Текст книги "Snow Wolf"

Автор книги: Glenn Meade

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It took Massey several minutes more to outline the exact details of the operation, and when he had finished Stanski looked through several pages of the file and said, "I'm impressed, Jake."

He picked up the bottle poured himself a shot and downed it on one gulp. Then he fixed Massey with a stare. "But I've got some questions."

"Ask away. You're the one this depends on."

"Why wait until now to kill Stalin? It should have been done a long time ago."

"Look at the file again. There's a second report I told you about, at the back. it ought to explain."

Stanski took the file and read. When he finished he looked up and smiled. "Interesting. But I don't need a report to tell me Stalin is crazy. He should have been put in a rubber room long ago."

"Maybe, but this time we're in deep enough trouble to have to put the man down for the dangerous beast that he is. Do you remember Max Simon?"

"Sure. He was a friend of yours, as I recall."

Massey explained about the deaths of Max and his daughter, and why they had been killed. A look of utter distaste crossed Stanski's face. He lit a cigarette and stood.

"There's something I don't like."

"What?"

"Bloody the waters in a pool full of sharks and it's difficult to get out with all those teeth chopping. Assuming I do the job, the KGB and militia are going to be swarming all over Moscow afterwards, if there is an afterwards. There are five hundred Kremlin Guards behind those red walls, another three thousand a stone's throw away. That's a lot of angry comrades."

"I was coming to that."

Stanski grinned. "I kind of hoped you were."

" You leave the Kremlin or the dacha the same way you enter. But there'll also be alternative exits just in case you need them. As soon as I have everything organized, I'll tell you the details. But assuming it all goes according to plan, after that you lie low in a safe house I'll set up in Moscow. A week later, if things work out the way I intend, I take you out."

"How?"

Massey smiled. "I'm working on it. But either way you don't go in without the safe house and exit being in place. Otherwise it's a suicide mission."

"I figured it was that already . Who else knows about the plan?"

"Only Branigan and the brass who approved it, but the exact details are up to me. And that's the way it stays. The fewer people who know the better." :"Branigan said there's going to be a woman?"

"She'll be with you as far as Moscow, then we take her out of the picture."

Stanski shook his head. "You know I always operate alone, Jake. Taking a woman along will only slow things up."

" Not this time. It's for your own good. Traveling alone to Moscow might make you a target for suspicion. Besides, she's part of the plan. She'll accompany you acting as your wife but for the obvious security reasons she won't know the target."

Stanski crushed his cigarette in an ashtray on the table. "You'd better tell me about her."

"You know the rules, Alex. Whenever we drop two or more people onto Soviet territory we don't reveal their backgrounds to one another. No real names, no real identities. That way there's less trouble for either of you if one gets caught."

Stanski shook his head firmly. "The rules don't apply. if I'm going into the lion's den I want to know who I'm going in with. Especially if it's with a woman I know nothing about."

Massey spread his hands on the table and sighed. "OK. I'll give you the basics. Her name's Anna Khorev. Age twenty-six.

She escaped from a Soviet Gulag near the Finnish border three months ago and we gave her asylum."

Massey saw the look on Stanski's face as he put down his glass.

"Jake, you must be crazy picking someone with that background. How can you trust her?" .

"She wasn't my choice. And if I had my way I'd leave her out of it. But not for the reasons you might think. She can definitely be trusted, Alex, take it from me. And she's the best we're going to get at short notice. It would take months to train another woman, even just so that she wouldn't stand out like a sore thumb on a Moscow street or turn white with fear every time she was asked for her papers by a militiaman."

"Can she handle herself?"

"She can use a gun, if that's what you mean. But all she's really got to do is play the part of being your wife and make your cover seem plausible until you reach Moscow. We can use Popov for a week or so to put you both through your paces. But I'll be relying on you to look after her. The girl's already had some basic military training with the Red Army."

There was a flash of anger or doubt on Stanski's face, Massey couldn't tell which.

"Branigan never said she was Red Army."

"She was a conscript during the war. She didn't volunteer out of ideology. And I would have thought her military background, however brief, was an advantage."

"What about the rest of her background?" Massey explained briefly about her parents but said nothing about Anna Khorev's personal experience before her imprisonment in the Gulag.

Stanski shook his head in disbelief. "This gets crazier by the minute."

:"What does?"

"Her father a Red Army officer."

