Hyde placed the ruler across the top sheet of print-out. Checked that the tape streamer and the printer for hard copy were both on-line. Then the screen. He cancelled the unchanged, unchanging football scores. The screen became empty; pale green. Georgi was seated in a chair beside him. The other guard had joined Stepanov and they were smoking in the glass booth, behind the No Smoking sign in Cyrillic. The red circle of the sign hid part of Stepanov's face like a birthmark.
Begin — Log on using the embassy code.
The guard, Georgi, was unwrapping sandwiches — some thick Czech sausage that smelt of garlic and was pressed in slices between doorsteps of white bread. And unfolding a copy of the evening newspaper. He was comfortable, in a satisfied mood. Easy work. Hyde glanced back down the long room. Two figures moving distantly beyond the glass of the highest security area. Inside the glass, only figures in uniforms. One, Stepanov, alert and intelligent.
He used the password to gain access to the Main Menu, then summoned the Education Records from the Menu presented to him on the screen. As Godwin had said, these remote terminals were permanently on-line to Moscow Centre for ease and speed of access to the records. After all, no one expected an illegal, someone unauthorised like himself, to tap at this keyboard. Access was permitted to permitted staff and only permitted staff knew the passwords.
The room stretched away on his right, towards the corridor and stairs. To his left, perhaps fifty feet away, Stepanov was smoking and drinking coffee. Georgi bit into a thick wedge of bread. Hyde smelt garlic sausage once more, until the air-conditioning whisked the odour away.
Hyde typed the first of the names on his list, Abalakin, I.P. A moment, then the screen spilled his education record and qualifications. Hyde checked them against his print-out — Godwin's own compilation supplemented by the official SIS roll-call for the Soviet embassy in Prague. Correct. He typed the next name, Aladko, I.A. Waterfall of facts. Correct. Antipin, V.V. Correct. Baranov, I.K. Correct.
Georgi munched, rustled the newpaper. Hyde studied his watch as Boyko's mediocre education achievements appeared on the screen. Eleven twenty-one. He selected the hard copy option, and the printer startled Georgi in mid-bite. Hyde stood up, leaned over the printer and checked the information against that on the screen. Boyko was dim, but his record was flawlessly presented. Chobotov, Dedov, Didenko, Fatayev, A.G. Correct, correct, correct.
Georgi folded his sandwich-bag with fastidious care. Hyde turned to him. Grim Party faces stared up at him from the newspaper.
"Sorry, Georgi," he said. "You're not allowed to see this. Not cleared, mate. I'll even have to shred it myself." Hyde shrugged. "I have to check up on their assignment histories now. Sorry."
Georgi glanced at his officer, still smoking, enjoying some kind of joke behind the birthmark of the No Smoking sign. Smoking Absolutely Forbidden, it read. The smoke did not escape into the computer rooms, thus they ignored the sign. Absolutely Forbidden. His hands hesitated over the keyboard. He had to make the transfer before Stepanov returned; he was cleared to supervise.
Before Stepanov, before Moscow discovered, before the telephone rang — go on, go on—!
Georgi got up slowly, wiping his mouth with a grey handkerchief. He nodded, cleaning his teeth with his tongue, bulging his right cheek into an abcess. "I'll get the lieutenant," he muttered thickly and walked away casually. As slowly as some ruminant animal.
Fifty feet.
Godwin had warned him to be prepared to snatch at any chance that offered itself. But not to make a mistake—
Now?
Now. He stared at the Cyrillic keyboard, momentarily baffled by the strange alphabet. Then it was as if he had refocused his gaze; the keys swam into clear meaning. Last three assignments, in reverse order, without break. He could almost hear Petrunin, feel his blood-wet lips against his cheek and ear. He shivered.
He cancelled the Education Records. The Menu presented itself, requesting usage of the Centre's records computer. For Assignment History, he needed the passwords that Petrunin had given him; his thread into the labyrinth. Forbidden, Absolutely Forbidden. He requested Assignment History, and the screen requested the passwords that would indicate his security clearance. What—?
He typed: WHITENIGHTS WHITEBEAR WHITE-RUSSIAN.
ERROR, the screen replied, and requested he submit the correct password. Three times, Godwin had said — you get only three chances. He heard Petrunin's voice, dammit—! That awful, empty whispered growl. Hatred, delight in destruction, fear of his imminent death. The bastard had lied—!
He glanced towards the glass cubicle which was misty with blue cigarette smoke. Georgi was pointing at him and Stepanov was nodding. Then the lieutenant studied the amount of coffee left in his mug and the length of cigarette yet to be smoked. Hyde, sweating freely, waved in a casual, delaying manner in their direction.
Cancel it — back away…
He wasn't lying.
He typed: WHITENIGHTSWHITEBEARWHITERUSSIAN — without breaks, just like the final secret password to what Petrunin had stored in the computer. Without breaks—!
ERROR, the screen offered implacably. Hyde felt his temperature rise, his body quiver. Critical, the reactor out of control, the organism terrified. Georgi, Stepanov — the telephone… Moscow couldn't cut him off now, they had to let it run—
He concentrated, screwing up his eyes and face as if in pain. Bending his head over the keys, as if about to begin some intense recital. Petrunin's voice whispered hollowly, as if echoing in the abandoned cave of his own body. What—?
Hyde listened, then, as if he had communicated with some lost spirit rather than his own memory, he typed trancelike on the keyboard.
WHITENIGHTSWHITERUSSIANWHITEBEAR
The screen cleared. He opened his eyes. PASSWORD CORRECT. The screen asked him what he wished to know, how he wished to be helped, what he required.
He typed in Petrunin's name, then rank, then given names. Then KGB number. He glanced at the glass booth. Stepanov showed no sign of movement, other than the lifting of his mug to his lips. To his right, the outer room stretched away into vagueness — his distance to run. Petrunin's assignments appeared on the screen, in summary. Hyde did not even glance at them. He knew the last three. London, Moscow First Directorate HQ, Kabul. Yes, Petrunin would have used Kabul, savouring and hating the irony. Or would he? Would he? When had he corrupted the computer?
In response to another password request, and in place of the valid password, Hyde typed: KABULMOSCOWLONDON.
Blank. Blank screen—!
He knew, almost by telepathy or spiritualism, that Petrunin had used Kabul as his final assignment. He would have changed the password sequence to include it, if necessary. Oh, yes, he would have—
Come on, come on, come on—
Behind the blank screen, Hyde sensed the bypass occurring, felt the computer seek for the tumour that Petrunin had lodged within it. Seek, seek, seek — find!
A poem. Not information. A poem in Russian. Petrunin's record continued to unfold, and then it broke off. Became these fourteen lines of verse rolling down the screen like gentle green water. Malfunction, of course. Petrunin had warned him. Even so, his hand hovered over the keyboard. He wanted to depress the Break key and return to the Menu, as anyone stumbling across Petrunin's secret by accident would now have done. This was the disarmer. Tears, was that? A sad parting. Something about career and love, and the conflict thereof. Petrunin in maudlin, self-indulgent mood. Hyde had no doubt of the poem's authorship. A younger Petrunin. Much younger. A single tear, the scenery about the lovers, a swan gliding into the distance. Hyde wrinkled his nose.