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thorough search. Alekhin says this is not our man, but I want to see for
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myself. I want to talk to that man."
Walking back to his desk, he dropped into a chair. He did not like all this
running about. There were others to do that, but there was so much wasted
effort, so much wasted time! Nobody really cared. That was the trouble.
No, he was wrong about that. Many people did care, and some worked very hard,
for one reason or another, but not enough of them. The great problem was
inertia.
By now the American was probably somewhere in the Chukchi Region or just over
the line into the Koryak. It was wild country, but there were few forests, and
the mountains were more icy and barren. The man would be more exposed.
They would get him now. They must get him.
The trouble was, back in Moscow they did not even grasp the sheer size of the
country he had been dealing with. To find one man in all that vast area,
especially one who wanted to hide and was skilled at it, was nearly
impossible.
Suvarov appeared in the doorway. "Sir? I have not been able to reach Comrade
Lebedev. Perhaps if I were to fly down there - ?"
You would like that, wouldn't you? Zamatev said to himself. "No," he said
aloud. "I shall need you with me. Get in touch with Comrade Yavorsky at my
office. Tell her that the Baronas father and daughter are not to be arrested.
They are to be left strictly alone. Tell her that Comrade Lebedev is now in
Iman for that purpose and must be stopped, stopped at all costs."
Emma Yavorsky had never liked Kyra Lebedev, but Kyra had to be reached
somehow, and he would be off searching for the American. It was a pity. Kyra
was a lovely and intelligent woman, but to fly in the face of orders would be
suicidal. Emma Yavorsky would not only stop her in time, she would take
pleasure in it. Maybe he could straighten matters out later, but for now Kyra
must be stopped at all costs.
Suppose she did arrest them and had Stegman put them to the question?
Forty-Three
Throughout the day, they waited. Several times cars drove by, but usually
their street was deserted. It led to nowhere, and easier routes were available
to anyone going in either direction. Natalya stood often at the dusty,
flyspecked window looking across the river into China and freedom. Or what she
hoped would be freedom.
It was cold, and they dared have no fire. The building where they were was
supposed to be an old warehouse.
"This woman you saw? You believe it was the Lebedev woman?"
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"You described her to me, and the man with her."
"They are searching for us, then. There could be no other reason why she would
be here."
She drew her coat more tightly about her, clasping her arms about her body.
Across the street, there were other warehouses and some ramshackle buildings
along the river. There were old boat landings there and a wharf from which
cargo had been loaded on riverboats long ago. Now they were gray, bare,
harried by the wind. It was a bleak outlook, and so was hers if Potanin failed
them.
Where was Joe Mack? There had been no word of him, but she had been nowhere
she would be likely to hear. There was always gossip, but one had to be
around, listening, at the places where gossip was repeated.
How could he ever escape? She remembered the woods and shivered. There had
been brief moments when she had loved them, moments when her father was alive
and they had walked out to see the flowers, to hear the birds, to watch for
small animals, but the winters were so brutally cold, and it was a fierce
struggle to gather fuel, even to keep alive. Often they had starved. There had
been weeks on end when they had survived on less food than was needed for a
child. Yet somehow they had survived, and then he had come.
Did she truly love him? Or was it that he had brought some strange magic into
their colorless, empty lives? He had given them meat, but more than that he
had given them hope. If he, pursued by them all, could believe in escape,
believe in a future somewhere after this, then it was possible for them to
believe also.
What was it that had drawn her to him? Undeniably, he was a striking figure of
a man, but it had been something more. When with him, she felt warm, secure,
safe. He was not blundering, wishing, complaining, or hopeless. He was going
somewhere, and he knew where he was going and how to get there, and suddenly
she did, too.
It was he who had given hope to her father. She could see that clearly now. He
had become resigned to suffering, resigned to working out a poor existence in
the taiga. Or he was becoming resigned.
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