She slammed down her coffee cup.
"I hate you," she said.
"That's obvious—but it doesn't matter, so long as we don't let it get in the way. You ready to go?" "Now?"
"We haven't a lot of time," he said. "And Kutsk is five hundred miles away. Are you frightened?"
"Horribly," she said. He nodded.
"Me too," he said, and caught her look of surprise. "No matter how often I do it, I'm always frightened. So are all the others—except the nuts, and they don't last very long. Being frightened's part of the game, Miss Loman." "This isn't my game," she said.
"Poor little innocent bystander," said Craig. "Get your things together."
The Greek taxi driver had found Craig a Mercedes, a battered 200S that had nothing to recommend it except its engine, but that was astonishing. He drove Craig to the outskirts of the city, and again the girl had glimpses of the other Istanbul, the five star dream world of the tourist —Haggia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, the Dolmabace Palace —that gave way too soon to the narrow caverns of streets, first shops, then houses, then the dusty wastelands that fence in all big cities: abandoned cars, billboards, the first ploughed field. The driver pulled up at last by a bus stop and made another speech. At the end of it, he shook hands with Craig, then got out.
"He hopes we'll be very happy," said Craig. "That's nice of him," the girl said. "He's not to know it's impossible, is he?"
When she looked back, the driver was waving to them, teeth flashing.
Turkey turned out to be mostly dry hills and plains, waiting for water. That, and terrible roads that the Merc took with more philosophy than she did. And mosques of course, mosques in every village and town, built of everything from mud to marble. There were almost as many mosques as sheep. The car ate up the miles to Ankara— this was Turkey's main highway, the one they kept repaired—and Craig drove quickly, yet with caution, saving his strength for what was to come. When darkness came the girl drowsed again, and woke to more street lights, and Istanbul was nearly two hundred miles away. Craig drove slowly now, following the directions the Greek had given him, and stopped in a wide avenue, lined with olive trees that whispered softly even in that still night. He led the drowsy girl to the doorway, rang the bell, and again there was the babble of Greek, another crone, another vast bed with cool, white sheets. Then supper came: olives, lamb kebab, rice and fruit, and a dark, acrid wine that Craig drank freely. The whisky stayed in his bag untouched. Then after supper came Turkish coffee, and the sound of the crone running a bath. She took the first bath without asking. This time there were bath salts, the talc he had bought her, and a dressing gown, a scarlet kimono he had chosen that did a lot for the plumpness of her body, made her taller, more elegant. She went back to the bedroom.
He was standing, half turned away from her, practicing with the gun, drawing it, aiming, the muzzle a pointed, accusing finger, then putting it back in the holster, repeating the process over and over, then switching, the gun in the waistband of his pants, pulling it, aiming: and the whole thing so fast that the gun seemed to unfold in his hands into the hardness of death. He saw her, but didn't stop until he was satisfied, the sweat glistening on his face, pasting his shirt to his body. The girl thought of boxing champions she had seen on television, the endless training sessions devoted to just such a skill in hurting the man who faced you.
"You work so hard at it," she said.
"I'm still alive."
He left her then, and this time took the gun with him to the bathroom.
He'd bought her a nightgown, yellow like her dress. It lay on the bed, and she picked it up, looked at it. Pretty. She pulled the cord of her kimono, felt the smooth silk slide from her, felt her naked body react to the coolness of the room. She was sleepy again, but sleep was a luxury and her world was poor. Her world was two hard hands and a terrifying speed with a lightweight Smith and Wesson .38. And beyond that the certainty of danger, probable pain, the possibility of death.
I'm twenty-three years old, she thought. It can't happen to me. It mustn't.
She turned, and the mirror on the wardrobe showed her a pretty, plump girl, her nude body in a showgirl's pose, holding a splash of yellow to bring out the honey gold of her skin. She jutted one hip and admired the result. In twenty years she would be fat—maybe in ten— but now she was, not beautiful maybe, but pretty. And desirable. Surely she was desirable? She put a hand to a breast that was firm and rounded—and cold. The cold was fear.
He came in from the bathroom wearing pajamas, carrying his clothes. This time the gun went under his pillow. "Who can hurt us tonight?" she asked. "The Russians," he said. "My people. Yours." "Mine?"
"Not the CIA," he said. "They're not bad, but they're not up to this one. For this, your side will use Force Three." He frowned, trying to explain it to her. "Look, the Russians have the KGB. But for really nasty jobs— like this one—they use the Executive. That's blokes like me. And Force Three—that's me too, ten years younger, in a Brooks Brothers suit."
"All to find Marcus's brother?"
"You know what he did," said Craig.
She pulled the sheet more tightly around her.
"Betrayed the Revolution," she said. "They sent him to Volochanka. But he escaped, so they want him dead."
"They have the easy job," said Craig, and she shivered. "Your people want him alive."
"Marcus wants him alive."
"Because he's his brother. The Americans want him alive because he can perform one miracle." "Only one?"
"It's a good one," he said. "He can turn sea water to rain water. Cheap. He can make the desert blossom. He's America's present to the underprivileged world."
"And why do you want him alive?"
"So that I can stay alive too," said Craig. "If I've got him, everybody will be my chum."
"With all that opposition—you think you can do it?"
"It's not much of a chance, but it's the only one I've got."
He put the light off and got into bed. Before he could turn from her, her arms came round him, her body eased against his. He put up his hands and found that she was naked.
"Miss Loman," he said, "you're making a big mistake." Her mouth found his, her hands tore at his pajama jacket, then she found herself pulled away from him. He
was gentle about it, but his strength was too much for her.
"Please," she said. "Please, Craig."
He got out of bed, switched on the light again, and looked down on her, her bare breasts tight with love, then he lit a cigarette and his hands were shaking.
"Miss Loman," he said. "What the hell are you playing at?"
"I don't love you," she said. "I never could love you. But I may die tomorrow. That scares me—it scares us both." She wriggled out of the sheets, her body supple in youth, but the logic she offered was ageless. "We need each other. Now," she said. "It's all there is." He turned away from her. "Am I that hard to take?"
"No, Miss Loman, you're not," he said. "But my interest in women ended a year ago. They have a machine that does that. All very modern. It gives you electric shocks."
"Oh, my God," she said.
"Maybe I'm wasting my time staying alive, Miss Loman." "Who did it to you?"
"A man who hated me. In our business, we stir up a lot of hatred. I nearly died. They tell me I was crazy for a while. Then they patched me together—the surgeons and psycho experts—and sent me after the man who did it."
"Did you kill him?"
"No," he said. "He had to live. But he wanted to die. Very much." He came to her then, and he looked at her body and smiled. His hand reached out, smoothed the hair from her brow.
"I'm sorry, Miss Loman," he said.