THE FLIGHT TOMOSCOW on Sabena Airlines took three and a half hours. Dana noted that most of the passengers were dressed in warm clothing, and the baggage racks were loaded with fur coats, hats, and scarves.

I should have dressed more warmly, Dana thought. Well, I won't be in Moscow for more than a day or two.

She could not stop thinking about Antonio Persico's words. Winthrop was like a crazy man. All he kept saying on the phone was "The Russian plan must go on. We've gone too far to let anything stop it now."

What important plan was Winthrop working on? What pieces had fallen into place? And soon after, the president had appointed him ambassador to Moscow.

The more information I get, the less sense it makes, Dana decided.

To Dana's surprise, Sheremetyevo II, Russia's international airport, was crowded with tourists. Why would any sane person visit Russia in the winter? Dana wondered.

When Dana reached the baggage carousel, a man standing nearby was surreptitiously watching her. Dana's heart skipped a beat. They knew I was coming here, she thought. How could they have?

The man was approaching her. "Dana Evans?" He had a thick Slovak accent.

"Yes..."

He broke into a broad smile and said excitedly, "You are my biggest fan! You watch me on television all the time."

Dana felt a surge of relief. "Oh. Yes. Thank you."

"I wonder if you would be so pleasant to give me your autograph?"

"Of course."

He thrust a piece of paper in front of Dana. "I do not have a pen."

"I do." Dana took out her new gold pen and gave him her autograph.

"Spasiba! Spasiba!"

As Dana started to put the pen back in her purse, someone jostled her and the pen fell to the concrete floor. Dana reached down and picked it up. The casing had cracked.

I hope I can get this repaired, Dana thought. And then she looked at it more closely. A tiny wire was showing through the crack. Puzzled, she pulled it out gently. There was a microtransmitter attached to it. Dana stared at it in disbelief. That's how they always knew where I was! But who put it there and why? She remembered the card that had come with it.

Dear Dana, have a safe trip. The Gang.

Furious, Dana ripped out the wire, threw it to the ground, and crushed it with her heel.

In an isolated laboratory room, the signal marker on a map suddenly disappeared.

"Oh, shit!"

"Dana?"

She turned. WTN's Moscow correspondent stood there.

"I'm Tim Drew. Sorry I'm late. The traffic out there is a nightmare."

Tim Drew was in his forties, a tall, red-haired man with a warm smile. "I have a car waiting outside. Matt tells me that you're here for just a couple of days."

"That's right."

They picked up Dana's luggage at the carousel and headed outside.

The drive into Moscow was like a scene fromDoctor Zhivago. It seemed to Dana that the entire city was wrapped in a mantle of pure white snow.

"This is so beautiful!" Dana exclaimed. "How long have you been here?"

"Two years."

"Do you like it?"

"It's a little scary. Yeltsin is always two rolls short of a baker's dozen, and no one knows what to expect from Vladimir Putin. The inmates are running the asylum." He slammed to a stop to let some jaywalkers pass. "You're booked at the Sevastopol Hotel."

"Yes. How is it?"

"It's one of your typical Intourist hotels. You can be sure there will be someone on your floor to keep an eye on you."

The streets were crowded with people bundled up in furs and heavy sweaters and overcoats. Tim Drew glanced over at Dana. "You'd better get some warmer clothes or you're going to freeze."

"I'll be fine. I should be on my way home tomorrow or the next day."

Ahead of them was Red Square and the Kremlin. The Kremlin itself stood high on a hill that towered over the left bank of the Moskva River.

"My God, that's impressive," Dana said.

"Yeah. If those walls could talk, you'd hear a lot of screaming." Tim Drew went on: "It's one of the most famous buildings in the world. It sits on a plot of land covering Little Borovitsky Hill on the north bank and..."

Dana had stopped listening. She was thinking, What if Antonio Persico lied? What if he made up the story about Taylor Winthrop killing the boy? And lied about the Russian plan.

"That's Red Square outside the east wall. The Kutafya Tower there is the visitors' entrance at the west wall."

But then why was Taylor Winthrop so desperate to come to Russia? Simply being ambassador would not have meant that much to him.

Tim Drew was saying, "This is where all the Russian power has been for centuries. Ivan the Terrible and Stalin had their headquarters here, and Lenin and Khrushchev."

All the pieces fell into place. I have to find out what he meant by that.

They had pulled up in front of an enormous hotel. "Here we are," Tim Drew said.

"Thanks, Tim." Dana got out of the car and was hit by a solid wave of freezing air.

"You go on inside," Tim called. "I'll bring your bags in. By the way, if you're free this evening, I'd like to take you to dinner."

