vietnam into a single immense field of unexploded ordnance. Ninety percent of all your bombs and nearly all your artillery were used on South Vietnamese soil. Would you have been so generous with your ordnance if you'd been fighting in California?"

"I doubt it. But that is not the issue here."

"What is the issue?"

"The issue is Kristinich and those who accept him. Kristinich's crime," Olivia said through the vodka, "is that he tortures not because he needs to but because he likes to. Your tragedy is that you believe that if you can limit torture to what you or Major Malinovsky define as professional methods to a moral end, you see nothing wrong with it."

"And what do you think of what Major Malinovsky did tonight?"

"I think," she said, suddenly intense, "that if torture could be measured by the kilo, tonight you used only two instead of twenty."

Suslov realized that he had been exceptionally foolish not to have a second measure of vodka, hesitated, then poured for himself. "Tell me, with so many lives at stake, what else would you have me do, Doctor Tolchinskaya? This is not two knightly armies meeting on an empty field. This is trying to separate people who want to kill us from people who do not—and who look and speak and dress identically. While we wear uniforms. The only apparent difference is that the bad Chechens aim weapons at us while the good ones do not. The good and the not so good, amongst whom the bad ones hide, some of whom are hostages and some of whom are quite willing shields and supporters—how are we to know? Chechen clan structure is very difficult for Russians to penetrate and exploit, or even sometimes understand. Sorting this out is not so simple as learning American divisional patches and branch insignia. Yes, for us torture has been for centuries just a way of life, a means to control people, enforce compliance, and impose terror. But I also know of no other tool, professionally used, so effective at producing information within close time constraints if you know what to look for, when you are dealing with tough prisoners who know something and are motivated not to cooperate. It works. Often enough."

"Comrade Colonel, I am an engineer, not a philosopher. And I know I am disturbing you."

He inhaled sharply as if he had taken a hard body blow. "It would take one call to have you on a plane back to Moscow."

"Probably. To do my job to the standards of others, I do not have to be here. Perhaps some of them would even prefer that I not be here."

"Indeed. The sons and daughters of the generals and the politicians who think this war is a good idea are not here. They let other people's children die, doing their duty to Mother Russia. So that leaves the professionals, like myself, the conscripts who refuse to dodge the draft, sadists who expect to be paid for their cruelty, and people who think they can actually do something decent here. You are one of them."

"Perhaps. Would you prefer that I not be here?"

"No." Spoken as softly and quietly as a weary breath. He wondered what was showing in his eyes. Longing, perhaps. Or something that might be called desire. Love, if love between men and women was not hopelessly confused with sex. Friendship, if you were able to so think of it. Suslov turned to look at her again. Watching his eyes, Olivia realized that he was very remote and detached, and yet also entirely present. He could have told her that that was how she lived: remote and detached, too much of herself buried far down, out of reach of the weak, the petty, the trivial. Now he knew she was returning to life, but in this awful way, in this awful place. "I would rather be blinded than fight in this city without you. But I also do not want you hating yourself for coming to terms with what I do and what you will be helping exploit." He looked away from her, closed his eyes, listened to her breathing, out of respect for her refusing to want anything from her.

"Then I will go on as I have."

"Thank you, my friend." His eyes still closed, he reached out, meaning to touch her lightly where he had gripped her so hard, then let his hand fall to the cement. "How long since you have really slept?"

"As long as I have been here."

"Tell your medic that you have had a hundred grams of vodka—the daily ration for front line troops during the Great Patriotic War, incidentally. He can adjust sedative dosage so you don't wake up dead. If at all possible, you should get about twelve hours' sleep. Tomorrow, you move in with the brigade staff. It was a mistake to separate you like I did. I have been cruel to expect you to go through this alone, rather than with your brothers."

"Thank you."

"One final question, if I might."

"Yes, please."

"Once again. What do you think of what your boxing instructor did tonight?"

"I think that...I think that he is my brother."

***

After two days of more-or-less very delicately avoiding each other, Olivia sat down before Suslov in the mess area. He looked at her with a startled relief that, he knew, showed clearly in his face. He watched her acknowledge the fact, then tuck it carefully away inside of her for later examination. "I will be back in approximately six weeks' time," she said.

"I had wondered about that."

"My sensors now perform well enough to justify low-rate production."

"Good. Will you now be working with other units?"

"Yes."

"If I can, I will be here. If I cannot, please regard my brigade not only as your test bed, but also as your military home, even as your work takes you elsewhere."

"I will do so. Thank you, my friend."

He smiled at her, worn and weary and elegant as an ancient Japanese sword. "Be safe, my friend. When you see my sisters, both of them please, give them my love."

At the other end of the mess area, Simonov was having breakfast with a comrade from back home in Petersburg, a sergeant with a nearby motorized rifle regiment. He watched his pal break off his conversation with him to stare at Olivia. "Your colonel could do better than that with the nurses. I mean, she's not ugly, but she's not really a woman."

Simonov found himself getting angry. "Misha, she's my principal. And she's not like that." He wasn't sure what he meant by that, but he didn't really care.

"Sure, you're just being a loyal, politically reliable whisperer." There was a first time for everything, Simonov thought in amazement, but a whisperer, not much better than a stool pigeon, was not something he'd ever expected to hear himself called. On the other hand, Misha's colonel was famous for calling his soldiers dumb pricks and worse. Clearly, Misha was learning some very bad habits. Back in Petersburg, he had been a working class street tough, but not a dumb prick. Well then, fish rot from the head down.

"She's an American engineer," Simonov began cautiously.

"And we know what they say about American women."

"Whoever they are, they aren't here. The brigade thinks very highly of her. American television crap doesn't count."

Misha smirked. Simonov glared. He had known Misha for years, since he was a kid. What he wanted to do now was grab his head and acquaint it with the tabletop.

"Sure, the brigade thinks highly of her. For sexual services. I mean, beggars can't be choosers. I certainly wouldn't say no to her."

The day this brigade lets an uncultured pig like you say two words to her is the day you become an American rock poet...

As Olivia began walking towards him to begin their final day, an idea presented itself to Simonov. He wondered if she could read his mind. Very likely. They had, in the way of people who spent a lot of time together in danger, gotten extremely good at picking up on the other's thoughts. "Her Russian is better than yours."

"I bet it is. Hey, Pah Pah Zhe. I mean, what's she going to do?" Simonov grimaced at the invocation. PPZh was military slang for pokhodno polevye zhenya, or marching field wife. Then Olivia, alerted by something, came toward them. Simonov rose to greet her. "Do you know what he said about you, Doctor?"

"Please, sit down, Warrant Officer. Of course. I couldn't help but hear."

She gets it...

"My buddy's lucky," said Misha. "Working for you. I bet you're working for him, though."

Olivia looked down at Misha with mild curiosity, then turned calmly to Simonov.

She gets it!

"Friend of yours, Warrant Officer?"

"Yes."

"Perhaps you could suggest to your friend that he stand in the presence of a woman he has taken such an interest in."

Misha turned and gaped at him.

"Go ahead," Simonov said cheerfully. "It could be a new experience for you."

Misha grinned, then started to rise. The next thing he felt was Olivia's right fist slamming into his jaw and the floor coming up hard in his back and his head. The next thing he saw was the two of them standing over him after Simonov dumped a glass of water in his face.

"You didn't tell me she could hit," he sputtered.

Olivia bent down, offered Misha her hand. He looked at it cautiously. It was her right hand. Slowly, he extended his hand. She took it. He had an instant to be startled by the strength of her grip before her left fist slammed into his jaw.

"Nice, Doctor," Simonov said happily. "I hoped you would do that."

"Didn't you teach me that if he's moving, shoot him again?"

"Got any more water?"

"No. But my tea won't scald him."

"Do it."

Misha sputtered back to consciousness, angry and afraid and humiliated, then took in the fact that only Simonov was standing over him. "What the fuck did you let her do that for?"

"Let her? It's not like she needed my permission. Only my telepathic encouragement."

"I'm not going to forget this."

"Hey...I told you she wasn't like that."

# CHAPTER THIRTEEN, MOSCOW, EARLY WINTER 1995: TRIMENKO

"Silicon-germanium, Doctor."

Olivia cocked her head, chin in her hand, and looked at Borodkin and the chips he held in his hand. "What do you think?"

"I think they may be for us the greatest thing since samovars. Your instincts paid off."

She smiled at him. "My instincts did not get us those chips. Your work did, and it was very good. Now, why don't we see if we can design some circuits that make use of these chips?"

We again, even though, with the growth of her lab, Borodkin's duties had expanded so that he no longer had time to do dual duty as both an administrator and the engineer she kept reminding him he was and encouraging him to be. He preferred to administer.

Careful not to jar herself against the desk, she rose from her chair, now well-padded with sheepskins. "I have a dinner engagement so I need to prepare."

"With who?"

She looked sidelong at him. "General Anatoly Petrovich Trimenko, the new Chief of Airborne. Also with Colonel Suslov, the commander of our test-bed brigade."

Borodkin blushed a little. "That's right, they're on your schedule."

"Yes." She paused. "Be prepared to come down to with me to Chechnya at the end of January. It's time you saw how we really do business."

"You mean that, don't you?"

"Yes. The rest of the lab is also starting to deploy in and out, so..."

"I understand."

"If I am killed...you will know what to do when you're there."

Later, Borodkin watched her settle her wolfskin coat about her shoulders. After the cold of her first winter in Grozny, Olivia had decided she would not be cold when not deployed. So boot-length fur it was. Olivia was wearing her mother's pearls and the peacock plume earrings from Tiffany's, rescued from the safe deposit box that was now only hers. She wore plain black wool trousers, and the sweater she had knit from the rich purple handspun she had purchased back in New York. No makeup. She no longer wore any, except for a little lipstick, this time a deep plum, striking against her tanned skin and pale hair.

After she had left the lab, her pistol in the pocket of her coat, to walk out into the Moscow night, Borodkin still smelled her perfume: dry leather and stone, spices and rose, weirdly evocative of beautiful ruins. He started to like it, then changed his mind. Disliking it was easier than understanding why he liked it. In any event, he had decided, once again, that he was spending far too much time thinking about Doctor Tolchinskaya and it was doing him no good. She was doing him no good. And he resented it.

***

The Russian Airborne Forces, or VDV, sometimes also known as Voiska Dyadyi Vacyi, or Uncle Vasya's Troops, after their legendary postwar commander, Vassily Filipovich Margelov, are not élite Army units. Instead, the VDV are a separate but minor branch of the Armed Forces and like all separate and minor branches, no matter how good, constantly engaged in bureaucratic and budgetary warfare with all the other separate and minor and separate and major branches. General Trimenko rose to command the VDV in no small measure due to his political skills and contacts. Little escaped him, and he made it a point and a passion to personally select the next generation of generals. He mentored them. Dmitri Borisovich Suslov was his favorite. Therefore, he had a significant political interest in an American Jewess whom Suslov had praised perhaps a bit too often and perhaps a bit too ardently. He was still pondering what that political interest might ultimately involve when his aide, a young captain recovering from wounds incurred in Chechnya, showed her in.

For an instant, he couldn't remember whether he should kiss this woman's hand, which was the Russian custom, or shake it, which was the American custom, and which Russians thought was fearfully masculine. Then he realized the absurdity of his thoughts and instead of waiting for her to extend her hand to him, as Russian men did with women, he simply offered her his hand, a senior to a junior. "Thank you for being my guest. You appear to have walked. I would have sent a car for you."

She smiled, her cheeks bright with the cold, a package clutched in her mittens. "Thank you, comrade General, but I wouldn't miss the first real snowfall of the year." She held out the package. "Good Georgian wine, if I may."

"Indeed, there is always something magical about the first snow. Thank you for this. I understand American drinking customs differ from ours."

"They do. We do not generally toast very much, and it is common to drink slowly while conversing."

"Well then, Doctor, may I pour you a glass?" The captain materialized a corkscrew from a part of the universe that only he could see, then poured for them both. "Leave us, please, and show in Colonel Suslov when he arrives."

"Yes, comrade General."

"Do sit down." He gestured to an upholstered chair by the fireplace. "Satisfy my curiosity, if you please. I shall ask plainly. You're an American, a woman and a Jew." Politely, he used evreika, not the offensive zhidovka. "How do you deal with this? Soldiers of any sort not being known for their tact."

As accustomed as she had become to Russian directness, Olivia found herself blinking. "Well, American is not really an issue, although my lab administrator thinks that I am a magician because I am an American. I have a similar opinion of your mathematicians." She looked at him to see if he was following her; he nodded. "As a woman, I neither ask for nor expect nor accept any special consideration. As a Jewess, I follow the Israeli tradition of giving as good as I get, and maybe a little bit better. Sometimes before I get it. Any one of these three could be a problem. However, I find the combination enables most soldiers to behave well. Also, I am much more a curiosity than a minority. That makes it easier."

Trimenko managed not to choke on his wine. "As an Airborne officer, I think that's an excellent Israeli tradition. Unfortunately, to be Russian seems to make one, to one degree or another, an anti-Semite. It seems to be, alas, in our blood."

"I know that. I get some looks and I've heard some comments. But since I don't look or act like anyone's idea of a Jew, it's just the usual comments are about being a woman in a male environment. Mostly from outside the brigade."

"They would be. You must come as a shock to some."

"I do." She offered Trimenko a satisfied smile that he couldn't help returning. "But my security team is extremely protective of me and very loyal."

"You do know that safer, more comfortable accommodations are available for you at higher headquarters? This is an offer, nothing more, you understand?"

"I do. Thank you. But my work requires immediate access to people using my equipment. It speeds up field repairs and modifications and gives me ideas for the future."

"Indeed, Doctor. You may understand where you can take us in ten years, but we understand that what you are doing now is so much better than what we have or could have gotten on our own."

"Thank you. In any event, wherever I go, there is someone to look after me."

"Doctor, you know that your odds mount up every time you go outside the wire."

"I do know that. Nevertheless, I came here to do something."

"And you are doing it and we like the results very much. Therefore, we will let you go on as you have." He looked at her steadily. "I imagine that you long ago resolved personally never to be taken alive. I'm sure you also know, even if you haven't been so informed, that we will not permit you to be taken alive."

"I understand," she said, flinching within. "If captured, I would likely be..." Her voice trailed off.

"And then sent on to Iran or whomever might wish to make use of your expertise. One of the penalties of success in war is that your enemies stay up at night, figuring out how you did it. Our enemies and their patrons have figured you out. Or so I have been informed. Ah...Colonel Suslov has arrived."

Olivia inhaled a bit as Suslov, whom she'd neither seen nor spoken with for weeks, entered in dress uniform. The two men embraced and kissed in the Russian manner, with a genuine affection that Olivia still found startling. Then she rose and she and Suslov did not kiss. Or embrace. Her scent, beautiful and proud, made it hard for him to breathe, and he realized he was looking at her with genuine admiration. She'd allowed her hair to grow out a little and regained the weight she burnt off when deployed. Now it was her turn to appraise him. She had never really acknowledged that he was extremely handsome, with his gem-cut features and ivory skin, his startling green eyes and deep chestnut hair. He was also extremely brave, if his many awards, particularly one single gold star, hanging from an unembellished red ribbon, meant anything. He also wore the new Russian Federal award of the Order of Merit to the Motherland, for his service in Grozny.

Trimenko watched them shake hands very briefly, in the manner of two people trying not to acknowledge the obvious. Ah, well. And why was he not surprised?

Aware of the general's appraising look, Olivia sat down. The aide materialized a glass of wine for Suslov, then left.

"Colonel," said Trimenko genially, "Doctor Tolchinskaya and I were just discussing how she deals with being an American Jewish woman in this situation. Might I request your observations?"

"Major Malinovsky taught her to box," he said dryly, looking down at his wine with a Russian man's typical suspicion of such a beverage.

Trimenko exploded into laughter, then caught himself. "And has she had opportunity to make use of such excellent instruction?"

Olivia blushed. Suslov muttered, "It is spoken of with reverence and awe." And with that, they moved to dinner.

After, they were drinking juice and mineral water and mostly sober when General Trimenko fixed Olivia in his gaze. "Now what, Doctor Tolchinskaya? Professionally and personally."

Olivia was startled. Instinctively, she found herself looking to Suslov, knowing as she did so that the general was watching her. Suslov's face was absolutely unreadable. Not hostile, not blank, not even calculating, but unreadable. Waiting. She waited him out, her eyes searching his for what he wanted, for what he needed. There was no help there. Olivia had accepted the dinner invitation because declining it had never really been an option. But she had not expected to find herself in a conversation that was in its own way as high-pressure and high-stakes as her conversations with Colonel Marianenko and Major Suslova back in Tver nearly a year and a half before. She realized she had been exceptionally foolish, not to be prepared for a question that sounded neutral but was in fact intensely personal. General Trimenko's curiosity, insofar as it involved his favorite protégé, was far from abstract and far from entirely benign.

She was, she realized anew and intensely, a foreign woman far from home with no power, no real rights, in a small room with two very civilized men who were nevertheless immensely hard. Olivia decided that, for the next moment or two, she would be as hard as they were. She had earned it.

"I came here to use my brain, to deliver useful..."

"Toys," Trimenko said in a quiet voice, intended to provoke her, to learn whatever might be of relevance.

"As you will. I am not offended. The value of my toys—I often think of them as my pets—has been proven to the extent that you now consider my capture a matter of State security. No country places such value on its toy makers. Russia has kept its word to me. I have not been asked to do anything that harms my country. Under the circumstances, we have behaved morally, I towards Russia and Russia towards me. When I came here, the science and the engineering were real to me. The people and the politics, not so much. You may fairly ask me what I was thinking back then about someday coming to terms with people and politics and I cannot answer you intelligently. I didn't think of it at all. I know this. Just as my work belongs in the world, I belong in the world. In fact, because my work belongs in the world, I belong in the world. This is the part of the world in which I find myself and I am far from unhappy about it."

"You should know," Trimenko said slowly, "that I was Colonel Suslov's battalion commander in 1978, when we took down the Kabul airport. I played a similar role as a junior officer in 1968 when we suppressed Prague Spring."

"Along with my mother," said Suslov suddenly, "who, with her snipers, played her own role in Budapest in 1956 and before that, in East Germany."

"I understand that you and the General go back a long way. I also understand that your family has a certain military tradition. Are you giving me to understand that this tradition consists largely of suppressing non-Russian peoples who deserved better?"

"Our families and to a lesser extent we ourselves lived through these cruelties, you understand," Trimenko said. "They did not occur in a vacuum. Czechoslovakia in '68 was not Hungary in '56 and still less East Germany in '53. We always understood that permitting any crack in the Warsaw Pact would result in its collapse. It took us longer to realize we no longer needed the Warsaw Pact. There was a joke amongst us back then. 'Russia is the only country on earth surrounded by hostile Communist powers.' We finally chose not to be surrounded any longer. At least, not to the West. It was, all things considered, a wise decision."

"I apologize," Olivia said with dignity.

"There is no need. You have your own history. And now you are a small part of ours," Trimenko said, adding sugar to his tea, offering her the bowl, realizing as she accepted it from him that even her hands were scarred.

"Indeed, I am a small part of your history now. So I wish to tell you that I can no longer function as someone simply providing tactical toys. The work matters, of course, and I intend for it to go on. I came here thinking only of my work. That is no longer enough."

"It would be less complicated for us if it were," Trimenko said. It was not, he realized, saying these things that made her gaze so difficult to bear. It was the knowledge that anyone could be direct. But directness with honesty was rare.

"I know the implications of my work at the tactical level and beyond. But I should like to contribute more than toys."

"What are you asking?"

"I don't know. I know that you have to rebuild your nation and one part of that is rebuilding the Army. My toys, my pets, point to the road you must travel."

"We have studied how your Army recovered from Vietnam. After all, it did quite well in Desert Storm." He was fencing with her, guarded but gentle.

"The Girl Scouts could have done as well with that kind of technology against that kind of foe."

An unfairly clever woman. Trimenko decided to add a little pressure before asking the question that might crush her. "Do you know that in 1937, the NKVD arrested, amongst others, the aircraft designer Mikhail Tupolev and his design team, along with the Petlyakov and Myasischev design teams and turned them into prison workshops?"

"I do." Her eyes never left Trimenko's. "A prison workshop is not in the bargain I made. It never will be."

"We do not do such things any more. But we do have closed cities. Still. The one here near Moscow is Krasnoznamensk, and there is Sosnovy Bor near Petersburg. Living and research conditions in them are, all things considered, quite good. Far better than what you enjoy in Chechnya. And given what you are doing, you would be regarded as relevant. I am saying this. If you wish to move beyond tactical toys to sensors of strategic significance, it is possible. But not in your small lab. If you entered one of these places, you would be cared for accordingly. Professionally and personally."

"General Trimenko, I must express my doubt that, as Chief of Airborne, you have standing in these matters or authority to offer me anything. So I'll assume that we're playing games to test my reactions. Very well. You, as in the State, can confine me to one of your luxurious cages. That is within your power, just as you can kill me. My lab administrator can now replicate the basic technology I have created. He won't do it very well, and neither he nor anyone else can take it where I can, but he will be adequate to your immediate needs and he is, after all, Russian. You can do anything in the world to me except the one thing you imported me for. You cannot make me think or create at any level. And I will do neither in a closed city, no matter what the professional opportunities and satisfactions, or how luxurious my cage."

Suslov rose, moved his chair so he was sitting very close to her. "Doctor Tolchinskaya, the country we were born into and genuinely loved and served as best we could is no more. It cannot be brought back as it was, and should not be. We knew how senseless and needless so much of its cruelty was." Sorrow in his voice. "Now you are offering what you can to help us resurrect something out of the wreckage that is Russia today, so that it can be part of the world without shame. Do I understand you correctly?"

"Yes. I say this as an American who will never cease to be American, who certainly is not a Communist, who does not make the mistake of thinking she is Russian, much less wanting to be Russian. I came here to become what I always knew I was, including how I wanted to live. How can you of all men want that I should be less than what I am?"

"I could tell you that it would be easier for him," Trimenko answered, his voice now gentle and warm. "You have known him long enough to know how ambitious he is, in the same way that you are. Command of a Spetsnaz brigade is not a normal part of the track to higher command in Airborne. But it can be. I asked Colonel Suslov to take it, arranged for him to take it, because 22 Brigade was a broken unit we desperately needed for this war, and because his success with that brigade would be an unanswerable demonstration of his fitness for higher command. He succeeded. I know I speak for Colonel Suslov that he would not demand or expect from or want for you any less in your own field, now or in the future.

"But that is only part of the matter. Doctor Tolchinskaya, this is a man I would see as Chief of Airborne to follow me. He or whoever holds that job will deal with problems that are unimaginable even by the standards of today."

"Then, comrade General," Olivia answered, "by that standard and by the standard of my own proven worth, I have earned what I am asking, which at this point is to look seriously towards the strategic development of my work. I intend to continue to earn the right to do that as long as I live."

"I recognize the potential value of your work for what I and others are trying to accomplish," Trimenko answered. "However, Doctor Tolchinskaya, you must understand that this is not entirely about your future. It is also about Colonel Suslov's."

"I...don't understand," Olivia said defiantly. The two men looked at her with identical expressions. That is unworthy of you. And then she realized she could no longer pretend. And then she slowly turned a deep, painful, dark red. And then she said, very simply, "I'm an idiot."

"No, you're not," Suslov admonished gently. "You simply lost track of the purpose of the conversation."

"I'm an idiot," Olivia repeated.

"Have it your way," Trimenko said affably. "I will note that you have studiously avoided admitting the real reason you're here tonight. You will note that I've given you ample opportunity to evade the issue. You have taken it."

"So that I could prove that I'm an idiot?"

"Intentionally or not, you have almost succeeded. I must now benevolently permit you to succeed no more. Are you aware of why you're here tonight?"

"To have the Chief of Airborne make me a shiddoch," she murmured.

"Or to stop one," Suslov replied. "Major Malinovsky once told me what a shiddoch is."

"Then someone please tell me," Trimenko interrupted.

"An arranged marriage."

"Excuse me," Olivia said hastily. "I have overstayed my welcome. I'll be leaving for America immediately. Or maybe Israel. Or Alaska, where I have never been, although as that was Russian once, it may be again. Or maybe..."

"Doctor, you have not come close to overstaying."

"Would you permit me to briefly excuse myself while I come to terms with this catastrophe?"

"Of course. My aide will show you the way."

When she returned, both men stood to her. They smiled benignly. "Doctor, may I send you home in a car?"

"Yes, thank you, General."

"Colonel, would you see her out?"

"It will be my pleasure, General." In the foyer, Suslov wrapped Olivia's soft grey lace shawlette around her throat and shoulders and helped her into her brindled coat, careful not to actually touch her despite his obvious desire. Because of his obvious desire. "You were not an idiot," he said softly.

"I was. I knew why I was there. But I hoped that if I talked long enough, hard enough and fast enough, the two of you would either forget or I could at least distract you long enough to escape. Tell me, did you come up for this specifically?"

"No. And yes. My sister told me that she made you a certain promise."

She looked straight at him. "Yes."

"Much the same as the promise we made each other. Never to live in captivity of any kind."

"Yes."

"I'm glad she did. Of all things, I hate slavery. The enslavement of women by men, beyond any compromise. You know our mother Inna was a slave for a time, and when she killed her 'husband'—her captor—and escaped... her mother, father, and brothers wanted to murder her because she had 'shamed' them. This was in 1941 and the Soviet Army was so desperate for infantry that they were even accepting women. They called you, they trained you, and if you managed to kill a German or two before you were killed, you had done your duty. She insisted upon changing her name and her nationality, which she was allowed to do because her grandmother was Russian, and perhaps also because some NKVD officer understood that after what she'd been through and done, Russia was getting a usable new Russian. She became that and more. She would never, for the rest of her life, have anything to do with Crimean Tartar nationality and I know she never grieved for the deaths of her family when Stalin deported the Tartars. So remember: Many things may be imposed upon you. This is Russia and you have chosen a post of danger. But we will protect you from any attempt to reduce you to slavery."

She could hear the car arrive. "Do you speak for your general as well?"

"Why else would he ask me to see you out? Now go home, my friend. We will see each other in Chechnya."

"Thank you."

***

General Trimenko was waiting for him in the dining room where Olivia's scent lingered like an echo. "Wine or vodka, Dmitri Borisovich?"

"It had better be vodka, Anatoly Petrovich." He needed to stop his mind.

Trimenko poured for him. "Do you know what you're doing?"

"I do. It's the consequences that I don't know about."

"I liked your first wife. I did not think a Jewish surgeon was the best possible choice of a wife, but I liked her a great deal. She is an astonishing surgeon and any soldier who does not respect that is beyond stupid. Your Doctor Tolchinskaya—even I am a little in love."

"The same may be said for at least half my brigade."

"How does she deal with it?"

"Ignores it and what man who is a man wants to make a fool of himself in those eyes?"

"As we get older, the big brain is more likely to overrule the little brain. However when the two brains talk to each other and agree, it's a problem of at least an order of magnitude greater than if the little brain alone is interested." Trimenko laughed softly. "I can order you not to sleep with her, but that isn't the issue. I certainly won't order you to sleep with her. You would disobey both orders."

"Correct."

"But if I thought ordering you not to love her would do the least good, I'd order you not to."

"Also correct."

"Dmitri Borisovich, you agree too easily."

"Also correct."

"You have not have known her for very long."

"My sister had warned me of her quality and so I was so determined to avoid any entanglement that I even permitted myself to forget that a woman was coming. When she reported in, I warned her that if she betrayed my soldiers, I would deal with her as a soldier dealing with an enemy soldier. She looked right back at me and told me that I was not only fair, I was generous. Sadly, like my father, and in their different ways, because of my mother and my sister and my ex-wife, I know what the real thing is and I'm too old to even be able to want less."

Trimenko found himself subsumed by yearning, then put it aside. "There are a great many things I could say about this woman in an attempt to dissuade you, Dmitri Borisovich. Brilliant, impossible, dangerous, you could find someone far more suitable for a rising officer who would be far less trouble for you. She may cost you an enormous amount."

"All true."

"If I were you, I would feel as you do. Just do not go too far with her too quickly, because you may some day have to choose."

"Alas, any talk of choosing is a bit precipitous because I have not as yet even given her reason to slap me."

Trimenko looked at him. "I do not know whether to be proud of you for upholding the honor of the Airborne or disappointed in you for letting down our reputation."

Suslov smiled wryly. "Sir, I don't think we want to know her opinion, whatever it may be, on that subject."

"Let us drink to our good doctor." They downed their vodka. "I will tell you another true thing, Dmitri Borisovich. You will never again meet anyone remotely like her."

"Isn't that one reason why we do what we do, starting with jumping out of perfectly good airplanes? To be the kind of people that no one will ever meet again?"

"You do indeed do the Airborne proud." Trimenko paused. "Because of what we already owe this woman, we will not hold her against you." Suslov said nothing, but in the hard and yet also very loving look the younger man gave him, Trimenko could see the depth of what Suslov had already offered Olivia. Very likely, he'd offered it without the woman's conscious understanding, certainly without her overt acceptance. Perhaps she'd done the same with him.

"So, Dmitri Borisovich...in this matter, I have no orders to give you. But do please be aware of your commander's intent."

"I am always, Comrade General, aware of my commander's intent."

# CHAPTER FOURTEEN, VEDENO GORGE, EARLY WINTER 1996: SIMONOV

Borodkin had never before deployed with Olivia, nor had he discussed her field style with the lab people who'd already gone. The subject was taboo to him and anyone who volunteered information was cut off harshly. But now they were going, and this woman who was pacing the lab one final time, terrified him anew. Her hair was shorn down nearly to her scalp for cleanliness and comfort. She wore jeans and a cotton sweatshirt under a battered black leather jacket and boots. Her eyes were brilliant with anticipation. Borodkin, who had learned to know her moods from her perfumes, was shocked that she wasn't wearing scent. Then there was the lip balm, liberally applied. It seemed salacious. And the fact that he'd forgotten to bring his own made him feel endlessly inadequate. He briefly wished that he hadn't ignored the detailed lists that Olivia provided.

He did not speak to this strange creature. He only feared. Resentfully.

As always at the start of a deployment, she felt very focused and peaceful. She anticipated pain during the flight. Sitting for so long was very unpleasant, but those hours of transition were precious to her. It was during them that she prepared herself for what it really meant to take what they had designed in the lab and made in the factory out into the world.

She was hard, Borodkin realized as she checked everything one last final, twentieth time, in preparation for the 4:00 AM ride to the military airport. Hard and sharp. He was very unprepared for how remote she was during the flight down, knitting silently on a pair of fingerless gloves from deep, weathered blue-grey wool, cabled across the backs, very large, far too large for her.

Gloves for a man, he thought.

Far too large for him.

A very large man.

He was not prepared for Mozdok, either. Particularly unsettling was a delegation of soldiers' mothers, looking for their sons. Or their sons' remains. Olivia went absolutely white when she saw them. "Thank you, once again and always and forever, for getting people panorexed and tagged and storing DNA samples," she murmured.

"It's this bad?"

"Worse. It is unforgivable."

Their lab team was met by delegations of officers and conscripts from several units. Borodkin was surprised to discover that Olivia knew all the officers and most of the conscripts as well, and that they knew her. Quietly, she assigned her people and equipment to their escorts, making introductions, until she and Borodkin were left alone with a raffish-looking collection of about a dozen heavily-armed men and a warrant officer who looked like a boy at once thuggish and angelic, pug-nosed and freckled like a trout. Again, Olivia made introductions.

"We'll load this stuff, Doctor. We brought your kit and some for Doctor...?"

"Mister." Borodkin resented having to say it.

"Mister Borodkin. We're in a convoy for most of the way and then after that, we're on our own. As you can see, Doctor, we're augmented for this trip."

Borodkin was startled when Olivia climbed up in the back of their assigned truck, stuck her hand down, and pulled him up. "Get in, Borodkin. Here, put these on."

He stared at her, slack-jawed. She was already changing out of her civilian clothes, shedding her leather jacket. "Praise wool," she muttered.

"Doctor, those men..."

"Aren't looking. Believe me, even Russian boys don't find long wool underwear sexy." She pulled on a dense grey wool sweater he realized was not uniform, then a uniform tunic.

"I'm not a soldier," he muttered.

"Neither am I. Standing out in any way is a good way to get your head blown off, Leonid Pavlovich. Well, so is wearing Russian uniform, but in a Russian convoy, not wearing it is like painting a big red target on yourself for Chechen gunners." She wriggled out of her civilian boots and jeans. Praise wool indeed, she thought, shivering, and put on a trouser liner and then uniform trousers, wrapped her feet quickly and expertly in cloths before pulling on boots. Borodkin watched, fascinated and horrified, as an armored vest, uniform jacket, and fighting harness completed her transformation. Almost. Her wallet and a small white plastic pouch went into her left cargo pocket. She removed her pistol from her bellyband, chambered a round, and slid it into the holster on her right leg, then slapped a magazine into her assault rifle, one of two magazines taped end to end. She neatly folded her civilian clothes and placed them into the duffle bag along with her boots and handbag.

"Leonid Pavlovich."

He looked at her. He had worked for her for nearly a year and a half and realized that he might as well have known her not at all. He felt cheated. In the lab, he had taken pride in handling little annoyances that he never brought to her attention. Here, such shielding was neither required nor desirable. His skills were now useless.

"Waiting will not make this truck warmer, Leonid Pavlovich. Change quickly."

"Decent, Doctor?" Simonov called.

"Always, Warrant Officer."

Simonov swung neatly up, took in Olivia ready to go and Borodkin slowly changing, and gave her a long look that said harshly, We are burning daylight. "Threat assessment, Doctor. The Chechens are operating in three-man teams: machine gunner, rifleman, and grenadier. They're wrecking our armor with our own RPG's. Most units are still relearning tank-infantry cooperation on the job and they're paying for it."

"Mines?"

"Several. Last week Lieutenant Aushan's BMD hit something very large. Total loss of life and nothing left. I'm sorry. I know you liked him very much."

For a moment, Olivia thought she might faint, she was so lightheaded with rage. "He was very sweet," she said in a flat tone.

"He was," Simonov agreed. "Never thought I would call an officer sweet, and say it as a compliment. But he was and so were his lads. So we've added more sandbags to the vehicles, not if you hit something that big, it does any good."

"How are you doing, Leonid Pavlovich?"

"Foot cloths, Doctor?" He asked, having none and wondering why he was asking. Perhaps to put a temporary stop to a dialogue that made him tremble.

"Yes."

"Not socks? Footcloths are primitive." He was being inane and he knew it.

"They also keep your feet warmer and drier and if you wrap them right, cause fewer blisters. Wrap them wrong and they make your life hell." Olivia spoke from both experiences, then reached into her kit and gave him a pair. Borodkin wrapped his feet. Not well, but not badly, either. He knew the knack would come back to him. "I assume you fired a weapon during your military training as a student," she said.

"Uh, yes, Doctor."

Both of them heard the hesitation in his voice. "Don't worry. You'll fire for familiarization for sure and probably also for qualification, so you're confident in your weapon. Don't worry if you're no good at first. Everyone here is very reasonable and professional."

The rifle in his hands felt profoundly alien to him.

Simonov's security team and the men who met them at brigade headquarters were also alien. Borodkin felt himself surrounded by a different species. Over the past few weeks, he'd made some efforts to prepare himself physically. He'd lost a good ten kilos and, at Olivia's urging, had started lifting. He'd gotten a little muscle in his upper body, but he was not like them. In fact, from what he'd seen of Olivia even in her wool long johns, he was not like her. The additional intimidation was not appreciated, and he felt quite inadequate when Olivia introduced him as, "Mister Borodkin, my administrator, who makes everything I do possible." The compliment, though true, seemed to cheapen him.

He had the first of several more shocks later than evening. He had expected Olivia to be sequestered somewhere under guard, not sleeping in the same large room as the rest of the senior staff, her sleeping bag and pad thrown down on a cot, tucked in a bit of a corner so that she could hang a blanket when she needed privacy, but that was it. The second shock was when he was shown to the brigade visitor's room. Sequestered, he thought bitterly, as if I am the woman _._ He did not know that he'd been given the room as a courtesy to ease his initial transition, and that he could join the others whenever he wanted. He did not know because he asked no questions and made no protests, only accepted with a sullen weariness that annoyed and estranged his hosts.

The third shock completed the wreckage of his mood. A balding, swarthy bull with a massive shelf of a brow overshadowing brilliant black eyes joined them for a dinner of dark bread with butter and shchi, cabbage soup rich with beef shin and marrow. Olivia, who rarely kissed people or permitted them to kiss her, rose up, embraced and kissed the bull, who responded with a great, warm gentleness. "Major Malinovsky, the chief of reconnaissance. Leonid Pavlovich Borodkin, my administrator."

"Be welcome, comrade. Good to have you here before dark. Russian vehicles are very vulnerable at night." He turned back to Olivia, leaving Borodkin feeling first perfunctory, then nonexistent. "So, how was the flight down?"

"The usual."

"Morphine or knitting," he responded. "And sometimes morphine and knitting, but not tonight, I think." He could usually tell when it was the latter, because he could find Olivia in a corner, swearing as she ripped out her work. Morphine only meant she had been able to drowse during the flight. The two together meant she had been utterly restless with pain.

"Knitting only, so a very good flight. Which reminds me..." She reached into the cargo pocket of her trousers and handed him the gloves. "For Hanukkah." Another Yid, Borodkin thought, utterly amazed, so much so that he failed to process the next phrase. "And for teaching me to box."

"Thank you. Although you know I'll wear them to rags here."

"That is what they're for."

"Spar tonight?"

"Yes. I need to. You know I always need to after even a good flight so I don't know why you bother asking."

"Good manners. My mother would beat me, if I hit a woman without asking her permission. In fact, I'm quite sure that if I told her about this, she'd beat me anyway."

"Doctor Tolchinskaya, what did he mean by that?" Borodkin whispered after Malinovsky left.

"We..." She hesitated. "He teaches me to box."

"He hits you? You mean that's what happened to your nose? He broke it?"

"No, just adjusted it a bit. It was a mistake. We try not to hit each other in the head, but I've blacked his eyes as well. It happens. Things occasionally get out of hand."

"You're a woman and he's huge. And he hits you—"

For the sake of privacy, she spoke to him in English. "A year ago, I gave Major Malinovsky twenty kilos in weight and probably thirty in muscle. We calculate now that while I still give him fifteen kilos, I give him no more than twenty in muscle, and probably closer to fifteen. We think there has been some bone development as well. I am not only stronger, I am more flexible and taller. My accident took five centimeters off my height; I have regained them all due to increased flexibility. Those gains are cheap at a recalibrated nose and a few bruises, not to speak of my ability to defend myself in close quarters." She paused. "I am in pain, no matter what. There is no choice. The choice is, does it become suffering or not? I find that if I incur pain towards my ends, towards my purposes, it does not become suffering. This thought may help you or it may not." Her blue gaze, as cold and hard as it was, was also kind; he would have preferred it not be so. "So long as you do not think this a place to indulge base pleasures, you can in this unit exercise those parts of yourself that have no ready home in peacetime society."

"Thank you, Doctor," he said stiffly.

"Mister Borodkin." The gentleness of her voice struck him. "You told me that we would do with each other as we would. And so we have and I find you only praiseworthy. But we also do with ourselves as we will. No one in this brigade cares about your past, any more than they do mine, only about what we may do now, and its implications for the future."

"Thank you, Doctor," he repeated stiffly.

Olivia started to lay her hand on his shoulder, but did not touch him when he froze in anticipation. "As you will. I know how hard certain changes can be."

"Thank. You. Doctor."

She inclined her head to him. "As you will," she repeated and walked away.

Drawn against his desires, Borodkin found himself watching as she and Malinovsky wrapped their hands, quietly talking about what they hoped to accomplish, watched as a very lean and elegant chestnut-haired man laced their gloves on for them. Later, that man joined him to observe. "I am Colonel Suslov, the brigade commander. And you, of course, are Mister Borodkin."

"Is it so obvious?"

"I know every man in this brigade, by face and from behind, by helmet and boot size, so I should hope I know a guest in my own headquarters."

"This is difficult to watch."

They were sparring fairly hard. Olivia needed the release from all those hours confined in a small, hard seat. The ligaments in her back and hips snapped audibly each time she moved, each time she landed a blow or took one. The hardness came from the intent and the speed with which they were moving, not from the absolute force behind their blows. Still, they were both hitting hard enough to get each other's attention. When their blows landed.

"Men beat women," Suslov said, more to himself than to Borodkin. "The world over, men think women less than human."

"He is beating Doctor Tolchinskaya now."

"Not even close." Suslov was amused. "She's giving very much as good as she gets."

"But she's much smaller than he is!"

"So are most Russian men. Major Malinovsky is our bull. What hurts her is not her size, it's that she was so badly injured. You can see how awkward and stiff she is in her lower back and pelvis, blocking the power from her legs. But she moves so much better than she did, she is so much more through than she was. Also, she has been doing this for less than a year. He began boxing as a boy."

"She can't win. She's a woman."

"Agreed, although winning has no meaning here. Training does. As reluctant as I am to admit it, with all of us at this level, it is a matter less of innate talent than of training. Boxing is about the skilled delivery of punishment even when in pain, not brutality. Limitations and all, Doctor Tolchinskaya when sparring is not an object of tenderness." Suslov watched Olivia do something with her feet that Borodkin perceived only as intricate, smoothly slipping out of Malinovsky's way and pivoting to sink one blow with her nasty left under his ribs, making the big man grunt as he moved out of range. The sound was of an axe striking wood.

What Malinovsky said through his mouth guard was, "Well done."

"Good, she can do that now." Suslov looked down at his watch. "One minute, my friends."

"That's all?" Borodkin asked, amazed, as they began to back down and then disengaged when Suslov called time again.

"Three minutes, working like that, is a long time. Three rounds of three minutes each, which they have done, is a very long time," he said, his low, quiet voice amused. He took their mouth guards from them, squirted water into their mouths and unlaced their gloves for them.

Borodkin sensed he would have things to say to her later about this, then realized that he would never say them. He was silent, letting Olivia and Malinovsky talk through what they had achieved together. "Colonel, do you do that with her?"

"No." His tone cut off any further conversation.

Watching them all from the shadows was Major Kristinich. When Olivia and Malinovsky noticed him, he smiled politely, raised an arm halfway in greeting, then turned away. His thoughts were not on them.

Kristinich did not approach Borodkin that night, nor all the next day, but the evening after. Olivia and Malinovsky were sparring again, leisurely, more thoughtfully, her back and legs not making quite so many hideous noises. Borodkin, immersed in his own blankness, did not become aware of Kristinich until he spoke.

"As a cultured man, Mister Borodkin, surely you do not find boxing that interesting? Unless, of course, you wish to hit a woman. Or be hit by her."

Borodkin turned to the man behind him. "I..."

"We have not met. But we do have the same employer. Perhaps also a common interest or two. You are Mister Borodkin, the man in the background who makes Doctor Tolchinskaya's glory possible. I am Major Kristinich. I also work in the background, making the successes of others possible. I would find this exhibition shameful. However, I choose not to. For now."

Borodkin panicked. He looked at Olivia and Malinovsky and could not bring himself to admit that what he was seeing was utterly beautiful. Then he looked over his shoulder at Kristinich, standing behind him, awaiting his response. And he could not admit that he found Kristinich hideous. Then a single, unbearable thought took him completely. He was not like anyone here, or anywhere. I am nothing. I am...void.

Major Kristinich waited calmly. He tortured people because it was a way to be certain of what they were really feeling, of where their minds really were. Pleasure could be faked, thoughts could be concealed. But not responses to pain. Yet he also enjoyed twisting people mentally and emotionally, to the point where they themselves did not know what they were thinking or feeling. Torture was for enemies of the State. Manipulation was for whomever came along.

Borodkin turned to face him. "I do find it shameful, Major."

"They do not think it so. Neither, apparently, does their commander."

"I hold to my opinion."

"I can think of other things that are shameful."

"Such as?"

"Some of the circumstances of your present position. As Russian patriots, we do what is required of us. Our duty takes us down many roads. But honestly, did you ever expect to find yourself working for an American woman? Did you ever expect to find yourself here, watching this vulgar display?"

"No. This was really not what I had in mind when I came to work for Line X."

"Still, in some ways it must be a fascinating experience."

"In some ways, yes." Borodkin was not a naïve man. He knew there were no innocent conversations with FSB officers. He also knew that he now had, he had been given, the opportunity to betray Olivia in a way that writing routine reports had never allowed. He also knew that he wanted the capacity. He wanted it because it was...something. "She doesn't think like anyone else I've ever met. Other people have bits and pieces. They're specialists. She knows so much. When it comes to knowledge and ideas, she has no regard for discipline. She steals what she wants and moves on."

"That is possibly why she is here, lacking intellectual rigor. Perhaps that's what made her a failure in her own country, to be shunned." Kristinich's voice went smooth. "We do live in amazing times. Amazing. I thought we were finally getting rid of our Jews, shipping them to Israel. Then the Americans start sending us their own. They seem to be everywhere in Moscow these days, all those advisers they bestow upon us like we were some primitive colony with no past of our own, no accomplishments of our own, no future except in imitating them. Well, we have no control, you and I, over the Jews they send to teach us how to do business or run our government. We have just our single Zhid to contend with."

"I do not know why she did not go to Israel."

Kristinich looked thoughtfully toward the ring and said only, "Indeed. We must continue this conversation at your convenience."

He walked back into the shadows. And Borodkin felt alive. He had been...noticed.

Then he realized that he had taken Kristinich's bait. He had said something against his boss to an officer of Federal Security and he realized that was exactly what Kristinich had wanted. An initial opening. To be continued. There was only one way to end the process. That was to go to Doctor Tolchinskaya and confess what he had said and its possible implications for her. He had not defended her; he had wronged her. But to grovel before a Jew, an American, a woman. No. It was intolerable. And now there was another factor. Major Kristinich. His FSB colleague, who might now become his comrade, his only comrade in this awful place amongst these awful people. Kristinich had observed Olivia through all her time in Chechnya. He doubtless knew things about her that Borodkin did not know. Things Borodkin now wanted to know. Things that might be of importance later.

The sparring match ended. Borodkin decided to return to his room. As he turned, he noticed Simonov watching him intently and he had the momentary sense that there were emotions on his face that Simonov should not see. Then he dismissed the thought. Simonov was scum. Kristinich was an officer of the FSB, no doubt destined for promotion and assignment back to Moscow.

He was a good man to know.

***

It was cold in the mountains above Vedeno, a small town of about three thousand, some fifty-five kilometers southeast of ruined Grozny. The Vedeno Gorge was the most dangerous area of Chechnya. Any time you wanted combat, you could have it.

In the deepest blue, the no-longer-black-but-not-yet-light of the very early morning, Simonov fancied he could feel the hate of the Chechens rising up to the abandoned ridgeline farmhouse that served as an observation post and their quarters for the night. It was why he had chosen the region for their new round of tests.

There was no need to wake Doctor Tolchinskaya. He could hear her already stirring in her sleeping bag when the time approached to relieve the midwatch. He remembered how surprised he'd been the first time she joined him for this, the last watch of the night, appearing with tea for both of them. It turned out that if she could get six solid hours of sleep a night, she was happy.

He had come to enjoy their conversations during these hours, and between those conversations, some amazing sunrises, as well as some miserably cold and wet early mornings. There had been times, talking to her, when he wished he was either much smarter or a whole lot dumber than he was. That had faded as he began to understand more and more of what she did. At least, the parts of it he could actually see and hold in his hands. He handed her a cup of tea as she joined him. "The boys and I have not really expressed our thanks to you for the gifts." She'd brought some cookies, baked by her housekeeper, a book and a CD she thought each man would enjoy, and those wonderful knit fingerless gloves.

"I have not really expressed my thanks for the time you have all taken to train me."

"Our orders are to keep you alive. Training you contributes."

"Thank you for both."

Simonov decided, once again, that it was time to raise a delicate subject. But he had no real idea of how, and her face was no guide. So in good Airborne fashion, Simonov decided to forget the niceties, jump out of the plane, and let gravity do the rest. "Your assistant, your...what do you call him? First deputy?"

"No, not that. He has the engineering degree, but he's an administrator."

"And you find him competent?"

"As an administrator, exceptionally."

"But not so much as an engineer."

Olivia did not look at Simonov. She had learned to read the timbre of his voice and she did not want him to see an uneasiness on her part that might make him go silent or change the subject. This was not like him. He was extremely protective of his own people; he would assume that she was the same about hers. Yet his interest in Borodkin was negative, and she sensed that it went beyond his various ineptitudes in the field. Had it been Kristinich speaking to her, she would have simply walked away. But this was Simonov. When he got serious, she listened. So she spoke. "He could be a fine one. Not great but far more than adequate. If he chose to be." Her voice was neutral but inviting.

Simonov felt relief flood through him that the conversation would continue. "Would you let him try to create for you?"

"I have tried to interest him. He prefers administration. Since he is good at that, so be it."

"Why doesn't he want to create?"

Olivia exhaled, took a large swallow of tea, felt the heat work its way deep into her chest. "He is afraid to fail and no engineer should be afraid of failure. I don't mean you should want to see your building or your bridge collapse, or your sensors not work through carelessness or sloppiness. But you should not be afraid to see if your preliminary plans don't work. These new pets I brought, that are programmed to seek light. They currently do it poorly. But in time, they will do it better."

"It's unsettling to see them scuttle around."

She grinned. "Isn't it? We're still trying to think up a use for them. We have some immature ideas about demining and booby traps and going places far too small for a human. But I believe a dozen good soldiers will come up with sound ideas for their tactical use much faster than a dozen good engineers. If the lads don't, they've amused themselves, no harm done. They're made from scavenged parts and the programming is fairly simple, so there's not a lot of money or time in them and they'll get no one hurt." She paused. "Mister Borodkin is afraid to fail like that."

"He's afraid to let himself want. I've seen you envious, Doctor. What I mean is, when you envy, you set yourself to achieve that which you envy, or at least something comparable. So there is no hatred in your envy. That's not true of everything you admire, of course. There are many things you simply find admirable. You do not reject things or people because they are admirable."

"Thank you. Genuine admiration is a pleasure for me, envy is a spur. But we all have limitations." Her voice was very calm.

Simonov was not deceived. "Yours are far away. It pains me as a man to say that. Like all men, I want to think myself better than a woman at anything, more than any woman, because I am a man. No man can know you and think he is more than you. He may be better at this or that, yes, of course. Just as you are better at this thing or that thing. He may not be less than you, but he will almost certainly never be more." He paused, struggling for language. "You are a master. But we have no way to evaluate you. We know what you do but we don't understand it. We have no standard of comparison for you. But each of us is starting to know quite a few Russian soldiers who owe you their lives or their limbs. And quite a few Chechen civilians, too. Not that the Chechens will know it or even thank you if they did. But we do."

Olivia silently looked at Simonov. His innocent thug's eyes beseeched her for permission to continue. She could see the question in his posture, hear it in his voice. At last, she nodded. Simonov took an audible deep breath. "Mister Borodkin hates you for these things. He hates you for being willing to make all kinds of mistakes, so long as they don't cost blood, if they mean you end up saving blood. He is afraid to envy you honestly. Instead, he resents. And while I can't speak to you being a Jew or an American, I can speak to you being a woman. That alone is enough to make him hate you."

"What are you saying, Warrant Officer?" Her voice was like the sword blade you do not feel, until your head looks over at your body on the ground beside it.

"He hates you. And not for your vices. He hates you for your virtues and even for your womanhood."

"Warrant Officer, what are you saying?"

"Doctor, such hate can do you no good."

"A given, Warrant Officer. Now. What makes you say this?"

Simonov paused. "I know what I know."

"Very well. Assuming you are right, what do you propose that I do about it?"

"Let the lads and me kill him."

She exhaled very hard. "Warrant Officer!" Her voice was, nevertheless, a whisper and Simonov couldn't help being proud of the noise discipline he'd ingrained in her.

"We've worked it out and no one will ask any questions, here in the Vedeno Gorge area. Out of respect for the service he has given you, he will find a humane and honorable end here."

Olivia had lived out of these men's rucksacks and they hers, for over a year. She knew very well that left to their own devices, Simonov and the rest of her security team would make anyone who threatened her beg for a bullet. And that was how Olivia decided to answer. "Warrant Officer, there is a difference between hatred and acting on hatred. Do you have proof that Mister Borodkin is some kind of real threat to me or anyone else?"

Simonov understood what she was asking. "Doctor Tolchinskaya, I have watched this man carefully since you brought him to us. He is a sullen, cowardly sort. Everything is a personal affront. He will never challenge you openly. But I saw him speaking with Major Kristinich. You were sparring with Major Malinovsky. They were watching you and speaking of you."

"But you did not hear the conversation."

"No. But I saw Mister Borodkin's face afterwards. It was evil, the kind of evil you see on a man when he's found a way to hurt his betters. Doctor Tolchinskaya, I have no reason to speak this way against someone you value. There is nothing in it for me. I am only saying, this man Borodkin is your enemy. By himself, he may be no threat. But if he and Major Kristinich get together..."

"If."

"Yes, Doctor. If. They could make trouble for you. Maybe not here. But back in Moscow, where there are different rules."

"I know that, Warrant Officer. Do I understand you correctly? You are asking me to give permission to kill a man who might harm me, when you have no proof."

"You do, and it will never come back to haunt you. We need only to know you won't be raising a fuss."

"And Major Malinovsky and the Kombrig?"

Simonov looked straight at her. "I have not spoken to them but, Doctor Tolchinskaya, they are Russian. They know what hate like this can do."

"I am an American. I need more than a nasty look or a suspicious conversation."

"Doctor Tolchinskaya, I am telling you, this man means you no good. This isn't America, where it seems people can say anything so long as it is meaningless. Here, words mean something, and Mister Borodkin knows what those words can do. This man is very likely to be a weapon at your back if anyone chooses to use him against you."

Olivia knew that by the rules of his culture, which was also Borodkin's, that Simonov was right. "I know that. But by my own culture, which still provides my reflexes, I cannot kill him."

"No disrespect to you, Doctor Tolchinskaya, but I'm not telling you to kill him. I know you can and will if you must. I'm asking you to let the lads and me solve a problem that is truly beneath you, before that problem rises up against you."

"Warrant Officer, if I can't do it, I can't order someone else to do it."

"Doctor, you would not be giving an order, you would be giving permission."

"I cannot bless your killing of a man I cannot bring myself to kill. If what you are saying is true, it may be wise to do so. But you are offering no proof. I am not speaking by imaginary American standards, but by real standards. The standards of civilization."

"Doctor, please forego the courtroom proof. This is not a courtroom. Believe me, you will place no one at risk by doing so. If you do not, you place yourself at real risk of a harm you do not deserve."

"I believe you, Warrant Officer. But I cannot kill or allow to be killed a man for what he might do. I have to have more than your instincts, as true as I know them to be. I have to have my own. I have to live with myself. And. There is the fact that Mister Borodkin may become more than what he is today. You and I both know about that."

Simonov could have wept for both her and Borodkin. "Do not forget the offer. Please, Doctor."

"Warrant Officer, I swear to you, I will not." Awkward about his loyalty, yet gentle with him, she chose to make a wry joke. "If I ever have need of your offer, you have my leave to tell me you told me so."

"Thank you, Doctor."

The morning came. Their watch ended. They went into back into the farmhouse to prepare for the day. Borodkin was sound asleep, snoring loudly.

"You know, Doctor, perhaps we could execute him for snoring," Simonov mused.

"In a perfect world," Olivia answered, "snoring would indeed be a capital offense, Warrant Officer. Sadly, we do not live in a perfect world."

"I know, Doctor," Simonov replied quietly. "I know."

# CHAPTER FIFTEEN, MOSCOW and GROZNY, SPRING 1996: COMBAT

Rebecca Taylor never ceased to be surprised by how quickly and how badly her field gear got trashed. On the other hand, she really couldn't complain. She had not been killed. Other reporters had been, sometimes by Russian troops, usually in circumstances that remained obscure. She believed some of those killings had not been accidental. Still, she had found the front-line troops normally helpful and considerate. Alcohol and indiscipline were something else, and she put most of the rest of those killings down to that.

Taylor was having a good war. She had not been present during much of the Grozny operation, but she had been with the forces that had taken the Chechen town of Samashki and was one of the first correspondents in after the massacre of military-age males and others by Russian troops. Her account was raw, but would later be regarded as one of the most accurate. Not even the Russians, who apparently wanted word of their latest capacity for undisciplined brutality to spread, had disputed it or refused her further access. In some ways, they even regarded her as an asset. So did the Washington Post. Her editors valued her work and were starting to drop hints that, after her next Stateside posting, she would be considered for Moscow bureau chief.

Just now, though, neither the war nor her career prospects were on her mind. An American was. The tall, strongly built woman with the pale platinum blonde hair, worn in a shaggy crew cut, and deep blue eyes, the clearly American woman who stood a few feet away from her, was. Fortunately, she thought as she approached her in the department store's lingerie section, we're different sizes. I wouldn't want to have to fight her over the same brassiere.

Taylor had first seen her several months ago, deplaning in Mozdok with a considerable tonnage of equipment and staff. She was clearly in charge. She was also met by a squad of heavily armed men, several of them obviously her personal security. But what Taylor found most intriguing about this woman was neither her air of authority nor her obvious comfort with her situation. She seemed happy, genuinely alive, and Taylor was shocked to find herself thinking, how un-American. Then the thought took on an eerie familiarity.

Taylor had returned to DC a few weeks before to attend to some medical business: nothing serious, provided she received better care than the Russians could provide. After the minor outpatient surgery, she'd walked the streets of DC, looking at all the angry, petulant faces and wondering, What in hell do they have to be so bitter about? Thanks, but I'm going back to Russia. It's crazy, it's brutal and corrupt, but at least it's not petty and ugly like this. For a moment, she wondered if she'd gone native, if she'd become a war junkie, or just grown inured to it all. She got one part of her answer a few hours later when she came across a greeting card in the "Relationships" section of an office lobby gift shop. The card said, "I love you. But I don't love some of the things you do." She bought the card and decided that, when she got back to Russia, she would mail it to America. But she never had. Who would she mail it to? And what would she write?

She still had the card and now she sensed that the woman before her would, in some way or other, understand. Taylor had seen her once more, in Grozny, at a modest distance, in the company of Colonel Suslov. She'd been in fatigues and armed, and she appeared completely comfortable, at home in her skin and at peace with what she was doing and where she was. Later, Taylor had paid a courtesy call on Suslov and asked him about the American woman. He had looked straight at her and replied, seemingly with total sincerity, "I know no American woman except you."

"Colonel..." she had begun. Then she stopped. As a reporter, she had long been accustomed to asking total strangers uncomfortable and outrageous questions. That had not been one of those moments. He had simply looked at her very flatly and she had decided that to press him would be, at the very least, impolitic. And she had no desire to alienate this man who had helped her get in and out of places more than once, and whom she respected. If he did not wish to acknowledge the American woman's existence, he no doubt had his reasons.

Now, she joined the woman at the bra counter. "I didn't know until I came here," she said casually, "how important dressing well is to Russians. They'll spend and spend on everything. But trying to find a decent sports bra is almost impossible."

Olivia, startled at the sudden surge of American English, looked up, then stepped back. For a moment, she surveyed Rebecca Taylor, quickly determining what she was not. She was not a tourist, nor a visiting academic. She was clearly professional, but not a business type. US government, perhaps.

Jay Lyons...

Olivia learned what her face looked like when Taylor asked in genuine concern, "Are you alright?"

"I...yes, of course. You just startled me. What were you saying?"

