“Yes,” agreed Danilov, intrigued by a different sort of mental deduction.
“So to the Duma-and the communists-we’ll appear to confirm their accusations of willingly being subservient to Washington.”
“I don’t know the answer to that,” said Danilov. Could he get an answer to another uncertainty?
“I’ll find one,” said the politician.
Danilov acknowledged that he’d fully committed himself, telling Georgi Chelyag everything he knew and what he suspected from it. He might as well take things as far as he could. He asked, “There was a lot of initial confusion at the Washington embassy?”
The humorless man allowed himself the briefest of smiles. “I needed to test others. It was obvious you’d come on to me as you did. It was the only thing you could do.”
“Test for what?” persisted Danilov.
“Loyalty. Attitudes,” the political aide said generally.
“And?” questioned Danilov. He’d known from the beginning he was the puppet, so it would be ridiculous to be irritated by the manipulation. Instead he had to use it in any self-protective way he could, as he was now sure that there was some official involvement in the switching of the warhead evidence.
“There’s a lot of support for the old ways over the new.”
Surprising honesty, decided Danilov. “How does it affect the investigation?”
“You have my total support,” declared Chelyag. “And there’ll be no more shared sessions with anyone else.”
“I am officially answerable to Interior Minister Belik,” reminded Danilov. “I’ve been summoned immediately after this.”
“It’s countermanded by presidential authority. Which Belik will be told,” said the other man. “The same authority will get-through me-the personnel dismissals and changes you believe important in the old and new intelligence service.”
He was, Danilov recognized, very definitely between a rock and a hard place.
Pamela Darnley was excited. Unable quite yet to believe how the opportunity had finally come about. Sufficient that it had. No point-no reason-for any analysis. She’d had time to learn from William Cowley’s leadership. Now, as she’d told him at the very beginning, she was going to run with her chance. Prove herself as head of the American part of the investigation. Alone. In total, unshared control. She wasn’t frightened or unsure. She knew she could do it. Even knew how she was going to do it, surprised that it hadn’t occurred to anyone else, Cowley or Danilov in particular.
She hadn’t actually been sidelined in all the frenzied activity of the preceding twenty-four hours, but one of the first decisions had been that she should remain in Washington and she’d seized it, reanalyzing, reassessing, rereading all there was, seeking the opening. When she’d realized it she’d almost laughed aloud, it was so obvious.
She also had put some hope on the search for Viktor Nikolaevich Nikov’s visa application and the American address he’d listed on it, but when it had finally been located by Immigration it had been 69 Bay View Avenue, Brooklyn. She got no satisfaction from telling the even more resentfully hostile Al Beckingsdale they not only already had it but that it was wired. She didn’t want anyone claiming any credit for what she’d worked out.
Pamela was actually refining her intended use of the Orlenko monitor when Terry Osnan appeared at her office door and said, “My number three at Albany-a good agent-is on line three: says she thinks she knows how it’s all being financed.”
“What’s the lead?” demanded Danilov.
“The possible supplier of the warhead,” said Reztsov, from Gorki.
“You’ve got a positive identity?”
“We expect to in the next couple of days. And there’s a possibility of a connection with the Zotin Brigade.”
“I’ll come for an arrest,” Danilov told the man. “Tell me when you’re ready to move.”
23
There was every career-advancing reason for Pamela Darnley to go up to Albany rather than to bring Anne Stovey to headquarters, totally emptying the bureau office there being among the considerations, but impatient though she was, Pamela determined that everything had to have its priority, and Chicago-and her agonizingly simple suggestion-dominated that. But the Albany message now gave her possibly two breaks. In addition, she had guaranteed access-visible, in-his-face recognition-to the director, to ensure all the credit was properly accorded.
The diligent Terry Osnan had followed the bureau’s evidence collation procedure to the letter, and that required the initialed identity of every examining agent recorded against each incoming item and message. Because of this it took only minutes to identify Al Beckingsdale as the incident room agent who had discarded Anne Stovey’s original alert and caused the delay in responding to it.
Despite being acting case officer, Pamela’s grade was insufficient to dismiss Beckingsdale. She continued strictly to follow procedure, verbally warning the blustering man before handing him his required copy of her written request for Leonard Ross instantly to remove the Pittsburgh agent in charge from the investigation.
Her summons came within the hour.
Leonard Ross didn’t rise at her entry. He remained behind the desk upon which her memorandum was laid out and disappointed her by appearing to ignore the link between the Chicago telephone number and both Roanne Harding and Arseni Orlenko. Instead, he asked her to refresh his memory about the original bank theft. He genuinely wanted only that-unlike Pamela, who’d needed a full account from Anne Stovey in Albany-because the first “pennypinching” case had come to trial soon after Ross had been elevated to the New York circuit bench.
“We’ve got four separate banks with God knows how many branches admitting it’s happened-or is happening-to them,” concluded Pamela. “That isn’t coincidence.”
“I don’t think so, either,” agreed the director. “It could answer one of the many outstanding unknowns.”
“So could putting a tap on the public phone in Chicago,” urged Pamela, eager to get the conversation back to her agenda. “We’ve got an even more definite connection there.”
