Strategic Moves

FOURTEEN

They walked along the water, carefully picking their way over rocks on the shore. The harbor was empty of boats, and the Tarratine Yacht Club was closed and shuttered.

“It’s beautifully desolate, isn’t it?” Adele said.

“Well-chosen words.”

“I like it that you brought me up here,” she said. “Most men would have taken me south to someplace warm.”

“I wanted you all to myself,” Stone said. “Up here I don’t have to compete with your friends and the tourists and the shops for your attention.”

“You have my undivided attention,” she said, squeezing his hand.

They were gone an hour, and when they returned Mary made them hot buttered rum, and that warmed them up.

At dinnertime Mary had managed to produce lobster Thermidor, and they ate it with a bottle of good white Burgundy from Dick Stone’s cellar.

Back in the living room, Adele stood at the window and watched the moon rising. “Are these windows tinted?” she asked. “The moon is a funny color.”

“Let me tell you about the house,” Stone said. “My cousin Dick was a lifelong employee of the Central Intelligence Agency, something I didn’t know until shortly before his death. Dick finally got the job he’d wanted all his life, deputy director for operations, but he died before he could assume the office. When he built the house, the Agency, in consideration of Dick’s importance to it, added many security features, among them thick, armored glass in all the windows. That’s why the moon’s color may seem a little odd.”

“Dick Stone was from your mother’s side of the family?”

“Yes, he was her brother’s son.”

“How did he die?”

“He was murdered, along with his wife and daughter.”

Adele looked shocked. “Was this in connection with his work?”

“No, it was a family matter. Say, can I show you the bedroom?”

She laughed and kissed him. “I’d love to see it,” she said.

He led her upstairs, and they helped each other undress, then plunged under the eiderdown duvet and clung to each other for warmth.

“I’m glad we’re not in Palm Beach,” she said, throwing a leg over his.

“I’m glad, too,” Stone said, then he turned his attention entirely to her needs.

After lunch the following day, Stone left the house alone and drove out to the airfield. There had been a little snow in the night, and he wanted to see if he was going to have an icing problem with the airplane.

The sun was well up, though, and what snow there may have been on the airframe had melted. Stone was about to get back into the old Ford when suddenly there was a helicopter over the runway. It was black, and he noticed that there was no registration number on the fuselage.

The chopper settled slowly, then a rear door opened and someone beckoned for him to approach. Stone walked over to the helicopter, and Lance Cabot leaned forward from a rear seat and offered his hand. Stone shook it, then other hands grabbed him and hoisted him aboard the aircraft. The door slammed, and the chopper rose straight up, then banked and turned south.

“What the hell is this?” Stone shouted over the noise of the rotor.

Lance pointed at his ear and mouthed, “Can’t hear you,” then he motioned for Stone to sit back in his seat, and another man buckled his seat belt.

They flew south for ten minutes across Penobscot Bay, then the helicopter descended and set down on a small island. The engines were cut, and the rotor spun down, then Lance and his two aides, along with Stone, got out and walked toward a large house fifty yards away.

“What is this place?” Stone asked. “And what the hell am I doing here?”

“I thought we’d have a chat,” Lance said as they climbed the steps to the front porch. They shed their coats in the entrance hall and Lance led Stone to a paneled library overlooking a rocky beach. He poured them both a brandy, and they sat down.

“Whose place is this?” Stone asked, grateful for the warmth of the brandy.

“It’s a rental, sort of,” Lance replied. “Belongs to an alumnus of the Agency. We use it for various tasks in the off-season. Right now there’s a Chinese agent upstairs in one of the bedrooms, being turned, I should expect.”

“Is this where you called me from?”

“Yes. As we flew in yesterday, I saw Jim Hackett’s little Mustang at the Islesboro field, so I knew you were here.”

So Lance was not all-knowing, after all, Stone thought. “You shouldn’t have told me that,” he replied. “I was terribly impressed with your knowledge of my whereabouts. And, by the way, the airplane is mine now. Hackett left it to me in his will.”

“You are a great inheritor of things, aren’t you, Stone? Your house in New York is from an aunt, I believe.”

“Great-aunt.”

“Then Dick Stone’s house, and now a jet airplane. You’re a fortunate fellow.”

“I suppose I am at that,” Stone said.

“Well, if you’re a nice fellow, nice things happen to you, don’t they?”

“If you say so,” Stone replied warily. He had the feeling something not so nice was about to happen to him.

“I expressed my displeasure with you yesterday, on the phone,” Lance said. “Now I want to expand on that a little.”

“You don’t need to expand, Lance; I’m well aware of your displeasure.”

“I thought it might help if I gave you a little background.”

“All right.”

“Will Lee, as you know, is now in his last term as president, and that means his wife, the lovely Katharine Rule Lee, is in her last years as our director.”

Stone nodded and sipped his brandy.

“Things are always changing in the intelligence game, but because of the president’s two terms and what turned out to be Kate’s calming presence, we at the Agency have had a rather long period of stability. There have been blips along the way, of course, among them various problems associated with the work of outside contractors.”

“Yes, I’ve read about those in the papers,” Stone said. “Particularly about the murder trial of a few of your mercenaries.”

“We do not accept that term,” Lance said. “These people are patriotic Americans, not simply hired guns. They actually save us money by performing many chores peripheral to our actual missions. We don’t have to train their people, you see; most are ex-military or ex-Agency or ex-something else, so they arrive with the requisite skill set.”

Stone continued to sip his brandy, which had warmed him down to his fingertips by this time.

“Because of some of the difficulties raised by previous contractors,” Lance said, “I am particularly interested in having Strategic Services on our team.”

“Because they’re clean?” Stone asked.

“Precisely. Jim Hackett has always operated in a highly ethical manner, and his reputation, and that of his company, is, as a result, impeccable.”

“And Mike Freeman wants to keep it that way,” Stone said.

“Of course, of course,” Lance replied, “and yet it is Mike himself who is the greatest threat to the company’s reputation.”

Stone stopped sipping brandy. “What do you mean by that?” he asked carefully.

“I think you may already know,” Lance said. “But I’m going to tell you anyway, just so all our cards will be on the table.” He took a sip of his brandy, then continued.