Without Honor - 01

by David Hagberg

  “You’re forty-four and your life is passing you by. You’re no longer in the fray, is that it?” Marta had asked, coming very close to the mark.

  His life had passed him by in Switzerland, at least five years of it had. He had become anxious without admitting why. Or at least without admitting that he missed the business. “You are either a part of the problem or a part of the solution,” his father used to say. He’d tried to step out of himself, and in the end it had been impossible.

  Day had ordered him to step aside. But that, too, was impossible now.

  The day had seemed six months long. Eight o’clock in the evening seemed never to come. Yet when it did and Leonard Day found himself driving onto the grounds of Gallaudet College in Brentwood Park, he wished he could somehow stop time. Powers had seemed preoccupied on the telephone, but he’d agreed to meet Day at eight at his home. “Only if it’s very important, Leonard,” Powers had said at the last. “It’s getting just a bit hairy around here at the moment, if you catch my drift.” How many crises had he weathered in this town? he wondered. How many late night meetings, private conferences, for-your-eyes-only memos passed hand-to-hand had he seen? Here in Washington at the top, among the elite—the policy makers, the movers and shakers —the big decisions were made, but so were the colossal blunders. The U-2 flight of Francis Gary Powers, the Bay of Pigs, the entire Vietnam debacle, the abortive hostage-rescue attempt from Tehran, Watergate, the Iran-Contra Affair. The list was endless. This small town on the Potomac was very nearly an exclusively all-white Anglo-Saxon Protestant male enclave. The chosen few belonged to comfortable clubs where they could rest from the vigors of leadership. Golf courses came with bar service out on the fairways. Restaurants and hotels were so exclusive that eighty percent of the city (the blacks) could not gain entrance except through the service doors as busboys and waiters and bellhops. But God, it was exciting to be a part of it. First California, Day thought, now the center of the universe.

  Driving past the college it was dark inside the car. The narrow road wound its way deep into the park, the trees and pathways mysterious in the warm night. Day lowered his window as he turned up the driveway to Powers’s home. Lights shone through the trees as he reached the security gate. He’d been here many times in the night. But never quite like this. Never with this intent. Never with this edge of fear that rode with him like some dark entity.

  From the gate house the security man came over. A handgun was holstered at his hip. “Good evening, Mr. Day,” he said.

  “I’m a little late.”

  “Yes, sir. So is the director, but you can go on up; I’ll tell them you’re coming.”

  Them? Day wondered as he proceeded up from the gate to the main house. Two cars were parked in the long circular driveway in front of the big three-story brick Colonial that Powers had taken over since becoming DCI. “A big rambling wreck of a mansion,” was how he described it. But with a certain fondness, Day had always suspected. Of course Powers had been raised with the proverbial silver spoon in his mouth and expected always to live this way. It was his due. Getting out of the car, however, Day thought again that the house was ostentatious in its size, in its location, and certainly in its security precautions.

  In the distance he suddenly could hear the dull chop of helicopter rotors beating the air. On the front step of the house he stopped and looked up as the DCI’s machine came low over the trees from the southwest, its landing lights coming on as it swung left and settled in for a landing on the helipad at the rear of the house.

  “Just this way, sir,” someone from the open door said. Day turned. “They’re in the study,” the houseman said politely.

  Day followed the man through the great hall beneath the U-shaped balcony and back along a narrow corridor to a pair of open doors that led into Powers’s study, a large, book-lined room with French doors leading to a veranda, a long leather-covered desk, and a grouping of couches, chairs, and Queen Anne tables in front of the fireplace. A high tension room. Not a retreat. The man who occupied this place was under the gun twenty-four hours a day, and Day had a huge respect for him. A lot of them were carried out feet first, but not Powers.

  “Would you care for a drink, sir?” the houseman asked.

  “No,” Day said at the doorway.

