The Sunday Spy

by William Hood

  Widgery lapsed into silence as Amanda approached the table. She placed the plate in front of Widgery and lingered long enough to make a delicate adjustment in its position. As Widgery murmured his thanks, a smile broke like a perfect wave across his impeccable features. Amanda blushed, shoved Trosper’s plate across the table, and hurried away.

  “I’ll be able to digest lunch better if you can give me at least a clue as to what is going on,” Widgery said.

  “It’s simple enough,” Trosper said. “I’ve read the Winesap file, and I’d like to get a more nearly firsthand impression of your agent.”

  “Oh … uh, I see.” Flustered, Widgery reached for the stemmed glass of Edelkraehe. He took a sip, and rolled the water over his tongue. Then, like a wine taster admiring a vintage color, or a restaurant guest who has found a trace of lipstick on the rim, he raised the glass and for a moment held it to the light. The image flickered as he caught Trosper’s amused expression. “But may I at least know why?” he blurted.

  “Winesap has come up in another connection, a matter important enough for me to want a personal impression of the man,” Trosper said. “Since he’s accredited to the U.N., and you’re meeting him in a safe house, it shouldn’t be much of a problem for me to slip into the back room and listen for a while.”

  “If you think it’s worth the time, but frankly, I’ve spent hours with this guy, and covered it completely in my reports,” Widgery said.

  “I’d have thought that almost any special interest could be answered from reading the file, or talking to me, and without any … er … intrusive, back-room monitoring … ”

  “To put it more simply,” Trosper flared, “I found the reporting on Winesap superficial, unfocused, and quite useless for my purposes.”

  Widgery flinched and lowered his head. “For months now, I’ve been busting my ass trying to make something out of this creep, and now in the first few minutes of talking to someone I never thought I’d catch sight of, much less meet, I find I’ve been doing everything wrong.” He was no longer talking through his nose.

  Trosper recognized the cri de coeur and throttled his exasperation. So much for forgetting that Widgery was scarcely out of the Firm’s romper room when he recruited Winesap. Trosper forced down another bit of the crepe and said, “Let’s start over again … ” Widgery occupied himself with the soup.

  “First, except for the food, I think this is a good place to meet — we’re the only two men in the joint, and if one of us was followed, the tail would be as conspicuous as a bald ballerina.”

  Widgery brightened.

  “Second, I might have told you at the outset that I’m involved in a sensitive case — a case that may involve half a dozen other matters, some of them quite touchy. Aside from Mr. Todd, no one in your division is aware that I’m here. What’s more, even Todd doesn’t know why I’m here.” Trosper took a final morsel of the tofu crepe. “To make the cheese more binding, you’re not to mention this to anyone whomsoever without my express permission.”

  “But Mr. Todd is my division chief … ”

  Trosper pushed his plate slightly to one side. “Is it possible to get bread in this place?”

  Widgery, his face still flushed, beckoned to Amanda. “Some of your house bread, please.”

  “Just write your routine report on the Winesap meeting without any reference to my being in the back room. If Dick Todd has any problems, he knows who to talk to.” Trosper smiled at Widgery. “Now, if I may see the questions you’ve prepared for the meeting.”

  “I didn’t think I needed any written notes,” Widgery muttered, his discomfort returning in a rush of color. “All I have is some follow-up stuff from the last meeting, and a query from the FBI.”

  “What is that?”

  Widgery appeared to have composed himself and was again talking through his slightly upturned nostrils. “An absolutely routine question on the official community.”

  Amanda put a plate of tissue-thin sliced bread and a saucer of olive oil with garlic cloves on the table. Widgery picked up a slice of the bread and dipped it into the olive oil.

  Trosper had never tasted a Communion wafer, but he suspected that Annie’s Cloud Nine house bread had the same flavor and consistency. But Widgery was right about one thing. The oil and garlic did wonders for the bread.

  *

  It was one of the undistinguished small apartment buildings in the lower thirties on the east side of Manhattan. The safe apartment was on the ground floor — a desirable feature that made it unnecessary to chance using the small elevator and risk sharing it with strangers, who in the absence of other distractions would have the opportunity to study and remember, or possibly recognize a fellow passenger.

