Assumed Identity

  'The apartment's clean.'

  'Good.' The hollow-cheeked controller opened his briefcase. 'I need your driver's license, your passport, your birth certificate, your credit cards, all of your documents for Brian MacDonald. Here are the release forms for you to sign, and here's my signed receipt.'

  Buchanan complied.

  'Now here are your further documents,' the thin-lipped controller continued, 'and the acceptance form for you to sign. Your new name is Edward Potter. You used to be employed as a. Well, it's all in this file. Every detail of your new background. Knowing how retentive your memory is, I assume that as usual you'll be able to absorb the information by the time I come back to retrieve the file tomorrow morning. What's wrong?'

  'What took you so long to get in touch with me?' Buchanan asked. 'It's been two months.'

  'After your last assignment, we wanted you to disappear for a while. Also we thought we'd have a use for you as Brian MacDonald. Now that scenario's been discarded. We've got a much more interesting project for you. I think you'll be pleased. It's as important as it is risky. It'll give you quite a rush.'

  'Tell me about it.'

  His controller studied him. 'I sometimes forget how intense field operatives can be, how anxious they are to. But then, of course, that's why you're field operatives. Because.'

  'Because? I've asked myself that many times. What's the answer?'

  'I should have thought that was obvious. You enjoy being someone else.'

  'Yes. Exactly. So indulge me. Pretend I'm a method actor. What's my new character's motivation?'

  4

  In the restaurant in Cancun's Club Internacional, Buchanan showed no fear when the first twin threatened him. Instead he replied matter-of-factly, 'Give you a reason not to kill me? I can give you several million of them.'

  'We have many millions as it is,' the first twin said. 'What makes you think a few more would make us risk trusting you?'

  'Human nature. No matter how much money a person has, it's never enough. Besides,' Buchanan said, 'I didn't offer a few million. I offered several.''

  'Hard to spend in prison. Impossible to spend in the grave,' the second twin said. 'The practical response to your offer is to eliminate your interference. We resent a competitor, and we have no need for a partner.'

  In the background, the drone of conversing diners muffled their exchange.

  'That's just the point,' Buchanan said, still showing no apprehension. 'I don't want to be your competitor, and you do need a partner.'

  The second twin bristled. 'You have the nerve to tell us what we need. Your eggs are truly hardboiled.'

  'But they can be cracked,' the first twin growled.

  'Definitely,' Buchanan said. 'I knew the danger when I set up shop here.'

  'Not only here, but in Merida, Acapulco, and Puerto Vallarta,' the second twin said angrily.

  'Plus a few other resorts where you apparently don't know I've established contacts.'

  The first twin's eyes narrowed, emphasizing their hawklike intensity. 'You have the impudence to brag to our faces.'

  'No.' Buchanan shook his head emphatically. 'I'm not bragging. I'm being candid. I hope you'll appreciate my honesty. I assure you, I'm not being disrespectful.'

  The twins considered his apology, frowned at each other, nodded with sullen reluctance, and leaned back in their chairs.

  'But by your own admission, you've been extremely industrious,' the second twin said. 'And at our expense.'

  'How else could I have attracted your attention?' Buchanan spread his hands deferentially. 'Consider the risk I took, a norteamericano, suddenly conducting business not only in Mexico, but in your backyard, in your country's resorts, especially here in Cancun. Even with my special knowledge, I had no idea who to approach. Fernandez, I suspected you,' Buchanan told the first man. 'But I had no idea you had a twin, and to tell the truth' - Buchanan switched his attention to the second man - 'I don't know which of you is Fernandez. When you entered this restaurant, I confess I was stunned. Gemelos. Twins. That explains so much. It was never clear to me how Fernandez could be in two places, Merida and Acapulco, for example, at one time.'

  The first man twisted his thin lips in what passed for a grin. 'That was our intention. To cause confusion.' Abruptly he sobered. 'But how did you know that even one of us had the first name of Fernandez?' He spoke with increasing speed and ferocity. 'What is this special information to which you refer? When our subordinates paid you our courtesy of warning you to stop interfering with our business, why did you ask for this meeting and give our subordinates the names on this sheet of paper?

  To demonstrate, the first twin reached into his wrinkled, linen suit coat and produced a folded page. He slapped it onto the table. 'The names on this paper are some of our most trusted associates.'

  'Well' - Buchanan shrugged -'that just goes to show.'

  'Show what?

  'How mistaken you can be about trusted associates.'

  'Fucker of your mother, what are you talking about?' the second twin demanded.

  So the bait really worked, Buchanan thought. I'm in! I've got their attention! Hell, they wouldn't have both shown up if they weren't afraid. That list of names spooked them more than I hoped.

  'What am I talking about?' Buchanan said. 'I'm talking about why you should trust me instead of those bastards. I used to belong to the.'

  Again Buchanan coughed in warning.

