Fairbairn frowned. “He came out first—Shaw with him—I think.”
“Come on, Wallace. You can do better than that.”
“I spoke to him. Yes, I asked about getting the lock fixed and what did we do with the Greek files. Would I have to wait with them until Maintenance got the lock working?”
“And he reassured you he’d call Maintenance and keep an eye on the files for the time being?”
“That’s about it. He’d ’phone Menlo and have him lock them up, once the cabinet was fixed.”
“How long did you talk—a minute or two?”
“Could be. I joked a little.”
“And where were the files? With Shaw?”
“Yes.”
“And where was he? Standing at the table?”
Fairbairn stared at Bristow. There was a long silence. “Yes,” he said at last. Then, quickly, “Not Shaw—it couldn’t be Shaw.”
“Take it easy. We aren’t saying it was Shaw who dropped something into O’Donnell’s coffee cup.” Until this moment, I thought—as Menlo had thought—it was Coulton who had that assignment. Then why was Coulton present? Just to receive the cassettes after they were stolen? He could have waited in the car park for that, never needed to show his face. Or was he there to give an appearance of complete innocence? Lurking around a car park where he didn’t belong would be hard to explain if he were seen. Or was he making sure that the job of drugging O’Donnell was efficiently done—no hesitation, no mistake, no rousing of any suspicion?
“But there was only Shaw and Coulton and myself in that corridor. And Shaw was close to that table longer than I was. If it wasn’t Shaw, then who—”
“Easy, Wallace,” Bristow cautioned again. “We don’t know yet. It’s your word against his, and he may not have the same story to tell.”
“But that’s what happened!”
“Let’s go back a little earlier. You visited the file room for twenty minutes that evening. Alone.”
“I was consulting material from several files, but not in the Greek cabinet, if that’s what you’re driving at. I didn’t go near it.”
“Did Shaw know you were consulting other files?”
“Sure. We were working on the same problem—tracing that Athens-to-London route of the Blitz disinformation.” Fairbairn’s face was tense as he remembered another detail. “Later, when we both visited the room at ten o’clock, I left Shaw to replace the Greek files and went to the Austrian cabinet.”
“Why?”
“Following a hunch—a vague memory. There’s a Graz newspaper that might be a transmission belt from Athens to West Germany. It did act as that a couple of years back.”
“So you opened the Austrian cabinet.” And that was on the opposite side of the room. Fairbairn’s back would be turned to Shaw.
Fairbairn nodded. “I had just found the Graz folder when Shaw called for help with the lock that was stuck. I closed the cabinet and went to help him.”
Bristow lit his second cigarette. “Have one?” He offered his pack. “Or are you still refusing them?”
“Gave up the habit for good.” Fairbairn watched him anxiously. “Well? Or is the jury still out?”
“Has to be until I talk with Shaw, too.”
“His word against mine. That’s what you said. Hopeless. Who can prove whose word is false?”
Bristow ignored that little outburst. Very quietly, he said, “Whoever removed the cassettes waited until you had left the corridor and O’Donnell had collapsed. Did Coulton stay with you all the way to the front entrance?”
“Yes. And Shaw left ahead of us—so that lets him off the hook, too, doesn’t it?” Fairbairn was embarrassed. “Guess I was too quick to judge him,” he admitted.
“You were defending yourself.”
“At his expense.” Fairbairn drew a long deep breath. “When you talk out of fear—well, you never make a pretty picture, do you?”
“Fear?”
“Fear of this shadow forever hanging over my head. But I have nothing to confess, Pete. Nothing. Except blindness, perhaps. There must be more involved in all this than just the theft of two cassettes.”
“Much more.”
“I feel I’m—I’m trapped. How or why, I don’t know. I could lose my job—my career—my family. My whole life, in fact. Pete—what do I do?”
“Ignore it.”
Fairbairn’s laugh was short and sour.
“Say nothing to anyone. Talk to no one about our meeting today. Keep your cool, play it loose.”
Fairbairn asked slowly, “Do you believe me?”
