Varak walked in, closing the door behind him. He was the same man who had stood guard on the dark balcony above the entrance at the top of the marble steps. The rifle was no longer in his hands, but the transistorized microphone was still strapped around his neck, and a thin wire led to his left ear. He was of indeterminate age, somewhere between thirty-five and forty-five—those years so well obscured by active men with strong, muscular bodies. His hair was light blond and cut short His face was broad with high cheekbones that, together with his gently sloping eyes, were evidence of a Slavic heritage. In contrast to his appearance, however, his speech was soft, the accent faintly Bostonian, the rhythm Middle European.
“Is there a decision?” he asked.
“Yes,” replied Genesis. “Affirmative.”
“You had no choice,” said Varak.
“Have you projected a schedule?” Bravo leaned forward, his eyes steady, noncommittal.
“Yes. In three weeks. The night of May first; the body will be discovered in the morning.”
“The news will break on the second of May, then.” Genesis looked at the members of Inver Brass. “Prepare statements where you think they’ll be solicited. Several of us should be out of the country.”
“You’re assuming the death will be reported in a normal fashion,” said Varak, raising his soft voice slightly to imply the contrary. “Without controls I wouldn’t guarantee that.”
“Why?” asked Venice.
“I think Sixteen hundred will panic. That crowd would put the corpse on ice inside the President’s clothes closet if they thought it would buy them time to get the files.”
Varak’s imagery gave rise to reluctant smiles around the table. Genesis spoke.
“Then, guarantee it, Mr. Varak. We will have the files.”
“Very well. Is that all?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you,” said Genesis with a nod of his head. Varak left quickly. Genesis got out of his chair and picked up his single page of paper with the coded words typewritten on it. Then he reached down and gathered up the six small notepad pages, all clearly marked with the Roman numeral 1. “The meeting is adjourned, gentlemen. As usual, will each of you be responsible for his own disposal? If any notes were made, dispose of them as well.”
One by one the men of Inver Brass approached the Franklin stove. The first member to reach it removed the cover with the tongs hung on the wall. He dropped the page of paper delicately into the well of burning coals. The others followed suit.
The last two men to perform the ritual were Genesis and Bravo. They stood away from the others. Genesis spoke quietly.
“Thank you for coming back.”
“You told me four years ago I couldn’t disappear,” replied Munro St. Claire. “You were right.”
“There’s more, I’m afraid,” Genesis said. “I’m not well. I have very little time.”
“Oh, Lord—?”
“Please. I’m the lucky one.”
“What? How?…”
“The doctors said two or three months. Ten weeks ago. I insisted on knowing, of course. They’re uncannily accurate; I can feel it. I assure you, there’s no other feeling like it. It’s an absolute, and there’s a certain comfort in that.”
“I’m sorry. More than I can say. Does Venice know?” St. Claire’s eyes strayed to the large black man talking softly in the corner with Banner and Paris.
“No. I wanted nothing to interfere—or influence—our decision tonight.” Genesis dropped the typewritten page into the yellow glow of the stove. Then he crumpled the six votes of Inver Brass into a ball and let it too drop into the flame.
“I don’t know what to say,” whispered St. Claire compassionately, watching Genesis’s strangely peaceful eyes.
“I do,” replied the dying man, smiling, “You’re back now. Your resources are beyond those of Venice. Or any other man here tonight. Say that you’ll see this through. In the event I’m removed from the premises, as it were.”
St. Claire looked at the page in his hand. At the name in the upper left-hand corner. “He tried to destroy you once. He nearly succeeded. I’ll see it through.”
“Not that way,” Genesis’s voice was firm and disapproving. “There must be no rancor, no vengeance. That’s not our way; it can never be our way.”
“There are times when differing objectives are compatible. Even moral objectives. I’m merely recognizing the fact. The man’s a menace.”
Munro St. Claire looked once more at the page in his hand. At the name in the upper left-hand corner.
