by Matthew Dunn
Helen slapped a hand on the table, a broad smile on her face. “In that case, girl, let’s you and me make a night of it. I’ve got plenty to drink at home.”
“Great.” Ellie grabbed her overnight bag. “That’s more than can be said for my hotel room. Can you hail a cab while I make a visit to the ladies’ room?”
“My pleasure.” After Helen put on her overcoat and grabbed her handbag, she walked to the exit, her footing a little unsteady.
Ellie waited until she was outside before approaching one of the waiters. “Found this by our seats. Someone’s going to be pissed when they realize it’s gone missing.”
She handed over Helen Coombs’s wallet, while mentally rehearsing what she’d say to Helen as their cab approached her home.
The cab’s on me, providing the liquor and music’s on you.
The waiter took the wallet that Ellie had stolen from Helen’s handbag. “Sure. If we don’t hear from the owner by tomorrow, we’ll report it. Can you give me your name?”
“Maggie Evans.”
“Okay, Ms. Evans. Thanks for your honesty, and have a nice evening.”
Ellie exited the bar.
Helen was standing by a cab and had a glint in her eye. “You like Abba?” Before Ellie could answer, Helen started singing “Dancing Queen” as she opened the door.
Ellie wished that Helen’s CIA security ID had been in her handbag. Then again, maybe it was good that it wasn’t, because Ellie could give Helen the mother of all hangovers, to the extent that tomorrow she’d think it perfectly plausible that she’d not only left her wallet at the bar, but also her treasured Agency ID. Also, it was probable that Helen would be late for work or call in sick. But that meant that Ellie was going to have to endure Abba, more wine, and inane small talk for several hours until she could steal Helen’s ID, leave her home, get changed into a wig and glasses and padding, and briefly pretend to be someone resembling the ID photo of Helen.
Will stood in front of Truro Heights Irving Big Stop, on McClure’s Mills Connector Road. It was a 24-7 gas station, but what was important to Will was that it was the largest truck stop in Truro.
The lot was to the left of the station forecourt and shop; despite the driving snow the lights from both gave him glimpses of parked trucks. Will kept away from the lights, moving down one edge of the forecourt and behind the 24-7 until he reached the parking lot. There was a single row of sedans, and two rows of sixteen trucks. Three of them had cab lights on and engines running, the rest were unlit. He imagined that most of the drivers would either be grabbing coffee and provisions while swapping notes with other drivers about destinations and road conditions, or were asleep in their cabs or in a nearby motel. No one from the shop or gas forecourt could see him as he moved in near pitch-darkness from one vehicle to another, checking their registration plates. Fourteen trucks had Canadian plates and were therefore no good to him; two of them had U.S. plates, one from Maine, the other from New Hampshire.
He withdrew the lockpick set he’d retrieved from the Russian cache and started working on the rear door locks of the Maine trailer. Two minutes later, both locks were open. The trailer was full of cardboard boxes with pictures showing their contents were televisions. A full container was no good to him because it meant the American truck was heading farther south into Nova Scotia, rather than returning home after making its delivery. He shut the door, locked it in place, and jogged to the New Hampshire truck.
This one had more basic padlocks and chains, and it took him half as long to open them. He pulled open the trailer door and breathed a sigh of relief. The truck was empty. Unless he was mistaken, this was a truck that had no need to be in Canada anymore, one that had to get home so that its driver could collect a paycheck, grab a day’s rest, and get back on the road. Like Will right now, truckers liked to stay on the move.
He entered the cold, long trailer, snapped the padlocks shut when the door was nearly closed, and sealed himself inside the trailer. He was now completely blind. The Canadian border with Maine was approximately 250 miles away. It had seventeen border controls, but the truck driver would be using the International Avenue crossing, since it was the only one that permitted commercial traffic.
He had to assume the cops who’d given him a ride would subsequently establish or be told the real identity of the man they’d picked up outside Truro, and that meant the Canadian border would be reinforced with armed officers. That was bad news for everyone, because if cops stopped the truck and opened the trailer, they’d be confronted by a man at the far end of the container who’d be pointing two pistols at their heads.
Will wondered how long it would take before the driver got it on the move. One hour later, he had an answer. The engine rumbled, causing the trailer to vibrate.
Then the truck started pulling away.
TWENTY-TWO
Though it was four ten A.M. in Washington, D.C., Marsha had no intention of going home to get some rest. Instead, she was working through the night at her desk, making and receiving calls from security service and law enforcement officials who were operating in different time zones.
One of her cell phones rang.
A man spoke to her. “I’m Inspector Campbell, RCMP H Division, Nova Scotia.”
“Inspector—what’s the latest?”
“Two of my guys picked up a male hitchhiker outside of Truro. His story for being on the road seemed plausible, but we subsequently showed the officers a photo of Cochrane. They think it’s a probable match.”
Marsha was motionless. “Probable?”
“Yeah. We got a sketch artist to copy the one photo we have of Cochrane, but make his face a bit thinner and add a short beard. My guys are convinced it’s him. I’ve got patrols all over Truro.”
