The Rhinemann Exchange (44 page)

He walked back to his own isolated, tiny office. To think.

He decided to meet Lyons himself. Walter Kendall had told him that Lyons’s male nurses would settle the mute,
sad man in San Telmo. Recalling the two men in question, David had premonitions of disaster. It wasn’t beyond Johnny and Hal—those were the names, weren’t they?—to deliver Lyons to the steps of the German embassy, thinking it was another hospital.

He would meet Pan Am Clipper 101. And proceed to take the three men on a complicated route to San Telmo.

Once he’d settled Lyons, David estimated that he would have about two, possibly three, hours before Rhinemann—or Stoltz—would make contact. Unless Rhinemann was hunting him now, in panic over the killings in the Colinas Rojas. If so, Spaulding had “built his shelter.” His irrefutable alibi.… He hadn’t been there. He’d been dropped off at Córdoba by two in the morning.

Who could dispute him?

So, he would have two or three hours in midafternoon.

La Boca.

Discreetly, Jean had checked naval surveillance at FMF. The discretion came with her utterly routine, bored telephone call to the chief of operations. She had a “loose end” to tie up for a “dead file”; there was no significance, only a bureaucratic matter—someone was always looking for a good rating on the basis of closing out. Would the lieutenant mind filling in?… The trawler erroneously listed for Tortugas was moored by a warehouse complex in Ocho Calle. The error was checked and confirmed by the embassy attaché, Mr. William Ellis, Import-Export Clearance Division.

Ocho Calle.

David would spend an hour or so looking around. It could be a waste of time. What connection would a fishing trawler have with his assignment? There was none that he could see. But there
was
the name “Tortugas”; there
was
an attaché named Ellis who crept silently outside closed doors and lied about nonexistent conferences in the early morning.

Ocho Calle was worth looking into.

Afterward, he would stay by his telephone at Córdoba.

“Are you going to take me to lunch?” asked Jean, walking into his office. “Don’t look at your watch; you haven’t got one.”

Spaulding’s hand was in midair, his wrist turned. “I didn’t realize it was so late.”

“It’s not. It’s only eleven, but you haven’t eaten—probably didn’t sleep, either—and you said you were going to the airport shortly after one.”

“I was right; you’re a corporate executive. Your sense of organization is frightening.”

“Nowhere near yours. We’ll stop at a jewelry store first. I’ve already called. You have a present.”

“I like presents. Let’s go.” Spaulding got out of his chair as the telephone rang. He looked down at it. “Do you know that’s the first time that thing has made a sound?”

“It’s probably for me. I told my secretary I was here.… I don’t think I really
had
to tell her.”

“Hello?” said David into the phone.

“Spaulding?”

David recognized the polished German of Heinrich Stoltz. His tension carried over the wire. “Isn’t it a little foolish to call me here?”

“I have no choice. Our mutual friend is in a state of extreme anxiety. Everything is jeopardized.”

“What are you talking about?”

“This is no time for foolishness! The situation is grave.”

“It’s no time for games, either. What the hell are you talking about?”

“Last night! This morning. What happened?”

“What happened where?”

“
Stop it!
You were
there!
”

“Where?”

Stoltz paused; David could hear his breath. The German was in panic, desperately trying to control himself. “The men were killed. We must know what happened!”

“Killed?… You’re
crazy.
How?”

“I
warn you
.…”

“Now
you
cut it out! I’m
buying
, and don’t you forget it.… I don’t want to be mixed up in any organization problems. Those men dropped me off around one thirty. Incidentally, they met your other boys, the ones covering my apartment. And also incidentally, I don’t like this round-the-clock surveillance!”

Stoltz was blanked—as David expected he would be. “The others?… What others?”

“Get off it! You know perfectly well.” Spaulding let the inference hang.

“This is all most disturbing.…” Stoltz tried to compose himself.

“I’m sorry,” said David noncommittally.

Exasperated, Stoltz interrupted. “I’ll call you back.”

