The Cardinal of the Kremlin by Tom Clancy EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: Tom Clancy
- Language: English
- Genre: Political Thrillers & Suspense
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2 MB
- Price: Free
The Reception of the Party
“BUSINESS was being conducted. All kinds of business. Everyone there
knew it. Everyone there was part of it. Everyone there needed it. And yet
everyone there was in one way or another dedicated to stopping it. For every
person there in the St. George Hall of the Great Kremlin Palace, the dualism
was a normal part of life.
The participants were mainly Russian and American, and were divided into
four groups.
First, the diplomats and politicians. One could discern these easily enough
from their better-than-average clothing and erect posture, the ready, robotic
smiles, and careful diction that endured even after the many alcoholic toasts.
They were the masters, knew it, and their demeanor proclaimed it.
Second, the soldiers. One could not have arms negotiations without the men
who controlled the arms, maintained them, tested them, pampered them, all
the while telling themselves that the politicians who controlled the men
would never give the order to launch. The soldiers in their uniforms stood
mainly in little knots of homogeneous nationality and service branch, each
clutching a half-full glass and napkin while blank, emotionless eyes swept the
room as though searching for a threat on an unfamiliar battlefield. For that
was precisely what it was to them, a bloodless battlefield that would define
the real ones if their political masters ever lost control, lost temper, lost
perspective, lost whatever it is in man that tries to avoid the profligate waste
of young life. To a man the soldiers trusted none but one another, and in
some cases trusted their enemies in different-colored uniforms more than
their own soft-clothed masters. At least you knew where another soldier
stood. You couldn’t always say the same of politicians, even your own. They
talked with one another quietly, always watching to see who listened,
stopping occasionally for a quick gulp from the glass, accompanied by
another look about the room. They were the victims, but also the predators–
the dogs, perhaps, kept on leashes by those who deemed themselves the
masters of events.
The soldiers had trouble believing that, too.
Third, the reporters. These could also be picked out by their clothing, which
was always wrinkled by too many packings and unpackings in airline
suitcases too small for all they carried. They lacked the polish of the
politicians, and the fixed smiles, substituting for it the inquisitive looks of
children, mixed with the cynicism of the dissolute. Mainly they held their
glasses in their left hands, sometimes with a small pad instead of the paper
napkin, while a pen was half-hidden in the right. They circulated like birds of
prey. One would find someone who would talk.
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