Imagine two friends. They have known each other longer than most lifetimes. When they met, they were young and cynical, already hardened by the wars they had seen and the things they had to do. One had been cycling through Europe when the Nazis swept through, and found himself recruited to be a courier in Dame Myra Hess’ network. The other grew up in a country immortalized by its ten thousand day war. They were colleagues in the counterintelligence community. It’s hard to be naïve in such circumstances, but they were still idealistic enough for one to say to the other in a dark moment in 1973, “Even if we lose, it’s worth it, Mark. It’s worth it to try for freedom.” They are in theory, part of the greatest generation, but now in their dwindling numbers, they are just two men and two friends who have not seen each other in some time, and likely will not see each other again.
It’s been eleven years since they last had dinner out together. They met at Au Pied de Cochon, in Georgetown, on Wisconsin and P Street. Au Pied de Cochon was an institution. It was open 365 days a year, 24 hours a day. Generations of Georgetown University students have crawled through the dimly lit café/bar with its scuffed wood bar and plastic covered banquettes, either to drink, or to recover from drinking with a greasy breakfast. Other long-standing patrons, Washingtonians in-the-know, came to Au Pied for their $12.95 lobsters and their French bistro fare. Cheap, fast, usually good. It had a sister restaurant at one time, Aux Fruits de Mer, which served seafood.
Au Pied is storied in Washington circles. They used to have a drink there called the “Yurchenko Shooter.” Vodka and Grand Marnier. Named after Vitaly Yurchenko. He was a KGB colonel and at the time, the highest ranking defector ever. He defected in August 1985. He later changed his mind, at Au Pied. On November 2, 1985, some three months after his defection, he was eating dinner with his CIA handler at one of the booths. He got up, ostensibly to use the bathroom. The bathrooms at Au Pied were spartan and battered, the doors old and hard to close – the wood having expanded and contracted in response to the constant heat and moisture from the kitchen, which faced the bathrooms. It didn’t take much effort for Yurchenko to simply walk out the kitchen and through the back door. He arrived at the Soviet Embassy’s gates that night, claiming he’d been drugged and kidnapped by American agents, and re-defected back to the Soviet Union. They used to have bronze plaque that marked where Yurchenko sat that night.
Maybe it was fitting that two former spymasters should meet there for dinner. They sat in the covered side patio and ordered lobster. They talked about Aldrich Ames, the CIA officer who had just been unmasked as a traitor, and fumed about the breakdown in protocol and analysis at their alma mater. It’s appropriate and ironic then that they were at Au Pied; it was Aldrich Ames who debriefed Yurchenko in 1985, and it was likely that Aldrich Ames reported back to the Soviets what Yurchenko had told the CIA. I wonder whatever happened to Yurchenko?
Au Pied closed down last year after three decades of non-stop service. It was time, according to the owner.
Things have been rushed for the younger one (and young is a relative term) these last few months. He has bought a home in Florida and sold the mainstay where he has lived and raised his children for three decades. The older one is frail now. The younger one talked about getting together with his friend before leaving Arlington. He didn’t have time.
Time’s a brutal thing. It’s a selfish mistress, demanding more than one can give, yet never offering enough in return. It’s 24 discrete units that seem impossible to fill, yet paradoxically is too brief. What do you do when the night’s gone late and the day is a thing of the past? What do you do at that twilight moment?
When it’s last call, there are few things better than sharing a drink with a good friend and reminiscing about the things you’ve been through together. In their greener days, they enjoyed drinks. The older one is deeply fond of Negronis. His friend liked a good gin and tonic, a penchant now shared by his youngest daughter. They liked drinking together.
Negroni
Invented at the Casoni Bar in Florence in the early century. Named after a Florentine count, Camillo Negroni, who wanted to enliven his favorite drink, the Americano, by adding gin.
- 1 oz gin
- 1 oz Campari
- 1 oz sweet vermouth
Mix ingredients and serve over ice. Garnish with a twist of lemon.
Gin and Tonic
- 2 oz Gin (sister would suggest Bombay Sapphire)
- 5 oz Tonic Water
Shake ingredients in a shaker with ice and strain into a rocks glass. Garnish with lime wedge.
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