“It wasn’t a jail cell, for pete’s sake, it was an interrogation room. No worse than the anteroom of any Senate Committee hearing. Friendlier, if anything, the Bulgarians being more civilized. Although our man reminded me of any number of Senate staff assistants. The same reckless bonhomie. Or maybe it was his needle.”
“You haven’t denied it,”
“Let me set the scene for you, councilor. Here we have our heroine, in a natty two-piece number you would have greatly admired, sitting placidly in a drab, yet neat room in the police headquarters in Sofia. She does deep breathing exercises as she waits so as not to waste a minute of the taxpayers’ money, when the door opens and a man appears. She is not shocked, she has seen men before, but something about this one draws her attention. Perhaps it is his purposeful, catlike tread, or perhaps it is the hypodermic needle he seems intent upon thrusting into her epidermis. Our heroine has never liked needles, and suggests an alternative. He seems insistent, however, and things are looking dicey. Suddenly a voice is heard in the hallway, the villain subsides quietly into a chair, looking as if butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, and into the room walks, ta da, our hero. He routs the bad guy with a glance, turns to our heroine and discovers that she is the long lost love he has misplaced some twenty-two years ago when she went out for coffee and did not return. They look deeply into each other’s eyes for a moment, then she whacks him manfully on the shoulder, shakes his hand vigorously, and says, ‘How you doin’, fella? Long time no see. How’s tricks?’”
“And what does he say?”
“Aha, I knew I’d get you with that one. He says, ‘That was a hell of a long cup of coffee.’ In a trice they pledge undying devotion, are parted, reconciled, and finally, with pain shadowed eyes, realize they must part forever. Alas, their loyalties lie elsewhere, his to his wife and family-and father-in-law, hers to the United States Government, without which no sane citizen would leave home. On that patriotic note, we ring down the curtain, raise the houselights, revealing a tear-washed audience.”
She glanced up at him. Dry eyes. She shrugged. “Maybe you had to be there.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this?”
“There was nothing to tell. We met when I toured Eastern Europe, had a brief, reasonably passionate fling, and parted.”
“Why?”
“Boy, you’re nosy! Why does anybody part?”
He looked at her without speaking.
“All right. In our case, it was a terminal case of communication breakdown. I spoke no Bulgarian; he spoke no English. It’s very difficult to have a lover’s quarrel in two languages. I went off in a fit of pique and just never got around to getting back.”
“But you learned Bulgarian.”
“Yes.”
“And he married the boss’s daughter.”
He was going to push, wasn’t he? Well, she didn’t have to tumble. She waited.
“How long has he been married?”
“Ten years.”
“You made quite an impression.”
“You met me soon afterward. And thought I was terribly gauche.”
“You were. But impressive. Especially to a youngster.”
“You had to spoil it, didn’t you, you silver tongued devil.”
“You had the most incredible vitality I’d ever encountered.” He was looking at her, but not seeing her. For God’s sake, this was the second time in weeks he’d gone all moony on her.
There was definitely something wrong.
“Max!”The snap in her voice brought him back to the present and his usual sardonic look, “Did you come to write my epitaph? I’m surprised you think I still have the energy. But, of course, Ilya is a doddering old codger of forty-four himself. Hardly spry enough to dodge if I were to hurl myself at him. Well, I’m glad you didn’t leave it to strangers. Something tasteful in marble, I think, don’t you? A couple of three foot angels at each side, just to let them know which side I was on…”
“I came to see if you were all right. I heard disturbing reports.”
“And?”
“In spite of the fact that you seem to have abandoned every vestige of dress sense I taught you, you don’t seem to have suffered irreparable damage. Now, you’d better get back out there. The fashion show will be over soon, and they’ll wonder where you are.”
“Fashion show? You knew all the time why they came!”
“No. It just seemed the obvious thing to occupy thirty-two women while I exposed myself to your withering wit,”
“Withering wit. Planning to run for vice president?”
He looked at his watch. Which she had given him, by God. She was going to ask for it back. He stood facing her for a moment, his hands on her shoulders.
“Jessica. You are important to me. Be careful.” He looked down at the material beneath his hands. “My God, what is this stuff?”
“Polyester. Named, I think, after Pollyanna. Neither ever wilt. Absolutely cannot wrinkle.”
“Neither does fiberglass,” he said with distaste. He moved his hands down to her elbows, possibly to keep her from hitting him. “I’m sending Sandy Carson to help out.”
She stiffened, her eyes blazed and his grip tightened on her elbows. She was about to speak when the sound of applause reached them. He swung her around toward the door of the galley, and pushed her gently through.
“You can thank me when you come home. Sandy will be there tomorrow.” The door swung shut behind her.
As angry and humiliated as she was, she had to appreciate his timing, and that absolutely wicked final shot. She was definitely going to get that watch back. She crossed the passageway and slipped into the back of the room just in time to mingle with the Bulgarian women. A much happier group than she had left forty minutes before. Karl’s wife darted over.
“Oh, Miss Winter, what a wonderful thing. And so much easier on the feet than window shopping. I have told them of our fears that we would not like this trip, but now we are most satisfied.”
