“Mr Baylor.”

“My husband.” She looked at him. “Where did you say you were from?”

“Immigration,” Nick said, on firm ground now. “We just like to check. Thank you. I’m glad there’s no trouble.”

“No trouble at all. Shall I tell her you were here?”

“You can,” Nick said carefully, “but sometimes it upsets them. You know what it’s like where they come from.”

Mrs Baylor nodded. “I do.”

“We don’t want them to think it’s like that here. Not with a routine check.” He had taken out a notepad and was pretending to write. “These last names,” he said, shaking his head.

“Aren’t they something? I can never remember either. Oh, well, here,” she said, flipping through the mail until she found a store catalogue. “K at the end. Kova.”

He glanced at it. “Thanks.”

“Any time. You couldn’t do better, letting people like her in. Better than some we’ve already got.”

Nick got in the car and waved to Mrs Baylor as he drove off.

“Irina Herlikova,” he said to Molly. “Quiet as a mouse.”

“I wonder what she does.”

“She’s learning the language.”

“No. For them.”

The third address, surprisingly, was on D Street, in a black neighborhood southeast of Capitol Hill. Not a slum, but tattered, the respectable brick fronts frayed around the edges, needing paint.

“Well, at least this one’s not a Russian,” Nick said.

“We can’t stay here. Two white people sitting in a car.”

“No, let’s just get a look at the house. We’ll swing back.”

“As if no one will notice.”

But they were lucky. The house was in better repair than its neighbors, trim, a neat front yard, and on their third pass a man in uniform came out, moved a tricycle to the end of the porch, and, taking out his keys, walked toward a new car parked in front. Nick turned at the corner and waited.

“Let’s see where he goes.”

“Have you ever followed anybody?” she said, her voice eager, enjoying it.

“I’m learning on the job.”

It turned out to be harder than he expected. He waited a few minutes after the car passed, then rounded the corner to find it idling at a red light.

“Don’t slow down. He’ll notice,” Molly said.

Green. Their luck held. Another block and a car came out of a driveway and put itself between them. Nick relaxed. More blocks. The new car moved smoothly, never running lights, as orderly and correct as its owner.

“But where’s he going?” Nick said. “There’s nothing this way. Why doesn’t he go into town?”

They followed for ten more minutes, unhurried, and then Nick saw the wires and gates, the sentry checking passes. The black man held out an ID badge and was waved through. The sentry looked up at Nick, who turned away, pretending to be lost.

“What is it?” Molly said.

“Anacostia. The naval base. I forgot it was down here. Well, that fits, doesn’t it? A little Red dot on the sonar screen.”

They drove up around the Jefferson Monument, then out through the park along the river and over the bridge. The fourth address was in Alexandria, not the Old Town of cobbled streets and ice cream shops but the maze of streets behind, lined with two-family houses. Anywhere.

“They’re certainly not doing it for the money,” Molly said, scanning the street.

“No. A better world.”

“1017. Next to the one on the end.”

They found a space two houses down and parked, then sat and had a cigarette. Another quiet street, a few children coming home from school.

Molly looked at her watch. “I’ll bet there’s no one home. Not at this hour. They must all do something, work somewhere. Otherwise, what good would they be?”

“I forgot to ask where the Russian girl worked.”

“We’ll find out. It’s only the beginning, you know. It’s not going to happen overnight.”

“It’s not going to happen here at all,” Nick said, putting the key in. “You’re right. We’ll come back in the morning.”

“Wait. Let’s find out who he is, anyway. Be right back.”

She got out, walked over to the house, and rang the doorbell. What would she say if someone answered? She rang again, then looked around once and put her hand into the mailbox, pulling out a few pieces and shuffling through them. It took a second.

“Ruth Silberstein. Miss,” she said in the car.

“Silverstein?”

“Ber.”

He drove past the house. “We’ll come back.”

“She gets the New Republic, if that means anything. Where’s the last one?”

He looked at the list. “Chevy Chase.”

“God, they’re all over the place. Creepy, isn’t it? No one has the faintest idea. You can walk right up and look at their mail. They could be anywhere.”

“Undermining our way of life,” he said, using a newsreel voice.

“Well, they are, aren’t they?”

“We don’t know what they’re doing, Molly. Maybe they’re just passing on the wheat crop estimates so somebody can make a good deal. Do you think Rosemary was undermining our way of life?”

Molly looked out the window, quiet. “Just her own, I guess.”

“Maybe they’re just small fry.”

“Your father didn’t think so.”

“No.” Names he was willing to sell, worth a life.

“What are you going to do after? With the list.”

“I don’t know,” he said, a curve, unexpected. “I’m only interested in one.”

“I mean, they’re agents.”

“So was my father.”

“But they might be—”

“I don’t know, Molly. What do you want me to do, turn them in to the committee? I can’t. It would be like turning my father in. Besides, there isn’t any committee anymore. It’s over. Just cops. Let Jeff catch them. I don’t take sides.”

“Yes, you do.”

“Not anymore. Not with this.”

“So Ruth Silberstein just keeps getting her New Republics and doing whatever she’s doing.”

“I guess that depends on what she’s doing.”

“So you’ll decide,” she said quietly. “You’ll be the committee.”

A pinprick, sharp. “Yes, I’ll be the committee,” he said, the sound of the words strange, as if even his voice had turned upside down. “What’s the address?”

The house in Chevy Chase was a snug Cape Cod with shutters and a fussy herbaceous border running along the front. In December there would be a wreath on the door and candles in the window, a Christmas card house. The wide glossy lawn was set off on either end by tall hedges to separate it from the neighbors, modern ranch houses, one with a For Sale shingle stuck in the grass. There was no car in the driveway or other sign of life.

“You going to read his mail too?” Nick said.

“No, it’s a slot,” Molly said, having already looked. “They’re showing the house next door.”

“How do you know?”

“See, they’re huddling, and he keeps looking at the roof. The one in the suit’s the real estate lady. You can always tell. She’s wearing flats. With a suit. They all do that. I guess it’s hard on the feet.”

Nick grinned at her. “Are you kidding me, or do you really know all this?”

“Everybody knows that,” she said, pleased with herself. “You just never notice things.” She turned back to the window and watched the scene on the lawn, another pantomime of gestures and nodding heads. “How’d you like to live in the suburbs?”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Yeah,” she said, still looking out, “but when you see the right house.” She opened the door, then closed it behind her and stuck her head through the window. “Maybe you’d better stay here. You look like somebody from Immigration.”

He watched her dart across the street and up to the group on the lawn, disengaging the woman wearing flats, a nod toward the hedge, heads together, the couple left to the side, unmoored. A shake of hands, the woman rummaging in her purse for a card, a smile and a wave, every step light and sure. When she crossed the street she seemed to move like liquid, and he thought of her coming toward him at the Bruces’ party, walking into his life, like the songs. Now she was grinning.