O'Farrell's Law

TWENTY-EIGHT

O’FARRHLL HAD no idea how long everything would take, so he called Petty on the man’s outside, insecure line and said he was being held in Chicago on family business for a few days; all the bookkeeping was up to date and there was nothing outstanding. Petty said he appreciated being told and solicitously asked if there were anything he could do. O’Farrell said he didn’t think so.

O’Farrell went to see McMasters on the second day. Billy’s description had rung some bells with people in the narcotics division. There was a blank on anyone named Rick, but there was a rap sheet for narcotics dealing on a Felipe Lopez Portillo, who was known to drive a Toyota. He was gay, so Rick was probably the current lover; Felipe got them through their drug dependence and could always take his pick. Boxer had been identified. There were two possession and three supplying convictions against a Rene Ibañez. He’d fought flyweight and briefly been considered a Golden Gloves contender in his class. He’d started living the good life before the good live arrived and had screwed up: he’d fought so badly in his last official fight that there’d been a drug test that had proven positive and he had lost his license. He still fought sometimes on the fifty-dollar-a-night circuit, so he kept himself in shape; particularly by bicycling on a racing machine. And he had a red rose tattooed on the middle finger of his left hand.

“Portillo?” O’Farrell asked. “Ibañez? What nationalities?”

“Portillo’s Colombian. Ibañez is Cuban-American.”

O’Farrell waited to feel something, but nothing came. The anger—the forbidden emotion—of that first night had gone now, and he knew although he had an identification he wouldn’t go seeking them, tonight or any other night. It was still difficult to believe that he’d done that, someone with his supposed control. He said, “You going to pick them up?”

McMasters shook his head. “They’re not on the streets, won’t be, I guess, until they think the heat’s off. And we won’t, even then. Not for what happened with Billy.”

“What!”

McMasters frowned. “You think we’re going to arraign streetwise drug dealers on the word of an eight-year-old kid? Their lawyers would suck us up and blow us out in bubbles.”

“Then what the fuck was it all about?” O’Farrell exploded. “Why’d you have me drive Billy so far into the ground that he’ll need a psychiatrist, if it was all one great big waste of time!”

“It wasn’t a great big waste of time, Mr. O’Farrell,” the other man said calmly. “We didn’t know Portillo and Ibañez were operating. Now we do. And we know how they’re operating, which is something else we didn’t know. There’s a marker sheet on both of them and we wait and we watch. We watch until they try it again and this time we catch them, only we have more than the word of a kid who believes spacemen exist. We have the evidence of an equally streetwise, hairy-assed narcotics officer who won’t be sliced up like chopped liver in the witness box.”

“Bullshit!” O’Farrell said. “They won’t try a kid from Billy’s school again, if they’re as streetwise as you say. So what have they got? The choice of a hundred schools, all over the city. You got enough officers to stake out every likely school, for as long as it takes? Your way they could go on operating for months! Years!”

“What’s your way, Mr. O’Farrell?” McMasters asked. “Pick them up off the streets, when we do see them, or bust into wherever we find they’re living? Take them to some back lot and tell them they don’t deserve to live, which they don’t, and blow them away? Summary justice, quick and neat and tidy, no need to bother a judge or jury? That’s not the way justice works in this country, sir, irritating though it is sometimes.”

O’Farrell swallowed, gazing at the other man, any response jumbled and clouded in his mind like those children’s toys that instantly become an obliterating snowstorm by being turned upside down. Finding them and killing them had been exactly what he’d been thinking, what he still thought. Justice—the justice of courts and attorneys and measured argument—didn’t come into it, had no place. At last he said, “And so it goes on?”

“And so it goes on, although we try to stop as much as possible,” McMasters said. “And I agree; it’s not enough.”

There was no purpose in discussing the philosophy of drug prevention on the streets of Chicago and its suburbs, O’Farrell thought. He said, “Ellen’s clean, according to the drug tests. We got a copy today.”

“So did I,” McMasters confirmed. “I’m glad.”

O’Farrell came close to asking the man’s recommendation, for a child psychiatrist, but at the last moment recalled that he knew someone else far better qualified. When he telephoned, Lambert listened without interruption, promised to get back to him, and did so within the day. He would, he said, recommend a female over a male and the best in the area was Patricia Dwyer. She turned out to be a motherly, big-chested woman whose office was like the toy-cluttered interview room at the police station. From her fees O’Farrell decided she had to be the best, but she and Billy developed an immediate rapport, so O’Farrell judged whatever it cost to be worthwhile. Before Billy’s first session he and Ellen spent an hour with the woman, answering every question. On impulse, because she told them of frequent involvement in matrimonial cases, O’Farrell asked her to recommend a lawyer through whom he could pursue Patrick.

Steven Giles was a nervously thin, stripe-suited man with rimless spectacles and a marine haircut—although he hardly looked robust enough to have served. Giles was peremptory and impatiently aggressive, which O’Farrell decided might be a good attitude for them.

Halfway through their first interview Giles said to Ellen, “So your reason for working late sometimes was that Patrick repeatedly reneged on alimony and child support?”

“Yes,” Ellen said, subdued.

“What took you so long to try to get the payments made through the court? The system exists.”

“He kept promising,” Ellen said emptily.

Giles sighed. “That doesn’t say much about your judgment.”

“Not a lot does,” Ellen said, depressed into self-pity.

The attorney took Ellen through the details of her job, the hours worked, and her income and expenditures and then said, “You don’t live a life of luxury, do you?”

“I’m giving her an allowance,” O’Farrell said. “She’ll be able to manage all right if the alimony and child-support arrears are paid up and then maintained.”

Speaking directly to Ellen, Giles said, “I can do my part, and if the facts are as you’ve outlined them, I don’t see we’ve got a great problem. But you’ve got to help yourself more if you want to stay ahead in the future.”

“What do you mean?”

“The moment he tries to duck, you’ve got to tell me so I can go back through the courts,” the lawyer insisted. “And I mean duck on anything: if he misses more than one visit with Billy without a proper excuse, you tell me. Likewise if there’s any job change, I want to hear that, too.…” The man hesitated, looking briefly at O’Farrell. “Your father’s right. Patrick left you; he’s responsible for you. He doesn’t deserve any breaks.”

“I know,” Ellen said sadly.

“So stop being a wimp,” Giles said. “Start standing up for yourself. And for Billy.”

“Well! well! well!” McCarthy said, putting aside the documentation that had been collated. “Here’s some more ingredients for the pot. O’Farrell has got some personal involvement with drugs, through what’s happened to his grandson. And José Gaviria Rivera is an official delegate to a conference in Spain. What can we make out of that?”

Sneider said, “Spain could be an excellent opportunity. O’Farrell’s the one we can’t anticipate or second-guess.”

“Yet the one who’s got to do it,” McCarthy said. To the third man in the room, the Plans director said, “So could he be persuaded?”

“Providing the argument was carefully enough prepared, I think he could,” Lambert said.

McCarthy smiled at his deputy. “You still got the Makarevich file out of records?”

“Yes,” Sneider said.

“It could all come good,” McCarthy said, distantly. “Then let’s see what people say about Soviet freedom and glasnost and all that other shit.”

TWENTY-NINE

THE WARNING that something particularly important was arriving by diplomatic courier came in code through the intelligence service’s supposedly secure electronics link with Havana, so Rivera was prepared. And worried. It was a method that had never been used before—openly connecting him with the DGI—so the risk had to have been judged acceptable even if the communication channel wasn’t secure from the British after all. Very important, then. Well aware that speculation was fruitless, Rivera speculated anyway, convinced there could only be one thing to justify it. But what could have gone wrong! His excuse about the VAX—that highly classified, state-of-the-art technology would take much longer to obtain—had been accepted, and everything else had been supplied. There’d been congratulations, the promise of the unwanted promotion. Which left only the siphoned-off bank account. But it was impossible for that to have been discovered! Or was it? If Belac had bypassed him about the held-back payment and complained or sought settlement direct from Havana (Why in God’s name hadn’t he paid! Why had he been so greedy!) it would have been possible to locate it by working backward, from Belac’s Swiss account to the other account from which the earlier money had come.

The pendulum swung, from pessimism to optimism. So what? Because of the Swiss bank secrecy regulations, Havana could only have gotten, at best, an account number. No amount. No evidence of what he’d been doing. And he would have known if Belac had approached Havana, Rivera reasoned. Havana didn’t know Belac was the supplier: Rivera’s refusal to disclose his or any other arms dealer’s identity had been essential to his remaining the indispensable intermediary. If Belac, someone completely unknown to Havana, managed somehow to penetrate the governmental layers demanding money, Rivera would receive a query. Could this, in fact, be that query? Unlikely, Rivera reassured himself. This wasn’t the level of first inquiry; this was far more serious.

Since Estelle’s death, Rivera had established a new routine with Jorge, arranging his ambassadorial commitments so that he could spend three evenings a week with the boy, and they ate together as often as possible. Tonight had been one of the three evenings, but whatever was coming from Havana took priority. He telephoned Maxine to tell her there was a possibility of his being delayed for dinner. She was to apologize to Jorge and hold the meal as long as possible, but perhaps no later than 8:30. He’d call again if he could.

Rivera had made the call on his private line; that phone sat now on his desk, a taunting reminder. Where the hell was Belac? Why didn’t the bastard call, to be told that everything was going to be settled between them? Indeed, why wasn’t it? It was infantile, an empty victory, wanting Belac to come to him. Rivera had the Belgian’s account number and the bank address: all he had to do was authorize the transfer, from one account to the other. Not yet, he decided: not now. He needed to know first what was coming from Cuba: to know if Belac had gone to Havana direct. To move money about, on the day of a signal from Havana so important that they’d gone through the intelligence network, could prove to be a mistake. Time enough tomorrow, early, if the incoming message were something completely and uncomplicatedly different. Definitely—without question—do it then. Tell the man everything was final between them. Would Belac still be in hiding in Paris? Somewhere at least away from his Brussels office? It wouldn’t matter. If Belac were not there, Rivera was sure the man would have established a procedure to get and convey messages. That’s what he’d do: make the approach himself. He hadn’t wanted to—infantile!—but things were different now. Very different. Too different.

The diplomatic wallet was hurried immediately to him. Surprisingly it contained only one envelope, but the seal was that of the president’s secretariat. His hands shaking, Rivera opened it, dry-throated with nervousness, and it was difficult for him at first to read.

The last shipment of Angola-bound tanks on the City of Athens had .been off-loaded in Cuba. Eight had proven to be completely inoperable; in four, the engines were so useless that they could not move the vehicles onto their heavy loaders from the dockside. None of the accompanying spares had been for the correct model or make of the tanks. A lot weren’t even tank spares at all: they were heavy-duty truck parts. Alarmed about everything in the consignment, the military had tested two of the Stinger missiles. Both were duds, making the rest doubtful.

For a long time Rivera sat unmoving, the still-trembling paper in his hands. His first cohesive reaction was toward Belac, putting against the man all the worn obscenities, but in the middle of the mental tirade Rivera stopped, a smile forming. Incredible! he thought. The opportunity was absolutely and utterly incredible! The tremble now was of excitement. Rivera went fully through the idea that had come to him, thinking it was all so simple, and his smile widened when he decided it could work. Completely.

Handled another way, he remembered. The precise words of Ramirez, the DGI general who’d flown from Cuba immediately after the explosion. If we discover who did it, everything could be handled another way. Now it would be. To everyone’s satisfaction, but most of all to his. He’d produce Belac as the man who’d cheated on the last consignment, desperate enough to try to kill the one man who could name him to Havana. There would need to be a meeting between himself and Belac, ostensibly for the benefit of the DGI but in fact for Rivera to be sure it was all settled without any revealing interrogation. And the meeting had to take place away from England, because in England the Diplomatic Protection Force was still assigned to him. That would be no problem, either. He was scheduled to travel to the Spanish conference accompanied only by his DGI professionals. There was even an additional explanation, as far as his own intelligence service was concerned, for his meeting with Belac: a payment refused. Because he had been so successful, Havana had trusted him and had no idea what had been agreed on for the faulty tanks and missiles, because he had not yet rendered the doctored accounts. Now they would be doctored even further. But not excessively so; maybe by two million. That sounded about right. Two million for himself, ten million repaid to Havana, and a very final settlement for Belac.

Rivera examined his proposal from the other side, to locate the faults. There weren’t many. The greatest would be the DGI wanting to interrogate the arms dealer independently, but Rivera was reasonably confident he could maneuver that. Which left Belac himself. And the necessary meeting. Again, Rivera reasoned everything to be in his favor. Briefly the ambassador read part of the letter again and got up to consult a map on his conference table, trying to make a calculation. Three weeks. He guessed Belac would have allowed three weeks for the shipment to get from San Diego all the way across the Atlantic before it was discovered to be worthless scrap upon its East African arrival. And maybe that discovery would have taken another few days. Whatever, it gave the unsuspecting Belac a fairly tight time schedule if he were to get the money before Havana learned what he’d sold them. There’d be contact. Rivera assured himself; sooner rather than later. He found it difficult to conceive how completely perfectly everything had resolved itself.

Rivera was tempted to respond in full and at once to Havana, but he realized it would be premature. He had to allow himself sufficient time in their eyes supposedly to investigate. Instead he formally acknowledged the message and said he was immediately commencing inquiries and went home for dinner with Jorge.

Rivera had come genuinely to enjoy their increased time together, time he supposed would have been more difficult if he had still been involved with Henrietta. Her, he tried to convince himself, he missed not at all and ignored his pride to concede that she didn’t miss him, either. After that humiliating night in Pimlico he had not bothered to call her. She’d telephoned him three times, the first time accepting the message that he was occupied with official duties, the second asking what the hell was wrong, and the third telling him to go fuck himself. He said it would probably be more exciting than fucking her. And so it had ended. Deep down he still wished it hadn’t.

