The Scorpio Illusion: A Novel

  24

  The corpse tangled in the fishing net was chalk-white and rigid, the flesh swollen, blown up by the intake of water, the face a balloon version of its former features. On the dock, under the glare of the single floodlight, were the personal effects that had been removed by the coast guard patrol from the deceased’s pockets.

  “That’s all there was, Commander,” John Allen, the naval intelligence officer, said. “Nothing else was disturbed, and prongs were used to extract the materials. As you can see, he’s CIA, top security, maximum clearance, and very dead. The doctor here, who’s done only a preliminary forensic, says he believes death occurred when O’Ryan’s head was smashed by a solid object or came in contact with multiple solid objects. He tells us that an autopsy might reveal more, but he doubts it.”

  “Good work, Lieutenant,” said Hawthorne. Poole and Catherine Neilsen were at his side, both mesmerized by the ugly sight below them. “Remove the body and proceed with the autopsy.”

  “Could I ask a question?” said Poole.

  “I’m amazed you’ve been silent so long,” replied Tyrell. “What is it?”

  “Well, ah’m jest a country boy—”

  “Cut the bullshit,” interrupted Cathy quietly, looking away from the dead, swollen body. “Ask.”

  “Well, in Loo’siana we got offshoots from the Pont-chartrain goin’ all over the place—backwaters, we call ’em. Does this here Chesapeake flow like normal, north to south?”

  “I assume so,” said Allen.

  “Sure does,” added a bearded fisherman, overhearing the conversation while disentangling the dead body. “What the hell else is there?”

  “Well, the river Nile doesn’t subscribe to that, sir. She goes—”

  “Forget it,” broke in Hawthorne. “What’s your question?”

  “Well, assumin’ that the flow is north to south, and ‘solid objects’ were involved, are there any backwater dams north of here?”

  “What do you mean, Jackson?” asked Cathy, turning around, aware that her subordinate officer did not pose foolish questions.

  “Take a look, Major—”

  “I’d rather not, Lieutenant.”

  “What’s your point, Poole?” said Tyrell.

  “That man’s head has been bashed in more than one location—I mean, take a look, the swellin’ and all. That ain’t one ‘solid object,’ but a whole bunch of ’em. That old boy got smashed in all directions. You got backwater stoppages here?”

  “Breakwalls,” said the bearded fisherman, his hands on the net, his eyes on Poole. “Up and down the ‘Peake,’ so’s the rich people can swim in front of their houses.”

  “Where’s the nearest, sir?”

  “This ain’t prime real estate down here, buddy,” answered the fisherman. “I suppose you could figure the jetty north of Chesapeake Beach. The kids hang out there a lot, y’know.”

  “It’s my turn to say it, Tye. Let’s go.”

  Bajaratt controlled her impatience. “Can’t you drive faster?” she coolly asked the chauffeur of her hotel-appropriated limousine.

  “If I do, ma’am, we’ll be stopped by the police and it will take longer.”

  “Just hurry, please.”

  “I’m doing the best I can, ma’am.”

  The Baj sat back in the seat, detonations going off in her mind. She could not lose Nicolo, he was the key! She had planned it all so carefully, so brilliantly, every step orchestrated, every move and nuance calculated—she was only days away from the ultimate kill of her life, prelude to chaos across the world. Muerte a toda autoridad!

  She had to be gentle, concerned, convincing. Once the dock boy got her into the White House, into the President’s office itself, then out, she could dispose of the barone-cadetto at will. He certainly could not be permitted to live more than a few minutes after the news of the President’s assassination was heard around the globe.

  Until then, she would feign near hysteria over Nico’s well-being, swear on the graves of the saints to force those responsible to pay for their hideous crime, make love to the young Adonis in ways he had never dreamed of—oh, God, anything! He had to become once more her marionette as quickly as possible. The appointment in the Oval Office was too close. This ride was taking forever!

  “We’re in Chesapeake Beach, ma’am, the diner’s over there on the left,” the uniformed chauffeur announced. “May I escort you inside?”

  “You go inside, please,” said the Baj. “My friend will come to me privately. I may need a blanket; do you have one?”

