ements in an absent-minded moment?"

Simonov slapped a palm down on the table. "Confound it, Comrade," he
snapped, "how is the Party to maintain discipline in the country if high
ranking persons such as yourself speak open subversion to strangers."

The other sported his contempt. "Perhaps there's too much discipline in
Russia, Comrade policeman."

"Rather, far from enough," Simonov snapped back.

The waiter, at last, approached and extended a menu to the security
officer. But Ilya Simonov had come to his feet. "Never mind," he clipped
in disgust. "There is an air of degenerate decay about here."

The waiter stared at him. The biologist snorted and returned to his paper.
Simonov turned and stormed out. He could find something to eat and drink
in his own apartment.

* * * * *

The old, old town of Prague, the _Golden City of a Hundred Spires_ was as
always the beautifully stolid medieval metropolis which even a quarter of
a century and more of Party rule could not change. The Old Town, nestled
in a bend of the Vltava River, as no other city in Europe, breathed its
centuries, its air of yesteryear.

Colonel Ilya Simonov, in spite of his profession, was not immune to
beauty. He deliberately failed to notify his new office of his arrival,
flew in on a Ceskoslovenske Aerolinie Tupolev rocket liner and spent his
first night at the Alcron Hotel just off Wenceslas Square. He knew that as
the new manager of the local Moskvich distribution agency he'd have
fairly elaborate quarters, probably in a good section of town, but this
first night he wanted to himself.

He spent it wandering quietly in the old quarter, dropping in to the
age-old beer halls for a half liter of Pilsen Urquell here, a foaming
stein of Smichov Lager there. Czech beer, he was reminded all over again,
is the best in the world. No argument, no debate, the best in the world.

He ate in the endless automated cafeterias that line the Viclavske Namesi
the entertainment center of Prague. Ate an open sandwich here, some
crabmeat salad there, a sausage and another glass of Pilsen somewhere else
again. He was getting the feel of the town and of its people. Of recent
years, some of the tension had gone out of the atmosphere in Moscow and
the other Soviet centers; with the coming of economic prosperity there had
also come a relaxation. The _fear_, so heavy in the Stalin era, had fallen
off in that of Khrushchev and still more so in