“Enough to try and find the whole truth.”
“I’ll settle for that.”
“Let’s get back to the office,” Bristow said.
There was a considerable walk ahead of them, and Bristow used it to say, “By the way—a week ago last Saturday, when I ’phoned you to meet me and take an envelope to the vault—”
“I remember. When I went to get my car, I found it had a flat—must have been a slow leak.”
“So you went back to the office to ask Shaw for a lift?”
“No, no. He was already in the parking lot. He was on his way home.”
“He offered you a lift?”
“And I took it gladly.”
“You arrived at the gas station ahead of time.”
“Well ahead. Shaw’s a wild driver. It would have been too noticeable to keep his Honda waiting in front of the gas station, so he parked it among some other cars close to the cafeteria.”
“With a clear view of me when I arrived?”
“Yes. But I didn’t notice you arriving—you weren’t driving your own car, and I was watching for the blue Camaro.”
“Did Shaw notice me?”
“Don’t think so. Didn’t say anything, at least.”
“Why did he suddenly shoot out of the parking space?”
Fairbairn was baffled by that question. “Guess he was a bit speedy in reaching the gas station. But it was twelve thirty, you know.”
“He knew of our appointment?”
“I—I may have mentioned it. He was in the office when you telephoned.” Fairbairn was embarrassed. “I suppose I talked out of turn. Sorry. Didn’t think it was any state secret we were dealing with. You were pretty casual about that envelope, you know.”
“Was I that good?”
“You fooled me.”
But not Shaw, Bristow thought. And then wondered if he were too quick in judgment. He’d have to talk with Shaw, too, hear his story... “See you around,” he told Fairbairn as they reached their floor. “And not one word about this discussion,” he added quietly.
“Not even in my sleep.”
He’s recovering, thought Bristow as he entered his office. Did I give him too much hope? It is one thing to believe a friend, another to prove he is innocent. I’ll have to do more than convince myself. And I doubt if I’m qualified for this job; I’m not objective enough. So why the hell did Menlo entrust me to take over his investigation? Perhaps I’d better choose someone to follow me—in case of an accident. Such as being eliminated as Menlo was.
Abruptly, he switched his mind away from that unpleasant idea. Shaw, he considered now—Shaw had longer access than anyone else to the guard’s table and his coffee cup. But Shaw had left ahead of the other two, and Fairbairn backed Shaw’s statement on that point. So where did that leave us—with some third party, who didn’t belong to this unit and yet knew the combination of the Farrago file, knew that the Vienna cassettes were there for the stealing? Coulton? But the time of his leaving the building was definite. He accompanied Fairbairn out. Accompanied or escorted? To make sure Fairbairn was safely and quickly away from the corridor when the Farrago file was opened and the cassettes lifted?
I may have answered my question why Coulton was present on Saturday night, Bristow thought, but I’m still floundering around on the exact timing of his departure. Both taped interviews had been vague about that. There was one wa
y to solve that problem: call Doyle and ask him to have Saturday’s records checked on everyone who was signed out between ten and ten thirty.
So he called Doyle.
“Yes, it’s possible,” Doyle said in answer to his request, but obviously thought Bristow was beginning to saw sawdust. “Give me until one o’clock. May have more to report by then. New developments. We’ve had a spot of luck.”
We could use it, thought Bristow. “Also, would you check if anyone returned to this building after he had signed out?”
“A re-entry? That’s a bit unusual.”
“Anything unusual—that’s what we want to know. Okay? One o’clock will be fine. See you here.”
Bristow spent the next hour making his own notes on his talk with Fairbairn, comparing them with the earlier statements to Menlo. No divergence. Just more explanation, a clarification that changed the whole picture. Carefully, he went over his series of questions to Fairbairn. They had prodded, but they hadn’t led. Why the hell hadn’t Fairbairn been more explicit in the first place? But when Menlo had talked with him, Fairbairn hadn’t thought it necessary to go into details of justifications. He had assumed, in typical fashion, that everyone knew he could never be guilty of theft or treason.
