The Scorpio Illusion (76 page)

“Oh, I see. Then you’re the ones who are bothered.”

“Safety is the issue, Miss Capell.”

“Oh! Well, I can’t fault you there, sir.”

“Thank you so much. If you don’t mind, we’d like to depart right away. Gate seventeen is a mess.”

Angel turned to Nicolo. “Hey, noble guy, you can kiss me good-bye if you want to. There’re no photographers here, or my father.”

“Thank you, Angel.” They embraced, kissed sweetly, and the young television star left the room with the airline official, carrying twenty-four thousand dollars in a thick brown envelope.

“Have you
got
him?” asked Hawthorne over the phone. “It’s been damned near three hours and we haven’t heard a word from you! That’s shit-kicking unfair!”

“And I haven’t heard from the two Israelis who are bringing me crucial information, and that’s even more unfair, Commander,” said Secretary of State Palisser, doing his best to control his anger.

“What about Meyers?”

“He’s under close surveillance, that’s all the President would agree to until there’s more substantive evidence.
He made it abundantly clear that it would be a very unpopular move for his administration to arrest a hero of Meyers’s stature. He suggested that we go to the Senate with your information and let
it
take the heat.”

“He’s all balls, isn’t he?”

“He vacillates, I’ll go that far.”

“Well, where
is
Meyers?”

“Currently in his office, doing whatever he does.”

“Is his telephone tapped?”

“He’d know it instantly. Don’t even think about it.”

“Anything from the CIA?”

“Not a thing. I spoke with the interim director himself and he’s heard nothing. Obviously London was a bust, otherwise MI-6 and our own unit would light up all the panels. Also, there appear to be so many leaks over there that I don’t dare make further inquiries even through our supposedly secure channels.”

“There’s an old adage, Mr. Secretary. When an exercise fails, let it die fast and silently; and if anyone mentions it, you don’t know what the hell he’s talking about.”

“What should we do now, Hawthorne? Or, more precisely, what can
you
do?”

“Something I’d rather not but damn well should. I’m going over to see Phyllis Stevens.”

“You think she might know something, be able to tell you something?”

“She could and not even know it herself. She was always overly protective where Henry was concerned. She was the concrete wall around him, nobody got past her. It’s an area we haven’t explored.”

“The police have kept everything quiet, but they haven’t a clue—”

“The people we’re dealing with don’t leave clues,” Tyrell interrupted. “At least not the kind the police would find. What happened to Henry Stevens had something to do with me.”

“You’re certain of that?”

“No, not really, but the odds are fair.”

“Why?”

“Because Hank made a mistake, the same mistake he made in Amsterdam. Despite his normal professional reticence, he talked too much when he shouldn’t have. He did just that in Amsterdam.”

“Would you explain, please?”

“At this point, why not? Your director, Gillette, knew there was bad blood between us; he told me himself. Infinitely more dangerous, he knew the root cause of the problem, which was intensely personal. Bad move on Henry’s part.”

“I fail to see the significance. As I recall, you made no secret of your hostility where Captain Stevens was concerned. It was common knowledge that he failed to recruit you; that was left to the British.”

“Hostility, yes, but I never elaborated on it to you or anyone else. I simply made it clear that he wasn’t my superior.”

“I think you’re splitting hairs.”

“I am. That’s what this business is all about.… There’s another axiom that goes back to when the pharaons sent spies up into Macedonia. The abused can make all the accusations he likes, but the abuser keeps his mouth shut. Why would Henry tell anyone of consequence about the trouble between us? It would raise questions about his own conduct. The salient point here is, who else might he have told? Someone who would immediately see the advantage of taking him out, cutting off my control since I couldn’t be reached.”

“I really don’t see the connection,” protested the secretary of state.
“What
control?”

“He was my inside man until I found you, Mr. Palisser.”

“I still don’t understand—”

“Neither do I,” said Tyrell, interrupting. “Maybe Phyllis can help us out.”

The vapor was so dense that the figure in the corner of the steam room could barely be seen. The hissing came to a stop, the door opened, and a second person came inside, propping the door open and carrying a large towel to the sole naked inhabitant on the tile seat. The steam rushed out in billows and streaks, revealing the sweat-drenched body of Senator Nesbitt. His eyes were in that phase between glazed and focused, his mouth open, sucking in the remaining vapors.

“I blacked out again, didn’t I, Eugene?” he said hoarsely as he rose unsteadily to his feet, accepting the towel that was draped over his shoulders by his driver-bodyguard.

“Yes, sir. Margaret spotted the signs just after lunch—”

“My God, it’s
afternoon
?” broke in the senator, close to panic.

“You haven’t done that in a long time, sir,” said the bodyguard, leading his disturbed employer out of the steam room toward a shower several feet away. “Only one or two slips,” he added.

“Thank heavens it’s summer and the Senate’s in recess.… Did you take me to … Maryland?”

“We couldn’t, there wasn’t time. The doctor came down here instead. He gave you a couple of shots and told us what to do.”

“There wasn’t time …?”

“You have an appointment at the White House, Senator. We have to pick up the countess and her nephew at seven-fifteen.”

“Oh,
Jesus
, I’m a wreck!”

“You’ll be fine, sir. After your shower Maggie will give you a massage and a B1 shot, then you rest for an hour before dressing. You’ll be in top shape, boss.”

“Top shape, Eugene?” Nesbitt’s expression was pathetic. “I’m afraid not, my friend, that’s a luxury I may
never know. I live with a horrible nightmare,
in
that nightmare. It strikes without warning and I have no control over it. I sometimes think almighty God tests me to the edge of my endurance, to see if I will commit the mortal sin of taking my own life to remove the pain.”

