Margaret Truman's Allied in Danger

by Margaret Truman

  “I don’t know if that’s possible.”

  “Why? You and your people aren’t capable of sitting down and talking?”

  “It isn’t that, Mr. Portland. It’s just that—well, I’ll have to discuss this with others.”

  Portland knew that SureSafe’s London office was small, no more than twenty people, mostly clerical types. He was talking to the CEO, the top guy. Who else would he have to “discuss” it with?

  “I used to work for SureSafe,” Portland said.

  “Yes, I’m well aware of that,” said the CEO.

  Really? Portland thought. He hadn’t signed on with SureSafe for an assignment in a long time.

  “Can we meet?” Portland asked.

  “Let me have your number and I’ll call you.”

  “I’ll be waiting,” Portland said.

  The call came an hour later, but it wasn’t from SureSafe. It was from the young man at XCAL UK, Manford Penny’s executive assistant.

  “Mr. Portland, Chairman Penny was wondering whether you would be free later today to meet.”

  Penny? XCAL’s UK chairman?

  “Sure,” Portland said.

  He was given a time to be at the oil company’s London offices. This had been easier than he’d anticipated. He certainly didn’t expect to end up meeting with Sir Manford Penny. Why would he make himself available for a sit-down? He also wondered whether he would hear back from SureSafe. It didn’t matter. Being able to ask questions of someone like Penny was more likely to produce useful answers than asking anyone from SureSafe.

  Portland wasn’t accustomed to meeting with the chairman of anything, and he wondered whether he should wear his suit. “The hell with it,” he mumbled as he prepared to leave. “I’m not applying for a job. I just want to know what happened to my son.”

  XCAL’s London offices were in a relatively new office building near Marble Arch. Dressed in his usual safari jacket, black T-shirt, and sneakers, Portland was escorted to a large, sparsely furnished conference room where a man greeted him.

  “Ah, Mr. Portland. Rufus Norris, SureSafe.”

  Norris was the CEO of SureSafe’s British office with whom Portland had spoken earlier in the day. That he was at XCAL’s corporate offices came as a surprise.

  “Sorry I didn’t have a chance to ring you back, but things got a tad hectic. I’m pleased that we have this opportunity to meet.”

  “Same here,” Portland said. What else was there to say? He took in the handsome room. “I thought I was meeting with Mr. Penny.”

  “Oh, yes, you will be. Manford’s running late, but he should be here any minute. I understand that you’re now working for our embassy in Washington.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Quite a departure from your previous work, isn’t it?”

  Portland cocked his head. “A departure? I don’t see it that way. I’ve been involved in security my whole adult life. Security is security, isn’t it? Doesn’t matter who you provide it for.”

  “I suppose you’re right, but I was referring to the sort of assignments you undertook with SureSafe earlier in your career.”

  “If you mean they involved more danger, you’re right.”

  Norris laughed. “And you’ve had your share of that danger.”

  Portland checked his watch. What sort of game was going on? He’d come expecting to meet XCAL’s chairman and instead ended up making small talk with Norris from SureSafe. His patience was running thin and he decided to move things along.

  “Do you know why I’m here?” Portland said.

  “Of course. Your son.”

  “That’s right. My son. What do you know about how he died?”

  “Only what I’ve been told.”

  “Who told you?”

  “The report I received. I don’t know who wrote it.”

  “Maybe Fournier wrote it,” Portland suggested.

  Norris had started to respond when the door opened and Manford Penny entered, dressed in his double-breasted blue blazer, sparkling white shirt, and red-and-blue regimental tie. He glided across the room and extended a weak hand. “Mr. Portland,” he said in his cultured voice, “this is indeed a pleasure. How good of you to come on such short notice.”

  “I’m glad you were available,” Portland said.

  “Of course I made myself available for you, sir. Please, have a seat. Tea? Something more alcoholic? I’ll have it sent in.”

  “Nothing for me, thanks, but you go ahead.”

  Penny turned to Norris. “You and Mr. Portland have met, I see,” he said.

  “Yes, we have,” said Norris.

