Hovey's Deception

Ex-CIA deskman Talley is lured back to help untangle an apparent plot to ruin the Agency's reputation. Professor Lawrence Hovey is arrested in Prague for receiving military secrets from a Russian dissident. Hovey protests his innocence but, confronted with damning evidence, he publicly confesses his involvement with the CIA. Talley uncovers enough to suggest that Hovey was led into espionage by someone falsely claiming to be CIA, but to prove this they must get Hovey out of a Czech prison. A complication is the affair Talley has begun with Jane Boudreau, Hovey's ex-lover. Real trouble arises when an American traitor, working for the Czechs, sets out to kill Hovey before he can be debriefed, using Jane as bait. The dialogue, especially officialese, is authentic, but the action is rather wooden and the characters are oddly inert. Ross wrote The Kreuzeck Coordinates. (June 16)