“Not here. I’ll be out most of the afternoon.… As a matter of fact,” added Spaulding quickly, pleasantly, “I’ll be in one of those sailboats our mutual friend looks down upon so majestically. I’m joining some diplomatic friends almost as rich as he is. Call me after five at Córdoba.”

David hung up instantly, hearing the beginning of Stoltz’s protest. Jean was watching him, fascinated.

“You did that very well,” she said.

“I’ve had more practice than him.”

“Stoltz?”

“Yes. Let’s go into your office.”

“I thought we were going to lunch.”

“We are. Couple of things first.… There’s a rear exit, isn’t there?”

“Several. Back gate.”

“I want to use an embassy vehicle. Any trouble?”

“No, of course not.”

“Your secretary. Could you spare her for a long lunch?”

“You’re sweet. I had the insane idea you were taking
me.
”

“I am. Could she put her hair up and wear a floppy hat?”

“Any woman can.”

“Good. Get that yellow coat you wore last night. And point out any man around here relatively my size. One that your secretary might enjoy that long lunch with. Preferably wearing dark trousers. He’ll have my jacket.”

“What
are
you
doing?
”

“Our friends are good at playing jokes on other people. Let’s see how they take it when one’s played on them.”

Spaulding watched from the third-floor window, concealed by the full-length drapes. He held the binoculars to his eyes. Below, on the front steps, Jean’s secretary—in a wide-brimmed hat and Jean’s yellow coat—walked rapidly down to the curb of the driveway. Following her was one of Ballard’s assistants, a tall man in dark trousers and David’s jacket. Both wore sunglasses. Ballard’s man paused
momentarily on the top step, looking at an unfolded road map. His face was covered by the awkward mass of paper. He descended the stairs and together he and the girl climbed into the embassy limousine—an upper-level vehicle with curtains.

Spaulding scanned the Avenida Corrientes in front of the gates. As the limousine was passed through, a Mercedes coupe parked on the south side of the street pulled away from the curb and followed it. And then a second automobile on the north side made a cautious U-turn and took up its position several vehicles behind the Mercedes.

Satisfied, David put down the binoculars and went out of the room. In the corridor he turned left and walked swiftly past doors and around staircases toward the rear of the building, until he came to a room that corresponded to his observation post in front. Bobby Ballard sat in an armchair by the window; he turned around at the sound of David’s footsteps, binoculars in his hands.

“Anything?” Spaulding asked.

“Two,” answered the cryp. “Parked facing opposite directions. They just drove away.”

“Same up front. They’re in radio contact.”

“Thorough, aren’t they?”

“Not as much as they think,” Spaulding said.

Ballard’s sports coat was loose around the midsection and short in the sleeves, but it showed off David’s new wristwatch. Jean was pleased about that. It was a very fine chronometer.

The restaurant was small, a virtual hole-in-the-wall on a side street near San Martín. The front was open; a short awning protected the few outside tables from the sun. Their table, however, was inside. Spaulding sat facing the entrance, able to see clearly the passersby on the sidewalk.

But he was not watching them now. He was looking at Jean. And what he saw in her face caused him to say the words without thinking.

“It’s going to be over soon. I’m getting out.”

She took his hand, searching his eyes. She did not reply for several moments. It was as if she wanted his words suspended, isolated, thought about. “That’s a remarkable thing to say. I’m not sure what it means.”

“It means I want to spend years and years with you. The
rest of my life.… I don’t know any other way to put it.”

Jean closed her eyes briefly, for the duration of a single breath of silence. “I think you’ve put it … very beautifully.”

How could he tell her? How could he explain? He had to try. It was so damned important.
“Less than a month ago,” he began softly, “something happened in a field. At night, in Spain. By a campfire.…
To me.
The circumstances aren’t important, but what happened to me was … the most frightening thing I could imagine. And it had nothing to do with the calculated risks in my work; nothing to do with being afraid—and I was always afraid, you can bet your life on that.… But I suddenly found I had no
feeling.
No feeling at all. I was given a report that should have shaken me up—made me weep, or made me angry,
goddamned angry.
But I didn’t feel anything. I was numb. I accepted the news and criticized the man for withholding it. I told him not to make conditions.… You see, he
rightfully
thought that I would.” David stopped and put his hand over Jean’s. “What I’m trying to tell you is that you’ve given me back something I thought I’d lost. I don’t ever want to take the chance of losing it again.”

