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  “And how will you select the assassin?”

  “I will leave that to Colonel Strokov—his ancestry is Russian, by the way. His family settled in Sofia at the turn of the century, but he thinks like one of us. He is nashi,” Bubovoy assured his boss, “a graduate of our own academy, and an experienced field operator.”

  “How long to set this up?”

  “That depends more on Moscow than Sofia. Strokov will need approval from his own command, but that is a political question, not an operational one. After he gets his orders . . . two weeks, perhaps as many as four.”

  “And the chances of success?” the Chairman asked.

  “Medium to high, I should think. The DS field officer will drive the killer to the proper place, and then kill him a moment after the mission is accomplished, before making his escape. That is more dangerous than it sounds. The assassin will probably have a pistol, and it will not be a suppressed weapon. So the crowd will be drawn to the sound. Most people will draw back, but some will leap forward into danger, hoping to detain the gunman. If he falls from a silent bullet in the back, they will still rush in, while our man, like others in the crowd, draws back. Like waves on the beach,” Bubovoy explained. He could see it all happening in his mind. “Shooting a pistol is not as easy as the cinema would have us believe, though. Remember, on a battlefield, for every man killed, two or three are wounded and survive. Our gunman will get no closer than four or five meters. That’s close enough for an expert, but our man will not be an expert. And then there’s the complicating factor of medical care. Unless you’re shot through the heart or brain, skilled surgeons can often reach into the grave and pull a wounded man back out. So, realistically, it is a fifty-percent operation. The consequences of failure, therefore, must be taken into account. That is a political question, Comrade Chairman,” Bubovoy concluded, meaning that it wasn’t his ass on the line, exactly. At the same time, he knew that mission success meant general’s stars, which, for the colonel, was an acceptable gamble with a huge upside and little in the way of a downside. It appealed to his careerism as well as his patriotism.

  “Very well. What needs to be done?”

  “First of all, the DS operates under political guidance. The section that Colonel Strokov commands operates with few written records, but it is directly controlled by the Bulgarian Politburo. So we would have to get political authorization, which necessarily means approval from our own political leadership. The Bulgarians will not authorize their cooperation without an official request from our government. After that, it’s actually a straightforward operation.”

  “I see.” Andropov went silent for half a minute or so. There was a Politburo meeting the day after tomorrow. Was it too soon to float this mission? he wondered. How difficult might it be to make his case? He’d have to show them the Warsaw Letter, and they would not be the least bit pleased by it. He’d have to present it in such a way as to make the urgency of the matter plain and . . . frightening to them.

  Would they be frightened? Well, he could help them along that path, couldn’t he? Andropov pondered the question for a few more seconds and came to a favorable conclusion.

  “Anything else, Colonel?”

  “It hardly needs saying that operational security must be airtight. The Vatican has its own highly effective intelligence service. It would be a mistake to underestimate their capabilities,” Bubovoy warned. “Therefore, our Politburo and the Bulgarians must know that this matter cannot be discussed outside of their own number. And for our side, that means no one, even in the Central Committee or the Party Secretariat. The smallest leak would be ruinous to the mission. But, at the same time,” he went on, “we have much working for us. The Pope necessarily cannot isolate himself, nor can he be protected as we or any other nation-state would do with such a threat to its chief of state. In an operational sense, he is, actually, rather a ‘soft’ target—if, that is, we can find an assassin willing to risk his life to get sufficiently close to take his shot.”

  “So, if I can get authorization from the Politburo, and then we make the request for assistance from our Bulgarian brothers, and then you can get this Colonel Strokov moving, how long before it actually happens?”

  “A month, I should think, perhaps two months, but not more than that. We would need some support from Station Rome, for issues of timing and such, but that’s all. Our own hands would be entirely clean—especially if Strokov assists in eliminating the assassin immediately upon completion of his mission.”

  “You’d want this Strokov fellow to act personally?”

  “Da.” Bubovoy nodded. “Boris Andreyevich is not averse to getting his hands wet. He’s done this sort of thing before.”

