"I remember Americans," said the field marshal. "All the impossible things they did. Oh, yes, everybody laughs at them today, but I tell you, those soft, silly self-indulgent children become very tough and shrewd when they have to. Oh, yes. I know what you think. You think, there is field marshal who started out as sergeant in czar's cavalry. There is field marshal who brought hot chocolate to Stalin and survived and became general. There is field marshal who fought Germans with tanks and then befriended both Beria and Khruschev and became field marshal. Well, I tell you men of slide rules, I have seen Russian blood spilled by Russians. I have seen Russian blood spilled by Germans. I have seen Russian blood spilled by Chinese and Americans and by Englishmen and Finns."
Tears were welling up in the strong swollen face of the field marshal, and some of the scientists were becoming a bit embarrassed.
"I will see no more Russian blood spilled than I have to. I have seen enough. You, Valashnikov, young man of such confidence and assurance, you who have never cried and prayed to God… yes, prayed to God… I have seen even political commissars do it during the hard winters of the last war… You, who think that all things can be worked out in mind and on paper… You, before you do another thing, find that Cassandra missile. Find it. You will do nothing else, rise to no other rank, until you find that horror for Mother Russia. I say, Mother Russia. Mother Russia. Mother Russia. Good day, gentlemen. God bless Mother Russia."
After the field marshal left, there was silence in the room, embarrassed silence. Finally Valashnikov spoke. "He's fallen right into their psychological trap. And to think we beat the Germans with that. Well, I don't see this taking any more than a week. Any of you see it differently?"
None did that day. But as the week passed and then the month and then many months, many of the top officers began remembering that, like the field marshal, they too, had thought the Cassandra might pose some problems.
And Valashnikov watched his classmates become captains, then majors, then lieutenant colonels and colonels, while he still searched for the Cassandra. One day he thought he had found it, but that turned out to be his most bitter disappointment. Everything was perfect for the Cassandra, but the marble and bronze turned out to be a stupid monument to some dead savages, much like the Russians' own Tartars. It was on that day that Valashnikov noticed the first hint of a receding hairline and realized that he was not a young man any more. And he was still a colonel.
Time passed in America, also. And what was once considered a noble monument constructed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs had become a rallying point for what many perceived as a grievous injustice to the only indigenous Americans. Especially after the best-selling book by Lynn Cosgrove, My Soul Rises from Wounded Elk.
Shouting, "It is a good day to die," some forty men and women wearing Indian warpaint and bonnets had seized the marble and bronze monument out in the Montana prairie and the Episcopal church that had been built a few yards from it. They wanted to bring attention, their leaders said, "to the oppression of the American Indian."
Real Apowa Indians—who had in the past ten years moved from their reservation and built the town of Wounded Elk half a mile from the monument—watched the goings-on and scratched their heads.
Television cameras came in to surround Wounded Elk. Federal marshals moved in and formed a giant loose circle around the monument and the Episcopal church but made no effort to remove the Indians. And General Van Riker was watching on Bahamian television as half a dozen of the Indians banged away with rifle butts on the bronze shield of the Cassandra. Then some lunatic began working with a power drill. General Van Riker phoned the Pentagon and demanded to speak to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
A snotty brigadier explained to Van Riker that he had clearance only for a Max-Emergency 7 call, which did not exist except in case of nuclear war.
"Put on the admiral," said Van Riker, "or you'll end your career in Leavenworth, making little ones out of big ones."
"Yes," came the admiral's somnolent tones from the receiver. "What do you want, Van Riker?"
"We've got a problem."
"Can we talk about it Monday?"
"There may not be a Monday," said Van Riker. "Not for us, at least…"
CHAPTER TWO
His name was Remo, and he had a problem. Without breaking any possible instruments, he had to snatch someone named Douglas Van Riker, fifty-six, Caucasian, tan, with gleaming white hair, blue eyes, and a mole under his left arm. Which was only the first part of the problem.
"Are you Douglas Van Riker?" asked Remo of a white-haired, blue-eyed gentleman with a fine, rich tan, reading Fortune magazine in the Bahamian Airport. The man wore an expensive white silk suit that seemed to match his perfect smile. Even if he hadn't been reading Fortune, he looked as if he could have been in it.
"No. Sorry, I'm not, old boy," said the man pleasantly.
Remo grabbed the left side of the man's white silk suit and, gripping a handful of nylon shirt with it, ripped it off the man in one wrenching tear. He checked the armpit. There was no mole.
"Right you are," Remo said. "You're right. I have to admit it. I'll admit that. You're right. No mole."
The man blinked, mouth agape, suit half off, magazine dangling.
"Wha?" he said, stunned.
"What are you doing half-dressed, George?" asked a portly woman sitting next to him.
"A man came over to me, asked me if I were Douglas Van Riker, and ripped off my suit. I've never seen hands move so fast."
"Why would he rip your suit off, dear, if you're not this Douglas person?"
"Why would he rip it off even if I were? Look. There he goes," said the half-dressed man. He pointed to a man about six feet tall, lean and wiry, with high cheekbones and surprisingly large wrists. The man wore gray slacks and a blue sports shirt.
"Someone's pointing at you, sir," the young man was told by a man with hair so white it looked bleached. "Odd. He seems half-undressed."
"Don't mind him," said Remo. "Are you Douglas Van Riker?"
"Why do you want to know?"
"Don't be rude. I asked first," Remo said.
"Turn around and you'll see that the man who was pointing at you is now approaching with two constables."
"I don't have time to be bothered," said Remo. "Are you Douglas Van Riker?"
"Yes, I am, and when you get out of jail, look me up."
Remo felt a hand on his shoulder. Grabbing its palm, he snapped it forward to see who was attached. It was a constable. The constable went back-cracking into a reservation booth. The second hand that touched him also belonged to a constable. He sailed into a baggage turntable and kept spinning slowly, along with the luggage of incoming Pan Am flight 105 from O'Hare.
"My God," said Van Riker. "I've never seen hands so fast. You didn't even turn around."
"That's not fast. Fast is when you don't see them," said Remo. "C'mon, we've got work to do. You are Douglas Van Riker."
"Yes, I am, and I like to stay dressed."
"Do you have any baggage?"
"Just this grip?"
Remo checked the name tag. It said Van Riker. The white-haired man offered his wallet. There were credit cards, driver's license, and military identification. He was a lieutenant general, United States Air Force, retired.
"Good," said Remo. "Come with me. That flight's going to Washington. You don't want that."
"I do want that."
"No, you don't. You want to go with me. Don't make a scene. I can't stand scenes."
"But I will make a scene," said Van Riker. Suddenly he felt an incredible wrenching pain in his right ribs.
"Now, that was fast," Remo said. C'mon. people are looking."
Doing his best to keep his weight off his right side and trying not to breathe deeply, Van Riker went with the young man to a cab outside. They drove to a small private airfield, where Van Riker saw a black Lear Jet, prepped for takeoff.