Джон Болл - The First Team

Following the orders that he had been given, Commander Ishiro Nakamura, the son of a central California strawberry grower, came down from the bridge. Under the direction of Chief Summers a small formal party took its place on the quarterdeck on each side of the brow and a pipe sounded. “Magsaysay, leaving,” came from the ship’s speaker system.

The captain crossed the brow as the television cameras recorded his every movement and then tightened in on his handsome dark features as he saluted the vice-admiral who stood waiting for him.

The admiral held out his hand. “Welcome back, commander,” he said. “How was your cruise?”

Commander Nakamura shook hands with proper dignity.

“Routine, sir,” he reported.

In response to the summons he had received Hewlitt crossed the hotel lobby and took an elevator to the fourteenth floor. As he walked down the corridor he was aware of the fact that one area had been sealed off — not obviously, but any casual visitors would have been stopped and asked their business. A few months earlier he might not have noticed this; now his sensitivity to such matters had been considerably sharpened. He was not surprised, therefore, when he had to produce an identity card before he was able to stop in front of one door and knock.

Feodor Zalinsky himself opened it. Hewlitt had not seen him since they had had their meeting in the hospital and his appearance was a surprise. He was a good ten pounds lighter, possibly even a little more. He had on a new suit which had some pretensions of fitting him. His face too, had changed. It was essentially the same, but there was a different cast to the features. As a first guess Hewlitt decided that he looked less harried.

“Come in, come in,” Zalinsky said and there was a change in his voice too, the built-in challenge which had characterized it was at least modified. Hewlitt entered, glanced at the view out of the window, and then sat down.

“I have discovered that you make very good beer,” Zalinsky said, “and I like beer. Will you have one with me?”

As he accepted, Hewlitt noted the fact that Zalinsky was speaking his own language; apparently the enforced English practice had been discarded.

At the small wet bar with which the apartment was equipped Zalinsky poured out the two drinks in pilsner glasses and then set one of them in front of his guest. Then he dumped himself into a chair and tasted his brew. “From time to time many different peoples have tried to conquer China,” he observed, “but it was too big and cumbersome; they could not digest it.”

Hewlitt nodded.

“This country, it is hopeless. I do not know how you run it yourselves.”

“Sometimes we can’t,” Hewlitt conceded. “We make a mess of things every now and then.”

“I could give you some very good suggestions,” Zalinsky said and then took a long drink from his glass that left foam on his lips. “But I do not have the time for all that; I am going home.”

Hewlitt shifted his position slightly, and waited.

“You may have in your mind many reasons for this: the submarine, the Thomas Jefferson business, the death of Gregor Rostovitch. I do not deny these, but the whole truth is not there either. We could have answered the submarine if Gregor had not gotten so far ahead of himself with the hostage business; there are too many other people in the world who would have recoiled from that, and we would have been left outside the church. We could have pretended to negotiate for a period of weeks and each day that passed…” He shrugged his shoulders and left the remark unfinished. “Anyhow, that is all over, you still have your high diver and there is perhaps less work for him to do now.”

“I hope so,” Hewlitt said.

“I will tell you this,” Zalinsky continued, “long before the submarine left San Francisco I advised my government that the occupation of the United States was a great mistake and that we should withdraw as soon as we could. We did not have the multitudes of skilled people that it would have taken and not very many of us can speak English; it is not a natural language for us. So when the submarine appeared on the scene, I urged that we use this fine excuse to get out of an impossible situation.”

Hewlitt drank his beer.

“So anyhow, it is finished. A little sooner than it would otherwise, perhaps, but we would not have been here too long no matter what happened; it simply wasn’t practical. We cannot occupy your country indefinitely, and you could not occupy us, for many of the same reasons.”

Once more Hewlitt nodded.

“So when Gregor, as you so picturesquely say, bought the farm, I forgot my pain long enough to call the premier and tell him for God’s sake not to lose the chance to save his own neck. This is not to be repeated, yes?”

“If you say not, no.”

“You will keep your word on that, I am aware, although it is not all that important; others will figure it out.”

“I suspect that they already have.”

Zalinsky shrugged his shoulders and finished his beer. “I regret that I did not meet the man who defeated Gregor Rostovitch; he must be a giant.”

Hewlitt shook his head this time. “Not really, although he is very powerful, there is no denying that. Most of all, he was angry and with a just cause — that helped.”

“You have him where he is safe?”

“He’s fine, thank you.”

“It is amazing that you rescued him so easily; you must have had some help.”

Hewlitt looked him in the eye. “I believe we did,” he said.

“Now, anyhow, I am going home. I will be glad to get back. After a little rest and a chance to see my family, I will probably be given another factory to run. There are times when I am tired of factories.”

That gave Hewlitt an opening he had been waiting for. “Mr. Zalinsky, I don’t think that you should go home. We talked once about suspicion — this time I am suspicious, they will want someone to blame besides Colonel Rostovitch and you will be the obvious choice. You have given me advice, I now have some for you: ask for political asylum and stay here. It will be granted, I have already asked. Your family will like it here. We are a funny people, but as soon as you ask for asylum they will accept you and you know now that this is a nice place to live. You speak English and you won’t have to run a factory — you can teach political science.”

Zalinsky smiled grimly for a moment. “It is a temptation, but the premier wants me to come back so I will, and if there is punishment for me, I will accept it. But I do not think so; you see the political climate in my country changes as the seasons do; it is spring at the moment and sins are being forgiven. I like it here, but it is not my own country — you understand that.”

“Yes, of course. But if you arrive and find that there is a blizzard, come back.”

Zalinsky changed the subject. “You were a good helper even if you were a bad spy. But that is forgivable; you had no experience and no training — dangerous for an amateur.”

“I tried hard,” Hewlitt said.

“Too hard, I could see that. But I did not tell Gregor because I do not like messy scenes myself and he did not appreciate any help. I missed only one entertainment — the night you were driven into bed with the Barbara girl.”

“It was not too difficult to accomplish.”

“This I can believe, but I would liked to have seen it. One complaint I had with this job was lack of amusement. Would you like some more beer?”

“No thank you, Mr. Zalinsky.”

“Then I give you a present as I leave — I will state that I was completely fooled and never suspected what you were doing. They will believe it and it will be all right.” He got to his feet. “You do speak my language very well.”