Sorensen nodded. “Heard a couple of the embassy guys talking. UPI is reporting a large protest at the East German government building. Thousands of people. Pretty amazing.”
“So what is the bad news?” Katie asked, nonplussed.
“We’ve been asked to move things up. Tonight. As in right now.”
Sorensen and Katie looked at each other in disbelief. “Right now? We only finished getting everything in place this morning.”
Mrs. Stevens put her hands on her hips and gave them a tight-lipped smile. “Well, then we’re ready, aren’t we? Contingency plan Beta-Beta. Let’s move it!”
Sorensen rolled his eyes and promptly disappeared, leaving only his civilian suit in place, which flopped to the floor seemingly of its own accord. Ekaterina, meanwhile, got up and dashed off to her embassy quarters to change into her outfit for the evening. Mrs. Stevens followed her to get into her own get-up, stopping by Jacob Beam’s office along the way. The chargé d’affaires wasn’t too pleased at being drafted into service with just two hours’ notice, but reluctantly agreed to the change in plans.
“Espionage doesn’t keep schedules,” Mrs. Stevens said cheerily. “Get your tux on. We’re out in twenty minutes.”
Lavrentiy Beria put on a game face, for sure, but Maggie Dubinsky could feel the tension inside him, ready to boil over at a moment’s provocation. She just needed to make damned sure she wasn’t the source of the provocation.
Instead, she hooked her arm into his and leaned over in the back seat of the limousine as they rode through the early Moscow evening. “Hey, it’s okay,” she said quietly. “Not your fault that the damn Germans can’t keep their own in check.”
Beria turned to her and gave her a small smile. “I told Molotov. I told him. Their economic plan was completely unsustainable. One cannot create entire industries out of whole cloth in just a few years. But the Party overruled me and let the Germans try. And now those fools have an insurrection on their hands.”
“Exactly,” Maggie said, watching his tension build further. “Not your fault, right?”
The smile evaporated. “Tell that to those fools, Malenkov and Khrushchev. It’s been less than twelve hours and they want heads to roll for this. Now I have my entire staff working through the night to determine the right levers to pull to quell the situation. I almost canceled tonight.”
“You couldn’t do that,” Maggie said. “Preview night at the Bolshoi for the diplomatic corps — you have to be there. If they see you’re missing, they’ll read even more into what’s going on. It’ll undermine you further, and we’re so close. So very close.”
Maggie pulled in a little tighter and pulled a few emotional strings in Beria’s head to bring his attention to the curves of her MGB uniform. “Yes, we are,” Beria said. “Close indeed.”
The car stopped before things progressed further, and Maggie waited for Comrade Illyanov to get out and open the rear door for them. Although he continued to look well past his prime, Boris Giorgievich Illyanov was as fast as ever when he needed to be, and Beria preferred to keep him close. The bodyguard’s reaction times and speed would easily thwart most assassination attempts, while his elderly appearance made Beria look unprotected — and also helped with his public image, since many of those who saw Boris Giorgievich thought he was a pensioner from the Revolution, kept on as driver as an act of kindness.
Maggie got out and scanned the crowds heading into the Bolshoi, both visually and with her Enhancement. Most people looked on at Beria’s arrival with mild curiosity, a little excitement, a few pangs of fear, but nothing she hadn’t seen before. She nodded at Illyanov, who gave the all-clear to Beria. The First Deputy Premier emerged from the car to a smattering of applause and a few flashbulbs, and he waved to the crowd as he proceeded into the Bolshoi, Maggie and Illyanov on his heels.
It was only inside the lobby where Maggie got her first glimpse that something was up. In the corner of her mind, she felt a surge of surprise, recognition, anger, and fear. And when she turned, she saw Rose Stevens there, dressed to the nines in a conservative, dark-green gown alongside Jacob Beam, that embassy peon they’d been stuck with at the funeral back in March.
And they were approaching.
“First Deputy Premier,” Beam said as he drew near, hand extended. “I wanted to thank you, on behalf of the United States Embassy, for hosting such a fine evening of culture. I hope it’ll be yet another way our two nations can come together in appreciation and respect.”
Beria smiled and shook his hand. “Of course, Mr. Beam. I am most pleased to see you as well. Your Russian is improving. Have I met this lovely woman yet?” he said, turning to Mrs. Stevens and smiling.
Mrs. Stevens jumped a little bit, then extended her hand. “I’m Jacob’s sister, Susan,” she said in English, and Maggie couldn’t help but smile at her enhanced Midwestern accent and volume. “This is such a lovely, lovely place, Mr. Beria. I must say, I’ve never been to the ballet before!”
Beria looked around blankly; his knowledge of English wasn’t common knowledge, and he preferred to keep it that way. Maggie stepped in instead, quietly speaking in Russian. “The woman here says she is Mr. Beam’s sister. She says the theater is lovely and she’s never been to the ballet before. She is also a spy.”
To her credit, Mrs. Stevens — who spoke decent Russian — barely flinched, and Maggie noticed it only because she was looking. Beria, meanwhile, spoke in rapid, sotto voce Russian. “Tell her I am pleased to meet her, and then we will talk, you and I.”
Maggie turned to her former colleagues. “The First Deputy Premier is very pleased to meet you as well, Susan Beam,” she said, trying on a Russian accent to go with her English. “If you’ll excuse us?”
Mrs. Stevens wasn’t having it. “Oh, darling, do you happen to know where the ladies’ room is? I’d hate to have to get up during the show.”
There was a time, not too long ago, when the prospect of field work terrified Mrs. Stevens. And now, here she was, brazen as all get out, right in front of the most powerful man in the Soviet Union. “Here, let me show you.” She turned to Beria. “I will join you in a moment, after I’ve interrogated this one,” she whispered in Russian.
Beria nodded and took his leave, while Maggie escorted Mrs. Stevens toward the ladies’ room. Before they got there, though, Maggie took her arm and pulled her through a maintenance door. The corridor beyond was vacant and dim, the chatter of the crowd dulled by stone walls.
“What the hell are you up to, Rose?” Maggie demanded.
Mrs. Stevens’s face was a mask of anger, and her emotional state was one of pure rage. To Maggie’s surprise, she was beginning to feel a little remorse. Was that what it was? Regret? Sadness? She and Rose were friends. Weren’t they?
“I could ask the same of you, Maggie Dubinsky,” Mrs. Stevens replied. “Shame on you. Shame on you! Do you know how much Frank and Danny are worried about you? And we’ve lost poor Cal and Rick, too, somewhere in Korea. They’re MIA! In a war zone! Your friends needed you, and you went and flipped on us. All of us!”
Maggie’s eyes widened. “Cal’s MIA? He never got out of Korea?”
“And if you were here, we would’ve bagged Beria by now and gone to Korea and got him back! Instead, Danny’s off to… Danny’s away. We’re all busy trying to do our jobs, and now we have to contend with you, too! You’re a traitor, Maggie! How could you!”
Maggie felt some genuine anger build inside her. “Shove it, Rose. You know why I’m here.”
“Because you think this will be better?” Mrs. Stevens countered. “You think we’re supposed to rule over people instead of help them? Because that’s what this is all about. Once you start thinking you’re better than everybody else, you’re already far worse. You know better than this, Maggie!”