Feeling ill-equipped to cope with all of it, Talbot drew the curtains. It was barely six in the evening but given the toll of the past few weeks—his arrest, his exile from work, the shock of learning who his wife really was—he found himself unable to remain upright. He retrieved a blanket from the hall closet, removed his clothes, and returned to the couch to sleep.

  . . .

  The next morning, Talbot found Eleanor in the kitchen, sitting exactly where she’d been when he last saw her, a box of tissues on the table.

  “You stay there all night?” he asked.

  She gave a sad little grin. “No. I slept in our room. Got up a couple hours ago. There’s coffee.”

  He poured himself a cup and sat across from her, seeing her, in a way, for the first time. The hair—still light, light blond. The crystal blue eyes, red and swollen. The slim, straight nose and high cheekbones. Russian, he thought. Of course she is. He sipped his coffee and shook his head. When finally he spoke, his voice was quiet, drenched in grief.

  “Well, this is embarrassing. I’m a goddam intelligence officer. A pretty bad one, I’ve come to realize. They drill it into you—and I guess at this point, hell, I can tell you this—don’t be fooled by the distraction, preoccupied by a small move that makes you miss the big one. So while I’ve been preoccupied with you, your sadness, this gulf in our marriage, I missed the big move: you were just creating space to operate. It wasn’t about you and me at all.”

  “Talbot,” she began, “the gulf, as you call it, was also to protect you. Partly to limit what I could pass along about your work. But also, so you could develop a life apart from me—find other people you could lean on.”

  “So you were being generous, Eleanor, or Marisha or whoever you are, wanting me to have a healthy social circle so I wouldn’t catch on to how you were ripping my life and career away. You’re quite the actress, Marisha. Had me fooled completely. I actually believed you loved me—that we could get back to who we’d been together. Couldn’t see all the other shit—all the things you hid from me—because I loved you. Love is, indeed, blind.”

  “I did love you. I do love you,” she began before he cut in.

  “Don’t even start. Enough with the manipulation—there’s no point. It won’t improve your case with the Feds—this last-minute change of heart, changing sides now that you got caught.”

  “I didn’t get caught, Tal. I gave myself up because I couldn’t do it anymore. I called George and he called Chamberlain. I told you: I wanted out ten years ago—once I grew up, once I realized what was at stake. But I was afraid. Afraid for myself and for you. Once Gilberto came here…”

  “Your boyfriend. Yes. Tell me more about him.”

  “He’s not my boyfriend. Not now. He was my sculpture professor in Florence—my advisor. It was pre-arranged, something my mother had a hand in. I got to the university and he took an interest in me. He was extremely well-thought of, admired for his talent—and I was flattered. Thrilled, actually. We spent hours alone in the studio and over time, he drew me in. Made my decisions for me. And once we began the affair, I was incapable…I couldn’t break away.”

  “And at what point did you trade your training in art for training in espionage?”

  “When the war began.”

  Talbot narrowed his eyes. “So 1939…until we met in’45? A six-year apprenticeship in becoming American. So when I met you…”

  “I had just emerged in Florence with my new name, the background we had invented.”

  Talbot stared off in the distance. “Hal—remember him? The banker? Way better intelligence officer than I am. He knew there was something off about you.” Talbot continued despite the tears gathering in her eyes. “When we met him and Molly in London, he made a comment to me that your English was ‘rusty.’ I just didn’t want to see it. I’d been in Europe so long, everybody’s accent sounded funny to me.”

  Eleanor nodded, head bowed. “My first test, that week in London. I was terrified.”

  He rose and put some bread in the toaster.

  “And all those stories you told. So elaborate—about life at Smith and the artists you met there, the receptions and parties. Hell. Where did that spring from?”

  “It was a version of how things go at many universities when visiting artists come for a term. I just imagined myself in the middle of it.”

  “What an idiot I was, thinking you’d stumbled into Europe because your mother didn’t read the papers—that you needed me because you’d lost your entire family.”