  “I am pleased that we have this opportunity to speak man-to-man about the dreadful events that led to the demise of your son.”

  “That’s why I’m here,” said Portland. “I’ve already told Mr. Norris that I’ve learned that my son wasn’t killed by members of MEND, no matter what the so-called ‘official’ report claimed. He was killed by someone from SureSafe, that organization’s top guy in Nigeria, Alain Fournier. Of course, SureSafe works for your company, XCAL Oil, which makes you a player in this.”

  Penny’s expression said both that he was surprised at what Portland had said and that he found it outlandish, if not amusing.

  The three men sat in silence until Penny broke it.

  “The reason I’ve made myself available today,” Penny said, “is that we must put this unfortunate episode behind us.” Portland started to respond, but Penny continued. “By ‘us,’ I mean this corporation, the good chaps at SureSafe, and of course you, Mr. Portland, whose grief I can only imagine.”

  Portland had disliked Penny the moment he walked through the door, and his disdain for the foppish chairman of XCAL UK only grew with each passing moment.

  “If I might say something,” Norris said.

  “Of course,” said Penny.

  “I can fully understand Mr. Portland’s obsession with his son’s death and the circumstance surrounding it, but it seems to me as someone who had spent considerable years in the field that lodging unsubstantiated charges accomplishes nothing. It certainly doesn’t bring back his son.”

  “No, it sure as hell doesn’t,” Portland snapped, his anger level rising, “but that’s not the point. My son was murdered. That’s a fact. What isn’t a fact is that he was murdered by MEND. He was shot to death by a guy from your organization, Mr. Norris, who killed him on orders from someone in this company.” He fixed Penny in a hard stare. “My question, Mr. Penny, is not how to put it behind us, as you suggest, but how to achieve justice for my son. What are you going to do about it?”

  “I must say, Mr. Portland, that I resent your tone.”

  “And I resent the whitewash that’s going on.”

  Penny looked past Portland as though seeking an easy exit.

  “How about this?” Portland said, directing it at Norris. “Bring Fournier here to London and let me question him face-to-face about Trevor’s death.”

  Norris looked at Penny before responding. “I’m afraid that’s out of the question,” he said.

  “Why?” Portland pressed.

  “You’re suggesting that Mr. Fournier be summoned to London based upon your belief that he was, in some way, involved in your son’s murder.”

  “My belief? It’s more than that, Mr. Norris.”

  “But only based on what you’ve been told by a former SureSafe employee. Who was that employee, Mr. Portland?”

  “That’s not important,” Portland said, knowing as he did that Norris wouldn’t put any stock in what some anonymous person supposedly said. He was tempted to mention Matthew Kelsey but didn’t out of fairness.

  Penny, who’d sat quietly during the back-and-forth between Portland and Norris, stood and said, “I had hoped that this little get-together might have cleared the air for Mr. Portland, and allowed everyone to go about their business free of baseless accusations. But since that doesn’t seem to be possible, I suggest that we end this pleasant little ga
bfest and—”

  Portland erupted. He slammed his fist on the table and shouted, “‘Pleasant little gabfest’? That’s what you call it, Mr. Penny? You’ve got a dead young man on your hands, sir!” He turned to Norris. “And you have a murderer working for you—sir!”

  “If you can’t calm yourself, Mr. Portland, and behave in a civilized manner, I’ll have to—”

  “What?” Portland yelled. “Have me arrested? Go ahead. But listen to this, Mr. CEO. I’m not going to rest until the person who killed my son is brought to justice, and I don’t give a rat’s ass if it takes you and your goddamn oil company, and SureSafe, down, too.”

  His sudden fury put both men on the defensive. Norris stood as though prepared to do physical battle. Penny moved smoothly toward the door. Portland, shaking with rage, willed himself under control.

  Penny opened the door to reveal two men in suits. The CEO said to Portland, “You can leave now, Mr. Portland. This meeting is over.”

  Portland glared at both men as he crossed the room. He paused in front of Penny, his fists clenched at his sides. He saw fear in Penny’s face, which pleased him. He flashed XCAL UK’s chairman a big smile and said, “You’ll hear from me again.”

