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own.
    Sergey added, “I’d love to see him. I live not far from Earl’s Court, in Notting Hill. Perhaps young Ivan Ivanovich could find time to have dinner with me some evening.”
    “I’m sure he would like that,” Ryan replied.
    “Don’t worry. I will not tell him too many old war stories.”
    “My son wouldn’t believe you, anyway.”
    The room erupted in laughter. Of those present, only Ed and Mary Pat knew the full history between the two men. Cathy was having a hard time imagining the aged Russian ever having been a threat to her husband.
    The talk turned to Ed and Mary Pat, and their time in Moscow in the eighties. They talked about their fondness for the country, the people, and the customs.
    Ryan ate his lunch, his eyes still across the table on Sergey. He imagined his old friend would probably much rather be drinking vodka instead of sipping iced tea, and eating borscht instead of pork tenderloin. Although his fork had poked and prodded his plate, Jack didn’t think he’d eaten a bite.
    Cathy asked Sergey about his speaking tour, and this seemed to perk him up considerably. He’d been to nearly a dozen cities across the United States in the past two weeks, and he had something nice to say about every one. He’d been speaking about what he saw as the corrupt administration of Valeri Volodin, mostly at universities, and he also had a book in the works to pound the message home even further.
    On that subject, Ed Foley said, “Sergey, we’re a year into Valeri Volodin’s first term. Just yesterday Volodin signed a new decree whereby he is allowed to handpick the governors throughout Russia’s eighty-three regions. It looks, to an old hand like me, as if the rollback of democracy is picking up steam.”
    Golovko replied, “From Volodin’s point of view, it makes sense for him to do this.”
    “How so?”
    “Regional elections are coming up later in the year. There was always the chance, small though it may be, that the population would elect someone whose loyalty to the central government was in question. It is Volodin’s goal to control everything from Moscow. Putting his own people in charge in the eighty-three regions will help him do that.”
    Mary Pat asked, “Where do you see democracy in Russia at the end of Volodin’s first term?”
    Golovko took a long sip of ice water. He said, “President Volodin explains away his iron fist by saying, ‘Russia has a
special democracy
.’ This is his reference to the fact he controls most of the media, handpicks governors, and throws businessmen in jail who he feels don’t keep the interests of the Kremlin in mind with every business decision they make.” Golovko shook his head slowly in disgust. Ryan saw a sheen of perspiration glisten through his thin white hair. “A
special democracy
. Russia’s special democracy is more commonly known around the world by another name. Dictatorship.”
    There were nods of agreement all around.
    “What is happening in Russia is not about government. It is about crime. Volodin and his cronies have billions of dollars of interests in Gazprom, the government natural-gas concern, and Rosneft, the oil concern, as well as minority ownership and total control over banks and shipping and timber concerns. They are raping the country of its wealth and natural resources, and they are using the power of the Kremlin to do it. After three more years of Volodin and his
siloviki
in power, I am afraid what is left of Russia’s democracy will only be a memory. This is no exaggeration on my part. Central power is a snowball that picks up snow as it rolls downhill. It will get bigger and bigger, and it will move faster and faster. In a few years there will be no one able to stop it.”
    “Why do the people stand for it?” Cathy asked.
    “The social contract in Russia is very simple. The population is willing to give up liberty and turn a blind eye to government corruption in exchange for security and prosperity. This worked as