John Edgar Hoover.
He crushed the page in his hand and let it drop into the fire.
2
Peter Chancellor lay in the wet sand, the waves slapping gently over his body. He stared at the sky; the gray was receding, the blue emerging. Dawn had come to Malibu beach.
He pressed his elbows into the sand and sat up. His neck hurt, and within moments he would feel the pain in his temples. He had gotten drunk last night. And the night before, goddamn it.
His eyes strayed to his left leg below his undershorts. The thin scar that curved from his calf through his kneecap up into his lower thigh was a twisting white line surrounded by suntanned flesh. It was still sensitive to the touch, but the complicated surgery beneath had been successful. He could walk almost normally now, and the pain had been replaced by a numb stiffness.
His left shoulder was something else; the pain was never completely absent, just dulled at times. The doctors said he had torn most of the ligaments and crushed assorted tendons; it would take longer for them to heal.
Absently he raised his right hand and felt the slightly swollen rivulet of skin that extended from his hairline over his right ear and down to the base of his skull. His hair covered most of the scar now, the break in his forehead only noticeable at close range. During the past weeks more women had remarked about it than he cared to remember. The doctors told him that his head had been sliced as though by a razor blade through a soft melon; a quarter of an inch above or below would have killed him. There had been weeks when he devoutly wished it had. He knew the desire would pass. He did not want to die; he merely was not sure he wanted to live without Cathy.
Time would heal the injuries, inside and outside; he never doubted it. He just wished the process were faster. So the restless energy would return and the early hours of the day could be filled with work, not pounding temples and vague, uneasy concerns about the previous night’s behavior.
But even if he remained sober, the concerns would still be there. He was out of his element; the tribes of Beverly Hills and Malibu confused him. In his agent’s wisdom it was the positive thing for him to come to Los Angeles—Hollywood, why didn’t he just say it, think it? Hollywood—to coauthor the screenplay of Counterstrike! The fact that he did not know the first thing about screenwriting apparently did not matter. The redoubtable Joshua Harris, the only agent he had ever known, told him it was a minor deficiency that would be compensated for by major money.
The logic had escaped Peter. But then so had his coauthor. The two men had met three times for a total of about forty-five minutes, of which, again perhaps, ten had been devoted to Counterstrike! And, of course, nothing had been written down. Not in his presence, at any rate.
Yet here he was in Malibu, staying in a hundred-thousand-dollar beach house, driving a Jaguar, and charging to the studio tabs from Newport Beach to Santa Barbara.
One did not have to get drunk to feel hints of guilt in a situation like that. Certainly not Mrs. Chancellor’s little boy, who had been told early in life that you earn what you get just as surely as you are what you live.
On the other hand, living was what was uppermost in Joshua Harris’s mind when he negotiated the contract. Peter had not been living at the house in Pennsylvania; he had been barely existing.
In the three months after his release from the hospital, he had done almost nothing on the Nuremberg book.
Nothing. When would ther
e be something? Anything?
His head hurt now. His eyes watered with the pain, and his stomach sent up alarms. Peter got to his feet and walked unsteadily into the surf. A swim might help.
He ducked beneath the surface, then sprang up and looked back toward the house. What the hell was he doing on the beach in the first place? He’d brought a girl home last night. He was sure of it. Almost.
He limped painfully over the sand to the steps of the beach house. He paused at the railing, breathing hard, and looked up at the sky. The sun had broken through, burning away the mist. It was going to be another hot, humid day. He turned and saw that two residents were walking their dogs about a quarter mile away at the water’s edge.
It would not do for him to be seen in wet undershorts on the beach. What remained of propriety ordered him back to the house.
Propriety and curiosity. And the vague feeling that something unpleasant had happened last night. He wondered what the girl would look like. Blond, he remembered, large-breasted. And how did they manage to drive from wherever it was in Beverly Hills to Malibu? The vague memory of the unpleasant incident was somehow related to the girl, but he could not remember how or why.
