“She kicked up a stink and refused to get in the car,” Dennison had complained. “She said she hadn’t heard directly from her superiors and the Air Force could go pound sand. Goddamned bitch! I was on my way to work and they reached me on the limo phone. You know what she said to me? ‘Who the hell are you?’ That’s what she said to me! Then to twist the knife, she holds the phone away and asks out loud, ‘What’s a Dennison?’ ”
“It’s that modest low profile you keep, Herb. Did anybody tell her?”
“The bastards laughed! That’s when I told her she was under the President’s orders and she either got in that car or she could spend five years in Leavenworth.”
“It’s a men’s prison.”
“I know that. Heh! She’ll be there in an hour or so. Remember, if she’s the sieve I get her.”
“Maybe.”
“I’ll get a presidential order!”
“And I’ll read it on the nightly news. With footnotes.”
“Shit!”
Kendrick started to leave the window for another cup of coffee when a nondescript gray sedan appeared at the base of the circular drive. It swept around the curve and stopped in front of the stone steps, where an Air Force major swiftly got out of the far backseat. He walked rapidly around the trunk and opened the curbside door for his official passenger.
The woman Evan had known as Khalehla emerged into the morning sunlight, squinting at the brightness, disturbed and unsure. She was hatless, her dark hair hanging to her shoulders over a white jacket above green slacks and low-heeled shoes. Under her right arm she clenched a large white handbag. As Kendrick watched her the memory of that late afternoon in Bahrain came back to him. He recalled the shock he had felt when she walked through the door of the bizarre royal bedroom bemused that he had raced back for the cover of the bed sheet. And how, despite his panic, bewilderment and pain—or perhaps adding to all three—he had been struck by the cool loveliness of her sharply defined Euro-Arabian face and the glare of intelligence in her eyes.
He had been right; she was a striking woman who carried herself erect, almost defiantly, even now as she walked toward the massive door of the sterile house, where inside she would be faced with the unknown. Kendrick observed her dispassionately; there was no rush of remembered warmth in his reaction to her—only cold, intense curiosity. She had lied to him that late afternoon in Bahrain, lied both by what she said and what she did not say. He wondered if she would lie to him again.
The Air Force major opened the door of the enormous living room for Adrienne Rashad. She walked in and stopped, standing motionless, staring at Evan by the window. There was no astonishment in her eyes, just that frigid glare of intellect.
“I’ll be going,” said the Air Force officer.
“Thank you, Major.” The door closed and Kendrick stepped forward. “Hello, Khalehla. It was Khalehla, wasn’t it?”
“Whatever you say,” she replied calmly.
“But then it isn’t Khalehla, is it? It’s Adrienne—Adrienne Rashad.”
“Whatever you say,” she repeated.
“That’s a little redundant, isn’t it?”
“And all this is very stupid, Congressman. Did you have me flown back here to give you another testimonial? Because if you did, I won’t do it.”
“Testimonial? That’s the last thing I want.”
“Good, I’m glad for you. I’m sure the representative from Colorado has all the endorsements he needs. So there’s no need for someone whose life and the lives of a great many colleagues depend on anonymity to step forward and add to your swelling cheers.”
“That’s what you think? I want endorsements, cheers?”
“What am I to think? That you took me away from my work, exposed me to the embassy and the Air Force, probably crippled a cover I’ve developed over the past several years just because I went to bed with you? It happened once, but I assure you it will never happen again.”
“Hey, wait a minute, bright lady,” protested Evan. “I wasn’t looking for any fast action. For Christ’s sake, I didn’t know where I was or what had happened, or what would happen next. I was scared stiff, and knew I had things to do that I didn’t think I could do.”
“You were also exhausted,” added Adrienne Rashad. “I was, too. It happens.”
“That’s what Swann said—”
“That bastard.”
“No, hold it. Frank Swann’s not a bastard—”
“Shall I use another word? Like pimp? An unconscionable pimp.”