“All sorts of legal difficulties, state and federal,” cautioned the man.
So he hadn’t realized the other way! “And practical, from the sheer volume of what will have to be listened to,” accepted Pamela, taking her time now. “But surely we’ve got to do it: try to do it.”
“I’ll discuss it with the attorney general,” Ross said. “Talk to the White House about getting the Illinois governor involved, if necessary. You heard anything from Moscow?”
She sure as hell wasn’t going to lose her big moment talking about Moscow, from which she hadn’t yet heard anyway! “Chicago’s a street phone. We could avoid involving anyone at all apart from ourselves by putting it under permanent bureau surveillance. We know every call that’s made from Brooklyn, as soon as a number is dialed. The moment we identify Chicago, we alert the observation team and pick up whoever’s at the Chicago end.”
Ross regarded her without speaking for several moments. Then he said, “Nothing’s more obscure than the obvious.”
What the hell was that, recognition or praise or what! Cautiously-knowing Cowley’s intention to let the Brooklyn couple remain free, to guide them further toward the Watchmen-she said: “We’d have to pick up the Orlenkos, too. But they would have served their purpose, giving us whoever it is in Chicago. Who’s clearly farther up the ladder, dealing with them and Roanne Harding.”
“Who was the Pentagon infiltrator and now a murder victim, providing just cause to arrest them,” completed the former judge. “I like the way you’re bringing this together.”
Acknowledgment, at last! “Thank you. I’ll talk to New York and Chicago before going up to Albany.” And get my name on the detailed instruction briefings, she thought. “Agent Stovey isn’t convinced the banks’ security people are taking it seriously enough.”
“Make them,” Ross demanded shortly. “What about Beckinsdale not taking it serious
ly enough?”
“You have my memorandum,” said Pamela, equally brief. All the necessary details were there. It would be wrong-impolitic-for her to offer any comment or opinion.
Once more the man remained momentarily silent. “You’re making an impressive contribution. It’s being noted.”
“Thank you,” Pamela said again.
Terry Osnan was waiting to follow her into the side office when Pamela got back. Al Beckinsdale wasn’t in the incident room.
Osnan said, “You really play hardball.”
“Come on, Terry!”
“Mistakes happen.”
“Not on my watch, not if I can help it. He’s been a pain in the ass from the start. I want team play, not resentment.”
“Anne could be wrong.”
“If it’s a blowout it still doesn’t alter the fact that he didn’t react properly.”
“OK,” capitulated Osnan.
“What about Anne Stovey?” demanded Pamela. “She get things wrong very often?”
“No,” said the woman’s station chief. “Hardly ever.”
“Good,” said Pamela. “It’ll be a welcome change.”
There was immediate female recognition between the two women.
Pamela Darnley identified the graying, sensibly dressed, sensibly shod Anne Stovey as a state capital stalwart, probably born within twenty miles of the office in which she’d remained, by choice, throughout her entire career. One framed photograph on the woman’s desk in the office they’d just left showed her as part of a family group of husband and son. The other had father and son proudly posing with pole and line and a fish half the size of the boy’s arm.
Anne Stovey saw the sveltely dressed, tightly coiffed, seriously bespectacled Pamela Darnley as an interested-in-nothing-but-a-career woman prepared to run up the downward escalator in her total determination to get to the top. In the fifteen years that she had served in Albany, Anne had seen the attitude in a lot of male agents-for whose families she felt sorry-but never in a female one. She was curious about the experience to come.
“You’ve done well,” Pamela praised at once. “I’ll see it’s properly noted. The delay was ours, in Washington. That’s been noted, too.”
“I appreciate it,” said Anne, who didn’t, particularly. Anne was driving, Pamela twisted toward her in the passenger seat. “It could still be nothing: normal bank discrepancies, as they all say.”
“And it could be everything, hidden behind reluctance to admit they’re either fallible or can be robbed or both.”
A little more of Anne’s remaining uncertainty went. “How’s Terry getting on?”
“He’s doing a great job, too. Got the incident room running like an engine.”
“You close to anything?”
“Not close enough.” But they would be, soon enough. The Chicago street phone on Lake Shore Drive and 14th Boulevard had been under total surveillance for the last two hours, the control car permanently linked to the Manhattan office to be notified the moment a call was initiated from Brooklyn. Pamela had already decided to go up to Chicago when the arrest was made to conduct the interrogation personally. She’d packed enough clothes to go on from Albany if it happened soon enough. The instructions were for her to be told on her cell phone the moment a call was made.
“Maybe this will get us somewhere.”
“If it’s there, I’ll find it,” said Pamela. If she established the finance route as well as the Chicago arrest, virtually everything would be down to her. She wished she’d said “we” instead of “I.” The other woman appeared not to have noticed.
When she’d called to arrange the second meeting, Anne Stovey had been referred to Christopher Jackson, the senior vice president of Clarence Snelling’s bank, not the security chief, Hank Hewitt. Hewitt emerged from the building with a second man when Anne pulled into the slot reserved for them. Pamela had already decided that the involvement of a vice president was intriguing. So, too, was the effusive greeting before they were led into the building through a side door, avoiding the crowded main hall. Jackson was an urbane, white-haired man whom Pamela guessed spent more time on golf courses, encouraging customers, than in his bank office, luxurious though this one was. In the other man’s presence, Hewitt’s blinking was even more pronounced.