  He left the conference room, saying to the two men as he passed, “You aren’t needed. Your boss is still in one piece.” He got in the elevator and rode it down to street level, where he drew in deep breaths. Although nothing tangible had been accomplished, he was glad they’d met. He could now put a face to Manford Penny, with whom his ex-wife spent considerable time, and the British head of SureSafe.

  As Portland made his way back to his flat, Rufus Norris accompanied Manford Penny into his office suite. The chairman, while maintaining a sanguine posture, was internally shaken, and ordered his private secretary to bring him a Cognac from his private bar. Without offering a drink to Norris, he sat behind his desk and said, “The man is dangerous, a volatile loose cannon. Keep tabs on him, Rufus. Keep very close tabs on him.”

  CHAPTER

  28

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  Robert Brixton decided to take the day off and drive to Maryland to visit his surviving daughter, Jill, and his grandson, Joey. Jill was married to Frank, an ex-marine who’d gone to college on the GI Bill and worked as an administrator at Walter Reed Hospital. Brixton adored Jill, and liked his son-in-law, too. Frank was a tall, taciturn guy with a buzz cut who said little. But what he did say was usually appropriate and meaningful. Maybe that Frank openly liked his father-in-law helped endear him to Brixton. No matter. Brixton considered himself blessed to have a wonderful daughter who’d established a thriving accounting practice from their home, a strapping grandson, and an okay son-in-law. Missing, of course, was his younger daughter, Janet, who’d perished in a terrorist’s bombing of a café in D.C. Nothing could ever fill that void.

  He hoped that his former wife, Marylee, wouldn’t be visiting Jill when he arrived. Following her divorce from Brixton Marylee had married Miles Lashka, an attorney with a dazzling set of white teeth and a smarmy personality, at least in Brixton’s estimation. Brixton, originally from Brooklyn, had been a uniformed cop in Washington, D.C., when he married the socially superior Marylee Greene. It had been a tumultuous marriage from the first day, and the divorce wasn’t any better, thanks to Marylee’s haughty mother’s interference. The old lady was deceased, bless her soul.

  But that was then. Following the divorce Brixton had moved to Savannah, Georgia, where he put in the requisite twenty years until retirement, the last few as a detective with a bad knee, the result of an errant bullet from someone he’d arrested. He stayed in Savannah and opened a private investigator’s office, a not especially successful venture. But while in that quintessential southern city he’d met Flo Combes, another New York transplant, and they’d been together ever since—with some notable contentious gaps. Now, at the urging of attorney friend Mackensie Smith and his wife, Annabel, Brixton operated a PI agency from an office adjacent to Mac Smith’s law office, and Flo was the proud proprietor of Flo’s Fashions in Georgetown.

  Brixton was disappointed when he arrived at Jill’s home that Marylee had taken the boy for an overnight visit and wasn’t due to return him until later that evening.

  “I should have mentioned it when you called,” Jill said.

  “No, that’s okay,” he said. “I’m glad Joey has a good relationship with his grandmother. By the way, how is she?”

  He read the expression on Jill’s face, and it wasn’t happy. “She and Miles are having troubles,” she said softly, as though not sure whether she was allowed to reveal it.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” said Brixton. “What’s the problem?”

  “Miles is—well, he’s been having affairs.”

  “Oh.”

  “Mom found out about it and is devastated.”

  “I’m sure she is.”

  As fractured as his relationship with Marylee was, he found himself becoming defensive of her and angry at Miles Lashka.

  “Are they still together?” he asked.

  “Sort of. I feel terrible for mom. She doesn’t deserve this.”

  “Looks like a divorce is in the works,” Brixton said.

  “They haven’t been married that long,” Jill said.

  Brixton started to say that he and Marylee hadn’t been married long either but didn’t. Instead, he said, “Mind some advice?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Stay out of it, Jill. Stay above the fray. You’ve got a nice life going, a terrific husband and a super son. Don’t let your mother’s problems with Lashka drag you down.”

  Tears formed in her green eyes. She placed her hand on his and said, “Thanks, dad. I’ll remember that.”

