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please: name, profession, and position?”
    The man spoke first, and the women quickly answered after him. As Levanter had suspected, they were minor functionaries, employees of the Moscow Ministry of Trade. The man offered his passport with a trembling hand, a gesture of utter servility and guilt. Levanter studied the document long enough to give the impression that he was memorizing the man’s name, then turned away without speaking, as if he were disgusted by the sorry affair and eager to end it.
    The cable car arrived at the midstation, from which point skiers either continued up on the PicSoleil gondola or skied down. The door opened. In the confusion of skiers pouring out, the Soviet trio scurried away.
    As he went through the passageway to the gondola, Levanter saw the Russians sitting at one of the most secluded tables on the terrace. They nervously shuffled their passports and other papers, no doubt preparing themselves for the investigation that would await them at home.
    For a moment he felt sorry for them and considered going over to apologize and tell them the truth, to shake hands with them and laugh at the masquerade in which they had all taken part. But he knew they would not laugh: he would only be frightening them more. They would then be convinced that a man who spoke perfect Russian and knew Soviet jargon must be an émigré spy for the CIA, donning still another disguise to find out more about them.
    Then he felt ashamed and somehow unnerved by his deception. To his surprise, the short encounter with the Soviets had resurrected a part of himself he had believed to be buried, the enjoyment of having certifiable power. When he had terrified those three Russian mice, he had actually felt himself being transformed into a Soviet lieutenant colonel; no real-life Soviet lieutenant colonel could have carried it off better.
    He promised himself to remember to tell the whole incident to Romarkin, his friend in Paris whose name he had borrowed. He could already imagine Romarkin laughing uproariously, repeating over and over, “And all I said was ‘Ya-ma-ha’!”
    Only when he skied was Levanter able to recognize the subtle changes brought about by age. While his mind retained its ability to consider circumstances and issue commands, his body, which had once reacted automatically, was now frequently unable to respondas expected. Refusing to acknowledge this breakdown, his mind kept supplying the images of past performances but, no matter how hard he tried, Levanter could no longer repeat them. He was becoming conscious of a division between what he knew he had done once and what he could actually do now.
    For a boy who had not learned to ski until he was twelve and could practice only during school vacations, Levanter had shown considerable aptitude for the sport. By the time he was in high school, he had entered a few local ski competitions and collected some equipment as prizes. He loved being on the slopes and saved up his money to take lessons to become a certified ski instructor. This certification proved to be an asset.
    To demonstrate to the world that pleasures once reserved for the privileged were now enjoyed by the masses, the Party had instituted a program of ordering peasants to the mountains for winter vacations about the time Levanter was a university student. Most peasants rarely left the agricultural flatlands, and few had ever seen mountains before. The twenty-four-hour railroad ride to the high-altitude ski resort often left many of them lightheaded, and a few older ones would faint or vomit as they stepped from the stuffy, overheated train into the thin, cold air. Overwhelmed by the towering mountain peaks that loomed like prison walls, the disoriented peasants would become querulous about everything from dizziness to dangers underfoot. They consistently refused to walk alone, even on the sloping village streets, for fear that they would lose their footing and plummet down