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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/30712-8.txt b/30712-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ebac1d8 --- /dev/null +++ b/30712-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2856 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Combat, by Dallas McCord Reynolds + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Combat + +Author: Dallas McCord Reynolds + +Illustrator: Schoenherr + +Release Date: December 19, 2009 [EBook #30712] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMBAT *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from Analog Science Fact & Fiction October + 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. + copyright on this publication was renewed. + + + + COMBAT + + + By MACK REYNOLDS + + + Illustrated by Schoenherr + + _An Alien landing on Earth might be readily misled, + victimized by a one-sided viewpoint. And then again ... it + might be the Earthmen who were misled...._ + + * * * * * + + + + +Henry Kuran answered a nod here and there, a called out greeting from +a desk an aisle removed from the one along which he was progressing, +finally made the far end of the room. He knocked at the door and +pushed his way through before waiting a response. + +There were three desks here. He didn't recognize two of the girls who +looked up at his entry. One of them began to say something, but then +Betty, whose desk dominated the entry to the inner sanctum, grinned a +welcome at him and said, "Hank! How was Peru? We've been expecting +you." + +"Full of Incas," he grinned back. "Incas, Russkies and Chinks. A poor +capitalist _conquistador_ doesn't have a chance. Is the boss inside?" + +"He's waiting for you, Hank. See you later." + +Hank said, "Um-m-m," and when the door clicked in response to the +button Betty touched, pushed his way into the inner office. + +Morton Twombly, chief of the department, came to his feet, shook hands +abruptly and motioned the other to a chair. + +"How're things in Peru, Henry?" His voice didn't express too much +real interest. + +Hank said, "We were on the phone just a week ago, Mr. Twombly. It's +about the same. No, the devil it is. The Chinese have just run in +their new People's Car. They look something like our jeep +station-wagons did fifteen years ago." + +Twombly stirred in irritation. "I've heard about them." + +Hank took his handkerchief from his breast pocket and polished his +rimless glasses. He said evenly, "They sell for just under two hundred +dollars." + +"Two hundred dollars?" Twombly twisted his face. "They can't transport +them from China for that." + +"Here we go again," Hank sighed. "They also can't sell pressure +cookers for a dollar apiece, nor cameras with f.2 lenses for five +bucks. Not to speak of the fact that the Czechs can't sell shoes for +fifty cents a pair and, of course, the Russkies can't sell premium +gasoline for five cents a gallon." + +Twombly muttered, "They undercut our prices faster than we can vote +through new subsidies. Where's it going to end Henry?" + +"I don't know. Perhaps we should have thought a lot more about it ten +or fifteen years ago when the best men our universities could turn out +went into advertising, show business and sales--while the best men the +Russkies and Chinese could turn out were going into science and +industry." As a man who worked in the field Hank Kuran occasionally +got bitter about these things, and didn't mind this opportunity of +sounding off at the chief. + +Hank added, "The height of achievement over there is to be elected to +the Academy of Sciences. Our young people call scientists egg-heads, +and their height of achievement is to become a TV singer or a movie +star." + +Morton Twombly shot his best field man a quick glance. "You sound as +though you need a vacation, Henry." + +Henry Kuran laughed. "Don't mind me, chief. I got into a hassle with +the Hungarians last week and I'm in a bad frame of mind." + +Twombly said, "Well, we didn't bring you back to Washington for a +trade conference." + +"I gathered that from your wire. What _am_ I here for?" + +Twombly pushed his chair back and came to his feet. It occurred to +Hank Kuran that his chief had aged considerably since the forming of +this department nearly ten years ago. The thought went through his +mind, _a general in the cold war. A general who's been in action for a +decade, has never won more than a skirmish and is currently in full +retreat._ + +Morton Twombly said, "I'm not sure I know. Come along." + +They left the office by a back door and Hank was in unknown territory. +Silently his chief led him through busy corridors, each one identical +to the last, each sterile and cold in spite of the bustling. They came +to a marine guarded door, were passed through, once again obviously +expected. + +The inner office contained but one desk occupied by a youthfully brisk +army major. He gave Hank a one-two of the eyes and said, "Mr. +Hennessey is expecting you, sir. This is Mr. Kuran?" + +"That's correct," Twombly said. "I won't be needed." He turned to Hank +Kuran. "I'll see you later, Henry." He shook hands. + +Hank frowned at him. "You sound as though I'm being sent off to +Siberia, or something." + +The major looked up sharply, "What was that?" + +Twombly made a motion with his hand, negatively. "Nothing. A joke. +I'll see you later, Henry." He turned and left. + +The major opened another door and ushered Hank into a room two or +three times the size of Twombly's office. Hank formed a silent whistle +and then suddenly knew where he was. This was the sanctum sanctorum of +Sheridan Hennessey. Sheridan Hennessey, right arm, hatchetman, _alter +ego_, one man brain trust--of two presidents in succession. + +And there he was, seated in a heavy armchair. Hank had known of his +illness, that the other had only recently risen from his hospital bed +and against doctor's orders. But somehow he hadn't expected to see him +this wasted. TV and newsreel cameramen had been kind. + +However, the waste had not as yet extended to either eyes or voice. +Sheridan Hennessey bit out, "That'll be all, Roy," and the major left +them. + + * * * * * + +"Sit down," Hennessey said. "You're Henry Kuran. That's not a Russian +name is it?" + +Hank found a chair. "It was Kuranchov. My father Americanized it when +he was married." He added, "About once every six months some +Department of Justice or C.I.A. joker runs into the fact that my name +was originally Russian and I'm investigated all over again." + +Hennessey said, "But your Russian is perfect?" + +"Yes, sir. My mother was English-Irish, but we lived in a community +with quite a few Russian born emigrants. I learned the language." + +"Good, Mr. Kuran, how would you like to die for your country?" + +Hank Kuran looked at him for a long moment. He said slowly, "I'm +thirty-two years old, healthy and reasonably adjusted and happy. I'd +hate it." + +The sick man snorted. "That's exactly the right answer. I don't trust +heroes. Now, how much have you heard about the extraterrestrials?" + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"You haven't heard the news broadcasts the past couple of days? How +the devil could you have missed them?" Hennessey was scowling sourly +at him. + +Hank Kuran didn't know what the other was talking about. "Two days ago +I was in the town of Machu Picchu in the Andes trying to peddle some +mining equipment to the Peruvians. Peddle it, hell. I was practically +trying to give it away, but it was still even-steven that the +Hungarians would undersell me. Then I got a hurry-up wire from Morton +Twombly to return to Washington soonest. I flew here in an Air Force +jet. I haven't heard any news for two days or more." + +"I'll have the major get you all the material we have to date and you +can read it on the plane to England." + +"Plane to England?" Hank said blankly. "Look, I'm in the Department of +Economic Development of Neutral Nations, specializing in South +America. What would I be doing in England?" He had an uneasy feeling +of being crowded, and a suspicion that this was far from the first +time Sheridan Hennessey had ridden roughshod over subordinates. + +"First step on the way to Moscow," Hennessey snapped. "The major will +give you details later. Let me brief you. The extraterrestrials landed +a couple of days ago on Red Square in some sort of spaceship. Our +Russkie friends clamped down a censorship on news. No photos at all as +yet and all news releases have come from Tass." + +Hank Kuran was bug-eying him. + +Hennessey said, "I know. Most of the time I don't believe it myself. +The extraterrestrials represent what the Russkies are calling a +Galactic Confederation. So far as we can figure out, there is some +sort of league, United Planets, or whatever you want to call it, of +other star systems which have achieved a certain level of scientific +development." + +"Well ... well, why haven't they shown up before?" + +"Possibly they have, through the ages. If so, they kept their presence +secret, checked on our development and left." Hennessey snorted his +indignation. "See here, Kuran, I have no details. All of our +information comes from Tass, and you can imagine how inadequate that +is. Now shut up while I tell you what little I do know." + +Henry Kuran settled back into his chair, feeling limp. He'd had too +many curves thrown at him in the past few minutes to assimilate. + +"They evidently keep hands off until a planet develops interplanetary +exploration and atomic power. And, of course, during the past few +years our Russkie pals have not only set up a base on the Moon but +have sent off their various expeditions to Venus and Mars." + +"None of them made it," Hank said. + +"Evidently they didn't have to. At any rate, the plenipotentiaries +from the Galactic Confederation have arrived." + +"Wanting what, sir?" Hank said. + +"Wanting nothing but to help." Hennessey said. "Stop interrupting. Our +time is limited. You're going to have to be on a jet for London in +half an hour." + +He noticed Hank Kuran's expression, and shook his head. "No, it's not +farfetched. These other intelligent life forms must be familiar with +what it takes to progress to the point of interplanetary travel. It +takes species aggressiveness--besides intelligence. And they must have +sense enough not to want the wrong kind of aggressiveness exploding +into the stars. They don't want an equivalent of Attila bursting over +the borders of the Roman Empire. They want to channel us, and they're +willing to help, to direct our comparatively new science into paths +that won't conflict with them. They want to bring us peacefully into +their society of advanced life forms." + +Sheridan Hennessey allowed himself a rueful grimace. "That makes quite +a speech, doesn't it? At any rate, that's the situation." + +"Well, where do I come into this? I'm afraid I'm on the bewildered +side." + +"Yes. Well, damn it, they've landed in Moscow. They've evidently +assumed the Soviet complex--the Soviet Union, China and the +satellites--are the world's dominant power. Our conflicts, our +controversies, are probably of little, if any, interest to them. +Inadvertently, they've put a weapon in the hands of the Soviets that +could well end this cold war we've been waging for more than +twenty-five years now." + +The president's right-hand man looked off into a corner of the room, +unseeingly. "For more than a decade it's been a bloodless combat that +we've been waging against the Russkies. The military machines, equally +capable of complete destruction of the other, have been stymied +Finally it's boiled down to an attempt to influence the neutrals, +India, Africa, South America, to attempt to bring them into one camp +or the other. Thus far, we've been able to contain them in spite of +their recent successes. But given the prestige of being selected the +dominant world power by the extraterrestrials and in possession of the +science and industrial know-how from the stars, they'll have won the +cold war over night." + +His old eyes flared. "You want to know where you come in, eh? Fine. +Your job is to get to these Galactic Confederation emissaries and put +a bug in their bonnet. Get over to them that there's more than one +major viewpoint on this planet. Get them to investigate our side of +the matter." + +"Get to them how? If the Russkies--" + +Hennessey was tired. The flash of spirit was fading. He lifted a thin +hand. "One of my assistants is crossing the Atlantic with you. He'll +give you the details." + +"But why _me_? I'm strictly a--" + +"You're an unknown in Europe. Never connected with espionage. You +speak Russian like a native. Morton Twombly says you're his best man. +Your records show that you can think on your feet, and that's what we +need above all." + +Hank Kuran said flatly, "You might have asked for volunteers." + +"We did. You, you and you. The old army game," Hennessey said wearily. +"Mr. Kuran, we're in the clutch. We can lose, forever--right now. +Right in the next month or so. Consider yourself a soldier being +thrown into the most important engagement the world has ever +seen--combating the growth of the Soviets. We can't afford such +luxuries as asking for volunteers. Now do you get it?" + +Hank Kuran could feel impotent anger rising inside him. He was off +balance. "I get it, but I don't like it." + +"None of us do," Sheridan Hennessey said sourly. "Do you think any of +us do?" He must have pressed a button. + +From behind them the major's voice said briskly, "Will you come this +way, Mr. Kuran?" + + * * * * * + +In the limousine, on the way out to the airport, the bright, +impossibly cleanly shaven C.I.A. man said, "You've never been behind +the Iron Curtain before, have you Kuran?" + +"No," Hank said. "I thought that term was passé. Look, aren't we even +going to my hotel for my things?" + +The second C.I.A. man, the older one, said, "All your gear will be +waiting for you in London. They'll be sure there's nothing in it to +tip off the KGB if they go through your bags." + +The younger one said, "We're not sure, things are moving fast, but we +suspect that that term, Iron Curtain, applies again." + +"Then how am I going to get in?" Hank said irritably. "I've had no +background for this cloak and dagger stuff." + +The older C.I.A. man said, "We understand the KGB has increased +security measures but they haven't cut out all travel on the part of +non-Communists." + +The other one said, "Probably because the Russkies don't want to tip +off the spacemen that they're being isolated from the western +countries. It would be too conspicuous if suddenly all western +travelers disappeared." + +They were passing over the Potomac, to the right and below them Hank +Kuran could make out the twin Pentagons, symbols of a military that +had at long last by its very efficiency eliminated itself. War had +finally progressed to the point where even a minor nation, such as +Cuba or Portugal, could completely destroy the whole planet. +Eliminated wasn't quite the word. In spite of their sterility, the +military machines still claimed their million masses of men, still +drained a third of the products of the world's industry. + +One of the C.I.A. men was saying urgently, "So we're going to send you +in as a tourist. As inconspicuous a tourist as we can make you. For +fifteen years the Russkies have boomed their tourist trade--all for +propaganda, of course. Now they're in no position to turn this tourist +flood off. If the aliens got wind of it, they'd smell a rat." + +Hank Kuran brought his attention back to them. "All right. So you get +me to Moscow as a tourist. What do I do then? I keep telling you +jokers that I don't know a thing about espionage. I don't know a +secret code from judo." + +"That's one reason the chief picked you. Not only do the Russkies have +nothing on you in their files--neither do our own people. You're safe +from betrayal. There are exactly six people who know your mission and +only one of them is in Moscow." + +"Who's he?" + +The C.I.A. man shook his head. "You'll never meet him. But he's making +the arrangements for you to contact the underground." + +Hank Kuran turned in his seat. "What underground? In Moscow?" + +The bright, pink faced C.I.A. man chuckled and began to say something +but the older one cut him off. "Let me, Jimmy." He continued to Hank. +"Actually, we don't know nearly as much as we should about it, but a +Soviet underground is there and getting stronger. You've heard of the +_stilyagi_ and the _metrofanushka_?" + +Hank nodded. "Moscow's equivalent to the juvenile delinquents, or the +Teddy Boys, as the British call them." + +"Not only in Moscow, they're everywhere in urban Russia. At any rate, +our underground friends operate within the _stilyagi_, the so-called +jet-set, using them as protective coloring." + +"This is new to me," Hank said. "And I don't quite get it." + +"It's clever enough. Suppose you're out late some night on an +underground job and the police pick you up. They find out you're a +juvenile delinquent, figure you've been out getting drunk, and toss +you into jail for a week. It's better than winding up in front of a +firing squad as a counterrevolutionary, or a Trotskyite, or whatever +they're currently calling anybody they shoot." + +The chauffeur rapped on the glass that divided their seat from his, +and motioned ahead. + +"Here's the airport," Jimmy said. "We'll drive right over to the +plane. Hid your face with your hat, just for luck." + +"Wait a minute, now," Hank said. "Listen, how do I contact these beat +generation characters?" + +"You don't. They contact you." + +"How." + +"That's up to them. Maybe they won't at all; they're plenty careful." +Jimmy snorted without humor. "It must be getting to be an instinct +with Russians by this time. Nihilists, Anarchists, Mensheviks, +Bolsheviks, now anti-Communists. Survival of the fittest. By this time +the Russian underground must consist of members that have bred true as +revolutionists. There've been Russian undergrounds for twenty +generations." + +"Hardly long enough to affect genetics," the older one said wryly. + +Hank said, "Let's stop being witty. I still haven't a clue as to how +Sheridan Hennessey expects me to get to these Galactic Confederation +people--or things, or whatever you call them." + +"They evidently are humanoid," Jimmy said. "Look more or less human. +And stop worrying, we've got several hours to explain things while we +cross the Atlantic. You don't step into character until you enter the +offices of Progressive Tours, in London." + + * * * * * + +The door of Progressive Tours, Ltd. 100 Rochester Row, was invitingly +open. Hank Kuran entered, looked around the small room. He inwardly +winced at the appearance of the girl behind the counter. What was it +about Commies outside their own countries that they drew such +crackpots into their camp? Heavy lenses, horn rimmed to make them more +conspicuous, wild hair, mawkish tweeds, and dirty fingernails to top +it off. + +She said, "What can I do for you, Comrade?" + +"Not _Comrade_," Hank said mildly. "I'm an American." + +"What did you want?" she said coolly. + +Hank indicated the travel folder he was carrying. "I'd like to take +this tour to Leningrad and Moscow. I've been reading propaganda for +and against Russia as long as I've been able to read and I've finally +decided I want to see for myself. Can I get the tour that leaves +tomorrow?" + +She became businesslike as was within her ability. "There is no +country in the world as easy to visit as the Soviet Union, Mr--" + +"Stevenson," Hank Kuran said. "Henry Stevenson." + +"Stevenson. Fill out these two forms, leave your passport and two +photos and we'll have everything ready in the morning. The _Baltika_ +leaves at twelve. The visa will cost ten shillings. What class do you +wish to travel?" + +"The cheapest." _And least conspicuous_, Hank added under his breath. + +"Third class comes to fifty-five guineas. The tour lasts eighteen days +including the time it takes to get to Leningrad. You have ten days in +Russia." + +"I know, I read the folder. Are there any other Americans on the +tour?" + +A voice behind him said, "At least one other." + +Hank turned. She was somewhere in her late twenties, he estimated. And +if her clothes, voice and appearance were any criterion he'd put her +in the middle-middle class with a bachelor's degree in something or +other, unmarried and with the aggressiveness he didn't like in +American girls after living the better part of eight years in Latin +countries. + +On top of that she was one of the prettiest girls he had ever seen, in +a quick, red headed, almost puckish sort of way. + +Hank tried to keep from displaying his admiration too openly. +"American?" he said. + +"That's right." She took in his five-foot ten, his not quite ruffled +hair, his worried eyes behind their rimless lenses, darkish tinted for +the Peruvian sun. She evidently gave him up as not worth the effort +and turned to the fright behind the counter. + +"I came to pick up my tickets." + +"Oh, yes, Miss...." + +"Moore." + +The fright fiddled with the papers on an untidy heap before her. "Oh, +yes. Miss Charity Moore." + +"Charity?" Hank said. + +She turned to him. "Do you mind? I have two sisters named Honor and +Hope. My people were the Seventh Day Adventists. It wasn't my fault." +Her voice was pleasant--but nature had granted that; it wasn't +particularly friendly--through her own inclinations. + +Hank cleared his throat and went back to his forms. The visa +questionnaire was in both Russian and English. The first line wanted, +_Surname, first name and patronymic_. + +To get the conversation going again, Hank said, "What does patronymic +mean?" + +Charity Moore looked up from her own business and said, less +antagonism in her voice, "That's the name you inherited from your +father." + +"Of course, thanks." He went back to his forms. Under _what type of +work do you do_, Hank wrote, _Capitalist in a small sort of way. Auto +Agency owner._ + +He took the forms back to the counter with his passport. Charity Moore +was putting her tickets, suitcase labels and a sheaf of tour +instructions into her pocketbook. + +Hank said, "Look, we're going to be on a tour together, what do you +say to a drink?" + +She considered that, prettily, "Well ... well, of course. Why not?" + +Hank said to the fright, "There wouldn't be a nice bar around would +there?" + +"Down the street three blocks and to your left is Dirty Dick's." She +added scornfully, "All the tourists go there." + +"Then we shouldn't make an exception," Hank said. "Miss Moore, my +arm." + + * * * * * + +On the way over she said, "Are you excited about going to the Soviet +Union?" + +"I wouldn't say excited. Curious, though." + +"You don't sound very sympathetic to them." + +"To Russia?" Hank said. "Why should I be? Personally, I believe in +democracy." + +"So do I," she said, her voice clipped. "I think we ought to try it +some day." + +"Come again?" + +"So far as I can see, we pay lip service to democracy, that's about +all." + +Hank grinned inwardly. He'd already figured that during this tour he'd +be thrown into contact with characters running in shade from gentle +pink to flaming red. His position demanded that he remain +inconspicuous, as _average_ an American tourist as possible. Flaring +political arguments weren't going to help this, but, on the other hand +to avoid them entirely would be apt to make him more conspicuous than +ever. + +"How do you mean?" he said now. + +"We have two political parties in our country without an iota of +difference between them. Every four years they present candidates and +give us a choice. What difference does it make which one of the two we +choose if they both stand for the same thing? This is democracy?" + +Hank said mildly, "Well, it's better than sticking up just one +candidate and saying, which one of this one do you choose? Look, let's +steer clear of politics and religion, eh? Otherwise this'll never turn +out to be a beautiful friendship." + +Charity Moore's face portrayed resignation. + +Hank said, "I'm Hank, what do they call you besides Charity?" + +"Everybody but my parents call me Chair. You spell it C-H-A-R but +pronounce it like Chair, like you sit in." + +"That's better," Hank said. "Let's see. There it is, Dirty Dick's. +Crummy looking joint. You want to go in?" + +"Yes," Char said. "I've read about it. An old coaching house. One of +the oldest pubs in London. Dickens wrote a poem about it." + +[Illustration] + +The pub's bar extended along the right wall, as they entered. To the +left was a sandwich counter with a dozen or so stools. It was too +early to eat, they stood at the ancient bar and Hank said to her, +"Ale?" and when she nodded, to the bartender, "Two Worthingtons." + +While they were being drawn, Hank turned back to the girl, noticing +all over again how impossibly pretty she was. It was disconcerting. He +said, "How come Russia? You'd look more in place on a beach in +Biarritz or the Lido." + +Char said, "Ever since I was about ten years of age I've been reading +about the Russian people starving to death and having to work six +months before making enough money to buy a pair of shoes. So I've +decided to see how starving, barefooted people managed to build the +largest industrial nation in the world." + +"Here we go again," Hank said, taking up his glass. He toasted her +silently before saying, "The United States is still the largest single +industrial nation in the world." + +"Perhaps as late as 1965, but not today," she said definitely. + +"Russia, plus the satellites and China has a gross national product +greater than the free world's but no single nation produces more than +the United States. What are you laughing at?" + +"I love the way the West plasters itself so nicely with high flown +labels. The _free world_. Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, Pakistan, South +Africa--just what is your definition of _free_?" + +Hank had her placed now. A college radical. One of the tens of +thousands who discover, usually somewhere along in the sophomore year, +that all is not perfect in the land of their birth and begin looking +around for answers. Ten to one she wasn't a Commie and would probably +never become one--but meanwhile she got a certain amount of kicks +trying to upset ideological applecarts. + +For the sake of staying in character, Hank said mildly, "Look here, +are you a Communist?" + +She banged her glass down on the bar with enough force that the +bartender looked over worriedly. "Did it ever occur to you that even +though the Soviet Union might be wrong--if it is wrong--that doesn't +mean that the United States is right? You remind me of that ... that +_politician_, whatever his name was, when I was a girl. Anybody who +disagreed with him was automatically a Communist." + +"McCarthy," Hank said. "I'm sorry, so you're not a Communist." + +She took up her glass again, still in a huff. "I didn't say I wasn't. +That's my business." + + * * * * * + +The turboelectric ship _Baltika_ turned out to be the pride of the +U.S.S.R. Baltic State Steamship Company. In fact, she turned out to be +the whole fleet. Like the rest of the world, the Soviet complex had +taken to the air so far as passenger travel was concerned and already +the _Baltika_ was a left-over from yesteryear. For some reason the +C.I.A. thought there might be less observation on the part of the KGB +if Hank approached Moscow indirectly, that is by sea and from +Leningrad. It was going to take an extra four or five days, but, if +he got through, the squandered time would have been worth it. + +An English speaking steward took up Hank's bag at the gangplank and +hustled him through to his quarters. His cabin was forward and four +flights down into the bowels of the ship. There were four berths in +all, two of them already had bags on them. Hank put his hand in his +pocket for a shilling. + +The steward grinned and said, "No tipping. This is a Soviet ship." + +Hank looked after him. + +A newcomer entered the cabin, still drying his hands on a towel. +"Greetings," he said. "Evidently we're fellow passengers for the +duration." He hung the towel on a rack, reached out a hand. +"Rodriquez," he said. "You can call me Paco, if you want. Did you ever +meet an Argentine that wasn't named Paco?" + +Hank shook the hand. "I don't know if I ever met an Argentine before. +You speak English well." + +"Harvard," Paco said. He stretched widely. "Did you spot those Russian +girls in the crew? Blond, every one blond." He grinned. "Not much time +to operate with them--but enough." + +A voice behind them, heavy with British accent said, "Good afternoon, +gentlemen." + +He was as ebony as a negro can get and as nattily dressed as only +Savile Row can turn out a man. He said, "My name is Loo Motlamelle." +He looked at them expressionlessly for a moment. + +Paco put out his hand briskly for a shake. "Rodriquez," he said. "Call +me Paco. I suppose we're all Moscow bound." + +Loo Motlamelle seemed relieved at his acceptance, clasped Paco's hand, +then Hank's. + +Hank shook his head as the three of them began to unpack to the extent +it was desirable for the short trip. "The classless society. I wonder +what First Class cabins look like. Here we are, jammed three in a +telephone booth sized room." + +Paco chucked, "My friend, you don't know the half of it. There are +_five_ classes on this ship. Needless to say, this is Tourist B, the +last." + +"And we'll probably be fed borsht and black bread the whole trip," +Hank growled. + +Loo Motlamelle said mildly, "I hear the food is very good." + +Paco stood up from his luggage, put his hands on his hips, "Gentlemen, +do you realize there is no lock on the door of this cabin?" + +"The crime rate is said to be negligible in the Soviet countries," Loo +said. + +Paco put up his hands in despair. "That isn't the point. Suppose one +of us wishes to bring a lady friend into the cabin for ... a drink. +How can he lock the door so as not to be interrupted?" + +Hank was chuckling. "What did you take this trip for, Paco? An +investigation into the mores of the Soviets--female flavor?" + +Paco went back to his bag. "Actually, I suppose I am one of the many. +Going to the new world to see whether or not it is worth switching +alliances from the old." + +A distant finger of cold traced designs in Henry Kuran's belly. He had +never heard the United States referred to as the Old World before. It +had a strange, disturbing quality. + +Loo, who was now reclined on his bunk, said, "That's approximately the +same reason I visit the Soviet Union." + +Hank said quietly, "Who's sending you, Paco? Or are you on your own?" + +"No, my North American friend. My lips are sealed but I represent a +rather influencial group. All is not jest, even though I find life the +easier if one laughs often and with joy." + +Hank closed his bag and slid it under his bunk. "Well, you should have +had this influencial group pony up a little more money so you could +have gone deluxe class." + +Paco looked at him strangely. "That is the point. We are not +interested in a red-carpet tour during which the very best would be +trotted our for propaganda purposes. I choose to see the New World as +humbly as is possible." + +"And me," Loo said. "We evidently are in much the same position." + +Hank brought himself into character. "Well, lesson number one. Did you +notice the teeth in that steward's face? Steel. Bright, gleaming +steel, instead of gold." + +Loo shrugged hugely. "This is the day of science. Iron rusts, it's +true, but I assume that the Soviet dentists utilize some method of +preventing corrosion." + +"Otherwise," Paco murmured reasonably, "I imagine the Russians +expectorate a good deal of rusty spittal." + +"I don't know why I keep getting into these arguments," Hank said. +"I'm just going for a look-see myself. But frankly, I don't trust a +Russian any farther than I can throw one." + +"How many Russians have you met?" Loo said mildly. "Or are your +opinions formed solely by what you have read in American +publications?" + +Hank frowned at him. "You seem to be a little on the anti-American +side." + +"I'm not," Loo said. "But not pro-American either. I find much that is +ridiculous in the propaganda of both the Soviets and the West." + +"Gentlemen," Paco said, "the conversation is fascinating, but I must +leave you. The ladies, crowding the decks above, know not that my +presence graces this ship. It shall be necessary that I enlighten +them. _Adios amigos!_" + + * * * * * + +The _Baltika_ displaced eight thousand four hundred ninety-six tons +and had accommodations for three hundred thirty passengers. Of these, +Hank Kuran estimated, approximately half were Scandinavians or British +being transported between London, Copenhagen, Stockholm and Helsinki +on the small liner's way to Leningrad. + +Of the tourists, some seventy-five or so, Hank estimated that all but +half a dozen were convinced that Russian skunks didn't stink, in spite +of the fact that thus far they'd never been there to have a whiff. The +few such as Loo Motlamelle, who was evidently the son of some African +paramount chief, and Paco Rodriquez, had also never been to Russia but +at least had open minds. + +Far from black bread and borscht, he found the food excellent. The +first morning they found caviar by the pound nestled in bowls of ice, +as part of breakfast. He said across the table to Paco, "Propaganda. I +wonder how many people in Russia eat caviar." + +Paco spooned a heavy dip of it onto his bread and grinned back. "This +type of propaganda I can appreciate. You Yankees should try it." + +Char was also eating at the other side of the community type table. +She said, "How many Americans eat as well as the passengers on United +States Lines ships?" + +It was as good an opportunity as any for Hank to place his character +in the eyes of his fellow Progressive Tours pilgrims. His need was to +establish himself as a moderately square tourist on his way to take a +look-see at highly publicized Russia. Originally, the C.I.A. men had +wanted him to be slightly pro-Soviet, but he hadn't been sure he could +handle that convincingly enough. More comfortable would be a role as +an averagely anti-Russian tourist--not fanatically so, but averagely. +If there were any KGB men aboard, he wanted to dissolve into +mediocrity so far as they were concerned. + +Hank said now, mild indignation in his voice. "Do you contend that the +average Russian eats as well as the average American?" + +Char took a long moment to finish the bite she had in her mouth. She +shrugged prettily. "How would I know? I've never been to the Soviet +Union." She paused for a moment before adding, "However, I've done a +certain amount of traveling and I can truthfully say that the worst +slums I have ever seen in any country that can be considered civilized +were in the Harlem district and the lower East Side of New York." + +All eyes were turned to him now, so Hank said, "It's a big country and +there are exceptions. But on the average the United States has the +highest standard of living in the world." + +Paco said interestedly, "What do you use for a basis of measurement, +my friend? Such things as the number of television sets and movie +theaters? To balance such statistics, I understand that per capita +your country has the fewest number of legitimate theaters of any of--I +use Miss Moore's term--the civilized countries." + +A Londoner, two down from Hank, laughed nastily. "Maybe schooling is +the way he measures. I read in the _Express_ the other day that even +after Yankees get out of college they can't read proper. All they +learn is driving cars and dancing and togetherness--wotever that it." + +Hank grinned inwardly and thought, _You don't sound as though you read +any too well yourself, my friend._ Aloud he said, "Very well, in a +couple of days we'll be in the promised land, I contend that free +enterprise performs the greatest good for the greatest number." + +"Free enterprise," somebody down the table snorted. "That means the +freedom for the capitalists to pry somebody else out of the greatest +part of what he produces." + +By the time they'd reached Leningrad aside from Paco and Loo, his +cabinmates, Hank had built an Iron Curtain all of his own between +himself and the other members of the Progressive Tours trip. Which was +the way he wanted it. He could foresee a period when having friends +might be a handicap when and if he needed to drift away from the main +body for any length of time. + +Actually, the discussions he ran into were on the juvenile side. Hank +Kuran hadn't spent eight years of his life as a field man working +against the Soviet countries in the economic sphere without running +into every argument both pro and con in the continuing battle between +Capitalism and Communism. Now he chuckled to himself at getting into +tiffs over the virtues of Russian black bread versus American white, +or whether Soviet jets were faster than those of the United States. + +With Char Moore, though she tolerated Hank's company, in fact, seemed +to prefer it to that of whatever other males were aboard, it was +continually a matter of rubbing fur the wrong way. She was ready to +battle it out on any phase of politics, international affairs or West +versus East. + +But it was the visitors from space that actually dominated the +conversation of the ship--crew, tourists, business travelers, or +whoever. Information was still limited, and Taas the sole source. +Daily there were multilingual radio broadcasts tuned in by the +_Baltika_ but largely they added little to the actual information on +the extraterrestrials. It was mostly Soviet back-patting on the +significance of the fact that the Galactic Confederation emissaries +had landed in the Soviet complex rather than among the Western +countries. + +Hank learned little that he hadn't already known. The Kremlin had all +but laughingly declined a suggestion on the part of Switzerland that +the extraterrestrials be referred to that all but defunct United +Nations. The delegates from the Galactic Confederation had chose to +land in Moscow. In Moscow they should remain until they desired to go +elsewhere. The Soviet implication was that the alien emissaries had no +desire, intention nor reason to visit other sections of Earth. They +had contacted the dominant world power and could complete their +business within the Kremlin walls. + + * * * * * + +Leningrad came as only a mild surprise to Henry Kuran. With his +knowledge of Russian and his position in Morton Twombly's department, +he had kept up with the Soviet progress though the years. + +As early as the middle 1950s unbiased travelers to the U.S.S.R. had +commented in detail upon the explosion of production in the country. +By the end of the decade such books as Gunther's "Inside Russia Today" +had dwelt upon the ultra-cleanliness of the cities, the mushrooming of +apartment houses, the easing of the restrictions of Stalin's day--or +at least the beginning of it. + +He actually hadn't expected peasant clad, half starved Russians +furtively shooting glances at their neighbors for fear of the secret +police. Nor a black bread and cabbage diet. Nor long lines of the +politically suspect being hauled off to Siberia. But on the other hand +he was unprepared for the prosperity he did find. + +[Illustration] + +Not that this was any paradise, worker's or otherwise. But it still +came as a mild surprise. Henry Kuran couldn't remember so far back +that he hadn't had his daily dose of anti-Russianism. Not unless it +was for the brief respite during the Second World War when for a +couple of years the Red Army had been composed of heroes and Stalin +had overnight become benevolent old Uncle Joe. + +There weren't as many cars on the streets as in American cities, but +there were more than he had expected nor were they 1955 model +Packards. So far as he could see, they were approximately the same +cars as were being turned out in Western Europe. + +Public transportation, he admitted, was superior to that found in the +Western capitals. Obviously, it would have to be, without automobiles, +buses, streetcars and subways would have to carry the brunt of +traffic. However, it was the spotless efficiency of public +transportation that set him back. + +The shops were still short of the pinnacles touched by Western +capitals. They weren't empty of goods, luxury goods as well as +necessities, but they weren't overflowing with the endless quantities, +the hundred-shadings of quality and fashion that you expected in the +States. + +But what struck nearest to him was the fact that the people in the +streets were not broken spirited depressed, humorless drudges. In +fact, why not admit it, they looked about the same as people in the +streets anywhere else. Some