There was still half an hour before Doyle would appear. Time to check in with Joe at the answering service, let him know he was back from vacation. Some vacation, he thought as he dialled Joe’s number and relaxed at his desk with a cigarette.
Joe was astounded to hear his voice. “Then you can take the six-ten call instead of Mr. Menlo. He told me to put it through to your office.”
Bristow swung his feet off the desk, stubbed out the cigarette. “What call?”
“Didn’t Mr. Menlo tell you? I ’phoned him at his home yesterday evening. He said I did the right thing.”
“’Phoned him about what?”
“An urgent call for you at five forty. A man. Spoke a lot, but wouldn’t give his name. Said—”
“Play it back to me.”
“Just a minute. Got your taped messages right here. You’ll have to listen to all of them, Mr. Bristow. They’re on one—”
“Okay, okay. I’ll listen.” A call puzzling enough to make Joe call Menlo, interesting enough for Menlo to thank Joe for having trespassed into his privacy—Bristow’s tension increased by the moment as Joe’s minute stretched to almost two. Finally, the week-end’s messages came through. And the very last was one in a stranger’s voice, speaking fluent American with a foreign inflection when his words rose in anger. The sudden oath was definitely Russian. The phrases “No one else. Only Bristow” echoed Vasek’s words to Karen in Prague. “Two weeks earlier”—yes, two weeks had been his time limit when he spoke with her in Rome. “Someone Bristow would very much like to meet...”
“You bet I’d like to meet you, Vasek,” Bristow said under his breath as the tape ended. “One more trick out of you, and I’ll wring your bloody neck.”
Joe was saying, “Okay, Mr. Bristow? Clear enough?”
“Clear and true. I’d like to collect that tape.”
“I’ll be here from five on. My brother—”
“That’s right—he takes over for the afternoon. I’ll drop around this evening—could be late, very late.”
“Anytime until midnight,” Joe reassured him. “Hope you had a good vacation.”
“Just loafing around,” Bristow said. “And Joe—tape all the calls for me for the next few days, especially the one that will be made at six ten this evening, even though I’m taking it in my office. Got that?” Bristow replaced the receiver, thinking of Vasek. Farrago. The man who trusted no one.
How the devil had he managed it—safely out of Europe, across the Atlantic, into America, and playing everything alone? He had courage, plenty of that to match his self-confidence. A master of planning, of the unexpected, of deception, too. In his peculiar way, a genius. Was he proving that we need him more than he needed us? Establishing his superiority, even domination, before we met? If he ever learned what a mess we are trying to clean up here, he’d add one more tally to his conviction that Americans are nitwits, only to be tolerated when useful.
Then Doyle breezed in, and Farrago retreated into the shadows.
23
Tom Doyle might not have had much time for sleep last night, but his step was elastic, his eyes gleamed with barely concealed excitement. “Some interesting developments,” he began as he took the chair opposite Bristow at his desk. “We got—”
“First,” said Bristow, “have you heard from Taylor or Hansen?”
“Every hour on the hour. Checked with Hansen just before I came here. Everything is quiet and under control at your place.”
Bristow drew a deep breath of relief. “What’s your news?”
“We got the car.”
“The one standing last night near Menlo’s house?”
“The same. Rented, of course. And abandoned in a parking lot at a bus stop on Wisconsin.”
“Quick work!” There were many bus stops along that avenue.
“Well—we needed some help on this one,” Doyle admitted. “We had the police circulate number and description—two-door sedan, dark colour, new-model Ford possibly. A patrol car spotted it this morning when they were cruising around Friendship Heights.”
Friendship Heights? That was near Chevy Chase, Fairbairn’s district. God, no!
“It wasn’t even well hidden. Standing in plain view.”
Bristow stared at Doyle. “Friendship Heights,” he said slowly, still aghast.
“About a couple of miles from Fairbairn’s house on Cherry Lane.” Doyle watched Bristow curiously. “He could have ditched the car and then hiked home. He walks a lot, I hear.”