"Past tense, and hardly in the Red Army mold. And it doesn't taint the girl. I told you, you can trust her."

"Then why was she in a Gulag?"

"You know the way the system works. There doesn't have to be a reason. She was an innocent victim. She did nothing wrong."

Stanski frowned. "So why has she agreed to go back into Russia?"

"She hasn't agreed to anything yet, because I haven't told her. But her reasons will be personal and nothing to do with you."

Stanski crossed to the window and looked out. "Another question. Why did your people come to me?"

Massey glanced over toward the photograph on the wall before looking back. "You know the reasons. I don't have to tell you."

"Tell me anyhow."

Massey pushed away his empty glass. "You were the best man OSS ever trained. You speak fluent Russian. You've been behind the curtain before. And the best two reasons of all. I figure you want to kill the son-of-a-bitch and you're bold enough to try."

Stanski smiled. "Thanks for the vote of confidence. You really have it all worked out, don't you, Jake?"

"You're just about perfect for the part. You've got no family ties, no wife and children. No emotional baggage to tie you down."

"Getting into Moscow is going to be difficult enough despite the plan. It's probably going to be a close hit, not one done with a rifle from a safe distance. And going in with a woman I don't know from Judas doesn't help,"

"I never said it would be easy. That's a risk you take. But you stick to the plan and you both stand some chance of getting out of this alive. But trust the girl, Alex. Me, I'd stake my life on her."

"This is going to be no ordinary walk in the woods, Jake. You think it's fair that she doesn't know how deep and dangerous she's getting in?"

"I don't have any choice. That's the way Branigan wants it. And maybe it's best. If she knew she probably wouldn't go."

Stanski thought for a moment. "Where have you got in mind for training?"

Massey shook his head. "Not the regular base we use in Maryland. It's too much of a security risk." He smiled and nodded over toward the window. "I kind of thought maybe here. The terrain is pretty similar to what you'll be crossing. If that's OK with you?"

"I guess Vassily won't object. I'll tell him we need to do some training. He won't ask why and he'll keep out of the way."

"There's another reason why I'd like to use her maybe you ought to know about. After Anna Khorev escaped, the Russians wanted her sent back. They claimed she was a common criminal. I figure that's a load of crap, but she did kill a camp guard and a border guard during her escape. Maybe I'm wrong, but I figure the KGB just might try to find her and take her back illegally. God knows, they've done it before with other escapees and defectors. Up here I'm pretty sure she'll be safely out of harm's way. And if and when she makes it back after the mission, I'll make sure she'll have deep enough cover so that she'll never be found."

"Interesting. You never told me about her killing the guards."

"If you're still unsure about her, I'll let you have the relevant details about her escape from her file."

:"Do that."

"Any more questions?"

"Just tell me the odds on the plan working."

Massey shook his head. "I can't answer that. Nobody can. At best you succeed, at worst you die. There's going to be no radio contact once you go in and you'll both be on your own, apart from the safe houses I'll set up. Your chances depend on yourselves and lady luck. And let's just hope she smiles on you i both, my friend."

He saw a sudden look of doubt on Stanski's face and said, "You're still in?"

Stanski was silent for several moments. He looked out of the window. Without turning back he said, "On one condition. I have the final say on whether the woman's in. You let me meet her as soon as she's made up her mind."

Massey thought for a moment. "Let's cross that bridge when we come to it." He picked up the file he had shown Stanski. "We've got a code name for the operation-Snow Wolf. But I keep the file, I'm afraid. It's eyes only. No one but you, me, and the folks at the top get to see it. We'll both go through all the details again later, so there won't be any mistakes, but the file stays with me."

He replaced the file in his briefcase, then removed another, placed it on the table and slid it across. "Joseph Stalin" was written on the folder cover in blue ink.

"in the meantime, you'd better read this."

Stanski picked up the folder. "What is it?"

"Everything we know about Joseph Stalin. His background, his personality, his weaknesses, his strengths. Even medical data. His present security arrangements, as far as we can as certain. The layout of the Kremlin and the dachas he uses. I want you to study it carefully. This isn't an ordinary mission, Alex. You're going to try and kill the devil incarnate. You know the rule-know your enemy like you know yourself, Needless to say, you don't show the file to anyone. Destroy it when you've memorized everything you need to."

Stanski half smiled. "Then all things being equal I guess there's really only one more question."

