The Cardinal of the Kremlin - By Tom Clancy Page 0,16

Lieutenant Filitov had been marked as a man on the move, a brilliant young tank officer for whom Stalin's brutal purge of the officer corps had meant opportunity and rapid promotion. He wrote articles on tank tactics, practiced innovating battle drills in the field, argued vociferously against the fall "lessons" of Spain with the certainty of a man born to themprofession.

But what do I do now? he'd asked himself. The Red Army hadn't taught him how to approach an artist. This wasn't some farm girl who was bored enough by work on the kolkhoz to offer herself to anyone-especially a young Army officer who might take her away from it all. Misha still remembered the shame of his youth-not that he'd thought it shameful at time-when he'd used his officer's shoulder boards to win any girl who'd caught his eye. But I don't even know her name, he'd told himself. What do I do? What he'd done, of course, was to treat the matter as a military exercise. As soon as the performance had ended he'd fought his way into the rest room and washed hands and face. Some grease that still remained under his fingernails was removed with a pocketknife. His short hair was wetted down into place, and he inspected his uniform as strictly as a general officer might, brushing off dust and picking off lint, stepping back from the mirror to make sure his boots gleamed as a oldier's should. He hadn't noticed at the time that other men in the men's room were watching him with barely suppressed grins, having guessed what the drill was for, and wishing him luck, touched with a bit of envy. Satisfied with his appearance, Misha had left the theater and asked the doorman where the artists' door was. That had cost him a ruble, and with the knowledge, he'd walked around the block to the stage entrance, where he found another doorman, this one a bearded old man whose greatcoat bore ribbons for service in the revolution. Misha had expected special courtesy from the doorman, one soldier to another, only to learn that he regarded the female dancers as his own daughters-not wenches to be thrown at the feet of soldiers, certainly! Misha had considered offering money, but had the good sense not to imply the man was a pimp. Instead, he'd spoken quietly and reasonably-and truthfully-that he was smitten with a single dancer whose name he didn't know, and merely wanted to meet her.

"Why?" the old doorman had asked coldly. "Grandfather, she smiled at me," Misha had answered in the awed voice of a little boy.

"And you are in love." The reply was harsh, but in a moment the doorman's face turned wistful. "But you don't know which?"

"She was in-the line, not one of the important ones, I mean. What do they call that?-I will remember her face until the day I die." Already he'd known that. The doorman looked him over and saw that his uniform as properly turned out, and his back straight. This was not a swaggering pig of an NKVD officer whose arrogant breath stank of vodka. This was a soldier, and a handsome young one at that. "Comrade Lieutenant, you are a lucky man. Do you know why? You are lucky because I was once young, but old as I am, I still remember. They will start to come out in ten minutes or so. Stand over there, and make not a sound." It had taken thirty minutes. They came out in twos and threes. Misha had seen the male members of the troupe and thought them-what any soldier would think of a man in a ballet company. His manhood had been offended that they held hands with such pretty girls, but he'd set that aside. When the door opened, his vision was damaged by the sudden glare of yellow-white light against the near blackness of the unlit alley, and he'd almost missed her, so different she looked without the makeup.

He saw the face, and tried to decide if she were the right one, approaching his objective more carefully than he would ever do under the fire of German guns. "You were in seat number twelve," she'd said before he could summon the courage to speak. She had a voice! "Yes, Comrade Artist," his reply had stammered out. "Did you enjoy the performance, Comrade Lieutenant?" A shy, but somehow beckoning smile, "It was wonderful!" Of course.

"It is not often that we see handsome young