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The Bannerman Solution (The Bannerman Series)

Page 35

by Maxim, John R.


  “More snow coming?” Susan saw the thickening clouds.

  He nodded. “Maybe we'd better unpack and get a couple of runs in while we can. If it snows more than a foot or so they'll close the trails.”

  “Let's do it,” she said. “Can we get help with these bags?”

  Paul hesitated. His intention had been that they'd carry the luggage themselves, all but the ski bags for which he'd have to make a second trip. That would give him a few minutes alone to call Anton for an update.

  A better idea, he thought. Don't call. Don't interfere. Don't second-guess. You're on vacation. Don't. ...

  “Don't what?” Susan asked.

  “Beg pardon?”

  “You're talking to yourself.”

  “No, I'm not.”

  “My mistake.”

  He pinched some snow off the top of a parking meter and flicked it at her.

  “Come on.” She took his arm and steered him to the luggage. “Let's go skiing.”

  Palmer Reid's morning had not improved.

  The single bright spot thus far was his own deniability of any foreknowledge of Whitlow's Byzantine plan for the mutual destruction of the Bannerman/Lesko/Elena axis. The agent of the plan would be a particularly repulsive Bolivian named Ortirez. Ortirez would make all arrangements. Even Whitlow did not know the specifics. He, Palmer Reid, would be at least four layers removed from any reasonable suspicion of involvement in the events Whitlow had set in motion.

  Reasonable suspicion. There was the rub. Bannerman, for all his cold-bloodedness, could not be expected to behave reasonably upon being presented with the corpse of the Lesko girl. No amount of insulation, be it four layers or .fifty, would keep him from suspecting that Palmer Reid, for all his innocence,. genuine innocence, was somehow behind it. He would not look long for proof.

  But Whitlow, manipulative little weasel that he is, had thought of that as well. “What, sir,” he asked, “would an innocent man do in your position? Would he not be legitimately concerned that Bannerman might suspect his hand in it? Would he not, therefore, contact Bannerman immediately upon hearing of the girl's death, express that concern, express utter outrage, and insist, your past differences notwithstanding, upon helping him to track down those responsible?”

  “Bannerman's not stupid, Charles,” Reid said thoughtfully. “An innocent man might do that. So might a guilty one.”

  “Yes, but he'll have other things to think about. It will be quite clear, sir, from the manner of her death that the girl died for her father's sins. Lesko and Bannerman will blame each other, both will blame Elena, Elena will blame Ortirez. You, sir, need only sit back and enjoy the carnage until, at last, you put Bannerman firmly in your debt by presenting him with the body of General Ortirez.”

  Or yours, Charles. Or yours.

  Within two hours of that conversation, however, the inner glow Palmer Reid was beginning to feel—Paul Bannerman's comeuppance finally at hand—was rudely extinguished by a summons to an immediate conference at the office of Barton Fuller, the second most powerful man in Washington, and fourth in line for the presidency of the United States.

  “Good morning, Mr. Reid.” The Secretary's executive assistant looked up from her desk but did not smile. “Mr. Fuller will see you at once.”

  Whitlow moved toward the door with him.

  “Mr. Fuller asks to see you alone, sir.”

  Whitlow hesitated, one eyebrow raised as if in protest, his hands balled into little fists at the end of arms that never seemed to bend or swing even when he walked quickly. The Secretary's assistant's young son had electric toys that reminded her of Charles Whitlow.

  “I won't be long, Charles.” Reid indicated a seat. Whitlow waited until Reid stepped through the door before he took it. Once there, he reached into his shirt pocket and fingered a pack of cigarettes but did not take one. The assistant knew that Whitlow never smoked. She also knew that the cigarette pack almost certainly contained a recording device and that Whitlow was switching it off.

  Palmer Reid closed the door behind him and waited for Barton Fuller to rise. He did not. Fuller made a final note on a paper he was reading and slid it into a file.

  “I have very little time,” Reid said coldly.

  “Then we'll move right along, Palmer.” Fuller stood now, revealing his exceptional height. He stepped around his desk and approached to within a foot of Palmer Reid's chest. “Palmer,” he asked, looking down into the smaller man's eyes, “could you be up to anything that might, just possibly, cause embarrassment to the president?”

  Reid could feel his breath. God, how he detested this man. Nothing in Fuller's background, in Reid's view, qualified him for the position of Secretary of State. Attended Kansas State University, of all places¿ on a basketball scholarship. Traded upon a gold medal, won at the 1960 Rome Olympics, to gain entrance into Harvard Law School. Made the Law Review, went into investment banking, took time off to manage two of the president's campaigns for lesser office, ultimately left Wall Street to head the Agency for International Development, finally worming his way into this job. All from a stupid game that no gentleman ever played. “You have, I hope, a specific question?” Reid asked. The gall of the man.