Jorge seemed to enjoy their evenings just as much. Rivera listened to the boy chatter on about the lycée and its schoolboy feuds and factions and how well—and sometimes not so well—Jorge believed himself to be doing. Because the opportunity was obvious, Rivera asked his son how he would feel about moving to Paris and Jorge solemnly considered the question before saying that he wouldn’t mind, and was it a possibility? Rivera said it was, uncomfortably aware that the whole idea seemed less attractive now that Henrietta was not coming. Paris provided a conversation for much of the meal, although Rivera kept everything vague, making no commitment. How long would it be? There was no benefit in remaining much after the Madrid conference, which now had added, essential importance. But Rivera thought—without bothering at that moment with any detailed consideration—that his resignation had to be timed properly. Too soon after the Belac episode might not be the right timing at all. It would be better if there were an interval between the two, as he had imposed an interval between Estelle’s death and his reappearing in public.

About Estelle an unspoken agreement had formed between them. She was never mentioned. Ever. Rivera accepted it to be Jorge’s way of coping with the horror of his mother’s death and did nothing to disturb it; if they were to talk about her, it had to be at Jorge’s choosing, no one else’s. In the immediate days after the assassination Rivera had even considered removing Estelle’s photographs from the house but didn’t, again taking his lead from the boy, in whose bedroom two pictures were still on display. From the first day, when it might have been expected. Jorge had never shown the slightest interest in the new security at the house or in being escorted to school by bodyguards. To the boy the arrangements seemed not to exist. So Rivera never remarked upon them, either.

There was a reminder from Havana within twenty-four hours that the inquiry was urgent. Despite the temptation, Rivera sent only a brief acknowledgment and late in the afternoon was actually considering ringing the Brussels number when the sound came on his private line. For a few seconds Rivera gazed at it, contemplating the pleasure and hoping it was not someone else. It wasn’t.

“There’s some unfinished business,” Belac declared at once, glad they were not face-to-face because he was sure his relief at Rivera taking the call would have been obvious.

“I know,” Rivera said. There was no uncertainty in the arrogant bastard’s voice, no hesitation with the words.

“I made allowances for the death of your wife, but I can’t understand why the settlement is still outstanding.” Belac began to relax.

“How could I have completed the settlement!” Rivera demanded, every move worked out.

Belac’s confidence faltered. It couldn’t have been discovered already! The City of Athens had days at seat yet. Weeks even. “What do you mean?”

“You didn’t think the payment account could remain open under the sort of investigation I was under, did you!”

A reasonable explanation, thought Belac. There was no friendliness in the ambassador’s voice, but then there never had been; friendship had not come into their association. But there was no suspicion, either. Which was the important thing. The fool still thought he was getting what he wanted; instead of which he was getting what he deserved. Belac grinned to himself, enjoying his play on words. “I hadn’t thought of that,” he admitted. “How are you going to settle?”

“A letter of credit,” Rivera said smoothly.

“What’s wrong with another money transfer from a different account?”

“Any account with which I’m associated is too dangerous.” Rivera said. Referring to the American episode, he added. “I thought you were being very cautious.”

“Upon whose account is the letter of credit to be drawn?”

“Government,” Rivera said. “No traceable link with me at all.”

“I’m still keeping away from Brussels, away from anywhere the Americans might be looking,” Belac said. “I’ll give you an address—”

“It must be handed over personally,” Rivera said. Without having to be tricked into it, the Belgian had just resolved the one remaining obstacle. If there had been a risk of U.S. surveillance, he couldn’t have moved against the man.

“Why?” Belac demanded, instantly apprehensive.

“Think of it!” Rivera urged. “It’s a government letter of credit. Going to someone under American investigation, someone whose name is on official files. Think about the result of it being intercepted and discovered. Besides, it’s an openly negotiable document, and we’re not risking that to any postal service; the idea is absurd.”

It was, Belac conceded. But the prospect of a personal meeting meant further delay. He’d have to find out the whereabouts of that damned freighter. It wouldn’t be difficult; he knew the way. Belac said, “What chance do we have of a safe, unobserved meeting?”

“I’ll come to you. in Europe,” Rivera offered. “Out of England I shall only be escorted by people who know, people who will actually provide protection!” The retribution became sweeter by the minute; there was just a minimal distortion of the truth.

“Where?” Belac demanded. “And when?”

Rivera had expected far more objection—why not transmit the letter through a one-off bank transaction, for instance, a question for which he’d prepared an answer—and was surprised at Belac’s apparently easy acceptance. And then he remembered that the arms dealer was in a hurry, and why. Flatter the sow’s ass, Rivera thought. He said, “I’ve got an official reason to come to Europe. The place and the time can be your choice. I don’t need more than two or three days’ warning.”

Time enough to find out about die City of Athens, Belac calculated. The arms dealer, who was staying in a small commercial hotel on Amsterdam’s Rozen Straat, near die Prinsen Canal, lied and said, “I am still in Paris but I’m moving on. I haven’t definitely decided where. I could call you in four days; arrange everything then.”

“That sounds fine,” Rivera said. In those four days there was going to be a lot of highly classified traffic between London and Havana.

“But no longer than four days,” Belac stressed.

“Definitely not,” the ambassador agreed.

Rivera was glad that he’d been able to dine on the promised night with Jorge because it would have been impossible now. He wrote a very full report, a duplicate copy to go to the DGI general. The uselessness of the final cargo made sense of the assassination, he argued; it had been an attempt of his supplier to remove him, the one person who could have provided the man’s identity when the fraud was discovered. He had spoken to the man and become further convinced by his evasiveness. There had, of course, been no open admission; all the blame for the worthless tanks and missiles had been put upon the American nominee purchasers. But there had been a hurried agreement to refund the purchase price, so hurried that Rivera took that as further indication of guilt. During his London visit, Rivera wrote, DGI General Ramirez had indicated a course of action that Rivera considered appropriate; to that end, he had arranged a meeting between himself and the arms dealer, to recover the money and to provide the necessary identification to DGI personnel who would anyway be accompanying him to Europe. He was sending a duplicate of this message to the DGI for its formal approval and asked for that approval, if given, to be communicated direct to the intelligence rezidentura at his embassy. Rivera concluded by deeply regretting his choice of supplier.

The response was as swift as Rivera hoped it would be. There was complete acceptance of his explanation. And approval that the matter be resolved according to the DGI general’s suggestion. The rezidentura was being separately advised. He, Rivera, retained the absolute confidence of the government.

The same day Carlos Mendez, the embassy head of the Directión Generale de Inteligencia, sought an interview.

“I have been told there is an assignment,” he said. The man was pleased. He’d never liked being excluded from monitoring what the ambassador did.

“Yes,” Rivera agreed. There was no nervousness, no reluctance. about what was going to happen. He was going to be involved in killing a man, he thought. He felt nothing.

Lloyds of London is the largest ship insurance organization in the world and for that reason maintains a global record of every vessel’s movement and position. It is a record to which the public has access, as Belac knew from previous experience of switching ships around the oceans. It took only minutes to learn about the City of Athens. Its last reported position was four hundred miles west of Puerto Rico. Because the record is updated daily there was no reference remaining to the emergency stop at Cuba several days before.

He was safe, Belac decided; quite safe. All that remained was to find a convenient meeting place in Amsterdam.

Patrick entered the court hesitantly, slightly behind his attorney, as if he were seeking protection from the man who was, in fact, protectively big, a fat, overflowing figure who waddled rather than walked.

O’Farrell and Jill were already there, in their turn protectively flanking Ellen on either side. O’Farrell was intent—and dismayed—at Ellen’s reaction to her ex-husband. Until Patrick entered the court she had been closed-face, but at once she smiled, hopefully. Patrick stared back, stone-faced, dismissive.

O’Farrell switched his attention fully upon Patrick. The suit was polyester, too sharp and too bright, an odd shade of blue. The undulating black hair had deeper waves and was longer than O’Farrell remembered and shone from some hair preparation. There was a heavy gold band on the same wrist as an even heavier watch, which was also gold, and as O’Farrell watched the man sit down at a table with his fat attorney, a yellow-metaled medallion attached to a neck chain slipped through his shirt. O’Farrell’s contempt increased: more fucking gold than in Fort Knox, yet the man couldn’t maintain payments to his first wife and child.

The two lawyers looked across the courtroom at each other, Giles nodding to the other man, who nodded back. Giles leaned closely to O’Farrell and said, “His name is Gerry Pallister.”

“Good?” O’Farrell asked.

Giles smiled. “That’s what we’re going to find out, aren’t we?”

There was a demand for them all to rise, which they did. The judge was a woman, a round-faced, motherly person. As the appellant Giles rose at once to outline Ellen’s application, but almost at once Pallister got to his feet, announcing that his client sought for the alimony—although not the child support—to be reduced on the grounds of hardship and that it was excessive.

O’Farrell gazed directly at Patrick, who studiously ignored the attention, and thought at that moment, despite all his training, he did not know if he could have kept his hands off the man if they had been in different surroundings.

A lot of the early part of the hearing came down to legal technicalities, the two lawyers close to the bench arguing procedural points, so it was some time before Ellen was called to give evidence. O’Farrell was impressed at how well she did. She was clearly nervous, but there was no tearful collapse. She gave her answers in a firm, respectful voice, following Giles through the questioning on unmade payments and unkept promises. O’Farrell was aware of Pallister frequently looking to Patrick, as if seeking clarification or confirmation, and O’Farrell wondered what bullshit story Patrick had fed his attorney before the hearing.

Ellen stood up well under examination from Pallister. The lawyer challenged her about payments she said had not been made that Patrick was insisting had, but Giles had anticipated that. Forewarned, Ellen produced her bank statements covering the disputed period, which clearly showed no deposits of either the alimony or child-support figures. The further attempt, after a hurried, head-bent consultation with Patrick, to insist that the payments had been made in cash, clearly did not impress the judge. Pallister tried several different ways to get Ellen to admit she could manage to keep herself and Billy on a reduced income and O’Farrell sat hot with concern that Ellen would misunderstand and agree, but Ellen didn’t, and when she returned to sit with them. O’Farrell squeezed his daughter’s hand and whispered. “Well done.”

Patrick tried hard in the witness stand, and O’Farrell couldn’t make up his mind at first whether the man was impressing the judge. Patrick admitted not paying some—but not all—of the arrears and pleaded remarriage and the commitments of a new family. It was not that he was unwilling to pay: it was that the lowness of his uncertain, commission-based income made it impossible for him to pay. If his income improved, he was willing, in fact, to advise his former wife, return to court, and have any new order increased. He was not intentionally neglectful. He sought to honor his responsibilities, as best he could.

Giles was absolutely brilliant, although not immediately so, and O’Farrell looked up worriedly at the man’s questioning. Giles’s stumbling, hesitant queries and practically servile demeanor at the beginning bewildered and shocked O’Farrell, because it was so alien to what he knew of the man.

Patrick, a bully, immediately discerned an imagined weakness. He seemed to grow in stature, as if he were being inflated, and the replies snapped back, sometimes before Giles had completed his wavering inquiry. There were times, once or twice, when Patrick actually smiled, an artificial expression like a clip-on bow tie. He was smiling when the trap opened and shut, engulfing him. The hesitancy and servility went as Giles repeated word for word an early answer from Patrick, comparing it as an obvious lie against some later response. He challenged the income figures produced by the man, and when Patrick argued that he had been telling the truth, Giles produced salary information from the car firm for which Patrick worked. Pallister made a token protest at Giles’s approach to Patrick’s employer, but it was only token, and O’Farrell suspected the burly lawyer was annoyed and displeased at having been so obviously lied to by his client.

Giles even asked about the gold watch and bracelet and got an admission from the supposedly impoverished and now groping Patrick that he’d bought both during the time he’d told the court he could not afford to keep up the payments.

By the time Giles finished, Ellen was shown to be a struggling devoted mother, Patrick the callous former husband, careless of her and of their child.

The court ruled that Patrick should pay off the full arrears that Ellen claimed at fifty dollars a month—through the court—and made an order that all future alimony and child-support payments should also be made through the court. The ruling was accompanied by the warning that the court would take a very critical view of any failure on Patrick’s part to meet his obligations.

Giles came to O’Farrell and said. “He was damned lucky he didn’t get hit with perjury.”

“So Pallister wasn’t so good after all?”

“I felt sorry for him,” Giles said. “You get a client who bullshits, there’s no way you can win.”

O’Farrell hurried from the courtroom ahead of Jill and Ellen, wanting to catch Patrick, which he did at the door leading out into the street. Patrick pretended not to hear the first shout, only stopping when O’Farrell overtook him and stood in front of him.

“You get all that, shithead!” O’Farrell demanded.

“Get out of the way, for Christ’s sake,” said Patrick, trying to push by.

O’Farrell didn’t move. He said, “But that’s just the point, shithead. Getting out of your way is something I am not going to do. I’m going to be in your way all the time, from now on. You be so much as an hour late, just once, in looking after my daughter and Billy. I’m going to have you back in court so fast there’ll be skid marks. There won’t be a moment when I’m not watching and waiting for you to fuck up. You hear me!”

On the way back to the apartment, Jill said, “I never imagined it would be possible to show Patrick up quite so clearly for what he is.”

“You were right, both of you. He is a bastard, isn’t he?” said Ellen. O’Farrell hoped that at last she believed it.

When they got back, the blips on the answering machine indicated there had been some calls without messages being left. O’Farrell had made the drinks, handed them around, and was saying. “I think we can celebrate,” when the telephone sounded again. He answered it with his glass in his hand, thinking it might be something or someone to do with the hearing, Giles for instance.

“I’ve been trying to get you all day,” said Petty. ‘There’s something I’d like us to talk about fairly urgently. You can get away, can’t you?”

It was a brief conversation. O’Farrell agreed, without any questions.

As he replaced the receiver, Petty said to the man with him, “You absolutely sure about giving him the position?”

“Of course I’m sure,” McCarthy said. “O’Farrell s a loyal operative, proved over a number of years, isn’t he? What could be more fitting than promotion?”

THIRTY

“IT IS an emergency,” Erickson stressed, in immediate support of the division chief’s proposal. “You can understand that, can’t you?”

There were black scuff marks on the wall by the radiator, as if the deputy sat there a lot, swinging his leg back and forth like he was doing now. O’Farrell said, “I wouldn’t have used the word ‘emergency.’”

