Declare

not do that yet, and the realization that he had seen the supernatural tonight kept him chilly and shaking even in the warm, sauerkraut-scented air of the candlelit restaurant.
    The old waiter brought over a tray with four glasses on it, and Hale and Elena each took a glass and gulped it at the same instant, without looking at each other. Then for a minute or so Hale just stared down at his plate and chewed his ham and eggs and black bread, and carefully sipped his second glass of brandy.
    Figures in dripping macintoshes entered by ones and twos through the street door, and soon Hale could hear the phrases “Brandenburger Tor” —as well as “boot” and “Teufel,” boat and devil—in the louder conversations from the other tables.
    But no one was sitting close to them, and he needed to at least refer to the events of the evening, so he leaned forward—Elena looked up at him warily, and after a moment’s hesitation he said in French, “We wound up wrecking the monster’s boat.”
    She didn’t stop frowning, but a nervous smile kinked her swelling mouth, and in spite of her white hair she looked very young. “That’s right,” she said in a low voice. “It wasn’t still on the truck, at the end.”
    Hale took a deep breath. “The thing in the sky—” he began.
    “Don’t speak of it!” She shook her head and then took a noisy sip of brandy, wincing at the alcohol on her cut lip. “We will speak of worldly things only. Claude—Cassagnac—he would not have told you about the Shihab meteor-bullet, if he had thought we might survive.”
    Hale sighed. “Well, the meteor-bullet didn’t work, in any case.” “No,” she said bleakly, “it did—not—work.” She looked straight into his eyes then, and suddenly he felt the warmth of the brandy. Her voice when she spoke again, though, was brisk. “And on the same assumption he told you that we are working for the French DGSS. I would venture to declare,” she went on, using the French infinitive declarer , “that you are working for the British secret service now… ?”
    Hale opened his mouth, hesitated, and then said, “Yes.” The abrupt question, coming from her, had caught him off-guard. We will speak of worldly things only. He knew that Theodora would have expected him to live his cover—deny any SIS connection and talk about his work in fertilizer manufacture—but this was Elena! And France was an ally. Nevertheless he could feel himself blushing at having so instantly broken his cover, and he bolted the rest of his second glass of brandy and glanced around for the waiter.
    “Duplication,” she said, “parallel sections, secrets within secrets. That arrogant man, Kim—we know he is an SIS section head, but he didn’t know you had been sent here. It is informative to know that the SIS was aware of the action tonight, and had two men independently observing. They have not held it against you, the work you did for the GRU in Paris?”
    Again Hale opened his mouth without speaking, and he felt his face getting hotter. “—No,” he said. The waiter had walked up to the table, and Hale hastily ordered four more brandies. The old man nodded and walked away without picking up the four emptied glasses.
    Elena’s frown had deepened. “Ah, you were working for the British secret service even then. You were—a double.”
    Hale was stung by the tone of accusation. “You work for the French now,” he protested. “Against the… the Party.” Which you once described to me as your husband, he thought sourly. He wanted to ask her what had happened when she obeyed the summons to Moscow in January of 1942, but while he was trying to phrase the question, she spoke again.
    “I work for them honestly,” she said, “as I worked then for the Party—honestly.”
    Hale remembered her leaving the Philippe St.-Simon passport in a dubok for him, but that had been too gallant an act, and too beneficial to himself, for him to raise it now as an objection. “You would not now do undercover work for the DGSS?” he asked instead.
    “I would. My loyalties have changed.”
    “Mine have not.”
    She leaned forward and gripped his hand in her cold fist. “But it was— you and me , do you understand? I was sincere.”
    The four fresh brandies arrived then, and with his free hand Hale dug out two packs of cigarettes to pay for them. When the waiter had again retreated, Hale said, “I was sincere too, where it was you and me. Hell, I was sincere in