"What's that?"

"When do I go in?"

"A month from now."

New York. January 26th The apartment was on the top floor and she came to the door as soon as Massey knocked, "Hello, Anna."

For a moment she hesitated, then a smile lit up her face. "Massey ... !"

"You look surprised."

"I thought I'd never see you again."

She took him by the hand, led him inside and closed the door. The apartment was a studio with a single bed, a table and two rickety chairs. There were some winter roses in a vase by the window and the view looked down to a liquor store below, Brooklyn and Queens in the distance.

The place didn't look like much but then Massey guessed she would have been happy with anything after her experience in the Gulag. She had done her best to make it pretty, but there were no family photographs on the walls and it made him feel sad, knowing how lonely she must have felt. He handed her the brown wrapped parcel. "For you."

She smiled and the surprise lit up her face. "I don't understand. What is it?"

"Open it and See."

She opened the brown paper. It was a box of Kuntz's chocolates. The big brown eyes looked almost childlike as they met his face. gain. One Massey said in Russian, "My way of saying hello a Russian to another. How have you been, Anna?"

"Good. And even better now I've seen you again. Thank you for the present, Jake."

"It's nothing." He looked at her figure. "Don't get angry when I say this, but you've put on weight since Helsinki and it suits YOU."

She laughed. "Then I'll take it as a compliment." She held up the box of chocolates. "And these are not going to help, but thank you again." She stood up as she said, "I found an immigrant store that sells really good Russian tea. Would you like some?"

"You read my mind, I'll have it Russian-style." He smiled. "Seven sugars but don't stir."

She laughed and went into the tiny kitchen.

They sat at the table. Massey sipped the tea and spoke in Russian.

"It's good to see you smile, Anna. I guess last time we met you didn't have much to smile about. I hear you have a job?"

"In a garment factory owned by a Polish-American. It's a crazy place, but I like it. And the girls I work with are not how I thought American girls would be."

"In what way?"

"They talk a lot more than Russian girls. And they laugh more. And eat more." She smiled. "A lot more. That's why I put on weight."

"I guess you must make big dresses, huh?"

She laughed. "Not that big."

"Have you made many friends?"

"Some."

Massey looked around the room. "Don't you get lonely here all on your own?"

"Sometimes." She shrugged. "It's not so bad. But I'm so glad you came to see me, Jake."

"Actually, it's unofficial business, not pleasure. But it's good to see you too."

She put down her cup and looked across at him. "I don't understand. I was told someone wanted to talk to me about my work permit. Is that why you're here?"

For several moments Massey sat there, not saying anything.

When he finally spoke his voice was quiet and serious.

"Anna, I didn't come here to talk about that. I came to talk about something else."

When he saw the confusion on her face he said, "Will you do something for me, Anna? Will You just listen to what I have to say? Then we can talk some more. But for now, just listen."

Anna hesitated, then nodded.

Massey stood up. He ran a hand through his hair and looked down at her face.

First, I want you to understand one thing. What I have to tel;,you is strictly confidential. if you speak about it to anyone I can promise that your right to remain in this country will be revoked. You may even face court charges," He saw the sudden look of fear on her face and said, "I'm sorry for being so blunt, Anna, but you'll understand why when I've finished. I want to put a proposition to you. If you say no to what I'm going to propose then I walk away from here and you never see me again and this conversation never took place. If you say yes, then we talk some more. Is that much clear, Anna?"

She was still looking at him, confusion on her face, and Massey said gently, "Don't be afraid. Whatever your answer is, it in no way affects your right to remain in America. But I want to make it clear that you speak to no one about this conversation."

She nodded slowly. "I understand."

"Good. Now we've got that part out of the way." He sat down and took his time before he began. "Anna ... The people I work for, they need a woman to be part of a mission. A very sensitive mission."

She stared back at him. "What sort of mission'? You mean something to do with the military?"

Massey shook his head and half smiled. "N(A the military, Anna. And I can't tell you who right now. But let's just say these people plan to send a man, an American, into Russia. Moscow to be precise. They need a woman to accompany him, someone who's recently been in the Soviet Union. Someone who knows her way around and wouldn't feel or look out of place. This woman would have to act at being the man's wife. It would be dangerous and difficult and there's no guarantee she'd come back."

"I don't understand. What has this got to do with me?"

"The people I spoke about want you to be that woman."

