"Too much to do. I couldn't get away. It would not have looked right to drop important business because of the race committee."
Nodding, Kinsman changed the subject. "I got a call from one of our doctors. She wants to transfer a heart patient of yours to our side of the hospital."
"Yes, I know. Baliagorev, the former dancer."
"She says your regulations won't let you send him over to us."
Leonov answered, "Of course. And your regulations do not allow you to take him in without permission from your superiors Earthside."
"Hell, Pete, I'll just do it and get them to okay it after the fact. There's a human life at stake."
"Ah, but your superiors are much easier to handle than mine. Mine would absolutely forbid transferring a Soviet citizen to your side of the hospital. Absolutely."
"Then he's going to die?"
"No, he's on his way to your side of the hospital. I gave the order this morning before I came out here to join you." 329
Kinsman stopped dead on the gravelly slope, sending a few loose pebbles rattling noiselessly down toward the shad- owed bottom of the crater. "You . . . Pete, sometimes you astound me."
"You think it's impossible for a good Communist to be flexible? To fly in the face of authority? You think only you Americans have feelings?"
"Oh hell."
Leonov put a hand on Kinsman's shoulder. "Old friend, I am being relieved of duty. I am being sent back to Mother Russia, to my wife and little ones. We will never see each other again."
"Shipped out? When?"
"In two weeks. Perhaps less. I'm not certain who my replacement will be, but the indications are that he will be a hard-liner. A good Marxist and a good soldier. Not a soft-hearted fellow like me. Not a collaborationist who at- tends capitalist parties and wastes the people's time and money on frivolities."
"You're in trouble?"
"I am always in trouble," Leonov said, trying to make it sound jovial. "That's why I was given the Lunagrad post in the first place. This is even better than Siberia—a banishment that appears to be a promotion. Most of the people in Lunagrad are exiles."
"If they're anything like the people in our half of Selene," Kinsman said, "they wouldn't want to go back to Earth. It's too crowded down there, Pete. Like rats, that's the way they're living."
"I know. But our superiors don't realize that. They are still living in the past. They still think of Lunagrad as a sort of exile for troublesome officers."
"They're calling you back, though."
