Practiced, thought the marksman, as her words were translated into English. Naturally she would be. Soviet envoys were always stuffed with canned answers and memorized slogans.
“Do you miss borscht, Lyudmila?” one of the First Lady’s aides asked, leaning across the orange juice and bacon.
“Nobody in their right mind misses beets,” Lyudmila Pavlichenko said through the interpreter, and got a laugh.
Funny, thought the marksman, in some surprise. He hadn’t anticipated a sense of humor.
More questions began to fly. “I understand you rode in on the Miami-Washington train this morning, Lyudmila—first time on an express? Were you shocked how fast it was?”
“The only thing I was shocked by was the sign on the carriage saying FOR WHITES ONLY.” The girl sniper forked a mushroom off her plate. “It’s a strange thing to see in a country that started with ‘All men are created equal.’ ”
Prickly, thought the marksman. He was fairly certain the head of the delegation gave her a kick under the table, but she just chewed her mushroom, looking bland. The interpreter looked relieved when the blonde leaned forward with another question.
“Tell me, are unmarried women allowed in the Red Army? I noticed you were Mrs. Pavlichenko.”
Married, the marksman noted. He wondered where the husband was.
“I can’t imagine Soviet husbands being any more keen than American ones about the idea of their wives heading off to war.” The blonde chuckled. “Men! My husband fusses so much when I’m off to chair a committee meeting, you’d think I was abandoning him for the Russian front!”
“Some husbands don’t like much of anything a wife does,” said the girl sniper. More chuckles around the table.
“I don’t know about that.” The First Lady spoke up unexpectedly. “If I decided to head for the Russian front, I imagine my husband would simply say, ‘Don’t get yourself killed, Eleanor, and bring back some Nazi scalps for the office.’ ”
The girl sniper laughed—before the interpreter murmured a translation. Understands English, the marksman thought with yet another flicker of surprise. And clever enough not to advertise the fact.
“I say, Mrs. Pavlichenko, you’re doing well for your first trip to the USA,” a hearty-looking man across the breakfast table boomed. “Look at you, managing that silverware like a pro!”
Lyudmila Pavlichenko’s voice grew edged. “Thank you,” she said brightly. “We just received silverware in the Soviet Union last week. Up until now it’s all been stabbing our food with sticks!”
Angry, the marksman thought, fairly certain she’d got another kick under the table. He watched her apply herself to her plate again, spearing her sausage with more force than necessary. Behave yourself and smile, the delegation head muttered in Russian, and she just gave back a narrow-eyed stare. Very angry, in fact, the marksman amended. Not so smooth and controlled as he’d assumed a propaganda poster girl would be. Lyudmila Pavlichenko didn’t want to be here, didn’t like smiling on command, and hated idiotic questions.
The marksman smiled, making a note of that. Be angry, little girl, he thought, sipping his coffee. Lose your temper, lose your poise, lose your script. The angrier you look over the week to come, the more these people here will be willing to believe you pulled the trigger on their president.
Notes by the First Lady
Franklin will be interested to learn that our Soviet guests speak more English than they let on—or at least the young woman does. “Those rascals,” he’ll say, chuckling around his cigarette holder. I’ll enjoy painting the scene for him later—not for nothing do they call me the President’s eyes and ears. He’ll pretend his fall this morning did not happen, he’ll wave away any suggestion of mine that the ill will of his enemies might be worrying him, and he’ll ask me to talk. “Describe it, Eleanor!”