He gripped the railing and pulled himself up the steps to the redwood deck. Redwood and white stucco and heavy wooden beams—that was the beach house. It was an architect’s version of Malibu Tudor.
The glass doors on the far right were partially open. It was the bedroom entrance; on the table by the door was a half-empty bottle of Pernod. The deck chair nearest the bottle was overturned. A pair of strapless sandals lay toe to heel beside it, in contradictory neatness.
Things were coming back to him. He had made love to the girl with the dramatic breasts—inadequately, he recalled—and in disgust or self-defense had wandered out to the porch and sat by himself, drinking Pernod without the benefit of a glass.
Why had he done that? Where had the Pernod come from? What the hell difference did it make to him whether he performed acceptably or unacceptably with an accommodating body recruited from Beverly Hills? He could not remember, so he held onto the railing and walked toward the overturned chair and the open glass door.
There were dead flies floating in the Pernod; a live one hesitantly circled the rim of the bottle. Chancellor considered righting the fallen chair, but decided otherwise. His head was in pain; not just the temples, but the winding corridor of skin between his hairline and the base of his skull. The pain was undulating, as though guided by an unseen beam.
A warning signal. He had to move slowly.
He limped cautiously through the door. The room was a mess. Clothes were strewn about the furniture, ashtrays were overturned, their contents scattered about the floor; a glass was smashed in front of the bedside table; the telephone was ripped out of its jack.
The girl was in the bed, lying on her side, her breasts pressed together, stretching, swelling like two pointed spheres. Her blond hair fell over her face, which was buried in a pillow. The top sheet was draped across the lower half of her body; one leg protruded, displaying the sun-darkened flesh of her inner thigh. Looking at her, Peter could feel the provocative stirring in his groin. He inhaled deeply for a few moments, excited by the sight of the girl’s breasts, her exposed leg, her hidden face beneath the fallen blond hair.
He was still drunk. He knew that, because he realized he did not want to see the girl’s face. He merely wanted to make love to an object; he did not want to acknowledge the existence of a person.
He took a step toward the bed and stopped. Fragments of glass were in his path; they explained the sandals outside. At least he’d had the presence of mind to wear them. And the telephone. He remembered yelling into the telephone.
The woman rolled onto her back. Her face was pretty in that innocuous California way. Pert, suntanned, the features too small and coordinated for character. Her large breasts separated, the sheet fell away, revealing her pubic hair and the swell of her thighs. Peter moved to the foot of the bed and pulled down his wet undershorts. He could feel sand on the tips of his fingers. He placed his right knee on the bed, careful to keep his left leg straight, and lowered himself on the sheets.
The woman opened her eyes. When she spoke, it was with a soft, modulated voice filled with sleep.
“Come on up, honey. You feeling better?”
Chancellor crawled beside her. She moved her hand to his half-swollen erection, cupping it gently.
“Do I owe you an apology?” he asked.
“Hell, no. Maybe to yourself, not me. You banged like a ram, but I don’t think it did you any good. You just got mad and stormed out.”
“I’m sorry.” He reached for her left breast; the nipple was taut under the pressure of his fingers. The girl moaned and began pulling him in short swift movements. She was either a good performer or a highly developed sexual partner who needed very little priming.
“I still feel warm all over. You just didn’t stop. You just went on and on and nothing happened for you. But Jesus, it did for me!… Fuck me, lamb. Come on, fuck me,” she whispered.
Peter buried his face between her breasts. Her legs parted, inviting him into her. But the ache in his head increased; shafts of pain pulsed through his skull.
“I can’t. I can’t.” He could barely talk.
“Don’t you worry. Now, don’t you worry about a thing,” said the girl. She eased him back so his shoulders again touched the sheets. “You just hold on, honey. Hold on and let me do the work.”
The moments blurred. He could feel himself waning, then the swift movements of the girl’s two hands and the wet moisture of her lips, caressing, provoking. He was becoming alive again. There was need.
