Leon Uris Read Online Free Page A

as well as his native language.
    Nordstrom approached the Kuznetov’s cottage these days to the sound of Tamara’s piano. She played magnificently. Olga now attempted to prepare luncheons and dinners, still baffled by the array of electric kitchen utensils and the unlimited varieties of food.
    The American and the Russian took long, unhurried winter walks along the river, during which Boris expounded Communist dialectic, literature, the American technical wonders, music. He was a well-informed buff on Western art and philosophy. Yet his only mention of personal matters was that Tamara had great promise as a musician and it was a pity to keep her from her studies.
    As the winter wore on, the confinement of Camp Patrick began to play on the family’s nerves. The Kuznetovs had, in fact, traded a small cell in the Laurel house for a larger cell.
    Yet Nordstrom sensed a softening. The interrogators, who had accomplished little, were called off at the turn of the year, much to Boris’s delight.
    Michael Nordstrom’s patience paid off.
    On a particular night in early spring he stayed over for the running of the weekly film for the family in their living room. A new breed of spy literature was being born. This film had the usual suave British hero lipping sly double entendres, being pursued by a bevy of half-naked girls, and using technical gadgetry to challenge the imagination. The dark Russians were depicted as men with dirty fingernails, ill-fitting clothes, sinister, brutal, mysterious, dedicated to false gods. Except for one Russian, a female agent of KGB, portrayed by a large-busted Italian actress whose Russian accent was unbelievable.
    There was a bedroom showdown. As the scene flickered on the screen, Boris Kuznetov put his head back and roared with laughter and he laughed till he nearly gagged.
    Michael had never heard him laugh before.
    After the film, Kuznetov treated himself to a rare drink of liquor. On his walks, he often commented, as an aside, that the Western agents drank too much. He, himself, was virtually a total abstainer. But on this night he felt good.
    “The days are long,” he said, placing a log on the fire and weighing his words with meticulous care. “I would like some company. Someone from my own part of the world. A fellow European.”
    Nordstrom raised his eyebrows. “Do you have anyone particular in mind?”
    “As a matter of fact, yes.”
    “Who?”
    Boris stirred his drink, took a short sip, looked into the budding fire. “Devereaux. André Devereaux.”
    “Who?”
    “SDECE, the French Secret Service. Your ININ Counterpart in Washington. You know him quite well.”
    Boris looked at Michael’s poker face.
    “Why Devereaux?”
    “Frenchmen are jolly.”
    “What else?”
    “I need some jolly company.”
    Nordstrom did not reply. The request was coldly calculated and Kuznetov wanted to speak no more about it.
    “I’ll think it over,” Nordstrom said.
    Marshall McKittrick, the President’s Intelligence Adviser, appeared to be exactly what he was, a well-groomed, silver-haired, meticulously dressed, dollar-a-year executive, who had served three Presidents without portfolio and was known as a member of the White House inner circle and the President’s personal watchdog on intelligence matters. He grimaced as Sanderson Hooper spilled tobacco over his highly polished desk.
    “How did Kuznetov know about Devereaux?” McKittrick asked.
    Hooper swept up the tobacco like bread crumbs and placed them in the large crystal ashtray, a gift of the President.
    “Possibly through one of the British defectors in the last several years. Or he could have been briefed by a Soviet resident back from Paris or Washington.”
    “I’ve worked with André Devereaux for twelve years,” Nordstrom said. “We set up ININ together, Marsh, and he’s the one man in Washington I’d stake my life on.”
    “Devereaux is not the question, Mike. He’s French. He’s obligated to report to his own people in