When he was finished he straightened up. “I haven’t got a lot of time to explain myself, Miss Borasova, so I’ll only tell you this once,” he said.
She was shivering. Carter expected that she was more frightened of what Kobelev would do to her when this was over than she was of the current situation.
“You are not returning to Moscow, at least not tonight. You’re coming with me.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“Paris.”
“Oh... no,” she cried. “No... please, I beg you! He will kill me!”
“Perhaps I will if you do not cooperate. And I’m here right now. Comrade Kobelev is far away.”
“I cannot.”
“You will,” Carter snapped. “And when it’s over, I promise that you will be given a choice. You’ll be allowed to return to Moscow, or you will be given asylum here in the States.”
She was shaking her head, but she seemed less certain than before.
“If you choose to return to Moscow, we’ll make sure you’ll go back blameless. You were kidnapped at gunpoint. It is your choice.”
She was searching for the right decision. He could see it in her eyes. “What am I supposed to do in Paris?”
“Provide me with information I may need. Nothing more. You won’t be in the line of fire if I can help it. I promise you.”
She looked down at the unconscious Russian on the floor. “There are two others outside. One in front and another in the back.”
“I know. We’ll get away, if you cooperate.”
She looked up. Her eyes softened. “Is it true that your... lover was killed?”
“She was burned to death,” Carter said grimly. “It was Ganin.”
She shook her head. “It was Kobelev. The man is insane!”
“We must leave now.”
“I have your promise?”
Carter nodded.
“And if I decide that I want to return to the United States? It will be arranged?”
Again Carter nodded.
She finally came to a decision. “Yes,” she said. “I will do it, if only to stop the monster.”
“Get dressed and pack a single bag.”
“I’m packed,” she said. She turned to go to the bedroom but then stopped. “What about a passport? I cannot travel on my diplomatic documents. I would be spotted.”
“Leave it here.”
She looked at Carter, then nodded and went into the bedroom. He followed her.
For a moment she hesitated about undressing in front of him but then she shrugged, understanding that he could not trust her — yet. She took off her robe. She was nude beneath, her large breasts soft and womanly, her stomach smooth and flat, and her legs somewhat short but very nice.
Quickly she pulled on panties, a bra, pantyhose, and then stepped into a skirt and pulled on a blouse. At the mirror she put on some lipstick, brushed her hair, then threw her makeup things into her purse, grabbed her coat, and picked up her suitcase where it stood next to the bed.
“I am ready,” she said. Her nostrils were flared and her eyes were wide. She was frightened.
“Do you have a weapon, Lydia?”
She shook her head. “No,” she said. “It was not my mission.”
“Which was?”
“To keep an eye on our delegation. There were certain of them... who were weak.”
“What is your connection with Comrade Kobelev?”
For a long moment Carter didn’t feel she would answer him. Her eyes became moist, and she hung her head.
“For two years... I was his mistress.”
“Did you love him?”
“No,” she snapped defiantly. “It was for my parents! He threatened to kill them if I did not cooperate!”
She was the key to Kobelev. Carter felt bad about using her that way, but he had been honest when he promised her sanctuary after it was over. Once Kobelev found out Carter had her, it would shake him up. Maybe he would begin making his own mistakes.
At the door, Carter checked to make sure the corridor was still empty, and then they hurried to the stairs and went down to the ground floor. The guard out front was halfway up the block when Carter checked outside. He waited until the man was around the corner, and then he and Lydia hurried outside, down the stairs, and rushed to the opposite corner, where they got a cab half a block away.
“Do you think he saw us?” Lydia asked when they were safely inside.
“No,” Carter said. He glanced out the rear window. No one was coming. As far as he could tell, no one was following them.
“Where to, buddy?” the cabby asked over his shoulder.
“Penn Station,” Carter said.
“By train?” Lydia asked.
Carter looked at her. Was it a slip? Had they expected him to return for her? Or was he being overcautious and paranoid?
“By train,” he said. “What did you expect?”
She was puzzled for a moment, but then she figured it out, and she shook her head. “If you do not trust me, I do not blame you. But I never expected to see you again. I assumed, if we are going to Paris, it would be by air, and not by rail.”
Carter had to laugh. “You’re right on both counts: I don’t trust you, and yes, we’re going to Paris, but not by train.”
With a couple of hours to kill before their train left, Carter checked Lydia’s bag into a storage locker next to his in the station, and then they walked across the street and down the block to an Italian restaurant on Eighth Avenue for something to eat.
She told him about her youth in Leningrad and how she had come to be accepted as a medical student at Moscow State University. In her second year she had gone to a party with friends, who were officers in the student Communist Party organization, where she met Kobelev. The man pursued her, sending her gifts, which she returned, but later sending her parents gifts and granting special favors such as permitting them to shop in the foreign exchange stores.
“After his wife died he made me move out to his dacha with him,” she said. “I hated it, but by then my parents could not exist without his help. There was no going back for them.”
“Did he tell you how his wife died?”
She shrugged. “Cancer, I think.”
“He shot her to death. I was there. I witnessed it.”
“But why? He said he loved her. He missed her.”
“She was in his way. There was an important assignment. He used his daughter the same way.”
“I didn’t know he had a daughter.”
“She’s dead.”
“He killed her?”
“I did,” Carter said.
Lydia sucked in her breath. “It is... a vendetta, then, between you two. You killed his daughter, he killed your lover, and now...” She hesitated a moment. “You two are alike?”
“No. I killed Tatiana in self-defense. She had become as desperate and as crazy as her father. I dislike killing women.”
Lydia managed a wry smile. “You do not trust me, and yet you tell me of this weakness. What is to prevent me from simply getting up and walking out of here?”
“The thought that when this is over, you can be free.”
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I would like more coffee, please.”
They made a couple of quick passes around Penn Station before Carter was satisfied that they had not been followed. A few minutes before eight, they went inside, got their bags, and climbed aboard the train just as it was about to pull out.
After the train had emerged from the station, and the conductor had collected their tickets, they went forward to the crowded, noisy club car, where they managed to find a couple of seats near the forward door.
Carter ordered scotch for himself and vodka, neat, for Lydia. When they were settled, he lit himself a cigarette. He was very tired, but he figured he would get some sleep on the transatlantic flight.