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it?”
    “Need-to-know.”
    “
I
need to know if I’m going to be digging into what led up to her death.”
    He shook his head. “Not now, Collette. The assignment is clear-cut, no ambiguities. You go home on leave and touch base with everybody in her life. You’re grieving, can’t believe your good friend is dead. You find out what you can and report it to a case officer at Langley.”
    “How cynical. I really do care what happened to my friend.”
    “I’m sure you do. Look, you don’t have to do this. It’s not in your area, but I’d suggest you think six times before turning it down. Like I said, the stakes are big here.”
    “Banana Quick?”
    He nodded.
    “Am I really taking leave?”
    “It’ll be on the books that way in case somebody wants to snoop. We’ll make it up to you later. That’s a promise from me.”
    “When do you want me to start?”
    “Leave in the morning.”
    “I can’t. You know I have a meet set up with Horgász.”
    “That’s right. When?”
    “Tomorrow night.”
    Podgorsky thought for a moment before saying, “It’s important?”
    “I haven’t seen him for six weeks. He left word at one of the drops that he had something. It’s been set, can’t be changed.”
    “Then do it, leave the next morning.”
    “All right. Anything else?”
    “Yeah. Go easy. Frankly, I tried to veto having you assigned to this. Too close. Good friends usually get in theway. Try to forget who she was and concentrate on business. A briefcase. That’s all anybody cares about.”
    She stood and said, “I really do hate this place, Stan.”
    “Gay ol’ Budapest?” He laughed loudly.
    “You know what I mean.”
    “Sure I do. Everything set for Horgász?”
    “I think so. We’re using the new safehouse.”
    “I still don’t like that place. I should have stuck to my guns and killed it when it was suggested. Too close to too many other things.”
    “I’m comfortable with it.”
    “That’s good. You’re a trouper, Collette.”
    “I’m an employee. You said I’ll be on leave, which means no official status. That makes it tough.”
    “No it doesn’t. The only thing having status would give you is access to our people. You don’t need them. They don’t have any answers. They’re
looking
for answers.”
    “I want to retrace Barrie’s steps. I’ll go to London first.”
    He shrugged.
    “I want to talk to the doctors who did the autopsy.”
    “Nothing to be gained there, Collette. They used cleared personnel.”
    “British SIS?”
    “Probably.”
    “How was she killed, Stan?”
    “Beats me. Maybe prussic acid if it was the Soviets.”
    “We use it, too, don’t we?”
    He ignored the question by going through a slow, elaborate ritual of clipping, wetting, and lighting a cigar. “Forget the British doctors, Collette,” he said through a cloud of blue smoke.
    “I still want to go to London first.”
    “Nice this time of year. Not many tourists.”
    She opened the door, turned, and asked, “How’s the typewriter repair business?”
    “Slow. They make ’em too good these days. Take care, and keep in touch.”
    She spent the remainder of the day, much of the night, and all of the next day preparing for her meet with a man, code name Horgász, Hungarian for “Fisherman.” He representedCollette Cahill’s coup since being in Budapest. Horgász, whose real name was Árpád Hegedüs, was a high-ranking psychologist within the KGB’s Hungarian intelligence arm.
    Cahill had met Árpád Hegedüs the first week she was in Budapest at a reception for a group of psychologists and psychiatrists who’d been invited to present papers to a Hungarian scientific conference. Three Americans were among the invited, including Dr. Jason Tolker. Cahill’s dislike for Tolker was instantaneous, although she hadn’t thought much about it until Barrie Mayer confided in her that he was the one who’d recruited her into the part-time role of CIA courier. “I didn’t like him,” Cahill