Revelation

14 Inquisition

'Hello FBI, Atlanta, this is Lewis Klein of Domestic Intelligence, Washington. Would you connect me to Don Dilati?' A pause, then: 'Don? Lewis Klein here… Fine, thanks, and yourself? … It's about this guy Petrosian… your very own commie, yeah. The HUAC hearings… there's been a change of plan. The guy's college is holding an internal enquiry to root out Reds and HUAC want him shunted onto it on account of they're overloaded up here. Anyway, it's being held locally and I was wondering if we might liaise with you guys down in darkest Arkansas. We have very bad vibes about this Petrosian. We see him as more than just a parlour pink. We suspect he passed information on to Russia when he worked on the atom bomb… Sorry, the source is restricted. We have permission from the man upstairs to plant the usual devices and we have a trash can recovery order… What do you mean, law and order Arkansas style, we can match you people any day… 'Kay, I'll come down with my team and see if we can't stick one on him this time. I mean get something to burn him. I'm deadly serious, that was the word, "burn" as in high voltage… Sure, same to you. Good hunting.'

A local junior grade high school had been turned over to the hearings. Petrosian, feeling terribly alone, turned into the main gate and made his way to the entrance, where a black security man was sitting at an uncomfortably small school desk. The man examined Lev's letter, checked his name against a list, and waved him to the left with a sympathetic grunt. In Petrosian's lonely world, a sympathetic grunt was like a mother's hug.

A bare corridor was lined with people, mostly men, smoking, and the air was blue with cigarette smoke. Eyes, some curious, some hostile, followed his route. Black cables snaked from a window into a noisy classroom. A card tacked on the door had 'HUAC INTERVIEW ROOM' written on it in blue crayon, and another blue-collared security guard looked at Lev's letter and led him by the elbow into the room. There was a buzz of conversation as he entered. Some flashbulbs popped. Two movie cameras sat on tripods at the back of the room. The guard ushered him to a seat at the front of the classroom and then went to another one to one side of the door. Two microphones faced Lev on the desk and he thought they were unnecessary for such a small room. He found himself facing a raised dais, on which was a long desk with carafes of water, tumblers, papers and a wooden gavel. Three black, high-backed chairs were at the desk. Each had a small card in front of it: 'Mr Andrew Dodds, Board of Regents, Greers Ferry College', 'Congressman Olaf B. Yates, Arkansas', 'Senator Henry Alvarez, HUAC, Washington'. On the wall was a blackboard which had been wiped clean, an American flag hanging limply, and next to it another door. Lev assumed that his inquisitors would enter through this second door, which probably adjoined another classroom. Hot, sticky air was circulating from an open window. The morning sun streamed across a stenographer next to the door. She had white, pulled-back hair and was sitting straight-backed in a corner, staring ahead, like a machine waiting to be started.

A couple of minutes passed. The heat was stifling and Lev's mind began to wander. He was wondering about the gavel, whether they'd transported it from Washington or borrowed it from the local courthouse, or bought it from a gavel shop, when the door near the blackboard opened and three men walked in.

They were all in their forties. Lev knew Andrew Dodds, the College representative, by sight. He was small, near-bald, with a weak, receding chin and small eyes which peered out from behind round, steel-rimmed spectacles. Petrosian thought he bore a startling resemblance to Himmler, could hardly separate the two in his mind.

Olaf B. Yates shambled in behind Dodds. The Arkansas congressman looked like, and probably was, a dirt farmer. He was a small, burly man with a rough complexion and a squat nose like a boxer's.

Alvarez was tall and stooped. He had a slightly asymmetric mouth, one corner being pulled down. It soon emerged that this corner of the mouth gave an occasional nervous twitch, which would also contract the senator's cheek. Instinctively, Petrosian felt that he could handle Dodds and the dirt farmer, that he had the intellectual edge over them; but the same instinct made him fear Alvarez, the travelling inquisitor from Washington. Alvarez had fixed a steady, hostile stare on Petrosian, as if he was reading the scientist's mind.