"About how hard it is to find a decent sports bra in Moscow."

"True," she answered, amazed at her own trivial coherence. "We once had all these images of Soviet women as muscle-bound weight lifters, over-developed child gymnasts, and anorexic ballet dancers. But not a sports bra in sight in this place. Just lingerie."

Now it was Rebecca Taylor's turn to be startled. This was native-speaker English, but the woman's voice now carried a discernible Russian accent. She had not, obviously, spoken much to other Americans for a while.

"I guess they're making up for lost time," Taylor answered.

Oh, fuck. They're making contact. The CIA or somebody. What in the hell do I do now?

Olivia said nothing, just wondered whether this dark, petite woman was wearing a wire sensitive enough to pick up the crashing of her heart against her chest. She quickly scanned the woman's hands for rings and saw none. She did see many small cuts, the kind acquired at a workbench or in the field. And she noticed that the woman was lean in the way she was. Toughened by something. And hard.

"Are you sure you're OK?" Taylor asked.

"I'm an idiot."

"Huh?"

"Oh...nothing. Just something I have reason to tell myself from time to time." She took in a deep breath and decided to try an oft-proven Simonov tactic. When in danger, either head away from the danger or through it. One or the other. Just do it fast. "So. What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?"

"Perhaps something similar to what you're doing."

Oh, Jesus, Moses, Cyril and Methodius... "I doubt that very much."

"I'm looking for bras. What are you doing?"

Olivia picked one up, set it down, then decided to head into the guns. "I would imagine you could get anything you wanted through the embassy."

"I don't work for the government. I did, but not anymore. My name is Rebecca Taylor. I'm a reporter with the Washington Post. Based in Moscow. I didn't catch your name."

"I didn't throw it."

Rebecca Taylor made her decision. "I know. But we've been to some of the same places recently and have some friends in common. If you tell me your name, I'll tell you where I've seen you before. You don't have to, of course. I'm a former Foreign Service officer and I know that I could get your name through the embassy. Every American who comes here is required to register. Or maybe I couldn't get your name through the embassy. Maybe you didn't register."

Olivia stepped back, still uncertain yet also relieved. "Would you mind if I asked to see some identification? Not a business card, please. Real identification."

Taylor reached into her purse, withdrew her employee ID and Russian accreditation card, plus a memo from her bureau chief, grousing about her latest expense vouchers for items damaged or lost in Chechnya.

"OK, my fellow American," Taylor said quietly yet firmly. "I've shown you mine. Now you show me yours."

"I've read some of your articles from Chechnya. Very well done."

"Thanks. Got any American ID?"

"Not on me."

Taylor nodded. "I'm not entirely surprised. As I said, we've been to some of the same places, including Mozdok, and we know some of the same people, including Colonel Suslov, who claims he knows only one American woman. Me. I've even heard a few fascinating rumors."

"Such as?"

"A tall American woman, very pale blonde, providing Russian forces with some sort of technology. Tactical ground sensors, I believe. Some of it strange and experimental, but enough of it good enough to use and far better than anything they've developed on their own. They use it."

Olivia was now looking at her steadily, a gaze Taylor found extremely uncomfortable because it was not the look of someone who has been caught. She also found it intriguing. "Let us make our purchases," Taylor said, "then get some food. My treat."

"Expense account?"

"Guest of the Washington Post."

"I accept."

Silent, they finished their shopping. Bras and underwear and socks for Taylor. For Olivia, bras in brightly colored, heavy cotton, plus a bag of men's briefs she'd already purchased. The women examined each other's items, continuing the old peasant tradition of collective responsibility. Russians would tell you if they thought there was anything amiss with the merchandise. Or with each other. Both women had enjoyed the experience of being told that they shouldn't sit on cold ground, that it would harm their ability to have children.

"What are you going to tell me about what I bought?" Taylor asked.

"Synthetics melt. Both sides are using incendiaries and of course there is always diesel or gasoline. Someone should have told you."

"No one did." It was an ugly thought. "What about wool?"

"Praise wool. Even spun-in-the-grease wool doesn't like to burn and tries to self-extinguish."

"I wish I'd met you months ago. Who are you? For real."

"Gotta feed me first. I spent a good bit of time in DC once. I know I'm worth a lunch at the fanciest place on the entire block. Whatever that might be."

They found a quiet restaurant, French in fact, catering to Moscow's nouveaux riches, almost empty because of the late afternoon hour. The waitress brought them wine, then took their orders. The women ordered in comfortable, fluid Russian. The waitress was not impressed.

"OK," Taylor said as the waitress departed. "Speak to me."

"First, got a business card?"

Taylor offered up her Washington Post business card. Olivia studied it, slipped it into her handbag, sipped her wine, and took a moment to observe her own emotions. The fear was gone, although she reminded herself that this could still be some sort of government contact, perhaps a prelude to a deadly contact. Then she noticed a strange irritation. As starved as she was for female companionship, for serious female friendship, she did not appreciate being so easily and casually identified as an American. Especially by this American, who already knew about her, and who as a reporter might bring her unwanted and possibly dangerous publicity.

Then there was regret. Except for Borodkin, who spoke English with her as a way of being exclusive, she had not spoken much English in nearly two years. She realized that the last American she had spoken to was Jay Lyons in Vienna. It was not a memory she cherished.

And there was curiosity. She had read a dozen of Taylor's articles, acquired by Borodkin when she'd asked him to see what kind of coverage the war was getting in America. She remembered one filed in the immediate aftermath of the Samashki massacre, incandescent with rage and rightly so. But Taylor never lost the habit of putting the ugly war in its contexts, past and present. The fact that the Chechen war was ugly, an ugliness compounded by ill-trained, ill-equipped troops led by officers they rarely trusted on behalf of a government they loathed and despised, did not make that war unnecessary.

It was a serious thing to write like that for Americans, who too often, even at the policy levels, preferred moral preening and a faux realism based on outdated categories to a real understanding of Russia's agony and America's interest in easing that agony.

"Perhaps we both know someone else," Olivia said.

"That's not answering my question."

"It could lead to an answer."

"So who would that be?"

"A Russian back in DC. A man who knows the meaning of American history far better than do many Americans."

Taylor paused, then thought of the only man she knew who met that description. "Perhaps he is or was a cultural attaché."

"He is," Olivia agreed. "His name, please?"

"Yuri Mikhailovich Getmanov."

"Of course," Olivia added, "he is more than a cultural attaché."

"Of course." Taylor drank her wine. "After my articles had been appearing for a while, he emailed me to invite me to call upon him when next I was in DC, or he would do the same when he was in Moscow. We have had several long conversations. I have to say, the degree of sophistication I encountered was a scary surprise."

"I am sure many Americans are used to thinking that most Russians swing from trees by their tails."

"I remember walking into his office the first time, thinking that, at least about the higher levels of the old nomenklatura. I walked out with my head spinning with ideas, along with a list of books by impeccably American and British historians of insurgencies to read. So. You know who I am and what I do. Who are you and what do you do?"

Olivia now had only her instincts to guide her. She chose to trust.

"Back in America, I was Doctor Olivia Tolchin. I'm an engineer, specializing in military sensor technology. I worked at Los Alamos and before that at Fort Belvoir. Here my name has been Russianized to Tolchinskaya."

Taylor set her wine glass down with a sharp click. "Are you telling me that you're part of some kind of clandestine military assistance program? God knows, the Russian Army could use it."

"I agree. I only wish I were part of an American assistance program. I'm not."

"Are you part of some other government program?"

Olivia silently shook her head.

Taylor stared at her for a long time, struggling to comprehend. "Are you a defector?"

"Of course not. The Cold War is over. The category no longer applies. Perhaps other categories apply. But not that one." Patrons were starting to trickle in and Olivia remembered General Getmanov in DC, his unwillingness to sit too long with her and his reasons why. "Let us walk and talk."

Taylor understood what she meant. "Agreed."

They walked for a while, lost in the swirl of pedestrians, seemingly two women friends with their shopping bags, nothing more, speaking very quietly in English, shrouded in the thickly falling snow of an early spring evening. "Are you a traitor?" Rebecca asked hesitantly.

"Treason," Olivia replied from memory, "consists only of levying war against the United States, or in adhering to their enemies and giving those enemies aid and comfort. If you do not know our Constitution's definition of treason, my fellow American, you should. It no more fits me than defector."

"Then what are you?"

"I accepted Russian employment in order to help the Russians levy war against people who mean them harm and who mean America harm, too. I accepted Russian employment after it became very clear to me that the US Department of Defense had absolutely no interest in what I could do for them. I chose to come here rather than throw away concepts that have proven their value in Chechnya, over and over. Many people, hundreds, perhaps thousands, are alive today because of me."

"Have you divulged classified information?"

"No. Nor will I. That is not what I have come here to do and the Russians respect my refusal for both practical and moral reasons. They want what I offer, what they need right now, not useless data from defense programs that, despite their highly classified nature, are worthless."

"What are you doing then? With a Spetsnaz brigade. In Chechnya."

"The brigade is my test bed. I build tactical sensors for urban combat. On the scale we are now using them, this is beginning to have strategic implications. It may be changing the entire nature of urban warfare. I am looking down the road to remotely piloted and unmanned aerial vehicles and robotics, with strong research lines in artificial life and intelligence and miniaturization trending towards nanotechnology. It is my lab and I control the projects from lab to field. Chechnya has been an exceptionally good testing ground."

"So you are one of the reasons that in spite of the sad state of the Russian Army, casualties are so much lighter than anyone could have reasonably have expected."

"Yes."

"Could you not have done this for the US military?"

"As I said, I tried for a decade and will always wonder if I could have succeeded, had I banged a few more tables or heads. But no one at my level ever has such influence. You know what American defense contracting is like."

"More and more money for less and less result. And that's the way they want it."

"Indeed," Olivia said flatly.

"So when the Cold War was over," Taylor said casually, sarcastically, "and the government wouldn't let you do useful defense work, you left government service and went to work for the Russians." Taylor watched words she had so carelessly said strike home, then regretted it. "I'm sorry, you don't deserve that tone. Have you renounced your citizenship?"

"No. Nor have I been asked to," Olivia answered, deciding to retaliate for Taylor's sarcasm with searing formality. "Nor will I be. Nor will I. The Russians have dealt with me fairly and honestly. They have kept every promise they made me, from permitting me my personal weapon to allowing me total intellectual and creative freedom."

The words were painful for Taylor to hear, as Olivia had known they would be. From an American, above all an American woman, it was hard to hear them spoken and to know that they were in fact true. "Does our government know what you're doing?"

Olivia sighed. "I do not know. I believe that nothing I have told you so far is dangerous to me, insofar as our government is concerned. I know I violated many regulations and undoubtedly some laws in coming here, given the clearances I held at Belvoir and Los Alamos. But I doubt that they'd go out of their way to get me back to prosecute me. What they might do if I returned voluntarily is another matter. I would probably become a target of opportunity for some ambitious deputy assistant prosecutor."

"So you think that no harm will come to you, so long as you stay in Russia?"

"That is my conclusion. Almost. However..."

"However," Taylor said slowly, "there is something else you want to tell me?"

"Yes."

"What?"

Olivia paused, then decided to trust her instincts—and maybe save her life. Or lose it. She could not know, she could only hope. "You are a serious woman. I know some of the fights you've covered. I know some of the officers and I know some of the conscripts you've talked to. You are fair, and you are attempting to get it through Americans' thick skulls that there are things Russia and America should do together."

"I am a serious woman or, like you, I wouldn't have been in and out of Chechnya two winters running. But you have a goal in mind, not just admiration of my virtues."

"Correct. I go about my business as a designer and engineer, but I am working towards something larger and I hope other people notice someday and understand. The last American I spoke with before coming here was a man with the US embassy in Vienna. I had asked in a roundabout way to speak to someone from the CIA. He may have been. That was never made clear."

"Why did you do that?"

"I wanted my government to know where I was going and what I was attempting to do."

"Were you offering to spy?"

Olivia found herself choking on disgust. "Never. Not then. And now, I'd rather die than betray people like those I work with. I had hoped to be some sort of link, some sort of bridge, to honorably further American ends while honorably discharging the employment I had been offered. I just wanted to be a bridge."

"What happened?"

"He thought it was a very unfunny joke. I recall his exact words. 'Lady, this ain't the Central Bridge Agency you're talking to.'"

"I've met a few like him. Why did he blow you off?"

Olivia smiled sadly. "Several reasons. In the summer of 1992, I was in a very serious aviation accident. Multiple broken bones, including my pelvis and both hips, as well as multiple fractured vertebrae and more lacerations than anybody cared to count. I use several controlled substances, including morphine. All by prescription. The level at which I function with them apparently did not matter. He decided I was a drug addict. In all honesty, I'd had some wine the night before, too much, and I was not at my best. So he decided that I was also an alcoholic. We went over a few other things. The gist of it was, he told me he'd write a memo for the files, but don't call us, we'll call you."

"Anything else?"

"He recommended that I go home and get a life. I didn't go home," she added dryly. "But I did get a life."

"Do the Russians know that you had this contact? Made this offer?"

"No."

"Do you know what they will do to you if they learn what you offered?"

"I used to think I did. Execution after very unpleasant preliminaries. Now I'm not quite so sure. Granted, the memo Mr. Lyons, or so he called himself, promised to write endangers me if the Russians learn of its existence and I truly hope they never do."

"The CIA's a fucking sieve these days," Rebecca Taylor grimaced. "Between the traitors and the leaks, the only secret left is how few secrets are left. Don't assume yours will stay in that category forever."

"I don't. But for whatever it's worth, I have many living Russians soldiers and Chechen civilians, and a lot of dead Chechen fighters, to my credit. I hope that if it comes to that they will judge me by what I have done, not for expressing to a maybe/maybe not CIA officer my hope to be some kind of bridge. Funny," she mused, "that's all I've ever thought of it as. Some kind of bridge. What kind? Never got the thought that far along. Anyway, I've had no contact with my government since Vienna, and if they're all like Jay Lyons, I want none."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Your writing is that of a woman who possess both physical and moral courage and you, too, believe that there are things that our countries should do together."

"Our countries?"

"Our countries. You love America."

"I wouldn't be anything else."

"Nor I. But you also love Russia, which is why you live here and I suspect are grateful to return here after you've gone back to America. America is where you vacation now, not where you live."

"How do you know these things about me?"

"Because they are true. I wish I could return to America from time to time, but I wouldn't want to live there. Not as it is and not as it's becoming."

"That damned greeting card," Taylor murmured.

"Pardon?"

"I was back in DC a few weeks ago, tending to some medical matters that I'd been putting off. I found I couldn't stand to be around Americans. Then I found this greeting card in a shop. 'I love you but I don't love some of the things you do.' I bought it, figured I'd mail it back to America when I got here. I know what you mean."

"Have you mailed it?"

"Of course not. Who would I mail it to? And what would I write on it?"

"I would write," Olivia said slowly, "Dear America, it isn't always true that you don't know what you've got until it's gone. You can be so far gone that you no longer understand what you're losing or that you've lost it. From Russia with Love."

"And concern." Rebecca Taylor added.

"Yes."

The sorrow in the woman's voice, Taylor realized, was a patriotism as pure as it was broken. She no longer yearned to return; she no longer yearned even for the desire to want to do so.

"So," Olivia continued somberly, "because you are a brave woman who understands how the world works, I want you to know what I hope for. Please keep this to yourself. But also, please don't forget it."

"I will not," Taylor answered, then laughed a little. "Who knows, maybe someday it will be OK to write about your accomplishments and ambitions. In any event, if you are ever arrested and wind up in the Lubyanka, I will do what I can to write favorable articles, get you some publicity, and serve as a character witness. Perhaps we will end up sharing a cell together."

Olivia laughed aloud, delighted by the woman's dark wit. "Done deal." Then, "Do you mean it? If I'm ever in real trouble here, and you find out, will you help?"

"American to American...yes."

"Then I must reciprocate. Tell me, do you run?"

"From time to time."

"Well then, if you also eat McDonald's hash browns and drink milkshakes after a hard workout, I shall ask my running partner if she would mind a third."

"I don't think I'm as fast as the two of you."

"That's all right. We push ourselves, but we're both injured. You'll do just fine."

"Who's your partner?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. Let's just say, it's a small world, even in Russia. You'll find her, well, challenging. Also, who knows, a fantastic source one day. I'll let her know that the Moscow Chapter of the Russo-American Women's Hash Brown Running Society now has a new member."

***

Russians tend to live in flats and have small families, while Chechens tend to live in houses or compounds of houses and have large families. There is a fairly clear, simple logic to an apartment building or a city of them, once you are used to construction patterns. There is also a logic to a compound and a city of compounds, but it is more complex and fuzzier, and so Chechen compounds tended to be death traps for Russians.

Olivia and her security team had gone along on a snatch-and-grab of suspected foreign fighters. It was three in the bitterly cold morning and the compound, which had been under very discreet observation, was quiet. There was no movement outside and there appeared to have been no movement inside for hours. All entrances and exits were covered by fire as well as observation. She had never been on this type of operation before. Her intent, as always, was to see how it worked, until she understood the tactics intuitively and could use that understanding to improve her sensors.

They went into the compound, then into a house. They went into a large room.

This was supposed to be safe, was Olivia's last conscious, coherent thought for a long time. The world exploded into gunfire and Simonov stepped in front of her, into a burst of fire that should have killed her. The rounds shredded his face, spattering her with his flesh and drenching her in his blood, as it poured and pumped out from beneath his helmet and vest. Nevertheless, in the way that sometimes happens, he fired back at his killer, suppressing him for a few precious seconds even as he fell back on Olivia, covering her with his body.

She rolled out from under Simonov and saw his killer, a black-bearded man, wearing a green headband with white Arabic script. Olivia felt something shift in her brain so deep, so far down, it was in her spine. No choice.

She felt hot agony trace her arm. A bullet had touched her. But there was no bone involvement, no arterial bleeding; her hand still obeyed her will. Pain joined rage within her, making its way through her like white phosphorus. Then she was possessed by the boxer's cold, controlled fury that Malinovsky had taught her to use to her own ends, only a fury stronger and more controlled than she'd ever imagined possible. Time seemed to become very slow, like thick liquid, and she felt she was moving in an almost leisurely manner as, rising to her knees, she lifted her rifle and shot Simonov's killer in the chest. Then, in the instant before death and gravity took him down, in the face.

She could hear the rest of her security team firing back, felt Sergeant Gumarov grab her arm to try to drag her out. She smelled the gasoline before it ignited, smelled it for the second time in her life. Fire came to them. For an instant, she was once again a being of broken bones and damaged ligaments in a wrecked and burning plane, and then she saw the terror in the sergeant's eyes. She grabbed him and shook him, her eyes alight with pure intelligence. "Concrete and rammed earth don't burn," she screamed. Then the entrance behind them went up in flame. Decorative wood supports. The fire would make a mess but nothing that couldn't be survived, especially if they stayed low, where the air was, and close to the walls. Gumarov forced himself to focus on her words and get control of himself. "I've been here before," she shouted. "In fire, I mean. Don't panic and we'll be fine." They could hear but not understand the Arabic shouts; they could understand a little Chechen. "They were waiting for us," she said.

"They were. If we try to break out through that door, we'll be cut down. If we find a way to get upstairs, they're probably up there, too. So—" Gumarov grabbed a soldier he hadn't seen until that day. "Radioman, get the BMD gunner to work the upper floor but have him stay off the cannon or he'll be killing us all."

He complied and they could hear the comforting sound of the 14.5 mm machine gun on their BMD open up as the gunner put fire into the upper story, suppressing the defenders. The screaming above them informed them of the result. There was no need to use the cannon; to do so risked killing friendlies. But now if the Russians had fire at their backs, the Chechens and the Arabs did, too. They could not stay where they were, without dying. Nor could they come down without death.

Scanning the room, Olivia fired at several points in the ceiling. Gumarov joined her, firing at several more, knocking out light bulbs and any possible observation devices that might have existed. "Let us honor our hosts." Her smile was feral.

Olivia had a strange, detached sense of time seeming to elongate and contract as she needed it to. Meanwhile the Russians, those who survived the initial shock, organized themselves almost automatically and began clearing the compound. The Chechens and Arabs were staggered. This was not supposed to happen. The Russians were clearly doing what the Chechens and the Arabs considered unthinkable. They were moving into their fire. But not blindly. Not blindly at all. And skillfully.

It was the first time Olivia had personally ever used her work in combat, throwing a little hand-held sensor around the corner, seeing what the monitor showed her. Not enough, never enough, but the yes/no of the monitor and the reactions of enemies told her enough of what she needed to know. Her mind worked with speed and clarity. She was able to react before the Chechens and Arabs did, and it felt like she had been working with Sergeant Gumarov all her life. Sometimes the Chechens and Arabs thought the device was a grenade and fell to the floor. That gave Olivia enough time to toss in a real grenade or, with Gumarov and others in the small group that formed and reformed around her, spray the room with automatic rifle fire. Sometimes they encountered an empty room or space and called for other troops to drive the enemy toward it. When the fighters took refuge, they learned there was none only as their heads and bodies exploded.

She had a few discrete memories. One was of an Arab—the features weren't Chechen—holding a pistol to an infant's head, yelling Alhamdulillah, and something else that didn't matter. Sergeant Gumarov, a Tartar, a Sufi Muslim, and a new father, shot the man in the eye. There was the pfft of penetration, then the thwat of a bullet, then nothing more worth considering. Then Olivia realized that her mind had processed the sounds backwards. Time is very strange today. She kept another memory of a woman wielding something, a hoe, a shovel, Olivia didn't bother verifying, shielding her son, a child who couldn't have been more than thirteen except that he was shooting at her with an AK he could not possibly control. She killed them both, the woman first because she was the closest and most dangerous, by reflex and utterly without conscious thought, with her pistol.

Then she realized that she was using her pistol. Her rifle was no longer with her. She didn't really want to remember where or how she'd left it. But she did. She had fallen hard and probably damaged the exposed gas tube, a known weakness, because the weapon failed at what seemed like the worst possible moment. So she struck a man with the extended stock. No, struck was not the right word at all. The weapon had penetrated the man's stomach, then remained there. For the time being, she let herself shy away from the knowledge of what she had done, and how much strength and rage it had required.

Then the firing ebbed and there was the hard silence that follows things of finality. She left securing the prisoners and searching the bodies for information to the troops. That was their job. Simonov was her responsibility. She had a profoundly detached memory of something she'd done in addition to killing his killer. She'd left the room, perhaps the house, then gone back in and dragged his ruined body out of the burning rubble. She slowly recalled briefly pausing before the body of the man who had killed him, whom she herself had killed, and looking upon the wreckage of his face. And she remembered, realizing as she photographed the scene in her mind, she knew that if she wanted to, she could remember every last detail later. And then she realized, the memory would not trouble her at all. It would gladden her.

She sat down beside Simonov's body and, like an engineer seeking a problem in her circuitry, searched for remorse or shame or anything normal. Then she accepted—this was normal. What she felt was far beyond a mere physiological reaction to successful combat, killing someone who had tried to kill her, then others who'd held the same intent. That had been an interesting set of problems to solve. What she felt was elation, satisfaction, and a profound sense of completion, as if all the fragmented parts of her had finally coalesced, and there was no more hiding her wholeness from herself or from the rest of the world. And what she felt was horror, not with what she had done, but with the fact that this carnage was what it had taken for her to reach this moment.

But no fear. No fear at all. Not even the tremors that ought to come when the adrenaline subsides and the muscles and the nerves collapse into exhaustion. Fear was absent. Perhaps it, too, was dead. But she was alive.

I'm...me. Olivia. At last.

***

Olivia had a small room for a field-expedient lab. Often of an evening, she could be found there, when she was not knitting or sparring with Major Malinovsky, repairing one of her younger drones or sensors, or dissecting an older one to learn its flaws or autopsy the battle damage. The door was usually open. Sometimes, Suslov would sit quietly, almost silently, with her, watching her, handing her a part or holding another for her, listening to her when she spoke, which was very rarely. When she was thinking hard, words were an encumbrance, not an aid. Suslov had learned to ask her simple questions that she could answer with Yes or No, a gesture of the head or hand, questions he often refined down to a part proffered, or a quizzical look. In its own way, theirs had become as peaceful and calm as her relationship with Major Malinovsky.

Not that night. The light was on, the door firmly closed.

"Doctor Tolchinskaya?" No answer. Suslov gathered the mugs of tea in one hand and let himself in, shutting the door just as firmly behind him.

Olivia was sitting with her back to a wall, her chin resting on crossed forearms braced against her knees, her uniform tunic stiff with dried blood, her right arm bandaged neatly from wrist to elbow, where a bullet had furrowed her almost down to bone. She'd gotten most of the blood out of her hair and off her face. Beside her was her pistol. From the scent, she'd cleaned it. Wordless, she looked up at him.

Suslov handed her a cup of tea, then sat down on the floor facing her. From her eyes, he could see that she was very reasonably on morphine for the pain and still somehow entirely present. She sipped the tea, letting the sweet, spicy warmth flood her.

He had long ago ceased to worry about her. But this was different.

Suslov silently held her eyes with his own, his very direct gaze unusually gentle. After a minute or so, she opened her mouth to speak. No words came. More silence, then another failed attempt. After her third attempt, when language no longer seemed like a brutal intrusion, Suslov spoke, his voice very low and quiet. "You learned something about yourself today."

"Yes. You knew it was there, all along, didn't you?"

"I thought it might be."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Suslov exhaled. "If you know, words aren't needed. If you don't know, none can help you understand. This is how we think about killing. The first man you killed meant nothing. It was simply something that happened. But this...you enjoyed."

She let out her breath. "I did. I am enjoying it still."

"Go on."

"I do not like to speak of myself."

"This time, you must."

Olivia felt the relief of a great weight lifting as she spoke. "I am feeling, I am thirty-six. I have worked very hard to build my life as an engineer and a scientist and it has made me happier than any other person I know or have known. But today I wasn't 'happier than,' I was happy. The full, complete emotion." Her vivid blue eyes were brilliant.

"What were you doing when you realized that?"

"Helping load Warrant Officer Simonov's body into the BMD. There wasn't much left of his face and chest. I was stunned by how much, after it was over, I wanted what I had done." Then she offered a small smile, full of grief, for Warrant Officer Simonov and the young wife he had left behind. Olivia hoped he had gotten her pregnant. "So. I loved it."

"What will you do with that knowledge?"

Olivia paused, then reached for the honesty that was now inside her. "I'll always want it. I'll always want more. But I'm not a soldier and I'm not going to become a war addict, any more than I'm a drug addict. However much I want it, I may never experience it again. I'll do it again if I have to, and I will love it. But I won't seek it out."

She was silent for a while then, and he let her be, waiting for the question she was going to ask him. "How do you feel about killing? And about combat?"

He chose to answer the second question first. "In Afghanistan, I felt the same way you did. Had I been just a conscript doing my two years, I could have given into it. The need that makes everything else a price you pay gladly. But to give into it as an officer would have been to break faith with my soldiers. The young ones, especially. They need officers and sergeants who don't live for blood. They need officers and sergeants who will remind them that our memories have no statute of limitations. Armies need officers, especially senior officers, who can enforce that perspective because they have lived it, or combat becomes no better than slaughter. Nations need such officers in charge of their young men because the survivors are going to come home to be husbands and fathers. So this monster, if indeed it is a monster—I'm sometimes unsure—is always inside me, as it always will be in you. But it's not in command. As much as I would sometimes like to let it be, I won't tolerate it."

"This pain you carry in your soul must be like the pain I have in my body."

"And now you have it in your soul too."

"But you're a soldier, I'm not, and since you have spent nearly your life at war or getting ready for war, it must be in some ways worse than what I know in my body."

He shrugged. "I don't believe in comparing pain like that. Also, we do other things at war, things we do because we love each other. There are other reasons, but love is the most important reason. Love, and the honor that comes with loving bravely and well. We do it, no matter how stupid or criminal or corrupt our leaders. So I think you were starting to wonder if enjoying killing meant that you were on the road to being one of the Kristiniches of the world."

"I was."

"Tell me, Doctor Tolchinskaya, who loves Major Kristinich? And who does he love?"

"I don't know that he understands that word."

"He doesn't. And so he is alone here. Whereas you, quiet as you are, have a gift for friendship."

"I do not feel the need to talk promiscuously."

"When you like people, you make them things. The things you make are the words you don't speak."

"I didn't realize that until now."

"We all see ourselves differently than others see us. You and I are very alike in that we seek mastery, first and always of ourselves. We will have that at all costs. And then we seek a real meaning for what we do. We love our abilities, our accomplishments, but other people have to get some good from our work or it's incomplete."

She was silent for a long time, sipping her tea. "Many words, Comrade Colonel. And true. You are a wise and honest and perceptive man."

"You usually need silence from me. Tonight, you need language."

"Also true." She studied that idea for a few moments. "I've noticed you're very kind to your soldiers. Usually."

"It is what is needed. Usually." He inclined his head to her. "Supply will issue you fresh uniforms. Those need to be burned. You can never get out that much blood."

"No, I suppose not."

There was a long silence between them, full of promise. Then Suslov rose in a single fluid motion to his feet. Olivia tried to do the same, but could not. She began to rise in an awkward series of moves. Suslov stepped over to her, did not take her hands and pull her to her feet, but offered her his hands for her to brace herself against, letting her control her own motion.

They were standing now very close together. He could smell the iron and the copper of the blood and burnt cordite scent of expended ammunition. He was afraid that if he touched her, he would not stop until he had found all the ways she liked to be touched, and she had sampled all the many pleasures he intended to offer her in order to find the ones she enjoyed. "I know you are unmarried. You do not, I think, have a lover in Moscow."

"If you mean Borodkin, of course not."

"I mean Borodkin. I am unable to determine what he thinks of you, what he wants."

"He does not think of me. Nor does he want anything from me."

"Do not be so sure. If he held to the simple desires of honest men, you would have known it by now. More complex desires, those of degraded men, do not come out so honestly."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I have noticed him in the company of Major Kristinich often enough to know that he, Borodkin, is the kind of man who is often attracted to a Kristinich. Timid, resentful, afraid. Borodkin is not, I think, himself a Kristinich. But a Kristinich can make him feel more alive than he might otherwise. Think of it, Doctor Tolchinskaya. What brought you to life and what might bring him to life."

"I would rather not," she said, remembering Simonov.

"Then we shall not discuss him. May I ask if you left a lover in America to come here?"

Olivia exhaled. "After my accident, the orthopedic surgeon told me I most likely would never walk again. Not properly, like a human being. But I had seen the x-rays, so I told him that if that was the best he could do, I didn't need him. Two weeks later, I was in rehab. Two weeks after that, I was at home."

He let her pursue the thought. Then he asked again. "And your lover?"

She exhaled again. "The injuries bothered him a great deal. I suspect he would have been repelled by the scars after they healed. He didn't stay to find out. He took one look in the hospital and fled." Suslov felt himself choking on his disdain. "The accident was four years ago," she went on. "Until now, I did not particularly care to remember the experience. When scars signify pride and courage, not simply wounds..."

"Then those who flee them are cowards." It was a long time before Suslov dared speak again. "I hope you do not think me vulgar or coarse for saying that had I been so fortunate to be your lover, I would have been delighted to tend to you, even while you were in hospital."

She remembered needing that very badly, to be touched in ways that offered pleasure sufficient to get beyond the pain. "Thank you for that. And your wife?"

"I was shot, seriously wounded, during my first tour in Afghanistan. I married the civilian surgeon who saved my life. Yes, it happens. The fact that so many men might think they want that, deters all but the serious. She was there doing her 'internationalist duty', as they called it. I loved her very much and wanted to have children with her. She could not. A botched abortion when she was younger: she responded to that by becoming a superb surgeon. But between two more Afghanistan tours and what we called 'internal security duty' I was extremely busy. I often put her in the position of being alone and waiting to be widowed." He smiled briefly. "That much I could understand. At the time, though, I did not understand why she could not understand that there are some people who simply need to be killed. Now, I look back and know I was very stupid. I thought our very real love for each other could bridge two fundamentally different ways of looking at the world and relating to people. I also thought that because I was faithful to her, that mattered more than her loneliness. It did not. I thought that fidelity could matter more than her knowledge of the things I had to do to our own people. It could not. Still, we ended decently."

"Why did you divorce her?"

"I would never have. She divorced me." The look he gave her was heart-breakingly direct. "I was never unkind to her, or struck her or insulted her. I commanded an Airborne battalion that was sent to Sumgait in Azerbaijan to end the 1988 anti-Armenian pogroms. She went in to provide medical relief for civilians. Rather than send in the Army, Gorbachev sent in MVD, Interior Ministry troops, armed for riot control. Totally inadequate. The Azeris nearly beat the MVD to death. So Gorbachev sent us in, Airborne and Spetsnaz uniformed as Airborne. We ended the pogrom. The official body count of twenty-six Armenians and six Azeris is far too low. Maybe six Azeris were killed in the pogroms they started, before we showed up. I myself counted nearly a hundred bodies, all Armenian, and that was only what I happened to see. Some had been burned alive, others had been mutilated but left alive as a warning, or gang-raped as a form of civic murder, also as a warning. And for pleasure. I saw children who had been thrown out of the windows of apartment buildings, women whose faces had been rubbed against asphalt and concrete until their features were obliterated. What can you say to those who do such things? Can you say any words to change them?" He was briefly silent. "So. I gave orders to shoot to kill, which some of my young men had never had to do before, certainly not fellow Soviets. Instead, they shot to wound, then took the wounded in for treatment. To my wife, who had volunteered once again, perhaps this time out of loneliness. It did not turn out well for us. I did not even know she was in that hospital. She did not know I was there, either, until she saw me in the hospital courtyard with my troops. I was extremely unhappy about the indiscipline and I ordered my soldiers to finish the work themselves there, in the courtyard. She saw me, she heard me give the order."

There was no need for Olivia to ask whether or not he had been obeyed.

He was silent for a long time, standing so close to her that their chests were almost touching. "I looked that night very much like you do tonight. As a surgeon, my ex-wife is one of the wonders of our world. I took the trouble to understand what her profession requires of her. It never occurred to me that she had not done the same. Not really. Until that night, she had never known, had never even thought, that part of her husband might exist. I terrified her and she never again looked at me without fear and—even worse, far worse—disgust. By the time we left Sumgait a few weeks later, I knew our marriage was dead beyond any hope of resurrection, so I agreed to a divorce."

"This is why you waited so long to address me."

"Yes. We are long past the point that anyone would call you a whore for taking a lover in the brigade or accuse me of forcing you into concubinage." He was being extremely delicate. "I wanted you to know this about yourself, which means I also wanted you to know this about me. I wanted you to be unable to hide from yourself or from your knowledge of me."

"We both reek." She politely drew back. "I somewhat worse than you."

Not moving any closer, he started to extend his hands, then realized what he was doing and put them down along his sides. When he spoke again after some seconds of silence, it was in a voice she had never heard from him before, the midnight voice of a beckoning saint. "We only ever get one first time with each other. I don't want to waste that with you. You know the brigade is changing command. I hate to leave it now. But my time here is nearly done. We can all feel the Chechens planning an offensive for later in the year, but you and I are also both tired and worn."

"Where will you go next?" she asked, experiencing the same sensation she'd had with Getmanov when she realized that what he would say next would change her life.

Suslov smiled. "A rest tour of sorts. Also a kind of finishing school. I'm being sent to the Voroshilov General Staff Academy."

"Where is that?"

"Moscow."

Olivia reminded herself that human beings required oxygen, so best she start breathing again. Suslov went on, "It has not yet been announced, but I have been selected for promotion to major general."

"Congratulations," Olivia answered softly. It was the best she could do. "What will you teach?"

"Teach? Nothing. I will learn. I will be a student, along with other very senior colonels and very junior generals. Nearly all will be in need of rest and a time to think. Unlike your Army, where generals are presumed to know everything because they are generals, we still go to school. The promotion itself will happen at the brigade change of command. There will be a final party of sorts before I leave, but I want no celebration of promotion. My men paid for that promotion with their lives and I find it indecent to celebrate such things. I would like to...be with you after we leave this place. I can only assume that your comments at our dinner with General Trimenko enhanced my career potential."

Olivia smiled, for the first time warmly. "I will not ask what you two discussed after I left."

"Oh, the usual."

"Explain, if you would."

"He asked me if...no matter. I shall soon enough be able to give him the answer he wants."

"Was he making a shiddoch in my absence?"

"No. Your previous panic demonstrated your lack of desire for such."

"The thought of marriage...in this context...does not bring out my rational self."

"So I have observed." Unbidden, he followed her thoughts. "I understand why. No, he was not making a shiddoch. But he was not forbidding one, either. We both have leave coming. My country is not all devastated cities and drunks. I know and love the cities of Old Russia. Moscow, Novgorod, Voronezh, Kazan, Bezhetsk, Yaroslavl and Kolomna and, yes, Saint Petersburg. Forgive me, but I love even their names, just as I do Riga and Vilnius in the Baltics, and Kiev in the Ukraine as well as the cities of the Silk Road: Fergana, Bukhara, Tashkent, Samarkand."

He remembers cities as I remember perfumes.

"We have lost some of these places that I love and for which I have shed blood. A Russian must be a fool to think that the old Soviet Union could be held together forever as it was, or that it should return as it was, just as a Russian must also be heartless not to mourn its passing _._ Will you let me show you what remains of this land I so love?"

"I can imagine nothing that would make me happier."

"Then, as you Americans say, done deal."

***

The next day, Sergeant Gumarov, who would soon enough be Warrant Officer Gumarov, taking pains to look like one more non-descript, uncared-for Russian draftee, traded with the Chechens for a fine young sheep, some oranges, and red wine. In return, he offered "salted" ammunition, five hundred rounds laced with a few that would rupture the chamber and badly injure, if not kill, the shooter. The Chechens seemed delighted and inquired if Gumarov had any more merchandise to trade. Gumarov assured them that, when he had it, they would know.

Olivia, growling, her back and pelvis an aching wreck and her bandaged arm a dull fire, moving very carefully indeed, confiscated the lamb, the wine, and the oranges. She would cook. The butchered and trimmed body went into a large pot, along with the wine, some cooking oil, and orange juice pressed from the oranges, several handfuls of chopped garlic, a rather smaller quantity of toasted cumin and red peppers, some salt and then, as an afterthought, the squeezed orange halves. The pot was covered and the whole thing went into her field lab, where it stayed until the morning of the third day after Simonov's death, the first of the feast days for Orthodox dead.

Major Malinovsky arrived with four of his men. The pot made its way from her lab into a slow oven, uncovered, the orange halves piled atop the meat. It was also their final day with the brigade, hers and Suslov's. The change of command ceremony would be simple, held indoors, so the men need not prepare for anything fancy or interrupt their routines. Suslov would be promoted immediately after, also indoors. Olivia would not attend the change of command. She would, however, stand beside Suslov as some local general—they both would have preferred Trimenko, but he was not available—administered the oath and she pinned on his new insignia of rank.

A hell of a party, Olivia thought as she tended to the lamb. Multi-purpose. Memorial for some, hail and farewell for others, promotion for one. Then goodbye to all. All save one. No. All save two, she thought, looking at Malinovsky's broad back as he wandered off with his men.

The party began at no particular time. But it began. Because not to drink to the dead as Russians did would have been an unforgivable insult, Olivia drank vodka in the Russian manner and joined in the telling of Simonov stories. Warrant Officer Simonov's security team was at the party, as were a number of his friends, including, of all persons, Misha. They smiled at each other in remembrance.

Afterwards, Olivia and Suslov sat close together, not touching, but the intimacy between them was very obvious. Malinovsky couldn't help but offer them a satisfied smile. "Now everything is as it should be with you and the Kombrig," he said, looking at Suslov.

"Former Kombrig," Suslov said quietly.

"Already?"

"Yes. A simple ceremony."

"One down, two to go," Malinovsky answered.

"Two?" Olivia asked.

"Of course." The Kombrig's promotion and..."

"And what?"

"If I said, a wedding ceremony, sister?"

"If you said that, you'd regret ever teaching me to box," Olivia said, turning her deepest red.

Very gently, Malinovsky put one massive arm around her shoulders. "Not quite. But remember when you first started to learn to box? Whose equipment do you think I scrounged for you? The Kombrig's, of course. There was from the beginning something very, very special between you and as someone who was suffering then, I wanted that for you both."

"And what do you want for yourself?"

He smiled peacefully. "I am a hopeful man. I'll tell you this. She ought not to be Jewish. Or Christian. Or Muslim."

"How about Mormon?"

"I might say yes, if I knew what a Mormon was."

"They don't drink."

"Then I say no. I want a heretic."

"A heretic of which faith?"

"Of fucking all of them. Nevertheless," he went on, determined to finish, "we all know everything is as it should be between you and the Kombrig. Don't you two go doing anything stupid like screwing in an infantry carrier, just to prove it to us."

"Easy, my friend," Suslov said, touching Malinovsky gently. The major grinned in acceptance, started to say something, then decided that any future statements would have to await alcohol-induced incoherence and justification.

The party went on. The living had done well. The officers especially. Major Malinovsky was headed to the Frunze Academy, then battalion command of his own. Suslov knew that Voroshilov was a passport to the highest positions, and that he was slated for command of an Airborne division after graduation. Whatever happened in the future and however harsh the past had been, the simplicity and clarity of the time he had had with these people would not come again. These hours were to be cherished. Still, he could not turn off his concern.

"How much have you got in this city?" Suslov asked Olivia.

Olivia understood. "And environs? I've put in just about everything and everyone I can spare, while maintaining both an emergency reserve and enough of an archive that if the roof ever falls in, other people can step in and take over. All those Arabs in that compound are surely a sign of things to come."

"GRU headquarters agrees with everything we're saying," Malinovsky said. Most of the Arabs had committed suicide to avoid capture. The prisoners had tended to be Chechen. "What you Americans were thinking in Afghanistan when you armed them, I don't know. The Muslims are going to be more trouble to you than they were ever worth."

"But you presume we thought further than defeating the Soviet Union." Olivia said. "I can assure you we did not."

"We?" another man, perhaps not drunk on vodka yet clearly drunk on fury, interjected.

Kristinich had never socialized with the other officers, much less the enlisted, even though in Spetsnaz units, relationships between and across ranks were much closer than in regular units. That had been more his choice than theirs. Suslov had found him useful, after all, and he would not ostracize Kristinich for doing what he tolerated, even authorized. But Kristinich was what he was and he was neither liked nor respected for it.

Now all the soldiers were looking at him, he knew, wondering who had let him in, or more to the point, who had let him out of the box they all wanted him in. But Kristinich was beyond noticing or caring. Olivia's existence, from the beginning an affront, was now to him a personal humiliation. It was intolerable that they treated this woman like a sister, an older, wiser sister, whilst scorning him. It was intolerable that this woman, this American Zhid, should be more respected than he was. Very well. Kristinich understood that in the old days, respect was unnecessary, so long as hatred was accompanied by fear. Kristinich missed the old days, those few he'd personally experienced and the many that had come before him.

He wanted her fear.

"Yes, we, Major Kristinich," Olivia said calmly. "I have never forgotten that I am an American and even if I should ever wish to, I have people like you to remind me."

Suslov and Malinovsky looked at each other, then Suslov quietly withdrew a meter or two, saying nothing. He would intervene only if it looked like it was getting out of hand. Olivia and Malinovsky exchanged a look. Remember what I taught you. She understood. The soldiers began to form a loose ring around Olivia and Kristinich, and she realized she was not alone.

"Well then, you have reminded me that I'd like a word with you."

"Speak, then."

"In private," he demanded.

"Here will be fine. If you want a private word with someone, you don't publicly demand it."

"In private," he tried to insist.

"No need. The days when that request would terrify anyone are gone. Anyway, we're all mischpocha."

"What?" he challenged her.

"That's Yiddish for family. You don't speak Yiddish, do you?"

"No, I don't. I'm a Russian," he snapped.

"So is Major Malinovsky, but he speaks a little Yiddish."

Kristinich grew angrier. He had meant for his demand to frighten her; he had no idea what he might have said to her, had she agreed. And now he was surrounded. He couldn't hit her. She wasn't a prisoner and no one would restrain her for him. More likely, they would restrain him, and he feared that. If he hit her, she'd hit back and he knew that in a fair fight, he was not remotely a match for her. He feared that even more.

"Well, you're very smart, as your successes here attest. I have read your dossier, though, as well as observing your accomplishments here. It appears that you have significant experience with fire."

"That is true, Major. I have mastered it twice. Once in America and once here."

"Perhaps you may have a third opportunity."

"Would you care to be more specific?"

"No, I would not. For now. Let us just say that fire belongs to my realm, not yours. Of course, unlike me, you work with things that cannot feel fire or anything else. Not humans with wills of their own."

"I know a little about that."

"Perhaps, Doctor. And now you're headed back to Moscow, taking your successes with you. Of course, I am headed back to Moscow too, to a position of far greater responsibility."

"Mazel tov, Major. Congratulations. Had you told us, we might have added your name to our list of those whose successes we celebrate. Or maybe not. Will you also be promoted? All my friends are being promoted, you know."

"That will come in time. I'm certain that your going back to Moscow permanently will make it easier for you to communicate with your American and Israeli masters."

The ring of troops slowly started to tighten.

"I have no masters, neither Israeli nor American. I work for the Russian Federation as a free woman and I am proud to do so." Her tone was very cool and civilized. Everyone was armed and everyone had been drinking, and she wanted none of them to end up in prison or worse for defending her when she didn't need their defense.

Kristinich felt his face begin to redden as no response came to him. As she had intended, no doubt. "Well, then, Doctor, you must be sad to be giving up some of the intimacies you've shared with the men."

"I am. I've met many wonderful men who have given me many cherished memories. I am honored to have known them and shared their lives a little."

"No doubt, although I do question the desirability of many of them." Someone snickered behind him. He half turned, saw no one intimidated by his glance, then turned back. "Tell me," he demanded, "how many desirable men do you think there are in Moscow?"

"One fewer than you do, Major."

There were a few amazed giggles, then more snickers. Slowly, they built to a crescendo of laughter as the troops realized what she'd said.

"I'll remember you," Kristinich spat.

"Please do. I'm already very well known. And to quote a wise American, 'I've got friends I haven't even met yet.'"

Red-faced with impotent fury, Kristinich spun around, shoved several soldiers out of his way, and stalked off, laughter trailing him. No one hit him. No one shot him. They let him go.

"Well done," Malinovsky told her quietly. "Who was that wise American?"

Olivia shrugged. "Will Rogers? Ronald Reagan? Walter Cronkite? I don't know. We Americans have proverbs for everything."

"What proverbs should we apply to you?"

Olivia smiled. "I'll let you know."

"No doubt," Malinovsky concluded. "Come with me, please. We've got a ceremony or two to attend to."

"Or two? Now?"

"Now."

"If you think I'm going to get married..."

"I think you're going to attend my promotion."

Olivia gave him a bear hug and kissed him. "Mazel Tov, Colonel."

"Thank you, sister. You, too."

"For what?"

He calmly studied her. "For such a smart woman, you can be very dense. Come on. We must not keep the generals waiting."

# CHAPTER SIXTEEN, MAY-JUNE 1996, OLD RUSSIA: IN RUSSIA, ALL TRACK IS ROUGH

"I would have liked to show you Sevastopol," Suslov told Olivia the next morning at Rostov station, "but because Ukraine is an independent state now and we are arguing over access to the Crimea and ownership of the Black Sea Fleet, things could be a little unpleasant. Especially with personal weapons. So I booked a two-person compartment for us from Rostov up to Moscow. Not direct, you understand."

"I do, indeed," Olivia answered happily. "The less direct, the better. I haven't spent much time on trains in ages."

"You never toured your country by train?"

"Not really. I rode Amtrak a bit between DC and Boston many years ago. Never overnight or anything this elaborate."

"Wonderful. Then you don't know the great secret of long-distance trains with sleeping compartments."

"Which is?"

"Such trains constitute a separate moral universe."

"I favor that. Greatly."

Their itinerary gave them a month riding the rails and visiting cities. They would arrive in Moscow by way of Volgograd, formerly Stalingrad and before that Tsaritsyn, then Voronezh, Vladimir, Kostroma, Yaroslavl, all the way west to Pskov before turning north again to ancient Novgorod itself, once capital of Kievan Rus, and finally Petersburg of the white nights. As Suslov had promised, Old Russia. There would be nights during that long wandering when neither of them slept, simply left their minimal luggage in an austere hotel room and prowled the cities when everyone was sleeping, and the militia seemed scandalized by two peaceful but legally armed citizens, one of them a major general of the Airborne Forces, the other an American woman, walking out well past midnight. They had wordlessly arrived at an agreement that the train was for sleeping and sex, cities for eating and exploring.

But first, they would have to ratify that agreement.

Suslov had closed out his command with a brief indoor ceremony. His men were too scattered and weary to justify anything more elaborate, and he hadn't wanted to stand before them in the stars their blood had bought. He signed a few papers, told his successor a few things that he hadn't wanted to write down, made him promise to see that Mashka the cat remained on the staff, then left quickly. The brigade belonged to another man now and it was improper to linger. He met Olivia at the Rostov train station, where they claimed their tickets for the trip.

"A two person-compartment, for Major General Suslov and his wife, Doctor Tolchinskaya, please."

While most Russian women took their husbands' names upon marriage, it was far from uncommon for them to keep their own, so the little lie was credible. Or would have been, except that Russian train tickets were sold by time and date, name and propiska number, and propiski specified marital status. The ticket master examined their passports. "Of course," he said, looking Olivia up and down, leering at her. He didn't say it, he didn't have to: PPZh, his face said clearly enough. Field wife.

Had Suslov seen the look the ticket master gave Olivia, he would have wiped it off the man's face with his eyes alone, but he didn't notice. He was checking the tickets for accuracy. Olivia was not used to dealing with unearned contempt from underlings. Simonov had taken care of that problem for her, until, first within 22 Brigade, then increasingly outside it, he hadn't had to say a word. Her accomplishments had more than sufficed. Kristinich, she'd handled deftly and with no small pleasure. Now, she found herself consumed by a silent, incoherent fury that numbed her, almost, to the other emotion she was enduring. Panic.

Neither the fury nor the incoherence were like her. She knew that, but it didn't prevent her, as she trailed Suslov to their compartment, from getting angrier and angrier. He could feel her radiating hostility at his back and it made him very nervous. He had never known her like this. He found himself wondering if a long train trip through old Russia in the early summer, locked up with an angry foreign woman, was the best way to spend his leave. He didn't understand why she was so furious. What had he done? Their customs differed but even so, he didn't think he'd been offensive.

They boarded the train and found their compartment. He closed the door and turned to her.

Suslov watched her look around the small compartment with its two sleeping couches. From her glare and the pulse pounding in the arteries at her throat, he guessed that her status as a mere woman in the company of a general had gotten to her, swiftly and nastily. He decided that it might be best to let her calm down a bit, give her some space, and endure her panic with genial devotion. Angry, frightened, suddenly claustrophobic women had to be taken on their own terms, especially since they would abide no others. So he physically backed away from her, into the opposite corner so she wouldn't feel trapped. He was beginning to feel so himself. Her panic would be extremely unpleasant and his own was becoming vexatious.

Very well, he thought. Jewish women have a habit of making you work. What was that Yiddish proverb Malinovsky had told him? No Chuppie, No Stuppie. The chuppah _,_ Malinovsky had explained, was the flower-covered canopy under which observant Jews wed. Stuppe had a more universal significance. The meaning of the proverb was totally clear to Suslov. No sex before marriage. He just hadn't thought it applied to Olivia, but now he was wondering if it might help to buy some flowers and tape them to the roof of the compartment. He promised himself to increase his situational awareness to include flower-vendors.

"We can go to the dining car and have a drink and some food."

"I don't want to," Olivia said, peering at herself from somewhere outside her own head, aghast at the situation before her. How on earth had she managed to find herself in a spalny vagon, a first-class train compartment, with a Major General of the Airborne Forces who might be expected to marry her? This she did not know, except that none of it could possibly have been her fault. She decided to take a close look at this stranger. Even with his scarred face, Suslov was a beautiful man, with his slanting emerald eyes, ivory skin stretched over sharp, broad Tartar cheekbones, and that stunning chestnut hair. There were Russian men—most, it seemed—who thought that to attract women, a man need only be marginally better looking than an ape. Some appeared to strive for just such a condition. Not him.

"Then perhaps we can have a drink and food here." Many people brought their own food and drink. He had. More could be purchased at every stop, from fresh fruit to bread to shashlik to vodka. Always and endlessly, vodka.

"I don't want to."

Suslov decided that it might be wise to take a close look at this stranger. For only the second time since he had met her, she was not wearing a uniform and boots and carrying a visible weapon. Instead, she wore ballet flats of soft black leather, slate grey leggings that ended at muscular mid-calf and a mid-thigh-length tunic of charcoal grey, loose in the upper body and arms, snug below the elbow and hips, with a deep cowl neckline that exposed a white tee shirt. He had never seen a woman dress like that and it struck him that she looked very modern, elegant and comfortable, sensuous and dignified at once. She was also clean. Deliciously, miraculously clean. Unfortunately, her pulse was hammering hard in her throat and she was red down past her collarbones.

He knew he was seeing panic, pure and simple, and he didn't understand why. She knew he did not rape and would not pressure her. But he simply could not find anything in his repertoire of behaviors appropriate to this situation. Usually, he could deal with panic by kicking people in the ass and cursing them. Their training would then take over and they would do their duty. With others, dark humor might work. But this was not combat. This was...women. This was worse, he thought with irony.

He knew Olivia's quality, and he was quite prepared to hope that her own desires would quickly overwhelm her misgivings. Just now, though she was terrified and upon reflection, he realized he did know why. She was terrified because of how much she wanted and that he would use it against her. What mattered was to get her past it. If humor could work in combat, maybe it might avail here. The only problem: Suslov hadn't the faintest idea of how to be funny in such a situation. One more miscue and she might throw him from the train. It was, he realized with some amazement, far from impossible. Very well. Major General Suslov gathered himself, girded himself, steeled himself, inhaled, exhaled, wondered if there were any Jewish prayers or importunings that a Gentile Communist atheist might employ upon this occasion, and began his attempt to be funny.

"Major, that is to say now Lieutenant Colonel, Malinovsky told me there is a phrase for American Jewish women of your class," he said, shifting from Russian to his stiff, formal, accented English, the better to relax her. "That is, Jewish American Princess. You are not now such an item. But tell me, as a teenage girl, were you a JAP?"

Olivia flushed even more brightly red, down, he guessed, well past her nipples to somewhere around her knees. "Goddamn you," she said, struggling for composure, laughing, angry, wanting to bolt out the door, all at once. "I was never a JAP but I do know some JAP jokes."

Suslov experienced a flash of absolute gratitude to the divine. Olivia knew jokes. Now to ask her to tell one.

"Please tell me one."

"Very well. What's a JAP's dream house?"

"I do not know."

"Five hundred square meters. No kitchen. No bedroom."

Suslov laughed dutifully, then inquired, "But where do they sleep? And do they eat out all the time?"

Olivia looked at him skeptically. "I don't think you understand."

"What have I missed?"

"JAPs don't like to cook or fuck."

Suslov started at her use of the word. "Perhaps if they called it something else."

"Such as?"

"I don't know. What are other English words for cooking?"

"Are you trying to be funny?"

"Yes. And failing miserably."

"Me, too."

Then they looked into each other's eyes and started laughing. They laughed until all things of any degree of absurdity had left them, except for the absurdity they could now share.

He moved towards her slowly and smoothly, his hands held low and open, away from his body, until they stood centimeters apart. Her perfume, the roses and irises blooming among the ruins of a fortress, proud and beautiful and haunting, that he remembered from their dinner with General Trimenko, made it very difficult for him to breathe. She was breathing hard and he could see she was shaking. "I told you, I would have...tended to you, even in hospital. Your lover left you because of your scars. I would kiss them."

He gently gathered her into his arms and held her very lightly against his chest, feeling her heart hammering, smelling her perfume, feeling the soft skin of her cheek against his, her hard, dense bones and muscles, her weapon and spare magazines beneath her tunic, slowing his heart rate and respiration, letting his calm seep into her. "Just as perhaps you might kiss my own."

She turned so she could look directly at him, her vivid blue eyes on his in a way they had never been before. No challenge; instead, a slow welcoming. "I place myself in your hands, Comrade General."

One could do something with that idea, he thought, and then the train lurched into motion, throwing her against him and he found it necessary to remember how to breathe. He could feel her breasts, even her nipples, against his chest, her pelvis against his groin, smell her perfume and her desire.

"Perhaps," he managed at last, "we might begin by addressing each other less formally."

It occurred to Olivia that as long as they had known each other and all that they had shared, they had never called each other by their first names. Doctor Tolchinskaya. Comrade Colonel. My friend. And always Vy, the formal address. "I should like that very much."

"My friends call me Mitya. You may do so too, if you like."

She tried it on her tongue. "Mitya." Then his full first name and patronymic, "Dmitri Borisovich. I like that better, actually. May I call you that, instead?"

He thought about it. The formality made him feel dignified, graceful, elegant, desired, and it had been a very long time since he had felt any of these things. "Please do."

"You may call me Olivia."

"I would be honored to do so." He drew her down to one of the couches, his touch the lightest invitation. They were not much wider than Army cots, but they were soft and clean. They would do, especially with sheets and blankets. She was still very tense, but no longer terrified. "I have brought us something for now," he said. An insulated container: in it were cold Georgian champagne and caviar, blini and sour cream. "A most decadent capitalist breakfast." The truth was, for more than two years, he had spent almost none of his pay. Even with inflation, it was a tidy sum of money.

"Goodness," Olivia said, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. "My father told me this is what my mother ordered..." She caught herself just in time. When they agreed to marry _,_ Suslov suspected was the ending. Too early for that, perhaps by years. The smile he offered her, wary and generous at once, acknowledged all his thoughts.

"It was also my last supper with my father before I left America," she confessed.

"So you were a Jewish American Princess."

"I was. Not as most people mean that term. I had a lot of grease and dirt under my fingernails from making things, or fixing them, or tinkering. But, yes, I was daddy's little girl."

He smiled and started to offer her a blini with caviar on it, then thought better. "Open," he said.

"Oh my." At first, she took food from his hand with great delicacy, careful not to touch him with her lips or her tongue.

He poured her some champagne, tilted the glass to her mouth.

As some of the extreme tension left her body, she started licking his fingers when she took food from his hand. Lovers' games, of a kind he had not played in years, not since he had been married, and infinitely sweet. For the first time since he'd known her, he had enough life left in him to want her in any way other than the most abstract. And there was a depth to his desire that he had not felt in many, many years, since before the divorce, when he had seen how the moral demands of their different professions were pulling him and his wife apart, but had not yet succeeded in sundering them.

He gave her another swallow of champagne, then slipped his fingers deeply into her mouth. Her eyes were on his, her pupils dilated so that there was only a thin rim of blue around the iris, a black lake of desire in which he felt himself capable of drowning. She was breathing hard again, but deeply and slowly; for himself, he thought he might faint. He drew her to him, took her head in his hands, and kissed her. Her mouth tasted of wine and the sea: of salt and minerals, of the sea itself, and of fruit and flowers, of pleasantly soured milk, and faintly of wheat. She drank more champagne and kissed him back. Deliberately, he licked her throat, feeling her strong pulse beneath his tongue, moved close to her. "What do you like?"

"To feel something other than pain."

He kissed her again. "So much trust." There was awe in his voice.

"Is it undeserved?"

"Do you remember when you reported to me, and I said that if you betrayed my troops, I would deal with you as an enemy soldier?"

