Strategic Moves

FIFTY-SEVEN

Stone lay in bed, the Times on his lap and the television murmuring. It was nine-thirty, and he had not stirred himself. Instead, he had allowed guilt to make him slothful. Willa had gone to work, and it was time he did, too, he thought, so he showered, shaved, and went down to his office, still feeling guilty. Finally, he decided to take Willa’s advice. He picked up the telephone and called an old flame, Tiffany Baldwin, who happened to be the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He was put through immediately.

“Why, hello, Stone,” Tiffany said, transmitting both surprise and interest. “Long time.”

“Yes, it has been, hasn’t it?” Stone replied. “I have a tip for you.”

“Stone, you know I don’t play the ponies.”

“Not that kind of tip.”

“What kind of tip?”

“A tip about the possible occurrence of a crime.”

“What crime?”

“You remember the business with Jack Gunn’s investment firm losing a billion dollars temporarily?”

“Yes, I was all over it. It was resolved.”

“Well, it may be about to happen again, and if it does, it won’t be resolved.”

“Stone, I’m busy. Tell me what you’re talking about.”

“Jack Gunn’s son and daughter, David and Stephanie, may be about to decamp to the island of Attola in the Pacific with a great deal of the firm’s money.”

“What evidence do you have to support this?”

“My client is married to Stephanie. He has overheard fragments of telephone conversations in which she is discussing Attola and making travel arrangements.”

“Go on.”

“That’s it.”

“That’s it?”

“Yes.”

“Stone, why are you wasting my time?”

“I thought you might want to instruct the FBI to investigate this.”

“Investigate what? No crime has been committed.”

“Well, not yet. Don’t you investigate crimes that may be about to be committed?”

“No, we don’t, and we don’t ask the FBI to do that, either, not without some sort of solid evidence on which to proceed. I’m surprised at you, Stone; you know better than this.”

“Okay, Tiff,” Stone said, “I’ve done my civic duty. Now I’m going to attack the work on my desk and forget all about this.”

“What a good idea!” she said, laughing. “Dinner?”

“I’m seeing somebody.”

“Who?”

“Oh, no, we’re not going there. Bye-bye, Tiff.” Stone hung up. He felt that a burden had been lifted from his shoulders. Now he could attack the work on his desk.

Except that there was no work on his desk.

Joan buzzed him. “Lance Cabot on one.”

Stone picked up. “Good morning, Lance.”

“I’m afraid not,” Lance said. “Pablo has disappeared.”

“Lance, there are eight men from Strategic Services guarding him; he can’t disappear.”

“Nevertheless,” Lance said.

“How did this happen?”

“His wife wanted to go to the market in Washington, and Pablo went with her. They went into the market, followed by two of Mike Freeman’s men, and then straight out the back door, and they disappeared.”

“You’d better check the airport at Newburgh,” Stone said. “It sounds like Pablo has decided to run.”

“Holly is all over that and every other airport in the area,” Lance said. “Run from what?”

“Well, Lance, your very good friend and colleague Moishe Aarons has been trying to find Pablo—God knows why—but Pablo found that disturbing. Somehow—and I’m not making any accusations—Mr. Aarons found out about your meetings with Pablo. How could that have happened?”

Lance was silent.

“Hello, hello? Can you think of any way that Aarons could have found out about those meetings?”

“I’m thinking,” Lance said.

“I’ll just wait while you think,” Stone said, then sat there silently.

“All right,” Lance said finally, “he may have inferred that from something I said to him.”

“Lance, we had a firm and very clear agreement that the existence of those meetings would be kept within a very tight circle of your people.”

“Yes, we did.”

“Did you intend that very tight circle to include the Mossad?”

“Of course not, Stone. It was just a slip of the tongue over lunch.”

“It must have been a very big slip of the tongue, since Aarons knew that the meetings took place at my house and that I was in touch with Pablo.”

“I have to go now,” Lance said. “There are people waiting to see me.”

“Lance—” But Lance had hung up.

Stone looked up to see a man he didn’t recognize standing in his doorway. He was tall, with a dark, heavy beard and black horn-rimmed glasses.

“Good morning, Stone.”

“Yes? Have we met?”

The man came across the room and sat down in the chair opposite Stone. “My disguise is better than I thought.”

“Pablo?” Stone said with astonishment.

“Don’t make me take the beard off; it took me too long to get it right. You were talking with Lance?”

“Yes, just now.”

“I heard you mention his name.”

“He called to tell me you had disappeared.”

“He’s quite right, I have,” Pablo said.

“Why?”

“Moishe Aarons wants me either in a Mossad interrogation facility or dead, and I don’t think he cares very much which.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Because early this morning I walked down to the lake—I take a walk every morning—and I saw a boat being driven by Moishe himself. I don’t think he saw me, since I was partly behind a tree.”

“Oh, shit,” Stone said.

“Exactly,” Pablo replied.