AMERICA'S RACIAL DIVIDE

I must be becoming an American. The racial landscape of this horribly divided culture was now making me shake. Back home, I'd not personalized it. Here, being beaten up by Negros does something to you.

In my head, I was 'with' the Negros in their class struggle. But here, it was personal. I would never, not at all I realized, 'be at one' with the Negros' struggle - I was so visibly…. ah, er, white. It seemed almost as simple as that.

It was bad enough that I'd had a rough reception in Philadelphia, what with the beat-down at Gregory Thomas and his buddy's hands. Up until being assigned here to live, I'd never thought of being 'White'. Back home, being 'White' had another connotation all together. Being called 'White' in Moscow would mean that you were counter-reolutionary, an anti-Bolshevik, an anti-communist, an anti-Red. The White movement back home, it existed until the beginnings of The Great…. ah, er, World War Two. The White Army back home was constantly fighting an insurgency against our red Army.

I think I need to stop calling it, 'back home'.

Here, Washington D.C.? Me, I'm on a bus going to work at DuPont Circle… I am one of three white people on it. Again, given my reception with Gregory Thomas's people in Philadelphia, on this bus I was on edge. It wasn't just that I'd have to explain at work where I'd got the bruises. I'd never before used that Americanism, 'mugged', but that's what I would tell them at work. Every one of whom was white. Mugged in D.C., obviously they were not to know about Philadelphia.

As they said, training really doesn't prepare one. General Zhukov, he had never lived this. He seemed to have had a good 'global' understanding of it all….. but being beaten by a gang from the 'hood, as they call it, that is something one cannot really train for.

As such, I have learned one thing. Now that the 'numbers stations' and my own Latin-alphabet Morse Code is presentable, I am starting to get direction from The Centre.

First and foremost, I cannot be available for all the assignments - if working on an hourly basis at DuPont Circle Travel. There's only so many times I can 'call in sick' when operations don't go as planned. There are only so many times I can do an operation all night, then show up sleepless for my shift at my desk.

My boss? He says not to worry. I am the top agent in his office, my sales are head-and-shoulders (an Americanism I'd not heard before) above everyone else.

Apparently I'm quite the capitalist. I admit it, there's a lot to like about America.

Tomorrow, my day off. I'll go shopping for a car. The Centre signaled its approval by arranging for an extra $1000 in the safety deposit box. (I wondered if that counted as using the box for 'operations'? If so, I should probably get on the next airplane out of the country.)

REUNION

It being the next day I picked up the car, I departed the bus 1/2-block from my apartment, but instead of going in, I went to the restaurant across the street, sitting in a window seat so as to be able to observe the comings and goings, as training dictated.

Besides, I needed the caffeine. There'd been two all night operations the last two nights, and I'd gone into work both mornings on no sleep. It must have showed. At noon earlier today, I'd been called into the back office where the boss worked - I'd bungled a holiday package for one of our family accounts, for a Disneyland vacation in California. I'd got them into the wrong motel on Harbor Blvd, outside of the main Disneyland entrance. My first real mistake.

All the boss had said was, "don't do it again," because as mentioned, I still was producing more for the agency than anyone else. I'd been called the 'champion of upselling', whatever that was.

Not wanting to eat alone, I ordered food at the restaurant, decided to order decaf-coffee because tonight I was determined to sleep. If something came up on one of the numbers stations, I would report later that I needed some better support - not just orders. No one at The Centre seemed to be tracking the actual toll this job took.

The apartment building as well as the street outside - both were clean. No sign, none whatsoever of catching surveillance, none at all. I finished up, paid the bill, grabbed a newspaper, then went across to my residence.

Gaining entry into the building and checking for mail, old Mrs. Jenkins was there, she gave me a big smile.

"Mr. Jennings," she beamed, "you said your wife was with her Aunt Helen out in Pennsylvania." She turned towards her apartment, then said coyly, "I guess I shouldn't spoil the surprise, but she's at your place - I'll tell you, she's quite the dish. You never mentioned anything about that!"

Tradecraft 101, be ready at a moment's notice for any eventuality. Yet my weapon was in the basement locker, and the key to that locker was in my apartment. Should I pick the lock? Lesson learned, albeit hopefully not too late - weapon had to be handier.

The building, it was clean - yet Mrs. Jenkins…

So it was I made one of the 100s of the tiny operational decisions illegals needed to make each day - each small, until they weren't. In my case, each day for the five years I would be here. I thought, 'if I survive that long,' as I decided to face whoever it was in that apartment, someone obviously unbeknownst to me - someone who Mrs. 'flippin' Jenkins had ratted me out to!

I don't think I ever came down that hallway so quietly. Taking a defensive posture outside the door, I reached over, put the key in the lock, turned the handle and pushed it open. I said in a strong, confident voice, "Honey, I'm home!"

ELIZABETH JENNINGS

She had already made up the little livingroom couch as a bed, and had laid out some things around her - carving out a space all her own.

Her first words, "Philip, we need to talk. General Zhukov, he's not pleased."

I had a bit of an advantage on her, though. I'd learned some typical American snark, the way that some 'couples' relate to one another here, after some years of marriage.

I said, "and I love you too, dear. How's your Aunt Helen?"

At that she swung her feet from the couch to the floor, adopting a 'ready' pose. She circled a finger above her, wordlessly asking if the room was secure for conversation.

I said, "Elizabeth, honey, welcome home. I'm just asking about Aunt Helen, not because I know she's fictitious…. but…." I struggled to be serious for a second, "how are you? How was the trip?" When she sat silently, I added, "there was nothing, no coded message, nothing saying that you'd be here. How on earth did you find the place? The last thing I was told was that I would be in charge of your 'settlement' here. So much for me being important!"