“Come on!” Petty said from behind the desk of the Lafayette Square office, his voice that of a reasonable man being misunderstood. He went on, “We wouldn’t be putting it to you if there were any alternative! But there isn’t. You’re the only one who’s studied completely the Rivera file, who knows and believes the assignment should be carried out—”

“There’s no time to prepare anyone else.…” Erickson picked up.

“The Madrid conference starts in a week,” Petty said. “It can’t be anyone else.…”

“… really no time …”

The only one who knows and believes, O’Farrell thought. He wasn’t sure he knew or believed anything anymore. He tried to remember the leisurely, logical conversations he’d had with Lambert at Fort Pearce, but couldn’t. Not the actual words and arguments. There was just the impression at the end that what he did—what he’d done in the past—was right. O’Farrell said, “What’s so important about it being done in Spain? Why not allow the time to brief someone else? There are other places.”

“After what happened in England, Rivera is wrapped up tighter than a baby,” Erickson said. “In England it would never work.”

“Why should security be any less in Madrid?” O’Farrell persisted.

“Because in Madrid the security people will have all the conference delegates to protect,” Petty replied at once.

“He’ll still have Cuban protection, presumably?”

“Not as complete again as in London,” Erickson said. “We’ve checked the Cuban delegation. There are only four security personnel.”

“I have a family problem, in Chicago. I don’t want to be out of the country at this time,” O’Farrell said. He hesitated. “In fact, I said this was going to be a turnaround trip. I’m expected back tomorrow.”

“You mentioned family difficulties when you called,” Petty said. “Anything we can do? Not just personally; the Agency as well, I mean.”

O’Farrell was surprised at the offer. And at the apparent sympathy. “I don’t think so, but thank you,” he said. “My grandson is caught up in a little bother.” Little bother? O’Farrell questioned himself at once. It hadn’t seemed little over the past few days. Still didn’t. Which was why Jill had been astonished when he’d announced he had to return to Washington. They hadn’t argued—because, of course, they never argued—but O’Farrell knew it was the closest they’d come for a long time, on Jill’s part at least. That’s why he’d promised to fly back the following day, to minimize the upset.

“Kids!” Erickson shrugged, as if he knew all about it and was having the same problems himself.

“The conference starts in a week,” Petty said. “Due to last just four days. So the whole business can’t last any longer than twelve days. America is sending an official delegation, so we have access to all the security arrangements being considered by the Spanish: routes, timings, everything. It won’t need the usual reconnaissance.”

“Operation,” “assignment,” “business,” O’Farrell noted: all the meaningless ambiguities to avoid the real word, “murder.” Flatly he said, “I don’t want to do it.” He waited for an emotion: fear, at the awareness of how the refusal would affect him, relief, at finally saying it after so much agonizing, so much doubt. He didn’t feel anything at all and was positively disappointed. Petty was not looking at him. Instead the man’s attention was entirely upon Erickson.

Petty said, “You were right.”

Erickson shrugged a so-what shrug but didn’t say anything.

O’Farrell, misunderstanding, supposed it was obvious that the two men would have discussed his reaction before his arrival that morning. Wanting to fill the strangely embarrassing silence, he said, “After what happened in London, what else did you expect me to say?”

There was an odd expression on Petty’s face when he looked back to O’Farrell, as if he had forgotten that the man was even in the room. The blankness went, but there did not appear to be full recognition. Petty said, “This isn’t going to sound right … not sound right at all.”

“I don’t understand,” O’Farrell said, confused.

Petty gestured toward his deputy. “He warned me it wouldn’t sound right if I did it this way. But I didn’t want to make it seem like a condition. I thought you’d agree, you see. Then it would have come out altogether differently. Now it won’t; no way.”

“I really don’t understand a word you’re saying,” O’Farrell protested, bewildered.

Petty selected one of the carved-bowl pipes tidily racked on his desk, lighted up, and emitted thunderclouds of smoke. O’Farrell thought what a useful ploy it was for delaying a discussion. The pipe going, Petty said, “There is no other way of saying it, except straight out.”

“I’d like that,” O’Farrell said.

It wasn’t, however, Petty who began. From his window-sill perch Erickson said, “There’s been a big personnel review at Langley, covering all the departments.…”

“Including ours …” Petty said, on cue. “There’s going to be a lot of changes: dead wood cut away, a lot of reshuffling.…”

“And you feature on the list.…” Erickson said.

The speed of his being dumped surprised O’Farrell. He knew that it was to be expected, because of his refusal, but he’d imagined there would be some cosmetic interim period, a week or two before the hidden privileges began to be stripped away. He tried to think of something to say but couldn’t.

“High on more than one list,” Petty said. “For all our secrecy and deniability, there’s a lot of respect for you … a lot of respect.”

It sounded just like the enforced-retirement speech O’Farrell suspected it to be: before presenting the much-deserved gold watch, the managing director talked at length of dedication and loyalty over many years.… The difference here was that the speech was in stereo, from two speakers. And there wasn’t going to be any gold watch. Feeling he should contribute something, O’Farrell said, “That’s nice to know.”

“Which is going to be recognized …” Erickson announced. The man’s swinging heel scuffed another black smear among all the others, a shape vaguely resembling a question mark.

“How’d you feel about working here?” Petty asked. “Permanently here, I mean. With Don and me.”

O’Farrell looked from one man to the other, his initial, irrational thought how unusual it was to hear Petty refer to the other man by his Christian name. Frowning, he said, “But I do work with you both.”

Petty smiled. “Ever wonder why Chris Winton was never replaced as second deputy?”

The asthmatic bachelor who’d been the third member of the group when he’d first joined the department, O’Farrell remembered. He said, “A long time ago. I supposed there was a good enough reason that was none of my business.”

“There was a good enough reason.…” Erickson started.

“And now it’s very much your business,” Petty finished. “Winton wasn’t replaced because there was no one good enough, no one with the necessary mental strength and qualifications to fill the position. The feeling at Langley is that there is, now; that you should get the job.”

O’Farrell was astonished and had to call upon every last bit of his training not to show it. His mind raced. He would no longer be in the field, no longer required to kill. The most important consideration. No reduction in his income. Essential, with all the family demands. No abrupt overseas trips, so he’d always be available to sort out Ellen’s problems. What about drawbacks? He didn’t think … And then he did, brought up with a jolt. He said, “No, it doesn’t come out right at all, does it?”

“I explained!” Petty insisted.

“So explain it some more,” O’Farrell said. “Has my promotion already been decided? Or does it depend upon my finishing the Rivera assignment? No Spain, no promotion?”

The looks were very obvious between Petty and Erickson. Petty poked into the bowl of his pipe with a pointed metal spike he took from the pipe rack. He said, “We’ve both been interviewed, separately and together. Both made it clear we very much want you on board.…”

“You’ve got to believe that!” Erickson said. “We really do want you here. It would be a terrific team.…”

“But no decision has been reached?” O’Farrell asked.

Petty shook his head. “No.”

“Nor will it be if I refuse the Rivera assignment?” Why had he been so contemptuous earlier of the ambiguities? Why didn’t he say “kill” or “murder”?

“That doesn’t necessarily follow,” Petty said. “It shouldn’t affect any decision.”

“Shouldn’t,” O’Farrell said. “But it will.”

“Not if I explain it properly. Which I will,” the division director promised.

So what was it? O’Farrell demanded of himself. A genuine although badly phrased invitation, for which Petty had already apologized? Or the ultimatum he’d accused them of presenting? As an ultimatum it had to be the clumsiest, most heavy-handed ever put forward in the history of ultimatums. So bad, in fact, that it practically supported the director’s apology for making the offer the wrong way around.

A loud silence built up in the room. Petty let his pipe go out and Erickson stopped swinging his leg. Both looked at O’Farrell, obviously expecting a response. O’Farrell looked back at them, wishing he could think of one but not able to. because there was so much at so many different levels to consider and decide upon. It was Petty who broke.

“That’s the best I can do.” The man shrugged. “I’ll make the strongest pitch I can. Okay?”

“When?” O’Farrell asked, speaking at last.

“When?” Petty frowned.

“When do you have to make this strong pitch?”

“There’s a meeting penciled in for Friday. I guess that’s when it’ll be. I haven’t heard any differently.”

Three days’ time, O’Farrell thought. “I just can’t do it; not after what happened in London. It’s—” He stopped, seeking the right way to express himself. “I don’t know. I just can’t do it.…”

“Your personal decision,” Petty said. “That’s the way it’s always been.…”

“Always will be,” Erickson said. “You going back to Chicago tomorrow?”

“Sometime,” O’Farrell agreed. Why the vagueness? He had a confirmed reservation on a noon flight.

“Hope everything turns out all right,” Petty said. “Don’t forget: if there’s anything we can do, just ask.”

O’Farrell didn’t catch that noon flight. After the interview at Lafayette Square he drank more than he had for a long time. He took the martini pitcher into the den of the Alexandria house and sat in head-sunk reflection, making and unmaking decisions until it became difficult to rationalize at all. But not because of the booze. O’Farrell still felt in complete control of himself when the pitcher was empty. His difficulty was the difficulty that always existed: his complete and utter aloneness, never having anyone with whom he could discuss anything. And then he remembered that there was someone.

O’Farrell used the unlisted number that John Lambert had given him, feeling a positive stomach lurch of relief when the psychologist answered at once. Lambert said of course they could meet—that had always been the understanding—but not until the afternoon of the following day. O’Farrell agreed that would be fine. He canceled the Chicago flight and didn’t book another and reached Jill at their daughter’s apartment at the first attempt, too.

The same brittle tenseness there’d been in Jill’s voice when he’d announced the Washington visit came back when O’Farrell apologized for having to extend the trip. There was a lot of “what the hell” and “for Christ’s sake” (and “fuck” once or twice) but O’Farrell remained levelvoiced and very calm. There was something important that had come up, jobwise, and he had to see it through. There was no practical purpose in his being in Chicago; everything that had to be done had been. She asked how long and O’Farrell hesitated and said he wasn’t sure; just one day later than she’d expected him back, maybe. When Jill had worked the anger out of her system, she asked suddenly if there were anything wrong and O’Farrell hoped she missed the hesitation in his reply. There was nothing wrong, he assured her. He promised to tell her all about it when he got up to Chicago; there’d be more than enough time to create some fantasy about embezzlement inquiries or clerical mistakes. After so much practice, he’d become expert at such stories. Jill said she loved him and he said he loved her, unusually anxious to end the conversation. She sensed the keenness, asking if there were anything else the matter apart from work, and O’Farrell said of course there wasn’t.

He decided against any more to drink, leafing instead through the mail that had built up. He dumped the circulars and slipped the bills into his diary for payment. The only letter left was from the historical society that had provided most of his ancestor’s archive. There was a lot of photocopied material. A cover letter explained the society had been bequeathed several storage boxes of records kept until now by a family who’d researched their own ancestor’s arrival and subsequent career in America. The man had been a judge who’d actually sat upon some of the first O’Farrell cases. From their past dealings the society had known, without the need for an offering letter, that O’Farrell would want the copies, for which they enclosed their bill. They hoped O’Farrell would find the shipment useful.

O’Farrell flicked through the shipment without actually reading any of it, which was as unusual with such new and potentially exciting material as wanting quickly to terminate a conversation with his wife. There had to be about fifteen to twenty legal-sized sheets and other pages of different sizes. O’Farrell put them tidily upon the top of his bound archival books, which he didn’t bother that night to open. Which was the most unusual deviation from habit of all.

O’Farrell arrived early at Fort Pearce but Lambert had already given the authority for his entry to all the checkpoints. The psychologist actually came in person to the last guardpost to sign him through.

Lambert appeared to have walked down because he rode in O’ Farrell’s immaculate Ford back to the barracks-type building in which the man had his office.

“So how are things with Billy?”

Momentarily the question startled O’Farrell, and then he recalled the telephone call for help from Chicago. He said, “I was going to thank you. The psychiatrist you recommended, Mrs. Dwyer, has been tremendous.”

“Ms.,” Lambert said. “It’s Ms. She’s not married. So what’s happened?”

O’Farrell told the other man, and Lambert said, “Sounds like Patrick is a contender for the shit-of-the-year award.”

O’Farrell stopped carefully in the parking lot behind the building, choosing a space where he thought the Ford would be least likely to be hit by another motorist. He said, “There’d be no contest, believe me.”

As they walked side by side into the building, Lambert said, “Do you think all that you threatened will keep him in line?”

“I don’t think the bastard is capable of being straight if he wanted to be. At least we’ve got the court order now; we can pressure him. And Christ, am I going to pressure him if he screws up!”

Lambert led the way into the windowless office. O’Farrell, his previous visits in mind, saw that again the impossibly young-looking man was as always dressed with Ivy League smartness, the willing guest always ready for a party invitation. Without asking, Lambert filled a plastic mug from the permanently steaming coffeepot and handed it to O’Farrell. For once the television wasn’t on.

“So what’s the problem?” the psychologist asked.

He didn’t know how to begin, O’Farrell realized; not in a way that would properly convey his conflict of feelings to the other man. He looked around the room, trying to sort out his thoughts. There appeared to be several new rubber trees since last time, neatly planted in individual pots, but their leaves still looked dry. Near one stood a watering can. O’Farrell hadn’t thought rubber trees had to be watered very much.

“I asked what the problem was,” Lambert said.

“I want to explain it all so you’ll get the true picture, so that you’ll understand,” O’Farrell said. “It’s important that you understand how it all fits together.”

Lambert grinned openly at him. “Why not stop trying to think for me?” the man suggested. “I’ve got degrees that say I can understand things pretty well.”

“I wasn’t being offensive.”

“Just let it come out whichever way it comes.”

Which was what O’Farrell did, and he wasn’t happy with how it sounded. Several limes he backtracked, explaining parts of the meeting with Petty and Erickson quite differently on the second attempt than on the first; at other times he petered out in the middle of a sentence, unable to find an ending. At last he stumbled to a halt and said, “I didn’t get that across at all, did I?”

“I got most of it,” Lambert assured him. “It certainly looks like an ultimatum. I just can’t believe anyone could make it as awkwardly as that.”

“That’s something I find hard to believe,” O’Farrell agreed.

“He’s your boss; you’ve worked for him for a lot of years,” the psychologist said, “Is he normally as half-assed as that?”

“The opposite,” O’Farrell said. “Ours isn’t a division that can allow any misunderstanding.”

