At the lieutenant’s desk, before the offices of Kliment Blagonravov, he stopped and said, “Colonel Simonov. I have no appointment but I think the Minister will see me.”
“Yes, Comrade Colonel,” the lieutenant said. He spoke into an inter-office communicator, then looked up. “Minister Blagonravov will be able to see you in a few minutes, sir.”
Ilya Simonov stared nervously and unseeingly out a window while he waited. Gorki Park lay across the way. It, like Moscow in general, had changed a good deal in Simonov’s memory. Everything in Russia had changed a good deal, he realized. And was changing. And what was the end to be? Or was there ever an end? Of course not. There is no end, ever. Only new changes to come.
The lieutenant said, ‘The Minister is free now, Comrade Colonel.”
Ilya Simonov muttered something to him and pushed his way through the heavy door.
Blagonravov looked up from his desk and rumbled affectionately, “Ilya! It’s good to see you. Have a drink! You’ve lost weight, Ilya!”
His top field man sank into the same chair he’d occupied nine months before, and accepted the ice-cold vodka.
Blagonravov poured another drink for himself, then scowled at the other. “Where have you been? When you first went off to Prague, I got reports from you almost every day. These last few months I’ve hardly heard from you.” He rumbled his version of a chuckle. “If I didn’t know you better, I’d think there was a woman.”
Ilya Simonov looked at him wanly. “That too, Kliment.”
“You are jesting!”
“No. Not really. I had hoped to become engaged — soon.”
“A Party member? I never thought of you as the marrying type, Ilya.”
Simonov said slowly, “Yes, a Party member. Catherina Panova, my assistant in the automobile agency in Prague.”
Blagonravov scowled heavily at him, put forth his fat lips in a thoughtful pout He came to his feet, approached a file cabinet, fishing from his pocket a key ring. He unlocked the cabinet, brought forth a sheaf of papers with which he returned to his desk. He fumbled through them for a moment, found the paper he wanted and read it He scowled again and looked up at his agent.
“Your first report,” he said. “Catherina Panova. From what you say here, a dangerous reactionary. Certainly she has no place in Party ranks.”
Ilya Simonov said, “Is that the complete file of my assignment?”
“Yes. I’ve kept it here in my own office. I’ve wanted this to be ultra-undercover. No one except you and me. I had hopes of you working your way up into the enemy’s organization, and I wanted no possible chance of you being betrayed. You don’t seem to have been too successful.”
“I was as successful as it’s possible to be.”
The security minister leaned forward. “Ah ha! I knew I could trust you to bring back results, Ilya. This will take Frol Zverev’s pressure off me. Number One has been riding me hard.” Blagonravov poured them both another drink. “You were able to insert yourself into their higher circles?”
Simonov said, “Kliment, there are no higher circles.”
His chief glared at him. “Nonsense!” He tapped the file with a pudgy finger. “In your early reports you described several groups, small organizations, illegal meetings. There must be an upper organization, some movement supported from the West most likely.”
Ilya Simonov was shaking his head. “No. They’re all spontaneous.”
His chief growled, “I tell you there are literally thousands of these little groups. That hardly sounds like a spontaneous phenomenon.”
“Nevertheless, that is what my investigations have led me to believe.”
Blagonravov glowered at him, uncertainly. Finally, he said, “Well, confound it, you’ve spent the better part of a year among them. What’s it all about? What do they want?”
Ilya Simonov said flatly, “They want freedom, Kliment.”
“Freedom! What do you mean, freedom? The Soviet Complex is the most highly industrialized area of the world. Our people have the highest standard of living anywhere. Don’t they understand? We’ve met all the promises we ever made. We’ve reached far and beyond the point ever dreamed of by Utopians. The people, all of the people, have it made as the Americans say.”
“Except for freedom,” Simonov said doggedly. “These groups are springing up everywhere, spontaneously. Thus far, perhaps, our ministry has been able to suppress some of them. But the pace is accelerating. They aren’t inter-organized now. But how soon they’ll start to be, I don’t know. Sooner or later, someone is going to come up with a unifying idea. A new socio-political system to advocate a way of guaranteeing the basic liberties. Then, of course, the fat will be in the fire.”
“Ilya! You’ve been working too hard. I’ve pushed you too much, relied on you too much. You need a good lengthy vacation.”
Simonov shrugged. “Perhaps. But what I’ve just said is the truth.”
His chief snorted heavily. “You half sound as though you agree with them.”
“I do, Kliment.”
“I am in no mood for gags, as the Yankees say.”
Ilya Simonov looked at him wearily. He said slowly, “You sent me to investigate an epidemic, a spreading disease. Very well, I report that it’s highly contagious.”
Blagonravov poured himself more vodka angrily. “Explain yourself. What’s this all about?”
His former best field man said, “Kliment—”
“I want no familiarities from you, Colonel!”
“Yes, sir.” Ilya Simonov went on doggedly. “Man never achieves complete freedom. It’s a goal never reached, but one continually striven for. The moment as small a group as two or three gather together, all of them must give up some of the individual’s freedom. When man associates with millions of his fellow men, he gives up a good many freedoms for the sake of the community. But always he works to retain as much liberty as possible, and to gain more. It’s the nature of our species, I suppose.”
“You sound as though you’ve become corrupted by Western ideas,” the security head muttered dangerously.
Simonov shook his head. “No. The same thing applies over there. Even in countries such as Sweden and Switzerland, where institutions are as free as anywhere in the world, the people are continually striving for more. Governments and socio-economic systems seem continually to whittle away at individual liberty. But always man fights back and tries to achieve new heights for himself.
“In the name of developing our country, the Party all but eliminated freedom in the Soviet Complex, but now the goals have been reached and the people will no longer put up with us, sir.”
“Us!” Kliment Blagonravov growled bitterly. “You are hardly to be considered in the Party’s ranks any longer, Simonov. Why in the world did you ever return here?” He sneered fatly. “Your best bet would have been to escape over the border into the West.”
Simonov looked at the file on the other’s desk. “I wanted to regain those reports I made in the early days of my assignment. I’ve listed in them some fifty names, names of men and women who are now my friends.”
The fat lips worked in and out. “It must be that woman. You’ve become soft in the head, Simonov.” Blagonravov tapped the file beneath his heavy fingers. “Never fear, before the week is out these fifty persons will be either in prison or in their graves.”
With a fluid motion, Ilya Simonov produced a small caliber gun, a special model designed for security agents. An unusual snout proclaimed its quiet virtues as guns go.
“No, Kliment,” Ilya Simonov said.
“Are you mad!”
“No, Kliment, but I must have those reports.” Ilya Simonov came to his feet and reached for them.
With a roar of rage, Kliment Blagonravov slammed open a drawer and dove a beefy paw into it. With shocking speed for so heavy a man, he scooped up a heavy military revolver.