“How’d you know I was coming?” I asked.
Bradford’s saturnine face turned toward Sabrina. “She told me to expect you. She said you were good.” Sabrina crossed the room to sit on a hassock beside Bradford’s knee. She rested her cheek against it.
“Sabrina’s quite a useful person,” he said, putting his hand on her head, almost as if caressing a trained hunting leopard. “Did you know she killed your little friend?”
I managed to hide the quick flash of fury I felt. “Julie was your god-daughter,” I pointed out.
Bradford shrugged indifferently. “She was in the way,” he said. “She had to be disposed of.”
I didn’t want to think about Julie just then. I changed the subject. “The KGB will be proud of you,” I commented. “Do they give you a special medal?”
Bradford broke into a laugh. “The KGB? Good Lord, Carter, when the KGB find out what’s actually going to happen, they’ll start hunting for scapegoats! Heads will roll at 2 Dzerzhinsky Square!”
I didn’t understand what he was talking about. “Would you let me in on the joke?”
Bradford smiled. “Why not? It’s much too good not to share. So far Sabrina’s the only one who knows the story. After you’re dead, it can never be told again. Sabrina, do get the man a glass of brandy!”
Sabrina rose lithely, crossing the room with her catlike tread to bring me a brandy snifter. Napoleon. Only the best for Bradford.
He indicated a chair some ten feet from him. “Sit down, Carter, but don’t try anything. I’m an excellent shot. The gun is a .357 magnum. At this distance I couldn’t possibly miss hitting you.”
Bradford eyed me carefully until I was seated. “How much of the story do you know, Carter?”
“I know what the Russian found out,” I said. “You’re a plant. You were switched with the real Alexander Bradford when he was in a Nazi military prison hospital that was liberated by Soviet troops in 1945. Since then you’ve lived here in New England, completely assuming his identity. You’re one of the power elite in Boston—”
“In the whole country,” Bradford interjected.
“—and I know that shortly you’ll try to trigger the economic collapse of the United States.”
Bradford nodded agreement to each of my statements.
“All for the sake of Mother Russia,” I added, a sour taste in my mouth.
Again Bradford broke into a laugh.
“That,” he said with great amusement, “is where you’re quite wrong! It’ll be for the sake of the United States of America!”
I stared at him in astonishment.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Bradford leaned back, still keeping the gun on me. “At first,” he said, “even though I acted the role of Alexander Bradford, I still felt like myself — Vasily Gregorovich Sudarov, born in Leningrad, educated at Moscow Technical Institute, and a member of the KGB. Then, as the years passed, something in me changed. I actually felt more like the real Alexander Bradford than he would have himself if we hadn’t killed him! I continued Bradford’s hobby of delving into every facet of the American Revolution of 1776, especially the ideals and goals of the original members of the Sons of Liberty.” A tone of fervor began creeping into his voice.
“As I began to get deeply into this hobby, I wondered what would have happened if this country had not gotten off the track its original founders had tried to set it on.”
His voice took on a hard, angry pitch. “The little people have taken over! The uneducated and the illiterate own this country! The vote of the dirtiest, scummiest drunk is just as valid and just as important as the vote of the most educated, most brilliant man! Does that make sense to you? No wonder this country’s in the trouble it’s in now!
“So I began to ponder about what would happen if one man took over. One man, completely indoctrinated in what the founding fathers really wanted! Did you know that some of them favored a king? An American king? Yes, Carter, they did! And George Washington came within a hairsbreadth of being the first American dictator!”
Bradford could no longer contain himself. Excitedly he got to his feet and began pacing the room.
“So I laid my plans. Bradford was rich. Bradford was well connected. I spent years in developing even more contacts among the most influential men in this country. Secretly I created an organization of men who believed as I do — the new Sons of Liberty! Their motto is—”
“Don’t Tread on Me!” I broke in. “And the emblem is the Snake Flag!”
Bradford stared coldly at me for a moment, then he let a superior, arrogant smile touch his lips. “Very good, Carter. You’re right. Now there are several thousand of us. When the time is right, we will arise in revolt and take over the country! We are the new American patriots — the true descendants of the American Revolution!”
“And you will be at their head?”
“Yes, I’ll be at their head,” Bradford acknowledged.
“Where do the Russians fit into this scheme?”
“They don’t,” said Bradford. “They showed me how to disrupt the economy of this country to a point where an armed revolt will succeed. The plan will be put into operation on Monday.”
I really wasn’t surprised that D-Day was so soon. “The day after tomorrow?”
“Yes. On Monday we issue the first sell orders. By the end of the week, there will be complete financial chaos throughout the country. Within a month the time will be ripe for the Sons of Liberty to take over the government in Washington. Almost exactly 200 years to the day this country was founded!”
“Who gives the word?” I asked.
“I do,” said Bradford. “No one else knows who the others are.”
“And if you’re not around to give the word?”
Bradford looked sharply at me, then chuckled. He shook his head. “Oh, no, Carter. Don’t even think you can do it! I assure you, I will be around on Monday to give the word. It’s a shame that you won’t be here for the occasion. Your public execution is set for tomorrow.”
“Public execution?”
“Tomorrow at high noon,” he stated, “you will be the first traitor to the new American Revolution to be executed! You’ll go down in history, Carter — the history books to come, that is!”
I had barely enough time to assimilate his wild remarks. Bradford reached for the bellcord and gave it a sharp tug. Almost immediately the door was flung open and half a dozen men marched in.
I swear to God, for a moment I thought I was hallucinating. Every man jack of them was dressed in colonial costume! They wore knee breeches, white stockings, black leather shoes with big square buckles and square toes, sleeveless leather jackets and white powdered wigs topped by tricorn hats! And every one of them carried a muzzle-loading flintlock rifle or pistol!
“Take him away,” said Bradford. “Lock him up!”
In seconds they had me in their midst, two of them at each arm. We were at the door when Bradford spoke up again.
“Carter, I haven’t told you the end of our plans.”
They let me turn around to face him.
“We realize that the only enemy this country has,” he said slowly, “the only thing that stands in the way of our dominating the Western world, is Russia. Once we have taken over, when we feel the time is ripe, when we have complete control of the government and of the armed forces—”
He paused dramatically to let the effect of his next phrase sink in.
“—we will then unleash a total atomic attack on Russia that will paralyze her for centuries to come! The United States and the Soviet Union cannot live together in the same world! I have been taught that since childhood!”