“So let’s turn it over the other way,” Lambert said. “If it’s not an ultimatum, then Rivera and Madrid don’t matter. And you’re still in line for the promotion.”

“Unless the panel or the director or whoever is making the final decision change their minds because of my refusal.”

“Good point,” Lambert agreed. “This promotion means a lot to you?”

O’Farrell paused before replying; he wouldn’t try to explain it because he was unsure if he could. He said, “A hell of a lot.”

“All the hidden extras, able to go on supporting everyone in the family and no longer having to be the executioner?” Lambert offered.

How was it that Lambert could sum it all up in about twenty words when he’d thrashed about for hours and still couldn’t put it in a comprehensible sentence? O’Farrell said, “I hadn’t thought about it as simply as that.”

“You’d still be involved, of course,” Lambert pointed out. “You wouldn’t be pulling the trigger or whatever, but with Petty and Erickson you’d be agreeing to the targets and initiating the operations.”

“I know that,” O’Farrell said.

“Still killing, then?” Lambert pressed. “The only difference would be that you wouldn’t be doing it yourself. You don’t find any difficulty there?”

“I thought we agreed on the need—and the justification—when I was here after the London mistake?”

Lambert nodded. “I thought we did, too. I was curious whether you’d changed your mind.”

“No,” O’Farrell said. “I haven’t changed my mind.”

“Not easier, perhaps, to be the judge rather than the man carrying out the sentence?”

Lambert hadn’t summed it all up, not in those first twenty or so words. It had taken him just a few more. Now he’d succeeded: everything laid out in the open, like items on a display stand. With that realization came another, the awareness of why he’d had so much difficulty expressing himself. It had all been so much bullshit the previous night, slumped in the den, pretending to examine all the options. He hadn’t examined anything, apart from the bottom of his martini glass. He’d refused to let himself think the thoughts that Lambert was making him examine now. O’Farrell said, “I would think both are equally difficult. It isn’t easy to kill a man. Or deciding if he should be killed.”

“I never supposed it was,” Lambert said.

The other man appeared briefly discomfited, and O’Farrell couldn’t understand why. As if in reminder, O’Farrell said. “I’ve definitely told them I wouldn’t do it: go to Spain and eliminate Rivera.” He detected an old petulance in his voice.

“You’ve already told me, several times,” Lambert said.

It seemed to be a moment—and a matter—for long and heavy silences, thought O’Farrell. As with Petty the previous day, it was Lambert who broke it.

The psychologist shook his head and said, “I’m not going to do it.”

“Do what?” O’Farrell asked. Now it was he who was discomfited.

“Make your decision for you. That’s what you want me to do, isn’t it? Tell you what to do. And I won’t do that.”

There was the temptation to argue, to insist that wasn’t why he’d sought the meeting, but O’Farrell knew it would have been a hollow protest, impossible to maintain. His reliance upon Lambert, a man he scarcely knew, was something else he had refused to admit to himself until this very moment, and he was disturbed by the awareness. It was a reversal of everything to which he was accustomed. Everyone—all the family—relied upon him. He was the strong one, the person who provided the guidance and the answers. He didn’t like the opposite, the implied weakness. He said. “I wanted to talk through the options. You were the only person I knew with sufficient clearance.” He even sounded reliant!

“And we’ve done just that, talked through the options. All of them,” Lambert said. “Now it’s time to decide. For you to decide.”

“I told you—” O’Farrell began, but Lambert interrupted him.

“If it were an ultimatum, absurdly put though it was, you can change your mind,” the psychologist said. “Petty’s meeting isn’t until Friday. And Petty can’t have given the assignment to anyone else, because you told me yourself there isn’t time to brief anyone else.”

“You sound as if you think I should do just that: change my mind,” O’Farrell said.

Lambert shook his head. “I told you I’m not going to do it, not decide for you,” he said. “It doesn’t matter a damn to me whether you change your mind or not. My official association with you ended when you left here the last time. What I am trying to do, because you asked to see me, is show you the way to face up to the reality of the situation. You’ve already made it clear you’re not going to do it, which would normally effectively retire you from the department. Fine, if that’s what you feel like doing. But there’s the promotion possibility. And I know all the reasons why that’s personally important. Petty says he’ll do his best for it not to be affected. I don’t know him well, but from what I do know he seems to be a pretty straight guy. So let’s trust him. Again, fine. You wanted all the options? There they are, spelled out for you again.”

O’Farrell used the psychologist’s phone to call Lafayette Square, using Petty’s direct and unlisted line. “I’m prepared to do it,” he announced.

“I’d hoped you would be,” Petty said.

“Amsterdam!” Rivera echoed, to the arms dealer’s announcement.

“And I want the money,” Belac insisted.

“You know it’s available,” the ambassador assured him. “Are you there now?”

“Not yet,” Belac lied. “Listen carefully: take a note. Six-eight, three-two, four-four.”

“What’s that?” Rivera asked, although he already guessed.

“A telephone number you are to ring, in three days’ time,” Belac said. With the City of Athens and its load of shit still miles from anywhere on the high seas, the Belgian thought, gloating.

“What’s wrong with an address?” Rivera queried.

“I told you already,” Belac reminded him. “I’m not having you lead the Americans to me.”

He’d questioned sufficiently, Rivera decided. Belac was on the hook once more and he didn’t want the man slipping off. “In three days,” he agreed.

“Don’t try and cheat me,” Belac said.

The cocky bastard, thought Rivera. He said, “I’ve never tried to cheat you. It’s been a misunderstanding.”

“I don’t want any more misunderstandings,” Belac said.

Rivera summoned the DGI chief the moment he disconnected from the Belgian’s call. Carlos Mendez listened intently to Rivera’s edited account of the conversation and said, “We’ll need to leave tomorrow, early. I’ll make the travel arrangements. And speak to Havana.”

Rivera frowned. “Belac isn’t expecting me for another three days.”

Mendez gave a palm-up gesture. “I don’t mean to be presumptuous, Excellency,” he said. “But this has to be my way. All of it.”

Rivera’s frown deepened. Presumption was precisely the attitude of the other man. He had to let it pass without correction for the moment, but he made a mental note not to let it continue.

Rivera left the embassy early, wanting as much time as possible with Jorge. He got to the Hampstead house just after the boy’s bath. Jorge came down the stairs still warm, smelling clean. And smelling of something else. It was the soap Estelle had used, Rivera realized at once. Had Jorge used it accidentally, picking up a piece that had been overlooked after Estelle’s death? Or had he intentionally ransacked some bathroom cabinet, searching it out?

They went through the established ritual of such evenings, Rivera sitting with a drink while Jorge recounted the events of the day, and then Rivera talking of anything that had happened at the embassy that he thought might interest the boy, which was not very much.

Rivera announced the following day’s departure, without saying where he was going, and apologized for the suddenness of the trip. Jorge, already warned of the Madrid conference, accepted the news quite contentedly. He asked his father when he would be returning and Rivera said definitely the day the conference ended, the sixteenth.

“Three days before school lets out,” Jorge said brightly.

Rivera knew of the extended, August-into-autumn holiday, of course, but he’d forgotten the precise dates. “We’ll really make it a vacation!” he promised. “You choose the place.”

Jorge was briefly silent with the seriousness of a twelve-year-old. Then he said, “Why not Paris, where we’re going to live?”

It made perfect sense, Rivera thought. They might even look at likely property, although house hunting was a fairly boring activity for a boy of Jorge’s age. “Paris it is,” he agreed. “I’ll have the arrangements made while I am away.”

“Did you talk to Mama about our going to live there?” asked Jorge.

The introduction of Estelle almost off-balanced Rivera. Aware that to show any surprise would be a mistake, he said at once, “No. I hadn’t decided about it.”

“I think she would have liked it, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Rivera said, with difficulty. “Yes, I think she would. She was fond of Paris.”

“Will you take me to the places you went to with Mama? I’d like to see them; know that she’d seen them, too.”

“Yes,” Rivera promised. “We’ll go to every one.”

“I loved Mama,” the child declared.

“I loved her, too,” Rivera said, for Jorge’s benefit.

THIRTY-ONE

NOTHING WAS as Rivera expected. He’d anticipated flying direct to Amsterdam, but they didn’t. They went—just he and Mendez—by train and cross-Channel ferry, and again not directly. From Calais, on a journey that required two changes, they traveled through France, going into Luxembourg at Namur and into Germany at Aachen. It was late into the evening before they reached Hannover.

The hotel was very small and dirty, halfway along the Davenshedterstrasse. They went out to eat, choosing a restaurant at random. It was bad. Rivera started to feel vaguely unclean; his skin itched, particularly on his arms, and he went twice to the toilet to wash his hands.

“Has all this really been necessary?” he demanded. Throughout the day he’d had to follow Mendez’s lead and he hadn’t enjoyed that, either. Mendez clearly had, every minute of it.

“If it weren’t, I wouldn’t have insisted upon it,” said Mendez, almost insolently. “There are far more checks at airports than at train border crossings and you’ve no reason, official or unofficial, to be in Holland anyway. Isn’t it better for your presence to remain completely unknown?”

“I suppose so,” Rivera said begrudgingly. “I expected more than just yourself.”

“I’m not alone,” Mendez said. “There are to be others in Amsterdam.”

“From London?”

Mendez pushed away his largely uneaten meal. “Cuba itself. It’s safer that way.”

Rivera felt the first flicker of apprehension. There might be a mistake and he, José Gaviria Rivera, might get caught up in an apparently squalid incident. Which wouldn’t remain squalid at all, once the investigation started.

“You mean they’re special…?” Rivera’s voice ebbed away, in his search of the word.

“Yes,” Mendez said helpfully. “What about protection? Belac, I mean. Does he have a lot of people around him?”

Rivera considered the question, recognizing its implication. “Never,” he said, surprised now that he thought about it. “We’ve only ever met alone, just the two of us. And according to what he told me, he’s staying away from Brussels, where he might have some protectors, because of the American investigation. That’s why we’re meeting in Amsterdam.”

Mendez gave a teeth-baring smile. “That’s good,” he said. “We’ll have to make sure, of course. But that sounds good.”

The hotel sheets, white in a long distant past, were gray, and the narrow bath was stained and actually dusty from lack of use. Rivera slept remarkably well, the pillow covered with a clean shirt and the one towel between himself and where he lay. When he showered the following morning, the water created an instant grime scum around his feet from the dirt in the bath.

The hotel in Amsterdam was much better. It was a pension on Wolvenstratt run by a Dutch doll of a woman, white-aproned, big-busted, and with a polished-apple face permanently creased by smiles. She allocated them adjoining rooms and hoped they found everything they wanted in Amsterdam. Rivera said he hoped so, too.

It was a day of pale, near-autumn sunshine and warm breezes, perfect for a country of gardeners and flower growers. Rivera and Mendez found a pavement cafe between the canals, but the intelligence man insisted upon their sitting inside and at a table at the back.

“Belac’s somewhere in Amsterdam,” Mendez said. “You’re not due to be here yet. Coincidence really does occur, sometimes. I don’t want to risk your being accidentally seen by the man.”

Irritating though it was to be subordinate to Mendez, the man did appear to be consummately professional, Rivera admitted to himself. The diplomat nodded understanding and said, “So we’re here. What now?”

“For you, very little until the meeting with Belac,” said Mendez. “I have to locate the others already here, although there’s little preparation we can make until you speak with Belac and make your arrangements.”

“Shall I be involved in the planning?” Rivera tried to make the question natural enough, but he was anxious for the answer. What if the professionals from Cuba seized Belac, instead of what he expected them to do! The truth about the withheld money would emerge in minutes. How could he have been so stupid as to have tried to manipulate it as he had!

“I’d prefer it if you weren’t, but it’s necessary,” Mendez said “They have to follow your lead; they’ve got to know you.”

The warmth of the day, and their sitting inside rather than out in the air, could account for the perspiration bubbling on his upper lip, Rivera decided. He said, “What about me reason for their being here at all? And what they have to do? Do they know I have to recover something, before they move?”

“They’ve been told Belac has cheated us, severely. But not how. Nothing at all about arms shipments. And nothing. either, about Belac’s part in what happened”—Mendez hesitated, considerately—“what happened in London.”

Nothing about the money! Rivera thought hopefully. Nothing, that is, providing Mendez were telling the truth. He said, “Will our meeting be today?”

“Tonight,” Mendez disclosed. He pushed a slip of paper across the table between them. Written on it was the address of a restaurant on Rapenburgerstratt. “There is a private dining room at the rear. Meet me there at seven.”

An order instead of a request, Rivera thought. “Where are you going to be until then?”

“Making contact,” Mendez said dismissively. “I’d like you to go back to Wolvenstraat and stay there, until it’s time to meet. And don’t shop on your way back, buy a gift or a souvenir for Jorge, for instance. There must be no visible record of your ever having been here.”

Rivera did exactly what he was told. Back at Wolvenstraat he stood at the window of his room, staring out at the tree-lined street, watching the early buildup of the rush-hour traffic. After that he sat in the only easy chair until he became bored, which was very quickly, so he went back to the window again. The traffic was heavier, a line stretching back from what he assumed to be a canal bridge.

Because of him—at his instigation—a man was going to die in a few hours, Rivera thought. It was an unreal feeling, now that the moment was almost here; difficult to rationalize. There was no guilt; no doubt, either. What then? He didn’t want to be part of it, not this close a part; he was a diplomat, not a thug. It made him feel dirty, like he’d felt in the German hotel. He was sweating again, too. Dear God, how glad he’d be when it was all over. Not just this. The ambassadorship and the London embassy and arms purchases: everything.

The run of thoughts led him back to the last evening with Jorge. The totally unexpected reference to Estelle was important. It had been more than reference, in fact: a normal conversation. Rivera was relieved. He took it to mean that the shock, the need to block every memory out, was easing at last. He wouldn’t remark about it, of course. He’d continue letting Jorge set the pace. Rivera thought it was important, too, that Jorge wanted to go to Paris for his vacation, knowing it was to be their new home. Perhaps it wouldn’t be boring for the boy to house-hunt. Perhaps that’s what Jorge wanted, a decisive break from a house and from a city that held so much horror for him. Just as he wanted a decisive break. Rivera couldn’t think of anything he wanted to retain from his time in London, apart from his polo. He’d have to put some serious thought to that. Choose the appropriately prestigious club to approach, get the right sort of stabling for the ponies, ship them across well in advance of the season. He didn’t want to enter a new club with animals that were below form, unsettled by their trip.