  “The gear is in the back room,” Widgery said. “My friend is due here at five forty-five. Meanwhile, I’m going to test the audio and recording system.”

  Trosper waited until Widgery had adjusted the earphones and tested and set the volume on the tape recorder before saying, “Why are we here?”

  Widgery looked up angrily. “I’m here to meet Winesap,” he said. “You’ve already told me why you’re here. But if you’re testing my cover, I’ll confess right now that I should have told you that I’m documented with the same name I used in Vienna, Peter Lynch. Now I’m a businessman from Boston. Rather than pay for hotel rooms, my firm keeps this apartment, and I stay here when I’m in town. Argo Electronics is in Boston, the apartment is on a two-year lease … ”

  “All right,” Trosper said with a grin, “you’ve passed.” There was much to be said for operating in the benign atmosphere of one’s own backyard, but it did tend to erode the security disciplines necessary to work effectively in less forgiving climates.

  “All the documentation is backed up,” Widgery continued, his face flushed. “But in the event a team of hard boys from the Iranian mission and a TV-Tehran spot-news outfit break the door down, what’s your cover?”

  “I’m Paul Doughty, a nautical equipment salesman and golf-playing pal of your father in Boston.” Trosper’s smile broadened. He was an enthusiastic supporter of doing things by the book. The ability to improvise quickly was a necessary skill for anyone in the racket, but Trosper had always found that case men with the best knowledge of conventional tradecraft were also the best at improvising.

  He adjusted the feather-light earphones in time to hear Widgery ask, “How much time do we have?” Trosper nodded; first things always first.

  “Not too long, my wife worries if I am late.”

  There was a rustling sound as Winesap moved to cross his legs or change position in the upholstered chair. Trosper wondered if Winesap adjusted his posture every time he answered a question or only when the question required a defensive answer.

  “I had to see that dummy Karem Nabavi. At the office, all day he does nothing, just oversees the housekeeping, watches his helper Bazargan fix that the roof doesn’t leak, and the toilets work. Nabavi is just a janitor with a diplomatic pass. Then, at about five o’clock he wants to give a few orders, ask some questions, just to impress everyone how good a revolutionary worker he is.”

  Winesap’s responses to Widgery’s probing for details on the mission staff were grudging, those of a man speaking impatiently and from superior knowledge. His accent was light, his English adequate.

  Finally, Widgery asked, “What do you have for me?”

  There was another rustle of cloth against the upholstered chair. “That bum Hassan is still selling tax-free whiskey to some bar he knows.”

  “This is not exactly what a newspaper would call a big news day,” Widgery said. “I find it impossible to believe there’s nothing going on in the mission except a bit of illegal whiskey peddling.”

  “Look,” Winesap said. “I got to be careful around that place. I can’t just walk into offices and ask questions like some big diplomat from third floor. I have to be careful. No one trust anyone there. It’s like the old days, just after the takeover, no one knows who to
trust. You can’t believe security police have just stopped work can you?”

  “That’s exactly the sort of thing I’ve been trying to find out,” Widgery said sharply.

  There was a long pause. If Widgery was not fussing with his notes, but remaining silent long enough to force Winesap to continue talking, he was on the right path. Another few seconds and there was the now familiar rustle.

  “What you expect from me, anyway? I always try hard but it’s not easy. Diplomats look down on me, my wife makes trouble at home. I do my best … ”

  There was another long wait before Widgery said, “What I expect is one thing, what I want is another. Do you understand?”

  In the silence that followed, Trosper imagined Winesap shaking his head, and acting the simple but honest man, struggling to do his best in a complex world.

  Even before Widgery had fixed the date of the next meeting and sent Winesap on his way, Trosper had recognized the man as a museum-quality example of a low-level agent who had no intention of reporting on anything that might conceivably jeopardize his tranquil existence. Unless the local FBI had a different reading on Winesap, the link between Sinon’s apparent access to highly restricted data and his casual reference to Winesap as an agent of the Firm and traitor would remain baffling.

