which country lane to take.
“The houses don’t look too bad,” Chavez observed.
“Built by German POWs,” John told him. “Ivan doesn’t exactly like the Germans very much, but he does respect their workmanship. These were built for the Politburo members, mainly after the war, probably. There’s our place.”
It was a wood-frame house, painted brown and looking like a cross between a German country house and something from an Indiana farm, Clark thought. There were guards here, too, armed and walking around. They’d been called from the first shack, John figured. One of them waved. The other two stood back, ready to cover the first one if something untoward happened.
“You are Klerk, Ivan Sergeyevich?”
“Da,” John answered. “This is Chavez, Domingo Stepanovich.”
“Pass, you are expected,” the guard told them.
It was a pleasant evening. The sun was down now, and the stars were making their appearance in the sky. There was also a gentle westerly breeze, but Clark thought he could hear the ghosts of war here. Hans von Kluge’s panzer grenadiers, men wearing the feldgrau of the Wehrmacht. World War II on this front had been a strange conflict, like modern TV wrestling. No choice between good and bad, but only between bad and worse, and on that score it had been six-five and pick ’em. But their host probably wouldn’t see history that way, and Clark had no intention of bringing up the subject.
Golovko was there, standing on the sheltered porch by the furniture, dressed casually. Decent shirt, but no tie. He wasn’t a tall man, about halfway between Chavez and himself in height, but the eyes always showed intelligence, and now they also showed interest. He was curious about the purpose of this meeting, as well he might be.
“Ivan Sergeyevich,” Golovko said in greeting. Handshakes were exchanged, and the guests conducted inside. Mrs. Golovko, a physician, was nowhere in evidence. Golovko first of all served vodka, and directed them to seats.
“You said you had a message for me.” The language for this meeting was to be English, John saw.
“Here it is.” Clark handed the pages across.
“Spasiba.” Sergey Nikolay’ch sat back in his chair and started to read.
He would have been a fine poker player, John thought. His face changed not at all through the first two pages. Then he looked up.
“Who decided that I needed to see this?” he asked.
“The President,” Clark answered.
“Your Ryan is a good comrade, Vanya, and an honorable man.” Golovko paused. “I see you have improved your human-intelligence capabilities at Langley.”
“That’s probably a good supposition, but I know nothing of the source here, Chairman Golovko,” Clark answered.
“This is, as you say, hot.”
“It is all of that,” John agreed, watching him turn another page.
“Son of a bitch!” Golovko observed, finally showing some emotion.
“Yeah, that’s about what I said,” Chavez entered the conversation.
“They are well-informed. This does not surprise me. I am sure they have ample espionage assets in Russia,” Golovko observed, with anger creeping into his voice. “But this is—this is naked aggression they discuss.”
Clark nodded. “Yep, that’s what it appears to be.”
“This is genuine information?” Golovko asked.
“I’m just the mailman, Chairman,” Clark replied. “I vouch for nothing here.”
“Ryan is too good a comrade to play agent provocateur. This is madness.” And Golovko was telling his guests that he had no good intelligence assets in the Chinese Politburo, which actually surprised John. It wasn’t often that CIA caught the Russians short at anything. Golovko looked up. “We once had a source for such information, but no longer.”
“I’ve never worked in that part of the world, Chairman, except long ago when I was in the Navy.” And the Chinese part of that, he didn’t explain, was mainly getting drunk and laid in Taipei.
“I’ve traveled to Beijing several times in a diplomatic capacity, not recently. I cannot say that I’ve ever really understood those people.” Golovko finished reading the document and set it down. “I can keep this?”
“Yes, sir,” Clark replied.
“Why does Ryan give us this?”
“I’m just the delivery boy, Sergey Nikolay’ch, but I should think the motive is in the message. America does not wish to see Russia hurt.”
“Decent of you. What concessions will you require?”
“None that I am aware of.”
“You know,” Chavez observed, “sometimes you just want to be a good neighbor.”
“At this level of statecraft?” Golovko asked skeptically.
“Why not? It does not serve American interests to see Russia crippled and robbed. How big are these mineral finds, anyway?” John asked.
“Immense,” Golovko replied. “I’m not surprised you’ve learned of them. Our efforts at secrecy were not serious. The