laughed, some looked troubled. Children +ran and played. Lovers held hands and looked into each other's eyes. +Some reeled under an overload of vodka. Some hurried along, business +bent. Some dawdled, window shopped, or strolled along for the air. +Some read books or newspapers as they shuffled, radar directed, and +unconscious of the world about them. + +They were only a day and half in Leningrad. They saw the Hermitage, +comparable to the Louvre and far and above any art museum in America. +They saw the famous subway--which deserved its fame. They were ushered +through a couple of square miles of the Elektrosile electrical +equipment works, claimed ostentatiously by the to be the largest in +the world. They ate in restaurants as good as any Hank Kuran had been +able to afford at home and stayed one night at the Astoria Hotel. + +At least, Hank had the satisfaction of grumbling about the plumbing. + +Paco and Loo, the only single bachelors on the tour besides himself, +were again quartered with him at the Astoria. + +Paco said, "My friend, there I agree with you completely. America has +the best plumbing in the world. And the most." + +Hank was pulling off his shoes after an arch-breaking day of +sightseeing. "Well, I'm glad I've finally found some field where it's +agreeable that the West is superior to the Russkies." + +Loo was stretched out on his bed, in stocking feet, gazing at the +ceiling which towered at least fifteen feet above him. He said "In the +town where I was born, there were three bathrooms, one in the home of +the missionary, one in the home of the commissioner, and one in my +father's palace." He looked up at Hank. "Or is my country considered +part of the Western World?" + +Paco laughed. "Come to think of it, I doubt if one third the rural +homes of Argentina have bathrooms. Hank, my friend, I am afraid Loo is +right. You use the word _West_ too broadly. All the capitalist world +is not so advanced as the United States. You have been very lucky, you +Yankees." + +Hank sank into one of the huge, Victorian era armchairs. "Luck has +nothing to do with it. America is rich because private enterprise +_works_." + +"Of course," Paco pursued humorously, "the fact that your country +floats on a sea of oil, has some of the richest forest land in the +world, is blessed with some of the greatest mineral deposits anywhere +and millions of acres of unbelievably fertile land has nothing to do +with it." + +"I get your point," Hank said. "The United States was handed the +wealth of the world on a platter. But that's only part of it." + +"Yes," Loo agreed. "Also to be considered is the fact that for more +than a hundred years you have never had a serious war, serious, that +is, in that your land was not invaded, your industries destroyed." + +"That's to our credit. We're a peace loving people." + +Loo laughed abruptly. "You should tell that to the American Indians." + +Hank scowled over at him. "What'd you mean by that Loo? That has all +the elements of a nasty crack." + +"Or tell it to the Mexicans. Isn't that where you got your whole +South-west?" + +Hank looked from Loo to Paco and back. + + * * * * * + +Paco brought out cigarettes and tossed one to each of the others. +"Aren't these long Russian cigarettes the end? I heard somebody say +that by the time the smoke got through all the filter, you'd lost the +habit." He looked over at Hank. "Easy my friend, easy. On a trip like +this it would be impossible not to continually be comparing East and +West, dwelling continually on politics, the pros and cons of both +sides. All of us are continually assimilating what we hear and see. +Among other things, I note that on the newsstands there are no +publications from western lands. Why? Because still, after fifty +years, our Communist bureaucracy dare not allow its people to read +what they will. I note, too, that the shops on 25th October Avenue are +not all directed toward the Russian man on the street, unless he is +paid unbelievably more than we have heard. Sable coats? Jewelery? +Luxurious furniture? I begin to suspect that our Soviet friends are +not quite so classless as Mr. Marx had in mind when he and Mr. Engels +worked out the rough framework of the society of the future." + +Loo said seriously, "Oh, there are a great many things of that type to +notice here in the Soviet Union." + +Hank had to grin. "Well, I'm glad you jokers still have open minds." + +Paco waggled a finger negatively at him. "We've had open minds all +along, my friend. It is yours that seems closed. In spite of the fact +that I spent four years in your country I sometimes confess I don't +understand you Americans. I think you are too immersed in your TV +programs, your movies and your light fiction." + +"I can feel myself being saddled up again," Hank complained. "All set +for another riding." + +Loo laughed softly, his perfect white teeth gleaming in his black +face. + +Paco said, "You seem to have the fictional _good guys and bad guys_ +outlook. And, in this world of controversy, you assume that you are +the good guys, the heroes, and since that is so then the Soviets must +be the bad guys. And, as in the movies, everything the good guys do is +fine and everything the bad guys do, is evil. I sometimes think that +if the Russians had developed a cure for cancer first you Americans +would have refused to use it." + +Hank had had enough. He said, "Look, Paco, there are two hundred +million Americans. For you, or anyone else, to come along and try to +lump that many people neatly together is pure silliness. You'll find +every type of person that exists in the world in any country. The very +tops of intelligence, and submorons living in institutions; the most +highly educated of scientists, and men who didn't finish grammar +school; you'll find saints, and gangsters; infant prodigies and +juvenile delinquents; and millions upon millions of just plain +ordinary people much like the people of Argentina, or England, or +France or whatever. True enough, among all our two hundred million +there are some mighty prejudiced people, some mighty backward ones, +and some downright foolish ones. But if you think the United States +got to the position she's in today through the efforts of a whole +people who are foolish, then you're obviously pretty far off the beam +yourself." + +Paco was looking at him narrowly. "Accepted, friend Hank, and I +apologize. That's quite the most effective outburst I've heard from +you in this week we've known each other. It occurs to me that perhaps +you are other than I first thought." + +_Oh, oh._ Hank backtracked. He said, "Good grief, let's drop it." + +Paco said, "Well, just to change the subject, gentlemen, there is one +thing above all that I noted here in Leningrad." + +"What was that?" Loo said. + +"It's the only town I've ever seen where I felt an urge to kiss a +cop," Paco said soulfully. "Did you notice? Half the traffic police in +town are cute little blondes." + +Loo rolled over. "A fascinating observation, but personally I am going +to take a nap. Tonight it's the Red Arrow Express to Moscow and rest +might be in order, particularly if the train has square wheels, burns +wood and stops and repairs bridges all along the way, as I'm sure Hank +believes." + +Hank reached down, got hold of one of his shoes and heaved it. + +"Missed!" Loo grinned. + + * * * * * + +The Red Arrow Express had round wheels, burned Diesel fuel and made +the trip between Leningrad and Moscow overnight. In one respect, it +was the most unique train ride Hank Kuran had ever had. The track +contained not a single curve from the one city to the other. Its +engineers must have laid the roadbed out with a ruler. + +The cars like the rest of public transportation, were as comfortable +as any Hank knew. Traveling second class, as the Progressive Tours +pilgrims did, involved four people in a compartment for the night, +with one exception. At the end of the car was a smaller compartment +containing two bunks only. + +The Intourist guide who had shepherded them around Leningrad took them +to the train, saw them all safely aboard, told them another Intourist +employee would pick them up at the station in Moscow. + +It was late. Hank was assigned the two-bunk compartment. He put his +glasses on the tiny window table, sat on the edge of the lower and +began to pull off his shoes. He didn't look up when the door opened +until a voice said, icebergs dominating the tone, "Just what are you +doing in here?" + +Hank blinked up at her. "Hello, Char. What?" + +Char Moore snapped, "I said, what are you doing in my compartment?" + +"Yours? Sorry, the conductor just assigned me here. Evidently there's +been some mistake." + +"I suggest you rectify it, Mr. Stevenson." + +Out in the corridor a voice, heavy with Britishisms, complained +plaintively, "Did you ever hear the loik? They put men and women into +the same compartment. Oim expected to sleep with a loidy in the bunk +under me." + +Hank cleared his throat, didn't allow himself the luxury of a smile. +He said, "I'll see what I can do, Char. Seems to me I did read +somewhere that the Russkies see nothing wrong in putting strangers in +the same sleeping compartment." + +Char Moore stood there, saying nothing but breathing deeply enough to +express American womanhood insulted. + +"All right, all right," he said, retying his shoes and retrieving his +glasses. "I didn't engineer this." He went looking for the conductor. + +He was back, yawning by this time, fifteen minutes later. Char Moore +was sitting on the side of the bottom bunk, sipping a glass of tea +that she'd bought for a few kopecks from the portress. She looked up +coolly as he entered, but her voice was more pleasant. "Get everything +fixed?" + +Hank said, "What bunk do you want, upper or lower?" + +"That's not funny." + +"It's not supposed to be." Hank pulled his bag from under the bunk and +from it drew pajamas and his dressing gown. "Check with the rest of +the tour if you want. The conductor couldn't care less. We were +evidently assigned compartments by Intourist and where we were +assigned we'll sleep. Either that or you can stand in the corridor all +night. I'll be damned if I will." + +"You don't have to swear," Char bit out testily. "What are we going to +do about it?" + +"I just told you what I was going to do." Taking up his things he +opened the door. "I'll change in the men's dressing room." + +"I'll lock the door," Char Moore snapped. + +Hank grinned at her. "I'll bet that if you do the conductor either has +a passkey or will break it down for me." + +When he returned in slippers, nightrobe and pajamas, Char was in the +upper berth, staring angrily at the compartment ceiling. There were no +hooks or other facilities for hanging or storing clothes. She must +have put all of her things back into her bag. Hank grinned inwardly, +carefully folded his own pants and jacket over his suitcase before +climbing into the bunk. + +"Don't snore, do you?" he said conversationally. + +No answer. + +"Or walk in your sleep?" + +"You're not funny, Mr. Stevenson." + +"That's what I like about this country," Hank said. "Progressive. Way +ahead of the West. Shucks, modesty is a reactionary capitalistic +anachronism. Shove 'em all into bed together, that's what I always +say." He laughed. + +"Oh, shut up," Char said. But then she laughed, too. "Actually, I +suppose there's nothing wrong with it. We are rather Victorian about +such things in the States." + +Hank groaned. "There you are. If a railroad company at home suggested +you spend the night in a compartment with a strange man, you'd sue +them. But here in the promised land it's O.K." + +After a short silence Char said, "Hank, why do you dislike the Soviet +Union so much?" + +"Why? Because I'm an American!" + +She said so softly as to be almost inaudible, "I've known you for a +week now. Somehow you don't really seem to be the type who would make +that inadequate a statement." + +Hank said "Look, Char. There's a cold war going on between the United +States and her allies and the Soviet complex. I'm on our side. It's +going to be one or the other." + +"No it isn't, Hank. If it ever breaks out into hot war, it's going to +be both. That is, unless the extraterrestrials add some new elements +to the whole disgusting situation." + +"Let's put it another way. Why are you so pro-Soviet?" + +She raised herself on one elbow and scowled down over the edge of her +bunk at him. Inside, Hank turned over twice to see the unbound red +hair, the serious green eyes. Imagine looking at that face over the +breakfast table for the rest of your life. The hell with South +American senoritas. + +Char said earnestly, "I'm not. Confound it, Hank, can't the world get +any further than this cowboys and Indians relationship between +nations? Our science and industry has finally developed to the point +where the world could be a paradise. We've solved all the problems of +production. We've conquered all the major diseases. We have the +wonders of eternity before us--and look at us." + +"Tell that to the Russkies and their pals. They're out for the works." + +"Well, haven't we been?" + +"The United States isn't trying to take over the world." + +"No? Possibly not in the old sense of the word, but aren't we trying +desperately to sponsor our type of government and social system +everywhere? Frankly, I'm neither pro-West nor pro-Soviet. I think +they're both wrong." + +"Fine," Hank said. "What is your answer?" + +She remained silent for a long time. Finally, "I don't claim to have +an answer. But the world is changing like crazy. Science, technology, +industrial production, education, population all are mushrooming. For +us to claim that sweeping and basic changes aren't taking place in the +Western nations is just nonsense. Our own country's institutions +barely resemble the ones we had when you and I were children. And +certainly the Soviet Union has changed and is changing from what it +was thirty or forty years ago." + +"Listen, Char," Hank said in irritation, "you still haven't come up +with any sort of an answer to the cold war." + +"I told you I hadn't any. All I say is that I'm sick of it. I can't +remember so far back that there wasn't a cold war. And the more I +consider it the sillier it looks. Currently the United States and her +allies spend between a third and a half of their gross national +product on the military--ha! the military!--and in fighting the Soviet +complex in international trade." + +"Well," Hank said, "I'm sick of it, too, and I haven't any answer +either, but I'll be darned if I've heard the Russkies propose one. And +just between you and me, if I had to choose between living Soviet +style and our style, I'd choose ours any day." + +Char said nothing. + +Hank added flatly, "Who knows, maybe the coming of these Galactic +Confederation characters will bring it all to a head." + +She said nothing further and in ten minutes the soft sounds of her +breathing had deepened to the point that Hank Kuran knew she slept. He +lay there another half hour in the full knowledge that probably the +most desirable woman he'd ever met was sleeping less than three feet +away from him. + + * * * * * + +Leningrad had cushioned the first impression of Moscow for Henry +Kuran. Although, if anything, living standards and civic beauty were +even higher here in the capital city of world Communism. + +They pulled into the Leningradsky Station on Komsomolskaya Square in +the early morning to be met by Intourist guides and buses. + +Hank sat next to Char Moore still feeling on the argumentative side +after their discussion of the night before. He motioned with his head +at some excavation work going on next to the station. "There you are. +Women doing manual labor." + +Char said, "I'm from the Western states, it doesn't impress me. Have +you ever seen fruit pickers, potato diggers, or just about any type of +itinerant harvest workers? There is no harder work and women, and +children for that matter, do half of it at home." + +He looked at the husky, rawboned women laborers working shoulder to +shoulder with the men. "I still don't like it." + +Char shrugged. "Who does? The sooner we devise machines to do all the +drudgery the better off the world will be." + +To his surprise, Hank found Moscow one of the most beautiful cities he +had ever observed. Certainly the downtown area in the vicinity of the +Kremlin compared favorably with any. + +The buses whisked them down through Lermontovskaya Square, down Kirov +Street to Novaya and then turned right. The Intourist guide made with +a running commentary. There was the famous Bolshoi Theater and there +Sverdlova Square, a Soviet cultural center. + +Hank didn't know it then but they were avoiding Red Square. They +circled it, one block away, and pulled onto Gorky Street and before a +Victorian period building. + +"The Grand Hotel," the guide announced, "where you will stay during +your Moscow visit." + +Half a dozen porters began manhandling their bags from the top of the +bus. They were ushered into the lobby and assigned rooms. Russian +hotel lobbies were a thing apart. No souvenir stands, no bellhops, no +signs saying _To the Bar_, _To the Barber Shop_ or to anything else. A +hotel was a hotel, period. + +Hank trailed Loo and Paco and three porters to the second floor and to +the room they were assigned in common. Like the Astoria's rooms, in +Leningrad, it was king-sized. In fact, it could easily have been +divided into three chambers. There were four full sized beds, six arm +chairs, two sofas, two vanity tables, a monstrous desk--and one wash +bowl which gurgled when you ran water. + +Paco, hands on hips, stared around. "A dance hall," he said. +"Gentlemen, this room hasn't changed since some Grand Duke stayed in +it before the revolution." + +Loo, who had assumed his usual prone position on one of the beds, +said, "From what I've heard about Moscow housing, you could get an +average family in this amount of space." + +Hank was stuffing clothes into a dresser drawer. "Now who's making +with anti-Soviet comments?" + +Paco laughed at him. "Have you ever seen some of the housing in the +Harlem district in New York? You can rent a bed in a room that has +possibly ten beds, for an eight-hour period. When your eight hours are +up you roll out and somebody else rolls in. The beds are kept warm, +three shifts every twenty-four hours." + +Hank shook his head and muttered, "They call me Dobbin, I've been +ridden so much." + +Paco laughed and rubbed his hands together happily. "It's still early. +We have nothing to do until lunch time. I suggest we sally forth and +take a look at Russian womanhood. One never knows." + +Loo said, "As an alternative, I suggest we rest until lunch." + +Paco snorted. "A rightest-Trotskyite wrecker, and an imperialist +war-monger to boot." + +Loo said, dead panned, "Smile when you say that stranger." + +Hank said, "Hey, wait a minute." + +He went down the room to the far window and bug-eyed. One block away, +at the end of Gorky Street, was Red Square. St. Basil's Cathedral at +the far end, and unbelievable candy-cane construction of fanciful +spirals, and every-colored turrets; the red marble mausoleum, Mecca of +world Communism, housing the prophet Lenin and his two disciples; the +long drab length of the GUM department store opposite. But it wasn't +these. + +There on the square, nestled in the corner between St. Basil's and +the mausoleum, squatted what Henry Kuran had never really expected to +see, in spite of his assignment, in spite of news broadcasts, in spite +of everything to the contrary. Boomerang shaped, resting on short +stilts, six of them in all, a baby blue in color--an impossibly +beautiful baby blue. + +The spaceship. + +Paco stood at one shoulder, Loo at the other. + +For once there was no humor in Paco's words. "There it is," he said. +"Our visitors from the stars." + +"Possibly our teachers from the stars," Hank said huskily. + +"Or our judges." Loo's voice was flat. + +They stood there for another five minutes in silence. Loo said +finally, "Undoubtedly our Intourist guides will take us nearer, if +that's allowed, later during our stay. Meanwhile, my friends, I shall +rest up for the occasion." + +"Let's take our quick look at the city," Paco said to Hank. "Once the +Intourist people take over they'll run our feet off. Frankly, I have +little interest in where the first shot of the revolution was fired, +the latest tractor factory, or where Rasputin got it in the neck. +There are more important things." + +"We know," Loo said from the bed. "Women." + +"Right!" + + * * * * * + +Hank was wondering whether or not to leave the room. The _Stilyagi_ +were to contact him. Where? When? Obviously, he'd need their help. He +had no idea whatsoever on how to penetrate to the Interplanetary +emissaries. + +[Illustration] + +He spoke Russian. Fine. So what? Could he simply march up to the +spacecraft and knock on the door? Or would he make himself dangerously +conspicuous by just getting any closer than he now was to the craft? + +As he stood now, he felt he was comparatively safe. He was sure the +Russkies had marked him down as a rather ordinary American. Heavens +knows, he'd worked hard enough at the role. A simple, average tourist, +a little on the square side, and not even particularly articulate. + +However, he wasn't going to accomplish much by remaining here in this +room. He doubted that the _Stilyagi_ would get in touch with him +either by phone or simply knocking at the door. + +"O.K., Paco," he said. "Let's go. In search of the pin-up girl--Moscow +style." + +They walked down to the lobby and started for the door. + +One of the Intourist guides who had brought them from the railroad +station stood to one side of the stairs. "Going for a walk, gentlemen? +I suggest you stroll up Gorky Street, it's the main shopping center." + +Paco said, "How about going over into Red Square to see the +spaceship?" + +The guide shrugged. "I don't believe the guards will allow you to get +too near. It would be undesirable to bother the Galactic delegates to +the Soviet Union." + +That was one way of wording it, Hank thought glumly. _The Galactic +delegates to the Soviet Union._ Not to the Earth, but to the Soviet +Union. He wondered what the neutrals in such countries as India were +thinking. + +But at least there were no restrictions on Paco and him. + +They strolled up Gorky Street, jam packed with fellow pedestrians. +Shoppers, window-shoppers, men on the prowl for girls, girls on the +prowl for men, Ivan and his wife taking the baby for a stroll, street +cleaners at the endless job of keeping Moscow's streets the neatest in +the world. + +Paco pointed out this to Hank, Hank pointed out that to Paco. Somehow +it seemed more than a visit to a western European nation. This was +Moscow. This was the head of the Soviet snake. + +And then Hank had to laugh inwardly at himself as two youngsters, +running along playing tag in a grown-up world of long legs and stolid +pace, all but tripped him up. Head of a snake it might be, but +Moscow's people looked astonishingly like those of Portland, Maine or +Portland, Oregon. + +"How do you like those two, coming now?" Paco said. + +Those two coming now consisted of two better than averagely dressed +girls who would run somewhere in their early twenties. A little too +much make-up by western standards, and clumsily applied. + +"Blondes," Paco said soulfully. + +"They're all blondes here," Hank said. + +"Wonderful, isn't it?" + +The girls smiled at them in passing and Paco turned to look after, but +they didn't stop. Hank and Paco went on. + +It didn't take Hank long to get onto Paco's system. It was beautifully +simple. He merely smiled widely at every girl that went by. If she +smiled back, he stopped and tried to start a conversation with her. + +He got quite a few rebuffs but--Hank remembered an old joke--on the +other hand he got quite a bit of response. + +Before they had completed a block and a half of strolling, they were +standing on a corner, trying to talk with two of Moscow's younger +set--female variety. Here again, Paco was a wonder. His languages were +evidently Spanish, English and French but he was in there pitching +with a language the full vocabulary of which consisted of _Da_ and +_Neit_ so far as he was concerned. + +Hank stood back a little, smiling, trying to stay in character, but in +amused dismay at the other's aggressive abilities. + +Paco said, "Listen, I think I can get these two to come up to the +room. Which one do you like?" + +Hank said, "If they'll come up to the room, then they're +professionals." + +Paco grinned at him. "I'm a professional, too. A lawyer by trade. It's +just a matter of different professions." + +A middle-aged pedestrian, passing by, said to the girls in Russian, +"Have you no shame before the foreign tourists?" + +They didn't bother to answer. Paco went back to his attempt to make a +deal with the taller of the two. + +The smaller, who sported astonishingly big and blue eyes, said to Hank +in Russian, "You're too good to associate with _metrofanushka_ girls?" + +Hank frowned puzzlement. "I don't speak Russian," he said. + +She laughed lightly, almost a giggle, and, in the same low voice her +partner was using on Paco, said, "I think you do, Mr. Kuran. In the +afternoon, tomorrow, avoid whatever tour the Intourist people wish to +take you on and wander about Sovietska Park." She giggled some more. +The world-wide epitome of a girl being picked up on the street. + +Hank took her in more closely. Possibly twenty-five years of age. The +skirt she was wearing was probably Russian, it looked sturdy and +durable, but the sweater was one of the new American fabrics. Her +shoes were probably western too, the latest flared heel effect. A +typical _stilyagi_ or _metrofanushka_ girl, he assumed. Except for one +thing--her eyes were cool and alert, intelligent beyond those of a +street pickup. + +Paco said, "What do you think, Hank? This one will come back to the +hotel with me." + +"Romeo, Romeo," Hank sighed, "wherefore do thou think thou art?" + +Paco shrugged. "What's the difference? Buenos Aires, New York, +Moscow. Women are women." + +"And men are evidently men," Hank said. "You do what you want." + +"O.K., friend. Do you mind staying out of the room for a time?" + +"Don't worry about me, but you'll have to get rid of Loo, and he +hasn't had his eighteen hours sleep yet today." + +Paco had his girl by the arm. "I'll roll him into the hall. He'll +never wake up." + +Hank's girl made a moue at him, shrugged as though laughing off the +fact that she had been rejected, and disappeared into the crowds. Hank +stuck his hands in his pockets and went on with his stroll. + +The contact with the underground had been made. + + * * * * * + +Maintaining his front as an American tourist he wandered into several +stores, picked up some amber brooches at a bargain rate, fingered +through various books in English in an international bookshop. That +was one thing that hit hard. The bookshops were packed. Prices were +remarkably low and people were buying. In fact, he'd never seen a +country so full of people reading and studying. The park benches were +loaded with them, they read as the rode on streetcar and bus, they +read as they walked along the street. He had an uneasy feeling that +the jet-set kids were a small minority, that the juvenile delinquent +problem here wasn't a fraction what it was in the West. + +He'd expected to be followed. In fact, that had puzzled him when he +first was given this unwanted assignment by Sheridan Hennessey. How +was he going to contact this so-called underground if he was watched +the way he had been led to believe Westerners were? + +But he recalled their conducted tour of the Hermitage Museum in +Leningrad. The Intourist guide had started off with twenty-five +persons and had clucked over them like a hen all afternoon. In spite +of her frantic efforts to keep them together, however, she returned to +the Astoria Hotel that evening with eight missing--including Hank and +Loo who had wandered off to get a beer. + +The idea of the KGB putting tails on the tens of thousands of tourists +that swarmed Moscow and Leningrad, became a little on the ridiculous +side. Besides, what secret does a tourist know, or what secrets could +he discover? + +At any rate, Hank found no interference in his wanderings. He +deliberately avoided Red Square and its spaceship, taking no chances +on bringing himself to attention. Short of that locality, he wandered +freely. + +At noon they ate at the Grand and the Intourist guide outlined the +afternoon program which involved a general sightseeing tour ranging +from the University to the Park of Rest and Culture, Moscow's +equivalent of Coney Island. + +Loo said, "That all sounds very tiring, do we have time for a nap +before leaving?" + +"I'm afraid not, Mr. Motlamelle," the guide told him. + +Paco shook his head. "I've seen a university, and I've seen a sport +stadium and I've seen statues and monuments. I'll sit this one out." + +"I think I'll lie this one out," Loo said. He complained plaintively +to Hank. "You know what happened to me this morning, just as I was +napping up in our room?" + +"Yes," Hank said, "I was with our Argentine Casanova when he picked +her up." + + * * * * * + +Hank took the conducted tour with the rest. If he was going to beg off +the next day, he'd be less conspicuous tagging along on this one. +Besides it gave him the lay of the land. + +And he took the morning trip the next day, the automobile factories on +the outskirts of town. It had been possibly fifteen years since Hank +had been through Detroit but he doubted greatly that automation had +developed as far in his own country as it seemed to have here. Or, +perhaps, this was merely a showplace. But he drew himself up at that +thought. That was one attitude the Western world couldn't +afford--deprecating Soviet progress. This was the very thing that had +led to such shocks as the launching of the early Sputniks. +Underestimate your adversary and sooner or later you paid for it. + +The Soviets had at long last built up a productive machine as great as +any. Possibly greater. In sheer tonnage they were turning out more +gross national product than the West. This was no time to be +underestimating them. + +All this was a double interest to a field man in Morton Twombly's +department, working against the Soviets in international trade. He was +beginning to understand at least one of the reasons why the Commies +could sell their products at such ridiculously low prices. Automation +beyond that of the West. In the Soviet complex the labor unions were +in no position to block the introduction of ultra-efficient methods, +and featherbedding was unheard of. If a Russian worker's job was +_automated_ out from under him, he shifted to a new plant, a new job, +and possibly even learned a new trade. The American worker's union, to +the contrary, did its best to save the job. + +Hank Kuran remembered reading, a few months earlier, of a British +textile company which had attempted to introduce a whole line of new +automation equipment. The unions had struck, and the company had to +give up the project. What happened to the machinery? It was sold to +China! + +Following the orders of his underground contact, he begged out of the +afternoon tour, as did half a dozen of the others. Sightseeing was as +hard on the feet in Moscow as anywhere else. + +After lunch he looked up Sovietska Park on his tourist map of the +city. It was handy enough. A few blocks up Gorky Street. + +It turned out to be typical. Well done so far as fountains, monuments +and gardens were concerned. Well equipped with park benches. In the +early afternoon it was by no means empty, but, on the other hand not +nearly so filled as he'd noticed the parks to be the evening before. + +Hank stopped at one of the numerous cold drink stands where for a few +kopecks you could get raspberry syrup fizzed up with soda water. While +he sipped it, a teen-ager came up beside him and said in passable +English, "Excuse me, are you a tourist? Do you speak English?" + +This had happened before. Another kid practicing his school language. + +"That's right," Hank said. + +The boy said, "You aren't a ham, are you?" He brought some cards from +an inner pocket. "I'm UA3-KAR." + +For a moment Hank looked at him blankly, and then he recognized the +amateur radio call cards the other was displaying. "Oh, a _ham_. Well, +no, but I have a cousin who is." + +Two more youngsters came up. "What's his call?" + +Hank didn't remember that. They all adjourned to a park bench and +little though he knew about the subject, international amateur radio +was discussed in detail. In fifteen minutes he was hemmed in by a +dozen or so and had about decided he'd better make his excuses and +circulate around making himself available to the _stilyagi_ outfit. He +was searching for an excuse to shake them when the one sitting next to +him reverted to Russian. + +"We're clear now, Henry Kuran." + +Hank said, "I'll be damned. I hadn't any idea--" + +The other brushed aside trivialities. Looking at him more closely, +Hank could see he was older than first estimate. Possibly twenty-two +or so. Darker than most of the others, heavy-set, sharp and impatient. + +"You can call me Georgi," he said. "These others will prevent +outsiders from bothering us. Now then, we've been told you Americans +want some assistance. What? And why should we give it to you?" + +Hank said, worriedly, "Haven't you some place we could go? Where I +could meet one of your higher-ups? This is important." + +"Otherwise, I wouldn't be here," Georgi said impatiently. "For that +matter there is no higher-up. We don't have ranks; we're a working +democracy. And I'm afraid the day of the secret room in some cellar is +past. With housing what it is, if there was an empty cellar in Moscow +a family would move in. And remember, all buildings are State owned +and operated. I'm afraid you'll have to tell your story here. Now, +what is it you want?" + +"I want an opportunity to meet the Galactic Confederation emissaries." + +"Why?" + +"To give them our side, the Western side, of the ... well, the +controversy between us and the Soviet complex. We want an opportunity +to have our say before they make any permanent treaties." + +Georgi considered that. "We thought it was probably something +similar," he muttered. "What do you think it will accomplish?" + +"At least a delaying action. If the extraterrestrials throw their +weight, their scientific progress, into the balance on the side of the +Soviet complex, the West will have lost the cold war. Every neutral in +the world will jump on the bandwagon. International trade, sources of +raw materials, will be a thing of the past. Without a shot being +fired, we'd become second-rate powers overnight." + +Georgi said nothing for a long moment. A new youngster had drifted up +to the group but one of those on the outskirts growled something at +him and he went off again. Evidently, Hank decided, all of this +dozen-odd cluster of youngsters were connected with the jet-set +underground. + +"All right, you want us to help you in the conflict between the Soviet +government and the West," Georgi said. "Why should we?" + +Hank frowned at him. "You're the anti-government movement. You're +revolutionists and want to overthrow the Soviet government." + +The other said impatiently, "Don't read something into our +organization that isn't here. We don't exist for your benefit, but our +own." + +"But you wish to overthrow the Soviets and establish a democratic--" + +Georgi was waggling an impatient hand. "That word democratic has been +so misused this past half century that it's become all but +meaningless. Look here, we wish to overthrow the present Soviet +government, but that doesn't mean we expect to establish one modeled +to yours. We're Russians. Our problems are Russian ones. Most of them +you aren't familiar with--any more than we're familiar with your +American ones." + +"However, you want to destroy the Soviets," Hank pursued. + +"Yes," Georgi growled, "but that doesn't necessarily mean that we wish +_you_ to win this cold war, as the term goes. That is, just because +we're opposed to the Soviet government doesn't mean we like yours. But +you make a point. If the Galactic Confederation gives all-out support +to the Soviet bureaucracy it might strengthen it to the point where +they could remain in office indefinitely." + + * * * * * + +Hank pressed the advantage. "Right. You'd never overthrow them then." + +"On the other hand," Georgi muttered uncomfortably, "we're not +interested in giving you Americans an opportunity that would enable +you to collapse the whole fabric of this country and its allies." + +"Look here," Hank said. "In the States we seem to know surprisingly +little about your movement. Just what _do_ you expect to accomplish?" + +"To make it brief, we wish to enjoy the product of the sacrifices of +the past fifty years. If you recall your Marx"--he twisted his face +here in wry amusement--"the idea was that the State was to wither away +once Socialism was established. Instead of withering away, it has +become increasingly strong. This was explained by the early Bolsheviks +in a fairly reasonable manner. Socialism presupposes a highly +industrialized economy. It's not possible in a primitive nor even a +feudalistic society. So our Communist bureaucracy remained in the +saddle through a period of transition. The task was to industrialize +the Soviet countries in a matter of decades where it had taken the +Capitalist nations a century or two." + +Georgi shrugged. "I've never heard of a governing class giving up its +once acquired power of its own accord, no matter how incompetent they +might be." + +Hank said, "I wouldn't call the Soviet government incompetent." + +"Then you'd be wrong," the other said. "Progress had been made but +often in spite of the bureaucracy, not because of it. In the early +days it wasn't so obvious, but as we develop the rule of the political +bureaucrat becomes increasingly a hindrance. Politicians can't operate +industries and they can't supervise laboratories. To the extent our +scientist and technicians are interfered with by politicians, to that +extent we are held up in our progress. Surely you've heard of the +Lysenko matter?" + +"He was the one who evolved the anti-Mendelian theory of genetics, +fifteen or twenty years ago." + +"Correct," Georgi snorted. "Acquired characteristics could be handed +down by heredity. It took the Academy of Agricultural Science at least +a decade to dispose of him. Why? Because his theories fitted into +Stalin's political beliefs." The underground spokesman snorted again. + +Hank had the feeling they were drifting from the subject. "Then you +want to overthrow the Communist bureaucracy?" + +"Yes, but that is only part of the story. Overthrowing it without +something to replace the bureaucracy is a negative approach. We have +no interest in a return to Czarist Russia, even if that were possible, +and it isn't. We want to profit by what has happened in these years of +ultra-sacrifice, not to destroy everything. The day of rule by +politicians is antiquated, we look forward to the future." He seemed +to switch subjects. "Do you remember Djilas' book which he wrote in +one of Tito's prisons, "The New Class"?" + +"Vaguely. I read the reviews. It was a best seller in the States some +time ago." + +Georgi made with his characteristic snort. "It was a best seller +here--in underground circles. At any rate, that explains much. Our +bureaucracy, no matter what its ideals might have been to begin with, +has developed into a new class of its own. Russia sacrifices to +surpass the West--but our bureaucrats don't. In Lenin's day the +commissar was paid the same as the average worker, but today we have +bureaucrats as wealthy as Western millionaires." + +Hank said, "Of course, these are your problems. I don't pretend to +have too clear a picture of them. However, it seems to me we have a +mutual enemy. Right at this moment it appears that they are to receive +some support that will strengthen them. I suggest you co-operate with +me in hopes they'll be thwarted." + +For the first time a near smile appeared on the young Russian's face. +"A ludicrous situation. We have here a Russian revolutionary +organization devoted to the _withering away_ the Russian Communist +State. To gain its ends, it co-operates with a Capitalist country's +agent." His grin broadened. "I suspect that neither Nicolai Lenin nor +Karl Marx ever pictured such contingencies." + +Hank said, "I wouldn't know I'm not up on my Marxism. I'm afraid that +when I went to school academic circles weren't inclined in that +direction." He returned the Russian's wry smile. + +Which only set the other off again. "Academic