Fatal Harbor

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

In the morning Lawrence made breakfast, tea and toast, and apologized for the thinness of the meal.

“Frances had a rough night,” he explained. “So I’m letting her sleep in.”

“I’m afraid it might have been my fault.”

He buttered a slice of toast. “How’s that?”

“I had a bad dream last night. Moved around a lot in the bed. I think that might have awakened Frances.”

He kept on buttering his toast.

“And I think… maybe the sound of me moving around in your son’s bed, that might have disturbed her. Brought back some memories. Maybe… some hope.”

Lawrence took a bite of his toast. “Yes, you’re correct. She poked me in the ribs, half-asleep, telling me that rascal John was trying to sneak back into his room. That I should go to his room and check him out, to see if he had been drinking. Then she realized what she had been saying. And that was that.”

“Sorry.”

“No more sorrys,” Lawrence said. “So what now?”

“Got one last appointment to keep, and then back to New Hampshire.”

“Do you think Chesak is still up there?”

“Don’t know where the hell he is,” I said. “But I intend to keep pressing and pressing.”

“Doing what, then?”

“Sometimes you press and poke, you get a reaction. That reaction can prove to be useful. It can lead you to places, to people. That’s what I intend to do.”

Lawrence nodded, got up from the table, went to a door that seemed to lead into a cellar. I finished my tea and toast, and then he came back up, holding a cell phone in his hand.

“This is for you.”

“Already have a cell phone.”

“Not like this one,” he said. “This one is shielded and encrypted. Your standard cell phone can easily be triangulated with the right equipment and the right agency, such that you can get a caller’s position within a certain number of yards. This one, however, is quite black and untraceable.”

I took the phone. “It’s already pre-programmed with my number,” Lawrence said. “You get anywhere, you have more information, you pass it along. If I come across anything of interest, I’ll pass it along as well.”

“You got a deal.”

A sharp nod. “I didn’t know about Munce, Price & O’Toole and their connection with Curt Chesak until you showed up. For that, you have my thanks.”

“Fair enough. But I want to make something quite clear before I leave here with this very cool James Bond phone. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. You and your friends in the Agency might want to scoop up Curt Chesak, interrogate him, find out who’s paying him and why they’re paying him. My interest in him is more medieval. Do you understand?”

“I do.”

“So if there’s going to be a conflict between the Agency’s wishes and my wishes, you can guess who’s coming out on top.”

Lawrence sighed. “As a retired yet active member of this nation’s intelligence community, I’m horrified at what you’re saying. As a father who’s lost his son, you have my full and total support.”

I went through the phone’s features one more time, and Lawrence said, “You said you have an appointment. Here, in Arlington?”

“Nope. In D.C.”

“How are you planning to get there?”

“Walk until I find a cab. Then get to the Metro station.”

Lawrence shook his head. “No. I’ll arrange for a ride.”

“I don’t think that’s a very good idea. I don’t think you want a record with a cab company that I was picked up here.”

He started gathering up our meager breakfast dishes. “You think just because I’m retired, I’ve gotten stupid all of a sudden? I have friends, I have previous arrangements. I’ll have a car and discreet driver ready to pick you up in a few minutes.” He went over to the sink. “May I ask where’s your appointment?”

“At the election headquarters of Senator Jackson Hale.”

That got his attention. “What, you intend to volunteer?”

“No.”

“Confess all?”

“Hardly. No, I’m going to see a friend of mine.”

He put the dishes in the dishwasher. “Former DoD co-worker?”

“No again. She’s a close friend. Girlfriend, I suppose you could say.”

“But you live in New Hampshire.”

“I do. And I intend to stay there.”

“Does she want to go back to New Hampshire after the election?”

I stood up from the table, new phone in hand. “Not for a second.”

He smiled. “Now I know why that’s your last appointment.”

My ride was a black Lincoln Town Car, and my driver was a cheerful Nepalese man who proudly told me that he had once been a Gurkha soldier, serving in the Royal Gurkha Rifles, and that Lawrence had once saved his life at some remote outpost in Afghanistan. His name was Suraj Gurung.

At a traffic light he turned, grinning. “So ever since then, I am in Mister Lawrence’s debt. Especially since he arranged for my family and me to come here, to this blessed land.”