  Lawrence Danielle stood at the French doors, holding the curtain back as he watched outside, and General Murphy, the deputy director of Central Intelligence, spoke on the telephone at the desk, his voice low and gruff. The room smelled of stale cigars and polished wood, and the only light was on the desk, casting the room in deep shadows. They were in crisis here, Day saw. All of them, each for a different reason, or perhaps the same one, had come to Powers for their salvation. Supplicants to the great man who sat on the seventh floor at Langley at the right hand of the president himself. In the days and nights to come he would always remember this exact moment as a watershed, as a bloody continental divide.

  “He’s just now touched down—” Danielle started to say, dropping the curtain and turning around. He stopped in midsentence.

  “Hello, Lawrence,” Day said.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Donald agreed to see me.”

  “About what?” Danielle demanded, remaining by the window. Danielle was always the dapper dresser. This evening, however, his tie was loose, his collar open, and his face was red and looked as if he had just run up six flights of stairs. His eyes were bloodshot.

  How far to go with this? There was a leak, according to McGarvey. One they hadn’t found yet. One at high levels within the agency. Danielle was number three. General Murphy was number two. And number one had just now landed.

  “When did you speak with him?” Danielle asked harshly. “We’re busy here. Maybe yours can wait.”

  “This morning,” Day said. “He asked me not to come if it wasn’t terribly important.”

  Danielle didn’t move, seeming as if he were listening for something, waiting for something to happen. He hadn’t shaved; a bit of stubble darkened his chin.

  “Mexico?” Danielle asked softly.

  Day remembered a bit of T. S. Eliot from the old days.

  It was from a poem called “The Hollow Men.”

  He remembered the exact moment that Trotter had come to him, what seemed like centuries ago, with his story. “Because I trust you,” he’d explained. “Because you’re close to Powers and Yarnell.”

  “Yes,” he said, nodding slightly.

  General Murphy was gazing across the room at him. “He’s just arrived,” he said into the telephone. “I’ll call you later.” He put down the telephone abruptly, his eyes narrow. He was a big man. An old friend of Powers who had pulled him from the army for duty as deputy director. Where Powers was sophisticated, Murphy was blunt. They made a wonderful team.

  “What about Mexico?” he asked menacingly.

  “I have some information,” Day said hesitantly. “For the director,” he added.

  Murphy and Danielle exchanged glances. From out in the corridor they heard someone coming. Day stepped away from the doorway as Powers came around the corner, his bodyguard just behind him.

  “Hello, Leonard,” he said. His bodyguard closed the doors behind him. “It’s confirmed, then?” he asked Murphy.

  “I’m afraid it is, Donald,” the DDCI replied.

  “Has the president been notified?”

  “No.”

  “Perhaps you should speak with Leonard first, and then we can get on with it, Mr. Director,” Danielle suggested.

  Powers took Day by the arm and led him the rest of the way into the room. “Leonard is a very old friend. My eyes and ears over at Justice, as a matter of fact. Didn’t you know? He understands the essentials. I believe we can trust him on this one.” He turned back to Day. “Isn’t that right?”

  Day felt as if he were standing next to a live high-tension wire. A wrong move and he would be killed. Instantly. “Yes, Mr. Director.”

  “We
’ve discussed the missile crisis, from the legal standpoint,” Powers said. “The latest now is that one of our SR-71 spy planes has unfortunately been shot down thirty miles south of the Mexican border. Not a pleasant bit of news to bring to the president.”

  “There are actually missiles then, sir?” Day asked. “It’s certain?”

  “It looks like it.”

  “God.”

  “Yes,” Powers said.

  “He’s come with something about Mexico,” Danielle interjected in his quiet voice.

  “I thought as much,” Powers said. “What have you got for us, Leonard? What have you found out?”

  “And from where?” Danielle added.

  Day had always been a cautiously ambitious man. His father had been a banker, but had gone too far too fast and had lost everything he’d worked a lifetime for, after which he had committed suicide. At this moment Day felt as if he were standing on the edge of the same chasm.

  “What i have to say is for your ears only, Mr. Director,” he said, girding himself.

