The Tourist (22 page)

All three men crossed Broadway and turned left on Amsterdam, where Grainger went into the Land Thai Kitchen at number 450. The shadow took a position across the street by a Mexican restaurant, Burritoville, while Milo waited at a southern corner of the block, groups of young diners swarming past him.

The old man was inside less than ten minutes, emerging with a plastic bag full of takeout boxes. Milo withdrew into the shadows. Grainger appeared at the corner, the bag high so he could peer inside. Beside a trashcan, he stopped.

He could also see Reynolds, a few doors back, watching Grainger take out a box, sniff, open it up, and put it back in. Then he took out a much smaller box, sniffed, made a face, then opened it. He shook his head in disgust, tossed the box into the trashcan, and continued back up Eightyfirst, toward home. Reynolds followed, but Milo didn't. The whole walk here, Milo had watched out for a second or third shadow. Three-man teams were the norm for intensive surveillance work, but it had struck him that Fitzhugh--and Fitzhugh had to be the one behind this--had assigned Reynolds to the job; Reynolds, who was off active duty. Fitzhugh wanted to keep this quiet and had decided on a skeleton crew: Reynolds and the FedEx man Milo didn't know. Once they were out of sight, Milo jogged up to the trashcan, snatched the light, nearly empty takeout box, and kept moving swiftly up Amsterdam, then east on Eighty-second until he reached Central Park. Along the way, he'd opened the box, taken out the single slip of paper, and dropped the box into another trashcan.

Near a streetlamp, he paused among some Japanese tourists discussing the details of a map. He unfolded the small square of notepaper and cursed Grainger for his brevity. He'd given no answers, only the tools to find them. Perhaps, though, the old man was just as in the dark as he was. After a scribbled international cell phone number, he read: E in Frankfurt:

The Last Camel / Collapsed at Noon

and a single word:

Luck

2 7

While waiting for his ten o'clock Singapore Airlines flight in JFK's recently reopened Terminal 1, pushing back his desire to fly instead to Florida and collect his family, he rechecked his belongings and added a few things from the gift shops: an extra T-shirt, underwear, a digital wristwatch, and a roll of duct tape.

Then, after passing from the United States into that stateless netherworld of the duty-free international terminal, he joined other travelers at the Brooklyn Beer Garden. He found a lonely Dutch businessman who kept his cell phone on the table. The Dutchman, he learned, was heading to Istanbul, trading in pharmaceuticals. Milo bought the man another beer and told him he sold advertising airtime for NBC. The Dutchman was intrigued enough by Milo's off-the-cuff story to get up and buy two more beers in return. While he was at the bar, Milo took the man's cel phone, popped it open under the table, removed the SIM card and replaced it with the one from his phone, then put it back on the table.

Before boarding, he turned on his phone and used the Dutchman's SIM card to call Tina. She answered on the third ring with a wary "Yes. .?"

"It's me, hon."

"Oh," she said. "Hi."

The silence was unnerving, so he broke it. "Look, I'm sorry about--"

"What are you
saying?"
she said, edgy. "This isn't the kind of thing you just say sorry to. It doesn't work that way, Milo. I need
more."
A light, girlish voice in the background said, "Daddy?" The blood rushed to Milo's head, mixing with the beers and his overall lack of food. "I don't know much. All I know is those agents are after me for something I didn't do."

"For Angela's murder," she said.

"Let me talk to Daddy!" said Stephanie.

Now he knew--Simmons believed he had killed Angela. "I have to figure this out."

Again, silence, punctuated only by Stephanie's plea: "I want to talk to Daddy!"

Explain,
she'd said, so he tried: "Listen, Tina. Whatever those people from Homeland said, it's not true. I didn't kill Angela. I didn't kill anyone. But I just don't know enough to say more than that."

"I see." Her voice was flat. "Special Agent Janet Simmons seemed to think she was pretty justified in her suspicions."

"I'm sure she thinks so. But whatever she's calling evidence . . . I don't even know what it is. Did she tell you?"

"No."

He wished she knew something. "The only thing I can think of is someone's setting me up."

"But
why}"
she insisted. "Why on earth--"

"I don't
know,"
he repeated. "If I knew why, I would know who. If I knew who, I could figure out why. You follow me? And in the meantime, Homeland Security thinks I'm either a killer or, I don't know, a traitor." Again, silence.

