"My President, it is not something we look upon kindly," Golovko assured him.

"That is doubtless true of the Americans also." Narmonov paused for a moment, then smiled. "Do you know what this could be?"

"We are always open to ideas."

"Think like a politician. This could easily be a sign of some sort of power-play within their government. Our involvement would then be merely incidental."

Golovko thought about that. "We have heard that there is - that Ryan, their deputy director, is unloved by Fowler."

"Ryan, ah, yes, I remember him. A worthy adversary, Sergey Nikolay'ch?"

"He is that."

Definitely something a politician would remember, Golovko thought.

"Why are they unhappy with him?" Narmonov asked.

"Reportedly a clash of personalities."

"That I can believe. Fowler and his vanity." Narmonov held up his hands. "There you have it. Perhaps I might have made a good intelligence analyst?"

"The finest." Golovko agreed. He had to agree, of course. Moreover, his President had said something that his own people had not examined fully. He left the august presence of his chief of state with a troubled expression. The defection of KGB Chairman Gerasimov a few years ago - an event that Ryan had himself engineered, if Golovko read the signs correctly - had inevitably crippled KGB's overseas operations. Six complete networks in America had collapsed, along with eight more in Western Europe. Replacement networks were only now beginning to take their place. That left major holes in KGB's ability to penetrate American government operations. The only good news was that they were starting to read a noteworthy fraction of American diplomatic and military communications - as much as four or five percent in a good month. But code-breaking was no substitute for penetration agents. There was something very strange going on here. Golovko didn't know what it was. Perhaps his President was right. Perhaps this was merely the ripples from an internal power-play. But it could also have been something else. The fact that Golovko didn't know what it was did not help matters.

"Just made it back in time," Clark said. "Did they sweep the wheels today?"

"If it's Wednesday " Jack replied. Every week, his official car was examined for possible electronic bugs.

"Can we talk about it, then?"

"Yes."

"Chavez was right. It's easy, just a matter of dropping a nice little mordida on the right guy. The regular maintenance man will be taken sick that day, the two of us get tapped to service the 747. I get to play maid, scrub the sinks and the crappers, replenish the bar, the whole thing. You'll have the official evaluation on your desk tomorrow, but the short version is, yeah, we can do it, and the likelihood of discovery is minimal."

"You know the down-side?"

"Oh, yeah. Major International Incident. I get early retirement. That's okay, Jack. I can retire whenever I want. It would be a shame for Ding, though. That kid is showing real promise."

"And if you're discovered?"