  11

  New York

  Trosper took a deep breath and braced himself. In contrast to the informality and clutter of the secret intelligence outposts in which he had spent much of his working life, the New York field office of the FBI was as taut and businesslike as a bank. The empty in-trays at the corner of each desk offered a mute but scarcely subtle suggestion that not so much as a moment’s backlog was to be tolerated in the daily activity. He would have welcomed at least a trace of the jumble of shabby files, worn city directories, tattered telephone books, and torn street maps that marked the workplaces he knew best. But the desks of the FBI agents sharing space in the squad room were immaculate and the work files as neat and uniform as the volumes of an encyclopedia.

  In the elevator to Grogan’s office, Widgery had glanced anxiously at their escort, and edged closer to Trosper. “I get the impression,” he whispered, “that all the Bureau guys are overworked, but Grogan’s fair and has always seemed to play straight with me. If there’s any problem at all, I think it’s just because he doesn’t have a very high regard for us, and he’s always worried about protecting his turf.”

  As they threaded their way across the squad room toward Grogan’s office, Trosper wondered if it was Dr. Spock’s guidance that rendered the new generation so dismally neat, or whether the desk discipline echoed back to Director Hoover’s day when legend had it FBI agents were not allowed to have more than one file and two pencils in sight at any time. Widgery broke the reverie with a final bit of advice. “His name is Elmer, but don’t ever call him that. He prefers Mike — it fits his image better.”

  “It’s your nickel,” E. M. Grogan said with enough of a smile to bring the requisite few moments of persiflage to term.

  The chief of CI/Section P was five-ten, weighed about a hundred and sixty pounds, and exuded a let’s-get-on-with-it approach to life and its problems. If Grogan was like the other Bureau men Trosper had met, he probably worked out three times a week at the New York Athletic Club. Aside from a few photographs and three plaques attesting to his ability with a handgun, Grogan’s office was strict government issue. It could as well have been in the Bureau of Indian Affairs as the FBI. The executive class-three desk and the chair behind it were as precise a measure of Grogan’s rank as the bronzed oak leaves on the shoulders of an infantry major. With Grogan’s next promotion would come a larger desk, a more impressive chair, and a chromium tray with a handsome metal carafe. Never in the years he had frequented government offices had Trosper seen any liquid poured from one of these emblems.

  “I’m not sure what you’ve been told,” Trosper said, “but I understand Mr. Whyte or Thomas Castle spoke to your director in Washington yesterday.”

  “It was Castle,” Grogan said.

  “It concerns Widgery’s friend, Gholam Alizadeh, functionary at the Iranian mission here.”

  “So I was told,” said Grogan with a glance at Widgery.

  “A few days ago,” Trosper said, “the Firm received an anonymous letter that, along with other data, made it clear that Alizadeh’s relationship with us was known to Moscow.”

  “To Moscow, not Tehran?” Grogan’s spurt of interest was not feigned.

  Trosper nodded and said, “Our tipster presented himself as a former Moscow Center agent, allegedly being recalled from the United States by the new crowd, the SVR. He’s looking for a deal, and enough money to establish himself in private business. Along with a few bits of substantiating data — all of it ostensibly and plausibly of Moscow Center origin — he tossed in the Alizadeh allegation for good measure. He didn’t explain why he had access to both Russian and Iranian information, but he was sure enough of himself to tell us we’d find Alizadeh in our active source registry.”

  “And enter at stage center, Thomas Augustus Castle — counterespionage, penetration, deception, and epistemology?” Grogan suggested with a slight smile.

  “You’ve met?”

  Grogan took a deep breath. “Ooooh, yeees,” he said. “Castle spoke at one of our training seminars at Quantico. Fascinating, but almost incomprehensible until afterwards, when he joined us for a couple of hoots. The bourbon may have helped.” Grogan leaned back in his chair. “At this point, I’d better tell you what I told Widge some time ago. We’ve never been much impressed with Alizadeh. And, to be blunt on a very busy day, the material Widge has passed to us is about at the level of the intelligence bouncing around on the street in front of the Iranian offices — we don’t even have to bend over to pick up that sort of stuff.”