circles!" he snorted. +"Sterile in both our countries. All professors of economics in the +Soviet countries are Marxists. On the other hand, no American +professor would admit to this. Coincidence? Suppose an American +teacher was a convinced Marxist. Would he openly and honestly teach +his beliefs? Suppose a Russian wasn't? Would he?" Georgi slapped his +knee with a heavy hand and stood up. "I'll speak to various others. +We'll let you know." + +Hank said, "Wait. How long is this going to take? And _can_ you help +me if you want to? Where are these extraterrestrials?" + +Georgi looked down at him. "They're in the Kremlin. How closely +guarded we don't know, but we can find out." + +"The Kremlin," Hank said. "I was hoping they stayed in their own +ship." + +"Rumor has it that they're quartered in the _Bolshoi Kremlevski +Dvorets_, the Great Kremlin Palace. We'll contact you later--perhaps." +He stuck his hands in his pockets and strode away, in all appearance +just one more pedestrian without anywhere in particular to go. + +One of the younger boys, the ham who had first approached Hank, smiled +and said, "Perhaps we can talk a bit more of radio?" + +"Yeah," Hank muttered, "Swell." + + * * * * * + +The next development came sooner than Henry Kuran had expected. In +fact, before the others returned from their afternoon tour of the +city. Hank was sprawled in one of the king-sized easy-chairs, turning +what little he had to work on over in his mind. The principal +decisions to make were, first, how long to wait on the assistance of +the _stilyagi_, and, if that wasn't forthcoming, what steps to take on +his own. The second prospect stumped him. He hadn't the vaguest idea +what he could accomplish singly. + +He wasn't even sure where the space aliens were. _The Bolshoi +Kremlevski Dvorets_, Georgi had said. But was that correct, and, if +so, where was the _Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_ and how did you get +into it? For that matter, how did you get inside the Kremlin walls? + +Under his breath he cursed Sheridan Hennessey. Why had he allowed +himself to be dragooned into this? By all criteria it was the +desperate clutching of a drowning man for a straw. He had no way to +know, for instance, if he did reach the space emissaries, that he +could even communicate with them. + +He caught himself wishing he was back in Peru arguing with hesitant +South Americans over the relative values of American and Soviet +complex commodities--and then he laughed at himself. + +There was a knock at the door. + +Hank came wearily to his feet, crossed and opened it. + +She still wore too much make-up, the American sweater and the flared +heel shoes. And her eyes were still cool and alert. She slid past him, +let her eyes go around the room quickly. "You are alone?" she said in +Russian, but it was more a statement than question. + +Hank closed the door behind them. He scowled at her, put a finger to +his lips and then went through an involved pantomime to indicate +looking for a microphone. He raised his eyebrows at her. + +She laughed and shook her head. "No microphones." + +"How do you know?" + +"We know. We have contacts here in the hotel. If the KGB had to put +microphones in the rooms of every tourist in Moscow, they'd have to +increase their number by ten times. In spite of your western ideas to +the contrary, it just isn't done. There are exceptions, of course, but +there has to be some reason for it." + +"Perhaps I'm an exception." Hank didn't like this at all. The C.I.A. +men had been of the opinion that the KGB was once again thoroughly +checking on every foreigner. + +"If the KGB is already onto you, Henry Kuran, then you might as well +give up. Your mission is already a failure." + +"I suppose so. Will you have a chair? Can I offer you a drink? My +roommate has a bottle of Stolichnaya vodka which he brought from the +boat." + +There was an amused light in her eyes even as she shook her head. +"Your friend Paco is quite a man--so I understand. But no, I am here +for business." She took one of the armchairs and Hank sank into +another opposite her. + +[Illustration] + +"The committee has decided to assist you to the point they can." + +"Fine." Hank leaned forward. + +"Tomorrow your Progressive Tours group is to have a conducted tour of +the Kremlin museum, Ivan the Great's Tower, and the Assumption +Cathedral." + +"In the _Kremlin_?" + +She was impatient. "The Kremlin is considerably larger than most +Westerners seem to realize. Originally it was the whole city. The +Kremlin walls are more then two kilometers long. In them are a great +deal more than just government offices. Among other things, the +Kremlin has one of the greatest museums and probably the largest in +the world." + +"What I meant was, with the space emissaries there, will tours still +be held?" + +"They _are_ being held. It would be too conspicuous to stop them even +if there was any reason to." She frowned and shook her head. "Just +because you will be inside the Kremlin walls doesn't mean that you +will be sitting in the lap of the extraterrestrials. They are probably +well guarded in the palace. We don't know to what extent." + +Hank said, "Then how can you help me?" + +"Only in a limited way." She pulled a folder paper from her purse. +"Here is a map of the Kremlin, and here one of the Palace. Both of +these date from Czarist days but such things as the general layout of +the Kremlin and the _Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_ do not change of +course." + +"Do you know where the extraterrestrials are?" + +"We're not sure. The palace was built in the Seventeenth Century and +was popular with various czars. It has been a museum for some time. We +suspect that the Galactic Confederation delegates are housed in the +_Sobstvennaya Plovina_ which used to be the private apartments of +Nicolas the First. It is quite define that the conferences are being +held in the _Gheorghievskaya sala_; it's the largest and most +impressive room in the Kremlin." + +Hank stared at the two maps feeling a degree of dismay. + +She said impatiently, "We can help you more than this. One of the +regular guide-guards at the facade which leads to the main entrance of +the palace is a member of our group. Here are your instructions." + +They spent another fifteen minutes going over the details, then she +shot a quick glance at her watch and came to her feet. "Is everything +clear ... comrade?" + +Hank frowned slightly at the use of the word, then understood. "I +think so, and thanks ... comrade." He, as well as she, meant the term +in its original sense. + +He followed her to the door but before his hand touched the knob, it +opened inwardly. Paco stood there, and behind him in the corridor was +Char Moore. + +The girl turned to Hank quickly, reached up and kissed him on the +mouth and said, in English, "Good-bye, dollink." She winked at Paco, +swept past Char and was gone. + +Paco looked after her appreciatively, back at Hank and said, "Ah, ha. +You are quite a dog after all, eh?" + +Char Moore's face was blank. She mumbled something to the effect of, +"See you later," directed seemingly to both of them, and went on to +her room. + +Hank said, "Damn!" + +Paco closed the door behind him. "What's the matter, my friend?" he +grinned. "Are you attempting to play two games at once?" + + * * * * * + +The morning tour was devoted to Red Square and the Kremlin. +Immediately after breakfast they formed a column with two or three +other tourist parties and were marched briskly to where Gorky Street +debouched into Red Square. First destination was the mausoleum, backed +against the Kremlin wall, which centered that square and served as a +combined Vatican, Lhasa and Mecca of the Soviet complex. Built of dark +red porphyry, it was the nearest thing to a really ultramodern +building Hank had seen in Moscow. + +As foreign tourists they were taken to the head of the line which +already stretched around the Kremlin back into Mokhovaya Street along +the western wall. A line of thousands. + +Once the doors opened the line moved quickly. They filed in, two by +two, down some steps, along a corridor which was suddenly cool as +though refrigerated. Paco, standing next to Hank, said from the side +of his mouth, "Now we know the secret of the embalming. I wonder if +they're hanging on meathooks." + +The line emerged suddenly into a room in the center of which were +three glass chambers. The three bodies, the prophet and his two +leading disciples flanking him. Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev. On their +faces, Hank decided, you could read much of their character. Lenin, +the idealist and scholar. Stalin, utterly ruthless organization man. +Khrushchev, energetic manager of what the first two had built. + +They were in the burial room no more than two minutes, filed out by an +opposite door. In the light of the square again, Paco grinned at him. +"Nick and Joe didn't look so good, but Nikita is standing up pretty +well." + +Trailing back and forth across Red Square had its ludicrous elements. +The guide pointed out this and that. But all the time his charges had +their eyes glued to the spaceship, settled there at the far end of the +square near St. Basil's. In a way it seemed no more alien than so much +else here. Certainly no more alien to the world Hank knew than the +fantastic St. Basil's Cathedral. + +A spaceship from the stars, though. You still had to shake your head +in effort to achieve clarity; to realize the significance of it. A +spaceship with emissaries from a Galactic Confederation. + +How simple if it had only landed in Washington, London or even Paris +or Rome, instead of here. + +They avoided getting very near it, although the Russians weren't being +ostentatious about their guarding. There was a roped off area about +the craft and twenty or so guards, not overly armed, drifting about +within the enclosure. But the local citizenry was evidently well +disciplined. There were no huge crowds hanging on the ropes waiting +for a glimpse of the interplanetary celebrities. + +Nevertheless, the Intourist guide went out of his way to avoid +bringing his charges too near. They retraced their steps back to +Manezhnaya Square from which they had originally started to see the +mausoleum, and then turned left through Alexandrovski Sad, the +Alexander Park which ran along the west side of the Kremlin to the +Borovikski Gate, on the Moskva River side of the fortress. + +Paco said, "After this tour I'm in favor of us all signing a petition +that our guide be awarded a medal, _Hero of Intourist_. You realize +that thus far he has lost only two of us today?" + +Some of the others didn't like his levity. They were about to enter +the Communist shrine and wisecracking was hardly in order. Paco +Rodriquez couldn't have cared less, being Paco Rodriquez. + +The _stilyagi_ girl had been correct about the Kremlin being an +overgrown museum. Government buildings it evidently contained, but +above all it provided gold topped cathedrals, fabulous palaces +converted to art galleries and displays of the jeweled wealth of +yesteryear and the tombs of a dozen czars including that of Ivan the +Terrible. + + * * * * * + +They trailed into the Orushezhnaya Palace, through the ornate entrance +hall displaying its early arms and banners. + +Paco encouraged the harassed guard happily. "You're doing fine. You've +had us out for more than two hours. We started with twenty-five in +this group and still have twenty-one. Par for the course. What happens +to a tourist who wanders absently around in the Kremlin and turns up +in the head man's office?" + +The guide smiled wanly. "And over here we have the thrones of the +Empress Elizabeth and Czar Paul." + +Unobtrusively, Hank dropped toward the tail of the group. He spent a +long time peering at two silver panthers, gifts of the first Queen +Elizabeth of England to Boris Godunov. The Progressive Tours assembly +passed on into the next room. + +A guard standing next to the case said, "Mr. Kuran?" + +Without looking up, Hand nodded. + +"Follow me, slowly." + +No one from the Progressive Tours group was in sight. Hank wandered +after the guard, looking into display cases as he went. Finally the +other turned a corner into an empty and comparatively narrow corridor. +He stopped and waited for the American. + +"You're Kuran?" he asked anxiously in Russian. + +"That's right." + +"You're not afraid?" + +"No. Let's go." Inwardly Hank growled, _Of course I'm afraid. Do I +look like a confounded hero?_ What was it Sheridan Hennessey had said? +This was combat, combat cold-war style, but still combat. Of course he +was afraid. Had there ever in the history of combat been a participant +who had gone into it unafraid? + +They walked briskly along the corridor. The guard said, "You have +studied your maps?" + +"Yes." + +"I can take you only so far without exposing myself. Then you are on +your own. You must know your maps or you are lost. These old palaces +ramble--" + +"I know," Hank said impatiently. "Brief me as we go along. Just for +luck." + +"Very well. We leave Orushezhnaya Palace by this minor doorway. Across +there, to our right, is the _Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_, the Great +Kremlin Palace. It's there the Central Executive Committee meets, and +the Assembly. The same hall used to be the czar's throne room in the +old days. On the nearer side, on the ground floor, are the +_Sobstvennaya Plovina_, the former private apartments of Nicholas +First. The extraterrestrials are there." + +"You're sure? The others weren't sure." + +"That's where they are." + +"How can we get to them?" + +"_We_ can't. Possibly _you_ can. I can take you only so far. The front +entrance is strongly guarded, we are going to have to enter the Great +Palace from the rear, through the Teremni Palace. You remember your +maps?" + +"I think so." + +They strode rapidly from the museum through a major courtyard. Hank to +the right and a step behind the uniformed guard. + +The other was saying, "The Teremni preceded the Great Palace. One of +its walls was used to become the rear of the later structure. We can +enter it fairly freely." + +They entered through another smaller doorway a hundred feet or more +from the main entrance, climbed a short marble stairway and turned +right down an ornate corridor, tapestry hung. They passed +occasionally other uniformed guards, none of whom paid them any +attention. + +They passed through three joined rooms, each heavily furnished in +Seventeenth Century style, each thick with icons. The guide brought +them up abruptly at a small door. + +He said, an air almost of defiance in his tone, "I go no further. +Through this door and you are in the Great Palace, in the bathroom of +the apartments of Catherine Second. You remember your maps?" + +"Yes," Hank said. + +"I hope so." The guard hesitated. "You are armed?" + +"No. We were afraid that my things might be thoroughly searched. Had a +gun been found on me, my mission would have been over then and there." + +The guard produced a heavy military revolver, offered it butt +foremost. + +But Hank shook his head. "Thanks. But if it comes to the point where +I'd need a gun--I've already failed. I'm here to talk, not to shoot." + +The guard nodded. "Perhaps you're right. Now, I repeat. On the other +side of this door is the bathroom of the Czarina's apartments. Beyond +it is her _paradnaya divannaya_, her dressing room and beyond that the +_Ekaterininskaya sala_, the throne room of Catherine Second. It is +probable that there will be nobody in any of these rooms. Beyond that, +I do not know." + +He ended abruptly with "Good luck," turned and scurried away. + +"Thanks," Hank Kuran said after him. He turned and tried the +door-knob. Inwardly he thought, _All right Henry Kuran. Hennessey +said you had a reputation for being able to think on your feet. Start +thinking. Thus far all you've been called on to do is exchange +low-level banter with a bevy of pro-commie critics of the United +States. Now the chips are down._ + + * * * * * + +The apartments of the long dead czarina were empty. He pushed through +them and into the corridor beyond. + +And came to a quick halt. + +Halfway down the hall, Loo Motlamelle crouched over a uniformed, +crumpled body. He looked up at Hank Kuran's approach, startled, a +fighting man at bay. His lips thinned back over his teeth. A black +thumb did something to the weapon he held in his hand. + +Hank said throatily, "Is he dead?" + +Loo shook his head, his eyes coldly wary. "No. I slugged him." + +Hank said, "What are you doing here?" + +Loo came erect. "It occurs to me that I'm evidently doing the same +thing you are." + +But the dull metal gun in his hand was negligently at the ready and +his eyes were cold, cold. It came to Hank that banjos on the levee +were very far away. + +This lithe fighting man said tightly, "You know where we are? Exactly +where we are? I'm not sure." + +Hank said, "In the hall outside the _Sobstvennaya Plovina_ of the +_Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_. The czar's private apartments. And how +did you get here?" + +"The hard way," Loo said softly. His eyes darted up and down the +corridor. "I can't figure out why there aren't more guards. I don't +like this. You're armed?" + +"No," Hank said. + +Loo grinned down at his own weapon. "One of us is probably making a +mistake but we both seem to have gotten this far. By the way, I'm +Inter-Commonwealth Security. You're C.I.A., aren't you? Talk fast, +Hank, we're either a team from now on, or I've got to do something +about you." + +"Special mission for the President," Hank said. "Why didn't we spot +each other sooner?" + +Loo grinned again in deprecation. "Evidently because we're both good +operatives. If I've got this right, the extraterrestrials are +somewhere in here." + +Hank started down the corridor. There was no time to go into the whys +and wherefores of Loo's mission. It must be approximately the same as +his own. "There are some private apartments in this direction," he +said over his shoulder. "They must be quartered--" + +A door off the corridor opened and a tall, thin, ludicrously garbed +man-- + +Hank pulled himself up quickly, both mentally and physically. It was +no man. It was almost a man--but no. + +Loo's weapon was already at the alert. + +The newcomer unhurriedly looked from one of them to the other. Then +down at the Russian guard sprawled on the floor behind them. + +He said in Russian, "Always violence. The sadness of violence. When +faced with crisis, threaten violence if outpointed. Your race has much +to learn." He switched to English. "But this is probably your +language, isn't it?" + +Loo gaped at him. The man from space was almost as dark complected as +the Negro. + +The extraterrestrial stepped to one side and indicated the room behind +him "Please enter, I assume you've come looking for us." + +They entered the ornate bedroom. + +The extraterrestrial said, "Is the man dead?" + +Loo said, "No. Merely stunned." + +"He needs no assistance?" + +"Nothing could help him for half an hour or more. Then he'll probably +have a severe headache." + +The extraterrestrial had even the ability to achieve a dry quality in +his voice. "I am surprised at your forebearance." He took a chair +before a baroque desk. "Undoubtedly you have gone through a great deal +to penetrate to this point. I am a member of the interplanetary +delegation. What is it that you want?" + +Hank looked at Loo, received a slight nod, and went into his speech. +The space alien made no attempt to interrupt. + +When Hank had finished, the extraterrestrial turned his eyes to Loo. +"And you?" + +Loo said, "I represent the British Commonwealth rather than the United +States, but my purpose in contacting you was identical. Her Majesty's +government is anxious to consult with you before you make any binding +agreements with the Soviet complex." + +The alien turned his eyes from one to the other. His face, Hank +decided, had a Lincolnesque quality, so ugly as to be beautiful in its +infinite sadness. + +"You must think us incredibly naive," he said. + +Hank scowled. He had adjusted quickly to the space ambassador's +_otherness_, both of dress and physical qualities, but there was an +irritating something--He put his finger on it. He felt as he had, some +decades ago, when brought before his grammar school principal for an +infraction of school discipline. + +Hank said, "We haven't had too much time to think. We've been +desperate." + +The alien said, "You have gone to considerable trouble. I can even +admire your resolution. You will be interested to know that tomorrow +we take ship to Peiping." + +"Peiping?" Loo said blankly. + +"Following two weeks there we proceed to Washington and following that +to London. What led your governments to believe that the Soviet +nations were to receive all our attention, and your own none at all?" + +Hank blurted, "But you landed _here_. You made no contact with us." + +"The size of our expedition is limited. We could hardly do everything +at once. The Soviet complex, as you call it, is the largest government +and the most advanced on Earth. Obviously, this was our first stop." +His eyes went to Hank's. "You're an American. Do you know why you have +fallen behind in the march of progress?" + +"I'm not sure we have," Hank said flatly. "Do you mean in comparison +with the Soviet complex?" + +"Exactly. And if you don't realize it, then you've blinded yourself. +You've fallen behind in a score of fields because a decade or so ago, +in your years between 1957 and 1960, you made a disastrous decision. +In alarm at Russian progress, you adopted a campaign of combating +Russian science. You began educating your young people to combat +Russian progress." + +"We had to!" + +The alien grunted. "To the contrary, what you should have done was try +to excel Russian science, technology and industry. Had you done that +you might have continued to be the world's leading nation, until, at +least, some sort of world unity had been achieved. By deciding to +_combat_ Russian progress you became a retarding force, a deliberate +drag on the development of your species, seeking to cripple and +restrain rather than to grow and develop. The way to win a race is not +to trip up your opponent, but to run faster and harder than he." + +Hank stared at him. + +The space alien came to his feet. "I am busy. Your missions, I +assume, have been successfully completed. You have seen one of our +group. Melodramatically, you have warned us against your enemy. Your +superiors should be gratified. And now I shall summon a guide to +return you to your hotels." + +A great deal went out of Hank Kuran. Until now the tenseness had been +greater than he had ever remembered in life. Now he was limp. In +response, he nodded. + +Loo sighed, returned the weapon which he had until now held in his +hand to a shoulder holster. "Yes," he said, meaninglessly. He turned +and looked at Hank Kuran wryly. "I have spent the better part of my +life learning to be an ultra-efficient security operative. I suspect +that my job has just become obsolete." + +"I have an idea that perhaps mine is too," Hank said. + + * * * * * + +In the morning, the Progressive Tours group was scheduled to visit a +co-operative farm, specializing in poultry, on the outskirts of +Moscow. While the bus was loading Hank stopped off at the Grand +Hotel's Intourist desk. + +"Can I send a cable to the United States?" + +The chipper Intourist girl said "But of course." She handed him a +form. + +He wrote quickly: + +SHERIDAN HENNESSEY +WASHINGTON, D. C. + + MISSION ACCOMPLISHED + + MORE SATISFACTORILY + THAN EXPECTED. + + HENRY KURAN + +The girl checked it quickly. "But your name is Henry Stevenson." + +"That," Hank said, "was back when I was a cloak and dagger man." + +She blinked and looked after him as he walked out and climbed aboard +the tourist bus. He found an empty seat next to Char Moore and settled +into it. + +Char said evenly, "Ah, today you have time from your amorous pursuits +to join the rest of us." + +He raised an eyebrow at her. Jealousy? His chances were evidently +better than he had ever suspected. "I meant to tell you about that," +he said, "the first time we're by ourselves." + +"Hm-m-m," she said. Then, "We've been in Russia for several days now. +What do you think of it?" + +Hank said, "I think it's pretty good. And I have a sneaking suspicion +that in another ten years, when a few changes will have evolved, +she'll be better still." + +She looked at him blankly. "You _do_? Frankly, I've been somewhat +disappointed." + +"Sure. But wait'll you see _our_ country in ten years. You know, Char, +this world of ours has just got started." + + +THE END + + * * * * * + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Combat, by Dallas McCord Reynolds + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMBAT *** + +***** This file should be named 30712-8.txt or 30712-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/7/1/30712/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Combat + +Author: Dallas McCord Reynolds + +Illustrator: Schoenherr + +Release Date: December 19, 2009 [EBook #30712] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMBAT *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + +<div class="tr"><p class="center">Transcriber's Note:</p> +<p class="center">This etext was produced from Analog Science Fact & Fiction October 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.</p></div> +<p> </p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;"> +<img src="images/image_001.jpg" width="600" height="231" alt="" title="" /> +</div> +<p> </p> + +<h1>COMBAT</h1> +<p> </p> + +<h2>By MACK REYNOLDS</h2> +<p> </p> + +<h3>Illustrated by Schoenherr</h3> +<p> </p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>An Alien landing on Earth might be readily misled, +victimized by a one-sided viewpoint. And then again ... it +might be the Earthmen who were misled....</i></p></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figleft"><img src="images/image_h.jpg" alt="H" width="59" height="60" /></div> +<p>enry Kuran answered a nod here and there, a called out greeting from +a desk an aisle removed from the one along which he was progressing, +finally made the far end of the room. He knocked at the door and +pushed his way through before waiting a response.</p> + +<p>There were three desks here. He didn't recognize two of the girls who +looked up at his entry. One of them began to say something, but then +Betty, whose desk dominated the entry to the inner sanctum, grinned a +welcome at him and said, "Hank! How was Peru? We've been expecting +you."</p> + +<p>"Full of Incas," he grinned back. "Incas, Russkies and Chinks. A poor +capitalist <i>conquistador</i> doesn't have a chance. Is the boss inside?"</p> + +<p>"He's waiting for you, Hank. See you later."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Um-m-m," and when the door clicked in response to the +button Betty touched, pushed his way into the inner office.</p> + +<p>Morton Twombly, chief of the department, came to his feet, shook hands +abruptly and motioned the other to a chair.</p> + +<p>"How're things in Peru, Henry?" His voice didn't express too much +real interest.</p> + +<p>Hank said, "We were on the phone just a week ago, Mr. Twombly. It's +about the same. No, the devil it is. The Chinese have just run in +their new People's Car. They look something like our jeep +station-wagons did fifteen years ago."</p> + +<p>Twombly stirred in irritation. "I've heard about them."</p> + +<p>Hank took his handkerchief from his breast pocket and polished his +rimless glasses. He said evenly, "They sell for just under two hundred +dollars."</p> + +<p>"Two hundred dollars?" Twombly twisted his face. "They can't transport +them from China for that."</p> + +<p>"Here we go again," Hank sighed. "They also can't sell pressure +cookers for a dollar apiece, nor cameras with f.2 lenses for five +bucks. Not to speak of the fact that the Czechs can't sell shoes for +fifty cents a pair and, of course, the Russkies can't sell premium +gasoline for five cents a gallon."</p> + +<p>Twombly muttered, "They undercut our prices faster than we can vote +through new subsidies. Where's it going to end Henry?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Perhaps we should have thought a lot more about it ten +or fifteen years ago when the best men our universities could turn out +went into advertising, show business and sales—while the best men the +Russkies and Chinese could turn out were going into science and +industry." As a man who worked in the field Hank Kuran occasionally +got bitter about these things, and didn't mind this opportunity of +sounding off at the chief.</p> + +<p>Hank added, "The height of achievement over there is to be elected to +the Academy of Sciences. Our young people call scientists egg-heads, +and their height of achievement is to become a TV singer or a movie +star."</p> + +<p>Morton Twombly shot his best field man a quick glance. "You sound as +though you need a vacation, Henry."</p> + +<p>Henry Kuran laughed. "Don't mind me, chief. I got into a hassle with +the Hungarians last week and I'm in a bad frame of mind."</p> + +<p>Twombly said, "Well, we didn't bring you back to Washington for a +trade conference."</p> + +<p>"I gathered that from your wire. What <i>am</i> I here for?"</p> + +<p>Twombly pushed his chair back and came to his feet. It occurred to +Hank Kuran that his chief had aged considerably since the forming of +this department nearly ten years ago. The thought went through his +mind, <i>a general in the cold war. A general who's been in action for a +decade, has never won more than a skirmish and is currently in full +retreat.</i></p> + +<p>Morton Twombly said, "I'm not sure I know. Come along."</p> + +<p>They left the office by a back door and Hank was in unknown territory. +Silently his chief led him through busy corridors, each one identical +to the last, each sterile and cold in spite of the bustling. They came +to a marine guarded door, were passed through, once again obviously +expected.</p> + +<p>The inner office contained but one desk occupied by a youthfully brisk +army major. He gave Hank a one-two of the eyes and said, "Mr. +Hennessey is expecting you, sir. This is Mr. Kuran?"</p> + +<p>"That's correct," Twombly said. "I won't be needed." He turned to Hank +Kuran. "I'll see you later, Henry." He shook hands.</p> + +<p>Hank frowned at him. "You sound as though I'm being sent off to +Siberia, or something."</p> + +<p>The major looked up sharply, "What was that?"</p> + +<p>Twombly made a motion with his hand, negatively. "Nothing. A joke. +I'll see you later, Henry." He turned and left.</p> + +<p>The major opened another door and ushered Hank into a room two or +three times the size of Twombly's office. Hank formed a silent whistle +and then suddenly knew where he was. This was the sanctum sanctorum of +Sheridan Hennessey. Sheridan Hennessey, right arm, hatchetman, <i>alter +ego</i>, one man brain trust—of two presidents in succession.</p> + +<p>And there he was, seated in a heavy armchair. Hank had known of his +illness, that the other had only recently risen from his hospital bed +and against doctor's orders. But somehow he hadn't expected to see him +this wasted. TV and newsreel cameramen had been kind.</p> + +<p>However, the waste had not as yet extended to either eyes or voice. +Sheridan Hennessey bit out, "That'll be all, Roy," and the major left +them.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>"Sit down," Hennessey said. "You're Henry Kuran. That's not a Russian +name is it?"</p> + +<p>Hank found a chair. "It was Kuranchov. My father Americanized it when +he was married." He added, "About once every six months some +Department of Justice or C.I.A. joker runs into the fact that my name +was originally Russian and I'm investigated all over again."</p> + +<p>Hennessey said, "But your Russian is perfect?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. My mother was English-Irish, but we lived in a community +with quite a few Russian born emigrants. I learned the language."</p> + +<p>"Good, Mr. Kuran, how would you like to die for your country?"</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran looked at him for a long moment. He said slowly, "I'm +thirty-two years old, healthy and reasonably adjusted and happy. I'd +hate it."</p> + +<p>The sick man snorted. "That's exactly the right answer. I don't trust +heroes. Now, how much have you heard about the extraterrestrials?"</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon?"</p> + +<p>"You haven't heard the news broadcasts the past couple of days? How +the devil could you have missed them?" Hennessey was scowling sourly +at him.</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran didn't know what the other was talking about. "Two days ago +I was in the town of Machu Picchu in the Andes trying to peddle some +mining equipment to the Peruvians. Peddle it, hell. I was practically +trying to give it away, but it was still even-steven that the +Hungarians would undersell me. Then I got a hurry-up wire from Morton +Twombly to return to Washington soonest. I flew here in an Air Force +jet. I haven't heard any news for two days or more."</p> + +<p>"I'll have the major get you all the material we have to date and you +can read it on the plane to England."</p> + +<p>"Plane to England?" Hank said blankly. "Look, I'm in the Department of +Economic Development of Neutral Nations, specializing in South +America. What would I be doing in England?" He had an uneasy feeling +of being crowded, and a suspicion that this was far from the first +time Sheridan Hennessey had ridden roughshod over subordinates.</p> + +<p>"First step on the way to Moscow," Hennessey snapped. "The major will +give you details later. Let me brief you. The extraterrestrials landed +a couple of days ago on Red Square in some sort of spaceship. Our +Russkie friends clamped down a censorship on news. No photos at all as +yet and all news releases have come from Tass."</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran was bug-eying him.</p> + +<p>Hennessey said, "I know. Most of the time I don't believe it myself. +The extraterrestrials represent what the Russkies are calling a +Galactic Confederation. So far as we can figure out, there is some +sort of league, United Planets, or whatever you want to call it, of +other star systems which have achieved a certain level of scientific +development."</p> + +<p>"Well ... well, why haven't they shown up before?"</p> + +<p>"Possibly they have, through the ages. If so, they kept their presence +secret, checked on our development and left." Hennessey snorted his +indignation. "See here, Kuran, I have no details. All of our +information comes from Tass, and you can imagine how inadequate that +is. Now shut up while I tell you what little I do know."</p> + +<p>Henry Kuran settled back into his chair, feeling limp. He'd had too +many curves thrown at him in the past few minutes to assimilate.</p> + +<p>"They evidently keep hands off until a planet develops interplanetary +exploration and atomic power. And, of course, during the past few +years our Russkie pals have not only set up a base on the Moon but +have sent off their various expeditions to Venus and Mars."</p> + +<p>"None of them made it," Hank said.</p> + +<p>"Evidently they didn't have to. At any rate, the plenipotentiaries +from the Galactic Confederation have arrived."</p> + +<p>"Wanting what, sir?" Hank said.</p> + +<p>"Wanting nothing but to help." Hennessey said. "Stop interrupting. Our +time is limited. You're going to have to be on a jet for London in +half an hour."</p> + +<p>He noticed Hank Kuran's expression, and shook his head. "No, it's not +farfetched. These other intelligent life forms must be familiar with +what it takes to progress to the point of interplanetary travel. It +takes species aggressiveness—besides intelligence. And they must have +sense enough not to want the wrong kind of aggressiveness exploding +into the stars. They don't want an equivalent of Attila bursting over +the borders of the Roman Empire. They want to channel us, and they're +willing to help, to direct our comparatively new science into paths +that won't conflict with them. They want to bring us peacefully into +their society of advanced life forms."</p> + +<p>Sheridan Hennessey allowed himself a rueful grimace. "That makes quite +a speech, doesn't it? At any rate, that's the situation."</p> + +<p>"Well, where do I come into this? I'm afraid I'm on the bewildered +side."</p> + +<p>"Yes. Well, damn it, they've landed in Moscow. They've evidently +assumed the Soviet complex—the Soviet Union, China and the +satellites—are the world's dominant power. Our conflicts, our +controversies, are probably of little, if any, interest to them. +Inadvertently, they've put a weapon in the hands of the Soviets that +could well end this cold war we've been waging for more than +twenty-five years now."</p> + +<p>The president's right-hand man looked off into a corner of the room, +unseeingly. "For more than a decade it's been a bloodless combat that +we've been waging against the Russkies. The military machines, equally +capable of complete destruction of the other, have been stymied +Finally it's boiled down to an attempt to influence the neutrals, +India, Africa, South America, to attempt to bring them into one camp +or the other. Thus far, we've been able to contain them in spite of +their recent successes. But given the prestige of being selected the +dominant world power by the extraterrestrials and in possession of the +science and industrial know-how from the stars, they'll have won the +cold war over night."</p> + +<p>His old eyes flared. "You want to know where you come in, eh? Fine. +Your job is to get to these Galactic Confederation emissaries and put +a bug in their bonnet. Get over to them that there's more than one +major viewpoint on this planet. Get them to investigate our side of +the matter."</p> + +<p>"Get to them how? If the Russkies—"</p> + +<p>Hennessey was tired. The flash of spirit was fading. He lifted a thin +hand. "One of my assistants is crossing the Atlantic with you. He'll +give you the details."</p> + +<p>"But why <i>me</i>? I'm strictly a—"</p> + +<p>"You're an unknown in Europe. Never connected with espionage. You +speak Russian like a native. Morton Twombly says you're his best man. +Your records show that you can think on your feet, and that's what we +need above all."</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran said flatly, "You might have asked for volunteers."</p> + +<p>"We did. You, you and you. The old army game," Hennessey said wearily. +"Mr. Kuran, we're in the clutch. We can lose, forever—right now. +Right in the next month or so. Consider yourself a soldier being +thrown into the most important engagement the world has ever +seen—combating the growth of the Soviets. We can't afford such +luxuries as asking for volunteers. Now do you get it?"</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran could feel impotent anger rising inside him. He was off +balance. "I get it, but I don't like it."</p> + +<p>"None of us do," Sheridan Hennessey said sourly. "Do you think any of +us do?" He must have pressed a button.</p> + +<p>From behind them the major's voice said briskly, "Will you come this +way, Mr. Kuran?"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>In the limousine, on the way out to the airport, the bright, +impossibly cleanly shaven C.I.A. man said, "You've never been behind +the Iron Curtain before, have you Kuran?"</p> + +<p>"No," Hank said. "I thought that term was passé. Look, aren't we even +going to my hotel for my things?"</p> + +<p>The second C.I.A. man, the older one, said, "All your gear will be +waiting for you in London. They'll be sure there's nothing in it to +tip off the KGB if they go through your bags."</p> + +<p>The younger one said, "We're not sure, things are moving fast, but we +suspect that that term, Iron Curtain, applies again."</p> + +<p>"Then how am I going to get in?" Hank said irritably. "I've had no +background for this cloak and dagger stuff."</p> + +<p>The older C.I.A. man said, "We understand the KGB has increased +security measures but they haven't cut out all travel on the part of +non-Communists."</p> + +<p>The other one said, "Probably because the Russkies don't want to tip +off the spacemen that they're being isolated from the western +countries. It would be too conspicuous if suddenly all western +travelers disappeared."