“He meant Stalin country, Emmett, not where the Braves play,” Irv said.

“I know,” Bragg said calmly. “But it doesn’t hurt any to have the boys on the other side take you for a natural born fool.” He checked the radar screen. A blip was showing: the Tsiolkovsky, coming up over the Minervan horizon. “Right on time,” Levitt said.

Bragg nodded. “They haven’t been playing with their orbit again, anyhow.” He had worn a crew cut when it was stylish, kept it through the years when it wasn’t, and still had it now that it was in again. The only difference was that gray streaked it now. He picked up the radio mike. “Zdrast’ye, Tsiolkovsky,” he said, and went on in Russian that was accented but fluent. “All well aboard?”

“Very well, thank you, Brigadier Bragg.” Colonel Sergei Tolmasov sounded like an Oxford don. Just as the Americans used Russian to talk to the Soviet ship, the crew of the Tsiolkovsky always replied in English. Tolmasov’s dry wit went well with the slightly fussy precision he brought to the language. “Good to find you in your expected place, old fellow.”

“We were thinking the same thing about you,” Bragg said. The Tsiolkovsky had changed orbits several times in the week since it and Athena had reached Minerva. Had each burn not taken place on the far side of the planet from Athena, Levitt would have been happier about believing the Russians when they said the maneuvers were just to enhance their observations. As things were, he had not been sorry when Bragg also started jinking. “Let them worry, too,” the pilot had said.

Now Tolmasov remarked, “I will be glad when we are all on the ground, and this foolish maneuvering can cease.”

“Agreed,” Bragg said at once. “We’ll be too busy cheating the natives to worry so much about each other.”

“Ah-quite,” Tolmasov replied after a moment’s pause. “There are times, Brigadier, when I must confess myself uncertain as to how facetious you are being. Tsiolkovsky out.”