Rivera became claustrophobic long before the scheduled meeting and impulsively set out to walk to Rapenburgerstraat. Obedient to Mendez’s warnings not to buy anything, Rivera had no street map, but he found a public one on the side of a tourist stand near the canal bridge. It took him several minutes to locate the street he wanted; it seemed to be a long way away. He began walking purposefully, enjoying being out in the open again despite the onset of the evening’s chill, the canal a marker to guide him. Paris would be the place for shopping; Paris would be the place for many things.

Rapenburgerstraat did appear to be a long way away, a much greater distance than he’d calculated from the map. He was beginning to feel the effort of unaccustomed walking and abruptly remembered Mendez’s further remark about a chance sighting by Belac. He looked almost nervously around for a taxi, relieved when he saw one near the Amstel Bridge.

The traffic had eased by now, so Rivera arrived early at the restaurant. For a few moments he remained uncertainly on the pavement, feeling it would be a mistake to enter the private dining room early, to appear in the role of receiving the others. Instead, on the spur of the moment, he posed himself a personal, private test. There was a tree-shadowed bench just past the junction with the main road. Disregarding the chill, Rivera sat there, in the growing dusk, concentrating absolutely on the brightly lighted restaurant entrance, a Cuban sure he could identify other Cubans as they arrived. He remained there for half an hour, until 7:15, without picking out anyone. The panic was quick to grow. He had the name of the restaurant written on a piece of paper (have to destroy it later) so he couldn’t be mistaken. Where were they, then! Had something happened, to make it necessary for everything to be changed? What possibly could have happened, at this early stage? Nothing, Rivera thought, grasping for reassurance. Mendez had known where he was, until the last hour at least. The man could have telephoned if there’d been any change. Unless … Rivera stopped, his nervousness running ahead of his conjecture, unable to think unless what.

There was an obvious way to find out.

He hurried across the street and entered the restaurant. It was a huge, cavernous place so brightly lighted it made him squint, with all the tables jammed close together. It was already full, because the Dutch habitually eat early, and loud from the clatter of plates and bottles and glasses and the babble of everyone talking and laughing at once. The reservation desk was just inside the door, in front of a zinc-topped bar that stretched the entire length of the right-hand wall. A large section of that was given over to food, too, with most of the stools already occupied.

Rivera was waved cursorily toward the rear and had to ask again before finding his way to the private room. Outside its door he hesitated, unsure whether to knock and then angrily dismissing the doubt. He entered without any warning but stopped again, just inside.

An oval table, set for dinner, stood at the far side of the room. It had only one vacant place, at the very end. Mendez sat at the other end, the top, clearly in command. There were four other men, two of whom appeared to have stood hurriedly at the sudden opening of the door. All were completely nondescript, bland-suited, blank-faced. Rivera was sure none of them had entered while he’d watched from outside. He hadn’t seen Mendez, either. It didn’t matter. It had been a ridiculous, meaningless test.

An intricately carved Dutch dresser dominated the wall to Rivera’s left. It was stocked with bottles, wine as well as liquor. Also displayed were salads and cheeses and cold meats. Being kept hot on a hot plate were four covered serving dishes.

“We were wondering where you were,” said Mendez. “We’ve been waiting for you. To eat and to talk.”

There was an obvious rebuke in the man’s voice. Rivera said, “I’m sorry,” feeling he had to, but wishing it were avoidable.

There were no introductions and none of the men appeared the slightest bit interested in him. Mendez indicated the place at the far end of the table but at least poured Rivera’s wine. At the intelligence chief’s suggestion they served themselves food—Rivera declining anything. The talk quickly became a monologue, from Mendez. Rivera inferred as the man spoke that unlike himself and Mendez the four nameless men had flown directly into Amsterdam to spend time becoming familiar with the city’s geography. Whenever Rivera’s function entered the explanation. Mendez always referred to the ambassador as “him,” never once using a name or title.

“Have you done anything about the telephone number he gave?” asked a man to Rivera’s right.

Mendez shook his head. “It’ll be a public kiosk, easy enough to find,” he predicted. “Passersby usually answer a ringing telephone, and we could get the location that way. But it’s also a safeguard for Belac, although it’s pretty basic. All it takes is a few dollars to some kid to hang around to see if a call is made, to find out where it is, and Belac knows someone’s looking for it. And for him. It’s not worth the risk of frightening him off.”

Looking between Mendez and Rivera, the same man said, “What if the meeting is somewhere very public?”

“It doesn’t matter where it is,” Mendez said. Nodding in Rivera’s direction, he said, “You’ll be watching him. Once Belac gives him an envelope and leaves, you just follow the man: deal with him at the best time.”

That wouldn’t work, Rivera realized. Belac was expecting an envelope from him, not the other way around! And wouldn’t go from the meeting without it. He said, “What if Belac asks me to go somewhere with him instead of making the exchange in the open?”

Mendez gestured around the table. “They’ll be with you all the time. But don’t remain a moment longer than you have to; you have to get away, to distance yourself, as quickly as possible.”

“I know that,” Rivera said. He was sweating again, the familiar hollowness deep in his gut. It wasn’t going to work! he thought. It had seemed so easy, so plausible, in London. But not now. And there was nothing he could do about it now! He was trapped!

“Are we to move if there is no exchange?” asked a man nearer to Mendez.

Rivera at once saw that the possibility had not occurred to the intelligence chief and he enjoyed the other man’s discomfort, despite his own. At the same time he saw a wisp of hope, a way to extricate himself. Before Mendez could reply, Rivera said, “No! That’s to be the signal. No one is to move until the envelope is passed over.” It was still a desperate gamble, probably impossible if Belac wanted to meet during the day, but it was a chance and he had to seize any chance he saw. Or imagined he saw.

Mendez was slightly flushed at a decision being taken away from him. Rivera stared at the man, waiting for the challenge, but eventually the intelligence chief said, “That’s right. No move until that’s done.”

There was more general discussion in which Rivera took no part, talk about contact procedures and methods of recognition, and Rivera sat listening and looking at the quiet men grouped around the table. I’m sitting with killers, he thought, men who take other men’s lives, as a job. More unreality. The voice of Mendez broke into his reflection: “There’s nothing more to discuss until tomorrow.”

The four showed no sign of leaving, but Mendez rose, and Rivera rose with him. There were nods among them, but otherwise no farewells.

“That wasn’t how I imagined something like this being done,” Rivera said. He hadn’t known how to imagine it.

“Something like this?” Mendez asked, not understanding.

“Planning … planning the sort of thing that we were.”

“Why not?” The man shrugged. “What better way to gather a group together without suspicion than at a party in a restaurant?”

“Party?”

“The manager, the staff, were told it was a retirement celebration.” Mendez looked both ways along the street, waving for a taxi. As they went by the bench upon which Rivera had sat, trying to identify the Cubans entering the restaurant, Mendez said, “Weren’t you cold, sitting there as long as you did?”

Rivera, his face burning, didn’t reply. There was nothing to say.

There had been a lot of unexpected changes in a very short time, most of them to the good. The tense farewell conversation with Jill, in Chicago, had been the only practical upset and O’Farrell didn’t feel as badly about that as he normally might have done. He would have liked, somehow, to tell her why he’d made the decision to go away at this time; how important it was to her and the family. To all of them. But as with so much else it would never be possible. Not completely. He guessed he could talk about the most dramatic development, his official and impressive-sounding promotion ostensibly within the State Department. Special Financial Adviser.

O’Farrell fastened his seat belt for the Madrid landing, letting the title echo in his head, enjoying it. With every reason for enjoyment. Tinged with relief, although that was vague in his mind and he was letting it stay that way. This wasn’t another meaningless title, like so many in Washington. This represented an official, provable position within the government, something he’d never had before. Not with this job, anyway. He’d had it in the army, even when he was attached to Special Forces. Known there was authority, legality, behind him. Now he had it again. He wasn’t on his own anymore; no longer deniable. It gave him the same rank and the same financial grading as Petty and Erickson. According to Petty, at the meeting just before he’d left Washington, his elevation to join them in Lafayette Square was inevitable, although it still had to be confirmed.

The arrival was announced. O’Farrell gathered up his flight bag and ensured that his briefcase was secure. It contained one of the other surprises, possibly that last revelation he’d ever expected about his great-grandfather. O’Farrell had stuffed the latest material from the historical society into his briefcase at the very moment of walking out of die Alexandria house, to read during me flight, and come across the article very near the top of the pile. He’d thought, initially, it might become the centerpiece of his collection, because it was the only full interview with the man he’d ever discovered.

The astonishment—and O’Farrell genuinely had been astonished—came halfway through. There it was, in black and white, in the man’s own words: he’d grown to dislike the role of lawman. The explanation was rambling and badly formed—but then wasn’t his own?—and O’Farrell was chilled by the uncomfortable parallels. The old man had talked about the unsound laws of the time. And evidence he considered insufficient to obtain safe and proper convictions under those laws. The most chilling disclosure of all was the one O’Farrell found the easiest to understand. The fear that maybe once—and once was all it had to be—the wrong man, an innocent man, might be sentenced to death.

O’Farrell collected his bags from the carousel, passed unhindered through Customs, and quickly got a taxi to the city. He’d never had that problem, he thought, the familiar reassurance. Never an innocent man. The Vietnamese had been guilty, and the PLO hijacker had been guilty—convicted out of his own mouth—and Leonid Makarevich had been the most guilty of all. With Makarevich the cliché really did fit: that time assassination really had saved lives.

As he began to enter die city, O’Farrell felt the first stir of unease but was not perturbed by it. It wasn’t like the London uncertainties. Or even before, when he really started drinking. There was an objective, professional reason here. This time it had to be hurried—everything planned and completed in less than a week—without the normal allowance for preparation. And O’Farrell, the pattern-and-habit man, didn’t like any departure from normal. He hoped it would all be okay when he became accustomed to the place: became acclimatized.

Even the usual changes of accommodation wouldn’t be possible. His hotel was the Tirol, on the Calle de Princesa, a wide, horn-echoing highway; O’Farrell wished it were quieter. The last time, he consoled himself; just a few days and then never again. He was a Senior Financial Adviser now, a man with an accredited position.

The CIA station chief at the American embassy was a cheerful man. red-faced from obvious blood pressure, named Dick Lewis. He acknowledged Washington’s advice of O’Farrell’s arrival but carefully scrutinized O’Farrell’s documentation before handing over the material Langley had instructed him to collate.

“Been working for weeks on this goddamned conference.” said the man. It was a complaint without any real feeling, the predictable moan of the local operative against faraway headquarters who never understood. “Can’t understand what’s so important about it.”

“You know what Washington bureaucracy is like,” O’Farrell commiserated, entering into the required performance. From Petty he knew there was a twenty-strong contingent coming from the Commerce Department, with some observers from die World Bank. He said, “I very much appreciate your getting all this together for me.”

Lewis flicked dismissively at the manila package. “What you wanted was easy,” he said. “You very much involved, or shouldn’t I ask?”

“You shouldn’t ask,” O’Farrell said. “Actually I’m only caught up peripherally. I’m going to have to use communications later. Ship some stuff in, too, in the diplomatic bag.”

“That’s my job,” Lewis said. “Postmaster to the free world. You gonna have time for a drink or dinner while you’re here, maybe?”

“Maybe. I’ll let you know,” O’Farrell said, avoiding the outright refusal. He said, “What’s the Spanish security like? Adequate?”

“I’d choose another side to fight a war with,” Lewis said. “I feel sorry for them, though. There’re the Basques, in the north, fighting a separatist campaign. Virtually the same thing with Catalan, in the east. With this international conference in the middle, like a ripe plum.”

“You expect trouble, then?” O’Farrell asked.

“I’d lay odds,” Lewis said. “They’re calling on the army and Christ knows what else, but they still can’t cover everything. The shit’ll hit the fan somewhere, believe me, or Mama didn’t call me dick after the size of my appendage.”

Lewis was telling him nothing he had not learned from the final meeting with Petty. It was another reason for O’Farrell to be worried. He hadn’t operated in a situation like this before, with security authorities anticipating an outrage. He hadn’t ever operated with security authorities on alert, in fact. He said, “I’ll be in touch.”

“Anytime,” Lewis said. “Don’t forget that drink.”

The local embassy package consisted entirely of maps and plans and sketches and memoranda, most included to disguise those with which O’Farrell was truly concerned: the plans of the Cuban embassy, and those of the official residence of the Cuban ambassador to Spain, where Rivera was to stay; the protected routes to and from the conference hall; the plans of the conference hall itself; and the timings for the delegates’ movements. It was fortunate, O’Farrell supposed, that America’s participation had given them access to all this advance information. O’Farrell added a detailed map of the center of the city and with it traced the routes, thoroughly acquainting himself with the locations of the buildings.

Even before reconnoitering on foot, O’Farrell instinctively knew it was going to be difficult, the most difficult yet. Everything was too wide open, too public. Not enough time to prepare chanted through his mind. Security everywhere. Army contingents too.

O’Farrell stored and locked all the documentation in his briefcase and sat for several moments staring at it, the doubts jostling for importance in his mind. Abruptly, without warning, he was convulsed by a shudder, his arms and legs visibly vibrating. It hadn’t gone, he knew. Despite Lambert’s reasoned arguments and logical persuasion—the arguments and the logic he’d said he could accept and really thought he had—O’Farrell recognized the fact that he hadn’t been convinced at all.

That he couldn’t do it.

But he had to do it. All he had at the moment was a title, three fatuous words. And he wouldn’t get it, not until he completed this assignment. However much Petty might protest and posture, it had been an ultimatum; was still an ultimatum.

O’Farrell sighed, very deeply. With so little time he should go out now, tonight, to begin the reconnoiter at once. He decided upon a drink instead. Maybe two.