  “Very well.” Andropov looked down at his desk. “There will be no written records of this operation. Once I have proper authorization, you will receive notice to proceed from my office, but only by operational code, and that is 15-8-82-666. Any complex information will be relayed by messenger or by face-to-face contact only. Is that clear?”

  “It is clear, Comrade Chairman. Nothing gets written down except the operation number. I expect I will be flying a good deal between Sofia and Moscow, but that is not a problem.”

  “The Bulgarians are trustworthy?” Andropov asked, suddenly worried.

  “Yes, they are, Comrade Chairman. We have a long-standing operational relationship with them, and they are expert at this sort of thing—more than we are, in fact. They have had more practice. When someone must die, it’s often the Bulgars who take care of matters for us.”

  “Yes, Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy has told me that. I just have no direct knowledge of it.”

  “You could, of course, meet with Colonel Strokov any time you wish,” Bubovoy suggested.

  Andropov shook his head. “Better that I should not, I think.”

  “As you wish, Comrade Chairman.” That figures, Bubovoy thought. Andropov was a party man, not used to getting his hands dirty. Politicians were all the same—bloodthirsty, but personally tidy, depending on others to carry out their nasty wishes. Well, that was his job, the colonel decided, and since politicians controlled the good things in his society, he needed to please them to get the honey from the hive. And he had as big a sweet tooth as anyone else in the Soviet Union. At the end of this mission might be general’s stars, a nice flat in Moscow—even a modest dacha in the Lenin Hills. He’d be glad to return to Moscow, and so would his wife. If the price of it was the death of some foreigner who was a political inconvenience to his country, well, that was just too bad. He should have been more careful about who he was offending.

  “Thank you for coming and for giving me your expertise, Comrade Colonel. You will be hearing from me.”

  Bubovoy stood. “I serve the Soviet Union,” he said, and made his way through the hidden door.

  Rozhdestvenskiy was in the secretaries’ room, waiting for him.

  “How did it go, Ilya?”

  “I am not sure I am allowed to say” was the guarded reply.

  “If this is about Operation -666, then you are allowed, Ilya Fedorovich,” Rozhdestvenskiy assured him, leading him out the door into the corridor.

  “Then the meeting went well, Aleksey Nikolay’ch. More than that, I can only say with the Chairman’s approval.” This might be a security test, after all, however much a friend Rozhdestvenskiy might be.

  “I told him you could be relied upon, Ilya. This could be good for both of us.”

  “We serve, Aleksey, just like everybody else in this building.”

  “Let me get you to your car. You can make the noon flight easily.” A few minutes later, he was back in Andropov’s office.

  “Well?” the Chairman asked.

  “He says the meeting went well, but he will not say another word without your permission. Ilya Fedorovich is a serious professional, Comrade Chairman. Am I to be your contact for the mission?”

  “Yes, you are, Aleksey,” Andropov confirmed. “I will send a signal to that effect.” And
ropov didn’t feel the need to run the operation himself. His was a big-picture mind, not an operational one. “What do you know of this Colonel Boris Strokov?”

  “Bulgarian? The name is familiar. He’s a senior intelligence officer who has in the past specialized in assassination operations. He has ample experience—and obviously Ilya knows him well.”

  “How does one specialize in assassinations?” the Chairman asked. It was an aspect of the KGB he hadn’t been briefed in on.

  “His real work is something else, obviously, but the DS has a small group of officers with experience in this sort of thing. He is the most experienced. His operational record is flawless. If memory serves, he’s personally eliminated seven or eight people whose deaths were necessary—mostly Bulgarians, I think. Probably a Turk or two as well, but no Westerners that I know of.”

  “Is it difficult to do?” Yuriy Vladimirovich asked.

  “I have no such experience myself,” Rozhdestvenskiy admitted. He didn’t add that he didn’t especially want any. “Those who do say that their concern is not so much in accomplishing the mission as in completing it—that is, avoiding police investigation afterwards. Modern police agencies are fairly effective at investigating murders, you see. In this case, you can expect a most vigorous investigation.”