"Thank you very much."

"There's a private club that has good food. I think you'll enjoy it."

"Lovely."

The lobby of the Sevastopol Hotel was large and ornate, and filled with people. There were several clerks working behind the reception desk. Dana walked up to one of them.

He looked up. "Da?"

"I'm Dana Evans. I have a reservation."

The man looked at her a moment and said nervously, "Ah, yes. Miss Evans." He handed her a reservation card. "Would you fill this out, please? And I'll need your passport."

As Dana began to write, the clerk looked across the lobby at a man standing in the corner and nodded. Dana handed the registration card to the clerk.

"I'll have someone take you to your room."

"Thank you."

The room had a vague air of onetime gentility, and the furniture looked worn and shabby and smelled musty.

A heavyset woman in a shapeless uniform brought in Dana's bags. Dana tipped her, and the woman grunted and left. Dana picked up the telephone and called 252-2451.

"American Embassy."

"Ambassador Hardy's office, please."

"One moment."

"Ambassador Hardy's office."

"Hello. This is Dana Evans. May I speak to the ambassador?"

"Could you tell me what it's concerning?"

"It's - it's personal."

"Just a moment, please."

Thirty seconds later Ambassador Hardy was on the phone. "Miss Evans?"

"Yes."

"Welcome to Moscow."

"Thank you."

"Roger Hudson called to say you were coming. What can I do for you?"

"I wonder if I could come and see you?"

"Certainly. I'm - hold on a moment." There was a brief pause, and the ambassador came back on the line. "What about tomorrow morning? Ten o'clock?"

"That will be fine. Thank you very much."

"Until then."

Dana looked out the window at the crowds hurrying through the bitter cold and thought, Tim was right. I had better buy some warmer clothes.

GUM Department Store was not far from Dana's hotel. It was an enormous emporium, stocked with cheap goods that ranged from clothing to hardware.

Dana walked over to the women's section, where there were racks of heavy coats. She selected a woolen red one and a red scarf to match. It was twenty minutes before she could find a clerk to handle the transaction.

When Dana returned to her room, her cell phone was ringing. It was Jeff.

"Hello, darling. I tried to call you on New Year's Eve, but you didn't answer your cell phone, and I didn't know where to reach you."

"I'm sorry, Jeff."So he didn't forget! Bless him.

"Where are you?"

"I'm in Moscow."

"Is everything all right, honey?"

"Wonderful. Jeff, tell me about Rachel."

"It's too soon to say. They're going to try a new therapy on her tomorrow. It's still very experimental. We'll have the result in a few days."

"I hope it works," Dana said.

"Is it cold there?"

Dana laughed. "You wouldn't believe it. I'm a human icicle."

"I wish I were there to melt you."

They spoke for another five minutes, and Dana could hear Rachel's voice calling Jeff.

Jeff said on the phone, "I have to go, darling. Rachel needs me."

I need you too, Dana thought. "I love you."

"I love you."

The American Embassy at 19-23 Novinsky Bul'var was an ancient, run-down building, with Russian guards standing in sentry booths outside. A long queue of people waited patiently. Dana passed the line and gave her name to a guard. He looked at a roster and waved her in.

Inside the lobby, an American marine stood in a bulletproof glass security booth. An American female guard in uniform checked the contents of Dana's purse.

"Okay."

"Thank you." Dana walked to the desk. "Dana Evans."

A man standing near the desk said, "The ambassador is expecting you, Miss Evans. Come with me, please."

Dana followed him up some marble stairs into a reception office at the end of a long hallway. As Dana entered, an attractive woman in her early forties smiled and said, "Miss Evans, this is a pleasure. I'm Lee Hopkins, the ambassador's secretary. You may go right in."

Dana walked into the inner office. Ambassador Edward Hardy rose as she approached his desk.

"Good morning, Miss Evans."

"Good morning," Dana said. "Thank you for seeing me."

The ambassador was a tall, florid-looking man with the hearty manner of a politician.

"I'm delighted to meet you. Can I get you anything?"

"No thanks, I'm fine."

"Please have a seat."

Dana sat down.

"I was delighted when Roger Hudson told me to expect your visit. You've come at an interesting time."

"Oh?"

"I hate to say this, but between you and me, I'm afraid this country is in free fall." He sighed. "To be perfectly frank, I have no idea what's going to happen here next, Miss Evans. This is a country with eight hundred years of history, and we're watching it go down the drain. The criminals are running the country."

Dana looked at him curiously. "What do you mean?"

