"I can't let that truck out of sight! My friend's in there," Powell shot back.

"I will maintain contact with my radio... and with whom do you maintain contact? Senor... I do not know your name."

"Damn, he's got the Pol's Beretta and now he's got the radio!" Lyons cursed. "He knows there's someone else out here."

In the rental car, Blancanales touched the hand radio in his coat pocket. "This radio?"

"I do not mean my radio." With his free hand, Illovich touched the earphone plugged into his left ear, then pointed at the hand radio in Blancanales's coat pocket. Blancanales did not move. The Soviet applied pressure to Blancanales's ribs with the suppressor. "I promise to return it also."

Blancanales laughed softly as he passed the radio to the Soviet. Illovich smiled, showing off a set of perfect white false teeth.

"You laugh at the promise of a Soviet diplomat? You Americans..." Illovich studied the hand radio. He pressed the transmit key again and again. "And, for your information, I will also return your pistol. Does that surprise you? You do not yet understand..."

Gadgets's faint voice answered the clicks, static pops and scratches almost drowning his words. "This is center unit. Come in unit three. Report position. Speak loudly, you are at extreme radio range." Only a few car lengths behind Illovich, Gadgets rubbed his hand radio's microphone against his beard stubble as he whispered again. "Report position. Speak distinctly..." He crumpled a piece of paper. "Extreme range..."

Illovich passed the radio back to Blancanales. "So you are not alone. I return the radio, as I promised, but I also promise to shoot you if you attempt to prematurely contact your CIA pals."

"CIA? Me?" Blancanales asked, incredulous. "Why do you accuse me of that?"

"Do not deny it, Senor American. It would not be amusing. And you, miss. Are you also an operative of the Central Intelligence Agency?"

"No!" She spat out the denial. "I am a citizen of Quebec and an independent journalist. I am researching the CIA, but I would never associate with those..."

Powell laughed. "Unless you could get a story."

"...that gang of international criminals."

"What's your opinion of the KGB?" Powell demanded.

"Of course you are CIA. All American journalists are spies."

"I am not American! I am Quebecois!"

"So you speak bad French? American, Canadian, what is the difference? All foreign journalists spy for the CIA. Have you not read the great newspaper of my country, Pravda? 'Pravda' means 'truth.' " The Soviet laughed at his own irony. "And you, Mr. Powell. You were an operative, but you are not now, correct?"

"News gets around, don't it?"

"Think of your sudden liberty as an opportunity. I know of you, I know your talents. A man of your skills and experience would not suffer if he worked for the security agencies of my country. Put the political conflicts of our countries aside, consider the benefits. You would work with other professionals, at the command of professional leaders in the government. No more impossible directives from senile movie actors attempting to win votes with television spectacles. Instead of racing from place to place, attempting to correct problems that have no solutions, you could work to preserve world order, a world without war, where the Party leads a joyous humanity into the..."

"Gulag. The Siberian concentration camps. The firing squads and the unending march of the living dead into the pits."

Illovich shrugged. "Severe measures regrettably must sometimes be taken. But those are only for criminal elements. Here, Mr. Powell. I brought an application with me. Take it, it is yours. Study it."

Without taking his eyes from the traffic ahead, Powell slapped away the paper. "Who are you? Some kind of commie comedian? Never heard such shit."

"Ah, yes. It is wrong of me to make the offer in front of others. It was my way of putting you all at ease. It was perhaps a joke. But consider it. When you go back to the United States, you return to a very uncertain future. And that is the truth, if I..."

Illovich went quiet, listening to a report through the earphone he wore.

"Mr. Powell, accelerate. The truck is stopping. They appear to be transferring him to another vehicle."

"What's going on?"

"Make a right turn at this boulevard. This may be a very perilous moment. Mr. Powell, you must be ready. If there is a difficulty, you must identify my men as friends, or there may be a very unfortunate misunderstanding with your Lebanese friend. There, you see the truck? It is stopping..."

On a quiet side street lined by evergreens and flowers, the panel truck slowed to a stop behind another truck. The driver threw open the door and ran to the second truck. He pointed back to Akbar.

Two Iranians stepped from the truck, pulling pistols from under their coats. They aimed at Akbar and fired.

Powell floored the accelerator. He sped past the first truck, then whipped the car to the right, hitting the contact man and a gunman, tearing away the truck's driver-side door, the three impacts coming in one crash, the men and the door flying into the street.

Standing on the brake, Powell slammed the car into reverse and shrieked rubber. A shot from the second gunman banged off the hood, Desmarais screamed, then the panel truck blocked the gunman's aim. Powell jammed the brakes again, skidding the rental car to a stop.

Converging on the scene from opposite directions, two sedans braked to a tire-smoking stop. Men in dark suits — Soviet gunmen — ran from the cars shouting in Spanish. "Policia! Policia! Alto!"

The surviving Iranian turned. As he raised his pistol to aim, the dark suits fired. The gunman staggered back, his pistol falling from his hand, his legs spurting blood. He fell against a wrought-iron fence.

Akbar came out the back of the panel truck. Powell shouted at him. "Overhere!"

In the back seat of the rented car, Blancanales shoved the suppressor against the seat. He felt the pistol jar as Illovich fired a round into the upholstery.

Desmarais turned and sprayed Illovich with tear gas. She held down the button of the purse-size canister with one hand as she opened the door with the other. "Americans, get out! We must run!" Akbar shouted.

As Powell and Desmarais abandoned the car, Blancanales and Illovich, both choking, coughing, with watering eyes, fought for the pistol. Finally, Blancanales twisted the autopistol out of the Soviet's hands.

A Soviet gunman leaned into the car and pointed a gun at Blancanales's face. Breathing hard, his eyes streaming tears, Illovich took the silent pistol from Blancanales.

"Thank you." Illovich gave a command in Russian, and the Soviet ran after Powell and Desmarais. "A waste of time. They will not get far," Illovich said as two Soviets dragged the leg-shot Iranian gunman to a car.

At the corner, another car screeched to a stop, and a Soviet enforcer pointed a submachine gun at the running couple. Powell and Desmarais sprinted across the street, trying to make the safety of the boulevard. The Soviet fired a burst in front of them, the slugs pocking a rough-stone wall. They stopped. The Soviet motioned them back to where Illovich waited.

At the rented car, another Soviet agent quickly and expertly searched both Powell and Desmarais. He took the tear-gas sprayer from the woman and handed it to Illovich. Then Powell was ordered to start the car and follow the other cars away.

His eyes still filled with tears, Illovich examined the tear-gas sprayer. "Do all American girls carry these?"

"I am not..." Anne Desmarais began.

Illovich silenced the woman's denial with a spray of tear gas.

"Is that an official residence?" Lyons asked as they watched the last car turn through the gates of the walled and guarded grounds of a city estate.