The Sleeping Spy by Clifford Irving & Herbert Burkholz

Author:Clifford Irving & Herbert Burkholz [Irving, Clifford & Burkholz, Herbert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Clifford Irving
Published: 2014-03-28T04:00:00+00:00

"For the moment, I'm afraid, it will have to be."

He drew her down to him and held her. There was no more talk, but sleep did not come quickly. After a while he realized that she was quietly crying, as she had on the night he had said good-bye to his paintings. His last thought before sleep was the uncertain hope that Eddie would think of something.

Such thoughts are sometimes best born of wine, and the idea came after another hour of drinking and reminiscences, the two old warriors trading stories of other, better times, while Ginger listened avidly and tried to drink along with them. Both tasks were difficult. The men were into the wine with muscle now, making no pretense of savoring after-taste and bouquet, and at one point she had the feeling that had she not been there they would have been drinking the stuff straight from the bottles. Their conversation, too, was difficult to follow, laced as it was with references to exotic chemicals, toxic gases, and explosive devices. Even though the technical aspects of it defeated her, she was fascinated by the dialogue. The two men spoke casually, almost disparagingly, of adventures that seemed to her to represent the height of daring, laughing the loudest as they recalled each other's failures. After a while she had the floating feeling of being transported in time to some pirate's den of long ago, listening to the buccaneer captains recounting their exploits as they gnawed on greasy bones and flung bottles crashing into walls. The scent swam in front of her, and with a muttered excuse she left the table and barely managed to make it to the couch, where she curled herself up and was instantly asleep.

Vasily looked at the sleeping girl with approval. "A lovely creature. It's a pity that the two of you can't stay here and enjoy the house."

"That's finished. Got to run again."

"When? And where?"

Eddie shrugged. His eyes were heavy and his head was low.

Vasily said carefully, "I take it then that you are committed to staying with Emerson?"

Eddie's head came up. "Yeah, I'm committed, all right."

Vasily nodded toward the couch. "Because of her?"

"Mostly."

"It's suicide, you know. Anybody who stays close to that man is bound to get caught in the line of fire."

"Maybe." His lower lip came out and muscles twitched along his jaw.

Vasily said quickly, "Please don't give me the tough-kid act; I've seen it before. You know as well as I do how these things work. He's going to get hit. Maybe next week, maybe next month. His car will crash, or his plane will go down, or he'll catch a whiff of VX gas . . . something that looks like an accident. But it's going to happen, and if you're in that car or that plane you're going to get it, too. You know that, Eddie. It's not a question of odds anymore. It's a sure thing."

"I don't believe in sure things. I'm sticking." He looked away, and, in a voice so low it was barely audible, he added, "I was sort of hoping that you'd stick, too.

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