spread too far. As it happens, I am called Solzhenitsyn. You are perspiring, Chekhov.”
“It is very warm.”
“They should let you leave Moscow more often,” Qazi said as he glanced over his shoulder. “And how have you found the Roman women?”
The Russian did not deign to reply. In a few minutes they reached the entrance to the Vatican Museum and Qazi paid the admission fee with lire for both of them. Once inside he paused where he could watch the door and consulted his guidebook. The Russian looked about dourly and stepped across the room, where he became absorbed in a dark medieval painting with little to recommend it.
Finally Qazi replaced the book in his pocket and wandered away, the Russian a few paces behind. After five minutes of this he entered a men’s room. Qazi stood beside a heavy Italian at the urinals while Chekhov used a stall. When the Italian departed, the door to the stall opened and the Russian exited to find Qazi pointing an automatic pistol with a silencer screwed into the barrel.
“Very slowly, Chekhov, lean against the door. We don’t need any visitors.” The Soviet’s face reddened and he started to speak. Qazi silenced him with a finger. “Do it, or this will be a very short meeting.” Chekhov slowly placed both hands against the door. “Feet wider apart. That’s right. Like in the American movies.” Satisfied, Qazi patted the man down. “What, no gun? A GRU man without a gun …” Qazi carefully felt the man’s crotch and the arms above the wrists. “First humor and now this! The GRU will become a laughingstock. But of course there is a microphone.”
Qazi lifted all the pens from the Russian’s shirt pocket and examined them, one by one. “It had better be here, Chekhov, or you will have to part with your buttons and your shoes.” It was in the third pen. “Now turn around and sit against the door.”
The Russian’s face was covered with perspiration, his fleshy lips twisted in a sneer. “The shoes.”
Qazi examined them carefully and tossed them back. “Now the coat.”
This he scrutinized minutely. From the uppermost of the large three buttons on the front of the coat a very fine wire was just visible buried amid the thread that held the button on. Qazi sawed the button free with a small pocketknife, then dropped the pen and button down a commode. He tossed the coat back to Chekhov. “And the belt.”
After a quick glance, Qazi handed it back. “Hurry, we have much to say to each other.” He unscrewed the silencer and replaced the pistol in his ankle holster. He opened the door as the Russian scrambled awkwardly to his feet.
An hour later the two men were seated in the Sistine Chapel against the back wall, facing the altar and Michelangelo’s masterpiece
“Is it in Rome, as General Simonov promised?”
“Yes. But you must tell us why you want it.”
“Is it genuine, or is it a masterpiece from an Aquarium print shop?” The Aquarium was the nickname for GRU headquarters in Moscow.
The Russian’s lips curled, revealing yellow, impacted teeth. This was his smile. “We obtained it from Warrant Officer Walker.”
“Ah, those Americans! One wonders just how long they knew about Walker’s activities.”
The Russian raised his shoulders and lowered them. “Why do you want the document?”
“El Hakim has not authorized me to reveal his reasons. Not that we don’t trust you. We value the goodwill of the Soviet Union most highly. And we intend to continue to cultivate that goodwill. But to reveal what you do not need to know is to take the risk that the Americans will learn of our plans through their activities against you.”
“If you are implying they have penetrated—”
“Chekhov, I am not implying anything. I am merely weighing risks. And I am being very forthright with you. No subterfuge. No evasion. Just the plain truth. Surely a professional like you can appreciate that?”
“This document is very valuable.”
“Perhaps. If it is genuine, it certainly has some potential value to El Hakim or we would not desire to obtain it. If it is genuine, El Hakim will no doubt be grateful in proportion to the value it ultimately has for us. If it is not genuine, the Americans have made very great fools of you. And of us, if we do not factor in that possibility.”
The Russian slid his tongue out and moistened his lips. “El Hakim has yet to approve the treaty granting the Soviet Navy port facilities. Anchoring privileges are very nice, but we need the warehouses and dock space provided for in the treaty.”
“Your masters should reconsider their position. A strong, united Arab people friendly to the Soviet Union and hostile to American imperialism would certainly fulfill many of the Soviet Union’s long-range diplomatic objectives. Yet, you ask for the politically impossible now as your price to assist in a great effort which will benefit you in incalculable ways.”
“If it succeeds.”
“First you must plant the potatoes, Anton.”
The Russian sneered. “We have it and you want it. The treaty must first be approved.”
Qazi stared into the Russian’s eyes. Then the Russian felt a sharp pain on the inside of his thigh. He looked down and saw the knife, ready to open an artery. “Your belt,” Qazi said.
“What?”
“Take off your belt and give it to me.”
Chekhov complied slowly, his eyes reflecting dismay. Qazi knelt as if to pray with the buckle a few inches from his lips. His eyes swept the chapel. “General Simonov, I would like to take delivery of the manual for the Mark 58 device tomorrow. I shall call the public telephone on the north side of Piazza Campo dei Fiori at ten o’clock. Please follow the directions you are given and come alone.”
Qazi laid the belt in Chekhov’s lap. The Russian watched him join a group of American students and leave the chapel. Chekhov slowly worked the belt with the transmitter in the buckle through the loops in his trousers as he wondered what General Simonov was going to say.
Qazi sat on a bench watching the lovers and office workers eating lunch near the lake. Through the trees he could see the Galleria Borghese and traffic in the Piazza le Brasile. This great green park in which he sat, the Villa Borghese, was one of his favorite places in Rome. The magnificent pines and oaks, the strolling lovers, and the squealing children seemed to him to epitomize the best of European civilization.
He sat on a bench under the trees. This walking area was covered with a mixture of dirt and pea gravel. When someone walked through a shaft of sunlight, he could see the little dust clouds rising every time a foot came down. Beyond the walkway there was grass, but it was spotty; the city didn’t water the grass and it suffered from the heat and too much traffic.
He wondered idly what his uncle would have said if he could have spent a few hours here watching the ducks upon the limpid blue water and feeling the soft breeze as it eased the effect of the heat and rustled the tree leaves.
Waterholes in the desert are always brown, and the sheep and camels wade in and urinate and stir the tepid mixture until it resembles thin mortar. Then in a few days, three at most, the water is gone, leaving only brown mud cracking and baking in the sun. Then one must dig, dig, dig, and haul the water from the well with skin bags. Could the old man have even fathomed wealth like this?
His uncle had insisted he join the army. Even though the old man had read only the Koran, had seen only that one book in his entire life, he sent Qazi to the city to join the army, the boy who loved the desert and the eternal wind and the free, wild life.
