2

“It changes nothing,” Alex said.

“The odds are longer now,” Baron Oleg said, and looked to Prince Leon for confirmation.

Count Anatol Markov said, “For once I agree with Oleg. We should have had more planes.”

“I asked the Americans for six. They said it was out of the question. We were lucky to get three. Actually I was prepared to accept two-the third bomber was always a backup plane. The operational plan calls for two aircraft-one to interdict the railway tracks and halt the train, the second to hit the troop carriages and gun cars before anyone can get out of them.”

“Then we had better not lose either of the remaining bombers, had we,” Anatol said drily.

Their accommodations in the Finnish encampment were primitive: the troops were billeted in field tents with portable coal stoves; there was a mess kitchen but the men had to eat outdoors or carry their meals back to their tents, by which time the food had gone cold. The command echelon was billeted barrack-style in what were ordinarily the pilots’ quarters of a Finnish air squadron. For a full week the temperature did not rise more than two degrees above freezing and most of the time it was well below. Alex and his men were used to it but some of the politicals had become too accustomed to their Mediterranean habitats; Anatol and General Savinov were forever complaining of the cold.

On the crisp nights they could hear the guns from the front thirty miles away. Alex and Corporal Cooper used the air-tower radio equipment to maintain contact with Vlasov in Moscow. There were brief nightly exchanges that could not settle Alex’s unease. He was ready for it-they all were-and the waiting ate away at him like acid even though they kept up a punishing training regimen. His nerves twanged with vibration and he was snappish with Irina, brusque with the politicals, authoritarian with the members of his command, noncommunicative with Cosgrove and Buckner. John Spaight chewed him out for it but he barked right back at his American friend and Spaight went away fuming: they were all on edge-all except ground-crew chief Calhoun who fussed maternally over his remaining airplanes and kept working on them when it seemed clear there was no work left to do. Then on Wednesday Calhoun came to Alex and said, “You’ve got a bad propeller on one of those C-47S, General.”

“What do you mean a bad propeller?”

“Metal fatigue. There’s a hairline crack in one of the blades. It could bust off any time.”

“Can you do anything about it?” Sudden alarm: they’d already lost one aircraft; they couldn’t do without one of the precious transports.

“Sure,” Calhoun drawled. “That’s essentially the same Wright Cyclone engine they’ve got on the B-17S. I already told my boys to take a prop off that one that wrecked in the trees. We’ll have it bolted on by this afternoon. But I thought I’d better tell you about it.”

“Next time see if you can give me the news without inducing cardiac arrest, will you Calhoun?”

On December fourth a daring Russian counterattack broke through the German lines to Shimki and halted the Wehrmacht’s advance on Moscow.

That night it snowed more heavily than before. The Germans were still falling back under attack by fresh Siberian regiments. Radio news broadcasts from Moscow were hearty with gusto: the announcers could not keep the excitement from their voices and there was no doubt this victory was more than mere propaganda.

But the signal that came from Vlasov at half-past eleven that night-when Alex’s transports were filling with troops-was to say that the tank trials had been put off.

A major storm was tracking northeast across Europe at twenty-five knots. It was expected to blow for the next three days in the Moscow area.

The tank trials had been postponed to Monday morning.

3

Vlasov’s last signal came late Saturday night.

KOLLIN X WEATHER CLEARING X PROJECTION FOR EIGHTH IS CLEAR X SCHEDULE AFFIRMED FOR EIGHTH X WILL NOT SEND AGAIN UNLESS CHANGE IN SCHEDULE X GOOD HUNTING X KOLLIN X CARNEGIE

It was strange to see them in these surroundings. They belonged against the luxurious backgrounds of villas, gaming rooms, lofty tapestried chambers, works of art of millennia. In the stark Suomi flying-officers’ dayroom they were uncomfortable strangers. They had endured twenty years’ exile and months of recent tension but now the time that you measured in minutes was attacking their composure. General Savinov had drunk himself to the point of glazed paralysis. Anatol and Oleg occupied opposite corners of the room and at intervals their white-hot glances locked across it. Old Prince Michael had gone very vague and loquacious: most of what he said made no sense to Alex in the snatches he overheard. Baron Yuri Ivanov sat bolt upright on a wooden chair with his straight-armed hands perched on his knees, staring at nothing. Leon sat with his cane hooked over the arm of his chair and a glass of vodka which by now had gone warm with neglect; he was talking in earnest low tones to Prince Felix who kept shoving a lock of hair back from his forehead. And Irina said in a voice calculated to reach no farther than Alex’s ears, “Do you think any of them will make it through the next twenty-four hours?” Then she made an impatient gesture. “I mustn’t laugh at them-it’s so unkind.”

“They wouldn’t notice.”

“Are you rattled too?”

“I suppose I am. I keep craving a thick American steak with all the trimmings.” But abruptly and unaccountably he had an image of Carol Ann’s melancholy frown in a flyspecked El Paso cafe; and he said, “Or maybe a big plate of chili and beans.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” he said. When this was over he would write to her. Just a polite note: how are things? — the sort of thing that couldn’t do her harm if her husband happened to see it. It was something he owed her: acknowledgment that she hadn’t been forgotten. She’d seen him through the worst of it, the months he’d thought he wasn’t going to see Irina again. Suddenly he brought her into the semicircle of his arm and gripped her shoulder.

“It’s all right,” she said, very gentle. “Do you want to come to bed?”

“In a little while.”

In the beginning the challenge had stirred him and made his juices run; he had formulated the plan in quick broad strokes with brilliant speed and then he had filled in the fine touches with careful foresight; he’d been confident he’d got the composition right, drawn every line and every dot where it had to be. Wherever there had been a conflict between methods or means he’d chosen the alternative that had the best odds of success. It was a plan worthy of the masters but now he began to believe in all the things that could go wrong and he knew he had to shake that off. It was the delay that did it. They’d keyed themselves up for a specific hour; it had been put back seventy-two hours and that was more than enough time to ruin the edge.

Buckner and Cosgrove entered the room: an odd pair-the gaunt one-armed brigadier, professionally reserved; the blunt cheerful American with his foolish facade of amiable buffoonery. They’d hit it off without any of the competitive rivalry he’d half expected to see.

Irina said, “Our two referees seem to be fast friends. Last night I caught them talking with feverish excitement about murder mysteries. Can you believe that? They’re both fanatical admirers of Dashiell Hammett. It’s incredible. They’re like two small boys who’ve just met and discovered they’ve got the same passion for backgammon and toy airplanes.”

Felix came toward them arching an eyebrow. “You two look disgustingly cozy and domestic together. Under the circumstances it’s hardly sporting.”

Alex smiled a little. “You’re nervous.”

“It’s probably a good thing. When I didn’t begin to get nervous the day before a race I knew I wasn’t going to win.”