</p> + +<p>They were passing over the Potomac, to the right and below them Hank +Kuran could make out the twin Pentagons, symbols of a military that +had at long last by its very efficiency eliminated itself. War had +finally progressed to the point where even a minor nation, such as +Cuba or Portugal, could completely destroy the whole planet. +Eliminated wasn't quite the word. In spite of their sterility, the +military machines still claimed their million masses of men, still +drained a third of the products of the world's industry.</p> + +<p>One of the C.I.A. men was saying urgently, "So we're going to send you +in as a tourist. As inconspicuous a tourist as we can make you. For +fifteen years the Russkies have boomed their tourist trade—all for +propaganda, of course. Now they're in no position to turn this tourist +flood off. If the aliens got wind of it, they'd smell a rat."</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran brought his attention back to them. "All right. So you get +me to Moscow as a tourist. What do I do then? I keep telling you +jokers that I don't know a thing about espionage. I don't know a +secret code from judo."</p> + +<p>"That's one reason the chief picked you. Not only do the Russkies have +nothing on you in their files—neither do our own people. You're safe +from betrayal. There are exactly six people who know your mission and +only one of them is in Moscow."</p> + +<p>"Who's he?"</p> + +<p>The C.I.A. man shook his head. "You'll never meet him. But he's making +the arrangements for you to contact the underground."</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran turned in his seat. "What underground? In Moscow?"</p> + +<p>The bright, pink faced C.I.A. man chuckled and began to say something +but the older one cut him off. "Let me, Jimmy." He continued to Hank. +"Actually, we don't know nearly as much as we should about it, but a +Soviet underground is there and getting stronger. You've heard of the +<i>stilyagi</i> and the <i>metrofanushka</i>?"</p> + +<p>Hank nodded. "Moscow's equivalent to the juvenile delinquents, or the +Teddy Boys, as the British call them."</p> + +<p>"Not only in Moscow, they're everywhere in urban Russia. At any rate, +our underground friends operate within the <i>stilyagi</i>, the so-called +jet-set, using them as protective coloring."</p> + +<p>"This is new to me," Hank said. "And I don't quite get it."</p> + +<p>"It's clever enough. Suppose you're out late some night on an +underground job and the police pick you up. They find out you're a +juvenile delinquent, figure you've been out getting drunk, and toss +you into jail for a week. It's better than winding up in front of a +firing squad as a counterrevolutionary, or a Trotskyite, or whatever +they're currently calling anybody they shoot."</p> + +<p>The chauffeur rapped on the glass that divided their seat from his, +and motioned ahead.</p> + +<p>"Here's the airport," Jimmy said. "We'll drive right over to the +plane. Hid your face with your hat, just for luck."</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute, now," Hank said. "Listen, how do I contact these beat +generation characters?"</p> + +<p>"You don't. They contact you."</p> + +<p>"How."</p> + +<p>"That's up to them. Maybe they won't at all; they're plenty careful." +Jimmy snorted without humor. "It must be getting to be an instinct +with Russians by this time. Nihilists, Anarchists, Mensheviks, +Bolsheviks, now anti-Communists. Survival of the fittest. By this time +the Russian underground must consist of members that have bred true as +revolutionists. There've been Russian undergrounds for twenty +generations."</p> + +<p>"Hardly long enough to affect genetics," the older one said wryly.</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Let's stop being witty. I still haven't a clue as to how +Sheridan Hennessey expects me to get to these Galactic Confederation +people—or things, or whatever you call them."</p> + +<p>"They evidently are humanoid," Jimmy said. "Look more or less human. +And stop worrying, we've got several hours to explain things while we +cross the Atlantic. You don't step into character until you enter the +offices of Progressive Tours, in London."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The door of Progressive Tours, Ltd. 100 Rochester Row, was invitingly +open. Hank Kuran entered, looked around the small room. He inwardly +winced at the appearance of the girl behind the counter. What was it +about Commies outside their own countries that they drew such +crackpots into their camp? Heavy lenses, horn rimmed to make them more +conspicuous, wild hair, mawkish tweeds, and dirty fingernails to top +it off.</p> + +<p>She said, "What can I do for you, Comrade?"</p> + +<p>"Not <i>Comrade</i>," Hank said mildly. "I'm an American."</p> + +<p>"What did you want?" she said coolly.</p> + +<p>Hank indicated the travel folder he was carrying. "I'd like to take +this tour to Leningrad and Moscow. I've been reading propaganda for +and against Russia as long as I've been able to read and I've finally +decided I want to see for myself. Can I get the tour that leaves +tomorrow?"</p> + +<p>She became businesslike as was within her ability. "There is no +country in the world as easy to visit as the Soviet Union, Mr—"</p> + +<p>"Stevenson," Hank Kuran said. "Henry Stevenson."</p> + +<p>"Stevenson. Fill out these two forms, leave your passport and two +photos and we'll have everything ready in the morning. The <i>Baltika</i> +leaves at twelve. The visa will cost ten shillings. What class do you +wish to travel?"</p> + +<p>"The cheapest." <i>And least conspicuous</i>, Hank added under his breath.</p> + +<p>"Third class comes to fifty-five guineas. The tour lasts eighteen days +including the time it takes to get to Leningrad. You have ten days in +Russia."</p> + +<p>"I know, I read the folder. Are there any other Americans on the +tour?"</p> + +<p>A voice behind him said, "At least one other."</p> + +<p>Hank turned. She was somewhere in her late twenties, he estimated. And +if her clothes, voice and appearance were any criterion he'd put her +in the middle-middle class with a bachelor's degree in something or +other, unmarried and with the aggressiveness he didn't like in +American girls after living the better part of eight years in Latin +countries.</p> + +<p>On top of that she was one of the prettiest girls he had ever seen, in +a quick, red headed, almost puckish sort of way.</p> + +<p>Hank tried to keep from displaying his admiration too openly. +"American?" he said.</p> + +<p>"That's right." She took in his five-foot ten, his not quite ruffled +hair, his worried eyes behind their rimless lenses, darkish tinted for +the Peruvian sun. She evidently gave him up as not worth the effort +and turned to the fright behind the counter.</p> + +<p>"I came to pick up my tickets."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, Miss...."</p> + +<p>"Moore."</p> + +<p>The fright fiddled with the papers on an untidy heap before her. "Oh, +yes. Miss Charity Moore."</p> + +<p>"Charity?" Hank said.</p> + +<p>She turned to him. "Do you mind? I have two sisters named Honor and +Hope. My people were the Seventh Day Adventists. It wasn't my fault." +Her voice was pleasant—but nature had granted that; it wasn't +particularly friendly—through her own inclinations.</p> + +<p>Hank cleared his throat and went back to his forms. The visa +questionnaire was in both Russian and English. The first line wanted, +<i>Surname, first name and patronymic</i>.</p> + +<p>To get the conversation going again, Hank said, "What does patronymic +mean?"</p> + +<p>Charity Moore looked up from her own business and said, less +antagonism in her voice, "That's the name you inherited from your +father."</p> + +<p>"Of course, thanks." He went back to his forms. Under <i>what type of +work do you do</i>, Hank wrote, <i>Capitalist in a small sort of way. Auto +Agency owner.</i></p> + +<p>He took the forms back to the counter with his passport. Charity Moore +was putting her tickets, suitcase labels and a sheaf of tour +instructions into her pocketbook.</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Look, we're going to be on a tour together, what do you +say to a drink?"</p> + +<p>She considered that, prettily, "Well ... well, of course. Why not?"</p> + +<p>Hank said to the fright, "There wouldn't be a nice bar around would +there?"</p> + +<p>"Down the street three blocks and to your left is Dirty Dick's." She +added scornfully, "All the tourists go there."</p> + +<p>"Then we shouldn't make an exception," Hank said. "Miss Moore, my +arm."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>On the way over she said, "Are you excited about going to the Soviet +Union?"</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't say excited. Curious, though."</p> + +<p>"You don't sound very sympathetic to them."</p> + +<p>"To Russia?" Hank said. "Why should I be? Personally, I believe in +democracy."</p> + +<p>"So do I," she said, her voice clipped. "I think we ought to try it +some day."</p> + +<p>"Come again?"</p> + +<p>"So far as I can see, we pay lip service to democracy, that's about +all."</p> + +<p>Hank grinned inwardly. He'd already figured that during this tour he'd +be thrown into contact with characters running in shade from gentle +pink to flaming red. His position demanded that he remain +inconspicuous, as <i>average</i> an American tourist as possible. Flaring +political arguments weren't going to help this, but, on the other hand +to avoid them entirely would be apt to make him more conspicuous than +ever.</p> + +<p>"How do you mean?" he said now.</p> + +<p>"We have two political parties in our country without an iota of +difference between them. Every four years they present candidates and +give us a choice. What difference does it make which one of the two we +choose if they both stand for the same thing? This is democracy?"</p> + +<p>Hank said mildly, "Well, it's better than sticking up just one +candidate and saying, which one of this one do you choose? Look, let's +steer clear of politics and religion, eh? Otherwise this'll never turn +out to be a beautiful friendship."</p> + +<p>Charity Moore's face portrayed resignation.</p> + +<p>Hank said, "I'm Hank, what do they call you besides Charity?"</p> + +<p>"Everybody but my parents call me Chair. You spell it C-H-A-R but +pronounce it like Chair, like you sit in."</p> + +<p>"That's better," Hank said. "Let's see. There it is, Dirty Dick's. +Crummy looking joint. You want to go in?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," Char said. "I've read about it. An old coaching house. One of +the oldest pubs in London. Dickens wrote a poem about it."</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;"> +<img src="images/image_002.jpg" width="600" height="411" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>The pub's bar extended along the right wall, as they entered. To the +left was a sandwich counter with a dozen or so stools. It was too +early to eat, they stood at the ancient bar and Hank said to her, +"Ale?" and when she nodded, to the bartender, "Two Worthingtons."</p> + +<p>While they were being drawn, Hank turned back to the girl, noticing +all over again how impossibly pretty she was. It was disconcerting. He +said, "How come Russia? You'd look more in place on a beach in +Biarritz or the Lido."</p> + +<p>Char said, "Ever since I was about ten years of age I've been reading +about the Russian people starving to death and having to work six +months before making enough money to buy a pair of shoes. So I've +decided to see how starving, barefooted people managed to build the +largest industrial nation in the world."</p> + +<p>"Here we go again," Hank said, taking up his glass. He toasted her +silently before saying, "The United States is still the largest single +industrial nation in the world."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps as late as 1965, but not today," she said definitely.</p> + +<p>"Russia, plus the satellites and China has a gross national product +greater than the free world's but no single nation produces more than +the United States. What are you laughing at?"</p> + +<p>"I love the way the West plasters itself so nicely with high flown +labels. The <i>free world</i>. Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, Pakistan, South +Africa—just what is your definition of <i>free</i>?"</p> + +<p>Hank had her placed now. A college radical. One of the tens of +thousands who discover, usually somewhere along in the sophomore year, +that all is not perfect in the land of their birth and begin looking +around for answers. Ten to one she wasn't a Commie and would probably +never become one—but meanwhile she got a certain amount of kicks +trying to upset ideological applecarts.</p> + +<p>For the sake of staying in character, Hank said mildly, "Look here, +are you a Communist?"</p> + +<p>She banged her glass down on the bar with enough force that the +bartender looked over worriedly. "Did it ever occur to you that even +though the Soviet Union might be wrong—if it is wrong—that doesn't +mean that the United States is right? You remind me of that ... that +<i>politician</i>, whatever his name was, when I was a girl. Anybody who +disagreed with him was automatically a Communist."</p> + +<p>"McCarthy," Hank said. "I'm sorry, so you're not a Communist."</p> + +<p>She took up her glass again, still in a huff. "I didn't say I wasn't. +That's my business."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The turboelectric ship <i>Baltika</i> turned out to be the pride of the +U.S.S.R. Baltic State Steamship Company. In fact, she turned out to be +the whole fleet. Like the rest of the world, the Soviet complex had +taken to the air so far as passenger travel was concerned and already +the <i>Baltika</i> was a left-over from yesteryear. For some reason the +C.I.A. thought there might be less observation on the part of the KGB +if Hank approached Moscow indirectly, that is by sea and from +Leningrad. It was going to take an extra four or five days, but, if +he got through, the squandered time would have been worth it.</p> + +<p>An English speaking steward took up Hank's bag at the gangplank and +hustled him through to his quarters. His cabin was forward and four +flights down into the bowels of the ship. There were four berths in +all, two of them already had bags on them. Hank put his hand in his +pocket for a shilling.</p> + +<p>The steward grinned and said, "No tipping. This is a Soviet ship."</p> + +<p>Hank looked after him.</p> + +<p>A newcomer entered the cabin, still drying his hands on a towel. +"Greetings," he said. "Evidently we're fellow passengers for the +duration." He hung the towel on a rack, reached out a hand. +"Rodriquez," he said. "You can call me Paco, if you want. Did you ever +meet an Argentine that wasn't named Paco?"</p> + +<p>Hank shook the hand. "I don't know if I ever met an Argentine before. +You speak English well."</p> + +<p>"Harvard," Paco said. He stretched widely. "Did you spot those Russian +girls in the crew? Blond, every one blond." He grinned. "Not much time +to operate with them—but enough."</p> + +<p>A voice behind them, heavy with British accent said, "Good afternoon, +gentlemen."</p> + +<p>He was as ebony as a negro can get and as nattily dressed as only +Savile Row can turn out a man. He said, "My name is Loo Motlamelle." +He looked at them expressionlessly for a moment.</p> + +<p>Paco put out his hand briskly for a shake. "Rodriquez," he said. "Call +me Paco. I suppose we're all Moscow bound."</p> + +<p>Loo Motlamelle seemed relieved at his acceptance, clasped Paco's hand, +then Hank's.</p> + +<p>Hank shook his head as the three of them began to unpack to the extent +it was desirable for the short trip. "The classless society. I wonder +what First Class cabins look like. Here we are, jammed three in a +telephone booth sized room."</p> + +<p>Paco chucked, "My friend, you don't know the half of it. There are +<i>five</i> classes on this ship. Needless to say, this is Tourist B, the +last."</p> + +<p>"And we'll probably be fed borsht and black bread the whole trip," +Hank growled.</p> + +<p>Loo Motlamelle said mildly, "I hear the food is very good."</p> + +<p>Paco stood up from his luggage, put his hands on his hips, "Gentlemen, +do you realize there is no lock on the door of this cabin?"</p> + +<p>"The crime rate is said to be negligible in the Soviet countries," Loo +said.</p> + +<p>Paco put up his hands in despair. "That isn't the point. Suppose one +of us wishes to bring a lady friend into the cabin for ... a drink. +How can he lock the door so as not to be interrupted?"</p> + +<p>Hank was chuckling. "What did you take this trip for, Paco? An +investigation into the mores of the Soviets—female flavor?"</p> + +<p>Paco went back to his bag. "Actually, I suppose I am one of the many. +Going to the new world to see whether or not it is worth switching +alliances from the old."</p> + +<p>A distant finger of cold traced designs in Henry Kuran's belly. He had +never heard the United States referred to as the Old World before. It +had a strange, disturbing quality.</p> + +<p>Loo, who was now reclined on his bunk, said, "That's approximately the +same reason I visit the Soviet Union."</p> + +<p>Hank said quietly, "Who's sending you, Paco? Or are you on your own?"</p> + +<p>"No, my North American friend. My lips are sealed but I represent a +rather influencial group. All is not jest, even though I find life the +easier if one laughs often and with joy."</p> + +<p>Hank closed his bag and slid it under his bunk. "Well, you should have +had this influencial group pony up a little more money so you could +have gone deluxe class."</p> + +<p>Paco looked at him strangely. "That is the point. We are not +interested in a red-carpet tour during which the very best would be +trotted our for propaganda purposes. I choose to see the New World as +humbly as is possible."</p> + +<p>"And me," Loo said. "We evidently are in much the same position."</p> + +<p>Hank brought himself into character. "Well, lesson number one. Did you +notice the teeth in that steward's face? Steel. Bright, gleaming +steel, instead of gold."</p> + +<p>Loo shrugged hugely. "This is the day of science. Iron rusts, it's +true, but I assume that the Soviet dentists utilize some method of +preventing corrosion."</p> + +<p>"Otherwise," Paco murmured reasonably, "I imagine the Russians +expectorate a good deal of rusty spittal."</p> + +<p>"I don't know why I keep getting into these arguments," Hank said. +"I'm just going for a look-see myself. But frankly, I don't trust a +Russian any farther than I can throw one."</p> + +<p>"How many Russians have you met?" Loo said mildly. "Or are your +opinions formed solely by what you have read in American +publications?"</p> + +<p>Hank frowned at him. "You seem to be a little on the anti-American +side."</p> + +<p>"I'm not," Loo said. "But not pro-American either. I find much that is +ridiculous in the propaganda of both the Soviets and the West."</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," Paco said, "the conversation is fascinating, but I must +leave you. The ladies, crowding the decks above, know not that my +presence graces this ship. It shall be necessary that I enlighten +them. <i>Adios amigos!</i>"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The <i>Baltika</i> displaced eight thousand four hundred ninety-six tons +and had accommodations for three hundred thirty passengers. Of these, +Hank Kuran estimated, approximately half were Scandinavians or British +being transported between London, Copenhagen, Stockholm and Helsinki +on the small liner's way to Leningrad.</p> + +<p>Of the tourists, some seventy-five or so, Hank estimated that all but +half a dozen were convinced that Russian skunks didn't stink, in spite +of the fact that thus far they'd never been there to have a whiff. The +few such as Loo Motlamelle, who was evidently the son of some African +paramount chief, and Paco Rodriquez, had also never been to Russia but +at least had open minds.</p> + +<p>Far from black bread and borscht, he found the food excellent. The +first morning they found caviar by the pound nestled in bowls of ice, +as part of breakfast. He said across the table to Paco, "Propaganda. I +wonder how many people in Russia eat caviar."</p> + +<p>Paco spooned a heavy dip of it onto his bread and grinned back. "This +type of propaganda I can appreciate. You Yankees should try it."</p> + +<p>Char was also eating at the other side of the community type table. +She said, "How many Americans eat as well as the passengers on United +States Lines ships?"</p> + +<p>It was as good an opportunity as any for Hank to place his character +in the eyes of his fellow Progressive Tours pilgrims. His need was to +establish himself as a moderately square tourist on his way to take a +look-see at highly publicized Russia. Originally, the C.I.A. men had +wanted him to be slightly pro-Soviet, but he hadn't been sure he could +handle that convincingly enough. More comfortable would be a role as +an averagely anti-Russian tourist—not fanatically so, but averagely. +If there were any KGB men aboard, he wanted to dissolve into +mediocrity so far as they were concerned.</p> + +<p>Hank said now, mild indignation in his voice. "Do you contend that the +average Russian eats as well as the average American?"</p> + +<p>Char took a long moment to finish the bite she had in her mouth. She +shrugged prettily. "How would I know? I've never been to the Soviet +Union." She paused for a moment before adding, "However, I've done a +certain amount of traveling and I can truthfully say that the worst +slums I have ever seen in any country that can be considered civilized +were in the Harlem district and the lower East Side of New York."</p> + +<p>All eyes were turned to him now, so Hank said, "It's a big country and +there are exceptions. But on the average the United States has the +highest standard of living in the world."</p> + +<p>Paco said interestedly, "What do you use for a basis of measurement, +my friend? Such things as the number of television sets and movie +theaters? To balance such statistics, I understand that per capita +your country has the fewest number of legitimate theaters of any of—I +use Miss Moore's term—the civilized countries."</p> + +<p>A Londoner, two down from Hank, laughed nastily. "Maybe schooling is +the way he measures. I read in the <i>Express</i> the other day that even +after Yankees get out of college they can't read proper. All they +learn is driving cars and dancing and togetherness—wotever that it."</p> + +<p>Hank grinned inwardly and thought, <i>You don't sound as though you read +any too well yourself, my friend.</i> Aloud he said, "Very well, in a +couple of days we'll be in the promised land, I contend that free +enterprise performs the greatest good for the greatest number."</p> + +<p>"Free enterprise," somebody down the table snorted. "That means the +freedom for the capitalists to pry somebody else out of the greatest +part of what he produces."</p> + +<p>By the time they'd reached Leningrad aside from Paco and Loo, his +cabinmates, Hank had built an Iron Curtain all of his own between +himself and the other members of the Progressive Tours trip. Which was +the way he wanted it. He could foresee a period when having friends +might be a handicap when and if he needed to drift away from the main +body for any length of time.</p> + +<p>Actually, the discussions he ran into were on the juvenile side. Hank +Kuran hadn't spent eight years of his life as a field man working +against the Soviet countries in the economic sphere without running +into every argument both pro and con in the continuing battle between +Capitalism and Communism. Now he chuckled to himself at getting into +tiffs over the virtues of Russian black bread versus American white, +or whether Soviet jets were faster than those of the United States.</p> + +<p>With Char Moore, though she tolerated Hank's company, in fact, seemed +to prefer it to that of whatever other males were aboard, it was +continually a matter of rubbing fur the wrong way. She was ready to +battle it out on any phase of politics, international affairs or West +versus East.</p> + +<p>But it was the visitors from space that actually dominated the +conversation of the ship—crew, tourists, business travelers, or +whoever. Information was still limited, and Taas the sole source. +Daily there were multilingual radio broadcasts tuned in by the +<i>Baltika</i> but largely they added little to the actual information on +the extraterrestrials. It was mostly Soviet back-patting on the +significance of the fact that the Galactic Confederation emissaries +had landed in the Soviet complex rather than among the Western +countries.</p> + +<p>Hank learned little that he hadn't already known. The Kremlin had all +but laughingly declined a suggestion on the part of Switzerland that +the extraterrestrials be referred to that all but defunct United +Nations. The delegates from the Galactic Confederation had chose to +land in Moscow. In Moscow they should remain until they desired to go +elsewhere. The Soviet implication was that the alien emissaries had no +desire, intention nor reason to visit other sections of Earth. They +had contacted the dominant world power and could complete their +business within the Kremlin walls.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Leningrad came as only a mild surprise to Henry Kuran. With his +knowledge of Russian and his position in Morton Twombly's department, +he had kept up with the Soviet progress though the years.</p> + +<p>As early as the middle 1950s unbiased travelers to the U.S.S.R. had +commented in detail upon the explosion of production in the country. +By the end of the decade such books as Gunther's "Inside Russia Today" +had dwelt upon the ultra-cleanliness of the cities, the mushrooming of +apartment houses, the easing of the restrictions of Stalin's day—or +at least the beginning of it.</p> + +<p>He actually hadn't expected peasant clad, half starved Russians +furtively shooting glances at their neighbors for fear of the secret +police. Nor a black bread and cabbage diet. Nor long lines of the +politically suspect being hauled off to Siberia. But on the other hand +he was unprepared for the prosperity he did find.</p> + +<div class="figleft" style="width: 500px;"> +<img src="images/image_003.jpg" width="500" height="537" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Not that this was any paradise, worker's or otherwise. But it still +came as a mild surprise. Henry Kuran couldn't remember so far back +that he hadn't had his daily dose of anti-Russianism. Not unless it +was for the brief respite during the Second World War when for a +couple of years the Red Army had been composed of heroes and Stalin +had overnight become benevolent old Uncle Joe.</p> + +<p>There weren't as many cars on the streets as in American cities, but +there were more than he had expected nor were they 1955 model +Packards. So far as he could see, they were approximately the same +cars as were being turned out in Western Europe.</p> + +<p>Public transportation, he admitted, was superior to that found in the +Western capitals. Obviously, it would have to be, without automobiles, +buses, streetcars and subways would have to carry the brunt of +traffic. However, it was the spotless efficiency of public +transportation that set him back.</p> + +<p>The shops were still short of the pinnacles touched by Western +capitals. They weren't empty of goods, luxury goods as well as +necessities, but they weren't overflowing with the endless quantities, +the hundred-shadings of quality and fashion that you expected in the +States.</p> + +<p>But what struck nearest to him was the fact that the people in the +streets were not broken spirited depressed, humorless drudges. In +fact, why not admit it, they looked about the same as people in the +streets anywhere else. Some laughed, some looked troubled. Children +ran and played. Lovers held hands and looked into each other's eyes. +Some reeled under an overload of vodka. Some hurried along, business +bent. Some dawdled, window shopped, or strolled along for the air. +Some read books or newspapers as they shuffled, radar directed, and +unconscious of the world about them.</p> + +<p>They were only a day and half in Leningrad. They saw the Hermitage, +comparable to the Louvre and far and above any art museum in America. +They saw the famous subway—which deserved its fame. They were ushered +through a couple of square miles of the Elektrosile electrical +equipment works, claimed ostentatiously by the to be the largest in +the world. They ate in restaurants as good as any Hank Kuran had been +able to afford at home and stayed one night at the Astoria Hotel.</p> + +<p>At least, Hank had the satisfaction of grumbling about the plumbing.</p> + +<p>Paco and Loo, the only single bachelors on the tour besides himself, +were again quartered with him at the Astoria.</p> + +<p>Paco said, "My friend, there I agree with you completely. America has +the best plumbing in the world. And the most."</p> + +<p>Hank was pulling off his shoes after an arch-breaking day of +sightseeing. "Well, I'm glad I've finally found some field where it's +agreeable that the West is superior to the Russkies."</p> + +<p>Loo was stretched out on his bed, in stocking feet, gazing at the +ceiling which towered at least fifteen feet above him. He said "In the +town where I was born, there were three bathrooms, one in the home of +the missionary, one in the home of the commissioner, and one in my +father's palace." He looked up at Hank. "Or is my country considered +part of the Western World?"</p> + +<p>Paco laughed. "Come to think of it, I doubt if one third the rural +homes of Argentina have bathrooms. Hank, my friend, I am afraid Loo is +right. You use the word <i>West</i> too broadly. All the capitalist world +is not so advanced as the United States. You have been very lucky, you +Yankees."</p> + +<p>Hank sank into one of the huge, Victorian era armchairs. "Luck has +nothing to do with it. America is rich because private enterprise +<i>works</i>."</p> + +<p>"Of course," Paco pursued humorously, "the fact that your country +floats on a sea of oil, has some of the richest forest land in the +world, is blessed with some of the greatest mineral deposits anywhere +and millions of acres of unbelievably fertile land has nothing to do +with it."</p> + +<p>"I get your point," Hank said. "The United States was handed the +wealth of the world on a platter. But that's only part of it."</p> + +<p>"Yes," Loo agreed. "Also to be considered is the fact that for more +than a hundred years you have never had a serious war, serious, that +is, in that your land was not invaded, your industries destroyed."</p> + +<p>"That's to our credit. We're a peace loving people."</p> + +<p>Loo laughed abruptly. "You should tell that to the American Indians."</p> + +<p>Hank scowled over at him. "What'd you mean by that Loo? That has all +the elements of a nasty crack."</p> + +<p>"Or tell it to the Mexicans. Isn't that where you got your whole +South-west?"</p> + +<p>Hank looked from Loo to Paco and back.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Paco brought out cigarettes and tossed one to each of the others. +"Aren't these long Russian cigarettes the end? I heard somebody say +that by the time the smoke got through all the filter, you'd lost the +habit." He looked over at Hank. "Easy my friend, easy. On a trip like +this it would be impossible not to continually be comparing East and +West, dwelling continually on politics, the pros and cons of both +sides. All of us are continually assimilating what we hear and see. +Among other things, I note that on the newsstands there are no +publications from western lands. Why? Because still, after fifty +years, our Communist bureaucracy dare not allow its people to read +what they will. I note, too, that the shops on 25th October Avenue are +not all directed toward the Russian man on the street, unless he is +paid unbelievably more than we have heard. Sable coats? Jewelery? +Luxurious furniture? I begin to suspect that our Soviet friends are +not quite so classless as Mr. Marx had in mind when he and Mr. Engels +worked out the rough framework of the society of the future."</p> + +<p>Loo said seriously, "Oh, there are a great many things of that type to +notice here in the Soviet Union."</p> + +<p>Hank had to grin. "Well, I'm glad you jokers still have open minds."</p> + +<p>Paco waggled a finger negatively at him. "We've had open minds all +along, my friend. It is yours that seems closed. In spite of the fact +that I spent four years in your country I sometimes confess I don't +understand you Americans. I think you are too immersed in your TV +programs, your movies and your light fiction."</p> + +<p>"I can feel myself being saddled up again," Hank complained. "All set +for another riding."</p> + +<p>Loo laughed softly, his perfect white teeth gleaming in his black +face.</p> + +<p>Paco said, "You seem to have the fictional <i>good guys and bad guys</i> +outlook. And, in this world of controversy, you assume that you are +the good guys, the heroes, and since that is so then the Soviets must +be the bad guys. And, as in the movies, everything the good guys do is +fine and everything the bad guys do, is evil. I sometimes think that +if the Russians had developed a cure for cancer first you Americans +would have refused to use it."</p> + +<p>Hank had had enough. He said, "Look, Paco, there are two hundred +million Americans. For you, or anyone else, to come along and try to +lump that many people neatly together is pure silliness. You'll find +every type of person that exists in the world in any country. The very +tops of intelligence, and submorons living in institutions; the most +highly educated of scientists, and men who didn't finish grammar +school; you'll find saints, and gangsters; infant prodigies and +juvenile delinquents; and millions upon millions of just plain +ordinary people much like the people of Argentina, or England, or +France or whatever. True enough, among all our two hundred million +there are some mighty prejudiced people, some mighty backward ones, +and some downright foolish ones. But if you think the United States +got to the position she's in today through the efforts of a whole +people who are foolish, then you're obviously pretty far off the beam +yourself."</p> + +<p>Paco was looking at him narrowly. "Accepted, friend Hank, and I +apologize. That's quite the most effective outburst I've heard from +you in this week we've known each other. It occurs to me that perhaps +you are other than I first thought."</p> + +<p><i>Oh, oh.</i> Hank backtracked. He said, "Good grief, let's drop it."</p> + +<p>Paco said, "Well, just to change the subject, gentlemen, there is one +thing above all that I noted here in Leningrad."</p> + +<p>"What was that?" Loo said.</p> + +<p>"It's the only town I've ever seen where I felt an urge to kiss a +cop," Paco said soulfully. "Did you notice? Half the traffic police in +town are cute little blondes."</p> + +<p>Loo rolled over. "A fascinating observation, but personally I am going +to take a nap. Tonight it's the Red Arrow Express to Moscow and rest +might be in order, particularly if the train has square wheels, burns +wood and stops and repairs bridges all along the way, as I'm sure Hank +believes."</p> + +<p>Hank reached down, got hold of one of his shoes and heaved it.</p> + +<p>"Missed!" Loo grinned.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The Red Arrow Express had round wheels, burned Diesel fuel and made +the trip between Leningrad and Moscow overnight. In one respect, it +was the most unique train ride Hank Kuran had ever had. The track +contained not a single curve from the one city to the other. Its +engineers must have laid the roadbed out with a ruler.</p> + +<p>The cars like the rest of public transportation, were as comfortable +as any Hank knew. Traveling second class, as the Progressive Tours +pilgrims did, involved four people in a compartment for the night, +with one exception. At the end of the car was a smaller compartment +containing two bunks only.</p> + +<p>The Intourist guide who had shepherded them around Leningrad took them +to the train, saw them all safely aboard, told them another Intourist +employee would pick them up at the station in Moscow.</p> + +<p>It was late. Hank was assigned the two-bunk compartment. He put his +glasses on the tiny window table, sat on the edge of the lower and +began to pull off his shoes. He didn't look up when the door opened +until a voice said, icebergs dominating the tone, "Just what are you +doing in here?"</p> + +<p>Hank blinked up at her. "Hello, Char. What?"</p> + +<p>Char Moore snapped, "I said, what are you doing in my compartment?"</p> + +<p>"Yours? Sorry, the conductor just assigned me here. Evidently there's +been some mistake."</p> + +<p>"I suggest you rectify it, Mr. Stevenson."</p> + +<p>Out in the corridor a voice, heavy with Britishisms, complained +plaintively, "Did you ever hear the loik? They put men and women into +the same compartment. Oim expected to sleep with a loidy in the bunk +under me."</p> + +<p>Hank cleared his throat, didn't allow himself the luxury of a smile. +He said, "I'll see what I can do, Char. Seems to me I did read +somewhere that the Russkies see nothing wrong in putting strangers in +the same sleeping compartment."</p> + +<p>Char Moore stood there, saying nothing but breathing deeply enough to +express American womanhood insulted.</p> + +<p>"All right, all right," he said, retying his shoes and retrieving his +glasses. "I didn't engineer this." He went looking for the conductor.</p> + +<p>He was back, yawning by this time, fifteen minutes later. Char Moore +was sitting on the side of the bottom bunk, sipping a glass of tea +that she'd bought for a few kopecks from the portress. She looked up +coolly as he entered, but her voice was more pleasant. "Get everything +fixed?"</p> + +<p>Hank said, "What bunk do you want, upper or lower?"</p> + +<p>"That's not funny."</p> + +<p>"It's not supposed to be." Hank pulled his bag from under the bunk and +from it drew pajamas and his dressing gown. "Check with the rest of +the tour if you want. The conductor couldn't care less. We were +evidently assigned compartments by Intourist and where we were +assigned we'll sleep. Either that or you can stand in the corridor all +night. I'll be damned if I will."</p> + +<p>"You don't have to swear," Char bit out testily. "What are we going to +do about it?"</p> + +<p>"I just told you what I was going to do." Taking up his things he +opened the door. "I'll change in the men's dressing room."</p> + +<p>"I'll lock the door," Char Moore snapped.</p> + +<p>Hank grinned at her. "I'll bet that if you do the conductor either has +a passkey or will break it down for me."</p> + +<p>When he returned in slippers, nightrobe and pajamas, Char was in the +upper berth, staring angrily at the compartment ceiling. There were no +hooks or other facilities for hanging or storing clothes. She must +have put all of her things back into her bag. Hank grinned inwardly, +carefully folded his own pants and jacket over his suitcase before +climbing into the bunk.</p> + +<p>"Don't snore, do you?" he said conversationally.</p> + +<p>No answer.</p> + +<p>"Or walk in your sleep?"</p> + +<p>"You're not funny, Mr. Stevenson."</p> + +<p>"That's what I like about this country," Hank said. "Progressive. Way +ahead of the West. Shucks, modesty is a reactionary capitalistic +anachronism. Shove 'em all into bed together, that's what I always +say." He laughed.</p> + +<p>"Oh, shut up," Char said. But then she laughed, too. "Actually, I +suppose there's nothing wrong with it. We are rather Victorian about +such things in the States."</p> + +<p>Hank groaned. "There you are. If a railroad company at home suggested +you spend the night in a compartment with a strange man, you'd sue +them. But here in the promised land it's O.K."</p> + +<p>After a short silence Char said, "Hank, why do you dislike the Soviet +Union so much?"</p> + +<p>"Why? Because I'm an American!"</p> + +<p>She said so softly as to be almost inaudible, "I've known you for a +week now. Somehow you don't really seem to be the type who would make +that inadequate a statement."</p> + +<p>Hank said "Look, Char. There's a cold war going on between the United +States and her allies and the Soviet complex. I'm on our side. It's +going to be one or the other."</p> + +<p>"No it isn't, Hank. If it ever breaks out into hot war, it's going to +be both. That is, unless the extraterrestrials add some new elements +to the whole disgusting situation."</p> + +<p>"Let's put it another way. Why are you so pro-Soviet?"</p> + +<p>She raised herself on one elbow and scowled down over the edge of her +bunk at him. Inside, Hank turned over twice to see the unbound red +hair, the serious green eyes. Imagine looking at that face over the +breakfast table for the rest of your life. The hell with South +American senoritas.