The man from Arkansas, Olaf B. Yates, tapped the gavel. 'This hearing will come to order in the matter of Lev Baruch Paytrojan.'

A few mysterious preliminaries over, mainly to do with the empty lawyer's chair next to Petrosian, Dodds alias Himmler fired the opening salvo. He had a methodical, clipped way of speaking and a slightly nasal, high-pitched voice which soon became irritating to listen to. 'Doctor Petrosian. It has been determined by the Attorney General, and by the Director of the FBI, that institutions throughout America are being penetrated by persons whose purposes are subversive, that is to say, broadly speaking, inimical to the American way of life. Unconstitutional means are being employed, in clandestine fashion, by these people — communists and their fellow travellers — to overthrow the state.'

From the corner of his eye Petrosian was aware that Alvarez's cheek had twitched. It was to become an increasing distraction throughout the long interrogation.

Dodds continued, 'They have infiltrated every level and every type of organization and institution. They have infested educational, scientific, governmental, labour and communications establishments, the latter including the entertainment world. The House Committee on Un-American Activities has been active in attempting to root out these subversive elements from American life. Young, idealistic people in educational establishments are especially vulnerable when exposed to dangerous and alien ideas. We in the Greers Ferry Community College are anxious to play our full part in this patriotic enterprise. The purpose of these hearings is to establish the loyalty to America of our staff members. Testimony has been given in closed session to this committee which may tend to call your loyalty into question. You are here to satisfy us that your loyalties do indeed lie with the country to which you now belong. Do you understand?'

Petrosian nodded.

'Please answer yes or no for the record.'

'Understood, sure.'

The Arkansas congressman asked, 'Doctor Paytrojan, where was you borned at?' The voice was almost comically hillbilly.

'Armenia.'

'That's Russia, right?'

'It is now. But Armenia is a country with its own culture, language and even script. The Armenian Church is the oldest established Christian Church. It goes back to 300 AD.'

'You don't say? But yo're still a Russian.'

'I became an American citizen in 1945.'

Dodds picked up the questioning. 'I have here the reading list you give to your sophomore students. It includes a book called Through Rugged Ways to the Stars, by Professor Harlow Shapley, Director of Harvard College Observatory.'

'Yes, It's on my recommended reading list.'

Dodds stared at Petrosian through his spectacles. 'Are you aware that Shapley has been co-chairman of the Progressive Citizens of America? That he has asked scientists to, I quote, "answer to a higher cause, and increase the importance of their world citizenship over their local loyalties"? What do you think he meant by that, Doctor Petrosian?'

'I know he has left-wing convictions.'

The hint of a sneer. 'You might say. HUAC have listed him as affiliated to between eleven and twenty communist front organizations.'

Alvarez interjected. He had a heavy, commanding voice, over-loud for the cramped little room and the microphones. 'Let me put it directly, sir. Do you think it right that impressionable young minds should be exposed to ideas from the minds of communists and their fellow travellers?'

'Yes.'

The answer took the panel by surprise. Petrosian added, 'But then, I'm not imposing an opinion, simply exposing students to a range of ideas.'

Alvarez changed tack abruptly. 'How are the Brooklyn Dodgers doing just now?'

It was Petrosian's turn to be surprised. 'I have no idea.'

'And the Cardinals?'

Lev shrugged, bewildered.

'Do you play baseball?'

'No, sir.'

'Football? Basketball?' Alvarez was adopting a tone of incredulity.

'No.'

'Are you physically prevented from so doing?'

'No, I'm in good health. I'm just not interested in sport.'

'Meaning you have no sense of belonging to a team. Don't you think that good American citizenship involves you in social as well as legal obligations?'

'You mean, I should answer to the higher cause of social conformity, like the communists?'

Alvarez glared at Petrosian. 'Before we go any further in this enquiry, sir, let me make one thing clear. Smart talk of that sort is unwelcome at this hearing.'

The Congressman said, 'Y'see, it's like this, Mister Paytrojan. I never knew a ballplayer who was a Communist. Good loyal Americans are team players.'

'Do you attend church?' Alvarez wanted to know, clearly rattled by Lev's defiant reply.

'No.'

