Borderless Deceit (43 page)

Anne-Marie cut in. “It is your business. She's your friend. I'm glad you came.”

“Is she in trouble?”

Anne-Marie dug an envelope from her briefcase and held it towards me. “This was in the mailbox last night when I got home. It kept me up half the night thinking. Take a look.” The stamp was Romanian. I
removed a postcard. The picture was a painting of a Madonna and Child in the Byzantine style. “Read it,” Anne-Marie ordered. I turned the card.

Dearest Anne-Marie,

I haven't been myself the last weeks. Too much has changed too fast. I can't see how the future can be anything like the past
.

I need time to sort it out. I'm leaving Bucharest. I don't want to draw attention. In a week or so, I hope to be…you can guess where. I'll write longer then
.

Please do me a favour. I can't manage the formalities of giving up my post. Can you contact Irving Heywood? Explain that for private reasons I could be away a long time. Ask him if he would kindly look after the paperwork. I'll be in touch with him eventually to explain
.

Off in minutes
.

Love to the family
.

Rachel
.

I turned the card for a longer look at the picture. The Madonna was reticent and pious, the infant teasingly alert, too precociously wise. I thought of Rachel's other postcards. She always chose them to convey humour. What message was this one delivering? I reread it, but her words were as obscure as what she might have intended to say through the painting. More cause for my unease to grow. “It's not like her. It's way off.”

Anne-Marie took her time, gazing at me steadily. “That's true… She sounds…”

She sounds…? Anne-Marie didn't complete her thought.

“How does she sound?” I asked. What more did Anne-Marie know? But Anne-Marie wouldn't say. Instead, she voiced questions of her own, many questions, too many questions, and threw them all at me.

The future can't be anything like the past
. What does that say about her state of mind?

Too much has changed too fast
. Does it mean she's lost control?

I haven't been myself
. Is this an excuse for something she's done, or about to do, a kind of whitewashing of awful things?

“What do
you
think, Carson?”

Anne-Marie, I could see, had been wrestling for hours with the realisation that Rachel – always in charge, always serene – was in some kind of crisis. Why else would she suddenly relinquish her responsibilities? But Rachel couldn't be asked, and Anne-Marie feeling powerless was grasping at straws. In directing her questions at me she seemed to think I could be held accountable for the answers. In self defence I raised my shoulders and opened my hands. I was perplexed too. But Anne-Marie's final question I couldn't duck. How is it, she asked, that I had read an e-mail from Lafontaine? What more did I know?

It froze me. For seconds nothing moved, neither my limbs, nor my tongue. Anne-Marie, back to sipping coffee, glared at me unwaveringly. Was she doubting my trustworthiness? Mere hours before in Jaime's presence, my conscience had eased; the truth about what I had done to Rachel had come out. It was accepted, no judgements rendered.
Well, there's alley-cat in all of us
. Jaime's few words amounted to a gigantic pardon and so the night unburdened me. But that bright interlude in the continuum of my fraudulent existence was now short-lived.
What more did I know?
The answer to Anne-Marie's question would have to be part lie and part evasion. As always, yet another layer of deceit.

Flippantly I explained that because the plague came out of Transylvania all e-mail traffic in and out of the Bucharest embassy had been monitored for months. The practice was classified information in itself. No one was allowed to know it was happening. Not even some of the senior officers. Not even Heywood. For good measure, and with my heart pumping brine, I hit this nail a second time. “He mustn't know that you know that we've read Lafontaine's message. It would constitute a security breach. Part of another world, Anne-Marie. Sorry.”

“That,” she calmly replied, “explains why Rachel prefers postcards. I bet the spook world forgets about postcards. Anyway, you're here because you care. That's more important.”

With this simple expression of faith in goodness Anne-Marie stopped questioning and revealed her thoughts. “The postcard shows breakdown, don't you think? What conceivably would cause that in
Rachel? I wracked my brain all night and I've come to think it's fear. Rachel left in fear. She tries to hide it, but she tries too hard. Read the postcard again. Only fear would make Rachel run off and write like that. She badly needs support. She needs someone she trusts to be near.”

