The Business, As Usual by Jack Sharkey (best ebook reader under 100 .TXT) 📕

The President's gaze was returned by two shiny black eyes, set on either side of a little brown muzzle with a gentle, stitched-on smile. Agent X-45 was clad in flight helmet, miniature jacket and tiny boots, with a baggy pair of brown canvas trousers belted at the waist with a bandolier holding a dozen small wooden bullets, and dangling a patent-leather holster containing a plastic water pistol. And he wore a small parachute and harness.

"But that's a teddy bear!" cried the President.

"Precisely," Professor Blake said.

"I think I'll sit down," said the President, and did so, visibly looking like a man who believes he is surrounded by lunatics.

"And look here!" said the Secretary, slipping his hand within Teddy's jacket and withdrawing a small oilskin pouch. "It's rather rudimentary, but the Cyrillic lettering is genuine, and our ambassador assures us the layout is correct."

The President took the pouch, unfolded it and drew out a small sheet of paper, covered with the inscrutable letterings, and numerous rectangles and curving red lines.

"I give up," he said. "What is it?"

"A map of the Kremlin," said the Secretary, his eyes dancing. "That big red 'X' is the location of the Politburo Council Chamber."

"Perhaps," the President said weakly, "you could explain...?"

"Mister President," said Professor Blake, "I am the new Chief of Propaganda for the government."

The President nodded, poured himself a glass of water from a pitcher and drained it. "Yes, yes?" he said.

"Naturally, I have spent my career studying the psychology of a Certain Power...."

The President groaned. "Please, gentlemen, let's name names! It need never go outside this room. My lips are sealed!"

The professor and the Secretary exchanged a look, a raising of eyebrows, then a shrug of surrender.

"Very well," said Blake. "Russia—"

"There," said the President. "That's more like it."

Blake cleared his throat and went on.

"We know the weak spot in the Russian armor is the mentality of the average Communist official," he explained, while the Secretary, who had heard this all before, fiddled with the straps of Teddy's parachute and hummed softly to himself. "They have a distrust complex. Everything and everybody is under 24-hour-a-day suspicion."

"Yes, so I hear," said the President.

"What do you suppose would happen to an agent that was caught by the Russians?" asked Blake.

"I'd rather not even think about that."

"Not the sadistic details, sir. I mean the general train of events, from the time of capture onward."

The President pondered this. "After his capture," he said thoughtfully, "he would be questioned. Through various methods—hopelessly at variance with the regulations of the Geneva Convention—they would discover his mission, and then he would be shot, I guess, or imprisoned."

Blake nodded grimly. "And what if an agent landed there that could not divulge his mission?"

The Secretary stopped fiddling with the harness and watched the President's face. On the worn features he read first puzzlement, then incredulity, then a flash of sheer amazement.

"Good heavens!" said the President. "They'd—they'd have to admit a defeat, I suppose...."

"But can they?" Blake leaned forward and slammed his fist upon the tabletop. "Can the Communist mentality ever admit that it's been bested?"

"I—I guess not. At least, they never do," said the President. "But this—" he wagged a forefinger at the stuffed thing on the table—"this certainly won't upset them. I mean, after all...." He looked from one to the other for agreement and found none. "But, gentlemen, it's nothing but a stuffed bear!"

"It won't upset them?" queried Blake slowly. "Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure. They'll find the bear, wherever it lands, and they'll—well, they'll know it's a gag and just laugh at us."

"How will they know?" Blake persisted.

"Well, they'll be pretty well certain!" the President said scathingly: "I mean a stuffed toy—"

"Would they give up on something of which they were 'pretty well' certain?"

"They'd have to. Teddy, here, certainly couldn't tell them anything. They'd say it was a joke and forget it...." His voice barely sounded the last few words. He no longer believed them. A smile flickered upon his face. "Gentlemen, you don't think they'd—"

"The Russians," said Blake, without emotion, "would go off their rockers, sir. To be unable to explain a thing like this would devastate their morale. The Communist is a man who must hold all the aces. He'll shuffle and reshuffle until he gets them, too. Well, we're giving him a cold deck, sir. There are no aces for him to find."

"Hmmm," said the President. "As long as there's any doubt in their minds, they'll have to keep plugging at it, won't they! And since there's no solution—" His smile grew calculating. "Yes, yes I begin to see. It's a small thing, to be sure, but I find I must leap at the opportunity to stick a few ants in their pants for a change."

"It won't wipe them out," began the Secretary.

"But it'll wear them down a little," Blake finished.

"Done!" said the President. "How soon can we get Operation Frustration under way?"

"The plane is ready to leave right now," said the Secretary, with a small blush. "I—I rather thought you'd see this thing our way."

The President frowned at this, then shrugged. "Good enough. Let's get this bear into the air."

"You sure this plane will work?" asked the President, averting his face from the spray of leaves caught up in the shrieking jet stream of the waiting plane.

"It's too simple not to," said Blake, clutching the suitcase—on whose side a large red "Top Secret" had been stenciled—to his chest, and shouting over the scream of the plane. "The radar-resistant device is nothing more than a radio-receiver that blankets the structure, making the entire plane a receiver. If it receives the radar impulses, they can't bounce back and make a blip on the enemy radar screens."

The President sighed. "You make it sound almost too easy. Very well." He shook the man's hand. "Good luck."

"Thank you, sir," said Blake, patting the suitcase. "I'll take good care of Teddy."

The President nodded and moved away. Blake boarded the jet, and, minutes later, the President was watching a last fading streamer of the twin exhausts dwindling upon the eastern horizon.

"I shan't sleep till he's back," said the Secretary.

"Nor I," said the President. "I have the weirdest damned apprehension...."

"About what, sir?" asked the Secretary, as they made their way from the field.

"About the—" the President looked around, then lowered his voice to a whisper—"the Russians. There's something in their makeup we may have overlooked."

"Impossible, sir," said the Secretary of Defense. "Blake is our top psychologist."

"I hope you're right. If this fails, I'd hate for it to be traced to us."

"It can't be. The jacket was made in Japan, the boots in Mexico, the parachute in—"

"I know, I know," said the President. "But if they should trace it to us, we'll be a laughing-stock."

"They won't," the Secretary assured him.

Two days later, Blake was back, his manner jovial when he met in secret session once more with the two executives.

"Couldn't