"Yes. And I said you were generous beyond fairness."

"That was when I knew I would love you. Then you went into fire to bring out Warrant Officer Simonov. When you told me how you felt about what you had done, I thought, She is a woman to whom I would give my last breath. I want to tend to your needs. All of them. I am offering that. For now."

"And later?"

"I want to tend to your needs until...I become your need."

Olivia was still in his arms, resting against his deep chest, held closely and lightly, breathing in and out in rhythm with him, smelling the warm, clean, fresh-bread scent of his body. He could feel the desire in his blood like a flood tide; he knew he could smell her desire.

In time, he discovered that he was kissing the back of her neck, where her short hair tapered into her skin, down to her shoulders; after some time of that, she turned her face towards his, seeking his mouth. At first, she was smooth and yielding as silk, then she alternated between being a little forceful with him herself and resisting him for the sheer pleasure of exciting him, of provoking his desire. She was absolutely soaking when he realized he had been so interested in her mouth and neck, and the delicate lines and fine scars that framed her eyes from where she must have been nearly blinded, that he had not so much as touched her nipples yet. A scandalous neglect. He removed her tunic and undershirt, along with her bra and then, somewhat later, helped her out of her bellyband that held her weapon and spare magazines.

She had small breasts, their shallow, perfect curve reminded him of ripe pears, a stunning contrast to her muscular torso. He took her nipples between his thumb and forefinger; her eyes rolled back. She told him, very specifically, how to touch them: a little friction and careful, delicate, almost fierce pressure with his nails. Surely, Olivia thought, riding the waves of sensation, there was a major nerve running straight down from her nipples to somewhere deep inside her. A wonderful nerve.

She had her hands inside his trousers and he had the sense of her feeling him with her palms, and once again the sense of knowing what she was thinking. "You don't have to worry about that," he said very gently.

"But I want," she said in an almost diffident voice, not looking at him, "to enjoy you...everywhere."

He understood the mixture of hesitation and desire in her voice, and how completely she had to trust him to be so honest. Little worse in the world, he thought, for a woman to offer herself to her lover and find herself not...received with gratitude, but taken, and used. "You do me great honor." His voice shaking a little with the intensity of his feeling.

He eased himself into her mouth with the smooth authority of a rifle bolt closing, Olivia thought, reaching for cynicism as if a shield and finding only sensations. The scent of his body, the softness of his skin. His hands on her face and neck, very strong and very gentle. His midnight voice that of a beckoning saint. "Bite if I'm too much for you. Hard." His laughter a rustle of pure desire. "I like teeth. If you're gentle, I'll think you want more." She was shocked by how aroused she was when he slowly sheathed himself deep in her throat, demanding and careful, absolutely stunned by the intimacy. By his slow withdrawal to kiss her deeply and play intensely with her nipples while he gave her a chance to catch her breath, the pupils of his own eyes huge with desire, before sheathing himself again. Quite deliberately teasing her, understanding what it could be like for a woman, knowledge given to a man only by a woman who trusts him with it. After some time of that, when it seemed all the nerves in her body were concentrated in her mouth and her throat, in her nipples and, perhaps, her cervix, his taste, mild and rich and salty, and his mouth on hers, intimate and grateful.

He was surprised to find himself making love to her like that. This intimacy with a woman was something he had accepted from no one, ever, but his ex-wife, and certainly never sought it from, much less imposed it upon, any woman. He liked to enjoy his partner's pleasure, and be enjoyed in his turn. But he also liked to maintain his distance and his self-control.

Olivia was heartbreakingly different. Sex was an easy start; he was quite certain the end would not be so easy. But he had meant what he said, about what he would give her. While still maintaining his distance. He had been aware, enjoying her mouth, that those two desires could not continue on together, not if he ever wanted to see her again after this month. For now, he had found it impossible to remain distant from Olivia when he was doing something so intimate with her. Indeed, feeling Olivia—her thick, soft hair, the hard bones of her skull and jaw, the slow pulse of her carotid arteries against his sex, the muscling of her neck and shoulders—he was simply unable to stop touching her—smelling her perfume and desire, remembering when she had so reeked of sweat and filth, blood and dirt that the scents of hot metal and gun oil were a pleasant counterpoint—feeling her brows and lashes beneath his fingertips and her hair and skin beneath his hands, remembering when she had worn her fatigues until they were practically rotting off her—a woman who had been exalted by killing, who enjoyed the sweet, brutal science of boxing, offering her sharp teeth as a piquant pleasure—he wondered why on earth he would want any distance from her.

Olivia would remember, after, how he would not let her hide beneath a sheet, but flung the curtains of the coach open wide to the light of the day before laying her down on the couch to finish removing her clothing. She would remember, too, the stark respect on his face when he saw the scars girdling her pelvis like a rusty skein of razor wire before he began to kiss them in an attempt to replace the memory and the reality of pain with pleasure.

A little later, Suslov was making love to her with his hands as well as his mouth, exploring what touches and kisses she liked, when he realized she was resisting what he was very obviously giving her. She was liquid with need, and starved, bracing up hard under pain, afraid to let herself enjoy her body for fear she would be unable to bear her chosen hardships. It was a problem he understood very well, from the first times as a young man he'd learned to manage that fear himself. Keenly aware of her pistol on the table beside them, he laid a hand on her throat. No pressure at all, just the warmth of his skin, both startling her and calming her. "I want this for you," he said quietly.

"I don't want to—"

"My love." He could see his words shocked her; he realized he had not meant to say them so soon. "I mean that. And I mean this. I want this for you. You need not be frantic with me. I will give you everything I can."

She heard herself sigh, heard herself say, "Thank You" over and over again.

Later, she lay back on the couch, for the moment satiated, vulnerable in her nakedness and at the same time splendid in her scars and the powerful muscling that was tangible proof of her triumph over her body's pain and her fear of more. He was embarrassed, almost ashamed, to realize he was still in his uniform; he had not even removed his tunic. He stripped then, revealing skin like thick cream and sparse, very fine body hair, almost a glimmer in the light, beneath which heavy muscle rippled like cable. He was flawless except for his scars—his chest looked like it had been sewn up with a zipper—and proud as a stallion. "You please me far better nude than you do in uniform, Dmitri Borisovich."

Scars and all, he realized. "I have lived in that hope, Olivia." He entered her slowly, not so much out of gentleness even though she was still very tight, as he wanted her to feel, watching her eyes start to lose their focus as he pressed against her cervix. She gasped a bit. "Too deep?"

"No. I made myself forget what this can be like..."

He was holding her hands to steady himself; tremoring against him, then moving, she kissed his hands in gratitude. "And I, what I can give..."

She stretched out under him, his wise mouth and knowing hands, his size and weight and warmth, the exquisite softness of his skin on her and in her the most incredible luxuries, luxuries she was slowly allowing herself to believe might be hers. The sun was high in the summer sky over the steppe when he allowed her to rest, for she had asked him to be very vigorous and intense and he'd been pleased to oblige. He poured them both some champagne and offered her a glass. "You look happy."

"I am. I'm thinking. If you time my orgasms to coincide with rough track..."

"My dear, in Russia, all track is rough. You know that, by your leave, I am not nearly done with you."

She permitted herself a tentative smile. "I am yours for this time at least."

For a lifetime, I hope, he wanted to say but did not. Every instinct told him it was too soon to make that kind of offer: not because she didn't want it, but because she did. And she was still too used to living within herself.

She watched his face change as he required himself to gain a slight distance from her, the same look she had seen while he was making love to her with his hands and his mouth, and moved the subject to safer ground. "How did you come to be circumcised?"

"My wife insisted."

"So she made you go to a mohel?"

"A mohel?"

"A Jew who does ritual circumcisions for Jewish babies and older converts."

"No. It was not a matter of religion. It was a matter of hygiene. Also of considerable pain and discomfort when healing."

"So it was a medical procedure only?"

"Somewhat more than that. She did the procedure herself. She had already had her hands in my chest so I thought it couldn't possibly hurt that much more or that long." He laughed. "I was wrong, of course." He laughed again.

"There's a JAP joke in there somewhere," Olivia muttered.

"Please?"

"Never mind. I presume she used anesthesia."

"Of course. We are not uncivilized." And then, quietly, decisively, he closed the door on those memories. "Turn over, please, Olivia: there is something I have wanted to do for you for a long time."

Hesitantly, she obliged him. More scars. He began stroking her back, gently working almond oil into her skin. She was at first absolutely rigid, but under the warmth of his hands, she gradually relaxed, allowing him to work deep into the ligaments so that he could ease the knotting, her back making sounds that were quite hideous: he had the sense of her hips actually opening up to him in a way they had not earlier. Another way to make love, he thought as he heard her long sigh of relief. He was surprised that she had even been able to tolerate the weight of fighting harness and body armor, much less been so constantly capable. And then he realized, her capability was her weapon against the pain. And that the intensity of pleasure might be a counterweight to that pain.

After some time of that, he became aware that she was looking at him over her shoulder; not since his marriage could he remember even wanting to be so intimate with a woman. "I have only ever done this for my ex-wife," he said in that midnight, beckoning voice. "I am doing things for you and saying things to you that I have not for anyone since her."

"You know," she quietly, "that I have to have the intensity."

"I do. My ex-wife needed intensity too. Her pleasure delighted me."

"My old lover thought it was about pain. After a time or two, I did not ask again."

A brute and a coward who left you because of tangible proof of your womanhood. But he said nothing; she deserved better of him than that. Instead, he quietly stroked her for a long time from her shoulders down past her hips, before carefully easing himself, slick with oil, into her tight muscles, listening to her breathing, feeling her body respond to his movements, giving her the time to slowly melt around him. No lover's games now, however sweet, only the greatest gentleness and most extreme body control on his part, just letting the motion of the train rock him into and out of her as she deliberately pressed slowly back against him. She had expected the intensity of sensation; what she had not expected was the utter, intimate luxury of opening herself so completely to the warmth and gentleness and sensuousness of another human being. His turn to stretch her out beneath him, his reward, as he sank deep within her, was to feel her arch up hard against him, seeking and maintaining as much contact as possible, offering herself up to him for his pleasure while thanking him quite sincerely and incoherently for that which he was giving her.

Then, unbidden and unwanted, the memory of Vienna and her own stupidity crowded in—a stupidity that could someday place this man, her lover, in grave danger by association with her. In a small part of her mind, she knew that if she told him what she had done in Vienna, that he might not be ignorant if it ever came to light, he would keep that secret for her. To ask him to bear that burden, however, was not only to endanger him, it was to ask him to break faith. And since she had taken up that burden to avoid breaking faith, she had no right to ask him to break faith by sharing it. It would become her deepest fear that in moments like this, when they were so very close, she would weaken and tell him.

He felt, as she was thinking of these things, once again, her resistance to the culmination of her pleasure. This time, he did not insist she permit herself to feel more than she wanted. To do so would have been to betray her in a way that he had not earlier. The older he grew, the more he understood sex as a ritual, even art; now he'd found someone who felt that way, too. As it was, it was enough to be allowed to give more than he had received, and quite wonderful that at least for a while, the hideous tension was gone from her back.

After, she lay with her head pillowed on his scarred chest, listening to the beating of his heart while he stroked her hair, satiated, so calm and relaxed that she felt uninjured, even boneless. "Olivia, my love. I should like you, after all your necessary embrace of pain, to embrace pleasure. I should like to give you that. The body is not just an expression of our will, it is also something quite splendid and beautiful. Yours, most especially."

"Where do you get your kindness?"

"It's more than a personal quality. Between our wars and our Purges, there was a horrible shortage of men, and women would do a great deal to sleep with a man and get pregnant by him so they could at least have a child. Much less marry him and keep him married. Those men became used to thinking of themselves as the lords of creation. The sons and even the grandsons of most of those men today aren't worth a damn. They drink, they smoke, they don't work, they can barely be bothered to bathe unless it's a special occasion, they expect their wives to give them their paltry earnings, cook and clean and wash for them, and defer to them constantly. Some expect to be able to curse and beat them with impunity. A man who is not so piggish these days—Russian women are grateful for any kindness they receive. Those who have not become totally embittered, at least. And the bosses wonder why Russian women don't have more children.

"You know my father was a tank officer who fought from Khalkhin Gol to Berlin. My mother was a master sniper. I have no idea how they survived, but I have never heard anything against their honor. They met in Berlin in '45 at a dance, although they had actually worked together during the taking of the city. My father wanted the two of them to have a chance to get cleaned up before he told my mother he hoped to marry her. My mother told him that having been a slave before the war, she wasn't going to be my father's serf after. My father, whose wife had killed their two daughters and herself before the Germans could burn them alive in '42, laughed and said that having on principle abstained from raping the conquered, he wanted a wife, not a serf. There was more to it than that, of course, and in their own ways, my parents were made to suffer for the peace they found with each other. I also knew we were far happier and more content and loving with each other than most families. My father had a few things to say about manhood to his sons and differently, to his daughter. Those were his words I spoke."

He kissed Olivia's head, burying his nose in her pale, short hair, inhaling her scent: warm, clean skin, the musk of sex, and roses and irises growing and blossoming on stony ground. Very gently, he lifted her off him and lay her on the couch before leaving their compartment to wash himself thoroughly, returning with a little more champagne. Olivia drew him to her.

A new sensation, he realized, letting himself relax into her arms. He had never been with such a physically strong woman. He realized he had been looking for such strength for a long time and counted himself blessed by his father's memory to have found it at last. Blessed, like his father, after one great loss, if far less terrible than his father's, to have a second chance. If he had found it in an American woman who had left her country, that was his fate. Perhaps they would survive it.

They were both drifting, swaying peacefully on the narrow couch to the rhythm of the train, when a thought occurred to him. "As an officer, I want Russia to become a nation that kills only our real enemies—and nothing worse than simple killing. Everything I do as a soldier is to that end."

"Dmitri Borisovich—"

He deliberately covered her mouth with a very hard hand. "Olivia, it is too early yet and may be by years. But the world is changing around us as we speak. Once this would have been unthinkable for us both. But I would belong to you, as my father did my mother. That means that as you are a foreigner, I am hostage to the State for your actions." She lay quiescent under his hand. When he was certain she would not speak, when he was certain that she had heard what he had said and understood him, he uncovered her mouth. Her profound silence rewarded him. "I am your man." Very carefully, he eased her back onto his chest and simply held her, cherishing the rhythm of her breathing and heartbeat against his. "Remember, whatever happens, that I am your man who would belong to you, Olivia."

***

Oscar Tolchin had agreed to the conditions imposed by Madame Getmanova. They never met. She'd contacted him by telephone; their entire conversation took less than ten minutes. But a few weeks later, an unmarked van with ordinary DC license plates pulled into his driveway. The crew spoke little English. Oscar simply pointed to what to take, and they took it. Madame Getmanova had assured him that Olivia's possessions would be waiting for her, a welcome-home gift, when she returned from...

The silence made him hurt, month after month. Then he finally accepted. If whatever she was doing, she was doing for the United States, it would do no good to make inquiries of the government. If she was engaged in something different, such inquiries might do a great deal of harm. He determined to leave it at that.

Then a FedEx courier arrived with an envelope. Within the envelope was a letter, bearing his address but no postage of any kind. The handwriting was Olivia's. It took him a moment to regain sufficient co-ordination to open it. There were many sheets of paper and a photograph of his daughter, thin, worn, but unmistakably happy, with a Russian officer on the bank of a canal, the beautiful Italianate Winter Palace, the Hermitage, behind them. Petersburg. The officer had his arm around Olivia's waist and he looked extremely proud of her. And tender, Oscar realized as the tears began. That, too.

The letter told of a long train trip through Russia, and of many other things, her words suffused with the calm contentment of a woman at last at peace with her soul.

And then a postscript in a male hand, the English letters stiff and awkward, the Cyrillic orthography sometimes breaking through.

Doctor Tolchin,

There are a number of things I would like to say to you, but you must accept my apologies for my silence. Perhaps fate will in time permit me to say them to your face.

Your daughter came to us as an engineer, bringing a great gift that has saved many lives and will continue to do so. Her presence among us is also a great gift, and that she shares herself as well as her work is, for those of us who love her, a constant inspiration and delight.

I have signed my name, but in truth it does not matter if the censor has cut it away. What matters is the happiness your daughter has found with us. And brought us. That too is a gift.

Dmitri Borisovich Suslov

Major General

Airborne Forces of the Russian Federation

# CHAPTER SEVENTEEN, CARLISLE BARRACKS, PA and MOSCOW, SUMMER 1996: CC COOPER

It was said of CC Cooper that many things were said of CC Cooper. Most were true. The rest would be, as soon as he got around to them. That he was already on the high side of sixty mattered not at all. The legend was always being augmented.

Some people considered CC Cooper insane, others merely a split personality. Cooper, aware of the opinions, argued with neither but preferred the latter assessment: two colonels for the price of one, a significant savings for the Army. One CC Cooper was imperious, stern, austere, intimidating, an officer of the My name is Colonel but you can call me sir variety. The other was aw-shucks/down home good ole boy, always a'joshin' and a'jestin'. Problem was, you never knew which one you were going to get, although those who'd watched CC Cooper slide between personalities soon understood the tactical value of such shifting, especially in military or bureaucratic encounters. CC Cooper knew how to keep people off balance until they finally found themselves agreeing with whatever he wanted. Later, they would wonder how he'd ever gotten them to go along. Later still, they would realize that despite all the seemingly random jinking between personae, CC Cooper rarely said or did anything that he hadn't thought through. When necessary, he could think things through very fast.

CC Cooper—it had taken the Army several generations of computers to find a way to get his first name, CC (no lower case, no periods), along with his NMI (No Middle Initial; the Army requires three letters to indicate the presence of none) properly data-based—was born in 1933. His father was an aging veteran of the First World War, a man who bragged to his son that the Army was the first time in his life he'd ever had two pairs of shoes at the same time. Also, apparently the last. The Great Depression hadn't really affected his part of rural eastern Kentucky; the region was already so poor that the Depression might have been an improvement. CC realized early on that if he wanted that second pair of shoes, he'd have to follow in his father's footsteps. So he punched out at age seventeen for the Army, won some medals in Korea, got out, went to college on the GI Bill, then back to the Army as an officer. There followed thirty-some years in uniform, three tours in Vietnam, multitudinous decorations, two European postings, once back to Korea, and a couple assignments that required the signing of lifetime non-disclosure agreements. But only twice in his professional life, according to CC Cooper, did he ever show real courage. The first got him a Ph.D. The other ended his military career.

In 1973, following his final Vietnam tour, Colonel Cooper had been assigned to command a college Army ROTC unit. At a very liberal college. In very liberal California. In defiance of both custom and the dean's specific request, he insisted on wearing his uniform on campus. At his first faculty meeting, he listened politely as the chair of the sociology department vented about military officers without Ph.D.'s holding the exalted title of professor, even if it was something as trivial as professor of military science. The dean then turned to him for response. CC Cooper introduced himself as jes' a good ole boy who'd be happy to instruct any and all in the experiencing of Kentucky's various bourbons and, by the way, he would not use the title professor until he completed his doctorate in sociology, which he was officially starting now, under the personal mentoring of the department chair. Extracts from his dissertation, Cohorts and Authority: Generational Radicalization and Institutional Stasis, were later published in several academic journals.

His second act of courage took less effort but was far more personally gratifying. An Army adage holds that the best soldiers are the colonels who will never make general. That the best colonels will not be promoted is an accepted fact of life in an Army where ticket-punching, politics, and gamesmanship routinely count for more than soldierly virtue and accomplishment. Still, the practice of not promoting the best has certain advantages. Some of these "old bull" colonels stay on for years, providing the system with practical wisdom and institutional memory, and their superiors with more than occasional private counsel. They are also used to justify the unjustifiable.

And so it was that, as the Cold War ended, Colonel CC Cooper found himself at the Pentagon, tasked with writing a series of reports praising a series of over-priced, over-hyped, no longer vital—if ever they had been—weapons and systems. Cooper could not understand why he'd drawn that assignment. He had no interest in post-retirement employment with any part of the defense industry. Plenty of other colonels did; they would be more than happy to prostitute themselves. But Colonel Cooper was given to understand that his very stature made his lies more credible, so please continue the fine effort. Cooper fumed quietly for a few weeks, then loudly, then decided that he'd had enough.

He'd just returned from a fact-finding visit to the prime contractor for the M-4077/2 Pulverizer. This was a shoulder-launched anti-armor missile, a project perpetually behind schedule and over-budget, but also an essential component of America's defenses against Soviet tank hordes, except that the Cold War was over and the Pulverizer was incapable of penetrating, let alone pulverizing, any armor developed after 1972. Pointing this out drew little response from anyone, save a shrug and a plan to spend more millions on it next year. CC Cooper wanted this program killed and decided to do what he could to hasten the demise. So he wrote up his report after witnessing the Pulverizer's latest triumph. This particular event was a milestone test known as "bench-firing." The missile with its test warhead was mounted on a bench and fired at a large paper target twenty yards away. Six hits out of ten were required to pass. The Pulverizer had scored five out of nine; the tenth launch was crucial.

The Pulverizer was fired. The Pulverizer ignited. The Pulverizer moved forward. Then the Pulverizer fell off the bench and, under its own power, slithered along the ground for twenty yards before hitting the base of the target. The contractor and the project officers decreed the final launch a hit, the test a success, the program ready to advance as soon as the next appropriation came in. CC Cooper agreed and wrote a glowing report, including commentary on the test and the Pulverizer's unexpected utility as a lawn edger, garden plow, charcoal lighter, and, possibly, as a new tool for unclogging septic tanks. It might also prove a dandy way of keeping neighbor dogs and children off the lawn, when rigged with a trip wire or some sort of automatic sensing device.

"Colonel Cooper."

"Yes, General?"

"Got a moment?"

"Sure. What's on your mind?"

"Your report on the Pulverizer."

"What of it?"

"Were you trying to be funny?"

"No, sir.'

"As written, it's unacceptable."

"As written, it's also my resignation. Would that be acceptable?"

Two weeks later, CC Cooper, now a civilian, accepted a professorship at the US Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania: a position he'd locked on, as he later put it, before pulverizing his Army career.

The students, usually Army colonels but also a smattering from other services and nations, loved CC Cooper. CC Cooper loved to teach. His lectures on doctrine and technology were as popular as his lectures on Kentucky's bodacious bourbons and the counties of their emanation. A widower with no children, his social life consisted largely of his students and Major Grace, an off-track Thoroughbred mare whom he delighted in riding around the countryside.

After six years at Carlisle Barracks, CC Cooper had become something of a beloved old fixture. But he was also bored. He wanted to do a book, applying the concepts he'd discovered in his dissertation to the Army. Specifically: what happens when young officers as a generational group lose respect for their elders and a system that refuses to change. He'd seen it happen during Vietnam. He was starting to watch it happen again. He wanted, with this book, to give one final gift to his Army. But the Army wasn't having it; his requests for a writing sabbatical went endlessly unapproved. He was, in short, expected to keep on teaching, keep on being CC Cooper, and live out his final professional years in placid eccentricity.

And so it came to pass that, one morning in early August 1996, CC Cooper was in the faculty lounge, gorging on Krispy Kremes and mulling how to improve a couple courses he'd already taught too many times. A hand descended from above him to confiscate one of his donuts. The hand, he discovered upon looking up, belonged once again to the dean, a normally dyspeptic man who seemed, this morning, more than normally dyspeptic.

"Problem, Deano?"

"Problem, Coop."

"Nothing so bad that stealing my coconut Krispy Kreme can't help?"

"Wish it were that simple."

"You mean, my donut isn't helping?"

"'Fraid not."

"Then give it back."

The Dean bit into the donut, smacked the stomach where he carried the remains of several hundred prior stolen Krispy Kremes, then looked dour. "Fucking Pentagon," he muttered.

"No argument there. What is it this time?"

The Dean pulled a Department of the Army message out of one pocket and unfolded it. "Seems the Russkies want us to send over somebody to teach American military history and doctrine at the Voroshilov General Staff Academy. Senior colonels and fresh new generals for students, all fast-track. No Russian language skills required; they all have adequate English. Ph.D. in something is required. They can be snooty that way. Very modest salary but all accommodations and other stuff, including meals, provided. Problem is, the damn request is six months old and it's just getting to us. Where in hell am I going to find someone to go spend a year in Russia on two weeks' notice?"

"May I see the message, please?" CC Cooper asked.

The Dean complied. Cooper scanned it, then said brightly, "Hey. I got me one o' them Ph.D.'s. I'll go."

"Who'll teach your courses?"

"Go hire one o'them neocon defense intellectuals. They ain't doin' nothin' of value as they be."

"Do you know how long it will take to staff through your leave of absence?"

"About fifteen minutes if you put down that fuckin' donut and turn to. I gotta go make some phone calls."

CC Cooper returned to his office, put his feet up on the desk, then reached for the phone. His first call was to the young woman, a student at nearby Dickinson College, who tended to Major Grace in exchange for free riding privileges. He'd known her for several years and she'd become something of a daughter.

"Hey, Ellen, honey. Me. Coop. How'd you like to live in my condo for a year, rent-free...course I won't be livin' there, I ain't that kind of man...where am I goin'?...Russia. Offer just come up, couldn't say no. Great, just look after Major Grace for me and pay the utilities...bring a TV if you want, I ain't got one...lookee, doll, I gotta make a couple phone calls, then probably head to DC to do some fancy expeditin'. You kin start movin' in now if you wanna. I'll need ya to drive me to the airport in about a week...say, honey, you wanna use my BMW while I'm gone, too?"

Three calls later, CC Cooper was on his way to Washington, DC, to do some fancy expeditin'. Six days later, he landed in Moscow to begin his year as an American visiting professor. He carried one suitcase, four bottles of bourbon, and a Russian-English phrase book. He was looking for the particular word, the absolutely positively right word, to describe a mature woman, one close to his own age, whom he might squire for the duration. Sadly, the book seemed more concerned with ordering in restaurants than in romance and he was beginning to wonder if post-Soviet Russia was more into eating than fucking. He finished the chapter on "Restaurants and Hotels" and moved on to "Family Life," which appeared to have less to do with families than with that latest Russian invention, dating, and with kindred and allied activities. There, he found the word he was looking for. He repeated it a couple times, added it to his list of phrases useful in bedroom and kitchen, and hoped that he could remember which was which.

***

You couldn't call what they did fucking, or having sex, or making love, although what they did partook of all those activities. It was Suslov who found the words. "We pleasure each other," he'd told her on the night train from Petersburg down to Moscow, the last leg of their long wandering.

"Yes," Olivia had murmured, satiated and languid.

This night, he'd bent her over the bed to find an extraordinarily interesting cluster of nerves high in the front of her vagina, and taken a deliciously long time learning what touches she liked best, how much pressure for how long, at what angle. Quite some time, too, touching her cervix. Olivia was quite certain that people underestimated the role the cervix played in female orgasm. Suslov agreed.

She liked her orgasms first, to burn off tension, then to be able to float on the sensations of prolonged penetration and whatever else they could think up. It tended to be a great deal of physical work for him, but very satisfying, both to see her floating and to enjoy his own orgasms when she was satiated. They lasted a long time, and she knew enough to be still for him then.

Now they were home in her flat. After the confines of the train, the bedroom seemed luxurious, but had taken a bit of getting used to. The real bed, especially. This time, he'd managed to float her straight into calm sleep. He ran his hand down her back, relaxed, and let it rest on her muscular ass. Even in sleep, snoring gently, she pressed against him. He smiled and drifted off again until a noise startled him awake. He had his robe on and was out the door before he remembered that someone else lived here, except she was usually not up this late.

There was a light in the kitchen. Maria Fedorovna was brewing tea.

"Good morning, Aunt." She jumped. "Forgive me for startling you. But it is after midnight. Are you unwell?"

"Did I wake you, General?"

He shrugged. "I sleep very lightly. Please, let us use the informal address with each other, and call me Mitya, if you would."

"Even Doctor Tolchinskaya uses your patronymic with you."

"She likes the sound." Olivia made the formality an intimacy. "I admit, it is quite strange to be called by my patronymic...at certain times but I've come to like it. And I can't imagine calling her Olya."

She poured tea for them both, and set out slices of the cobbler she had made according to Olivia's half-remembered recipe, from the berries they had picked. "Thank you."

"I see the way you look at each other. Do you think you will marry her?"

He looked at her calmly, taking heed of but speaking beyond the FSB minder to the deep pain in her old brown eyes. "I have had several conversations about her. First, of course, with my sister, and also with my superior general. There are no strong feelings against it. If anything, the feeling is that I help bind her to this country. It is always possible that she will someday run afoul of something here and I would certainly be drawn into that, since she is a foreigner. But it is a chance we all take, one way or another. I have seen the way you two look at each other. There is friendship between you."

"Do they do such marriages in America without consequences?"

"In situations such as this, there are always consequences. I am not, after all, simply having relations with her. If she were an American general, yes the Americans do have women Generals in their Army, not many, but a few, and I were a Russian engineer and scientist? Their security services would be very interested. Ours, I fear, always will be."

"Knowing all this, why?" Maria Fedorovna nearly whispered.

"I've never known a woman remotely like her and I never will again." And would consider myself living an utterly wasted life if I did not offer all I have to give, and accept all she has to offer. He drank his tea. "Tell me, why do you care? My sister told me how you came to be here. But this is beyond that."

"You know," she said cautiously, "I was a zek. I was in the camps." He nodded. Of course, his sister would have told him, Maria Fedorovna thought. After all, it made sense: like so many released from the camps, she had little choice but to work in some capacity for those who had imprisoned her, because people didn't want to associate with zeks. "My sweetheart came home to me from the war. A neighbor...hers didn't. She wanted mine. She denounced me for telling jokes about Stalin. I got a child's sentence, ten years. When I had been in the camps for three, I'd lived that long thanks to older women helping me survive, I told a new girl not to work so hard or she'd die. Someone overheard me and I spent ten days in solitary, in an unheated cell in winter. I got three hundred grams of bread, that was all. I didn't want to die. I'd seen frost-bitten bodies, and I was still young enough and pretty enough that I didn't want to look like that. So I struggled to live. And I never did a kind thing for another human being again. After I'd watched Olivia...I wanted to do kind things again. For her."

Suslov embraced her. For a moment, she went rigid. Then, when his embrace did not change, but remained very strong and very gentle, Maria Fedorovna realized he was like his sister, Irina, in more than looks. She allowed herself to put her head down against his chest and then, at last, weep quietly for a long time. When she stopped, he wiped her face with a cold cloth and held her while he poured enough brandy into her to permit her to sleep.

Olivia woke, found herself alone, and made her silent way to the kitchen where her housekeeper was drowsing in her lover's arms, held carefully and tenderly. "Will you help me?"

"Of course, dear," she murmured. "Let us not wake her." They put Maria Fedorovna, half-drunk, half-asleep, and mercifully beyond pain, back in her bed. Olivia covered her with a light blanket against the morning chill before kissing her forehead.

"Should I ask?" she asked in her own bed.

"No. It was something between Russians." The camps, she knew from the sorrow she could see in his eyes even in the dark, could hear in the timbre of his voice even if she were deaf. "I didn't ask. Do you know what happened to her husband?"

"He slept with the woman who wanted him long enough to give her a child. And then he got very drunk one winter night and took a walk in the forest, in the snow. No remains were ever recovered. Perhaps the wolves took him after he froze. Perhaps before."

"You never speak of your mother," Suslov went on cautiously, "and yet you treat Maria Fedorovna as a mother. Why? Was your mother unkind to you?"

"No, dear. She died when I was thirteen. I have only good memories of her. My father has some of the mercurial Hungarian temperament. My mother was old Pennsylvania, hard and calm and strong as a stone wall. We were a happy family."

***

Suslov was to spend the weeks between his leave with Olivia and the beginning of the academic year at Voroshilov as deputy division commander of the 106th Guards Airborne Division at Tula. The assignment carried no real responsibilities; it was purely to familiarize him with the unit he would likely command after his studies at Voroshilov.

The next Monday, the day he left for Tula, he first went to Olivia's lab with her. Olivia kept early hours at the lab, arriving at about 0700 and working straight through until about 1300. After that, lunch. Then she was available to her staff, held meetings and took calls. Borodkin had once thought it was an easy schedule, until he watched what she accomplished in six hours of entirely focused work. Most people were simply incapable of such intense and sustained concentration.

As the administrator and expediter, Borodkin arrived later and left later, keeping more normal business hours. But this was Olivia's first day back. He had not seen her for nearly three months and he looked forward to an hour or so alone with her.

He did not appreciate finding a man's uniform cap in the coatroom. He looked at the trim. A general officer's cap. He appreciated even less seeing the man in Olivia's office, standing very close to her, closer even than was the Russian custom. He recognized the chestnut hair and the elegant Tartar features from his trip to Grozny. Borodkin had never seen her so calm and relaxed. Content to stand so close to the man, content that he should stand so close to her. And when she moved, it was shocking. She didn't move as if she was in pain, or even guarding herself against pain. There would always be a faint awkwardness to her movements, but she moved as if she had been put back together. She moved as if her body gave her pleasure, not pain, and he knew without doubt the officer with her was responsible for that pleasure.

He watched them speaking quietly, knowing from her gestures that she was talking about the lab and what they did there, from the man's keen expression that he was following her words with interest and understanding.

How _,_ Borodkin thought angrily but abstractly, can I compete with this man? Borodkin was taller than Suslov and he knew he made more money and was paid more regularly. Suslov was better looking than Borodkin. Then the assessment stopped. He would not say, not even to himself, that Suslov was braver, kinder, most likely a better lover...a man who was so many things that he, Borodkin, was not. To compete, even to consider competition, was, Borodkin consoled himself, unfair.

For the months of Olivia's absence, Borodkin had half-pondered what might pass between them upon her return. His thoughts alternated between something resembling courtship and...Kristinich

And then a thought erased from his consciousness the consequences of wanting. He did not want her, not really. Not after what he had seen of her in Chechnya. Not after what she had allowed herself to become there. Well, of course she prefers a vicious, uncultured killer. That's what she is herself, now. And I...I am free of her.

Olivia walked Suslov out of the lab. "And you remember Mister Borodkin, my administrator."

"I do. A pleasure to meet you again."

They shook hands, and Borodkin found himself looking away from Suslov for a few seconds, not bearing his gaze, thinking, This is my lab, not yours. I work with her all day. You don't. And you'll always wonder.... "How nice," he said, "for us that you were able to make the time to see us briefly."

Suslov swallowed his surprise. "I appreciate being given the opportunity to do so, and I hope to later be able to bring my classmates from Voroshilov here. I have a train to catch, so I hope you will both excuse me."

"Of course, General." He turned to Olivia. "Doctor Tolchinskaya, I will be available all day, should you need me." He then returned to his office, making a mental note to write himself a memorandum for the record. Just in case.

***

Suslov said nothing to Olivia about Borodkin until he came back up to Moscow that Friday from Tula, arriving at nearly 2200, or ten at night, the evening sky just barely dark. She met him at the station and they went to a small café nearby that served shashlik and lemonade scented with orange flower water, eating in a companionable silence. It was only back at her flat, after pleasure in a bedroom illuminated by the fading light of the long Northern summer day, that he raised the issue. "Your administrator, Borodkin..."

"Is a problem," she finished.

"You know this."

"You are not the first person to tell me."

"Who else?"

"Simonov, for one."

"He was a wise young man."

"I saw the way Borodkin looked at you," she said in tacit agreement.

"I saw the way he looked at you," Suslov said. "He is not now a danger to you. But he is becoming one."

"These are not Stalin's years. They're not even Brezhnev's."

"No, they're not. Of course, during Stalin's years, and even Lenin's, really, although it is still somewhat heretical to say that, there were no rules. After Stalin's death, there were rules. Now, we don't know what the rules are. Or will be. They can change. Baseless accusations, even from your minder, have no force for the moment. But..."

But... "Is there anything I should do?"

"Yes. Your work, which you do so well. Make whatever professional friends you can. Be discreet and modest. Be careful, if you can, not to awaken their insecurities and regrets. Say nothing about Borodkin to Maria Fedorovna; she will feel obliged to report. Don't pit her against another minder."

"Anything else?"

"I was going to say, keep my sister out of this, and that's a good principle. Ira can't know what she'll be getting involved in next, any more than I can. But Ira will be loyal to you. Loyalty obligates us. That obligation is not to be called upon lightly."

"I know."

He kissed her between her brows. "One final thing."

"Yes?" Her voice slightly suspicious.

"Don't be afraid."

"That's hard." Meditatively, she kissed his chest, laid her head down on the scarred flesh to hear his heart beating, almost in fact as quickly as hers.

"I know." He stroked her hair, growing out of its crew cut into something still short, but now beginning to be trimmed into sleek elegance.

***

During the start-up and the field testing, eighteen months of working six and sometimes seven days a week, Olivia had let Borodkin handle the details of hiring virtually unimpeded. They needed few staff, and the men he'd brought her proved more than adequate. But now that they were beginning a serious, planned expansion before developing their next generation of sensors, Olivia had some very distinct ideas about what she wanted in engineers.

She preferred younger because they tended to be in better shape than older, not having had so long to smoke or drink themselves to death. Also, they were not as likely to have the idea that if they pretended to work, she would pretend to pay them. Older, flexible, curious engineers and scientists in good shape were, as near as she could tell, not very numerous. She would take as many of those as she could find, which so far was none. She preferred female. She realized that Borodkin had neither hired nor mentioned any promising women. One evening she searched Borodkin's discard pile and found a number of extremely interesting resumes, about a third submitted by young women. She placed them on his desk with a simple note. "See me, please," and signed it in the Russian manner, with her first initial, O.

The note was the first thing he saw the next morning. Olivia was in her office. One of her latest experimental pets was "resting" in the corner, knee-high, something of a hybrid of a spider and an octopus, but with sixteen legs, built for going into places humans could not or should not go. Right now, it was programmed to follow the movements of anyone who carried a little emitter, at least within a few meters, and it had taken to following her around the lab, so light on its many legs that it appeared to be drifting.

"Would you like some tea, Leonid Pavlovich?"

"No thank you."

"Very well. Shut the door and sit down." He complied slowly. "What's going on with these résumés?"

"They weren't right for us."

"Explain."

He looked at the motionless pet in the corner, then back to her. "Most of them were young."

"There were some who weren't."

"Well, yes, but the men are too idiosyncratic for us."

Fuck, she thought. Idiosyncrasy is our middle name. "And the women?"

"Most of them are young. They'll get married and have babies, which means they get three years' maternity leave, and we have to give them their positions back at that time. The older ones need to be at home cooking dinner for their husbands."

"Starting now," she said tightly, "I see all résumés that are sent in and everyone we interview, Leonid Pavlovich. And we will interview most people who send in resumes, however...idiosyncratic."

These are my duties, Borodkin thought. She cannot take them away.

Olivia's thoughts were no less direct, and she found herself with the ugly sensation of seeing the man as he really was for the first time. What Borodkin didn't want, she realized were male engineers and scientists who would inevitably come to treat him as, at best, a useful appendage. He wanted no women there at all, except as menials. He wanted Olivia to himself, the lab to himself, on his own terms. Terms of domination and of cowardice.

"You're wasting your time," he said sullenly.

"That's OK. We have the time now. For me, it is not wasted. I am going to have to live with these people so it's important that they be the right people. And I'd like to meet as many good people as possible, even if we don't hire them immediately or at all. I am interested in people and their intellects. So unless someone's résumé is utterly, completely, and totally inappropriate for the positions we need to create and fill, we will be interviewing them and I will be meeting them. I am looking for the best people we can find. I intend to overpay them wildly in order to make them feel guilty, give them lots of computing power and paper and very large wastebaskets, then let them get to work."

"Yes, Doctor," Borodkin said very stiffly. "Will there be anything else, Doctor?"

"No," she said quietly.

"May I go?"

"Of course."

He arose, cast a nasty look at Olivia's pet, as though machines, too, were competition he did not care to encounter. He left.

***

On 6 August, Chechen and foreign fighters began fighting to retake Grozny, or what remained of it. They infiltrated easily, wearing stolen or purchased Russian uniforms and equipment. Some even had genuine documents sold by Russians. By 9 August, they controlled Grozny and the Russian Army was retreating from the city it had taken and held at such cost, while Russian generals threatened to bomb the rubble into dust.

Suslov was in the habit of taking the early train down to Tula on Monday mornings, and an early evening train back up to Moscow on Fridays. Weekends were for Olivia. During the week, he lived in a room in the division's officers' hostel. As the brigade commander, his quarters had been a two-room flat in Aksai. He neither needed nor wanted more. Major general or not, he was used to hardship, and he saw no point in occupying a flat for even a short time when there were husbands and fathers on the waiting list. He needed only a place to sleep and wash; he could eat in the mess. Should he require anything other, he and his sister co-owned a tiny, austere dacha about an hour north of Moscow. It had been given to their mother by the Soviet government after the Great Patriotic War. He and Ira had their reasons for avoiding the place; his sister-in-law, Valentina, went there when she was in need of solitude and maintained it.

As the division's first deputy for so brief a time, he had no real duties. Mornings, he signed whatever paperwork the divisional commander needed signed, while knowing little, if anything, about the matters involved. The dispersion of the division meant that administration was complicated; some of the regiments were hundreds of kilometers away. The rest of the day, he tended to spend with the troops themselves, including lunches and dinners with the enlisted, or board games with the warrant officers. Sometimes in Tula, other times in the Ryazan, Kostroma, or Efremovo regimental garrisons.

Tonight, the 51st, which was garrisoned in Tula, was in an uproar of officers and men, most of whom had served in Chechnya. Suslov spent the day spreading calm while controlling his inner rage and longing for Olivia. He contented himself with another thought, one that had first appeared in his mind like a cloud of dust. But like occasional clouds of dust in the universe, this one had begun to swirl and glow. It might remain forever dust. Or it might become a star.

Always, his ambition had been to become chief of Airborne. Never had he thought beyond that. But in ten years, Russia could be either a place of freedom and rebirth, or a place of oppression and squalor. Either way, perhaps he might have some part to play in that, beyond what an Airborne general might accomplish.

He and Olivia.

Perhaps.

For the moment, he had a more prosaic duty to discharge. The officers' hostel was bound to be in a vodka-fueled frenzy over events in Grozny. He would keep it peaceful.

He could hear the noise from the hostel before he reached it. So much for that plan. He started running and flung open the door to the lobby and found himself confronted by a brawl. Drunken men were doing their best to flatten other drunken men. With predictably ineffectual results. Also without regard to rank or dignity. Which boded well for the peace-making process he decided to initiate. He grabbed the nearest man at random, his face vaguely familiar. He easily slipped the drunken man's startled punch, jabbed him very stiffly in the solar plexus, then shoved him against the wall. "I'm talking to you because you look like you have more sense than the others."

"Yes, Comrade General," the man gasped, shocked, perhaps wondering what the consequences were for trying to hit a general officer.

"You're going to help me break this up."

"We need my cousin to help." They fished him out of the chaos of struggling men, another thickly-muscled, sandy-haired, brown-eyed Slav whose face also tugged at Suslov's memory. Then they were wholly occupied by peace-making, he and the two young officers pulling the combatants apart, throwing them against walls when they had to. It was as effective a cure for melancholy as Suslov could imagine. As it occurred to the officers that the deputy division commander himself was ending their fight, they gradually ceased brawling and calm returned to the lobby.

Suslov, breathing hard but undamaged, looked at his two bruised and battered deputies. Then he looked around at the abashed officers, who were likewise wondering about the consequences for starting a brawl a general had ended. "Brothers," he said quietly. "Whatever happens in Chechnya over the next few weeks, this is a long war. There will be plenty of opportunity for vengeance. We don't need to fight each other."

The officers dispersed to talk, to mourn, to rage, to drink, to sleep, to give oblivion its share or memory its due. Suslov turned to his deputies. "We shall drink to your family. I have never seen you before but your faces are familiar. Perhaps we shall find some connection."

In his room, he set out vodka and the last of the delicacies that Aunt Maria never sent him off without. Pickled asparagus and tomatoes, marinated mushrooms and onions, along with good brown bread and butter tangy from the milk she deliberately let sour. "Tell me your names, please."

"Lieutenant Mikhail Sergeievich Surko, comrade General. My cousin, Nikolai Vladimirovich Surko, just out of the Academy."

Surko. Yes. Afghanistan. The memory coalesced. A funny man, something like Simonov, always working to piss off the zampolit, the political officer, on the grounds of, he was in Afghanistan in an Airborne regiment, so what else could be done to him? Usually succeeding. "Whose father did I know in Afghanistan?"

"Actually, our uncle, both our fathers' younger brother."

"Does your uncle have children?"

"He does. A daughter, Elizabeta, and a son, Viktor."

"Then give him, and them, my greetings. Let us drink to your families."

"And yours, comrade General?" The elder, Mikhail Sergeievich, was well within bounds. Russians would ask perfect strangers what Americans considered intimate details of their family lives.

"Divorced and without children, sadly."

"But surely the general has a friend."

"I do, a wise and brave woman for whom I have very great hopes." Now that was something different. Russians expected women to be smart, not wise, and beautiful, not brave.

"Then we should drink to your friend as well as our families."

"Indeed. To their health."

When the alcohol had lubricated the Surkos a bit more, they began to open up. Mikhail Sergeievich had already been to Chechnya and expected to go back, while Nikolai Vladimirovich knew he was probably going, so what else could be done to them?

Mikhail Sergeievich spoke in a rush. "Comrade General Is this what this is all about? Is this what I lost men for, and killed people for? The MVD practically gives Grozny back to the Chechens, so we have to do it all over again?"

"Unfortunately, yes."

"You're telling us that we're going to have to do Grozny again."

"Yes, Mikhail Sergeievich."

"You don't think that that the generals will bomb Grozny to rubble." This would be Nikolai Vladimirovich.

Not that there was much left of Grozny that wasn't rubble, but there were people living in the ruins. "No."

"Do you think we should?" Both young men.

"Why don't you tell me your own thoughts on the matter?" They stared at him. "If we live and you stay in the Airborne, you may be my colonels."

"We argue about this a lot," Mikhail Sergeievich said. "I'm a Communist."

"And I'm a Democrat. And yourself, comrade General?"

Suslov shook his head, resolutely ignoring the small chill on his spine. "Irrelevant, Nikolai Vladimirovich. What do you think?"

"We should have worked with the Chechens to establish a relationship we could live with, as we have with Uzbekistan. But now, if we don't do Grozny again, we're going to have to watch the slow decay of Russia, and every nationality that feels like it's getting a raw deal or wants to enforce its own laws, no matter how barbaric, will do what it pleases. That's a recipe for another Time of Troubles."

"And if Gorbachev had been strong in the first place, we wouldn't now be dealing with such chaos. We're going to have to reassert order so there can be some kind of normal life for people," Mikhail Sergeievich said.

A bickering started. Suslov decided to end it before the two young officers said things he couldn't countenance, drunk or sober. "You know, you sound like American officers in about 1973."

"Sir?" They both stared at him. "How," Nikolai Vladimirovich asked plaintively, "do you know that?"

"I have American friends. We're all shaped by the wars of our youth. After Vietnam, American officers knew they were going to have to rebuild their Army, but they could pretend they were going to fight us on the German plain, and fighting regular troops is always easier than fighting insurgents or terrorists. We have no such illusions. You're going to have to decide if you want to make a career in an Army that is in very bad shape for many reasons. And there is a despair over killing our own, because we fear that killing our own will be our life. War is what we train for, and we want the chance to do it. But for a lifetime?"

"Did you know this when you chose this life, comrade General?"

"When I entered Ryazan back in 1973, the Army, especially the Airborne and Spetsnaz, offered a good profession. I was very idealistic and that was an outlet that didn't require me to parrot too many slogans. In Afghanistan, I came to understand the Islamist threat, although I did not think it would be combined with the destruction of the Union. But these are the wars we're given. I cannot foresee any other. Perhaps we dare hope that the next generation won't have to fight them. But that's only a hope."

"If you were our age, would you go into the Army?" Mikhail Sergeievich asked,

"Honestly, I don't know."

# CHAPTER EIGHTEEN, MOSCOW, FALL 1996: VOROSHILOV

Borodkin would have been happy to sulk passively for months except that he received a phone call. "Allo?"

"Major Kristinich here."

"Oh."

"Oh. indeed." The intelligent voice sardonic, almost mocking. "Tell me, are you engaged this evening?"

"No."

"Nor am I. Let us sample a bit of Moscow's more restrained night life. It will be my pleasure to entertain you."

Borodkin hung up the phone, thinking only, It begins. What was beginning, he did not care to consider too deeply. All that mattered was...he was.

Borodkin met Kristinich at one of the new restaurants springing up all over Moscow. Dinners at restaurants were still a big deal: many courses and plenty of alcohol, including vodka, champagne, and brandy. They honored the custom fully. To each other's families, to each other's health and prosperity—to those who had served and died in Chechnya.

"So tell me about work," the FSB officer finally asked. It was the question Borodkin had been awaiting.

"The bosses are very pleased. We're getting money, equipment, and people. Unfortunately, my boss prefers to hire women."

"Well, she will surely get some use out of them before they go off and marry and have babies, if they haven't already. Nevertheless, she does good work, although it is truly hard to believe we had to go all the way to America to find her."

"True. We have incredibly talented men."

"My point exactly," Kristinich said. "Tell me, I've never worked for a woman. What is it like?" A touch of sympathy, not overdone. Borodkin was a smart man who would not appreciate having the obvious brought to his attention too harshly.

"If something interests her, she chases it. Other than that, she's very level-headed..."

"For a woman," Kristinich murmured. "Excuse me, that was uncultured."

"No, she's not much of a woman. It's very strange that a general would be interested in her." Borodkin said, realizing that he was tired of serving a woman, tired of thinking about a woman in half-formed fantasies, tired of remembering that she was taken.

"The general's mother was a servicewoman."

"Ah, she joined the Army to find a husband."

"Well..." Kristinich answered, "the general's mother did spend four years at the front and that requires some respect." Borodkin took the rebuke calmly, then Kristinich went on. "His sister is an FSB officer."

"I didn't know."

"Now you do."

"Well then, I can imagine what she does."

Kristinich didn't care for that. "You may imagine anything you like regarding Major Suslova. You would not be imagining if you thought that Doctor Tolchinskaya is not universally liked. You're not the only one who dislikes Doctor Tolchinskaya." And for good reason _,_ Kristinich thought. She had showed up a lot of people without ever intending to, by simply doing her work very well. Woman or not, Zhid or not, American or not, he had to admire her for that much, an extorted admiration that simply increased his hate.

"I can imagine," Borodkin murmured.

"Let's drink to the girls of the Army and the Security Services." A pinprick on Kristinich's part.

Borodkin drank enthusiastically. "So, tell me what you do? With such women as you might professionally encounter."

Kristinich was used to having to keep a clear head while drinking. Bemused, he allowed himself to think about what Borodkin was really asking, about the question that underlay the question. He did not care for rape. He had tried it and found it not distant enough, far too personal and anyway, over with far too quickly, and he suspected Borodkin might be much the same way. "Do you really want to know?"

"Yes."

"Well, as you no doubt noticed during your stay with us in Chechnya, I hurt people. Amongst other things, of course. Amongst many other things. It is not my chief or even a main duty. Sometimes I tend to it personally, sometimes I have my assistants do it on my orders." He watched Borodkin's eyes and deliberately warned him of the type of seduction he was offering. "I prefer it if my assistants start out disliking my orders, and are honest about it. The results are better, later on."

"What's it like?"

"To hurt? It's honest. Pleasure can be faked. Indifference can be faked. That kind of pain can't be. I thought I'd like it, that it would be something marvelous to impose that level of feeling on another human being." Kristinich waited while the waiter brought them their cognac. "And to be sure, I do like it a great deal. It is occasionally marvelous. But it's also not enough for me, because I realized that I wasn't getting through in the manner required by my work, which is the work of the State. The work of the State requires that I take my subjects to the Window of Truth."

"Again, please?"

"There is a moment, a few minutes, perhaps, during torture when the subject is still conscious and coherent and willing to say or do anything to stop the pain. That is the moment they reveal the information the State requires. Go beyond this little window of opportunity and they become useless. For State purposes."

"But not for personal purposes?"

"Quite so. If I accidentally take them beyond the Window of Truth...it happens."

"And if you take them beyond on purpose?"

Kristinich smiled. "I find that, personally, I really get through to people only afterwards. Those who survive. That's when they begin to comprehend what has happened to them in all its nuances and complexities. Insofar as they still can. This combination of great pain and great mental damage..." he leaned a bit closer. "It twists them."

Borodkin understood. "I'll report to you on Doctor Tolchinskaya,"

And she won't know a thing until I walk into her cell.

"The State will be grateful to you."

***

"Something I want you to see," Irina Borisovna Suslova panted at Olivia on one of their runs, this time through the historic Zamoskvorechye district in the center of old Moscow, in sight of the Kremlin towers. It was a district of museums, the remains of old churches, and increasingly of restaurants and retail shops and upscale residential real estate.

"I'm game," she gasped back. Taylor hadn't made it that day and Olivia didn't know whether that was good or bad. Suslova was a hard partner. She knew to a hair's breadth what each woman was capable of, and she pushed them all up to that point, then well beyond it. Taylor's presence mercifully diluted the intensity Suslova was able to apply to Olivia. Still, the results of working out with her one-on-one were spectacular.

It had been a long run, leisurely but hard, on a Saturday morning and they were cooling now, jogging briskly along an ancient narrow lane, when Irina Borisovna stopped before an iron gate that reminded Olivia of an old portcullis set in a high brick wall. The front of the property was a neatly manicured and planted lawn. The tower house itself was white brick and ornate white stonework of Naryshkin Baroque architecture, the roof tiles of the dome surmounting the building a fine, dark, blue-green.

"God knows what this building has seen," Suslova said as she unlocked the front door. "Yakov Bukhvostov built it for a mistress of Peter Naryshkin long before he became Peter the Great. After the Revolution, it was turned into a multi-family residence."

Suslova unlocked the front door of reveal an entrance vestibule with a vaulted ceiling. Beyond it were the public reception rooms: a catering kitchen, a formal dining room and ballroom with manicured gardens behind, a formal parlor. The walls and windows were hung with a fortune in paper and silk. Another fortune of furniture occupied the rooms.

"When we showed you your apartment more than two years ago, we expected it to be an interim measure. We did not expect you to take the first apartment we showed you." Suslova had suggested it because it had been on the top floor, which Russians did not normally prefer because they never knew what condition the roof might be in. That roof had been very sound. "Nor for you to stay there for two years. Were it not for Maria Fedorovna, I think you would be living in a single room, eating..."

"Not so well as I do. And I admit, I now like coming home to her. You know she will always have a place with me."

"We take care of our own, but it's not the same as what you offer her. She has no living children, so you have become that to her."

Olivia heard something in her voice. "Does it make you uneasy?"

Suslova shook her head. "No, actually. The more you are bound to this land by love for its people, the less likely you are to betray the faith we place in you."

Olivia could not help growling, angry and frustrated—after all this time and everything else. But she growled only softly. They had become very close, closer in some ways, if also differently, as she and Malinovsky were, and Olivia did not believe it was a professional charade.

"Don't be angry," Suslova said gently.

"I apologize. I am being unfair."

"Only a little and I would bear it no better."

"It would be no different in America for someone in my position."

The first floor above them was much smaller: a living room and eating area with vaulted, ceilings floors of wide boards, polished like silk, anchored at each end by a massive hearth. The second floor was smaller still: two spacious offices and a library between them. The third floor was two bedrooms with a spacious bathroom between them.

"For Maria?" Olivia asked.

"No. She will have her own apartment above the garage—overlooking the gardens."

"You sound like an American realtor." They began to climb the last spiral of the stairs. "Anything else to recommend this wonderful house?"

"Yes. The wiring and plumbing have all been replaced by new. The roof is in good repair. We'll inspect the gardens in a while. For now..."

They entered the master bedroom, high in the octagonal tower that dominated the front facade. It was nearly filled by something large and very irregular, covered with a heavy tarp.

"What is this?" Olivia asked.

"Take a look."

Olivia threw back the canvas. All the possessions her father had sent, all the trunks and boxes and chests she'd left with him and a few extra, were there, neatly stacked and awaiting her. After some minutes, wondering how long she'd been crying in Suslova's steady embrace, Olivia gently extracted herself. "How long have these been here?"

Suslova smiled. "They came in one or two at a time. It was Madame Getmanova's idea not to tell you until the shipments were complete and in the house the State now wishes to give you as an expression of gratitude and in the hope that you will continue to be ours."

Olivia wiped her eyes and nose, then laughed, then asked, "To whom did this house belong before? I hope that the previous owner was fully compensated."

"The previous owner," Suslova said drily, "has received compensation befitting what he did to be able to afford this house. You are certainly a better...Russian...than he was."

Olivia understood.

"When I first saw this house, after I'd finished my task with the previous owner, I knew it ought to be yours. To avoid provoking jealousy of a foreign woman and a Jew, I doubt you will ever be adequately paid. But there are other ways the State expresses its gratitude. This is one: the formal rooms are regularly rented out for events and should you wisely continue to do so, they will provide you with an income more than adequate to maintain the property. Now, let's finish up here and inspect the gardens. Some of the vegetables need immediate harvest and preserving, so Maria is going to be busy. As for all this," she gestured to the trunks and boxes, "my brother can help you unpack."

***

The Voroshilov General Staff Academy was a passport to the highest positions in the armed forces. It was often a restful assignment for officers who'd completed arduous tours, especially in combat. But it was also a place to study war seriously and to make connections with other officers. And also with the faculty.

In late August, Suslov took the train from Tula to Moscow for the last time and checked into the officers' hostel at Voroshilov before registering and selecting his classes. One in particular caught his eye. The American Way of War, taught by a CC Cooper, which was definitely not a Russian name. Advanced written and spoken English required. He checked the professor's brief bio and found him to be a retired American Army colonel with a doctorate in sociology. Interesting combination. He paused a moment before writing it into his schedule. Then he shrugged. What's a third American when you're already in love with one and consider another, a reporter for the Washington Post, to be a good friend? Perhaps they could all get together sometime and he could listen to them speak to each other about things they might not tell him separately. That could be interesting.

He didn't know what he was expecting the first day of class, 1 September, the traditional beginning of the academic year, as he sat in the seminar room with a dozen other officers, awaiting the American. One colonel wondered, if this man was an exchange professor, what had Russia traded for him and how soon could they get it back? Another muttered that if this American gave them any of that How we won the Cold War nonsense, everyone should stand together and leave. Suslov said nothing.

CC Cooper made his entrance. And their world changed perceptibly.

Cooper was a small man, very wiry and fit, with snow white hair and blue eyes that were as piercingly intense as Olivia's, but with a nearly perpetual twinkle in them. He wore neatly pressed khakis, a blue blazer, white shirt, striped tie. He saw no reason to mention to the class that he'd acquired his taste in clothes on 17 April 1955, as a college student who needed to know what to wear and had, therefore, bought a book and two magazines on the latest prep school fashions. His tastes had not changed since and he was now on Blue Blazer #7, although he still had and could fit into Blue Blazers #1 through #6. It was enough that the class understood him to dress like the typical rich American of good breeding and conservative taste. The cowboy boots and hippie glasses could come later.

Cooper took his place at the head of the table, opened his briefcase, and began passing out the requisite forms and syllabi. He scanned the officers, some clearly Slavic, others Mongol, men in uniforms laden with medals or heavy with ribbons. Even two years ago, this would not have been possible. Now he was glad that it was.

