One from Without

by Jack Fuller

  “Clearly one area of debate has been Afghanistan,” Nederlander said. He held up the Early Bird digest. “Even reports in the press have suggested that the growing success of the mujahideen has led a substantial faction close to Gorbachev to favor complete and expeditious withdrawal.”

  “Do give the Director our compliments,” said McWade.

  “Their tanks are still in Kabul, of course,” said Nederlander.

  “Meaning, don’t cut our budget yet,” Bradley whispered.

  “But looking long term,” Nederlander said, “we have to think about the aftermath. If the Soviets withdraw, what will be left behind?”

  “Our worthy allies,” said McWade.

  “Yes,” said Nederlander. “They need us now. We have trained and armed them. But we haven’t converted them. They are believers, and it is certainly not the West they believe in.”

  The men at the table who were nodding now were probably from State. Post-Soviet risks were their talking points, not the Agency’s.

  “We will have to be eternally vigilant,” said McWade. “Which is, of course, the writ of the agency you serve.”

  This cued Nederlander back into place.

  “Vigilance is the note I wanted to conclude on,” he said.

  “A skillful, provocative performance, Peter,” said McWade. “We are a bit ahead of schedule, so I suggest that we break now for lunch and return at a quarter to one.”

  The room extended its limbs, mumbling. Bradley was in motion. Rosten stayed seated, trying to process what he had just heard. She turned, saw he wasn’t following, and showed her displeasure.

  “Come with me,” she said.

  Rosten caught up at the door.

  “Could you tell what your boss thought of that last business?” he said.

  “He thinks you guys just love to issue warnings,” she said. “That way, if something turns to shit, you pull out the memo. But you should ask him yourself.”

  The people who had sat with them along the wall all turned toward a buffet table that had been set up in the corridor. Bradley took his arm and steered him in the opposite direction.

  “I’d be delighted to have lunch with you,” he said.

  “Yes, that might be pleasant,” she said, giving him the slightest little squeeze. “But actually you’ll be sitting with Ike.”

  “My God,” he said.

  “He used to work for your boss,” she said. “Did you know that? Here we are.”

  The room was not nearly as fancy as the one they had been meeting in, but it had portraits on the wall and tables sparkling with silver and crystal on fine linen. Each table was set for six.

  “I’m supposed to know which fork?” he said.

  “Use your education,” she said, taking him to a table at the center of the room. “Here’s you. Here’s Ike.” Side by side.

  “Where is Nederlander?” he said.

  “I put him at a table in the corner,” she said. “Do you two have a history?”

  “I don’t know if you’ve got the clearances,” he said.

  “You would be surprised what I have,” she said.

  At this point he did not think he would be surprised by much.

  “Where is your place?” he said.

  “At the buffet,” she said. “I don’t work for Ernest Fisherman. When lunch is over, I’ll pick you up at the door.”

  He was the first at the table, having no urgent telephone calls to answer, Early Bird to read, or important documents to review. He was left looking at the portraits of men he did not recognize, each of whom had obviously once been a commanding presence here and then was not anymore. Washington had ways of reminding you of tradition and impermanence at the same time.

  Other conferees began to fill the room. Each person who arrived at Rosten’s table asked him his job. He said deputy cultural attaché, London. Even if they read that as Agency, they figured it was very low level and looked at him as if to say the buffet is down the hall. When McWade arrived and greeted him by name, there was no more of that.

  “I’ll never forget hearing the Messiah at the Royal Albert Hall,” said the man on his right. “A thousand voices, I think it was.”

  “That’s probably enough,” said Rosten.

  “Yes,” said the man.

  The rolls were passed.

  “So you work for Ernest,” said McWade. “How is he these days?”

  His hair had faded from copper. Beneath his diplomatic manner, Rosten sensed a Viking rage, red beneath the gray. A man stepped up and said something into his ear.

  “Tell him to go ahead,” he told the man, “carefully.”

  The man showed McWade a piece of paper, which McWade took in at a glance before returning it.

  “Ernest is a piece of work,” McWade said to Rosten. The table paused to listen.

  “Did you read the Will column this morning?” said the woman on McWade’s left.

  “Yes,” said McWade then immediately showed her the back of his collar again.

  “I heard that you worked for Fisherman once,” Rosten said.

  “Everyone should,” said McWade, “and then should get over it.”

  They talked throughout lunch, the woman on the left occasionally trying to bring George Will into it again and the man on the right trying to insert his thoughts about the plans for the new Tate. McWade never allowed Rosten to be trapped for long. His curiosity about Fisherman—his health, his work habits, his demeanor, his views—seemed insatiable. Rosten tried to be responsive but careful.

  “I think it is fair to say that Fisherman is concerned about the Soviets’ continued ability to compromise us,” he said.

  McWade put down his fork and stared across the table at a man who did not seem to know what to do with the attention. Before he decided, McWade looked away.

  “I have never known a moment when Ernest was not concerned,” he said.

  “He isn’t specific,” said Rosten.