Massey studied her face. She looked totally confused. For several long moments she stared back at him.

"I don't understand? You're asking me to go to Moscow?"

"I know it sounds crazy. What you escaped from doesn't bear thinking about. To ask you to go back again is like asking you to return to hell. But not for nothing, Anna. Like I said, there's something these people can do for you in return." She looked at Massey, totally dumbstruck, then she said, "What?"

"Get your daughter back."

Massey studied her reaction. It was as if a painful, terrible wound had opened. Her face drained of color and she didn't speak for several moments, the dark eyes probing Massey's face.

"Anna, I told you before this conversation began all I needed to know after I put the proposition to you was do we keep talking, or do I walk away from here and we never see each other again."

She stared at him and Massey saw the wet eyes. "You didn't lie when you said you can get Sasha out of Russia? You can really do that? You can bring her to America?"

"It can be done, Anna. You'll just have to trust me." He stood up slowly. "Do you want a little time to think about what I've said? If you like I can take a walk and come back in an hour."

She stared back at him. For several moments she stood there, tears at the edges of her dark eyes.

"No, I want to hear what you have to say."

Massey put a hand gently on her shoulder and said, "How about I fix us some more tea'? Then we can talk this over."

She sat there listening intently. When Massey had finished she asked, "How long would I be in Russia?"

"At the outside, ten days. But that's not something I can guarantee. We'll do our best to keep it as brief as possible. But it will be dangerous, Anna. Make no mistake. I'd be lying if I told you otherwise."

"What is this man going to do in Moscow?"

"Kill someone." Massey said the words so matter-of-factly he thought she Would be shocked, but she didn't react, her face blank. "Who?"

"That's not something you need to know."

"Then am I allowed to ask why?"

"You don't need to know the answer to that question either. But you'll be long gone from Moscow before it happens.""He paused. "Anna, I'll be honest with you. It's a very difficult and dangerous operation. And like I said, you may not come back. But that's a risk you're going to have to take to get your daughter back."

She hesitated a moment. "Why did you come to me?"

Massey smiled. "I guess the people I speak for think you have all the right qualifications for the job. You speak Russian and you know the country."

"You didn't tell me how you'd get my daughter out. You didn't tell me how you'd find her."

He shook his head.

"And I can't. Not until I know you agree to go along with what I've proposed. But what we do know will help. She's in an orphanage, probably in Moscow. We have contacts in Moscow through the immigrant organizations. Underground groups and dissidents. People who could help us find your daughter. It's not going to be easy-in fact, it's going to be downright difficult-but if you go along with this then you'll have my word the deal will be kept. Not only that, but I'll arrange new identities for you and Sasha, and whatever you'll need materially to start a new life together afresh."

The tears had stopped but Massey saw a look like grief on her face. He guessed she had tried hard to put her daughter from her mind but had found it impossible.

He stood up slowly. "Maybe things are moving a little too fast for you right now. And I guess my vagueness hasn't helped, but like I said I can't tell you any more until I know where I stand."

He wrote down a phone number on a slip of paper. "You need to be alone to think this through. I'm staying at the Carlton off Lexington Avenue. Room 107. You can contact me there when you make up your mind. There's someone at the hotel I want you to meet. He'll have the final decision whether you go to Moscow or not. But call me tonight one way or the other."

As Massey left the note on the table Anna shook her head. "That's not necessary. I've already thought about it, The answer is yes."

Stanski sat in the room on the eighth floor of the hotel off Lexington Avenue, sipping a Scotch. He heard the footsteps outside, then the door opened and he saw Massey standing in the doorway.

A woman stood beside him. She was very beautiful. She had high cheekbones and dark hair. She wore a simple, inexpensive black dress that emphasized her figure, and he couldn't help but admire the splendid curves of her body.

But it was her face that held him; a face he instantly reacted to. Something in those dark Slavic eyes that suggested a curious mixture of strength and remorse. It seemed like a long time before his eyes left her face, as Massey said, "Alex, meet Anna Khorev." Anna stood there staring at the man. There were a few moments of hesitation, and then she saw his eyes take her in. It was as if they bored into her very soul, terribly frightening and terribly reassuring both at once, and it seemed he was trying to make up his mind about something.

Then he glanced at Massey, and as he looked back at Anna he suddenly smiled broadly, raised his glass in a toast, and said in Russian, "I guess it's welcome to the club."