  Powers patted him on the arm. “It’s all right, believe me.”

  “We can step outside for a moment,” Danielle suggested, breaking the sudden awkward silence.

  “No,” Powers said without taking his eyes off Day. “We’re terribly busy here, Leonard. I’ve yet to get over to the White House. We’re in a shambles at the moment. It’s going to get rough around the edges.”

  Still Day hesitated. Perhaps McGarvey’s original assessment about Basulto’s story was correct. Perhaps there was nothing to it at all. But then who had killed Plónski, who had killed Owens, and why? Something was happening inside of Day. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. Yet he knew it had to do with fear of the second kind. The first was concern for oneself, while the second was fear for the world. For existence.

  “It’s about Darby Yarnell, Mr. Director,” he said. “I have reason to believe the man is a Soviet spy.”

  PART THREE

  26

  McGarvey had a small room in the Four Seasons Hotel. The place was old but well kept and the bed was reasonably comfortable, though he hadn’t come to sleep. The day had closed in on him, and in the afternoon he had found himself wandering almost aimlessly around the city; first to the White House, as if he thought to catch another glimpse of Yarnell the diplomat; then out to Chevy Chase where he passed his ex-wife’s house, but her Mercedes was not in the driveway and the windows were all dark; and finally, dangerously, past Yarnell’s fortress a block up from the safe house where Trotter’s team was—or had been—doing its job. He’d returned to take a shower and change his clothes, then went down to the bar where he had a beer and a sandwich. They’d wanted him to back down for the moment, the Mexican crisis would first have to be contained, was their argument. But it made increasingly less sense to McGarvey, who was beginning to see that Baranov and whoever worked for him were the Mexican crisis. Yarnell was their only viable lead. At nine he headed on foot back into Georgetown along 29th Street. The traffic was heavy; the air was thick and smelled of exhaust fumes. The brownstone houses were expensive and implacable in their rows, like soldiers at attention. He turned left on R Street, passing Oak Hill Cemetery, the trees standing as natural counterparts to the grave markers, some of which were ornate and monumental, some of which were small and sad, lost in the darkness. At 3 I st Street he stopped and looked up toward Dumbarton Oaks Park. He thought about Marta back in Lausanne. Alone, he hoped. Sad. He’d begun to believe that she had told him the truth, that in the beginning she had watched him for the federal police, but that later she had fallen in love with him. But there wasn’t a thing he could do about, or for, her now. Even if he wanted to do something, which he wasn’t at all sure he did.

  A pale yellow Mercedes coupe pulled up in front of the Boynton Towers Apartments across the street, and a woman got out from the passenger side. McGarvey decided there was something familiar about her. She turned and looked back inside the car, the street light illuminating her face and hair. She was Lorraine Hawkins, the girl with the sommersprossen. This evening she was dressed elegantly in a tight-fitting evening dress and her hair was done up in the back. She was background noise, McGarvey thought. Cover. Yarnell might notice the setup. Might become suspicious. If and when he did, they hoped he would notice her. A normal girl with friends who came and went. Nothing suspicious here. She made a gesture, then shut the passenger door, crossed the sidewalk, and entered the building. A moment later the Mercedes moved off. McGarvey caught a glimpse of the man behind the wheel, but he didn’t recognize him.

  Day had told him that there were more important considerations now. That Powers and the president would have to be brought in on this. But Janos had not been Day’s friend. Day would not have to face Pat and the children. Nor had Day come face-to-face with Owens; he hadn’t listened to the old man’s story, hadn’t looked into his eyes, hadn’t in the end been witness to the cold wind whipping the flames hundreds of feet above the beach house.

  The block was quiet for the moment. The watchers and the watched. As had been happening to him all along, he had the feeling that someone was lurking in the shadows, their eyes on him. But no one was about. There were no odd cars or trucks or vans with too many aerials. No lingering pedestrians. Nothing at all to suggest that his feeling was anything other than paranoia, plain and simple. There was more here though. Something else in the equation. Something he felt he should be aware of. Some flash of intuition that would make all the pieces fit.