“You’re wrong. I don’t know what your business was with him but he had a job to do.”
“Like sacrificing you?”
“Maybe.… I admit the thought’s not too attractive, but he was pretty well boxed in then.”
“Forget it, Congressman. Why am I here?”
“Because I have to learn something, and you’re the only one left who can tell me.”
“What is it?”
“Who broke the story on me? Who violated the agreement I made? I was told that those who knew I went to Oman—and they were damn few, a tight little circle they called it—none of them would have any reason to do it and every reason in the world not to. Outside of Swann and his computer chief, whom he swears by, there were only seven other people in the entire government who knew. Six have been checked out, all absolutely negative. You’re the seventh, the only one left.”
Adrienne Rashad stood motionless, her face passive, her eyes furious. “You ignorant, arrogant amateur,” she said slowly, her voice acid.
“You can call me any goddamned names you like,” began Evan angrily, “but I’m going to—”
“May we go for a walk, Congressman?” broke in the woman from Cairo, crossing to a large bay window on the other side of the room that looked over a dock to the rocky shoreline of the Chesapeake.
“What?”
“The air in here is as oppressive as the company. I’d like to take a walk, please.” Rashad raised her hand and pointed outside; she then nodded her head twice as if reinforcing a command.
“All right,” mumbled Kendrick, bewildered. “There’s a side entrance back there.”
“I see it,” said Adrienne-Khalehla, starting for the door at the rear of the room. They walked outside onto a flagstone patio that joined a manicured lawn and a path leading down to the dock. If there had been boats lashed to the pilings or secured to the empty moorings bouncing on the water beyond, they had been removed for the autumn winds. “Keep up your harangue, Congressman,” continued the undercover case officer for the CIA. “You shouldn’t be deprived of that.”
“Just hold it, Miss Rashad or whatever the hell your name is!” Evan stopped on the white concrete path halfway to the shoreline. “If you think what I’m talking about amounts to a ‘harangue,’ you’re sadly mistaken—”
“For God’s sake, keep walking! You’ll get all the conversation you want, more than you want, you damn fool.” The bay shore to the right of the dock was a mixture of dark sand and stones so common to the Chesapeake; to the left was the boathouse, also common. What was not common, however, except to the larger estates, was a profusion of tall trees some fifty yards both north and south of the dock and the boathouse. They provided a measure of privacy, more in appearance than in reality, but the sight of them had appealed to the field agent from Cairo. She headed to the right, over the sand and the stones close to the gently lapping waves. They passed the border of trees and kept going until they reached a large rock that rose out of the ground by the water’s edge. Above, the immense house could not be seen. “This’ll do,” said Adrienne Rashad.
“Do?” exclaimed Kendrick. “What was that little exercise all about? And while we’re at it let’s get a couple of things straight. I appreciate the fact that you probably saved my life—probably, not by any manner of means provable—but I don’t take orders from you, and in my considered opinion I’m not a damn fool, and regardless of my amateur status you’re answering to me, I’m not answerin
g to you! Check and double check, lady?”
“Are you finished?”
“I haven’t even begun.”
“Then before you do, let me address the specifics you’ve just raised. That little exercise was to get us out of there. I presume you know it’s a safe house.”
“Certainly.”
“And that anything you say in every room, including the toilet and the shower, is recorded.”
“Well, I knew the telephone was—”
“Thank you, Mr. Amateur.”
“I don’t have a damn thing to hide—”
“Keep your voice down. Talk into the water as I am.”
“What? Why?”
“Electronic voice surveillance. The trees will distort sound because there’s no direct visual beam—”
“What?”
“Lasers have improved the technology—”
“What?”
“Shut up! Whisper.”
“I repeat, I haven’t got a damn thing to hide. Maybe you do, but I don’t!”
“Really?” asked Rashad, leaning against the huge rock and talking down into the small, slowly encroaching waves. “You want to involve Ahmat?”
