from the circle to little stick figures of planes, missiles, and submarines. 'Tells everybody when to shoot, how much to shoot, where to shoot.' He tapped the chalk on the blackboard. 'Same SIOP since 1963. Forty years, still same. Wolfe and me, we tell them ten years ago, when we at Foundation together, time to change SIOP. But noooo, they say. Too expensive, too complicated.'
He shook his head, laughed. 'Not make sense. Soviet Union is gone. Half of Russian missiles, submarines, bombers? All gone. But still, this SIOP not change. Like doesn't matter Soviet missiles mostly gone.' Anton wrinkled his nose. 'Something fishy, yes?'
He moved to the other side of the blackboard, drew another circle. Inside this one he wrote strategija #1.
He tapped with the chalk. 'This Strategy Number One. Stalin's strategy. Basically, is start war, if anything go wrong, blow up world. But then, thanks god, Stalin dies, Khrushchev comes. Little more sense than Stalin. So,' he erased the #1 with the cuff of his sweater, wrote #2, 'we get strategija #2. Put missiles in Cuba. Big SS-4s, even bigger SS-5s. Spook Kennedy. Great idea.'
He turned and faced Benjamin. 'Only not so great idea. Kennedy not spooked. Why?' Anton smiled at him, a bright twinkle in his eye.
'Kennedy tells everyone, big missile gap, Russians have thousand missiles. Ha!' Under the circle he wrote two numbers: 3,000 and 300. He tapped the 3,000. 'This is how many bombs U.S. has.' He tapped the 300. 'This how many bombs USSR has.' He looked at Benjamin. 'As kids say, do the math.'
'So,' Benjamin said, 'the whole missile gap scare-'
'Big hooey,' said Anton. 'Cuba episode spooks somebody, yes. Spooks Soviets. And,' he held up a finger, 'Soviets spook themselves. Khrushchev sends four submarines, new Foxtrots, to Cuba. Each has nuclear torpedo. U.S. Navy sits on them, like hen on egg. One Soviet captain gets nervous, damn near shoots big fish at U.S. Navy boat.'
'How could he have the authority to do that?'
'Ah,' said Anton. He pointed to the SIOP circle. 'In U.S. plan, president controls everything, even submarines. But,' he pointed to the strategija circle, 'in Soviet plan, tell submarine captains, you decide whether blow up world or not. And good luck.'
He turned and looked at Benjamin, frowning. 'Big problem, yes? So,' again he erased the number next to strategija, and now wrote in 55, 'something change. After Cuba, new strategy. New launch codes, all controlled by Moscow.'
Benjamin thought of two questions, asked the first. 'But why fifty-five? Why not Strategy Number Three?'
Anton laughed. 'Old Soviet joke. In Red Army after Revolution, every officer responsible for his own pistol. All pistols numbered. So, Cheka-Secret Police-line up officers. Ask first one, 'What number pistol?' Officer answers, '23.' Cheka man looks, number should be 32. So bang, shoots officer. Asks next one, 'What number pistol?' Officer says, '34.' Cheka man looks, number should be 43. Bang, shoots again. Asks third officer, 'And what number your pistol?' '55,' he says.' Anton smiled. 'Get it? Number can't be wrong.'
'So,' Benjamin said, 'this strategy 55, it's a joke?'
'Not joke,' said Anton. 'But not real, either. Nobody sees it. It's a privedenie, a ghost.'
'Okay, here's my second question,' said Benjamin, 'and maybe it's dumb, because I don't know Russian. But the name of the file on Fletcher's computer is Stzenariy 55, not Strategija 55. And Samuel said he thought stzenariy meant 'script,' not 'strategy.' '
Anton smiled very broadly. 'Samuel right,' he said. 'Means 'script,' like for movie. Screenplay you call it?' Benjamin nodded. 'Very dramatic word. Very… artistic word. And therefore very interesting word. Is KGB-type word.'
'I don't see the-'
'KGB guys consider themselves not soldiers, not apparatchiks. Great spies. Great artistes. Tend to use such words.'
'So that name indicates the plan originated with the KGB?'
Anton nodded, made his way to the armchair, sat down again, exhaled.
'Anyway, whether is strategija or stzenariy, nobody ever see this number 55. Only rumors, then nothing. Instead get Strategija Chetyre, number four. But strange, is not much strategy. Mostly propaganda and nonsense.' Anton held up a finger. ' And something else. Americans think 1963 and Cuba closest world comes to big bang, yes? Not so. Was 1968.'
'What happened in 1968?' Benjamin asked.
'You don't remember so-called Prague Spring?' Anton asked, looking surprised. Then he answered his own question. 'No, too young. Anyway, Czechs rebel, Soviets send in tanks. Everybody in Soviet Union thinks NATO will invade, help rebels. Sit with fingers on buttons for two weeks. But, pfft, big nothing happens. Except one small something.'
Anton tapped at the keyboard again, opened the file labeled 'Stzenariy 55.'
Borba s tenyu appeared on the screen.
'Yes, we saw that,' said Benjamin. 'But Samuel had no idea what it meant.'
'Click on it,' instructed Anton.
Benjamin reached forward, clicked on the text.
A small black border appeared around the phrase.
'It's an image,' said Benjamin, 'not text.'
'Exactly so. Now make bigger.'
'How much bigger?' asked Benjamin.
'Much bigger.'
Benjamin shrugged, enlarged the image several hundred percent.
What had been the black blocks of text revolved themselves into long columns of numbers and letters. Benjamin saw each column was eight figures wide.
'What on earth…'
'Is octal code,' said Anton. 'Code computer uses for letters and numbers. Fletcher scanned letter into computer, converted words to octal, hid code in picture.'
'Letter? What letter?'
'Letter from Fyodor Myorkin.'
'My god,' said Benjamin. 'Are you able to read this?'
'Kids don't know octal these days. Don't need to. But Anton very old,' he smiled, 'so, yes, I can read.
'Fletcher writes Myorkin because Myorkin wrote about Cold War years, exposed secrets. Made many enemies. Anyway, Fletcher asked him, ever heard anything about something in sixties, in Siberia, something… stranno, strange? Myorkin writes back, yes, found something in KGB archives in St. Petersburg. About place called Uzhur-4 and something called Stzenariy 55. After Prague Spring, KGB all over the place. People arrested, officers reassigned. Big panic. Myorkin says he will go back to archives next week, but first wants to interview one of few officers from Uzhur-4 still alive. And officer's name interesting, I think. Kapitan Nikolai Orlov.'
'Orlov?' Benjamin thought. 'Why does that sound…'
'Female version Orlova. Like, for daughter.'
'N. Orlova, at the RCC,' said Benjamin. 'Then it's a woman. And she's somehow connected to this Stzenariy 55, which is somehow connected to the 'wobble' TEACUP found in the Cold War, which the Gadenhower data somehow convinced Fletcher is all part of some enormous conspiracy?'
'Now you understand,' Anton said with a mischieveous grin, 'why I keep saying, is all maybe.'
Benjamin leaned back in the chair. He was still processing much of what Anton had told him. He realized he had reached a point where he didn't even know the right questions to ask anymore.
He looked over his shoulder out the second-story window of Anton's study. He could see a narrow sliver of gray sky. He suddenly wished he were back in his small, safe cubicle in the basement of the Library of Congress, his greatest concern deciphering the spelling in eighteenth-century legal codes.
Anton rose and came over to him.
'You need more sleep,' he said.
'No,' Benjamin answered. 'I still have an appointment to keep at the Library of Congress to look for this diary. Though I still don't see how it could possibly fit into all this.'