She finally relaxed enough, to say, "I found the bank-box, Philip. I'm not stupid. I saw that you'd been in it."

She then cooled her jets a bit. She said, "Leanne and Emmett, they have their communication with The Centre down to a science. But it's clear that a lone agent in the field cannot do it all." She paused, then added, "that means you, Philip. Before my insertion, I read everything to you, everything from you. It's clear that there's a bottleneck somewhere. It's amazing, you're still alive - or not in prison."

I'd finally taken off my jacket, and sat at the little kitchen table, then said, "well, I'd like to think it is a matter of my sheer talent as an illegal!"

She went stonily silent. Then she said to no one in particular, not to me anyway - and I was the only other person in this, our 'marriage home', "did you really get a job? Did you really get beaten up in Philadelphia? Is Gregory Thomas not being run right now? You know that 1/2 of NASA is within an hour of here, and you've not infiltrated any of it?"

I had my very first flash of anger. "Elizabeth, could you at least hang out here for a month or two before all the devastating assessments!?" When she did not reply, I backed up a bit, "I will give you something, though - Emmett and Leanne be damned. This system of receiving orders and filing reports - it is horribly inefficient. I did not even know that you'd be…."

".… they told you, Philip, they told you. I read the transcripts of the coded messages!"

My anger flashed so that she'd not miss it, "I'm telling you, Elizabeth, I'd not known. Or else I would have moved heaven and earth to be in northern Vermont to get you."

"Northern Vermont!? You really are out of it, Philip…."

To which I interrupted, "….. that's the point, Elizabeth, that's the point. Give it a couple of months before you judge, this is worse than working without a net. They never trained for this level of working blind…. missed transmissions, etc. etc., etc."

She then calmed, pulling her legs back up on to the couch and pulling her cover over her. "We'll talk in the morning, Philip. Believe it or not, I'm exhausted. I'm needing sleep, and there you are, still talking."

What did the woman want? I told her I was going out, and I'd be back in about 45 minutes. I needed to send a coded Morse Code to back home. That she had arrived, safe and sound….. a strange Americanism, because she had produced nothing but sound since I walked in on her.

Down in the lobby, there was Mrs. Jenkins with her garbage to put out into the bin. She said, "I hope everything is all right, Mr. Jennings. You young couples, you need your private time…. I'll be praying for you."

I guess that was what we needed. Prayer. That and a better method of communicating to and from The Centre. Our Morse Code messages back home, they were limited to 200 characters, or about 40 words. I now had the expertise to send the dits and dahs according to Latin-characters, but that was the least of the problems to be overcome.

I just didn't know how to explain ( in 40 words)….. this.

REMEMBERING THE BEAT-DOWN

This time, it was just the three of us. Me and Elizabeth, sitting with Gregory Thomas in Philadelphia. Elizabeth's presence guaranteed that it would go more smoothly than last time. The two of them, they hit it off far better than I had!

Last time, I'd gotten an epic beat-down from Gregory and his 'homies'. No beat-down, now, not yet.

Elizabeth opened with what I'd thought was a violation of protocol. She'd got immediately all ideological with the man.

She said, "I bring revolutionary greetings to you and your movement, Mr. Thomas. We, me and my friend here," meaning me, "we're due back in D.C. by the morning, he has a job he reports to." She paused then added, "my people, we want to be of assistance to you in your struggle. I understand that the killing of Malcolm Little, el-Hajj el-Shabazz, has politicized large portions of your people."

Gregory corrected, "we call him Malcolm X… he was an important corrective to the impotent nonviolent movement of others, but he was also distancing himself from the Nation of Islam."

Elizabeth corrected herself, "Malcom X. Apologies." She repeated, "but my people, we wish to support you in all this. I'll be up front, we have our own interests, and I want to be as transparent as possible with that."

Thomas scoffed, "yes, transparent 'as possible'. I don't know what that means, lady."

She pressed on, "we can be helpful when our interests align. So far, they do, for as much as I can see. Your people, Mr. Thomas, they are the perennial victims of capitalism."

Thomas sighed, "you know what? First, call me Gregory. Let me then tell you, look around, take a walk on these streets….. you don't know the half of it….. "

Elizabeth broke in, "….that's what we'd love to do…" As she was speaking he offered her a smoke, which she accepted.

Lighting it for her, he then replied, "if you do, then you'll realize that we don't want anything from you!" He added even more emphatically about himself, "I don't want anything from you. Not money, not guidance, not moral support….." He then looked at me, I turned red with embarrassment when he said, "we gave your man here an epic beatdown because he thought otherwise, that he was here to save us….."

That had not been what I'd been there for, but it was telling that he put it that way.

Elizabeth then took another drag from the cigarette, then said, "look, 'my man' here, he's the one who has to get back to D.C. for work. Why don't I remain - for a week or so. I'd like to learn from you, what your movement is all all about. Praxis, context, we cannot offer anything to do with that, that is for you and your people. But let me stay."

As it was, Elizabeth kept the car in Philadelphia. I bused it back to D.C., got into Union Station after midnight. I was into DuPont Circle travel by 8 am just a few hours later.

But not until I'd sent a coded message to The Centre, that Elizabeth had made an inroad with Negro radicals in Philadelphia. One of General Zhukov's directives, it was panning out. It took Elizabeth to do it.

Me, I thought it was a mistake, staying there by herself. I did not put that in my report.

All I knew was that after having had Elizabeth around recently, the apartment seemed emptier for her absence.

For the first time in America, I had an extended dream about Irina - then the alarm clock went off. Way too soon for my exhaustion. Then it was to DuPont Circle for my shift.