He paused. A great light seemed to burst in his mind, shedding a

perfectly horrible glow over the wreck of his mental processes. “You

know,” he said in a tentative tone, “we never have been properly

introduced. I only know your name is Lou.”

“That’s what people call me,” the girl said. “For short. I’m Luba

Garbitsch.”

“And I’m Kenneth Malone,” Malone said. “Kenneth J. Malone. Of the

FBI.”

She nodded. “Yes,” she said. “I know.”

“Your father—”

“My father is going to Russia,” she said, “and I am going along with

him.”

“Oh,” Malone said. “Sure. Sure. Oh.”

There was a longer silence.

“Can I get on board now?” Luba said.

“There isn’t any hurry,” Malone said. “We’re still waiting for—for

passengers. And this is one of them.” He turned and indicated the

Queen. “This is Her—Rose Thompson. She’ll be traveling along with

us.”

Her Majesty was wearing a broad, broad grin, Malone noticed nervously

as he turned. Undoubtedly she had been tuned in to the whole

conversation, and knew just what had gone on in both minds. But she

only said, “I’m very pleased to meet you, my dear.”

Lou blinked, smiled and stretched out her hand. “Well, then,” she

said. “Hello. And let’s all have a happy trip.”

“By all means,” Malone said. “And the trip seems to be about to

start.”

He could hear the tramping of a lot of feet coming across the field

toward them. He looked and saw that the feet were all neatly attached

to bodies, two to a body. There were Thomas Boyd’s feet, the assorted

twelve feet of six FBI agents, and three pairs that belonged to Alexis

Brubitsch, Ivan Borbitsch and Vasili Garbitsch. Brubitsch looked even

fatter than ever, Borbitsch even thinner. Garbitsch was of an

indeterminate middling shape; he had grey hair and a pair of

pince-nez, and he walked a trifle unevenly, like a duck, with his

hands clasped low in front of him. He was looking down at the ground

as the crowd shoved him along.

When the crowd neared the steps, Luba went over to him. Garbitsch

looked up, with a pleasant, somehow wistful smile on his face. “Hello,

Luba, my child,” he said.

Luba smiled, too. “Hello, Dad,” she said. “All ready to go?”

“Certainly I am ready,” he said. “I am all packed. We take off in a

few minutes. And you, Luba, my child?”

“Fine, Dad,” she said.

She looked down. “They’ve got handcuffs on you,” she said. “Why,

that’s—”

Garbitsch shrugged. He looked even more wistful. “A formality,” he

said. “It makes no difference.”

“Okay,” Boyd said suddenly. “We’ve got to get out of here pretty soon,

and you’ll be taking off. Let’s break it up. Miss Thompson, you and

Luba go aboard. Malone, you follow with the others.”

Malone rounded up Brubitsch, Borbitsch and Garbitsch and followed the

ladies aboard.

He came back to the door then, and stuck his head out. “The keys,” he

said.

Boyd stared. “What?”

“The keys to the handcuffs,” Malone said. “I’ll need ’em.”

“You’re going to take them off when they get to Russia?” Boyd said.

Malone shook his head. “No,” he said. “Now.”

“But—”

“I think we’ll have plenty of warning if they decide to try anything,

Tom,” Malone said quietly. “Her Majesty, after all, is keeping them

under surveillance.”

Without another word, Boyd tossed up the keys. Malone caught and

pocketed them. “I’ll be back as soon as possible,” he said.

“Meanwhile, you can keep digging on other stuff—what we’ve discussed

and anything it seems to lead into.”

“Right,” Boyd said. “Stay out of trouble, Ken. So long.”

Malone nodded and ducked back into the plane. He unlocked the

handcuffs, and Brubitsch and Borbitsch immediately went and sat down

mournfully together at the back of the plane. Malone looked for Lou,

but she was already seated—with Her Majesty, naturally. He sighed

briefly and sat down, at last, next to the wistful Garbitsch.

“It will be nice to see Russia again,” Garbitsch said. “I hardly hoped

to do so.”

The plane shuddered, roared and took off. Then it settled down to its

normal state of unnatural quiet. Malone sat back and tried to relax.

It was impossible.

7

Red Square was, somehow, disappointing. It was crowded with men and

women, all looking very Russian in an undefined sort of way, and the

big glass windows sparkled from every side. “I know it’s silly,” Luba

said in a baffled voice, “but, somehow, I always expected Red Square

to be red.”

“And why should that be?” the MVD man next to her said. He was a burly

man with a sour expression, as if he had eaten too many onions the day

before.

“Well,” Malone said, “it is Red Square, after all.”

“But red is symbolic only,” the MVD man said surlily. “Is not color.

Only symbol of glorious Russia.”

“I suppose so,” Luba said. “But it’s still disappointing.”

“You expect, perhaps, that we recruit our glorious Red Army from

American Indian tribes?” the MVD man said sourly. “You are

literal-minded bourgeois intellectual. This is not good thing to be.”

“Somehow,” Malone mused, “I didn’t think it was.”

“But this is different,” Luba said. “The Red Army is made up of

Russians. But this is just a square. You could paint it.”

“After all,” Malone offered, “the White House is white, isn’t it?”

“White is cowardly color,” the MVD man pointed out with satisfaction.

“Never mind that,” Malone said. “We call it a white house, and it is a

white house. You call this a red square, and it isn’t even pink. Not

even a little bit pink. It’s just—just—”

“Just building-colored,” Luba put in. Malone turned to her and

executed a small bow.

“Thank you,” he said.

“Think nothing of it,” Luba said.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Malone said. “I will.”

The MVD man hissed like a teakettle and both heads swung round to look

at him again. Her Majesty, who had been admiring some dresses in a

shop window, also turned. “My goodness,” she said. “That’s a terrible

wheeze. Do you take something for it?”

“Is not wheeze,” the MVD man said. “Is noise representing impatience

with arrogance and stupidity of capitalist warmonger conversation.”

“Arrogance?” Luba said.

“Stupidity?” Malone said.

Her Majesty drew herself to her full height. “We do not monger war,”

she said. “Not in the least. We are not mongers.”

The MVD man looked at her, blinked, sighed and looked away. “This

color discussion,” he said, “it is very silly. Look at the Blue Ridge

Mountains, in your country. Are they blue?”

“Well—” Malone said.

“What color, for example, is the Golden Gate Bridge?” the MVD man

continued, with heavy sarcasm. “Is not even a gate. Is a bridge. Is

not golden. But you say we disappoint. No. You disappoint.”

There seemed to be no immediate answer to that, so Malone didn’t try

for one. Instead, he went back to looking at the Square, and beyond it

to where the inverted turnips of the Kremlin gleamed in the moonlight.

The turnips were very pretty, if a little odd for building-tops. But

Red Square, in spite of all its historic associations, seemed to be a

little dull. The buildings were just buildings, and the streets were

filled with Russians. They were not bomb-throwing Russians, bearded

Russians or even “Volga Boatman”-singing Russians. They were just

ordinary, dull Russians of every sort, shade, race, color and previous

condition of servitude.

It was just about what he’d expected after the trip. That hadn’t been

exciting either, he told himself. There had been no incident of any

kind. None of the three spies seemed to be exactly overjoyed about

being sent back to good old Mother Russia, but none seemed inclined to

make much fuss about the matter, either. Malone had blandly told them

that they were being deported, instead of tried, because there was no

evidence that was worth the expense of a trial. And, besides that, he

had particularly emphasized that the FBI did not believe any of the

stories the three men had told.

“They just don’t match up,” he said. “You all told different stories,

and there’s too much disagreement between them. Frankly, we don’t

believe any of them—not yet, we don’t. But mark my words. We’ll find

out the truth some day.”

He’d thought it was a good speech, and Her Majesty had agreed with

him. It had its desired effect, since the plane was the first place

the three had had a chance to meet since their arrest. “Each one knows

that he told the truth,” Her Majesty said, “but nobody knows what the

other two said.”

“That’s what I figured,” Malone said. “They didn’t have a chance to

talk to each other.”

“And so each one is lying his head off to the others,” Her Majesty

said, “and telling them all about how he, too, lied gloriously and

bravely in defense of the Motherland. It’s really very funny.”

“Well,” Malone said, “it makes them happy. And why not?”

Luba, too, had chatted with her father quite a lot of the time. Her

Majesty reported that none of this conversation could possibly be

understood as dangerous or harmful. It was just simple conversation.

Of course, Luba and her father hadn’t talked all the time, and Malone

did have a chance to get a few words in edgewise. Her Majesty made no

report on those conversations, but Malone was comfortably aware that

they did not belong in the harmless class. His relationship with the

girl seemed, he told himself happily, to be improving slightly. Now

and again, he even won a round from her.

As the American plane crossed the border, it was picked up by an

escort of Russian fighter craft, which stuck with them all the way

into Moscow. The fighters didn’t do anything; they were just there,

Malone figured, for insurance. But they made him nervous when he

looked out the window. The trip from the border to Moscow seemed to

take a long time.

Then, at the airfield, a group of MVD men had almost elbowed the

American Embassy delegation out of the way in greeting the

disembarking little band. There was a lot of palaver, in Russian,

English and various scrambled mixtures which nobody understood. The

American delegation greeted Malone, Luba and Her Majesty formally, and

the MVD concentrated on Brubitsch, Borbitsch and Garbitsch. The three

spies were hustled away, apparently to MVD Headquarters, without much

fuss. Luba said goodbye to her father calmly enough, and Vasili

Garbitsch seemed almost entirely unaffected by his surroundings. As

the plane touched ground, he had said: “Ah, the soil of Mother

Russia,” but, outside of a goodbye or two, those were his last words

before leaving.

One MVD man stayed behind, even after the American delegation had

left. His name, he explained, was Vladimir Josefovitch Petkoff. “It

will be my pleasure to show your group the many historic and

interesting sights of Moskva,” he announced to Malone.

“Pleasure?” Malone said. Petkoff was tall and heavy, and wore a row of

medals that strung out across his chest like a newspaper headline.