  “I did come to need you,” she said. “But I believed I had to follow the path Gilberto laid out.”

  Talbot rolled his eyes. “But at some point, early on, you wanted to quit. What changed?”

  She gave a small, wincing shrug. “Because after we got here, I actually felt happy. Happy to be married to you, to have freedom and privacy. Our little place in Georgetown, interesting friends who said whatever they wanted—I saw the world, finally, not Gilberto’s interpretation of it. America seemed pretty good. Not perfect. But better than what I’d grown up in. So when Gilberto came, I planned to tell him I wanted to ease out—that Rémy could just handle things. But he was furious, enraged at how I had adapted to things here. He could see I liked it. He made it clear I’d be removed and they’d hurt you if I didn’t follow my orders.”

  “Nice little story, there. You should have come clean then, Eleanor. You should have told me and we would have dealt with it.”

  “McCarthy was raging right down the road, Talbot. Have you forgotten? Imagine how we would have been treated—both of us. We’d both be in jail. Or dead, depending on who got to us first. I was trying to avoid that.”

  He scoffed. “Right. Yes. Thank you for protecting my career by maintaining your surveillance of me. Very noble.” He retrieved his toast without offering her a slice. “So, whatever mixed feelings you had about the work, you must have enjoyed reunions with your lover.”

  “I did not.” By now, her tears flowed freely, her tissue a torn scrap in her lap.

  “It fits the timeline, Eleanor, of when you pulled away from me.”

  “The hysterectomy. I had a hysterectomy.”

  Talbot froze, the toast in midair, mouth attempting to form a syllable.

  “He was afraid I’d get pregnant and it would interfere with my work. Or a baby would arrive that looked like him.”

  “You agreed to this?” he roared, dropping his toast, splattering coffee across the table.

  “I never agreed,” she said. “I complied. Because I was afraid. I was young. I didn’t want them to hurt you.”

  He began to pace, throwing long looks at her as he sorted out the details, the timeline of what she had told him.

  “So that’s why…” she began.

  “That’s why you kept yourself away from me. Locking the door when you bathed.”

  “And why I looked the other way when you took other women. Helen. The others before her. And Caroline.”

  His head whipped around when she said it, frantically thinking for a brief moment that this secret between them mattered, that there remained a small portion of himself he couldn’t reveal to her. But no, he realized. His reflexive response to keep this secret could be discarded now. There was no risk in her knowing this because there was no marriage to protect. He could drop the mask. He went to the sink and splashed some water on his face, grabbing the kitchen towel to dry himself, working it in his hands, gripping and twisting. He paced a few more steps around the kitchen, then sat back down at the table to face her.

  “When did you find that out?” he asked. “Caroline, I mean.”

  “I knew then. I knew your schedule and when there were holes in it. And when I pressed him, Rémy verified it. He had recordings.”

  “It was stupid. Brief. We just fell into it, both of us feeling like we didn’t understand the two of you, all you’d been through in the war.”

  “I know, Talbot. I saw it. And it was then—when you became involved with Caroline—that I knew I loved you, because of how betrayed I felt by the both of you. Isn’t that stupid? Me, doing what I was doing, feeling that? I wanted a real life, for you to come back and want me, so I tried to quit the work. But Cossutta wouldn’t let me.”

  “So he used you. Is that your defense?”

  “He used me, yes. They all used me. But I know what I did.”

  “You traipsed around after me. Lied to me. Made me a laughingstock. Then you busted up the Paris Summit, Eleanor—a meeting that could have made the world safer. For Americans, for all your Russian friends in Kirov. That’s what you did, ultimately.”

  She nodded, her sobs overtaking her, her voice breaking. “I’m cooperating now, Talbot. I’m working for the U.S. now. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  He looked at her, wanting to believe her, knowing he could reach his arms around her, let her collapse into him as she seemed so desperate to do. That in doing so, he would telegraph a way forward, that he still cared about her welfare, believed that she was sorry and believed that in some aberrant, outlandish way, she loved him.

