The Cry of the Halidon: A Novel

  The second shale-bedrock analyst was listed as A. Gerrard Booth. Booth was a university applicant personally recommended by Ralston in the following manner:

  “I promised Booth I’d bring these papers and articles to your attention. I do believe Booth would be a fine asset to the survey.”

  Professor Ralston had given McAuliff a folder filled with A. Gerrard Booth’s studies of sheet strata in such diverse locations as Turkey, Corsica, Zaire, and Australia. Alex recalling having read several of the articles in National Geologist, and remembered them as lucid and professional. Booth was good; Booth was better than good.

  Booth was also a woman. A. Gerrard Booth was known to her colleagues as Alison; no one bothered with the middle name.

  She had one of the most genuine smiles McAuliff had ever seen. It was more a half laugh—one might even say masculine, but the word was contradicted by her complete femininity. Her eyes were blue and alive and level, the eyes of a professional. Her handshake was firm, again professional. Her light brown hair was long and soft and slightly waved—brushed repeatedly, thought Alex, for the interview. Her age was anywhere from late twenties to middle thirties; there was no way to tell by observation, except that there were laugh lines at the corners of her eyes.

  Alison Booth was not only good and a woman; she was also, at least on first meeting, a very attractive, outgoing person. The term “professional” kept recurring to McAuliff as they spoke.

  “I made Roily—Dr. Ralston—promise to omit the fact that I was a woman. Don’t hold him responsible.”

  “Were you so convinced I was antifeminist?”

  She raised her hand and brushed her long, soft hair away from the side of her lovely face. “No preformed hostility, Dr. McAuliff. I just understand the practical obstacles. It’s part of my job to convince you I’m qualified.” And then, as if she were aware of the possible double entendre, Alison Booth stopped smiling and smoothed her skirt … professionally.

  “In fieldwork and the laboratory, I’m sure you are qualified.”

  “Any other considerations would be extraneous, I should think,” said the woman, with a slight trace of English aloofness.

  “Not necessarily. There are environmental problems, degrees of physical discomfort, if not hardship.”

  “I can’t conceive of Jamaica being in that league with Zaire or the Aussie Outback. I’ve surveyed in those places.”

  “I know—”

  “Roily told me,” interrupted Alison Booth, “that you would not accept tour references until you had interviewed us.”

  “Group isolation tends to create fallible judgments. Insupportable relationships. I’ve lost good men in the past because other good men reacted negatively to them for the wrong reasons.”

  “What about women?”

  “I used the term inclusively, not exclusively.”

  “I have very good references, Dr. McAuliff. For the right reasons.”

  “I’ll request them.”

  “I have them with me.” Alison unbuckled the large leather purse on her lap, extracted two business envelopes, and placed them on the edge of McAuliff’s desk. “My references, Dr. McAuliff.”

  Alex laughed as he reached for the envelopes. He looked over at the woman; her eyes locked with his. There was both a good-humored challenge and a degree of supplication in her expression. “Why is this survey so important to you, Miss Booth?”

  “Because I’m good and I can do the job,” she answered simply.

  “You’re employed by the university, aren’t you?”

  “On a part-time basis, lecture and laboratory. I’m not permanent … by choice, incidentally.”

  “Then it’s not money.” McAuliff made a statement.

  “I could use it; I’m not desperate, however.”

  “I can’t imagine your being desperate anywhere,” he said, with a partial smile. And then Alex saw—or thought he saw—a trace of a cloud across her eyes, an instant of concern that left as rapidly as it had come. He instinctively pressed further. “But why this tour? With your qualifications, I’m sure there are others. Probably more interesting, certainly more money.”

  “The timing is propitious,” she replied softly, with precise hesitation. “For personal reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with my qualifications.”

  “Are there reasons why you want to spend a prolonged period in Jamaica?”

  “Jamaica has nothing to do with it. You could be surveying Outer Mongolia for all that it matters.”

  “I see.” Alex replaced the two envelopes on the desk. He intentionally conveyed a trace of indifference. She reacted.

