"Glad to meet you, comrade," said Stearns in Chinese. "What is your name?"
"Don't you speak Russian?" said Dugan sullenly in Russian.
"Not enough," smiled Stearns, staying within the safe limits of Chinese.
"My name," said Dugan, "is Andreanov. I am an upper-category private in the Soviet Red Army. I have lived in Mukden with the Americans and the Kuomintang all around me. When Mukden got clear, I started home. Now I come here and I see more Americans. You talk in English. I think that you talk about me. You should have a drink instead." Dugan poured himself another strong slug of the vodka. Though he was doing it on an empty stomach, he was sure enough of the Andreanov role for the assumed character to stand up under mild drunkenness.
Stearns said to Byelov in English, "Wait till tomorrow." And he drank with Dugan. The armistice had been called.
Dugan sighed with relief. He had been fearing that he would have to kill them both, a policy which would have let him in for a lot of trouble from the local boys upstairs; and he had been unable to think up any way of dusting off "Stearns" alone without getting Byelov thoroughly hostile. For a moment or two he had considered having a drunken brawl with Stearns, in which the imitation American would get accidentally killed; but Comrade Sarzhant Byelov looked too alert and too judicious for any shallow deception to be worked on him. Dugan let the pressure pass. He jollied them into giving him food. By a combination of stupidity, good humor, and persistence he got them to take him into their quarters. Stearns was reluctant; Byelov did not care.
The next morning, Dugan awoke with an idea. He needed Byelov as a friend. But he had to get Stearns out of the way. Overnight he had figured Stearns out as a smooth cosmopolitan Soviet agent who was waiting for the double mission of winning the confidence of visiting American military groups whenever necessary, and of interrogating downed or wounded American air personnel. The flyers could then be murdered — without their going back to HQ with inexplicable reports of finding an Air Force captain in Communist territory. But Dugan did not worry about the rights and wrongs of the mission. He had been ordered to go to Atomsk, and the authority which ordered him was lawful. That was all that he needed to ask.
For the fulfillment of his plan, he needed an influx of strange Chinese Communist troops — soldiers who would be politically unobjectionable, but who would not know the local personalities. He followed Wu around with admiration and friendliness, somewhat to Wu's annoyance. Wu gave him no news until the afternoon. Another detachment was expected the following week.
By the following week, Dugan and the Sarzhant were calling one another Ossya — short for Josif — and Pyotr. Dugan had taken over many little chores around the message center. The two of them sent weather reports, and transmitted long messages in the Latin alphabet which arrived through Chinese Communist couriers; they were presumably reports or requests coming in from the field, where Russian agents worked with the Chinese Communists. Once or twice Dugan was alone and quiet long enough to break the code, but he found nothing concerning Atomsk or fissionable materials, so he bothered no further; he had no couriers, and could not get the local political information back to Tokyo even if he did figure it out.
Stearns preened himself around town. He talked fair Chinese and gave out horrifying stories of brutality and oppression in America. He let it be known that he was a supporter of the "peace elements" in the United States and that when the American revolution against capitalism broke out, he would be more than glad to go home. For hours on end, the sloppy Red Army man Andreanov would watch the trim American, Stearns; Dugan was reasonably sure that the other spy had not penetrated his own disguise.