“Well, this is not exactly an invasion, Aleksei. Is it not a matter that should be taken up with the U.S. State Department?”

“Not in this case, sir. The plane gave its positions, so we were able to chart its course. It was flying near Department Three Thirty-one when the pilot made plans to rendezvous with the ship.”

Petrov's lips parted in a silent curse. “You're certain of their position?”

“Absolutely.”

“Where is the NUMA ship now?”

"The coastguard's dispatched a helicopter to the scene. The ship has left Russian territorial waters and appears to be on its way to Istanbul. We're continuing to monitor radio messages.

“What about the aircraft?”

“No sign of it.”

“There was a thorough visual inspection of their landing site, I assume.”

“Yes, sir. The landing party reported seeing about an acre of burned grass. There were many footprints and evidence of horses.”

Horses. Petrov had the feeling someone had walked on his grave.

“I want you to follow the progress of the ship. If it makes port, place it under twenty-four-hour surveillance. Alert me to any development that has to do with this vessel.”

“Yes, sir. Is that all?”

“Send me the printed conversations between the pilot and ship.”

“I'll do that immediately.”

Petrov praised the agent for his thoroughness and hung up. The fax machine hummed a few minutes later and spat out several sheets of paper. Petrov studied the double-spaced transcript of the conversation between the Argo's captain and the man in the aircraft. His fingers stiffened as he read. the first sentence.

“Austin to Argo.”

Austin. It couldn't be.

Petrov took a deep breath to steady his nerves. Austin was a common name in the United States, and NUMA was a large organization. He tried to persuade himself that it was sheer coincidence, but as he read the transcript, his lips curled into a grim smile. There was no mistaking the pilot's wisecracking tone. The irreverent reference to the director of NUMA clinched it. He was reading pure Kurt Austin. Petrov reached into the dusty file cabinet and extracted a thick folder marked NUMA, Kurt Austin. The dossier's well-worn pages told him what he already knew by heart. Austin had been born in Seattle, his father the wealthy owner of a marine salvage company. The sea had shaped his adventurous personality. He could sail as soon as he could walk, and as he grew older, he acquired a taste for racing speedboats, although in recent years he had taken up sculling on the Potomac. He lived in a converted boathouse below the Palisades in Washington, D.C., less than a mile from the Central Intelligence Agency at Langley. He enjoyed philosophy, collected dueling pistols, listened to progressive jazz....