The Charm School

in a ten-minute flight if the wind was as strong as thirty to forty knots. He had a sudden desire to meet Mills’ flight advisers. He said to Mills, “What air force was that?”
    “Excuse me?”
    “The guys with whom you consulted.”
    “Oh… what’s the problem? Besides fuel, I mean?”
    “Navigation. Two moving objects. He has to contend with the seas; we have to contend with the air.”
    O’Shea observed, “Sort of like threading a moving needle.”
    “In the dark,” Hollis added.
    Mills didn’t reply.
    Brennan said, “I guess we only have one shot at this rendezvous.”
    O’Shea said, “If that many.”
    A voice said in Russian, “Fuck you… I’ll kill you all.”
    Hollis inquired, “Is that a prerecorded announcement?”
    Brennan chuckled. “I think that’s our passenger in coach. What did he say?”
    “He said he needs another shot of sodium pentothal,” Hollis replied. “Bert, shut him up.”
    Mills made his way to the rear and looked at Burov. He called out to Hollis, “He’s in bad shape already, General. I don’t want to kill him.”
    Burov said indistinctly through swollen lips, “I’ll have you all back in the cells.”
    The recorded warning came on again, and Burov said, “You see? Land this helicopter immediately.”
    Hollis called back in Russian, “Shut your mouth, Burov, or I’ll throw you out.”
    Burov fell silent.
    Mills looked Dodson over and announced, “Our other passenger seems okay.”
    O’Shea said, “Time, seven-nineteen, two minutes elapsed.”
    Mills looked out the rear window toward the southeast. “The sun is coming up.” He added, “They won’t take us aboard if it’s light.”
    Lisa asked, “What choice do they have?”
    Mills replied, “Well, they have the choice of shutting off their landing lights. Then we wouldn’t know what ship it is down there. All I know is that it’s a freighter. I don’t know anything else about the ship, not even its nationality. We’re not supposed to know anything for security reasons, and I guess also so that we can’t make a landing in the daylight and endanger the ship. All we know is to look for three yellow lights on a freighter.”
    Hollis said, “Maybe your friends in Washington picked a Soviet ship for us.”
    Mills smiled weakly. “That’s not funny.”
    Burov spoke in English through his broken teeth. “Listen to me. Listen. Land this helicopter and let me out. You can make good your escape. I will guarantee you that no harm will come to the men and women at the school. You have my word on that.”
    There was a silence in the cabin, then Hollis said to O’Shea, “Take the controls.” He made his way to the rear of the cabin and stood over Burov, whose wrists were bound to the chair with steel flex. Hollis stared at Burov, and Burov stared back. Finally Hollis said, “Would you like something for the pain?”
    Burov didn’t respond for a second, then shook his head.
    “Are you thirsty?”
    “Yes. Very.”
    Hollis turned around. “Anything left to drink?”
    “Just this,” Mills said, handing him a flask. “Cognac. Real stuff.”
    Hollis took the flask and held it to Burov’s blood-encrusted lips. Burov’s eyes stayed on Hollis, then his mouth opened, and Hollis poured half the flask between Burov’s lips. Burov coughed up dried blood, but got most of the cognac down. Hollis saw tears forming in the man’s eyes and assumed it was because of the burning alcohol on his split lips and gums. Hollis said, “We have no water.”
    Burov didn’t reply.
    Hollis put the cap back on the flask and said to Burov, “It’s over, you know.”
    Burov said nothing.
    “Within a few minutes you will be either a prisoner on a ship or will be dead in the water. There’s no other fate for you.”
    Burov nodded.
    “Do you pray?”
    “No. Never.”
    “But your mother taught you how.”
    Burov didn’t reply.
    “You might consider it.”
    Burov seemed to slump further into his seat, and his head dropped. “I congratulate you. All of you. Please leave me alone.”
    Hollis looked at Dodson’s battered face, then looked back at Burov. Hollis said to Burov, “You’ve got a lot to answer for. I’m going to see to it that you answer directly to Major Dodson on behalf of the other airmen.” Hollis moved to the port side windows and looked out to the southeast. He saw a small red rim poking above the flat horizon, casting a pink twilight over the city of Leningrad. But out here, in the gulf, the