  “Right behind you, madam, between the lamps. There are two lap rugs.”

  “Thank you. Now leave me.”

  * * *

  “Yes, Captain Stevens, I did, sir,” said a subdued Lieutenant Allen over the car telephone in the naval intelligence vehicle. “The commander was explicit, sir. He ordered me not to disturb you—honest.”

  “He’s not a commander and he can’t give you orders!” Stevens shouted over his bedside telephone. “Where the hell is he?”

  “They mentioned something about a jetty in Chesapeake Beach—”

  “The same place where O’Ryan lives?”

  “I believe so, sir.”

  “Have the O’Ryans been notified?”

  “Absolutely not, sir. The commander—”

  “He’s not a commander!”

  “Well, his instructions were to keep everything secure, and that’s consistent with our policy in these matters. We agreed upon that. On a temporary basis, of course.”

  “Of course,” sighed the resigned Henry Stevens. “I’ll inform the DCI right away; he can handle that part. And then you go find that son of a bitch and make damn sure he calls me immediately!”

  “Excuse me, sir, but if Hawthorne isn’t an intelligence officer, just who is he?”

  “A remnant, Mr. Allen. A rogue has-been we’d all like to forget.”

  “Then why is he here, Captain? Why is he in the loop?”

  Silence. Then finally Stevens answered quietly. “Because he was the best there was, Lieutenant. We came to understand that. Find him!”

  While the chauffeur was inside the diner, the bare-chested, bleeding Nicolo came up to the rain-swept window of the limousine. Bajaratt flung open the door and pulled him into the back seat, holding him fiercely and throwing the lap rug around him.

  “Stop it, signora,” he shouted. “You have gone too far with me. I was nearly killed!”

  “You don’t understand, Nico. He was another agente segreto, a man who opposed us, opposed me, opposed the wishes of your Holy Church!”

  “Then why is everything so secret? Why do you and the people with you and my holy priests not speak out about this terrible thing, whatever in God’s name it is?”

  “Things are not done that way, my glorious child. You tried it, you tried to openly expose a corrupt man on the piers and what did it get you? Everyone on the Portici docks wants you dead; your own beloved family cannot acknowledge you, for they’d be killed. Don’t you see?”

  “I see that you are using me, signora, using your invention, the barone-cadetto, for your own purposes.”

  “Naturalmente! I chose you because you had a native intelligence far above anyone else; I’ve told you that, haven’t I?”

  “Sometimes. When you don’t call me a fool and a dock boy.”

  “Explosions of frustration. What can I tell you?… Believe in me, Nico. In later years, when I am gone, and you are a studioso, thanks to your money in Napoli, you will look back and understand. You will be proud of the silent part you played in this great cause.”

  “Then in the name of Mary, Mother of Christ, tell me what it is!”

  “In the broadest sense, it’s not much different from what you did before they wanted to hang you off that pier in Portici. Expose the corruptors, not on a deserted dock on the waterfront but all over the world.”

  Nico shook his head, trembling under the limousine blanket, his teeth chattering. “Again, so many
words, so many things I cannot understand.”

  “You will, my darling. In time.… You’re in pain! What can I do for you?”

  “This is a restaurant, no? Perhaps coffee or some wine. I’m so cold.”

  The Baj yanked down the handle of the door and dashed outside in the oppressive rain toward the steps of the diner. Suddenly, two automobiles careened into the front parking lot, skidding on the wet concrete, screeching to a stop beside each other as Bajaratt reached the door. Then she heard the words through the wind and the downpour.

  “Commander, you must do as I say! It’s an order!”

  “Fuck off, pissant!”

  “Tye, for Christ’s sake, listen to him!” yelled a woman as the parade of arguing voices approached the steps of the diner.

  “No! They’ve screwed up enough! I’m going down and dirty, using everything that I can get from the O’Ryans and the Ingersols. That’s it!”

  It was Hawthorne! Bajaratt, dressed in her matronly fashionable clothes from the Via Condotti, rushed into the diner and saw the chauffeur eating a large slice of pie in a nearby booth. “Out!” she whispered. “Now!”