He tried again: "I don't know what that woman's been telling you, but I've got nothing to be ashamed of."

"And how are you going to prove that?"

He wanted to ask if the proof was for them or for her. "Are you going to Austin?"

"Tomorrow, probably. But where are you?"

"Good. I'll be in touch. I love--"

"Daddy?"

He jerked physically; she'd handed over the phone without telling him.

"Hey, Little Miss. How are you?"

"I'm tired. Your friends woke me up."

"Sorry about that. They're jerks, aren't they?"

"When're you coming back?"

"As soon as my work's done."

"Okay," she said, again sounding so much like her mother that Milo's stomach started to cramp. When they finished, Stephanie claimed not to know where her mother was, so they hung up.

Milo stared across the rows of chairs at families, some excited and others bored by their prospective trips. A fresh cramp hit him. He got up, stiff, and half-jogged down the carpeted terminal, past electric walkways, until he reached the bathroom. He shut himself into a stall and was sick, getting rid of all the beer his body hadn't yet absorbed. He wiped his mouth, gargled water, and returned to the corridor. The sickness had gotten rid of a mental block he hadn't even known was there, fogging up his vision of what to do next. He didn't want to use the Dutchman's phone card after boarding the plane--calling Tina had compromised it--so he put it to use now, dialing + 33 1 12. A female operator informed him in French that he had reached France Telecom directory assistance. He asked for the number for a Diane Morel in Paris. There was only one listing, and he asked her to put him through. It was five in the morning there, so the old woman who answered sounded vaguely terrified. Yes, she was Diane Morel, but she sounded at least sixty. He hung up.

It was a wash, but at least he knew he couldn't simply call up Diane Morel and have a leisurely conversation about Angela Yates and Colonel Yi Lien. If he called the DGSE and asked to be passed on to her desk, or her home, his location would be tracked in minutes and relayed to the Company, and their conversation would be rushed. Milo needed time with Mme. Morel. He popped the battery out of his phone and tossed the SIM

card in a wastebasket.

Eight hours later, at one on Friday afternoon, a stolid, graying German behind Plexiglas compared his passport photo to the well-attired but exhausted-looking businessman in front of him. "Mr. Lionel Dolan?"

"Yes?" said Milo, smiling broadly. "Are you here for business?"

"Happily, no. Tourism."

Just saying it again brought back unwanted memories. Milo remembered all those other airports, border guards, customs officials, and carry-on bags. He remembered plainclothes policemen and agents clutching newspapers and the times when he, too, held those newspapers, sitting for hours in airports, waiting for contacts who sometimes didn't arrive. Frankfurt Airport, one of Europe's great, ugly hubs, had hosted him many times.

The border guard was holding out his passport, so he took it. "Have a good vacation," the man told him.

Steady, but not hurried.
He carried his knapsack past the customs officials, who--like most of Europe's customs officials--weren't going to bother a man in a tie. He continued through the crowded baggage claim, heading directly out to the noisy, car-choked curb, where he smoked a Davidoff. It didn't taste as good as it should have after the long flight, but he finished it anyway as he walked to a pay phone near the taxi stand. He dialed the number he'd memorized somewhere over the Atlantic.

It rang three times. "Ja?"

"The last camel," said Milo.

A pause, then: "Collapsed at noon?"

"It's me, James."

"Milo?"

"Can we meet?"

Einner didn't sound overjoyed by the call. "Well, I am in the middle of something."

"Right now?"

"Uh, yeah," he said, then Milo's throat closed up as he heard a muffled voice in the background trying to scream. He knew that sound. The noise of someone who'd been gagged.

"When'll you be free?"

"Give me . . . I don't know. Forty minutes?"

"Where?"

"I'm in the Deutsche Bank right now, so--"

"The twin towers?"

"Yeah."

Milo imagined him in an office in one of the upper floors of those famous mirrored towers in the center of the financial district, some unfortunate CEO bound and gagged under his desk, while Einner casually made a date on the phone. He'd forgotten how rough Tourism could be.

"Listen, you know the Frankfurt Opera? Let's meet in front of there around two. I'll have another chance to prove we're not uncultured hacks."