  He rose, used the dish towel to mop up the spilled coffee on the table, and headed to the shower.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY-SIX

  Monday, June 27, 1960

  Arlington, VA

  Just before noon Monday, Eleanor dragged the rotary phone off her bedside table and into the bathroom, uncoiling the phone cord and finding it reached just far enough. She sat on the side of the tub and placed a call to the Arlington Planning Department. A chipper voice happily transferred the call to Mr. Auclair. Eleanor turned on the shower and let it run.

  Rémy picked up and greeted her in his loud, professional voice and inquired how things were going at the library. He was busy, he said, so he would look into the issue she described and call her back later. She told him to hurry. Ten minutes later, her phone rang.

  “You’ve resurfaced. I was concerned.”

  “We had a horrible fight, Rémy. I came back early, but I haven’t had any privacy to call.”

  “Where’s Talbot now?”

  “In his office, I think. I’m in the bathroom. Told him I needed a shower so I don’t have much time. What about you? Are you alone?”

  “More or less. I’m at the deli around the corner from the office.”

  “Where? Is that a good idea?”

  Rémy heaved an impatient sigh. “Santucci’s, Eleanor. You know it. It’s loud and busy. Our old art teacher would be at home here. No one’s anywhere near me. And we’re the side that taps your phone, remember?”

  Eleanor laughed, relaxing. “Of course. Right. Then, I just need you to get a message to him. Tell him I’m fine and I’m terribly sorry. I made an awful mistake. I know that. Whatever he wants me to do, I’m ready.”

  Rémy was quiet for a beat. “He’s furious at you, Eleanor. Very. The plan to move you has been set in motion. You understand that. It only makes sense. You’re disgusted with your husband and decided to leave the country.”

  “Right. Okay. Do you know how? When?”

  “Just stay ready. When he’s got it worked out, he’ll send an escort who will come to the library, make an inquiry, and get you out.”

  “I won’t be at the library for a bit. I’m taking a few days off.”

  “Hmm. Then we’ll have to make an adjustment. Is Talbot making you stay home? Is he trying to keep you within reach for some reason?”

  “No. I’m just tired of the looks and the whispers, Rémy. If we’re at the end of this, I’d just as soon not play-act at the library.”

  “Toughen up, Eleanor. You need to be sturdier than this. It’s fine for Tal to believe you’re upset. Cry on his shoulder all you want. But when I heard what happened Saturday, I thought maybe you’d had some sort of breakdown—lost your nerve. And that doesn’t play well with our friends up the line, you know? Since Caroline and I had just been with Tal for dinner Friday night, I couldn’t very well call looking for you because as far as I knew, you were out of town. I did see people coming out of your place late Saturday, after I’d learned you were…missing, shall we say. I was sent there to take a look.”

  Eleanor shuddered. “Yeah, I arrived just as that party was getting started. Investigators asking more questions. A team of them—plus Tal’s lawyer, of course, and the rector from St. John’s.”

  “The rector?” Rémy asked. “What was he doing there?”

  “Tal called him. Everything is pressing down on him now so he’s looking for some help with his mental state, I guess.”

  “Poor ole Tal. He was pretty melancholy Friday night. Barely on this side of despair. Still can’t believe how all this came together. What were they asking him on Saturday?”

  “Nothing new, really.”

  “You were the properly distraught wife?”

  “Yeah, my fight with Gilberto left me a little raw and that worked to my advantage.”

  Rémy gave little chuckle. “It’ll be a tough thing to explain to Caroline, though, when you’re pulled out and you don’t stay in touch with her. Which you can’t do, you understand.”

  “I do. Of course. But who knows, Rémy? Maybe we’ll be able to collaborate down the road—in Eastern Europe, perhaps. I imagine we’ll see each other again.”