“My duty,” Petkoff said flatly, “is my pleasure. That is how we

arrange matters in Russia.”

And so the tour had started, with Red Square. Malone told himself he

didn’t really mind if it weren’t red, but he did think it could at

least look sinister. Unfortunately, the Square did not seem

particularly willing to oblige.

“So this is Red Square,” Malone said, after a long silence.

“You do not sound interested,” Petkoff said in what sounded like a

vaguely ominous voice. “Because it is not painted in capitalistic and

obvious colors, it bores you?”

“Not exactly,” Malone said. “But when you’ve seen one Square, you’ve

seen them all, is how I feel about it. There must be somewhere else to

sight-see.”

“Somewhere?” Petkoff said. “There is everywhere. This is Moskva, the

capital and the greatest city in Mother Russia. That is what we are

told to say.” He lowered his voice. “Personally,” he added, “I come

from Leningrad. I prefer it. But in Moskva one talks only of Moskva.”

“I know just how you feel,” Malone assured him. “I’ve been to San

Francisco.”

“Well, then,” Petkoff said, almost smiling at him. “What is there you

would like to see?”

Malone fished in his pocket for an American cigarette. He’d brought a

carton with him, having once tried Russian makes. They seemed to be

mostly cardboard, both the long filter and the tobacco. He lit the

cigarette and thought for a second. “I don’t suppose,” he said

cautiously, “that we could take a look around inside the Kremlin,

could we?”

“Aha,” Petkoff said. “I see what is in your mind.”

“You do?” Malone said, startled.

“Naturally,” Petkoff said. “You wish to see the tomb of Lenin. It is

famous throughout the world.”

Malone considered that for a minute. “Somehow,” he said cautiously,

“the coffin of Lenin doesn’t exactly sound like a gay start for

sight-seeing.”

Petkoff looked pleased instantly. “I understand,” he said. “Truly I

understand. You, too, feel sad over the death of the great Lenin. How

beautiful! How cultured!”

Malone wondered whether or not to disillusion the man, and decided

against it. “Well, something like that,” he said vaguely.

“I’ll tell you what: is there a restaurant around here where we could

get something to eat?”

“To eat?” Petkoff said, still looking pleased. “You wish to eat?”

“Well,” Malone said, “I’m rather hungry, and I guess the ladies must

be, too.”

“What?” Luba said, returning to the group. She had joined Her Majesty

in viewing the display of dresses. The Queen came scurrying over, too,

through the silent and jostling Russian crowds.

“I was suggesting a restaurant,” Malone said.

“Best idea anybody’s had all day,” Lou said. Her Majesty graciously

consented to agree, and Petkoff beamed like the rising sun.

“My friends,” he said. “My very fine friends—although you are

capitalistic bourgeois intellectuals, thrown aside by the path of

progress—in Moskva we have the finest restaurants in all the world.”

“How about ... oh, Leningrad?” Malone said in a low voice.

“In Leningrad,” Petkoff admitted, “the restaurants are better. But in

Moskva, the restaurants are very good indeed. Much better than one

might expect, if one knows Leningrad.”

“Well,” Malone said, “I suppose we’ve just got to put up with Moscow.”

They went back to the corner, and hailed the long, black,

sleek-looking limousine that had brought them in from the airport. The

two silent men in the front seat of the gleaming Volga sedan were

waiting patiently. Malone, Her Majesty and Lou got into the back,

Petkoff in front. The two men were as still as statues—and rather

unpleasant-looking statues, Malone thought—until Petkoff snapped

something in Russian. Then one of them, at the wheel, said: “_Da,

Tovarishch_.”

The car started down the Moscow streets.

Her Majesty was silent and somewhat abstracted during the ride, just

as she had been during the entire trip so far. She was, Malone knew,

prying into every mind she could touch. He smiled inwardly when he

thought about that.

The MVD, all unbeknownst to itself, was busily carrying around and

protecting the single most dangerous spy in Moscow.

Nobody else spoke, either, until the car was moving along at a good

clip. Petkoff began some small talk then, but it wasn’t very

interesting until he finally managed to edge it around to the subject

he really wanted to talk about.

“By the way, Mr. Malone,” he said, in a voice that sounded as if

Petkoff were trying to establish an offhand manner, and not succeeding

in the least. “It was thoughtful, very thoughtful, of American

government, to return to us those men. Very kind.”

Malone’s expression conveyed nothing but the sheerest good will.

“Well, you know how it is,” he said. “Anything we can do to preserve

peace and amity between our countries—we’ll do it. You know that.

Getting along, coexistence, that sort of thing. Oh, we’re glad to

oblige.”

“I am sure,” Petkoff said darkly. “You realize, of course, that they

are criminals? Deserters from Red Army, embezzlers. Embezzlers of

money.”

Wondering vaguely what else you could be an embezzler of, Malone

nodded. “That’s what your ambassador in Washington said, when we told

him about the deportation order.”

“But Dad’s not an embezzler,” Luba broke in. “Or a deserter, either.

He—”

“We have the records,” Petkoff said.

“But—”

“Ordinarily, Mr. Malone,” Petkoff said pointedly, “we do not find it

the policy of the American government to send back political

refugees.”

“Now, listen,” Lou said. “If you think you can shut me up—”

“That is exactly what I think,” Petkoff said. “Let me assure you that

no offense has been intended.”

Lou opened her mouth and started to say something. Then she shut it

again. “Well,” she said, “I guess this isn’t the time to argue about

it. I’m sorry, Mr. Petkoff.”

The MVD man beamed back at her. “Call me Vladimir,” he said.

Malone broke in hastily. “You see, Major,” he said, “these men are all

embezzlers, as you’ve said yourself. We have the word of your

government on that.”

Petkoff took his eyes off Lou with what seemed real reluctance. “Oh,”

he said. “Yes. Of course you do.”

“Therefore,” Malone said smoothly, “the three are criminals and not

political refugees.”

“Indeed,” Petkoff said blandly. “Very interesting. Your government has

done a good deal of thinking in this matter.”

“Sure we have,” Malone said. “After all, we don’t want to cause any

trouble.”

“No,” Petkoff said, and frowned. “Of course not.”

“Naturally,” Malone said.

After that, there was silence for almost a full minute. Then Major

Petkoff turned to Malone again with a frown. “Wait,” he said.

“Wait?” Malone said.

“The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,” Petkoff said, “has no

extradition treaty with your capitalist warmongering country.”

“We’re not warmongers,” Her Majesty put in. Both men ignored her.

“True,” Malone admitted.

“Then there was no reason to send these men back to us,” Petkoff said.

“Oh, no,” Malone said. “There was a very good reason. You see, we

didn’t want them in our country, either.”

“But—”

“And when we found that they’d lied on their naturalization papers,

why, naturally, we took immediate steps. The only steps we could take,

as a matter of fact.”

“The only steps?” Petkoff said. “You could have preferred charges.

This was not done. Why was it not done?”

“That,” Malone said, sidestepping neatly, “is a matter of governmental

policy, Major Petkoff. And I can’t provide any final answer.”

“Ah?” Petkoff said.

“But, after all, a trial would not make sense,” Malone said, now

busily attacking from the side. “You see, at first we thought they

were espionage agents.”

“A foolish conclusion,” Petkoff said uneasily.

Malone nodded. “That’s what we finally realized,” he said. “We

questioned them, but their stories were nonsense, absolute nonsense.

Of course, we had no idea of what foreign government might have

employed them.”

“Of course not,” Petkoff said, shifting slightly in his seat. The car

took a wide curve and swayed slightly, and Malone found himself nearly

in Lou’s lap. The sensation was so pleasant that all conversation was

delayed for a couple of seconds, until the car had righted itself.

“So,” Malone went on when he had straightened out, “we decided to save

ourselves the expense of a trial.”

“Very natural,” Petkoff said. The slight delay had apparently allowed

him to recover his own mental balance. “The capitalist countries think

only of money.”

“Sure,” Malone said agreeably. “Well, anyhow, that’s the way it was.

There was no point, really, in putting them in prison—what for? What

good could it do us?”

“Who knows?” Petkoff said.

“Exactly,” Malone said. “So, since all we wanted to do was get rid of

them, and since we had an easy way to do that, why, we took it, that’s

all, and shipped them here.”

“I see,” Petkoff said. “And the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is

properly grateful.”

“My goodness,” Her Majesty put in, apparently out of an irrepressible

sense of fun. “Maybe we’ll get medals.”

“Medals,” Petkoff said sternly, “are not given to capitalist

agitators.”

“We are not agitated,” Her Majesty said, and folded her hands in her

lap, looking quite satisfied with herself.

Petkoff thought for a second. “And why,” he said, “did you feel that

such elaborate precautions were necessary in returning these men to

us?”

Malone shrugged. “Well, we couldn’t have them just running around all

over the world, could we?” he said. “We felt that here they’d be

properly housed and fed, in their own homeland, even if they didn’t

get a job.”

“They will be properly taken care of,” Petkoff prophesied darkly.

“Now, wait a minute—” Lou began, and then stopped. “Sorry,” she said.

Malone felt sorry for her, but there was nothing he could say to make

things any better. “Exactly,” he told Petkoff with what he hoped was a

smile.

“Ah, well,” Petkoff said. “My friend and colleague, we should cease

this shoptalk. Shoptalk?”

“Quite correct,” Malone said.

“I have studied English a long time,” Petkoff said. “It is not a

logical language.”

“You’re doing very well,” Malone said. Petkoff gave him a military

duck of the head.

“I appreciate your compliments,” he said. “But I fear we are boring

the ladies.”

The major had timed his speech well. At that moment, the ornate Volga

pulled up to a smooth stop before a large, richly decorated building

that glowed brightly under the electric lights of a large sign. The

sign said something incomprehensible in Cyrillic script. Under it, the

building entrance was gilded and carved into fantastic rococo shapes.

Malone stared at the sign, and was about to ask a question about it

when Petkoff spoke.

“Trotkin’s,” he said. “The finest restaurant in all the world—in

Moskva, this is what they say of it.”

