Hank said, "What are you doing here?"
Loo came erect. "It occurs to me that I'm evidently doing the same thing you are."
But the dull metal gun in his hand was negligently at the ready and his eyes were cold, cold. It came to Hank that banjos on the levee were very far away.
This lithe fighting man said tightly, "You know where we are? Exactly where we are? I'm not sure."
Hank said, "In the hall outside the Sobstvennaya Plovina of the Bolshoi Kremlevski Dvorets. The czar's private apartments. And how did you get here?"
"The hard way," Loo said softly. His eyes darted up and down the corridor. "I can't figure out why there aren't more guards. I don't like this. You're armed?"
"No," Hank said.
Loo grinned down at his own weapon. "One of us is probably making a mistake but we both seem to have gotten this far. By the way, I'm Inter-Commonwealth Security. You're C.I.A., aren't you? Talk fast, Hank, we're either a team from now on, or I've got to do something about you."
"Special mission for the President," Hank said. "Why didn't we spot each other sooner?"
Loo grinned again in deprecation. "Evidently because we're both good operatives. If I've got this right, the extraterrestrials are somewhere in here."