If he does, Curtis thought, we have to go after it on his terms. It all comes down to using Williams. “So this is a go, I take it.” It wasn’t a question. Curtis knew Mead had already decided, perhaps back at the jazz club or maybe even before he left Washington. He just wanted a firsthand look at Gene Williams. Mead wouldn’t be here otherwise. Curtis smiled. The spy who played jazz. No one at Langley could have devised a more perfect legitimate cover than Gene Williams would have, and since the CIA had no jazz musicians available, it could only be Williams.
“When does Williams leave for Prague?” Mead asked.
“Tomorrow night. I’ve had him under surveillance just in case.”
“I thought you might,” Mead said. “Well everybody at Ronnie Scott’s knows. Just go very carefully on this and let’s hope he cooperates. This could blow up in our faces if anything goes wrong.”
Curtis didn’t need reminding that the Redskin Program was not one of the Company’s great success stories. While it was true that select businessmen and tourists were routinely approached and sometimes encouraged to report any interesting conversations or even turn over photographs they took while traveling in Soviet bloc countries, they were never used in any operational sense, except in extreme cases.
“How are you planning to handle Williams?”
“He did a short stint in Vietnam, no combat, but knows the ropes on security, so I thought the patriotic pitch would be best and the Redskin fund will add a little sweetener.”
“What about getting him with Blaha in Prague?”
“Roberts says Williams is bringing in some new music for the jazz festival so we can doctor it somehow so Blaha knows Williams is his contact, then have Williams insist Blaha do the copying of the parts for the band.”
“Roberts is the Cultural Attaché, right?”
“Yeah. The Jazz festival is one of his pet projects. He fancies himself as some sort of jazz promoter. He’s pretty friendly with the leader, convinced him his band would be even better with an American drummer.”
“Roberts hasn’t tumbled to any of this has he?”
“No way,” Curtis said. “Although he tries. I feed him something once in a while to make him feel like he’s in the loop and keep him off my back.” Curtis put down his glass. He was suddenly very tired.
“Okay, but no rough stuff with Williams. If he doesn’t go for it, well, we’ll worry about that when we come to it. I want Grant with you when you make the pitch to Williams. I’ve told him if there’s anything that bothers him, I mean anything, we scrub the whole project and start from scratch. Understood?”
“Sure, no problem. I agree.”
“I’ll be back in Washington Friday. I’ll see if I can turn up more on Williams. The file is pretty light.” He paused, remembering something. “Oh, and one more thing.”
Curtis looked up. “What’s that?”
“For God’s sake keep Williams in the dark as much as possible. We want whatever Blaha is running, but we don’t want some Goddamn jazz musician skulking around Prague thinking he’s James Bond.”
Curtis smiled at Mead. He spread his hands. “Sure, you know me.”
“Yeah,” Mead said. “I know you.”
“By the way. What are we calling this operation?” Curtis stood up and shrugged into his raincoat.
“Czechmate.”
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Burning Moon Page 34