  “Which is why I’ve never had a moment when I wasn’t more concerned than he.”

  As soon as McWade finished his main course, everyone’s plate was removed.

  “You worked for him when?” said Rosten.

  “A long time ago,” said McWade. “Many of us find that we seem to have been working for him all along.”

  “I was interested in the point Mr. Nederlander made,” Rosten said.

  “What did you think of it?” said McWade.

  “I was intrigued.”

  “I’m sure Ernest will be, too.”

  “Did you understand him to be raising doubts about the mujahideen?” Rosten said.

  “I’m sorry,” said McWade. “I must be impolite and leave you. There are some things I need to take care of before the afternoon session. It has been good to meet you. Ellen will look after you and give you my coordinates, including the direct line in case you ever need to get in touch urgently.”

  “It must be quite a secret society, Fisherman’s alumni,” said Rosten.

  “The chosen,” said McWade. “Eventually each of us comes to understand what he was chosen for.”

  As he left, the table rose and put themselves in his path to shake his hand. He managed to touch most of them. Those too poorly positioned he simply disregarded. Then the waiters brought berries.

  “You two were deep into it,” said the man next to him.

  “Friends in common,” said Rosten.

  The lunch had barely begun to break up when Bradley reappeared and led him out ahead of the crowd. He noticed people noticing him. One of them was Nederlander.

  “Here,” she said as they reached the corridor. She handed him a piece of paper with three numbers. “The last is only when it is very urgent.”

  “Mr. McWade used that word, too,” said Rosten. “What is urgent?”

  “You’ll know it when you see it,” she said, bringing them to a stop in front of the grand room, which was still largely empty. “I have a few things to do, so you’ll need to fend for yourself.”


  “I’ll navigate by the compass in the floor and the stars on the ceiling,” he said.

  “You really were an English major,” she said.

  He did not know what to do but to put out his hand. She touched the back of it then turned. The click of her heels faded down the corridor.

  Back in the grand room, he took the same chair as in the morning and had to tell several people that the one next to him was taken. The meeting eventually resumed and quickly began to drone. Rosten started to make notes, not of what the gentleman from State was saying, but instead as much as he could remember of what McWade had said at lunch, the exact words. Fisherman would expect that. When he finished, he moved to Nederlander’s presentation. This caused him to miss a lot of what was now being said, but he could not imagine that Fisherman would care. Throughout the afternoon the chair next to Rosten remained empty. He found himself looking toward the door frequently. Meanwhile, McWade, too, seemed distracted. When he adjourned the session, he was first out the door. Rosten stayed where he was and reviewed his notes.

  “An unexpected pleasure,” said a voice.

  Rosten looked up. Nederlander was standing over him. Rosten did not rise.

  “It isn’t like Fisherman to concern himself with these little charades,” Nederlander said.

  “I haven’t heard anything more about our friend in Spain,” Rosten said. “Have you?”

  “He survives.”

  “That’s a relief,” said Rosten. “So many have not.”

  “As I said in my presentation, the bear has not become a lapdog.”

  “Though it seems to have one,” said Rosten. “But I’m sure you know that better than anyone.”

  “Interesting that you still think you are sure,” said Nederlander. “Say hello to Ernest for me.”

  He moved off before Rosten had a chance to answer back. The room was almost empty now. Rosten turned toward the door just as Bradley came through it.

  “Good,” she said. “You didn’t get away.”

  “Wasn’t trying,” said Rosten.

  “You’re having dinner with me,” she said. “McWade’s orders.”

  “Maybe I have other plans.”

  “You don’t,” she said.

  “And how is it that you know?” he said.

  “Look at you trying to figure out my sources and methods,” she said. “Don’t you think a girl can tell when a boy wants to be with her?”

  The place she chose was in Georgetown, naturally. Young was how she described it, young and well positioned. They got a good table, away from the window, secluded from the rest of the room. She ordered a wine miles beyond him, and they relaxed into it until the waiter brought the entrées. The food was so perfectly arranged on the plate that it felt like vandalism to touch it. It turned out that Ellen had not been to this restaurant since graduating from Georgetown’s foreign service program.

  As he had guessed, she had grown up in the East. He had passed through her hometown whenever he had taken the New Haven Railroad to the city. She had gone to boarding school through twelfth grade and could not quite fathom the idea of actually spending a childhood with parents.

  “You must have known lots like me at Yale,” she said, “probably slept with some of them.”

  “I had a different kind of friends,” he said.

  “You had to sleep with somebody,” she said.

  He had the sense that, although he may have come to Washington to observe, he had also come to be observed.

  “Tell me, why do I have McWade’s numbers?” he said well into their second bottle. “And yours.”

  “Networking,” she said.

  “Does he want something?”

  “Something,” she said. “If I were you, I’d keep my eyes open.”

  “For what?” he said.

  The check came and she took it.

  “It’s on the government, I hope,” he said.

  “I imagine you’d like to come back to my place,” she said. “It isn’t far.”