“I’ve mentioned him. To the President. He should know how much help that kid was—”
“Oh, Ahmat will appreciate that. And his personal doctor? And his two cousins who helped you and protected you? And El-Baz, and the pilot who flew you to Bahrain?… They could all be killed.”
“Outside of Ahmat, I never mentioned anyone specifically—”
“Names are irrelevant. Functions aren’t.”
“For Christ’s sake, it was the President of the United States!”
“And contrary to rumors, he does communicate beyond a microphone?”
“Of course.”
“Do you know who he talks to? Do you know them personally? Do you know how reliable they are in terms of maximum security; does he? Do you know the men who are on the listening devices up in that house?”
“Of course not.”
“What about me? I’m a field officer with an acceptable cover in Cairo. Would you have talked about me?”
“I did, but only to Swann.”
“I’m not referring to what you did with someone in authority who knew everything because he was the control, I’m talking about up there. If you started questioning me up in that house, mightn’t you have brought up any or all the people I’ve just mentioned? And to break the bank, Mr. Amateur, isn’t it conceivable that you might have mentioned the Mossad?”
Evan closed his eyes. “I might have,” he said softly, nodding. “If we’d gotten into an argument.”
“An argument was unavoidable, which is why I got us out and came down here.”
“Everyone up there is on our side!” protested Kendrick.
“I’m sure they are,” agreed Adrienne, “but we don’t know the strengths or the weaknesses of people we’ve never met and can’t see, do we?”
“You’re paranoid.”
“It goes with the territory, Congressman. Furthermore, you are a damn fool, as I think I’ve amply demonstrated by your lack of knowledge regarding safe houses. I’ll skip the question as to who gives orders to whom because it’s irrelevant, and go back to your first point. In all likelihood I did not save your life in Bahrain, but, instead, because of that bastard Swann, put you in an untenable position we and certain pilots call the point of no return. You were not expected to survive, Mr. Kendrick, and I did object to that.”
“Why?”
“Because I cared.”
“Because we—”
“That, too, is irrelevant. You were a decent man trying to do a decent thing for which you weren’t equipped. As it turned out, there were others who helped you far more than I ever could. I sat in Jimmy Grayson’s office and we were both relieved when we got word you were airborne out of Bahrain.”
“Grayson? He was one of the seven who knew I was there.”
“Not until the last hours, he didn’t,” said Rashad. “Even I wouldn’t tell him. It had to come from Washington.”
“In White House language, he was put on the spit yesterday morning.”
“For what?”
“To see if he was the one who leaked my name.”
“Jimmy? That’s even more stupid than thinking it was me. Grayson wants a directorship so badly he can taste it. Also, he doesn’t care to have his throat slit and his body mutilated any more than I do.”
“You say those words very easily. They come quickly to you, maybe too quickly.”
“About Jimmy?”
“No. About yourself.”
“I see.” The woman who had called herself Khalehla moved away from the rock. “You think I’ve rehearsed all this—with myself, of course, because I damn well couldn’t reach anyone else. And, of course, I’m half Arab—”
“You walked into the room up there as if you expected to see me. I wasn’t any surprise to you.”
“I did, and you weren’t.”
“Why and why not? On both counts?”
“Process of elimination, I suppose—and an arrangement, a man I know who protects me from real surprises. For the last day and a half, you’ve been hot news throughout the Mediterranean, Congressman, and a lot of people are shaking, including myself. Not only for myself but for many others I used and misused to keep you in sight. Someone like me builds a network based on trust, and right now that trust, my most vital commodity, has been called into question. So you see, Mr. Kendrick, you’ve wasted not only my time and my concentration but a great deal of the taxpayers’ money to bring me back here for a question any experienced intelligence officer could answer.”
“You could have sold me, sold my name for a price.”
“For what? My life? For the lives of those I used to track you, men who are important to me and the work I do—work I think has real value, which I tried to explain to you in Bahrain? You really believe that?”