  “Very well, Dr. McAuliff. It’s no secret among my friends.” The woman held her purse on her lap. She did not grip it; there was no intensity about her whatsoever. When she spoke, her voice was steady, as were here eyes. She was the total professional again. “You called me Miss Booth; that’s incorrect. Booth is my married name. I regret to say the marriage was not successful; it was terminated recently. The solicitousness of well-meaning people during such times can be boring. I’d prefer to be out of touch.”

  McAuliff returned her steady gaze, trying to evoke something beyond her words. There was something, but she would not allow his prying further; her expression told him that … professionally.

  “It’s not relevant. I apologize. But I appreciate your telling me.”

  “Is your … responsibility satisfied?”

  “Well, my curiosity, at any rate.” Alex leaned forward, elbows on the desk, his hands folded under his chin. “Beyond that, and I hope that it’s not improper, you’ve made it possible for me to ask you to have dinner with me.”

  “I think that would depend on the degree of relevance you ascribed to my acceptance.” Alison’s voice was polite, but not cold. And there was that lovely humor in her eyes.

  “In all honesty, I do make it a point to have dinner or a long lunch, even a fair amount of drinks, with those I’m thinking about hiring. But right now, I’m reluctant to admit it.”

  “That’s a very disarming reply, Dr. McAuliff,” she said, her lips parted, laughing her half laugh. “I’d be delighted to have dinner with you.”

  “I’ll do my damnedest not to be solicitous. I don’t think it’s necessary at all.”

  “And I’m sure you’re never boring.”

  “Not relevantly.”

  5

  McAuliff stood on the corner of High Holborn and Chancery and looked at his watch. The numbers glowed in the mist-laden London darkness; it was 11:40. Preston’s Rolls-Royce was ten minutes late. Or perhaps it would not appear at all. His instructions were that if the car did not arrive by midnight, he was to return to the Savoy. Another meeting would be scheduled.

  There were times when he had to remind himself whose furtive commands he was following, wondering whether he in turn was being followed. It was a degrading way to live, he reflected: the constant awareness that locked a man into a pocket of fear. All the fiction about the shadow world of conspiracy omitted the fundamental indignity intrinsic to that world. There was no essential independence; it was strangling.

  This particular evening’s rendezvous with Warfield had necessitated a near-panic call to Hammond, for the British agent had scheduled a meeting himself, for one in the morning. That is, McAuliff had requested it, and Hammond had set the time and the place. And at 10:20 that night the call had come from Dunstone: Be at High Holborn and Chancery at 11:30, an hour and ten minutes from then.

  Hammond could not, at first, be found. His highly secret, private telephone at M.I.5 simply did not answer. Alex had been given no other number, and Hammond had told him repeatedly never to call the office and leave his name. Nor was he ever to place a call to the agent from his rooms at the Savoy. Hammond did not trust the switchboards at either establishment. Nor the open frequencies of cellular phones.

  So Alex had to go out onto the Strand, into succeeding pubs and chemists’ shops to public telephones until Hammond’s line ans
wered. He was sure he was being observed—by someone—and thus he had to pretend annoyance each time he hung up after an unanswered call. He found that he had built the fabric of a lie, should Warfield question him. His lie was that he was trying to reach Alison Booth and cancel a lunch date they had for the following day. They did have a lunch date, which he had no intention of canceling, but the story possessed sufficient truth to be valid.

  Build on part of the truth. Attitude and reaction. M.I.5.

  Finally, Hammond’s telephone was answered, by a man who stated casually that he had gone out for a late supper.

  A late supper! Good God!… Global cartels, international collusion in the highest places, financial conspiracies, and a late supper.

  In reasoned tones, as opposed to McAuliff’s anxiety, the man told him that Hammond would be alerted. Alex was not satisfied; he insisted that Hammond be at his telephone—if he had to wait all night—until he, Alex, made contact after the Warfield appointment.

  It was 11:45. Still no St. James Rolls-Royce. He looked around at the few pedestrians on High Holborn, walking through the heavy mist. He wondered which, if any, was concerned with him.

