Hale glanced around for Philby-and he saw only the two KGB men, who were striding between the upright stones in evident alarm.
Philby had evaded them-but where was he? Hale took a deep breath and stepped away from the gravestone.
And he noticed with a sort of ringing tunnel vision that he was casting two shadows across the gravel-or, rather, that he stood between two shadows, with no evidence that his own body was stopping the sunlight at all. He raised his arm, and so did the shadow a foot away to his right. He looked up to his left, where the person casting the other shadow should be standing, and for a moment he saw the back of his own head, with the hair still standing up in spikes, and saw below it the shoulders of the crazy-looking quilted pink-satin coat.
A moment later the vision was gone, and aside from his two shadows he seemed to be alone on the gravel path.
His left leg flexed forward into an involuntary step, and in his left ear he heard a whisper: "Walk back out. Drink your vodka as you go."
In his disorientation Hale would have gone along with almost any proposal, and he obediently lurched back toward the arch, tipping the bottle up for a slug of vodka.
He saw bubbles wobble up through the clear liquor, and heard them gurgling, but no liquid reached his mouth. Then his arm was pulled back down, and the whispering voice in his ear said, "Ahh," and Hale could smell vodka fumes over the metallic oil reek. "Straight ahead, across the street," the voice went on, "there's a park where drunks sun themselves, two blocks away, just alleys to get there."
Hale stumbled out through the arch and swayed and shuffled across the street like a man with a concussion. When he had stumbled up onto the far sidewalk his left leg flexed again, and he wobbled away in that direction. If the KGB men had observed him at all, they must have dismissed him as an unsignifying drunk.
Within a few steps Hale had turned right, off the Spiridonovka; and when he had walked one block down an alley that led away to the north, past windowsill flower boxes and the back doors of old wooden houses, he regained his balance. Out of the corner of his left eye he could see Philby walking along beside him now, and he could hear Philby's boots crunching on the pavement; but Hale didn't look directly at him for fear of overlapping him again. Hale did notice with relief that his own shadow stretched ahead properly from his own feet now, and that Philby's was moving normally beside it, not alarmingly close to it.
As if this ordinary sight were a signal, Hale's heartbeat was suddenly very fast in his chest, and he was panting. "What-" he said hoarsely, "-happened?"
"I often duck in there, or into any cemetery," said Philby quietly, his own voice sounding a little strained, "when I want to lose my escorts. The guardian angel is present in such places, and when she is focusing on me, other people seem to have difficulty doing it." He took a deep breath and sighed gustily. "I guess you're my other half, right enough, my ten-years-delayed twin-today she obviously mistook you and I, authoritatively, for one person." Hale saw the shadow of Philby's head lift and turn in profile toward him. "Not very flattering to me, I must say," Philby added. "What is that garment?"
"Overcoat," said Hale shortly. "Inside-out.">A twitch of the blade, Hale thought, but not a full parry. This isn't the building. He dug a pack of Trud cigarettes out of a pocket and shook one out and struck a match to it. Half the length of the black cigarette was an empty cardboard tube.
He stepped back out onto the sidewalk and resumed walking in the direction of the pond. Soon the street curved away to the west, and an alley was the only route by which to move farther south, but he didn't hesitate before stepping into the shadows between the high brick walls.
The windows he passed were painted over, though he heard voices behind a couple of them, and the vertical iron pipes radiated heat. Just as he came out the far end of the alley, he heard a soft scuff echo behind him.
Hale was in a cul-de-sac now, with flower gardens in the gaps between the old yellow-brick houses on his left. The view to his right was blocked by one of the prewar apartment buildings, an eight-story gray-faced stone edifice with butcher-paper packages and milk bottles visible in the windows, between the insulating double panes of glass.
Hale took a deep draw on his Russian cigarette, and a throat-full of hot air let him know that he had used up all the tobacco in it. He ground it out under his heel and began walking out across the pavement toward the apartment building.
Immediately two men in green fedoras had stepped up from a set of basement stairs, and they made straight for Hale. One of them asked a question in Russian.
"Dobriy vyechyir," said Hale amiably. It meant Good evening. "Vi gavrarityeh pa angliski?" he went on. "Nyimyetski? Frantsuski?" Do you speak English? German? French?
In German the KGB officer said, "Let me see your passport. What are you doing here?" His companion had stepped to the side, probably to have a clear shot at Hale.
"I am an English journalist for the London Evening Standard," replied Hale in German. With his right hand he pulled open his overcoat, and with two fingers of his left hand he slowly drew out his passport. "I wish to write an article about Pushkin Square and the picturesque old neighborhoods around it."
"This is a restricted area," the KGB agent said, handing the passport to his companion. "You are staying at the hotel on the Sadovaya Samotechnaya?"
"Var-noom Leeyonard," said the agent with Hale's passport, and it took Hale a moment to realize that the man was pronouncing the name on the passport, Varnum Leonard.
Hale nodded. "That's right."
"Joor-nalist," the man added.
"Right again."
"Do not come here again," said the first man, waving Hale back the way he had come.
Hale retrieved his passport, nodded apologetically, and walked back toward the alley. The cul-de-sac was in deepening shadow, and he noticed that there were no streetlamps.
A committed parry, he thought with satisfaction. That's the place. And probably there'll be a new shift of guards tomorrow morning.
At the alley-mouth he glanced back, and he saw a pair of lighted windows on the eighth floor of the apartment building. Are you at home, Kim? he thought. I hope you're an early riser-I need to be at St. Basil's Cathedral at noon.
The prospect of his visit to the cathedral was much more troubling than the thought of cornering Kim Philby tomorrow morning.