'What is your religion exactly?'

'I was brought up as a Christian Armenian.'

'And now?'

'I'm no longer active.'

Mister Arkansas grinned. 'You admit to being an aytheeist?'

'Agnostic is the word. There are things in the natural world I can't explain, like why it exists at all.'

'And do you expose students to this aytheeism of yours?'

'I don't expose them to classroom propaganda of any sort, unless you consider doing your own thinking to be propaganda. All they get from me are the ideas and concepts of modern physics.'

'You have a problem with God, country and flag?' Senator Alvarez wanted to know.

'Not at all. But I also think it's my duty to make young people do their own thinking. I don't know how to do that except by exposing them to new ideas. And all new ideas are subversive to some extent.' A light sweat was forming on Lev's brow.

Alvarez again: 'So while our boys are out there in Korea meatgrinding their way back to the 38th parallel, you're back here nice and cosy telling our young people to go easy on the loyalty thing?'

'Did I say that?'

'No sir, you did not. Not in so many words.'

Alvarez leaned back. Mister Arkansas had a mock-puzzled look on his face. 'Did I hear you just admit you teach subversive ideas to students?'

'The syllabus includes some discussion of new ideas in physics. I said that all new ideas are subversive.'

'Subversive.' The congressman paused, to give the impression he was thinking about that, and also to focus attention on himself. 'Subversive. Doan that word mean undercutting the established order of things?'

'Yes.'

'And doan disloyalty involve the same thang?'

'Yes.'

'Well pardon me if I've missed somethang. I ain't had the privilege of a higher education. It seems to me that you doan give your impressionable young students classroom propaganda but you do just happen to expose them to disloyal ideas.' A triumphant, yellow-toothed grin spread over the Arkansas farmer's face: he had outwitted an atomic scientist, delivered a crushing blow. He noted with approval the busy scribbling of the reporters.

The logic was so unbelievable that Petrosian couldn't answer it. He sat, literally speechless, until Alvarez stepped in. The senator now asked the ritual, and deadly, question: 'Doctor Petrosian, are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party of the United States?'

It was expected, but still Petrosian felt his skin going clammy. 'No.'

'Nevertheless in 1946, you joined the American Committee for Democratic and Intellectual Freedom.'

'Yes.'

'Are you aware that this is a known communist front organization for the defence of communist teachers? That it has been declared un-American and subversive by this very House Committee on Un-American Activities?'

'So I heard. I didn't know that when I joined.'

Alvarez referred to a sheet of paper in front of him. 'On June 30th of 1946 you attended a party at the home of Max and Gill Brogan, who are alleged members of the Communist Party'

'I don't remember.' Petrosian wiped sweat from his brow.

'Present at that party was Martha Haines. Are you acquainted with her?'

'Yes.' The question puzzled Petrosian. She was the local public librarian, a plump, motherly woman. He saw her every fortnight over the library counter.

'Are you aware that Miss Haines is a member of the Daughters of Bilitis?'

'The who?'

'A lesbian organization, sir. You also attended meetings at the house of Paul and Hannah Chapman, who are known to be functionaries of the Communist Party. Paul Chapman was recently dismissed from employment with General Electric as a security risk. I don't suppose you remember those meetings either.'

'I have a lot of friends from my Los Alamos days. I neither know nor care about their affiliations.'

'Yes, let's go back to those Los Alamos days, Doctor.'

A vague feeling of dread began to suffuse through Petrosian's body. 'Let me say it again. I have a lot of friends from my Los Alamos days. I neither know nor care about their affiliations.'

'One acquaintance in particular.'

Kitty! They want me to squeal on Kitty. The bastards! Petrosian wondered if they had noticed the anger which gripped his body.

Alvarez was pretending to read a name. 'A Miss Catherine Cronin. You knew this woman?'

Get the tone right. Don't get hostile, play it cool. 'Kitty Cronin. Yes, we were friends.'

'You were friends.' Alvarez was almost gloating. 'And what was the nature of this friendship?'

