Jones was standing outside his house in the early heat, waiting for Heike to pick him up. She was a little late, and he crossed the street to get in the shadow of the house opposite. When her little blue car eventually came around the corner, he stepped out to be more visible. That was a mistake, and he had to retreat quickly as she screeched up. This was even worse than her usual driving, and he knew that something was wrong.

When he did manage to get in, she said,

"I can't go to work today. There was a special delivery letter from Ha-yo early this morning."

Jones felt a momentary horror. Was she still in love with Ha- jo? But, then, she was far from happy. She explained,

"He says that, since our "wonderful evening", he's been in Germany on government business. He's taken that opportunity, through some relatives living in the east, to track down my parents. My father, he says, is well, and is a high police official in East Germany. He's given me his address."

At once relieved and surprised, Jones could hardly answer. Heike continued,

"Of course, I've been thinking of nothing else for the last couple of hours. Since we know who Ha-jo is, he could really have traced and found my father. Or they may have someone who will write letters pretending to be my father."

"They'd have to have some sample of his writing to do that. Given the state of records in bombed-out Germany, that wouldn't be easy to get."

"I didn't get very far with my amateurish inquiries, but I did get the impression that my parents were dead."

"I imagine the odds went that way, but lots of people survived in all kinds of improbable ways."

"I've got the letter here, but I know it should be handled as little as possible on account of fingerprints. I suppose I should call Reggie."

"I bet he'll have you take the letter to Captain Armitage."

Heike called Reggie from a pay phone while Jones watched from the car. She was on the phone a long time, and, when she came back, she said,

"He didn't seem very surprised, and said that they probably just want to continue the game. He then did arrange for me to give the letter to Captain Armitage. We're to meet him in Lafayette Park, across from the White House. We first have to go through an elaborate rigamarole to make sure I'm not being followed."

Heike, for the first time, allowed Jones to drive her car. They did a number of loops around blocks, with some sudden stops to allow some surprised pedestrians to cross. After some other maneuvers, they barely made a couple of lights as Heike looked to see if any car went through the red behind them. As they finally proceeded down Wisconsin Avenue, she said,

"A new symmetry has popped up."

"What do you mean?"

"You have a mission I don't want you to perform. But, now, they may want me to continue my affair with Ha-jo. I'm sure you don't want that."

"God, no."

"How about a trade?"

Jones went through a red light, narrowly avoiding a collision, and pulled over. Heike said,

"We can't dally, or we won't make our appointment with Captain Armitage."

"Okay, but I can't deal with this while I'm driving."

"We'll wait til we've seen the captain."

After parking, Jones let Heike get a good distance ahead in order to watch for anyone following her. From her bouncy step, he could see that she was now enjoying herself, evidently developing a taste for espionage.

Captain Armitage was already in the park, walking the gravel paths and pointing the tip of his umbrella menacingly at pigeons. He greeted Heike warmly with a hug, and she managed to look like a young woman skipping out of work for a tryst with a lover. Jones came up quickly, wondering how his presence could be explained. The captain didn't seem to be worried, and enjoined them to address him as 'Jimmy'. He then led them to a little grouping of three chairs well away from the tourist industry in the neighborhood of the White House.

Having said that he didn't want to touch the letter himself, Heike held it for Armitage to read. He then produced a large envelope for the letter and said,

"If you don't mind, Heike, I'll take your fingerprints so that we can separate them from those of the opposition."

He then pulled out a small ink pad and a pad of paper. Heike pressed and printed, and Jones said he hadn't touched the letter. That accomplished, Jimmy leaned back and said,

"Let's suppose, as we hope, that they've kept their suspicions in check and think that Heike is an innocent. They want to continue the game because, if there's something wrong from their point of view, a man of Ha-jo's ability will eventually be able to pick up something false in Heike. For example, he might declare himself a Russian agent and propose that she elope with him to Moscow. If she doesn't react in just the right way, he'll spot that."

Heike had actually caught her breath at the mention of that possibility. Armitage laughed, and said to her,

"You did a great job of acting, but no one could keep that up indefinitely. We need to find the best way of breaking it off."

"I could just not respond."

"I'm afraid that won't do. The woman you were pretending to be couldn't resist this."

Jones suggested,

"What if she says that she can't see him any more because she's gotten engaged to someone, namely me?"

"Yes. That would be in character. For the rest, how about this: After thanking him warmly for his efforts and explaining about her engagement to you, she says that she realizes that her father, a Nazi to begin with, must now have become something even worse. An East German communist and state policeman. She has no desire to establish contact and asks Ha-jo not to give her father her address. Then, in a final note, she adds that she regrets not in the slightest their wonderful night together."

Jones asked,

"Will he still try to see her, or will you deport him?"

"No, it's useful to have Ha-yo where he is. But he's a gentleman. He won't try to crawl in Heike's bedroom window. The most he could do is to try to make out her father as a friendly constable in some small town, not a secret policeman.

"Why did he tell her that her father was a high official in the first place?"

"It might have the advantage of being true. That always simplifies things. Besides, for Ha-jo, it's respectable to be a high policeman of a communist sort. He's not far from that himself. Our sorts of people, myself and Reggie included, sometimes forget the different perceptions of these things that people have."

When they were back in the car together, Heike said,

"I guess the symmetry has disappeared."

"Thank God for Armitage! Reggie might have wanted you to continue."

"Probably not. He'd reason the same way. Little to be gained, and a lot to be lost. I do wonder, though, whether he'd volunteer Tensy if she happened to be just right for one of these missions?"

"I bet he would. I feel, not for the first time, that we shouldn't get too close to Reggie."

"The trouble is that I do feel very close to Tensy."

"Yes. We'll just have to make it clear to Reggie that we're not doing any more spying."

"Anyway, Jones, symmetry or no symmetry, I can still arrange for Drew Pearson to get an anonymous little note."

"You're no longer talking about breaking my leg with a baseball bat?"

"No, I don't want to hurt you. The leak wouldn't hurt either of us."

"It might compromise all of JOAD and possibly put it out of business."

"That would only be because JOAD, in conjunction with the sub force, is doing something that it isn't authorized to do."

"They will have to get permission before it's actually done."

"I bet they do that at the last minute."

"Isn't that okay?"

Heike shook her head hard enough to make her black hair stand out from her head and said,

"It's sleazy. You get something all set to go that wouldn't normally be approved, and, at the last minute, you say that all this time and money will be wasted if you can't go ahead. And you need approval in two hours' time. That sort of thing may sometimes work, but it's not nice."

"You wouldn't worry about it's not being nice if I weren't involved."

"I suppose not, but there it is."

Jones reached over to draw Heike to him, but she resisted and said,

"Get out of this first. I'll help you figure out a way."

"Maybe LeMay will mount his attack before we can get going."

It was meant as a joke, but Heike didn't laugh.