  “Bubovoy wants this Strokov fellow to go on the mission and then eliminate the assassin immediately afterward.”

  Rozhdestvenskiy nodded thoughtfully. “That makes good sense. We have discussed that option ourselves, as I recall.”

  “Yes.” Andropov closed his eyes for a moment. Again, the image paraded itself before his mind. Certainly it would solve a lot of political problems. “Yes, my next job will be to get the Politburo’s approval for the mission.”

  “Quickly, Comrade Chairman?” Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy asked, unable to contain his curiosity.

  “Tomorrow afternoon, I think.”

  DOWN IN COMMUNICATIONS, Zaitzev had allowed his daily routine to absorb his consciousness. It suddenly struck him how mindless his job was. They wanted this job to be done by machines, and he’d become that machine. He had it all committed to memory, which operational designator went to which case officer upstairs and what the operations were all about. So much information slid into his mind along the way that it rather amazed him. It had happened so gradually that he’d never really noticed. He noticed now.

  But it was 15-8-82-666 that kept swimming around his mind. . . .

  “Zaitzev?” a voice asked. The communicator turned to see Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy.

  “Yes, Comrade Colonel?”

  “A dispatch for rezident Sofia.” He handed across the message form, properly made out.

  “On the machine or the pad, comrade?”

  The colonel paused for a moment, weighing the two options. He came down on the side of consistency: “The pad, I think.”

  “As you wish, Comrade Colonel. I will have it out in a few minutes.”

  “Good. It will be waiting for Bubovoy when he gets back to his desk.” He made the comment without thinking about it. People all over the world talk too much, and no amount of training can entirely stop them from doing so.

  So, the Sofia rezident was just here? Zaitzev didn’t have to ask. “Yes, Comrade Colonel. Shall I call you to confirm the dispatch?”

  “Yes, thank you, Comrade Major.”

  “I serve the Soviet Union,” Zaitzev assured him.

  Rozhdestvenskiy made his way back upstairs, while Zaitzev went through the normal, mind-numbing routine of encryption.

  MOST SECRET

  IMMEDIATE AND URGENT

  FROM: OFFICE OF CHAIRMAN, MOSCOW CENTRE

  TO: REZIDENT SOFIA

  REFERENCE: OPERATIONAL DESIGNATOR 15-8-82-666

  FOR ALL FUTURE COMMUNICATIONS YOUR OPERATIONAL CONTACT

  WILL BE COLONEL ROZHDESTVENSKIY. BY ORDER OF THE

  CHAIRMAN.

  It was just a housekeeping message, but coded “Immediate and Urgent.” That meant it was important to Chairman Andropov, and the reference made it an operation, not just a query to some rezident.

  They really want to do it, Zaitzev realized.

  What the hell could he do about it? No one in this room—no one in the entire building—could forestall this operation. But outside the building . . . ?

  Zaitzev lit a cigarette. He’d be taking the metro home as usual. Would that American be there as well?

  He was contemplating treason, he thought chillingly. The crime had a fearsome sound to it, with an even more fearsome reality. But the other side of that coin was to sit here and read over the dispatches while an innocent man was killed . . . and, no, he could not do that.

  Zaitzev took a message blank off a centimeter-thick pad of them on his desk. He set the single sheet of paper on the desk surface and wrote in English, using a #1 soft pencil: IF YOU FIND THIS INTERESTING, WEAR A GREEN TIE TOMORROW. That was as far as his courage stretched this afternoon. He folded the form and tucked it inside his cigarette pack, careful to do everything with normal motions, because anything the least bit unusual in this room was noticed. Next, he scribbled something on another blank form, then crumpled and tossed it into the waste can, and went back to his usual work. For the next three hours, Oleg Ivan’ch would rethink his action every time he reached in his pocket for a smoke. Every time, he’d consider taking out the folded sheet of paper and ripping it to small bits before relegating it to the waste can and then the burn bag. But every time, he’d leave it there, telling himself that he’d done nothing yet. Above all, he tried to set his mind free, to do his regular work and deliberately put himself on auto-pilot, trying to let the day go by. Finally, he told himself that his fate was in hands other than his own. If he got home without anything unusual happening, he’d take the folded form out of his cigarette pack and burn it in his kitchen, and that would be the end of it. About four in the afternoon, Zaitzev looked up at the water-stained ceiling of Communications and whispered something akin to a prayer.

