Red Rabbit - Tom Clancy [242]
"I know Budai's family well, Andy. That will not be a problem." Budai had a young daughter, and giving something for little Zsoka would cause no problems for the smuggler.
Hudson made a calculation for distance. Two and a half hours to the Yugoslav border should be about right at that time of night. They'd be using a small truck for the first part of the journey. Istvan would handle the rest in his larger truck. And if anything went wrong, Istvan would expect to be shot by the British Secret Service officer. That was one benefit of the world-famous James Bond movies. But, more to the point, five thousand d-mark went a very long way in Hungary.
"I will be driving to what destination?"
"I will tell you tonight," Hudson answered.
"Very well. I shall meet you at Csurgo at two tomorrow morning without fail."
"That is very good, Istvan." Hudson finished his coffee and stood. "It is good to have such a reliable friend."
"You pay me well," Kovacs observed, defining their relationship.
Hudson was tempted to say how much he trusted his agent, but that wasn't strictly true. Like most field spooks, he didn't trust anybody—not until after the job was completed. Might Istvan be in the pay of the AVH? Probably not. No way they could afford five thousand West German marks on anything approaching a regular basis, and Kovacs liked the good life too much. If the communist government of this country ever fell, he'd be among the first to become a millionaire, with a nice house in the hills of Pest on the other side of the Danube, overlooking Buda.
* * *
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, Hudson found Ryan at the front of the line in the embassy canteen.
"Like your eggs, I see," the COS observed.
"Local, or do you truck it in from Austria?"
"The eggs are local. The farm products here are actually quite good. But we like our English bacon."
"Developed a taste for it myself," Jack reported. "What's happening?" he asked. Andy's eyes had a certain excitement in them.
"It's tonight. First we go to the concert hall, and then we make our pickup."
"Giving him a heads-up?"
Hudson shook his head. "No. He might act differently. I prefer to avoid that complication."
"What if he's not ready? What if he has second thoughts?" Jack worried.
"In that case, it's a blown mission. And we disappear into the mists of Budapest, and come tomorrow morning many faces will be red in London, Washington, and Moscow."
"You're pretty cool about this, buddy."
"In this job, you take things as they come. Getting excited about them doesn't help at all." He managed a smile. "So long as I take the Queen's shilling and eat the Queen's biscuit, I shall do the Queen's work."
"Semper fi, man," Jack observed. He added cream to his coffee and took a sip. Not great, but good enough for the moment.
* * *
SO WAS THE food in the state-run cafeteria next door to the Hotel Astoria. Svetlana had chosen and positively inhaled a cherry Danish pastry, along with a glass of whole milk.
"The concert is tonight," Oleg told his wife. "Excited?"
"You know how long it has been since I've been to a proper concert?" she retorted. "Oleg, I shall never forget this kindness on your part." She was surprised by the look on his face, but made no comment on it.
"Well, my dear, today we have more shopping to do. Ladies' things. You will have to handle that for me."
"Anything for myself?"
"To that end, we have eight hundred and fifty Comecon rubles, just for you to spend," Oleg Ivan'ch told her, with a beaming smile, wondering if anything she bought would be in use by the end of the week.
* * *
"YOUR HUSBAND STILL off on business?" Beaverton asked.
"Unfortunately," Cathy confirmed.
Too bad, the former Para didn't say. He'd become a good student of human behavior over the years, and her unhappiness with the current situation was plain. Well, Sir John was doubtless off doing something interesting. He'd taken the time to do a little research on the Ryans. She, the papers said, was a surgeon, just as she'd told him weeks before. Her husband, on the other hand, despite