</p> + +<p>Char said earnestly, "I'm not. Confound it, Hank, can't the world get +any further than this cowboys and Indians relationship between +nations? Our science and industry has finally developed to the point +where the world could be a paradise. We've solved all the problems of +production. We've conquered all the major diseases. We have the +wonders of eternity before us—and look at us."</p> + +<p>"Tell that to the Russkies and their pals. They're out for the works."</p> + +<p>"Well, haven't we been?"</p> + +<p>"The United States isn't trying to take over the world."</p> + +<p>"No? Possibly not in the old sense of the word, but aren't we trying +desperately to sponsor our type of government and social system +everywhere? Frankly, I'm neither pro-West nor pro-Soviet. I think +they're both wrong."</p> + +<p>"Fine," Hank said. "What is your answer?"</p> + +<p>She remained silent for a long time. Finally, "I don't claim to have +an answer. But the world is changing like crazy. Science, technology, +industrial production, education, population all are mushrooming. For +us to claim that sweeping and basic changes aren't taking place in the +Western nations is just nonsense. Our own country's institutions +barely resemble the ones we had when you and I were children. And +certainly the Soviet Union has changed and is changing from what it +was thirty or forty years ago."</p> + +<p>"Listen, Char," Hank said in irritation, "you still haven't come up +with any sort of an answer to the cold war."</p> + +<p>"I told you I hadn't any. All I say is that I'm sick of it. I can't +remember so far back that there wasn't a cold war. And the more I +consider it the sillier it looks. Currently the United States and her +allies spend between a third and a half of their gross national +product on the military—ha! the military!—and in fighting the Soviet +complex in international trade."</p> + +<p>"Well," Hank said, "I'm sick of it, too, and I haven't any answer +either, but I'll be darned if I've heard the Russkies propose one. And +just between you and me, if I had to choose between living Soviet +style and our style, I'd choose ours any day."</p> + +<p>Char said nothing.</p> + +<p>Hank added flatly, "Who knows, maybe the coming of these Galactic +Confederation characters will bring it all to a head."</p> + +<p>She said nothing further and in ten minutes the soft sounds of her +breathing had deepened to the point that Hank Kuran knew she slept. He +lay there another half hour in the full knowledge that probably the +most desirable woman he'd ever met was sleeping less than three feet +away from him.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Leningrad had cushioned the first impression of Moscow for Henry +Kuran. Although, if anything, living standards and civic beauty were +even higher here in the capital city of world Communism.</p> + +<p>They pulled into the Leningradsky Station on Komsomolskaya Square in +the early morning to be met by Intourist guides and buses.</p> + +<p>Hank sat next to Char Moore still feeling on the argumentative side +after their discussion of the night before. He motioned with his head +at some excavation work going on next to the station. "There you are. +Women doing manual labor."</p> + +<p>Char said, "I'm from the Western states, it doesn't impress me. Have +you ever seen fruit pickers, potato diggers, or just about any type of +itinerant harvest workers? There is no harder work and women, and +children for that matter, do half of it at home."</p> + +<p>He looked at the husky, rawboned women laborers working shoulder to +shoulder with the men. "I still don't like it."</p> + +<p>Char shrugged. "Who does? The sooner we devise machines to do all the +drudgery the better off the world will be."</p> + +<p>To his surprise, Hank found Moscow one of the most beautiful cities he +had ever observed. Certainly the downtown area in the vicinity of the +Kremlin compared favorably with any.</p> + +<p>The buses whisked them down through Lermontovskaya Square, down Kirov +Street to Novaya and then turned right. The Intourist guide made with +a running commentary. There was the famous Bolshoi Theater and there +Sverdlova Square, a Soviet cultural center.</p> + +<p>Hank didn't know it then but they were avoiding Red Square. They +circled it, one block away, and pulled onto Gorky Street and before a +Victorian period building.</p> + +<p>"The Grand Hotel," the guide announced, "where you will stay during +your Moscow visit."</p> + +<p>Half a dozen porters began manhandling their bags from the top of the +bus. They were ushered into the lobby and assigned rooms. Russian +hotel lobbies were a thing apart. No souvenir stands, no bellhops, no +signs saying <i>To the Bar</i>, <i>To the Barber Shop</i> or to anything else. A +hotel was a hotel, period.</p> + +<p>Hank trailed Loo and Paco and three porters to the second floor and to +the room they were assigned in common. Like the Astoria's rooms, in +Leningrad, it was king-sized. In fact, it could easily have been +divided into three chambers. There were four full sized beds, six arm +chairs, two sofas, two vanity tables, a monstrous desk—and one wash +bowl which gurgled when you ran water.</p> + +<p>Paco, hands on hips, stared around. "A dance hall," he said. +"Gentlemen, this room hasn't changed since some Grand Duke stayed in +it before the revolution."</p> + +<p>Loo, who had assumed his usual prone position on one of the beds, +said, "From what I've heard about Moscow housing, you could get an +average family in this amount of space."</p> + +<p>Hank was stuffing clothes into a dresser drawer. "Now who's making +with anti-Soviet comments?"</p> + +<p>Paco laughed at him. "Have you ever seen some of the housing in the +Harlem district in New York? You can rent a bed in a room that has +possibly ten beds, for an eight-hour period. When your eight hours are +up you roll out and somebody else rolls in. The beds are kept warm, +three shifts every twenty-four hours."</p> + +<p>Hank shook his head and muttered, "They call me Dobbin, I've been +ridden so much."</p> + +<p>Paco laughed and rubbed his hands together happily. "It's still early. +We have nothing to do until lunch time. I suggest we sally forth and +take a look at Russian womanhood. One never knows."</p> + +<p>Loo said, "As an alternative, I suggest we rest until lunch."</p> + +<p>Paco snorted. "A rightest-Trotskyite wrecker, and an imperialist +war-monger to boot."</p> + +<p>Loo said, dead panned, "Smile when you say that stranger."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Hey, wait a minute."</p> + +<p>He went down the room to the far window and bug-eyed. One block away, +at the end of Gorky Street, was Red Square. St. Basil's Cathedral at +the far end, and unbelievable candy-cane construction of fanciful +spirals, and every-colored turrets; the red marble mausoleum, Mecca of +world Communism, housing the prophet Lenin and his two disciples; the +long drab length of the GUM department store opposite. But it wasn't +these.</p> + +<p>There on the square, nestled in the corner between St. Basil's and +the mausoleum, squatted what Henry Kuran had never really expected to +see, in spite of his assignment, in spite of news broadcasts, in spite +of everything to the contrary. Boomerang shaped, resting on short +stilts, six of them in all, a baby blue in color—an impossibly +beautiful baby blue.</p> + +<p>The spaceship.</p> + +<p>Paco stood at one shoulder, Loo at the other.</p> + +<p>For once there was no humor in Paco's words. "There it is," he said. +"Our visitors from the stars."</p> + +<p>"Possibly our teachers from the stars," Hank said huskily.</p> + +<p>"Or our judges." Loo's voice was flat.</p> + +<p>They stood there for another five minutes in silence. Loo said +finally, "Undoubtedly our Intourist guides will take us nearer, if +that's allowed, later during our stay. Meanwhile, my friends, I shall +rest up for the occasion."</p> + +<p>"Let's take our quick look at the city," Paco said to Hank. "Once the +Intourist people take over they'll run our feet off. Frankly, I have +little interest in where the first shot of the revolution was fired, +the latest tractor factory, or where Rasputin got it in the neck. +There are more important things."</p> + +<p>"We know," Loo said from the bed. "Women."</p> + +<p>"Right!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Hank was wondering whether or not to leave the room. The <i>Stilyagi</i> +were to contact him. Where? When? Obviously, he'd need their help. He +had no idea whatsoever on how to penetrate to the Interplanetary +emissaries.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> +<img src="images/image_004.jpg" width="500" height="355" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>He spoke Russian. Fine. So what? Could he simply march up to the +spacecraft and knock on the door? Or would he make himself dangerously +conspicuous by just getting any closer than he now was to the craft?</p> + +<p>As he stood now, he felt he was comparatively safe. He was sure the +Russkies had marked him down as a rather ordinary American. Heavens +knows, he'd worked hard enough at the role. A simple, average tourist, +a little on the square side, and not even particularly articulate.</p> + +<p>However, he wasn't going to accomplish much by remaining here in this +room. He doubted that the <i>Stilyagi</i> would get in touch with him +either by phone or simply knocking at the door.</p> + +<p>"O.K., Paco," he said. "Let's go. In search of the pin-up girl—Moscow +style."</p> + +<p>They walked down to the lobby and started for the door.</p> + +<p>One of the Intourist guides who had brought them from the railroad +station stood to one side of the stairs. "Going for a walk, gentlemen? +I suggest you stroll up Gorky Street, it's the main shopping center."</p> + +<p>Paco said, "How about going over into Red Square to see the +spaceship?"</p> + +<p>The guide shrugged. "I don't believe the guards will allow you to get +too near. It would be undesirable to bother the Galactic delegates to +the Soviet Union."</p> + +<p>That was one way of wording it, Hank thought glumly. <i>The Galactic +delegates to the Soviet Union.</i> Not to the Earth, but to the Soviet +Union. He wondered what the neutrals in such countries as India were +thinking.</p> + +<p>But at least there were no restrictions on Paco and him.</p> + +<p>They strolled up Gorky Street, jam packed with fellow pedestrians. +Shoppers, window-shoppers, men on the prowl for girls, girls on the +prowl for men, Ivan and his wife taking the baby for a stroll, street +cleaners at the endless job of keeping Moscow's streets the neatest in +the world.</p> + +<p>Paco pointed out this to Hank, Hank pointed out that to Paco. Somehow +it seemed more than a visit to a western European nation. This was +Moscow. This was the head of the Soviet snake.</p> + +<p>And then Hank had to laugh inwardly at himself as two youngsters, +running along playing tag in a grown-up world of long legs and stolid +pace, all but tripped him up. Head of a snake it might be, but +Moscow's people looked astonishingly like those of Portland, Maine or +Portland, Oregon.</p> + +<p>"How do you like those two, coming now?" Paco said.</p> + +<p>Those two coming now consisted of two better than averagely dressed +girls who would run somewhere in their early twenties. A little too +much make-up by western standards, and clumsily applied.</p> + +<p>"Blondes," Paco said soulfully.</p> + +<p>"They're all blondes here," Hank said.</p> + +<p>"Wonderful, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>The girls smiled at them in passing and Paco turned to look after, but +they didn't stop. Hank and Paco went on.</p> + +<p>It didn't take Hank long to get onto Paco's system. It was beautifully +simple. He merely smiled widely at every girl that went by. If she +smiled back, he stopped and tried to start a conversation with her.</p> + +<p>He got quite a few rebuffs but—Hank remembered an old joke—on the +other hand he got quite a bit of response.</p> + +<p>Before they had completed a block and a half of strolling, they were +standing on a corner, trying to talk with two of Moscow's younger +set—female variety. Here again, Paco was a wonder. His languages were +evidently Spanish, English and French but he was in there pitching +with a language the full vocabulary of which consisted of <i>Da</i> and +<i>Neit</i> so far as he was concerned.</p> + +<p>Hank stood back a little, smiling, trying to stay in character, but in +amused dismay at the other's aggressive abilities.</p> + +<p>Paco said, "Listen, I think I can get these two to come up to the +room. Which one do you like?"</p> + +<p>Hank said, "If they'll come up to the room, then they're +professionals."</p> + +<p>Paco grinned at him. "I'm a professional, too. A lawyer by trade. It's +just a matter of different professions."</p> + +<p>A middle-aged pedestrian, passing by, said to the girls in Russian, +"Have you no shame before the foreign tourists?"</p> + +<p>They didn't bother to answer. Paco went back to his attempt to make a +deal with the taller of the two.</p> + +<p>The smaller, who sported astonishingly big and blue eyes, said to Hank +in Russian, "You're too good to associate with <i>metrofanushka</i> girls?"</p> + +<p>Hank frowned puzzlement. "I don't speak Russian," he said.</p> + +<p>She laughed lightly, almost a giggle, and, in the same low voice her +partner was using on Paco, said, "I think you do, Mr. Kuran. In the +afternoon, tomorrow, avoid whatever tour the Intourist people wish to +take you on and wander about Sovietska Park." She giggled some more. +The world-wide epitome of a girl being picked up on the street.</p> + +<p>Hank took her in more closely. Possibly twenty-five years of age. The +skirt she was wearing was probably Russian, it looked sturdy and +durable, but the sweater was one of the new American fabrics. Her +shoes were probably western too, the latest flared heel effect. A +typical <i>stilyagi</i> or <i>metrofanushka</i> girl, he assumed. Except for one +thing—her eyes were cool and alert, intelligent beyond those of a +street pickup.</p> + +<p>Paco said, "What do you think, Hank? This one will come back to the +hotel with me."</p> + +<p>"Romeo, Romeo," Hank sighed, "wherefore do thou think thou art?"</p> + +<p>Paco shrugged. "What's the difference? Buenos Aires, New York, +Moscow. Women are women."</p> + +<p>"And men are evidently men," Hank said. "You do what you want."</p> + +<p>"O.K., friend. Do you mind staying out of the room for a time?"</p> + +<p>"Don't worry about me, but you'll have to get rid of Loo, and he +hasn't had his eighteen hours sleep yet today."</p> + +<p>Paco had his girl by the arm. "I'll roll him into the hall. He'll +never wake up."</p> + +<p>Hank's girl made a moue at him, shrugged as though laughing off the +fact that she had been rejected, and disappeared into the crowds. Hank +stuck his hands in his pockets and went on with his stroll.</p> + +<p>The contact with the underground had been made.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Maintaining his front as an American tourist he wandered into several +stores, picked up some amber brooches at a bargain rate, fingered +through various books in English in an international bookshop. That +was one thing that hit hard. The bookshops were packed. Prices were +remarkably low and people were buying. In fact, he'd never seen a +country so full of people reading and studying. The park benches were +loaded with them, they read as the rode on streetcar and bus, they +read as they walked along the street. He had an uneasy feeling that +the jet-set kids were a small minority, that the juvenile delinquent +problem here wasn't a fraction what it was in the West.</p> + +<p>He'd expected to be followed. In fact, that had puzzled him when he +first was given this unwanted assignment by Sheridan Hennessey. How +was he going to contact this so-called underground if he was watched +the way he had been led to believe Westerners were?</p> + +<p>But he recalled their conducted tour of the Hermitage Museum in +Leningrad. The Intourist guide had started off with twenty-five +persons and had clucked over them like a hen all afternoon. In spite +of her frantic efforts to keep them together, however, she returned to +the Astoria Hotel that evening with eight missing—including Hank and +Loo who had wandered off to get a beer.</p> + +<p>The idea of the KGB putting tails on the tens of thousands of tourists +that swarmed Moscow and Leningrad, became a little on the ridiculous +side. Besides, what secret does a tourist know, or what secrets could +he discover?</p> + +<p>At any rate, Hank found no interference in his wanderings. He +deliberately avoided Red Square and its spaceship, taking no chances +on bringing himself to attention. Short of that locality, he wandered +freely.</p> + +<p>At noon they ate at the Grand and the Intourist guide outlined the +afternoon program which involved a general sightseeing tour ranging +from the University to the Park of Rest and Culture, Moscow's +equivalent of Coney Island.</p> + +<p>Loo said, "That all sounds very tiring, do we have time for a nap +before leaving?"</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid not, Mr. Motlamelle," the guide told him.</p> + +<p>Paco shook his head. "I've seen a university, and I've seen a sport +stadium and I've seen statues and monuments. I'll sit this one out."</p> + +<p>"I think I'll lie this one out," Loo said. He complained plaintively +to Hank. "You know what happened to me this morning, just as I was +napping up in our room?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," Hank said, "I was with our Argentine Casanova when he picked +her up."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Hank took the conducted tour with the rest. If he was going to beg off +the next day, he'd be less conspicuous tagging along on this one. +Besides it gave him the lay of the land.</p> + +<p>And he took the morning trip the next day, the automobile factories on +the outskirts of town. It had been possibly fifteen years since Hank +had been through Detroit but he doubted greatly that automation had +developed as far in his own country as it seemed to have here. Or, +perhaps, this was merely a showplace. But he drew himself up at that +thought. That was one attitude the Western world couldn't +afford—deprecating Soviet progress. This was the very thing that had +led to such shocks as the launching of the early Sputniks. +Underestimate your adversary and sooner or later you paid for it.</p> + +<p>The Soviets had at long last built up a productive machine as great as +any. Possibly greater. In sheer tonnage they were turning out more +gross national product than the West. This was no time to be +underestimating them.</p> + +<p>All this was a double interest to a field man in Morton Twombly's +department, working against the Soviets in international trade. He was +beginning to understand at least one of the reasons why the Commies +could sell their products at such ridiculously low prices. Automation +beyond that of the West. In the Soviet complex the labor unions were +in no position to block the introduction of ultra-efficient methods, +and featherbedding was unheard of. If a Russian worker's job was +<i>automated</i> out from under him, he shifted to a new plant, a new job, +and possibly even learned a new trade. The American worker's union, to +the contrary, did its best to save the job.</p> + +<p>Hank Kuran remembered reading, a few months earlier, of a British +textile company which had attempted to introduce a whole line of new +automation equipment. The unions had struck, and the company had to +give up the project. What happened to the machinery? It was sold to +China!</p> + +<p>Following the orders of his underground contact, he begged out of the +afternoon tour, as did half a dozen of the others. Sightseeing was as +hard on the feet in Moscow as anywhere else.</p> + +<p>After lunch he looked up Sovietska Park on his tourist map of the +city. It was handy enough. A few blocks up Gorky Street.</p> + +<p>It turned out to be typical. Well done so far as fountains, monuments +and gardens were concerned. Well equipped with park benches. In the +early afternoon it was by no means empty, but, on the other hand not +nearly so filled as he'd noticed the parks to be the evening before.</p> + +<p>Hank stopped at one of the numerous cold drink stands where for a few +kopecks you could get raspberry syrup fizzed up with soda water. While +he sipped it, a teen-ager came up beside him and said in passable +English, "Excuse me, are you a tourist? Do you speak English?"</p> + +<p>This had happened before. Another kid practicing his school language.</p> + +<p>"That's right," Hank said.</p> + +<p>The boy said, "You aren't a ham, are you?" He brought some cards from +an inner pocket. "I'm UA3-KAR."</p> + +<p>For a moment Hank looked at him blankly, and then he recognized the +amateur radio call cards the other was displaying. "Oh, a <i>ham</i>. Well, +no, but I have a cousin who is."</p> + +<p>Two more youngsters came up. "What's his call?"</p> + +<p>Hank didn't remember that. They all adjourned to a park bench and +little though he knew about the subject, international amateur radio +was discussed in detail. In fifteen minutes he was hemmed in by a +dozen or so and had about decided he'd better make his excuses and +circulate around making himself available to the <i>stilyagi</i> outfit. He +was searching for an excuse to shake them when the one sitting next to +him reverted to Russian.</p> + +<p>"We're clear now, Henry Kuran."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "I'll be damned. I hadn't any idea—"</p> + +<p>The other brushed aside trivialities. Looking at him more closely, +Hank could see he was older than first estimate. Possibly twenty-two +or so. Darker than most of the others, heavy-set, sharp and impatient.</p> + +<p>"You can call me Georgi," he said. "These others will prevent +outsiders from bothering us. Now then, we've been told you Americans +want some assistance. What? And why should we give it to you?"</p> + +<p>Hank said, worriedly, "Haven't you some place we could go? Where I +could meet one of your higher-ups? This is important."</p> + +<p>"Otherwise, I wouldn't be here," Georgi said impatiently. "For that +matter there is no higher-up. We don't have ranks; we're a working +democracy. And I'm afraid the day of the secret room in some cellar is +past. With housing what it is, if there was an empty cellar in Moscow +a family would move in. And remember, all buildings are State owned +and operated. I'm afraid you'll have to tell your story here. Now, +what is it you want?"</p> + +<p>"I want an opportunity to meet the Galactic Confederation emissaries."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"To give them our side, the Western side, of the ... well, the +controversy between us and the Soviet complex. We want an opportunity +to have our say before they make any permanent treaties."</p> + +<p>Georgi considered that. "We thought it was probably something +similar," he muttered. "What do you think it will accomplish?"</p> + +<p>"At least a delaying action. If the extraterrestrials throw their +weight, their scientific progress, into the balance on the side of the +Soviet complex, the West will have lost the cold war. Every neutral in +the world will jump on the bandwagon. International trade, sources of +raw materials, will be a thing of the past. Without a shot being +fired, we'd become second-rate powers overnight."</p> + +<p>Georgi said nothing for a long moment. A new youngster had drifted up +to the group but one of those on the outskirts growled something at +him and he went off again. Evidently, Hank decided, all of this +dozen-odd cluster of youngsters were connected with the jet-set +underground.</p> + +<p>"All right, you want us to help you in the conflict between the Soviet +government and the West," Georgi said. "Why should we?"</p> + +<p>Hank frowned at him. "You're the anti-government movement. You're +revolutionists and want to overthrow the Soviet government."</p> + +<p>The other said impatiently, "Don't read something into our +organization that isn't here. We don't exist for your benefit, but our +own."</p> + +<p>"But you wish to overthrow the Soviets and establish a democratic—"</p> + +<p>Georgi was waggling an impatient hand. "That word democratic has been +so misused this past half century that it's become all but +meaningless. Look here, we wish to overthrow the present Soviet +government, but that doesn't mean we expect to establish one modeled +to yours. We're Russians. Our problems are Russian ones. Most of them +you aren't familiar with—any more than we're familiar with your +American ones."</p> + +<p>"However, you want to destroy the Soviets," Hank pursued.</p> + +<p>"Yes," Georgi growled, "but that doesn't necessarily mean that we wish +<i>you</i> to win this cold war, as the term goes. That is, just because +we're opposed to the Soviet government doesn't mean we like yours. But +you make a point. If the Galactic Confederation gives all-out support +to the Soviet bureaucracy it might strengthen it to the point where +they could remain in office indefinitely."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Hank pressed the advantage. "Right. You'd never overthrow them then."</p> + +<p>"On the other hand," Georgi muttered uncomfortably, "we're not +interested in giving you Americans an opportunity that would enable +you to collapse the whole fabric of this country and its allies."</p> + +<p>"Look here," Hank said. "In the States we seem to know surprisingly +little about your movement. Just what <i>do</i> you expect to accomplish?"</p> + +<p>"To make it brief, we wish to enjoy the product of the sacrifices of +the past fifty years. If you recall your Marx"—he twisted his face +here in wry amusement—"the idea was that the State was to wither away +once Socialism was established. Instead of withering away, it has +become increasingly strong. This was explained by the early Bolsheviks +in a fairly reasonable manner. Socialism presupposes a highly +industrialized economy. It's not possible in a primitive nor even a +feudalistic society. So our Communist bureaucracy remained in the +saddle through a period of transition. The task was to industrialize +the Soviet countries in a matter of decades where it had taken the +Capitalist nations a century or two."</p> + +<p>Georgi shrugged. "I've never heard of a governing class giving up its +once acquired power of its own accord, no matter how incompetent they +might be."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "I wouldn't call the Soviet government incompetent."</p> + +<p>"Then you'd be wrong," the other said. "Progress had been made but +often in spite of the bureaucracy, not because of it. In the early +days it wasn't so obvious, but as we develop the rule of the political +bureaucrat becomes increasingly a hindrance. Politicians can't operate +industries and they can't supervise laboratories. To the extent our +scientist and technicians are interfered with by politicians, to that +extent we are held up in our progress. Surely you've heard of the +Lysenko matter?"</p> + +<p>"He was the one who evolved the anti-Mendelian theory of genetics, +fifteen or twenty years ago."</p> + +<p>"Correct," Georgi snorted. "Acquired characteristics could be handed +down by heredity. It took the Academy of Agricultural Science at least +a decade to dispose of him. Why? Because his theories fitted into +Stalin's political beliefs." The underground spokesman snorted again.</p> + +<p>Hank had the feeling they were drifting from the subject. "Then you +want to overthrow the Communist bureaucracy?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but that is only part of the story. Overthrowing it without +something to replace the bureaucracy is a negative approach. We have +no interest in a return to Czarist Russia, even if that were possible, +and it isn't. We want to profit by what has happened in these years of +ultra-sacrifice, not to destroy everything. The day of rule by +politicians is antiquated, we look forward to the future." He seemed +to switch subjects. "Do you remember Djilas' book which he wrote in +one of Tito's prisons, "The New Class"?"</p> + +<p>"Vaguely. I read the reviews. It was a best seller in the States some +time ago."</p> + +<p>Georgi made with his characteristic snort. "It was a best seller +here—in underground circles. At any rate, that explains much. Our +bureaucracy, no matter what its ideals might have been to begin with, +has developed into a new class of its own. Russia sacrifices to +surpass the West—but our bureaucrats don't. In Lenin's day the +commissar was paid the same as the average worker, but today we have +bureaucrats as wealthy as Western millionaires."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Of course, these are your problems. I don't pretend to +have too clear a picture of them. However, it seems to me we have a +mutual enemy. Right at this moment it appears that they are to receive +some support that will strengthen them. I suggest you co-operate with +me in hopes they'll be thwarted."</p> + +<p>For the first time a near smile appeared on the young Russian's face. +"A ludicrous situation. We have here a Russian revolutionary +organization devoted to the <i>withering away</i> the Russian Communist +State. To gain its ends, it co-operates with a Capitalist country's +agent." His grin broadened. "I suspect that neither Nicolai Lenin nor +Karl Marx ever pictured such contingencies."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "I wouldn't know I'm not up on my Marxism. I'm afraid that +when I went to school academic circles weren't inclined in that +direction." He returned the Russian's wry smile.</p> + +<p>Which only set the other off again. "Academic circles!" he snorted. +"Sterile in both our countries. All professors of economics in the +Soviet countries are Marxists. On the other hand, no American +professor would admit to this. Coincidence? Suppose an American +teacher was a convinced Marxist. Would he openly and honestly teach +his beliefs? Suppose a Russian wasn't? Would he?" Georgi slapped his +knee with a heavy hand and stood up. "I'll speak to various others. +We'll let you know."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Wait. How long is this going to take? And <i>can</i> you help +me if you want to? Where are these extraterrestrials?"</p> + +<p>Georgi looked down at him. "They're in the Kremlin. How closely +guarded we don't know, but we can find out."</p> + +<p>"The Kremlin," Hank said. "I was hoping they stayed in their own +ship."</p> + +<p>"Rumor has it that they're quartered in the <i>Bolshoi Kremlevski +Dvorets</i>, the Great Kremlin Palace. We'll contact you later—perhaps." +He stuck his hands in his pockets and strode away, in all appearance +just one more pedestrian without anywhere in particular to go.</p> + +<p>One of the younger boys, the ham who had first approached Hank, smiled +and said, "Perhaps we can talk a bit more of radio?"</p> + +<p>"Yeah," Hank muttered, "Swell."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The next development came sooner than Henry Kuran had expected. In +fact, before the others returned from their afternoon tour of the +city. Hank was sprawled in one of the king-sized easy-chairs, turning +what little he had to work on over in his mind. The principal +decisions to make were, first, how long to wait on the assistance of +the <i>stilyagi</i>, and, if that wasn't forthcoming, what steps to take on +his own. The second prospect stumped him. He hadn't the vaguest idea +what he could accomplish singly.</p> + +<p>He wasn't even sure where the space aliens were. <i>The Bolshoi +Kremlevski Dvorets</i>, Georgi had said. But was that correct, and, if +so, where was the <i>Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets</i> and how did you get +into it? For that matter, how did you get inside the Kremlin walls?</p> + +<p>Under his breath he cursed Sheridan Hennessey. Why had he allowed +himself to be dragooned into this? By all criteria it was the +desperate clutching of a drowning man for a straw. He had no way to +know, for instance, if he did reach the space emissaries, that he +could even communicate with them.</p> + +<p>He caught himself wishing he was back in Peru arguing with hesitant +South Americans over the relative values of American and Soviet +complex commodities—and then he laughed at himself.</p> + +<p>There was a knock at the door.</p> + +<p>Hank came wearily to his feet, crossed and opened it.</p> + +<p>She still wore too much make-up, the American sweater and the flared +heel shoes. And her eyes were still cool and alert. She slid past him, +let her eyes go around the room quickly. "You are alone?" she said in +Russian, but it was more a statement than question.</p> + +<p>Hank closed the door behind them. He scowled at her, put a finger to +his lips and then went through an involved pantomime to indicate +looking for a microphone. He raised his eyebrows at her.</p> + +<p>She laughed and shook her head. "No microphones."</p> + +<p>"How do you know?"</p> + +<p>"We know. We have contacts here in the hotel. If the KGB had to put +microphones in the rooms of every tourist in Moscow, they'd have to +increase their number by ten times. In spite of your western ideas to +the contrary, it just isn't done. There are exceptions, of course, but +there has to be some reason for it."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps I'm an exception." Hank didn't like this at all. The C.I.A. +men had been of the opinion that the KGB was once again thoroughly +checking on every foreigner.</p> + +<p>"If the KGB is already onto you, Henry Kuran, then you might as well +give up. Your mission is already a failure."</p> + +<p>"I suppose so. Will you have a chair? Can I offer you a drink? My +roommate has a bottle of Stolichnaya vodka which he brought from the +boat."</p> + +<p>There was an amused light in her eyes even as she shook her head. +"Your friend Paco is quite a man—so I understand. But no, I am here +for business." She took one of the armchairs and Hank sank into +another opposite her.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> +<img src="images/image_005.jpg" width="500" height="412" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>"The committee has decided to assist you to the point they can."</p> + +<p>"Fine." Hank leaned forward.</p> + +<p>"Tomorrow your Progressive Tours group is to have a conducted tour of +the Kremlin museum, Ivan the Great's Tower, and the Assumption +Cathedral."</p> + +<p>"In the <i>Kremlin</i>?"</p> + +<p>She was impatient. "The Kremlin is considerably larger than most +Westerners seem to realize. Originally it was the whole city. The +Kremlin walls are more then two kilometers long. In them are a great +deal more than just government offices. Among other things, the +Kremlin has one of the greatest museums and probably the largest in +the world."</p> + +<p>"What I meant was, with the space emissaries there, will tours still +be held?"</p> + +<p>"They <i>are</i> being held. It would be too conspicuous to stop them even +if there was any reason to." She frowned and shook her head. "Just +because you will be inside the Kremlin walls doesn't mean that you +will be sitting in the lap of the extraterrestrials. They are probably +well guarded in the palace. We don't know to what extent."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Then how can you help me?"</p> + +<p>"Only in a limited way." She pulled a folder paper from her purse. +"Here is a map of the Kremlin, and here one of the Palace. Both of +these date from Czarist days but such things as the general layout of +the Kremlin and the <i>Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets</i> do not change of +course."</p> + +<p>"Do you know where the extraterrestrials are?"</p> + +<p>"We're not sure. The palace was built in the Seventeenth Century and +was popular with various czars. It has been a museum for some time. We +suspect that the Galactic Confederation delegates are housed in the +<i>Sobstvennaya Plovina</i> which used to be the private apartments of +Nicolas the First. It is quite define that the conferences are being +held in the <i>Gheorghievskaya sala</i>; it's the largest and most +impressive room in the Kremlin."</p> + +<p>Hank stared at the two maps feeling a degree of dismay.</p> + +<p>She said impatiently, "We can help you more than this. One of the +regular guide-guards at the facade which leads to the main entrance of +the palace is a member of our group. Here are your instructions."</p> + +<p>They spent another fifteen minutes going over the details, then she +shot a quick glance at her watch and came to her feet. "Is everything +clear ... comrade?"</p> + +<p>Hank frowned slightly at the use of the word, then understood. "I +think so, and thanks ... comrade." He, as well as she, meant the term +in its original sense.</p> + +<p>He followed her to the door but before his hand touched the knob, it +opened inwardly. Paco stood there, and behind him in the corridor was +Char Moore.</p> + +<p>The girl turned to Hank quickly, reached up and kissed him on the +mouth and said, in English, "Good-bye, dollink." She winked at Paco, +swept past Char and was gone.</p> + +<p>Paco looked after her appreciatively, back at Hank and said, "Ah, ha. +You are quite a dog after all, eh?"</p> + +<p>Char Moore's face was blank. She mumbled something to the effect of, +"See you later," directed seemingly to both of them, and went on to +her room.</p> + +<p>Hank said, "Damn!"</p> + +<p>Paco closed the door behind him. "What's the matter, my friend?" he +grinned. "Are you attempting to play two games at once?"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The morning tour was devoted to Red Square and the Kremlin. +Immediately after breakfast they formed a column with two or three +other tourist parties and were marched briskly to where Gorky Street +debouched into Red Square. First destination was the mausoleum, backed +against the Kremlin wall, which centered that square and served as a +combined Vatican, Lhasa and Mecca of the Soviet complex. Built of dark +red porphyry, it was the nearest thing to a really ultramodern +building Hank had seen in Moscow.</p> + +<p>As foreign tourists they were taken to the head of the line which +already stretched around the Kremlin back into Mokhovaya Street along +the western wall. A line of thousands.</p> + +<p>Once the doors opened the line moved quickly. They filed in, two by +two, down some steps, along a corridor which was suddenly cool as +though refrigerated. Paco, standing next to Hank, said from the side +of his mouth, "Now we know the secret of the embalming. I wonder if +they're hanging on meathooks."</p> + +<p>The line emerged suddenly into a room in the center of which were +three glass chambers. The three bodies, the prophet and his two +leading disciples flanking him. Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev. On their +faces, Hank decided, you could read much of their character. Lenin, +the idealist and scholar. Stalin, utterly ruthless organization man. +Khrushchev, energetic manager of what the first two had built.</p> + +<p>They were in the burial room no more than two minutes, filed out by an +opposite door. In the light of the square again, Paco grinned at him. +"Nick and Joe didn't look so good, but Nikita is standing up pretty +well."</p> + +<p>Trailing back and forth across Red Square had its ludicrous elements. +The guide pointed out this and that. But all the time his charges had +their eyes glued to the spaceship, settled there at the far end of the +square near St. Basil's. In a way it seemed no more alien than so much +else here. Certainly no more alien to the world Hank knew than the +fantastic St. Basil's Cathedral.</p> + +<p>A spaceship from the stars, though. You still had to shake your head +in effort to achieve clarity; to realize the significance of it. A +spaceship with emissaries from a Galactic Confederation.</p> + +<p>How simple if it had only landed in Washington, London or even Paris +or Rome, instead of here.</p> + +<p>They avoided getting very near it, although the Russians weren't being +ostentatious about their guarding. There was a roped off area about +the craft and twenty or so guards, not overly armed, drifting about +within the enclosure. But the local citizenry was evidently well +disciplined. There were no huge crowds hanging on the ropes waiting +for a glimpse of the interplanetary celebrities.