"I have many talents, ma'am," he said. Still smiling, George leapt on the desk, his feet straddling the map; in the same quick move, he'd snatched up a letter opener and put the blade to Peggy's throat. "I've also been trained to kill, quickly and silently."

Their eyes locked, and almost at once George realized that that had been a mistake. She'd done it to distract him as she brought her rigid forearms together hard on either side of his wrist. The letter opener clattered to the desktop and, a moment later, she swung her stiff right leg across the map, kicking his legs out from under him. As he fell to his side, she grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him to the floor, dropping him on his back and putting her foot on his neck.

"Just make sure," she said, "that if you plan to kill, you do so without the speech. All right?"

"All right," he said, kicking up with both feet so that he was momentarily resting on his shoulder blades. Locking his ankles around Peggy's neck, he pulled her down and flipped her onto her back. "Though I'll make an exception this time."

George kept the operative in a chokehold for several seconds to teach her a lesson, and then released her. As she sucked down air, he helped her to her feet.

"Impressive," she gasped, rubbing her throat with her left hand. "But you missed one thing."

"What, ma'am?"

She showed him the letter opener in her right hand. "I grabbed it when you brought me down. The way you were holding me, I could've stuck you anywhere."

Rubbing her throat, Peggy returned to the map while Private George looked at the letter opener and silently cursed himself. It didn't bother him that a woman had bested him; in training, Sondra and he had knocked each other around mercilessly. But on a mission, missing something like the letter opener would have meant the difference between living and dying.

Still standing by the closed door, Aho said, "Now that the introductions have been made, perhaps you'd care to go to work?"

Peggy nodded.

"When you reach the boat at the harbor," Aho said, "your password for the boat will be 'wonderful stempost.' The response is 'handsome dragonhead.' Private George, I've already explained the process of gaining access to the midget submarine to Ms. James. I've also given her money and the Russian uniforms you're to wear." He grinned. "We have more Russian uniforms here, and better fitting, than the Russians do." He took a sealed packet from his inside jacket pocket and handed it to Private George. "Here are the papers identifying you as a Principal Shipboard Starshina Yevgeny Glebov and Senior Sailor Ada Lundver in the Russian Navy. You're the Sailor, Ms. James, assigned to coastal mapping and buoy refurbishing. This means that if anyone sees you, you'll have to look like you're following Private George's orders."