  “Who the hell are—oh, my God! Yes, of course, madam!” The chauffeur threw down three dollars and got up quickly as five people, angry people, walked through the door of the diner, at least three or four arguing vociferously.

  “Stay down!” commanded the Baj, clasping the chauffeur’s shoulder and pushing him beneath the top of the booth. The five intruders took a large table across the entrance aisle against the wall, their angry debate now muted, but, as Amaya Bajaratt saw, her once and former lover would not be moved. She had seen it too often: The intelligence officer from Amsterdam knew when his instincts were right—right on the mark. The dead man was another key to Little Girl Blood. Well done, Tye-Boy, she mused to herself as she and her driver stayed below the banquette in the aisle. I rarely, if ever, made love to an inferior. Oh, you, so like my husband, Tyrell, a gentle animal who wanted only the best, and I gave it to him as I gave it to you, my darling. Why, in all that’s so insane in this world, could you not have been on my side? I’m right, you know, my darling. There is no God! For if there were, children would not starve to death with pain and swollen bellies—what has that God have against them? I hate your God, Tyrell! If it ever was your God; I never knew that, really; you never said so, one way or another. And now I must kill you, Tye-Boy. I don’t want to; I couldn’t in St. Barts, although I should have—I think the padrone understood. I think he sensed how much I really loved you, and was wise enough not to probe, for he loved another he could not kill, yet knew he should. If the truth were told, my darling Tye-Boy, the Scorpios have collapsed because my only father could not do what he should have done years ago. Neptune should have been cut down. He was far too emotional where love was concerned.

  That is not me, Commander!

  “Now,” said Bajaratt to the chauffeur beside her. “Get up slowly, walk to the door, go outside, and run to the car. Don’t be alarmed—an injured young man is in the back. He is my nephew, a good boy who was attacked by men who robbed him. Bring the car to the front steps. Touch the horn twice when you are there.”

  “Madam, I’ve never been asked to behave this way!”

  “You are now, and you will be a thousand dollars richer for it. Go!”

  The limousine driver, in his anxiety walking to the entrance far more rapidly than instructed, pushed the door open with such force that the occupants of several tables glanced up at the sharp noise, among them, Tyrell Hawthorne in the corner seat. The Baj could not see his face, the questioning frown on that face, but another could. “What is it, Tye?” asked Catherine Neilsen.

  “What’s an angry chauffeur doing in here?”

  “You heard that fisherman on the dock. He said rich people lived out here, up and down the ‘Peake,’ I think he called it. Why shouldn’t they have chauffeurs?”

  “Maybe.”

  Neither could Bajaratt hear that brief exchange of conversation; she had ears only for the signal that would tell her the limousine was out front. It came, two short bursts of a horn.

  “A chauffeur?” said Hawthorne more to himself than anyone else. “Van Nostrand’s!” he exclaimed out loud. “Let me out of here,” he cried, shoving Poole, and in turn Cathy, along the soiled green plastic banquette.

  Simultaneously, Bajaratt rose from the booth and started for the door, her chin locked into her neck. There were now two figures rushing toward the diner’s entrance, each intent on racing outside.

  “Sorry!” said Tyrell curtly as he dashed past the woman, grazing her, shoving his right shoulder against the brass-plated latch cover, propelling the heavy door out into the rain, once more a downpour. “You!” he roared at the unseen driver of the limousine as he ran down the steps toward the huge automobile. He stopped, spinning around in the rain, the lightning bolts of his mind crashing down, then up at the diner’s entrance and the woman he had just shoved aside. The Shenandoah Lodge, the old woman—the eyes! Dominique! Bajaratt!

  The gunshots echoed in the rain; bullets pierced the limousine’s metal and ricocheted off the pavement as Hawthorne raced to his left, suddenly feeling an ice-cold sensation in his upper thigh. He had been hit! He dived, rolling under the cover of a parked pickup truck as another woman burst through the diner’s door, screaming for him. Bajaratt fired the remaining shells in her direction while pulling the door open and jumping into the automobile. Catherine Neilsen plummeted down the steps as the limousine bolted forward into the darkness of the highway.