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, the Intourist guide went out of his way to avoid +bringing his charges too near. They retraced their steps back to +Manezhnaya Square from which they had originally started to see the +mausoleum, and then turned left through Alexandrovski Sad, the +Alexander Park which ran along the west side of the Kremlin to the +Borovikski Gate, on the Moskva River side of the fortress.</p> + +<p>Paco said, "After this tour I'm in favor of us all signing a petition +that our guide be awarded a medal, <i>Hero of Intourist</i>. You realize +that thus far he has lost only two of us today?"</p> + +<p>Some of the others didn't like his levity. They were about to enter +the Communist shrine and wisecracking was hardly in order. Paco +Rodriquez couldn't have cared less, being Paco Rodriquez.</p> + +<p>The <i>stilyagi</i> girl had been correct about the Kremlin being an +overgrown museum. Government buildings it evidently contained, but +above all it provided gold topped cathedrals, fabulous palaces +converted to art galleries and displays of the jeweled wealth of +yesteryear and the tombs of a dozen czars including that of Ivan the +Terrible.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>They trailed into the Orushezhnaya Palace, through the ornate entrance +hall displaying its early arms and banners.</p> + +<p>Paco encouraged the harassed guard happily. "You're doing fine. You've +had us out for more than two hours. We started with twenty-five in +this group and still have twenty-one. Par for the course. What happens +to a tourist who wanders absently around in the Kremlin and turns up +in the head man's office?"</p> + +<p>The guide smiled wanly. "And over here we have the thrones of the +Empress Elizabeth and Czar Paul."</p> + +<p>Unobtrusively, Hank dropped toward the tail of the group. He spent a +long time peering at two silver panthers, gifts of the first Queen +Elizabeth of England to Boris Godunov. The Progressive Tours assembly +passed on into the next room.</p> + +<p>A guard standing next to the case said, "Mr. Kuran?"</p> + +<p>Without looking up, Hand nodded.</p> + +<p>"Follow me, slowly."</p> + +<p>No one from the Progressive Tours group was in sight. Hank wandered +after the guard, looking into display cases as he went. Finally the +other turned a corner into an empty and comparatively narrow corridor. +He stopped and waited for the American.</p> + +<p>"You're Kuran?" he asked anxiously in Russian.</p> + +<p>"That's right."</p> + +<p>"You're not afraid?"</p> + +<p>"No. Let's go." Inwardly Hank growled, <i>Of course I'm afraid. Do I +look like a confounded hero?</i> What was it Sheridan Hennessey had said? +This was combat, combat cold-war style, but still combat. Of course he +was afraid. Had there ever in the history of combat been a participant +who had gone into it unafraid?</p> + +<p>They walked briskly along the corridor. The guard said, "You have +studied your maps?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"I can take you only so far without exposing myself. Then you are on +your own. You must know your maps or you are lost. These old palaces +ramble—"</p> + +<p>"I know," Hank said impatiently. "Brief me as we go along. Just for +luck."</p> + +<p>"Very well. We leave Orushezhnaya Palace by this minor doorway. Across +there, to our right, is the <i>Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets</i>, the Great +Kremlin Palace. It's there the Central Executive Committee meets, and +the Assembly. The same hall used to be the czar's throne room in the +old days. On the nearer side, on the ground floor, are the +<i>Sobstvennaya Plovina</i>, the former private apartments of Nicholas +First. The extraterrestrials are there."</p> + +<p>"You're sure? The others weren't sure."</p> + +<p>"That's where they are."</p> + +<p>"How can we get to them?"</p> + +<p>"<i>We</i> can't. Possibly <i>you</i> can. I can take you only so far. The front +entrance is strongly guarded, we are going to have to enter the Great +Palace from the rear, through the Teremni Palace. You remember your +maps?"</p> + +<p>"I think so."</p> + +<p>They strode rapidly from the museum through a major courtyard. Hank to +the right and a step behind the uniformed guard.</p> + +<p>The other was saying, "The Teremni preceded the Great Palace. One of +its walls was used to become the rear of the later structure. We can +enter it fairly freely."</p> + +<p>They entered through another smaller doorway a hundred feet or more +from the main entrance, climbed a short marble stairway and turned +right down an ornate corridor, tapestry hung. They passed +occasionally other uniformed guards, none of whom paid them any +attention.</p> + +<p>They passed through three joined rooms, each heavily furnished in +Seventeenth Century style, each thick with icons. The guide brought +them up abruptly at a small door.</p> + +<p>He said, an air almost of defiance in his tone, "I go no further. +Through this door and you are in the Great Palace, in the bathroom of +the apartments of Catherine Second. You remember your maps?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," Hank said.</p> + +<p>"I hope so." The guard hesitated. "You are armed?"</p> + +<p>"No. We were afraid that my things might be thoroughly searched. Had a +gun been found on me, my mission would have been over then and there."</p> + +<p>The guard produced a heavy military revolver, offered it butt +foremost.</p> + +<p>But Hank shook his head. "Thanks. But if it comes to the point where +I'd need a gun—I've already failed. I'm here to talk, not to shoot."</p> + +<p>The guard nodded. "Perhaps you're right. Now, I repeat. On the other +side of this door is the bathroom of the Czarina's apartments. Beyond +it is her <i>paradnaya divannaya</i>, her dressing room and beyond that the +<i>Ekaterininskaya sala</i>, the throne room of Catherine Second. It is +probable that there will be nobody in any of these rooms. Beyond that, +I do not know."</p> + +<p>He ended abruptly with "Good luck," turned and scurried away.</p> + +<p>"Thanks," Hank Kuran said after him. He turned and tried the +door-knob. Inwardly he thought, <i>All right Henry Kuran. Hennessey +said you had a reputation for being able to think on your feet. Start +thinking. Thus far all you've been called on to do is exchange +low-level banter with a bevy of pro-commie critics of the United +States. Now the chips are down.</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The apartments of the long dead czarina were empty. He pushed through +them and into the corridor beyond.</p> + +<p>And came to a quick halt.</p> + +<p>Halfway down the hall, Loo Motlamelle crouched over a uniformed, +crumpled body. He looked up at Hank Kuran's approach, startled, a +fighting man at bay. His lips thinned back over his teeth. A black +thumb did something to the weapon he held in his hand.</p> + +<p>Hank said throatily, "Is he dead?"</p> + +<p>Loo shook his head, his eyes coldly wary. "No. I slugged him."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "What are you doing here?"</p> + +<p>Loo came erect. "It occurs to me that I'm evidently doing the same +thing you are."</p> + +<p>But the dull metal gun in his hand was negligently at the ready and +his eyes were cold, cold. It came to Hank that banjos on the levee +were very far away.</p> + +<p>This lithe fighting man said tightly, "You know where we are? Exactly +where we are? I'm not sure."</p> + +<p>Hank said, "In the hall outside the <i>Sobstvennaya Plovina</i> of the +<i>Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets</i>. The czar's private apartments. And how +did you get here?"</p> + +<p>"The hard way," Loo said softly. His eyes darted up and down the +corridor. "I can't figure out why there aren't more guards. I don't +like this. You're armed?"</p> + +<p>"No," Hank said.</p> + +<p>Loo grinned down at his own weapon. "One of us is probably making a +mistake but we both seem to have gotten this far. By the way, I'm +Inter-Commonwealth Security. You're C.I.A., aren't you? Talk fast, +Hank, we're either a team from now on, or I've got to do something +about you."</p> + +<p>"Special mission for the President," Hank said. "Why didn't we spot +each other sooner?"</p> + +<p>Loo grinned again in deprecation. "Evidently because we're both good +operatives. If I've got this right, the extraterrestrials are +somewhere in here."</p> + +<p>Hank started down the corridor. There was no time to go into the whys +and wherefores of Loo's mission. It must be approximately the same as +his own. "There are some private apartments in this direction," he +said over his shoulder. "They must be quartered—"</p> + +<p>A door off the corridor opened and a tall, thin, ludicrously garbed +man—</p> + +<p>Hank pulled himself up quickly, both mentally and physically. It was +no man. It was almost a man—but no.</p> + +<p>Loo's weapon was already at the alert.</p> + +<p>The newcomer unhurriedly looked from one of them to the other. Then +down at the Russian guard sprawled on the floor behind them.</p> + +<p>He said in Russian, "Always violence. The sadness of violence. When +faced with crisis, threaten violence if outpointed. Your race has much +to learn." He switched to English. "But this is probably your +language, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>Loo gaped at him. The man from space was almost as dark complected as +the Negro.</p> + +<p>The extraterrestrial stepped to one side and indicated the room behind +him "Please enter, I assume you've come looking for us."</p> + +<p>They entered the ornate bedroom.</p> + +<p>The extraterrestrial said, "Is the man dead?"</p> + +<p>Loo said, "No. Merely stunned."</p> + +<p>"He needs no assistance?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing could help him for half an hour or more. Then he'll probably +have a severe headache."</p> + +<p>The extraterrestrial had even the ability to achieve a dry quality in +his voice. "I am surprised at your forebearance." He took a chair +before a baroque desk. "Undoubtedly you have gone through a great deal +to penetrate to this point. I am a member of the interplanetary +delegation. What is it that you want?"</p> + +<p>Hank looked at Loo, received a slight nod, and went into his speech. +The space alien made no attempt to interrupt.</p> + +<p>When Hank had finished, the extraterrestrial turned his eyes to Loo. +"And you?"</p> + +<p>Loo said, "I represent the British Commonwealth rather than the United +States, but my purpose in contacting you was identical. Her Majesty's +government is anxious to consult with you before you make any binding +agreements with the Soviet complex."</p> + +<p>The alien turned his eyes from one to the other. His face, Hank +decided, had a Lincolnesque quality, so ugly as to be beautiful in its +infinite sadness.</p> + +<p>"You must think us incredibly naive," he said.</p> + +<p>Hank scowled. He had adjusted quickly to the space ambassador's +<i>otherness</i>, both of dress and physical qualities, but there was an +irritating something—He put his finger on it. He felt as he had, some +decades ago, when brought before his grammar school principal for an +infraction of school discipline.</p> + +<p>Hank said, "We haven't had too much time to think. We've been +desperate."</p> + +<p>The alien said, "You have gone to considerable trouble. I can even +admire your resolution. You will be interested to know that tomorrow +we take ship to Peiping."</p> + +<p>"Peiping?" Loo said blankly.</p> + +<p>"Following two weeks there we proceed to Washington and following that +to London. What led your governments to believe that the Soviet +nations were to receive all our attention, and your own none at all?"</p> + +<p>Hank blurted, "But you landed <i>here</i>. You made no contact with us."</p> + +<p>"The size of our expedition is limited. We could hardly do everything +at once. The Soviet complex, as you call it, is the largest government +and the most advanced on Earth. Obviously, this was our first stop." +His eyes went to Hank's. "You're an American. Do you know why you have +fallen behind in the march of progress?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not sure we have," Hank said flatly. "Do you mean in comparison +with the Soviet complex?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly. And if you don't realize it, then you've blinded yourself. +You've fallen behind in a score of fields because a decade or so ago, +in your years between 1957 and 1960, you made a disastrous decision. +In alarm at Russian progress, you adopted a campaign of combating +Russian science. You began educating your young people to combat +Russian progress."</p> + +<p>"We had to!"</p> + +<p>The alien grunted. "To the contrary, what you should have done was try +to excel Russian science, technology and industry. Had you done that +you might have continued to be the world's leading nation, until, at +least, some sort of world unity had been achieved. By deciding to +<i>combat</i> Russian progress you became a retarding force, a deliberate +drag on the development of your species, seeking to cripple and +restrain rather than to grow and develop. The way to win a race is not +to trip up your opponent, but to run faster and harder than he."</p> + +<p>Hank stared at him.</p> + +<p>The space alien came to his feet. "I am busy. Your missions, I +assume, have been successfully completed. You have seen one of our +group. Melodramatically, you have warned us against your enemy. Your +superiors should be gratified. And now I shall summon a guide to +return you to your hotels."</p> + +<p>A great deal went out of Hank Kuran. Until now the tenseness had been +greater than he had ever remembered in life. Now he was limp. In +response, he nodded.</p> + +<p>Loo sighed, returned the weapon which he had until now held in his +hand to a shoulder holster. "Yes," he said, meaninglessly. He turned +and looked at Hank Kuran wryly. "I have spent the better part of my +life learning to be an ultra-efficient security operative. I suspect +that my job has just become obsolete."</p> + +<p>"I have an idea that perhaps mine is too," Hank said.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>In the morning, the Progressive Tours group was scheduled to visit a +co-operative farm, specializing in poultry, on the outskirts of +Moscow. While the bus was loading Hank stopped off at the Grand +Hotel's Intourist desk.</p> + +<p>"Can I send a cable to the United States?"</p> + +<p>The chipper Intourist girl said "But of course." She handed him a +form.</p> + +<p>He wrote quickly:</p> + +<p> +SHERIDAN HENNESSEY<br /> +WASHINGTON, D. C. +</p> +<p class="p1">MISSION ACCOMPLISHED<br /> +<br /> +MORE SATISFACTORILY<br /> +THAN EXPECTED. +</p> +<p class="p2">HENRY KURAN</p> + + +<p>The girl checked it quickly. "But your name is Henry Stevenson."</p> + +<p>"That," Hank said, "was back when I was a cloak and dagger man."</p> + +<p>She blinked and looked after him as he walked out and climbed aboard +the tourist bus. He found an empty seat next to Char Moore and settled +into it.</p> + +<p>Char said evenly, "Ah, today you have time from your amorous pursuits +to join the rest of us."</p> + +<p>He raised an eyebrow at her. Jealousy? His chances were evidently +better than he had ever suspected. "I meant to tell you about that," +he said, "the first time we're by ourselves."</p> + +<p>"Hm-m-m," she said. Then, "We've been in Russia for several days now. +What do you think of it?"</p> + +<p>Hank said, "I think it's pretty good. And I have a sneaking suspicion +that in another ten years, when a few changes will have evolved, +she'll be better still."</p> + +<p>She looked at him blankly. "You <i>do</i>? Frankly, I've been somewhat +disappointed."</p> + +<p>"Sure. But wait'll you see <i>our</i> country in ten years. You know, Char, +this world of ours has just got started."</p> + + +<h3>THE END</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Combat, by Dallas McCord Reynolds + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMBAT *** + +***** This file should be named 30712-h.htm or 30712-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/7/1/30712/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Combat + +Author: Dallas McCord Reynolds + +Illustrator: Schoenherr + +Release Date: December 19, 2009 [EBook #30712] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMBAT *** + + + + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from Analog Science Fact & Fiction October + 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. + copyright on this publication was renewed. + + + + COMBAT + + + By MACK REYNOLDS + + + Illustrated by Schoenherr + + _An Alien landing on Earth might be readily misled, + victimized by a one-sided viewpoint. And then again ... it + might be the Earthmen who were misled...._ + + * * * * * + + + + +Henry Kuran answered a nod here and there, a called out greeting from +a desk an aisle removed from the one along which he was progressing, +finally made the far end of the room. He knocked at the door and +pushed his way through before waiting a response. + +There were three desks here. He didn't recognize two of the girls who +looked up at his entry. One of them began to say something, but then +Betty, whose desk dominated the entry to the inner sanctum, grinned a +welcome at him and said, "Hank! How was Peru? We've been expecting +you." + +"Full of Incas," he grinned back. "Incas, Russkies and Chinks. A poor +capitalist _conquistador_ doesn't have a chance. Is the boss inside?" + +"He's waiting for you, Hank. See you later." + +Hank said, "Um-m-m," and when the door clicked in response to the +button Betty touched, pushed his way into the inner office. + +Morton Twombly, chief of the department, came to his feet, shook hands +abruptly and motioned the other to a chair. + +"How're things in Peru, Henry?" His voice didn't express too much +real interest. + +Hank said, "We were on the phone just a week ago, Mr. Twombly. It's +about the same. No, the devil it is. The Chinese have just run in +their new People's Car. They look something like our jeep +station-wagons did fifteen years ago." + +Twombly stirred in irritation. "I've heard about them." + +Hank took his handkerchief from his breast pocket and polished his +rimless glasses. He said evenly, "They sell for just under two hundred +dollars." + +"Two hundred dollars?" Twombly twisted his face. "They can't transport +them from China for that." + +"Here we go again," Hank sighed. "They also can't sell pressure +cookers for a dollar apiece, nor cameras with f.2 lenses for five +bucks. Not to speak of the fact that the Czechs can't sell shoes for +fifty cents a pair and, of course, the Russkies can't sell premium +gasoline for five cents a gallon." + +Twombly muttered, "They undercut our prices faster than we can vote +through new subsidies. Where's it going to end Henry?" + +"I don't know. Perhaps we should have thought a lot more about it ten +or fifteen years ago when the best men our universities could turn out +went into advertising, show business and sales--while the best men the +Russkies and Chinese could turn out were going into science and +industry." As a man who worked in the field Hank Kuran occasionally +got bitter about these things, and didn't mind this opportunity of +sounding off at the chief. + +Hank added, "The height of achievement over there is to be elected to +the Academy of Sciences. Our young people call scientists egg-heads, +and their height of achievement is to become a TV singer or a movie +star." + +Morton Twombly shot his best field man a quick glance. "You sound as +though you need a vacation, Henry." + +Henry Kuran laughed. "Don't mind me, chief. I got into a hassle with +the Hungarians last week and I'm in a bad frame of mind." + +Twombly said, "Well, we didn't bring you back to Washington for a +trade conference." + +"I gathered that from your wire. What _am_ I here for?" + +Twombly pushed his chair back and came to his feet. It occurred to +Hank Kuran that his chief had aged considerably since the forming of +this department nearly ten years ago. The thought went through his +mind, _a general in the cold war. A general who's been in action for a +decade, has never won more than a skirmish and is currently in full +retreat._ + +Morton Twombly said, "I'm not sure I know. Come along." + +They left the office by a back door and Hank was in unknown territory. +Silently his chief led him through busy corridors, each one identical +to the last, each sterile and cold in spite of the bustling. They came +to a marine guarded door, were passed through, once again obviously +expected. + +The inner office contained but one desk occupied by a youthfully brisk +army major. He gave Hank a one-two of the eyes and said, "Mr. +Hennessey is expecting you, sir. This is Mr. Kuran?" + +"That's correct," Twombly said. "I won't be needed." He turned to Hank +Kuran. "I'll see you later, Henry." He shook hands. + +Hank frowned at him. "You sound as though I'm being sent off to +Siberia, or something." + +The major looked up sharply, "What was that?" + +Twombly made a motion with his hand, negatively. "Nothing. A joke. +I'll see you later, Henry." He turned and left. + +The major opened another door and ushered Hank into a room two or +three times the size of Twombly's office. Hank formed a silent whistle +and then suddenly knew where he was. This was the sanctum sanctorum of +Sheridan Hennessey. Sheridan Hennessey, right arm, hatchetman, _alter +ego_, one man brain trust--of two presidents in succession. + +And there he was, seated in a heavy armchair. Hank had known of his +illness, that the other had only recently risen from his hospital bed +and against doctor's orders. But somehow he hadn't expected to see him +this wasted. TV and newsreel cameramen had been kind. + +However, the waste had not as yet extended to either eyes or voice. +Sheridan Hennessey bit out, "That'll be all, Roy," and the major left +them. + + * * * * * + +"Sit down," Hennessey said. "You're Henry Kuran. That's not a Russian +name is it?" + +Hank found a chair. "It was Kuranchov. My father Americanized it when +he was married." He added, "About once every six months some +Department of Justice or C.I.A. joker runs into the fact that my name +was originally Russian and I'm investigated all over again." + +Hennessey said, "But your Russian is perfect?" + +"Yes, sir. My mother was English-Irish, but we lived in a community +with quite a few Russian born emigrants. I learned the language." + +"Good, Mr. Kuran, how would you like to die for your country?" + +Hank Kuran looked at him for a long moment. He said slowly, "I'm +thirty-two years old, healthy and reasonably adjusted and happy. I'd +hate it." + +The sick man snorted. "That's exactly the right answer. I don't trust +heroes. Now, how much have you heard about the extraterrestrials?" + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"You haven't heard the news broadcasts the past couple of days? How +the devil could you have missed them?" Hennessey was scowling sourly +at him. + +Hank Kuran didn't know what the other was talking about. "Two days ago +I was in the town of Machu Picchu in the Andes trying to peddle some +mining equipment to the Peruvians. Peddle it, hell. I was practically +trying to give it away, but it was still even-steven that the +Hungarians would undersell me. Then I got a hurry-up wire from Morton +Twombly to return to Washington soonest. I flew here in an Air Force +jet. I haven't heard any news for two days or more." + +"I'll have the major get you all the material we have to date and you +can read it on the plane to England." + +"Plane to England?" Hank said blankly. "Look, I'm in the Department of +Economic Development of Neutral Nations, specializing in South +America. What would I be doing in England?" He had an uneasy feeling +of being crowded, and a suspicion that this was far from the first +time Sheridan Hennessey had ridden roughshod over subordinates. + +"First step on the way to Moscow," Hennessey snapped. "The major will +give you details later. Let me brief you. The extraterrestrials landed +a couple of days ago on Red Square in some sort of spaceship. Our +Russkie friends clamped down a censorship on news. No photos at all as +yet and all news releases have come from Tass." + +Hank Kuran was bug-eying him. + +Hennessey said, "I know. Most of the time I don't believe it myself. +The extraterrestrials represent what the Russkies are calling a +Galactic Confederation. So far as we can figure out, there is some +sort of league, United Planets, or whatever you want to call it, of +other star systems which have achieved a certain level of scientific +development." + +"Well ... well, why haven't they shown up before?" + +"Possibly they have, through the ages. If so, they kept their presence +secret, checked on our development and left." Hennessey snorted his +indignation. "See here, Kuran, I have no details. All of our +information comes from Tass, and you can imagine how inadequate that +is. Now shut up while I tell you what little I do know." + +Henry Kuran settled back into his chair, feeling limp. He'd had too +many curves thrown at him in the past few minutes to assimilate. + +"They evidently keep hands off until a planet develops interplanetary +exploration and atomic power. And, of course, during the past few +years our Russkie pals have not only set up a base on the Moon but +have sent off their various expeditions to Venus and Mars." + +"None of them made it," Hank said. + +"Evidently they didn't have to. At any rate, the plenipotentiaries +from the Galactic Confederation have arrived." + +"Wanting what, sir?" Hank said. + +"Wanting nothing but to help." Hennessey said. "Stop interrupting. Our +time is limited. You're going to have to be on a jet for London in +half an hour." + +He noticed Hank Kuran's expression, and shook his head. "No, it's not +farfetched. These other intelligent life forms must be familiar with +what it takes to progress to the point of interplanetary travel. It +takes species aggressiveness--besides intelligence. And they must have +sense enough not to want the wrong kind of aggressiveness exploding +into the stars. They don't want an equivalent of Attila bursting over +the borders of the Roman Empire. They want to channel us, and they're +willing to help, to direct our comparatively new science into paths +that won't conflict with them. They want to bring us peacefully into +their society of advanced life forms." + +Sheridan Hennessey allowed himself a rueful grimace. "That makes quite +a speech, doesn't it? At any rate, that's the situation." + +"Well, where do I come into this? I'm afraid I'm on the bewildered +side." + +"Yes. Well, damn it, they've landed in Moscow. They've evidently +assumed the Soviet complex--the Soviet Union, China and the +satellites--are the world's dominant power. Our conflicts, our +controversies, are probably of little, if any, interest to them. +Inadvertently, they've put a weapon in the hands of the Soviets that +could well end this cold war we've been waging for more than +twenty-five years now." + +The president's right-hand man looked off into a corner of the room, +unseeingly. "For more than a decade it's been a bloodless combat that +we've been waging against the Russkies. The military machines, equally +capable of complete destruction of the other, have been stymied +Finally it's boiled down to an attempt to influence the neutrals, +India, Africa, South America, to attempt to bring them into one camp +or the other. Thus far, we've been able to contain them in spite of +their recent successes. But given the prestige of being selected the +dominant world power by the extraterrestrials and in possession of the +science and industrial know-how from the stars, they'll have won the +cold war over night." + +His old eyes flared. "You want to know where you come in, eh? Fine. +Your job is to get to these Galactic Confederation emissaries and put +a bug in their bonnet. Get over to them that there's more than one +major viewpoint on this planet. Get them to investigate our side of +the matter." + +"Get to them how? If the Russkies--" + +Hennessey was tired. The flash of spirit was fading. He lifted a thin +hand. "One of my assistants is crossing the Atlantic with you. He'll +give you the details." + +"But why _me_? I'm strictly a--" + +"You're an unknown in Europe. Never connected with espionage. You +speak Russian like a native. Morton Twombly says you're his best man. +Your records show that you can think on your feet, and that's what we +need above all." + +Hank Kuran said flatly, "You might have asked for volunteers." + +"We did. You, you and you. The old army game," Hennessey said wearily. +"Mr. Kuran, we're in the clutch. We can lose, forever--right now. +Right in the next month or so. Consider yourself a soldier being +thrown into the most important engagement the world has ever +seen--combating the growth of the Soviets. We can't afford such +luxuries as asking for volunteers. Now do you get it?" + +Hank Kuran could feel impotent anger rising inside him. He was off +balance. "I get it, but I don't like it." + +"None of us do," Sheridan Hennessey said sourly. "Do you think any of +us do?" He must have pressed a button. + +From behind them the major's voice said briskly, "Will you come this +way, Mr. Kuran?" + + * * * * * + +In the limousine, on the way out to the airport, the bright, +impossibly cleanly shaven C.I.A. man said, "You've never been behind +the Iron Curtain before, have you Kuran?" + +"No," Hank said. "I thought that term was passe. Look, aren't we even +going to my hotel for my things?" + +The second C.I.A. man, the older one, said, "All your gear will be +waiting for you in London. They'll be sure there's nothing in it to +tip off the KGB if they go through your bags." + +The younger one said, "We're not sure, things are moving fast, but we +suspect that that term, Iron Curtain, applies again." + +"Then how am I going to get in?" Hank said irritably. "I've had no +background for this cloak and dagger stuff." + +The older C.I.A. man said, "We understand the KGB has increased +security measures but they haven't cut out all travel on the part of +non-Communists." + +The other one said, "Probably because the Russkies don't want to tip +off the spacemen that they're being isolated from the western +countries. It would be too conspicuous if suddenly all western +travelers disappeared." + +They were passing over the Potomac, to the right and below them Hank +Kuran could make out the twin Pentagons, symbols of a military that +had at long last by its very efficiency eliminated itself. War had +finally progressed to the point where even a minor nation, such as +Cuba or Portugal, could completely destroy the whole planet. +Eliminated wasn't quite the word. In spite of their sterility, the +military machines still claimed their million masses of men, still +drained a third of the products of the world's industry. + +One of the C.I.A. men was saying urgently, "So we're going to send you +in as a tourist. As inconspicuous a tourist as we can make you. For +fifteen years the Russkies have boomed their tourist trade--all for +propaganda, of course. Now they're in no position to turn this tourist +flood off. If the aliens got wind of it, they'd smell a rat." + +Hank Kuran brought his attention back to them. "All right. So you get +me to Moscow as a tourist. What do I do then? I keep telling you +jokers that I don't know a thing about espionage. I don't know a +secret code from judo." + +"That's one reason the chief picked you. Not only do the Russkies have +nothing on you in their files--neither do our own people. You're safe +from betrayal. There are exactly six people who know your mission and +only one of them is in Moscow." + +"Who's he?" + +The C.I.A. man shook his head. "You'll never meet him. But he's making +the arrangements for you to contact the underground." + +Hank Kuran turned in his seat. "What underground? In Moscow?" + +The bright, pink faced C.I.A. man chuckled and began to say something +but the older one cut him off. "Let me, Jimmy." He continued to Hank. +"Actually, we don't know nearly as much as we should about it, but a +Soviet underground is there and getting stronger. You've heard of the +_stilyagi_ and the _metrofanushka_?" + +Hank nodded. "Moscow's equivalent to the juvenile delinquents, or the +Teddy Boys, as the British call them." + +"Not only in Moscow, they're everywhere in urban Russia. At any rate, +our underground friends operate within the _stilyagi_, the so-called +jet-set, using them as protective coloring." + +"This is new to me," Hank said. "And I don't quite get it." + +"It's clever enough. Suppose you're out late some night on an +underground job and the police pick you up. They find out you're a +juvenile delinquent, figure you've been out getting drunk, and toss +you into jail for a week. It's better than winding up in front of a +firing squad as a counterrevolutionary, or a Trotskyite, or whatever +they're currently calling anybody they shoot." + +The chauffeur rapped on the glass that divided their seat from his, +and motioned ahead. + +"Here's the airport," Jimmy said. "We'll drive right over to the +plane. Hid your face with your hat, just for luck." + +"Wait a minute, now," Hank said. "Listen, how do I contact these beat +generation characters?" + +"You don't. They contact you." + +"How." + +"That's up to them. Maybe they won't at all; they're plenty careful." +Jimmy snorted without humor. "It must be getting to be an instinct +with Russians by this time. Nihilists, Anarchists, Mensheviks, +Bolsheviks, now anti-Communists. Survival of the fittest. By this time +the Russian underground must consist of members that have bred true as +revolutionists. There've been Russian undergrounds for twenty +generations." + +"Hardly long enough to affect genetics," the older one said wryly. + +Hank said, "Let's stop being witty. I still haven't a clue as to how +Sheridan Hennessey expects me to get to these Galactic Confederation +people--or things, or whatever you call them." + +"They evidently are humanoid," Jimmy said. "Look more or less human. +And stop worrying, we've got several hours to explain things while we +cross the Atlantic. You don't step into character until you enter the +offices of Progressive Tours, in London." + + * * * * * + +The door of Progressive Tours, Ltd. 100 Rochester Row, was invitingly +open. Hank Kuran entered, looked around the small room. He inwardly +winced at the appearance of the girl behind the counter. What was it +about Commies outside their own countries that they drew such +crackpots into their camp? Heavy lenses, horn rimmed to make them more +conspicuous, wild hair, mawkish tweeds, and dirty fingernails to top +it off. + +She said, "What can I do for you, Comrade?" + +"Not _Comrade_," Hank said mildly. "I'm an American." + +"What did you want?" she said coolly. + +Hank indicated the travel folder he was carrying. "I'd like to take +this tour to Leningrad and Moscow. I've been reading propaganda for +and against Russia as long as I've been able to read and I've finally +decided I want to see for myself. Can I get the tour that leaves +tomorrow?" + +She became businesslike as was within her ability. "There is no +country in the world as easy to visit as the Soviet Union, Mr--" + +"Stevenson," Hank Kuran said. "Henry Stevenson." + +"Stevenson. Fill out these two forms, leave your passport and two +photos and we'll have everything ready in the morning. The _Baltika_ +leaves at twelve. The visa will cost ten shillings. What class do you +wish to travel?" + +"The cheapest." _And least conspicuous_, Hank added under his breath. + +"Third class comes to fifty-five guineas. The tour lasts eighteen days +including the time it takes to get to Leningrad. You have ten days in +Russia." + +"I know, I read the folder. Are there any other Americans on the +tour?" + +A voice behind him said, "At least one other." + +Hank turned. She was somewhere in her late twenties, he estimated. And +if her clothes, voice and appearance were any criterion he'd put her +in the middle-middle class with a bachelor's degree in something or +other, unmarried and with the aggressiveness he didn't like in +American girls after living the better part of eight years in Latin +countries. + +On top of that she was one of the prettiest girls he had ever seen, in +a quick, red headed, almost puckish sort of way. + +Hank tried to keep from displaying his admiration too openly. +"American?" he said. + +"That's right." She took in his five-foot ten, his not quite ruffled +hair, his worried eyes behind their rimless lenses, darkish tinted for +the Peruvian sun. She evidently gave him up as not worth the effort +and turned to the fright behind the counter. + +"I came to pick up my tickets." + +"Oh, yes, Miss...." + +"Moore." + +The fright fiddled with the papers on an untidy heap before her. "Oh, +yes. Miss Charity Moore." + +"Charity?" Hank said. + +She turned to him. "Do you mind? I have two sisters named Honor and +Hope. My people were the Seventh Day Adventists. It wasn't my fault." +Her voice was pleasant--but nature had granted that; it wasn't +particularly friendly--through her own inclinations. + +Hank cleared his throat and went back to his forms. The visa +questionnaire was in both Russian and English. The first line wanted, +_Surname, first name and patronymic_. + +To get the conversation going again, Hank said, "What does patronymic +mean?" + +Charity Moore looked up from her own business and said, less +antagonism in her voice, "That's the name you inherited from your +father." + +"Of course, thanks." He went back to his forms. Under _what type of +work do you do_, Hank wrote, _Capitalist in a small sort of way. Auto +Agency owner._ + +He took the forms back to the counter with his passport. Charity Moore +was putting her tickets, suitcase labels and a sheaf of tour +instructions into her pocketbook. + +Hank said, "Look, we're going to be on a tour together, what do you +say to a drink?" + +She considered that, prettily, "Well ... well, of course. Why not?" + +Hank said to the fright, "There wouldn't be a nice bar around would +there?" + +"Down the street three blocks and to your left is Dirty Dick's." She +added scornfully, "All the tourists go there." + +"Then we shouldn't make an exception," Hank said. "Miss Moore, my +arm." + + * * * * * + +On the way over she said, "Are you excited about going to the Soviet +Union?" + +"I wouldn't say excited. Curious, though." + +"You don't sound very sympathetic to them." + +"To Russia?" Hank said. "Why should I be? Personally, I believe in +democracy." + +"So do I," she said, her voice clipped. "I think we ought to try it +some day." + +"Come again?" + +"So far as I can see, we pay lip service to democracy, that's about +all." + +Hank grinned inwardly. He'd already figured that during this tour he'd +be thrown into contact with characters running in shade from gentle +pink to flaming red. His position demanded that he remain +inconspicuous, as _average_ an American tourist as possible. Flaring +political arguments weren't going to help this, but, on the other hand +to avoid them entirely would be apt to make him more conspicuous than +ever. + +"How do you mean?" he said now. + +"We have two political parties in our country without an iota of +difference between them. Every four years they present candidates and +give us a choice. What difference does it make which one of the two we +choose if they both stand for the same thing? This is democracy?" + +Hank said mildly, "Well, it's better than sticking up just one +candidate and saying, which one of this one do you choose? Look, let's +steer clear of politics and religion, eh? Otherwise this'll never turn +out to be a beautiful friendship." + +Charity Moore's face portrayed resignation. + +Hank said, "I'm Hank, what do they call you besides Charity?" + +"Everybody but my parents call me Chair. You spell it C-H-A-R but +pronounce it like Chair, like you sit in." + +"That's better," Hank said. "Let's see. There it is, Dirty Dick's. +Crummy looking joint. You want to go in?" + +"Yes," Char said. "I've read about it. An old coaching house. One of +the oldest pubs in London. Dickens wrote a poem about it." + +[Illustration] + +The pub's bar extended along the right wall, as they entered. To the +left was a sandwich counter with a dozen or so stools. It was too +early to eat, they stood at the ancient bar and Hank said to her, +"Ale?" and when she nodded, to the bartender, "Two Worthingtons." + +While they were being drawn, Hank turned back to the girl, noticing +all over again how impossibly pretty she was. It was disconcerting. He +said, "How come Russia? You'd look more in place on a beach in +Biarritz or the Lido." + +Char said, "Ever since I was about ten years of age I've been reading +about the Russian people starving to death and having to work six +months before making enough money to buy a pair of shoes. So I've +decided to see how starving, barefooted people managed to build the +largest industrial nation in the world." + +"Here we go again," Hank said, taking up his glass. He toasted her +silently before saying, "The United States is still the largest single +industrial nation in the world." + +"Perhaps as late as 1965, but not today," she said definitely. + +"Russia, plus the satellites and China has a gross national product +greater than the free world's but no single nation produces more than +the United States. What are you laughing at?" + +"I love the way the West plasters itself so nicely with high flown +labels. The _free world_. Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, Pakistan, South +Africa--just what is your definition of _free_?" + +Hank had her placed now. A college radical. One of the tens of +thousands who discover, usually somewhere along in the sophomore year, +that all is not perfect in the land of their birth and begin looking +around for answers. Ten to one she wasn't a Commie and would probably +never become one--but meanwhile she got a certain amount of kicks +trying to upset ideological applecarts. + +For the sake of staying in character, Hank said mildly, "Look here, +are you a Communist?" + +She banged her glass down on the bar with enough force that the +bartender looked over worriedly. "Did it ever occur to you that even +though the Soviet Union might be wrong--if it is wrong--that doesn't +mean that the United States is right? You remind me of that ... that +_politician_, whatever his name was, when I was a girl. Anybody who +disagreed with him was automatically a Communist." + +"McCarthy," Hank said. "I'm sorry, so you're not a Communist." + +She took up her glass again, still in a huff. "I didn't say I wasn't. +That's my business." + + * * * * * + +The turboelectric ship _Baltika_ turned out to be the pride of the +U.S.S.R. Baltic State Steamship Company. In fact, she turned out to be +the whole fleet. Like the rest of the world, the Soviet complex had +taken to the air so far as passenger travel was concerned and already +the _Baltika_ was a left-over from yesteryear. For some reason the +C.I.A. thought there might be less observation on the part of the KGB +if Hank approached Moscow indirectly, that is by sea and from +Leningrad. It was going to take an extra four or five days, but, if +he got through, the squandered time would have been worth it. + +An English speaking steward took up Hank's bag at the gangplank and +hustled him through to his quarters. His cabin was forward and four +flights down into the bowels of the ship. There were four berths in +all, two of them already had bags on them. Hank put his hand in his +pocket for a shilling. + +The steward grinned and said, "No tipping. This is a Soviet ship." + +Hank looked after him. + +A newcomer entered the cabin, still drying his hands on a towel. +"Greetings," he said. "Evidently we're fellow passengers for the +duration." He hung the towel on a rack, reached out a hand. +"Rodriquez," he said. "You can call me Paco, if you want. Did you ever +meet an Argentine that wasn't named Paco?" + +Hank shook the hand. "I don't know if I ever met an Argentine before. +You speak English well." + +"Harvard," Paco said. He stretched widely. "Did you spot those Russian +girls in the crew? Blond, every one blond." He grinned. "Not much time +to operate with them--but enough." + +A voice behind them, heavy with British accent said, "Good afternoon, +gentlemen." + +He was as ebony as a negro can get and as nattily dressed as only +Savile Row can turn out a man. He said, "My name is Loo Motlamelle." +He looked at them expressionlessly for a moment. + +Paco put out his hand briskly for a shake. "Rodriquez," he said. "Call +me Paco. I suppose we're all Moscow bound." + +Loo Motlamelle seemed relieved at his acceptance, clasped Paco's hand, +then Hank's. + +Hank shook his head as the three of them began to unpack to the extent +it was desirable for the short trip. "The classless society. I wonder +what First Class cabins look like. Here we are, jammed three in a +telephone booth sized room." + +Paco chucked, "My friend, you don't know the half of it. There are +_five_ classes on this ship. Needless to say, this is Tourist B, the +last." + +"And we'll probably be fed borsht and black bread the whole trip," +Hank growled. + +Loo Motlamelle said mildly, "I hear the food is very good." + +Paco stood up from his luggage, put his hands on his hips, "Gentlemen, +do you realize there is no lock on the door of this cabin?" + +"The crime rate is said to be negligible in the Soviet countries," Loo +said. + +Paco put up his hands in despair. "That isn't the point. Suppose one +of us wishes to bring a lady friend into the cabin for ... a drink. +How can he lock the door so as not to be interrupted?" + +Hank was chuckling. "What did you take this trip for, Paco? An +investigation into the mores of the Soviets--female flavor?" + +Paco went back to his bag. "Actually, I suppose I am one of the many. +Going to the new world to see whether or not it is worth switching +alliances from the old." + +A distant finger of cold traced designs in Henry Kuran's belly. He had +never heard the United States referred to as the Old World before. It +had a strange, disturbing quality. + +Loo, who was now reclined on his bunk, said, "That's approximately the +same reason I visit the Soviet Union." + +Hank said quietly, "Who's sending you, Paco? Or are you on your own?" + +"No, my North American friend. My lips are sealed but I represent a +rather influencial group. All is not jest, even though I find life the +easier if one laughs often and with joy." + +Hank closed his bag and slid it under his bunk. "Well, you should have +had this influencial group pony up a little more money so you could +have gone deluxe class." + +Paco looked at him strangely. "That is the point. We are not +interested in a red-carpet tour during which the very best would be +trotted our for propaganda purposes. I choose to see the New World as +humbly as is possible." + +"And me," Loo said. "We evidently are in much the same position." + +Hank brought himself into character. "Well, lesson number one. Did you +notice the teeth in that steward's face? Steel. Bright, gleaming +steel, instead of gold." + +Loo shrugged hugely. "This is the day of science. Iron rusts, it's +true, but I assume that the Soviet dentists utilize some method of +preventing corrosion." + +"Otherwise," Paco murmured reasonably, "I imagine the Russians +expectorate a good deal of rusty spittal." + +"I don't know why I keep getting into these arguments," Hank said. +"I'm just going for a look-see myself. But frankly, I don't trust a +Russian any farther than I can throw one." + +"How many Russians have you met?" Loo said mildly. "Or are your +opinions formed solely by what you have read in American +publications?" + +Hank frowned at him. "You seem to be a little on the anti-American +side." + +"I'm not," Loo said. "But not pro-American either. I find much that is +ridiculous in the propaganda of both the Soviets and the West." + +"Gentlemen," Paco said, "the conversation is fascinating, but I must +leave you. The ladies, crowding the decks above, know not that my +presence graces this ship. It shall be necessary that I enlighten +them. _Adios amigos!_" + + * * * * * + +The _Baltika_ displaced eight thousand four hundred ninety-six tons +and had accommodations for three hundred thirty passengers. Of these, +Hank Kuran estimated, approximately half were Scandinavians or British +being transported between London, Copenhagen, Stockholm and Helsinki +on the small liner's way to Leningrad. + +Of the tourists, some seventy-five or so, Hank estimated that all but +half a dozen were convinced that Russian skunks didn't stink, in spite +of the fact that thus far they'd never been there to have a whiff. The +few such as Loo Motlamelle, who was evidently the son of some African +paramount chief, and Paco Rodriquez, had also never been to Russia but +at least had open minds. + +Far from black bread and borscht, he found the food excellent. The +first morning they found caviar by the pound nestled in bowls of ice, +as part of breakfast. He said across the table to Paco, "Propaganda. I +wonder how many people in Russia eat caviar." + +Paco spooned a heavy dip of it onto his bread and grinned back. "This +type of propaganda I can appreciate. You Yankees should try it." + +Char was also eating at the other side of the community type table. +She said, "How many Americans eat as well as the passengers on United +States Lines ships?" + +It was as good an opportunity as any for Hank to place his character +in the eyes of his fellow Progressive Tours pilgrims. His need was to +establish himself as a moderately square tourist on his way to take a +look-see at highly publicized Russia. Originally, the C.I.A. men had +wanted him to be slightly pro-Soviet, but he hadn't been sure he could +handle that convincingly enough. More comfortable would be a role as +an averagely anti-Russian tourist--not fanatically so, but averagely. +If there were any KGB men aboard, he wanted to dissolve into +mediocrity so far as they were concerned. + +Hank said now, mild indignation in his voice. "Do you contend that the +average Russian eats as well as the average American?" + +Char took a long moment to finish the bite she had in her mouth. She +shrugged prettily. "How would I know? I've never been to the Soviet +Union." She paused for a moment before adding, "However, I've done a +certain amount of traveling and I can truthfully say that the worst +slums I have ever seen in any country that can be considered civilized +were in the Harlem district and the lower East Side of New York." + +All eyes were turned to him now, so Hank said, "It's a big country and +there are exceptions. But on the average the United States has the +highest standard of living in the world." + +Paco said interestedly, "What do you use for a basis of measurement, +my friend? Such things as the number of television sets and movie +theaters? To balance such statistics, I understand that per capita +your country has the fewest number of legitimate theaters of any of--I +use Miss Moore's term--the civilized countries." + +A Londoner, two down from Hank, laughed nastily. "Maybe schooling is +the way he measures. I read in the _Express_ the other day that even +after Yankees get out of college they can't read proper. All they +learn is driving cars and dancing and togetherness--wotever that it." + +Hank grinned inwardly and thought, _You don't sound as though you read +any too well yourself, my friend._ Aloud he said, "Very well, in a +couple of days we'll be in the promised land, I contend that free +enterprise performs the greatest good for the greatest number." + +"Free enterprise," somebody down the table snorted. "That means the +freedom for the capitalists to pry somebody else out of the greatest +part of what he produces." + +By the time they'd reached Leningrad aside from Paco and Loo, his +cabinmates, Hank had built an Iron Curtain all of his own between +himself and the other members of the Progressive Tours trip. Which was +the way he wanted it. He could foresee a period when having friends +might be a handicap when and if he needed to drift away from the main +body for any length of time. + +Actually, the discussions he ran into were on the juvenile side. Hank +Kuran hadn't spent eight years of his life as a field man working +against the Soviet countries in the economic sphere without running +into every argument both pro and con in the continuing battle between +Capitalism and Communism. Now he chuckled to himself at getting into +tiffs over the virtues of Russian black bread versus American white, +or whether Soviet jets were faster than those of the United States. + +With Char Moore, though she tolerated Hank's company, in fact, seemed +to prefer it to that of whatever other males were aboard, it was +continually a matter of rubbing fur the wrong way. She was ready to +battle it out on any phase of politics, international affairs or West +versus East. + +But it was the visitors from space that actually dominated the +conversation of the ship--crew, tourists, business travelers, or +whoever. Information was still limited, and Taas the sole source. +Daily there were multilingual radio broadcasts tuned in by the +_Baltika_ but largely they added little to the actual information on +the extraterrestrials. It was mostly Soviet back-patting on the +significance of the fact that the Galactic Confederation emissaries +had landed in the Soviet complex rather than among the Western +countries. + +Hank learned little that he hadn't already known. The Kremlin had all +but laughingly declined a suggestion on the part of Switzerland that +the extraterrestrials be referred to that all but defunct United +Nations. The delegates from the Galactic Confederation had chose to +land in Moscow. In Moscow they should remain until they desired to go +elsewhere. The Soviet implication was that the alien emissaries had no +desire, intention nor reason to visit other sections of Earth. They +had contacted the dominant world power and could complete their +business within the Kremlin walls. + + * * * * * + +Leningrad came as only a mild surprise to Henry Kuran. With his +knowledge of Russian and his position in Morton Twombly's department, +he had kept up with the Soviet progress though the years. + +As early as the middle 1950s unbiased travelers to the U.S.S.R. had +commented in detail upon the explosion of production in the country. +By the end of the decade such books as Gunther's "Inside Russia Today" +had dwelt upon the ultra-cleanliness of the cities, the mushrooming of +apartment houses, the easing of the restrictions of Stalin's day--or +at least the beginning of it. + +He actually hadn't expected peasant clad, half starved Russians +furtively shooting glances at their neighbors for fear of the secret +police. Nor a black bread and cabbage diet. Nor long lines of the +politically suspect being hauled off to Siberia. But on the other hand +he was unprepared for the prosperity he did find. + +[Illustration] + +Not that this was any paradise, worker's or otherwise. But it still +came as a mild surprise. Henry Kuran couldn't remember so far back +that he hadn't had his daily dose of anti-Russianism. Not unless it +was for the brief respite during the Second World War when for a +couple of years the Red Army had been composed of heroes and Stalin +had overnight become benevolent old Uncle Joe. + +There weren't as many cars on the streets as in American cities, but +there were more than he had expected nor were they 1955 model +Packards. So far as he could see, they were approximately the same +cars as were being turned out in Western Europe. + +Public transportation, he admitted, was superior to that found in the +Western capitals. Obviously, it would have to be, without automobiles, +buses, streetcars and subways would have to carry the brunt of +traffic. However, it was the spotless efficiency of public +transportation that set him back. + +The shops were still short of the pinnacles touched by Western +capitals. They weren't empty of goods, luxury goods as well as +necessities, but they weren't overflowing with the endless quantities, +the hundred-shadings of quality and fashion that you expected in the +States. + +But what struck nearest to him was the fact that the people in the +streets were not broken spirited depressed, humorless drudges. In +fact, why not admit it, they looked about the same as people in the +streets anywhere else. Some laughed, some looked troubled. Children +ran and played. Lovers held hands and looked into each other's eyes. +Some reeled under an overload of vodka. Some hurried along, business +bent. Some dawdled, window shopped, or strolled along for the air. +Some read books or newspapers as they shuffled, radar directed, and +unconscious of the world about them. + +They were only a day and half in Leningrad. They saw the Hermitage, +comparable to the Louvre and far and above any art museum in America. +They saw the famous subway--which deserved its fame. They were ushered +through a couple of square miles of the Elektrosile electrical +equipment works, claimed ostentatiously by the to be the largest in +the world. They ate in restaurants as good as any Hank Kuran had been +able to afford at home and stayed one night at the Astoria Hotel. + +At least, Hank had the satisfaction of grumbling about the plumbing. + +Paco and Loo, the only single bachelors on the tour besides himself, +were again quartered with him at the Astoria. + +Paco said, "My friend, there I agree with you completely. America has +the best plumbing in the world. And the most." + +Hank was pulling off his shoes after an arch-breaking day of +sightseeing. "Well, I'm glad I've finally found some field where it's +agreeable that the West is superior to the Russkies." + +Loo was stretched out on his bed, in stocking feet, gazing at the +ceiling which towered at least fifteen feet above him. He said "In the +town where I was born, there were three bathrooms, one in the home of +the missionary, one in the home of the commissioner, and one in my +father's palace." He looked up at Hank. "Or is my country considered +part of the Western World?" + +Paco laughed. "Come to think of it, I doubt if one third the rural +homes of Argentina have bathrooms. Hank, my friend, I am afraid Loo is +right. You use the word _West_ too broadly. All the capitalist world +is not so advanced as the United States. You have been very lucky, you +Yankees." + +Hank sank into one of the huge, Victorian era armchairs. "Luck has +nothing to do with it. America is rich because private enterprise +_works_." + +"Of course," Paco pursued humorously, "the fact that your country +floats on a sea of oil, has some of the richest forest land in the +world, is blessed with some of the greatest mineral deposits anywhere +and millions of acres of unbelievably fertile land has nothing to do +with it." + +"I get your point," Hank said. "The United States was handed the +wealth of the world on a platter. But that's only part of it." + +"Yes," Loo agreed. "Also to be considered is the fact that for more +than a hundred years you have never had a serious war, serious, that +is, in that your land was not invaded, your industries destroyed." + +"That's to our credit. We're a peace loving people." + +Loo laughed abruptly. "You should tell that to the American Indians." + +Hank scowled over at him. "What'd you mean by that Loo? That has all +the elements of a nasty crack." + +"Or tell it to the Mexicans. Isn't that where you got your whole +South-west?" + +Hank looked from Loo to Paco and back. + + * * * * * + +Paco brought out cigarettes and tossed one to each of the others. +"Aren't these long Russian cigarettes the end? I heard somebody say +that by the time the smoke got through all the filter, you'd lost the +habit." He looked over at Hank. "Easy my friend, easy. On a trip like +this it would be impossible not to continually be comparing East and +West, dwelling continually on politics, the pros and cons of both +sides. All of us are continually assimilating what we hear and see. +Among other things, I note that on the newsstands there are no +publications from western lands. Why? Because still, after fifty +years, our Communist bureaucracy dare not allow its people to read +what they will. I note, too, that the shops on 25th October Avenue are +not all directed toward the Russian man on the street, unless he is +paid unbelievably more than we have heard. Sable coats? Jewelery? +Luxurious furniture? I begin to suspect that our Soviet friends are +not quite so classless as Mr. Marx had in mind when he and Mr. Engels +worked out the rough framework of the society of the future." + +Loo said seriously, "Oh, there are a great many things of that type to +notice here in the Soviet Union." + +Hank had to grin. "Well, I'm glad you jokers still have open minds." + +Paco waggled a finger negatively at him. "We've had open minds all +along, my friend. It is yours that seems closed. In spite of the fact +that I spent four years in your country I sometimes confess I don't +understand you Americans. I think you are too immersed in your TV +programs, your movies and your light fiction." + +"I can feel myself being saddled up again," Hank complained. "All set +for another riding." + +Loo laughed softly, his perfect white teeth gleaming in his black +face. + +Paco said, "You seem to have the fictional _good guys and bad guys_ +outlook. And, in this world of controversy, you assume that you are +the good guys, the heroes, and since that is so then the Soviets must +be the bad guys. And, as in the movies, everything the good guys do is +fine and everything the bad guys do, is evil. I sometimes think that +if the Russians had developed a cure for cancer first you Americans +would have refused to use it." + +Hank had had enough. He said, "Look, Paco, there are two hundred +million Americans. For you, or anyone else, to come along and try to +lump that many people neatly together is pure silliness. You'll find +every type of person that exists in the world in any country. The very +tops of intelligence, and submorons living in institutions; the most +highly educated of scientists, and men who didn't finish grammar +school; you'll find saints, and gangsters; infant prodigies and +juvenile delinquents; and millions upon millions of just plain +ordinary people much like the people of Argentina, or England, or +France or whatever. True enough, among all our two hundred million +there are some mighty prejudiced people, some mighty backward ones, +and some downright foolish ones. But if you think the United States +got to the position she's in today through the efforts of a whole +people who are foolish, then you're obviously pretty far off the beam +yourself." + +Paco was looking at him narrowly. "Accepted, friend Hank, and I +apologize. That's quite the most effective outburst I've heard from +you in this week we've known each other. It occurs to me that perhaps +you are other than I first thought." + +_Oh, oh._ Hank backtracked. He said, "Good grief, let's drop it." + +Paco said, "Well, just to change the subject, gentlemen, there is one +thing above all that I noted here in Leningrad." + +"What was that?" Loo said. + +"It's the only town I've ever seen where I felt an urge to kiss a +cop," Paco said soulfully. "Did you notice? Half the traffic police in +town are cute little blondes." + +Loo rolled over. "A fascinating observation, but personally I am going +to take a nap. Tonight it's the Red Arrow Express to Moscow and rest +might be in order, particularly if the train has square wheels, burns +wood and stops and repairs bridges all along the way, as I'm sure Hank +believes." + +Hank reached down, got hold of one of his shoes and heaved it. + +"Missed!" Loo grinned. + + * * * * * + +The Red Arrow Express had round wheels, burned Diesel fuel and made +the trip between Leningrad and Moscow overnight. In one respect, it +was the most unique train ride Hank Kuran had ever had. The track +contained not a single curve from the one city to the other. Its +engineers must have laid the roadbed out with a ruler. + +The cars like the rest of public transportation, were as comfortable +as any Hank knew. Traveling second class, as the Progressive Tours +pilgrims did, involved four people in a compartment for the night, +with one exception. At the end of the car was a smaller compartment +containing two bunks only. + +The Intourist guide who had shepherded them around Leningrad took them +to the train, saw them all safely aboard, told them another Intourist +employee would pick them up at the station in Moscow. + +It was late. Hank was assigned the two-bunk compartment. He put his +glasses on the tiny window table, sat on the edge of the lower and +began to pull off his shoes. He didn't look up when the door opened +until a voice said, icebergs dominating the tone, "Just what are you +doing in here?" + +Hank blinked up at her. "Hello, Char. What?" + +Char Moore snapped, "I said, what are you doing in my compartment?" + +"Yours? Sorry, the conductor just assigned me here. Evidently there's +been some mistake." + +"I suggest you rectify it, Mr. Stevenson." + +Out in the corridor a voice, heavy with Britishisms, complained +plaintively, "Did you ever hear the loik? They put men and women into +the same compartment. Oim expected to sleep with a loidy in the bunk +under me." + +Hank cleared his throat, didn't allow himself the luxury of a smile. +He said, "I'll see what I can do, Char. Seems to me I did read +somewhere that the Russkies see nothing wrong in putting strangers in +the same sleeping compartment." + +Char Moore stood there, saying nothing but breathing deeply enough to +express American womanhood insulted. + +"All right, all right," he said, retying his shoes and retrieving his +glasses. "I didn't engineer this." He went looking for the conductor. + +He was back, yawning by this time, fifteen minutes later. Char Moore +was sitting on the side of the bottom bunk, sipping a glass of tea +that she'd bought for a few kopecks from the portress. She looked up +coolly as he entered, but her voice was more pleasant. "Get everything +fixed?" + +Hank said, "What bunk do you want, upper or lower?" + +"That's not funny." + +"It's not supposed to be." Hank pulled his bag from under the bunk and +from it drew pajamas and his dressing gown. "Check with the rest of +the tour if you want. The conductor couldn't care less. We were +evidently assigned compartments by Intourist and where we were +assigned we'll sleep. Either that or you can stand in the corridor all +night. I'll be damned if I will." + +"You don't have to swear," Char bit out testily. "What are we going to +do about it?" + +"I just told you what I was going to do." Taking up his things he +opened the door. "I'll change in the men's dressing room." + +"I'll lock the door," Char Moore snapped. + +Hank grinned at her. "I'll bet that if you do the conductor either has +a passkey or will break it down for me." + +When he returned in slippers, nightrobe and pajamas, Char was in the +upper berth, staring angrily at the compartment ceiling. There were no +hooks or other facilities for hanging or storing clothes. She must +have put all of her things back into her bag. Hank grinned inwardly, +carefully folded his own pants and jacket over his suitcase before +climbing into the bunk. + +"Don't snore, do you?" he said conversationally. + +No answer. + +"Or walk in your sleep?" + +"You're not funny, Mr. Stevenson." + +"That's what I like about this country," Hank said. "Progressive. Way +ahead of the West. Shucks, modesty is a reactionary capitalistic +anachronism. Shove 'em all into bed together, that's what I always +say." He laughed. + +"Oh, shut up," Char said. But then she laughed, too. "Actually, I +suppose there's nothing wrong with it. We are rather Victorian about +such things in the States." + +Hank groaned. "There you are. If a railroad company at home suggested +you spend the night in a compartment with a strange man, you'd sue +them. But here in the promised land it's O.K." + +After a short silence Char said, "Hank, why do you dislike the Soviet +Union so much?" + +"Why? Because I'm an American!" + +She said so softly as to be almost inaudible, "I've known you for a +week now. Somehow you don't really seem to be the type who would make +that inadequate a statement." + +Hank said "Look, Char. There's a cold war going on between the United +States and her allies and the Soviet complex. I'm on our side. It's +going to be one or the other." + +"No it isn't, Hank. If it ever breaks out into hot war, it's going to +be both. That is, unless the extraterrestrials add some new elements +to the whole disgusting situation." + +"Let's put it another way. Why are you so pro-Soviet?" + +She raised herself on one elbow and scowled down over the edge of her +bunk at him. Inside, Hank turned over twice to see the unbound red +hair, the serious green eyes. Imagine looking at that face over the +breakfast table for the rest of your life. The hell with South +American senoritas. + +Char said earnestly, "I'm not. Confound it, Hank, can't the world get +any further than this cowboys and Indians relationship between +nations? Our science and industry has finally developed to the point +where the world could be a paradise. We've solved all the problems of +production. We've conquered all the major diseases. We have the +wonders of eternity before us--and look at us." + +"Tell that to the Russkies and their pals. They're out for the works." + +"Well, haven't we been?" + +"The United States isn't trying to take over the world." + +"No? Possibly not in the old sense of the word, but aren't we trying +desperately to sponsor our type of government and social system +everywhere? Frankly, I'm neither pro-West nor pro-Soviet. I think +they're both wrong." + +"Fine," Hank said. "What is your answer?" + +She remained silent for a long time. Finally, "I don't claim to have +an answer. But the world is changing like crazy. Science, technology, +industrial production, education, population all are mushrooming. For +us to claim that sweeping and basic changes aren't taking place in the +Western nations is just nonsense. Our own country's institutions +barely resemble the ones we had when you and I were children. And +certainly the Soviet Union has changed and is changing from what it +was thirty or forty years ago." + +"Listen, Char," Hank said in irritation, "you still haven't come up +with any sort of an answer to the cold war." + +"I told you I hadn't any. All I say is that I'm sick of it. I can't +remember so far back that there wasn't a cold war. And the more I +consider it the sillier it looks. Currently the United States and her +allies spend between a third and a half of their gross national +product on the military--ha! the military!--and in fighting the Soviet +complex in international trade." + +"Well," Hank said, "I'm sick of it, too, and I haven't any answer +either, but I'll be darned if I've heard the Russkies propose one. And +just between you and me, if I had to choose between living Soviet +style and our style, I'd choose ours any day." + +Char said nothing. + +Hank added flatly, "Who knows, maybe the coming of these Galactic +Confederation characters will bring it all to a head." + +She said nothing further and in ten minutes the soft sounds of her +breathing had deepened to the point that Hank Kuran knew she slept. He +lay there another half hour in the full knowledge that probably the +most desirable woman he'd ever met was sleeping less than three feet +away from him. + + * * * * * + +Leningrad had cushioned the first impression of Moscow for Henry +Kuran. Although, if anything, living standards and civic beauty were +even higher here in the capital city of world Communism. + +They pulled into the Leningradsky Station on Komsomolskaya Square in +the early morning to be met by Intourist guides and buses. + +Hank sat next to Char Moore still feeling on the argumentative side +after their discussion of the night before. He motioned with his head +at some excavation work going on next to the station. "There you are. +Women doing manual labor." + +Char said, "I'm from the Western states, it doesn't impress me. Have +you ever seen fruit pickers, potato diggers, or just about any type of +itinerant harvest workers? There is no harder work and women, and +children for that matter, do half of it at home." + +He looked at the husky, rawboned women laborers working shoulder to +shoulder with the men. "I still don't like it." + +Char shrugged. "Who does? The sooner we devise machines to do all the +drudgery the better off the world will be." + +To his surprise, Hank found Moscow one of the most beautiful cities he +had ever observed. Certainly the downtown area in the vicinity of the +Kremlin compared favorably with any. + +The buses whisked them down through Lermontovskaya Square, down Kirov +Street to Novaya and then turned right. The Intourist guide made with +a running commentary. There was the famous Bolshoi Theater and there +Sverdlova Square, a Soviet cultural center. + +Hank didn't know it then but they were avoiding Red Square. They +circled it, one block away, and pulled onto Gorky Street and before a +Victorian period building. + +"The Grand Hotel," the guide announced, "where you will stay during +your Moscow visit." + +Half a dozen porters began manhandling their bags from the top of the +bus. They were ushered into the lobby and assigned rooms. Russian +hotel lobbies were a thing apart. No souvenir stands, no bellhops, no +signs saying _To the Bar_, _To the Barber Shop_ or to anything else. A +hotel was a hotel, period. + +Hank trailed Loo and Paco and three porters to the second floor and to +the room they were assigned in common. Like the Astoria's rooms, in +Leningrad, it was king-sized. In fact, it could easily have been +divided into three chambers. There were four full sized beds, six arm +chairs, two sofas, two vanity tables, a monstrous desk--and one wash +bowl which gurgled when you ran water. + +Paco, hands on hips, stared around. "A dance hall," he said. +"Gentlemen, this room hasn't changed since some Grand Duke stayed in +it before the revolution." + +Loo, who had assumed his usual prone position on one of the beds, +said, "From what I've heard about Moscow housing, you could get an +average family in this amount of space." + +Hank was stuffing clothes into a dresser drawer. "Now who's making +with anti-Soviet comments?" + +Paco laughed at him. "Have you ever seen some of the housing in the +Harlem district in New York? You can rent a bed in a room that has +possibly ten beds, for an eight-hour period. When your eight hours are +up you roll out and somebody else rolls in. The beds are kept warm, +three shifts every twenty-four hours." + +Hank shook his head and muttered, "They call me Dobbin, I've been +ridden so much." + +Paco laughed and rubbed his hands together happily. "It's still early. +We have nothing to do until lunch time. I suggest we sally forth and +take a look at Russian womanhood. One never knows." + +Loo said, "As an alternative, I suggest we rest until lunch." + +Paco snorted. "A rightest-Trotskyite wrecker, and an imperialist +war-monger to boot." + +Loo said, dead panned, "Smile when you say that stranger." + +Hank said, "Hey, wait a minute." + +He went down the room to the far window and bug-eyed. One block away, +at the end of Gorky Street, was Red Square. St. Basil's Cathedral at +the far end, and unbelievable candy-cane construction of fanciful +spirals, and every-colored turrets; the red marble mausoleum, Mecca of +world Communism, housing the prophet Lenin and his two disciples; the +long drab length of the GUM department store opposite. But it wasn't +these. + +There on the square, nestled in the corner between St. Basil's and +the mausoleum, squatted what Henry Kuran had never really expected to +see, in spite of his assignment, in spite of news broadcasts, in spite +of everything to the contrary. Boomerang shaped, resting on short +stilts, six of them in all, a baby blue in color--an impossibly +beautiful baby blue. + +The spaceship. + +Paco stood at one shoulder, Loo at the other. + +For once there was no humor in Paco's words. "There it is," he said. +"Our visitors from the stars." + +"Possibly our teachers from the stars," Hank said huskily. + +"Or our judges." Loo's voice was flat. + +They stood there for another five minutes in silence. Loo said +finally, "Undoubtedly our Intourist guides will take us nearer, if +that's allowed, later during our stay. Meanwhile, my friends, I shall +rest up for the occasion." + +"Let's take our quick look at the city," Paco said to Hank. "Once the +Intourist people take over they'll run our feet off. Frankly, I have +little interest in where the first shot of the revolution was fired, +the latest tractor factory, or where Rasputin got it in the neck. +There are more important things." + +"We know," Loo said from the bed. "Women." + +"Right!" + + * * * * * + +Hank was wondering whether or not to leave the room. The _Stilyagi_ +were to contact him. Where? When? Obviously, he'd need their help. He +had no idea whatsoever on how to penetrate to the Interplanetary +emissaries. + +[Illustration] + +He spoke Russian. Fine. So what? Could he simply march up to the +spacecraft and knock on the door? Or would he make himself dangerously +conspicuous by just getting any closer than he now was to the craft? + +As he stood now, he felt he was comparatively safe. He was sure the +Russkies had marked him down as a rather ordinary American. Heavens +knows, he'd worked hard enough at the role. A simple, average tourist, +a little on the square side, and not even particularly articulate. + +However, he wasn't going to accomplish much by remaining here in this +room. He doubted that the _Stilyagi_ would get in touch with him +either by phone or simply knocking at the door. + +"O.K., Paco," he said. "Let's go. In search of the pin-up girl--Moscow +style." + +They walked down to the lobby and started for the door. + +One of the Intourist guides who had brought them from the railroad +station stood to one side of the stairs. "Going for a walk, gentlemen? +I suggest you stroll up Gorky Street, it's the main shopping center." + +Paco said, "How about going over into Red Square to see the +spaceship?" + +The guide shrugged. "I don't believe the guards will allow you to get +too near. It would be undesirable to bother the Galactic delegates to +the Soviet Union." + +That was one way of wording it, Hank thought glumly. _The Galactic +delegates to the Soviet Union._ Not to the Earth, but to the Soviet +Union. He wondered what the neutrals in such countries as India were +thinking. + +But at least there were no restrictions on Paco and him. + +They strolled up Gorky Street, jam packed with fellow pedestrians. +Shoppers, window-shoppers, men on the prowl for girls, girls on the +prowl for men, Ivan and his wife taking the baby for a stroll, street +cleaners at the endless job of keeping Moscow's streets the neatest in +the world. + +Paco pointed out this to Hank, Hank pointed out that to Paco. Somehow +it seemed more than a visit to a western European nation. This was +Moscow. This was the head of the Soviet snake. + +And then Hank had to laugh inwardly at himself as two youngsters, +running along playing tag in a grown-up world of long legs and stolid +pace, all but tripped him up. Head of a snake it might be, but +Moscow's people looked astonishingly like those of Portland, Maine or +Portland, Oregon. + +"How do you like those two, coming now?" Paco said. + +Those two coming now consisted of two better than averagely dressed +girls who would run somewhere in their early twenties. A little too +much make-up by western standards, and clumsily applied. + +"Blondes," Paco said soulfully. + +"They're all blondes here," Hank said. + +"Wonderful, isn't it?" + +The girls smiled at them in passing and Paco turned to look after, but +they didn't stop. Hank and Paco went on. + +It didn't take Hank long to get onto Paco's system. It was beautifully +simple. He merely smiled widely at every girl that went by. If she +smiled back, he stopped and tried to start a conversation with her. + +He got quite a few rebuffs but--Hank remembered an old joke--on the +other hand he got quite a bit of response. + +Before they had completed a block and a half of strolling, they were +standing on a corner, trying to talk with two of Moscow's younger +set--female variety. Here again, Paco was a wonder. His languages were +evidently Spanish, English and French but he was in there pitching +with a language the full vocabulary of which consisted of _Da_ and +_Neit_ so far as he was concerned. + +Hank stood back a little, smiling, trying to stay in character, but in +amused dismay at the other's aggressive abilities. + +Paco said, "Listen, I think I can get these two to come up to the +room. Which one do you like?" + +Hank said, "If they'll come up to the room, then they're +professionals." + +Paco grinned at him. "I'm a professional, too. A lawyer by trade. It's +just a matter of different professions." + +A middle-aged pedestrian, passing by, said to the girls in Russian, +"Have you no shame before the foreign tourists?" + +They didn't bother to answer. Paco went back to his attempt to make a +deal with the taller of the two. + +The smaller, who sported astonishingly big and blue eyes, said to Hank +in Russian, "You're too good to associate with _metrofanushka_ girls?" + +Hank frowned puzzlement. "I don't speak