on clothing? What did clothing matter to anyone? Through my binoculars, she looked like she had the brains of a bird? but not in these photos-why?
It was the eyes, he thought. In the still photos her eyes sparkled with something different from what he'd watched in person. Why was that?
In the photographs, her eyes-they were blue, he remembered-were always focused on something. The face, he noticed, had vaguely Slavic cheekbones. He knew that Foley was an Irish name, and assumed that her ancestry was Irish, too. That America was a country of immigrants, and that immigrants cross ethnic lines in marriage, were foreign concepts to the Russians. Add a few kilograms, change her hair and clothing, and she could be any face encountered on a (?) he thought. She looked more like a (?) proclaimed the slight arrogance affected by people from that (?) wonder what her ancestry really is. He kept flipping through the photos, and remembered that (?) The file (?), street in Moscow? or Leningrad. The latter was more likely, he thought. She looked more like a Leningrader. Her face proclaimed (?) the Foleys had never been given this sort of scrutiny. The tile on both was a relatively thin one. They were regarded by 'Two' as nonentities. Something told him that this was a mistake, but the voice in the back of his head wasn't yet loud enough. He approached the last of the photographs, checking his watch. Three in the damned morning! he grumbled to himself and reached for another cup of tea.
Well, that must have been the second score. She was jumping like a gazelle. Nice legs, he saw for the first time. As his colleagues had noted up in the rafters, she was probably very entertaining in bed. Only a few more frames till the end of the game and? yes, there she was, embracing Yazov-that randy old goat! — then hugging Colonel Filitov-
He stopped dead. The photograph caught something that he hadn't seen through the binoculars. While giving Filitov a hug, her eyes were locked on one of the four security guards, the only one not watching the game. Her hand, her left hand, was not wrapped around Filitov at all, but rather down by his right one, hidden from view. He flipped back a few frames. Right before the embraces her hand had been in her coat pocket. Around the Defense Minister, it was balled into a fist. After Filitov, it was open again, and still her eyes were on the security guard, a smile on her face that was very Russian indeed, one that stopped at the lips-but in the next frame, she was back to her normal, flighty self. In that moment he was sure.
'Son of a bitch,' he whispered to himself.
How long have the Foleys been here? He searched his weary memory but couldn't dredge it up. Over two years at least-and we didn't know, we didn't even suspect? what if it's only her? That was a thought-what if she were a spy and her husband were not? He rejected the idea out of hand, and was correct, but for the wrong reason. He reached for the phone and called Vatutin's home.
'Yes,' the voice answered after only half a ring.
'I have something of interest,' the officer said simply.
'Send a car.'
Vatutin was there twenty-five minutes later, unshaven and irritable. The Major merely set out the crucial series of photographs.
'We never suspected her,' he said while the Colonel examined the pictures through a magnifying glass.
'A fine disguise,' Vatutin observed sourly. He'd been asleep only for an hour when the phone rang. He was still learning how to sleep without a few stiff drinks beforehand-trying to learn, he corrected himself. The Colonel looked up.
'Can you believe it? Right in front of the Defense Minister and four security guards! The balls of this woman! Who's her regular shadow?'
The Major merely handed over the file. Vatutin leafed through it and found the proper sheet.
'That old fart! He couldn't follow a child to school without being arrested as a pervert. Look at this-a lieutenant for twenty-three years!'
'There are seven hundred Americans attached to the embassy, Comrade Colonel,' the Major observed. 'We have only so many really good officers-'
'All watching the wrong people.' Vatutin walked to the window, 'No more! Her husband, too,' he adaedd. 'That will be my recommendation, Comrade Colonel. It (?) he added.
(?) Comrade would seem likely that they both work for CIA.'
'That will be my (?),
'She passed something to him.'
'Probably-a message, perhaps something else.'
Vatutin sat down and rubbed his eyes. 'Good work, Comrade Major.'
It was already dawn at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. The Archer was preparing to return to his war. His men had packed their new weapons while their leader-now that was a new thought, the Archer told himself- reviewed his plans for the coming weeks. Among the things he'd received from Ortiz was a complete set of tactical maps. These were made from satellite photographs, and were updated to show current Soviet strongpoints and areas of heavy patrol activity. He had a long-range radio now on which he could tune to weather forecasts-including Russian ones. Their journey wouldn't start until nightfall.
He looked around. Some of his men had sent their families to this place of safety. The refugee camp was crowded and noisy, but a far happier place than the deserted villages and towns bombed flat by the Russians. There were children here, the Archer saw, and children were happy anywhere they had their parents, and food, and friends. The boys were already playing with toy guns-and with the older ones, they were not toys. He accepted that with a degree of regret that diminished on every trip. The losses among the Mudjaheddin demanded replacements, and the youngest were the bravest. If freedom required their deaths-well, their deaths came in a holy cause and Allah was beneficent to those who died for Him. The world was indeed a sad place, but at least here a man could find a lime for amusement and rest. He watched one of his riflemen helping his firstborn son to walk. The baby could not do it alone, but with each tottering step he looked up at the smiling, bearded face of a father he'd seen only doing the same for his son twice since birth-The new were taught to walk a very different path
The Archer returned to his own work. He couldn't be a missileer anymore, but he'd trained Abdul well. Now the Archer would lead his men. It was a right that he'd earned, and, better still, his men thought him lucky. It would be good for morale. Though he had never in his life read books on military theory, the Archer felt that he knew their lessons well enough.
There was no warning-none at all. The Archer's head snapped around as he heard the crackling sound of exploding cannon shells, then he saw the dart-shapes of the Fencers, barely a hundred meters high. He hadn't yet reached for his rifle when he watched the bombs falling free of the ejector racks. The black shapes wobbled slightly before the fins stabilized them, their noses tipping down in slow motion. The engine noise of the Soviet Su-24 attack-bombers came next, and he turned to follow them as his rifle came up to his shoulder, but they were too fast. There was nothing left to do but dive to the ground, and it seemed that everything was happening very, very slowly. He was almost hovering in the air, the earth reluctant to come to meet him. His back was turned to the bombs, but he knew they were there, heading down. His eyes snapped up to see people running, his rifleman trying to cover the infant son with his body. The Archer turned to look up and was horrified to see that one bomb seemed to come straight at him, a black circle against the clear morning sky. There was no time even to say Allah's name as it passed over his head, and the earth shook.
He was stunned and deafened by the blast, and felt wobbly when he stood. It seemed strange to see and feel noise, but not to hear it. Instinct alone flipped the safety off his rifle as he looked around for the next plane. There it was! The rifle came up and fired of its own accord, but made no difference. The next Fencer dropped its load a hundred meters farther on and raced away before a trail of black smoke. There were no more.
The sounds came back slowly, and seemed distant, like the noises of a dream. But this was no dream. The place where his man and the baby had been was now a hole in the ground. There was no trace of the freedom fighter or his son, and even the certainty that both now stood righteously before their God could not mask the blood-chilling rage that coursed through his body. He remembered showing mercy to the Russian, feeling some regret at his death. No more. He'd never show mercy to an infidel again. His hands were chalk-white around the rifle.
Too late, a Pakistani F-16 fighter streaked across the sky, but the Russians were already across the border, and a minute later, the F-16 circled over the camp twice before heading back to its base.
'Are you all right?' It was Ortiz. His face had been cut by something or other, and his voice was far away.
