The Director

3

Far from Washington, a young man skittered toward the U.S. Consulate in Hamburg like a shorebird blown by the North Sea wind. He was dressed in low-slung jeans and a zip-up gray hoodie, his hands thrust deep in his pockets. His eyes were dark-rimmed with fatigue, and he was shivering in the cold October breeze that raked the inland lake along the Alsterufer. At the gate, the guard stopped the visitor, but he showed his Swiss passport and said he had an urgent appointment.

Inside the guardhouse, the Marine told the youth to lower his hood so that his face was visible. The top of his head was thin stubble, like a layer of soot. In his right ear were three metal studs. Tattooed on his neck were a dotted line and the Russian words, . His passport identified him as Rudolf Biel. The guard wanted to send him away, but the young man said slowly and emphatically that he needed to talk to the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

“I have a message for Graham Weber, CIA director, no one else but him.”

He was a mess. His eyes were bulging and red-veined. His pallid skin was dotted with acne scars, as if he had lived his entire life in a cave. He spoke English with a German accent. His passport said he was from Zurich.

“Do you have an appointment with Mr. Weber?” asked the Marine guard behind the glass. It was a dumb question, but the Marine was confused. He had never seen a walk-in, twenty-five years after the Cold War.

“I must see him, the new CIA director. Mr. Clean. He will want to talk to me, sir, believe me.”

The Marine behind the glass shook his head. He thought for a moment and then handed the man a form with an email address and phone number and told him to make an appointment. But this only made the visitor more agitated and insistent.

“Listen to me: This is a big secret. Email is not safe. I want a face-to-face meeting only, with Mr. Weber.” He pointed his finger as he spoke, to emphasize his point. “No Internet. No electronic message. Otherwise, I am finished.” He said these last words in deadly earnest.

The Marine pointed to the Russian words tattooed on the man’s neck. At least he could start with that.

“What does that mean, in English?”

“It says, ‘Cut here.’” The Swiss youth gave a cockeyed grin and then glowered at the guard. “I mean it,” he said. “I am a dead man if you don’t let me in.”

The guard stared at him a moment longer and then nodded. He told the man to wait outside while he called the regional security officer. He didn’t want to be blamed for letting in the scruffy young man or keeping him out.

The Swiss boy stood shuffling outside, hands stuffed into the pockets of his sweatshirt. The visitor glanced every few seconds over his shoulder, down the Alsterufer toward the bridge on Kennedybrücke, a long block away. A passerby glanced at him and made a distasteful face when he saw the shaved head and scruffy clothes. This was Hamburg’s fanciest neighborhood. What was this clod of dirt doing here?

The visitor stuck his hands deeper against the wind. The waters of the Alster were like corrugated tin. The sun had vanished behind thick clouds, shadowing the lakeside walk in the flat gray of late afternoon. To the south were the towers of old Hamburg, to the west the great docks and freight yards along the Elbe River, and, beyond that, the North Sea and escape.

The regional security officer arrived at the guardhouse, carrying the red binder with the code phrases. He looked at the young man’s passport and summoned him back inside the security hut. He’d been working at the State Department for nearly thirty years, long enough to remember what a defector was.

“Mr. Weber doesn’t work here,” said the security officer. “He works in Washington. Why do you want to see him?”

“I have special information. It is too dangerous to tell anyone else. I know a very big secret.” The Swiss boy stared the State Department functionary dead in the eyes. His hands were open before him, as if he were holding an invisible gift that he wanted to present.

The officer nodded. There was something about the young man’s intensity that made him believable. He looked in his red folder and dialed the number of one of the nominal political officers, K. J. Sandoval.

“Mr. Bolt is here. He says he has a package for Mr. Green.”

There was a long pause. The CIA officer inside had forgotten the walk-in procedures, too, and she needed to look at her own cheat sheet.

“Is this a joke?” she muttered into the phone while searching. “The Cold War is over.”

“No, ma’am.” His voice was clipped. “No joke.”

“Okay. Sorry.” A few more seconds passed, until she found her script. “Did Mr. Bolt say what was in the package?”

“Nope. Just says it’s important.”

There was another pause, as she looked in the list of code phrases for what she wanted to ask. It wasn’t there.

“Is he a nut?”

The security officer studied the man standing on the other side of the glass barrier. He had unzipped his hoodie, revealing a dirty black T-shirt with the faded inscription DEF CON XX and a skull and crossbones. On his wrist was a bracelet with metal studs. He was a normal adult’s bad dream, yet his eyes — as fearful and strung out as they were — were alive with intelligence.

“It’s hard to say what he is,” answered the security officer. “He looks like a punk, basically. He’s standing here. Check him out yourself on the closed circuit. It’s your call. I can send him packing if you want.”

She studied the grainy camera image. He looked like a loser, but she was a new base chief, and she’d never had a walk-in. And she was bored with the ever-repeating loop of the European economic crisis. It was the only topic on which anyone in Washington ever queried the consulate or Embassy Berlin these days. It would be a pleasure to think about something different.

“What the hell?” she said. “Bring him up. I’ll be in Conference Room A.”