Russian," he said. + +She laughed lightly, almost a giggle, and, in the same low voice her +partner was using on Paco, said, "I think you do, Mr. Kuran. In the +afternoon, tomorrow, avoid whatever tour the Intourist people wish to +take you on and wander about Sovietska Park." She giggled some more. +The world-wide epitome of a girl being picked up on the street. + +Hank took her in more closely. Possibly twenty-five years of age. The +skirt she was wearing was probably Russian, it looked sturdy and +durable, but the sweater was one of the new American fabrics. Her +shoes were probably western too, the latest flared heel effect. A +typical _stilyagi_ or _metrofanushka_ girl, he assumed. Except for one +thing--her eyes were cool and alert, intelligent beyond those of a +street pickup. + +Paco said, "What do you think, Hank? This one will come back to the +hotel with me." + +"Romeo, Romeo," Hank sighed, "wherefore do thou think thou art?" + +Paco shrugged. "What's the difference? Buenos Aires, New York, +Moscow. Women are women." + +"And men are evidently men," Hank said. "You do what you want." + +"O.K., friend. Do you mind staying out of the room for a time?" + +"Don't worry about me, but you'll have to get rid of Loo, and he +hasn't had his eighteen hours sleep yet today." + +Paco had his girl by the arm. "I'll roll him into the hall. He'll +never wake up." + +Hank's girl made a moue at him, shrugged as though laughing off the +fact that she had been rejected, and disappeared into the crowds. Hank +stuck his hands in his pockets and went on with his stroll. + +The contact with the underground had been made. + + * * * * * + +Maintaining his front as an American tourist he wandered into several +stores, picked up some amber brooches at a bargain rate, fingered +through various books in English in an international bookshop. That +was one thing that hit hard. The bookshops were packed. Prices were +remarkably low and people were buying. In fact, he'd never seen a +country so full of people reading and studying. The park benches were +loaded with them, they read as the rode on streetcar and bus, they +read as they walked along the street. He had an uneasy feeling that +the jet-set kids were a small minority, that the juvenile delinquent +problem here wasn't a fraction what it was in the West. + +He'd expected to be followed. In fact, that had puzzled him when he +first was given this unwanted assignment by Sheridan Hennessey. How +was he going to contact this so-called underground if he was watched +the way he had been led to believe Westerners were? + +But he recalled their conducted tour of the Hermitage Museum in +Leningrad. The Intourist guide had started off with twenty-five +persons and had clucked over them like a hen all afternoon. In spite +of her frantic efforts to keep them together, however, she returned to +the Astoria Hotel that evening with eight missing--including Hank and +Loo who had wandered off to get a beer. + +The idea of the KGB putting tails on the tens of thousands of tourists +that swarmed Moscow and Leningrad, became a little on the ridiculous +side. Besides, what secret does a tourist know, or what secrets could +he discover? + +At any rate, Hank found no interference in his wanderings. He +deliberately avoided Red Square and its spaceship, taking no chances +on bringing himself to attention. Short of that locality, he wandered +freely. + +At noon they ate at the Grand and the Intourist guide outlined the +afternoon program which involved a general sightseeing tour ranging +from the University to the Park of Rest and Culture, Moscow's +equivalent of Coney Island. + +Loo said, "That all sounds very tiring, do we have time for a nap +before leaving?" + +"I'm afraid not, Mr. Motlamelle," the guide told him. + +Paco shook his head. "I've seen a university, and I've seen a sport +stadium and I've seen statues and monuments. I'll sit this one out." + +"I think I'll lie this one out," Loo said. He complained plaintively +to Hank. "You know what happened to me this morning, just as I was +napping up in our room?" + +"Yes," Hank said, "I was with our Argentine Casanova when he picked +her up." + + * * * * * + +Hank took the conducted tour with the rest. If he was going to beg off +the next day, he'd be less conspicuous tagging along on this one. +Besides it gave him the lay of the land. + +And he took the morning trip the next day, the automobile factories on +the outskirts of town. It had been possibly fifteen years since Hank +had been through Detroit but he doubted greatly that automation had +developed as far in his own country as it seemed to have here. Or, +perhaps, this was merely a showplace. But he drew himself up at that +thought. That was one attitude the Western world couldn't +afford--deprecating Soviet progress. This was the very thing that had +led to such shocks as the launching of the early Sputniks. +Underestimate your adversary and sooner or later you paid for it. + +The Soviets had at long last built up a productive machine as great as +any. Possibly greater. In sheer tonnage they were turning out more +gross national product than the West. This was no time to be +underestimating them. + +All this was a double interest to a field man in Morton Twombly's +department, working against the Soviets in international trade. He was +beginning to understand at least one of the reasons why the Commies +could sell their products at such ridiculously low prices. Automation +beyond that of the West. In the Soviet complex the labor unions were +in no position to block the introduction of ultra-efficient methods, +and featherbedding was unheard of. If a Russian worker's job was +_automated_ out from under him, he shifted to a new plant, a new job, +and possibly even learned a new trade. The American worker's union, to +the contrary, did its best to save the job. + +Hank Kuran remembered reading, a few months earlier, of a British +textile company which had attempted to introduce a whole line of new +automation equipment. The unions had struck, and the company had to +give up the project. What happened to the machinery? It was sold to +China! + +Following the orders of his underground contact, he begged out of the +afternoon tour, as did half a dozen of the others. Sightseeing was as +hard on the feet in Moscow as anywhere else. + +After lunch he looked up Sovietska Park on his tourist map of the +city. It was handy enough. A few blocks up Gorky Street. + +It turned out to be typical. Well done so far as fountains, monuments +and gardens were concerned. Well equipped with park benches. In the +early afternoon it was by no means empty, but, on the other hand not +nearly so filled as he'd noticed the parks to be the evening before. + +Hank stopped at one of the numerous cold drink stands where for a few +kopecks you could get raspberry syrup fizzed up with soda water. While +he sipped it, a teen-ager came up beside him and said in passable +English, "Excuse me, are you a tourist? Do you speak English?" + +This had happened before. Another kid practicing his school language. + +"That's right," Hank said. + +The boy said, "You aren't a ham, are you?" He brought some cards from +an inner pocket. "I'm UA3-KAR." + +For a moment Hank looked at him blankly, and then he recognized the +amateur radio call cards the other was displaying. "Oh, a _ham_. Well, +no, but I have a cousin who is." + +Two more youngsters came up. "What's his call?" + +Hank didn't remember that. They all adjourned to a park bench and +little though he knew about the subject, international amateur radio +was discussed in detail. In fifteen minutes he was hemmed in by a +dozen or so and had about decided he'd better make his excuses and +circulate around making himself available to the _stilyagi_ outfit. He +was searching for an excuse to shake them when the one sitting next to +him reverted to Russian. + +"We're clear now, Henry Kuran." + +Hank said, "I'll be damned. I hadn't any idea--" + +The other brushed aside trivialities. Looking at him more closely, +Hank could see he was older than first estimate. Possibly twenty-two +or so. Darker than most of the others, heavy-set, sharp and impatient. + +"You can call me Georgi," he said. "These others will prevent +outsiders from bothering us. Now then, we've been told you Americans +want some assistance. What? And why should we give it to you?" + +Hank said, worriedly, "Haven't you some place we could go? Where I +could meet one of your higher-ups? This is important." + +"Otherwise, I wouldn't be here," Georgi said impatiently. "For that +matter there is no higher-up. We don't have ranks; we're a working +democracy. And I'm afraid the day of the secret room in some cellar is +past. With housing what it is, if there was an empty cellar in Moscow +a family would move in. And remember, all buildings are State owned +and operated. I'm afraid you'll have to tell your story here. Now, +what is it you want?" + +"I want an opportunity to meet the Galactic Confederation emissaries." + +"Why?" + +"To give them our side, the Western side, of the ... well, the +controversy between us and the Soviet complex. We want an opportunity +to have our say before they make any permanent treaties." + +Georgi considered that. "We thought it was probably something +similar," he muttered. "What do you think it will accomplish?" + +"At least a delaying action. If the extraterrestrials throw their +weight, their scientific progress, into the balance on the side of the +Soviet complex, the West will have lost the cold war. Every neutral in +the world will jump on the bandwagon. International trade, sources of +raw materials, will be a thing of the past. Without a shot being +fired, we'd become second-rate powers overnight." + +Georgi said nothing for a long moment. A new youngster had drifted up +to the group but one of those on the outskirts growled something at +him and he went off again. Evidently, Hank decided, all of this +dozen-odd cluster of youngsters were connected with the jet-set +underground. + +"All right, you want us to help you in the conflict between the Soviet +government and the West," Georgi said. "Why should we?" + +Hank frowned at him. "You're the anti-government movement. You're +revolutionists and want to overthrow the Soviet government." + +The other said impatiently, "Don't read something into our +organization that isn't here. We don't exist for your benefit, but our +own." + +"But you wish to overthrow the Soviets and establish a democratic--" + +Georgi was waggling an impatient hand. "That word democratic has been +so misused this past half century that it's become all but +meaningless. Look here, we wish to overthrow the present Soviet +government, but that doesn't mean we expect to establish one modeled +to yours. We're Russians. Our problems are Russian ones. Most of them +you aren't familiar with--any more than we're familiar with your +American ones." + +"However, you want to destroy the Soviets," Hank pursued. + +"Yes," Georgi growled, "but that doesn't necessarily mean that we wish +_you_ to win this cold war, as the term goes. That is, just because +we're opposed to the Soviet government doesn't mean we like yours. But +you make a point. If the Galactic Confederation gives all-out support +to the Soviet bureaucracy it might strengthen it to the point where +they could remain in office indefinitely." + + * * * * * + +Hank pressed the advantage. "Right. You'd never overthrow them then." + +"On the other hand," Georgi muttered uncomfortably, "we're not +interested in giving you Americans an opportunity that would enable +you to collapse the whole fabric of this country and its allies." + +"Look here," Hank said. "In the States we seem to know surprisingly +little about your movement. Just what _do_ you expect to accomplish?" + +"To make it brief, we wish to enjoy the product of the sacrifices of +the past fifty years. If you recall your Marx"--he twisted his face +here in wry amusement--"the idea was that the State was to wither away +once Socialism was established. Instead of withering away, it has +become increasingly strong. This was explained by the early Bolsheviks +in a fairly reasonable manner. Socialism presupposes a highly +industrialized economy. It's not possible in a primitive nor even a +feudalistic society. So our Communist bureaucracy remained in the +saddle through a period of transition. The task was to industrialize +the Soviet countries in a matter of decades where it had taken the +Capitalist nations a century or two." + +Georgi shrugged. "I've never heard of a governing class giving up its +once acquired power of its own accord, no matter how incompetent they +might be." + +Hank said, "I wouldn't call the Soviet government incompetent." + +"Then you'd be wrong," the other said. "Progress had been made but +often in spite of the bureaucracy, not because of it. In the early +days it wasn't so obvious, but as we develop the rule of the political +bureaucrat becomes increasingly a hindrance. Politicians can't operate +industries and they can't supervise laboratories. To the extent our +scientist and technicians are interfered with by politicians, to that +extent we are held up in our progress. Surely you've heard of the +Lysenko matter?" + +"He was the one who evolved the anti-Mendelian theory of genetics, +fifteen or twenty years ago." + +"Correct," Georgi snorted. "Acquired characteristics could be handed +down by heredity. It took the Academy of Agricultural Science at least +a decade to dispose of him. Why? Because his theories fitted into +Stalin's political beliefs." The underground spokesman snorted again. + +Hank had the feeling they were drifting from the subject. "Then you +want to overthrow the Communist bureaucracy?" + +"Yes, but that is only part of the story. Overthrowing it without +something to replace the bureaucracy is a negative approach. We have +no interest in a return to Czarist Russia, even if that were possible, +and it isn't. We want to profit by what has happened in these years of +ultra-sacrifice, not to destroy everything. The day of rule by +politicians is antiquated, we look forward to the future." He seemed +to switch subjects. "Do you remember Djilas' book which he wrote in +one of Tito's prisons, "The New Class"?" + +"Vaguely. I read the reviews. It was a best seller in the States some +time ago." + +Georgi made with his characteristic snort. "It was a best seller +here--in underground circles. At any rate, that explains much. Our +bureaucracy, no matter what its ideals might have been to begin with, +has developed into a new class of its own. Russia sacrifices to +surpass the West--but our bureaucrats don't. In Lenin's day the +commissar was paid the same as the average worker, but today we have +bureaucrats as wealthy as Western millionaires." + +Hank said, "Of course, these are your problems. I don't pretend to +have too clear a picture of them. However, it seems to me we have a +mutual enemy. Right at this moment it appears that they are to receive +some support that will strengthen them. I suggest you co-operate with +me in hopes they'll be thwarted." + +For the first time a near smile appeared on the young Russian's face. +"A ludicrous situation. We have here a Russian revolutionary +organization devoted to the _withering away_ the Russian Communist +State. To gain its ends, it co-operates with a Capitalist country's +agent." His grin broadened. "I suspect that neither Nicolai Lenin nor +Karl Marx ever pictured such contingencies." + +Hank said, "I wouldn't know I'm not up on my Marxism. I'm afraid that +when I went to school academic circles weren't inclined in that +direction." He returned the Russian's wry smile. + +Which only set the other off again. "Academic circles!" he snorted. +"Sterile in both our countries. All professors of economics in the +Soviet countries are Marxists. On the other hand, no American +professor would admit to this. Coincidence? Suppose an American +teacher was a convinced Marxist. Would he openly and honestly teach +his beliefs? Suppose a Russian wasn't? Would he?" Georgi slapped his +knee with a heavy hand and stood up. "I'll speak to various others. +We'll let you know." + +Hank said, "Wait. How long is this going to take? And _can_ you help +me if you want to? Where are these extraterrestrials?" + +Georgi looked down at him. "They're in the Kremlin. How closely +guarded we don't know, but we can find out." + +"The Kremlin," Hank said. "I was hoping they stayed in their own +ship." + +"Rumor has it that they're quartered in the _Bolshoi Kremlevski +Dvorets_, the Great Kremlin Palace. We'll contact you later--perhaps." +He stuck his hands in his pockets and strode away, in all appearance +just one more pedestrian without anywhere in particular to go. + +One of the younger boys, the ham who had first approached Hank, smiled +and said, "Perhaps we can talk a bit more of radio?" + +"Yeah," Hank muttered, "Swell." + + * * * * * + +The next development came sooner than Henry Kuran had expected. In +fact, before the others returned from their afternoon tour of the +city. Hank was sprawled in one of the king-sized easy-chairs, turning +what little he had to work on over in his mind. The principal +decisions to make were, first, how long to wait on the assistance of +the _stilyagi_, and, if that wasn't forthcoming, what steps to take on +his own. The second prospect stumped him. He hadn't the vaguest idea +what he could accomplish singly. + +He wasn't even sure where the space aliens were. _The Bolshoi +Kremlevski Dvorets_, Georgi had said. But was that correct, and, if +so, where was the _Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_ and how did you get +into it? For that matter, how did you get inside the Kremlin walls? + +Under his breath he cursed Sheridan Hennessey. Why had he allowed +himself to be dragooned into this? By all criteria it was the +desperate clutching of a drowning man for a straw. He had no way to +know, for instance, if he did reach the space emissaries, that he +could even communicate with them. + +He caught himself wishing he was back in Peru arguing with hesitant +South Americans over the relative values of American and Soviet +complex commodities--and then he laughed at himself. + +There was a knock at the door. + +Hank came wearily to his feet, crossed and opened it. + +She still wore too much make-up, the American sweater and the flared +heel shoes. And her eyes were still cool and alert. She slid past him, +let her eyes go around the room quickly. "You are alone?" she said in +Russian, but it was more a statement than question. + +Hank closed the door behind them. He scowled at her, put a finger to +his lips and then went through an involved pantomime to indicate +looking for a microphone. He raised his eyebrows at her. + +She laughed and shook her head. "No microphones." + +"How do you know?" + +"We know. We have contacts here in the hotel. If the KGB had to put +microphones in the rooms of every tourist in Moscow, they'd have to +increase their number by ten times. In spite of your western ideas to +the contrary, it just isn't done. There are exceptions, of course, but +there has to be some reason for it." + +"Perhaps I'm an exception." Hank didn't like this at all. The C.I.A. +men had been of the opinion that the KGB was once again thoroughly +checking on every foreigner. + +"If the KGB is already onto you, Henry Kuran, then you might as well +give up. Your mission is already a failure." + +"I suppose so. Will you have a chair? Can I offer you a drink? My +roommate has a bottle of Stolichnaya vodka which he brought from the +boat." + +There was an amused light in her eyes even as she shook her head. +"Your friend Paco is quite a man--so I understand. But no, I am here +for business." She took one of the armchairs and Hank sank into +another opposite her. + +[Illustration] + +"The committee has decided to assist you to the point they can." + +"Fine." Hank leaned forward. + +"Tomorrow your Progressive Tours group is to have a conducted tour of +the Kremlin museum, Ivan the Great's Tower, and the Assumption +Cathedral." + +"In the _Kremlin_?" + +She was impatient. "The Kremlin is considerably larger than most +Westerners seem to realize. Originally it was the whole city. The +Kremlin walls are more then two kilometers long. In them are a great +deal more than just government offices. Among other things, the +Kremlin has one of the greatest museums and probably the largest in +the world." + +"What I meant was, with the space emissaries there, will tours still +be held?" + +"They _are_ being held. It would be too conspicuous to stop them even +if there was any reason to." She frowned and shook her head. "Just +because you will be inside the Kremlin walls doesn't mean that you +will be sitting in the lap of the extraterrestrials. They are probably +well guarded in the palace. We don't know to what extent." + +Hank said, "Then how can you help me?" + +"Only in a limited way." She pulled a folder paper from her purse. +"Here is a map of the Kremlin, and here one of the Palace. Both of +these date from Czarist days but such things as the general layout of +the Kremlin and the _Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_ do not change of +course." + +"Do you know where the extraterrestrials are?" + +"We're not sure. The palace was built in the Seventeenth Century and +was popular with various czars. It has been a museum for some time. We +suspect that the Galactic Confederation delegates are housed in the +_Sobstvennaya Plovina_ which used to be the private apartments of +Nicolas the First. It is quite define that the conferences are being +held in the _Gheorghievskaya sala_; it's the largest and most +impressive room in the Kremlin." + +Hank stared at the two maps feeling a degree of dismay. + +She said impatiently, "We can help you more than this. One of the +regular guide-guards at the facade which leads to the main entrance of +the palace is a member of our group. Here are your instructions." + +They spent another fifteen minutes going over the details, then she +shot a quick glance at her watch and came to her feet. "Is everything +clear ... comrade?" + +Hank frowned slightly at the use of the word, then understood. "I +think so, and thanks ... comrade." He, as well as she, meant the term +in its original sense. + +He followed her to the door but before his hand touched the knob, it +opened inwardly. Paco stood there, and behind him in the corridor was +Char Moore. + +The girl turned to Hank quickly, reached up and kissed him on the +mouth and said, in English, "Good-bye, dollink." She winked at Paco, +swept past Char and was gone. + +Paco looked after her appreciatively, back at Hank and said, "Ah, ha. +You are quite a dog after all, eh?" + +Char Moore's face was blank. She mumbled something to the effect of, +"See you later," directed seemingly to both of them, and went on to +her room. + +Hank said, "Damn!" + +Paco closed the door behind him. "What's the matter, my friend?" he +grinned. "Are you attempting to play two games at once?" + + * * * * * + +The morning tour was devoted to Red Square and the Kremlin. +Immediately after breakfast they formed a column with two or three +other tourist parties and were marched briskly to where Gorky Street +debouched into Red Square. First destination was the mausoleum, backed +against the Kremlin wall, which centered that square and served as a +combined Vatican, Lhasa and Mecca of the Soviet complex. Built of dark +red porphyry, it was the nearest thing to a really ultramodern +building Hank had seen in Moscow. + +As foreign tourists they were taken to the head of the line which +already stretched around the Kremlin back into Mokhovaya Street along +the western wall. A line of thousands. + +Once the doors opened the line moved quickly. They filed in, two by +two, down some steps, along a corridor which was suddenly cool as +though refrigerated. Paco, standing next to Hank, said from the side +of his mouth, "Now we know the secret of the embalming. I wonder if +they're hanging on meathooks." + +The line emerged suddenly into a room in the center of which were +three glass chambers. The three bodies, the prophet and his two +leading disciples flanking him. Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev. On their +faces, Hank decided, you could read much of their character. Lenin, +the idealist and scholar. Stalin, utterly ruthless organization man. +Khrushchev, energetic manager of what the first two had built. + +They were in the burial room no more than two minutes, filed out by an +opposite door. In the light of the square again, Paco grinned at him. +"Nick and Joe didn't look so good, but Nikita is standing up pretty +well." + +Trailing back and forth across Red Square had its ludicrous elements. +The guide pointed out this and that. But all the time his charges had +their eyes glued to the spaceship, settled there at the far end of the +square near St. Basil's. In a way it seemed no more alien than so much +else here. Certainly no more alien to the world Hank knew than the +fantastic St. Basil's Cathedral. + +A spaceship from the stars, though. You still had to shake your head +in effort to achieve clarity; to realize the significance of it. A +spaceship with emissaries from a Galactic Confederation. + +How simple if it had only landed in Washington, London or even Paris +or Rome, instead of here. + +They avoided getting very near it, although the Russians weren't being +ostentatious about their guarding. There was a roped off area about +the craft and twenty or so guards, not overly armed, drifting about +within the enclosure. But the local citizenry was evidently well +disciplined. There were no huge crowds hanging on the ropes waiting +for a glimpse of the interplanetary celebrities. + +Nevertheless, the Intourist guide went out of his way to avoid +bringing his charges too near. They retraced their steps back to +Manezhnaya Square from which they had originally started to see the +mausoleum, and then turned left through Alexandrovski Sad, the +Alexander Park which ran along the west side of the Kremlin to the +Borovikski Gate, on the Moskva River side of the fortress. + +Paco said, "After this tour I'm in favor of us all signing a petition +that our guide be awarded a medal, _Hero of Intourist_. You realize +that thus far he has lost only two of us today?" + +Some of the others didn't like his levity. They were about to enter +the Communist shrine and wisecracking was hardly in order. Paco +Rodriquez couldn't have cared less, being Paco Rodriquez. + +The _stilyagi_ girl had been correct about the Kremlin being an +overgrown museum. Government buildings it evidently contained, but +above all it provided gold topped cathedrals, fabulous palaces +converted to art galleries and displays of the jeweled wealth of +yesteryear and the tombs of a dozen czars including that of Ivan the +Terrible. + + * * * * * + +They trailed into the Orushezhnaya Palace, through the ornate entrance +hall displaying its early arms and banners. + +Paco encouraged the harassed guard happily. "You're doing fine. You've +had us out for more than two hours. We started with twenty-five in +this group and still have twenty-one. Par for the course. What happens +to a tourist who wanders absently around in the Kremlin and turns up +in the head man's office?" + +The guide smiled wanly. "And over here we have the thrones of the +Empress Elizabeth and Czar Paul." + +Unobtrusively, Hank dropped toward the tail of the group. He spent a +long time peering at two silver panthers, gifts of the first Queen +Elizabeth of England to Boris Godunov. The Progressive Tours assembly +passed on into the next room. + +A guard standing next to the case said, "Mr. Kuran?" + +Without looking up, Hand nodded. + +"Follow me, slowly." + +No one from the Progressive Tours group was in sight. Hank wandered +after the guard, looking into display cases as he went. Finally the +other turned a corner into an empty and comparatively narrow corridor. +He stopped and waited for the American. + +"You're Kuran?" he asked anxiously in Russian. + +"That's right." + +"You're not afraid?" + +"No. Let's go." Inwardly Hank growled, _Of course I'm afraid. Do I +look like a confounded hero?_ What was it Sheridan Hennessey had said? +This was combat, combat cold-war style, but still combat. Of course he +was afraid. Had there ever in the history of combat been a participant +who had gone into it unafraid? + +They walked briskly along the corridor. The guard said, "You have +studied your maps?" + +"Yes." + +"I can take you only so far without exposing myself. Then you are on +your own. You must know your maps or you are lost. These old palaces +ramble--" + +"I know," Hank said impatiently. "Brief me as we go along. Just for +luck." + +"Very well. We leave Orushezhnaya Palace by this minor doorway. Across +there, to our right, is the _Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_, the Great +Kremlin Palace. It's there the Central Executive Committee meets, and +the Assembly. The same hall used to be the czar's throne room in the +old days. On the nearer side, on the ground floor, are the +_Sobstvennaya Plovina_, the former private apartments of Nicholas +First. The extraterrestrials are there." + +"You're sure? The others weren't sure." + +"That's where they are." + +"How can we get to them?" + +"_We_ can't. Possibly _you_ can. I can take you only so far. The front +entrance is strongly guarded, we are going to have to enter the Great +Palace from the rear, through the Teremni Palace. You remember your +maps?" + +"I think so." + +They strode rapidly from the museum through a major courtyard. Hank to +the right and a step behind the uniformed guard. + +The other was saying, "The Teremni preceded the Great Palace. One of +its walls was used to become the rear of the later structure. We can +enter it fairly freely." + +They entered through another smaller doorway a hundred feet or more +from the main entrance, climbed a short marble stairway and turned +right down an ornate corridor, tapestry hung. They passed +occasionally other uniformed guards, none of whom paid them any +attention. + +They passed through three joined rooms, each heavily furnished in +Seventeenth Century style, each thick with icons. The guide brought +them up abruptly at a small door. + +He said, an air almost of defiance in his tone, "I go no further. +Through this door and you are in the Great Palace, in the bathroom of +the apartments of Catherine Second. You remember your maps?" + +"Yes," Hank said. + +"I hope so." The guard hesitated. "You are armed?" + +"No. We were afraid that my things might be thoroughly searched. Had a +gun been found on me, my mission would have been over then and there." + +The guard produced a heavy military revolver, offered it butt +foremost. + +But Hank shook his head. "Thanks. But if it comes to the point where +I'd need a gun--I've already failed. I'm here to talk, not to shoot." + +The guard nodded. "Perhaps you're right. Now, I repeat. On the other +side of this door is the bathroom of the Czarina's apartments. Beyond +it is her _paradnaya divannaya_, her dressing room and beyond that the +_Ekaterininskaya sala_, the throne room of Catherine Second. It is +probable that there will be nobody in any of these rooms. Beyond that, +I do not know." + +He ended abruptly with "Good luck," turned and scurried away. + +"Thanks," Hank Kuran said after him. He turned and tried the +door-knob. Inwardly he thought, _All right Henry Kuran. Hennessey +said you had a reputation for being able to think on your feet. Start +thinking. Thus far all you've been called on to do is exchange +low-level banter with a bevy of pro-commie critics of the United +States. Now the chips are down._ + + * * * * * + +The apartments of the long dead czarina were empty. He pushed through +them and into the corridor beyond. + +And came to a quick halt. + +Halfway down the hall, Loo Motlamelle crouched over a uniformed, +crumpled body. He looked up at Hank Kuran's approach, startled, a +fighting man at bay. His lips thinned back over his teeth. A black +thumb did something to the weapon he held in his hand. + +Hank said throatily, "Is he dead?" + +Loo shook his head, his eyes coldly wary. "No. I slugged him." + +Hank said, "What are you doing here?" + +Loo came erect. "It occurs to me that I'm evidently doing the same +thing you are." + +But the dull metal gun in his hand was negligently at the ready and +his eyes were cold, cold. It came to Hank that banjos on the levee +were very far away. + +This lithe fighting man said tightly, "You know where we are? Exactly +where we are? I'm not sure." + +Hank said, "In the hall outside the _Sobstvennaya Plovina_ of the +_Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets_. The czar's private apartments. And how +did you get here?" + +"The hard way," Loo said softly. His eyes darted up and down the +corridor. "I can't figure out why there aren't more guards. I don't +like this. You're armed?" + +"No," Hank said. + +Loo grinned down at his own weapon. "One of us is probably making a +mistake but we both seem to have gotten this far. By the way, I'm +Inter-Commonwealth Security. You're C.I.A., aren't you? Talk fast, +Hank, we're either a team from now on, or I've got to do something +about you." + +"Special mission for the President," Hank said. "Why didn't we spot +each other sooner?" + +Loo grinned again in deprecation. "Evidently because we're both good +operatives. If I've got this right, the extraterrestrials are +somewhere in here." + +Hank started down the corridor. There was no time to go into the whys +and wherefores of Loo's mission. It must be approximately the same as +his own. "There are some private apartments in this direction," he +said over his shoulder. "They must be quartered--" + +A door off the corridor opened and a tall, thin, ludicrously garbed +man-- + +Hank pulled himself up quickly, both mentally and physically. It was +no man. It was almost a man--but no. + +Loo's weapon was already at the alert. + +The newcomer unhurriedly looked from one of them to the other. Then +down at the Russian guard sprawled on the floor behind them. + +He said in Russian, "Always violence. The sadness of violence. When +faced with crisis, threaten violence if outpointed. Your race has much +to learn." He switched to English. "But this is probably your +language, isn't it?" + +Loo gaped at him. The man from space was almost as dark complected as +the Negro. + +The extraterrestrial stepped to one side and indicated the room behind +him "Please enter, I assume you've come looking for us." + +They entered the ornate bedroom. + +The extraterrestrial said, "Is the man dead?" + +Loo said, "No. Merely stunned." + +"He needs no assistance?" + +"Nothing could help him for half an hour or more. Then he'll probably +have a severe headache." + +The extraterrestrial had even the ability to achieve a dry quality in +his voice. "I am surprised at your forebearance." He took a chair +before a baroque desk. "Undoubtedly you have gone through a great deal +to penetrate to this point. I am a member of the interplanetary +delegation. What is it that you want?" + +Hank looked at Loo, received a slight nod, and went into his speech. +The space alien made no attempt to interrupt. + +When Hank had finished, the extraterrestrial turned his eyes to Loo. +"And you?" + +Loo said, "I represent the British Commonwealth rather than the United +States, but my purpose in contacting you was identical. Her Majesty's +government is anxious to consult with you before you make any binding +agreements with the Soviet complex." + +The alien turned his eyes from one to the other. His face, Hank +decided, had a Lincolnesque quality, so ugly as to be beautiful in its +infinite sadness. + +"You must think us incredibly naive," he said. + +Hank scowled. He had adjusted quickly to the space ambassador's +_otherness_, both of dress and physical qualities, but there was an +irritating something--He put his finger on it. He felt as he had, some +decades ago, when brought before his grammar school principal for an +infraction of school discipline. + +Hank said, "We haven't had too much time to think. We've been +desperate." + +The alien said, "You have gone to considerable trouble. I can even +admire your resolution. You will be interested to know that tomorrow +we take ship to Peiping." + +"Peiping?" Loo said blankly. + +"Following two weeks there we proceed to Washington and following that +to London. What led your governments to believe that the Soviet +nations were to receive all our attention, and your own none at all?" + +Hank blurted, "But you landed _here_. You made no contact with us." + +"The size of our expedition is limited. We could hardly do everything +at once. The Soviet complex, as you call it, is the largest government +and the most advanced on Earth. Obviously, this was our first stop." +His eyes went to Hank's. "You're an American. Do you know why you have +fallen behind in the march of progress?" + +"I'm not sure we have," Hank said flatly. "Do you mean in comparison +with the Soviet complex?" + +"Exactly. And if you don't realize it, then you've blinded yourself. +You've fallen behind in a score of fields because a decade or so ago, +in your years between 1957 and 1960, you made a disastrous decision. +In alarm at Russian progress, you adopted a campaign of combating +Russian science. You began educating your young people to combat +Russian progress." + +"We had to!" + +The alien grunted. "To the contrary, what you should have done was try +to excel Russian science, technology and industry. Had you done that +you might have continued to be the world's leading nation, until, at +least, some sort of world unity had been achieved. By deciding to +_combat_ Russian progress you became a retarding force, a deliberate +drag on the development of your species, seeking to cripple and +restrain rather than to grow and develop. The way to win a race is not +to trip up your opponent, but to run faster and harder than he." + +Hank stared at him. + +The space alien came to his feet. "I am busy. Your missions, I +assume, have been successfully completed. You have seen one of our +group. Melodramatically, you have warned us against your enemy. Your +superiors should be gratified. And now I shall summon a guide to +return you to your hotels." + +A great deal went out of Hank Kuran. Until now the tenseness had been +greater than he had ever remembered in life. Now he was limp. In +response, he nodded. + +Loo sighed, returned the weapon which he had until now held in his +hand to a shoulder holster. "Yes," he said, meaninglessly. He turned +and looked at Hank Kuran wryly. "I have spent the better part of my +life learning to be an ultra-efficient security operative. I suspect +that my job has just become obsolete." + +"I have an idea that perhaps mine is too," Hank said. + + * * * * * + +In the morning, the Progressive Tours group was scheduled to visit a +co-operative farm, specializing in poultry, on the outskirts of +Moscow. While the bus was loading Hank stopped off at the Grand +Hotel's Intourist desk. + +"Can I send a cable to the United States?" + +The chipper Intourist girl said "But of course." She handed him a +form. + +He wrote quickly: + +SHERIDAN HENNESSEY +WASHINGTON, D. C. + + MISSION ACCOMPLISHED + + MORE SATISFACTORILY + THAN EXPECTED. + + HENRY KURAN + +The girl checked it quickly. "But your name is Henry Stevenson." + +"That," Hank said, "was back when I was a cloak and dagger man." + +She blinked and looked after him as he walked out and climbed aboard +the tourist bus. He found an empty seat next to Char Moore and settled +into it. + +Char said evenly, "Ah, today you have time from your amorous pursuits +to join the rest of us." + +He raised an eyebrow at her. Jealousy? His chances were evidently +better than he had ever suspected. "I meant to tell you about that," +he said, "the first time we're by ourselves." + +"Hm-m-m," she said. Then, "We've been in Russia for several days now. +What do you think of it?" + +Hank said, "I think it's pretty good. And I have a sneaking suspicion +that in another ten years, when a few changes will have evolved, +she'll be better still." + +She looked at him blankly. "You _do_? Frankly, I've been somewhat +disappointed." + +"Sure. But wait'll you see _our_ country in ten years. You know, Char, +this world of ours has just got started." + + +THE END + + * * * * * + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Combat, by Dallas McCord Reynolds + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMBAT *** + +***** This file should be named 30712.txt or 30712.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/7/1/30712/ + +Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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