By the time I left Anne-Marie, my coffee was cold. Once more I carried the paper cup through corridors, down elevators, and through the Service complex from one end to the other. First, some promises to Jaime; now more to Anne-Marie. It wasn't mid-morning yet and already I had made more commitments that day than a tally of all the ones over the many years before.
Yes,
I promised Anne-Marie,
I'll go there. I'll leave today
.

But I wasn't done with commitment-making.

Francis Merrick's morning always began at 9:30 a.m. with tea. When I arrived at his office he was just starting the brewing. “Carson,” he muttered, lowering little bags into a decorative Chinese pot, “when did I see you last? Is it that time of year again?”

Avuncular Francis. His management of the watchers meant that twice a year he received a two-minute, pro-forma, verbal report from each of us that all was well. This done, his fingers would run through the few remaining snow-white filaments of his hair and he'd mumble,
Good. That's fine. You're on top of things
. Once he had added when I was with him:
And you're forthright, Carson, a quality few have
.

Missing Merrick
was what the unit called him. On the surface the judgment wasn't undeserved. Yet Francis was appreciated. His philosophy was to stay out of the way unless there was a problem, although if one appeared, his door stood open. Sitting in a low chair, his feet up, staring into space, soon taking on the appearance of a grandfather dozing, he would listen. Eventually a hand would wave and the visitor would be asked to go away. Oddly, soon enough, so did the problem. The watchers never clearly saw solutions, but never faced real trouble either. As for me, I liked Francis because he wasn't afraid to give his underlings a long rein.

Coming directly to the point, I said I hadn't had a proper holiday in years.

A holiday?
he whispered.

Yes.

What a good idea. Where?

Not sure yet. Maybe a cottage on a quiet lake.

Fishing is restful, especially if you don't catch any
.

I said I planned to be away a while.

It should be so. What's that thing with the Americans you manage?

The pipeline.

Yes, you mentioned it last two years ago
.

I replied the pipeline had been functioning well. In my absence Arthur Beausejour could manage it. Pushing information through it back and forth was administratively routine.

You'll talk to Beausejour
?

Francis's whisper was nearly unintelligible. I confirmed that, yes, I would, of course.

And Hugh-S? You'll let him know you'll be away?

Francis seemed to be fading, disappearing into the ceremony with his tea. His voice was ghostly. Even so, I was surprised he knew about Hugh-S and asked how that was. The words could have come from the other side of the grave.

We talk sometimes
.

I thought this over. Had we been underestimating Missing Merrick all these years? Was it we who had been doing the missing? Behind the screen of near-death, was he actually actively managing our business? Not
Missing
, but
Minding
Merrick? My holiday was settled and yet I lingered. How could I induce him to open up still more? Francis became busy pouring tea and as an afterthought pushed an empty cup my way. Then he saw the paper coffee container I had brought in and began to shake his head.

You can go now Carson…

The whisper sounded tired.

One last thing…promise me…

I leaned forward to hear.

If you go angling and something ends up in your boat…find a way to let me know
.

The enigmatic fishing imagery bewildered me.
Yes,
I uttered.
I'll do that. I promise
. Merrick had hunched forward in his chair, drawn himself together in a tight bundle, cradling a hot tea cup in both hands as if it was mid-winter. He sipped and stared, not at me, but at a scene
somewhere distant which was unreachable, unfathomable for me. Then he added,
And don't worry about Irving Heywood
.

My mind ground to a standstill. My robotic mumble was an auto-response. Ah…sure. Thank you, Francis.

Minutes later I was closeted with Beausejour to ask if he would administer the pipeline. His gleaming head immediately began a vigorous nodding. I took Arthur to the special place and there, hovering over him, solemnly revealed the codes. He did a practice round, skittish fingers bouncing from key to key.
Whoa, Carson!
he hollered when the mythical glory of the pipeline formed on the screen. Some further steps were necessary to go through it, to approach the treasures at the other end. He became ecstatic, grinning from ear to ear.
Awesome! Carson, promise me you'll be away a long time
. My reply was a laconic,
Sure, yeah, I promise
. Oddly, after all the years of humbling Beausejour, I now suddenly determined he was a nice guy. Why, I wondered, had we never done some simple thing, like having a coffee together, to find out who we were.