“I understand,” Malone said.

“Come,” Petkoff said grandly, and got out of the car. One of the two

silent men leaped out and opened the back door, and Her Majesty, Lou

and Malone climbed out and stood blinking on the sidewalk under the

sign.

Petkoff leaned over and said something to the driver. The second

silent man got back into the car, and it drove away down the street,

turned a corner and disappeared. The party of four started toward the

entrance of the restaurant.

The door swung open before Major Petkoff reached it. A doorman was

holding it, and bowing to each of the four as they passed. He was

dressed in Victorian livery, complete to knee-breeches and lace, and

Malone thought this was rather odd for the classless Russian society.

But the doorman was only the opening note of a great symphony.

Inside, there were tables and chairs—or at least, Malone told

himself, that’s what he thought they were. They were massive wood

affairs, carved into tortuous shapes and gilded or painted in all

sorts of colors that glittered madly under the barrage of several

electric chandeliers.

The chandeliers hung from a frescoed ceiling, and looked much too

heavy. They swayed and tinkled in time to the music that filled the

room, but for a second Malone looked past them at the ceiling. It

appeared to represent some sort of Russian heaven, at the end of the

Five-Year Plan. There were officers and ladies eating grapes,

waltzing, strolling on white puffy clouds, singing, drinking, making

love. There was an awful lot of activity going on up on the ceiling,

and it wasn’t until Malone lowered his gaze that he realized that none

of this activity had been exaggerated.

True, there were no white puffy clouds, and he couldn’t immediately

locate a bunch of grapes anywhere. But there were the musicians, in

the same Victorian outfits as the doorman: three fiddlers, a cellist,

and a man who played piano. “Just like in night-clubs in bourgeois

Paris,” Petkoff said, following Malone’s gaze with every evidence of

pride.

Between the musicians and Malone were a lot of tables and chairs and

ancient, proud-looking waiters who appeared to have been hired when

Trotkin’s had opened—and that, Malone thought, had been a long, long

time ago. He felt like those two ladies, whose names he couldn’t

remember, who said they’d slipped back in time. Officers and their

ladies, the men in glittering uniforms, the ladies in ball dresses of

every imaginable shade, cut, material and degree of exposure, were

waltzing around the room looking very polite and old-world. Others

were sitting at the tables, where candles fluttered, completely

useless in the electric glare. The noise was something terrific, but,

somehow, it was all very well-bred.

The headwaiter was suddenly next to them. He hadn’t walked there, at

least not noticeably; he appeared to have perfected the old-world

manner of the silent servant. Or, of course, Malone thought, the man

might be a teleport.

“Ah, Major Petkoff,” he said, in a silken voice. “It is so good to see

you again. And your friends?”

“Americans,” Petkoff said. “They have come to see the glorious Soviet

Union.”

“Ah,” the headwaiter said. “Your usual table, Major?”

Petkoff nodded. The headwaiter led the party through the dancers,

snaking slowly along until they reached a large table near the

musicians and at the edge of the dance floor. Her Majesty

automatically took the seat nearest the musicians, which she imagined

to be the head of the table. Lou sat at her left hand, and Malone at

her right, his back against a wall. Petkoff took the foot of the

table, called a waiter over, and ordered for the party. He did a

massive job of it, with two waiters, at last, taking down what seemed

to be his entire memoirs, plus the list of all soldiers in the Red

Army below the rank of Grand Exalted Elk, or whatever it might have

been. Malone had no idea what the major was ordering, except that it

sounded extensive and very, very Russian.

Finally the waiter went on his way. Major Petkoff turned to Malone and

smiled. “Naturally,” he said, “we will begin with vodka, _nyet_?”

Malone considered saying _nyet_, but he didn’t feel that this was the

time or the place. Besides, he told himself grimly, it would be a sad

day when a Petkoff could drink a Malone under the table. His proudest

heritage from his father was an immense capacity, he told himself. Now

was his chance to test it.

“And, naturally, a little caviar to go with it,” Petkoff added.

“Certainly,” Malone said, as if caviar were the most common thing in

the world in his usual Washington saloons.

It wasn’t long before the waiter reappeared, bringing four glasses and

three bottles of vodka chilled in an ice-bucket, like a bouquet of

champagne. Petkoff bowed him out after one bottle had been opened, set

the glasses up and began to pour.

“Oh, goodness,” Her Majesty started to say.

“None for me, thanks,” Lou chimed in.

“Oh, yes,” Her Majesty said. “I don’t think I’ll have any either. An

old lady has to be very careful of her system, you know.”

“You do not look like an old lady,” Petkoff said gallantly.

“Middle-aged, perhaps, to be cruel. But certainly not old. Not over ...

oh, perhaps forty.”

Her Majesty smiled politely at him. Malone began to wonder if it had

been gallantry, after all. From what he’d seen of the Russian women,

it was likely, after all, that Petkoff really thought Her Majesty

wasn’t much over forty at that.

“You’re very flattering, Major,” Her Majesty said. “But I assure you

that I’m a good deal older than I look.”

Malone tried to tell himself that no one else had noticed the stifled

gulp that had followed that remark. It had been his own stifled gulp.

And his face, he felt sure, had aged one hundred and twelve years

within a second or so. He waited for Her Majesty to tell Major Petkoff

just how old she really was....

But she said nothing else. After a second she turned and smiled at

Malone.

“Thanks,” he said.

“Oh, you’re quite welcome,” she said.

Petkoff frowned at both of them, shrugged, and readied the bottle.

“Well, then,” he said. “It seems as if the drinking will be done by

men—and that is right. Vodka is the drink for men.”

He had filled his own glass full of the cold, clear liquid. Now he

filled Malone’s. He stood, glass in hand. Malone also climbed to his

feet.

“To the continued friendship of our two countries!” Petkoff said. He

raised his glass for a second, then downed the contents. Malone

followed suit. The vodka burned its merry way into his stomach. They

sat.

A waiter arrived with a large platter. “Ah,” Petkoff said, turning.

“Try some of this caviar, Mr. Malone. You will find it the finest in

the world.”

Malone, somehow, had never managed to develop a taste for caviar. He

was willing to admit, if pressed, that this made him an uncultured

slob, but caviar always made him think of the joke about the country

bumpkin who thought it was marvelous that you could soften up buckshot

just by soaking it in fish oil.

Now, though, he felt he had to be polite, and he tried some of the

stuff. All things considered, it wasn’t quite as bad as he’d thought

it was going to be. And it did make a pretty good chaser for the

vodka.

Her Majesty also helped herself to some caviar. “My goodness,” she

said. “This reminds me of the old days.”

Malone waited, once again, with bated breath. But, though Her Majesty

may have been crazy, she wasn’t stupid. She said nothing more.

Petkoff, meanwhile, refilled the glasses and looked expectantly at

Malone. This time it was his turn to propose the toast. He thought for

a second, then stood up and raised his glass.

“To the most beautiful woman in all the world,” he said, feeling just

a little like a character in _War and Peace_. “Luba Vasilovna

Garbitsch.”

“Ah,” Petkoff said, smiling approvingly. Malone executed a little bow

in Lou’s direction and followed Petkoff in downing the drink. Two more

glasses of vodka wended their tortuous ways into the interior.

“Tell me, colleague,” Petkoff said as be spooned up some more caviar,

“how are things in the United States?”

Malone shot a glance at Her Majesty, but she was concentrating on

something else, and her eyes seemed far away. “Oh, all right,” he said

at last.

“Of course, you must say so,” Petkoff murmured. “But, as one colleague

to another, tell me: how much longer do you think it will be before

the proletarian uprising in your country?”

There were a lot of answers to that, Malone told himself. But he chose

one without too much difficulty. “Well, that’s hard to judge,” he

said. “I’d hate to make any prediction. I don’t have enough

information.”

“Not enough information?” Petkoff said. “I don’t understand.”

Malone shrugged. “Since our proletariat,” he said, “have shown no sign

of wanting any rebellion at all, how can I predict when they’re going

to rebel?”

Petkoff gave him an unbelieving smile. “Well,” he said. “We must have

patience, eh, colleague?”

“I guess so,” Malone said, watching Petkoff pour more vodka.

By the time the meal came, Malone was feeling a warm glow in his

interior, but no real fogginess. The dance floor had been cleared by

this time, and a group of six costumed professionals glided out and

took places. The musicians broke out into a thunderous and bumpy

piece, and the dancers began some sort of Slavic folk dance that

looked like a combination of a _kazotska_ and a shivaree. Malone

watched them with interest. They looked like good dancers, but they

seemed to be plagued with clumsiness; they were always crashing into

one another. On the other hand, Malone thought, maybe it was part of

the dance. It was hard to tell.

The dinner was as extensive as anything Malone had ever dreamed of:

_borshcht_, beef Stroganoff, smoked fish, vegetables in gigantic

tureens, ices and cheeses and fruits. And always, between the courses,

during the courses and at every available moment, there was vodka.

The drinking didn’t bother him too much. But the food was too much.

Unbelieving, he watched Petkoff polish off a large red apple, a pear

and a small wedge of white, creamy-looking cheese at the end of the

towering meal. Her Majesty was staring, too, in a very polite manner.

Lou simply looked glassy-eyed and overstuffed. Malone felt a good deal

of sympathy for her.

Petkoff finished the wedge of cheese and ripped off a belch of

incredible magnitude and splendor. Malone felt he should applaud, but

managed to restrain himself. Her Majesty looked startled for a second,

and then regained her composure. Only Lou seemed to take the event as

a matter of course, which set Malone to wondering about her home-life.

Somehow he couldn’t picture her wistful little father ever producing a

sound of such awesome magnitude.

“My dear colleague,” Petkoff was saying. Malone turned to him and

tried to look interested. “There is one thing I have wondered for many

years.”

“Really?” Malone said politely.

“That is right,” Petkoff said. “For years, there has never been a

change of name in your organization of secret police.”

“We’re not secret police,” Malone said.

Petkoff gave a massive shrug. “Naturally,” he said, “one must say

this. But surely, one tires of being called FBI all the time.”