  The twins stiffened as their waiter returned, carrying a tray from which he set onto the table a plate of sliced limes, a bowl of salt, a small spoon, and six shot glasses filled with amber tequila.

  'Gracias,' Buchanan said. 'Give us ten minutes before we order dinner.'

  He used the tiny, metal spoon to place salt on his left hand, on the web of skin between his thumb and first finger. 'Salud,' he told the twins. He licked the salt from his hand, quickly swallowed the contents of one of the glasses, and as quickly bit into a slice of lime. The sour juice of the lime spurted over his tongue, mixing with the sweet taste of the tequila and the bitterness of the salt, the various flavors combining perfectly. His mouth puckered slightly. His eyes almost watered.

  'Never mind drinking to our health. Just worry about yours,' the first twin said.

  'I'm not worried,' Buchanan said. 'I think we're going to have a productive relationship.' He watched them lick salt, swallow tequila, and chew on wedges of lime.

  Immediately they placed more salt on their hands and waited for him to do the same.

  As Buchanan complied, it occurred to him that his was one of the few occupations in which the consumption of alcohol was a mandatory requirement. His opponents wouldn't trust anyone who didn't drink with them, the implication being that an abstainer had something to hide. So it was necessary to consume quantities of alcohol, for the purpose of gaining trust from those opponents. By vigilant practice, Buchanan had learned the limit of his tolerance for alcohol, just as he'd learned how believably to pretend that he'd exceeded that tolerance and to convince his opponents that he was drunk and hence saying the truth.

  The narrow-faced twins raised their second glass of tequila, clearly expecting Buchanan to do the same. Their dark eyes glowed with the anticipation that he would soon lose control and reveal a weakness.

  'You were saying,' the first twin said,'that you suspect the loyalty of our associates because you used to belong to.'

  5

  'The Drug Enforcement Administration,' Buchanan's controller had told him three months earlier. They'd sat opposite each other in the living room of the safe-site apartment in the sprawling complex in Fairfax, Virginia. Between them, on the coffee table, the gray-haired controller had spread documents, the details of Buchanan's new identity, what was known in the trade as his legend. 'You have to convince your targets that you used to be a special agent for the DEA.'

  Buchanan, who was already assuming the characteristics of Edward Potter, deciding how the man would dress and what foods he preferred, pressed the
tips of his fingers together almost prayerlike and raised them meditatively to his chin. 'Keep talking.'

  'You wanted to know your character's motivation? Well, basically he's sick of seeing the war against drug dealers turn into a joke. He thinks the government hasn't provided sufficient funds to prove that it's serious about fighting the war. He's disgusted with CIA interference whenever the DEA gets close to the really big dealers. According to your new character, those big dealers are on the CIA payroll, supplying information about the politics in the volatile Third World countries from which they get their product. So naturally the CIA clamps down on the DEA whenever one of the agency's informants steps in shit.'

  'Well, that part won't be hard to fake. The CIA does have the biggest Third World dealers on its payroll,' Buchanan said.

  'Absolutely. However, that's about to change. Those Third World dealers have become too smug. The information they've been supplying isn't worth squat. They think they can take the agency's money, do virtually nothing in return, and in effect give the agency the finger. Apparently they didn't learn from our invasion of Panama.'

  'Of course not,' Buchanan said. 'After we grabbed Noriega, other dealers took his place. Nothing changed, except children starved to death because of the economic embargo.'

  'Good. You're beginning to sound like your new personality,' Buchanan-Potter's controller said.

  'Hey, I lost friends in the Panama invasion. At the start, I believed the invasion was necessary. But when I saw the pathetic follow-up -why doesn't the American government do things all the way?- I wanted to vomit.'

  'Even better. You're convincing me, and I know you're acting, so obviously you've got a damned fine chance of convincing your targets.'

  'But I'm not acting.'

  'Buchanan, give it a rest, okay? We've got a lot of details to cover. So save your method-acting techniques until later.'

  'Don't call me "Buchanan." My name is Edward Potter.'

  'Sure, right, Edward. Maybe it'll give you further motivation to know that your assignment is intended to compensate for the half-hearted follow-up to what happened in Panama. Your ultimate objective is to scare the living be Jesus out of the agency's Third World drug-lord informants who still make jokes about the American lives lost in the useless invasion of Panama.'

  'No. That's Buchanan's motivation. I don't want to hear that. I don't want my mind to be contaminated. Just tell me about Edward Potter. What's his motivation?'

  The pallid controller lowered his head, shook it, and sighed. 'I have to tell you, Buchanan-'

  'Potter.'

  '-sometimes you worry me. Sometimes I think you absorb yourself too much in your assumed identities.'

  'But you're not risking your ass if I forget who the hell I'm supposed to be. So don't fool with my life. From now on, talk to me with the assumption that I'm Edward Potter.'