  * * *

  It was five o’clock in the morning and Henry Stevens recognized an affliction that went with his job. He was at that point beyond exhaustion where sleep would not come, not after his initial rest had been shattered by a startling interruption. The mind would not stop, could not stop, the questions geometrically building until his head was filled with so many possibles and probables that they crowded out all thoughts of immobility. To stay in bed meant only turning constantly, eyes open and glazed, concerned that his wife in the twin bed next to his would hear his movements and, as usual, wake up and try to calm him down. She was good at that; she had always been good at that. He could not admit it, but deep in his silent reflections he knew that he would not be where he was without Phyllis. She was irritatingly rational, always calm, the strong helmsman who kept their own ship on a steady course, never dictatorial, but making damn sure her husband rode out a heavy sea without capsizing.

  It was funny in a way, he mused as he sat on the couch in their glassed-in sun porch, that he should think in nautical terms. The only time he had been on the water was during his final year at Annapolis, when all the graduating midshipmen had to endure ten hellish days on some huge sailing ship, pretending to be seamen from the goddamn nineteenth century. He could barely remember those ten days for, in truth, he’d spent most of the time throwing up in the toilet—the head, the head.

  Seamanship notwithstanding, the navy came to recognize his other talents, organizational talents, bureaucratic talents. He was one hell of a desk sailor, spotting mediocrities and incompetents, dismissing them out of hand without suffering their feeble explanations. If there was a job to be done, get it done; if there was a problem he or she could not solve, come to him, do not wallow in the shallows of indecision. He had been right—most of the time.

  And once—just once—he had been wrong. Fatally. In Amsterdam he had told Phyllis about Hawthorne’s wife, Ingrid, and she had said simply, quietly: You’re wrong, Hank, you’re wrong on this one. I know Tyrell and I know Ingrid, and you’re missing something.

  And when Ingrid Hawthorne’s dead body was pulled out of the Amsterdam canal, his wife had come to his office from the embassy.

  Did you have anything to do with this, Hank?

  Good God, no, Phyll! It was the Soviets, the markings were all there!

  I hope so, Henry, because you’re about to lose the finest intelligence officer the navy has ever had.


  Phyllis never called him Henry unless she was furious with him.

  Goddamn it! How could he have known? Logged out of the system! What kind of crap was that?

  “Hank?”

  Stevens snapped his head around to the door of the sun porch. “Oh, sorry, Phyll, I was just sitting here thinking, that’s all.”

  “You haven’t slept since that phone call. Do you want to talk about it—can you talk about it, or am I out of the loop?”

  “It concerns your old friend Hawthorne.”

  “Is he back in the system? If so, that’s a real stunner, Hank. He’s not very fond of you.”

  “He always liked you.”

  “Why not? I programmed his travels, not his life.”

  “Are you saying I did?”

  “I don’t really know. You told me you didn’t.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Then the chapter is closed, isn’t it?”

  “It’s closed.”

  “What’s Tyrell doing for you, or can’t you tell me?” There was no resentment in Phyllis Stevens’s remark, for it was understood that wives and husbands of high-level intelligence personnel were vulnerable; what they did not know could not be extracted from them. “You’ve been working around the clock several times over, so I assume it’s a red alert.”

  “I can give you a couple of brush strokes, the leaks probably go beyond them anyway.… There’s a terrorist out of the Baaka Valley, a woman who’s sworn to assassinate the President.”

  “That’s cartoon time, Hank!” interrupted the wife, suddenly stopping, her head tilted in thought. “Or maybe it isn’t. In fairness to my gender, there are an awful lot of things we can do and places we can go that men can’t.”

  “She already has, leaving a number of very strange deaths and ‘fatal accidents’ in her wake.”

  “I won’t ask you to amplify that.”

  “I wouldn’t.”

  “And Tyrell? Where does he fit in?”

  “For a while the woman operated from the Caribbean, from the islands—”

  “And Hawthorne has his charter business down there.”

  “Exactly.”