The Schoolboy (Agent Orange Book 2)
Page 30
“I see. Well, I don’t want any additional documentation about this. Only verbal, is that understood? Good. Thank you for the briefing, comrade. That’s all for now.”
The Chairman nodded and silently left the office. The Secretary sipped the chilled vodka he had had delivered earlier. He knew the KGB chief needed to be replaced, and soon.
Would it be through political action or violence?
***
Sir Thomas had known he was being followed. He cursed his own recklessness for going out into public too soon or at least without an adequate disguise and a weapon. The man tailing him was tall with very fair hair, and wearing sunglasses. He moved with the residual swagger of past successes. Who was he, and who had sent him? The irony of narrowly escaping execution at the hands of the Frenchman—with the help of Waypoint, of course—only to be found and tracked down gnawed at his spy’s sensibilities.
Baddeley ducked into the little church by its side entrance and discovered that the interior passage led only to a locked door in one direction and an ancient stone spiral staircase in the other. He began climbing the steps as quickly as he could, the pain from his previously broken toes having returned with the exertion. He tried pulling himself along faster, but his fingers had not fared much better under Bleudot’s brutal interrogation.
Despite the cold mountain air he was sweating heavily and breathing hard. He reached the top of the staircase when the sound of the door opening and closing washed up the stone column. Then he heard the steady, confident footfalls as the blond-haired man ascended. Baddeley was in a little room with narrow crosses cut through the walls for both pious decoration and crossbow defense many centuries earlier. There were enough of them to illuminate the room.
Baddeley looked around for any weapon of opportunity—there was nothing, not even the odd stone fallen out of the walls by disrepair. Could he pry one out? Unlikely. These medieval keeps were supposed to have swords and shields all over the place, right? No, not in a church. Could he fit through one of these little windows? His thinking got more desperate until finally his pursuer reached the top. A long suppressor affixed to a pistol was the first thing to enter the room, then the man himself.
“I assume if you had a gun you would’ve pulled it by now,” the man said. He was an American.
“Hold on a minute,” Baddeley pleaded. “Curtis? I don’t understand, but we can work out something, right?”
“Doubtful,” Robert Curtis answered coldly. “This would be the part where you offer me a bunch of dough to let you live.”
“Of course,” Baddeley said. “I have money; I can get you a lot of it. It’s stashed in all sorts of places. You can be rich and off to enjoy a proper peaceful retirement in twenty-four hours.”
“Sir Thomas, I thought you were broke, with debts. At any rate it just wouldn’t work out. You see, your boss sent me.”
“My boss? Ebsen? Or Waypoint?”
Curtis nodded. “Both, I guess. But we both know Waypoint’s cover has changed again. Charger, right?”
“But I didn’t let any information get out,” Baddeley insisted. “About Charger or anything else.”
“The way I heard it you sang like a bird.”
“But you got to the Frenchman before he could tell anyone else, right? So no harm done.”
Curtis shrugged. “I’m not here because of what you said. Ebsen sent me because of what you might say in the future.”
“That French bastard tortured me!” Baddeley said as he fell against the wall. “When you came in and killed him, you saw what he’d done to me! Please!”
“I’ve got more bad news,” Curtis said with a cold, wolfish grin. “Bleudot isn’t dead…”
The anguish on Baddeley’s face melted briefly into surprise as the meaning of Curtis’s words sank in. “Wait! I’ll tell you more!”
“…but you are.”
“Scala—” Baddeley managed to get out the single word before Curtis raised the gun and fired twice in quick succession into Baddeley’s forehead.
Curtis thought it fortunate that Sir Thomas had led him up here. It was secluded and probably very rarely visited. Practically speaking, the crows would be able to fit through the narrow slits to feed; then various other insects would join in. Even for a numbed veteran like himself, however, Curtis was repulsed by the imagery.
Back down at the bottom of the staircase he put the pistol away before casually exiting the church and walking back to the parked Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. He had several hours of driving ahead of him—plenty of time to think about what was to come. He chastised himself for the quick kill as Baddeley was beginning to divulge something—what did scala refer to? He would need to chase down the reference later. At any rate, phase one was complete. Hopefully Ebsen would be pleased. Eliminating Baddeley had been relatively easy.
The rest of the plan was going to be very tricky indeed.
End Notes
If you’ve enjoyed Agent Orange and The Schoolboy, the first two books of the Agent Orange trilogy, and wish to continue along with Andrew Keeton’s adventures, please sign up for a free copy of “The Jungle of Death,” a short story featuring Keeton, and for news about the thrilling finale to this three-book story arc.
If you haven’t read Agent Orange yet, don’t worry! Simply find it here for purchase on Amazon to catch up on Keeton’s mission to save a fellow spy captured in East Berlin. Although some of the story line carries through to The Schoolboy, the East Berlin rescue is a standalone adventure sure to take you back to the Cold War days when hundreds of millions of human lives were trapped behind a political and physical construct called the Iron Curtain.
The conclusion to the Andrew Keeton/Agent Orange trilogy, Jetsetter, is scheduled to be published by February 2018.
Here’s the Jetsetter mission brief: Chase Hawkins is a world famous adventurer—and an American-controlled asset with a very special talent. Then he’s suspected by enemy agents. In order to save the man, Andrew Keeton must dodge assassins, a nefarious new spy ring, and Hawkins’s own stubborn ego. Set in 1966 Europe, this final chapter is packed with action and with the period details that made Agent Orange and The Schoolboy thoughtful thrill rides through the world of ‘60s Cold War espionage!
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About the Author
Stephen Langford has several fiction projects underway, most notably his inaugural Agent Orange series. He lives a quiet and unassuming life in the midwestern plains of the United States surrounded by his faithful friends and family.
Website: stephenlangfordbooks.com