Felless turned to Reffet. “You were right to rouse me, Exalted Fleetlord. This will be a more challenging problem than anyone could have anticipated-and, no doubt, the conquest fleet has made its share of mistakes in dealing with these bizarre Tosevites.” She let out a hissing sigh. “I can see I shall have my work cut out for me.”

Without false modesty, Vyacheslav Molotov knew himself to be one of the three most powerful men on the face of the Earth. Without false self-aggrandizement, he knew Atvar, the Lizards’ fleetlord, was more powerful than he or Heinrich Himmler or Earl Warren. What had not been obvious over the past two crowded decades was whether Atvar was more powerful than the leaders of the USSR, the Greater German Reich, and the USA put together.

But soon, very soon, the Lizards’ colonization fleet would bring millions more of their kind, males and females both, to Earth. Even though the fleet was entirely civilian-the Lizards had not anticipated needing more military help when it left their home world-it would tilt the scales in their direction. It could hardly do anything else.

As he sat in his Kremlin office, Molotov did not show what he was thinking. He had reached the top of the Soviet hierarchy, succeeding Iosif Stalin as general secretary of the Communist Party, not least by never showing what he was thinking. His stone face-poker face was the American idiom, which he rather liked- had also served him well in dealing with foreigners and with the Lizards.

His own secretary stuck his head into the office. “Comrade General Secretary, the foreign commissar has arrived.”

“Very well, Pyotr Maksimovich, send him in,” Molotov answered. He glanced at his wristwatch as the secretary disappeared. Ten o’clock on the dot. Since no one could see him do it, Molotov nodded approval. Some people understood the virtue of punctuality, however un-Russian it was.

In strode Andrei Gromyko. “Good day, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich,” he said, extending his hand.

Molotov shook it. “And to you, Andrei Andreyevich,” he said, and gestured to the chair across the desk from his own. “Sit down.” Without any further small talk, Gromyko did. Molotov thought well of the foreign commissar not least because his craggy countenance revealed almost as little as Molotov’s own.

Gromyko went straight to business, another trait of which Molotov approved: “Is there any change in our position of which I should be aware before we meet with the Lizards’ ambassador to the Soviet Union?”

“I do not believe so, no,” Molotov replied. “We remain strongly opposed to their settling colonists in Persia or Afghanistan or Kashmir or any other land near our borders.”

One of Gromyko’s shaggy eyebrows twitched. “Any other, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich?” he asked.

Molotov grunted. Gromyko had caught him fair and square. “You are correct, of course. We have no objection whatever to their colonization of Poland, however extensive that may prove.”

While withdrawing from most of their European conquests, the Lizards had stayed in Poland: neither Germany nor the USSR was willing to see it in the other’s hands, and neither was willing to see a Polish state revive. With the Lizards administering the area, it made a splendid buffer between the Soviet Union and Nazi-dominated Western Europe. Molotov was delighted to have the Lizards there. He feared the Greater German Reich, and hoped with all his heart that Himmler likewise feared the USSR.

Gromyko said, “I remind you, Comrade General Secretary, that the Lizards have consistently maintained we have no right to dictate to them where they may settle on territory they rule.”

“We are not dictating. We are not in a position to dictate, however unfortunate that may be,” Molotov said. “We are making our views known to them. We are in a position to do that. If they choose to ignore us, they show themselves to be uncultured and give us grounds for ignoring them in appropriate circumstances.”

“They are of the opinion-the strong opinion-that we ignore their views by continuing to supply weapons to progressive forces in China and Afghanistan,” Gromyko said.

“I cannot imagine why they continue to hold such an opinion,” Molotov said. “We have repeatedly denied any such involvement.”

Gromyko did own an impressive stone face, for he failed to crack a smile at that. So did Molotov. Here, as so often, denials and truth bore little relation to each other. But the Lizards had never quite been able to prove Soviet denials were false, and so the denials continued.

“A thought,” Gromyko said, raising a forefinger.

“Go on.” Molotov nodded. His neck creaked a little as he did so. He was up past seventy, his face more wrinkled than it had been when the Lizards first came to Earth, his hair thinner and almost entirely gray. Aging mattered relatively little to him; he had never been a man who relied on creating an overwhelming physical impression.

Gromyko said, “Should the Yashcheritsi offer not to settle heavily along our southern border if we truly do stop arms shipments that annoy them, how ought we to respond?”

“Ah. That is interesting, Andrei Andreyevich,” Molotov said. “Do you think they would have the imagination to propose such a bargain?” Before Gromyko could answer, Molotov went on, “If they do not, should we propose it to them?” Now he did smile, unpleasantly. “How Mao would howl!”

“So he would. Seldom have I met a man who had so much arrogance,” Gromyko said. “Hitler came close, but Hitler actually led a state, where Mao has spent the last thirty years wishing he could.”

“Even so,” Molotov agreed. He pondered. Would he sell his Chinese ideological brethren down the river to gain advantage for the Soviet Union? He did not need to ponder long. “I hope Queek does propose it; if we do so, it may suggest weakness to the Lizards. But we can raise the issue if we must. Keeping the Lizards well away from us counts for more than keeping Mao happy.”

“I agree, Comrade General Secretary,” Gromyko said. “The Lizards will not settle China in any great numbers; it already has too many people. Mao’s chief value to us is keeping the countryside unsettled, and he will do that with or without our arms.”

“A very pretty solution indeed,” Molotov said, warming up all the way to tepid. “One way or another, we shall use it.”

Molotov’s secretary came in and announced, “The ambassador from the Race and his interpreter are here.” He did not call the Lizard a Lizard, not where the said Lizard or the interpreter could hear him.

Queek skittered into Molotov’s office. He was about the size of a ten-year-old, though he seemed smaller because of his forward-slung posture. One of his eye turrets, weirdly like a chameleon’s, swiveled toward Molotov, the other toward Gromyko. Molotov could not read his body paint, but its ornateness declared his high rank.

He addressed Molotov and Gromyko in his own hissing language. The interpreter, a tall, stolid, middle-aged human, spoke good Russian with a Polish accent: “The ambassador greets you in the name of the Emperor.”

“Tell him that we greet him in return, in the name of the workers and peasants of the Soviet Union,” Molotov answered. He smiled again, down where it did not show. At his very first meeting with the Lizards, not long after their invasion, he’d had the pleasure of letting them know that the Soviets had liquidated the Tsar and his family. Their own Emperors had ruled them for fifty thousand years; the news taught them, better than anything else could have done, that they were not dealing with creatures of a familiar sort.

The interpreter hissed and squeaked and popped and coughed. Queek made similar appalling noises. Again, the interpreter translated: “The ambassador says he is not certain this meeting has any point, as he has already made it clear to the foreign commissar that your views on the settlement of the Race are unacceptable.”