Goddamn it. He had to be good for something.
He pulled her head into his groin. She moaned and spread her legs; all was sweet wetness and soft flesh. He grabbed her under her arms, pulling her parallel to him. Her breath came in quick, loud, throated groans.
He could not stop now. He could not allow the pain to interfere. Goddamn it!
“Oh, Pete, you’re something. Oh, Christ, you’re the fucker of all time! Come on, lamb! Now! Now!”
The girl’s whole body began to writhe. Her whispers now bordered on shouts.
“Oh, Jesus! Jesus Christ! You’re driving me crazy, lover! You’re the best there ever was! There was never anyone like you!… Oh, my! Oh, my God!”
He exploded inside her, draining himself; his body limp, the ache in his temples receding. At least he was good for something. He had aroused her, made her want him.
And then he heard her voice, all professionalism.
“There, lamb. That wasn’t so difficult, was it?”
He looked at her. Her expression was that of a well-applauded performer. Her eyes were plastic death.
“I owe you,” he said softly, coldly.
“No, you don’t.” She laughed. “I don’t take money from you. He pays me plenty.”
Chancellor remembered everything. The party, the argument, the drunken trip from Beverly Hills, his anger on the telephone.
Aaron Sheffield, motion-picture producer, owner of Counterstrike!
Sheffield had been at the party, his young wife in tow. In fact, it was Sheffield who had called him, asking him to come along. There was no reason not to accept, and there was a very good reason to do so: His elusive coauthor of the Counterstrike! screenplay was the host.
Not to worry. You wrote a winner, sweetheart.
But last night there was something to worry about. They wanted to tell him in pleasant surroundings. More than pleasant. Quite a bit more.
The studio had received several “very serious” calls from Washington about the filming of Counterstrike! It was pointed out that there was a major error in the book: The Central Intelligence Agency did not operate domestically. It did not involve itself in operations within the borders of the United States. The CIA’s 1947 charter had specifically prohibited this. Therefore, Aaron Sheffield had agreed to change th
at aspect of the script. Chancellor’s CIA would become an elite corps of disaffected former intelligence specialists acting outside government channels.
What the hell, Aaron Sheffield had said. It’s better dramatically. We got two types of villains, and Washington’s happy.
But Chancellor was furious. He knew what he was talking about. He had spoken with truly disaffected men who had worked for the agency and was appalled at what they had been called upon to do. Appalled because it was illegal and appalled because there were no alternatives. A maniac named J. Edgar Hoover had severed all intelligence conduits between the FBI and the CIA. The men of the CIA themselves would have to go after the domestic information withheld from them. Who were they going to complain to? Mitchell? Nixon?
Most of whatever power Counterstrike! had was in the specific use of the agency. To eliminate it was to vitiate a great part of the book. Peter had objected strenuously, and the more angry he became, the more, it seemed, he drank. And the more he drank, the more provocative had the girl beside him become.
Sheffield had driven them home. Peter and the girl were in the backseat, her skirt above her waist, her blouse unbuttoned, her enormous breasts exposed in racing shadows driving him wild. Drunken wild.
And they’d gone inside together while Sheffield drove off. The girl had brought two bottles of Pernod, a gift from Aaron, and the games began in earnest. Wild games, drunken, naked games.
Until the shooting pains in his skull stopped him, providing a few moments of clarity. He had lurched for the telephone, thumbed insanely through his notes on the bedside table for Sheffield’s number, and punched the buttons furiously.
He had roared at Sheffield, calling him every obscenity he could think of, screaming his objections—and his guilt—at having been manipulated. There’d be no changes in Counterstrike!
As he lay there on the bed, the blond girl beside him, Chancellor remembered Sheffield’s words over the phone.
“Easy, kid. What difference does it make to you? You don’t have script approval. We were just being polite. Get down from your sky-high perch. You’re just a lousy little homemaker-fucker like the rest of us.”