from the days before buses got tinted windows and air-conditioning. Alongside it there was another car, and as we came to a stop our headlights caught the shiny bodywork of a vintage Packard convertible, reconditioned by some enthusiast.
Mann switched off the lights and the radio. 'Well, here we are,' he said. 'Plenty of time for supper.'
'Eight twenty,' said Bessie Mann. Bekuv yawned, and his wife eased her shoes on and opened the car door.
'Happy Christmas,' I said, and Red kissed me on the ear.
'You'll love this place,' said Mann.
'We'd better,' said Bessie, 'or I'll never believe you again.'
As I climbed out of the warm car the cold of the open countryside bit into me. 'Isn't that beautiful,' said Red. 'It's been snowing.', 'Is that like home, Professor Bekuv?' Bessie asked.
'I was born in the desert,' said Andrei Bekuv. 'I was born in a region more desolate than the Sahara — the U.S.S.R. is a big place, Mrs Mann.'
'Is your home hi the desert too, Katerina?' said Mrs Mann.
Mrs Bekuv wrapped herself hi a long red cape and pulled the hood up over her head to protect her from the chilly wind. 'America is my home now, Bessie,' she said. 'I loved New York. I will never leave America.'
Mann was locking the doors of the car and I caught his glance. Any fears we'd had about Mrs Bekuv's conversion to capitalism seemed unfounded.
'Just take your pocket-books, and the cameras,' Mann told anyone who was listening. 'They'll send someone out for the baggage.'
'You always lock the car,' said Bessie Mann. 'He's so suspicious,' she announced to a world that already knew.
We went into the lobby of the hotel and I thought for a moment that Mann must have chosen it to make the Bekuvs feel at home. The furniture was massive and there were old-fashioned floral curtains and cracked lino on the stairs. Behind the reception counter there was a framed photo of Franklin Roosevelt and
Mann picked up the menu from the desk. 'I think we'd rather eat,' he said.
'He changes the reel at the half-hour. The lights go on; you'll not disturb the show.'
'You want to send some food up to the rooms?'
'Whatever you say,' agreed the old lady.
'The home-made soup and steak — rare — and salad,' said Mann. 'And give us a bottle of Scotch and a bottle of vodka with a few mixes and ice.'
'I'll do it right away. Everyone the same?' She smiled. 'There's an ice-box in your rooms.'
We mumbled agreement, except for Mrs Bekuv who wanted her steak well done.
'The best steak this side of Texas,' said the old lady. 'That's what they all tell me.'
The two single rooms, booked for Red and me, were at the far end of the corridor. One had a shower and the other a bathroom. 'Shower or bath?' I asked as we looked into the rooms.
'I hate showers,' she said going into the room that was equipped with it. 'Especially these tin-sided contraptions. They make such a racket.'
She went over to the single bed and prodded it to see if it was soft. Then she pulled the blankets back and pummelled the pillows. 'No,' she said coming back to where I was standing and putting her arm through mine. 'I think we'll use the room with the tub.' She took me to the other room.
She sat on the bed and pulled off the silly little woollen hat she liked to wear. Then she undid the buttons of her dress. Her long red hair tumbled down over her pale shoulders. She smiled. She was the most beautiful creature I'd ever seen and her happiness warmed me. She kicked off her shoes. I picked up the phone. 'Can I have a bottle of champagne?' I asked. 'Yes, French champagne. On second thoughts, better make that two bottles.'
It was a long time before we got back to the sitting-room that the Bekuvs shared with the Manns. There was a boy in starched apron and black bow-tie smoothing the tablecloth and setting out the cutlery.
'Thought you two were hungry enough to give dinner a miss,' said Mann archly.
'Mickey!' said his wife. 'You haven't ordered the wine.'
'You got red wine?' Mann asked the young waiter.
'Only Californian,' said the boy.
'I like Californian,' said Major Mann. He put a flattened hand over his heart, as if swearing to it.
The proprietor's wife had fixed the dinner. The homemade soup was clam chowder and the steaks were delicious. Mann praised the buttered corn. 'You can keep all that lousy French chow,' Mann offered. 'You give me American cooking every time.'
Mrs Mann said, 'You like it; you got it.' The Bekuvs smiled but said nothing.
From downstairs the louder parts of the film's soundtrack were sometimes audible. We heard exploding bombs and wartime melodies.
I suppose Bekuv must have been anticipating the pep-talk that Mann decided was due. When Mann produced a box of cigars and suggested that we smoke them down the hall, rather than wake up to the aroma of stale tobacco, Bekuv readily agreed, and I went with them.
The lounge was furnished in the same down-beat way that the lobby had been. There were several large sepia photographs of men with goggles, standing round old racing cars and grinning at each other. I guessed that Pierce, the proprietor, was a vintage-car freak, and probably owned the finely preserved Packard outside, and maybe the vintage bus, too.
Bekuv chose the dilapidated sofa. Mann leaned over him to light his cigar. There have been a lot of new developments since you arrived Stateside,' said Mann.
'What kind of developments?' said Bekuv cautiously.
'At first we were asking you to tell us about the scientific data you were handling before you defected.'
'And I did that,' said Bekuv.
'Up to a point you did it,' said Mann. 'But you must have realized that there was another motive too.'
'No,' said Bekuv, drawing on his cigar and facing Mann quite calmly.
'For God's sake, Bekuv! You must see by now that our work on masers is way ahead of anything being done in the Soviet Union. We don't need you to tell us about masers.'
Bekuv had no intention of admitting anything like that. 'Then why ask me?'
'No one can be as dumb as you pretend to be at times,' said Mann.
I interrupted them before Mann blew his top. 'We know that American scientific data is being betrayed to the Soviet Union.'
Bekuv turned to look at me. He frowned and then gave a despairing shrug. 'I don't understand,' he said. 'You will have to explain.'
'We are hoping to recognize the form in which you recall the material. It might help us to trace the source of it. We might be able to find where it's coming from.'
'Much of it came from published work,' said Bekuv.
'Now don't get smart,' said Mann. He stood up, and there was a moment when I thought I was going to have to step between them. 'We are not talking about the kind of stuff that Greenwood and his committee are giving away. We are talking about military stuff.'
'What began as a scientific leak has now become a flood of material,' I said. 'Some of it is intelligence data. There is British material too, which is why I am involved.'
'I wondered about that,' said Bekuv.
'I'm being squeezed,' said Mann, 'and when I get squeezed, you go through the wringer.'
'I'm giving you the material as fast as I can recall it,' said Bekuv.
'And that's not fast enough,' said Mann. There was an element of threat there.
'I can't go any faster,' said Bekuv. I watched his face. Perhaps this was the time he started to realize that his assistants at N.Y.U. had been trying to interrogate him.
Mann straightened and threw his head back. He held the cigar to his lips and put the other hand in the small of his back. It was a gesture both reflective and Napoleonic, until he scratched his behind. He strode slowly across