Marsha looked at the map above her desk. “Forget Truro—you won’t find him there. He’s heading for the border. Get men there ASAP!”
The taxi firm told Ellie Hallowes that a driver would be at the address in thirty minutes. Ellie snapped shut Helen’s cell, glanced at the CIA analyst, who was passed out on the sofa, and turned off the alarm clocks that had been programmed into her cell and in the adjacent bedroom’s clock. If later challenged by Helen, Ellie would ask her whether she remembered declaring in the early hours that they should carry on drinking until sunrise and to hell with wake-up calls and work.
She opened Helen’s closet, selected clothes that were frumpy and similar to those Helen was wearing, unzipped her overnight bag containing the wig and other items, and set to work.
At eight fifty A.M. Ellie Hallowes used Helen Coombs’s ID to enter the security gates in the lobby of the CIA headquarters. She felt totally calm and focused, despite the possibility that someone might see through her disguise, grab her, and pin her to the floor. It was the same feeling she always had when going undercover. She likened it to putting on a suit of armor.
Underneath her pleated skirt, jacket, and frilly blouse, she had padding around her hips and stomach. Her wig covered her throat and the sides of her face, to hide the fact that there was nothing she could do to make it puffier. Plus, her thick-rimmed glasses and carefully applied rouge and other makeup had altered her appearance sufficiently, she hoped.
After taking an elevator, she waddled down a corridor in the way that Helen had done when she’d entered the bar yesterday evening. She was fully cognizant of the dangers—Helen could be awake now and on her way to work; she might have realized her CIA ID was missing and alerted Langley’s security department; someone could pass Ellie in the corridor and challenge her; hidden cameras in the headquarters could be watching her; and someone at the reception of the place she was headed toward could look at her ID and her face and say, “I know Helen Coombs, and you’re not her.” But Ellie didn’t let any of these possibilities worry her. Worry had no place in her line of work.
Langley was buzzing with people arriving for work, and with others who’d already been here for an hour or so. She stopped by the entrance to the Russia
n and European Analysis division’s archive room. Of all of the archives in Langley, this was without doubt the one that contained the CIA’s most sensitive secrets. She was going to try to steal one of them.
She entered the big hall, at the head of which was a wide reception desk with ten computer screens in a row and people behind them, beyond that a room resembling a library that kept all of its books behind combination-locked steel shutters. But in here there were no books; instead there were paper files that recorded all of the developments relating to the Agency’s Russian spies as well as ongoing and closed operations against Russia.
The Herald files were in here, containing Ellie’s contact reports and intelligence briefings.
She wasn’t interested in those files.
She looked at the archive employees. Hundreds of other Agency officers would use this archive, but there was still a real risk that one or more of the people working here knew Helen Coombs.
The place was busy, with officers lining up in front of the reception desk to get access to files they were cleared to read. None of them were allowed beyond the desk, so they had to wait patiently while members of the archive went off to retrieve the files.
Whom to approach? Not the archivists who were approximately Helen’s age—they might socialize with the analyst or at least make the effort to engage in small talk with her every time she came in. Or the old guy who looked like he was head of the archive and probably made it his business to get to know the people who came in. That left the bored-looking young man.
She stood in the line, behind another officer who was being served. The officer took a file that was handed to him and moved out of the way. Ellie was in front of the archivist.
She handed Helen’s ID over. “I need the Ferryman files.”
The receptionist typed the word into his computer, swiped the ID into the system, looked at the photo, and looked at Ellie.
He stared at her for five seconds. “You want both of them?”
“What?”
“Both files.”
Ellie smiled. “Yes, please.”
“Okay.” The archivist handed the ID back to her. “Come with me. System says you can’t take them away—got to be read in one of the booths.”
Ellie followed him to a series of tiny cubicles, each containing a desk and one chair. “Wait here.”
Ellie sat at the desk.
Was the archivist going to return with two burly security guards?
One minute later, he dropped the files on the desk. “They can’t leave the booth. You press that button when you’re finished and I’ll come and get them. Make sure the door’s shut.”
After he was gone and the closed room secure, Ellie placed her hands on the files and momentarily didn’t want to open them. Whatever Ferryman was, the Agency had decided it was important enough to sacrifice Ellie in order to keep Antaeus alive, and to crucify Will Cochrane because he’d broken Ferryman protocols. Inside the files, she’d find whatever secret was more important than her life. She couldn’t help but wonder whether learning about Ferryman was pointless, considering Will stood no chance of reaching the States.
But she was a spy, and all spies lust after the truth with the mental and physical yearning of a crack addict searching for another fix.
No matter what the dangers.
She opened the files.
The New Hampshire truck idled in the stationary traffic at the newly built large customs complex on the American side of the International Avenue crossing. The buildings resembled a small airport complex, and to the left of them were six lanes that led to six passport controls, three of which trucks were permitted to use, plus six bays where cargo could be unloaded, examined, and reloaded.
The bays were at capacity and every vehicle going through the complex was being checked.