“You’ll make me cry,” she said quietly, her eyes moist, her lips trembling to a smile. “Don’t you know girls cry when things like that are said to them?… I’ll have to teach you so much.… Oh, Lord,” she whispered. “Please,
please
 … years.”

David leaned over the small table; their lips touched and as they held lightly together, he removed his hand from hers and gently ran his fingers over the side of her face.

The tears were there.

He felt them, too. They would not come for him, but he
felt
them.

“I’m going back with you, of course,” she said.

Her words brought back the reality … the other reality, the lesser one. “Not
with
me. But soon. I’m going to need a couple of weeks to settle things.… And you’ll have to transfer your work down here.”

She looked at him questioningly but did not ask a question. “There are … special arrangements for you to take back the blueprints or designs or whatever they are.”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“If everything goes as we expect, in a day or two. At the most, three.”

“Then why do you need a couple of weeks?”

He hesitated before answering. And then he realized he wanted to tell her the truth. It was part of the beginning for him. The truth. “There’s a breach of security in a place called Fairfax.…”

“Fairfax,” she interrupted. “That was in your file.”

“It’s an intelligence center in Virginia. Very classified. A man was killed there. He was a friend of mine. I purposely withheld information that might stop the leaks and, more important, find out who killed him.”

“For heaven’s sake, why?”

“In a way, I was forced to. The men in Fairfax weren’t cleared for the information I had; the one man who was, is ineffectual … especially in something like this. He’s not Intelligence oriented; he’s a requisition general. He buys things.”

“Like gyroscopic designs?”

“Yes. When I get back I’ll force him to clear the data.” David paused and then spoke as much to himself as to Jean. “Actually, I don’t give a damn whether he does or not. I’ve got a long accumulated leave coming to me. I’ll use a week or two of it in Fairfax. There’s a German agent walking around in that compound with a four-zero rating. He killed a very good man.”

“That frightens me.”

“It shouldn’t.” David smiled, answering her with the truth. “I have no intention of risking those years we talked about. If I have to, I’ll operate from a maximum security cell.… Don’t worry.”

She nodded. “I won’t. I believe you.… I’ll join you in, say, three weeks. I owe that to Henderson; there
will
be a lot of adjustments for him. Also, I’ll have something done about Ellis.”

“Don’t touch him. We don’t
know
anything yet. If we find out he’s on an outside payroll he can be valuable right where he is. Reverse conduits are jewels. When we uncover one we make sure he’s the healthiest man—or woman—around.”

“What kind of a world do you live in?” Jean asked the question with concern, not humor.

“One that you’ll help me leave.… After Fairfax, I’m finished.”

Eugene Lyons edged into the back seat of the taxi between Spaulding and the male nurse named Hal. The other attendant, Johnny, sat in front with the driver. David gave his instructions in Spanish; the driver started out the long, smooth roadway of the Aeroparque.

David looked at Lyons; it wasn’t easy to do so. The proximity of the sad, emaciated face emphasized the realization that what he saw was self-inflicted. Lyons’s eyes were not responding; he was exhausted from the flight, suspicious of the new surroundings, annoyed by David’s aggressive efficiency at hurrying them all out of the terminal.

“It’s good to see you again,” David told him.

Lyons blinked; Spaulding wasn’t sure whether it was a greeting or not.

“We didn’t expect you,” said Johnny from the front seat. “We expected to get the professor set ourselves.”

“We’ve got it all written down,” added Hal, leaning forward on Lyons’s right, taking a number of index cards out of his pocket. “Took. The address. Your telephone number. And the embassy’s. And a wallet full of Argentine money.”

Hal pronounced Argentine, “Argentyne.” David wondered how he could be given a course in hypodermic injection; who would read the labels? On the other hand his partner Johnny—less talkative, more knowing somehow—was obviously the leader of the two.

“Well, these things are usually fouled up. Communications break down all the time.… Did you have a good flight down, doctor?”