Jackson said, “I want to thank you for bringing this to the bank’s notice.
“I thought it was a customer, Clarence Snelling, who did that,” said Pamela. There was no purpose in-or time for-verbal niceties. She didn’t like the man or his unctuous attitude.
“Quite so,” agreed Jackson, smiling. “The extent, I mean.”
He hadn’t meant to say that, Pamela knew. “That’s what we’ve come here to learn about, the extent.”
Jackson looked at his security chief, shaking his head, before saying, “Our internal auditors would have picked it up, of course.”
“Why haven’t they already?” asked Pamela.
“No books balance out with total accuracy at the end of any day’s trading,” the bank executive lectured patiently. “Some days there’s a shortfall, sometimes a slight excess. That’s why we have internal audits. As I think Hank explained, shortfalls are made good. It’s the way it works.”
Anne Stovey said, “Are you telling us you still think these differences are the few cents you’re accustomed to being short in normal bank business?”
“We’ve no reason to think otherwise, have we?” Jackson’s question was addressed to his security official.
“I don’t believe so,” Hewitt said dutifully.
“How many cases have you discovered in addition to Mr. Snelling?” demanded the local agent.
“A few. Again only pennies. The sort of differences Mr. Jackson is talking about.”
Pamela allowed the silence, hoping Anne wouldn’t break it. Only when the security man shifted uncomfortably did she say, “Mr. Hewitt-Hank-I’m not getting the feeling you’re offering us the cooperation we should expect. How many? And how much?”
“Just twenty-eight dollars in total. From thirty accounts,” said Hewitt, a faint note of triumph in his voice.
“Nothing to worry about?” coaxed Pamela, at once.
“On the contrary, we consider it too high,” insisted Jackson. “That’s why I’ve already thanked you for bringing it to our attention. We’re taking the proper steps, I can assure you.”
“Doing what?” persisted Pamela.
“The internal audit I talked about.”
“You familiar with the famous case of the teller here in New York State who stole a million in pennies, nickels, and dimes?” said Anne.
Jackson’s smile was vaguely patronizing. “Of course.”
“You don’t think history could be repeating itself?” broke in Pamela. She curbed her anger, convinced now of the way the bank, in the person of the smoothly persuading Christopher Jackson, imagined the matter was going to be resolved. As the other banks doubtless imagined.
“Of course not.”
“Hank, when Anne first spoke to you a few days ago, she asked you to check other branches?”
“Yes?”
“Did you?”
“The larger ones in town.” He stopped himself from looking toward Jackson.
“How many?”
“Three.”
“What’s the shortfall in each?”
“The highest is forty dollars.”
“The other two?”
“Twenty-three and thirty-one.”
She’d had enough condescension, Pamela decided: enough of men thinking they were superior because she couldn’t piss up the wall like they could. “Mr. Jackson. You’re the victim of a clever thief. You know it and we know. We also know that you intend making up the pennies he embezzles, hoping to find him in an internal audit and fire him. That way there’s no publicity and your bank customers don’t lose confidence and move their accounts elsewhere. But there’s a problem you’re not aware of, not yet. You haven’t got a clue how long he
’s been doing it and how much money he’s stolen from you alone. But it isn’t from you alone. We’re checking out losses in three other banks-two your primary competitors-with branches all over the state and links with other financial institutions beyond the state ….” She paused, expecting an attempted contradiction that didn’t come. “The FBI has a highly trained and expert fraud division. I want to move investigators and auditors into all the regional offices that handle accounts from your smaller branches, which I intend asking all other involved banks to agree to my doing. I would like that to be at your-and their-invitation, but if it’s not I can-and will-do it by court order. Which unfortunately could result in your bank being publicly named, something I do not seek nor want to do.”
“All you’ve told me about is, I repeat, normal end-of-day shortages!” protested the senior vice president. “I certainly don’t intend giving that permission. In fact, I think it is something my board will have to take it up with Washington.”
“I’d like you to do that as soon as possible,” said Pamela. “It’s urgent. I still have the other banks to meet.”
“Urgent! The FBI considers the loss of exactly one hundred fourteen dollars, in nickels and dimes, urgent!”
“If the losses are far greater than that and are being used to finance even bigger crime.”
“What evidence have you got for that!”
“That’s what we want to find, evidence. And why we want your cooperation,” said Pamela. “Why don’t we have my director talk to your chairman right away? Save a lot of time.”
Jackson tilted his head to one side, frowning. “You’re quite serious, aren’t you? Imagine you can make that happen?”
“Quite serious,” agreed Pamela. “Can I use that phone?”
Patrick Hollis was, as usual, drinking his coffee alone in the cafeteria when Gilliam Carling, a junior programmer in his loans and securities division, came in, smiling expectantly for someone she knew. When she only found Hollis the smile faded but she still came over, needing someone in her excitement.
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