Blagonravov, Minister of the _Chrezvychainaya Komissiya_, the Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage, was of the opinion that if this virus of revolt was originating from the West, then it would be stronger in the satellite countries than in Russia itself. Simonov held no opinion as yet. He would wait and see. However, there was an uncomfortable feeling about the whole assignment. The group in Magnitogorsk, he was all but sure, had no connections with Western agents, nor anyone else, for that matter. Of course, it might have been an exception. He left the Ministry, his face thoughtful as he climbed into his waiting Zil. This assignment was going to be a lengthy one. He'd have to wind up various affairs here in Moscow, personal as well as business. He might be away for a year or more. There was a sheet of paper on the seat of his aircushion car. He frowned at it. It couldn't have been there before. He picked it up. It was a mimeographed throw-away. It was entitled, _FREEDOM_, and it began: _Comrades, more than a hundred years ago the founders of scientific socialism, Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, explained that the State was incompatible with liberty, that the State was an instrument of repression of one class by another. They explained that for true freedom ever to exist the State must wither away._ _Under the leadership of Lenin, Stalin, Krushchev and now Zverev, the State has become ever stronger. Far from withering away, it continues to oppress us. Fellow Russians, it is time we take action! We must...._ Colonel Simonov bounced from his car again, shot his eyes up and down the street. He barely refrained from drawing the 9 mm automatic which nestled under his left shoulder and which he knew how to use so well. He curtly beckoned to the plainclothes man, still idling against the building a hundred feet or so up the street. The other approached him, touched the brim of his hat in a half salute. Simonov snapped, "Do you know who I am?" "Yes, colonel." Ilya Simonov thrust the leaflet forward. "How did this get into my car?" The other looked at it blankly. "I don't know, Colonel Simonov." "You've been here all this time?" "Why, yes colonel." "With my car in plain sight?" That didn't seem to call for an answer. The plainclothesman looked apprehensive but blank. Simonov turned on his heel and approached the two guards at the gate. They were not more than thirty feet from where he was parked. They came to the salute but he growled, "At ease. Look here, did anyone approach my vehicle while I was inside?" One of the soldiers said, "Sir, twenty or thirty people have passed since the Comrade colonel entered the Ministry." The other one said, "Yes, sir."