THIRTY-TWO

THE LINE was engaged. Rivera stood in the public kiosk, tightly controlling his nervousness, the busy signal mocking in his ear. He’d tensed himself to hear Belac’s voice, half thought of the words to say in reply to finalize their meeting. He had never considered a busy signal. It was an understandable setback if he were calling a public kiosk as Mendez guessed, but it disturbed him. As frightened as Rivera was, everything had omens and this was not a good one. He replaced the receiver and pressed the lever to regain his money, shrugging to Mendez beyond the glass. The intelligence chief was the nearest to him, with the others close at hand: two sat in a café just across the road, drinking coffee, and two were leaning against the canal rail, but were looking back toward him. Rivera’s most vivid childhood memory was his reluctant appearance in a school drama production, exposed upon a stage before what at the time had seemed hundreds of people. He’d hated it and forgotten his lines and made a fool of himself; he could remember still his embarrassment and felt it again now, the object of attention from an audience judging his performance.

He dialed again, fleetingly wondering whether he’d called the wrong number on the first occasion, although he didn’t think he had. It was still busy. Every digit had been correct that time. He recovered his money again and shrugged once more at Mendez.

The intelligence chief came right up to the kiosk, frowning. Before the man could speak Rivera said, “It’s engaged.”

“Engaged? Or out of order?”

Rivera’s stomach lurched at the thought of not being able to establish contact at all; there were too many implications in that for his disordered mind to assimilate. “Engaged,” he said uncertainly.

“Try again.”

Rivera did. and this time it rang clear. Rivera’s feelings switchbacked from apprehension to relief and immediately back to apprehension. Mendez remained close to him, close enough perhaps to hear the conversation and Rivera wasn’t sure he could risk that. Telephone in hand, he looked pointedly at the intelligence man, who stared back challengingly. He didn’t move.

“Yes?” It was Belac’s voice.

“I rang at the arranged time,” Rivera said. With Mendez so near he would be performing: to Mendez, if the man could hear, he had to sound demanding—the wronged and cheated person recovering millions—and to Belac he had to appear misunderstood, even conciliatory, wanting to hand the millions over. Rivera turned his back upon Mendez, trying for a position that would make what was said as indistinct as possible. And then thought of another escape; the switchback climbed toward relief again. He’d never liked switchbacks, even as a kid: they’d made him feel sick then, too.

“Someone was using it,” the Belgian said, not bothering with any fuller explanation.

Belac had spoken in English and Rivera had responded automatically in English. But they’d usually conversed in French! And throughout the journey across France and then here Mendez had shown no knowledge of the language. Reverting to it at once, Rivera said, “This cloak-and-dagger business is absurd.”

“I’m imposing the rules,” Belac said, confident he was able to do just that. “You got the letter of credit?”

Thank God die man had answered in French! Rivera said, “I want to meet and get the whole thing settled.” He decided that sounded sufficiently aggressive, even if Mendez could understand.

“I’m glad to hear it at last,” Belac said.

Rivera’s nerves were too tightly stretched for the other man’s arrogance to upset him; he was scarcely aware of it. He said, “We’re supposed to be fixing a meeting.”

“I’ve got to be careful, like I told you,” Belac said. “I can’t risk the possibility that you might have been followed by the Americans, to get me.”

If only you knew, Rivera thought. He managed a definite sigh into the mouthpiece. “I wasn’t followed to Paris and I haven’t been followed here. What do you want, for Christ’s sake!”

“Not for you to lose your temper, for a start,” Belac said.

“I’m waiting,” Rivera said, refusing to be goaded.

“Don’t you think Amsterdam is a beautiful city?”

“Yes,” Rivera said flatly, accepting the fact that he had to go along with the other man.

“I’ve decided we should see it, you and I. The way the tourists see it, that is. There’s a canal-boat dock near where Nieuwe Spiegel Straat goes over the Keizers Canal. Make the six o’clock departure; we can see the city lit up for the night.”

“Yes,” Rivera said, shortly again. He’d tried to guess how Belac would stage the encounter, of course; a canal trip had never even entered his mind. It could hardly be more public, encapsulated with God knows how many others! It would definitely be impossible for Mendez—for any of them—to make a move against the man in surroundings like that! He said, “How long’s the trip?”

“Why’s that important?” Belac snapped back at once.

“No reason.” Rivera stumbled, regretting the careless question. He was finding it difficult to hold single, sensible thoughts; three or four words would come into his mind but then drift away, and others, unconnected, would get in the way when he tried to call them back.

“You in a hurry to keep another appointment?”

“I wasn’t thinking,” Rivera said, retreating further. Please don’t let Mendez speak French, because this wasn’t forceful or demanding at all!

There was a silence from the other end of the line, so protracted that Rivera suddenly thought the other man had disconnected. He said, “Hello! You there!” and wished he hadn’t when Belac said. “Yes, I’m still here.”

“I’ll be at the dock at six o’clock,” Rivera said briskly, trying to recover.

“A little before six o’clock,” the other man stipulated. “It’s a popular trip this time of the year. Don’t want to find we can’t get on, do we?”

“A little before,” Rivera agreed.

They gathered around the café table, all of them listening in various attitudes of attention as Rivera set out the arrangements.

“Careful bastard,” Mendez said when the ambassador finished.

“Could be clever, too,” said one of the others.

“Nothing will be possible aboard a packed canal boat, will it?” Rivera said.

“It will still provide an identification,” Mendez reassured him. “That’s all that matters.”

Desperately Rivera wished that really were all that mattered; he’d never be able to spend any length of time with Belac—a few minutes even—without Belac demanding some sight of the money draft.

“These boats don’t let passengers off during the tour,” said one of the Cubans, showing the benefit of their extra day’s reconnaissance, but further unsettling Rivera. “So he’ll disembark at Nieuwe Spiegel, where he started.”

“Good area?” Mendez queried.

“Adequate,” the spokesman said. “I’ve known better.”

“We need to look at it in detail, now we’ve got a definite location,” Mendez said. “Divide into two pairs, positively no contact with each other. Tourist cover: cameras, travel bags, maps, stuff like that. I’ll split separately again.”

Rivera let the planning talk swirl around him. only half listening. There was so much that could go wrong! So many assumptions that could be mistakenly drawn. Why had he—Rivera stemmed the familiar demand, the mental whine of self-pity; it wasn’t a question to which he’d find any better answer than he had already. Rivera was aware of everyone except Mendez standing up from the table and brought his attention back to the group, but again, as on the previous night, there were no farewell gestures.

“There’s not a lot for you to do for a few hours,” Mendez said. “You might as well get something to eat.”

“I’m not hungry,” Rivera said. The sickness was in fact bubbling within him, threatening to erupt. He hoped he could control it.

“You all right?” Mendez asked solicitously. The concern was not for Rivera himself but for any difficulty arising in the part the ambassador had to play.

“I’m fine,” Rivera said, wishing he were.

He remained at the table after the other Cuban left, forcing another coffee upon himself to claim occupancy. After that he wandered without direction or awareness of his surroundings, occupied entirely in the self-justifying inward debate necessary to steel himself for what was to come. It shouldn’t be difficult pinpointing Belac for retribution, after what the bastard had done. Wrong to be nervous. Wrong to be frightened. Positively dangerous, in fact, because if he were frightened he’d make mistakes he couldn’t risk making. Fumble the supposed envelope exchange, to make Mendez curious maybe. Or worse, by his attitude, alert Belac that he was being targeted. Give the man the chance to escape. He couldn’t let that happen; it was inconceivable that Belac should escape. So he had to stay calm. Calm and controlled. Not difficult, he told himself again. Belac was a killer. The man had murdered Estelle; arranged it at least. Thrown Jorge into shock. And cheated. Or tried to cheat. Been caught, though. Now came the punishment. Not, actually, his decision. Havana’s decision. The correct one, of course. Belac deserved everything that was coming to him, everything and more.

It was a clock striking that brought Rivera out of himself: the sound, reminding him that time was important, not the hour itself, which he was too late to catch. He checked his own watch, saw it was a quarter past five, and stared around, with no idea where he was. The taxi driver spoke bad English but better French, although there was still some difficulty before the man properly understood the destination. Rivera rode on the edge of his seat, arm held so he could constantly see the time. He shouldn’t have left it so late! Stupid to have wandered so long and so far, without concentrating upon what he was doing! He should have—Stop it! he told himself. No panic. Plenty of time. Remain calm. Controlled.

It was past the half hour when they reached the landing stage, a well-organized tourist attraction with metal rails arranged to channel customers into an orderly line toward the tickets and the glass-roofed boats beyond. Except there was no line. A board promised a six o’clock departure, and as he entered the metaled walkway Rivera saw there was a boat already waiting. It appeared moderately filled, perhaps slightly less than half the seats occupied. Rivera purchased his ticket and had it punched at the gangway and bent forward to enter the viewing deck. It was entirely upon one level, benches and seats running the complete width apart from the aisle breaks. The glass canopy spanned from rail to rail, giving a panoramic view apart from the thin support ribs, which caused hardly any obstruction.

Mendez was in a rear seat, immediately inside the door, so that he had a full view of the observation area. Another Cuban whom Rivera recognized was three rows ahead, on the same side. A second was much nearer the front.

Rivera edged forward to a seat five rows short of the leading Cuban, liking the layout of the boat. He put his coat down to reserve the seat beside him. Any conversation or exchange between himself and Belac would be more difficult for the others to monitor than he’d imagined!

“It was good of you to reserve me a seat.”

Belac spoke in French, taking his lead from that morning’s conversation. He was hatless but wore a light raincoat and carried a tourist map. Rivera nodded his head and moved his coat. Belac sat without removing his.

“I watched you arrive,” the arms dealer said.

“By myself,” Rivera said. Was his feeling revulsion? Or fear? Revulsion, he assured himself. He had nothing to fear from this man.

“It would seem so.”

“How long are you going on like this, dodging around Europe?” Rivera asked.

“For a while yet,” Belac confided. “I know the system. At the moment they’re trying to make a case for another indictment. So they want to know where I am, hoping to lure me somewhere to be arrested. The search will slacken off when someone else becomes more important.”

“You’re certainly very careful.”

“Didn’t I tell you I was when we first met?”

“I don’t remember,” Rivera said. “Maybe.”

“What happened to your wife was terrible,” Belac said almost formally. “You have my sympathy.”

How could he do it! Rivera thought, incredulous; how could Belac sit there and parrot the words when he’d been the instigator! There wasn’t the nervousness he’d feared; no threatening sickness, either. Rivera decided it was going to be easy leading this man to his destruction. He said, “Thank you.” His voice was calm, controlled, just like it was supposed to be.

Through the glass canopy Rivera could see men moving among the mooring lines, preparing to release the boat. A sound—he wasn’t sure if it were a bell or a horn—signaled what he presumed was their departure.

“Let’s go!” Belac demanded with sudden urgency.

“What!”

He turned to see the Belgian already standing, looking down at him. “Go!” Belac repeated. “Come on!”

Rivera hesitated, not knowing what to do, and then stumbled up after the man. He was confused, conscious of everyone looking at him. Mendez’s face was a mask, but its very blankness showed his fury as they swept by. Rivera actually did stumble, following the other man back up the gangway. Belac was at the top, near the rails, engaged in a shoulder-shrugging apology to the ticket collector by the time Rivera got there.

“What the hell…!” Rivera erupted.

Belac turned, smiling, and settled with his arms against the rail, gazing back at the canal boat. “Elementary caution,” he said. “You might have thought you traveled here without company, but the Americans would hardly have announced their presence, would they? You’d be a suspect as well. They would have followed us onto the boat, though. And now, if you were under surveillance, they’ll follow us off again. So we’ll know, won’t we? And I can laugh in their faces because here in Holland they can’t touch me!”

Neither would anyone else be able to touch the man, Rivera realized, the first cohesive thought to come through the bewilderment. He could actually see Mendez and the other two Cubans he’d earlier identified, each in clear profile because all three were sitting gazing straight ahead, refusing to look toward the shore. Rivera strained to see through the glass, to pick out the others who would have boarded after Belac, but couldn’t. It didn’t matter; nothing they could do now if they were going to remain unsuspected. Could be clever, too. That had been the remark from one of the Cubans. Rivera hadn’t known what the man meant then but he did now; knew it horrifyingly well. In one simple move Belac had reversed everything. Saved himself from the planned retribution. Worse, Rivera assessed, he’d been separated from his protectors, the men who were going to keep him safe! Rivera gripped the rail, beneath the concealment of his coat, needing to stop the shaking. Alone; he was alone with a man prepared to kill! Armed too; of course Belac would be armed! Wasn’t that his business! Armed and prepared to kill, like he’d been prepared to kill before.

Could he refuse to pay? Declare that he knew all about the worthless cargo and say their deal was off? He’d confronted the man before. But before he hadn’t known how far Belac would go. He couldn’t do anything but pay, to get the man away. Rivera was terrified.

The gangway was withdrawn, and the boat edged away from the canal wall. From where they watched they heard, although not clearly, the beginning of the guide’s commentary. A girl, Rivera saw; quite pretty.

Belac turned to him, still smiling, and said, “So! All’s well!”

“I’d already told you that,” Rivera said. “It was completely unnecessary.”

Belac led the way through the zigzag of railings; because they were spaced narrowly, to maintain a single file of people, Rivera had to trail behind, follow-my-leader fashion. Over his shoulder, Belac said, “It would have been a boring ride anyway. And I don’t like boats.”

The man appeared very sure of himself, Rivera thought; cockily so. With much more reason than he knew. To extend the conversation, although he didn’t know why, Rivera began, “What did—” and then stopped because he saw them. The Cuban who’d actually made the remark about cleverness was standing on the far corner, his companion at his elbow. Both were studying something the first man carried, a map or a pamphlet. Safe! Rivera thought, euphorically. He was safe after all! It could still work, still be all right. He could still win! Up went the switchback of emotion.

The Belgian was waiting at the end of the delineated walkway. “Yes?” he said curiously.

“What explanation did you give for us leaving like that?” Rivera improvised. Only two of the squad. So a lot would depend upon him now. He would have to lead and hope they followed properly, anticipating him. Safe! he told himself again, his mind held by the single, most important fact. He was safe!