  “May it be so, ma petite amie. I’ll let Caroline know you’re having a terrible time of it so when they take you, she’ll just think you were overcome, you couldn’t bear to stay in touch. Stay ready. I’ll send a message when I have something.”

  Eleanor thanked him and said she’d be ready to move.

  She pressed the button to disconnect the call.

  . . .

  Rémy hung up and exited the phone booth, giving a quick look around to ensure no one was paying him undue attention. He made his way to the counter and ordered his lunch, wishing for the millionth time that he could get a salami and bologna sandwich on a proper baguette, instead of an over-salted Italian loaf. Just one of the many sacrifices he continued to make—and was willing to make—to continue this work.

  He thought about Eleanor, how she’d cooperated with assignments but had always been somewhat diffident; she could have gleaned much more if she’d been willing to dig a little with Talbot, ingratiated herself with his colleagues. It had been a bit of an issue, her lack of strategic creativity, but Cossutta had insisted she stay in the role—for his own reasons obviously—but also because she was so well-positioned. And he’d been proven right, Talbot moving up in the ranks to his career capstone, overseeing the U-2 project.

  They had a lot to be proud of, accomplishing what they had and now, it was the right moment for their little partnership to dissolve. It had been messier than he would have liked, Caroline developing a deep but inconvenient friendship with Eleanor that led to the four of them socializing. He’d never liked his wife accompanying Eleanor to New York—always worried something random would cause a slip up and expose him—but it never had. The affair, too, had been useful, providing a point of leverage that could be exercised if needed. Rémy harnessed his fury at their infidelity, their scheming, into greater motivation to undermine Talbot and destroy his career. Things had worked out well.

  He glanced at his watch. The man behind the counter was moving more slowly than usual, stopping to take a phone call midway through preparing a sandwich. No matter. Rémy was not in a huge hurry and he enjoyed standing amid the energy and aroma of the deli, sipping his Coke. He considered how Eleanor would handle leaving all this behind. In East Germany or the Soviet Union, she would not enjoy the autonomy and the abundance she’d grown used to. He did not envy her that. If he were pulled out, he could return to France and never even break his cover.

  At last, the man at the counter called his number. Rémy collected his sandwich and his Lay’s chips, left a generous tip in the jar, and walked out the door into the still June day. As he did, two men who had surveilled him for the past week came up from behind, each clasping an elbow, smoothly steering him into a waiting car.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Monday, June 27, 1960

  Arlington, VA

  The running shower masked the hurried activity in the Bentleys’ home. Talbot spent the first few minutes of the call to Rémy seated on the side of the bathtub next to his wife, leaning into the phone receiver she held between them, holding his breath and listening. Once he’d heard enough, he crept away to his office to phone Engwall on his work line. Intercepting Rémy unobtrusively, outside the deli, without making a scene at the Arlington Planning Department, would afford Rémy a longer window to entertain options for his future.

  Talbot returned to the bedroom to find Eleanor placing the phone back on her bedside table, tucking away the now-stretched out phone cord.

  “Brava,” he said. “Completely believable.” He sat down on the bed, eyes weary, shoulders rolled forward. “Engwall says what Rémy said in that call will be quite useful. They’ve probably already got him in custody. My old fishing buddy. My golfing buddy. Not exactly the grateful French ally I thought. Wonder what he’ll have to say for himself—how he’ll explain this to his wife.”

  . . .

  That evening, they turned on the local news in time to see film of Helen’s departure from the DC jail earlier that day. Cousin Todd clutched her elbow, steering her through the pod of reporters and photographers. Her make-up was understated, her hair tied back, and she wore a sleeveless orange sheath, a dress Talbot didn’t recognize. She looked every bit the inexperienced recent college grad who might have been led astray by her boss. The anchorman explained in his This-Just-In voice that her lawyer had reached a plea deal with the government. He cut to an interview with Helen.