The ambassador leaned back in his chair. "The law here says that no member of the Duma - that's the lower parliament - can be prosecuted for any crime. The result is that the Duma is filled with men who are wanted for all kinds of felonies - gangsters who have served time in prison, and criminals who are in the process of committing crimes. None of them can be touched."

"That's incredible," Dana said.

"Yes. The Russian people are wonderful, but their government.... Well, what can I do for you, MissEvans?"

"I wanted to ask you about Taylor Winthrop. I'm doing a story about the family."

Ambassador Hardy shook his head in sorrow. "It's like a Greek tragedy, isn't it?"

"Yes."That phrase again.

Ambassador Hardy looked at Dana curiously. "The world has heard that story over and over. I wouldn't think there's much more to say about it."

Dana said carefully, "I want to tell it from a personal angle. I want to know what Taylor Winthrop was really like, what kind of man he was, who his friends were here, if he had any enemies..."

"Enemies?" He looked surprised. "No. Everyone loved Taylor. He was probably the best ambassador we ever had here."

"Did you work with him?"

"Yes. I was his deputy chief of mission for a year."

"Ambassador Hardy, do you know if Taylor Winthrop was working on anything where - " She stopped, not sure how to phrase it. " - all the pieces had to come together?"

Ambassador Hardy frowned. "You mean some kind of business deal or government deal?"

"I'm not sure what I mean," Dana confessed.

Ambassador Hardy thought for a moment. "I'm not, either. No, I have no idea what that could be."

Dana said, "Some of the people who are working here in the embassy now - did they work with him?"

"Oh, yes. As a matter of fact, my secretary, Lee, was Taylor's secretary."

"Would you mind if I talked to her?"

"Not at all. In fact, I'll give you a list of some of the people here who might be helpful."

"That would be wonderful. Thank you."

He rose. "Be careful while you're here, Miss Evans. There's a lot of crime on the streets."

"So I've heard."

"Don't drink the tap water. Not even the Russians drink it. Oh, and when you eat out, always specifychisti stol  - that means a clean table - or you'll find your table loaded with expensive appetizers that you don't want. If you're going shopping, the Arbat is the best place. The shops there have everything. And be careful of the taxis here. Take the older, shabbier ones. The con artists mostly drive new ones."

"Thank you." Dana smiled. "I'll remember."

Five minutes later Dana was speaking to Lee Hopkins, the ambassador's secretary. They were in a small room alone with the door closed.

"How long did you work for Ambassador Winthrop?"

"Eighteen months. What is it you want to know?"

"Did Ambassador Winthrop make any enemies when he was here?"

Lee Hopkins looked at Dana in surprise. "Enemies?"

"Yes. In a job like this, I imagine that sometimes you have to say no to people who might resent it. I'm sure that Ambassador Winthrop couldn't please everybody."

Lee Hopkins shook her head. "I don't know what you're after, Miss Evans, but if you're intending to write bad things about Taylor Winthrop, you've come to the wrong person for help. He was the kindest, most considerate man I've ever known."

Here we go again, Dana thought.

In the next two hours, Dana talked to five more people who had worked at the embassy during Taylor Winthrop's term.

He was a brilliant man...

He really liked people...

He went out of his way to help us...

Enemies? Not Taylor Winthrop...

I'm wasting my time, Dana thought. She went to see Ambassador Hardy again.

"Did you get what you wanted?" he asked. He seemed less friendly.

Dana hesitated. "Not exactly," she said honestly.

He leaned forward. "And I don't think you will, Miss Evans. Not if you're looking for negative things about Taylor Winthrop. You have everyone upset around here. They loved the man. So did I. Don't try to dig up skeletons that don't exist. If that's all you came here for, you can leave."

"Thank you," Dana said. "I will."

Dana had no intention of leaving.

The VIP National Club, directly opposite the Kremlin and Manezh Square, was a private restaurant and casino. Tim Drew was waiting there for Dana when she arrived.

"Welcome," he said. "I think you'll enjoy this. This place entertains the cream of Moscow's high-society movers and shakers. If a bomb fell on this restaurant, I think the government would be out of business."

The dinner was delicious. They started with blini and caviar and followed that with borscht, Georgian sturgeon with a walnut sauce, beef stroganoff ands'loukom rice, andvatrushki cheese tartlets for dessert.

"This is wonderful," Dana said. "I had heard that the food in Russia was terrible."

"It is," Tim Drew assured her. "This isn't Russia. This is a special little oasis."

"What is it like living here?" Dana asked.