“Oh, Jesus, I don’t know what to believe!” admitted Evan, expelling his breath and shaking his head. “Everything I wanted to do, everything I’d planned, has been thrown out in the garbage. Ahmat doesn’t want to see me again, I can’t go back—there or anywhere else in the Emirates or the gulfs. He’ll see to it.”
“You wanted to go back?”
“More than anything. I wanted to take up my life again where I did my best work. But first I had to find and get rid of a son of a bitch who’d crippled everything, killed for the sake of killing—so many.”
“The Mahdi,” interrupted Rashad, nodding. “Ahmat told me. You did it. Ahmat’s young and he’ll change. In time he’ll understand what you did for everyone over there and be grateful.… But you just answered a question. You see, I thought that you might have blown the story yourself, but you didn’t, did you?”
“Me? You’re out of your mind! I’m getting out of here in six months!”
“There’s no political ambition, then?”
“Christ, no! I’m packing it in, I’m leaving! Only, now I haven’t got any place to go. Someone’s trying to stop me, making me into something I’m not. What the hell is happening to me?”
“Offhand I’d say you were being exhumed.”
“Being what? By whom?”
“By someone who thinks you were slighted. Someone who believes you deserve public acclaim, prominence.”
“Which I don’t want! And the President isn’t helping. He’s awarding me the Medal of Freedom next Tuesday in the goddamned Blue Room with the whole Marine Band! I told him I didn’t want it, and the son of a bitch said I had to show up because he refused to look like a ‘chintzy bastard.’ What kind of reasoning is that?”
“Very presidential—” Rashad suddenly stopped. “Let’s walk,” she said quickly as two white-suited members of the staff appeared at the base of the dock. “Don’t look around. Be casual. We’ll just stroll down this poor excuse for a beach.”
“May I talk?” asked Kendrick as he fell in step.
“Not anything germane. Wait till we get around the bend.”
“Why? Can they hear us?”
“Possibly. I’m not really sure.” They followed the curve of the shoreline until the trees obscured the two men on the dock. “The Japanese have developed directional relays, although I’ve never seen one,” continued Rashad aimlessly. Then she stopped again and looked up at Evan, her intelligent eyes questioning. “You spoke to Ahmat?” she asked.
“Yesterday. He told me to go to hell but not to go back to Oman. Ever.”
“You understand that I’ll check with him, don’t you?”
Evan was suddenly astonished, then angry. She was questioning him, accusing him, checking up on him. “I don’t give a damn what you do, my only concern is what you may have done. You’re convincing, Khalehla—excuse me—Miss Rashad, and you may believe what you say, but the six men who knew about me had everything to lose and not a goddamned thing to gain by saying that I was in Masqat last year.”
“And I had nothing to lose but my life and the lives of those I’ve cultivated throughout the sector, some of whom, incidentally, are very dear to me? Get off your plug horse, Congressman, you look ridiculous. You’re not only an amateur, you’re insufferable.”
“You know, it’s possible you could have made a mistake!” cried Kendrick, exasperated. “I’d almost be willing to give you the benefit of the doubt—I implied as much to Dennison and told him I wouldn’t let him hang you for it.”
“Oh, you’re too kind, sir.”
“No, I meant it. You did save my life, and if you made a slip and dropped my name—”
“Don’t compound your asininity,” Rashad broke in. “It’s far, far more likely that any five of the others might have made a slip like that than either Grayson or myself. We live in the field; we don’t make that kind of mistake.”
“Let’s walk,” said Evan—no guards in sight, only his doubts and his confusion forcing him to move. His problem was that he believed her, believed what Manny Weingrass said about her: “… she had nothing to do with exposing you.… it would only add to her shame and further inflame the crazy world she lives in.” And when Kendrick protested that the others couldn’t have, Manny had added: “Then there are others beyond others.…” They came to a dirt path that led up through the trees apparently to the stone wall bordering the estate. “Shall we explore?” asked Evan.