Picnics in the woods. Skiing. Glorious days on mountain trails. Barbecues. Movies. Soft, hot flesh and tousled hair on pillows, and passion, and fun. And none of your fucking business. 'We were good friends.'

'How good?'

Show the bastard up. Force him to ask the intimate stuff. Make him look like the prying goat he is. 'We were close.'

Alvarez, however, seemed to sense a trap. He changed tack. 'Did you and she not meet on every occasion when you took time off from your wartime work on the Los Alamos mesa?'

'We did, which wasn't often.'

'On January 14th 1943, did you and Kitty Cronin not conduct a meeting in her house near Santa Fe? And was Klaus Fuchs, the atom spy, not also present at that meeting?'

'I don't recall. Yes I do.' Petrosian steepled his fingers in thought. 'There was a bunch of us. Dick Feynman, Klaus, someone else I can't remember. We all took off in Dick's car. It wasn't a meeting of course, that's just your way of making it sound purposeful and sinister. We just took off for the day to have a picnic and a good time. As I recall we went into Santa Fe first. Dick had arranged to pick up some girl.'

'Did you not stay overnight with Miss Cronin after the others had left?'

'The question is outrageous. A gentleman doesn't ask, nor does he tell.'

Their eyes locked. Alvarez twitched, wondering whether to make an issue of Lev's defiance. Then: 'Did you not, in the course of that evening, pass over a document to Miss Cronin?'

'No.'

It was a lie.

And Alvarez knew it.

The faces on the bench were now displaying a range of expressions from grim to angry. Petrosian felt the hostility like a physical, crushing pressure.

'Were you, at Los Alamos, a close friend of a Doctor David Bohm?'

Petrosian nodded. 'It was a small, intense, closed community. Everyone knew everyone else.'

'Let it be put on the record that Petrosian admitted to friendship with David Bohm. Are you aware that Oppenheimer has described him as an extremely dangerous man?'

'No, but it doesn't surprise me. David is full of dangerous ideas. That's not the same as disloyalty.'

The dirt farmer again: 'Let me get this right, Mister Paytrojan from Russia. Yo're admitting you hob-nob with commies and front organizations, but still you claim you ain't red.'

'Correct.'

'Not even pink?'

Someone near the back of the room laughed.

Alvarez with a twitch: 'Doctor, I'd like to explore this curious claim of yours a little further, if I may. You are aware that the Communist Party in this country is a channel for espionage?'

'No, sir.'

The senator sighed. 'I remind you, sir, that you're under oath.'

Lev shrugged. 'I'm aware of common perceptions in this area. I have no hard evidence to support them.'

Mr Arkansas was leaning over his microphone. His voice was dripping scorn. 'I ain't been to Australia. Are you saying I shouldn't believe it exists because I ain't seen it with my own eyes? Maybe you think Australia is hearsay or sumthin?' There was some tittering from the audience, and the congressman grinned again, openly basking in his wit. Petrosian sat quietly, blinking through his spectacles.

Alvarez threw a brief, irritated glance at his Arkansas colleague. 'Doctor, the American Communist Party has been designated by the Attorney General as a subversive organization which seeks to overthrow the form of government of the United States by unconstitutional means, within the purview of Executive Orders 9835 and 10450. Given time, we could find any number of highly authoritative sources, from former communists to professors of history, who will confirm that communism has emerged as a world power with the stated goal of dominating all mankind. In the light of all this, Doctor, are you happy with the statement you have just made?'

Petrosian shook his head stubbornly. 'I don't belong to the American Communist Party and never have. I have no direct knowledge of their activities. I hear the accusations but for all I know they're the product of paranoia or mass hysteria. Or plain stupidity: there's plenty of that around.'

'Don't be absurd.' Dodds was adopting a use-your-common-sense tone. In Petrosian's mind, the identification with Himmler was becoming complete. 'Everyone knows that the Party uses conspiracy, infiltration and intrigue, deceit and duplicity and falsehood. It has infiltrated our universities, our culture and even our State Department.'

Petrosian sat quietly.

'Answer the question,' Dodds-Himmler said sharply, his eyes hard behind his steel-rimmed glasses.