Hugh-S was next The secure phone key was turned and a red light showed eavesdroppers had no chance. I told him something had come up and that Beausejour had been indoctrinated. Hugh-S wasn't surprised. He already seemed to know I was going on vacation. Amiably he chatted about a catfish his son pulled in last year and, with the boy now bigger, that a white marlin holiday was next. Casually, as if talking about bait with the captain of a hired boat, he asked,
D'yuh want puhdah, Cahsun?

Purdah?

Purdah…the veil…a cryptonym for pre-programmed incognito status. I couldn't think fast enough. Were there dots to be connected? Had Merrick been in touch with Hugh-S while I was busy initiating Beausejour? Were they already on top of what Heywood was up to? And if so, who had informed them? Jamie? Had a flanking movement of some kind started up? Was my vacation being treated as some kind of decoy, or probe, or ruse? If so, aimed at what…or who?

Well?
Hugh-S repeated.

Originally, years before, I was the one who urged Hugh-S to develop purdah. Certain individuals, I pointed out, should be invisible when they act. He put the challenge back to me. And so I developed a
program which created what I called
indiscernibility
. Purdah takes data heading into cyberspace and negates it as it's generated. Travelling behind the veil of purdah is like travelling as a spirit that can't be seen.

I replied that, yes, purdah could help.

Through the secure phone Hugh-S announced my purdah would be activated in minutes.
And Cahsun, when you get to your holiday spot, send me a signal. You know how. I got thousands a analysts here, sure, but they just catch the minnows. I may need you fast if there's a shark
.

I promised, Yes. I will. Of course.

From Hugh-S it was to the bank. The teller was amiable, a grand-motherly type, fussing over customers as if she was nurturing her children's children. She scanned my account. I've never been a spender; money goes in and mostly it stays. “Oh!” she said, studying the figures with approval in her eyes. Suddenly she frowned. “Oh,” she repeated, this time with worry. She punched an activation key with a determined jab. As quickly as she had soured, she brightened. “You disappeared. But I've got you back.” I smiled the smile of tolerance. Purdah was working. I made the trivial remark that information systems sometimes wear veils which make them mysterious. She looked up immodestly. “You mean as with a negligé?” and laughed at the imagery. This grandmother hadn't abdicated life. Then she was all business again. “How much cash?” Unfazed by the amount, she began to count…and counted…and counted. One wad after another disappeared into my case. My trip wouldn't be on credit. She gave me a final piece of wisdom: “Now don't go gambling all that away. Promise?”

I promised.

Not until the bus gained speed out on the open road did I have peace to sort out that jumbled day. Partial thoughts, bits of dialogue, fragments of insight, cryptic remarks – too much had got piled up. And then there were the promises. So many were made I hadn't kept count.

When Jaime walked away from me at dawn, she left with intent; she had a destination, her brother in Silicon Valley. As for me, I hadn't the vaguest idea and told her I might rent a summer cottage. “Wherever you end up,” she had instructed, “when you get there, this is how to contact me.” She told me to find an Internet Café, any one
would do, choose a computer and punch in an obscure web address. It would bring on a message that the web page didn't exist. I was to wait one second, click the message closed, then try again. I was to do this four times. On the fourth time, Jaime said, a tracking system she would have running would be connected to that web page. It would allow her to determine exactly where I was. The next day I was then to go to that same café, to the identical computer, and access the same site again. The screen would then provide instructions for how we could send each other messages. “We'll write them using numbers,” Jaime decreed. “We'll use the classics, like in your scheme, but simplify it.” She went to my computer and printed out two copies of a few chapters from an on-line edition of
Crime and Punishment
. “You use the numbers of the letters as they appear beginning with
chapter 2
. When I write back I'll use them beginning with
chapter 3
. It's not perfect, but, hey, at least we'll read the book. A deal? And don't worry too much about Irv. I'll bring him around.”