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she was no more than a woman going about her business, enjoying the watery sunshine between winter storms. Today she had shed her upscale persona for that of a drab housewife. No one ever noticed her when she took on this guise. Everyone noticed when she was herself. |
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She and Camilla had laughed together over the FBI reports issued when Suslova first appeared among the Russians at Mount Alto. The psychologists at Langley classified her as one of the familiar breed of corrupt Russian apparatchiki who had grown rich, Brezhnev-style, on the prerogatives of her post. A minority of the evaluators believed that she was the mistress of a high-ranking official in the Cherny government, sent off to avoid some scandal. None of them seemed to expect that such a flamboyant character would be dangerousher very visibility obviated that. "The last female spy Americans believed in was Mata Hari," Camilla told Marina. |
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Marina approached black operations with the eagerness of a predator and the caution of the trophy hunter. She had insisted that the Intelligence Directorate supply her with both the luxurious place in Georgetown (to maintain her image) and another, much less visible place in Silver Spring. |
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The Georgetown house might be empty for days at a time, but she visited Silver Spring daily, never in the Porsche, nor wearing her sable coat. Silver Spring required an old Dodge Dynasty for transport, and jeans and a denim jacket for fashion. The house stood on the bank of Sligo Creek, an ordinary sort of place, a little shabby, in a black, working-class neighborhood. The house contained a well-disguised scrambler telephone, a fax machine, and a personal computer. |
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Only Marina's own assets had access to the telephone number at Silver Spring. At the moment, these two assets were Evangeline and Joe Ryerson. |
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She drove down the narrow street and into the garage behind the house, closed the garage door, and let herself in through the kitchen. The house had a musty smell of dust and mouse droppings. A pallid sunlight leaked past the drawn |
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