His eyes went around the table, holding each man for a second or two. He did not smile. He had read on the plane that Russians looked you in the eye and rarely smiled at you or expected you to smile at them. Smiles were a sign of approval, and Russians thought Americans who went through Russia indiscriminately smiling at strangers were, to put it politely, mentally defective. Cooper couldn't really disagree with that evaluation. He'd also read that when Russians liked you, they liked you. Of course, if they didn't, they didn't.

"Good morning, gentlemen," he said after a moment.

The class nodded in silent greeting.

"My name is CC Cooper. Most people call me CC. Colonel is also acceptable. Please do not call me Doctor. I understand that the Russian doctorate is far more rigorous than the American and I do not believe in claiming honors I do not fully deserve." He spoke slowly and deliberately, keeping his language and grammar simple, then started to warm.

"This course is entitled, The American Way of War. It is so called because that is the course I have been asked to teach. The title derives from a well-read book by a good American military historian. I shall now teach you The American Way of War." He stared hard at his students. "It is stupid, unimaginative—the lazy way of a rich nation that substitutes things for men and things for intellect and things for strategy and requires us all to pretend that we have not killed and injured millions of civilians and other innocents as a result. There. I have just taught you The American Way of War."

The Russians looked at each other, amazed.

"Now," CC Cooper went on, ramping up a bit, "I shall teach you The Other American Way of War. This has nothing to do with the Pentagon, whose main business is getting and spending money, not war. It has nothing to do with the latest technologies or with much of technology at all. It has nothing to do with the 1991 Gulf War, fought at our leisure against one of the most incompetent, most obliging, most upgefuckt foes in history." For the first time, a student smiled. "It has nothing to do with..." he sent his eyes around the table again, "...with the preposterous notion that the United States somehow 'won' the Cold War, as though everything that happens in the world is either caused by us or doesn't matter unless and until we say it does. No, gentlemen. The Other American Way of War derives from four centuries of fighting our Native Americans across three thousand miles of forest, desert, plain and everything else, especially in my native state of Kentucky, where the ladies are fast, the horses are smooth, the livin' is slow, and the bourbon magnificent. It has to do with how we fought most of our American Revolution against the British. It has to do with certain activities before, during and after our Civil War that few Americans are prepared to acknowledge, let alone understand. It derives from our experiences in counter-insurgency, starting with our support for a bunch of Cuban terrorists in the 1890s, our struggles in the Philippines in the early 20th century, our endless involvements in Latin America, and our subsequent ventures during World War II and thereafter."

He paused. "And it has everything, I say again, everything to do with the wars you gentlemen have fought in Afghanistan and Chechnya, with the wars that lie before you...and with the wars that my country will, sooner or later, have to fight.

"May we all prevail. If at all possible, together."

Cooper paused and looked around. Every man looked straight back at him. Some seemed to be sitting at attention.

"I have never taught a course like this before. To a significant extent, I'm making this up as I go along. So I will not give grades unless I must. If so, you will all get A's, or whatever your mark is for 'excellent', so long as you participate fully. You will not be penalized for my shortcomings. I'm sure you've had that experience before and will again, but not in my classroom." A few mouths started twitching into hard smiles. Yes, they'd had that experience.

"I have not brought with me my full official biography. I gather, to judge by the notation on the course offering, that the Academy has not received a copy, either. However, it is important for you to know who this man in front of you is, who will be taking your time these next few months. I am a retired colonel of infantry in the US Army. I grew up on a hardscrabble farm in Kentucky. In 1949, I enlisted in the Army and for the first time in my life, had more than one pair of shoes and ate three meals a day. I spent two years in Korea as a rifleman, squad leader, and platoon sergeant. My decorations from that war include my first Distinguished Service Cross, my first Silver Star and my first of four Purple Hearts, which we give for wounds in battle. Our highest award for valor is the Medal of Honor, equivalent to the Hero of the Soviet Union. I see some of those here in this room, I think." Nods. "But the ribbon is now different, not the red of the former Union, but the white, red and blue of the Russian Federation, am I also correct?" More nods.

"After the Medal of Honor, in descending order, we have the Distinguished Service Cross, the Silver Star, and the Bronze Star with V device for valor. These are combat awards. This may give you a sense of your own equivalents. I am sorry that I do not understand your decorations yet. I'm sure you will teach me. I also hold several non-combat decorations, the kind given to majors and colonels who manage to stay out of trouble for six consecutive months.

"I served three tours in Vietnam, one as a battalion commander, one as a division operations officer and brigade commander, one—it grieves me to relate—as a Saigon staff officer, tasked with making sure that, in the event anything went right, the proper people were punished. I had additional duties with an intimate little outfit known as the Studies and Observations Group. We studied and observed. In Vietnam, I was awarded my second Distinguished Service Cross, two more Silver Stars, a Bronze Star, and acquired three more Purple Hearts. After Korea and Vietnam, I entered real combat, first as a professor of military science, commanding an Army reserve officer training program on a college campus filled with vicious, violent radicals who regularly plotted my death, and that was only the faculty. Fortunately, I wore them down."

A few more smiles, a little larger.

"My final experience in combat came at the Pentagon, when I refused to write any more glowing reports for useless, over-priced weapons, so that Congress would spend more money and the arms makers would be kept fat and happy. Having told it like it was once too often, I was given to understand that my services would not be missed, should I choose to retire. I did, and for the past six years have been a civilian on the faculty of the US Army War College at Carlisle Barracks in Pennsylvania, a place where future generals go to sleep, play golf, and learn the latest fashionable nonsense in preparation for their next assignments at the Pentagon.

"I'm a widower, sadly, no children, also sadly. I live in the hostel with many of you, in the visiting faculty flat. I understand that most of you drink vodka, which I do not, being of not so sturdy a constitution anymore. As I am from Kentucky, I prefer Kentucky bourbon whiskey, which comes in many flavors and brands, some better known than others. I have embassy commissary privileges, which means an endless supply that I'm happy to share. Please consider it part of your course work."

Some grins, full of metal teeth.

"My Russian is limited. In truth, I have none. I am sometimes able to pronounce a word when it is spelled out in English, but hope to move on to real Russian shortly. I have, however, mastered a few words from a phrase book that I studied on the flight over, to get me started on an important undertaking. As I am a widower, I have no problem stating that if any of you gentlemen know a nice zakuska my age, for me to practice my Russian with and perhaps share other activities, of course, I will be grateful."

Dead silence and a table of students looking at each other. CC Cooper hesitated. Then, after some seconds, one officer spoke up. "We will not procure for you. Meeting women is your task. I believe the word you seek is babushka, not zakuska. However, if you really want a sixty-five year old appetizer, we will help you find one."

Real smiles and laughter all around. CC Cooper felt himself blushing hard, then joined them in their laughter. They were his. And he was theirs.

***

It had been a difficult week at work. The staff had already gone. Olivia had remained behind, doing nothing of any importance. But Maria had made it clear that she would attend to organizing and decorating the new house, and Olivia had agreed to accept her judgment and her tastes once more. No matter, now that she had her things from home.

Home? This is home now.

"Doctor Tolchinskaya?" Just the faintest quiver in the voice.

Startled, she looked at the guard, whose real, legal name really was Ivan Ivanovich Ivanov. When introduced to him, she'd asked him to show her his propiska. She was used to armed security; she had been so back in America. Her .45, by now an extension of her body, was against her belly, beneath her cardigan, but she was glad to see another armed, living human being. "Yes?"

"Doctor."

She smiled. "I am keeping you from your own weekend, and you a family man."

"Yes, Doctor." Said with gratitude. "And you should go home to your own man."

"Let us put the lab to bed, then." When they were finished, she handed him some rubles. "Take your family to dinner, with my compliments to your wife and my apologies to her for delaying you."

Maria Fedorovna met her at the doorway to the first floor of the private rooms, the older woman now more slender and lively than she could ever remember being. Clearly, also, the weight loss had improved her decorating abilities, as had some time spent with Valentina, the widow of Ira's dead brother Alexander and for many years since then, her partner and lover. Walking into the kitchen was like walking into morning, waves of color shimmering up from the floor into walls of palest, clearest yellow, the ceiling a gentle, calm blue. In the living room, Olivia's Two Grey Hills rug took pride of place. The walls were painted a soft, mottled blue green of sea glass that echoed the stone terrace outside, and yet Olivia could see the most delicate tracery of greenery and flowers on the wall that would mirror whatever Maria Fedorovna intended to plant.

"Doctor, go up to your bedroom." Olivia looked at her. "Alone, Doctor."

Knowing whom she would meet, Olivia climbed the circular staircase of ironwork past the second floor with its studies and library, past the third floor with the spare rooms for guests or the children she wondered if she would ever have, to the octagonal master bedroom, high in a tower that had once dominated Moscow. Had Peter, not yet the Great, who had forced his wife into a convent, tortured their son to death and imprisoned his mistress, slept here? Very likely.

Olivia opened the door to the room, nodded to the woman sitting there, whom she knew to be Valentina, then stood lost in wonder. A chest of drawers, made by a furniture co-op in New Mexico, had taken up residence in the walk-in closet. The only furniture in the room was two nightstands, a long chest at the foot of the bed, and the bed itself. From the floor, the vivid oranges of a sunset shimmered into pink, then rose and violet, finally purple, then a blue that became darker and deeper, while still somehow retaining a translucent clarity, until it reached the vaulted ceiling, where the color was so dense it seemed velvet. Lacey molded fretwork in the Ottoman style extended up the corners of the walls to the high, arched ceiling where all the corners intersected; the fretwork had been left white, but the openings of it were painted in jewel tones. Then she looked at the bed. It was newly covered with Maria Fedorovna's weaving, long runs of deep, verdant greens and oranges, golds and browns that melted into each other. She had learned to spin and weave as a young girl and Olivia had given her the loom as a belated Christmas gift after her first winter in Chechnya. Finally, she looked down, out of the eight windows, their blinds raised, much of official Moscow at her feet.

Olivia turned to the massive woman sitting cross-legged on the blanket chest, a glass of wine in her hand, a second beside her. Valentina was a big woman, a former nationally ranked swimmer, when her hair had been all golden curls: every Russian girl's dream when she'd met Ira's brother Alexander at the swimming pool of the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul one summer day back in 1981. He'd been an Airborne officer, brave, beautiful, and useful; she'd been a combat correspondent and artist with her own good reputation. He had given her that name, now her artistic name, the one everyone knew her by. She still swam, had not gotten fat or even soft, and in her mind's eye, Olivia could easily see Valentina forcing herself onto that helicopter headed into Chernobyl. The photographs she had taken there had only cemented her reputation. The paintings she had done from them and her memory had created another. After the radiation sickness had passed, her hair had grown back in, in the brindled, marled colors of fossilized mammoth ivory that gave her a weird, rawboned beauty.

Valentina looked back at her out of clear eyes the color of burnt water—grey flecked with brown and gold—and handed her the second glass. They had met before, but barely spoken: taciturn herself, Olivia was shocked by how little need or desire Valentina had to speak. "Home is the sailor from the sea; And the hunter from the hill," she quoted Byron in a voice rusty with disuse.

"Thank you," Olivia answered.

"It's for my brother, too."

"Why?" Olivia heard herself ask stupidly.

"Because I remember him after his divorce, for three years staggering around like a slaughtered bull, trailing pain behind him like blood. Now you make him happy. Because you spared many, many Russian women my pain and my darling's pain, and that of both our parents, although few of those women will thank you. Because working for you, Maria Fedorovna has become whom she should have become long ago. Because I could see the colors you missed from the high desert so I found a way to give them to you that was suited to this northern light. In truth, Maria Fedorovna did a great deal of the painting herself. As you gave to people I love, so I give to you."

More than once, Olivia had been an unwontedly timid guest at the former printing plant that was part home to two women and their four sons, and part studio, part living quarters for Valentina's apprentices in an increasingly expensive city. "I was terribly afraid you would be jealous," she said quietly.

One word described Valentina. Varangian, descendant of the original Russian conquerors who may have been Vikings. But the smile she offered Olivia was bemused, not deadly. "You both need women friends; as an artist, it's somewhat easier for me. In any event, no one who is loved as much as I am has any need of jealousy—"

"But it's more than that."

"Of course. And it has nothing to do with the fact that you have no more of a wandering eye than do either my darling or the man who is in fact, if not blood, my brother."

"Honestly, I have no sexual interest in women."

"Although your life would have been easier if you were, in fact, like-minded." The polite Russian term for lesbian.

Startled, Olivia smiled in rueful acknowledgement of that particular fact.

Valentina smiled. "If you consent, I will tell you something about yourself that you may be afraid to hear."

"I consent." A little afraid of what she would hear. She'd seen this woman's work. She had first publicly displayed her paintings from what she had seen at Chernobyl in the spring of 1989, three years after the catastrophe. They had caused a scandal and a sensation and in the years since lost none of their power to hammer the viewer with their sheer power. People had gone into the exhibit with a great many noisy, foolish opinions—dissent, treason, she should be put against a wall and shot, she's a war widow, she should be ashamed of herself, she's crazy, the radiation has caused a brain tumor—all of which were silenced by the huge, starkly over-painted photo montages. The near-universal reaction to actually seeing the work was a stunned silence that dissolved into tears: love and grief and loss, shame and sorrow and yearning and a huge pride in the men who had prevented an even greater catastrophe, knowing the deaths they would have to endure. Her later portraits and landscapes showed a perception not only beyond politics—which was why you could not call her a dissident—but beyond most language; pictures that showed what was, without recourse to the categories that most people needed to make sense of life, and yet so hampered their understanding.

"What you do with my Ira, and with Volodya Malinovsky, is about pain. Your friendships with them are about far more than pain, but without that pain, you would not love them. You love them not because they inflict pain on you, but because they show you a way to use your pain. To bring sex into that would be evil and obscene. Which they know and want nothing of."

"This is why you love Ira. Like her brother, the only people she wants to hurt are Russia's real enemies."

Valentina offered her a dazzling smile and Olivia realized that the two women had reached an understanding very different from the old Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies ethos so common among people who lived in the classified world. Rather, at some point, they had reached a decision that Ira would answer any question Valentina asked. For her part, Valentina would ask only the questions she had to, and Ira would tell her—without being asked—all she could that Valentina needed to know.

"You, too, were an only child," Valentina went on.

"Yes."

"Our parents, yours and mine and Ira's, all had dreadful pasts. Love would have vanished from their lives totally, except that they refused to let that happen. It—made them different."

"How many of your clients are afraid to sit for you?"

"Many. Yet that is why they come. They know I can help them to see and to learn their hopes, their fears, their regrets, their yearning. Sometimes they curse me when I show them their portraits, but I have never yet had one refuse to pay. Often, those who curse me the most bitterly send me clients, or commission a second portrait. Incidentally, you will do well to continue renting out the public spaces of this house. If you allow Maria Fedorovna to handle the event planning and rentals, she will, as I think you have surmised, only blossom further."

Olivia stood there, drinking her wine, pondering Valentina's words, realizing that Valentina had not simply married into a typical military family. They had accepted her as daughter and sister and wife for her own obvious value. Olivia did not have to be interested in women to understand why Ira might find Valentina profoundly attractive. This had never been simply a relationship of comfort and convenience between two desperately hurt young women, as Olivia had half-allowed herself to think, while knowing better. "You helped her too," she said defensively, blushing hard, embarrassed by her idiocy.

"Only when it came to color," the big woman answered coolly, her eyes glinting with amusement, even high up in the Moscow night. "Shall we go down to your guests?"

"Guests? I'm not expecting anyone."

"But they're expecting you." Firmly, Valentina led her downstairs to her lover, his arms full of roses for her, and his sister. Rebecca Taylor, warned beforehand by Suslov that everything she heard and saw was utterly and completely off the record, smiled her most unjournalistic smile. Then she saw Colonel Marianenko, then her brother, Volodya Malinovsky, grinning impishly.

Maria vanished, then returned with a cart. Champagne and zakuski. Caviar. Blini.

"To our Olivia," they drank. Maria retreated to prepare to serve dinner.

"My family," Olivia murmured, her eyes wide with wonder.

"To that also," Suslov answered.

Olivia sent her guests home a bit before midnight with food and drink. When the last were gone, and Maria Fedorovna had gone off to bed, only Olivia and Suslov remained. And Colonel Marianenko, who shed his genially drunk persona like a snake shedding his skin, becoming, once again, the man Olivia had spent a week with, in a small room, taking her apart without ever laying a finger on her. "If I were a single, male engineer, I would enjoy working in your lab, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

"Why do you say that?"

"Word gets out. Your staff is now nearly half women."

"I've made it very clear that I won't tolerate a soap opera."

"Nor would I provide you with theatrics but I might very well become a happily married male engineer." He nodded to Suslov, who was sitting so close to Olivia that his shoulder touched hers, his arm very protectively around her waist. "Sadly, word also gets out about other things."

Olivia stiffened. "Such as?"

"Doctor Tolchinskaya," Marianenko chided her. "As a security service, the FSB is as compartmentalized as any other. You know what you need to know to do your job, and no more. Officially. Unofficially, there is professional chatter, gossip, even. So there are things I have heard and overheard that I believe you and the general need to know."

"Go on," said Olivia, her voice low.

"Your Mister Borodkin doesn't like the staff you've assembled. He doesn't like General Suslov. He does not like your sixteen-legged friends."

" _What?"_ Suslov exclaimed.

"An invention of mine that follows me around in the lab from time to time. She makes Borodkin nervous. Go on, Colonel."

"Mr. Borodkin does not like you."

"I've known that for quite some time."

"As a personal matter, his dislike is neither here nor there. As a professional matter, it is."

"What does he want?" Olivia asked.

"At a guess? You. In an interrogation room, with him. Or perhaps with his newly acquired friend, Major Kristinich."

Simonov...

"I have no authority over Borodkin," Marianenko went on. "He works for the Science and Engineering Service, as you know: the old Line X. I am in the Service for the Protection of the Constitutional System and the Fight Against Terrorism. A mouthful for which I am not responsible. Maj—as of next week, Lieutenant Colonel Suslova is in one of the directorates, for Terrorism and Political Extremism. So, different command lines. I can't reassign him, but there is no question that he should be."

"There's only one problem," Olivia answered tautly, "and it's serious. If I pull him out, I have a mess on my hands. He is an able administrator and expediter and has become a vital source of institutional memory. I have to have someone in place who has the technical knowledge and the clearances to run my lab, and the administrative ability to take over without any overlap. Such people are not common and finding the right one will take time. Transition will also be time-consuming and difficult."

"Can you bear with him for a while longer?"

"Yes. I have no choice."

"Your decision. I do not presume to second-guess you. But I will tell you this. Watch your back."

"Thank you, Colonel."

He smiled a little. "And enjoy this beautiful old home. You have earned it."

# CHAPTER NINETEEN, MOSCOW, CHRISTMAS 1996: AN AMERICAN GUEST

The problem with offering to spy for a foreign nation is that, once you start, it's very hard to stop. Short of death, there are only three real ways out. One is to get caught or let yourself get caught. Another is to go to your own government and confess. You risk prosecution and worse, but there's always a chance your government might find some use for you, at least temporarily. You might be doubled back, used to provide false information to your foreign masters. This carries obvious risks of its own, since foreign masters tend to expect such reversals. A final way is to vanish.

Richard Hahn, an eighteen-year counter-intelligence officer of the Central Intelligence Agency, was now considering option three. He'd begun working for the Russians just after Gorbachev withdrew Soviet troops from Afghanistan, to garner a little extra money to cover child support and a girlfriend's occasional extravagances. So far, he'd pocketed about $150,000, earned by providing the name of an occasional Russian working for the CIA, or in process of recruitment by same. Of late, however, Hahn hadn't been giving the Russians much of anything. Unfortunately, this meant that the Russians hadn't been paying him much, either.

He needed to start sending them more. During one of his computer-gleaning sessions, he came across a short memo written by an officer in Vienna. He skimmed it briefly. It concerned some hung-over, drug-addicted slut, former Los Alamos engineer, who claimed she was on her way to Russia to develop tactical ground sensors for their Army. She had pestered the embassy to set up a meeting so she could offer her services. She wanted to be some sort of "bridge" between Russia and the United States. Apparently, Lyons at first dismissed her out of hand. A few hours later, he'd changed his mind and had tried to locate and detain her, but she'd vanished, presumably to Russia.

Jay Lyons' recommendation: No further action required.

Richard Hahn smiled briefly. The world was certainly full of strange people. But Christmas was coming up. He needed cash. At least, it would be something to give the Russians.

***

The drapes of Olivia's bedroom were open so that the room was lit by the ambient light of Moscow at night reflected off the snow. She was lying face down in bed, languid after a very hot soak and a glass of wine, just resting, her legs spread so Suslov could kneel between them and stroke her back while she made soft sounds deep in her chest. "I would like to ask something of you," Suslov said quietly.

"Sexual favors?" she murmured, aroused.

He smiled. "In a while, yes, of course. My request is, I'd like you to meet one of my instructors."

"Why?"

"He's a retired US Army officer, an infantry colonel."

He felt her breath catch. There was real fear in her voice, and not unreasonably. "Why would you suggest I meet with an American officer?"

"I do not know if you will stay here in Russia forever. I think he might be useful to you someday. At the very least, he's a man I've come to respect for his intelligence and openness."

"Dmitri Borisovich, if I went home to America, it would be to arrest and probably many years in prison. What I've done would be taken very seriously."

"Even if that is true now, it may not always be."

"Are you trying to tell me something?"

"Only in the abstract. However, the abstract has a way of becoming suddenly real. Relations with the United States are in flux. They may settle into something very good for all, or something very bad. Russia may settle into something very good. Or very bad. We cannot yet know. We do know that there are people who want Russia to return to the former ways, with themselves as masters."

"Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven."

"A quote, obviously. From what?"

"A very bad poem everybody had to read in freshman English literature."

"Then why read it?"

"Because the central problem of Paradise Lost is that the most interesting character is Satan. God, the saints and the angels are all such bores."

"The poet never visited Russia. Here the evil are boring."

"And God?"

"Boring also. Also nonexistent. No matter. It may be that someday you have to leave, perhaps suddenly. It never hurts to know people who might have influence back in America."

Olivia sat up. "If I left...would you come with me?"

He paused. "No. But I will tell you this. If we are shot, much less imprisoned or tortured, just because you are an American, a Jewess, and my lover, and for no other reasons, I will have lived too long. I have come to believe that what happens to us, if anything, will be symbolic of where my country is going. I am not confident. But as long as you will have me, I am your man."

"As long as you will have me...I am your woman." They kissed briefly. "Now. Who is this American?"

"Colonel Cooper is a widower and childless, and he will be here over the holy days. He has heard of you from my classmates. In fact, he has been asked if he knows you. At this level, even large armies are very small. You're not a secret anymore and even if you were, if the CIA has any acuity whatsoever, they know about your work here. They don't need a visiting professor at the General Staff Academy to tell them about that."

And that was her fear, the worry always in the back of her mind. Not just that somebody would know. But that somebody would come across something that might damn her. And now, something that might also damn also her lover and everyone who'd known them.

"I know."

"I very much doubt he will be anything but kind to you, and he is another American in a strange land at his Christmas. If you do him the kindness, I believe you will enjoy his company."

"Then I will do so, my love."

"Thank you."

And because he is a fellow American, my love, perhaps he will be a lifeline for you, if we Russians collapse the roof in upon ourselves.

There were times when he liked to be aggressive with her, liked her to resist a little, just as there were times when he liked her to overpower him. But just as there were times when he liked to be decadent and perverse and utterly civilized with her, there were also times when he liked to be sweet and innocent and tender, a little forceful and very gentle, and this was one of those times. He entered her without preliminary, finding her barely moist, but very welcoming, her skin smooth and almost hot from the water as he covered her with his own warm weight, making her gasp. "I need this," she managed to say.

"Yes, you do. We both do. Take all you want, love. All you want, for as long as we have."

***

The first thing CC Cooper noticed about the woman who opened the door to him was the briefest flicker of genuine fear and pain in her eyes, instantly, almost brutally, suppressed. "Colonel Cooper?"

"Doctor Tolchinskaya, should I leave? I can plead sudden illness."

She smiled a bit. "No, don't be silly. It's OK. Come in, please."

He set his package down on the floor beside him so she could take his coat from him. "Thank you for having me."

"Truly, I'm glad you could come." Olivia evaluated him: a small man with an exceptionally good chest and shoulders and watchful, vivid blue eyes. "This is a beautiful sweater. Did you knit it?"

"No, but thank you for the compliment. My wife made this for me as she was dying. If a man is lucky enough to have a woman who makes him beautiful things, he'd better not complain that there are more colors than brown, grey, and black, with a little blue and green when we feel daring."

Olivia smiled. "I agree. Men should wear color more. How do you find Moscow in the winter?"

"Cold. Very, very cold, even by the standards of Pennsylvania."

She smiled wryly. "I grew up in Pennsylvania. It was never like this. I'm Olivia." Belatedly, she offered him her hand.

"I'm CC."

He followed her back to the kitchen, where Suslov and Maria Fedorovna were squabbling amiably. "I think," she murmured in English to CC as she withdrew cautiously, "that discretion is very much the better part of valor here."

"What do I smell?"

"Maria's interpretation of an American Christmas dinner. No turkey available, so roast geese with a stuffing of bread and dried fruit that the recipe promises will be more savory than sweet. Brussels sprouts with lemon and mustard seed, and pommes Anna made with the fat I cut out of the geese and chopped. Also chocolate mousse made with olive oil, a recipe she claims she found in a Sephardic cookbook. For me." He followed her into the dining room with its bar. "Maria Fedorovna is Russian Orthodox, so her holiday comes later. But she feels I need to get back in touch with my faith."

"Jewish?"

"By birth and minimal upbringing. But there's not much getting-in-touch to do in Moscow. I'm told that one of the meanings of the word 'Israel' is, 'Struggles with God.' I may do that someday. But struggle with some of the local rabbis? No, thank you. Old Yiddish proverb. 'More horse's asses in the world than horses.'"

"That's a Kentucky proverb, too. I've never wrestled much with God. I have had some run-ins with His staff."

"Who won?"

"Me, mostly, although God doesn't like me to advertise it."

"What are your beliefs?"

"I'm an eggplant."

"Again, please?"

"When it comes to religion, I take on the flavors of whatever I'm being cooked with. I'd rather be sautéed Protestant than flambéed Catholic, but that's a personal preference. My wife was overcooked Catholic."

"How long were you married?"

"Twenty-six good years. Done too soon. And our general? What does he believe?"

"Atheistic former Communist. Not even superstitious. Coldly rational, extremely cultured, very kind to women and children and animals and, almost always, men."

CC grinned. "Not exactly how we think of atheistic Communists. Or atheistic former Communists, which I much prefer. Of course, no atheist ever told me I was going to char broil in Hell unless I did things his way."

"True. My bro...my closest male friend here...is a Jewish mystic."

"Does the General know?"

"Yes. This Jew is also an Airborne colonel and was Dmitri Borisovich's chief of reconnaissance in Chechnya."

"A perfect billet for a mystic. They see things we don't. Also, a bit of mystical faith is required to jump out of airplanes."

"Or fly them at all, even when you know how and why they work. Volodya and Maria Fedorovna have some fascinating conversations when he's visiting, about how religions seem to usually be founded by saints and heretics whose understanding is deeper than the common run, but are quickly co-opted by the bureaucrats and thugs and brutes and bullies."

"Just like countries," CC agreed, handing her the bag he was carrying. She opened it. Two bottles of good champagne, which went into the small refrigerator under the bar, a bottle of Armagnac, and a bottle of Kentucky bourbon. "You are very generous."

"I have embassy commissary privileges. Also, I've been introducing my students to Elijah Craig and Evan Williams."

"Thank goodness it's not Wild Turkey."

"Of which you don't think much?"

"No." Olivia's voice was emphatic. "Certainly not the high-test."

"The Hundred and One Proof? Who could ask for anything more?"

"Humanity. But Tennessee whiskey is very good."

"Ain't nothin' good ever come outta Tennessee."

"I feel the same way about California. Armagnac is always beautiful, as are some of the Georgian and Armenian brandies."

"And vodka?"

She looked at him. "This is the Western Christmas, then there's New Year's, and finally the Orthodox Christmas on 7 January, for those who cling to the old ways. Very little work will be done in the country until after the 7th. Drinking here, if your students haven't already warned you, is all or nothing. Russians distrust moderation."

"What do you do?"

"Drink in moderation. I'm entitled to be a little eccentric but I don't abuse it."

"I'll remember that."

Suslov came out of the kitchen, looking bemused, wearing an intricately cabled sweater of deep purple wool, shaped to show off his chest and waist. You could always tell, CC realized, what women thought of their men by what they made for them.

"You put the geese and the potatoes in at the same time," he recounted. "Now should go in the stuffing and the vegetables and they should all be done in an hour, this is correct?" She nodded. "Maria Fedorovna says neither of us know anything about food in general or cooking in specific, much less about geese, potatoes or...dessert. But I told her, if she burns the stuffing, I'll say 'I told you so' for the rest of her life.' Then she chased me out of the kitchen."

"Maria Fedorovna is your mother?"

CC watched Olivia and Suslov exchange wry glances and quickly felt himself a fool.

"Maria Fedorovna is my housekeeper," Olivia said. CC looked a question at her and she nodded. "That, too, Colonel." Suslov watched them, two native English speakers giving him an insight into how the language kept its secrets. "But she is also family. She looks after me like I might be her daughter and as far as I am concerned, this is her home."

"And your family, sir?" Cooper asked.

"My parents both died some years ago. My sister is with the security services and at the moment she is not Moscow. My brother and brother-in-law were killed in Afghanistan."

"I'm sorry."

"I am told," Olivia interrupted, "that you were looking for a zakuska your own age."

CC found himself blushing. "I may never live that story down. Ah, well, you know the saying. Snow on the roof means fire in the chimney. But I'm too old to make a fool of myself or be anything but the perfect gentleman my wife never quite made me into."

Maria Fedorovna came in, nodded toward Cooper when introduced, then engaged Olivia in Russian squabble. But her brown eyes remained fixed on CC's. If you hurt her... When Maria Fedorovna had gone, Olivia had poured the men two stiff bourbons and herself a brandy. They went to the table. CC Cooper made up his mind.

"Merry Christmas, Colonel," Olivia toasted.

"Merry Christmas, Doctor. Merry Christmas, General." He touched his glass to that of his hostess and her lover, his student. He could smell her perfume, a vision of roses and irises blossoming in the stone ruins of some ancient fortress. "Listen," he said suddenly. "This is not fair to you."

She went absolutely rigid, her blue eyes huge.

Suslov, who had never seen Olivia like this, sat back.

"I repeat my offer, Doctor. If I'm making you uncomfortable, I will understand and leave."

"And I will repeat, you are our welcome guest."

"Very well," Cooper replied. "However, we might be more comfortable if we were a bit more forthcoming. We are both Americans, very far from home in a foreign land. It is Christmas. I am your guest. I want to understand you. There is a question I would ask you. American to American. You know that I want to ask it. I know that you know I want to. And you know that I know that you know I want to. And the general knows it, too, or he would not have invited me."

Drinking a little of her brandy, her eyes never left his face. "You recited that well. Just like an old comedy routine. You know and I know and I know and you know."

"I said it that way to take a bit of the edge off. But it remains a serious matter."

"Very well. Before you eat my bread and salt, American to American, ask."

"OK. American to American. What the fuck are y'all doing here?"

"Y'all?" Suslov asked, quietly asserting himself, making his presence known and his loyalties very clear. "You mean there is more than one of you?"

"Sometimes we Southerners say it when we want it to seem like there are more of us than there really are. Other times, we say it affectionately, as if to another Southerner, even when they're not."

"I do not understand you, and yet I think I do," Suslov said, allowing himself to recede.

"What am I doing here?" Olivia answered carefully. "Feeding you."

"I think I deserve a more serious explanation."

"As you wish. Our general here tells me that your final posting as an officer was at the Pentagon, where you were required to write preposterous reports praising useless weapons so that the country could waste billions on them."

"Correct."

"Then you will know what is a strap-down chicken test."

CC Cooper smiled. "Deedy do."

"A what?" Suslov asked.

"Your lady will explain."

Olivia took another sip of her brandy. "In American weapons development, every so often, you want to show you're making progress, even when you've made none and aren't expected to. So you strap down a chicken, blow it away with your weapon, and declare the test a success. A strap-down chicken test, then, is one that is simple, rigged, blatantly dishonest, and meaningless. I worked for the Defense Department for eleven years and all I ever did was strap-down chicken tests. When they'd let me get that far. I had no desire to spend my life pulverizing innocent chickens."

CC Cooper laughed softly. "Remind me someday to tell you about an anti-armor missile that would've considered a chicken a real challenge. But do go on."

"To make a long story short, in December of 1993, I was made an offer by the GRU to help provide sensor technology for urban combat, particularly in Chechnya. This was something I'd been advocating to the Defense Department for years and they were having none of it. I wanted to build simple, cheap, plentiful, reasonably reliable. They wanted complicated, expensive, scarce, and useless. So here we are."

"But I can go home."

"You can. I can't. That was the price I chose to pay for doing important work honorably, against enemies of both our countries, even if the battlefield is confined to Russia for now. There was no way I would do this work in America. Even if I'd been able to have my project at Los Alamos or Belvoir or anywhere else, giving the information to the Russians would have been criminal. Selling it would have been far worse. So when this possibility opened up to me, I took it. And I tell you in all honesty, Colonel, I would rather be here than whoring for the Pentagon."

"At what point did your ambition override and overwhelm your duties as a citizen?"

Olivia's eyes and voice, her entire bearing, became glacial. "Thank you for not inflicting upon me the standard verbiage about 'traitor' and 'defector.' I've been there before. I will tell you this. It is not a citizen's responsibility to allow her intellect to be strangled by her government or her society. It is not a citizen's responsibility to squander her nation's limited resources. As a citizen, it is my responsibility to help safeguard civilization itself. We all have our talents. Creating tactical ground sensors is mine. My government chose to prohibit me from doing so, even though they knew that such items will be vital in future wars and will save thousands of lives. They already have. They forbade me to make my contribution, in order to continue to waste American wealth and lives. I chose neither to be complicit in that squandering nor abandon what I knew I could create. I found a country that gave me a chance. I have proven I was right."

"And you took it upon yourself to make those decisions?"

"Yes."

"And who are you to do so?"

"Who do I have to be? Who is anyone to make any choices at all when somebody else says no? Whose permission do I need to be a citizen and a human being who has assumed responsibility for my country and our world? A great poet once stood in front of a Soviet judge, who asked him who'd given him permission to be a poet. He answered much the same as I am answering."

"Josef Brodsky," Suslov added. "He's an American now."

Cooper nodded, then turned back to Olivia. "We could have had this conversation in America."

"We could have, had we known each other. But we are nonetheless situated differently. When you refused to be complicit in the fraud that American military research and development has become, you retired with a comfortable pension and moved on to a comfortable second career as a professor. I had no such options. My country denied them. Was I to waste the rest of my life because I wanted to do something of value that others found threatening?"

"A woman of your talents could have gone into many fields besides this one."

"There's an old Yiddish proverb, Colonel. 'Play it as it lays.'"

Cooper nodded. "It's a Kentucky proverb, too. Do you conceive of yourself as a citizen of the world?"

Her disdain showed in her eyes. "No, I am an American citizen who knows her nation has enemies in common with Russia and that there are things our two nations should do in the world together."

"Agreed."

Then Olivia's eyes revealed something else: once again the unmistakable flicker of real fear. Cooper knew she was not so much afraid for herself. It was fear for the man beside her, fear for her housekeeper whom she loved, fear for her mystic paratrooper brother, fear for others he knew not of. He wondered what that must be like for an American, so unused to that kind of fear, a fear that billions accepted as normal. And he understood that, if her fears ever turned to reality, neither her reasons for coming nor her accomplishments would matter to two governments.

He watched her shut away her fear. "I never wanted to be a soldier," Olivia went on. "But when I was eight, I watched the Marines fighting for Hue City. Were you in Vietnam in 1968, Colonel?"

"No. I was between tours. I was," he looked down at his bourbon, "a student at Carlisle."

"If you were in America during Tet and the rest of that awful year, you experienced what your fellow citizens were thinking and doing. I had no real understanding of the war. But I do remember feeling as I watched the television, Those are my people, I should be there. It never occurred to me that being female made that any less imperative. I also thought, there has to be a better way to do this than just blindly throwing grenades around walls and shooting through ceilings and sending human beings into fire and leveling whole cities. After that, everything I learned about city fighting as it was practiced nauseated me. Everyone accepting that this was how it had to be. When I realized that cities were going to be the primary battlefields of the future, I chose the contribution I wanted to make. When the Russian offer came, and I realized that all my life I'd been right about these things and I was being throttled and ignored in America because I was right, not because I was wrong... Colonel, I hope that someday the United States and Russia start talking to each other. And I pray to God and His staff that when that day comes, I can provide some kind of bridge, some kind of link, between us. We're going to need it."

CC Cooper drained his bourbon, then silently held out his glass. Olivia, silent, refilled it, then added to Suslov's.

"Olivia," he said, swirling the liquid a bit, "you have told me what I wanted to know. When I first heard of you, there were words in my mind. Everything from traitor and defector to CIA spy. I do not believe you're any of these. I do believe you're more right than wrong. 'Tis a pity we didn't meet back in the States. I would have been more than sympathetic. I might have been able to help you."

"Understood. But it's too late for that."

"One never knows what help any of us may someday require."

"True. Now, Colonel..."

"CC, please."

"No doubt, General Suslov has told you that I am somewhat given to formality."

"I sense that much. Dignity matters. Just don't let it get in your way."

"It doesn't. But I would like to ask you a question in a dignified way."

"Proceed."

"So far as I know, only two Americans actually know who I am and why I'm here. One is my father back in America, who has promised to say nothing to anyone about it. The other is a reporter for the Washington Post, currently here in Moscow."

"His name?"

"Hers."

"Her name?"

"Does it matter?"

"I could find out very easily. Please spare me the aggravation of contending with the Moscow telephone system."

"Rebecca Taylor. Have you read her articles?"

"Yes, back in the States. I was impressed. Why did you tell a reporter?"

"Because she is a friend who understands. I also told her what I've told you, what I've told so many Russians, what I say every chance I get. Where I hope this all may lead us."

"And she no doubt told you how unlikely it was?"

"In some ways. After she understood that I was neither a traitor nor a defector. But that's neither here nor there right now. There is a question I have to ask."

"Shoot."

"Are you going to report me to our government?"

CC Cooper looked her steadily in the eyes for a moment, then looked down.

"Bourbon," he said softly. "One kind of American whiskey. There are many. None as good, but at least American. Doctor Olivia...right now there are tens of thousands of Americans selling our country down the river economically. They're selling us out to every country on earth that'll provide us with cheap labor and cheap junk. They're wrecking our industries, our farming, and our people. There are tens of thousands of others who are wrecking our future by manufacturing all kinds of lies. Like we're going to run the world forever while going into debt to everybody, or there ain't gonna be any more wars, or we can keep on trashing the planet. I grew up on a farm that didn't grow nothin' because we'd ruined the land and everybody around us was also ruining the land and erosion don't stop at the neighbor's fence or the county line. I know. Most of all, we're being sold down the river by our own government, don't matter who's in or who's out. You, Doctor Olivia, have done none of that. They're not getting us ready for what's gonna happen sooner or later. You are trying to. Does that answer your question? One American to another."

"It does. One American to another. Thank you. Now, if I may ask another dignified question."

"Reload and fire."

"What the fuck are y'all doin' here?"

Cooper laughed. "Y'know, that's the first time anybody has asked me that question. Haven't ginned up an answer yet."

"Please do so. Will more bourbon be required to assist?"

"Not at the moment. This is what I'll tell ya. I was bored with what I was doing. I'd wanted to teach counter-insurgency but they wouldn't let me. Nam-era stuff, they said. Best forgotten, not where the money is, and what with the Cold War over, it was getting harder to justify those big budgets, so no competition wanted from a specialty that doesn't take a lot of money if you do it right. Here the Russians let me do what I want." His eyes twinkled into Olivia's. "Sound familiar?"

"Deedy do," she answered. "Anything else?"

"Lotsa stuff. My life was boring. No family, not even a part-time zakuska. Jes' me and my horse and my students. Thought about retiring but, hell, I'm too young to wear my trousers hitched up under my armpits and play golf all day. This offered a change of pace. It were a chance to spend time with some real soldiers fightin' some real wars, not a bunch of pogues who get along by goin' along and couldn't hold a firm opinion on whether the sun's gonna come up tomorrow. I like to see things for myself. I like to meet new people, stay busy, maybe even..."

"Maybe even what?"

"Maybe even be some kinda bridge someday. We're gonna need 'em, sure as God made Wild Turkey 101. Now it's time to change the subject. There are things I want to know that I can't ask in a classroom provided by my hosts. So let me ask the Gin'rel here."

Suslov nodded in acceptance. Cooper spoke slowly. "General, what do you think of what your country is doing with its freedom?"

They were all silent for a long time. Then Suslov spoke. "My sister is an FSB officer. She will tell you there was no honor or even pride, in what we did to dissidents. But at least we had something worth repressing, Akhmatova and Grossman or Solzhenitsyn or Brodsky, who became your poet laureate, although I doubt one American in five hundred has heard of him. Now we have the 'Naked News' on television. Women strip while reading newscasts. Some of us remain Communists, but now are bitter and contemptuous and want the former ways back. Others of us who are not quite so rigid, we ask ourselves the question you have asked. Is this what we do with our freedom? Do we waste it on cheap things and cheap ideas and cheap people? Do we sacrifice ourselves on the altar of garbage? Have we come this far, have we endured so much, just so our ambition must be to become just like..." he stopped.

"Just like America," Cooper finished for him.

"I have learned," Suslov went on, "that many Americans also despise what their country is letting itself become. Olivia is one of them. So, I think, are you."

"I am an old soldier who now teaches at a foreign war college. That limits my opinions."

"In the political realm, certainly. But you may think as you wish about your culture. Stupid is stupid, vulgar is vulgar. I learned English to read your military literature but I was required to learn more when I was training in Spetsnaz for the invasion of NATO Europe. The invasion everyone knew would never happen. I still read your popular magazines occasionally, when available. At our hostel, as you may know, some of the officers indulge a taste for American videos and other forms of your popular culture. We have access to much. I must confess that I share what must be your opinion of so much of it."

There was not much to be said to that. Olivia was grateful to smell the roasting geese and be able to excuse herself.

"Well," CC said after a while. "I suppose I should leave."

"No. For the third time, no. We have had a revealing conversation that offended no one too severely. Had Olivia wished to throw you out, she would have."

"Yes, I can see that."

"That being so, since she has not and you are her countryman..."

CC Cooper looked Suslov straight in the eyes, just as he had Olivia. "I am glad for that. As a soldier who understands where things are going, she has taken a tremendous step towards taking the sheer slaughter out of city fighting and she is right to have done so. But it is hard to acknowledge as an American she is right to be here, even if our own country refused her offer."

"I understand."

Olivia came in, carrying a tray laden with plates and glasses, knowing without having to overhear that they had made a truce. "Gentlemen, if you will serve yourselves, I will bring Maria Fedorovna her dinner."

When she returned, she found they had served her as well.

It was later in the evening, after red wine and champagne, and a great deal of food, very boozy, never quite drunk, now slowly sobering up with tea, that they had dessert—chocolate mousse, made with olive oil, scented with curry, heated with chili, strange and utterly wonderful. "So, you are here for another semester," Suslov said.

"Possibly, until the end of the summer. My thought is to do some travelling before I go back to America."

"What would you like to see of my country?"

"The people, General. The people."

***

For CC Cooper, the most interesting part of any seminar began after the class ended. Talking with the students who stayed behind to question and to argue and to probe. Suggesting that they continue the discussion over coffee or tea or vodka or bourbon or whatever. Then listening, just listening, as his students—men in the prime of their lives and the ascending trajectory of their careers—grew sometimes honest. Even better was between the fall and spring semesters, when everyone had time. So now he sat, silently drinking his tea in the students' canteen, while they verbally buffeted each other. From time to time, he heard a trace of the kind of English he'd taught them. Odd to hear a Russian-accented Kentucky drawl, but the inflections of Old Dixie were contagious. After all, the unofficial language of the United States Army was a combination of jargon and profanity, expressed in a mild Southern accent, natural or acquired. His mind drifted off as the men slipped into Russian. After a few minutes, one of his students turned to him.

"Colonel Cooper, we in your fall seminar would like to enroll as a group in your spring course. Is that possible?"

"Deedy do, it is."

"The course is not yet listed."

"I know. I'm still working on the title."

"What are you thinking of?"

"American Power in the 21st Century: Dominant, Exorbitant, Irrelevant."

Another student squirmed uncomfortably. "How can you, an American officer, teach such a course here?"

"Perhaps, sir, the important question is not, how can I teach it here? The important question is, will it be true?"

"Perhaps. But still..."

"But still, nothing, sir. Maybe if I teach it here, word will get back and they'll let me do something like it at home. Even if not, this is material that you and your comrades will have to address as history takes its course. Anyway, we have a saying back in Kentucky. 'You pays your money and you takes your choice.' Maybe someday my country will understand that it's paying for some very wrong choices, and will be for a long time to come. Maybe this will someday help us all to make some right ones. In any case, remember. You heard it here first."

"Another Kentuckyism, Colonel?"

"Absolutely. And by the way, have I ever explained to you what a 'Kentucky Colonel' really is?"

"A retired officer who sells vast quantities of chicken?"

"Not exactly."

***

The holidays were over. Russia was recovering. Borodkin was writing a memo on poor morale at the lab and possible future adverse effects on productivity. Too early to tell, he concluded, and possibly nothing. But still...

And an FSB analyst, beginning his assessment of Richard Hahn's latest, was reviewing the Lyons memo. Sounds like he wanted to fuck her and she said No, he concluded. Then he wondered, Did she ever make it to Russia? He did not know. But the general for whom he was sorting the papers, he might. In any case, he might wish to find out. For the record, if nothing else. In matters such as this, the record should always be clear.

# CHAPTER TWENTY, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: SMART COUNTRIES, FOOLISH CHOICES

Lieutenant General Georgii Genrikovich Schwartz, head of the FSB's counter-intelligence directorate, was a man of firm habits. He loved the gigantic fruit-filled muffins that American corporations were now peddling in Moscow. He started each workday promptly at 0700 with one such muffin, purchased fresh by an aide and emplaced on his desk atop the morning's correspondence and other priority items. General Schwartz insisted that each workday muffin be cut into eight pieces exactly. The reason why was simple. No one who did not outrank him, and there were few in the FSB who did, could disturb him until he had consumed all eight pieces. This meant that he controlled his morning's vital first thirty to sixty minutes, giving him time to awaken fully, to think things out, and to plan. Many were his subordinates who'd anxiously paced his office waiting room or called repeatedly, only to be told by his secretary, "I'm sorry, comrade, but the General hasn't finished his muffin yet."

By controlling his American muffins, General Schwartz also controlled the entire counter-intelligence directorate of the FSB. And though many were annoyed, most, including his aides, staff, and secretaries, preferred his methods to those of his predecessors.

He also had a very large nose, which he was in the habit of trusting. Whenever he said, "My nose tells me..." he was indicating that he had some sort of intuition about something. And although he was capable of rigorous analysis and astute rational insight, his nose was damn near telepathic. Or perhaps it was because he was capable of such mental self-discipline that his intuitions were so often right. In any event, he never let his nose tell him anything unless his nose had already cleared it with his brain.

This Monday morning, now three pieces into his muffin, Schwartz was sitting at his desk, pondering the latest packet from Richard Hahn, the documents carefully arranged, it had been noted, in order of importance. None so far were important. Most intelligence work, he took care to remind himself, was boring, and Richard Hahn's latest submission proved the adage anew. Or perhaps, now that the Cold War was over and the Americans glorying that history had finally ended in their favor, the CIA was such a boring, inept, bureaucracy-ridden place that this was genuinely the best Hahn could come up with.

At 0743, midway through muffin section five, General Schwartz' day became untedious.

He stared down at the memo before him. His nose told him immediately that it was trouble and ought to be ignored or, better yet, destroyed. But the memo had already been reviewed and recorded, and never would he discard information because it was inconvenient. He read the memo again. It was short, but he realized that he would need the rest of his muffin, and more, to decide what to do about it.

Many more people were aware of Olivia Lathrop Tolchinskaya than she was aware of them. This was especially true in Moscow, where some regarded her as an affront, others as a curiosity, and a very few, usually military, as a trusted asset. Schwartz shared all three beliefs, if only because he lacked sufficient evidence on which to base a final conclusion. His nose told him that she was genuine. But his nose had never seen her.

Schwartz took up his next piece of American muffin, number six, and turned to what he knew of Tolchinskaya's professional reputation. He had heard about her good work and the growing realization amongst the security and intelligence services that what she had done in Chechnya was just the beginning of what her accomplishments were likely to be. Now her lab was in a sustained push to develop miniature unmanned aerial vehicles and remotely operated vehicles of several sorts, including robotics. She still kept her habit of rushing off madly in all directions to investigate whatever caught her eye. But the lab's work was focused now. It no longer depended on the fanciful. It worked with the proven, or the about to be.

Then Schwartz shuddered. If he knew about Doctor Tolchinskaya's work, if much of official Moscow did, then the CIA did too, almost certainly. And you always feared your moles had been discovered and compromised. The CIA might suspect Hahn and decide to solve two problems at once, by creating a memo to discredit her, then arranging for Hahn to find it. If the Russians acted on it and dealt with Olivia, they could both lose her services and give the CIA proof that Hahn was a mole.

Schwartz moved on to his penultimate piece of muffin. If so, if this was what the Americans were up to, then why not just say she was a CIA operative, perhaps even an officer, rather than casting snippy, petulant aspersions on her character and intellect? You could compare the living woman to the aspersion. It didn't wash. Schwartz concluded that the memo was genuine precisely because it was so inept. But that raised another problem. Were Tolchinskaya some sort of active spy or even a sleeper, he would have known what to do with her. Shoot her, imprison her, turn her around, throw her back—the standard responses. But what did you do with a brilliant woman whom the Americans had rejected, and who had given Russia so much?

Quickly, he moved on to the next question. To what might she have access? What could she have learned that the Americans might want to know? How badly the Russian Army had performed in Chechnya? He doubted very much that the Americans needed spies to tell them that when they had the BBC and the Russian press to tell them the same thing. Not to mention the Washington Post and that woman reporter who did such fine...Holy Mother of God, are we being invaded by American superwomen to complete the devastation? An interesting possibility.

Very well, then. What might she send back to the Americans? Practically her entire brain was filled with classified material. She could perhaps be transmitting information on her work back to the Americans, but why would they send her here to do work she could have done far more easily at home? Perhaps she was recruiting future generations of Russian traitors. Schwartz rejected the possibility. As an American, she would have to approach too many people to gain even one, and someone no doubt would have informed. On the other hand, assuming the memo was a genuine report of what happened, she might in fact have made a final honest offer to her nation to help do...what? In any event, that had apparently been spurned. The memo gave no indication that she had remained in contact. But the memo was a one-time affair. Much could have happened in two and a half years.

Doctor Tolchinskaya, he knew, had served Russia well. In his field, emotions such as gratitude were not operative. But she would surely be needed down the road for the second show in Chechnya, and beyond, and he wanted her to be available if possible.

If possible.

And there was his decision. This needed to be dealt with, but there was no reason for it to take on a life of its own. This could be handled quietly, decently. More importantly, he didn't want this going public or getting out of hand. From hard experience, Schwartz was very well aware of how real and imagined spies had been used to terrorize and oppress innocent Russians. He also knew what happens to a security service when the inquisitors take over and turn on each other. Far too often, the most evil and most worthless prevail.

He rang his secretary. "Tea, please, and the complete dossier on an American national, Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchin, Russianized as Tolchinskaya."

"Yes, comrade General. May I ask how this morning's American muffin is proceeding?"

"I have one more piece to finish. It won't be consumed until after I've reviewed the dossier."

An hour later, he sat back. He now knew Olivia Lathrop Tolchinskaya. He also knew her recruiter, Major General Getmanov. One of the world's honest men and an extremely good intelligence officer. He knew the officers who had verified her, Colonel Marianenko and Lieutenant Colonel Suslova. Two able and respected officers. If she were in fact an agent of some sort for her government, Doctor Tolchinskaya would have had to be very good indeed for all three of them to have missed it. And he knew Colonel General Trimenko as a tough, cautious soldier who was attempting to steer his service through the wreckage of the Union, always with an eye on the wars coming down the road.

Others, he also came to know through their dossiers. A Leonid Pavlovich Borodkin. Mediocre engineer, adequate analyst, and according to Tolchinskaya, a very good administrator and expediter. But, as Borodkin's reports showed, increasingly given to moods and undercutting. A Major Mikhail Kristinich, who had no good reputation, either personal or professional. He'd been with her in Chechnya, had filed negative but inconsequential reports, and was apparently now in Moscow. He worked in the Lubyanka in some sort of administrative position, but occasionally had to be respectfully removed from the prison levels by the guards. He was also known, increasingly, as a man who wanted the return, if not of the former regime, then of the former ways. His immediate superiors had flagged him as adequate in his present duties but not currently meriting promotion.

Very well. He would start with those two. Later, he would talk with the good men. For a moment, he contemplated a final, forlorn piece of American muffin, nibbled away but not consumed. Rather like Russia at the moment. He swallowed it in a purposeful gulp, then summoned his personal assistant, a tough old warhorse slowly adjusting to imminent retirement, pronounced him to secrecy, and told him whom to send for and what to do.

"No, Colonel Zhuralev," said Schwartz in response to a procedural. "I do not want them together. See that they do not see each other while reporting to me. Also, schedule a secure conference call with General Trimenko and General Getmanov most immediately for 1100, Moscow time. That will be 0300 in Washington, and convey my apologies to Getmanov and his wife. Please listen in on these two meetings and on the conference call. Silently."

"Very well, General."

Borodkin was there within the hour. He entered. Schwartz said nothing for a few seconds, just had him sit down. Schwartz was so used to being silent that there were times when people thought he had forgotten how to speak. His family, ethnic Germans, had been in Russia for well over a century and had stayed impeccably loyal through everything. Schwartz' father, the last of the family to speak native German, had served as an Army interrogator of German prisoners. His father had never discussed those experiences. But when Schwartz had finished his Army service in 1966 and was approached by the KGB and offered a career in counter-intelligence, his father had spoken to him about the corruptions of intelligence work. It was getting better now that Stalin was gone, but certain things never changed. He gave his son a simple set of rules.

When dealing with human beings, always remember, people will tell you what they want you to know. Understand why they want you to know it.

Beware of colleagues who are too eager to investigate; they'll usually find whatever they seek.

An interrogation room is no place for a sadist or a brute.

And above all else remember this:

All truth is provisional. Know what you know. But never refuse to know more.

Schwartz had practiced his father's creed for thirty years, during which he had purged from his character all impetuosity, all corrupting ambition, all hate and any need to fall in love with his own theories. He knew what he knew. He always sought more.

And he knew that in this, the final assignment of his service, it was his absolute duty to his country to keep the brutes and the sadists and the crazies and the tyrants-in-waiting under control. Not an easy job. There were so many of them. At that thought, Schwartz permitted himself a small inner smile and asked himself again. Was he himself getting perhaps a little paranoid? Then he gave himself the standard answer. After all his country had done to its own people, after all that had been done to this country by others, and with all the future's dark possibilities...get back to work.

He inspected, once more, the man before him. Late thirties but looking older, of medium height and medium weight, clearly intelligent, but something missing from the eyes. He began with a small display of authority and something to get this man interested.

"Mister Borodkin, you are here concerning a matter of State security. You are ordered to discuss this meeting with no one outside this room. No one. Do I make myself clear?"

"Absolutely, Comrade General," Borodkin answered shakily.

So. There was something to Mister Borodkin after all. Fear. Schwartz watched him closely. "I want to ask you some questions about Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchinskaya. You are, I understand, her lab administrator and FSB minder. You know her well."

Borodkin's eyes gleamed a little. He started to smile, involuntarily, then caught himself. "I do know her well, Comrade General. What can I say?"

"Say what you think. I've read your reports. Now say what you think."

"She's...she's a brilliant scientist and engineer."

He's afraid of her, Schwartz realized and the hair on the back of his neck began to prickle in warning. Perhaps more afraid of her than of me. "Obviously. What else can you tell me?"

Schwartz watched Borodkin shift a little in his chair, watched his eyes flicker away from his, watched his hands clench and unclench. "Well, Comrade General, I'd need to know what you want me to tell you."

Schwartz never liked to intimidate the weak; it made him feel slightly shameful and it rarely worked. Strange, he thought, to be thinking of an FSB man in such terms. Still, Borodkin's very response, Tell me what you want to hear, attested to that weakness and fear. No, he would not indicate what he wanted to hear. So Schwartz decided to back off a bit, treat Borodkin with a combination of firmness that might not intimidate him and a respect that he in no way deserved. "Mister Borodkin, we are both intelligence professionals. Our interests in Doctor Tolchinskaya are the same. In your reports, you have suggested nothing amiss in her character or suspicious in her behavior. So I ask you now, as one professional to another, do you stand by your reports?"

"Yes, comrade General, I do. But as an intelligence professional, it is also my sense that she has another agenda."

"Your sense?"

"My sense, yes, comrade General." His eyes now moved about frantically, as though looking for an escape route.

"Well then. Let us determine just what this sense might be telling you. You have been her minder since June 1994. Two and a half years. In that time, have you ever observed her acquiring or attempting to acquire information that she should not have?"

"No, Comrade General."

"Have you ever observed her in the company of foreigners, about which she has been deceptive?"

"No, Comrade General."

"Has she had or tried to have any contact with domestic dissidents or activists?"

"Not that I am aware, Comrade General."

"Does she possess or has she tried to acquire communications equipment she should not have?"

"No, Comrade General."

"Have you ever known her to have relationships with her subordinates that she should not have?"

"Well, she likes to hire women."

"What is the problem with that?"

"They might get pregnant."

"Are her relationships with these women improper in any way, including the sexual?" Schwartz distracted himself from the distaste of the question by permitting himself to observe that to his knowledge, relations between women did not result in pregnancy.

Borodkin answered with a disappointed leer. "No, comrade General."

"Have you ever known her to do anything improper or suspicious with her computers, her files, or her products?"

"Well, she likes to fail, and she encourages people to fail. She says failure is the only way to know if you're doing it right, or if you've gotten lucky and simply avoided failure for the present."

"Is there anything else, Mister Borodkin?"

Borodkin realized that Schwartz had walked him up to a precipice. He was now in a position where he had to commit himself one way or the other, but that was the one thing he'd refused to do in his life, over and over, until he was no longer capable of doing it. It was one of the things he had come to hate Olivia for: her ability to commit, her willingness to be wrong for the right reasons, in order to be right for the right reasons. But he had no choice now. "Yes, comrade General. I strongly suspect that it is possible she may be a sleeper, awaiting instructions."

Always possible, Schwartz thought. He assessed Borodkin. The man's character was clear. The next matter to be addressed was his motivation. Had she spurned his advances? Unlikely. Borodkin probably had no advances to spurn. Perhaps he loved her in silence and knew that if he tried, he'd end up a humiliated failure who still had to work with her. More probably, he was just a man who did not like taking orders from women or working with them. Far from unusual. But for him to accuse her, even in the weak way he had, of something that could end her life, he had to have a deeper motivation. Yet this man did not seem capable of deep motivation. Then the answer came. He hates her because she makes him feel like the man he knows himself to be.

His face and voice revealed nothing. "Mister Borodkin, you say that you suspect that maybe she might be. Do you or do you not think she is a sleeper agent?"