“That we’d realized the trip wouldn’t allow us the time necessary to catch our flight home,” the Belgian said. He extended his hand, palm upward, offering the money. “I got a refund on the tickets. Take it. That’s what we’ve met for, isn’t it? To settle debts.”

Rivera took the florins, saying nothing. Belac was gloating, he knew, imagining himself very much in charge. Enjoy, Rivera thought; gloat on. Not much longer now. To gloat himself, Rivera said, “Yes. We’re here to settle debts.”

He set off along the canal-bordering road, wanting the Belgian to follow him now, determined to reverse their roles. As he walked he put on his coat, using the maneuver to glance behind. The two Cubans were following, but very casually, and farther behind than he would have expected.

“Hey!” Belac protested. “Where we going?”

“Walking awhile,” Rivera said. He guessed he was vaguely circling the center of the city, through the part crisscrossed by canals. Would it be quieter, ahead? He didn’t know—why hadn’t he listened to their planning, the previous night!—but it was logical that the two following wouldn’t move unless it were quiet, with few people around.

“What’s there to walk for?” Belac demanded. “Just give me what you owe me. Now!”

The man stopped, which gave Rivera another opportunity to turn. He was relieved to see the two Cubans had moved quite a good deal closer. He said, “Don’t we have things to talk about?” and continued on.

The Belgian remained unmoving for a few seconds and then had to hurry to catch up. Rivera enjoyed having the other man running after him. How it had begun and how it was going to end, he reflected. It was very satisfying.

“What’s there to talk about?” Belac demanded, coming alongside.

For the first time Rivera caught a note of uncertainty in the man’s voice and decided he had to beware of it. Rivera had intended to humiliate Belac absolutely, openly letting the man know how he’d failed abysmally, in everything. But now he reconsidered. He couldn’t predict how Belac would react if taunted too far. Rivera refused to deprive himself completely, though. He deserved some triumph. It was quite dark now, and the cafés and shops had given way to canalside houses, so it was quieter, too. He knew it would only be a brief gap before more cafés and brighter lights near the next bridge. He said, “Debts, like you said. Value for money might be a better way of putting it.”

“You’re not making sense,” the Belgian said. His voice was frayed by further doubt.

There had to be the apparent exchange for the benefit of the following men. Rivera took the envelope from inside his jacket, completely concealed from behind but so that Belac could see it. The Belgian reached out, greedily, and at that moment, Rivera opened a space between them and turned, so the impression was of his receiving from the Belgian’s outstretched hand rather than offering it. Just as quickly he put it back and Belac said, “What the…!”

‘That was it,” Rivera said, refusing to stop, carrying the Belgian along with him. “That was the twelve million dollars you were owed, the twelve million you’re not going to get.”

“I warned you—” Belac started, but Rivera talked over him, hurriedly now, anxious to get it over because he could see the next bridge ahead, with its shops and restaurants.

“I know about your warnings. Like I know about those tanks.” Now Rivera stopped, turning to face the man, praying those behind would understand. “You tried to cheat me, Pierre,” he said quietly. “You loaded rubbish, shit, on that ship in San Diego and thought you’d °et the money before it was discovered. That’s what you did, didn’t you? You treated me like a fool.…” Enough, Rivera knew; he’d risked more than enough, unable to stop himself.

“No, listen …” Belac said, all the bombast gone now. “I didn’t know. Don’t know …”

Where were they! Why weren’t they here! “Liar!” said Rivera, as loudly as he believed he dared risk. He saw them at last, from the corner of his eye, still yards away.

Belac seemed to become aware of them at the same moment. He snatched a look toward the men, then back at Rivera, and for a moment stood utterly still. Then he began to turn, toward the sanctuary of the bridge ahead, and was actually moving when Rivera stepped forward. It wasn’t in any way an attack upon the man—not as he was later to convince himself boastfully that it had been. He did nothing more than collide with the Belgian, but it impeded the man long enough for the Cubans to reach him.

Belac was bulge-eyed with terror, like a rabbit caught in the beam of a poacher’s torch. He whimpered, not able to make a proper cry, and started scrabbling beneath his coat. But they were on him now, not hitting the man or showing any weapons. They seemed merely to close around him, like people crushed together in a crowd.

Rivera stood watching, transfixed himself, until one of the men said, without looking at him, “Get out!”

It broke the mood, but only just. Rivera started toward the bridge but kept glancing back, wanting to see. Nothing appeared to be happening; they remained close together, almost comically so. But then the figure in the middle, Belac, slumped, but he didn’t fall because of the support of each man on either side. Just before Rivera got too far away to be able to distinguish what was happening, he thought he saw them moving toward the water’s edge.

Rivera just managed to regain his room at the Wolven straat pension. As soon as he was inside the locked door the emotion gripped him and he had to support himself from collapse by clutching a chair back. He crouched against it, rocking back and forth, but peculiarly glad it was happening now, before he confronted Mendez. It was just shock, he knew, shock that he hoped was being literally shaken out of him.

It took a long time for the sensation to subside, and when it did it left him aching. Cautiously he lowered himself into the chair but sat with his arms wrapped around his body, as if he were hugging himself in self-congratulation. Which, largely, he was. He’d succeeded! Somehow, miraculously, he’d avoided all the snares and all the potential hazards to rid himself of Belac. The familiar, comforting word presented itself: to be safe. Forever. There was a brief return of the shaking, at that awareness, but not so severe as before.

By the time Mendez returned, Rivera was quite recovered, contentedly waiting.

“You got the money?” the intelligence chief demanded at once.

“Knowing the boat had to come back to where it started, at Nieuwe Spiegel, it wasn’t such a good idea to concentrate three people aboard, was it?” said Rivera. He wasn’t dependent upon this supercilious whoremonger any longer; nor would he be, ever again. He wanted very quickly to relegate Mendez to the position he had held before, the clearly defined subordinate to the clearly defined superior. Mendez visibly flushed, and Rivera knew he had jabbed a nerve.

“Two were ashore just for that eventuality,” Mendez said defensively. “I asked about the money.”

“I heard you,” Rivera said. And stopped.

Mendez stared back, the redness increasing. Finally he said, “Well, do you have it?”

It had been incredibly fortunate—another miracle—that Mendez had been trapped aboard the boat and not involved in the ambush. “Yes,” Rivera said.

“I think I should see proof of its return,” the man insisted.

“Why?”

“There were two purposes in this operation,” said Mendez. “Recovering the money. Then dealing with Belac. I’m sure of one. Not the other.”

“I have told you the money has been returned,” said Rivera. “That is sufficient.”

“I may tell Havana that, upon your authority?” Mendez fought back, weakly.

“No you may not!” Rivera said at once. “You will tell Havana nothing in my name. Confine yourself to your own service and your own authority.”

The following morning Rivera expected to see the other men, but they did not appear, and he refused to give Mendez the satisfaction of asking. Their train to Paris, from where they were to fly to Madrid, did not leave until midday, so they were able to read all the newspapers. The most comprehensive account of Belac’s death appeared in Der Telegraph, the story newsworthy because the man had a .375 Magnum still in his shoulder holster and was identified as an arms dealer for whom two indictments were outstanding in the United States. A Commerce Department spokesman in Washington was quoted as saying Pierre Belac was a much-wanted criminal under other investigations at the time of his death. There was a further statement from an Amsterdam police spokesman. An autopsy was still to be carried out, but at that stage there was no evidence of foul play; the death appeared to be either an accident or suicide.

“How was it done?” Rivera asked.

Mendez sat regarding him and Rivera knew the man was debating whether to tell him. In the end Mendez said, “A concentrated gas, from a capsule gun. Forces the heart muscles to contract into the appearance of a heart attack. It dissipates completely from the body in minutes: nothing suspicious will show up during any postmortem examination.”

“Clever,” Rivera said.

“A Russian invention,” Mendez disclosed.

“Well, now!” Petty said. The U.S. indictments had automatically placed Pierre Belac’s name on the watch list of Interpol, the international police communication organization, so the death in Amsterdam and all its circumstances were relayed to Washington within hours of the body being dragged from the canal.

“Intriguing,” Erickson agreed. Getting in first with the question, he said, “What odds do you give on there being a Cuban connection?”

“No bet,” Petty said. “It’s an obvious thought, but people like Belac are mixed up in too many things.” He picked up and put down a pipe, unlighted. “I couldn’t give a shit how or why Pierre Belac died,” he went on. “What I am worried about is it spooking Rivera in some way.”

“I’ll signal Madrid for us to be told the moment the Cuban group gets in,” Erickson said.

“Wouldn’t that be a bastard, after all the effort that’s gone into it!” said the division chief bitterly.

“What about O’Farrell?”

“Nothing more than the local man’s confirmation that he’s arrived,” Petty said.

“Belac’s death is being publicly reported,” Erickson pointed out. “What if O’Farrell reads about it and gets spooked as well?”

Petty lighted up at last. His face obscured, he said, “I’d like something to be easy! Just once I’d like something to be fucking easy!”

THIRTY-THREE

BY INCREDIBLE coincidence O’Farrell witnessed Rivera’s arrival; saw the man through the car window, autocratically gazing straight ahead from his seal behind the chauffeur, a second escorting limousine tight behind. The barred gates of the embassy opened—presumably from some advance warning radioed from the car—and then snapped shut again, swallowing up the cavalcade like a devouring mouth.

O’Farrell strode on up the incline. A perfect target, he thought ironically; jnst what he needed, and hist what he had been searching for, for hours. Guided by the information he’d picked up at his own embassy. O’Farrell had on foot explored the conference hall approaches and the designated link roads and the ambassador’s official residence and finally this, the embassy itself. And there Rivera had been, impossible to miss. Not that he could have done anything, of course; exposed himself, making his arrest inevitable. How—or when—could he act, then? The conference area was impossible. It was already obvious that the security would be at its highest there, army units and police and militia moving themselves and their vehicles into position, all main and side roads cordoned off with crash barriers. The routes to and from the Cuban embassy and the official residence appeared out of the question, too; they were largely closed off by more crash barriers, and from the documents he’d collected from the U.S. embassy he knew traffic lights and intersections were going to be police-controlled to enable all the delegates’ vehicles to travel at high speed.

At the top of the incline O’Farrell paused, hot from exertion, gazing back in the direction from which he’d come. It had to be here, somehow, he decided. Or at the residence. Both walled and both guarded, by Cuban as well as Spanish security. But possible, O’Farrell calculated, making his way back to the Calle de la Princesa through side roads to avoid passing by the embassy again. Just possible. And by virtue of that strict security.

The arrival and departure of each delegation was to be rigidly regulated, timed and distanced and ordered. And from the U.S. embassy guidance O’Farrell knew precisely when it was intended that Rivera should set out and return. The gate operation was extremely smooth, but the limousine had been forced to slow. Just possible, O’Farrell thought once more.

Technically, that is. He recognized that the biggest uncertainty remained himself. He wouldn’t get drunk this afternoon, not like he had last night, anesthetizing himself to what he had to do and how he felt about doing it. Had to force himself on, to perfect the planning. It would mean explosives again. In a car parked at the cross street he’d noted and isolated, just before Rivera’s limousine swept by. The side roads brought O’Farrell out very close to his hotel, and despite the earlier resolution he went unhurriedly to the bar, his mind busy. It definitely needed a car and explosives. But it wouldn’t be possible to activate the detonator by a preset clock, because there was no guarantee that the listed timings would be kept precisely to the second. He had to allow for a variable of up to five minutes. Which meant exploding the device himself, by electrical remote control, from some vantage point from which he could watch and wait until Rivera’s vehicle was in exactly the right position.

O’Farrell chose local brandy, harsh to his throat. The glass wobbled with the unsteadiness of his hands as he lifted it, like the glass had the previous night. Watch, he thought; he’d have to watch and see it happen. Hear the roar and see the metal tear and split and know a body was being torn and split and—

No! He wouldn’t do it! Never again! It wasn’t right; it had never been right, and he’d always known it. Why so long! Why had he for so long postured about patriotism and hidden justice, and sought parallels with a long-dead relative when there weren’t any parallels! He didn’t know; so much he didn’t know. Or want to know. Maybe he could rationalize it, in time. Rationalize but never excuse it. What about now, this very moment? That was the pressing consideration, the problem he had to solve first. There was a way out. Simple, in fact, Easy. Perhaps not the way to conclude his active career in the eyes of a very few people back in Washington—Petty and Erickson and the others he knew existed, although he didn’t know who they were—but that’s all. Very few indeed. They might suspect, he supposed. It was practically inevitable that they would suspect. But suspicion wasn’t proof, and there certainly wouldn’t be any proof. He’d ensure that well enough. Nothing they would be able to do. Nothing at all.

O’Farrell gestured for another drink, sure that already there was less movement in his hands. He certainly felt better; felt great. He’d have to make the right moves, in their proper order. Petty first then. Describe the supposed plan and stress the problems as strongly as possible, without making it sound like excuses in advance. Ask for the explosives and timing device at the same time. Then reserve a car. All so easy, so incredibly easy. He was free! It became another word to lodge in his mind. That was exactly how he did feel, free of a burden physically grinding him down, like a weight that was too great for him to support anymore. Overly dramatic, O’Farrell decided. But just how it was.

O’Farrell telephoned the embassy to advise that he was on his way, instinctively cautious on an open link, so the station chief was waiting when he arrived. The air conditioner had broken, and Lewis was redder-faced than before, puffing in his distress.

“Sometimes it’s days before they fix it,” the man complained. “You don’t know what it’s like to be without it until you don’t have it.”

“I can imagine,” O’Farrell said sympathetically. Preparing the ground for any later inquiry from Langley or Petty, he said, “You were certainly right about security. The Spanish are locking this place up tighter than a drum.”

“Trying to,” the fat man qualified. “Something will happen. Mark my words.”

“You warned the State Department?” O’Farrell pressed.

“Three separate memoranda,” Lewis said. “The Secret Service increased their escort because of it.”

A bonus, O’Farrell reflected. The secure communication area was in the basement of the embassy and the clear telephones were isolated in small cubicles. The lack of air-conditioning made it ovenlike. The connection, as always, was immediate. As he invariably did at the beginning of such contact, Petty remained completely silent while O’Farrell talked himself out. This time Petty was waiting for O’Farrell to make some reference to Belac’s death, in Holland, but there was nothing. He shook his head to Erickson, on the other side of the room.