  He crossed the street, a taxi rushing past just behind him, and he went inside. The elevator was on its way back down. Lorraine had taken it up to the eighth floor but had thoughtfully sent it back. They were paying attention to the details, McGarvey thought, which was very good. Their lives could very well depend on their tradecraft. No use in advertising her floor number. Yet he was surprised that they were still here. He would have thought that by now Trotter would have called them away. Unless his were not the only second thoughts.

  Riding up he took out his gun and checked the action, holstering it finally when the door opened onto an empty corridor. The building was quiet. He made absolutely no noise on the carpeted floor as he approached the apartment door. From inside he could faintly hear the murmur of someone talking, but then it fell quiet. He knocked and a moment later it opened. Lorraine Hawkins, her hair down now, stood in the doorway, the Mexican, Gonzales, right behind her, a long-barreled Smith & Wesson .357 in his right hand. The apartment was in darkness. McGarvey could smell the night air from an open window. A big infrared Starlight scope was set on a tripod across the room. The telephone monitoring equipment had been set up on the buffet. Sheets, the tan mack from Lausanne, was speaking softly into the other telephone.

  “Anything from his phone calls?” McGarvey asked.

  “Nothing that’s worth anything,” Lorraine said, moving back away from the door. “He came in an hour and a half ago. His daughter is with him.”

  McGarvey stepped inside. Lorraine closed and locked the door behind him. Gonzales holstered his gun and went back to the scope that was trained across 32nd Street on Yarnell’s house. Sheets turned his back to them and continued with his telephone conversation.

  “Anyone else?”

  “I just arrived myself.”

  She was hiding something, he could see it in her eyes. “Who else is down there?”

  Gonzales looked away from the scope. “Your ex-wife showed up about twenty minutes ago.”

  “Alone?”

  “With a man named Phillip Brent,” Lorraine said.

  “They’re over there now?”

  “Yes.”

  This was not how he had imagined it would be coming back to the States, he thought; Kathleen involved in this business, wittingly or not. From the beginning she’d distanced herself from his work, then later from him. Now she was in the middle of it. At the dangerous core.

  He went to the window and looked across toward Yarnell’s house. Even wi
thout the glasses he could make out the lit upper-story windows and the vague black squares of the dark attic windows. The watchers and the watched. The listeners and the listened to. A bit of De la Mare came to him; “Tell them that I came, and no one answeredl/ That I kept my word.” But that didn’t matter. There was no honor here, he thought. No one else kept his word.

  But why Kathleen? he wondered. Why her of all people? She had nothing to do with this. She’d never had anything to do with it. And for years she hadn’t even had anything to do with him.

  “Mr. Trotter is on his way over,” Sheets said, putting down the telephone. “Apparently he’s been trying to reach you all afternoon.”

  “Well, he’s found me,” McGarvey growled, dragging his eyes away from Yarnell’s house.

  “Would you like something to drink, Mr. McGarvey?” Lorraine asked abruptly.

  “We’re shutting down,” Sheets said before McGarvey could say a thing.

  “Not with my wife down there you’re not!”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but—”

  “We’ll just wait until John gets here. You can give me at least that much.”

  “He said break it down,” Sheets insisted.

  “Bingo,” Gonzales said softly from the Starlight scope. He straightened up and stepped aside, his eyes narrow, his lips pursed. He glanced at Sheets and then at McGarvey and shrugged. “Maybe you want to take a look, maybe you don’t.” He nodded toward the scope. “But it’s something.”

  He walked away and went down the hall to the back bedroom. Lorraine and Sheets were watching McGarvey, who felt as if he were on center stage in a sideshow. He looked out the window. Nothing had changed as far as he could tell with his naked eye. Look, don’t look. Stay, go. Think, don’t think. Just run away and keep running. Don’t ever look back. Christ, never look back.