Borodkin was visibly sweating and he knew it. It was embarrassing, and the realization made him sweat more. "It is my instinct, Comrade General, that I would not be surprised if she were a sleeper agent."

Schwartz rubbed his nose. What do you know about instincts, you little worm? "Is it your professional assessment that she is in fact a sleeper agent? Not might be. Is."

"Yes, Comrade General. That is my assessment. My preliminary assessment only. I believe you should talk to Major Mikhail Kristinich, who was with her in Chechnya. He is presently..."

"I am aware of Major Kristinich."

"He knows far more about these matters than I do."

"What matters might these be?"

"Dealing with the disloyal."

Schwartz sat there looking at him from behind his eyes. "Thank you, Mister Borodkin. That will be all. I remind you again that you are not to discuss this conversation with anyone. Nor from this moment on may you discuss Doctor Tolchinskaya with anyone. That includes Major Kristinich."

"Yes, Comrade General. May I ask why?"

Your boss has nothing but praise for you and you've tried to sell her out for the ugliest and pettiest of personal reasons. Vicious spite. The kind of resentment that would drag down the world if it could. If her name weren't on that piece of paper, I'd be on the phone to her right now. And after she was done with you, I'd ship you off to the Kurile Islands with a pair of binoculars, a broken telephone, and instructions to call when the Americans invade, not before. After this is over, one way or another, I may do just that.

"There is an officers' canteen in this building. Go there. You will not leave the canteen until I send for you again or you receive word that you may go."

"Yes, Comrade General. I hope the information I have provided has been useful."

"It has been. Thank you, Mister Borodkin. You may go."

"Yes, Comrade General."

Next in, five minutes later, was Kristinich. "Sit down, please."

Kristinich did as he was told. His gaze was more direct. He did not know why he was there, but clearly sensed some sort of opportunity, if only contact with a senior officer. He did know, he had no doubt, that the general who sat behind the desk regarded him with loathing and disgust. He was not ashamed.

"I am taking an interest in Doctor Tolchinskaya," Schwartz said blandly. "I understand you observed her closely in Chechnya. What can you tell me?"

Kristinich suddenly felt very cold. He had planned to build a little dossier against Olivia, and then if she gave him any reason, send it up the chain. He had never expected to find interest in Olivia, of any sort, coming down on his own head. "May I ask why?"

"It's enough for you to know I'm interested, Major," Schwartz said calmly, his refusal to respond with "Comrade" a clear insult.

"I did observe her in Chechnya, but not really with any intensity or regularity. She did not spend a lot of time with the brigade headquarters. Most of her time was spent with the groups. She'd drop off the latest batch of sensors and other toys, talk to the men about what worked, what didn't, and why, fix what she could that was broken."

"What was she like?"

"Very active."

"Who was with her?"

If Schwartz is interested, that means he suspects her of something. She's an American and a Jew, so it's probably espionage of some kind. These days, if you make an accusation, it had better stick. But a little innuendo used to go a long way. Maybe it still might. "She had a permanent security detail. The head of it was a warrant officer named Simonov. He was killed. She and Simonov were very close."

"In what sense?"

"Well, I never saw them do anything untoward. But they were very close. She has an interesting relationship with Lieutenant Colonel Malinovsky, who was the brigade chief of reconnaissance. They're both Jews and they...box. Which is of course very strange in a Jew and even more a Jewess. You know about her relationship with the brigade commander, Colonel Suslov."

"Now General Suslov."

"I forgot. And she is also close to his sister, Lieutenant Colonel Suslova."

"She sounds like a very busy woman."

"Oh, she was. I never understood how someone who used that much medication could have so much energy."

"Extraordinary," Schwartz murmured.

"Extraordinary, indeed."

"Most extraordinary that she ever even came to us."

"True, Comrade General. Hardly a routine occurrence. To be sure, I have always had misgivings."

He hates this woman. His hate is taking precedence over his duty.

"Her Russian is excellent," Schwartz went on, his tone now neutral but encouraging. "We all know Americans don't study Russian as an innocent hobby. She said that she learned it to read our technical literature, but we also all know the Americans are years, if not decades, ahead of us."

"Not in all things, Comrade General. Not so long ago, we taught the Americans some much needed lessons in modesty."

"So we did. Fifty years ago. Then they gave us a few. Perhaps someday we will continue their education."

"It is to be hoped for, Comrade General."

"It is, indeed. Do you have any further thoughts on Doctor Tolchinskaya, Major?"

"I do, comrade General. My duties with 22 Brigade were to participate in the interrogation of prisoners, with emphasis on political intelligence. Doctor Tolchinskaya was very popular with the troops, of course. And Col...General Suslov made it very plain that the normal rules did not apply to her. I always felt that, although she was neither a Russian nor a soldier, a bit more discipline might have been appropriate. Of course, she was always extraordinarily circumspect. If I may say so, the general will also want to talk to her minder and laboratory administrator, Mister Borodkin."

"Thank you, Major. That will be all. You've been most helpful."

"I will be happy to assist in any way I can."

"Indeed. You will probably be called upon again. Do you work in this building?"

"Yes, Comrade General. In the prison administration."

"Then return to your duties. You are under strict orders to discuss this matter with no one."

"I understand, Comrade General."

"Thank you for coming. You may go now, Major."

"Thank you, Comrade General." Then he paused. "Would you like me to write up my own full report on Doctor Tolchinskaya? I have been considering it."

"Please do."

"Perhaps Mister Borodkin and I could work on this together. After you lift the restriction on communication, of course."

"I'll consider it."

Kristinich was barely out of his office before Schwartz's face resolved itself into stone. Then he found himself wishing for another muffin. That, however, was not possible. The technique was only good once a day and anyway, the damn things were fattening, though perhaps not nearly so deadly as the garbage he'd heard was sold at McDonald's. No wonder so many Americans had the asses and bellies that they did.

He looked down at his hands, folded neatly atop the closed dossier. Damn it all. The name on that memo could not be conjured away. His disgust for the two men did not change that. Then there was the very real fact that by mentioning her to them, he had indicated she was under suspicion of something, most probably espionage. His orders notwithstanding, those two would be at it again, soon enough. Inevitably, word would get out. And then, also inevitably, the matter would get out of hand and those who wished to use it for their own reasons, would do so. That's how it always started, the purges, the witch hunts, the inquisitions. Give the vicious their chance, they'll take it. And people who would never do such things themselves, are happy to see it happen.

I will deal with those two, in time. Now, let's talk with some men who really are men and who know her.

***

"Thank you, Comrades, for agreeing to this conference call on such short notice. Especially you, General Getmanov. I take it that you are at your home at your ungodly hour."

"I am, comrade General. In my study. My wife is making the coffee now. How may I help you and the Chief of Airborne?"

"My best to Madame Getmanova. I am hoping that you comrades may both help me, for this involves a person well known to you. One of our moles in the CIA—his identity is unimportant..."

"The one I recruited several years ago?" Getmanov asked.

"Yes, but for present purposes, no names. This man transmitted to us a CIA memo about a woman who concerns you, General Getmanov, directly, as her recruiter, and you, General Trimenko, indirectly, as the mentor of her lover. The memo is very likely authentic. The woman's name is Olivia Lathrop Tolchin, whom Russia knows as Olivia Lathrop Tolchinskaya."

There was the silence of sudden dread. Then Getmanov spoke slowly. "Comrade General, I request permission to have my wife sit in on this call. She knows Doctor Tolchinskaya well and her opinion is always valuable."

"Permission granted, General Getmanov."

Getmanov called for his wife, who ambled in with two cups of coffee and her traditional dour morning expression. For over thirty years, they had gone to bed together and arisen together, as much a form of mutual protection as would be one of them standing guard while the other slept. At times, that had also been necessary. "May I put this on speaker phone so she may hear?"

"I would prefer not. I assume that your home is periodically examined for American listening devices, but just in case."

"Very well, comrade General." He motioned his wife to another telephone in the room.

"Could you tell us what this memo says?" Getmanov asked as his wife took up the receiver.

"I will read it to you. I have to say, I find it one of the most bizarre documents I have ever encountered. This is a memorandum for the record, written by one Jay Lyons, apparently a CIA officer in Vienna."

He began to read aloud. When he finished, there was silence for some seconds. Finally, General Trimenko spoke. "Surely we do not know the same person."

Lyudmila Trofimovna looked at her husband, both of them remembering when Olivia had faced them and said, It has been a hard few hours. You know me now. Please promise me this. If ever I need an advocate and in your eyes I have earned one, be mine.

That time had come.

General Getmanov, though the most junior in rank, was the oldest of the three men and a legend in the intelligence community, a wise old stallion indeed. He cleared his throat. Once, to defend Olivia would have been to sign his own death warrant, and very likely the warrants of his wife and children. Perhaps it might be so again. But this was the matter at hand.

"General Schwartz, this is not our Olivia."

"I, too, find it hard to believe the memo describes her." Schwartz paused. "That, however, is not the issue. The immediate question before us is, I think, is it your sense that she is would have said such a thing to the Central Intelligence Agency?"

"General," Trimenko said hesitantly. "I have come to know her reasonably well. I had initial misgivings. Over time, I have come to regard Doctor Tolchinskaya as a future daughter-in-law, the probable wife of a man who is almost my son and whom I hope succeeds me as chief of Airborne, so I am obviously not entirely objective. However, I must say this. I once asked her what she hoped to accomplish in Russia, and she talked a little bit about the road she planned to travel as an engineer. Then she said she hoped that eventually her work would serve as a bridge between her two countries because she did not believe a weak and hostile Russia was in the best interests of America, Russia, or the world we share. I am quoting her almost directly."

Schwartz also heard what Trimenko did not say. She said it to me and I found nothing wrong with her words. She had also, as Schwartz had read in Marianenko's report on her initial interrogation, said the same thing to him and Colonel Suslova. But the knowledge wasn't comforting, for it provided additional proof that the memo was genuine.

"She mentioned this to me, also," Getmanov said. "She also mentioned to me her meeting with this Lyons."

"What did she tell you?"

"In Vienna, as we were preparing to leave for Moscow, she said she had dealt with one American too many, and that he had showed her she was right to come here."

"She might have meant..." Schwartz shut up, realizing he had been incautious.

"She did not, Comrade General. I knew in my heart that she was not talking about some idiot American tourist she'd met in a hotel bar. It had to have been something regarding her plans."

"And you put her on that flight to Moscow anyway?" Trimenko asked.

"Yes," Getmanov said simply. "I knew what and how great our needs were, and that she could very likely fill them."

"Even though she might be passing it back to the CIA?" Schwartz asked.

"An interesting arrangement. The CIA dispatches a brilliant engineer to Russia to send back information on work she wanted to do for her own country and could have done far more efficiently at home. Perhaps it was their way of helping us out in Chechnya. However, comrade General, I doubt it."

"It does seem hard to believe," Trimenko heard himself say, "that she had to leave America and come to Russia for creative and intellectual freedom."

"General Trimenko, whatever Doctor Tolchinskaya may have told you about the intellectual state of affairs in America, she was probably being extremely gracious. The country is squandering its intellectual, moral and physical capital and doesn't give a damn. Doctor Tolchinskaya is symbolic of something that is happening in many other ways."

"True," Schwartz cut in, "but not immediately relevant to our conversation. General Trimenko, do you think she would be passing information back to the Americans?"

"She was closely observed in Chechnya by many people and there were no indications she was anything other than what she claimed to be, doing anything other than what she was obviously there to do. If she was, she's very, very, very good. And extremely devious and deceptive. That does not accord with everything I have heard of her, and have seen in her myself."

"General Getmanov?"

"She told me, more or less, of her contact with Mr. Lyons. No name was mentioned. She was subtle but direct and I did not misunderstand. We might not know what a bridge looks like, this kind of imaginary bridge. But we know what spies and traitors look like, and they are not the same. Now I must ask a theoretical but important question."

"Go on."

"If her government had accepted her offer and she had told us, would that have been so terrible? I ask again, comrades. If her imbecile CIA had accepted her offer, would that have been so bad?"

Trimenko's voice held a passion and a sorrow that surprised even him. "God knows, we could stand to deal with Americans who do not believe Russia is to be humiliated and ignored. No, it would not have been terrible. It might have taken us years to figure it out, we might have failed to make it happen on our end. But it would not have been terrible. No, not at all."

"Now that is wisdom," Schwartz agreed. "But why would she go to the CIA?"

Trimenko shook his head, the gesture not visible to the men. "I don't know. She's a brilliant woman. She had to know how dangerous it was, what she was doing. But what could she have done at that final hour? Joined their Peace Corps? Applied for a grant?"

Getmanov remembered the weary sorrow and utter defeat in Olivia's eyes that day. "Doctor Tolchinskaya is an honorable woman. I believe she would no more betray Russia than she would betray America."

"Then why, General Getmanov?"

He looked at Lyudmila. She had put down the phone and was walking the book stacks of the study. She went directly to the shelf where she placed books for her husband to read. The shelf had two piles, one for the books he needed to read and would, one for the books he needed to read but wouldn't. She drew one from the second pile and showed her husband the cover. Getmanov laughed in surprise.

"General?" Schwartz queried.

"My apologies. We were discussing possible motivations for Doctor Tolchinskaya's action. We are agreed, I think, that she is sincere in her desire to be a bridge. The question is, why did she choose that particular way of going about it? I think we would agree that she made her choice during a period of emotional turmoil. Perhaps there is an additional explanation."

"Proceed."

"Comrades, my wife gives me great and constant insight into American women. They are a subject I am, for many reasons, all of them valid, unable to investigate myself." Lyudmila glared happily. "She is at this moment presenting me with a book I have not yet read. But the title seems evocative and perhaps explanatory."

"And what, might we ask, is the title?"

"Smart Women, Foolish Choices."

Now it was Trimenko's turn to laugh. "It may indeed come down to that. I speak from personal experience here. She can be dense."

"Do we truly think," Schwartz interjected, "that this is what it comes down to? A good and brave and brilliant woman with a capacity for occasional stupidity."

"I have heard her call herself an idiot," Trimenko added.

"With cause?"

"In that particular situation, with great cause."

"She is an honest woman," Madame Getmanova said. "When she says she's an idiot, we can believe her."

"Occasional idiocies aside," Trimenko answered, "she is very brave and I know her as an America patriot who is nevertheless loyal to Russia so long as we do not wage war or act against her country. God and the Airborne Forces know well that such qualities are not conducive to common sense. I think," he concluded, "that if she was indeed a smart woman doing something foolish, such dangerous stupidity probably deserves a hug and kiss for surviving it, then a spanking for being such a stupid child as to play in the world's traffic like that."

"I am inclined to agree with you, comrades," Schwartz said. "However, the explanations only validate the memo. This happened. I therefore have to bring her in for questioning. She also has, as I have come to learn, real enemies who are in a position to fabricate and plant incriminating evidence. I believe they would do so. So this is how we shall proceed. We shall proceed with dignity and courtesy and without violence or intimidation beyond that which must occur. She will be arrested shortly, but treated as a prisoner of status and not yet officially charged with anything. We will seal her house and her lab. Her staff will be detained and questioned. Her housekeeper will also be questioned, but treated as a loyal FSB Russian employee. If Doctor Tolchinskaya comes up as clean as you two think she will, she comes up clean and we proceed accordingly. If she doesn't..."

"She doesn't," Getmanov said simply.

"Agreed," Schwartz said. "Let her be judged by what she has done and by her intentions. Not by something written by someone who seems to have met someone else entirely. General Getmanov, thank you once again for taking this call at this time, on such short notice. General Trimenko, would you please stay on the line with me after General Getmanov rings off?"

"Of course."

Knowing himself dismissed, Getmanov rang off and sat shaking in his study with Lyudmila. After a time, he reached out and took her hand and kissed it, and then they held each other silently.

In his Moscow office, General Schwartz continued his conversation. Getmanov had been valued for his opinion, but now it was time to act. "General Trimenko, how confident are you in General Suslov?"

"Totally. He did not become involved with Doctor Tolchinskaya until I told him this was permissible. And until his sister told him that separately, as both a family and a State matter."

"And your confidence in Doctor Tolchinskaya?"

"Very strangely, even now total."

"All right then. This is how I wish to proceed, in order to protect those who have relationships with Doctor Tolchinskaya. This is not a standard procedure and I wouldn't do this for anyone else. Obviously, I cannot order you to this. I am asking for your voluntary co-operation. If you feel deeply that what I am going to propose is unworkable or wrong, please tell me and I will proceed more normally."

"Please tell me your plan, Comrade General."

"As I mentioned, Doctor Tolchinskaya will be taken into custody as a prisoner of status, her lab and her house sealed. I would ask you to inform General Suslov personally that Doctor Tolchinskaya is being taken into custody as a person of interest, concerning her possible relationship with the CIA, rather than being arrested on suspicion of espionage. By the time you speak with him, that will have been accomplished. We will take her from her lab to her house, where she can pick up a few things. Tell me, does General Suslov have a home in Moscow, other than his quarters at Voroshilov or Doctor Tolchinskaya's house?"

"There is a modest family dacha north of Moscow. Too far out to be convenient for anyone to live there regularly and too barren for most people's comfort. But it is there and available."

"Very well. Then we will convey her to the dacha and inform her that we will come for her again in the morning. Have him join her there for one night. I would like him to find out what he can. If she's not going to come up clean, it would be best for a great many people and possibly Russia itself if they handled this themselves. Certainly, it would be best for them. Unfortunately, this is Russia with its unquiet ghosts. Even if she is clean, that may still be best for her. Perhaps for them both."

"I understand. I will tell him so. Will you have the dacha under surveillance, wired for recording, and the phone tapped?"

Schwartz thought a moment. "No. At this point, I would rather not do such a thing to a Russian general and hero of two wars. There will be security around the dacha so that..." Schwartz smiled to himself, "I almost said, so that our lovers don't leave. So that General Suslov and Doctor Tolchinskaya don't leave. There will be no recording devices or communications monitoring. If there is guilt here, I want no record of it. If there is guilt here, significant and premeditated guilt, General Suslov will want to behave as he knows a Russian general officer should."

"He also loves her deeply."

"If there is genuine guilt here, and he places his emotions above his duty, best we let him discover that now."

"Agreed. Thank you for the wisdom of your plan, General Schwartz. Let us proceed."

"Thank you, General Trimenko."

General Schwartz hung up the phone. He sat in the silence of his office for a few minutes, listening to the pain echoing in the room. Then he called in his personal assistant. Colonel Avrum Vissarionovich Zhuralev, much to his disgust, would soon be retired for wounds received in Chechnya that had aggravated wounds received in Afghanistan. It is hard to take bullets in the same leg and belly twice, and the fact that Zhuralev still had a full head of hair was not, to the ever-balding Schwartz, sufficient reason to retain him. Or so he joked with the Colonel. Schwartz trusted the man completely.

"What do you think, Vissarionovich?"

"This is the strangest thing I have ever heard of, Comrade General."

"Isn't it? Well, then. You understand the plan that General Trimenko has approved, do you not?"

"I do, comrade General."

"You will execute it. Take smart, tough, cultured people you can trust. All armed. About twenty should be sufficient for everything. Use your judgment. Take also several women, for propriety if needed. Organize them into two details. After Doctor Tolchinskaya is arrested, one detail will seal the lab. Get our technical people in there immediately. Everyone on the staff goes off for rigorous but non-hostile interrogation. If they're not at the lab, have your people locate their homes. All must be done today. No one is to be harmed or insulted in any way without ample provocation. Escort Doctor Tolchinskaya to her home with the second detail, including matrons. Allow her to pack an overnight bag. Make sure she includes her medications. Have her housekeeper pack a bag, too. Seal the house and have one man escort the housekeeper here for debriefing. She's one of ours. Have our forensics and technical people search the house thoroughly."

"Yes, Comrade General. What shall I say to Doctor Tolchinskaya?"

"Just that she is being taken into custody regarding a matter of intelligence interest, but has not been formally accused of anything. Tell her nothing else and answer no questions, but please make it very clear that if she offers no violence, none will be used against her. Make it also very clear to her that we are interested in real information, not making her confess to be the Virgin Mary made pregnant by the ghost of Peter the Great and engaged in a vast conspiracy to restore the Czar."

"If she resists?"

"Subdue her with as little damage as possible."

"If she resists with a weapon, Comrade General?"

"Then you will know that for one reason or another, she is offering us a graceful exit from the situation that her idiocy has placed us all in. You will accept her offer, if at all possible making certain that only one person dies. However, try to persuade her to do nothing rash. Tell her that we would like her and General Suslov to have a private conversation before we proceed."

"Understood. Major Kristinich and Mister Borodkin are conspiring in the officers' canteen. It appears that Major Kristinich stopped in on his way back to work. Perhaps the General should have stored Mister Borodkin in a less public place."

"I'm an idiot."

"Sir?"

"Oh, well. They were going to get together eventually, anyway. We'll deal with that later. Keep Borodkin here under observation until you seal the lab. Then inform him of the closure and have him sent home."

"And Major Kristinich?"

"He'll wander on back to his office eventually. Maybe Russia can get a few final hours of decent work out of him."

"Understood, comrade General." Colonel Zhuralev came to brief attention, then left.

General Schwartz sat silent once again. He had nothing now to do with the matter until something happened, or until Tolchinskaya was brought to the Lubyanka tomorrow. No, that was not true. He needed to select, then brief his lead interrogator, give the man time to select and brief his team. This was going to require men who could get it right, right from the start. He began a quick mental review of the senior interrogators available to him. But a single thought kept crowding into his mind.

If this all blows up, what am I going to do? What will I do? What should I do?

Lieutenant General Georgii Genrikovich Schwartz went back to work.

***

Irina Borisovna Suslova had three telephones on her desk. Exterior: unrestricted and non-secure. Exterior: restricted and secure. And Interior: restricted for internal use only, and secure. All three lines were, it was necessary to assume, constantly monitored. Phone calls could be terminated at will by monitors who didn't like what they were hearing. Such terminations could have other consequences. Her internal line rang. "Lieutenant Colonel Suslova."

"Colonel, my name is Colonel Zhuralev, personal assistant to General Schwartz. We've met before. Do you recognize my voice?"

"I do and I remember you, comrade Colonel. General Schwartz, also." She remembered them both very well. She'd briefed Schwartz numerous times, usually in the presence of Zhuralev. They were on excellent informal terms. But in their world, telephone calls were best conducted as tersely as possible.

"There is something I have determined that you need to know."

Her cultured voice was very still and composed. "Continue."

Zhuralev wondered if this was why he had been allowed to survive Afghanistan and Chechnya. To do, in his last assignment and perhaps, very likely the way his health was deteriorating, at the end of his life, one final thing for his country. I want this to turn out right for Russia.

"A person known to you—and to your family—has come under suspicion of possible involvement in espionage. She is soon to be taken into custody. It is possible that you may become...professionally involved. You may wish to volunteer your involvement in the very near future."

Instinctively, Suslova began the management of her emotions. Observing them. Evaluating them. Determining their present and possible impact upon her decisions and actions. It was a family trait, but honed by years of ruthless self-mastery. Her stern outer visage was real. But it was also a façade behind which she lived.

Her initial reaction was a cold, clear rage as she wondered if she had been lied to and betrayed. She examined her closeness to Olivia and found it real, although without any kind of permanent commitment. She noted that. It might matter later. Then her rage led her to wonder if she had personally served as the conduit for others to be lied to and betrayed. Starting with her brother and through him... Her cold rage gave way to the chill which, for her, was the initial experience of what she understood to be fear—a most controllable emotion.

"Colonel Suslova?"

"Yes, Colonel." She had been so still and silent that Zhuralev had not been certain she had remained on the line. "I understand. What would you like me to do?"

"Make your expertise available to General Schwartz."

"My personal knowledge, also?"

"Yes."

"Put me on his schedule."

"He will be able to see you at 1600."

She glanced at hers. "I'll be there. When he asks me how I know of this, what do you wish me to tell him?"

"The truth."

"Will you be there?"

"No. I will be performing a duty I have been assigned in this matter."

He would be, she realized instinctively, the arresting officer. "Thank you, Colonel."

"Good afternoon, Colonel."

After he rang off, Suslova moved away from her desk to make herself a cup of tea and sit down at the small table in her office. It was necessary to continue the process of taking account of what was going on inside her, matching it to what had happened and might happen. The process that would lead to whatever actions she might take. The process of keeping fear from becoming dread, helpless dread, and of using fear to goad herself to a self-mastery that could then be used in the world and, as necessary, against the world.

"What," Suslova heard herself say aloud, "does any of us really know of the human heart?"

No answer came. She pressed on within, tasking herself with an internal formality that was no less real for being internal and formal.

I am an intelligence professional. It is time to act like one.

Is my brother capable of betraying his country?

No.

How do I know this?

Because I know who Mitya is.

All right then. What do I really know about Olivia?

I know Olivia is no more a traitor to her country than my brother is to ours. She truly loves America, and deeply grieves for what it is becoming. An attitude with which I am familiar.

I know Olivia has never sought information or equipment that she should not have. Not from me or my brother. Nor from Volodya Malinovsky. Nor anyone else I know of, including General Trimenko. So could this American have fooled all of us, including General Getmanov and Colonel Marianenko as well?

It is possible. It is always possible. But I cannot conclude, on the basis of what I know at this moment, that this is what happened. New information will be made available to me and I must be prepared to reach whatever conclusions it supports. But until such information comes to me, I will continue to believe that...

Suslova sat back, accepted her judgment, then turned to her fear. It should have abated under the pressure of thought. But it had not. Fear gave way to dread. Then she realized she had distracted herself as long as she could with an unnecessary exercise because it did not address the fundamental issue that she, as a professional, understood. At issue was not really Olivia and what she might or might not have done. At risk were not her brother's life or hers, or even the lives of Valentina and their sons. At issue was what this—whatever it was—might be used to provoke. Suslova had studied Stalin's purges. She'd studied Ivan the Terrible and his secret police, the Oprichnina. She knew full well how things could get out of hand once an investigation began, and how many people stood to profit. At risk were Russians, beginning with the Russians who had known Olivia, extending to Russians who had known Russians who had known Olivia, continuing to Russians who had known Russians who had known Russians who knew Olivia, and from those outermost Russians, extending to Russians who knew them. And so on and so forth and so on. For the real threat to those Russians were not Americans, but other Russians.

Thus the dread. The dread for her country that it might be headed back toward that particular abyss. The dread, not that she might be caught up in it, but that she might be unable to protect Russia from it.

Suslova found a handkerchief in one of her pockets, dried her eyes, noticed her hands were shaking.

I may have to sacrifice my brother and Volodya and...my friend Olivia...to contain this. I may have to sacrifice myself. But what of it? If things get out of hand, there is no possibility of the four of us surviving it, no matter who does the killing. Better to go down trying to stop it than as a victim of it.

Yes. This is the action I will take.

And from somewhere outside herself, she felt the tears running silently down her face like rain on stone, a mixture of grief and relief that she would do whatever needed to be done to prevent far worse.

***

General Schwartz was surprised to see Suslova enter his office. She came to a brief attention in front of his desk and he looked into her eyes, dreading what he would find. In his father's day, had someone so close to a probable espionage suspect like Doctor Tolchinskaya come to see him, it would have been to grovel and beg and betray and accuse in an attempt to save his life. Some would be happy to return to those ways. He thought of Kristinich and Borodkin and tasted bile.

He did not know Suslova well. They had spoken from time to time at briefings and receptions. But he knew her by reputation. An extraordinarily able officer, of deep honesty and unquestionable loyalty, very clearly rising. She had worked a vicious, grueling deep-cover assignment for as long she could, and longer. You became known, and even if they didn't get to you, the work itself did. She had killed a few people herself and sent more to execution, in Russia and elsewhere. Her tragedy was that she could do that work for the rest of her life and barely dent the numbers of people who were a plague upon the planet. If a Nobel Peace Prize were ever to be awarded for real-world prevention of nuclear catastrophe, her name would be very high on the list. An amusing thought, painful in this context.

Schwartz studied her intently, seeking the slightest trace of groveling in her eyes and finding only the most reassuringly calm clarity. "It is good to see you again, Colonel, even if unexpectedly. What brings you here?"

"General, I am here to offer my expertise."

"In what specific regard?"

"In the matter of Doctor Tolchinskaya."

Now it was Suslova's turn to study him. Schwartz showed no reaction, except for the slightest crinkling around his eyes. She took it for what it was: the outer manifestation of a quizzical inner smile, and of happiness that she should have found her way here so quickly. He pondered who would have told her. His aide, Zhuralev? Trimenko or Getmanov? Zhuralev, he decided quickly. The man's deteriorating health meant that he was very frank. It was one of the reasons why Schwartz trusted him so much. I have allies, he thought. I am not alone even here.

"Once I would not have tolerated this, Comrade Colonel."

"I know that, Comrade General."

"Colonel Zhuralev often has a fine sense of what needs to be done, without being told. Or sometimes, after being forbidden to do what he knows should be done."

"Colonel Zhuralev?"

"Yes, Irina Borisovna. The man who did not make the phone call that has resulted in your not being here. I assume that he gave you the necessary details in his office before you entered here." She began to smile, suppressed it, then permitted it. "But now I am very glad you are here. At ease, close the door, pour yourself some tea, let us just talk."

She nodded and did as ordered, courteously handing him a fresh glass before she joined him in the cluster of armchairs at the opposite end of his office from his desk. "Thank you." He looked at her closely. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I have two heads. Perhaps three."

"I understand. After this morning's events, I am feeling much the same. I note, however, that you still have a head. As do I. Perhaps we will both retain our heads. How well do you know Doctor Tolchinskaya?"

"Very well, although I wasn't with her in Chechnya. I was one of her interrogators at Tver, as you know. As you probably also know, I developed a personal relationship with her after."

"Yet you obviously keep some distance from her."

"I do. And she does not try to cross that boundary."

"Did she discuss her relationship with your brother with you?"

"She asked my blessing."

"And you gave it."

"Yes, after speaking with General Trimenko and making other inquiries."

"Do you see your brother as a target?"

"He could be, but he has no weaknesses that can be exploited."

"Except for this woman." Schwartz paused, then spoke a bitter truth. "But then our loved ones always are our vulnerability. Or can be made so. Tell me, is it your instinct, without any evidence one way or the other, that she is also an intelligence operative?"

Suslova was silent for a while, then finally shook her head. "I've asked myself that question many times over the years I've known her. The answer has always been the same. I will tell you this. It is not so much that she has never done anything to arouse my suspicions, it is that on a very deep level, I have come to feel myself and my family safe with her. I conclude on the basis of the information available to me that she is not. However, my conclusion may be wrong."

He spoke very plainly. "You know where this can go."

"Yes. As do you."

"Then, Comrade Colonel, you know this has to be contained. At all costs."

"Comrade General, I do."

"What will you do if we fail to contain it?"

"Resign if it is permitted me. If not, suicide."

"Well then, Comrade, let us do together the things we have to do."

Elegant as an unsheathed sword, Suslova silently inclined her head to him. He nodded back to her, waiting. "I made Doctor Tolchinskaya a promise at Tver. It concerned her death—that if it came to that, it would be decent and honorable."

"If need be, I will see that you are able to keep your promise. But let us see if we can contain this otherwise."

Relieved, she inclined her head again. "I believe that silence and secrecy are our allies for the moment, but ultimately our enemies."

"That is an unbureaucratic instinct, but I agree with you. What do you have in mind?"

"The American reporter for the Washington Post, Rebecca Taylor."

"What of her?"

"It may be that, to settle this, we have to get the Americans openly involved and under some pressure. I understand that the Washington Post is the kind of paper you go to when you have a secret that you're afraid no one knows."

"That is how they deal with each other. As they used to remind us, a secret weapon doesn't scare anybody if you keep it a secret. Or a scandal. Or a possible espionage situation. How well do you know this Taylor?"

"I've run with her a few times, perhaps a dozen. We've attended a few social gatherings together and talked over drinks once or twice. I respect her as a journalist and a human being."

Schwartz paused, then spoke slowly. "At the moment, our senior leadership knows nothing of Doctor Tolchinskaya and would care nothing if they did. There are far, far more important issues for them to wrestle. However, there are many people in subordinate positions, including some in this building, who might be most eager to get something started that would bring them to the attention of our senior circles. A Washington Post reporter could interest our leaders most economically in resolving this. Of course, the opposite could also be true. Involving the press is always an act with many possible consequences. The American press, especially."

"Yes. Shall I approach her?"

"Not just yet. But hold yourself in readiness."

"For anything, Comrade General."

"Good. Today is nearly done. Go home to your family, try to get some sleep, Comrade Colonel. I doubt we are going to have much time for sleep so long as this case is active. After that, there will be plenty of time for us to sleep, one way or the other." He smiled briefly, and she could see the fathomless fatigue and sorrow in his own eyes.

# CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE DACHA

Running the lab at reduced speed during the Russian Orthodox Christmas week was not difficult. Neither Olivia's staff nor the rest of Russia was motivated to work. Those who had not taken leave were on a half-schedule. Olivia insisted on a few good hours out of them in the morning, then let them go at noon. Now the afternoon was in full brightness. Olivia was in her office alone, standing with her back to the open door, contemplating a white board covered with equations and schematics, thinking hard and feeling peaceful. Borodkin had left very early that morning, taken suddenly ill, he'd said. It was nice to have him out of the lab.

She sensed motion behind her. "Ivan Ivanovich," she said without turning, "you are a family man and once again I am keeping you from your wife and children. So we will put the lab to bed and perhaps I will find my mistake in my dreams."

"Doctor Tolchinskaya, I am not Ivan Ivanovich."

Be calm, she told herself quickly. No sudden moves. She turned slowly. There were men, one at the door, several behind him. They did not carry weapons openly, but they were clearly armed. Agents of the FSB always were when they made their calls. "I presume," she said to the man before her, "that if Ivan Ivanovich admitted you, you have the proper clearances. This is a classified facility."

"We do and we presented them to him. We now present them to you." He began to step forward.

Still preternaturally calm, Olivia moved towards him, clearly the ranking officer and even more the leader, a tall, dark-haired man who moved with a heavy limp and a dignity of carriage that belied his swarthy face. Colonel Zhuralev realized that although their steps brought her within his reach, he was now within hers. He did not fear her, but from what he knew of her, it was prudent to be cautious. He felt the hairs prickling on the back of his neck and his hands as he handed her his credentials. She examined them carefully, handed them back, and said nothing.

Zhuralev waited for her to say something, ask anything. They often did at this moment, more as a means of controlling their panic and shock than as an attempt to say or ask anything. He'd also seen men who, unable to speak, had collapsed before him without even being told the nature of the visit. Such was the way of it. Then he realized that she would not speak. She'd been through detention and interrogation before and knew better than to volunteer anything. She had the composure of a seasoned dissident of the former world, unrepentant but aware of the protocols.

Zhuralev straightened a bit. "Doctor Olivia Lathrop Tolchinskaya, you are a person of interest to the FSB. We have some questions to ask you, although at this point, no charges have been preferred against you. My orders are to tell you that our interest is in accurate information, and in accurate information only, nothing else. So long as you do not use force or violence, no harm or insult will be done to you and you will be treated as a prisoner of status."

"And my staff?"

He respected her for that; it bespoke both composure and care. "Your employees are also people of interest, yet at this time suspected of no wrongdoing. We will interrogate them, too, but they will be non-hostile interrogations. Likewise, so long as they do not use force or violence, no harm or insult will be done to them. However, your lab will be sealed and thoroughly inspected. This detail," he motioned to the men behind him, "will tend to that. Another detail of a man and a woman is waiting outside. We will now take you to your home. Under my eyes and those of the matron, you will pack an overnight bag, including any medications you may need. If you wish to retain your weapon for...personal reasons...we will hold it for you until we reach our destination. You will be allowed one magazine and seven rounds of ammunition."

Olivia did not ask the obvious question.

Zhuralev continued calmly. "After you have packed, we will seal your home. Your housekeeper will also pack a bag. She will be taken to FSB headquarters for debriefing, not interrogation, as she is one of ours. We know that General Suslov has a family dacha outside of Moscow that is not presently inhabited. You will be taken there. He will also be there, although he will probably arrive after you do. There will be an outside security detail but no one within, save the two of you. There will be no intrusions on your privacy, either human or," he almost smiled, "electronic. Tomorrow morning, I will return to escort you to the Lubyanka."

"May I ask," Olivia said slowly, calmly, "why I am not being taken directly to prison?"

Zhuralev nodded. "It has been decided that you and General Suslov might wish to discuss certain matters tonight. This is not, if you will forgive me the crudity, a conjugal visit or a last night together or anything like that. It is desired that the two of you make whatever decisions you feel appropriate. The perimeter detail has orders to apprehend you if you try to leave, so please do not."

"May I ask if General Suslov is also under arrest?"

"He is not, Doctor. Not at the moment."

Zhuralev watched her very closely as he spoke. She was cold and composed, but he could also see that she was sick inside. Yet her dignity did not betray her. "My orders," Zhuralev concluded, "include reminding you that if it is established that you have done nothing wrong, you will be set free. My orders are also to tell you nothing beyond this, so please ask me no questions."

"I won't," Olivia murmured, now aware only of the shame cascading within her like lava from a volcano whose eruption she'd feared since leaving Vienna.

She said nothing for a long time, just watched him out of eyes that had seen combat and agony and death. He met her steady gaze, smelled the cedary violets of the perfume she was wearing, very strong with the heat of her body, and under them the glittering steel scent of the adrenaline that had flooded her system. He knew that her heightened senses meant that she would be able to smell him, perhaps hear his breathing and his pulse, so he tried to keep them normal. He did not worry that his own scent would betray fear or cruelty or anything else. He simply wanted this all to be done with dignity and respect.

After what seemed hours but had, he knew, been no more than a few seconds, she nodded and stepped back away from him and lifted her hands. "I am wearing my pistol beneath my cardigan. I will now take it out and surrender it to you."

***

"You know, my love, you really ought to read more of the books I present to you. You never know when they might prove useful."

"Don't change the subject," General Getmanov growled at his wife as he went into to their bedroom closet, came out with a suitcase, threw it on the unmade bed, and started packing.

"You really think I would do such a thing? After all the years I spent going to bed and getting up on your schedule. Do you really think I could ever get used to some other man's annoying habits?"

"Lyudya, that is not the point," he said. "I would prefer it if, just as soon as my flight is in the air, you go to the embassy and file for Russian divorce. You may cite any reason you like, including my sleeping habits."

"Not those. I would have to get into your snoring and I'd prefer not to disgrace you that way."

"Then cite years of chronic infidelity with waitresses at those wretched pancake parlors. What do they call them?"

"IHOP, my beloved. And they're not wretched, although I personally prefer the male baristas at Starbucks. Every time I order an Americano grande, I swoon. Sounds like some sort of gigolo, no?"

"Lyudya...damn you. If things work out in Moscow, you can withdraw your petition. It may not be necessary. It may be worthless if this all goes to hell. But it may also provide you with some protection. Quickly divorcing an enemy of the State could save you."

"But I'm not married to an enemy of the State."

"Not everyone might see it that way. I may never return."

"From where?"

"From Moscow."

"Oh, so you're going to Moscow? Thank you for finally getting around to telling me. I was afraid you were about to run off with one of your IHOP courtesans."

"IHOP does not hire courtesans."

"Very well, then. Howard Johnson's."

"I am serious."

"So am I. And just what makes you think you're going to Moscow alone?"

"Because it will be easier to try to save a friend if you're not there to get yourself arrested, too."

"I'm sorry, husband, but we are going back to Moscow to try to save a friend."

He glared at Lyudmila. "What you mean 'we,' White Girl?" he inquired in perfect idiomatic English.

"Just that," she said, peremptorily closing the lid of his suitcase. "I assume you don't mean, White Russian Girl. In any event, I am pleased that you have read more of my books than you admit."

"I admit nothing," he said.

"Have you been doing more researches than reading?"

"I admit nothing," he repeated with dignity.

"Nevertheless, we are going back to Moscow. Now please go into that ridiculously huge closet and get me down a suitcase. Women always take longer to pack than men."

Getmanov complied, once again marveling at a closet that was larger than some rooms he'd lived in. Then he marveled again at what he and his wife were about to do. Not so long ago, returning to Russia would have been a particularly unpleasant way of committing suicide. Indeed, he probably would have had only three choices available to him. Defect to the Americans, if he could do so in time. Offer them a lifetime's worth of knowledge and expertise in exchange for living out his remaining years somewhere, doing something or perhaps doing nothing. Or he could let his own people put him on an Aeroflot flight back to Moscow under armed guard. Or he could kill himself, an expiation that might save his wife from a similar or worse fate.

"Very well," Getmanov grumbled, reopening his suitcase. "Come along. However, I would prefer you not running your neck into this trouble. It's bad enough I didn't tell her in Vienna what she deserved to hear from me, that it would be best if she returned home. Now I've endangered others by my failure. You could still be blameless. But not if you get involved. "

"Beloved husband, have I mentioned to you that I've been corresponding with our Olivia quite regularly?"

Getmanov's jaw dropped a little. Then a lot. He looked down at his half-filled suitcase and said in the most beloved husbandly tone he could manage, "I didn't know about that."

"That's because I didn't tell you. Old American proverb. Every girl needs some secrets."

"Old Russian proverb. Sufficient unto the day is its own evil. You know, when they search her home, they'll find the letters. Perhaps she destroyed them but we must assume not for now. Anything in them I should know about?"

"No. Well, yes. I've been giving her instruction on how to please Russian men. They are, how you say, considerably more demanding than their American counterparts."

"And how would you know that?"

"I read books. No, there is nothing in those letters that could complicate things."

"Except that they may still exist." Getmanov went to his wife and took her hands. "Darling, this is about our Olivia. It is also about where our country is going, what it might become, what it might return to. Do you really think you need to have a role in that?"

"Am I not a citizen, too?"

"But you have no position, no power, no..."

"I have you. Alright, I slept my way to the top, well, most of the way to the top. But that's where I am now and I intend to use it in any way I can to make this come out right."

He sighed. "Fuck you, White Girl."

"You don't mean, fuck you, White Russian Woman, do you?"

"No, I mean, fuck you, Russian Woman."

"Please?"

"When we get back to Moscow. They say it's better there."

"It is."

***

They brought Olivia to her home, numb with a mixture of fear, utter shame, and shameful relief that, finally, it was happening. But—her mind began to function again—she had perhaps assumed too easily that this was the Lyons idiocy. She could not yet be sure. All she could be sure of at the moment was that there was one man on either side of her and a man and a woman trailing behind, but no handcuffs or leg irons. A courtesy, she knew, that could be revoked at any second. Maria Fedorovna opened the door to them, then fell back.

"Oh, no, Doctor. Please, not you."

"I am afraid so, my dear. They have sealed the lab and they are sealing the house. I am told that I am a prisoner of status. They have some questions for me and I will be enjoying the hospitality of the Lubyanka for a few days." She turned to Zhuralev. "Maria Fedorovna will have a place to go?"

"Yes, Doctor. We are going to be debriefing her rather extensively. Decent accommodations will be provided."

"Maria Fedorovna," Olivia said, turning back, "Speak of me honestly, as you have found me, and all will be well."

She has far more faith than I do. "This is real?"

"Yes, my dear."

It's starting again... Maria Fedorovna made her decision. It was pitifully little, but it was what she could do. "They are allowing you to pack a bag?"

"Yes."

"Then I will help you."

Olivia swallowed hard and composed herself before she spoke. Tears were not for the security services. "That is unnecessary."

"For me, now, it is very necessary, Doctor."

"As you will, my friend." Olivia had never called her that before.

Olivia, Maria, Zhuralev, and the matron went into her bedroom. Olivia was uncertain whether she was packing for prison or suicide, but planned for either eventuality. She asked Maria to get her warm socks and long underwear, jeans and a sweater. Then she put in a favorite suit and blouse. By instinct, perfume: Guerlain's Djedi. By instruction, her medications: codeine, valium, and morphine. Then a kit of toiletries. Maria packed Olivia's current knitting, a bell-sleeved lace tunic, worked not in the white gossamer yarns most people associated with lace, but in a heavier yarn of deep lavender.

Then Olivia kissed Maria Fedorovna. "If we do not see each other again, I have loved you very much, my friend." Her voice was steady and her eyes were dry.

"And I you, Doctor. You been one of the great blessings of my life."

They left the bedroom and went down to the street. Zhuralev handed the suitcase to his driver, then motioned to the others to get in their cars.

***

"Sit down please, Dmitri Borisovich," Colonel General Trimenko said as they took two chairs in an unused conference room at the Voroshilov Academy.

"Yes, Comrade General."

Trimenko pushed across the table to him a glass of hot, sweet tea. "There is no easy way to say this, General Suslov, so I will just say it. Doctor Tolchinskaya's name has turned up on a CIA memo that the FSB has acquired. She is described as having sought out some kind of relationship between herself and the CIA."

Suslov heard himself speaking from a great distance, remembering the day the American engineer had first reported to him, promising her that if she broke faith he would deal with her soldier to soldier, as an enemy, not a spy, and she had praised his generosity. "What sort of relationship?"

"That is the problem, Dmitri Borisovich. We do not know. She approached the CIA in Vienna, hours before coming to Moscow, and asked to be a bridge between Russia and America."

"She has said the same thing to both of us, comrade General. And to others."

"And also at her intake interrogation. Such seems to be the aria she sings. Sadly, she seems also to have sung it to the CIA."

Suslov was struggling to control an honest and therefore overwhelming desire to go immediately to Olivia's lab and shoot her in the face. How could such a wise woman have been so stupid? he raged inside himself. She had wanted to be a bridge so she had called the Central Intelligence Agency? Who did she think they were, the Central Bridge Agency?

Trimenko's next words quenched his rage. "She has already being taken by the FSB." He could see the hideous images filling Suslov's head. "For the moment, she has not been charged with anything and is being well-treated, so long as she does not resist. However, she will not be taken directly to the Lubyanka."

"May I ask why not?"

"She is also being permitted to retain her sidearm. For personal reasons."

Now, Suslov linked his hands around the glass to keep them from shaking and sipped the hot liquid. "Why are they behaving this way?"

"Very honestly, none of us knows what she has done or what it means."

"Us?"

Trimenko paused. "Dmitri Borisovich...I was on a conference call a while ago with General Schwartz of the FSB, who is responsible for this case for now, and with General Getmanov in Washington. We believe that Doctor Tolchinskaya has done nothing untoward since her arrival. But the damn memo exists, is genuine, and cannot be wished away. General Schwartz has devised an unusual procedure. You have a dacha outside of Moscow, do you not?"

"I do. Inherited. It is owned jointly by my sister and me. It is very modest and seldom used, and then only by Valentina when she needs silence and solitude."

Trimenko knew of Valentina and her relationship to the family. Also of her art. Both were complex. "We know. At this moment, Olivia is being taken to that dacha. You will join her there. I assume that there are no weapons at your dacha. Please take your pistol."

Suslov felt nothing, except that he'd leapt from an airplane and was waiting for his parachute to open, knowing it would not. "I would ask you, General Trimenko, to please be explicit about what is...expected of me."

Trimenko exhaled. "We should like you to talk with her, to learn what you can. If she is not clean, it would be preferable in many ways if she handled this herself. Or you did. Before they return in the morning. Even if she is clean, she may reasonably prefer not to take her chances with the FSB. General Schwartz is very concerned that this could get out of hand. Too many people might want it to. So, in essence, we are asking you to do what you can to help us end this situation. Please be clear. It may not be the best thing for all of us if she does go in for questioning. Or it may be. That is for you and her to decide. I am told that the dacha will not be electronically monitored, so there should be no record of what passes between you. General Schwartz wants no record of that, for many reasons, including your...reputation as a soldier. There will be a security perimeter around the dacha. Please don't try to leave."

"Where would we go?" Suslov asked, bitter and astonished.

"One never knows. And Russia is wide."

"So that I do not misunderstand you, General...is there anything that I am being ordered to do specifically?"

"Yes, Dmitri Borisovich. Talk with her. Beyond that, your course of action is yours. And hers."

"Am I to be placed under arrest?"

"Not for the moment. I will handle that, when and if the time comes. At least, I may be informed before the fact. But doubt it not that you are involved, in the eyes of the security services. It could not be any other way."

"I know. I cannot say that you did not warn me of the problems associated with this woman."

"Regrets, my friend?"

"None, comrade General." He spoke with an absolute certainty.

"Now. The other side of all this is that we do not want to lose your services. Not yours and not Doctor Tolchinskaya's, unless we absolutely have to. So please do not act rashly or out of unreasoning fear. I have great difficulty seeing her as any kind of spy and I find it impossible to believe you would betray Russia."

Suslov shook his head. "No, comrade General. No more than Doctor Tolchinskaya would betray America."

"And that is the crux of the problem. She is an American patriot. We know what she did in Vienna. Now we must understand what, if anything, she has done since or might do. We want you to help us understand, if you can. We would like to get through this and return to our present lives, if we can. If you conclude that will not be possible, please help us limit the damage and the pain. For Russia's sake."

"I will, Comrade General Trimenko."

"My friend, my son, I love you and I have come to love her," Trimenko said simply. "I had hoped that you would eventually succeed me as chief of Airborne. That may no longer be possible. But I have always considered you the kind of man to whom I could entrust not just the Airborne, but our country. So, in this way, I am entrusting you with our country now."

Suslov placed his right hand flat on the table and after a few seconds Trimenko took it, then reached out and took Suslov's left hand as well, and held both of his hands in his own for a long time. Then they embraced and kissed and Suslov left.

***

Olivia knew about the Suslov family dacha, an hour north and a little west of Moscow. Neither brother nor sister had been there much since the death of their parents. Only Valentina, for her own reasons. Briefly, she wondered how they would get in without a key. Then she realized that they probably had keys to every door in Russia. Still.

Riding in the car in the back seat with Colonel Zhuralev, her hands uncuffed, the driver and matron up front, Olivia forced herself to think. A picture began to form. They'd let her keep her pistol; Suslov was most likely on his way. It was, very possibly, a setup. They'd shoot the two of them with their own weapons, then call it a murder-suicide or a double suicide or whatever was most convenient to whomever had ordered it. Or perhaps she and her lover really were expected to kill themselves and were being allowed the time to prepare for it. Olivia preferred the first scenario; Suslov might not. If she survived the night, would they really take her into custody for interrogation, as Colonel Zhuralev had said? If she was investigated, then what? She knew what she had done in Vienna. She also knew what she had not done since. She trusted Zhuralev. But he was only a colonel, a subordinate with no real power.

Then there was the matter of what might be fabricated. And then there was the matter that anguished and disgusted her. Those she had endangered. Their names would be on an FSB list.

When we love, we give hostages to fortune.

And then a hideous thought suddenly came to her. Kristinich.

If that came to pass, she would do everything she could to take him with her. Once, Suslov had told her that you could always commit suicide by biting off your own tongue, far enough back to bleed to death. She began to envision what it might be like to grasp Kristinich's tongue and, smashing his jaws together, force him to bite off his own. Then she smiled grimly. Most probably, she could only force him to bite off the tip. But at least he would go through life with a speech impediment, and every word he spoke would be a reminder of how he got it.

Hey, Kristinich, she thought to amuse herself. Stick out your fucking tongue.

***

The small dacha, painted a muted sage green trimmed with white, with a red door, had been built alongside a brook. Across the meadow, perhaps a hundred meters away, there was a birch grove, the mottled black and white limbs of the trees lace against the snow and the sky promising more snow.

They pulled up to the door and got out. The driver followed, carrying Olivia's valise. "Have you any idea if there is a key about?" Zhuralev asked. "We'd rather not pick the lock or break down the door."

After a moment, she remembered. "The key is on my ring." Valentina had given her a copy against the day she, too, might need solitude and silence.

"You understand," he said, "that there will be an armed detail outside all night. They will not observe or bother you while you are inside. It would be safer if you did not venture out. We will come for you at first light, about 0800."

"I understand. Thank you for your courtesy."

"Your pistol, Doctor, is in your valise. With an empty magazine and seven rounds of ammunition." Olivia took the suitcase, then turned away. She did not look back as she went into the dacha. When Zhuralev got back into the car, the musk of her fur and the green, cedary scent of the violets remained.

The dacha, first built as a small summer house, then later insulated against the weather, was very cold and musty from being closed up, too cold for Olivia to remove her wolfskin coat. The first thing she did was build a fire in the peasant masonry stove, which would radiate heat for hours. Then she swept the wide wooden floorboards of the dust that had accumulated since Valentina's last visit.

The dacha was one large room with a kitchen area, a bathroom, a huge, beautifully tiled central masonry stove with a sleeping platform on top and a loft above. Olivia guessed that the platform would have been for the parents, the loft for the children. In the kitchen area, there was a table made from a slab of tree, planed and waxed to a smooth silken sheen, the benches made from the same wood. There were many books, a stereo and a radio, but no television. Carpets, good ones from the Inner Asian Republics before they became separate countries, lay on the floor of the large room. There were cushions and pillows to recline on or pad the benches, but no chairs or couches. There was electricity, water and an indoor composting toilet, but only a nun would have been at home in the austerity. There was also food in the kitchen, not much but still reasonably fresh. Flour, butter, yeast, preserves, sugar and tea. She made herself tea.

Olivia was nervous, awaiting her lover. But she was also, she realized, alone in a haunted building. She wondered what the security detail would think if she joined them, if she found their company preferable to the memories in this place.

There were ghosts in the small building, and Olivia realized they were of Suslov's parents. The man and the woman who might have been her father- and mother-in-law. A man who had died of cancer, a woman who had shortly thereafter suffered a massive stroke and heart attack. How many memories of his first wife, who had killed their daughters quickly before taking her own life to deprive the Germans of the pleasure of burning them to death, had Boris Suslov brought to his second marriage to the Crimean Tartar woman who had chosen the very Russian name of Inna? And what of Suslov's brother and Suslova's husband, both killed in Afghanistan? How many such dachas all over Russia held similar ghosts?

A haunted place. A Russian place. A haunted place in a haunted country that needed desperately to stop making ghosts, but didn't know how to stop, wasn't sure that it could, perhaps wasn't even sure that it wanted to.

Olivia inventoried the kitchen, decided she had enough to make bread, then rolled up her sleeves. A few minutes later, she put the kneaded dough near the stove to rise in the warmth, then climbed the ladder to the sleeping loft. Out of the loft window, she looked across the field to the birch grove. There was something very strange about the trees; they were planted with an unnatural regularity. She did not know what that meant. She did know it bothered her. After some minutes, she put fresh sheets on the bed, and drew out an immense eiderdown comforter from the chest at the foot of the bed. Then she went down and made up the sleeping platform on the stove. She wondered which bed they would use tonight, or if they might sleep separately...or if they might kill themselves separately. She laid aside the thought, checked the rise of the bread, punched it down, then refilled her tea glass, put the bread into the oven, and sat down at the table. Then she remembered her valise. She opened it, took out her pistol, loaded it, chambered a round, put the weapon on safe, then put it down. But her hand stayed upon the lacey, silken steel as she continued, unwillingly, to stare at the grove.

"That is a mass grave," she heard her lover say behind her.

He had not meant to startle her, and he realized how wrapped in thought she must have been for him to have done so. She looked away from the window, wondering if she had lived too long. Brilliant eyes confronted him from a skull of hard, elegant bones, covered with fine, scarred skin, and he realized that there was no one she wanted to see more and no one she wanted to see less.

She rose to him with that lovely, proud courtesy he realized was a part of her and never failed to appreciate.

"Is that loaded?"

"Yes. A round chambered. The safety is on."

He nodded and quietly went to the kitchen, opened the bottle of wine he had brought for them, and poured for them both, realizing with some irony that she had taught him to appreciate the American custom of drinking slowly. "Please, sit," he said gently, joining her. He had taken his time in arriving, allowing his rage to burn itself out. The ashes were still there, but they were only ashes. He hoped there were no remaining embers waiting for ignition.

"You never brought me here because it is haunted."

"Yes. I don't know whether I love or I hate this place. It was given to my mother after the war for what she'd done. Every holiday we could, we came here. One summer, on my way to Afghanistan, Ira and Sasha and I walked out to that grove. It had been a hard winter and I suppose the frost action... We found human bones. If they were German soldiers, I would have thought nothing of it. But they were ours. Their hands had been bound with wire and they'd been shot in the back of their heads. Some of the bones were very small and delicate. We stopped the Germans well west of here, so it was we who murdered our own."

"There were lists, weren't there?"

"Ira and I have talked about that. She tried to find the lists but was told to forget it. The FSB doesn't like to release any of them. If people know who died in these places, they'll also know how they were made to suffer before they were murdered. I don't know if that's right or wrong. If those were my parents, I don't know if I'd want to know. Others feel differently and I understand them. After we found those bones, we had a long conversation here at this table with my parents although they didn't really open up to us until Ira and I came back from Afghanistan. And then my parents came here to die. First my father, then my mother. Valentina comes here to paint, but only very specific pieces that...fit the ambience."

He looked at the pistol where it lay before her. It was not pointing towards him. "General Trimenko has told me that you have some kind of connection to the CIA."

Finally.

"What I tell you, you will know. If I don't tell you, you don't know."

He understood what she was saying and looked at her directly. "Tell me. I want to hear it from you."

In a flat, low voice, she reprised her meeting with Lyons in Vienna. He could feel his rage flaring up again at her stupidity and naïveté. "How could you have been such an idiot?"

"I didn't want to be a traitor," she said simply. "I never expected the life I have made. If I had thought this life was even remotely possible, I would not have done it because all I have done is endanger others."

"Have you been in contact with the CIA since you have been in Russia?"

"No, nor they with me. Not in any way. I have transmitted no information. I have received nothing. No communications, advice, money, instructions, nothing. I've expected none. All I wanted was to be a..."

"It is too late for that," he said, a slow, hard anger in his voice. "Tell me, did you think that if the CIA had contacted you, you would have been able to keep from spying?"

She looked at him very straight. "Yes."

He felt his anger gutter out. "I believe you. Does anyone else know about this?"

She nodded. "Rebecca Taylor at our first, accidental meeting. I told her because I wanted someone, somewhere to know what I hoped my work to do, and that I had not abandoned our country, that I had done all I could before giving up."

"Does everyone but me know about this? Holy Mother of Kazan, Olivia, but a Washington Post reporter?"

"Whom you and your sister know and trust and respect. Who has published nothing about me but has done fine work trying to get Americans to understand a little of what's going on here."

"Anyone else?"

She shook her head. "I would never burden anyone with that. No Russian. Not you. Not my father."

"I believe you."

"Tell me, if I had told you, would you have told anyone?"

"Never."

"I believe you." Then she was silent, wondering whether she and Suslov were about to become the dacha's newest ghosts. And Russia's. Suslov let the simple act of sipping wine calm himself down. He stared at her silently until she could endure it no more. "You have the right to expect atonement."

"Are you asking me to kill you?"

"No. I will not lay that burden on you. But you should not suffer for my idiocy. Neither should anyone else. If necessary to avoid that..."

"If you are going to kill yourself, kill me first," he heard himself say, knowing that the man who owned the voice, meant it. "I cannot bear to see your body."

"You have the right to ask that of me." Her worn voice was very calm, despite the image his words conjured up. "My love, this is a matter of protecting people. We know what happens when people break under torture. They say anything, they make up the most awful lies. The FSB colonel who brought me here said there would be none of that. He seems to believe it. But he is only a colonel and events could take a very different course."

He took her hands and held them, then kissed them. "We are not living in Stalin's years or even Brezhnev's. Once, what you had done would have been enough. But still..." he looked at her pistol, "I doubt they were afraid that I would come unarmed. They just wanted to make a suggestion."