*****
The trip home was a silent one; the Bulgarian women were drained by the events of the day. They sat quietly, clutching the designer scarfs which had been presented to them at the end of the very satisfying fashion show. The fashion show and the red carpet treatment on the boat had gone far to relieve their earlier resentment. In fact, they had largely forgotten their annoyance, and now looked back on their previous trips as wasted effort. Drifting aimlessly from boutique to boutique, looking in windows, could hardly compare with model after model dressed in stunning outfits parading expressly for their enjoyment. And the scarf and the accompanying rose were frosting on the cake. When Max did something, he did it well. Jessica was amused and pleased at the response of the women. She had been genuinely sorry when she thought she was depriving them of their treat.
Her silence was not induced by contentment, however. She knew Max very well, or thought she did, and she had never, in twenty years, seen him in the field before. And he hadn’t wanted to hear about her troubles, had he? Au contraire, she muttered impatiently, he seemed more intent on telling her his. She simply could not buy a jealous Max. He had not come 3000 miles to see if she had run off the rails over a twenty-year-old love affair. He took her too much for granted for that. His information had certainly come swiftly. In itself, this did not bother her. She was used to being surrounded by support systems. She took for granted that she was not the only person working in Bulgaria, even if she was ostensibly working alone. Nor did the rather striking news that the hypodermic wielder was theirs and there to expunge her before she could talk distress her as it might have only days earlier. She had lost just a little of her innocence in the last few days. It did not occur to her to wonder how she’d gotten this far with it intact.
Ray had said it was cockeyed, hadn’t he? Max hadn’t inquired about Ray, had had no comment about the appearance of his body in her dressing room, showed remarkably little interest, in fact, in her main responsibility. Why? Because he trusted her? O
r because he didn’t? Sending a babysitter in the person of Sandy Carson did not sound like a vote of confidence. She’d have given a lot to be able to discuss this with Ray. He never got ahead of the evidence, never got emotional about things; he just looked at the results and watched his back.
And what about Ilya?If he didn’t know why she was there, he was surely the only man in the Balkans so deprived. He was either naive or slipping from power, or crafty beyond her imagining. Or, she thought wearily, rubbing the back of her neck, all or none of the above.
Why had Ray’s body been put in her dressing room? Her first thought had been that it was simply to call attention to her and make it more difficult for her to move quietly. Certainly they had succeeded there. But they could have accomplished that without lugging a corpse 300 miles. There had to be some reason she should see the body. Had she missed something in those few minutes she’d had alone with Ray’s body? Very likely. Since she had no idea what she was looking for. Perhaps they meant to frighten her. It seemed unlikely that they would expect her to be overcome with maidenly vapors and confess all. On the other hand, it was always rash to impute intelligence to an intelligence agent, on either side. And certainly Micha Borov had expected her to be unnerved. Had he put the body there himself in an attempt to unmask her? How would he have known about her in the first place? Though, God knows, there did seem to have been an international telex announcing her arrival and each subsequent move. She’d never been in this kind of situation before. If she could only talk to Ray. Or to Max, for that matter. Why had he been so cavalier? Because he knew she could carry out the mission? Or because he knew she couldn’t? The gooseflesh she sported at that thought had nothing to do with air-conditioning.
The plane was descending. She could see Mt. Vitosha, the jewel of Sofia, out her window. She’d spent a precious hour going around in circles. She managed to conquer her depression long enough to thank Karl’s wife and the other women for the wonderful day. It was clear that they considered her a good luck charm. Each of them kissed her on the cheek and invited her to visit them. She was touched and for a moment felt better. But as she turned on the light in her bedroom and looked longingly at the bed she wasn’t going to inhabit for another eight hours, the depression returned.
“Is it paranoia if they’re really after you?” she said to the mirror. Ray had said not to trust anyone. Even one of those nice women could be the enemy. He’d also said not to trust herself. Well, he could have relaxed. She’d never trusted herself less. Everyone and everything she’d relied on, taken for granted, up to now seemed to be slipping away. Had it ever been there? Had she been living in a fool’s paradise?
“Very likely,” she said matter-of-factly, and firmly, to herself. Aloud. When she was really serious, she was given to talking to herself. She lay down on the floor, put cotton balls dipped in witch hazel over her eyes, put her feet up on the bed and breathed deeply. She had an hour before she had to be at the club, and she’d been over all that ground before. It was time to do her Scarlett O’Hara impression. Think about it tomorrow.
It would have cheered Jessica considerably to hear how Ray’s body had found its way from Varna to her dressing room. While, in fact, Panov and Leontov did know more about her than she’d have liked, the decision had little to do with omniscience.
It had been Panov’s decision, made out of frustration and a growing personal enmity toward Jessica. She had been sent because he had failed. The voice on the telephone had been brutally specific about that. Why, it had demanded, was Panov carting bodies around, calling attention to Jessica?
