Traitor

Начало книги

The darkness fell out of nowhere. So blue and pristine just a few minutes earlier, the sky turned momentarily purple and then black, as if infused with ink. The warmth of the day, a pleasant enough one in early March, was replaced with a sudden chill. Shadows lengthened and darkened. Dim lights illuminated the street, while the beams of concealed floodlights washed over the walls. And in their glow, the magnificent structures took on the appearance of a grandiose backdrop for a play. The time was 6:02. A young man walked down the narrow street once more, tugging on his coat zipper, which was already pulled up as far as it could go anyway, and again passed by the iron gate of the American embassy. He was alone on the street, which appeared deserted for a moment. The noise of incessant traffic could be heard coming from the Via Veneto, the wide street that the splendid façade of the embassy, located in a building that had once served as a palace, overlooked. Whipped by the cold wind, its red and white stripes glowing in the beam of a spotlight, a large American flag flew at the top of a tall pole. To the young man, the huge building, with all of its windows sealed shut, looked empty and gloomy; but he knew its rooms were filled at that very moment with hundreds of people. He retraced his steps and firmly pressed the intercom buzzer on the gate. Two security cameras installed high above him rotated silently and focused on him.

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