"Should you be saying all that aloud, James?" Einner grunted. "This guy? In ten minutes, he won't be able to say a thing."

The man's muted howls rose in pitch.

He took a clean, sparse train to Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof, where he hooked his knapsack over his shoulder and went on foot past afternoon gridlock toward the Friedensbrucke. Instead of crossing the bridge, he turned left up the dock running alongside the Main River. All the well-dressed businessmen and teenagers and pensioners reminded him of Paris. Only a week ago.

He grabbed a schnitzel sandwich from a street vendor and walked back inland to the long park at Willy-Brandt-Platz, where he took a bench and gazed at the glassy modern face of the Oper Frankfurt. Despite Einner's confidence that he could speak openly in front of his captive, Milo kept an eye on passersby. It was" a habit he'd lost in the last six years, a habit he needed to regain if he wanted to stay a free man.

All Tourists know the importance of awareness. When you enter a room or a park, you chart the escapes immediately. You take in the potential weapons around you--a chair, ballpoint pen, letter opener, or even the loose, low-hanging branch on the tree behind Milo's bench. At the same time, you consider the faces. Are they aware of you? Or are they feigning a forced ignorance that is the hallmark of other Tourists? Because Tourists are seldom proactive; the best ones bring you to them. Here in the sunny park, he noticed a woman at the curb having trouble starting her car. That was a typical setup. Feign exasperation until the target makes his own decision to come and help. Then you have him. Two children--twelve or so--played along the base of a huge, lit-up euro sign that dominated the park. Another potential trap, because Tourists are not above using children for their ends. One child falls and pretends injury; you go to help; a "parent" approaches. Simple. And over there, by the eastern edge of the park, a university student took vertical photos of the European Central Bank skyscraper that looked down on everything. Casual photographers were everywhere in a city like this, and they could shoot you from all directions.

"Hands up, cowboy!"

Milo almost fell off the bench as he jumped and twisted, finding Einner with a finger pistol pointed at him, grinning madly. "Jesus."

"Little rusty," Einner said as he safely pocketed his hand. "Keep going like this, old man, you'll be dead by sundown."

Milo recovered his breath, ignored the dangerous sound of his heart. They shook hands. "Tell me what you know."

Einner nodded in the direction of the opera house. "Let's walk." They moved together, neither in a hurry.

"It's not what you think," said Einner. "They haven't called in Tourists--you're not that important yet. Tom told me to expect you." If it was true, Milo was relieved. He was starting to believe that having Einner on his trail would be a serious problem. "Did Tom tell you why you should expect me?"

"I got that elsewhere. Had breakfast with a friend at the consulate. She's not. . " He paused as they reached the street, wondering how to put it.

"She's not quite a security risk, but she's no security saint either. She told me about a wire that came in, for all embassies and consulates, to look out for Milo Weaver."

"Company wire?"

"State Department."

"Are they looking?"

"Well, you don't get these all-embassy alerts often. They're looking. Last I heard, a lead went cold in Istanbul."

As they crossed the street, Milo felt a tug of regret for the Dutchman, whose phone had been a beacon for all the Company agents in Turkey. The feeling passed, though, when he realized that, by backtracking the Dutchman and his SIM card, they certainly knew that Milo had flown out of JFK and, within a few hours, when. "How about Frankfurt?" he asked when they reached the Opera doors. "Are you done here?" The Tourist checked his watch. "Been off the clock eighteen minutes. I'm all yours."

Milo held open the door for him. "And you've got a car?"

"I can always get a car."

"Good." They entered the broad, modern lobby, and when Einner veered toward the opera cafe Milo tugged his arm and guided him through a side corridor leading past the bathrooms.

"You know a better place for a drink?"

"I know another exit. Come on."

"Jesus, Milo. You really are paranoid."

While Milo could only jimmy the doors of old-model cars, Einner had a more advanced tool at his disposal--a small remote control for power-door locks. He pointed it at a Mercedes C-Class saloon, pressed a small red button on the quarter-sized mechanism, and waited while it automatically went through possible code combinations. After forty seconds, they heard the car alarm bleep its disarming, then the doors unlocked with a quiet pop. It took just over a minute for Einner to start the car. They were soon heading out of town, and Einner said, "Where to?"