“One does?” Malone said. “I don’t know. It gives a person a sort of

sense of security.”

“Ah,” Petkoff said. “But take us, for instance. We pride ourselves on

our ability to camouflage ourselves. GPU, and then OGPU—which were, I

understand, subject for many capitalist jokes.”

Malone tried to look as if he couldn’t imagine such a thing. “I

suppose they might have been,” he said.

“Then we were NKVD,” Petkoff said, “and now MVD. And I understand,

quite between us, Mr. Malone, that there is talk of further change.”

There was a sudden burst of applause. Malone wondered what for, looked

at the dance floor and realized that the six Slavic dancers were

taking bows. As he watched, one of them slipped and nearly fell. The

musicians obliged with a final series of chords and the dancers

trotted away. A waltz began, and couples from the tables began

crowding the floor.

“How can you manage the proletariat,” Petkoff asked, “if you do not

keep them confused?”

“We don’t, exactly,” Malone said. “They more or less manage us.”

“Ha,” Petkoff said, dismissing this with a wave of his hand.

“Propaganda.” And then he, too, turned to watch the dancers. The waltz

was finishing, and a fox-trot had begun. “With your permission, Mr.

Malone,” he said, rising, “I should like to ask so-lovely Miss

Garbitsch to dance with me.”

Malone glanced at the girl. She gave him a quick smile, with just a

hint of nervousness or strain in it, and turned to Petkoff. “I’d be

delighted, Major,” she said. Malone shut his own mouth. As the girl

rose, he got to his feet and gave the couple a small, Victorian bow.

Petkoff and Lou walked to the floor, and Malone, sitting down again,

watched enviously as he took her in his arms and began to guide her

expertly across the floor in time to the music.

Malone sighed. Some men, he told himself, had all the luck. But, of

course, Lou had to be polite, too. She didn’t really like Petkoff, he

told himself; she was just being diplomatic. And he had made some

progress with her on the plane, he thought.

He looked over at Her Majesty, but the Queen was staring abstractedly

at a crystal chandelier. Malone sighed again, took a little caviar and

washed it down with vodka. The vodka felt nice and warm, he thought

vaguely. Vodka was good. It was too bad that the people who made such

good vodka had to be enemies. But that was the way things were, he

told himself philosophically.

Terrible. That’s how things were.

The fox-trot went to its conclusion. Malone saw Petkoff, chatting

animatedly with Lou, lead her off to a small bar at the opposite side

of the room. “Some people,” he muttered, “have too much luck. Or too

much diplomacy.”

Her Majesty was tugging at his arm. That, Malone thought, was going to

be more bad news.

It was.

“Sir Kenneth,” she said softly, “do you realize that this place is

full of MVD men? Of course you don’t; I haven’t told you yet.”

Malone opened his mouth, shut it again, and thought in a hurry. If the

place were full of MVD men, that meant they probably had it bugged.

And that meant several things, all of them unpleasant. Her Majesty

shouldn’t have said anything—she shouldn’t have shown any nervousness

or anxiety in the first place, she shouldn’t have known there were so

many MVD men in the second place—because there was no way for her to

know, except through her telepathy, a little secret Malone did not

want the Russians to find out about. And she should definitely, most

definitely, not have called him “Sir Kenneth.”

“Oh,” Her Majesty said. “I am sorry, Sir—er—Mr. Malone. You’re quite

right, you know.”

“Sure,” Malone said. “Well. My goodness.” He thought of something to

say, and said it at once. “Of course there are MVD men here. This is

just the place for good old MVD men to come when they go off duty. A

nice, relaxing place full of fun and dancing and food and vodka....”

And he was thinking, at the same time: _Are they doing anything odd?_

“Russian, you know,” Her Majesty said, almost conversationally, “is an

extremely difficult language. It takes a great deal of practice to

learn to think in it really fluently.”

“Yes, I should think it would,” Malone said absently. _You mean you

haven’t been able to pick up what these people are thinking?_

“Oh, one can get the main outlines,” Her Majesty went on, “but a

really full knowledge is nearly impossible. Though, of course, it

isn’t quite as bad as all that. A man who speaks both languages, like

our dear Major Petkoff, for instance—so charming, so full of _joie de

vivre_—could be an invaluable assistant to anyone interested in

learning exactly how Russians really think.” She smiled nervously. Her

face was suddenly set and strained. “I find that—”

She stopped then, very suddenly. Her eyes widened, and her right hand

reached out to grasp Malone’s arm more strongly than he had thought

she ever could. “Sir Kenneth!” Her voice, all restraint gone, was a

hissing whisper. Malone started to say something, but Her Majesty went

on, her eyes wide. “Do something quickly!” she said.

“What?” Malone said.

“They’ve put something in Lou’s drink!” Her Majesty hissed.

Malone was on his feet before she’d finished, and he took a step

across the room.

“She’s already swallowed it!” the Queen said. “Do something! Quickly!”

The dancers on the floor were no concern of his, Malone told himself

grimly. He didn’t decide to move; he was on his way before any thought

filtered through into his mind. Officers and their ladies looked after

him with shocked stupor as he plowed his way across the dance floor,

using legs, elbows, shoulders and anything else that allowed him free

passage. Sometimes the dancers managed to get out of his way.

Sometimes they didn’t. It was all the same to Kenneth J. Malone.

Her Majesty followed in his wake, silent and stricken, scurrying after

him like a small destroyer following a battleship, or like a

ball-carrying grandmother following up her interference.

Malone caught sight of Lou, standing at the bar. In that second, she

seemed to realize for the first time that something was wrong. She

pushed herself violently away from the bar, and looked frantically

around, her mouth opening to call. Petkoff was a blur next to her;

Malone didn’t look at him clearly. Lou took a step....

And two men with broken, lumpy faces came through a door somewhere in

the rear of the restaurant, closer to her than Malone. Petkoff

suddenly swam into sight; he was standing very still and looking

entirely baffled.

Malone pushed through a pair of dancers, ignored their glares and the

man’s hissed insult, which he didn’t understand anyhow, and found his

view suddenly blocked by a large expanse of dark grey.

It was somebody’s chest, in a uniform. Malone shifted his gaze half an

inch and saw a row of gold buttons. He looked upward.

There, towering above him, was a face. It stared down, looking heavy

and cruel and stupid. Malone, his legs still carrying him forward,

bounced off the chest and staggered back a step or two. He heard a

hissed curse behind him, and realized without thinking about it that

he had managed to collide with the same pair of dancers again. He

didn’t look around to see them. Instead, he looked ahead, at the giant

who blocked his path.

The man was about six feet six inches tall, a great Mongol who weighed

about a sixth of a ton. But he didn’t look fat; he looked strong

instead, and enormously massive. Malone sidestepped, and the Mongol

moved slightly to block him. To one side, Malone saw Her Majesty

scurrying by. The Mongol was apparently more interested in Malone than

in trying to stop sweet little old ladies. Malone saw Her Majesty

heading for the bar, and forgot about her for the second.

The Mongol shifted again to block Malone’s forward progress.

“What seems to be such great hurry, _Tovarishch_?” he said in a voice

that sounded like an earthquake warning. “Have you no culture? Why you

run across floor in such impolite manner?”

The man might have been blocking his way because of Lou, or might

simply want to teach an uncultured _Amerikanski_ a lesson. Malone

couldn’t tell which, and it didn’t seem to matter. He whirled and

reached for a glass of vodka standing momentarily unattended on a

nearby table.

He tossed the vodka at the giant’s eyes, and scooted around the

mountain of flesh before it erupted with a volcanic succession of

Russian curses that shook the room with their volume and sincerity.

But Lou and Her Majesty were nowhere in sight. Major Petkoff was

staring, and Malone followed his line of sight.

A door in the rear of the restaurant was just closing. Behind it

Malone saw Her Majesty and Lou, disappearing from sight.

Malone knocked over a waiter and headed for Petkoff. “What’s going on

here?” he bellowed over the crash of dishes and the rising wave of

Russian profanity.

Petkoff shrugged magnificently. “I have no ideas, colleague,” he said.

“I have no ideas.”

“But she—”

“Miss Garbitsch was taken suddenly ill,” Petkoff said.

“Damn sudden,” Malone growled.

“Her friend, Miss Thompson, has taken her to the ladies’ room,”

Petkoff said. He gestured, narrowly missing a broken, lumpy face

Malone had seen before.

“You are under arrest,” the face said. Its partner peered over

Petkoff’s shoulder.

“I?” Petkoff said.

“Not you,” the face said. “Him.” He started for Malone and Petkoff

threw out both arms.

“Hold!” he said. “My orders are to see that this man is not molested.”

The guests had suddenly and silently melted away. Malone backed off a

step, looking for something to stage a fight with.

“On the other hand, Comrade,” one of the lumpy-faced men said, “we

have orders also.”

“My orders—” Petkoff began.

“Your orders do not exist,” the other lumpy man said. “We are to

arrest this man. Our orders say so.”

“You are fools,” Petkoff said. He spread his arms wider, blocking both

of them. Malone edged back against the bar, feeling behind him for a

bottle or maybe a bungstarter. Instead, his hand touched a sleeve.

A voice behind him bellowed: “Cease!”

The two lumpy-faced men goggled. Petkoff did not move.

Malone turned, and saw a tall, thin civilian with dark glasses.

“Cease,” the civilian repeated. “It is the girl we are to arrest! The

girl!”

“This is not a girl,” one of the lumpy men said. “Sir. We are to

arrest this man. Our orders say distinctly—”

“Never mind your orders!” Petkoff said. “Go and reduce your orders to

shreds and stuff them up your nostrils and die of suffocation! My

orders say—”

“The girl!” the civilian said. “Where is the girl?”

Malone darted forward. Petkoff caught him neatly with one arm as he

went by. “Until we decide what to do,” the MVD man said, “you stay

here.” Malone bucked against him, but could get nowhere. “Meanwhile,”

Petkoff said, “I am for letting you go.”

“I appreciate it,” Malone said through his teeth. “How about proving

it?”

