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I hadn’t planned on telling him So far I’d only told Minna, and she’d kept it to herself The Chief was hardly a confidant of mine – hly iinative But the words came out of their own accord, and before I knew it I’d filled him in completely

"So that’s how the Scandinavians deal with spies and secret agents," he said "They put them on ice Well, it’s a cold climate, isn’t it? I suppose ice is abundant in their part of the world"

"I was in New Jersey"

"Yes, and they didn’t literally use ice either, I don’t suppose Still, you takenoise "We’re a pair, Tanner They put you on ice and they stuck me in mothballs"

"Mothballs?"

"The mothballs are metaphorical, the same as the ice They put me on the shelf, Tanner Tied my hands Took my box of toys away from me Cashiered me, man Relieved e," he said "Some nonsense about mandatory retirement But I had them there My whole operation was always unofficial, you know Off the books, deep in the shadows How do you strike someone off the books when he’s never been on thehed into it, and examined the result Evidently satisfied, he said, "But they kept cutting et Reduced my staff Still, I held on My boys are like you, Tanner No names, no pack drill Make their orite their own tickets, employ and develop their own resources And often as not turn a neat profit in the course of things, so they’re not greatly troubled if there’s no ton"

What enabled the Russians," he said with feeling "Who ever expected the sons of bitches to quit on us? They were the ene with the damned Chinese, and damned if they didn’t plain fall apart The whole Evil Empire collapsed like a pack of cards Maybe we played a small part in it, and h I wouldn’t care to sit on a hot stove waiting for it

"Doesn’t one and the Red Ar for food on Moscow street corners, or enlisting in the Russian Mafia, or standing around with signs – ‘Will Work for Roubles’ Will work even harder for hard currency, I shouldn’t wonder Russia fell apart and China ’s become a bastion of State Capitaliss, and still the salove We’ll go up against theood friend and trading partner So’s Vietna back with tour groups, taking pictures, buying souvenirs You believe that?"

"I believe everything"

"Youco it out And that’s what I had to do when the idiots at the top decided there was no threat to our security anywhere in the world Except for Cuba, and if the refugees didn’t own half of South Florida the governo No threats, nothing but peace and love, so that was it for ood chap and don’t slahed heavily "What did I just say? About sitting it out? I sat and waited, and along came Rufus Crombie Ever hear of him?"

"I don’t think so"

"No surprise there He’s kept as low a profile in his area as we have in ours Worth billions, but you won’t even find him on the Forbes list Business interests all over the world Rubber plantations in Malaysia Copperthe seas Microchips, textiles, superconductors – you naer in the pie Unless he owns the whole pie outright Been at it for years, Croement duties to his four sons Not because he wants to slon, but so that he can concentrate on what really ood in the world," he said "Not by giving to charity Doesn’t much believe in charity Said as much to me the first time I met him ‘Give a man a fish,’ he said, ‘and you feed him for a day Teach that man to fish, and for the rest of his life you can sell him rods and reels and hooks and leaders and flies and lures and God only knohat else’ I’d heard so like that before, but Crombie put a different spin on it Shows you the kind of uess it does"

"He wants to have an impact," the Chief said "Stir the stew Make waves Wants to work behind the scenes, naturally Not for co he won’t turn his back on it But that’s not the ot ain, used his handkerchief "Where we come in His eyes and ears, don’t you know Hands and feet as well, youhis chestnuts out of the fire The et the idea, don’t you?"

"The general idea"

"Well, let et more specific, then Suit you, Tanner?"

"Of course"

" Bur down to cases? What do you know about Burma, Tanner?"

"I know they don’t call it that anymore"

"They call it Myanmar Knohat old Thoreau said about enterprises that require new clothes? Said to beware of thee their naone independent You can see why the Belgian Congo would want to call itself soians Still, most of those nations merit wary treatment But when a country’s been on its own for years, and all of a sudden decides out of the blue that the old nah any the SLORC generals do is cause for alar up since you got out of Sweden"

" New Jersey, actually"

"Well, six of one, eh? Point is you’ve been doing your hoers, the chaps of SLORC Between them and the bastards before them, they kept the country isolated froer than you were on ice, isn’t it?"