  Again the controller sighed. 'Whatever you want, Edward. Your wife divorced you because you were too devoted to your job and not enough to her and your two sons. She remarried. Because of the numerous threats you've received from drug dealers, she asked for and was granted a court order that forbids you to come anywhere near her and your children without prior approval from her and without guarantees of safety. Her new husband earns two hundred thousand a year as an owner of several health spas. You, by comparison, earn a paltry forty thousand, or rather used to earn that amount, a salary that's especially humiliating in contrast with the millions earned by the scum you arrested and saw released on bail and eventually plea-bargained to a short-term sentence in a minimum-security prison. You're convinced that if you'd accepted the bribes you were offered, your wife would have been satisfied with a new house, et cetera, and wouldn't have left you. When everything you believed in collapsed, you got pissed. You decided that by God, if you couldn't beat the drug lords, you'd join them. You'd show your fucking wife that you could earn a hundred times as much as her faggot new husband. Your dick was bigger than his.'

  'Yes,' Buchanan-Potter said. 'My dick is bigger.'

  The controller stared. 'Amazing.'

  Buchanan-Potter's cheek muscles hardened. 'So how do I get even?'

  6

  'You used to be an agent for the Drug Enforcement Administration? In the restaurant in Cancun's Club International, the first Hispanic twin spoke softly yet with paradoxical force. Shocked, he and his brother jerked back in their chairs.

  'Take it easy,' Buchanan said. 'I'm on your side now.'

  'Certainly,' the second twin said derisively. 'By all means. Of course.'

  'And you truly expect us to believe this?' the first twin demanded. 'To accept that you're a defector and to trust you?'

  'It's not as if I haven't made a gesture of good faith,' Buchanan said. 'That folded sheet of paper beneath your hand. If you put pressure on the Bahamian bank officials you hire to launder money, you'll find that the supposedly loyal associates I mentioned on that list all have secret, offshore bank accounts. Now I realize that graft is a way of life down here. But I think you'll agree that the amounts your supposedly loyal associates put away for a rainy day are considerably higher than payoffs and kickbacks alone would explain.'

  The second twin squinted. 'Assuming for the moment that your information is correct.'

  'Oh, it is. That goes without saying. After all, I'm guaranteeing it with the best collateral imaginable.'

  'And what is that?' The first twin tapped his fingers on the table.

  'My life. If I'm lying about those bank accounts - and it won't be hard for you to discover if I am - you'll have me killed.'

  'But in the meantime, perhaps you'll be able to accomplish whatever you intend and drop out of sight before we can get our hands on you.' The second twin squinted more severely.

  'What could I possibly accomplish?' Buchanan gestured. 'Until you investigate the men on that list and decide if my information is valuable, you won't let me into your confidence. You won't do business with me.'

  'We might not do business with you, even if you're telling the truth.' The first twin kept tapping his fingers on the table.

  'There's always that possibility.' Buchanan shrugged. 'But the way I see it, I'm taking all the risks and you're taking none. Certainly there's nothing risky about your meeting me here - at a mutually agreeable, neutral place - for drinks and dinner. At the worst, you've been inconvenienced. From my point of view, however, at the worst, I get dead.'

  Without looking at each other, the twins seemed to reach a mutual conclusion.

  'Exactamente.' The second twin turned toward the half-filled restaurant, caught their waiter's attention, pointed toward the glasses on their table, held up two fingers, and then waved his hand in a circle, indicating he wanted another round of tequila, doubles for everyone. Seeing the waiter nod, he pivoted toward Buchanan. 'You interrupted before I could finish my earlier question.'

  'Perd¢n. So ask it now.'

  'Assuming you're telling the truth about these offshore bank accounts, how do you explain the considerable amounts you claim our associates have hidden from us? What is the source of those funds? They must be bribes from drug-enforcement officers for supplying information. Because the only other explanation would be that they're stealing a portion of our merchandise or else the money we collect, and I assure you we can account for every kilo we send to the United States and every dollar we get back.'

  Buchanan shook his head. 'Bribes alone won't explain the tremendous sums in these offshore accounts. As you're aware, drug-enforcement officers have never been known for being overly generous with their bribes. Their budget's stretched too thin. But as it happens, you're wrong about having protected yourselves against theft. Your men are running an extremely sophisticated skim operation.'

  'What? The second twin looked stunned. 'No es posible.'

  'It's not only possible. It's a fact.'

  'I'm telling you, we'd know!'

  'Not this way. Not the way they're doing it. They're using rogue DEA officers to help them ski
m. How many shipments did you lose last year? An approximate percentage. Ten percent?'

  'More or less,' the first twin said. 'It's inevitable that some of our shipments will be discovered. Couriers get nervous and make mistakes. Or DEA officers happen to be at the right place at the right time. We expect a certain percentage of losses. It goes with the business.'

  'But what if some of those couriers weren't as nervous as they pretended?' Buchanan asked. 'And what if those DEA officers had advance warning to be at the right place at the right time? And what if those couriers and DEA officers were in business for themselves?'