"I know. Are you armed?"

"Of course."

"So we have the means to solve their problem for them."

"Should we so choose. Trimenko has told me that there is a desire to understand what you have done, and retain your services if at all possible. That means a desire to see you set free."

"Do you want me to take my chances in the Lubyanka?"

"Yes," he said simply. "You will always have a final, last-ditch way out, and you will take it if you must." She nodded. It was a simple statement of fact. "But not before. I don't want my country or our world to lose you unnecessarily."

"And you do not want to lose me unnecessarily?"

Suslov rose and kissed her on the top of her head, then sat again. "Honestly, Olivia. There are times when I wish I knew what part of the human brain governs common sense and if perhaps we could find a transplant for you."

"I just wanted reassurance. It's a JAP kind of thing."

"Consider yourself reassured, princess. Now to another matter. Since we have chosen not to kill ourselves before we have to, the issue becomes what we do until we are taken away."

" _We?"_

"You did not let me face Chechnya alone. Do you think I did not realize that? Do you think I do not know that you refused to let Russian soldiers face Chechnya alone? For their sakes and mine, do you think I will let you face the Lubyanka alone?"

"You will not, Dmitri Borisovich. Not until they come for you on their own."

"Do you expect me just to go about my business as a student while you are alone in that terrible place?"

"Yes."

"And do nothing?"

"There is one thing you might do for me. It is a very large thing. It may not be possible and it may also be wrong. But find a way to get word to Rebecca Taylor."

"Approach her directly?"

"Not unless you have to. But we know someone who can."

"And who might that be?"

"CC Cooper."

Suslov let out his breath. Involving an American officer and an American journalist... "There are many issues here," he said slowly. "The first is Colonel Cooper." He paused, not knowing how to say it.

She said it for him. "In whose eyes I am almost certainly, if not a traitor, than the next closest thing. But maybe not. He understands my motivations and agrees, at least in the abstract. He doesn't want another Cold War, he doesn't want Russia to disintegrate, and he wouldn't be here if he didn't like Russia, or at least want to understand. He will do what he believes best for America."

"Which leaves us with Miss Taylor, and the larger issue of the American press. Miss Taylor is not the problem. I met her before she was a reporter. I respected her then, and more now. I trust her. The issue is your press. Even if they could get their minds off the whereabouts of your President Clinton's penis or which movie star is going to which fancy clinic to dry out, why would they report this at all? If they do, one of two things will happen. Both bad. Either they'll forget all about it and leave you right where you are, sitting in the Lubyanka, or they'll keep at it and infuriate some people who might be working quietly on your behalf."

"The friends I haven't even met yet," she said with a small laugh.

"Please?"

"At my farewell encounter with Major Kristinich, I told him there was an American proverb. I have friends I haven't even met yet."

"Perhaps you do. You certainly have enemies you haven't met."

"I may meet them tomorrow. Have you ever poured some vodka into Rebecca and encouraged her to discuss the shortcomings of the American press?" Suslov shook his head. "Your sister and I have, and were stunned by some of the things she had to say."

"Rather like CC Cooper on the Pentagon, after he's poured some bourbon into himself."

"Two Americans who understand America and Russia. We could do worse."

"General Trimenko said twice that he wanted neither of us to act rashly."

"Colonel Zhuralev, the arresting officer, told me the same thing."

"Then I guess he's one of your new friends."

"If so, then there are Russians, even in the FSB, who want to help."

"So," Suslov said slowly, "don't make it harder for them. If this gets into the American media, there's no way it can be kept out of the Russian media. Have you thought of that? It will certainly anger people and it may force their hands. It may give some hideous people ammunition. There is a very small potential positive to this and a very large, real negative."

"I know that. But if we don't go public, we do nothing to let America know that there are good people contending with monsters here."

"You have not renounced your citizenship and have been a loyal American. But your government will not see it that way. Our nations are between worlds right now and I doubt they will lift a finger for you."

"I understand," she said. "I've offered my idea. Something you might do for me. You are going to have to be guided by your best judgment, and if you get word to Colonel Cooper, you will tell him that he and Taylor must do the same thing."

"There are some very large issues in play. They may not wish to involve themselves in where this could go."

"I know that. But it's their decision."

"Then you must understand my final problem with this. To go to an American reporter, to go to Americans, violates everything I've ever understood about loyalty to Russia."

"Why? I am an American. Our countries are no longer enemies."

"It is still treachery."

"Why?"

"Because, my love, we Russians know that, in the end, we have only ourselves, and to require the help of another is treason to that truth."

"Dmitri Borisovich," she said quietly, "I wish I knew what part of the brain controls common sense, so I might arrange a transplant for Russia. We Jews know that in the end we have only ourselves. America will learn that lesson about herself, soon enough. But it is not treachery that brings us together and makes us need each other. It is civilization. Unless we help each other when we can, when we must, there will be no civilization."

"Perhaps. But as a general officer, I must respect more stringent standards. I have to assume that if this goes public, it will be traced back to me. At best, my service may be over. I may end up in front of a court martial. If that happens, I will kill myself. But to do nothing is intolerable." He paused. "There is another treachery here. If you know that General Trimenko has asked me to find out what I can, you know I am obligated to report this conversation back to him. What do you want me to say?"

"You're a soldier and he is your superior. You love and trust him. How can you even ask me such a thing?"

"Because the issues at stake are very large."

"They are. And Taylor and Cooper may find them irresistible for that reason."

Suslov was holding her hands across the table while they spoke. Now he took her head in his hands. "Very well. I will contact Colonel Cooper and ask him to have Rebecca Taylor do whatever. We Russians have never liked reading about our problems in the American press."

"A Shande für die Goyim."

"What?"

"A scandal in front of the Gentiles. One of the few Yiddish phrases my father ever taught me. It's a Jewish thing."

"Russian, too. No doubt. I will lie to General Trimenko. That alone is enough to disgrace me, at the least. After that, whatever happens, happens. However..."

"Yes?"

"If you change your mind in the morning about letting them take you, kill me first. I cannot bear to see your body," he charged her again.

"I promise," she said somberly. "But I do not think I will change my mind."

Still holding her head, he kissed her so deeply that it startled her. She braced for an instant, then yielded.

Tasting her mouth, smelling the violets and cedar of her perfume, he made his decision. "We are not Romeo and Juliet."

"The dove Juliet..." Olivia whispered. "That's what your greatest poet called her. In a poem she wrote when the Soviet Union was allied with the Nazis, sharing the spoils, and London was being bombed."

"Her poetry is among my parents' books. Suslov went to the shelves, searched a bit, withdrew an old volume, scanned the contents until he found "To the Londoners."

There by the leaden river

We would rather, today, with torches and singing,

Be bearing the dove Juliet to her grave

"We are not Romeo and Juliet," Suslov repeated. "They cared about nothing but themselves, even if their deaths ended the war between their families. We care too much for this world to leave it to those who might be inconvenienced by our existence. If we die, it will be because those who willed it, had no choice but to do it themselves. In that case, our deaths will serve a purpose. They will be a warning that the former ways are returning. If we live, we will go on, against the day we finally do die, when we'll know if we are leaving the world better than we found it. I will tell Cooper. He can always go back to America. But I will not tell Trimenko. He cannot leave."

"Agreed. Thank you."

Later that evening, he lit the lantern in the loft, then undressed her, his strong hands very gentle on her body. At first she resisted a little, seriously, not her usual provocation of their desire. He could feel her physical power and running beneath her skin not rage or refusal or rejection but utter bewilderment. "This is permissible," he said. "This is not our final time together. It is the beginning of whatever comes next."

"Dmitri Borisovich...the next man who touches me, in that prison..."

"Will not be kind. So let me be kind now."

She let out her breath in a great sigh and yielded to the wisdom of his mouth and hands and body.

***

Olivia stood on the porch of the dacha for a few seconds, savoring the pristine and ermine silence occasioned by a heavy fall of new snow. Then, slowly, one step at a time, as if moving through a minefield or very deep water, she walked towards Colonel Zhuralev, carrying her valise in her left hand.

Zhuralev stood braced against the door of his car, his maimed leg shaking, his belly feeling again the bullets. She had not shot herself. But she might still resist. He looked toward the dacha's window for the presence of General Suslov. He saw no one.

"Good morning, Colonel. I trust none of your men have frostbite."

The simple civility stunned him. "No, Doctor. They are fine, but you are kind to ask."

"We did not hear them."

"I told them that it required only one man to monitor the house. The others could take refuge from the elements in that grove." He pointed across the open field. "They slept well when not on watch. They are there now, if needed. I do not believe they will be."

Olivia nodded. "No, they will not. Thank you for that courtesy."

"How do you wish to proceed?"

"I will now reach into my pocket and surrender my pistol."

"I will accept it."

Giving herself no time to change her mind, she reached into the pocket of her wolfskins, withdrew her pistol by the barrel, then handed it to him butt first.

It was, Zhuralev knew, an act of pure defiance. He nodded to his driver, who came out with a pair of handcuffs. "I am sorry to have to do this, but they won't be tight."

She shook, badly, as they cuffed her hands behind her, and Zhuralev knew she was shaking not only with fear but also with the immense restraint she had imposed upon herself.

They assisted her into the back seat, positioning her so that her pinioned hands were in the corner between the seat and the door, so that her weight would not be on them, and then Zhuralev joined her. She said nothing at all, but stared straight ahead. In the enclosed space, he could smell her perfume, the scent of smoke and stones and very faintly, of rose and iris. The proud and mournful scent of some noble fortress now in ruins, a scent he'd never encountered before and knew, therefore, that he would always hauntingly associate with her.

He ordered his driver to proceed.

# CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE LUBYANKA

General Suslov's duty station was the Voroshilov General Staff Academy. The new semester was underway and he, like the rest of the fall seminar, was enrolled in CC Cooper's new course. Having no direct orders to the contrary, he decided to go to work. He dressed and closed up the dacha. The house had acquired its next generation of ghosts. He got into his Zhiguli, a simple black four door sedan of a staff car that Trimenko had lent him, and returned to the Academy. He was unaccustomed to driving—men of his rank had drivers—and had never cared for the activity. Yesterday, rage had kept him from feeling the tedium and distaste of traffic. Today, fear did the same.

He arrived in time for Cooper's class, which he uncharacteristically felt was a good omen for the decision he and Olivia had made. He sat at the table quietly, listening, taking notes, feeling utterly dead inside. He made eye contact whenever he could with Colonel Cooper, staring hard as though he could communicate his message without actually having to say it. After a few repetitions, Cooper looked at him knowingly.

Neither man was surprised when a young orderly brought Suslov a note. He read it, then quickly rose to leave. Cooper watched him go. Such interruptions were not uncommon; his students, after all, were far from mere students. But now Cooper knew that Suslov's eye games held meaning, and that their meaning was not unrelated to his departure.

Little alcohol and less sleep, General Trimenko thought as Suslov entered the same conference room where they'd met the day before. Yesterday, Trimenko had thought of delivering his message by secure telephone, then rejected it. When you tell a man you love that he might have to kill the woman he loves and perhaps also himself, when you tell a man that the woman he loves might be a spy, you do it to his face. Suslov came to a brief attention. Trimenko motioned for him to sit, then took the chair across from him.

"I have been informed that Doctor Tolchinskaya has been taken into custody. I am glad, Dmitri Borisovich, that you are...alive."

"I imagine that the proper response is, 'Thank you.' We chose to survive. I hope it turns out to be a wise decision."

"I also. Have you learned anything?" he asked, watching Suslov's face very closely.

Suslov looked back at him and spoke the language he and Olivia had rehearsed together. "We talked for some hours. She told me this much. She was not a spy, a mole, a sleeper agent, a traitor to anybody, or anything else. She had neither transmitted nor received anything, was awaiting nothing, and would have refused any approaches. She had never made any offer to spy, had in fact explicitly rejected the suggestion she do so because she would not have such betrayals marked against her soul. She offered herself to the CIA, once and once only, as a bridge. It is the same hope she has expressed many times to many people. She said that nothing to the contrary would be found at home, at work, on her computers, in her lab or accounts. And," he added with a small rise in his voice, "she said that she had told no one of her appalling stupidity in approaching her own government in that manner."

"I see," Trimenko said quietly. Then he asked the question he had to ask, even though he knew the answer would be a lie. "Have you anything else to tell me?"

"No, Comrade General. I do not."

Trimenko exhaled. He did not believe him. And yet, if this man, or any man, let his woman go to a fate like that without having some other course of action in mind, he was nothing but a coward. He made his choice. "It may have been a mistake to leave the two of you alone in an unmonitored dacha. It may not have been. Only time will tell. However, given the volatility of the situation, I cannot have you going about as though nothing has happened. For everyone's sake, I am placing you under house arrest at your dacha."

So I am going back there. As my own ghost. Will there be a real ghost to meet me?

"Please collect your things from the seminar room," Trimenko went on. "Then go to your quarters. One of my aides will meet you there to help you pack whatever you'll need. Once you are at the your dacha, determine what provisions you will need for the next few days. He will attend to that. He will not stay with you, but he will be on call, should you need anything. For the moment, there will be no security detail. Please do not leave or attempt to contact anyone."

A pause. Then: "Comrade General, I must make a formal request."

"If this is to appeal your house arrest, it will do you no good."

"No, not that. I formally request that if Doctor Tolchinskaya does not come out of this as a free woman, unharmed, I share her fate with her."

Trimenko swallowed hard. Now I have two problem children. "Please. No dramatics."

"I am not being dramatic, General. I am stating my intentions. I wish to make them clear to the FSB. In writing."

"Dmitri Borisovich, you're becoming as dense as your lady. You do not simply pen a memo to the FSB. To Whom It May Concern: If you imprison my lover, could we please share the same cell? If you execute her, I'd like to be shot alongside her."

"I may be dense. But I am also serious. I will not live in or serve a country that imprisons or kills her."

"I will let certain persons of my acquaintance in the FSB command structure know of your attitude. I do not say, intention. This is a hard day for all of us, Olivia especially, and you may not wish to get too stubborn too soon. And if the lady is set free, what will you do?"

"Marry her."

"You are very certain of her."

"As certain as I am of you or myself, comrade General. Do you think she will have me?"

"You're perfect for each other. So I've reluctantly come to believe. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. You two gallop. Very well, General. Now. Please give me your word. Once you leave this building, you will do or say nothing that might affect the situation in any way at all. You will go to your dacha and wait until I or someone of the FSB contacts you. Your word, my son?"

"I promise. After I leave this building, I will do nothing."

Trimenko blanched a bit at the phrasing. In silence, he embraced and kissed the younger man farewell, holding him very close for a few seconds, then released him to whatever would happen next.

***

Something is wrong, Cooper thought as Suslov returned to take his seat. The man seemed turned utterly inward. He wrapped up the session as quickly as he could, then dismissed the students, adding a brief apology that he wouldn't be able to stay after class to take questions and chat. However, his bar would be open as usual at noon and he had several new brands of bourbon to share.

The seminar room emptied. Suslov went into the corridor and walked slowly. Cooper gathered up his notes and fell in behind the general. Then he came alongside him, pretending to read his notes as they walked.

"Olivia," Suslov said quietly, "has been arrested on suspicion of espionage and is being held in the Lubyanka. The charges are false but the FSB does have a genuine basis on which to proceed: a basis provided by the CIA. Olivia wants you to contact Rebecca Taylor of the Washington Post. She knows what that basis is, and has promised to do certain things in the event this happened. It has happened. I cannot order you to do this, obviously. I am only asking that you do this to help Olivia and our two countries."

"And what of you?"

"I am to be held under house arrest, alone at my family dacha, until the situation develops further. General Trimenko has ordered me to say and do nothing after I leave this building. I am complying with his orders exactingly."

Cooper briefly raised his eyes from his papers and smiled a bit. "You Russians place a high value on exactingness."

"We do, Colonel. It is our way. I have made it clear to General Trimenko that I choose to share Olivia's fate, whatever that might turn out to be, in whatever way might be open to me. Please consider Olivia's request. Our request. It is not made lightly."

And then he was gone, striding ahead of Cooper, who found himself standing still in the middle of an ornate, busy hallway, pretending to study his papers, while thinking in the hypertrophic Kentucky inner accent he used when it was time for serious decisions.

Well, now, what we got here? We got ourselves a Russkie gin-rel, a pretty decent fella and a damn fine soldier, askin' me, an American colonel what spent two wars killin' Commies and some other stuff...askin' me, right here in friggin' Moscow, to go to a Washington Post reporter so she can most like do a story to help spring his American girlfriend from the Lubby-Yanky or whatever they call it. His American girlfriend, what used to work at Los Alamos, but moved to Russia to make the Russkies gear I wish to Holy Jesus and Robert E. Lee that we had ourselves, but don't 'cause we turned her down 'cause it didn't cost enough. If she's really an American spy, guess I'll have to improve my opinion of her. If she ain't, well, her lover says she ain't, but he's only a Russkie gin-rel, so what does he know?

I kinda like 'em both.

He looked up at the officers passing by on their way to class. Nearly all knew him or of him. Nearly all spoke or nodded. He nodded back.

OK, Colonel. Decision time. You pays your money and you takes your choice. But damn it, all I really wanted outa this trip was a nice zakuska. Course, this is a chance to meet this Miss Rebecca. You might get lucky there, CC. Stranger things have happened.

***

Olivia was in a holding cell. Her possessions had been inventoried and taken away. She had then been searched and exchanged her clothing for a loose prison uniform and felt slippers. Except for the arresting officer, Colonel Zhuralev, and his detail, she had been handled exclusively by women guards. She was addressed as Doctor and in the formal manner. Olivia was formal and polite to her guards. No need to complicate anything.

The cell was not designed to cause pain. There was light from a caged bulb and a narrow cot that took half the cell. She could pace back and forth beside the cot. The temperature was comfortable, there was water and a toilet, which she had used, purging herself of what little remained in her. She'd had nothing to eat but some bread the night before. This morning she could have managed nothing and so she h

ad not tried. Now she was left alone, neither hungry nor in pain, to ponder the greatest mistake of her life.

Trying to offer value one last time to her country. Trying to be herself in a country that wanted neither her nor her work. Trying to be an American.

So far, she had been treated correctly, as she had been since her first hour in Russia. How long that correct treatment would last, she could not know. She knew that if it came to torture, it was over. They would no longer want truth. They, whoever they might be, would then want confessions, the implication of others, assent to any ludicrous tale they might concoct for whatever purposes they might hold. Idly, she wondered what the compensation package of an FSB torturer amounted to, whether there was an FSB budget line item for torturers, or whether it was folded into some other category. Special projects, perhaps. Or maybe, the department of subhuman resources.

This was not a situation that her CIA handler or case officer might get her out of. She had no handler, no case officer and although it was probable that her government knew something about her, they would probably regard her as an inconvenience, a freak, a traitor. But nothing more. She was not one of theirs. They might not even care to trade for her. Why should they? Her fate would be determined by Russians and Russians only.

But she hadn't come to Russia to die. She'd come to Russia to live and do work that needed to be done, and she was not yet done with either her work or her life. Pain would be no obstacle. The thought made her newly grateful for the serious and permanent injuries she had sustained in the crash of that Cessna. There had been a time when she couldn't imagine offering gratitude for pain: for the injuries, the rehab, the life afterwards when nothing worked as it should.

Then there was her boxing coach and sparring partner.

She might call Lieutenant Colonel Vladimir Alexandrovich Malinovsky that. With more justice, she might call him her brother, although whether he might still want her as a sister when he learned...that was a question whose probable answer she could not bear to consider.

"You know how to endure pain," he'd told her. "That's good." In fact, learning to bear pain had saved her sanity. "But you do not know how to use pain. That's better. Time you learned how."

Enduring punishment was not the same thing as enduring pain. Especially when the point of enduring punishment was to set your opponent up so you could administer punishment to him.

Valentina, who had never boxed, whose life was built around creation, had understood that very well.

Beloved General.

Brother Vladimir.

Be with me now. Even if you hate me as you should.

Let me not wrong you. Not to save myself.

Worse than the prospect of pain or damage was the idea of being used against Russians who had done nothing wrong. Once upon a time, in living memory, her name on that CIA memo would have meant the torture and liquidation of all who had known her, helped her, worked with her, loved her. She would have been forced to implicate them, if she were unable to find a way to die. She blessed Suslov and his dead father for his advice there. Just put out your tongue and bite down hard. Smash your lower jaw into a table top or your skull into a wall or anything to get it done. That was always available. And in the end, the only thing that mattered was to keep faith. Only she should suffer for her stupidity.

Play it straight, Olivia. Keep it simple and play it straight.

***

CC Cooper went to his distinguished visiting professor's flat at the Academy's officers' hostel, a two-room affair that would have been called a "deluxe efficiency" back in America. He considered it neither deluxe nor efficient. He got a yellow pad from his desk, scrawled on it, Bar Closed until Further Notice. Sorry, and taped it to his outer door. He then poured himself a stiff bourbon over ice, rummaged in the refrigerator for a bit of cheese and salami, chewed thoughtfully, and calmly analyzed the possibilities. If he tried to help Olivia, he could not expect his role not to become known. It would be traced. In any event, he wasn't going to make a single phone call, then sit back and hope for the best. In for a kopek, in for a buck. He was going to get involved, deliberately and open-endedly, in a Russian mess and perhaps an international mess as well. He didn't have diplomatic immunity, but neither was he just another tourist or businessman. He could very easily wind up in jail himself, at least for a few hours or days or weeks. He wasn't too worried about what the Russians might do to him. He did have friends at Voroshilov, who had friends elsewhere, and Uncle Sammy wouldn't take too kindly to a man of his years and distinction getting worked over or worse. Kicking him out of their country was far more likely. They certainly wouldn't shave his head and send him back to Vietnam. Or to Chechnya.

But should he help Olivia?

What Olivia had done appalled him. True enough, all that verbiage about common enemies and the like. But to go to Russia as a private person who had worked on American classified projects, to develop vital technologies for them and then to participate in their wars herself...the Constitution might not call it treason but in his mind, in the mind of any average American, it came pretty damn close to treason. Or to insanity. And yet Cooper knew that from her perspective, her decision had been eminently rational. Her career was stalled, her life going nowhere. Her country refused, over and over, when she offered her best. Somebody made her an offer she liked. She accepted.

Perfectly rational. But not for that reason, right. Never would he call it right. But she was. Right to do it, right to hope that more might someday come of it.

Damn, my head's startin' to hurt from all this. OK. Just because it's right don't mean I have to say it is. But I sure don't like the idea of Americans ending up in Russian dungeons, locked up by the people they been helpin'. Ain't exactly hospitable. But most of all. Come on, Coop, face facts. Most of all...

I've always wanted to visit the Moscow Bureau of the Washington Post. I just betcha it's a fascinatin' place. All them smart people. And hell, if I end up in the Lubby-Yanky for a couple days, it'll give me some stories I can improve for the rest of my life. Who's gonna dispute them? Some Russkie, probably, who shows up teachin' at Carlisle. Just my luck.

CC Cooper poured himself another bourbon, then called a contact at the American embassy and asked for the address and phone number of the Washington Post Moscow Bureau. Five minutes later, a phone rang.

"Taylor."

The voice that drilled into her was imperious, stern, unmistakably American, the faint Southern accent only giving emphasis to the precise enunciation. "Ms. Taylor, my name is CC Cooper. I'm a retired US Army colonel, currently on the faculty of the Army War College back in the States. I'm here for a year as a visiting professor at the Voroshilov General Staff College."

"What can I do for you, Colonel?"

"We have a friend in common. She's in trouble."

"Can you be more specific?"

"Not until we meet. A very close friend of hers told me to get in touch with you. He said that you'd know what this is about and what to do. How soon can you see me?"

"How soon can you be here?"

"I'm on my way."

***

Olivia judged she had been in the holding cell for several hours when she was taken to an interrogation room, about four meters by four meters. It had two chairs, bolted to the floor so they could not be used as weapons. A table, likewise bolted. Across from where she knew she would be sitting, an opaque one-way window like the one at Tver. She sat down, folded her hands neatly on the table, nodded into the window, noticed that if she inclined her head just so, she could see her own dim, wraithlike reflection. She nodded to herself. The reflection nodded back. Then she withdrew into herself to resume her waiting.

On the other side of the window, standing beside the video recorder that would film all her sessions, Colonel Sergei Lazarevich Raduyev watched her. Normal procedure before beginning. Adjust the volume, the lens, the angles. He wanted to get a sense of how nervous she was. But this was no normal interrogation. He had read her file and he was more than a little in awe of her. He did not want Doctor Tolchinskaya to be guilty.

She was very still and after some minutes, he sensed that she was very much less nervous and frightened than ashamed. But not with the shame of contrition. He'd seen that before, seen it genuine and seen it faked. Neither moved him. This was the shame of innocence defiled. Her eyes were clear and observant, but her head was bowed. Usually, that meant despair. Here it indicated less fear than internal torment. That was not a reaction he was used to. It intrigued him. The complexity of the case intrigued him. So did the absurdity. He watched a few minutes more, then chose his approach.

The door of the room opened. A man in turtleneck and jeans entered with a uniformed guard. "Good afternoon, Doctor Tolchinskaya. My name is Colonel Raduyev. I am in charge of your interrogation. You have been correctly treated?"

She rose and inclined her head slightly to him. "Good afternoon, Colonel. I have been, thank you for asking."

He turned to the guard. "Please bring us both some water in paper cups."

Raduyev sat down across from her, feeling slightly afraid of her. Normally, he would have considered it a disgrace to be physically intimidated by a woman, but not this one, with her fine, scarred face and hint of a boxer's nose, and her beautiful, strong neck and hands. Fear of what she could do, if she was pushed very hard, and it would have to be very hard because she also seemed extremely stable, was prudent, self-protective. He was glad, once again, that he stayed in shape and hadn't gotten fat over the years. Physical intimidation mattered in such a small space and this woman would not appreciate being pressured by a slob.

He placed his hands on the table top while his right knee pressed against the button on the inside of the desk. Interrogators went in unarmed. If they used a translator, there were two of them to subdue a prisoner who suddenly panicked or attacked. One-on-one was a bit different. The button connected to a light by the guard post outside the door. When that light flashed, a guard or two went in to do whatever needed to be done. The alert could also be activated from behind the one-way window. An observer with sufficient authority could use it to stop the interrogation.

The guard returned, carrying two paper cups of water. Raduyev thanked him. The guard nodded. The alarm system worked.

"I know that you were interrogated during your in-processing. The best way for you to proceed now is to behave in a similar manner. We have some questions to ask you about your relationship to your government."

"I understand."

"Since you have been through this before, you will understand certain procedures that I am and am not using. You will note, for example, that unlike your intake interrogation, I am using no laptop to communicate outside this room. Nor have I even brought in paper for note-taking. If you were to assume that this session is being recorded, you would be correct. But my intention at this, our first session, is just to talk."

"I understand."

"I am sure you also understand that this does not fit into any of our standard categories. It is not hostile in the sense that we assume you must be broken before you will talk. But neither is it non-hostile, in the sense that we can assume your truthful co-operation. Despite the fact that you've worked for us, neither is this a debriefing of one of our own people. It is somewhere in between or perhaps in some other place entirely. This makes it all the more important to decide as soon as possible how this is to be classified. That will determine how we proceed. It will also be of importance to my superiors. I am sure you understand that there is interest in this case at higher levels."

"I do."

"Very well, Doctor Tolchinskaya. I will leave the initial determination to you. How shall we proceed? Hostile or non-hostile?"

Olivia eyes locked onto Raduyev's and he saw neither fear nor shame now, only dignity. "Non-hostile."

"I appreciate that. But now you must show that you mean it. Please tell me in your own words, taking all the time you wish...why do you think you are here?"

Olivia saw the ground rushing toward her. "There is very little to be said. When I was in Vienna, just before I came here, I contacted the United States embassy on what I said would be a matter of interest to them. I identified myself and asked to meet with someone who had a clue. They sent a man to meet me by the name of Jay Lyons. He did not identify which agency or department he worked with. I assume he was CIA. I identified myself to him in more detail and explained to him that I was on my way to Russia to accept an offer of employment by Russian Military Intelligence to develop tactical sensors for the Russian army. I told him that since the United States and Russia had enemies and concerns in common, perhaps what I was doing might serve as some sort of bridge between our countries. His initial response was pure sarcasm."

"What did he say?"

"Something on the order of, 'What do you think this is, the Central Bridge Agency?'"

"Not a particularly astute response. Go on."

She paused. "I'd gotten off a nine-hour flight the day before and was in considerable pain from having to sit so long. I'd used morphine during the flight. I checked into my hotel and drank a bottle of wine. But I waited for my head to clear, at least I thought my head was clear, before I made the call. I kept the appointment the next day, hung-over but sober."

"Go on."

"When I left America, I knew that I could probably never return. I'd accepted that as the price I had to pay. I'd told no one where I was going or why, not even my father. But I could not bear to leave my country without some final attempt to get through. Colonel, when I left, I knew I was starting a new life. But I was also vanishing without a trace. Can you imagine what that's like?"

"Yes," he answered quietly, "I can. Please continue."

"Mr. Lyons told me that human spies were passé. I told him I was not offering to be a spy. I told him I was offering to be a bridge." Then she laughed. The sound was bitter and hard.

"Doctor?"

"Forgive me, Colonel. I was just realizing how many times I've said this over the last two and a half years, to how many people. Over and over and over. If I'd known growing up that I would become so taken with the idea of building bridges, I'd have gone into civil engineering and built them for real. It would have been simpler."

Raduyev smiled at her gently. "The problem with being a bridge is that you spend your time hanging over empty space while people walk all over you. Please continue."

"Mr. Lyons was contemptuous of Russia. He also told me that I was clearly emotionally unstable. However, he said that he would write a memo and maybe someday something would come of it."

"Do you think something has come of it?"

Olivia looked down at her own hands. "Colonel, I have no definite knowledge of why I am here. I made the decision to tell you this at the beginning because it is true. I did it. I was an idiot. If I am here for some other reason, I assume that I will be told in due time. This is why I believe I am here."

"Would you consider it unreasonable if I believed that you concocted this somewhat piteous tale in order to evade other possibilities?"

Olivia showed her teeth a little, raising all the hairs on the back of Raduyev's neck. "If there are other possibilities, please tell me what they are."

"Let us return to this Jay Lyons business. Do you believe that he wrote the memo?"

"At this point, I must assume that he did. I must also assume that, in some way or other, it came into your possession."

"How do you think that came about?"

"You paid someone for it," she said, her eyes now blue pits of disgust and contempt.

Raduyev chose not to respond. "If I am to believe you, this means that when you were asked during your intake interrogation at Tver, 'Since you terminated your employment at Los Alamos, have you been in touch with your government or have they been in touch with you?' you lied."

"That is correct. On the plane to Moscow, I decided to pretend my meeting with Mr. Lyons had never happened and hope for the best."

"Why did you lie to us?"

"If I had told the truth, what would have happened?"

Raduyev decided to press her. "Why did you lie to us?"

"Because I may be an idiot, but I'm a consistent idiot."

Against all his training and experience, Raduyev laughed. "I would not dispute that."

"Colonel...may I?"

"Continue."

"I understand interrogation techniques. Once someone is caught in a lie, it is assumed that there are other lies to be uncovered. The process is extremely repetitive and time-consuming. I don't suppose we can avoid it. So I would just like to summarize now. I have told you what happened in Vienna on the assumption that it's best to come clean at the beginning. I lied in Tver out of fear, of course. I lied because I wanted my life and my work. I lied because I refused to accept the possibility of being—what is the correct terminology?—turned around and used against my own country. I lied because I was..."

"Go on."

"I lied because I was unwilling to endanger two people who had been very kind to me."

"Who were they?"

"The Getmanovs."

"I see."

"Then you also know that, in my time here, I have entered into many friendships and relationships with good people. The thought of endangering those people shames and sickens me. That is why I decided to tell my story at the start, whether or not you have such a document in your possession."

"So that I do not misunderstand you. Two and a half years ago, you decided to pretend that your meeting with Mister Lyons did not happen. Now you are coming clean with a story that we may never have heard, a story that may itself be a lie, in order to protect Russians."

"That is half-correct. The story is true."

Raduyev looked at her hard. "You do understand that your story is..."

She looked hard back at him. "True."

"The truth and, as you Americans like to brag, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?"

Still hard eye contact. "Yes."

"What else?"

"I believe," she said finally, "that it is time to proceed to the next phase."

Raduyev was silent for a moment. Never had he permitted a prisoner to guide an interrogation. He'd had other prisoners say much the same thing, but in a sham defiance that broke quickly enough. This was different. "Very well," he said, calmly taking back control, "I shall now ask you a series of questions that can be answered, yes or no. We will go through the entire series before coming back to anything that might require additional attention. Am I clear?"

"Yes, Colonel."

"Just yes or no."

"Yes."

"Since your meeting with Mister Lyons in Vienna, have you initiated contact with any government but the Russian?"

"No."

"Since your meeting with Mister Lyons in Vienna, has any government but the Russian been in contact with you?"

"No."

"Are you awaiting any such contact?"

"No."

"Are you planning any such contact?"

"No."

Raduyev paused, then took a folded piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to Olivia.

Memorandum for the Record

From: Lyons, Jay, Deputy Assistant Chief of Station, Embassy of the United States, Vienna, Austria

Subject: _Tolchin_ , Olivia Lathrop, US National, Possible Defector to Russia

Date: 27 May 1994

On the evening of 23 May 1994, Dr. Olivia Lathrop _Tolchin_ , US national, telephoned the US Embassy in Vienna, Austria. _Tolchin_ identified herself by name and nationality and hinted broadly that she would like to speak to someone who would understand a matter of intelligence interest. _Tolchin_ suggested a lunchtime meeting at the Café Landtmann. I met her there the following day, May 24.

_Tolchin_ was provocatively dressed, obviously hung-over, and in a drug-induced stupor. _Tolchin_ claimed to hold a Ph.D. from MIT; to have worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory; to hold TS/SCI clearances whose names I did not recognize (except for the standard Q clearance, denoting nuclear access); and to be on her way to Russia to accept an offer of employment from Russian Military Intelligence. _Tolchin_ claimed that her assignment was to stand up a facility to develop tactical battlefield ground sensors, particularly for use in Chechnya. I did not believe her.

_Tolchin_ told me that she wanted to be a bridge of some sort between Russia and America, stating that despite Russia's obvious weakness, corruption, and decay, she, in her words, did not believe a weak and hostile Russia was in best interests of America, Russia, or our world. I asked if she was offering to serve as a spy, and she emphatically said that she was not. I explained that we did not need some kind of international free-lance military do-gooder who was obviously very troubled emotionally and into some very bad habits. At that point, _Tolchin_ became very distraught, drinking heavily and lecturing me on international relations. _Tolchin_ drew very close to me physically. I drew back and indicated again that I was not interested in whatever she had in mind. When I suggested that she abandon this ludicrous project (if it existed), go home and get her life in order, she became personally abusive and insulting.

Upon my return to the embassy, on the off-chance that _Tolchin_ might be who she said she was, I contacted Los Alamos. They responded several hours later, indicating that she did indeed hold a Ph.D. from MIT; had worked for them; held the clearances she had told me she held; and did have considerable expertise in sensor technology. They indicated their awareness that _Tolchin_ used a number of controlled substances by prescription, including valium, codeine and morphine, following injuries sustained in a light plane crash. They also informed me that _Tolchin_ had resigned her position; had successfully completed her out-processing, including exit polygraph; and had asked for and obtained permission to attend a conference in Vienna, IAW standard post-employment procedures and current interdict and travel policies and guidelines. Los Alamos did not appear to be unhappy over her resignation and expressed no further interest in _Tolchin_.

Since _Tolchin_ had worked on classified projects and held code word clearances, I initiated standard detention procedures for US nationals attempting to defect. These were unsuccessful. Apparently, _Tolchin_ had already left for Russia or wherever she was going next.

Conclusion: _Tolchin_ , Olivia is alcoholic, drug-addicted, probably promiscuous, given to grandiosity, more than a little delusional, and therefore utterly unreliable. If _Tolchin_ did indeed go to Russia, they are welcome to her.

Recommendation: No further action required. File.

As Olivia read the memo, a slow wave of pure rage crept up her spine. It was the same rage she'd felt as the plane hit the ground, as she fought the men who'd killed Simonov, as she'd faced down Kristinich, as she'd lived whenever it became essential to take action. All of it, now suffused with shame. But shame was all she had left. There was no action she could take now, in this place, no action that could redeem her, save death.

Olivia handed him back the memo in silence, breathing hard, her eyes and mouth white around the corners, her hand shaking a little. Raduyev gave her a solid minute to regain her self-control. "Tell me your thoughts."

"I have only two," she answered calmly.

"What are they?"

"That my idiocy and dishonesty may have endangered the innocent, whose only crime has been to know me."

"And the other thought?"

She laughed. "The part of that memo about my becoming abusive. He'd said to me, 'Take care of yourself, babe.' I really didn't care for the babe."

"And you replied?"

"'Take care of yourself, gelding.'"

Her Russian was very fluent, but he wished to be clear. "Gelding?"

"A castrated stallion. I'd watched the morning work of the Spanish Riding School and was thinking about their stallions. After reading that memo, I realize now what an insult that comment was to every gelding on the planet."

"An interesting combination of thoughts. Now, Doctor Tolchinskaya, I ask you this. Do you repent of what you did in Vienna?"

"I repent of nothing that I did for the right reasons. I repent of my stupidity. I repent of endangering the innocent."

"Would you do it again?"

"Knowing what I know now...never. If my country ever again wants anything of me, first they'll have to..."

"Have to...what?"

"Get a life."

"I understand."

"Do you believe that, apart from Vienna and Tver, I am what I say I am?"

"Doctor Tolchinskaya," he said slowly, intrigued once again at her ability to turn things around in this room, "that is a conclusion that I will not share with you. Not until I reach it and perhaps not even then. I would remind you that my conclusion will be only one conclusion in a series, and not the conclusion that determines your disposition." He wondered what kind of report he would make in a few minutes. She had co-operated. She had confessed. But she hadn't broken. Far from it. Still, there was a procedure to be followed for co-operative prisoners. Small rewards, immediate and tangible. "I'm going to have some tea sent in. Have you had anything to eat today?"

She shook her head. "I couldn't have kept anything down."

"Can you now?"

"I don't know."

"I'll have some food sent in as well. Try to eat it. Do you smoke?"

"No, Colonel. You do."

"How can you tell?"

"My nose is very sensitive. It tells me many things."

"I'll return shortly."

"Thank you."

***

"Well, hon, is we is or is we ain't?"

Rebecca Taylor fidgeted at her desk; her cubicle was making her claustrophobic. The man on the hard wooden chair beside her, the small man with the white hair and the fit physique, certainly understood the fine art of persistence. He was also not, she thought again, the man on the phone. That CC Cooper had made her feel like a Girl Scout standing before a field marshal. This man seemed a caricature of something off The Beverly Hillbillies. Except for the eyes. Except for the eyes.

"Colonel Cooper..."

"CC, Miss Rebecca. CC."

"All right, if you insist. CC. You must understand that..."

"I understand that you made a promise to a friend. You gonna keep it?"

"Colonel Cooper..."

"OK, Miss Rebecca, ya don't wanna call me CC? Fine by me. How about you just call me zakuska?"

"Zakuska?"

"Yep. That's Russian. It means, appetizer."

"I know what it means. Why would you want me to call you an appetizer?"

"Long story. I promise to tell ya soon as we get past this business. Let's lookee down at what we know. Doctor Olivia told you about Vienna and you promised to help her out if it ever caught up. We don't know if it has or hasn't, but it's like to have. We know she's settin' in a slammer where no American ought to be. If you don't do something to let the world know about it, she's good to vanish without a trace. Or worse. Miss Rebecca, friends don't let friends go out that way. Not when they got the power of the press at their pretty little fingertips."

"Colonel Cooper..."

"Zakuska!"

"CC...."

"That's better. Now, let's write ourselves a story."

"With what? I can't just say I made a promise and assume the rest. I need sources. I can't just call the Lubyanka and ask for Doctor Tolchin, please. Oh, she's being interrogated? I'll call back later. The only credible source I have is General Suslov and he's impossible to use or even reach."

"Honey chile, you got me."

"What do you know?"

CC Cooper cast his eyes upward. "Back when I was hangin' at the Penty-gon, writin' up all them lies to keep the contractors in barrels o' cash, I got to know this reporter. Ever' so often, he'd call me up and say, 'Coop, I need a quote from an anonymous source.' Then he'd read me the quote he'd written and ask, 'Would you say that'? Bein' a great believer in helpin' out the honorable Fourth Estate, I'd go along."

"That's totally unethical!"

"He worked for the Washington Post."

Rebecca Taylor put her forehead down on her desk top and began banging it. "Aw, don't do that, hon." He stood behind her, gently pulled her up, then put her hands on her computer keyboard. "Now, then, Miss Rebecca. What would ya like me to say?"

"CC, you're impossible."

"Nope. Just not standard-issue. How about we start with somethin' along these lines? I'll talk. You type."

***

Raduyev closed the door behind him, gave his orders to a guard, and then went straight up to Schwartz's office. "I need to see the General now," he told his secretary.

"The General..." she began.

Colonel Zhuralev spoke up from his own desk near the inner office. "The General will see Colonel Raduyev any time the Colonel needs to see him, Katrina."

The secretary buzzed and announced him. Schwartz came out, shook his hand, told his secretary to bring tea, then escorted him in.

"Sit down and tell me all about it, Colonel."

Raduyev summarized his conversation.

"Your preliminary conclusion?" Schwartz asked.

"I think she's telling the truth."

"So do I. However, fifteen minutes is not enough. At the very least, we have to keep the process going. Have you picked your men?"

"Two teams of two men each. Young, not all that experienced, but promising. It will be good training for them."

"No doubt."

"Three to four hour sessions, teams alternate. Standard batteries of questions, standard repetitions. We'll start with foreign contacts in Moscow, do Chechnya later. Has anything turned up at the lab or in her flat, comrade General?"

"Not yet."

"I doubt that anything will. Do you wish me to fabricate something? Just to test her reactions, of course."

Schwartz thought a moment. "No. These sessions are videotaped. We don't need to introduce anything now that might be misconstrued later."

"What about General Suslov?"

"By order of General Trimenko, he is under house arrest at his family dacha. Incommunicado. Security but no monitoring. We plan to leave him that way for now. Please supervise your teams carefully. Record everything. Report to me twice a day, or upon discovery of something important. Please converse with her yourself at least twice a day. Keep it human."

"I will."

"Tell me, Colonel, speaking of human, what do you think of her as a person?"

"Admirable. Intense. Sensitive."

"Do you find her physically attractive?"

"Yes and no."

"Explain."

"Well, Comrade General, it's not so much that I wouldn't know what to do with her. It's that I wouldn't know where to start."

"I think I understand."

"How do you think this will all play out?"

"I don't know, Sergei Lazarevich. I truly do not know."

***

Rebecca Taylor's bureau chief finished scanning her draft. "I have to say, this is awfully shaky stuff. Are you sure you want to put your name to it?"

"Yes, Howie."

"And who's your friend?" he asked, pointing through the glass of his office at the small white-haired man reading everything in her cubicle.

"The guy who brought me the information."

"The guy got a name?"

"CC Cooper. Retired Army colonel, teaches at Carlisle. He's here for a year as a visiting professor at Voroshilov."

"And he's your anonymous source?"

"Actually, he's two anonymous sources. His idea."

"Rebecca, even by the standards of how we throw together Russian stories, this is really questionable. You're not only using a source with no firsthand knowledge of anything, you're splitting him into an American and a Russian."

"At least we'll make the FSB boys work to figure out who they are."

"You can bet your next book deal, they'll be working."

"CC calls it a reconnaissance by fire. Shoot into the bushes, see what shoots back. Once this comes out, the Russians will have to respond one way or another. Publicly or privately. CC thinks it's best if we continue to motivate them with a second piece the day after."

"On what?"

"An op-ed under my byline. A thought piece on what it means for this woman to be here and what the Russians are doing to her."

"If they're doing anything."

"This is Russia. They're doing something."

"They'll deny it."

"Around here, you learn what's going on by means of denials."

"Just like DC. OK, I'll send it along. We'll see what the homies do with it."

"Page one, Howie. Above the fold. And major on the website."

"Out of my hands. You know that."

"This won't work if it's buried."

"I'll suggest it. You know, they read this, they just might call you home on psychiatric leave. Come to think of it, who don't you just file, then get yourself to Paris or someplace for a few days? Once this hits the fan, the FSB's really going to want to know where you got this."

"Zakuska says he'll protect me."

" _Zakuska?"_

"The man in my cubicle. It's a long story. Is we in or is we ain't?"

"Huh?"

"That man out there speaks colorful. It rubs off."

"I'll send it in. You get packed and get out of here. You can write your op-ed on the plane."

"No."

"That's not a suggestion."

"I'm not going. If I did Chechnya for over a year, I can handle this."

"This is different."

"It sure is. Friends don't let friends sit in the Lubyanka alone."

"You could end up keeping her company. Well, OK. But let's just hope your Pulitzer isn't posthumous."

"Don't worry. Like I said, Zakuska says he'll protect me."

"And you believe him?"

"Yes," Rebecca Taylor said with a small cheerful smile. "I do."

***

Raduyev rejoined Olivia in the interrogation booth. "How are you feeling?"

"OK."

"You'll be going back to your cell soon for some time. I'm going to assume that you are not a potential suicide. For now. You will be monitored but I will not have the items in your cell removed. For now."

"I understand."

"For the next period, you will spend many hours each day in this room. I will visit from time to time. Four of my men will continue the process. You will not be harmed or abused. For now. If you grow violent, you will be restrained but not punished. We will begin sometime later today, so you have a while to think things over. If there is anything else, you would do well to tell me now."

"There is nothing."

"May I ask you something personal?"

Olivia looked at him warily. "Not too personal, I hope."

"Did you ever expect to care for us so much?"

"Colonel," she said quietly, "I did not come to Russia looking for love or, as they call it in America, meaningful relationships. I was not looking for a new family or a new country. But I have grown to care about Russia in many ways. And I will tell you one thing." She stood to him. "Whatever Russia learns about me, Russia will also be learning about Russia. Whatever Russia does to me, Russia will also be doing to Russia."

Colonel Raduyev rose to her and inclined his head. "Then let us hope for the best."

"Agreed."

# CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE MASTER PLANS OF THE MOMENT

All bureaucracies have rules. The larger they are, the more rules they tend to have. Amongst the most important of bureaucratic rules: no surprises.

By late Tuesday afternoon, Raduyev had a sense that there weren't going to be any surprises. It would take time to go through her lab, but initial interviews indicated nothing untoward in Olivia's behavior or relationships with her employees. Her home held nothing suspicious; her personal computer was clean. Other investigations also yielded nothing. There were no unaccounted-for withdrawals or deposits of money in her personal accounts. Her spending was wise and reasonable, her charitable giving, mostly for the families of dead and disabled soldiers, was generous but anonymous. Her prescription drug usage was not unreasonable. She drank in moderation, enjoyed a small circle of close friends and a larger circle of acquaintances, and was a highly skilled knitter. She wasn't religious in any conventional sense. She didn't socialize with dissidents, human rights agitators, or bohemian types, although several of her friends were serious artists. She had two foreign contacts, both American. Her love affair with Major General Suslov was cause for substantial gossip, but they behaved discreetly and there was no evidence of any infidelity.

The next session began in mid-afternoon. Matrons escorted her from her cell back to the interrogation booth. She sat down in the chair across from the opaque, one-way window, placed her hands on the table, and waited. After a few minutes, two very muscular young men entered. She knew that interrogators sometimes identified themselves truthfully. Other times, to gain advantage, they went in with false names or ranks or affiliations. There was, however, a limit to the play-acting. A sergeant could no more convincingly claim to be a colonel than someone like Raduyev could pretend to be a conscript. She guessed their rank as senior lieutenants, perhaps junior captains. Politely, she half-rose and inclined her head. One took the seat, the other stood beside him, arms folded, the window unimpeded.

"Good afternoon, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

"Good afternoon, gentlemen. May I know your names?"

"It is not necessary for you to know our names," said one.

"We will ask the questions. You will answer them," said the other.

She studied the two young men, decided she was not intimidated, and chose to startle them by saying, "Let us begin."

"If you please, we decide when we start and stop. This phase of your interrogation will concentrate on your activities and contacts since coming to Russia. Since you have been here for nearly three years, there is much to review."

The questioning, dull and dreary and repetitious, went on the rest of the day and into the early evening. Sometimes the two men stayed in the booth, one pacing beside the table or standing behind her. Olivia was not permitted to turn toward him, even when he asked a question. Sometimes only one stayed with her. She knew the technique from her American experience and a few vaguely remembered television shows from her youth. Mutt and Jeff. Good cop, bad cop. But this version of Mutt and Jeff behaved precisely the same and were in many ways indistinguishable.

They finally took a break. A matron took her to the latrine. Upon her return, she found Colonel Raduyev in the room, along with a guard who'd brought dinner for two on a tray, paper cups and plates, no utensils. Although she had no watch and there were no clocks in the room or anywhere else, her stomach told her that it was past dinner and reminded her that she hadn't eaten that day, or much the evening before.

"I will join you for dinner, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

"In the hope that I eat more?"

"Yes, in fact. It is one of the most important points to be made when armies train their people how to behave as prisoners. Eat everything they give you. You do not know when you'll eat again. It is important to keep one's strength up."

"I will try." She examined the contents of the tray the guard had placed before her. Included were two pills, valium and codeine.

"We assume you need these."

"Thank you. Prolonged sitting used to be almost unendurable. Now it is merely extremely unpleasant."

"How do you cope at your lab?"

"I pace a great deal and I often work at a standing desk. An entire wall of my office above the waist is white board. I hope my notes weren't erased."

"They have not been. What are you working on?"

"I am thinking about being able to activate sensors and other circuitry through signals sent over a commercial cell phone."

"Interesting. We found some magazines in your flat. They're in Japanese. You have not noted that as one of your languages."

"It isn't. I subscribe to a Japanese knitting magazine. You need not know Japanese to be able to read a Japanese knitting pattern, although I know a few kanji, or characters. I recognize for example, the kana for silk. But if you look at the pattern in my valise, you'll see it's almost entirely graphical and that the graphics correspond to the texture and shape of the fabric. If I taught you how to read the graphic, you could knit the pattern."

"But you said you don't know Japanese."

"I do not. I recognize a few kanji, that's all. If you like, I will write you a list of the kanji I recognize, in Russian, because I cannot write Japanese characters themselves. And then, if you like, I will also show you how to read and work the pattern I am knitting so you can see for yourself that you do not in fact need to know Japanese to knit a Japanese pattern."

Raduyev's sense of the absurdity of the case was growing stronger. "How do I know that these patterns do not contain coded instructions?"

She looked at him oddly. "The patterns would be very wrong and the magazine's subscribers would let them know."

"No, I mean, what if certain patterns were prearranged signals and...we'll pursue that later," he heard himself say hastily. "Have you had any contacts with any Japanese nationals while in Russia?"

"No. I order off the Internet. It's all done by credit cards."

"But those are Japanese sites. Therefore, you have had contact with Japanese nationals."

"No, the sites are hosted in Japan, but I deal with a graphical user interface."

"A what?"

"A computer screen."

"How did you come to knit Japanese patterns?"

"I was introduced to them by Madame Getmanova. As beautiful as Russian and Shetland lace styles are, Japanese lace is from another universe."

"I will ask Madame Getmanova about that." Between question and answers, Olivia was picking at her food again, not really eating. "Will you please eat?"

"Yes." She chewed and swallowed politely.

"What else do you correspond with Madame Getmanova about?" Another wary look from Olivia. "Yes?" Raduyev prodded her.

"Russian marriage and family traditions and customs."

"I see. Did you save this correspondence?"

"Was I supposed to?"

Slightly frustrated, Raduyev glared at her. "Do you often answer questions with questions?"

"It's a Jewish thing."

"You would do well not to remind us that you are Jewish."

"Shall I also not remind you that I am an American and a woman?"

"If you answer a question with a question one more time..." He caught himself. "You do know that all our sessions are being video-taped, don't you?"

"Yes, you told me so. What is the problem?"

"The problem is that you're making me look unprofessional!"

"I am?"

"You are. You seem to have a tendency to take things over."

"I do?"

" _Stop that this minute!"_

"Very well."

"I'm going out for a cigarette."

"You do know those are bad for you, don't you?"

Raduyev stalked out. Mutt and Jeff returned, except that this time it was two new Mutt and Jeffs—or was it Mutts and Jeffs, she wondered—making a total of four. Like the first two, they were young, strong, and indistinguishable. This time they carried paper, pens, and what looked like a thick dossier. It was certainly thick. The repetitive questioning, the always probing for inconsistencies or changes, began again. Olivia began to become aware of a strange sense of the world behind the window. During the afternoon, she had intuited Raduyev, then sensed an absence, as though the recorder might be unattended. Now she sensed the first team behind the window, watching her.

After several more hours, everyone was becoming a bit dazed and lost. Olivia could read Russian upside down but she didn't need to look at their question lists even right side up to know the sequence. One young man, looking down at the sheet and rubbing his eyes, paused a moment.

"'Have you used any illicit or unauthorized drugs?'" she prompted.

"No," both young men replied automatically, and then, realizing what they had done, began to stammer an admonition.

"I know. I know," she said, gentle and weary. "I'm supposed to answer the questions, not ask them. Isn't that right?"

Raduyev and the first team, watching from behind the mirror, shook their collective heads. This had the makings of an extremely unfunny personal and professional joke. He dismissed the two young men, then walked into the interrogation booth. "I think we're all done for the night. Doctor, a matron will escort you to your cell."

At the Wednesday noon meeting, after another four-hour shift, this time with Olivia one-on-one with each of her interrogators in turn, Raduyev had the beginnings of a quiet, low-grade mutiny on his hands.

"Have we found anything on the good doctor?" one of the young men who had answered the question about illicit drugs asked.

Raduyev shook his head. "And we've running out of places to look. Very well, comrades. Keep it up. I'll take her for lunch. After that, two shifts of two, three hours each, and I'll take her again in the evening. I know it's boring and disheartening to keep going over the lists. So let's just start talking with her. Maybe she'll let something slip. But please...don't let her take over the interrogation. Again."

***

The process plodded on through Wednesday and late into Thursday. As they worked through the standard list of questions several times, from her sex life to her drug use, her comings and goings in Chechnya, her acquaintances and her personal habits, her interrogators began to feel more and more abashed. They'd come to admire her poise and calm dignity; they were more than a little in awe of her intelligence and strength. And of her record in Chechnya.

"Doctor, we see here that you were awarded the Order of Valor."

"Yes."

"Would you tell us about that?"

She paused. "I suppose I could say that a gentlewoman does not discuss her personal kills, but I don't think that would be appropriate in this setting. Tell me, have you ever served in the military?"

"Yes. Both of us wanted careers in the security services and military service is a good way to come to the attention of the proper people. Along with university. As you may know, it is not possible to apply to the security services in the manner of applying for an ordinary job."

"I did not know that. In America, you can apply for the CIA the way you would apply for..."

"Yes?"

"I was about to say, a job at McDonald's."

"Doctor, do not change the subject."

"Very well. Have you been in combat situations?"

"No. Our service was cut short when we were selected for this."

"I see. In combat, most people have two major emotions. One is fear. The other is excitement. You try to balance them because if you let them get out of balance, you are in trouble. You want the adrenaline, you want the excitement, but you also want the fear. At least enough fear to keep you cautious. Then there is training. The better your training, the more things you can do automatically, so your brain is free to concentrate on the moment. Combat is in many ways a very mechanical process."

"We understand. But what did you do?"

For a moment, Olivia could not speak and she needed to look away from them while she composed herself. "In Chechnya, I had a personal security detail, led by a Warrant Officer Simonov. A fine man, perhaps a little younger than you, who loved the Army and life. He and his men were very kind to me and kept me very safe. He was killed when we went into a building that we had been told was secure. When someone close to you is killed like that, the normal fear and excitement fall away and you enter a world beyond rage and the limits of your body. Revenge does not begin to describe it. You become something of an avenging god, destroying utter evil with no sense of anything but the fullness of what you're doing. Prisoners were taken out of that engagement, but I gave no one I encountered a chance to surrender. I was enraged and I was in pain, including the pain of being shot. The Chechens set the building on fire, but I wasn't going to leave my friend's body to burn. I wanted his widow to have his body. So I brought it out. If there were living Chechens in that building when I left, they didn't live long. I hope their deaths were painful."

"You were very close to him."

"To all of them. We knew what we were thinking before we said it, as all good partners in war do." She watched their faces and decided to make things a little easier for them. "Was this sexual? No. We were too close for that. We were brothers and sister. When we were apart, we barely thought of each other. But when we were in the field together, especially out with the units, it was a closeness where sex had little place."

Then Olivia held up her hand. "Please, a favor, if we are going to be talking like this." The two young men stared at her, startled. She had never asked for anything. Not food, not water, not a bathroom break, nothing. In normal interrogations, it was a significant advance if the source asked for things. It meant the subject was accepting dependence on the interrogator. But this was different.

"If we can."

"I know that you wish me only to answer questions. Machine to machine, almost. But it is very hard to talk to you as human beings if I don't know your names. I do know Colonel Raduyev's name."

They looked at each other. She had now taken them so completely off-script they couldn't go back. "Doctor, we can't tell you for security reasons. Proper procedures require us not to tell you our names, unless there is some compelling reason to do so. Colonel Raduyev introduced himself to emphasize that this is an interrogation that is of interest at senior levels. We do not have that option."

"But if we're going to be spending all this time together, courtesy requires that I call you something. Would you make up names?"

"We're sorry. That is something that can be done at the beginning of an interrogation when it would seem honest. It is too late for that now."

"Then may I choose?"

They both shrugged. "If you like."

"Boris." The name popped out automatically and she wondered where it had come from. At first, she thought of Boris, Suslov's father. Then she realized, no, that's not where it came from.

The first young man smiled his acceptance. His partner asked, "What is my name?"

"Boris," she said again.

"But he's Boris."

"You're now Boris, too."

They stared at her, baffled. "And Arkady and...the other team. Who are they?"

"Boris. And Boris."

They looked at each other and began laughing helplessly. One of the Borises asked, "Very well. As long as we're playing this game, what may we call you? Would you prefer something other than Doctor Tolchinskaya?"

"Natasha," she managed to gasp out between giggles, afraid that if she was not careful, her giggles would turn to tears.

"Why Natasha?"

She re-imposed control over herself and her emotions. "It's an American thing."

"An American thing?"

"Indeed, an American thing."

***

General Schwartz required twice-daily reports from Raduyev, who delivered them personally. He read that one and shook his head. "Why Boris? Why Natasha? And what is this 'It's an American thing?'"

"Shall I pursue the matter?" he asked dourly. "It could be our first big break in this case."

Schwartz looked at him, chin in one hand, drumming the fingers of the other on the table. "I think not, Colonel. She's clean."

"Yes, she's clean. We resolved that in the first fifteen minutes. Of course, there's the matter of this Japanese knitting magazine—Nihon Vogue?"

"I will ask Madame Getmanova. I will ask General Getmanov about this Boris and Natasha. Of course, he will probably have to ask his wife, so maybe I'll just ask her. In the meantime, let the men continue the questions and conversations, some occasional pressure, not much, unless she changes and becomes difficult."

"She's difficult now."

"Yes, but...how can a woman be so intimidating and so charming at the same time?"

"I'd call it interesting, comrade General."