“A lot of obstacles,” Petty agreed.

“A car bomb is the only way,” O’Farrell said.

“Just like London,” Petty mused. “That’s not a bad idea; it’ll send the investigators around in circles.”

“Semtex explosive, like before,” O’Farrell requested. “And a remote control, like I said.”

“In tonight’s pouch,” the division head promised. “I’m sorry there wasn’t time for more preparation.”

O’Farrell took the opening. “To be absolutely safe I needed it.”

“You’ve got all the routes and timings?”

“Yes.”

“Check them thoroughly, every morning and night,” Petty instructed. “Those schedules can screw up.”

“Of course,” O’Farrell said.

“You got the job,” Petty said.

The announcement was so abrupt and O’FarreH’s mind so occupied elsewhere that initially he did not comprehend what he was being told. “What?”

“Your promotion here, to join Erickson and me. It’s been confirmed.”

“That’s wonderful news,” O’Farrell managed, his throat working up and down. How could it be! There was no moral difference between initiating a killing in the comfort of a Washington office and carrying it out in some backstreet part of the world. One thing at a time, he told himself; concentrate upon evading this assignment before worrying about anything else.

“Congratulations,” Petty said. “We’re looking forward to your joining us. You take care now, you hear?”

Practically an invitation for what he intended to do! O’Farrell thought He said, “You know I will.”

“All luck.”

“Thanks.”

O’Farrell left the embassy, still promising to drink sometime with Lewis, deciding he might as well occupy the afternoon renting the car. He ignored the big agencies, as he had in London. On the outskirts of the city, on the road toward Las Rozas, he rented a Seat from a broken-toothed garage owner grateful for the cash transaction, and considered himself lucky to make it back to central Madrid. The drinking that night was quite different from before. It was for pleasure, relaxation, and not for oblivion, and although he had a bottle of wine with dinner and brandy afterward, O’Farrell went to bed feeling quite sober.

The following day, the last before the conference began, O’Farrell repeated his earlier surveillance and climbed the incline toward the embassy, knowing that the brief moment of Rivera’s car slowing upon entry and departure really would have been the only opportunity had he intended going through with it. It would, of course, be necessary to continue making it appear that he was: monitor the daily movements, as Petty advised, and create the bomb and park the Seat in the street he had selected. There was always the possibility of a watch squad that he hadn’t bothered this time to locate, and they would have to support his account that he’d done everything possible before aborting the attempt because his own detection and seizure would have been inevitable. The taking care that Petty had insisted upon.

O’Farrell hid himself among a small crowd watching Rivera’s departure that first morning and, afterward, in his hotel room, watched the television coverage of the formal opening, although he couldn’t understand the commentary. He saw Rivera on three occasions, each time enclosed by security men. He checked the man in and out of the embassy during the luncheon adjournment, saw more television coverage in the afternoon, and was standing on the pavement again in the evening when Rivera returned. It was interesting, O’Farrell reflected, that the scheduled timings had been remarkably accurate, the only difference being in the evening, and that by Rivera being just two minutes late.

The sealed, eyes-only package containing the Semtex and the timer would be at the embassy by now. It would be wrong if he didn’t collect them sometime the following day. He’d do it after seeing Rivera away. It would mean his carrying a bomb around a city on full security alert, but by itself Semtex looked like gray cement, and he could leave it in the trunk. The timer he would keep in his room, a rather elaborate alarm clock to anything but the closest of examinations.

O’Farrell was awake early, once more without any discomfort from .the previous night’s intake, setting out in good time for what was becoming routine. He was attracted by a perfume shop on the opposite side of the road and crossed, spending several minutes looking at the window selection, trying to decide upon a present for Jill. Definitely perfume, because she enjoyed perfume. And something for Ellen, too. Her birthday, he remembered; the birthday for which Billy had been saving. They could say it was from both of them.

The window-shopping had delayed him and the crowd had already formed ahead as he approached. He was still about thirty yards away when the gates of the embassy opened and the diplomatic vehicles began emerging. The timing’s off today, thought O’Farrell. Rivera’s car was just clear of the entrance when the explosion came, a window-shattering eruption with an immediate after-punch blast of air that knocked him heavily into the bordering wall. Rivera’s limousine disintegrated in front of his eyes: O’Farrell was just able, to its left, to see the other car that had formed the bomb, its cratered and burning shell visible through the debris and dust.

O’Farrell’s training automatically took over. He rebounded off the wall, already turning to get away from a scene of violence. What the hell! What or who in the name of Christ had—

It was as far as O’Farrell’s bewilderment ever got. The shot was perfect, absolutely professional, a spread-on-impact, high-velocity shell that caught him midchest, gouging the life from him. It was too quick for there to be the slightest pain. He was dead before his body landed, half on the pavement, half on the road. But his face was frozen by shock. His eyes were wide open, staring, an expression of astonishment.

THIRTY-FOUR

IT WAS the first bad day of a Washington autumn, gray and sullen with a spiteful wind strong enough to howl through the larger catafalques and burial vaults. There was a lot of security because of the Secretary of State’s attendance, secret servicemen with their walkie-talkies and earpieces standing point around the entire grave area. The official cars had been allowed to pull very close, a further precaution, but McCarthy’s vehicle, a long stretch limousine to accommodate all the people, had been allowed to park on a promontory separate from the rest. Against the smoke-glassed windshield were attached sufficient passes and official clearances to allow it to go anywhere it wanted.

There were five men in the vehicle. All were dressed solemnly, although just short of funeral black. The elevation of the vehicle enabled them to see everything.

“There’s the family,” Petty said as a group got from one of the huddled cars and slowly led the way to the grave edge. “Billy’s the one to the right.”

The boy was in fact holding his mother’s hand and weeping bitterly. Ellen was walking with difficulty, trying to support her head-bowed, sobbing mother on her other arm. John was helping on the other side, and Beth was holding tightly to their son. Mother and son were crying, too.

“You put the fix in, with Chicago?” McCarthy asked.

Petty nodded. “Patrick’s payments are being computer-monitored. There’s no chance of his falling behind.”

“That’s good,” the Plans director said absently.

There was a flurry of movement from cameramen as the Secretary of State and his party came into shot with the family.

“We can’t go down there. We could be photographed too easily,” Sneider said from behind the wheel. He was driving because of the need for absolute security within the vehicle.

“I’m still not sure that O’Farrell had cracked completely, that he would have fouled up some way,” Petty said. “He’d made all the right moves.”

“He would have cracked,” Lambert said, with quiet, expert insistence. “My guess is that he wouldn’t have fouled up; he was still too good for that. My guess is that in the end he wouldn’t have gone through with it.”

“We owe a lot to you, doctor,” McCarthy said, the architect of everything that had happened. “If it hadn’t been for you, O’Farrell would have stayed a basket case after London, and none of the rest would have been possible. Not so perfectly as it has turned out.”

“He certainly developed a strong dependence,” Lambert agreed modestly. “It was too strong for him to continue on his own anymore. The doubt was too deep.”

“So often the way it happens.” McCarthy sighed.

“He was doing every thing he should have done in Ma drid,” Erickson insisted, coming out in support of his division chief.

“What was the point in taking the risk!” McCarthy said, with strained patience. “This way everything is boxed and tied with ribbon. Rivera’s dead, as we intended. The speculation about the who’s and why’s of that killing will go on for weeks, and every day it’ll act as the warning we always planned it to be to Havana. And in Spanish custody is a man provably a Soviet assassin; it doesn’t matter a damn that the guy won’t talk or admit anything. They got him in the room with the gun still in his hand, for Christ’s sake! It fits perfectly with the history of O’Farrell’s mother; Moscow pursuing relentlessly the son of a nationalist dissident. We can even seed the doubt that the murder-suicide verdict on the parents was wrong. That their deaths were Soviet orchestrated, too …” McCarthy looked at Petty, as the doubter. “You see anything hanging loose from that?”

Petty wished he could. He still believed absolutely in the correctness of what he and his department had to do, but this was the first time they’d turned on one of their own people. It frightened him. He said, “I agree it wraps everything up.”

“Maneuvering the Soviet involvement and then alerting the Spanish authorities was brilliant,” Sneider said syco-phantically, stroking McCarthy’s favorite hobbyhorse.

“Didn’t I say that’s what the Russians would do when we leaked O’Farrell as the killer of Leonid Makarevich?” McCarthy said.

The arrested Soviet assassin was named Vladimir Kopalin, Petty knew. He knew, too, that the Agency had monitored the man’s arrival in Madrid and watched him stalk O’Farrell and let it happen: wanted it to happen. He said, “We’re going to keep O’Farrell’s State Department appointment, right? It wasn’t just a way to guarantee the media hype by getting the Secretary of State here today?”

“Sure, why not?” The Plans director shrugged. “That way Mrs. O’Farrell collects a nice fat pension as well as the insurance.”

“What about the new man, who really took Rivera out?” Lambert queried.

“What about him?” Erickson demanded. He was as unsettled as Petty.

“He okay?”

“He said it was easy; called it a piece of cake,” Petty reported. “Actually it was the way suggested by O’Farrell.…” He paused and added defiantly, ‘The way he was going to do it.”

Lambert appeared to miss the jab. He said, “We’d better tell Symmons to keep an eye on him. Let’s not recruit someone who enjoys it. That’s dangerous.”

“I thought everything we did was dangerous,” Petty said. He felt oppressed within the limousine and desperately wanted a pipe. Below them, through the protectively black windows, he saw that the interment was almost over. The mourners were shifting, about to leave, and the limousine drivers were standing ready to open the doors. Abruptly Petty announced, “I’m going down to speak to her.”

“That’s not wise,” Sneider said.

“A lot of things aren’t,” Petty said. “I’ll make my own way back.”

He left the car before there could be any more objection, shivering at once as the wind cut through his topcoat. It was too strong to attempt lighting a pipe, he realized miserably. He shrugged his collar up further and took a pathway to bring him out by the other official cars, as if he had emerged from one of them.

The family group were still some way away when he got there and he hung back from the media rush as the Secretary of State spoke briefly to them. Mrs. O’Farrell was shiny-faced and very red around the eyes, but she wasn’t crying anymore. She didn’t appear to speak a lot, hardly at all, but nodded and even smiled faintly at what was being said to her.

Petty waited until the woman had almost reached her car before stepping forward. “Mrs. O’Farrell?”

Jill hesitated, looking toward him, waiting.

“I knew your husband; worked with him,” Petty said, awkwardly. “I wanted you to know how sorry I am.”

“Thank you,” said the woman. Her voice was quite resolute.

“You’ll have all the State Department material: telephone numbers and references. If you need any help, please use them.” State would automatically channel any communication through to him.

“I’ll remember that,” Jill promised. “I’m thinking of selling out here and moving to Chicago. I’ve a daughter there, you know.”

“No,” Petty lied. “I didn’t know. It would probably be a good idea.”

“There’s a church in Evanston that’s been very kind to me since it happened,” Jill said, the dam unblocked, wanting to talk now. “We attended church regularly, Charles and I. We both found it a comfort.”

Petty’s throat moved and he was glad his coat collar was high. “Yes,” he said inadequately. Beside her the child he knew to be Billy had stopped crying, too, but the breath was going into him in sobs that made his tiny shoulders shudder. “Please don’t forget,” Petty urged. “Any problem at all, just get in touch.”

“Yes,” Jill said.

Petty doubted that she would. He pulled away and watched until her car led the cortege out of the cemetery, eventually following toward the exit. He was quite close before he realized the figure there was Erickson, hunched for protection by the gate pillar.

“I thought we could get a cab back together,” the man said.

“I didn’t like that,” Petty declared. “I didn’t like that one little bit.”

Erickson began waving for a cab. “McCarthy says he wants to talk. Another assignment, I guess. He said it was important.”

“Aren’t they all?” Petty queried wearily. It wasn’t until he was inside the cab and it was moving away that he realized it was festooned with No Smoking stickers.

Everything was completely alien to Jorge; he could remember none of it. It was very hot and his clothes stuck to him and the streets stank of sewage and gas fumes, making his chest tighten. He’d been escorted from England by a woman as well as a man from the Foreign Ministry. She kept trying to hold him and he wished she wouldn’t.

“Your father is a hero,” the man said in the car taking them from the airport. “He is to be honored. There is already a place for you in a state academy.”

Jorge was taken straight there and he hated it, as he hated everything else. The curriculum was completely different from what he had studied at the lycée, he was bullied, and an older boy sexually molested him the first week. Jorge complained to the housemaster, who dismissed it as a fact of academy life. The master let the other boys know of Jorge’s complaint and he was beaten very badly and kept for several days in the academy’s sanatorium, with a suspected rib fracture.

The same couple who had brought him from London collected him for the ceremony they had promised. Jorge was allowed to stand on a podium with a lot of important-looking men, one of whom had a beard and appeared to be obeyed by everyone else. The man ruffled his hair once. He smelled of cigars.

Jorge understood little of it. There were a lot of speeches and a lot of cheering and a small curtain was pulled away from a plaque set into a wall. His father’s name was written upon it. So were the words FIGHTER FOR FREEDOM.

This time Jorge let the woman hold him and on the way back to the academy told both her and the man how he was beaten and how the older boys kept getting into his bed at night. The man promised to speak to the principal. Jorge begged him not to, because of the beating he had gotten on the previous occasion. The man said it would be different this time.

“Please sir,” said Jorge, guessing the importance of politeness. “I would like to go home.”

“What?” said the ministry official.

“Home,” Jorge repeated. “I don’t like it here. I want to go home.”

The embracing woman withdrew her arm. The man said, tightly Jorge thought, as if he were offended. “This is your home. This is where you are going to live now.”

It took three days for the complaints to percolate down from the principal’s office. This time the beating was worse than before and Jorge had to stay longer in the sanatorium because an X ray disclosed that one of his ribs was definitely cracked.

The woman from the ministry visited him at the end of the month. She said, “You’ve got to start trying harder. It is a great privilege for you to be taught in the academy. There have been complaints about you from the authorities. They say that you are a troublemaker, upsetting the other boys. You want to be liked, don’t you? Behave yourself!”