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East Berlin.”
    “Russell,” Glass said, “you badly need a drink.”
    It was so dark they could see light from the Neva lobby slanting across the pavement from the far end of the street. When they got out of the car, they saw there was in fact another light, the blue neon sign of a cooperative restaurant opposite the hotel, the H.O. Gastronom. The condensation on the windows was its only outward sign of life.
    At the Neva reception a man in a brown uniform silently directed them toward an elevator just big enough for three. It was a slow descent, and their faces were too close together under a single dim bulb for conversation.
    There were thirty or forty people in the bar, silent over their drinks. On a dais in one corner a clarinetist and an accordion player were sorting through sheets of music. The bar was hung with studded, tasseled quilting of well-fingered pink which was also built into the counter. There were grand chandeliers, all unlit, and chipped gilt-framed mirrors. Leonard was heading for the bar thinking to buy the first round, but Glass guided him toward a table on the edge of a tiny parquet dance floor.
    His whisper sounded loud. “Don’t let them see your money in here. East marks only.”
    At last a waiter came and Glass ordered a bottle of Russian champagne. As they raised their glasses, the musicians began to play “Red Sails in the Sunset.” No one was tempted onto the parquet. Russell was scanning the darker corners, and then he was on his feet and making his way between the tables. He returned with a thin woman in a white dress made for someone larger. They watched him move her through an efficient foxtrot.
    Glass was shaking his head. “He mistook her in the bad light. She won’t do,” he predicted, and correctly, for at the end Russell made a courtly bow and, offering the woman his arm, saw her back to her table.
    When he joined them he shrugged. “It’s the diet here,” andrelapsing for a moment into his wireless propaganda voice, he gave them details of average calorie consumption in East and West Berlin. Then he broke off, saying “What the hell,” and ordered another bottle.
    The champagne was as sweet as lemonade and too gassy. It hardly seemed a serious drink at all. Glass and Russell were talking about the German question. How long would the refugees flock through Berlin to the West before the Democratic Republic suffered total economic collapse because of a shortage of manpower?
    Russell was ready with the figures, the hundreds of thousands each year. “And these are their best people; three quarters of them are under forty-five. I’ll give it another three years. After that the East German state won’t be able to function.”
    Glass said, “There’ll be a state as long as there’s a government, and there’ll be a government as long as the Soviets want it. It’ll be pretty damn miserable here, but the Party will get by. You’ll see.”
    Leonard nodded and hmmed his agreement, but he did not attempt an opinion. When he raised his hand, he was rather surprised that the waiter came over for him just as he had for the others. He ordered another bottle. He had never felt happier. They were deep in the Communist camp, they were drinking Communist champagne, they were men with responsibilities talking over affairs of state. The conversation had moved on to West Germany, the Federal Republic, which was about to be accepted as a full member of NATO.
    Russell thought it was all a mistake. “That’s one crappy phoenix rising out of the ashes.”
    Glass said, “You want a free Germany, then you got to have a strong one.”
    “The French aren’t going to buy it,” Russell said, and turned to Leonard for support. At that moment the champagne arrived.
    “I’ll take care of it,” Glass said, and when the waiter had gone he said to Leonard, “You owe me seven West marks.”
    Leonard filled the glasses and the thin woman and her girlfriend walked past their table, and the