Part 57 (1/2)

Simbal was very still. He could hear the rasping breath of the old man as he sank further and further away from them. ”Which is what? The old ways are the best ways?”

”Not precisely,” Jake said. ”I recall that one of the old man's watchwords was: change. Beridien felt that flexibility in a network such as the Quarry was essential. He was convinced that the KGB's major defect was that it never changed. Invalid thinking, he called it.” Jake p.r.o.nounced it with the emphasis on the first syllable.

”It's more Donovan's att.i.tude that I don't like. The old man thought about his people. He could be ruthless and, I suppose, at times even cruel. But through it all his heart beat for his field executives. He was once with Wild Bill Donovan. He knew what it was like. Rodger Donovan hasn't a clue what it's like out here.”

”But he's smart,” Simbal said.

”Smarter than any of us thought.”

”That could be true,” Simbal admitted. Coming to a decision, he pulled out a sheaf of papers. ”Take a look at these.”

Jake riffled through the flimsies that Max Threnody had given Simbal. ”What are they?” Bliss wanted to know.

”Evidence,” Jake said. ”Proof that someone has been systematically blowing Quarry networks to the KGB.”

”Then Apollo's for real,” Bliss said.

Jake looked up. ”It would appear so.”

”Apollo?” Simbal said.

”Henry Wunderman's legacy,” Jake told him, ”A deep a.s.set inside the Kremlin. My a.s.set now.”

Simbal produced a photo. ”This was with the evidence.” He handed it over.

”It's a surveillance shot of Daniella Vorkuta,” Jake said.

”Right.” Simbal sighed. ”When we were younger Rodger was hung up on a girl in college. Leslie. She and Daniella Vorkuta could easily be sisters.”

”That's how Donovan was recruited? Through Daniella Vorkuta?”

”Her and a Seurat in Paris,” Simbal said. ”It seems so, yes.” He gave Jake an odd look. ”It occurs to me now that if Apollo really was Wunderman's a.s.set, he'd've known that Wunderman could not have been Chimera.”

Jake nodded. ”That's true enough.”

”Then this evidence can be corroborated by another source.”

”It already has,” Jake confirmed.

Then Max wasn't lying, Simbal thought. And then, Can I trust this man? He's ex-Quarry. Does he still hold a grudge for his abrupt dismissal? Threnody had called Simbal a paladin, and now he recognized in this man standing before him a kind of kindred spirit.

”But Donovan can't be why you're here now,” Jake said.

”No,” Simbal admitted. It was easier this way. He was not yet certain what he would do when he met up with Rodger Donovan. ”I'm after the end product of two voodoo spooks: Peter Curran and Edward Martin Bennett. They've sold out, joined the diqui. Now they're set to meet the Naga.”

”We're here to find the Naga,” Jake said. ”He's set out to destroy me, my work and everything my father built.”

Bliss was by his side, staring into his face. ”Chen Ju” ”Who's Chen Ju?” Simbal interrupted. ”The Naga.”

”The head of the diqui?” He was incredulous. ”You know who he is?”

”Yes.” Jake's voice was hoa.r.s.e, as if he had been screaming for hours. ”My father, my family knows him.” He wiped at his face. ”It all boils down to Kam Sang. My father's secret. You see, Kam Sang is a nuclear project in Guangdong province. Ostensibly, work is being done there on a radical way to desalinize water in a cost-effective way for Hong Kong. But there is another, far more secret side to Kam Sang. It is a discovery that my father told me had already changed the world. Until this moment, I did not truly understand how irrevocably it had been changed.”

In the ringing silence, the noise of the rain reverberated eerily through the smoke-filled house, repository for dreams of faith and, now, abruptly, of fear.

Daniella Vorkuta hugged the honey-colored rabbit to her breast. Its s.h.i.+ning brown eyes stared up at her with an inherently adoring expression.

”He's perfect,” Mikhail Carelin said. He was obviously anxious to leave.

Daniella's lips pressed inward in a pout. ”How do you know it's a he. I think it's a she.”

”Fine,” he said. ”She's perfect Buy her.”

”I don't know. Martina's particular about her animals.”

”Your Uncle Vadim's grandchild is going to be seven, isn't that what you told me? How particular could she be?”

Daniella put the rabbit back among her sisters and they moved on. It was not so easy. They were in Detsky Mir, Children's World, what was renowned throughout the Soviet Union as the largest children's department store in the world. It seemed more crowded than Lenin's Tomb, unarguably the most popular tourist attraction the entire country had to offer.

”It's d.a.m.ned hot in here, Da.n.u.shka,” Carelin said. ”I hope we're not going to spend all morning looking.” He had more time to spend with her now that his wife had gone to visit her mother in Leningrad.

”When I find Martina's gift, I'll know it immediately,” she said.

”Personally, I liked the rabbit.”

”Because it was the easy thing,” she said lightly, taking his arm.

”No, I quite fancied her face. I could see her whiskers twitch.”

She laughed, her eyes scanning the counters on either side of theaisles. ”You know,” she said, sometime later, after running the daunting gantlet of the store's stock, ”you were right.” And led him back to the counter full of honey-colored rabbits. She picked up the stuffed creature.

”How do you know your cousin will like it?” Carelin asked.

Daniella stared into the rabbit's face. She could not tell him that this rabbit was for her unborn baby, that she had wanted him here with her this one last time so that, together, they would choose a creature that eventually the baby would come to love, and by which Daniella could someday recall this moment encysted within time, free of anger, rancor or regret.

”Take her,” he said. ”She's perfect.”

Daniella produced her Party card and received immediate service. While the rabbit was being gift wrapped, she opened her purse and took out a square manila envelope. She handed it wordlessly to Carelin.

He glanced at her, then opened it cautiously. ”Good G.o.d,” he said softly. He flipped through the photos, feeling a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach. It was disorienting, seeing himself and Daniella in intimate embrace. He, too, was drawn to the facial expressions; his embarra.s.sment was acute.

When he came to the last one, he said, ”Where are the negatives?”

”I burned them,” Daniella said, paying for the rabbit.

”How did you manage that?”

”Don't ask.”

”Da.n.u.shka, I want to know.”