'I'm sorry, I didn't recognize that as a question.'

'Were you a Communist Party member in Germany, before you fled to this country?'

'No.'

Another lie.

Petrosian wondered in near-panic what they knew, whether they had noticed his tiny hesitation. But how to explain to these morons that he had joined first for the love of a girl, and then to oppose thugs, and never out of any conviction about new world orders or similar nonsense?

Dodds-Himmler picked up a sheet of paper and handed it down to the stenographer, who seemed to be doubling as a clerk. Lev became aware of a tremendous tension in his jaw muscles. He tried to relax them, but his body wasn't obeying his brain. 'I'm now going to show you a copy of an entry held in FBI files. Mister Chairman, this is an extract from Gestapo files brought to the States in 1945, and indexed in 1948. I request that this extract be put in the record.'

'It may be made part of the record.'

'The entry is of course in German, a language in which I believe you are fluent, Doctor. Perhaps you would read it out in English for this Subcommittee. Do try to be accurate; I have an English translation in front of me.'

Petrosian read through the brief paragraph. It was a Gestapo file about him, and it was the first time he had set eyes on it. He couldn't control the trembling in his voice:

Petrosian, Lev, student of physics, born 29 December 1911. Subject is associated with Communist cell active in Kiel. Was previously active member of Communist Party in Leipzig. In 1932 and 1933, contacted known pro-Soviet academics during visits to Berlin and Heidelberg. Visited briefly the Austrian Jewess Lise Meitner at the Nobel Institute in Stockholm.

Russelheim, RSHA IVA, Gestapo Field Office, Kiel.

'The letters RSHA —' Dodds-Himmler began.

'—refer to the Central Office of Security Police,' Petrosian interrupted. 'Our paths have crossed.' Something dangerous in Petrosian's voice; Dodds backed off.

'Associated with communist cells… active member of Communist Party.' Dodds waited for Lev's response, his eyebrows raised. There was an expectant stillness in the room. Lev remained silent. 'Would you please explain the circumstances.'

'I was a student in Germany. In those days the communists were the only real opposition to the fascists.'

Mister Arkansas was displaying his teeth again. 'You don't say,' he repeated with exaggerated sarcasm.

'I ran with them for about two years. That was from 1932 to 1934. Not out of belief in their system, but because I opposed the Nazis.'

'Opposed them? By running with Communist street gangs?'

'With respect, you just don't know what it was like.'

Alvarez was passing down another piece of paper, this one like a sheet from a stenographer's notebook. 'I'm going to show you a page from a notebook left on your desk at Los Alamos on March 1945. It was drawn to the attention of the Board of Regents some weeks ago.' Petrosian's hands were trembling slightly as he took it.

'Would you confirm that this is your handwriting?'

'Yes.'

'It has calculations on it.'

'Yes. How did you get hold of this?'

'We ask the questions here. Look at the handwritten note on the top right-hand corner of the page. Mister Chairman, the actual writing was done on the page above, but the message was recovered by the FBI through high contrast photography and other techniques. Doctor, would you read it out, please?'

'Jurgen, Grand Central, 4.15 p.m.'

'This is a note to meet someone called Jurgen, is it not?'

'Yes.'

'In your handwriting?'

'Yes.'

'Who is this Jurgen?'

'Jurgen Rosenblum. A colleague from my pre-war days. I was arranging to meet him in New York.'

'And did you?'

'Yes.' Petrosian was beginning to feel faint. His back and thighs were wet with sweat.

'What precisely was the nature and purpose of this meeting with Rosenblum?'

'Why do you make it sound like something sinister? It was a simple social meeting. We have a common bond. We'd both been persecuted by the Nazis, we'd both escaped from Nazi Germany. You clearly haven't the faintest idea what that means to those of us who came through. As to the purpose of the meeting? The purpose was talk. We talked about people we knew who'd made it out, people who hadn't. We talked about science. We talked about books. We talked about the ladies. We talked and we talked —'

'Was political discussion part of all this talk?'

'Stuff like that, yes, of course.'

