lines of the
politically suspect being hauled off to Siberia. But on the other hand
he was unprepared for the prosperity he did find.

[Illustration]

Not that this was any paradise, worker's or otherwise. But it still
came as a mild surprise. Henry Kuran couldn't remember so far back
that he hadn't had his daily dose of anti-Russianism. Not unless it
was for the brief respite during the Second World War when for a
couple of years the Red Army had been composed of heroes and Stalin
had overnight become benevolent old Uncle Joe.

There weren't as many cars on the streets as in American cities, but
there were more than he had expected nor were they 1955 model
Packards. So far as he could see, they were approximately the same
cars as were being turned out in Western Europe.

Public transportation, he admitted, was superior to that found in the
Western capitals. Obviously, it would have to be, without automobiles,
buses, streetcars and subways would have to carry the brunt of
traffic. However, it was the spotless efficiency of public
transportation that set him back.

The shops were still short of the pinnacles touched by Western
capitals. They weren't empty of goods, luxury goods as well as
necessities, but they weren't overflowing with the endless quantities,
the hundred-shadings of quality and fashion that you expected in the
States.

But what struck nearest to him was the fact that the people in the
streets were not broken spirited depressed, humorless drudges. In
fact, why not admit it, they looked about the same as people in the
streets anywhere else. Some laughed, some looked troubled. Children
ran and played. Lovers held hands and looked into each other's eyes.
Some reeled under an overload of vodka. Some hurried along, business
bent. Some dawdled, window shopped, or strolled along for the air.
Some read books or newspapers as they shuffled, radar directed, and
unconscious of the world about them.

They were only a day and half in Leningrad. They saw the Hermitage,
comparable to the Louvre and far and above any art museum in America.
They saw the famous subway--which deserved its fame. They were ushered
through a couple of square miles of the Elektrosile electrical
equipment works, claimed ostentatiously by the to be the largest in
the world. They ate in restaurants as good as any Hank Kuran had been
able to afford at home and stayed one night at the Astoria Hotel.

At least, Hank had the satisfaction of