“If you let him go,” a lumpy man said, “you will answer to our group

head.”

Petkoff tightened his hold protectively. Meanwhile, the civilian was

climbing up into a stratospheric rage.

“You are dolts, imbeciles, worms without brains and walking bellies

filled with carrion!” he said magnificently. “I have orders which I am

sworn to carry out!”

“You are not alone,” Petkoff said.

Malone took another try at a getaway, and failed.

“We take precedence,” a lumpy man said. “We can talk later. Arrest

comes first.”

“But who?” the civilian snapped. “I insist—”

“There shall be no arrest!” Petkoff screamed. “No one is to be

arrested at all!”

“I swear by the bones of Stalin that my orders state—” the tall man

began.

“The bones of Stalin are with us!” a lumpy man said. “Go and die in a

kennel filled with fleas and old newspaper! Go and freeze to the

likeness of an obscene statue of a bourgeois deity! Go and hang by the

ears from a monument four thousand feet high in the center of the

great desert!”

Inspired, the other lumpy man screamed “Charge!” and came for Petkoff

and the civilian. Petkoff whirled, letting go of Malone in order to

beat back this wave of maddened attackers, and Malone took the

advantage. He ducked free under Petkoff’s left arm and started around

the gesticulating, screaming, fighting group for the door at the back

of the restaurant. He took exactly four steps.

Then he stopped. The Mongol, his eyes red with a combination of vodka

and bull-roaring rage, was charging toward him, his hands outflung and

his fingers grasping at the air. “Warmonger!” he was shouting.

“Capitalist slave-owner! Leprous and ancient cannibal without culture!

You have begun a war you can not finish!”

“Ha!” Malone said, feeling inadequate to the occasion. As the Mongol

charged, he felt a wave of intense pragmatism come over him. He

reached back toward the bar, grabbed a bottle of vodka and tossed

several glassfuls into the giant’s face. The Mongol, deluged and

screaming, clawed wildly at his eyes and spun round several times,

cursing Malone and all his kin for the next twenty-seven generations,

and grabbing thin air in his attempt to reach the _Amerikanski_.

All of the customers appeared to have discovered urgent engagements

elsewhere. There was little for the Mongol to collide with except

empty tables and chairs. But he did manage to swipe one of the

lumpy-faced men on the side of the head with one flail of his arms.

The lumpy-faced man said “Yoop!” and went staggering away into

Petkoff, who spun him around and threw him away in the general

direction of the bandstand. The diversion provided Malone with just

enough time to start moving again.

Four uniformed men were making their way toward the ladies’ room from

the opposite side of the restaurant. They were carrying a stretcher,

which seemed pitifully inadequate for the carnage Malone had just

left.

He blocked their path. “Where are you going?” he said.

“You are American?” one of them said. “I speak English good, no?”

Behind him, Malone heard a yowl and a crunch, as of a body striking

wood. It sounded as if somebody had fetched up against the bar. “You

speak English fine,” he said, feeling wildly out of place. “Have you

been taking lessons?”

“Me?” the man said. “It is no time for talk. We got to get lady for

hospital.”

“Lady?” Malone said. “For hospital?”

“Miss Garbitsch her name is,” the stretcher-man said, trying to get

past Malone. The FBI agent shifted slightly, blocking the path. “We

wait outside one revolution—”

“One what?”

“When hands revolve once,” the man said. “One hour. Now we get call so

we take her to hospital.”

It sounded suspicious to Malone. He heard more yells behind him, and

they sounded a little closer. The sound of running men came to his

ears. “Well,” he said happily, “goodbye all.”

The stretcher-bearer said, “Vot?” Malone shoved him backward into the

approaching mob, grabbed the stretcher away from the other three men,

who were acting a little dazed, and swung it in a wide arc. He caught

an MVD man in the stomach, and the man doubled up with a weird

whistling groan, turned slightly in agony, and hit another MVD man

with his bowed head. The second man fell; Malone heard more crashes

and screaming, but he didn’t find out any details. Instead, he threw

the stretcher at the milling mob and turned, already in motion, racing

for the ladies’ room.

He had no notion of what he was going to do when he got there, or what

he was going to find. Her Majesty and Lou were in there, all right,

but how were they going to get out without being arrested, clubbed,

disemboweled or taken to a Russian hospital for God alone knew what

novel purposes?

His mind was still a little foggy from the vast amounts of vodka he

had poured down, and he wasn’t in the least sure that teleportation

would even work. He tried to figure out whether Her Majesty had

already carried Lou off that way—but he doubted it. Lou was quite a

burden for the old woman. And besides, he wasn’t at all sure whether

it was possible to teleport a human being. A lump of inanimate matter

is one thing; an intelligent woman with a mind of her own is

definitely something else.

It seemed to take forever for him to reach the door, and he was

panting heavily when he reached for it. Suddenly, another hand shot in

front of his, turning the doorknob. Malone looked up.

It was impossible to figure out where she had come from, or what she

thought she was doing, but a bulging, slightly intoxicated Russian

matron with bluish hair piled high on her head, a rusty orange dress

and altogether too many jewels scattered here and there about her

ample person, stood regarding him with a mixture of scorn, surprise

and shock.

Malone crowded her aside without a thought and jerked the door open.

Behind her he could see the melee still continuing, though it looked

by now as if the Russians weren’t very sure who they were supposed to

be fighting. The Mongol’s great head rose for a second above the

storm, shouting something unintelligible, and dropped again into the

crowd.

Malone focused on the matron, who was standing with her mouth open

staring at him.

“Madam,” he said with stern dignity, “wait your turn!”

He ducked inside and slammed the door behind him. There was a small

knob to bolt the door with, and he used it. But it wasn’t going to

hold long, he knew. If the mob outside ever got straightened out, the

door would go down like a piece of cardboard, bolt or no bolt.

Undoubtedly the gigantic Mongol could do the job with one hand tied

behind his back.

Malone turned around and put his own back to the door. Women were

looking up and making up their minds whether or not to scream. Time

stood absolutely still, and nobody seemed to be moving—not even the

two directly before him: a frightened-looking little old lady, who was

trying to hold up a semiconscious redhead.

And, somewhere behind him, he knew, was a howling mob of thoroughly

maddened Russians.

8

The door rattled against Malone’s back as a hand twisted the knob and

shook it. He braced himself for the next assault, and it came: the

shudder of a heavy body slamming up against it. Miraculously, the door

held, at least for the moment. But the roars outside were growing

louder and louder as the second team came up.

Where was the Mongol? he wondered. But there was no time for idle

contemplation. The scene inside the room demanded his immediate

attention.

He was in the anteroom, a gilded and decorated parlor filled with

overstuffed chairs and couches. There was a door at the far side of

the room, and a woman suddenly came out of it holding a pocketbook in

one hand and a large powder-puff in the other. She saw Malone and

reacted instantly.

Her scream seemed to be a signal. The two other women sitting on

couches screamed, too, and jumped up with their hands to their faces.

Malone shouted something unintelligible but very loud at them and

brandished a fist menacingly. They shrieked again and ran for the

interior room.

Malone heard the roaring outside, and pressed his back tighter against

the door. Then, suddenly, he broke away from it and ran over to Her

Majesty and Lou. He looked down. Lou was apparently completely

unconscious by this time, and there was a peaceful look on her face.

The Queen looked down at her, then up at Malone.

“I’m sorry, Sir Kenneth,” she said, “but we really haven’t time for

romantic thoughts just now.”

Malone passed a hand over his brow. “We haven’t got time for

anything,” he said. “You can see what’s going on outside.”

“My goodness,” Her Majesty said. “Oh, yes. My goodness, yes.”

“Okay,” Malone said. “We’ve got to teleport out, if we can—and if we

can take Lou with us.”

“I don’t know, Sir Kenneth,” the Queen said.

“We’ve got to try,” Malone said grimly, looking down. There was a

crash as something hit the door. It shuddered, creaked, and held.

Malone took a breath. Lou was too beautiful to leave behind, no matter

what.

“I’ll mesh my mind with yours,” Her Majesty said, “so we’ll be

synchronized.”

“Right,” Malone said. “The plane. Let’s go.”

There was another crash, but he hardly heard it. He closed his eyes

and tried to visualize the interior of the plane that was waiting for

them at the airfield. He wasn’t sure he could do it; the vodka might

have clouded his mental processes just enough to make teleporting

impossible. He concentrated. The crash came again, and a shout. He

almost had it ... he almost had it....

The last sound he heard was the splintering of the door, and a great

shout that was cut off in the middle.

Malone opened his eyes.

“We made it,” he said softly. “And I wonder what the MVD is going to

think.”

Her Majesty took a deep breath. “My goodness,” she said. “That _was_

exciting, wasn’t it?”

“Not half as exciting as it’s going to be if we don’t hurry now,”

Malone said. “If you know what I mean.”

“I do,” Her Majesty said.

“That’s good,” Malone said at random. “I don’t.” He helped the Queen

ease the unconscious body of Luba Garbitsch into one of the padded

seats, and Malone pushed a switch. The seat gave a tiny squeak of

protest, and then folded back into a flat bedlike arrangement. Lou was

arranged on this comfortable surface, and Malone took a deep breath.

“Take care of her for a minute, Your Majesty,” he said.

“Of course,” the Queen said.

Malone nodded. “I’m going to see who’s up front,” he said. He walked

through the corridors of the plane and rapped authoritatively on the

door of the pilot’s cabin. A second passed, and he raised his hand to

knock again.

It never reached the door, which opened very suddenly. Malone found

himself facing a small black hole.

It was the muzzle and the bore of the barrel of an M-2 .45 revolver,

and it was pointing somewhere in the space between Malone’s eyes.

Behind the gun was a hard-eyed air force colonel with a grim

expression.

“You know,” Malone said pleasantly, “they’re good guns, but they

really can’t compare to the .44 Magnum.”

The pilot blinked, and his gun wavered just a little. “What?” he said.

“Well,” Malone said, “if you’d only join the FBI, like me, you’d have

a .44 Magnum, and you could compare the guns.”