'I'll bet,' Alvarez said. He paused. Then: 'Did you not meet Rosenblum in an internee camp for enemy aliens in Sherbrooke, Canada, in 1939? And did you not there register with the Communist Party through Rosenblum?'

'Register? What are you talking about?'

'You know perfectly well, and before you continue with that insolent tone, sir, I ask you to remember who you're talking to. I'm not suggesting that application forms or membership cards changed hands. How was it done, Doctor Petrosian? With a handshake in some quiet corner? A nod and a wink? An understanding that in due course you might be approached for information? Were you ever a loyal resident of America? Or have you not always been a mole, a sleeper, a Trojan horse, first in Harwell and then Los Alamos?'

'No.'

Alvarez said, 'Mister Chairman, I wish to enter the following documents in the record. They are, first, decoded extracts of messages obtained in 1939 by the British MI5 between Moscow and the Russian Embassy in London. They refer to one Leo, a GRU officer planted amongst the internees for the specific purpose of befriending refugee scientists and opening up what they call "channels of communication". The second document is an assessment by MI5 that the GRU agent in question was probably Jurgen Rosenblum.'

'Why was this Rose in Bloom allowed into America?' Mister Arkansas asked.

'The fog of war,' Alvarez replied. 'The MI5 filed their report away, and our FBI wasn't notified of their suspicions until 1943. A long surveillance failed to come up with anything until 1951. That was the meeting between Petrosian and Rosenblum.'

'Where is Rose in Bloom now?' Mister Arkansas wanted to know.

'He is living openly in New York City.' Alvarez turned his attention again to the sweating physicist. 'I'd like to get back, if I may, to the meeting you attended on July 7th at the home of Paul and Hannah Chapman.'

'It was a social evening. Their wedding anniversary, as I recall.'

'So you said. Who else attended this social evening?'

'You want me to name names?'

'You ain't a commie, right?' the Arkansas congressman asked. Lev nodded. 'So what's the problem?'

Petrosian momentarily closed his eyes. He hesitated, took a deep breath, and then said, 'Okay. Okay. Okay. I did attend one meeting of the Communist Party. There were about twenty of us present.'

The room went still.

'We were addressed by a very important Hollywood personage.' Petrosian's voice was shaky, and he was taking breath in deep gulps.

'Take your time. Tell us about it.' Mister Arkansas's eyes were gleaming. Confess your sins, my son. Unburden your soul.

'This was July 7th, just after the Chapman party. I was directed to go to Greers Ferry Park after dark.'

'Who delivered this message?'

'My—' Petrosian lowered his voice '—my controller.'

The tip-tip of the stenographer; the faint whirr of the movie cameras; something rustling in the parched grass outside.

'Your controller?' The congressman's voice was almost a whisper. Don't break the atmosphere. Let the confession flow. He leaned forward across the desk.

'Yes. My controller.'

'Who was this controller?'

'I've never set eyes on him.'

'How did he deliver his message?'

'It came to me by thought rays.'

A bewildered expression crossed the congressman's face.

Petrosian continued, 'There was a flying saucer in the park. It was about fifty feet across and twenty high. There was an open ramp and I went into it. I sat at a porthole and it took off. We went right up there at amazing speed but I didn't feel any acceleration. We flew over to Los Angeles to collect John Wayne. He just materialized right there in front of us, in the middle of the saucer.' There was a suppressed belly laugh from the back of the room. Petrosian continued: 'Then we went on to Saturn, which by the way is my home planet. It only took us half an hour. There we met the Leader. He was tanned with long blond hair and kind blue eyes. He told us that world domination by aliens is the only way forward for the salvation of mankind and world communism was only a step on the way and asked if we would help in this great enterprise.'

The deathly hush had been replaced by a scattering of giggles, and now laughter was surging through the room. The congressman, his face contorted by anger, was hammering the gavel. He shouted, 'I hairby cite Doctor Lev Paytrojan for perjury and contempt of these hair proceedings,' but Petrosian, mouth up against the microphone, was still testifying: 'Then the Duke gave us the low-down on how his boys were infiltrating Hollywood and influencing American minds while he acted the part of the anti-red to fool people like you. There are lots of fine Hollywood Americans in this enterprise, I'll give you that list now.'

