The Chairman picked up a pad and scrawled out a message. He then rang for his KGB colonel.
"You summoned me, Comrade Chairman?" asked the colonel.
' 'Da,'' replied Kostiashak as he handed over the folded paper. "Take this to the Communications Centre and have it encrypted and sent without delay. Watch over it yourself to ensure it is handled quickly."
"Certainly, Comrade Chairman," replied the colonel. He turned and departed.
Kostiashak called after him, "And bring some cigarettes from my office when you return."
The loading ramp of the Antonov-72 Coaler transport closed up, sealing the docking collar, the Chief Designer, and his KGB escort into the cargo hold.
The Coaler looked like any generic military transport, except for its two engines. They rested on top of the wings, thrusting forward in an extreme overhang. The aircraft appeared somewhat comical — as if it were holding up a gigantic pair of binoculars to see where it was going. And this one knew where it was going. It roared down the runway and lifted off on a vector toward the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
The Foreign Minister prided himself on being an early riser. Although he was eighty years old, he looked fifteen years younger, and was always at his desk no later than 8:00 a.m. His brushlike black hair showed only a few flecks of gray, and the skin around his face did not hang down in jowls, but remained firm and tight. Only the liver spots on the back of his hands betrayed his true age. A brisk swim every morning in the private indoor pool at the Kutuzovsky Prospekt 26 building kept him fit as a fiddle, and he enjoyed casting a scornful eye on his soft subordinates who straggled in later than he. Often with hangovers.
He hung up his coat and Borsolino hat, then sat down at his desk — which had once belong to Czarina Catherine the Great, and had been appropriated from the Hermitage Museum in Leningrad. Following his standard morning ritual, the Foreign Minister sipped his tea and began plowing through the overnight cable traffic before reading his copy of the International Herald Tribune, which was flown in for him each morning from Paris.
The cable traffic from Washington came first, of course, although he was watching the communiques, from London these days with great care. The British elections were near, and it looked as if that Thatcher woman was finally on her way out. She'd always been a royal — ha, ha — nuisance; but at long last, Britain's recurring unemployment problems were finally undermining her administration. Her opponent was a firebrand liberal who'd promised to evict the Americans from their airbases if elected, and it looked as if that was a real possibility. So much the better, thought the Foreign Minister. Someday all Europe will be ours, and we will not have fired a single shot. All it took was patience. And for one who'd survived Stalin, Beria, Malen-kov, Kaganovich, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov, Cher-nenko, Gorbachev, and now General Secretary Vorontsky, the Foreign Minister knew something about patience.
He picked up the leather folder containing the Washington cables and read.
Then he reread.
Then he reread, again, and scratched his head. In his fifty plus years of foreign service he'd never read anything quite like this. He picked up the phone and buzzed the Soviet Minister of Defense on a private line.
' 'Da?'' came the reply.
"Ah, Konstantin," purred the diplomat. "I am pleased you are in."
"Of course, my dear Foreign Minister. What is on your mind?" The military chieftain was always direct.
"I have received a rather disturbing cable from Yakolev in Washington. The message concerns something that does not make any logical sense whatsoever, but the ambassador insists the American President is genuinely concerned."
"Yakolev is a good man," observed the Defense Minister. "What does the cable concern?"
The Foreign Minister cleared his throat. "It appears the Americans believe that we are communicating with one of their manned spacecraft, which was launched approximately two days ago."
There was a pause.
"What?" asked a perplexed voice.
The Foreign Minister explained again.
"I do not understand," said the military chieftain.
"Nor do I," said the diplomat, "but I will send a copy of the cable over to you at once. Please investigate and get back to me without delay. I do not think it appropriate to disturb the General Secretary with this unless it turns out to be something of substance. He had already left for a long weekend at his dacha in Usovo."
"As you wish," promised the Defense Minister, "without delay."
The duty officer colonel looked rather odd. He was standing at attention, saluting with his right hand while holding the phone receiver in his left. "No, Comrade Minister," he said nervously. "I know of no such occurrence. It is inconceivable."
The Defense Minister's thick voice came through the line. "I quite agree, Colonel, but our ambassador would not trouble us unless he had reason. You did almost shoot down an American spy plane, is that not correct?"
"Yes, Comrade. I was not on duty at the time, but I read the reports. There was nothing about communication with an American spacecraft."
"Hmmm," murmured the thick voice. "Review the reports again and talk to the colonel who was on duty at the time. Find out if he knows anything concerning this matter. Then call me back with verification within fifteen minutes."
"Of course, Comrade Minister."
When the line went dead the duty officer finally lowered his salute and collapsed in his chair. Both of his hands were trembling. He'd never spoken with a Politburo member before.
He found it terrifying.
"I have no idea what you are talking about," said Popov into the phone.
"I felt as much, dear Likady," purred the Defense Minister, "but with this cable from Washington I had to investigate."
"I quite understand, Comrade Minister," replied Popov. "I can only speculate that the Americans have had some technical malfunction with their spacecraft, and they are attempting to blame it on the Rodina for propaganda purposes. I seem to remember the Americans tried to generate some false accusations about Soviet agents being responsible for their space shuttle disaster several years ago. This could be a similar situation."
The minister pondered this for a few moments.' 'Good point, Likady," he agreed. "You are most probably correct." Then he changed the subject. "Someday we must go hunting in the taiga. As we did in the old days."
"Those were grand times, Comrade Minister," said Popov with feigned enthusiasm. "I will never forget the Siberian bear you bagged with a single shot — from that ancient musket of yours."
The military chieftain chuckled. "I still have the hide on the wall in my dacha. Very well, old friend. I am sorry to have bothered you. Should anything unusual occur along this line, leave word with my office." "Certainly, Comrade."
After the line went dead, Popov slowly hung up the phone, then turned to look down the gun barrel which had been aimed at his temple. "You can put that away now,'' he said in a strained voice. "I am in too deep to turn back."