The pilot blinked again. “You’re—”

“Malone,” Malone said. “Kenneth J. Malone, FBI. My friends call me

Snookums, but don’t try it. Why not let’s put the gun away and be

friends?”

“Oh,” the colonel said weakly. “Mr.—sure. I’m sorry, Mr. Malone.

Didn’t recognize you for a second there.”

“Perfectly all right,” Malone said. The gun was still pointing at him,

and in spite of the fact that he felt pleasantly like Philip Marlowe,

or maybe the Saint, he was beginning to get a little nervous. “The

gun,” he said.

The colonel stared at it for a second, then reholstered it in a hurry.

“I am sorry,” he said. “But we’ve been worried about Russians coming

aboard. I’ve got my copilot and navigator outside, guarding the plane,

and they were supposed to let me know if anybody came in. When they

didn’t let me know, and you knocked, I assumed you were Russians. But,

of course, you—”

Conversation came to a sudden dead stop.

“About these Russians—” Malone said desperately. But the pilot’s eyes

got a little glazed. He wasn’t listening.

“Now, wait a minute,” he said. “Why _didn’t_ they notify me?”

“Maybe they didn’t see me,” Malone said. “I mean us.”

“But—”

“I’m not very noticeable,” Malone said hopefully, trying to look small

and undistinguished. “They could just have ... not noticed me. Okay?”

He gave the pilot his most friendly smile.

“They’d have noticed you,” the pilot said. “If they’re still out

there. If nothing’s happened to them.” He leaned forward. “Did you see

them, Malone?”

Malone shrugged. “How would I know?” he said.

“How would you—” The pilot seemed at a loss for words. Malone waited

patiently, trying to look as if everything were completely and

perfectly normal. “Mr. Malone,” the pilot said at last, “how _did_ you

get aboard this aircraft?”

He didn’t wait for an answer, and Malone was grateful for that.

Instead, he stepped over to a viewport and looked out. On the field,

two air force officers were making lonely rounds about the plane.

Fifty yards farther away, a squad of Russian guards also patrolled the

brightly-lit area. There was nothing else in sight.

“There isn’t any way you could have done it,” the pilot said without

turning.

“That’s the FBI for you,” Malone said. “We’ve got our little trade

secrets, you know.” Somehow, the pilot’s back looked unconvinced.

“Disguise,” Malone added. “We’re masters of disguise.”

The pilot turned very slowly. “Now what the hell would you disguise

yourself as?” he said. “A Piper Cub?”

“It’s a military secret,” Malone said hurriedly.

The pilot didn’t say anything for what seemed a long time. “A military

secret?” he asked at last, in a hushed voice. “And you can’t tell me?

You’re a civilian, and I’m a colonel in the United States Air Force,

and you can’t tell me a military secret?”

Malone didn’t hesitate a second. “Well, Colonel,” he said cheerfully,

“that’s the way things are.”

The pilot threw up his hands. “It’s none of my business,” he said

loudly. “I’m not even going to think about it. Because if I do, you’ll

have a mad pilot on your hands, and you wouldn’t like that, would

you?”

“I would hate it,” Malone said sincerely, “like hell. Particularly

since I’ve got a sick woman aboard.”

“Disguised,” the pilot offered, “as Lenin, I suppose.”

Malone shook his head. “I’m not kidding now,” he said. “She is sick,

and I want a doctor for her.”

“Why didn’t you bring one with you?” the pilot said. “Or wasn’t the

disguise big enough for three?”

“Four,” Malone said. “We’ve got three now; me and Miss Garbitsch and

Miss Thompson. Lou—Miss Garbitsch is the one who’s sick. But I want a

doctor from the American Embassy.”

“I think we could all use one,” the pilot said judiciously. “But you’d

better tell me what’s the matter with the girl.”

Malone gave him a brief and highly censored version of the melee at

Trotkin’s, particularly omitting the details of the final escape from

the MVD men.

When he had finished, the pilot gave a long, low whistle. “You have

been having fun,” he said. “Can I go on your next adventure, or is it

only for accredited Rover Boys?”

“You have to buy a pin and a special compass that works in the dark,”

Malone said. “I don’t think you’d like it. How about that doctor?”

The pilot nodded wearily. “I’ll send my navigator over to the airfield

phone,” he said. “As a matter of fact, I’ll tell him to tell the

doctor I’m the one who’s sick, so the Russians don’t get suspicious.

It may even be true.”

“Just so he gets here,” Malone said. The pilot was flagging his

navigator through the viewport as Malone went out, closing the door

gently behind him. He went back down the plane corridor to Her Majesty

and Lou.

Lou was still lying on the makeshift bed, her eyes closed. She looked

more beautiful and defenseless than ever, and Malone wanted to do

something big and terrible to all the Russians who had tried to take

her away or dope her. With difficulty, he restrained himself. “How is

she?” he asked.

“She seems to be all right,” the Queen said. “The substance they put

in her drink doesn’t appear to have had any other effect than putting

her to sleep and making her a little sick—and that was a good thing.”

“Oh, sure,” Malone said. “That was fine.”

“Well,” Her Majesty said, “she did get rid of quite a bit of the drug

in the ladies’ room.” She smiled, just a trifle primly. “I think

she’ll be all right,” she said.

“There’s a doctor on the way, anyhow,” Malone said, staring down at

her. He tried to think of something he could do for her—fan her, or

bring her water, or cool her fevered brow. But she didn’t look very

fevered. She just looked helpless and beautiful. He felt sorry for all

the nasty things he had said to her, and all the nasty things she had

said to him. If she got well—and of course she was going to get well,

he told himself firmly—things would be different. They’d be sweet and

kind to each other all the time, and do nice things for each other.

And she was definitely going to get well. He wouldn’t even think about

anything else. She was going to be fine again, and very soon. Why, she

was hardly hurt at all, he told himself, hardly hurt at all.

“Sir Kenneth,” Her Majesty said. “I’ve been thinking: while we were

about it, why didn’t we just teleport all the way back home?”

Malone turned. “Because,” he said, “we’d have had the devil of a time

explaining just how we managed to do it.”

“Oh,” she said. “I see. Of course.”

“This teleportation gimmick is supposed to be a secret,” Malone went

on. “We don’t want to let out anything more about it than we have to.

As it is, there’s going to be some fierce wondering among the Russians

about how we got out of that restaurant.”

“Obviously,” the Queen said, entirely unexpectedly, “a bourgeois

capitalistic trick.”

“Obviously,” Malone agreed. “But we don’t want to start up any more

questions than we have to.”

“And how about the plane itself?” Her Majesty went on. “Do you think

they’ll let us take off?”

“I don’t know how they can stop us,” Malone said.

“You don’t?”

“Well, they don’t want to cause any incidents now,” Malone said. “At

least, I don’t think they do. If they could have captured us—me, or

Lou, or both of us, depending on which side of the argument you want

to take—anyhow, if they could have grabbed us on their own home

grounds, they’d have had an excuse. Lou got sick, they’d say, and they

just took her to the hospital. They wouldn’t have to call it an arrest

at all.”

“Oh, I see,” Her Majesty said. “But now we’re not on their home

grounds.”

“Not so long as we stay in this plane, we’re not,” Malone said. “And

we’re going to stay here until we take off.”

Her Majesty nodded.

“I wish I knew what they thought they were doing, though,” Malone

mused. “They certainly couldn’t have held us for very long, no matter

how they worked things.”

“I know what was on their minds,” Her Majesty said. “At least partly.

It was all so confused it was difficult to get anything really

detailed or complete.”

“There,” Malone said fervently, “I agree with you.”

“The whole trouble was,” the Queen said, “that nobody knew about

anybody else.”

“I’d gathered something like that,” Malone said. “But what exactly was

it all about?”

“Well,” the Queen said, “Major Petkoff was supposed to tell Lou, in

effect, that if she didn’t agree to do espionage work for the Soviet

Union, things would go hard with her father.”

“Nice,” Malone said. “Very friendly gentleman.”

“Well,” the Queen continued, “he was supposed to tell her about that

at the bar, when he had her alone. But she got that drugged drink

before he could begin to say anything.”

“Then who drugged it?” Malone said. “Lou?”

The Queen shrugged. “Someone else,” she said. “Major Petkoff didn’t

know anything about the drugged drink.”

“A nice surprise for him, anyhow,” Malone said.

“It was a surprise for everybody,” the Queen said. “You see, the

drugged drink was meant to get her to the hospital, where they’d have

her alone for a long time and could really put some pressure on her.”

“And then,” Malone said, “there were the men who wanted to arrest me.

And the ones who wanted to take Lou to jail. And the mad Mongol who

just wanted to fight, I guess.”

“There were so many different things, all going on at once,” the Queen

said.

Malone nodded. “There seems to be quite a lot of confusion in the

Soviet Union, too,” he said. “That does not sound to me like an

efficient operation.”

“It wasn’t, very,” the Queen said. “You see, they have Garbitsch now,

but they can’t do anything to him because they can’t get to Lou. And

it doesn’t do them any good to do anything to her father, unless she

knows about it first.”

“It sounds,” Malone said, “as if the USSR is going along the same

confused road as the good old United States.”

The Queen nodded agreement. “It’s terrible,” she said. “I get those

same flashes of telepathic static, too.”

“You do?” Malone said, leaning forward.

“Just the same,” the Queen said. “Whatever is operating in the United

States is operating over here, too.”

Malone sat down in a seat on the aisle. “Everything,” he announced,

“is now perfectly lovely. The United States is being confused and

mixed up by somebody, and the Somebody looked like a Russian spy. But

now Russia is being confused, too.”

“Do you think there are some American spies working here?” the Queen

said.

“If they’re using psionics,” Malone said, “as they obviously are—and

I don’t know about them, Burris doesn’t know about them, O’Connor

doesn’t know about them and nobody else I can find knows about them—

then they don’t exist. That’s flat.”

“How about outer space?” the Queen said. “I mean, spies from outer

space trying to take over the Earth.”