The two men sitting in the black Packard across the street from the hotel had followed the yellow cab from Manhattan's East Side.

As Massey and Anna had climbed out, the man in the passenger seat had rolled down the window and steadied the Leica.

The light was bad but there was a wash from the blaze of lights at the front of the building and the man got two shots of the couple as they got out of the cab, another three as they went up the steps into the hotel.

New York. January 27th, 8 Pm.

The man who called himself Kurt Braun had his eyes on the girl's breasts as she leaned over to place his double Scotch on the table. They were magnificent in the low-cut top, even in the dim lighting of the dingy bar on Manhattan's Lower East Side docks.

"That'll be a dollar, sir."

Braun smiled at the girl as he peeled off two singles from the wad he took from his pocket.

"Keep the change. You look like you're new here."

"Thanks, mister. I started Friday."

"Where do you come from?"

The girl smiled back. "Danville, Illinois. You ever hear of it?"

"No, I can't say that I have."

"Maybe that ain't such a bad thing."

Braun grinned back and glanced around the bar. The private club Lombardi ran as a sideline was doing good business. it was only eight but the place was buzzing already. Friday night and every young tough from the docks and visiting sailors were coming in for drinks and a look at the girls. A record was on in the background, Kay Kyser and his orchestra playing "On a Slow Boat to China."

He looked back at the girl. "Do me a favor and tell Vince that Kurt Braun is here."

"Sure."

She walked away and Braun watched her retreating buttocks wobbling beneath the tight skirt before he looked around the bar. There were a couple of dozen men in the place, and a handful of the girls were working the tables. They looked like the hookers they were, all lipstick and too much makeup and cheap flashy clothes that showed off their bedroom assets.

It was five minutes later when Vince, Lombardi's bodyguard, came to the table. Broad and well built, he had a nose that looked like it had been flattened into his face with a sledgehammer. The man hadn't a hint of grace in his body and there was a bulge under his left arm where Braun knew the holstered pistol would be.

Despite the man's appearance, Braun knew he could kill him with little effort. The two men looked at each other a moment, like prizefighters sizing each other up, before Vince spoke.

"Carlo is waiting upstairs. He said to go right on up."

Braun finished his Scotch and stood.

The sign in scratched gold lettering on the door of the second floor above the club said "Longshoreman's Union. C. Lombardi-District Chief."

Carlo Lombardi was a small fat Sicilian in his middle forties with a pencil-thin mustache. As his title suggested, he ran the Manhattan Lower East Side dockland as if it was his private territory, and besides the club downstairs he had numerous business interests, including a share in the profits from three local brothels that serviced visiting merchant sailors. Despite his harmless appearance, Lombardi had a reputation for violence, especially with a knife. The only vanity he allowed himself was occasionally combing his hair to cover the pink scalp that erupted like an angry Lash through the hair.

A smart hick in the bar had once joked that Lombardi combed his hair with a wet sponge, and Lombardi had taken pleasure in waiting, for him in an alleyway a block away and sticking a knife in his eyeball and twisting till the shit-kicking hick screamed like a stuck pig. No one slighted Carlo Lombardi and walked away unhurt.

He heard the knock as Vince opened the door to admit Braun.

The visitor looked small beside Lombardi's muscular bodyguard, but had a livid red scar on his left cheek and an air of menace about him that suggested he was equally as dangerous.

"Mr. Braun to see you, Mr. Lombardi."

"Leave us, Vince."

The door closed and Lombardi came around slowly from behind his cluttered desk to greet his visitor. The office blinds were drawn, cutting@ out the view of the East River and docks beyond the window, but the light was on overhead, and when Lombardi had shaken the man's hand, he said gruffly, "You wanna drink?"

"Scotch."

Lombardi poured two Scotches from a chrome cabinet by the window and threw in some ice cubes. He came back and handed Braun his drink before he sat down.

"You want the story on the broad?"

"That's why I'm here."

"You mind if I ask a personal question? What The fuck is up?

You got me watching her for months now. She does nothin'."

Braun sipped his Scotch, sat back in his chair and said sharply, "Just give me the story, Lombardi. That's why you get paid."

Lombardi sighed and reached toward a drawer and pulled out a large brown envelope, clusters of gold rings on his fat fingers. As he looked back up he smiled and said, "The new girl downstairs, you see her?"