"Yes, of course. Interesting. It is hard to keep pressing for something that you know isn't there. But I want you all to continue."

"Each and every Boris?"

"All the Borises. For now."

"You know we have scum here who need our attention. You might let us attend to them before every Boris in the building falls in love with her."

"How many Borises have we?"

"In the whole building? The entire complex? Do you wish me to check the rosters?"

"It might make more sense than what we're doing. No. Just continue. I may decide to send in a new interrogator for a final attempt."

"May I ask who, comrade General?"

"Major Kristinich."

Raduyev suddenly felt very faint. "General..." Kristinich was a possible witness against her, although his reports and debriefing had turned up nothing more than baseless innuendo. To allow a witness to participate in an interrogation was something well outside the bounds of acceptable practice. It virtually guaranteed tainted information. And then there were Kristinich's methods.

"Don't worry, Colonel. His interrogation will be, shall we say, well-supervised," Schwartz said blandly. "Many outcomes are possible. Or so I'm beginning to think. And oh, yes, have you read that Washington Post story?"

"Yes, the minute you sent it down. Doctor Tolchinskaya has not been made aware of it, per your orders. May I inquire if the reporter has been arrested or deported yet?"

"Not yet. I have learned that the reporter has some sort of acquaintance with one of our best people. I've asked Colonel Suslova to contact her and learn what she can."

"I hope this works. May I say, the general is taking the latest events very calmly."

"Only on the outside, Colonel. However, there may be some chance that we can turn this to our advantage."

"In what manner?"

"Perhaps by demonstrating how stupid our relations with the Americans have become. As General Getmanov put it: smart countries, foolish choices. For another, it may help us not to make quite so many foolish choices in the near future. We shall see."

***

All bureaucracies have rules. One rule is universal. No surprises.

Maxwell Fajans, CIA Chief of Station, US Embassy, Moscow, was not expecting any surprises. He was actually having a very good Thursday morning and he planned on mentioning it to God the following Sunday. Raised strict Lutheran by a family whose idea of exploring the world was an occasional weekend venture from Queens to Manhattan, he'd abandoned his faith while still a child. After a few years and some nasty scrapes in places like Vietnam, Laos and the inter-German border later, he and God reached an agreement. Every Sunday morning, he would think about going to church. After being reassured that it was not necessary, he would report the events of the preceding week, ask for praise or censure as he felt he deserved (usually praise), receive it, then close out his dedicated circuit to the divine for another week.

Divine approval on such an extended basis had other benefits. He and his wife, Kate, a very successful Washington, DC realtor, had been married for over thirty years and raised three daughters, all of whom were launched into careers they loved, good marriages, and children of their own. Over the past several months, he and Kate, who'd cheerfully and wisely refused to give up her thriving business for one last stint in Moscow, had begun to discuss divorce. Their conversations were benign. It wasn't that they didn't love each other or enjoy each other anymore. But they'd spent so much time apart that they'd grown apart. They no longer considered themselves husband and wife in any volitional sense, only members of the same family and that would never change. Still, each was wondering what it might be like to be married again to someone of choice.

They had broached the issue in a joint email to their daughters and received three identical responses. "There will be no divorce. Mom, you're too old to start over. Dad, you're too ugly. Matter closed." He and his wife had agreed.

Life is good together, dear Kate. I think our children like us. Let's see if we can make it to the finish line together.

Maxwell Fajans had joined the CIA as a poli sci grad straight out of Dartmouth in 1962. He'd chosen the CIA because he'd been genuinely moved by John Kennedy's challenge to ask himself what he could do for his country, a choice made easier because Dartmouth had the standard Ivy League connections. The events of October of that year, when the United States and Russia nearly agreed to blow up the world, and the events of November 1963—he still wept at the memory—only deepened his resolve. He'd spent three years in Vietnam and Laos because that was where the action was. In 1973, he was doing an obligatory Langley tour, pondering what next as America lost interest in Southeast Asia. For weeks, he found himself in no good mood regarding his country, his employer, or himself. Then he heard it said that Henry Kissinger was going around proclaiming that his job was to negotiate with the Soviets for the best second-place deal available to America. Fuck that, pal. And fuck you, too, while you're at it. He'd then taken his boss to lunch and poured a few more gin and tonics into him than usual, prior to informing him that he was transferring to the East Europe/USSR division.

"Max," his boss had sloshed out a protest, "you don't even speak Russian."

"I will after I finish a year at DLI."

"And how do you expect to get to Monterey?"

"You will arrange it as your departing gift to me after all my loyal service in your section. Quickly, boss. The Defense Language Institute awaits."

"Why are you doing this?"

"First, Southeast Asia's now a career dead end. Second, I've never been comfortable with Asian languages and I'd rather learn Russkie than Chink. And third," he repeated Kissinger's comment and added with considerable emphasis, "whenever you get an asshole like that as national security adviser to the president, this country needs me. Bad."

He was on his way to Monterey within the month.

Fajans was not surprised to find he enjoyed learning the Russian language. And as his career progressed, he discovered that he liked the Soviets he dealt with. Not all the Brezhnev-era people were corrupt, cynical apparatchiki, faking their Communist beliefs. There were any number of good people struggling to help their country move beyond what so many Soviets had inflicted upon her. Not all of them were dissidents; some showed up in surprising places. And a few months of Soviet experience led him to reject, utterly and forever, the notion that there was, as so many American academics loved to claim, a permanent social contract between the Communists and the people. The people would submit and accept in exchange for things getting a little better, each generation. Just a little. But things were not getting better, even a little, as anyone knew who spent time there. Fuck the theories. Go look at the lines outside the stores, waiting for hours to purchase whatever the Kremlin had decided they would have for dinner that night. Try making a phone call. He marveled at the CIA's estimates of the USSR's steadily advancing prosperity and was one of the first to realize that whatever prosperity they'd achieved was crumbling under the weight of their lunatic military expenditures and their utter inability and unwillingness to enter the computer age.

He recalled, always vividly, the day he realized that the Soviets also knew what was going on. It was the Gorbachev era and the two countries were ramping up what became known as MBFR, the conference on Mutual and Balanced Force Reductions, starting to scrap the conventional forces that had stared at each other in Central Europe since 1945. Assigned to the US delegation, he'd been drinking with an intriguing new acquaintance, an ethnic Russian colonel, a GRU type whose interests seemed to go far beyond counting things. The Soviet Army, the colonel explained, was having great difficulty coming up with decent figures on what it had, since it had no idea what it had. Fajans had countered that, if the USSR didn't know something as simple as how many tanks and planes it had, how could it know what shape its economy was in?

"No problem," Colonel Yuri Mikhailovich Getmanov had replied. "We use CIA statistics and reports and adjust our plans accordingly."

"But that garbage is based on your official figures and you know they're worthless."

"I know."

"But you can't run a modern economy that way."

"I know."

"The whole thing's going to collapse on your head."

"I know."

And so it had, much to the delight of Maxwell Fajans: a delight that included the chance to stop being a Soviet expert, which he'd always hated, and become a Russian expert, which he'd always loved. And so he did. Now he was at the end of his career, the Moscow job a final special posting for a man who'd served well, and he had a chance to maybe do some good. And he had, quietly, taking whatever unexpected opportunities came his way, working mostly with the men and women his age who were determined to leave their country better than they found it. From time to time, Major General Getmanov had provided such opportunities.

Count me happy. If I die today, I've left the world better than I found it. I have served my country well. My family still loves me. And there is much still to live.

"Better read this, chief."

"What is it?"

"Just off the fax. Washington Post."

"What is it?"

"Just read it."

Max Fajans stared at the copy a moment, then reached into a desk drawer and withdrew an item he kept available for just such moments. It was a dinosaur fossil, a genuine, certified, four-inch long bit of dinosaur bone that he'd been given as a memento by a Polish paleontologist after a rather bizarre encounter involving the return of some items seized by the Germans during World War II: art, jewelry, rare books, dinosaur bones, a samurai sword (probably given to the Germans by the Japanese, but who could be sure?), a gown allegedly worn by Our Lady of Swoboda at her consecration as a prioress, a...

Max Fajans took out the dinosaur bone, stuck it between his teeth, started chewing, then started reading. His young assistant left his office quietly, closing the glass door behind him.

"How's he taking it so far?" asked his secretary.

"Mad enough to chew dinosaur fossils."

"Oh, Jesus. Here we go again."

American Woman Held on Espionage Charges

By Rebecca Taylor, Washington Post Moscow Bureau.

Moscow, Thursday, January 9th, 1997.

During the Cold War, Americans in Moscow were occasionally arrested on charges of espionage or subversion and imprisoned in the dreaded Lubyanka. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, a few Americans have been detained. These have generally been fraudulent or otherwise offensive businessmen, criminals, tourists and students who brought their bad habits with them, or activists run afoul of the authorities. With the fall of the USSR, everyone assumed that the espionage era was over. But now an American national, a woman, is once again being held as a spy. Neither government has yet issued any official statement. However, from what is known, this incident has the makings not just of a spy thriller, but of an international love story with a war and some high-tech military miracle gear thrown in.

According to Russian and American sources in Moscow, on, Tuesday, January 7th, Dr. Olivia Tolchin, an American electronics engineer who once did top-secret work at Los Alamos National Laboratory, was arrested by the FSB at the dacha of her lover, a highly decorated Russian major general named Dmitri Borisovich Suslov. According to a Russian source, in 1993 Tolchin accepted an offer to come to Russia to design tactical ground combat sensors for the Russian Army. According to the Russian source, she established a special laboratory in Moscow, developed these sensors, and personally supervised their testing and use during the bloody and still-simmering war in Chechnya. Apparently, she also participated in combat and was decorated for courage by the Russian Army. In recent months, Tolchin, tall, blonde, and strangely beautiful, whom the Russians call "Tolchinskaya," has been seen around Moscow, often in the company of General Suslov. She has not been seen since last Monday and, according to the Russian source, both her laboratory and her home have been sealed. General Suslov's whereabouts are unknown.

Tolchin apparently came under suspicion when the FSB obtained a copy of a CIA memo about her. How they obtained it is unknown, as are the exact contents. The Russian source believes the memo, written in 1994 before Tolchin arrived in Russia, indicates that she had, at the last minute, offered her services to the CIA, but not as a spy. "It seems preposterous," says a Russian source familiar with her activities here. "Tolchinskaya has done excellent work. We are in her debt. However, one cannot be too careful, even today. The Cold War may be over but many tensions remain. It is unfortunate."

An American source, also familiar with the situation, says: "I don't know if she's a spy or not. If she isn't a spy, if she really came here on her own, she certainly violated a lot of regulations from the conditions of her previous employment and probably a couple laws. If she was actively fighting in the army of a foreign nation without prior consent by the US government, that breaks some other laws. Whatever she is, she doesn't seem to be a traitor or defector in the usual sense of the word. But if I was her, and the Russians let me out, I'd have to think long and hard before I returned to America."

At the moment, if in fact Tolchin is under arrest and held in the Lubyanka, she has more immediate problems to consider. Perhaps the greatest of these problems is that, unless she really is a spy, none of the standard categories apply to her. Neither do the standard protections that countries sometimes accord each other's operatives. This is what makes the case, if there is a case, deserving of attention. A strange new situation in a strange new world.

Statements by both governments are expected soon. Sources indicate that both governments wish to resolve this situation as quickly as possible.

Max Fajans took the dinosaur bone out of his mouth, inspected it for new teeth marks, noticed several, and then wiped it clean with his handkerchief. He knew his phone was about to begin ringing with some very senior people back in America asking some very direct questions. He took a deep breath and screamed for his assistant. The glass vibrated. The assistant tumbled in. Fajans got out his strongest New York accent and screamed in native dialect: "Why the fuck don't we know anything about this?"

"Easy, chief. We're looking into it."

"What have you learned?"

"Not much so far. We've had reports of a woman who fits the description here in Moscow. We've heard stories for over a year about a tall blonde out with the Spetsnaz in Chechnya with some sort of super-gear. But we've never followed them up because..."

"Because what?"

"Because it seemed too ridiculous."

"Doofus, this is Russia. It exists to be fucking ridiculous. What do you know about this memo?"

"Hey, chief. That's Langley. Not us."

"Yeah? Well, don't tell that to Langley. In about a minute, that phone's going to starting ringing and..."

"Sorry, chief," his secretary called from her desk. "No minute. You've got a call."

"Langley?"

"Uh...not exactly."

"Can it wait?"

"Better not."

"OK," said Fajans, popping the fossil back between his teeth. He took a deep breath, rotated his fossil, and got his voice under control. He picked up the receiver. "Fajans."

"Getmanov. Are we holding one of your people?"

"I don't know. Are you holding one of our people?"

"No games, Max. It was a long flight and I'm very tired. We need to get to work on this very quickly. Before it explodes in all our faces."

"If you say so. Good to hear your voice again, by the way. How long has it been since our last personal encounter?"

"A regime or two ago. I still have fond memories of the MBFR talks, arguing over how many of our fifty thousand tanks actually worked. You said twenty thousand. I said five hundred and forty-six. I was closer to the truth."

"Yeah, yeah. But I got it right on all those movies about how your tanks were able to snorkel across river bottoms so you didn't have to build bridges. You people fucking paved the river beds before you made the films."

"In America, you would call it special effects."

"Look, Yuri Mikhailovich, at the moment I can't speak for anybody but myself and that's hard enough."

"If would be easier if you took that fossil out of your mouth."

"How do you know?"

"I am sensitive to dialect."

"Look, if she's what this article says she is, you're welcome to her."

"She's much more than that."

"In my book, she's nothing but a traitor and one thing I know about you is that you hate traitors."

"True. But we're beyond that with this woman. She has betrayed you not at all and has given us some incredible technology that she offered your Defense Department and they turned down over and over. And over. We're five years ahead of you in ground sensors. Maybe ten. You're an intelligence officer, show some curiosity and see what you can learn about her. You might also get hold of Ms. Taylor, assuming she has the total lack of sense to still be in Russia."

"She's probably that dumb."

"Yes. The more I learn about smart American women, the more I wonder."

"The more I don't. What will you be doing at your end?"

"Calming down my superiors. I'll let you know what happens."

"Thank you."

"And Max..."

"What now?"

"That memo is genuine. It was written by one of your people in Vienna. A certain Mister Jay Lyons. Tolchinskaya did not offer to spy. She offered herself in some undefined capacity so that our two nations might work together a little better. He dismissed her, and I am quoting from memory, as alcoholic, drug-addicted, probably promiscuous, certainly delusional. He then wrote a memorandum for the record and filed it and there it sat until..."

"Until what?"

"Until we obtained it. You said that I never liked traitors. I don't. I like even less traitors who hurt people who save the lives of Russian soldiers. You might ask your Langley to consider how this memo came into our possession."

"I'm sure they already are."

"Do me a favor?"

"What?"

"If you have any more alcoholic, drug-addicted, delusional women like Doctor Tolchin, please send them to us."

"Not my department. But if what you say about this Lyons jerk is true, I may recommend that we lock him up and beat him until he's better."

"We used to do that in my country. It did not work. Please emulate only our good qualities. As for how we obtained the memo...Seek and ye shall find, my friend. Seek within and ye shall find."

"Fuck you, Yuri," Fajans snapped happily.

"Yes," Getmanov answered. "They say it's better here. My wife agrees. Let's get together before I return to Washington."

"If you return."

"Life is full of ifs, my friend. Goodbye."

Fajans hung up the receiver. It felt good to have the blood going again. He opened his mouth to bellow for his assistant. The fossil fell onto his lap. He wanted to tell his assistant to call the Washington Post Moscow bureau and start asking questions. Then he realized that the number was in his Rolodex.

"Hell, I'll do it myself," he growled, his eyes twinkling. "Should be fun."

***

Dmitri Borisovich Suslov no longer knew what he felt, or if he felt, or if he would ever feel again. His world had gone silent. He could break that silence any time he wanted, by turning on a radio that reported nothing about Olivia, or by his own voice, which had nothing to say. So he chose silence, the silence of the dacha, of the grove beyond the house, the silence of a telephone that did not ring.

For a day and a night, he'd alternated between fury and fear. Then the two had melded together and slowly burned out. Now there was nothing to do but live. General Trimenko's aide had provisioned him well. There was easily food for two weeks and enough vodka, brandy and wine to inure him for at least that long. He was thankful that this had come when he was only a student, not a commander. He wondered if he would ever command anything again. Or would want to.

More than once, he'd asked Olivia what it was like to feel oneself a stranger in one's own country. He had not fully understood her answers. Russia to him, whatever else it might have been or might become, was Russia. Always his. He could no more imagine leaving his country than he could imagine crawling out of his skin. But now, he wondered if the country that might imprison, torture, or kill Olivia could really be his anymore, or if he could ever serve it again.

Suslov stared out his window at the birch grove. A true Russian would never believe that those who were destroying the country somehow had more right to be there than those who worked to save it. To be a stranger in one's own home meant that one had surrendered that home to evil. Then the silences melded into words, and Dmitri Borisovich Suslov wept as, over and over, he heard them.

When are we going to stop doing this to each other?

***

"Taylor."

"Ms. Taylor," said a strong voice with a gravelly New York accent. "I'm surprised you're still in Russia. My name is Maxwell Fajans. I'm with the embassy. Interesting little article you wrote. I'd like to talk to you about it."

"I'm a reporter. This is my beat. I'm very busy."

"I'm sure you are. You did some good work in Chechnya. But you're a long way from home and the Russians haven't quite figured out freedom of the press yet."

"Who are you?"

"Maxwell Fajans."

"I worked at the Moscow embassy when I was Foreign Service and I haven't heard of you."

"You were before my present posting. Which is also my third tour here. I assure you that the embassy staff knows who I am. I can also assure you that if you don't come voluntarily, I have the authority and the resources to bring you in. Please be here within the next two hours."

Five minutes later, Rebecca Taylor's phone rang again. "Taylor," she said cautiously.

"Rebecca, this is Irina Borisovna, your occasional running partner." Her voice was utterly uninflected, the Russian accent very strong, the message clearly, Don't make me be Colonel Suslova. "I should like to speak with you about your article. I recommend that you accept my invitation. If you don't, you will find yourself talking to someone less courteous. You have an hour to let me know your response. You have my number." She hung up.

Her bureau chief had seen her on the phone, noticed her shaking. It was something he'd expected. He went to her cubicle. "Problem, Rebecca?"

"Umm, no, not quite, boss."

"You can tell me."

"No problem, Howie."

"You damn well better tell me. Or just let me guess. Representatives of two governments are suddenly interested in talking with you now and are giving you to understand that this won't be a social chat. Correct?"

"Correct."

"Probably too late to get out of Dodge. Also correct?"

"Correct."

"OK," he said, laying a hand on her shoulder. "You think it over and tell me what you want to do."

"I will."

She thought it over, then made another call. The voice at the other end was calm, with a trace of good-natured amusement. "Howdy, Miss Rebecca. Been wonderin' when you was gonna call. What took ya so long?"

"I was being intimidated by representatives of two governments."

"Ours and theirs."

"You got it, Colonel."

"Please, CC. Or better yet, zakuska."

"CC, would you please be serious!"

"If I get any seriouser, all joy will go out of my life. I'm an old, old widower and I know you wouldn't want that to happen. OK, hon. Who was it?"

"One call was from an FSB officer who wants a response from me within the hour."

"This person already known to you?"

"Yes."

"That's how they usually start off. Who is he?"

"She. Lieutenant Colonel Irina Borisovna Suslova."

"Any relation?"

"The general's sister."

"My oh my, ain't this gettin' cozy? How do you know her?"

"Olivia introduced us. We run together from time to time."

"I guess that relationship is on hold for a while. Anything else?"

"We go to McDonald's."

"A Washington Post reporter and an FSB colonel go to McDonald's together?"

"That's right."

"What do you order, Happy Meals?"

"No. Big Macs and fries. Hash browns when they have them. Olivia says they're to die for."

"Sorry I asked. You got a good number for Suslova?"

"Yes."

"Lemme have it."

She read it off. "CC, do you know anyone at the embassy named Maxwell Fajans?"

"Can't say as I do. He's your other caller?"

"Yes. I wouldn't be surprised if he was..."

"Neither would I, hon. Tell ya what. You just hang where you are and I'm gonna do me some fancy expeditin'. I'll be back to you in a few minutes."

From his flat at Voroshilov, Cooper dialed the embassy and asked them to place a call for him to a number that rang on the desk of another old Army colonel, an Army intelligence officer who'd retired on a Friday and gone to work for his new employer in another branch of the government the following Monday.

"Hey, Clem, how you been?"

"Fine, Coop. How the Russkies treating you?"

"I've acquired a new appreciation for appetizers."

"Huh?"

"It's a Russian thing. Hey, Clem..."

"You want something, don't you, Coop?"

"Just a little something. Hey, remember that time at Long Binh when them B-30s was comin' in on us like hailstones flyin' flatways and I..."

"Coop, you started working that one before the rockets stopped falling. Just tell me what you want."

"Well, Clem, it's like this. I'm thinkin' about taking this embassy guy out for some drinks. Name's Fajans and I wanna know if he's who I think he is."

"Dunno, Coop. Who do you think he is?"

"I think he's who I think he is."

"Then I guess I think he's who you think he is. Anything else, buddy?"

"Yeah, I'll give him your regards."

"Please don't."

"OK. I won't. Take care, Clem."

That's my boy, Clem thought, ringing off and looking once again at the front page of his Washington Post. Dunno how he got himself involved in this one but I got a feeling that he's having fun.

Cooper poured himself another bourbon, then called the embassy back. "Colonel Cooper for Mister Fajans. Priority call."

"Fajans."

"Max, you don't know me. Name's CC Cooper, Army colonel, retired. I'm a visiting professor from the War College at Carlisle Barracks, teachin' out at the Voroshilov General Staff Academy. General Suslov is one of my students. Ain't seen him in a day or three, though."

Max Fajans lit up within. "And what can I do for you, Colonel?"

"Well, first of all, Max, I can't have you scarin' my little zakuska when the FSB's already got her wonderin' if she'll see the sun come up tomorrow."

"Your zakuska?"

"That's right."

"A zakuska's an appetizer."

"Affirm on that. You sure got your Russian down."

"Look, pal, just get to your point."

"My point is, poor Miss Rebecca's pretty distraught and I'd sorta kinda like to ease her pain, if you know what I mean. So why don't you and me and Miss Rebecca and that nice Colonel Suslova from the FSB all get together and have us some drinks. My treat, since I'm the one what's issuin' the invites. I'm bettin' that if I got y'all together, we might be able to get a thing or two straightened out. I know this little restaurant, Mama Zoya's, in the Arbat."

"I know it. I'll be there."

"See ya in two hours. Now I gotta issue some more invites."

"And what if only you show?"

"We'll still have each other."

Next, Cooper dialed Suslova's number. She greeted him in a stream of Russian that ended with one word he understood, "Privet'." I am listening.

"Colonel Suslova, you don't know me. My name is Colonel CC Cooper, US Army, retired. I'm a visiting professor at Voroshilov. General Suslov is one of my students. I also know Doctor Tolchinskaya and Rebecca Taylor."

"Continue." A cold, quiet voice.

"I'm arranging a little cocktail hour this afternoon with the three of us and a fourth you may know by reputation, if not personally."

"Continue."

"Max Fajans."

"I am aware of Mister Fajans. Do you have a place and time in mind, Colonel?"

"I do." He gave her the information. "About two hours?"

"Two hours, Colonel."

Taylor's phone rang again. "Taylor."

"CC. OK, we got us a meetin' in two hours with Max and Irina and you and me. Here's the address. Be there." He hung up.

Rebecca's bureau chief, who'd been jumping every time she picked up the phone, came over. "What now?"

"Zakuska's somehow lined up a meeting with everybody in two hours."

"What are you going to do?"

"Go, of course. You were wondering if my Pulitzer might be posthumous."

"I still am. Are you?"

"Me? Hell, Howie, I may be the first reporter to be killed by a joint CIA/FSB hit team."

"Now, that would betoken an improved relationship. Not to worry. I'll write you a splendid obit. Anything else you'd want me to mention?"

"Yes. 'Rebecca was also one of the original members of the Moscow Chapter of the Russo-American Women's Hash Brown Running Society. Not that it did her much good.'"

***

Georgii Genrikovich Schwartz had never been a big-picture man. He'd learned early on, such concerns led to two kinds of distortion. One kind involved giving his superiors the information he thought they wanted to have, regardless of truth. The other kind involved giving his superiors the information he wanted them to have, regardless of truth. Instead, he'd chosen to keep it honest and play it straight. And that had kept him alive, his service on track, and his conscience clean in that regard.

This was about to change. Never before had he staged anything for the purpose of reporting it. Never before had he attempted to manipulate those above him. But now he had no choice. Schwartz sat at his desk, a surface now covered with material regarding Doctor Olivia Tolchinskaya. A television on a cart sat before him. He hit the "play" button on his remote. A video of an interrogation came on. He watched and listened for a few minutes, then turned it off.

Very well. He would do it. For the first time ever, he would deliberately manipulate those above him to achieve a result he desired but they might not. Schwartz buzzed his secretary, had her summon Colonel Raduyev and, a few minutes later, told him his plan. Raduyev protested, as expected. But Schwartz reassured him as he had earlier. "Don't worry. The interrogation will be well-supervised. And many outcomes are possible."

***

From the very moment the four sat down together at a small table in a quiet corner of Mama Zoya's, it was clear that someone had to be in charge. The only question was, who.

"I thank you all for comin' on such short notice," said CC Cooper genially. "I know I'm just the outsider here, but I've been doin' some outsider thinkin' and I reckon if we all just get down to business, we can get this thing squared away in no time."

"Colonel Cooper," Suslova said calmly, "You are certainly right about being an outsider here."

"You may also be violating the Logan Act," Fajans added.

"Logan Act?" Suslova inquired.

"It forbids private citizens from negotiating on behalf of the US government."

"Oh, pshaw, Max. I ain't negotiatin' nothin'. I'm just hostin' a leetle get-together."

Suslova's face betrayed no flicker of amusement. "Before we go any further, I need to know certain things."

"Shoot, Colonel. But don't ask me about my relationship with Miss Rebecca here."

"Very well." She turned. "Ms. Taylor, what is your relationship with Colonel Cooper?"

"He's my zakuska."

"Yeeeee...hah!"

Everyone turned to Cooper. "Sorry," he said. "But I just died and went to Heaven."

"Coming back any time soon?" Fajans asked, disgusted.

Suslova turned to Fajans. "It appears that we are the professionals here," she said, still very calm. "Perhaps we should proceed accordingly."

"I'm a professional, too," Rebecca Taylor added helpfully.

Suslova stared hard at her, making her swallow. "We know."

"Colonel Suslova, ma'am," Cooper interjected. "Y'know. I'm kinda fond of your brother. What's he up to these days?"

"Trying to stay warm, I imagine. Nothing else."

"Have ya talked at him since all this started?"

"No," she said, her voice still cold and quiet and hard, her face still impassive, her eyes alive with pain.

Cooper noticed. "Colonel, ma'am, this must be awful hard on you personally. Tell me, how do you feel about all this?"

Irina Borisovna Suslova looked at him from a great distance. "I am not given to revealing my emotions to strangers. In any event, my English is inadequate."

"No problem. Miss Rebecca will help. Miss Rebecca, would you please confer with the colonel and make sure she's got the proper vocabulary?"

Taylor and Suslova spoke with each other very quietly for a moment; there was a soft laugh. Then they broke apart and Suslova said in perfect English, "In the beginning, I was conflicted. Now I'm just fucking pissed."

Cooper beamed. "That's better. Good to get it out, ain't it?"

"Is this a serious meeting or group therapy?" Fajans fumed.

"Little a both," Cooper answered. "Little a this, little a that, it'll all work out..."

"Colonel Cooper," Fajans went on, "don't you know anything about procedures?"

"Surely do. That's why I ignore them. Used to work with you guys in Vee-et-Nam. Taught me ever-thing I needed to know. Ever been to Vee-et-Nam, Max?"

"Three years."

"Yeah? Me too. Remember that little place on Tu Do Street..."

"God damn it!" Fajans roared.

"Enough!" growled Suslova, low in her chest.

You leave my zakuska alone! thought Taylor, then said, "CC, you're getting on everybody's nerves."

"Exactly my intention," said Cooper, shifting from dialect to forthright. "Now that you're all mad at me, maybe you won't be quite so mad at each other."

Why," Fajans asked himself aloud, "do I get a sense that Colonel Cooper may have a point?"

"Cause you're smarter than the average spook. Shall we get down to work?"

There was the silence of agreement.

"OK," said Cooper. "Basic rule is, anything anybody says here, anybody else is free to use in any way they want. I'm going to control this meeting because I'm the one with the least to lose. I'm going to lay my cards on the table and then ask a few questions. OK by everybody?"

It was.

"Tuesday morning, General Suslov was called out of my seminar. When he returned, it was clear that he wanted to talk with me. After class was over, we were walking down the hall and he told me that Olivia had been taken to the Lubyanka and he was headed for house arrest at his dacha. He asked me to get in touch with Rebecca, said she'd know what this was about and would know what to do. That's what I did and that's how that newspaper story came about. It was based entirely on what Olivia had told Rebecca some time ago about what had happened when she tried to contact the CIA in Vienna. Rebecca and I assumed that the memo had in fact been written and that somehow it had made its way to Russia."

"Made its way..." Fajans growled softly.

"For the moment, Max, all we need to know is that it did. Now. First question. Does anybody have reason to dispute what I've said so far?" No one answered. "OK," Cooper went on, "then we'll go on the assumption that the story is correct as written, even though we were shooting in the dark on much of it. Now we get to the next question." His eyes went around the table. "Mister Fajans, to the best of your knowledge, is Tolchin a spy?"

"To the best of my knowledge...no."

"Rebecca, do you have any reason to believe that she is a spy?"

"No."

"Colonel Suslova, you met Doctor Tolchin through your brother?"

"No. I was one of her intake interrogators when she first came here. The personal relationship came later, as did her affair with my brother."

"I see. So you know her better than any of us here. Much better. What is your thought?'

At last Suslova nodded. "I have read the Lyons memo. Still, nothing that I have learned of her, nothing in my professional experience, nothing...human...tells me that she is anything other than the woman we know. She is not a spy."

Cooper leaned back in his chair. "Then it's unanimous. Whatever else we may think of her and what she's done, she is not a spy. That brings us to the next question. What do we do about it?"

"Cooper," Fajans said darkly, "it's one thing to host a discussion. When you start moving into policy and actions, you have no authority to..."

"Well, Max," Cooper replied, "Sociology tells us that there's all different kinds of authority. There's traditional authority, legal authority, rational authority, charismatic authority. Traditional authority I ain't got. Legal, neither. Rational? Who, me? So I guess we're just gonna have to make do with charisma. Now, we ain't none of us got no power here, except the power to make recommendations and, in the case of Miss Rebecca, the power of the press. We are in agreement that Olivia is innocent. What do we recommend? Let's start with Max."

Fajans shook his head, then laughed. "Cooper, you sure know how to run a meeting."

"Deedy do. That's why I'm going to ask you again. What are your intentions?"

"My intention," said Fajans, "is to report this meeting to my superiors, along with my conclusion that Tolchin is not an American spy. My recommendation will be that we ask the Russian government to release her, but not necessarily into our custody. We've got too many people, here and in the States, who would be happy to fry her for what she's done and that would just keep the case open. If she wants to come home, that's a different kettle of worms. We can deal with that when and if, not before."

"Anything else, Max?"

"Yes. There are some delicate negotiations going on right now regarding aid to Russia, loans, whatever. This case is an irritant that nobody needs. I'll recommend that if Russia doesn't make a fuss, neither do we."

"Well said, Max. Well said and wise." Cooper turned to Suslova. "Colonel?"

"I will report this conversation to my superiors and report that I am in total agreement with Mister Fajans, with one exception. There are domestic considerations here. Our economic situation grows worse with each passing month. Our secessionists and terrorists may be quiet for the moment, but they are far from defeated. Our society is in turmoil; our politics are inadequate to address our needs. There are many people in the FSB, many people in Russia, who want a return to the former ways. They will be happy to use this case to further their desires. We all know how it works. They start by investigating those who have known Olivia. That means many senior VDV officers. That means FSB people. It means GRU people. They may find nothing on her, but things start turning up on other matters and other people in the course of the investigations. People are accused. Then they start to investigate who knows the accused and in a while, Olivia is forgotten and things are out of control." She looked around the table. "This would be tragic for Russia and the world. So my recommendation will be that we terminate this matter as quickly as possible."

"What do you mean by terminate?" Cooper asked quietly. "By any means necessary?"

"Yes," Suslova answered. "It may become desirable for Tolchinskaya to leave Russia. I would ask Mister Fajans to reconsider the option of our turning her over directly to you."

"Even if it means locking her away in an American prison?"

Suslova looked at Fajans. "Yes."

Cooper folded his hands. "Will you recommend that to your superiors?"

"I will remind them that as long as Tolchinskaya remains in Russia, some people will remain interested in exploiting her alleged misdeeds. Innocence may be asserted, even proven. But the events of the past few days will remain."

"Very well. Rebecca?"

Taylor exhaled deeply. "I...I'm going to proceed as planned, CC. An op-ed on all this for tomorrow's Post. It may not make the print edition until Sunday. But it will be on the website as fast as they can get it up."

"No names," Fajans cautioned.

"No names. Not even the usual anonymous sources, if I can avoid it. Just me this time."

"Not exactly," Cooper answered.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, honey, I'm gonna help. Just like last time. You and me."

"Why don't I just quit and you take my job, CC?"

"Cause I'm gettin' too old to start any more new careers this week. OK, folks. Anybody got anything else?"

"Yes." Taylor looked at Suslova. "Are you still angry with me for writing what I did?"

"Yes. But I must tell you that had you not written it, I might have called you and asked you to write something similar."

"That's not rational. It makes no sense to be angry at me for doing what you wanted me to do."

"Rebecca, this is Russia. If you want rationality, I suggest you request reassignment to Washington, DC."

***

Three hours later, CC Cooper watched with satisfaction as Rebecca Taylor hit the Send button and her op-ed made its instant journey back to DC, copies to Maxwell Fajans and Irina Borisovna Suslova.

"Nice job, Miss Rebecca."

"Thanks, CC. Couldn't have done it without you."

"I know."

"Conceited bastard, aren't you?"

"Nope. Just respectful of my own abilities. You going home?"

"No. I'll be here all night, in case the editors need me. Won't be the first time I've slept here."

"Should I stay?"

"No reason. You've got classes tomorrow. Also, Voroshilov's a good place to be for keeping your ear to the ground purposes."

"I know. I'm outa here. Say, Rebecca, honey..."

"I know what you're going to ask."

"What?"

"Did I mean it when I said you were my zakuska?"

"You see through me like a piece of glass."

"I'll answer, but first you have to explain what you mean."

Cooper explained. Rebecca Taylor looked down, then up, and smiled wryly. "Sure, I'll be your zakuska."

"You will? Honest?"

"Absolutely. But you'll have to get the rest of your dinner somewhere else."

# CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR, MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: THE FORMER WAYS

From Russia with Love...and Concern

By Rebecca Taylor, Washington Post Moscow Bureau

Moscow, Friday, January 10th, 1997.

Some symbols are very simple. Others are very complicated. Olivia Tolchin is a very complicated symbol and we would all do well to understand what she symbolizes. For unless we come to terms with what she represents, only disaster awaits.

Yesterday, January 9th, I reported that a US national, Olivia Tolchin, had been arrested in Moscow on suspicion of spying for the CIA and was being held in the infamous Lubyanka Prison. The facts of the case can be summarized. Tolchin, an electronics engineer with a Ph.D. from MIT, worked on classified Defense Department projects for more than ten years before coming to Russia in 1994. She came because Russia offered her a chance to develop a family of inexpensive, reasonably reliable tactical ground sensors for use in urban combat. These sensors worked well in Chechnya. They show that urban warfare, which will likely be the predominant form of combat these next few decades, need no longer be conducted the in the old manner of savage house-to-house fighting and mass slaughter. I covered Chechnya for nearly a year and can attest to the value of these sensors.

So why is she in prison?

The answer is that, before she came to Russia, she contacted the CIA and offered her services, but not as a spy. She wanted her hoped-for accomplishments to be some kind of bridge between Russia and America. She did this because she felt strongly that the United States and Russia have interests and enemies in common. The CIA spurned her offer. Then, perhaps a few days ago, a CIA memo recounting her offer and rejection found its way to Russia's FSB, the Federal Security Service, successor to the dreaded KGB and NKVD of Soviet years. The Russians had no choice but to arrest her until the matter was clarified. As of this writing, Tolchin is still in prison. Neither government has issued any official statement.

Is Tolchin a traitor? Not in the sense that the Constitution defines the term, as levying war against the United States or giving aid and comfort to our enemies. The Cold War is over. If anything, Tolchin's work advanced American interests by hurting the Islamists who are currently fighting in Chechnya and whom, if recent history is any guide, we will soon enough be fighting on our own. Nor is she a defector. She has neither renounced her citizenship nor applied for Russian citizenship. Should she ever return to America, she could well end up in prison for violating laws and policies pertaining to her previous classified work. But there is no evidence and no one is suggesting that she has ever revealed classified information to the Russians. She came here as a free woman to do work she believed in, work she hoped would ultimately benefit all of civilization. So far, she has been much more right than wrong.

But why did she have to come here in the first place? If her work is so vital, why didn't she just stay at home and do it there?

To answer that, a bit of full disclosure. I first met Tolchin over a year ago. We became, if not friends, then certainly drawn to each other as two American women in a foreign country. As I learned about her activities, I also learned about the two reasons that combined to drive her from America.

The first was that the Defense Department consistently rejected what she offered. In the corrupt and wasteful world of defense contracting, her work just didn't cost enough. Not enough power players were involved. And she was too intent on doing it quickly and doing it right. Tolchin came to Russia because Russia offered her the intellectual and creative freedom, autonomy, and the resources to do it. If it comes as a shock that a brilliant scientist and engineer might have to come to Russia in order to think and succeed in a vital endeavor, then let it be a shock.

The second reason may be less shocking, but only because of what we Americans have become, what we are letting ourselves become, as a people. I love America and would never leave permanently or give up my citizenship. I would never do what Tolchin has done. But we share a common disgust with the sloth, the torpor, the passivity, the arrogant mediocrity that is settling over our country. Whenever I return to America from foreign assignments, I am thrilled to be home. But home is growing ugly and cheap and, more and more, I find myself a stranger in my own home. In Tolchin's case, it literally drove her out of the country. She could no more abide the sloth of the customers at McDonald's than the sloth of the Los Alamos National Laboratory or the sloth—the mendacious, avaricious sloth—of Washington DC.

Olivia Tolchin is sitting in the Lubyanka, enduring God knows what, awaiting God knows what. Her personal fate is a matter of direct concern to only a few people. As an international incident, she barely registers. But as a symbol of the world we're moving into, the world we're creating, as a symbol of what should be and a reproach to what is, this woman matters.

Governments move slowly, but they move. In two capitals, phones started ringing; emails and other, more old-fashioned technologies were employed. Conferences were held. Inter-governmental contacts followed. In Falls Church, Virginia, an officer of the CIA was arrested at his home. He had not tried to flee; indeed, he seemed almost relieved that his treachery was finally over. At a CIA office in Rosslyn, Virginia, another officer was given to understand that, although he had done nothing to deserve termination or official reprimand, his career prospects were now rather limited. In Moscow, as Thursday gave way to Friday, Olivia's interrogation continued. With predictable results.

Raduyev stood behind the one-way window, watching Natasha with two of the Borises. He was very tired and the only thing keeping him going was the sheer absurdity of it all. He knew he would never see a show like this again. The five of them had spent over fifty hours with her; Raduyev alone had spent nearly ten. Lately, they had begun to discuss the operational and strategic implications of her work in Chechnya. He was learning a great deal about urban counterinsurgency from a woman whose expertise derived entirely from her own observations and experiences. She made sense.

"Thank you," he'd said at the end of their last session. "What would you like in return?"

She looked at him through her fatigue for a long time. "Pardon?" she finally asked.

"When the source co-operates, you reward. That's a fundamental tenet of interrogation."

Again, her ghostly smile. "This has nothing to do with co-operation. But if you're serious, guarantee that no innocent person who knows me will ever be punished for my idiocy, then return me to my work."

"I wish I could, Doctor. There are people who have the power to release you. I am not among them."

"Too bad. Then I will settle for an early lunch. What I am able to eat of it. It is important to keep my strength up. And I'm sure you're hungry."

"You will eat properly this time?"

"I will try."

Raduyev sent out for tea and food and encouraged her to stand and stretch, her body making hideous sounds as the ligaments and tendons popped and released tension. He realized how hard the forced inactivity was for her.

That had been in the late morning. Lunch never arrived. Now he was watching and listening when talk turned to women. The Borises, Borises Numbers One and Two, actually, were having trouble satisfying their girlfriends. Raduyev found himself drawn to the conversation in the way one might watch a building suddenly start to collapse. "The problem, isn't, ahh, potency," said Boris Number One.

"But someone's keeping secrets from us," said Boris Number Two.

"We think it must be so," Boris Number One agreed.

"True enough," she said. "The problem is technique. There's nothing secret about it. But neither is technique enough. Simple praxis rarely avails."

"Praxis? What's that?"

"A fancy way of saying practice. The point is, there are many, many techniques, alternative techniques, variations of techniques, combinations of techniques..."

"Doctor, can you help us or not?"

"You understand that my degree is not in medicine, psychiatry, or psychology."

"Doctor, we don't care if your degree is from some cooking school. What should we do?"

"Have you considered simply asking your girlfriends what they might enjoy?"

"Is that acceptable?"

"It is certainly more acceptable than continuing to bumble-fuck around."

"Bumble...what?"

"It's an American thing. Do your girlfriends communicate with you on these matters?"

"They say we're not pigs," Boris Number Two replied firmly, trying not to blush.

"But do you take steps to determine their desires?"

"We're not pigs," Boris Number One repeated, starting to blush. "Even our girlfriends say that."

Weary beyond tact, she said simply, "Very well. We now begin our instruction in technique. Boris."

"Yes?"

"And Boris."

"Yes?"

"Stick out your tongues."

Which both of them obediently did. "Now, the important thing is to..."

Raduyev burst into the room. "All stop!" he commanded.

Olivia put her face in her hands, the back of her neck to the tips of her ears scarlet with mortification, muttering, "Oh my goodness gracious."

Boris Number One and Boris Number Two tried shrinking into invisibility, but remained stubbornly corporeal. "We're sorry, Colonel."

"Out, gentlemen."

"I'm sorry, Colonel," Olivia, her face now also scarlet, said as the Borises departed. "I hope they don't get into trouble."

Raduyev began to laugh quietly. "I must say, this is the first time I've ever heard a prisoner express concern for the welfare of interrogators. Are you well?"

"So far," she confessed. "I have been in worse places. I have to tell you, as little as I eat, I like the food here better than I did in hospital." She looked down at her prison uniform. "Also the clothing."

A guard knocked on the door of the interrogation booth. "Comrade Colonel, the general needs you, most immediately."

"On my way. Take care of our good doctor here. The usual. Find out whatever happened to lunch. Latrine, tea, some decent food." Maybe she'd eat it, he thought. She didn't refuse to eat, she just barely ate.

***

The first thing Raduyev noticed as he entered Schwartz's office was the man himself, sitting almost at attention behind his desk, phone to his ear, listening much, saying nothing except to indicate agreement or obedience to command. The second thing Raduyev noticed was the muffin on the desk, whole and uneaten, flattened as though by someone's fist, crumbs radiating outward. Clearly, Raduyev realized, things were beginning to develop. Schwartz looked up, motioned to Raduyev to approach, then handed him Rebecca Taylor's op-ed off the Washington Post website. Raduyev read. Schwartz finally put down the receiver.

"What do you think of the article?" he asked Raduyev.

"The American press appears to be taking an interest."

"Anything else?"

"It's a strange piece."

"Rebecca Taylor," Schwartz muttered, "certainly knows how to write for Americans. Write about Russia, everybody yawns. Criticize America, suggest that they're less than God's grandest and final creation, watch people sit up and bark. This thing is printing out everywhere. Our leadership is less than happy. They want this resolved before a curiosity becomes a nuisance and a nuisance becomes a crisis. There will be a meeting this evening. Very senior. They want my final analysis and recommendation within three hours. They will have it, plus an item they did not request. We shall proceed as planned."

"Are you quite certain this is wise?"

"No. But it may work. Have the corridor outside Doctor Tolchinskaya's interrogation room sealed at both ends. Place one Boris at each end. No one enters after our party has arrived, except Colonel Zhuralev and the Getmanovs. Remove the room guards and replace them with the two other Borises. Are our Borises all adequate and willing to undertake this task?"

"Oh, yes."

"Have Kristinich and Borodkin arrived?"

"They are waiting in the officers' canteen."

"Hugging and kissing, no doubt. Think what children they could have."

"Sir?"

"Have them sent in. And the Getmanovs?"

"In the senior officers' dining room."

"Good. Colonel Zhuralev will bring them to the observation room as soon as Borodkin and Kristinich enter the interrogation room. Proceed."

***

Eight men stood in the observation room: Schwartz, Raduyev, Kristinich, Borodkin, four Borises. Schwartz was calm, Raduyev alert. Borodkin trembled. The Borises stood rigid and hostile. Only Kristinich seemed eager. But his was a strained and fearful eagerness, a scenting of danger, a whiff of This is not how it should be. But he had no choice, save to remain.

"Comrades," Schwartz addressed the group. "As you know, the American media seem to be taking an interest in this case. Our government desires that it be resolved as quickly and cleanly as possible, so that it not interfere with more important matters of state. An admission of guilt by the prisoner is preferred. Time is short and I have had no choice but to bring in Major Kristinich. Mister Borodkin will provide such services and information as Major Kristinich may require during the course of the interrogation. Major Kristinich is authorized to take a more aggressive approach than previously. Harsh and abusive language and direct threats of violence are permissible. However," he faced Kristinich, "at this point, there will be no physical contact of any kind. None whatsoever. Not yet. Is that clear, Comrade Major?"

"Yes, Comrade General."

"Very well. Comrade Major, Comrade Borodkin, we begin."

Raduyev positioned the Borises. Then he entered, with Borodkin and Kristinich behind him. Olivia began to rise, then stopped. For the first time, he saw in her face real terror. He permitted his face to show nothing, but he looked her hard in the eyes, thinking at her as if he could communicate with her, Trust me. "I believe you know these two gentlemen," he said drily.

"I do," she answered. Then her mind began to reclaim her and she understood. There were only two possibilities here. It was all over and Kristinich would be her torturer. Or something else was going on. If it was the first, she would do all she could to take him with her, or at least maim him. If it was the second, she had to try to understand what it was and go with that. She decided on a test.

Borodkin was quavering. She approached him. She stood a meter away and locked her eyes on his. Borodkin tried to stare back, but failed. He tried to smile, but failed. He looked to Kristinich for support, but found none. The man remained silent. Then he turned back to Olivia. "Doctor...I...I..."

"Get out," she said calmly.

Borodkin began to shake and cower and look around for help. Kristinich and Raduyev remained silent, immobile, impervious to him. Slowly, Borodkin began talking to himself. "I...I didn't...I didn't want to...I didn't want to...I never meant for you to end up here..."

"Get out," Olivia repeated in that voice of cold, quiet murder.

Borodkin sagged against the wall. Then his face contorted into hate and he gathered himself at her and in a voice that was half snarl, half sob, screamed: "I would have loved you."

She took a step closer, put her nose centimeters from his. "Get out," she said again.

Borodkin covered his face with his hands and began weeping. Raduyev opened the door. "Escort this man out," he said to the Borises. "Return immediately, per your orders."

They obeyed. Kristinich shrugged. "No matter. He was worth little to me. To be sure, I'm glad he's gone. Comrade Colonel, may I begin?"

"You may."

Raduyev gave Olivia a final look, nodded slightly, then closed the door behind him as he left. Two Borises were returning with Colonel Zhuralev and the Getmanovs. All went into the observation room. Olivia was sitting at the table, head bowed, Kristinich, arms folded across his tieless collared shirt, standing silent beside her. Getmanov permitted himself to show nothing. Raduyev took the Borises out into the corridor and positioned them by the door. "Watch that light," he said, pointing to the alarm. "When General Schwartz activates it, you will go in and restrain Major Kristinich."

The Borises smiled as one. "Yes, Comrade Colonel. It will be a pleasure."

"And remember. This time, keep your tongues in your heads."

***

"You know," Rebecca Taylor told CC Cooper as they walked through Gorky Park, "I used to think wearing fur was decadent and rich and cruel and..."

"Maybe it is. But it's been keeping mammals warm for millions of years."

"I don't think I could survive here without it." They ducked out of the thickly falling snow into one of the small cafés where she bought him a glass of tea and some pelmeni fried in butter and served with a vinegar sauce, on the Post's expense account.

"Much obliged. Any reaction?" he asked.

"Yes and no. Lots of Americans apparently upset about what I said about America. Plenty of insults. Some people going off on how I could support that traitor and she's a Commie like the rest of them. Seems they don't know the Soviet Union's gone."

"Always some son of a bitch doesn't get the word. What are people saying about what you wrote about Russia and us having common concerns?"

"Nothing. But you have to read what this one woman wrote about how it's glorious to be fat and I'm the real pig."

"Oink."

"I guess she proved my point."

"Any public government reaction?"

"Howie's been monitoring that. He says, no. Looks like DC doesn't want to mess with this any more than the Russians do. Different motivations, same result."

CC Cooper looked into his tea leaves. "So what do you think will happen?"

"I don't know."

"Got a bag packed, just in case?"

"No. And you?"

"Course not."

They sat a moment in silence. Then Rebecca asked delicately, "So, what are your plans? Assuming we don't find the FSB making plans for us."

"Me? Finish out the semester, then head home. I thought about riding the rails this summer. But I'd rather go home. Lot of things I want to do, still. Not that much time left to do them."

"Oh, hell, CC. You'll be looking for zakuski when you're ninety."

"Yeah, and maybe die at the hands of an outraged pastry chef for stealing his piroshky before they're fully cooked. I think I've got a book in me. Maybe two. Maybe they'll do some good. Your plans?"

"Another year here. Then back to DC for my next assignment."

"No book contract?"

"I honestly don't know. I suppose I could get one. I don't know if I'd want to write about what I've seen right away. Give it a little time to process."

"On the other hand, spike while the iron is hot."

"Lousy pun there, Colonel."

"I know. OK, I guess I've inflicted enough punishment on you already."

"You're getting worse."

"Listen, hon, don't take this the wrong way, but I've got an idea."

She looked at him skeptically. "Speak."

"You guys get sabbaticals to do books, don't you?"

"Sometimes. Depends on the book and the person. You can usually get one if it's unpaid. I can't afford that."

"Well, here's what I'm thinking. You decide to write a book, I bet I can get you a visiting professorship at Carlisle. Teach a seminar or two, no heavy lifting, argue with the colonels for recreation, write the rest of the time. What do you think?"

"Sounds attractive." Then her eyes narrowed. "But I have to warn you, CC Cooper."

"Yes, ma'am?"

"I won't be your zakuska back home."

"No problem, Miss Rebecca. No problem a'tall. Once I get back, no more zakuski. It'll be Krispy Kremes again, all the way. You got any idea how many varieties they put out nowadays? And they're all good."

***

That was too easy, Olivia thought as she recoiled within from the presence of Kristinich, her head bowed in order to shield her face, and its reflection in the window, from his gaze. Raduyev's given me grief all week about not taking over the interrogation. Now they let me just run someone out of the room? Not your normal interrogation. Then she glanced up briefly at the window. There are people watching this. Whatever happens, I am not alone with this man. I'd guess Rebecca Taylor has kept her word. Maybe the whole world knows. Maybe that's why they're upping the pressure by bringing this monster in. Maybe...OK. You go, girl. At least sometimes. You know how to think things out. You know how to take it one step at a time. You know how to see things, how to know when you're wrong, how to adjust and correct. This is not yet a torture session. It may come to that, but as long as you've got control of your mind, use it. It may not be enough. But what the fuck else do I have?

***

One down, Schwartz thought, watching from the observation room. One down, one to go. He turned to the Getmanovs and did not need to speak to communicate his question. Having recovered her own composure, Madame Getmanova answered him calmly. "She will."

***

Mikhail Yegorevich Kristinich moved behind Olivia and stood, arms folded, his crotch bulging within his blue jeans, almost pressed against her back. She'd discovered during her first hour of interrogation that she could discern vague reflections in the window if she concentrated. Just like Tver. Just like Tver. She concentrated now, forcing time to stop. As she did, she compelled herself to rational speculation. OK, they came in together. They've probably been conspiring for a long time now, planting things, making things up. Simonov was right. I should have killed Borodkin myself.

Kristinich unfolded his arms and took his seat across from her at the small table. "It appears that these circumstances differ somewhat from our last encounter."

Olivia looked directly at him, then beyond him to the window. "In a normal interrogation," she said, "there is no idle chatter. The interrogator asks the questions, the source answers."

Kristinich paused, long enough for Olivia to realize that this was no normal interrogation for him. He seemed distracted, almost afraid. "Yes," he forced himself to reply calmly, but a trace of annoyance was audible in his voice. "However, before one can start asking questions, the co-operation of the prisoner must be secured. One way or another. So before we begin the questioning, we must ascertain your level of co-operation."

"How do you propose to do that?"

"I propose to..."

"Kristinich, at our last encounter, I was not the experienced prisoner I am now. You're letting me take over the interrogation. This does not speak well for your professionalism."

Kristinich glared. "If you wish, I shall ask questions. Not the important questions. Not yet. Just one or two to satisfy my curiosity and provide some background. Tell me, Doctor Tolchin, what do you think of Mister Borodkin?"

"I no longer think of Mister Borodkin."

"But if you were to think of Mister Borodkin, what would you think?"

"I would think that he is a mediocre engineer, an excellent administrator although sadly disloyal, and a very weak man with a very poor choice of friends."

Behind the glass, Schwartz smiled. Kristinich leaned back and folded his arms across his chest. "And what do you think of me? Be honest, Doctor Tolchin. Believe me, it will not affect what is going to happen, one way or another. But I am curious. What do you think of me?"

"I think you are one of the most boring human beings I have ever encountered."

Kristinich looked startled. "I have been called many things, Doctor, but boring has never been among them. However, I must thank you for answering honestly my two questions. I hope for your sake that the honesty continues." Kristinich stood, then leaned back against the wall to one side of the mirror. "I know that you consider yourself an intelligent and straightforward human being, so I won't try to manipulate you. I will simply explain the situation and permit you to make the rational decision." He paused. No answer came. "There are men in very senior positions who desire to dispose of this matter quickly. In order to do so, we require that you provide us with information concerning your activities on behalf of the CIA, to include a full confession and the names of your Russian and American contacts and accomplices. We suspect that there are more than a few."

Olivia felt herself collapsing within, as if in a dive, and she lowered her eyes to the table again, struggling to regain control.

"In a very few moments, we will begin the process of naming names. Before we do so, I must, how would you Americans put it, inform you of your rights. That is a simple task. You no longer have any. Except for the right to answer questions. If you choose not to exercise this right, I have the right to employ whatever means I deem necessary to convince you to exercise this right."

Olivia... A pure voice, within her.

Kristinich looked at his watch. "I will now give you one minute to think it over."

Sister...

Olivia staggered through her mind.

Volodya?

Yes, sister.

Oh, Jesus, I'm hallucinating already.

No, sister. This is you hearing me from within yourself. We could not do this if we were not so close. Accept it. Stay with me. Listen to what you hear. Stay with me, sister.

Stay with me, brother.

"Time is up, Doctor Tolchin. What are you thinking?"

Sister...I taught you to fight. This man knows nothing of fighting. He has never taken a punch. Get ready to fight him with your mind...

"You are correct," she said calmly. "I am Doctor Tolchin. However, I prefer to be addressed as Doctor Tolchinskaya."

"In a few hours," Kristinich snarled, "no one who looks at you will even recognize a human being, let alone address you as Doctor."

"Then I will address myself as such."

"There will not be enough of you left for that. That is why I'm here, Doctor Tolchin. I am the choice the State now offers you."

"Not much of a choice."

Kristinich began to pace in agitation. "Call it what you wish. It is still your situation and there is no way around it. I will therefore give you one more minute to think it over."

Brother...

I am here, sister.

What do I do?

Think of it as boxing, sister. You cannot knock him out on your own. You must force him to lose control so he defeats himself. Then you have a chance.

How?

Counter-punch and jab. With your words, sister. With your words. Counter-punch and jab. Keep your head a little back. Take his punches on your gloves. Never let him land a solid blow. Do you understand?

I think so...

"Well, Doctor Tolchin, what have you concluded?"

"That I am bored."

Kristinich moved behind her again, arms at his sides, hands now clenching and unclenching. "I'm going to give you one final minute, Doctor Tolchin. But first I must explain something to you. It's a matter of technique so I am sure you will appreciate it." He paused long enough to raise his hands and begin softly striking his left palm with his right fist. "There is some debate, even in this country, about whether or not torture extracts accurate information. There is no simple answer to that. Everything depends on the skill of the interrogator. As the process goes on and the pain intensifies, people reach a stage, a period, just before losing consciousness or becoming incoherent, when they'll say anything to stop the pain. We call that the Window of Truth."

Sister...

Yes, brother.

Look through the window to the other side. That is the real Window of Truth. That is where the truth is.

There are people behind it?

Of course. They want you to win.

"I am experienced in bringing people to the Window of Truth. I am prepared to take you there. So I will give you one more minute to think it over."

Counter-punch and jab, sister. Counter-punch and jab. Make him lose control...

"It is time," Kristinich said, moving back to his chair. He sat down and took up a pencil and a pad that the Borises had left.

"You will please now give me the names of your contacts."

"Boris and Natasha."

Kristinich began to write. "Their patronymics and last names?"

"I don't remember. It was so long ago."

"It can't have been that long ago. What year?"

"Probably around 1968."

Kristinich looked up. "Are you being funny?"

"No. But they were. Very funny. I remember laughing myself silly in front of the television set. Rocky T. Squirrel and Bullwinkle J. Moose were OK. But Boris and Natasha were my faves."

"What are you talking about?"

"It's an American thing. You wouldn't understand."

Kristinich threw down his pencil. "I see we are playing games. The kinds of games American prisoners played in Hanoi when they signed confessions implicating their superiors but using the names of famous movie stars and cartoon characters. I do not play such games."

Counter-punch and jab...counter-punch and jab...and remember the Window of Truth...

Olivia saw an opening. "Major Kristinich..."

"What?"

"I thought so. Still Major Kristinich. What games would you prefer, Major Kristinich? Everyone I was with in Chechnya has been promoted. Why not you? Major Kristinich."

It's falling apart, Kristinich thought. This isn't working. He began feeling claustrophobic and sick. "Promotions in the Army and the FSB do not move together," he answered tautly. "My new position involves much more responsibility than sitting with some..."

"Some brave Russian patriots? Once again, Major Kristinich, I am taking over the interrogation. Perhaps this interrogation may restart a stalled career? If you succeed, Major Kristinich."

"Enough!"

Counter-punch and jab...counter-punch and jab...

"As you wish," she said with a small, dismissive shrug. "Major."

Kristinich took up his pencil again. "The names of your contacts and accomplices."

"I'm hungry," she said, fixing her eyes on the window beyond him. "Do you think you might send out for an early dinner? Major."

