After an all too brief love affair with the ex-KGB agent Ivan Sasanov Davina Graham is left inconsolable after his murder by Russian assassins. She is violently embittered by English Security's dismal failure to provide adequate protection and cover for the defector. In Washington, Elizabeth Fleming, the British wife of the new President's closest personal associate, has been drinking heavily and claiming that her husband plans to murder her. There is the threat not only of a major scandal, but also the suspicion that Fleming himself might be a double agent.

Brigadier James White of the Secret Intelligence Service want to avoid CIA interference. And Mrs. Fleming has made a hysterical demand to the Ambassador for protection as a British citizen. It is a situation that needs kid-glove treatment. It needs an investigator who can win Elizabeth's confidence, get close to the husband, someone who is also ultra-alert to the espionage techniques of Moscow Center. Elizabeth Fleming's file reveals that she was at school with an ex-operative, Davina Graham.

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