The driver glanced at his watch, desperate to get moving onto Maine State Route 9 so that he could reach New Hampshire with time to spare for some food and rest before his next pickup.
A tap on the window. A Maine state cop stood there, making no effort to hide the fact that he was holding a pistol in one hand.
Clearly, something really serious was going down.
The driver opened his window.
“You got cargo in the trailer?”
The trucker shook his head. “I dropped off at Truro. Heading back to Concord. What’s going on?”
The cop ignored the question and gestured to a bay containing three more police officers, one of them holding a mirror on the end of a pole, all of them carrying pump-action shotguns. “Put her in there, ignition off. We’ll need to check inside.”
The driver did as he was told. The cop walked alongside the vehicle and once again stood by the window when it was stationary.
The trucker said, “I’ll open the trailer for you.”
“No you won’t. You’ll stay here while we get things unlocked. Give me the trailer keys.”
The driver handed them to him.
“You pick anyone up en route?”
“No.”
“See anything suspicious? Maybe a man on foot in a place where people don’t generally take a walk?”
“Nope.”
“All right. Don’t do it yet, but when I tell you to I want you to immediately turn on the interior trailer lights. Immediately, understand?”
“Sure.”
The police officer looked at his colleagues. “This one’s from Truro. We give it the VIP treatment. All of you, with me.”
They moved to the rear of the trailer. Three of them stood back so that they could not be seen by anyone inside. The cop holding the pistol and keys unlocked the container, yanked the doors open, and immediately stepped back while shouting, “Lights on, now! Police. If there’s anyone in there, call out your name.”
Silence.
The cop holding the mirror on a pole moved it to the entrance and adjusted angles so that he could see everything inside. He shook his head.
His commander held three fingers up, then two, then one. All four men swung their weapons so that they were pointing at the interior of the trailer.
It was brightly illuminated.
And completely empty.
“Okay. Let’s check underneath and in the cab.”
Forty feet away from the cops, at the front of the trailer, Will released his grip on the undercarriage, dropped to the road, pulled out his handgun, and rolled away from the vehicle until he was on his back. He fired six rounds, all of them aimed with precision so that they struck the truck inches from the police but had no chance of ricocheting and injuring them. The police ducked low, dashed for cover, and started shouting. Will fired two more rounds, jumped to his feet, ran to the head of the truck, and swerved left just before a shotgun boomed and sent pellets into the side of the cab. While changing his magazine clip, he dodged between stationary trucks and other vehicles in the six lanes leading to the passport control booths. Behind him, the police were screaming at passengers to stay in their vehicles and get down.
Will spun around and got to one knee between two trucks, fired at the road to the right of the four encroaching cops, sent three more rounds over their heads, dived under one of the trucks as they returned fire with shotguns and pistols, and leopard-crawled to the other side.
As he emerged, something hit him on the back with tremendous force, causing him to wince in agony. A man was on top of him, wrapping a muscular arm around his throat and squeezing. Will lashed his skull backward into the man’s face, making him loosen his grip and allowing Will to twist and smash a hand into his face with sufficient force to crush his nose. The man fell away, writhing on the ground crying. He was a big trucker who’d leapt out of his cabin onto Will the moment Will had crawled from underneath his trailer. Now, he probably wished he’d listened to the cops’ orders.
Two police officers peered from behind the truck and fired their shotguns just as Will rolled away, got to his feet, and jumped onto the roof of an adjacent car. Most of the pellets
missed him, but some tore through his jacket and raced alongside the skin of one arm, sending needlelike pain down the limb.
Will ran onto the roof of the next vehicle, leapt forward to another car, jumped down as more shots were fired, and sprinted as fast as he could to the passport booth while wondering if the man in there was armed. He took no chances and fired two warning shots through the glass, close to his head.
“Stop!”
Will dived onto a car as one cop fired again, his body causing the metal beneath him to buckle.
Whoever these cops were, they were tenacious professionals.
Ones that couldn’t be deterred by warning shots.
He regretted that as he fired a bullet into the officer’s shoulder and watched him twist and drop his shotgun.
He ran alongside the booth, past vehicles containing men, women, and children who were embracing each other and looking at him with mouths open and eyes wide in disbelief and disgust.
They thought he was a criminal.
But not a common one.
Instead, a rabid creature who’d shot a cop and therefore could savage them if they gave him reason to.
The officer in the booth was squatting with his hands on his head while staring at him. He looked middle-aged, overweight, and terrified.
Will shouted, “Stay in there!” as he ran onward. Ahead of him were empty roads and zero cover. But that didn’t matter, because he knew he could outpace the three remaining cops and stay beyond the limited range of their shotguns and pistols. All he had to do was keep running.
Two hundred yards later, the roads converged into a two-lane bridge that took drivers into Maine. Will was halfway across the bridge when he heard a police siren and a vehicle approaching fast from behind him. He spun around and saw a cop car with three cops inside, racing toward the bridge.
He stood no chance of reaching the end of the bridge before the cruiser.
Kneeling down, he held his pistol in two hands, and was motionless as he took aim.