The audience had split into two camps, half of it booing angrily, the other half laughing and applauding. The congressman was hammering the gavel sharply and shouting 'Remove this man from the microphone,' but Petrosian's voice was still coming over the uproar. 'There are three hundred names on it, people like Gary Cooper and Daryl Zanuck at the top.'

The security men, big hulks of overweight menace, were bearing down. Petrosian stood up. At the door, he glanced back at the scene of bedlam he had created. Mr Arkansas was still hammering at the desk. Dodds-Himmler was staring through his steel-rimmed spectacles at the physicist as if he had just landed from a flying saucer. The nervous twitch in Alvarez's cheek was in full swing. Half a dozen reporters were scribbling furiously.

Powerful hands gripped Petrosian's elbows. His last view of the room was the clock. The interview, it had seemed to him, had lasted a gruelling three or four hours. He was astonished to see that it had taken only twenty-five minutes.

In the corridor, Lev was startled by a sudden blaze of popping flashlights. He found himself wedged in by a scrum of reporters. He pushed his way along the corridor, answering a babble of questions as politely as he could. In the playground, near the school entrance, another movie camera had been put in place.

As he drifted towards the street, dragging the entourage, a taxi stopped and disgorged a man and woman. The man was small, round-faced and nearly bald. The woman was about thirty, with long dark hair and dressed in a long green coat. She took the man's arm and they walked unnoticed in the direction of the school. It was some moments before Lev recognized her, but when he did the reporters and the microphones and the gabble faded away, and a lump rose in Lev's throat. Their eyes met briefly as they passed. Contact was impossible. She gave a brief, wan smile and then was gone, and Petrosian thought that, apart from a little extra weight around the hips and a few wrinkles around the eyes, Kitty had changed little in eight years, and as he fought back the tears he realized that he had always loved her and always would.

'You bloody fool,' Brogan said for the fourth time in an hour.

'I'm in love with your wife, Max,' said Petrosian, smiling over at her. She raised her eyebrows and rattled a skillet onto the big electric hotplate. 'It's her crawfish pie,' said Petrosian, helping himself to more.

'Then you'd better fill up on it. You won't get any where you're headed.'

A black waitress came in through the swing door, carrying a pile of plates on each arm. 'Nummer Four wann bare an fraid aigs an oyster po-boy with dirty rice, the main in One say is yawl gone fishin for ma baked grouper, an Three doan finish their bean stew,'

'Gombee faive mins for the grouper,' Mary Brogan called back. She poured Southern Comfort into the skillet, shook it, and flames leapt towards a burned-black patch in the ceiling.

Max waved his arms. 'Some grand gesture that achieves nothing, as in zilch, as in a big round frigging zero. What the hell got into you, Lev? A good career down the tubes and maybe a year in some godawful pokey.'

'Stuffed with queers and sadistic wardens,' Petrosian suggested.

'Why did you do it, Lev? Why did you throw away your future?'

Petrosian sipped at the Coca-Cola. 'Those creeps just got up my nose.'

'Lev, maybe you can afford the grand gesture, but I have kids to get through school. And what if people start to boycott this place? All it needs is some American Legion redneck to hand out leaflets at the door and we might as well rename this place The Commie Diner.'

'Mary's not a communist, is she?'

'Come on, Lev, what the hell has that got to do with anything? Association is all it takes.' Max's expression was pained.

Lev said, softly, 'Out with it.'

There was an unbearable stress in Brogan's voice. 'Look, Lev, I'm sorry. But maybe you shouldn't come around for a while. You know — career. Mary and the boys.'

Lev nodded sadly. 'I understand fully, Max. Don't worry about it. Nothing in our friendship says you have to stand up to the bad guys like Gary Cooper in High Noon. I'll stay away awhile.'

The relief was palpable. Brogan extended his hand and Lev shook it silently. The Texan looked quizzically at his friend. 'I finally get it.'

'What's that, Max?'

'Your testimony to these creeps. It was the absolute truth. You really do come from Saturn.'