Hopscotch

— 7 -

Cutter made a face when he stepped into the FBI building. Myerson beside him took off his hat, wiped the inside hatband and then his forehead where the hat had welted a red dent. Then he looked at the hat. “That’s appropriate.”

“What is?”

“I walk in with my hat in my hand.” Myerson winced and blubbered his heavy lips around an exhalation. He patted his stomach. “I’m back on the cottage cheese and salad number. I envy you wiry bastards. Here we are.”

The secretary kept them waiting a while and then they were granted their audience with the Assistant Director of the FBI, a trim sandy man named Tobin in the regulation seersucker.

There were the usual interdepartmental preambles-cautious courtesies-and then Myerson gave Cutter the floor. Cutter proffered one of the composites. “His name’s Miles Kendig. Retired Agency official…”

“I’ve met him a few times,” Tobin said. “What’d he do, defect?”

“He may have. He’s ramming around somewhere and we’ve got to get our hands on him. There are things we need to find out from him.”

“What secrets did he steal?”

“That’s what we want to find out from him,” Cutter said smoothly. He didn’t like the Bureau; he especially didn’t like it when they had to kowtow to the Bureau. “He was in Virginia yesterday. God knows where he is by now. But if he’s still in the United States it’s your bailiwick, not ours. Anyhow we haven’t got the domestic manpower for it.”

“You’re asking me to put up a dragnet for him?”

“I’m afraid we are,” Myerson said. “It’s that important.”

“But you won’t even tell us what he’s charged with?”

Cutter said, “He hasn’t been charged. We want him for questioning.”

“Sure you do. In connection with what?”

Cutter contained his temper and deferred to Myerson because he didn’t trust himself to speak calmly. Myerson said, “I’m afraid that’s on a need-to-know basis.”

“You guys are something else,” Tobin said. Now Cutter was amused: this was the kind of treatment the Bureau habitually gave to local police departments and now the shoe was on the other foot.

Myerson said, “It’s a matter of national security.”

“That’s a phrase that’s lost a lot of meaning lately, Mr. Myerson.”

On the curb Myerson put his hat on and scowled. “I’ll have to take it upstairs. Tobin won’t put any enthusiasm into it. It’s going to have to come down from the top before he gets his ass in gear. But that’ll take a day or two. In the meantime keep your people working around the clock-and keep them working afterwards too. I’d like to get to Kendig ahead of the Bureau if we can. Shove their noses in it. Smug bastards.”

“I’ll be surprised if anybody gets close to Kendig very fast. He’s quick. All he ever needed was the smell of an opportunity.”

Myerson shook his head. “He only needs to slip once and the ceiling comes down on top of him. You want to have some lunch?”

“No thanks. Ross will be reporting back at one.”

“Cottage cheese and salad.” Myerson left him.

Cutter caught a taxi to take him back to the Arlington lot where he’d left the motor-pool car. He’ll go to ground for a while, he thought. Now where would he hide?

Ross was early-waiting for him. Ross looked too long for the chair he was in-absurdly tall with pink smooth baby-skin and the brown hair cropped close to the skull like fuzz on a tennis ball, in-candescently eager and energetic. “We had a signal from Follett.”

“Where’s Follett?”

“Marseilles. Kendig bought his papers from Saint-Breheret.”

Something twanged inside Cutter. This was the real start of the hunt.

“Three blank passports-two American, one French. Three blank driver’s licenses, same distribution. But he bought a wallet full of credit cards in the name of James Butler.”

“Okay,” Cutter said. He smiled abruptly. “Okay. It’s a con game but we’ll play it his way. Maybe he’ll tell us something he didn’t mean to.”

“What do you mean a con game?”

“We’re supposed to waste a lot of energy tracking James Butler. It’ll turn out to be a dead end when it suits Kendig’s purpose. But he may leave us a trace or two he didn’t count on leaving.” He reached for the phone. “FBI headquarters, please. Mr. Tobin.”