Santa Fe Edge

43

Teddy Fay sat down at his computer and logged in to the Agency mainframe, first establishing his own computer’s position in Elmira, New York. He went to the personnel files and pulled up Todd Bacon’s service record.

Young Bacon, he learned, had been born in Charleston, West Virginia, to a single mother, had been a star athlete and valedictorian of his high school class, and had attended Columbia University on a full academic scholarship, majoring in languages while playing football and rowing for his school. He had been recruited for the CIA by a professor there and had graduated summa cum laude. He was perfect for the Agency.

He had excelled in every area of his training at the Farm and had had three foreign postings since. In Panama, after Teddy had assassinated the station chief, who had recognized him in a bar, Bacon had been made acting station chief.

It was shortly after Bacon’s promotion that he had crossed Teddy’s trail on Cumberland Island, in south Georgia, and had managed to put some bullet holes in his airplane’s wing. Teddy was uncertain how or why Bacon had made the leap from Panama to Georgia, but he had to believe that the young agent was pursuing him.

Teddy thought he could see the fine hand of Lance Cabot in all this, and that meant Holly Barker as well. This was irritating, since Teddy, after faking his death, had enjoyed being dead. He could not believe that it was in the Agency’s interests to pursue and kill him. The media had bought the story of his death, and it would be embarrassing if it was learned that he was still alive. Probably Cabot was just tidying up a messy corner of his realm as deputy director of operations, and if so, Holly Barker would be involved too, since she was his assistant deputy director.

He went to the interoffice e-mail program and addressed a message to her.

My Dear Holly,

It was so very good to encounter you in Florida recently. I had thought that since we were not at loggerheads there, you and your superior were prepared to let sleeping dogs lie, as it were. However, the presence of your representative in my last city of residence, and his ingenious but ineffectual attempts to locate me, has told me that someone at Langley wishes to put me permanently to sleep. That is regrettable, and not just for me.

You may tell your superior(s) that I am now reestablished in another part of the world, and should your young protégé, or anyone else, pursue me, I will be forced to put him out of his misery and to do so in a very public manner, requiring distasteful explanations to be made.

I should think that your young man could be more useful to the Agency alive and that he might better be employed elsewhere. If your superior(s) can see the way clear to preserve your agent’s good health and not to send others after him, I will promise to henceforth live very quietly. If not, things could get very, very messy.

You may respond to this missive at your internal box number 100001.

Hugs and kisses,

T.

Teddy gave his e-mail a high-priority rating and inserted a sender’s line not his own.

HOLLY BARKER SAT at her desk, making notes for a report she had to write on a recent Agency operation, when her computer made a chiming noise and a box appeared on her screen, reporting that she had received a high-priority internal message from the director. She opened and read it with growing consternation, then printed it, saved the message and went next door to Lance Cabot’s office.

“A moment?” she asked from his open door.

“Come in,” Lance replied, not looking up from his desk.

Holly closed the door behind her, which got his attention, then sat down and passed the message across his desk.

Lance began to read it, and she saw a tiny flicker of something on his usually impassive face. When he finished, he put the message down. “I don’t believe it,” he said.

“You’ll notice that the e-mail appears to have been sent from the director’s computer,” Holly said.

“The gall!” Lance said, with more emotion than she had ever seen him display. “He broke into our mainframe and into the director’s mailbox!”

“Looks that way,” Holly said. She leaned forward. “Lance, what is your response going to be?”

“Response? You think I’m going to respond to this?”

“It’s addressed to me. I’ll respond, if you like. He’s apparently created an internal mailbox for himself.”

“When did you last hear from Todd Bacon?” he asked.

“This morning. I’m afraid Teddy is running rings around him.”

“Should we send someone to help him?”

“Lance, read the message again.”

“I’ve read it twice.”

“Then you understand that he is going to start killing again. Do you want that?”

“Of course not.”

“Please remember,” Holly said, “that Teddy is professionally and personally very well equipped-perhaps as much as anyone in the Agency-to eliminate anybody who tries to get to him, and he’s right: If he starts to do that, then explanations are going to have to be made.”

“Are you telling me that Todd can’t handle this?”

“I have a high opinion of Todd,” Holly said. “He is certainly a rising star here and could succeed at any number of assignments. He could also get dead on this one. In fact, I’m surprised that since Teddy so obviously knows about him, he isn’t dead already.”

“Do you believe, as he implies in his message, that Teddy has moved on from Santa Fe?”

“That’s what he does when he thinks he might be discovered: He moves on. I have no reason to doubt him.”

“Todd found him once. He could find him again.”

“That could very well be the worst possible thing that could happen, both to Todd and to you and, by extension, to me.”

“So, Holly, you’re worried about your hide?”

“In dangerous situations, Lance, I always worry about my hide.”

“Not the mission?”

“This isn’t a mission, it’s a vendetta, and vendettas can always turn around and bite you on the ass.”

“I’ll give it some thought.”

“Do you want me to respond to the e-mail?” Holly asked.

“Yes. Say, ‘Message received and understood.’ ”

“Is that a threat or are you agreeing to his terms? We’d better be clear.”

“I don’t want to be clear,” Lance said. “I want him to worry.”

“Then respond to the message yourself,” Holly said, standing up and walking out.