Malone wondered whether or not to disillusion the man, and decided against it. “Well, something like that,” he said vaguely.
“I’ll tell you what: is there a restaurant around here where we could get something to eat?”
“To eat?” Petkoff said, still looking pleased. “You wish to eat?”
“Well,” Malone said, “I’m rather hungry, and I guess the ladies must be, too.”
“What?” Luba said, returning to the group. She had joined Her Majesty in viewing the display of dresses. The Queen came scurrying over, too, through the silent and jostling Russian crowds.
“I was suggesting a restaurant,” Malone said.
“Best idea anybody’s had all day,” Lou said. Her Majesty graciously consented to agree, and Petkoff beamed like the rising sun.
“My friends,” he said. “My very fine friends—although you are capitalistic bourgeois intellectuals, thrown aside by the path of progress—in Moskva we have the finest restaurants in all the world.”
“How about ... oh, Leningrad?” Malone said in a low voice.
“In Leningrad,” Petkoff admitted, “the restaurants are better. But in Moskva, the restaurants are very good indeed. Much better than one might expect, if one knows Leningrad.”