“It’s a nice idea,” Malone said sourly. “I wish they’d hurry up and do

it.”

“Then you don’t think—”

“I don’t know what to think,” Malone said. “There’s some perfectly

simple explanation for all this. And somewhere, in all the running

around and looking here and there I’ve been doing, I’ve got all the

facts I need to come up with that answer.”

“Oh, my,” the Queen said. “That’s wonderful.”

“Sure it is,” Malone said. “There’s only one trouble, as a matter of

fact. I don’t know what the explanation is, and I don’t know which

facts are important and which ones aren’t.”

There was a short silence.

“I wish Tom Boyd were here,” Malone said wistfully.

“Really?” the Queen said. “Why?”

“Because,” Malone said, “I feel like hearing some really professional

cursing.”

* * * * *

Three-quarters of an hour passed, each and every minute draped in some

black and gloomy material. Malone sat in his seat, his head supported

by both hands, and stared at the back of the seat ahead of him. No

great messages were written on it. The Queen, respecting his need for

silent contemplation, sat and watched Lou and said nothing at all.

It was always possible, of course, Malone thought, that he would fall

asleep and dream of an answer. That kind of thing kept happening to

detectives in books. Or else a strange man in a black trenchcoat would

sidle up to him and hand him a slip of paper. The words: “Five

o’clock, watch out, the red snake, doom,” would be written on the

paper and these words would provide him with just the clues he needed

to solve the whole case. Or else he would go and beat somebody up, and

the exercise would stimulate his brain and he would suddenly arrive at

the answer in a blinding flash.

Wondering vaguely if a blinding flash were anything like a dungeon,

because people kept being in them and never seemed to come out, Malone

sighed. Detectives in books were great, wonderful people who never had

any doubts or worries. Particularly if they were with the FBI. Only

Kenneth J. Malone was different.

Maybe someday, he thought, he would be a real detective, instead of

just having a few special gifts that he hadn’t really worked for,

anyhow. Maybe someday, in the distant future, he would be the equal of

Nick Carter.

Right now, though, he had a case to solve. Nick Carter wasn’t around

to help.

And Kenneth J. Malone, FBI, was getting absolutely nowhere.

Finally, his reverie was broken by the sounds of argument outside the

plane door. There were voices speaking both English and Russian, very

loudly. Malone went to the door and opened it. A short, round,

grey-haired man who looked just a little like an over-tired bear who

had forgotten to sleep all winter almost fell into his arms. The man

was wearing a grey overcoat that went nicely with his hair, and

carrying a small black bag.

Malone said: “Oog,” replaced the man on his own feet and looked past

him at the group on the landing ramp outside. The navigator was there,

arguing earnestly with two men in the uniform of the MVD.

“Damn it,” the navigator said, “you can’t come in here. Nobody comes

in but the doctor. This is United States territory.”

The MVD men said something in Russian.

“No,” the navigator said. “Definitely no.”

One of the MVD men spat something that sounded like an insult.

The navigator shrugged. “I don’t understand Russian,” he told them.

“All I know is one word. No. _Nyet_ Definitely, absolutely irrevocably

_nyet_.”

“_Sikin sin Amerikanyets!_”

The MVD men turned, as if they’d been a sister act, and went down the

steps. The navigator followed them, wiping his forehead and breathing

deeply. Malone shut the door.

“Well, well, well,” the doctor said, in a burbling sort of voice.

“Somehow, we thought it might be you. Anyhow, the ambassador did.”

“Really?” Malone said, trying to sound surprised.

“Oh, yes,” the doctor assured him. “You have raised something of a

stench in and around good old Moscow, you know.”

“I’m innocent,” Malone said.

The doctor nodded. “Undoubtedly,” he said judiciously. “Who isn’t? And

where, by the way, is the girl?”

“Over there.” Malone pointed. News apparently traveled with great

speed in Moscow, MVD and censorship notwithstanding. At any rate, he

thought, it traveled with great speed to the ears of the Embassy

staff.

The doctor lifted Lou’s limp wrist to time her pulse, his lips pursed

and his eyes focused on a far wall.

“What have you heard?” Malone said.

“The MVD boys are extremely worried,” the doctor said. “Extremely.” He

didn’t let go of the wrist, a marvel of which Malone had never grown

tired. Doctors always seemed to be able, somehow, to examine a patient

and carry on a conversation about totally different things, without

even showing the strain. This one was no exception. Malone watched in

awe.

“According to the reports we got from them,” the doctor said, “you

wandered off from _Trotkin’s_ without your escort.”

“Well,” Malone said at random, “I didn’t think to leave them a

farewell note. I hope they don’t think I disliked their company.”

“Officially,” the doctor said, lifting Lou’s left eyelid and gazing

thoughtfully into the blue iris thus exposed, “they’re afraid you’re

lost, and they were apologetic as all hell about it to the

ambassador.” The iris appeared to lose its fascination; the doctor

dropped the eyelid and fished in his black bag, which he had put on

the seat next to Lou.

“And unofficially?” Malone asked.

“Unofficially,” the doctor said, “we’ve got news of a riot at

_Trotkin’s_ tonight, in which you seem to have been involved. Mr.

Malone, you must be quite a barroom brawler when you’re at home.”

“Frankly,” Malone said, “I’m a little out of practice. And I hope I

never have the chance to get back _into_ practice.”

The doctor nodded, removing a stethoscope from the bag and applying it

to Lou’s chest. He waited a second, frowned and then took the plugs

out of his ears. “I know just what you mean,” he said. “You might be

interested to know the first unofficial score of that little match.”

“Score?” Malone said.

The doctor nodded again. “Three concussions,” he said, “one possible

skull fracture, a broken arm, two bitten hands, and a large and varied

assortment of dental difficulties and plain hysteria. No dead,

however. I really don’t understand why not.”

“Well,” Malone said, “nobody wanted to create an international

incident.”

“Hmf,” the doctor said. “I see. Or I think I do, which is as far as I

care to go in the matter. The Russians suspect, by the way, that

you’ve managed to get aboard the plane. They do know, of course, about

the girl, and when the pilot called for me they put two and two

together. In spite of his story about being sick. What they can’t

figure out is how you managed to _get_ aboard the plane.”

“Neither can I,” Malone said at random. The doctor gave him a single

bright stare.

“Well,” he said at last, “I suppose you know your own business best.

By the way, my examination accords pretty well with our unofficial

information about the girl—that she was given some sort of drug in a

drink. Is that what happened?”

Malone nodded. “As far as we know,” he said. “She did get rid of a lot

of it within a few minutes, though.”

“Good,” the doctor said. “Very sensible.”

“Sense had nothing to do with it,” Malone said.

“In any case,” the doctor went on doggedly, “there can’t be too much

left in her system. Her pulse is good, she’s breathing easily and

there don’t seem to be any complications, so I should doubt strongly

that there’s been much damage done. Besides all which, of course, the

Russians would hardly have wanted to hurt her; what they gave her

would probably have done little more harm even if she’d ingested it

all, and kept it down.”

“Good,” Malone said sincerely.

“I’ll give you some pills,” the doctor said, fishing in his bag again,

“and you can give them to her when she wakes up.”

“Is that all?” Malone said, vaguely disappointed.

The doctor eyed him keenly. “Well,” he said, “I could give her an

injection, but I’d be a little afraid to. If it had a synergistic

action with the drug, she might be worse off than before.”

“Oh,” Malone said. “By all means. Just the pills.”

“I’m glad you agree,” the doctor said. “Oh, and about leaving—”

“Yes?” Malone said. “We want to get out of here in a hurry, if we

can.”

“I think you can,” the doctor said. “The ambassador mentioned that

he’d try to arrange it with the Russians. I don’t know what he’ll tell

them—but then, that’s why he’s an ambassador, and I’m a doctor.” He

straightened up and handed Malone an envelope containing three green

capsules. “Give her these if she wakes up with a headache,” he said.

“If she feels all right, just forget all about them.”

“Sure,” Malone said. “And thanks, Doctor. Tell the ambassador we’d

appreciate it if he got us out of here as soon as possible.”

“Certainly,” the doctor said. “After all, I might as well take on the

job of a diplomatic courier.”

Malone nodded. “Well,” he said, “goodbye, Mr. Courier.”

The doctor went to the door, opened it and turned.

“Absolutely,” he said, “Mr. Ives.”

9

Lou didn’t wake up until the plane was dropping toward the Washington

airfield, and when she did awaken it was as if she had merely come out

of an especially deep sleep. Malone was standing over her, which was

far from a coincidence; he had been waiting and watching virtually

every minute since takeoff.

During his brief periods of rest, Her Majesty had taken over, and she

was now peacefully asleep at the back of the plane, looking a little

more careworn, but just as regal as ever. She looked to Malone as if

she had weathered a small revolution against her rule, but had managed

to persuade the populace (by passing out cookies to the children,

probably) that all was, in the last analysis, for the best in this

best of all possible worlds. She looked, he thought, absolutely

wonderful.

So did Lou. She blinked her eyes open and moved one hand at her side,

and then she came fully awake. “Well,” she said. “And a bright hello

to you, Sleuth. If it’s not being too banal, where am I?”

“It is,” Malone said, “but you’re in an airplane, coming into

Washington. We ought to be there in a few minutes.”

Lou shook her head slowly from side to side. “I have never heard any

news that sounded better in my entire life,” she said. “How long ago

did we leave Moscow?”

“Our trip to Beautiful Moskva,” Malone said, “ended right after they

tried to get you to the hospital, by giving you a drugged drink. Do

you remember that?”

“I remember it, all right,” she said. “I’m never going to forget that

moment.”

“How do you feel?” Malone said.

“Fine,” Lou said. “And how are _you_?”

“Me?” Malone said. “I’m all right. I’ve _been_ all right. Don’t worry

about _me_.”

“Well, one never knows,” Lou said. “With your cold and all.”

“I think that’s better,” Malone said hastily. “But you’re sure you

feel fine?”

Lou nodded. “A little tired, maybe, but that’s all.” She paused. “I

remember Miss Thompson taking me to the ladies’ room. I got pretty

sick. But from there on, I’m not sure what happened.”