Kristinich tried to look into her eyes, but turned away when he realized that she was no longer seeing him. And then he realized that he was the one who was trapped. He had promised to deliver what Schwartz had told him was wanted: Olivia's own confession and her implication of others. He'd asked for permission to hurt her, but Schwartz had refused him with a laugh and a pat on the shoulder and a Not yet, Comrade _._ Now Kristinich found himself in the worst position an interrogator could be in. He had threatened. Now he either followed through or he lost all power over the subject. He had to do something. But he did not know what to do. It was one-on-one in a very small space.

Kristinich stood and began to pace again. Olivia, eyes steady on the window, said only, "You seem nervous, Major. Shall I call the guard and have some tea sent in for you?"

"Shut up!"

Counter-punch and jab...counter-punch and jab...

Olivia...

Yes, brother.

Do you know who is behind that window?

No.

Russia is behind that window.

Counter-punch and jab...counter-punch and jab...

"Doctor Tolchin," he said, returning to sit, no longer sneering at her name and title. "You do realize that, once it begins, the damage to your person will be severe and probably irreversible."

Olivia...

Yes, brother.

You've got him in the corner now. Next jab...hit hard...

"For that I have only your word. You seem reluctant to start. Why, Major?"

Kristinich began to perspire. "Because..."

"You know, Major," Olivia said, leaning back a bit. "There's a certain type of man, he's always telling women how good it's going to be. But he never gets around to doing it."

Jab harder now...harder...

"I could have someone sent in here who would..."

Harder...

"Sent in, Major? Why? Because you can't do it yourself?"

Kristinich reddened and began to visibly tremble. "I'm warning you, you Jew bitch..."

He's losing it...now harder...

"Jewess, Major."

"Shut up!"

He's on the ropes, sister. He's on the ropes. Now one more time...hit hard...

"You know, Major," Olivia said calmly. "Every time I watched you work in Chechnya, the prisoner was restrained. I am not restrained."

Watching Kristinich's face contort, Olivia continued, "I also recall that once or twice you watched me sparring with Major, now Lieutenant Colonel Malinovsky. A stunning boxer, even if a Zhid. Also an excellent instructor. Care to go a few rounds with me, Major?"

"How dare you...?"

Now, sister...

"Or are you afraid that I'll hit back?"

Kristinich, lost in fury, stood and tried to throw his chair back behind him while pushing the table toward Olivia with the other. He'd forgotten that both were bolted to the floor and staggered a bit as nothing moved. Olivia laughed, low and expressive of the purest contempt. Kristinich's face turned murderous and he began to lean toward her.

Now!

Olivia stood to confront him, stood so rapidly and then grew so motionless that Kristinich moved backwards without intending to. Olivia laughed. The chair caught him for a moment. As he moved to the side, he continued falling backwards until he hit the window with a dull thud. Olivia laughed again. Then Kristinich stood erect and started moving toward her. Olivia moved back and prepared to fight.

No, sister...keep your arms down...let him come on...remember the Window of Truth...

Forcing her hands to remain at her sides, struggling to control the pure white rage burning up her spine, Olivia gave ground until she felt the corner covering her back and both her flanks. Kristinich came to her and slapped her once, then again. Olivia barely registered the blows even as she tasted blood. "Is that the hardest you can hit, Major?" Genuinely surprised.

Kristinich struck her again.

"A little better." Her voice objective, cold.

It should have given him pause that she did not defend herself. He should have remembered that the session was being taped. He should have thought that other people, people well above General Schwartz, might see the tape. He should have remembered his orders. Instead, he grasped her hair with one hand, his hand on her throat, and began to force his mouth on hers.

He's dead already...

The door burst open, and in the split second it took Olivia to recognize the Borises, she knew that she had won.

So permission has been given, Kristinich thought. He jerked his head away, gave the guards a twisted smile, began to step back so that the two men could deal with Olivia.

His smile remained fixed in place even as the impossible happened. The Borises grabbed him, one arm each, spun him around, then smashed the side of his head against the wall to stun him. They cuffed him within seconds, then turned him around to face them. Boris Number One put his hand under Kristinich's chin, jerked it up and rammed the back of his head into the wall. Blood began to flow from Kristinich's mouth. He had bitten down hard on his tongue.

"Enough." General Schwartz entered, followed by Raduyev. Kristinich, dazed and reeling, tried to stand erect but failed. The Borises supported him by holding his arms. "You were told, Major," Schwartz said in his flat voice, "no violence."

"I..."

"You disobeyed the direct order of a general officer. That is never acceptable, Major. Never."

And then Kristinich understood. "You...you set this up as a trap! A trap for me!"

"I do not tolerate insubordination."

Kristinich began to struggle against the Borises. "Restrain him," Raduyev ordered in a tone that would have been appropriate, had he said only, Please squash that bug.

Kristinich struggled pointlessly for a few seconds, blood dripping from his mouth onto his shirt. Then his head rose. "This is only for today. Do you know...do you know how many there are like me in this building?"

"One fewer than a minute ago," Olivia said in a taut voice.

Mikhail Yegorevich Kristinich looked at her and began to rant. "I have knives and pincers and boiling water. I have electricity. I have fire. You know about fire. One day I'll use fire on you after I've broken your arms and legs. I have fire...I have fire...I have fire..."

Well done, sister.

Thank you, brother.

"Remove him," Raduyev said to the Borises.

"With pleasure!"

"And bring the good doctor some vodka."

As they left, the Getmanovs entered. In the echoing horror of Kristinich's words, Olivia wondered again if she was hallucinating. Then Madame Getmanova embraced her and Olivia allowed herself to lean on her for real support, shaking violently as she let the adrenaline dissipate into her blood, which became just blood again, not molten lava, grateful for the woman's warm strength. Lyudmila held her and stroked her hair, supporting her until Olivia's legs could bear her full weight. The Borises returned, one with a glass full of clear liquid. General Getmanov took it, gently separated the two women, and said, "Drink, Doctor Tolchinskaya."

She drank the vodka down quickly, wanting a barrier between herself and the memory. She started to speak.

General Schwartz raised a cautioning hand. "Silence, please. We are all aware of your instinct to master your environment and this is not the proper moment." Politely, Olivia inclined her head to him. "Thank you," he went on. "I am Lieutenant General Georgii Genrikovich Schwartz, head of the counter-intelligence directorate of the FSB. Your interrogation is over. Your case has come to the attention of the highest levels of our government. There will be a meeting tonight to determine your disposition." His eyes on hers were very hard and also very honest. "We will know in the morning."

Between the vodka and the shock, Olivia was detaching from the event but she understood what he was saying. This is still in play. Her death was still possible.

"I will tell you this," Schwartz went on. "I have been asked for my opinion. It is written and ready for delivery by secure courier. My opinion is that, for what you did in Vienna, you deserve a stern lecture and perhaps a goodly thump on the head, but nothing more. Except for one understandable lie at Tver, you are completely without guilt and to be honored and rewarded, not punished. My recommendation is that you be set free immediately and that this not prejudice your future with us, should you wish to remain among us. My recommendation will be accompanied by..." he turned to Raduyev, "Colonel, please take possession of the video of this last interrogation. Edit it so that Major Kristinich's comment about a trap does not appear, but do leave Doctor Tolchinskaya's final words and his own. Then make a good copy and bring it to Colonel Zhuralev for inclusion with my letter."

"Yes, Comrade General."

Schwartz turned back to Olivia. "It always helps when people see such things with their own eyes. It will no doubt improve their decision-making. As you may surmise, you have a friend here who will keep you company. Madame Getmanova tells me that there is a proverb in America. Tend to your knitting. That is what the two of you will do in one of our senior staff rooms. There will be a guard present but no other restraints. There will be decent food. Please eat it."

Lyudmila took Olivia's arm. "Come along, my dear. I have some opinions about what I hope will be your wedding dress."

"One more thing," Schwartz interrupted.

"Comrade General?"

"Would somebody please inform me—what is all this Boris and Natasha nonsense?"

The Borises immediately pricked up their ears. Olivia looked to Getmanova, who looked to her husband.

"Oh, Boris," she said in happy adoration. "You're so evil."

Getmanov beamed back. "Why, thank you, Natasha."

"What are earth are you two talking about?" Schwartz demanded.

"It's an American thing," Getmanov said. "Perhaps Olivia will explain."

"Perhaps," Olivia said. "Maybe later."

***

Dmitri Borisovich Suslov had eaten little for four days, and had drunk perhaps far too much. He had not shaved for the last two of those days, nor had he turned on the radio. He'd let the silence immure him until he was convinced that he'd been buried alive, though still above ground. He paced from time to time, and from time to time he touched his pistol. The phone rang. He swallowed hard enough to force his heart back down into his chest, then picked up the receiver.

"Suslov."

"Trimenko. I hope you are well. My aide has not heard from you regarding your needs."

"My only need is to get out of this place. What can you tell me?"

"I can tell you that your violation of my orders has had some effect."

"I violated no orders."

"Of course not. Colonel Cooper decided on his own to approach Rebecca Taylor, whose articles in the Washington Post have had the desired impact."

"You ordered me to do or say nothing after I left the building. I spoke with Colonel Cooper in the corridor. I complied exactingly. I am therefore am guilty of no insubordination."

"And I am President Clinton's next girlfriend."

"How did you find out about Colonel Cooper?"

"Your sister told me. Much has happened over the last few days."

"How is Ira?"

"She has ordered me to keep you alive because, when I'm finished with you, she wants a turn."

"I don't blame her." Then he asked the question he feared. "And...Olivia?"

"At the moment, she and Madame Getmanova are sitting in the Lubyanka together."

" _What?"_

"They're knitting in one of the senior lounges and discussing wedding dresses. Or so General Schwartz tells me. Do you require any additional details?"

"...Yes..." he said, very shakily.

"Natasha is unharmed."

"Natasha?"

"I mean, Olivia. For a while, she was calling herself Natasha."

"Can you explain?"

"No, I cannot. Apparently, it's an American thing. She is well and unharmed, but rather shaken. Which is all to the good. There will be a meeting at the Kremlin this evening to settle things. We will know in the morning."

"I see. Am I still under house arrest?"

"Absolutely. You will be released tomorrow in all probability. But not before. I will call you personally. Please be available."

"Where the fuck would I go?"

"One never knows, General. Do stay warm."

Trimenko hung up and allowed himself a small smile of satisfaction. In all probability, the lovers would be reunited and there would be a wedding. Ah, he thought. A happy ending in Russia, for once. Who knew?

***

The two women were settled in a day room for senior officers with large, soft leather armchairs. Lyudmila Trofimovna took a good look at Olivia. "Poor lamb. I was told they were feeding you."

Olivia shrugged. "They tried, I just couldn't manage to eat most of it."

Lyudmila Trofimovna spoke to the matron who had accompanied them, unarmed although there were armed male guards in the corridor. "Could you get us some food, please? Is there any shashlik available?"

"Spicy food would be nice," Olivia agreed, swimming through the haze of vodka.

"Doctor," the matron asked, "do you promise..."

"I give you my word of honor that I will do no harm to Madame Getmanova, nor to myself. I won't even damage the furniture. Nor will I try to jump out the window and fly away."

"Then I will get us all food. Doctor, you do understand that I'm under orders to keep an eye on you."

"I do. And since you have accepted my word, I shall not violate it or in any way embarrass you."

With a last, worried look, the matron left them.

"I found it curious that I was actually permitted pain medications. They made the prolonged sitting reasonably bearable, if not exactly pleasant."

"They wanted you rational and not going through withdrawal. The point of this, initially, was, What, if anything, did you actually do? You came up clean. But there was concern that if the investigation widened, people might use it for their own purposes and things would get out of hand. Fortunately, these—" she reached into her capacious handbag and brought out Taylor's articles— "have generated sufficient publicity to create the beginnings of an affair that no one wants. This has impacted upon the Kremlin. The video that General Schwartz is sending will provide an additional inducement to avoid going back to the former ways. Our belief is that you will be set free tomorrow. At worst, you may be charged with some minor infraction of something, pardoned, and then the whole thing quietly dropped. One never knows for certain until it happens, but I do believe this is over."

Olivia read the articles, then handed them back. "She writes well."

"Indeed."

"How soon do you think I can get back to work?"

Madame Getmanova peered over her reading glasses at Olivia. "My dear, would you desire my honest assessment?"

"Please."

"That may not be possible. You are far too well known and even if you are proclaimed totally innocent, too many people will still have their knives ready for you."

"So what are my options, do you think?"

Madame Getmanova sighed. "You may have, I think, four. One, if all goes well, would be to return to your life of a week ago, properly chastened by the experience and now far more cautious."

"I would like that."

"I must tell you again, my dear, that may not be possible. Your second option would be to return to America."

"And imprisonment?"

"Perhaps. Your third option might be to go to Israel. As a Jewess, you are automatically a citizen of Israel and the Jewish Agency has some experience in moving Jews out of Russia quickly. I would actually expect the Mossad to be well aware of your technical achievements. You would certainly be welcomed for those."

"I have never considered that. My mother was a convert. Perhaps I'm not Jewish enough for them?"

"My dear, Israel is taking every Russian Jew who wants to leave, plus a lot who aren't but claim they are. All kinds. They would take you in a minute."

Olivia thought a moment, then shook her head. "And my fourth option?"

"To stay in Russia in some other capacity."

"Such as?"

"Oh, some other kind of engineer. Or perhaps just as a general's wife. Being a general's wife does have its rewards. Now," she reached down into her bag and brought out some yarn. "The dyer calls it mother-of-pearl," Lyudmila said. White kid mohair plied with silk, it had been hand-painted in short, gentle washes of color: pale pinks, blues, greens, purples, shot through with the sheen of silk. It demanded a high degree of technical skill to handle the colors so carefully, refining them down to their essence, let alone working on mohair, with its desire to felt. "The last thing I did before I got on the airplane was to buy several skeins. My husband thought I had lost my mind, and perhaps I had. But it was also an act of faith."

"So you have opinions about my wedding dress," Olivia said warily, looking at the fine yarn, achingly soft, with more than a little suspicion. "You do know I have never had the slightest desire to find myself wearing something looking like it is made of spun sugar."

"I can imagine no one less amenable to spun sugar." Instead, she handed Olivia a written pattern for a very simple, elegant pullover sweater, so light that the extra-large size that Olivia required because of the depth of her chest and breadth of her shoulders, would weigh only a hundred and fifty grams. It would be easy enough to turn it into a dress, and almost as easy to add some lace edging to the collar and cuffs for interest.

"So many words for such a simple pattern!"

"Every engineer and scientist I know who knits, prefers Japanese patterns," Lyudmila observed. "The schematics really do appeal to us."

"The question is, I think, whether or not to double this yarn, because knitting a dress takes some time."

"True, but not every stitch need be yours. And it can be knit in pieces. Summer is the time for weddings."

The matron returned with shashlik and lemonade. Olivia began to eat, slowly, steadily, not greedily, savoring the taste of the food, while casting on her estimate of the number of stitches required for a swatch. After a while, Olivia sat back and contemplated the pattern and thought about yardage for the kidsilk. "Five hundred grams for the dress itself, and that should give us a good margin."

"Yes," Lyudmila said. "A dressmaker can sew it to a silk lining to support the fabric, as well as provide for modesty." She thought about colors. "Two layers of silk chiffon beneath the knitting, next to your skin, in different but very pale iridescent colors, perhaps gold and rose, but we will have to lay swatches underneath to see how the colors interact. The entire weight will be less than a kilogram."

"What an awful lot of work to go through for something to be worn once."

"I do not think you'll be wearing it just once. I think it should come out on anniversaries."

"And perhaps this will all be for nothing."

"Let us be optimists, Olivia. And if we're wrong, then this has been quite a pleasant way to spend these hours."

"I agree. You are very kind to see me through them."

Madame Getmanova smiled back at her. "It is the least I could do. After all, I'm the one who got you into this in the first place."

Not entirely surprised, Olivia gave her a hard, appraising look. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," said Lyudmila, "that it was I who first pointed you out to my husband."

"Do I understand you correctly?"

"Yes. Although I have not been a practicing engineer for many, many years, part of my work at the embassy involved reading American technical publications that might not be available to our people in Russia for one reason or another. I read a paper you had written. I admired your work greatly. I was, if I may use the word, jealous. Admiringly jealous because I knew that you had seen the future. I showed it to my husband, who agreed. And the rest, as they say, is history."

"Might I ask something?"

"Of course, dear."

"Why did you wait until now to tell me?"

"Because," said Madame Getmanova, returning to her knitting, "as they say in America, a girl has to have some secrets."

***

The lights came on in the conference room. An aide turned off the television and asked if it was desired that the video be replayed. It was not. The men at the table drank their mineral water, smoked their cigarettes, shuffled the papers before each of them, their copies of a dossier, of interrogation transcripts, of articles from the Washington Post in Russian translation. They did not look at each other. None of them spoke. Then, suddenly, they began to chatter and babble in words carefully chosen to convey no meaning. The prurient among them: Is that all? The ludicrous: Do we still employ people like that? The simple-minded: How terrible!

Finally, a man raised his hand. He was small but extremely fit, with pale grey eyes and pale blond hair. Everyone grew silent. Their stupidity had been exhausted. The man picked up his copy of the dossier, then dropped it back onto the table and spoke very quietly.

"And if their imbecile CIA had taken her up on her offer...would that have been so bad?"

# EPILOGUE: MOSCOW, JANUARY 1997: REDEMPTION

It was very late at night in the Lubyanka. Olivia, who during the exhaustion of the long days of interrogation, had slept hard, far beyond nightmares but also without true rest, now slept deeply, untroubled, and calm. She was not, however, too deep for dreaming herself back to the dacha, where Suslov took her face in his hands, and she gave herself to him without reservation or fear, kindness like a benediction between them, beyond all need for anyone's pardon. She knew even in her sleep that he was sharing the dream with her.

In a windowless cell below ground, her sense of time distorted by prolonged interrogation and odd meal schedules, her body still knew when it was morning. The arrival of the prison matron, who took Olivia for her first shower since she had arrived, only confirmed that.

She asked; the matron knew nothing. It did not matter. For, very early that morning, before the matron arrived, the dream still vivid in her mind, Olivia had made her peace. There were things she still wanted to do with her life. But there was solace and satisfaction in her past. She had lived her life as she had needed to, had wanted to, had willed herself to. She had accomplished more than most people ever would. She had good memories of many people, including one particular man. If that was not enough to fulfill a woman's life, nothing was. She wanted to live very much, but if she had to die or go to prison for years, she was content.

She'd also made another decision. If she were set free, she would demand her old life back, or at least seek a new one, equivalent. She had not left the frustrations of America, the enforced mediocrity and pointlessness, just to endure them here.

After she was clean to her satisfaction, she dried herself. She found her valise waiting for her when she returned to her cell. The cuffs of the very plain, elegant blouse in fine ivory silk crepe, ornamented with only the most perfect stitching and slightly bell sleeves, fell like froth from the cuffs of the blue pinstripe that had once been tailored to fit her, but now hung loosely off her frame. She had lost five kilos, she guessed. Also some perfume, the echoing beauty of flowers growing amongst ruins.

She had nearly finished dressing when the door of her cell opened. "Come in, please," she said, a bit amazed that a prisoner could invite someone into her cell in that manner.

Irina Borisovna stood in the threshold.

Olivia looked at her, wondering what her presence meant and if she should grieve for her. She could think of only one thing this might mean and it provoked a different, less terrifying but far deeper fear than when Kristinich had walked into the interrogation room. Was this a test of loyalty, as well as an extraordinarily cruel punishment of brother and sister? Olivia wondered. It was far from unthinkable; it was in fact the only thing she could think of.

"If you have come to keep me the promise you made at Tver, that if you ever had to kill me, it would be face-to-face, I am deeply grateful. If you like, I will absolve you of it." Her voice shook but her eyes were steady.

Suslova did not dare trust her voice. After a long few seconds, still unable to speak, she shook her head, simply pointed at Olivia's valise where it lay on her prison bed, then crooked her finger.

Olivia understood, put her knitting away, closed the valise, took it up, walked to her.

Irina Borisovna took her face in her hands and kissed her with great intimacy on the mouth in the Russian manner. But it was more than that. Olivia wondered if it was the kiss of death, or perhaps the kiss of peace. She could not know and so she simply kissed her back with the same intimacy, a thank-offering for all she had been given. Then the FSB officer wrapped her arm around her and they clasped hands. Suslova led her to a private elevator that took them up and out of the cell levels.

The elevator's rise puzzled Olivia. She suspected that if the FSB had needed her signature, for a confession, perhaps, or on the disposition of her personal effects, they would most likely have her sign the documents in her cell. Or would they? Was there a certain ritual to be followed, a certain form for prisoners of a certain status? She did not want to hope and be disappointed, and lose her composure at the end.

The elevator opened onto a long corridor, where a male guard guided the women to an office suite midway down the hall, then left. A secretary motioned them toward an inner door.

Before Olivia went in, Irina turned to her, her voice at last under control, her dread during the last week finally beginning to dissipate. "Behave yourself in there."

"I'll try."

"Do better than try. You know that General Trimenko is even now ordering my idiot brother ..."

"I hope he's also told many people that Russia cannot live without my gifts," Olivia said hastily.

"Russia will survive without your gifts. Or mine. Or anyone else's. But why should Russia always have to be deprived of her best?"

They kissed each other again, this time on their cheeks, and then Suslova left her.

Olivia was not surprised to see the Getmanovs, both looking very stern, standing by a large desk. The man at the desk, General Schwartz, seemed to be staring intently at an uneaten muffin. She noticed that it was still intact, although cut into precise pieces and, seemingly, ready to fall apart.

"Doctor Tolchinskaya," he said as he looked up. "You do understand that it is Saturday and you're the only reason why I'm working today."

"Senior FSB generals now supervise individual executions?"

"Sometimes," he said calmly. "It is a vast improvement over the days when Stalin would scrawl on a list of thousands of names, Shoot them. I assume that, since you are dressed in your own clothes, you know what decision was reached."

She finally allowed herself to hazard a guess. "That I am free to go."

"Yes. Also, this matter will be expunged from the record. People will remember, but in the eyes of our law and the FSB, this never happened."

"Thank you," she said, bowing her head until she was able to control her voice.

"What are your thoughts?" he asked when she lifted her head.

"I am thinking," she said slowly, "that in the past week I have traveled a bit of a path that many millions of Russians have known. I hope that this affair has made it a bit easier to keep other Russians from walking it in the future."

"Perhaps it has," Schwartz replied. "I thank you for making no comparisons between the United States and Russia."

"I have no such comparisons to make, General. Nor would any be appropriate. I would ask you to tell me the particulars of my freedom."

"Very well, Doctor. In essence, this. You are free to go. When you leave, we will return to you your papers, your handgun, everything. I believe that this event was unfortunate but I shall not apologize to you. It was also a matter of state security and we are a people who take such matters seriously."

"I understand. No apologies were expected. None are needed."

"You committed a world-class act of stupidity in Vienna but you haven't done anything wrong. Not that that would have saved you under the former regime. I do not have to tell you what your fate would have been, and the fates of all who knew you."

Lyudmila took Olivia's hand, felt it clench down hard on hers for a second before she remembered her strength and eased off. "I know that, General."

"Of course, under the former regime, you'd have never had anything to do with us."

"Also true."

"At this point, we still don't know what to do with you. I suspect that you're uncertain yourself."

"Madame Getmanova explained yesterday what my options might be."

"Then I will clarify a bit. One is, of course, to return to America. This would have to be voluntary on your part. It was decided last night that, because of your contributions here, we would refuse any American request to extradite you and would deeply resent any attempt to spirit you out of the country. This will not change. Do you wish to return to America?"

Olivia paused, then raised her head and looked at him out of remote eyes. "Perhaps someday. But not now."

He understood that she was speaking very politely out of long loyalty and answered her in the same manner. "Very well. That is a matter between you and your government. I would recommend that you contact your embassy to get a sense of what might await you, if you do wish to return. I am no expert on your laws and procedures dealing with those who hold state secrets or have done classified work, such as you. But there may be a statute of limitations. Or perhaps the authorities may simply decide, as we have, to drop the whole thing."

"I will investigate that someday, General."

"Another possibility, which I am sure Madame Getmanova has mentioned, is Israel. Do you wish to pursue this possibility?"

"No."

"Are you certain?"

"May I speak honestly?"

"Please."

"I am a Jewess and hold a great respect and a certain measure of fondness for Israel. But there are only two reasons why I would go there. One is, the world has returned to its former ways regarding Jews and I have no other option."

"One hopes that never happens again. And the other reason?"

Olivia looked at Lyudmila, then turned back to Schwartz. "I left America because, among other reasons, I would never accept a consolation prize life. I would never voluntarily submit to being less than I am. I came to Russia to do important work. This is not my country, although I've grown to love it deeply. Still, I came here to work. If I can't work here to my fullest and I can't go back to America, I am certain that Israel could use my talents."

"Indeed, they could," Getmanov said.

"So," said Olivia calmly. "I believe it comes down to this. I either resume my former life, or something equivalent, or..."

"Olivia," Madame Getmanova interjected quietly. "Aren't you forgetting someone?"

"Who?"

"General Suslov."

Olivia remembered him saying late at night, If they will not free you to your life that you have made so I may marry you, then I will go to the FSB and demand imprisonment and execution with you, before he had made it impossible for her not to accept the pleasure he wanted to give her. She stood in silence for a moment, remembering also the dream they had shared, at last allowing herself to accept its full meaning, then answered, "I'm an idiot."

"Yes, dear. You are. Perhaps before making any more pronouncements, you might consult him."

"It's just that..."

"Yes, dear?"

"The idea of marriage to a Russian general makes me very nervous. Particularly when Russian general officers and their wives keep encouraging it. I keep saying everything I can think of to distract Russians at such moments and it never works. You are a stubborn people."

"And Jews are not?"

"Only when we have to be."

"Which seems to be, all the time," Lyudmila said, patting her on the shoulder. "I understand. We all do. But as I told you yesterday, being married to a general has its rewards. Wouldn't you say so, General Schwartz?"

"So does being married to a general's wife. At least in my case."

"And mine," General Getmanov added.

"I should say so. Now," Schwartz turned to Olivia, "I take it that it is your intention to remain with us?"

"If I can go back to work."

"That is not my decision. But I believe that would be possible. I will certainly work to make it so."

"If it happens, I will need a new laboratory administrator."

"You don't believe Mister Borodkin is still suitable?"

"I will take that statement as your prelude to telling me what will happen to him."

"Oh, I don't know. From our point of view, he hasn't done anything terribly wrong and the Bering Strait could always use another coast watcher, in case you Americans invade. He will remain with us, hopefully in that or some similar capacity. We will find you a new administrator."

Olivia shook her head. "I think it would be better if I found my own candidates, whom the FSB may vet and approve."

Schwartz stared hard at her. "You are extremely lucky not to have been shot and now you're telling us how to do our job?"

Lyudmila and her husband could not help looking at each other. Now this is our Olivia.

"I'm sorry, General. Mister Borodkin may have been an able administrator but he was an utterly untrustworthy man. I'm certain that any candidate acceptable to both me and the FSB would be trustworthy."

Schwartz kept staring at her while she looked straight back at him, bemused. Eventually, he gave up and let his mouth twitch into a brief smile. "Well played, Doctor."

"Thank you, General."

"Are there any other conditions you wish to place on your freedom?"

"At some point in the near future, I'm going to need a few days off. I seem to have a wedding to plan."

"Has he in fact proposed?"

"From what his sister hinted to me, I'm not sure if he has a choice. And before I came here, he implied that if we survived, I didn't have a choice. I don't know if it's a proposal, but it works for me."

"Very well then. We will need to unseal your home and your lab. Please stay away from your lab until you are authorized to return. Your home should be available in a few hours. In the meantime, what would you like to do?"

"We can have food sent up from the canteen," Lyudmila said.

"Yes, we can," said Schwartz, "although nothing there really appeals to me." He looked back at his desk. "And to tell the truth, I'm thoroughly sick of muffins."

Olivia had a thought. "Perhaps the three of you will join me at McDonald's for breakfast? And perhaps we might invite Colonel Suslova, if she is still in the building, to join us?"

Schwartz stared at her again. "First you decide to stay with us and now you wish to rub our noses in American cultural imperialism?"

"Hardly, sir. I wish to take you to breakfast. I would never say McDonald's is a good thing, but their hash browns are to die for."

The Russians looked at each other in silence, all thinking the same thing. An unfortunate choice of words in this building.

"Erm," Olivia coughed and blushed furiously as she realized what she'd said.

"So," asked Schwartz, quietly laying a white cloth napkin over his muffin, "what is this 'hash brown'?"

"Kartoffel kotlet," Lyudmila translated. "And she's right. McDonald's is in many ways a stench in the nostrils of the Lord. But their hash browns are excellent. Far better," she added, looking at her husband, "than anything to be found at IHOP."

Coloring faintly along her cheekbones, Olivia smiled. "It would please me greatly if the three of you, four counting Colonel Suslova, would permit me to take you to breakfast at McDonald's."

"If I accept your gracious invitation, would you also be so kind as to explain to me about Boris and Natasha?"

"Done deal."

Schwartz began to laugh. "You know, in some ways, you really may turn out to be a bridge, after all."

"In some ways, maybe," Olivia answered quietly, her heart full almost to overflowing with an emotion she did not recognize there, in that place. "In some ways, maybe someday. Yes." After some examination, she realized it was the most extraordinary happiness.

# AN AUTHOR'S NOTE TO THE READER

Someone Else's War takes place 1993–1997, in Russia and America. It is, like all novels, about people: human beings. In this case, it is also an examination of what would drive a woman with a lucrative future in America to choose to take her chances in Russia, in the brutality and chaos and corruption of the Yeltsin years and the Chechen Wars.

This book has been a long time coming. Growing up in the American Midwest, daughter of a pair of conventionally liberal college literature professors, I had two great intellectual passions: military history and Soviet samizdat (dissident) literature. I began trying to write this book in December 1981, at age fifteen. As I set to work with adolescent vigor and naïveté, in Poland, General Wojciech Jaruzelski declared martial law and suppressed Solidarity, the first non-Communist trade union in the Warsaw Pact bloc. General Jaruzelski claimed he had imposed martial law to prevent a Soviet invasion. I suspect that he told the truth. The Soviets clearly wanted the Poles to handle Solidarity themselves, but reliable units from Russian and other Warsaw Pact armies were on high alert.

Some of those would have almost certainly been Soviet VDV (Airborne) units. In those weeks, when it seemed that Warsaw might once again be martyred, a junior VDV officer named Dmitri Borisovich Suslov, recovering from wounds received in Afghanistan, took up residence in my head. So did his sister, Irina Borisovna Suslova, a taciturn KGB (now FSB) officer who wouldn't give James Bond and his harem directions to the nearest cliff. We had some interesting conversations about what they might or might not find themselves doing as their lives progressed, including if the Soviet Union invaded Poland. They themselves weren't certain. From time to time, they changed their minds.

I have never yet understood why they would choose to move into in the skull of someone who had Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov in translation on her bookshelves, someone who read both National Review and Ms. Magazine. Perhaps that was why. In any case, they were no longer characters in search of an author. They'd found me. Now all I had to do was become an author.

I tried to write about them on and off all though high school. It proved predictably impossible. So instead I wrote a senior paper on the Soviet abuse of psychiatry.

I set them aside during my undergraduate years at Indiana University, where I studied a little Russian, got a degree in history, an Army ROTC reserve commission, and a Marine husband. I tried to write about them again during my first marriage. Since I wasn't working and my husband was often absent, I had the leisure. At that time, I conceived the Suslovs as so disgusted with what had happened to their country that it had driven them to emigrate to America. I think I now know why I plotted thus. Despite a certain amount of feminist activism and volunteering, I was paying insufficient attention to what America was starting to let herself become during a decade that may someday be known to history as "The Wasted Nineties." In writing about their disgust with Russia, I was really writing about my disgust with America.

I struggled so long and hard and failed so utterly to write well about them, and became so grouchy, that my ex probably had grounds to name them as co-respondents in the divorce proceedings. Had I indulged in normal adultery, his home life certainly would have been happier.

I made my final failed attempt to write about them in the very late 1990s, after a stint at a federally funded national security research corporation, or "think tank." My boss, a retired Air Force fighter pilot with considerable combat experience, once told me his job was "to keep the crap going." By crap, he meant government contracts. And thus my introduction to the world of defense contracting and all the phony studies and reports that justify and defend the wasting of trillions of dollars and, inevitably, human lives.

Going to work there was my first mistake. My second was exhibiting my keen grasp of the obvious. When you hold no security clearances and are read into no programs, when you have a mere B.A. and no significant military experience, and you figure out how to defeat the very expensive stealth technology that was then regarded as key to American military invincibility, and you announce your findings and no one can dispute them...you're not particularly well-liked. You're also told to keep your mouth shut. Or else. And you do. But you don't stop thinking. At that moment, Olivia Tolchin, the American defense engineer who illegally emigrates to Russia in search of intellectual and creative freedom, joined the Suslovs in my mind.

After that, I put Someone Else's War away. I accepted that I had neither the skills nor the discipline to write well about them and if any more people moved in, I would have to have my head rezoned for multi-family construction. I then went to grad school, worked several jobs, and wrote non-fiction. I got research grants to study American female soldiers. This took me to Iraq in 2004 and Afghanistan in 2005; I was embedded with combat troops in both countries. My first book, Women in the Line of Fire (Seal, 2006), gave me the practical experience and literary tools to conceive, finally, of Someone Else's War.

One matter remained. In late October, 2007, I summoned courage sufficient to tell my second husband, Philip Gold, himself a writer and former Marine officer (I like Marines), about the Suslovs. Hi, honey. You don't know this, but you've been sleeping with a Russian paratroop general and a female FSB colonel. Also a female American engineer whom many people would consider not much better than a traitor. Philip understood, not least of all because he'd had some imaginary playmates of his own. Also, four years prior, he'd encouraged me to go to war(s) because he knew it would settle some unfinished business in my past, including my failure to be born male so I could have been a combat arms officer. Now he encouraged me to confront the Suslovs and Olivia; until I kept faith with them, I would be blockaded in other ways. Marines are smart.

We got to work. The initial 30,000-word rough cut, dark beyond belief, was done by Christmas 2007. Over the holidays, I realized that I no longer felt that way; I was no longer the same person. On New Year's Day, I began rewriting for a happier ending. After some thinking, researching, and non-fiction writing, I began writing in earnest in June 2008. I finished major work in June 2009 and in the early days of 2010. At least, I thought I had. Now, at the end of 2013, I am finally satisfied.

Writing Someone Else's War required hundreds of hours in conversation with Philip, who was doing a book of his own at the time and who sometimes welcomed the interruptions. As a former intelligence officer and interrogator, he gave me real-world insights into how things work and how they might be plausibly adapted for the novel. We surrounded Olivia and the Suslovs with a rich and vibrant world of their own, and it was great fun watching somebody else deal with my Russians and Americans. Minor characters got invented, then became real imaginary people. One in particular: CC Cooper, an eccentric retired US Army colonel who drives much of the final part of the book. He's Philip's creation, though based on a man, a very good man, I actually knew. Perhaps most enjoyable was Philip teaching me the value of humor in a book such as this, both for the lighter moments themselves and for the making of serious points lightly. Marines are funny. Sometimes they have to be.

But the time during which I wrote Someone Else's War was unfunny in the extreme. I understood, as did anyone not willfully self-blinded by ignorance, hope, or ideology, that the American economy was not going through an old-style cyclical downturn. I knew that the "recession" was going to yield what is now called "The New Normal," and that it would hasten the destruction of America's middle class. This, indeed, is happening. And it makes Someone Else's War, insofar as it predicts what has in fact happened, an urgent book.

America has surrendered to impoverishment and is beginning to surrender to chaos. I have watched my countrymen wander around in a state of learned helplessness, furious and despairing but unwilling to change. I have watched American conservatism cease to be a legitimate political idea and become a cult with nothing to offer save hatred and contempt. I have watched President Obama refuse to address our core problems, and liberalism continue its relentless pursuit of irrelevance. I have also realized that many Americans, in government and out, want foreign enemies and would, for reasons of their own, welcome a New Cold War. That this is the last thing America, Russia, and the world need—doesn't matter to them.

While I was writing, I had an opportunity to look back at one of the major political and moral influences in my life: Soviet-era dissident literature. I reread the fiction, poetry, and essays of Soviet dissidents and I thought about what they dared and suffered in order to write that which they believed. It was impossible for me not to compare their work, for which they and their readers risked so much, to the writing that so many Americans consume. And I found myself reading interviews with people like Vladimir Putin and Dmitri Medvedev, measuring their coherence and grasp of detail against that of similar American political figures, such as John McCain, Sarah Palin and George Bush or, for that matter, Barack Obama.

The comparisons weren't comforting. In truth, it is neither my job nor my intention to make apologies for Vladimir Putin. He is a thorough-going authoritarian and I would not care to serve or live under him. But I will say this much. If one of the standards of morality in this world is, "Did you leave it better than you found it?" then who is the more successful leader? Vladimir Putin, who drew his country back from the edge of the abyss—or George Bush, who tossed us into one and his successor, who has so far refused to lead us out?

I write these things not because I'm a Russophile, a member of the Blame-America-First Club, or a believer in the "moral equivalence" of the United States and present-day Russia, let alone the old USSR. I grew up in that kind of household and punched out as fast as I could.

I wrote Someone Else's War to provide a different perspective on what we've become—and on what we might also wish to be. The book that started out as an adolescent fantasy is now my gift to my fellow citizens. If it says things that some people might not wish to hear, so be it. But at least let them be honest about why they don't want to hear them.

A final item. Someone Else's War was originally entitled The Doves.

As a title, The Doves suggested an image of peaceful people, of those who want peace. My characters do. But I've taken the title from someone else. It's a line in a poem by Anna Akhmatova, Russia's greatest poet, and a dissident who somehow managed to intimidate (or at least fascinate) Joseph Stalin into letting her live and stay out of the Gulag. She wrote "To the Londoners" in 1940, when Britain was under Nazi bombardment and the Soviet Union an ally of Germany. It is not an easy poem for an American to understand. Poetry in translation always loses something; Russian poetry, especially so. And few Americans know, or care to know, the tenor of that year. The poem speaks to many things. It certainly issues a warning against denying the world's realities, whatever those realities might be.

Time, with an impassive hand, is writing

The twenty-forth drama of Shakespeare.

We, the celebrants at this terrible feast,

Would rather read Hamlet, Caesar, or Lear

There by the leaden river;

We would rather, today, with torches and singing,

Be bearing the dove Juliet to her grave;

Or peer in at Macbeth's windows

And tremble with the hired killer.

But not this one, oh Lord, not this one.

This one we haven't the strength to read.

Some things never change. But others do. And it matters to remember that.

# ABOUT THE AUTHOR/CONTACT

Erin Solaro is the author of Women in the Line of Fire (Seal, 2006), based on her experiences as a journalist and researcher embedded with combat troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Her work has appeared everywhere from the Marine Corps Gazette and the US Naval Institute's Proceedings to the Seattle Weekly, Christian Science Monitor, and Baltimore Sun. She writes The Woman Citizen blog for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Erin was raised in the American Midwest and has lived in Malaysia. She received her B.A. in History from Indiana University and her M.A. in Military Science and Diplomacy from Norwich University. She has been a reserve lieutenant in the US Army, a professional dog trainer, a secretary, an insurance agent, and a program director for an international post-graduate management institute.

Erin lives with her husband, writer Philip Gold. Her current writing projects include My American Vacation, a sequel to Someone Else's War.

Erin is best reached by email at esolaro@msn.com or horsepersons@msn.com. She can also be found on Facebook.

# My American Vacation: A Novel of Russia and America

## From a work in progress.

Vladimir Putin had thrown the world a party. Not everyone approved of the party. Or of Mr. Putin. The weather had not cooperated, but then the weather wasn't cooperating much for anyone anymore. Still, all things considered, the party had gone reasonably well. There had been no boycott. The guests had mostly behaved. And, much to the disgust of Putin-haters both professional and recreational, there had been no massacre. Some among the media had also publicly expressed near-regrets.

Major General Irina Borisovna Suslova, Director of the Service for Protection of the Constitutional System and the Fight against Terrorism of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, the FSB, never expressed opinions regarding Mr. Putin. Or the weather. Both were facts. She dealt in facts. At the moment, three facts confronted her. The absence of terror at the Sochi Olympics had been very much her personal accomplishment. She was not proud; Irina didn't do pride. She was, however, deeply satisfied. All those months of sixteen-hour days and sleepless nights, all those take-no-chances preventive and pre-emptive things she'd ordered done or done herself, but without unnecessary violence or repressions, had paid off. There had been the best of all possible outcomes. Nothing had happened.

But now she was exhausted. This, too, was a fact. Unfortunately, it led to a third fact that she didn't care to consider. This was a new kind of exhaustion, the kind that a few days at some VIP Crimean resort or a brief stand-down at work or a new assignment wouldn't assuage. This went deeper: it could even be assuaged by a long hunting trip in the most beautiful place on earth, the dangerous and remote Putorana plateau. The exhaustion had come upon her suddenly, as the sum of all the exhaustions she'd endured but never succumbed to or even really acknowledged during her thirty-plus years of service as an Army and security officer, an Afghan war widow with two young sons to raise and . . .

And at the moment, her boss wasn't helping. Deputy Director Andrei Zotipov never had. These, too, were facts. And now, from somewhere within her exhaustion, she was considering them. In rage. In a rage that grew stronger and less controllable with every sneering sentence that droned from the old lizard's wet and sputtering mouth. Nothing new there. He'd long been in the habit of dissing her at the weekly open-agenda conferences chaired by the FSB Director. The other men at the table—Suslova was the only woman—had long ago stopped listening, or even pretending that Zotipov's digs at her weren't what they were. Graceless attempts by a has-been, politically connected but no longer quite so protected, to evade acknowledgement of his own ineptitude, and the fact that only Irina stood between him and retirement-for-cause. For two years, Suslova had accepted the situation, serene in her own abilities and reputation and comforted by the silent, and sometimes not so silent, sympathies of the colleagues she respected and cared about. But now, sitting at the conference table and aghast at the sense of watching herself about to do something unprecedented, she felt no power to resist, and no desire.

"Perhaps," she heard her boss drone on, "the easy success of our lovely General," he paused and glanced at her smugly, "indicates that there never was that much of a threat to begin with. Be that as it may," he paused again, "our lovely General has spent so much time in the field that her other responsibilities have suffered seriously. I am uncertain as to whether she can . . ."

Suslova rose. For a moment, she said nothing. The men at the table tensed in expectation, and in an unspoken affirmation of, What took you so long?

Suslova faced her superior, her low voice cold and disdainful. "Deputy Director, you talk too much."

Then she watched herself meeting his furious stare. She held him steadily in her eyes until, baffled and enraged and impotent, he looked away.

And then she turned and walked out, and no longer cared, and did not see her real boss, FSB Director Pyotr Stepanovich Bogdanov, smile. The other men at the table, all save one, smiled, too. Once, she would have cared about that, welcomed it, thanked the men with a small gracious nod and a slight crinkling of her green eyes above high Tartar cheekbones. But no more.

Major General Irina Borisovna Suslova, holder of two Hero awards, the highest decoration of both the former Soviet Union and the Federation that had replaced it, legendary among those few who knew, for her work in keeping nuclear weapons and materials out of the wrong hands—a legend to the CIA for other reasons, as well—returned to her office suite. Her personal assistant, Colonel Igor Mikhailovich Smoliakov, tall, strong, and slowly dying of old wounds from Chechnya and more recent injuries sustained elsewhere, was standing by the secretary's desk. "Boss," he asked, "Can I—"

**"No."**

Smoliakov flinched. Olga Rodionovna, her stout, graying secretary, a woman compounded of fierce efficiency and equally fierce loyalty, looked at Suslova with the beginnings of concern.

"General . . ."

**"No."**

Suslova entered her office, slamming the door behind her. Smoliakov and Rodionovna heard the turn of the lock, then the sound of objects hitting walls before landing hard on the floor. Books, most likely. Then a series of light crunches against walls, each followed by a tinkling sound. They looked at each other.

The Meissen.

"I think," said Smoliakov slowly, "that Deputy Director Zotipov has finally provoked an intense personal reaction."

"Pity he's not here to serve as target."

The crunches grew a bit deeper. Suslova, Smoliaknov concluded, had finished hurling the cups in her tea service and had started on the saucers.

"Do you think I should call the canteen and have them send up some of their crockery?"

"No. That would take too long. Let us hope that this burns itself out quickly."

"That's expensive china."

"Indeed."

"Perhaps one of us should . . ."

"Not me," Smoliakov said with deep feeling.

The phone rang, the internal secure line on Olga Rodionovna's desk. She picked it up but was not permitted even to greet the caller. "Olga Rodionovna," a man's firm voice said. "This is Director Bogdanov. How is my General?"

"In a rage, Comrade Director."

"How intense?"

"She's in her office, throwing dishes against the walls." Olga held the phone a bit away from her ear and listened as the sounds grew deeper yet again. "My impression is that she's finished with the cups and saucers and has started on the plates. She is, as you know, very methodical."

There was a pause at the other end, perhaps a brief silent chuckle. "Not unexpected. The anger, that is. This wanton destruction of State property is certainly out of character. Very well. No one is to be permitted entry to or exit from the General's office until I arrive. Which will be in about two minutes."

"Yes, Comrade Director. If Deputy Director Zotipov shows up . . ."

"You will lock the outer doors, Olga. Immediately. If Deputy Director Zotipov shows up, say nothing through the door. He can spend his time admiring the portraits in the corridor. I'll take care of the situation if it arises."

Bogdanov hung up without waiting for response. He knew he needed none from Olga. It would be done. He also knew that Zotipov would not be showing up. Much as he might want the final word, he lacked the courage to face Suslova alone. Getting physical was certainly not beyond her in her present state, and he preferred not to have her hospitalize a man he'd been working on removing via retirement. Nor did he expect Suslova to leave her office. She was, he knew from long decades of experience as her colleague, then mentor, utterly averse to being seen in any state of personal indiscipline or disarray. What worried him was that she might decide to leave permanently.

Zotipov, the Director mused as he opened the door of the private elevator in his office and took it two flights down, had provided a useful cover. He'd complained and insinuated and protested, but he'd never interfered as Bogdanov had advanced Suslova, given her responsibilities beyond her position, educated her, prepared her for...what? To succeed him as the first woman Director of the FSB? Perhaps: she was already the most powerful woman in Russian history since Catherine the Great. But now, the Zotipov charade could end. Now, after Suslova's latest success, Zotipov could be pensioned off. As for Suslova, whatever her future, he did not want it to end with...this.

Composing his face, unwilling to let either her assistant or her secretary see his concern, the Director marched up to the outer door, noted the absence of anything resembling Deputy Director Zotipov, and knocked firmly.

"Bogdanov."

Colonel Smoliakov let him in. They heard a platter go splat. Bogdanov shook his head. "Have you considered ringing up the canteen and asking for . . ."

"I did," Olga replied grimly. "Colonel Smoliakov said they wouldn't send it up in time. He thought this would end quickly."

"Apparently, Colonel Smoliakov misjudged. Ah, well. There can't be that much left."

An exceptionally loud crash made Olga Rodionovna and Colonel Smoliakov flinch. "I appear to have been proven wrong, also," Bogdanov muttered. "Wish me well."

He strode to the inner door. "Irina Borisovna," he called, knowing she'd recognize his voice and open the door without the necessity of ordering it.

A pause. Then, in a low, deep growl that startled him, "Stay out."

The timbre reminded him of nothing so much as a tiger. Did Suslova have a tiger in there? Not possible. Surely building security would never have let her bring in a tiger. And where would she have found a tiger and how would she have taught it to talk in so brief a period? A plate spattered against the door. No, he decided, tigers neither speak nor hurl dishes. Nor, most days, did generals destroy the magnificent china that had been Russian property since the Red Army had seized it from some dead Nazi's estate in 1945. It had been a large collection, long since parceled out among senior NKVD, then KGB, then FSB officials. There was ample still elsewhere. But that pattern wasn't made anymore, and losses couldn't be replaced. Bogdanov decided to take charge.

"General Suslova, that china belongs to the people of the Russian Federation. Cease and desist immediately. Do not disobey me. I don't want to have to add insubordination to what will doubtless be a difficult report to write. And open the damn door."

A final thud, tinkle, crash. Then silence. Then the door opened. Bogdanov walked in and closed it behind him.

What a mess.

Suslova had apparently begun by pulling books out of the cases and throwing them to the floor via the walls. When that failed to satisfy, she had swept her desk clean of everything on it, which wasn't much but had included the computer screen. Cyclamen in a pot that had survived its fall to the carpet. Silently, Bogdanov restored the vivid pink flowers to her desk, noting that the pictures of her family on the credenza behind her desk had survived unscathed. Also safe were the bulbs of narcissus and paperwhites blooming in blue-and-white delft forcing pots on the credenza, scenting the office. The little grace notes that made a visit to her office such a pleasure. He would come to her office and, often accompanied by a quiet, beautiful music, they would discuss the things that needed doing and the things that would advance her, while drinking tea from cups as fine as her own ivory skin.

"Well, Irina Borisovna," he said as he picked up a couple books, noted their titles and replaced them. "Did you enjoy your tantrum?"

**"Yes."**

"I believe. But all good things must end."

"Bad things, also." Letting out her breath in a sigh.

"No doubt. And now that this bad thing has ended, will you offer me tea?"

Suslova gave him a flat, hard look that softened into a smile as she surveyed the wreckage. Bogdanov smiled back. She cracked open the door and spoke in her normal voice: low, cultured, courteous. "Olga, would you please bring us some tea?"

"Just the pot, or will you be needing cups and saucers, also?"

"I'm afraid we will," Suslova answered ruefully.

A few moments later, Olga, who knew her boss's civilized rituals as well as Bogdanov, entered with a tray, ignoring the wreckage while exuding disapproval. She placed it on a coffee table before a long couch and left. Suslova and Bogdanov seated themselves, then drank silently for a moment while he studied the low celadon planter on the table, filled with purple and ivory violas, snowdrops, and grape hyacinths.

"You know, Irina Borisovna, back there in my conference room you reminded me of something I'd forgotten. When I was a very junior KGB officer, on my first assignment to the United States, I became a fan, as they say, of their Country-Western, I believe they called it, music. One song in particular. If memory serves, it was 'Take This Job and Shove It'."

"I recall it also, from my UN posting. Was I that bad in there?"

"Worse. A tirade would have been far more acceptable than such a deadly insult. Any residual respect that Zotipov might have commanded, is now gone. That could be a problem for me. But what's done is done. The question now, General, is . . ."

"What next?"

"Next is, we clean up this disaster," he answered. "I'd rather our comrades on the cleaning crews didn't have to deal with it."

"Not to mention, the security inspectors with their nightly visits."

"Those also."

They worked in silence, reshelving books and filling the waste baskets with Meissen, while Suslova slowly floated down from the high of her rage. Looking at what she'd done to some perfectly innocent books and dishes and began to be quite abashed, even ashamed. Bogdanov watched her. He saw a lean woman in her early fifties, tall for her sex—a centimeter taller than the Russian male average—and very strongly built, wearing one of the men's suits she favored, tailored to fit and expensive once, now old and nondescript. He wondered, as he had for decades, whether or not she was beautiful. Perhaps. Perhaps not. She was clearly female but not remotely feminine. Most men would never look at her twice. That, he knew she preferred for both personal and professional reasons. Those who looked twice rarely looked again. Too intimidating. That, she also preferred. But those who looked carefully, who got beyond their preconceptions and their aversion to fearing a woman, saw skin like cream over gem-carved features and slanting Tartar eyes over high, broad cheekbones. Her eyes were the sometimes the green of olive leaves on a sunlit field, often of lichen on stone, and, very rarely, of spring moss between the roots of a birch tree beside a cold Siberian stream. Her wavy chestnut hair, silvering at the temples, was worn short, an elegant severity.

But beautiful?

No. Not really.

Still, those who looked carefully, might sense a cleanliness to her. If the rare was also the beautiful, then she was beautiful indeed.

They finished their chore, more or less, then sat again.

"Feeling better, Comrade General?"

A rueful smile as she refilled their cups. "Yes, thank you, Comrade Director. Now what?"

"Now we discuss what next, in terms of your future."

"Assuming I still have one."

"You do, although I can't say today's performance in my conference room did your prospects much good. What message do you think your behavior has conveyed?"

Suslova exhaled. "That I am tired beyond endurance."

"Yes. You've lasted in this profession far longer than most men do. You've borne up under terrible stresses and dangers. However, as the Devil says, 'Pay me now or pay me later.' I fear that latter may be upon us."

"Another Americanism, Comrade Director?"

"America has been on my mind of late. As have you."

She paused. "May I ask if the two are somehow connected?"

"They are now."

She paused again, in the manner of a patient awaiting her doctor's diagnosis. Then she determined not to wait. "Explain, if you would."

"Irina Borisovna," he said, in the manner of a physician preparing the patient for unpleasant news, "you have risen higher in the security services than any woman. Ever."

"For which I thank you."

"But not too much. I mentored you and protected you because I saw your value. As a professional and as a human being."

Suslova looked down and waited for Bogdanov to redirect the conversation, away from the personal. He always had.

"My hope for you," he went on, "was that some day you would occupy my office."

"Was?"

"Was and is. However . . . " he steeled himself, "it is a fact in all organizations that the higher you go, the less room you have for mistakes or for the exhaustion that so often brings them about. The less room you have for erratic behavior. And if you are someone who has enemies as well as admirers, enemies who are enemies because they refuse to admire . . . well, Irina Borisovna, they watch for weaknesses most carefully."

"So what are you suggesting? A month's vacation?"

"No. A year's sabbatical."

"A sabbatical at this point in my career effectively takes me out of the running for promotion." Dealing in facts, no matter how much they cost.

"So does your current condition. Unless you deal with it now."

Another fact. "Yes. But what has this to do with America?"

"As the Americans say, America would be a good place to chill. Don't you think?"

"If you happen to enjoy that way of life. Why send me to America?"

"To get the Americans to love us."

Her laugh was appealing, the first sign of real life beyond exhaustion. "OK, as they say in America . . . Boss, you gotta be shittin' me."

Bogdanov grinned, suddenly boyish. "Not at all. Permit me to think out loud for a moment."

She nodded.

"When our empire, then our nation, collapsed, the Americans reacted in predictable fashion. First, they congratulated themselves on how they weren't congratulating themselves. Then for a couple years, they sent us food and economists. The food proved useful. Then, as our country staggered toward anarchy and abyss, they decided that we could be pitied, we could be scorned, but there was no longer any reason to take us seriously. Then Comrade Putin pulled us back enough to let us steady ourselves a bit. He proved once again that the standard is not perfection. The standard is the alternative. Where would we be today, had not he or someone like him told us, We're going to survive, but we're not going back to the old ways. And we're going to survive as Russians."

"And so we did," she agreed.

"He made it happen. But not to American liking. And now the Americans hate him for it. He's the latest in their collection of men they love to hate. Perhaps that's because..." he smiled at some private memory, "if history asks, Did you leave it better than you found it?—who has done more for his country? Putin or Bush? Putin or Obama? Putin or whomever they disgorge into the White House next?"

"Not a comparison most Americans would enjoy."

"Nor should they. But what do the Americans really know of us?"

"What did they ever?"

"They knew our power, they knew our faults, they knew our crimes. Now they think they know Pussy Riot and a couple billionaires and they think that's all they need to know. At some level, they know that we mean them no harm. But to admit it would be to deprive themselves of their favorite punching bag. So they don't."

"True enough. But what has this to do with me?"

"Irina Borisovna, we Russians are hideously poor at what the West calls public diplomacy. No, not poor. We don't even bother. Why try? Their minds are already made up. But," now it was Bogdanov's turn to laugh, "a while back, one of my research people brought me a tape of an American television show. A political comedy talk show. Do you know who was the guest?"

"No. There are so many American politicians who do comedy."

"It was a retired chief of the Israeli Mossad. He was in America, on a book tour, of all things. Peddling his memoirs and hopes for his country and the world. I know the man. He's tougher than frozen blini. But in America he came across as human, even likable." Bogdanov looked at her directly. "Irina Borisovna, would you like to do the same?"

Suslova's laugh was unhappy. "I'd have to watch the tape first. Then turn into a frumpy old man."

"The first will be arranged. The second is expecting too much. Now," he leaned toward her a bit, "this is what I want you to do. You don't have to. But if you remain in this building in your present condition, I can't guarantee your next promotion. Or your retention when I retire in three years. Or sooner."

Suslova nodded, vaguely wondering where thirty years had gone, and how it was possible that a lifetime could come down to this. "Tell me what you want me to do."

"You know Americans as well as any Russian in our trade who has not made them his specialty. You opposed certain CIA activities when we were in Afghanistan. You shut them down. Later, you worked with them on matters of mutual concern. You still have contacts with them."

"One good friend. Now retired."

"But still influential, if it's the man I'm thinking of. You did your doctorate on American politics."

"Back in the 1980s. On American neocons and their quest for endless enemies."

"Still a relevant topic. You've also lived and travelled in America. Your English is excellent. You are impressive physically."

"Thank you, Comrade Director, for the compliments. Now, what do you want me to do?"

"I want you to go there for a year, write a fast book, then hype it to the skies. I want you in their media, on their blogs and lecture circuits, at their conferences. I want you to take every opportunity to explain us. Why we do what we do, our hopes, the nightmare past we've yet to begin to come to terms with. I want you," he concluded, "to become a celebrity."

"Where will I do all this?"

"Your base will be a Washington, DC think tank."

"And be infected by the anaerobic bacteria that they call analysts and scholars?"

"We'll vaccinate you before you go. General, I want you to place our country before the American people in a way they've never seen us before."

"And do it out of an American think tank?"

"Precisely. A university placement would take too long to arrange. But think tanks . . . for the right amount of money, they'll take you as a resident fellow immediately. They usually have good media connections that you may use. We will, of course, provide you with the services of an American PR firm. They'll also help you find a publisher."

Suslova shrugged. "PR firms I know about. Whores."

"But useful whores."

She stood. "Comrade Director, the only difference between a brothel and an American think tank is that the people in the brothel are honest about why they're there and what they're doing."

"You've been in worse places," he said sharply.

She sat down again, sobered. "Yes."

"At the very least, you'll get a rest, do good work for your country and come back, as they used to say of Richard Nixon, tanned, rested and ready."

"Or some such nonsense. If I agree, how long would it take to staff this through?"

"A few hours. The necessary expenditures to place you will come out of my private discretionary funds. You will remain on full salary, with an unlimited expense account. I can contact the institute I have in mind, well, now. The chairman of their board is a businessman with varied interests who is known to me."

"Which institute is this?"

"If I told you that, I might have to kill you. In self-defense, of course. Why don't you take until tomorrow to think it over? Talk with your family. Honestly, Irina Borisovna, don't you want to have an American best-seller on your resume?"

"Will I have to reveal State secrets?"

"Only those we pre-approve. Now go home. Call your sons. Fine young men, both. Talk it over with Valentina. How is she?"

"I suspect," Suslova answered, admitting the fact to full consciousness for the first time, "more than a little perturbed at my inattentiveness whenever I've been home these last few months. Perhaps . . . perhaps she could use a sabbatical, too."

"I would not doubt." Bogdanov stood. "Go home. I'll see you tomorrow. And Irina Borisovna . . ."

"Yes?"

"You've come a long way, baby. Don't blow it now."

Major General Irina Borisovna Suslova, Director of the Service for the Protection of the Constitutional System and the Fight against Terrorism of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, the FSB, nodded solemnly. And then, in fine American style, she winked.

—30—