“Mister Lawrence is lucky to have you at his side.”

Suraj chuckled. In the front seat of the Town Car was a copy of that day’s Washington Post. He reached underneath the paper, pulled out a long, curved knife called a kukri. “Many Taliban have felt the kiss of this, and if anyone attempts to harm Mister Lawrence, they will get a sweet kiss, indeed.”

I was dropped off on M Street, at an impressive office building that had a huge banner stretched across the lobby entrance: HALE FOR PRESIDENT CAMPAIGN HEADQUARTERS. I went down the street and purchased that day’s Post from a kiosk, and then slowly walked back to campaign headquarters. I took my time. I slowly went up the sidewalk and down, and then, on a return trip, my patience paid off.

Two black limos rolled up and a group of serious-looking men and women in power suits bailed out. I resisted the urge to make a serious circus clown car reference. Half of them were talking on cell phones, and the other half were talking to each other, hands and arms flying. They went through the double glass doors, and I fell in step behind them. They skirted past a security desk, flashing badges, and they didn’t hesitate as they approached a bank of elevators. A uniformed security guard — a young female — waved us all through.

So much for D.C. security.

With the aid of cheerful campaign workers who were no doubt impressed with the newspaper I was carrying and my age, it took just a couple of minutes to find Annie Wynn’s office, which was an impressive office indeed. When I had first seen her at work for Senator Jackson Hale of Georgia, it had been a frigid January in New Hampshire with lots of snow and ice. Her office back then had been a battered surplus battleship-gray desk, jammed up against a host of others in a rented space that had once been a clothing store in downtown Manchester. The phones would always be ringing, voices would be raised, and trash barrels were overflowing with pizza boxes and Chinese takeout food containers.

Now she had a private office, with expensive-looking furniture, leather chairs, a couch, a credenza, and piles of newspapers and briefing books. I sat down on the couch, looked out the window which had a jaw-dropping view of the office building across the street. The whole floor was neat, with nary a pizza box to be found, and the phones had low ringing chimes that seemed to gently ask you to pick them up.

Yet there was still a sense of energy to the people out there in the other offices and cubicles, a grim determination to fight these last few weeks to elect their man president. I recalled my father, years and years ago when I was in high school, talking about the last presidential candidate who had seemed to enjoy it all, Humphrey, the former V.P. from Minnesota. A “happy warrior,” my father had said, the very last of the breed.

I took in the office. A television set that was muted, showing CNN, and a computer monitor. No photos, no mementoes, nothing personal in here that said it belonged to Annie Wynn, formerly of Massachusetts, who spent a lot of time in New Hampshire.

Her voice, coming down the hall: “… and tell Eddie to bump back the caucus meeting to two P.M. The Senator’s BBC interview is going to run over, I know it. And get me the latest numbers from Colorado, and damn it, I don’t care what they say, I want a better sampling this time!”

She breezed in, dumped a set of black briefing books on the table, and turned to me, cell phone in hand.

Her hand lowered. Her face showed shock, but still looked pretty good. Pretty damn good, in fact. She had on black high-heeled shoes, black hose, and a dark gray skirt cut just above her knees. The blouse fit her curves nicely and was ivory with lots of collar and lace, and her fine auburn hair was curled around at the base of her neck in some sort of braid. I was pleased to see she was wearing a gold necklace that I had bought for her last summer at a crafts fair up at Sunapee, New Hampshire.

“Annie,” I said.

She shook her head. “Lewis, what the hell are you doing here?”

I stood up. “Nice to see you, too.”

She bit her lower lip, closed her eyes for a quick moment. “Sorry, it’s been one of those months.” Now she smiled and I went to her, and we hugged and kissed, and the touch and smell of her made it suddenly seem all right.

Still smiling, she went around and sat behind her desk, and I sat across from her on a fine black leather chair. “You bad boy, how did you get in here?”

“I walked.”

“Past security?”

“Apparently so,” and she shook her head.

“Sorry,” she said. “Not a laughing matter.” She picked up a pen, scribbled a note, and then said, “Dear one, why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”

“It was sort of a last-minute trip,” I said. “Some business to take care of down here.”

