Soul of the Assassin by Jim DeFelice, Larry Bond Page A

last meet with him?”
     
    Only then did Rostislawitch realize that he had somehow gotten himself into the middle of a political fight. He’d become a pawn in a struggle between Fradkov and the army.
     
    Fradkov did not lose many battles at this stage of his career, and he did not lose this one. Rostislawitch’s work had played a minuscule role in the trial used by Fradkov and his allies to punish the defense minister, but it was enough to effectively end Rostislawitch’s career.
     
    Worse, Olga became ill shortly after her husband’s “audience” with the Russian Premier. Sick with the flu, she was taken to the local hospital in Saratov, where they were living practically under house arrest. At the hospital, she caught a much worse infection—a strain of streptococcus resistant to antibiotics. She died within a week.
     
    In a final irony, the strain was one Rostislawitch had considered but rejected for use as a weapon some twenty years before.
     
    Fradkov’s campaign against the defense minister complete, the lab’s funding was restored. Rostislawitch’s project, however, was given short shrift. Supposedly newer ideas—one involved the bubonic plague, so how could that be new?—were in vogue, and researchers familiar with them received top priority. Rostislawitch, tainted forever by his political troubles, was shunted to the side. He was forced to take a job teaching introductory biology at a nearby college to earn money. The director of the lab was a friend of his, and so allowed him lab access, but only during off-hours. He had continued his work with E. coli B 589-A , keeping the strain alive, though by now no one else seemed to be much interested in it.
     
    Except for the hour or two he spent in the lab each day, Dr. Rostislawitch hated life. Sometimes he thought of killing himself; other times he thought of killing a large number of people. He fantasized about killing Fradkov especially, until an airplane accident deprived him of the pleasure.
     
    Then came the Iranian, with his offer. The Iranian didn’t know exactly what he was asking for; apparently he had heard of Rostislawitch’s work through Chechnyan friends who were fools and dullards. But to give the devil his credit, the Iranian sent a man to speak to him who did know what he was looking for, and who was intelligent enough to know that Rostislawitch could supply it.
     
    And now he was here.
     
    A new beginning. More like an old ending, a final gesture of payback to a world that had treated him so poorly. He had no doubt the material would be used. He wanted it to be.
     
    He wished that weren’t true. He wished he could feel something, anything. Then he might have something to live for.
     
    Shaving done, Rostislawitch retrieved his white shirt and began buttoning it slowly, rehearsing his English so that he could make his job pitch. For just one night, he decided, he would make himself believe that it wasn’t a cover story, or a fantasy, that he really did hope to get a legitimate job to put his skills to use. For just one night, for his dead wife’s sake, he would believe in himself and a future that did not involve destruction and terrible agony, let alone revenge.
     
    ~ * ~
     

5
     
    WASHINGTON, D.C.
     
    Even though the State Department had emphasized that the meeting was not only important but time sensitive, the Italian ambassador’s secretary claimed the earliest he could meet with Corrine was one p.m., and then only for ten minutes.
     
    “Typical with the Italians,” said Undersecretary of State Gene Lashley as they drove up to the ambassador’s residence in suburban Washington. “My bet is that he doesn’t get out of bed until then.”
     
    “I see.”
     
    “Mention that we’re planning a reception at the embassy with free booze and women, they’ll be all over it,” Lashley said sarcastically as the State Department limo stopped at the front door. “They have a different set of priorities.”
     
    Corrine