Free The Assassin by Stephen Coonts Page B

photo in his hospital bed, his hair had already started to come out. His ghastly countenance was the photo of the year.
    If that weren’t enough, British and German investigators had found a radioactive trail from Moscow to Germany to London. Apparently another man who had been at the dinner where Surkov was poisoned, now labeled as one of the suspected killers, had dribbled radioactivity everywhere he went. This man was hospitalized, according to the television, in Moscow due to radiation poisoning. A third man, in London, claimed he, too, was ill, but he wasn’t in the hospital. British, German and Russian politicians were in a tizzy.
    Meanwhile, Grafton and I flew back to the States. He wanted to confer with his bosses, and I wanted to find out if any of my female acquaintances still remembered me.
    The day after Surkov died, I was in Grafton’s office watching some of the latest on this story on television. When the talking head went on to another story, Grafton used the remote to kill the idiot beast.
    “Pretty amazing,” I muttered.
    “A novelist would have rejected a scenario like that,” Grafton mused, “as too far-fetched. A deathbed accusation, the president of Russia, an alpha-radiation source emitting isotopes of helium nuclei . ..” Obviously, Grafton knew a little more about nuclear radiation than the average Joe. And he knew more than I did.
    “What I don’t understand,” I said, “is why the Russians used a radioactive isotope to pop this dude when the chemists have a cornucopia of undetectable poisons.”
    “There is no such thing as undetectable,” Grafton said, sighing, “if you have the time and equipment to run enough experiments. Still, the Brits claim they wouldn’t have tested for plutonium poisoning if it weren’t for a medical-student prodigy working the intake desk, who suggested it as a possibility.” He glanced at his watch and stood. “I have a five o’clock meet downtown. I would appreciate it if you would come along.”
    ‘Sure,” I said. Although Grafton phrased his order like a request, it was indubitably an order, and I was smart enough to know it.
    As he checked his safe and burn-basket and made sure his desk was locked, I asked who we were meeting.
    “A Russian.”
    “Oleg Tchernychenko?”
    “No. I talked to him a while ago on the telephone. He is stunned and devastated, he said. He also claims that the Russian government killed Surkov.”
    “Why?”
    “He had a dozen reasons.” Grafton made a gesture with his hands.
    “This guy we’re meeting—what’s he want to talk about?”
    “My guess is a murder in London. Want to lay a little wager?”
    I didn’t. Betting against Jake Grafton was a sure way to lose money.
    Washington, D.C., in winter is a miserable place. It’s too warm to snow and too cold to be pleasant. The wet, chilly wind that blows most days cuts like a knife. I trudged along beside Grafton after the guy driving the agency heap let us off on the Mall near the Washington Monument. The only people out there were hard-core runners in Lycra and spandex, drug addicts in the various stages of euphoria or withdrawal, winos and a few screwballs from Iowa, snapping away with cameras. The people from Iowa actually thought the weather was warm, but being from California, I knew different.
    “So how are you and Sarah getting along these days?” Grafton asked, for want of anything better to talk about. Sarah Houston lived with me for a while after our adventure in Paris.
    “We broke up again. She moved out.”
    “Ahh,” he said, as if my revelation explained the state of the world. He asked no more questions.
    A wino mining a trash can glanced at us as we walked by but said nothing. Probably figured the chances of wheedling change out of us were too slim to be worth the air. We passed the Smithsonian castle and were nearing the Hirshhorn when we passed another wino sitting against a tree. He made eye contact with Grafton and nodded.
    We went into