  He stayed an hour. She whipped up tuna fish sandwiches for lunch. He didn’t like tuna fish but pretended that he did. She indicated that she had better get back to work, which he understood. They parted in the driveway.

  “Give that big kid a hug for me,” he said.

  “Frank?” she asked, laughing.

  “Yeah, that big kid, too,” he said.

  They embraced and he saw her waving good-bye in his rearview mirror. Once she was out of sight he pulled over, took a handkerchief from his pocket, and dabbed at his own tears.

  He swung by the office, where Mrs. Warden was filing papers.

  “Anybody call?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  “Is Mr. Smith in?”

  “No. He’s gone for the day with Mrs. Smith.”

  Disappointed that no potential client had phoned, he settled in his office and rifled through a pile of correspondence he’d fallen behind in answering. Included in them was a note he’d written to himself: “Follow up on Dimka.”

  He dialed Ammon Dimka’s number, expecting to reach a machine. Instead, Dimka answered.

  “Mr. Dimnka, Robert Brixton here.”

  “Yes, Mr. Brixton.”

  “I wasn’t sure I’d catch you at home.”

  “Your timing is good. I’ve taken off two personal days that I’ve been saving up.”

  “Good for you. I was wondering if we could get together again.”

  “I suppose so. When were you thinking?”

  “Later today? Tomorrow?”

  “It would have to be tomorrow. Abi, my wife, is leaving work early today and we’re doing some shopping together.”

  “Good for you. Tomorrow it is.”

  “I assume it’s about the same matter we discussed when you were here before.”

  “Yes, sir, that’s right. My friend Mac Smith, the attorney I told you about, wanted me to explore with you the possibility of you coming forward with what you know about Bright Horizons and the financial scams. He has this client and—”

  “I remember. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since your last visit. Maybe it’s time that I become a little more open about it.”

  “Would you be willing to sit down with Mac and tell him what you know?�
��

  “I’m not sure I’d be willing to do that yet, but we can discuss it when you’re here. Tomorrow, say at noon. I’ll put out a lunch for us.”

  “I wouldn’t want to—”

  “It’ll be my pleasure. See you tomorrow.”

  Abi Dimka arrived home from work in time to greet her two daughters when they got off the school bus. After snacks for the girls, the family set off to shop for a new bedroom set for the older one, which set her younger sister into a pout that didn’t last long. “We’ll buy you a new set next year,” their mother said comfortingly.

  They topped off their family shopping excursion with pizza at a local Italian shop, and large cones of chocolate gelato for the girls. On the drive home Abi asked Ammon how his day had been, and what he intended to do the following day. He almost mentioned his lunch date with Brixton but decided not to. He was well aware of her concerns about his telling people of Bright Horizons’ complicity in Nigerian financial scams and didn’t want to further upset her.

  “Just planning to hang around,” he said as they pulled into the driveway. “Maybe I’ll finally get around to cleaning out that hall closet.”

  * * *

  As the Dimka family settled in for the night, two men in Bright Horizons’ back office listened again to the tap on Dimka’s phone that had recorded Brixton’s call to the transplanted Nigerian.

  “I’ll send this to Fournier in Port Harcourt,” the man who’d recorded the conversation said.

  “Good. Agu Gwantam will want to know about it, too.”

  “Of course.”

  “Dimka has to go.”

  “That isn’t my decision,” the second man said as he secured the recorder in a closet, slipped on his coat and a knit cap, and left the building.

  It had started snowing.

  CHAPTER

  29

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  David Portland’s flight from London landed on time at Dulles International Airport despite snow squalls. He hadn’t told Brixton that he was returning; he didn’t want him to feel obligated to pick him up again.

  His combative confrontation with XCAL UK’s chairman, Manford Penny, and SureSafe’s head guy in London, Rufus Norris, had unsettled him to the point of considering getting drunk, and maybe even taking up smoking again. But while those urges were born of emotions, his cognitive sense overruled and he contented himself with sipping a glass of beer in his flat, and eyeing a clean empty ashtray that he kept on his desk as a reminder of when he used to go through two packs a day.