  The pocket of fear.

  He wondered, too, about Alison. They had had dinner for the third night in succession; she had claimed she had a lecture to prepare, and so the evening was cut short. Considering the complications that followed, it was a good thing.

  Alison was a strange girl. The professional who covered her vulnerability well; who never strayed far from that circle of quiet humor that protected her. The half laugh, the warm blue eyes, the slow, graceful movement of her hands … these were her shields, somehow.

  There was no problem in selecting her as his first choice … professionally. She was far and away the best applicant for the team. Alex considered himself one of the finest rock-strata specialists on both continents, yet he wasn’t sure he wanted to pit his expertise against hers. Alison Gerrard Booth was really good.

  And lovely.

  And he wanted her in Jamaica.

  He had prepared an argument for Warfield, should Dunstone’s goddamn security computers reject her. The final clearance of his selections was the object of the night’s conference.

  Where was the goddamned black ship of an automobile? It was ten minutes to midnight.

  “Excuse me, sir,” said a deep, almost guttural voice behind McAuliff.

  He turned, and saw a man about his own age, in a brown mackinaw; he looked like a longshoreman or a construction worker.

  “Yes?”

  “It’s m’ first time in London, sir, and I thinks I’m lost.”

  The man then pointed up at the street sign, barely visible in the spill of the lamp through the mist. “This says Chancery Lane, which is supposed to be near a place called Hatton, which is where I’m supposed to meet m’ friends. I can’t find it, sir.”

  Alex gestured to his left. “It’s up there two or three blocks.”

  The man pointed again, as a simpleton might point, in the direction of McAuliff’s gesture. “Up there, sir?”

  “That’s right.”

  The man shook his arm several times, as if emphasizing. “You’re sure, sir?” And then the man lowered his voice and spoke rapidly. “Please don’t react, Mr. McAuliff. Continue as though you are explaining. Mr. Hammond will meet you in Soho; there’s an all-night club called The Owl of Saint George. He’ll be waiting. Stay at the bar, he’ll reach you. Don’t worry about the time. He doesn’t want you to make any more telephone calls. You’re being watched.”

  McAuliff swallowed, blanched, and waved his hand—a little too obviously, he felt—in the direction of Hatton Garden. He, too, spoke quietly, rapidly, “Jesus! If I’m being watched, so are you!”

  “We calculate these things—”

  “I don’t like your addition! What am I supposed to tell Warfield? To let me off in Soho?”

  “Why not? Say you feel like a night out. You’ve nothing scheduled in the morning. Americans like Soho; it’s perfectly natural. You’re not a heavy gambler, but you place a bet now and then.”

  “Christ! Would you care to describe my sex life?”

  “I could, but I won’t.” The guttural, loud North Country voice returned. “Thank you, sir. You’re very kind, sir. I’m sure I’ll find m’ friends.”

  The man walked swiftly away into the night mist toward Hatton Garden. McAuliff felt his whole body shiver; his hands trembled. To still them, he reached into his pocket for cigarettes. He was grateful for the opportunity to grip the metal of his lighter.

  It was five minutes to twelve. He would wait until several minutes past and then leave. His instructions were to “return to the Savoy”; another meeting would be set. Did that mean it was to be scheduled later that night? In the morning hours? Or did “return to the Savoy” simply mean that he was no longer required to remain at the corner of High Holborn and Chancery Lane? He was free for the evening?

  The words were clear, but the alternative interpretation was entirely feasible. If he chose, he could—with a number of stops—make his way into Soho, to Hammond. The network of surveillance would establish the fact that Warfield had not appeared for the appointment. The option was open.

  My God! thought Alex. What’s happening to me? Words and meanings … options and alternates. Interpretations of … orders!

  Who the hell gave him orders!

  He was not a man to be commanded!

  But when his hand shook as he raised his cigarette to his lips, he knew that he was—for an indeterminate period of time. Time in a hell he could not stand; he was not free.