  Finally, the workday ended. He took the usual route at the usual pace to the usual metro stop, down the escalator, onto the platform. The metro schedule was as predictable as the coming and going of the tides, and he boarded the carriage along with a hundred others.

  Then his heart almost stopped cold in his chest: There was the American, standing in exactly the same place, reading a newspaper in his right hand, with his left holding on to the overhead rail, his raincoat unbuttoned and loose around his slender frame. The open pocket beckoned to him as the Sirens had to Odysseus. Zaitzev made his way to the center of the railcar, shuffling between other riders. His right hand fished in his shirt pocket for the cigarette pack. He deftly removed the message blank from the pack and palmed it, shuffling about the car as it slowed for a station, making room for another passenger. It worked perfectly. He jostled into the American and made the transfer, then drew back.

  Zaitzev took a deep breath. The deed was done. What happened now was indeed in other hands.

  Was the man really an American—or some false-flag from the Second Chief Directorate?

  Had the “American” seen his face?

  Did that matter? Weren’t his fingerprints on the message form? Zaitzev didn’t have a clue. He’d been careful when tearing off the form—and, if questioned, he could always say that the pad just lay on his desk, and anyone could have taken a form—even asked him for it! It might be enough even to foil a KGB investigation if he stuck to his story. Soon enough, he was off the subway car and walking into the open air. He hoped nobody saw his hands shake as he lit up a smoke.

  FOLEY’S HIGHLY TRAINED senses had failed him. With his coat loose about him, he hadn’t noticed any touch, except for the usual bumps associated with the subway, whether in Moscow or New York. But as he made his way off the train, he stuck his left hand into the left-side pocket, and there was something there, and he knew that it wasn’t something he’d placed there himself. A quizzical look crossed his face, which his training quickl
y erased. He succumbed to the temptation to look around for a tail, but instantly realized that, given his regular schedule, there’d be a fresh face here on the surface to track him, or most likely a series of cameras atop the surrounding buildings. Movie film was as cheap here as everywhere else in the world. And so he walked home, just as on any other day, nodded at the guard at the gate, and then made his way into the elevator, then through the door.

  “I’m home, honey,” Ed Foley announced, taking out the paper only after the door was closed. He was reasonably certain that there were no cameras in the apartment—even American technology wasn’t that far along yet, and he’d seen enough of Moscow to be unimpressed with their technical capabilities. His fingers unfolded the paper, and then he stopped cold in his tracks.

  “What’s for dinner?” he called out.

  “Come and see, Ed.” Mary Pat’s voice came from the kitchen.

  Hamburgers were sizzling on the stove. Mashed potatoes and gravy, plus baked beans, your basic American working-class dinner. But the bread was Russian, and that wasn’t bad. Little Eddie was in front of the TV, watching a Transformers tape, which would keep him occupied for the next twenty minutes.

  “Anything interesting happen today?” Mary Pat asked from the stove. She turned for her kiss, and her husband replied with their personal code phrase for the unusual.

  “Not a thing, baby.” That piqued her interest enough that when he held up the sheet of paper, she took it, and her eyes went wide.

  It wasn’t so much the handwritten message as the printed header: STATE SECURITY OFFICIAL COMMUNICATION.

  Damn. His wife’s lips mouthed the word.

  The Moscow COS nodded thoughtfully.

  “Can you watch the burgers, honey? I have to get something.”

  Ed took the spatula and flipped one over. His wife was back quickly, holding a kelly green tie.