  Widgery tilted his head and was about to speak when Trosper intervened. “In the course of your other activity, has your shop ever spotted anything of concern about Alizadeh? Any connection with the usual terrorist suspects, with the old Moscow Center staff, or the SVR?”

  Grogan frowned. “Up front, I can tell you that we’ve never noticed any particular contact between Alizadeh and any of the hard boys — Iranians, Algerians, Iraqis, the wrong kind of Egyptian, or with anyone in whom we have any special interest. Certainly, nothing with the Russians.”

  “What about his personal life, social activity, finances, girlfriends?” Trosper waited a moment before saying, “Any suspicious activity on Alizadeh’s part — countersurveillance maneuvering, using a pay phone at odd times of day? Odd incoming calls? Any of the usual stuff?” Grogan stiffened. “If you’re asking if the Bureau has one of your agents under surveillance, the answer is no. And you can quote me.” Trosper waved his hand impatiently, brushing aside Grogan’s obvious irritation. “Not at all … ”

  “But to confirm your suspicions, I’ll confess that sometimes we put an eye and an ear on the little birds that one of your crowd promises us are as innocent as newborn chicks,” Grogan said with a barely audible chuckle. “Every once in a while we do just that, maybe even a little more than usual for someone like Alizadeh because, after all, he’s family — your family — in a manner of speaking.” He eased himself closer to the desk. “But there hasn’t been so much as a whisper. Until a few minutes ago, if you’d asked me, I’d have said Alizadeh was running clean, and there are damned few in his part of the world I’d say that about.”

  Grogan glanced at Widgery and turned back to Trosper. “I probably shouldn’t admit this either, but since you’ve come all the way from Washington to discuss this, I might as well tell you that for a few weeks now one of my men has had someone in casual contact with Alizadeh. Not that we planned it, he just bumped up against us. From what he’s gathered, your man is just about as advertised, a loyal Iranian clerk, good family man — wife and son — and as our mayor would surely say, a credit to his race, creed, and color.” Grogan pulled the bottom drawer of his desk open, propped his
feet against it, and leaned back in his chair. “The only thing wrong, if anything is wrong, is that Alizadeh is so very clean that anyone with a really suspicious turn of mind might think he’s blowing smoke.”

  “Look,” Widgery said. “My man, as you call him, may be a bit tricky, but he’s not blowing smoke. He may not be much of an observer, but he’s too dumb to lie convincingly over a long period of time.”

  Grogan stared at the ceiling for a moment before leaning forward to fix his attention on Widgery. “Dumb?” he questioned. “When I was still on the street I always figured I had to know someone pretty well before I could be sure he was any dumber than I am. If Alizadeh is so damn dumb, how come he and his wife are regulars at the opera? Tickets don’t come cheap on his wages, and a taste for Western fine arts is not likely to sit well with the neighborhood ayatollah. How come he has a library card, and uses it every couple of weeks? How come the family lives in a better apartment than any of the other clerks? How come they don’t hang out with any other clerks at about their level in life?” Grogan kicked the drawer closed and hunched over his desk. “Dumb is when you don’t take time to get to know anything about your agent except the chicken feed he tells you to write down.”

  “Alizadeh lives well because he’s a double agent, and they probably cosset him,” Widgery said loudly. “We know that now, we didn’t know it a while ago … ”

  “Easy does it,” Trosper interjected. He turned to Grogan.

  “In this connection, I also want to mention Viktor Feodorovich Volin … ”

  “The Russian who handed you the Mills woman?”

  Trosper nodded. “Yes, and as you probably know, he levanted out of our resettlement program a while ago, presumably so anxious to get on with exploiting the free enterprise system that he didn’t take time to say goodbye.”

  “There was a notice circulated, but I’ve heard nothing since,” Grogan said. “I gather all he had to offer was the Mills woman?”