  The dual hands on his wristwatch converged. It was midnight. To goddamn hell with all of them! He would leave! He would call Alison and tell her he wanted to come over for a drink … ask her if she would let him. Hammond could wait all night in Soho. Where was it? The Owl of Saint George. Silly fucking name!

  To hell with him!

  The Rolls-Royce sped out of the fog from the direction of Newgate, its deep-throated engine racing, a powerful intrusion in the otherwise still street. It swung alongside the curb in front of McAuliff and stopped abruptly. The chauffeur got out of his seat, raced around the long hood of the car, and opened the rear door for Alex.

  It all happened so quickly that McAuliff threw away his cigarette and climbed in, bewildered; he had not adjusted to the swift change of plans. Julian Warfield sat in the far right corner of the huge rear seat, his tiny frame dwarfed by the vehicle’s expansive interior.

  “I’m sorry to have kept you waiting until the last minute, Mr. McAuliff. I was detained.”

  “Do you always do business with one eye on secrecy, the other on shock effect?” asked Alex, settling back in the seat, relieved to feel he could speak with confidence.

  Warfield replied by laughing his hard, old-man’s laugh. “Compared to Ross Perot, I’m a used-car salesman.”

  “You’re still damned unsettling.”

  “Would you care for a drink? Preston has a bar built in right there.” Warfield pointed to the felt back of the front seat. “Just pull on that strap.”

  “No, thank you. I may do a little drinking later, not now.” Easy. Easy, McAuliff, he thought to himself. For Christ’s sake, don’t be obvious. Hammond can wait all night. Two minutes ago, you were going to let him do just that!

  The old man took an envelope from his jacket pocket. “I’ll give you the good news straight off. There’s no one we objected to strenuously, subject to minor questions. On the contrary, we think you finalized your selections rather ingeniously.…”

  According to Warfield, the initial reaction at Dunstone to his list of first choices was negative. Not because of security—subject to those minor questions—nor quality. McAuliff had done his homework. But from a conceptual viewpoint. The idea of female members of a geological survey expedition was rejected out of hand, the central issue being that of less strength, not necessarily weakness. Any project entailing travel had, by tradition, a ma
sculine identification; the intrusion of the female was a disquieting component. It could only lead to complications—any number of them.

  “So we crossed off two of your first choices, realizing that by eliminating the Wells woman, you would also lose her husband, Jensen.… Three out of the first five rejected; knew you’d be unhappy, but then, you did understand.… Later, it came to me. By George, you’d outthought the lot of us!”

  “I wasn’t concerned with any strategies, Warfield. I was putting together the best team I could.” McAuliff felt he had to interject the statement.

  “Perhaps not consciously, and qualitatively you have a splendid group. But the inclusion of the two ladies, one a wife and both superior in their fields, was a profound improvement.”

  “Why?”

  “It provides—they provide—a unique ingredient of innocence. A patina of scholarship, actually; an aspect we had overlooked. A dedicated team of men and women—on a grant from the Royal Society—so different somehow from an all-male survey expedition. Really, most remarkable.”

  “That wasn’t my intention. I hate to disabuse you.”

  “No disabusement whatsoever. The result is the same. Needlessly said, I pointed out this consideration to the others, and they agreed instantly.”

  “I have an idea that whatever you might ‘point out’ would be instantly agreed to. What are the minor questions?”

  “ ‘Incidental information you might wish to consider’ is a better description.” The old man reached up and snapped on a reading lamp. He then removed several pages from his overcoat, unfolded them, and placed them in front of the envelope. He adjusted his glasses and scanned the top paper. “The husband and wife, this Jensen and Wells. They’re quite active in leftish political circles. Peace marches, ban-the-bombing, that sort of thing.”

  “That doesn’t have any bearing on their work. I doubt they’ll be organizing the natives.” McAuliff spoke wearily, on purpose. If Warfield intended to raise such “questions,” he wanted the financier to know he thought them irrelevant.

  “There is a great deal of political instability in Jamaica; unrest, to be precise. It would not be in our interests for any of your people to be outspoken on such matters.”