Ryan's wary look was replaced briefly with one of measurement. "You have that one right."
"So, my friend – what will they do to you?"
Jack let out a long breath as he focused his eyes down the corridor. "I have to get a lawyer this week. I suppose he'll know. I'd hoped to avoid that. I thought I could talk my way out of it, but – but this new bastard in SEC, a pansy that Trent–" Another breath. "Trent used his influence to get the job for him. How much you want to bet that the two of them… I find myself in agreement with you. If one must have enemies, they should at least be enemies you can respect."
"And CIA cannot help you?"
"I don't have many friends there – well, you know that. Moved up too fast, richest kid on the block, Greer's fair-haired boy, my connections with the Brits. You make enemies that way, too. Sometimes I wonder if one of them might have… I can't prove it, but you wouldn't believe the computer network we have at Langley, and all my stock transactions are stored in computer systems… and you know what? Computer records can be changed by someone who knows how… But try to prove that one, pal." Jack took two aspirins from a small tin and swallowed them.
"Ritter doesn't like me at all, never has. I made him look bad on something a few years back, and he isn't the sort of man to forget that sort of thing. Maybe one of his people… he has some good ones. The Admiral wants to help, but he's old. The Judge is on his way out, supposed to have left a year ago, but he's hanging on somehow – he couldn't help me if he wanted to."
"The President likes your work. We know that."
"The President's a lawyer, a prosecutor. He gets even a whiff that you might have bent a law, and – it's amazing how quick you can get lonely. There's a bunch in the State Department who're after my ass, too. I don't see things quite their way. This is a bitch of a town to be honest in."
It's correct, then, Platonov thought. They'd gotten the report first from Peter Henderson, code-named Cassius, who'd been feeding data to the KGB for over ten years, first as special assistant to the retired Senator Donaldson of the Senate's intelligence committee, now an intelligence analyst for the General Accounting Office. KGB knew Ryan to be the bright, rising star of the CIA's Intelligence Directorate. His evaluation at Moscow Center had at first called him a wealthy dilettante. That had changed a few years ago. He'd done something to earn him presidential attention, and now wrote nearly half of the special intelligence briefing papers that went to the White House. It was known from Henderson that he had assembled a massive report on the strategic-arms situation, one that had raised hackles at Foggy Bottom. Platonov had long since formed his own impression. A good judge of character, from their first meeting at Georgetown's Galleria he'd deemed Ryan a bright opponent, and a brave one – but a man too accustomed to privilege, too easily outraged at personal attack. Sophisticated, but strangely naive. What he saw over lunch confirmed it. Fundamentally, Ryan was too American. He saw things in blacks and whites, goods and bads. But what mattered today was that Ryan had felt himself invincible, and was only now learning that this was not the case. Because of that, Ryan was an angry man.
"All that work wasted," Jack said after a few seconds. "They're going to trash my recommendations."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that Ernest Fucking Allen has talked the President into putting SDI on the table." It required all of Platonov's professionalism not to react visibly to that statement. Ryan went on: "It's all been for nothing. They've discredited my analysis because of this idiot stock thing. The Agency isn't backing me up like they should. They're throwing me to the fucking dogs. Not a damned thing I can do about it, either." Jack finished off the hot dog.
"One can always take action," Platonov suggested.
"Revenge? I've thought of that. I could go to the papers, but the Post is going to run a story about the SEC thing. Somebody on the Hill is orchestrating the hanging party. Trent, I suppose. I bet he put that reporter on me last night, too, the bastard. If I try to get the real word out, well, who'll listen? Christ, I'm putting my tight little ass on the line just sitting here with you, Sergey."
"Why do you say that?"
"Why don't you guess?" Ryan allowed himself a smile that ended abruptly. "I'm not going to go to jail. I'd rather die than have to disgrace myself like that. God damn it, I've risked my life – I've put it all on the line. Some things you know about, and one that you don't. I have risked my life for this country, and they want to send me to prison!"
"Perhaps we can help." The offer finally came across.
"Defect? You have to be joking. You don't really expect me to live in your workers' paradise, do you?"
"No, but for the proper incentive, perhaps we could change your situation. There will be witnesses against you. They could have accidents…"
"Don't give me that shit!" Jack leaned forward. "You don't do jobs like that in our country and we don't do them in yours."
"Everything has a price. Surely you understand that better than I." Platonov smiled. "For example, the 'disaster' Mr. Trent referred to last night. What might that have been?"
"And how do I know who you're really working for?" Jack asked.
"What?" That surprised him. Ryan saw past the pain in his sinuses.
"You want an incentive? Sergey, I am about to put my life on the line. Just because I've done it before, don't you think that it's easy. We have somebody inside Moscow Center. Somebody big. You tell me now what that name would buy me."
"Your freedom," Platonov said at once. "If he's as high as you say, we would do very much indeed." Ryan didn't say a word for over a minute. The two men stared at each other as though over cards, as though they were gambling for everything each man owned – and as though Ryan knew that he held the lesser hand. Platonov matched the power of the American's stare, and was gratified to see that it was his power that prevailed.
"I'm flying to Moscow the end of the week, unless the story breaks before then, in which case I'm fucked. What I just told you, pal, it doesn't go through channels. The only person I’m sure it isn’t is Gerasimov. It goes to the Chairman himself, direct to him, no intermediaries, or you risk losing the name."
"And why am I supposed to believe you know it?" The Russian pressed his advantage, but carefully.
It was Jack's turn to smile. His hole card had turned out to be a good one. "I don't know the name, but I know the data. With the four things that I know came from CONDUCTOR – that's the code name – your troops can handle the rest. If your letter goes through channels, probably I don't get on the airplane. That's how far up the chain he is – if it's a he, but it probably is. How do I know you'll keep your word?"
"In the intelligence business one must keep one's promises," Platonov assured him.
"Then tell your Chairman that I want to meet him if he can arrange it. Man to man. No bullshit."
"The Chairman? The Chairman doesn't–"
"Then I'll make my own legal arrangements and take my chances. I'm not going to jail for treason either, if I can help it. That's the deal, Comrade Platonov," Jack concluded. "Have a nice drive home."
Jack rose and walked away. Platonov did not follow. He looked around and found his own security man, who signaled that they had not been observed.
And he had his own decision to make. Was Ryan genuine?
Cassius said so.
He had run Agent Cassius for three years. Peter Henderson's data had always checked out. They'd used him to track down and arrest a colonel in Strategic Rocket Forces who'd been working for CIA, had gotten priceless strategic and political intelligence, and even inside American analysis of that Red October business of the previous – no, it was two years now, wasn't it, right before Senator Donaldson had retired – and now that he worked in the GAO, he had the best of all possible worlds: direct access to classified defense data and all his political contacts on the Hill. Cassius had told them some time before that Ryan was under investigation. At the time it had been merely a tidbit, no one had taken it seriously. The Americans were always investigating one another. It was their national sport. Then a second time he'd heard the same story, then the scene with Trent. Was it really possible… ?