"I saw her."

Lombardi smiled and gripped his crotch. "She's as green as cow shit but she's a fucking rodeo in the hay. She also likes it rough, know what I mean?"

Braun didn't smile. "Tell me what you have for me."

That's what I like about you. Mr. Braun. Everything is click-click. Direct and to the point. Busy man. Places to go, things to do." Lombardi handed across the envelope. "It's all written up the way you wanted it. Nothin– much new, except the girl had a visitor."

"Who?"

"A guy. Stayed one night at the Carlton, off Lexington Avenue. Name of Massey. Took the girl there too. She left after a couple of hours. That's all I know from shit." Lombardi nodded to the envelope. "It's all in there, anyway. Including the pics."

Braun opened the envelope and examined the contents briefly, looking at the photographs, then closed it again and put his hand in his inside pocket, took out another envelope and handed it across. "For you."

"Amigo, I thank you from the bottom of my black heart."

Lombardi took the envelope in his fat hand and looked at Braun. "So what's with the Russian broad?"

"Who says she's Russian?"

"Mister, I've had my guys watching her for over two months. You think I don't ]know nothing?"

Braun smiled, a cold smile, but didn't reply. Lombardi's fat hand stuffed the envelope into a drawer and banged it shut, "OK, you pay the tab so we play it your way. As long as I don't get no Feds crawling up my ass with a hot poker."

"You won't. Just keep watching her." Braun finished his drink and stood. "It's been a pleasure doing business, Lombardi."

"Sure."

Lombardi looked up at his visitor's scar-red face . "Seeing as I got to keep you happy, you want a girl before you go? No charge for the hick from Illinois if she's what you want."

This time Braun smiled back. "Why not?"

It was almost ten when Braun arrived back at the one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. He climbed the stairs to the fourth floor and let himself in, leaving the lights off as he closed the door. The curtains were open and he went into the kitchen to the refrigerator and picked a bottle of beer off the shelf.

As he came back into the front room he saw the man sitting in the shadows by the window. He wore an overcoat and hat and smoked a cigarette, a full glass in his hand. In the faint wash of light from the windows, Braun saw the smile on the man's face. The man said, "Working late. Greaot-?" Braun let his breath out and said, "Christ ... I wish you wouldn't do that, Akashin."

The man named Akashin lau-he'd and stood up. "I helped myself to some of' your excellent Scotch. I hope you don't mind."

Feliks Akashin was short and stocky. His fleshy cheek" were limp and shallow, small eyes hard in a weathered face. It wasn't a handsome face; there was a large dark mole on his left _jaw, tufts of beard– sprouting from the blemish, and his skin had the texture of" leather. At forty-eight he was an attache with the Soviet Mission to the United Nations in New York. In reality he held the rank of major in the KGB. Braun looked at him.

"You're taking risk coming here. You could have been followed."

Akashin smiled. "They tried as usual. And as result] I lost them in the subway. A wily old fox will always lose the hunter, my dcai– Gregor. Besides, I quite like the thrill of the chase."

Braun crossed to the window. The lights of New York dazzled beyond the glass and as he stood there he drank, from the bottle and smoked his cigarette.

"So why the visit@?"

"You have the report on the woman?"

Braun raised his eyebrows, a trace of anger in his voice. "Is that all'?

You could have waited until you picked it up from the drop tomorrow."

"There's been a directive from Moscow on the woman in today's diplomatic bag. I need to make a decision tonight."

Braun looked back, surprise on his face. "What directive?"

"Let's hear your report first, Gigegoig."

Braun told him and Akashin scratched the mole on his jaw and raised his eyebrows.

"Interesting. You trust Lombardi?"

"I'd sooner trust the devil himself. Moscow may secretly contribute to his union, but he has his fat fingers in a lot of pies, most of them ilegal. And that's dangerous."

Akashin shrugged. "We have no choice but to use him. If the Americans discovered US Mounting Our own surveillance operation, there would be hell to pay. In this way, we keep every thing at arm's length. Besides, Lombardi owes us. Without our help he'd still be a union steward."

"So who do you think this man Massey might be?"

Akashin Put down his glass. For a long time he seemed to have difficulty making up his mind about something, then he said, "Who knows" The photographs Lombardi's men took are not the best quality, amateurish really, but they may help. I'll have our people check and see if any of our station officers recognize him."