  “Sure.” Fuller smiled pleasantly. “Why is Buzz Donovan dead? Is that specific enough for you?”

  Reid sucked air through his teeth. “How dare you talk to me like…”

  But Fuller turned away from him. He walked to his desk where he pressed a button. “What say we skip the bullshit, Palmer?” The smile was gone. “One day Donovan's calling all over Washington asking questions about you and Paul Bannerman. The next day you clear your calendar and fly to New York. That same man, meanwhile, has disappeared. The following day, he's found dead of a heart attack that the New York City Police Department is now calling murder.”

  A side door opened before Reid could speak. Roger Clew stepped into the room. He offered no greeting.

  “You two know each other,” Fuller said. “Roger seems to think you've been doing bad things, Palmer.”

  The sarcasm was too much. “You will change your tone,” Reid said icily, “or I will leave at once.”

  “Do what you want. But you walk out of here and I call the Attorney General. I'll have the FBI offering all assistance to the NYPD within the hour. I will also have them looking into the apparent disappearance of one of your men.” He turned to Roger Clew. “What's his name?”

  “Burdick.”

  “And Burdick is one of your special nasties, isn't he Palmer? What am I to conclude from his disappearance right on top of Buzz Donovan's death? What am I to conclude from the fact that you spent most of the weekend holed up in Fort Meade?”

  “I will account for my actions, as always,”' Reid hissed, “to appropriate and competent authority in the proper circumstances.”

  “That authority, Palmer, is the National Security Council, of which I, need I remind you, am the ranking Cabinet member.”

  Reid looked at the ceiling.

  “Let me ask you another question.” Fuller sat on the edge of his desk. “If I had time, I'd work on a more polite way to phrase this. But do you imagine that I'm the only person in this administration who knows what a dangerous old fool you really are?”

  Reid's eye developed a violent tic. His lips tried to move but he was momentarily struck dumb by the appalling gracelessness of this prairie bumpkin, this party hack. And to be so insulted in the presence of Bannerman's. . . .

  “Why is this man here?” he asked hoarsely.

  “For the purpose of checks and balances, Palmer. You've heard of the concept. I'm going to ask you some questions. You will lie to me. He will tell me the truth.”

  Reid stared at Fuller and then at Roger Clew with undisguised loathing. He knew perfectly well the under secretary's role and why he was there. It was Clew, he'd long known, who'd caused Bannerman's passport to be reinstated over his own violent objections. It was Clew who engineered that the State Department take a pol
icy of expressed disinterest in Colonel Anton Zivic, even ignoring the fact that he was, at the very least, an illegal alien. It was surely Clew who'd told Bannerman about Westport three years ago and was therefore just as much a traitor to his country.

  “You dare,” he curled his lip, “the two of you, to call yourselves Americans.”

  “Oh, Christ, Reid.” Fuller was smiling again, sadly.

  “When one realizes that the United States Senate,’* his voice had found its strength, “has confirmed a man who would condone and protect the most heinous of criminal acts. . . .”

  “Ah,” Fuller clapped his hands. “We're ready to talk criminal acts. Tell me about them, Palmer.”

  “Treason,” Reid sputtered. “Murder. Theft of government property. Arson.”

  “Arson?” Fuller turned questioningly to Roger Clew.

  “I suspect he's talking about his yacht. There's been talk that Bannerman may have taken some retaliatory action a couple of years ago.”

  “Retaliation,” Fuller repeated. “But against what? Certainly not against any action Mr. Reid here might have taken on United States soil because Mr. Reid, as we all know, is specifically constrained by law against any domestic activity.”

  “There may have been a lapse or two in that regard.”

  “I see.” Fuller stepped close to Reid again. He fingered the smaller man's lapels. “I know you're busy, Palmer, so we'll cut this short. It seems clear to me that the way to avoid having your boats burned in the future is to leave Paul Bannerman the hell alone. Do that, Palmer, and whatever else might be happening right now might just possibly die down without anyone getting indicted. Is that clear or shall I express it another way?”

  “You, sir,” Reid tried to brush his hand away, “would do well to reread your oath of office.”

  “Okay,” Fuller said wearily, “how about this?” He took a firmer hold on both lapels as he considered whether to lift Reid to eye level. “Go near Westport again, go near Bannerman again, interfere with him in any way, and I will personally have your ass.”

