Jack's Widow Read Online Free PDF Page B

promised, from now on we would both wear hats, try to appear more serious and more mature to the voters,” he said, lowering his voice in a theatrical way.
    “Why don’t you do what I do, just carry it.”
    “You don’t have a handbag to cart around, as well,” she said, thinking how this election was changing everything.
    Even with an internal band of elastic her headgear would not stay put. The next day, knowing she was going out on the lake, she had tried to skewer it to her hair with several hair grips but it had started to slip. When they came in for lunch she was glad to take it off and leave it on a high wooden shelf in an empty conference room on the ground floor.
    She didn’t see Guy Steavenson arrive, and would not have recognized him anyway in his disguise as a stooped figure with gray hair and heavy tortoiseshell glasses in an ill-fitting suit who spent the afternoon pretending to be delivering important papers and interpreter equipment around the atrium entrance hall. He watched everything and noted that each time the Russians emerged from their conference room, Jackie’s hat on the shelf remained untouched. He continued his vigilance until Jackie remembered to pick it up at the end of the day.
    The next morning there was real animosity between the delegations. Constructive talks seemed impossible.
    Just before lunch when the small bus that had taken the delegates’ wives to a china factory drew up outside the conference center, Jackie was delighted to bump into Guy again.
    She wore a simple scarlet wool suit, matching hat in hand. Thewind blowing off the lake lifted her hair. He thought that motherhood had made her even more beautiful.
    She wondered why he was looking so pale with such dark circles under his eyes but when he suggested that she take him to a small boutique, just around the corner, to buy a layette for his best friend who was a brand-new father, she thought this explained it.
    He was glad that the agency had sent for him on the off chance that he could be helpful. He hoped that his good contacts in Switzerland (his first posting for the CIA had been in Basel), added to the relationships that had been forged during the two earlier Atoms for Peace conferences, would prove useful.
    He had been briefed on the failure of the bugs to gather any intelligence. His first order was to send an undercover expert out to check on the equipment in one of the villas. It had not been tampered with. It was still in place. The only conclusion was that no one had spoken of anything significant in that room.
    He had been up nearly all night talking to the other agency members about where and how they had been stymied. They had come to no conclusions. At four A.M. he had finally gone to bed, only to remember that before he could go to sleep he had to remove the gray from his hair. He was drained.
    Jackie took a good look at him as they stepped across the tramlines.
    She wondered what his life in Prague was like. As he guided her toward an expensive baby boutique she wondered what was going on, realizing that she knew absolutely nothing about him.
    After the preliminaries he had launched straight in.
    “We did good work in Prague. Did your husband tell you? The other three that you described, the ones at the airport, they were really important. We soon nipped their traveling plans in the bud.” He grinned. “With a tip-off here and an anonymous note there we ensured that their bosses questioned their loyalty.”
    She felt a moment’s dismay. Why hadn’t Jack told her?
    “Because of their skills they are working inside Russia or at theSiberian testing stations. I guess less clever scientists are advising the Chinese.
    “See how helpful you were? Now I’d like your assistance again. Would you help us if I promise that I’ll make sure your husband is informed?”
    “Of course”—she grinned—“I’m a loyal American citizen. How can I refuse?” she said.
    “Before we leave I want you to buy