“I came in,” Malone said, “and got you out.”

“How brave!” Lou said.

“Not very,” Malone said casually. “After all, what could happen to me

in a ladies’ room?”

“You’d be surprised,” Lou murmured. “And you came and got me, and took

me to the plane and all. And I—” She hesitated, and for a second she

looked very small and wistful. “Do you—do you think they’ll do

anything to Dad?” she said.

“I don’t see why,” Malone said confidently. “After all, the only thing

he did wrong was to get caught, and that’s an occupational risk if

you’re in the spy business. Lots of people get caught. Happens all the

time. Don’t worry about it.”

“I—all right,” she said. “I won’t, then.”

“Good,” Malone said. He fished in his pocket. “I’ve got some pills

here,” he said, “in case you have a headache. The doctor said I could

give them to you if you had a headache, but otherwise I should just

forget about them.”

Lou smiled. “I think you’d better just forget about them,” she said.

Malone’s hand came out of his pocket empty. “I just want to make sure

you’re okay,” he said. “Probably very silly. Of course you’re okay.”

“Of course I am,” she said. “But I don’t think you’re silly.” She

smiled again, a very warm smile. Malone took a deep breath and

discovered that he hadn’t been breathing at all regularly for several

minutes. Lou’s smile increased a trifle in intensity and he stopped

breathing all over again. “All things considered,” she said, “I think

you’re pretty wonderful, Ken.”

Malone’s voice sounded to him as if it were coming from a great

distance. He wondered if the strange feeling in his stomach were the

pangs of love, or the descent of the plane. Then he realized that he

didn’t care. “Well, well,” he said airily. “Well, well, well. Frankly,

Lou, I’m inclined to agree with you. Though I’m not sure about the

qualification.”

“Fine thing,” she said. “Tell a man he’s wonderful and he just nods

his head as if he knew it all along.”

Malone swallowed hard. “Maybe I did,” he said. “And how did you come

to this startling conclusion?”

It was Lou who broke the light mood of their speech first. “Look,

Ken,” she said seriously, “I’m the daughter of an enemy spy. You know

that. You’re an FBI agent.”

“So what?” he said.

“So,” she said, “you don’t treat me like the daughter of a spy. You

treat me just like anybody else.”

“I do not,” Malone said instantly.

“All right,” she said, and shrugged. “But I’m sure none of this is in

the FBI manual for daughters of convicted spies.”

“Now, you look,” Malone said. “Just what do you think this is? The

McCarthy era? Any way I treat you, it has nothing to do with your

father. He’s a spy, and we caught him and we sent him back to Moscow.

That’s our job. But all this about the sins of the fathers being

visited on the heads of the children, even unto the seventh

generation—this is just plain silly. You’re you; you’re not your

father. You haven’t done anything—why should I treat you as if you

have?”

“How do you know I’m not a spy, too?” she said.

“Because,” Malone said flatly, “I know.”

“Really?” she said softly. “Do you really?”

Malone opened his mouth, shut it and then started again. “Strictly

speaking,” he said carefully, “I don’t know. But we’re in the United

States now, where a person is considered innocent until proven

guilty.”

“And that,” Lou said, “is all you’re going on, I suppose.”

“Not all,” Malone said.

“I didn’t think so,” Lou said, still smiling.

“Don’t ask me how,” Malone said, “but we’re pretty sure you knew

nothing about your father’s activities. Forget it.”

Lou looked suddenly slightly disappointed. Malone wondered why. Of

course, there was one more reason, and maybe she’d thought of that.

“It does make it easier,” he said, “that you happen to be a beautiful

girl.”

She smiled again, and started to say something, but she never got the

chance. The landing gear of the aircraft bumped gently against the

runway, and the ship rolled slowly in to a stop.

A second passed. From the back of the plane a voice said: “Are we back

in Washington, S—Mr. Malone?”

“That’s right, Miss Thompson,” Malone told the Queen.

“And Miss Garbitsch—”

“I’m fine, Miss Thompson,” Luba said. She swung her feet around to the

deck.

“Wait a minute,” Malone said. “Do you think you ought to get up?”

Lou’s smile seemed to reduce him to small, very hot ashes. “Ken,” she

said, “the doctor said I was fine, so what are you worrying about? I

can get up. I’ll be all right.”

“Oh, okay,” he said, and stepped back. Her Majesty had already left

the plane. Lou got up, and wavered just a little. Malone held out his

arms, and found her in them before he had thought about it.

A long time seemed to pass. Malone wasn’t sure whether he was standing

still because he wanted to, or because he was absolutely incapable of

motion. Lou didn’t seem in any hurry to break away, either.

Then she put her arms around his neck.

“Sleuth,” she said, “don’t you ever follow up a hint?”

“Hint?” Malone said.

“Damn it,” Lou said in a soft, sweet voice, “kiss me, Ken.”

Malone had no answer to that—at least, no verbal answer.

One didn’t seem to be needed.

When he finally came up for air, he said: “Lou....”

“Yes, Ken?”

“Lou, where are you going from here?”

Lou stepped back a pace. “What?” she said.

“I mean, back to New York?” Malone said. “Or someplace else? I mean—

well, what are you going to do?”

“Oh,” Lou said. “Oh, yes. I’ll be going back to New York. After all,

Ken, I do have a living to make, such as it is, and Sir Lewis is

expecting me.”

“I don’t know,” Malone said, “but it still sounds funny. A girl like

you working for—well, for the Psychical Research people. Ghosts and

ectoplasm and all that.”

Lou stepped back another pace. “Now, wait a minute,” she said. “You

seemed to need their information, all right.”

“But that was—oh, well,” Malone said. “Never mind. Maybe I’m silly.

It really doesn’t matter.”

“I guess it doesn’t, now,” she said. “Except that it does mean I’ve

got to leave for New York almost at once.”

“Can you cut out that ‘almost’?” Malone said. “Because I’ve got to be

there myself, and right away. If you hurry, we can get the same

plane.”

“That would be great,” she said.

“Okay, then,” Malone said. “Don’t you worry about a thing, I’ll take

care of reservations and everything.”

“My, my,” Lou said. “What it must be like to have all that pull and

influence.”

“What?” Malone said.

Lou grinned. “Nothing,” she said. “Nothing.”

“Then it’s all settled. I’ll take care of the reservations, and we’ll

go in together,” Malone said.

“Fair enough,” Lou said, “my fine feathered Fed.”

* * * * *

Actually, it took Malone nearly three hours to get everything set in

Washington for his New York departure. He had to make a verbal report

to Andrew J. Burris first, and that consumed quite a lot of time,

since Burris was alternately shocked, horrified, gleeful and confused

about the whole trip, and spent most of his time interrupting Malone

and crying out for God’s vengeance, mercy, justice or understanding.

Then Malone had to dictate a longer report for the written record.

This didn’t take quite as long, since there were no interruptions, but

by the time it was over he felt as if he were going out to become a

Carthusian monk. He felt, as he rubbed his raw throat, that it

wouldn’t be a bad idea at all to take a nice vow of silence for

awhile. He could write people little notes, and they would all treat

him kindly and gently. He would be pointed out to strangers, and

people would try to do him favors.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t take the vow at once. During his absence,

his desk log showed, several calls had come in, all of which had to be

taken care of at once. Some of them dealt with evidence or statements

from old cases, some were just nuisances. The most urgent was from Dr.

O’Connor at Yucca Flats.

“If you’re not too busy,” O’Connor said in his icily polite tone, “I

would like to have Miss Thompson back as soon as possible.” He sounded

as if Malone had borrowed his scalpel.

“I’ll see what I can do,” Malone said carefully.

“There is a new series of tests,” O’Connor said, “on which I am now at

work; the assistance of Miss Thompson would be invaluable to me at

this time.”

After he’d hung up, Malone called Her Majesty at her Washington hotel.

She was very glad of the chance to return to Yucca Flats, she said.

There, Malone knew, she would be able to return to her accustomed

dignity as Queen of the Greater English Commonwealth, a district

which, in her mind, seemed to include the greater part of the Western

world. On her present mission, she was plain Miss Thompson and, though

the idea of going about incognito had its charms, it became a little

dull after awhile. The adventuring was fine, although a little rougher

than she’d thought it would be; the sight of the Queen’s Own FBI in

action was still a powerful attraction for Her Majesty. But the peace

and quiet and dignity of Her Own Royal Palace won out without too much

trouble.

“Of course,” Malone said, “you’ll be on call in case I need you.”

“I am always in touch with my subjects,” Her Majesty said with

dignity, “and most especially with you, Sir Kenneth. I shall so

remain.”

And then there was a little paperwork to take care of. By the time

Malone had finished, he would have been glad to teleport to New York

on his own. But on reflection he decided that he would much rather

travel with Lou, and hurried down to the airport.

By the time the plane landed at La Guardia, and they’d taken

a ’copter to the East Side Terminal and a taxi to the big

blue-aluminum-and-glass Ravell Building, Malone had reached a new

decision. It would be nothing short of wonderful, he felt, if he

could spend the rest of his life traveling around with Luba Garbitsch.

Of course, that name was something of a handicap. It was hardly a

romantic one. He wondered, very briefly, whether or not “Luba Malone”

were an improvement. But he buried the thought before it got any

further. Enough, he told himself firmly, was enough.

“It’s been a nice trip,” Lou said. She, too, sounded subdued, as if

she were thinking about something terribly serious.

“Great,” Malone said happily. “A wonderful trip.”

“I enjoyed being with you,” Lou said.

“Me, too,” Malone said. He paid off the taxi-driver and they got out

at the corner. Malone went to the newsstand there and picked up a copy

of the _Post_.

“That,” Lou said over his shoulder, “is one whole hell of a headline.”

It filled the entire page, four lines of thick black capitals:

JUDGE

DROPS

UNION

SUIT!

“Well, well,” Malone said. “Let’s see what this is all about.” He

flipped to page three. Lou craned her neck over his shoulder and they

read the start of the story together.