“Not while we’re around, sir,” said the bodyguard-keeper, gently placing his naked charge on a white plastic stool beneath the shower head and slowly turning on the lukewarm water, gradually making it colder and colder until icelike sprays pounded the politician’s body. “Your head’s a little messed up at certain times, sir, but like the doctor says, you can function otherwise better than the best of them.… We’re getting a little cooler now, sir. Stay here, please.”

“Aughh
!” cried Nesbitt as the cold spray assaulted him. “That’s enough, Eugene!”

“Not yet, sir, just a few moments longer.”

“I’m freezing!”

“I’ll shut it off in about fifteen seconds, that’s what the doctor said.”

“I can’t stand it!”

“Four, three, two, one—
off
, sir.” Once again the nurse-cum-guard threw the heavy towel over his patient and helped him to his feet. “How’s that, Senator? You’re back in the land of the living, sir.”

“They say there’s no cure, Eugene,” replied the senator softly, his eyes clear, his facial muscles in place as he stepped out of the shower with his driver’s assistance. “They say it either goes away with time and therapy, or yon take massive drugs to contain it. Naturally, they diminish the assaulted brain to the point of dysfunction.”

“There’s none of that crap while we’re around, sir.”

“Yes, I understand, Eugene, and my gratitude is such that you and Margaret will be well compensated after I’m gone. But, good God, man, I’m two people! And I never know when one takes over the other. It’s pure
hell
!”

“We kinda know, sir, and so do your friends in Maryland. We’ll all take care of you.”

“Do you realize, Eugene, that I haven’t the vaguest idea where those friends of mine in Maryland ever came from?”

“Sure you do, sir. Their doctor came down to see us after we had that little problem in the adult movie place in Bethesda. You didn’t do anything wrong; it was just that a couple of people thought they recognized you.”

“I have no memory of that.”

“That’s what the doctor figured.… Hey, it’s all gone, right, boss? You’re back on track, and you got a big night, right? The
President
, sir! You’re gonna make a lot of points with the voters with this rich countess and her richer kid nephew, right?”

“Yes, I guess I will, Eugene. Let’s have Margaret’s massage and a short nap.”

The permanent secretary to the interim director of the Central Intelligence Agency had for the third time taken the call from London, finally making it clear that the newly installed temporary DCI, having “gotten the word from the Little Girl Blood unit,” was up to his neck in emergency meetings all over Washington, currently with the President’s Cabinet at the White House, and would get back to the chairman of MI-6, Special Branch, as soon as the crisis passed. She had been as firm as her position allowed, perhaps dangerously firm, but there was no alternative. With Dulles airport successfully executed, she was the final checkpoint; the news from London could not get past her. She looked at the crystal clock on her desk; it was her last few minutes in that office.

Scorpio Seventeen gathered up the materials in front of her, rose from the desk, and approached her em
plover’s door; she knocked. “Come in,” said the voice inside.

“It’s that time of day, sir.” The secretary opened the door and walked through, carrying the papers and a stack of messages. “Here are the notes you wanted, as well as the calls that’ve piled up while you were on the phone. My Lord, it’s like the
Who’s Who
in Washington; everyone’s trying to reach you.” She placed the papers on the director’s desk.

“Everybody’s got advice and wants me to know how much they think of me. Naturally, it’ll all disappear once the President nominates his permanent choice for this job.”

“I thought you knew—”

“Knew what?”

“The Beltway rumor is that he likes you, respects your record here, and knows that the Agency upper levels want you to take over rather than some amateur from the political hat box.”

“I’ve heard it, but I wouldn’t bank my mortgage on it. The Man’s got a lot of political debts, and a deputy director isn’t one of them.”

“Well, if that’s all, I’ll head for home and hearth, sir.”

“Nothing from the Little Girl unit? I was to be informed immediately.”

“The message’s in the pile. You were on the phone with the Vice President.”

“Damn
it, you should have broken in!”

“There was nothing to break in with, sir. I don’t know all the circumstances, but I assumed that ‘no dice in London’ meant what it usually means. The operation didn’t pan out.”

“Goddamn
!” exploded the temporary DCI. “If I could have delivered on this one, I might have had a chance!… Where’s what’s-his-name, the fellow that headed up the unit?”

“He and the others have been here since three this
morning, over fifteen hours with very little sleep before that. The way he put it was that he was closing up shop and hopes for a better day tomorrow—after they got the red out of their eyes.”

“All right, I’ll speak to him tomorrow. You, too, of course.”

“I’ll stay if you like.”

“What for? To watch me lick my wounds and start my good-byes to this pretty damned impressive office? Go home, Helen.”

“Good night, Mr. Director.”

“It has a nice sound, doesn’t it?”

The secretary drove into the nearest shopping center in Langley, Virginia, locked her car, and walked to a pay phone on the pavement next to a supermarket. She inserted a coin, dialed a number long committed to memory, and waited for the usual series of beeps. She then dialed five additional digits and in moments, a voice was there. “Utah, I presume?”

“Number Seventeen.… As it must eventually happen with most of us, my time has come. I can’t go back in the morning.”

“I kind of figured that. I’ll get you out of the country tonight. Take as little as possible with you.”

“There’s basically nothing. Everything I want is already in Europe, has been for several years.”

“Where?”

“That I won’t tell even you.”

“Fair enough. When do you want to leave?”

“As soon as I can. There’s nothing I need from my apartment except my passport and some jewelry. I’ll get there in a taxi. Everything should remain the way it is, as if I’d never returned. I live near here, so I can be ready in fifteen or twenty minutes.”

“Then take the cab to Andrews and go to security.
You’ll be cleared for the next diplo-military shuttle to Paris.”

“Good choice. When is it?”

“In about an hour and a half. Have a good life, Seventeen.”

“I intend to. I’ve earned it.”

36