Tim Drew was thoughtful for a moment. "It's like standing near a volcano, waiting for it to erupt. You never know when it's going to happen. The men in power are stealing billions from the country and the people are starving. That's what started the last revolution. God knows what's going to happen now. To be fair, that's only one side of the story. The culture here is incredible. They have the Bolshoi Theater, the great Hermitage, the Pushkin Museum, the Russian ballet, the Moscow Circus - the list goes on and on. Russia produces more books than the rest of the world combined, and the average Russian reads three times as many books a year as the average United States citizen."

"Maybe they're reading the wrong books," Dana said dryly.

"Maybe. Right now the people are caught in the middle, between capitalism and communism, and neither is working. There's bad service, inflated costs, and a hell of a lot of crime." He looked at Dana. "I hope I'm not depressing you."

"No. Tell me, Tim, did you know Taylor Winthrop?"

"I interviewed him a few times."

"Did you ever hear anything about some big project he was involved in?"

"He was involved in a lot of projects. After all, he was our ambassador."

"I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about something different. Something very complicated - where all the pieces had to fall into place."

Tim Drew thought for a moment. "It doesn't ring a bell."

"Is there anyone here that he had a lot of contact with?"

"Some of his Russian counterparts, I suppose. You might talk to them."

"Right," Dana said. "I will."

The waiter brought the check. Tim Drew scanned it and looked up at Dana. "This is typical. There are three separate surcharges on the bill. And don't bother asking what any of them are for." He paid the bill.

When they were out on the street, Tim Drew said to Dana, "Do you carry a gun?"

She looked at him in surprise. "Of course not. Why?"

"This is Moscow. You never know." He got an idea. "I'll tell you what. We're going to make a stop."

They got into a taxi, and Tim Drew gave the driver an address. Five minutes later they pulled up in front of a gun shop and got out of the taxi.

Dana looked inside the shop and said, "I'm not going to carry a gun."

Tim Drew said, "I know. Just come with me." The counters of the shop were filled with every type of weapon imaginable.

Dana looked around. "Can anybody walk in and buy a gun here?"

"All they need is the money," Tim Drew said.

The man behind the counter muttered something in Russian to Tim. Tim told him what he wanted.

"Da."He reached under the counter and pulled out a small, black, cylindrical object.

"What's this for?" Dana asked.

"It's for you. It's pepper spray." Tim Drew picked it up. "All you have to do is press this button at the top and the bad guys will be in too much pain to bother you."

Dana said, "I don't think - "

"Trust me. Take it." He handed it to Dana, paid the man, and they left.

"Would you like to see a Moscow nightclub?" Tim Drew asked.

"Sounds interesting."

"Great. Let's go."

The Night Flight Club on Tverskaya Street was lavish and ornate and crowded with well-dressed Russians dining, drinking, and dancing.

"There doesn't seem to be any economic problem here," Dana commented.

"No. They keep the beggars outside on the street."

At two o'clock in the morning, Dana returned to her hotel, exhausted. It had been a long day. A woman was seated at a table in the hallway, keeping a record of the movements of the guests.

When Dana got to her room, she looked out the window. She had a picture-postcard view of soft snow falling in the moonlight.

Tomorrow, Dana thought determinedly, I'll know what I've come here for.

The noise from the jet overhead was so loud it sounded like the plane might hit the building. The man quickly rose from his desk, snatched up a pair of binoculars, and stepped to the window. The tail of the receding aircraft was rapidly descending as it prepared to land at the small airport a half mile away. Except for the runways, everything in the stark landscape was covered with snow as far as his eyes could see. It was winter and this was Siberia.

"So," he said to his assistant, "the Chinese are the first to arrive." His comment did not call for a reply. "I am told that our friend Ling Wong will not be back. When he returned from our last meeting empty-handed, it was not a happy homecoming for him. Very sad. He was a decent man."

At that moment, a second jet roared overhead. He did not recognize the make. After it had landed, he trained his high-powered glasses on the men descending from the cabin onto the tarmac. Some of them made no effort to hide the machine pistols they were carrying.

"The Palestinians are here."

Another jet roared overhead. Still twelve to go, he thought. When we start negotiations tomorrow, it will be the biggest auction yet. Nothing must go wrong.

He turned again to his assistant. "Take a memo."

CONFIDENTIAL MEMO TO ALL OPERATION PERSONNEL: DESTROY IMMEDIATELY AFTER READING.

CONTINUE CLOSE SURVEILLANCE ON SUBJECT TARGET. REPORT ACTIVITIES AND STAND BY FOR HER POSSIBLE ELIMINATION.

P/S: Copyright -->www_novelfreereadonline_Com

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