"With me as your Control?"

"No."

His thin mouth tightened; or perhaps I imagined it; Croder isn't a man to give anything away, anything at all.

"You can't have it both ways," he said, and glanced down at his watch. "And I can't give you very long." His dark expressionless eyes were raised again to watch me.

I wanted to turn and walk away from him; I think I tried. I sensed Tilson near me, and heard the four men talking together below the slanting rotor of the machine. I said:

"Give me someone else."

They wanted me for this mission, or they wouldn't have dragged me out of hospital with the shock still in my nerves and the drugs still clouding my brain. So it would have to be on my terms.

"I am already in control of this one," Croder said, his tight mouth nibbling at the words like a rat. "And I am inviting you to join me as the executive in the field. I believe you're the most appropriate man for the job, and so do my advisers."

"I'm not fit," I said. I was going to make him ask.

"There's no immediate action foreseen, in Pekin. And you can rest on the flight out."

"The notice is too short." I was going to make him ask me outright.

"You don't like delays. They don't suit your temperament."

"But this is too rushed. I've had no London briefing."

Then he asked me. "Why won't you accept me as your Control?"

"Because of Moscow."

His hooded lids closed for an instant as he fought for patience. I knew how much patience he was having to use; he was extremely high in the London echelon, a controller who could pick his missions and his executives and his directors in the field without any competition, and any executive would work with him simply for the prestige. He wasn't used to refusal.

"You did well," he said, "in Moscow."

"I broke the rules."

With impatience coming into his tone for the first time he said, "You showed compassion for Schrenk as a fellow executive and as a result he nearly killed you.