“I’d have thought he’d have his own car waiting in that parking lot—if he was abandoning the Ford there.”
Doyle shook his head. “His Buick stayed in his driveway all night. Looked as if he never left home. But someone telephoned him around eleven. His wife answered. She said he had gone out for a late stroll.”
“You mean—you’ve his place under surveillance?”
“Menlo requested it. Suggested a proper search warrant, too. I’ve hung back on that, but perhaps it’s now time to get one and use it. We found a stocking mask lying on the floor of the rented car—slipped off the seat and was forgotten, no doubt. There were also a couple of cigarette butts—”
“Fairbairn doesn’t smoke,” Bristow interjected. A foolish clutch at hope, he realised. Fairbairn, under strain, might have gone back to his old habit.
“Then it could have been the other guy who does. We found his thumbprints on the steering wheel, but we can’t identify them. The FBI has no record of them, either. The same thumbprint is on an outside panel of Menlo’s front door and on his stereo.” Doyle looked at Bristow with some impatience. “Two men did the job: one wearing gloves and the other a little careless about that. Perhaps because he knew he couldn’t be traced in this country.”
“Two men—are you sure?”
“At least two. If a gun had been used, one man could have dealt with Menlo. But there is no trace of a bullet fired. There is no trace of a fight, either, and I don’t see Menlo being overpowered by one man without a struggle. Also, the search of the house was complete—a big job for someone working alone—upstairs, downstairs. They weren’t ordinary burglars. Nothing was taken. Not radio or a camera lying on the hall table or silver candlesticks and tray or Menlo’s supply of extra cash in his bedroom. The papers in his desk drawer—cleverly opened, by the way, and no fingerprints left—were jumbled. The bookcases had also been searched. My guess is they were looking for something like—well, those notes he made. And the guy who led that search must have known about them. How many in your unit could have known? The two who were interviewed by Menlo. Right?”
“What about Shaw’s movements last night? You had his apartment house under surveillance, too, hadn’t you?”
Doyle nodded. “Seemed to
be spending the night at home. His Honda was parked in front—for a change, I must say—and the lights went on in his bedroom when the living-room was darkened.”
“That can be controlled with a timer.”
“Yes. But there was a telephone call at midnight, and he answered.”
“He spoke himself? Not a recorded message?”
Doyle took out a small notebook and consulted it. “He said, ‘Yes? Shaw here. Who’s speaking?’ A man’s voice answered, ‘Carl.’ Shaw said, ‘Look, Carl, call me tomorrow, will you? That’s a good chap. I’m busy right now.’ And he hung up.” Doyle waited for Bristow’s reply, got none. “You’re a hard man to convince,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m thinking you don’t find my news too welcome.”
“To tell you the truth, it knocked the wind out of me. I spent a good part of this morning listening to Fairbairn, studying his answers. And,” Bristow added wryly, “I found him innocent. A dupe, yes. Someone who was being used, set up to take the fall if our mole was in danger of being unearthed.”
“Mole?”
“That’s what it’s all about. Didn’t Menlo tell you? We’ve got one in my unit. He took the Vienna cassettes—Menlo used them as bait to catch him.”
Doyle was silent. Then he said, “A mole is a pretty expert con man. Clever, too. That car he ditched—” He broke off, looked at Bristow.
“Too clever to leave it anywhere near his own house,” Bristow said, and Doyle nodded in agreement. “Shaw’s apartment is right in Washington, isn’t it?”
“M Street, west of Connecticut. But a long way from Friendship Heights early in the morning.”
“Unless Shaw had someone waiting for him in the parking area to drive him home. Or almost home.” Bristow thought over that and had a better idea. “If his friend was unwilling to be seen waiting there, what about a bus? Doesn’t one of the Owl Routes run from Friendship Heights right down into north-west Washington?”
“From one until five A.M.,” Doyle said softly. “Takes you down Wisconsin to Pennsylvania Avenue, ends at Seventeenth Street.”