The President picked up some papers and then tiredly laid them down again. ‘You’re the Director of the FBI, Charles, and a very good director. But you can’t use the same street-fighting methods when it comes to international diplomacy. Just for the sake of satisfying your hunches, you’re thinking of bringing the whole world down on our heads.’

‘Hunches? demanded Kurnik. ‘We already hold a list of two hundred cannery workers from Washington State to Florida – every one of whom has gone missing – and every one of whom has forged or questionable papers! We’ve already found out that most of the crop virus was spread by two phony aerial photography businesses – Your Spread From The Sky, Inc., and Hi-Lens, Ltd! We already know for a proven fact that the Soviet armed forces have between 70,000 and 100,000 chemical warfare specialists, and that every line regiment has a chemical defence company assigned to it!’

Kurnik reached into his breast pocket and produced a folded news-magazine cutting. ‘It’s public knowledge, for heaven’s sake! Look at this – from Time, March 10, 1980. “Using bombs, artillery shells, mortars, multiple rocket-launchers, air-delivered sprays or even land mines, the Soviets can attack with phosgene, mustard gas, hydrogen cyanide, nerve agents, botulin, and a variety of lethal viruses.” What more proof do you want, Mr President, when every half-informed adult in the country already knows it for a fact?’

The President closed his eyes. He spoke without opening them. ‘Charles,’ he said, ‘when you bring me just one of those two hundred missing cannery workers, and you establish to me beyond any reasonable doubt that your one cannery worker is a Soviet agent – when you bring me just one pilot from either of those aerial photography corporations, and prove to me that your one pilot works for Moscow – then I shall act. Immediately, decisively, totally.’

Charles Kurnik waited for the President to say something else, but he didn’t. He remained white-faced against his pillow, his eyes still closed.

‘And not until then?’ asked Kurnik, hoarsely. ‘Is that what you’re saying? Under no circumstances at all?’

‘Charles, you’re asking me to drop nuclear bombs on Moscow. You’re asking me to devastate a nation.’

Charles Kurnik wiped his mouth with his hand, as if he had tasted something objectionably bitter. ‘Well, why not?’ he asked. ‘They’ve already devastated ours.’

He stood silent, his eyes fixed on the floor. Outside, there was the intermittent popping and crackling of gunfire. The President said to Louis Krupner, ‘Hand me those tablets on the side-table, would you? Thanks.’ Then he turned to Charles Kurnik and asked, in a formal, curiously unreal voice, ‘Are you staying here for dinner, Charles, or must you get back to the office?’

‘Dinner?’ asked Charles Kurnik, with an expression of disgust.

Fourteen