“Really? You told me you’d never, ever come back to D.C. Even to visit. Must have been something pretty important to get you out of New Hampshire.”

“Important enough.”

“So when are you going to take care of your business?”

“Already done.”

“Let me guess. Your quest to make everything right for your Diane Woods?”

“That’s right.”

“Guess I do know you, huh?” she asked. “So, when did you get to town?”

“Yesterday morning.”

Another “oh,” followed by “I see. So I was last on your schedule, then?”

“No,” I said, “I was saving the best for last.”

Her face was impassive on that one. More than ever, I felt out of sorts, out of place. Annie looked at her calendar and said, “Lewis, I’m already late for a status report, and I’m booked solid for the rest of the day, not even time for dinner. But maybe cocktails at eleven tonight, if things aren’t too crazy.”

“No, I’ve got something to say, Annie, and it shouldn’t take long.”

She leaned back in her chair. “Funny, I have something to say too. You first.”

I looked into that sweet, adorable face that I had spent so many long and delightful hours with, from cross-country skiing along deserted trails near the Atlantic Ocean, to trips to Fenway Park and gourmet meals at hidden restaurants in the North Shore. Hikes in the White Mountains and late nights watching old movies on TCM, and long, luscious, and soul-fulfilling hours in bed.

I took a breath. “I’m sorry, Annie, it’s not going to work. The two of us. This is your town now. Some time ago it was mine. I belonged here. I thrived here. But those days are long gone. I’ve been here less than two days, and I feel like I’m going to jump out of my skin, or that some car is going to run me down on Pennsylvania Avenue.”

I paused. She stayed quiet. I went on. “But I can’t ask, I can’t hope, I can’t expect you to head back north when the campaign ends. You’ve already told me that the Senator has promised you a future here, on his senate staff if he loses, on his presidential staff if he wins.”

“So glad you remembered,” she said, voice dry.

“You belong here now, Annie. Not me. So it’s not going to work.”

She slowly moved her pen around in a circle on her desk. “So you think it’s over.”

“Considering the few encounters we’ve had these past several weeks, and the quality of our conversations, I can’t see it being anything else.”

My mouth had dried out, my heart was slowly and heavily thumping along, and I waited.

Annie looked out the window, looked back at me. “Once again, you’ve led the way, my friend. As much as it pains me to say so, you’re right. It is over. And I just haven’t had the time or the guts to take a look at it.”

She made another rotation of her pen, looked up. “Still friends?”

“Forever, Annie. Forever.”

Her phone started ringing, and a young man with a pained expression on his face rapped at the side of the door. “Annie, Mister Geers is really getting impatient.”

“I’ll be right there.”

I got up and the young man stepped out, and I leaned over the desk and gave her a kiss. She smiled when I pulled back, but she hadn’t really kissed me in return. “There are some things of yours, back at Tyler Beach,” I said. “I’ll box them up and send them here, if you don’t mind.”

A quick nod as she gathered up her papers and briefing books. She still ignored her ringing phone. “That’d be fine, Lewis, but as you can see, I’m already late.”

“No problem.”

I started out of the office, recalled something and turned. “Annie, what were you going to say?”

Her head was still bent down. “What? What do you mean?”

“When I got here, you said you had something to say to me. What was it?”

“Oh.” She raised up her head, briefing books and binders clasped to her chest. “Yes, sorry. I was going to ask if you’d do me a favor. But… it’s not that important anymore.”

“Go ahead, Annie, say it.”

“Well… ”

“Please, tell me what you were going to say.”

Again, she bit her lower lip. “The thing you’re doing for Diane. The man who hurt her. Your hunt for Curt Chesak. Please stop it, will you?”

It felt like my heart had slowed right down, my blood now the consistency of cold molasses.

“What did you just say?”

“You heard me. This obsession on finding Curt Chesak. Please stop it. You’re making waves, Lewis, waves that can get the wrong people pissed off enough to hurt you, me, and the Senator. So stop it. Please. For me.”

I looked behind me and up and down the adjacent wide hallway, suddenly wondering if hard-eyed men with dark suits and earpieces were coming my way.

But so far, the coast was clear.

“Annie?”

“Yes?”

“You know what I said right back then, about being friends forever?”

“I do.”

I walked out her door. “Forever just ended.”