Panov had considered the idea just short of genius when it occurred to him. They would obtain the icon. But he had left too much to chance already. Jessica had been sent because of her relationship with the dead man. They very likely had a plan for just this situation. Stephens would secrete the microfilm on some part of his person and Jessica would simply retrieve it. Well, it was up to Panov to give her the chance. With appropriate supervision, of course. If at the same time it called official attention to Jessica and linked her with the two deaths in Varna, it was just an added bonus. At the very least, it would slow her down considerably.
When he had outlined the rationale for this marvelous scheme to the man on the telephone, he had gotten another shock.
“Panov,” the voice said coldly, “Keep out of her way and let her find it.”
“You don’t know she’s going to find it.”
The voice on the other end was silky. “All we know for certain is that you did not find it. And that you let him get away.”
“Dying isn’t exactly getting away,” the Russian snapped.
“Isn’t it?” The voice was still bland.
“Then by all means interrogate him. Our worries are over.”
“I’ll be pleased when she does find it. IF she finds it …”
“You’d better hope she does.”
Panov ignored the interruption. “…because it will be a pleasure to dispose of her as well.”
“I’m afraid that’s a pleasure that’s going to be denied you.”
“What do you mean? You can’t let her leave the country with the microfilm?”
The voice was cold steel now and even Panov, who was not easily impressed, felt a chill. “You have botched this thing from the beginning. I have had to come up with a new plan and you must do exactly as you are told. Years of work are at stake here. You know where your instructions come from?”
Reluctantly. “Yes.”
“Then you understand that you can’t afford to fail again.”
Panov was going to give it one more try. “How can you be sure she’ll bring it to you?”
“She is well trained. She is not given to hare-brained schemes. I need her back here with that microfilm. I am holding you responsible.”
Panov gave up. But didn’t change his mind. If he could get his hands on that microfilm, Jessica was never going to see it.
*****
In spite of her fatigue, the evening’s performance went very well. A group of Stephan’s friends from the university had come early and stayed until the last set. They were an enthusiastic audience, particularly when Stephan and Jessica did their country and western medley. The club was next door to the American Embassy and several members of the staff had dropped in around ten-thirty and stayed for an hour or so. They were particularly appreciative of the pure jazz numbers. With one thing and another, the evening flew by, and when Jessica got into bed around three-thirty, she was almost too keyed up to sleep. She lay there, thinking about the evening’s high points. They were getting better and better as a group. Maybe she ought to take them all back with her. Maybe she could earn her living singing after all. If she got back. And on that happy thought her mind closed down and she slept.
She was awakened at ten-thirty by the ringing of the phone. Her arm was languid as she reached for it, but her voice was brisk.
“Yes?”
“Jessica, May I come up?”
It was Ilya. His voice was hard.
“Of course. Give me fifteen minutes, will you? I’m a little disheveled.”
“Ke Qua?”
“I have to get dressed. I was asleep.”
“I’ll be up in ten minutes,” he said curtly and put down the phone.
She lay there for a moment staring at the ceiling. “Send not to ask for whom the bell tolls, cookie.” She tapped her fingers idly on the spread. “La, la, la, what to do?” as the Bulgarians were so fond of saying. He was not pleased. There was no reason for him to be. She had been trying to avoid facing this situation since she had first seen him. Well, here it was and she still had no idea how she was going to handle it. Max was wrong for once in his assessment of the situation between them. She had been genuinely pleased to see him, but her next thought had been one of dismay. He could only complicate an already murky situation. She hauled herself slowly out of bed and headed for the shower. He knew why she was here; but it had taken him a long tim
e to find out.
She had put on a robe by the time the brisk knock sounded. She opened the door and he strode in, not speaking. She closed the door and turned to face him. He was clearly angry. She waited.
“Why didn’t you tell me why you were here?”
“I’m singing; you knew that.”
“Jessica! Are you denying you have another reason for being here?”
She looked at him for a long moment, weighing her reply.
Finally, she said, “Did Micha Borov tell you?”
He was instantly wary. “No. Did he know?”
“I think so. One of the band is reporting to him daily.”
“The bass player.”
“No, dear. The bass player is reporting to the Chinese.”
“How do you know these things?”
“It’s my job to know.” And I let the rest of that statement dangle. “How did you know then?”
“You are being followed by Russian agents. Did you know that?”
“Ilya, darling, children on the streets of Sofia know I’m being followed by Russian agents. I’m also being followed by your people, by my people, and by three dwarfs and a mongoose who’ll follow anybody. I have to get a parade permit to get from my hotel to the club. Restaurant owners ask me not to come during the rush hour, they can’t handle the crush.”
“Are you finished?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It’s perfectly obvious you achieved this position in bed. You should have stayed there! What did you want me to do? Walk in and ask for your help? I did not expect to find you here, especially not in this position. Had I known, I would never have come back to Bulgaria. I had hoped that I would be out of Bulgaria before you knew.”
“So you wished to make a fool of me?”
“To do that I’d have to stand in line. Doesn’t it seem odd to you that you’re the last man in the Balkans to know why I’m here? I think you’ve stopped getting memos.”
“What?”
“When a man is being pushed out of power in an American corporation, he stops getting memos with essential information. I think you’d better look and see where yours are stopping.”
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