  “For what you call networking?” he said.

  “Forget it,” she said. “Bad idea.”

  “We could stop for a drink somewhere,” he said. “Keep our eyes open.”

  “You’re too young for me.”

  “A gentleman never asks.”

  “And anyway, it wouldn’t be good if I actually got to like you.”

  “Perish the thought,” he said.

  Things would have been so much better if it had.

  7

  Lawton pushed through the revolving door, stirring icy air into the lobby, which smelled of fresh, warm bread from Au Bon Pain.

  “Morning,” said Maurice from behind the security desk.

  “Brutal,” said Lawton.

  “They say more snow,” said Maurice.

  In the elevator the music was a piano solo. One of the Germans. His wife would have been able to come up with the composer and name of the piece, just like that. Most people only knew her to look at her. They saw the surface, how she became her clothes, like a model in high gloss. They noticed that she did not speak much, but they had no idea how deeply she was able to hear. Lawton had known from the very beginning how much more she was, and she had known that he did, because she heard him deeply, too.

  The doctor gave him an even chance of being whole for her again one day. We’ll just have to wait and see. We. It was a matter of Bayesian probability. Every day things did not get worse actually improved the odds of things getting better.

  These days Joyce seemed to be living the same way. Ever since Lawton had discovered that his file had been tampered with, the Gnomon acquisition had gone on hold. But the more time passed without another security breach, the more you could see the desire rising in Joyce. How much lack of evidence of something was evidence enough of nothing? Gunderman had come up with Bayesian numbers and taken them to Rosten. He called them lipstick on a guess. Only Joyce knew when he would be confident enough to make his move.

  “I need help.”

  “That’s why we do this.”

  “It’s Megan. Somebody has been impersonating her on AOL.”

  “This is not a problem I know how to deal with, I’m afraid. I can’t find the on switch. They have code words or something, don’t they?”

  “Passwords. Great name. The girls all pass them around.”

  “These cannot be changed?”

  “She doesn’t know who’s doing it.”

  “Not change the friends. Change the password.”

  “I did that first thing. But the harm’s already done.”

  “Being betrayed is painful at any age, but particularly in adolescence. They don’t expect it yet.”

  “Someone sent a message in her name to all her friends saying that her mother is having an affair with one of her friends’ fathers. Do you want the details?”

  “They are always pretty much the same. We will want to deal with the cruelty of those messages first.”

  “Megan was in shock. I told her everything would be all right, which actually used to work. She wanted me to say that I didn’t believe it.”

  “Did you?”

  “Of course I said it.”

  “Of course.”

  “She had called me at work. She never does that. I came home as soon as I could, but she had already gone to practice. Maggie was in the kitchen. I asked about her day. She said this and that.”

  “It does no good to let your imagination play X-rated videotapes.”

  “When we went to bed that night, I couldn’t sleep. I could tell that Maggie wasn’t asleep either. We lay there, not touching, facing outward in the dark. It’s been a long time since we really touched.”

  “We were talking about your daughter.”

  “I got ahead of myself, I guess.”

  “It is hard not to in this kind of situation.”

  “When Megan came home from practice that evening, Maggie and I were still at the table. Megan couldn’t look at either of us. Maggie acted
no differently than she did any other evening. It was as if Megan and I were the only ones feeling shame.”

  “You don’t know what your wife was feeling.”

  “This morning I was out of the house before either of them got up. I don’t know whether I should even go home tonight.”

  “Do you think she believes her mother really is having an affair?”

  “Not a chance.”

  “We can’t hide from our children as well as we can from each other. Our children are actually paying attention.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Please. If you need a tissue.”

  “I mean, her knowing but not being able to tell me.”

  “She did tell you. Go ahead. Take a minute.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “I am finally seeing a whole person across from me. That is what the tissue is for. For whole people. Do you realize that you haven’t used a single mathematical metaphor today?”

  “What am I supposed to do? I’ve never doubted Maggie.”

  “Ask her.”

  “She’ll deny it. I know her.”

  “Sounds like your trust was already showing some cracks.”

  Simons’s lunch meeting had been easy. It was a huge account but a long relationship. She knew his kids. He had known her father. There was always business along with coffee, some glitch that had to be worked out, a revision of policy on one side that needed to be accommodated by the other. Someone had told her once that give-and-take in a marriage was a 60-40 proposition, with both sides being the 60. Good business partnerships were like that, though she doubted that marriages ever could be.

  As she walked back to her office, the wind rasped her face and got through the buttons on her coat. She wished she could wear fur again. She kept hers in storage, just in case. They said you could get a Patagonia that would keep you just as warm as mink, but those things made a woman look like the Michelin Man.

  She had just entered the Dome lobby and was waiting to tell Maurice to let her appointment from Sears go right up when the door hissed behind her on a very low note, sounding like someone was having trouble pushing. She turned and there was Sam Gunderman. He slowed to a full stop inside the door. When he saw her taking a step toward him, he got the thing moving again.