  ”A bad meeting, sir?” In the backseat of Reid's limousine, Whitlow switched on an harmonic device, that thwarted most forms of electronic eavesdropping.

  Palmer Reid had the look of a man who'd been slapped. Eyes closed, he waggled his fingers as if to say; Let me get my thoughts together.

  “That man's a pig,” he said finally.

  ''Yes, sir.”

  “I'll want to see a file on him, Charles. I'll want it today.”

  “I've seen it, sir. I'm afraid you won't find much that's useful. Fuller's personal history has been very closely examined.”

  ”A nigger sport,” Reid muttered.

  “Sir?”

  “Basketball. It's a nigger sport.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Suits him. He was probably a drug user just like the rest of them.”

  “Urn . . . I'm afraid there's no indication of that in his file, sir.”

  “What is his relationship with Bannerman?”

  “None at all, sir. There's no indication that they've even met.”

  “What is Fuller's interest in him then? Why would he protect him?”

  “I'm sure I don't know, sir. Unless. . . .”

  “Unless what?”

  “One protects those who are useful, sir.”

  Reid stared at his shoes. “Of course,” he whispered. “Of course.”

  “But how would he use Bannerman, sir? More to the point, would Bannerman permit himself to be used?”

  “Think, Charles. What do assassins do?”

  “They assassinate, sir.”

  “And what do trained operatives do?”

  Whitlow's lips moved to say operate but he didn't say it. It would have risked a scowl. “Sir, I really don't imagine that Barton Fuller is putting together his own death squad. But an occasional exchange of favors might not be out of the question.”

  Reid nodded slowly, still staring at nothing. “Charles, until I get to the bottom of this I want all operations against Paul Bannerman put on hold.”

  “That may be difficult, sir. I'm not sure if we can recall. . . .”

  “Do it, Charles.”

  “Sir,” he said firmly . . . must he explain again about the layers? “You must understand this. All I've done is provide Ortirez with the girl's itinerary, suggested that punishment of the father is overdue, and that Elena's wishes with regard to the daughter are no longer of concern to us. We are not involved in any arrangements Ortirez might choose to make although I did suggest a method that is classically Bolivian. When they take the girl they will. . . .”

  Reid raised a staying hand. He could do without an image of that young girl nailed to a door or whatever other gesture might be in favor with those animals these days, The shine of anticipation on Whitlow's Himmler-esque little face was sufficiently graphic. But Whitlow, Reid supposed, had done well. The girl's death will be seen as a case of Lesko's chickens coming home to roost. Lesko, in a killing rage if all goes well, will look first to Elena and then to Bannerman, who led Susan into harm's way and then failed to protect her. Whitlow is right. They'll all be feeding upon themselves within a matter of days. Pity he hadn't thought of a way to leave a trail leading back to the State Department.

  He touched his fingers to his lapels. Wrinkled. He could never wear this suit again. Ever.

  “He put his hands on me, you know,” he said distantly.

  “Sir?”

  “That man, Fuller. He put his hands on me.”

  “For heaven's sake.”

  “Can you imagine such a thing?”

  ”A basketball player, sir.” That would seem to explain it.

  “Has it occurred to you, Charles, that he might be protecting Bannerman because he fears him?”

  “Um ... as opposed to using him, sir?”

  “He fears him, Charles. And he hates him. Given a chance, he would probably punish Bannerman any way he could.”

  “Sir. . . .”

  “Well done, Charles. Very well done, indeed.” Perhaps, he thought, his heart quickening again, there could be a way to lay that trail after all.

  CHAPTER 21

  In the solarium of her Zürichberg villa, Elena stared at her still-unfinished painting of the distant mountainscape. Two days ago she was pleased with it. Now she was not. It had lost its ... serenity. Each stroke of the palette knife she'd added since her call to Raymond Lesko seemed somehow more severe, more jagged. Even putting Brahms on the record player had not helped.

  The telephone rang. She glanced at her watch. Lesko's daughter, she assumed, must have arrived safely in Klosters. She wiped her hands and picked up the receiver.

  “Elena?”

  “Yes, Uncle Urs.” She listened to the familiar grunting sounds that said he was settling into his wheelchair for a conversation of some length. A fall while rock-climbing had fractured his spine some twenty years before. He was head of the family then and even more so since. There were those, not least Urs Brugg himself, who considered his fall a mixed blessing. The Brugg family's holdings had more than quadrupled during the two decades in which they had received his full attention.

 

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