by Len Levinson
Issuing classic fiction from Yesterday and Today!
FROM CIA AGENT TO MURDER SUSPECT!
Butler was a CIA man who criticized the agency too much—at least that’s what they told him. The next day he was the prime suspect in a sensational murder case. Did the CIA frame him? Or did a foreign power want him to get rattled enough to give away Agency secrets?
Butler wasn’t going to wait to find out. Escaping to Mexico, where he kept a secret bank account, he got ready for a very pleasant temporary retirement. Unfortunately things weren’t going to be that easy.
THE HYDRA CONSPIRACY
BUTLER 1
By Len Levinson
Published by Piccadilly Publishing at Smashwords: February 2014
Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader.
Cover image © 2014 by Tony Masero
This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book
Published by Arrangement with the Author.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of the combination endanger our liberties or democratic process.
Dwight D. Eisenhower January 17, 1961
Chapter One
Butler walked down the corridor of the New York field office of the Central Intelligence Agency. His face was puffy because he’d just been awakened. It was two o’clock in the morning on a Tuesday in September.
At the end of the corridor was a secretary sitting at a desk. She was an elderly woman named Winifred Dooley and she’d been working the lobster shift at the field office for as long as Butler had been assigned there—about five years.
Butler grinned as he approached her desk, carrying his Burberry raincoat over his arm. “I just got a call from the old man,” he said.
Winifred looked up from her typewriter. “He’s expecting you. Go right in.”
Butler opened the door and entered the oak-paneled office of F. J. Shankham, director of the counterintelligence operations for the New York regional area. Shankham sat behind his desk, puffing a briar. He looked up from the papers he was reading. “Hello, Butler. Have a seat.”
Butler draped his raincoat over one chair and sat in another, crossing his legs. He wore a glen plaid suit by Ralph Lauren and his red Countess Mara tie was a bit askew. His black hair was tousled and he needed a shave. These middle-of-the-night summonses to headquarters were always a pain in the ass, but Shankham frequently sent them. Evidently he thought they kept his agents on their toes.
“I know what you want to see me about,” Butler said. “Heard it on the radio in the cab that brought me down here. Cuban crackpots set off a bomb in front of the Cuban Mission of the U.N. I’ll get right to work on it.”
Shankham shook his head slowly. “No, that’s not why I’ve called you here,” he said in his slow monotonous voice.
“Oh?”
“I’ve called you here about another matter entirely.” He picked his pipe up and leaned forward. “I’m afraid I have some rather unpleasant news for you.”
Butler smiled and shrugged. “What is it?”
“I think you’d better prepare yourself.”
“I stay prepared. What is it?”
Shankham gazed with great sincerity into Butler’s eyes, so Butler knew that some heavy horseshit was about to come down.
“I’m very sorry to be the one who has to tell you this,” Shankham said, “but your services are no longer required by the Agency.”
Butler’s jaw sagged open. For once he had been caught totally unprepared. “Huh?”
“I’m afraid I must ask for your resignation,” Shankham added, puffing his pipe as calmly as if he fired secret agents all the time.
Butler leaned back in his chair and took a deep breath of the smoky air. “Oh.”
“I imagine you’re shocked,” Shankham said in a fatherly way.
“As a matter of fact I am.”
“But surely you must have had an inkling.”
“Not at all.”
“You haven’t been aware that you’ve been extremely critical of the Agency since you returned from Chile?”
“Well yes, but I didn’t think that’d get me fired.”
“You haven’t been fired, Butler. You’re going to resign.”
“That’s right too.”
“No one in the Agency is ever fired.”
“Of course not.”
“We’ll have a job waiting for you on the outside, naturally. We don’t throw our people to the wolves.”
“Naturally.”
“Hope you’re not too upset.”
“How would you feel if it happened to you?”
Shankham smiled, showing horsey teeth. “But it didn’t happen to me. Should I gather from your tone that your answer is in the affirmative?”
“I think you’d be justified in gathering that.”
“I think you’re being ingenuous, Butler. Surely you must have known that we couldn’t let you bitch and moan all the time. We can’t have the younger agents hearing that sort of thing day in and day out. If you disapproved of us so much, I’m surprised you didn’t take it upon yourself to resign earlier.”
“Resign and do what?”
“There are similar jobs in private industry. In fact, we have one all lined up for you. You’ll like it, and it’s totally nonpolitical. Pays more than you’re earning now, too. And it’ll make good use of your knowledge of the Spanish language.”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it.”
“You’ve never been able to understand that we’re an arm of the government and we follow orders like soldiers. Ours is not to reason why—ours is but to do or die. I’m sure you’ve heard that expression.”
“It was the defense of the war criminals at Nuremburg.”
“All a soldier can do is follow orders,” Shankham said firmly.
“Maybe it’s time to examine who’s giving orders, and why. When is my last day here, by the way?”
“Thirty days from today, but you don’t have to come in if you don’t want to.”
“Don’t I get some kind of pension after ten years of service?”
“Yes indeed, Butler. I’m glad you reminded me. Actually it’s fifteen years of government service when we include your time in the army. It should come to several hundred dollars a month.”
“When do I get it?”
“In thirty days, and on top of that there’ll be your severance pay and vacation pay, which will probably come to a few thousand dollars.”
“Good. Send the money and keep that job you were planning to get me. I don’t think I’ll want to work for awhile.”
Shankham looked nervous. “What are you planning to do with your time?”
“Don’t know yet.”
“Surely you’re not planning to write a book about the Agency, or anything like that? That wouldn’t be nice.”
“I’m not going to write a book. Don’t worry.”
“If you do, no pension.”
“I told you I’m not going to write a book.”
“And we’ll prosecute.”
“I’m not going to write a book, Shankham! Get it through your head that I’m not going to write a book. Do we have anything else to discuss?”
“I don’t thi
nk so.”
“Then I’ll be on my merry way.” Butler stood and draped his raincoat over his arm.
Shankham got up and held out his bony hand. “It’s been nice working with you, Butler. Really it was. I hope you understand that there’s nothing personal in this. I’ve always rather liked you. Well, good luck.”
“Thanks.”
“Would it be all right if we wrote your letter of resignation ourselves and mailed it to you for your signature?”
“Sure,” said Butler. “You can sign it for me too, if you want to.”
“Oh, we couldn’t do that.”
Butler raised his eyebrows. “Why not?”
“Well, that wouldn’t be proper.”
Butler looked at Shankham for a few moments, then burst into laughter. He laughed his way out of Shankham’s office, out of the building, and into a cab on the street below.
“What’s so funny?” asked the cabbie.
“You’d never believe it,” Butler said. “Take me to the Plaza Hotel, if you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind,” said the cabbie, pulling down his flag.
Chapter Two
Butler ambled into the Oak Room of the Plaza Hotel, his hands in his pockets. There was an empty table beside a window that overlooked Central Park and he sat down, crossing his legs. He felt like he was on a submarine that had just been torpedoed. A waiter came over and he ordered his customary shot of Old Bushmill’s Irish Whisky with a soda back.
The waiter hurried toward the bar and Butler looked out the window at a horse and carriage trotting by. It was difficult for him to adjust to the fact that he was no longer with the Agency. He felt as if he’d been with them all his life and would remain with them until he died. But Shankham was right, he should have known that he couldn’t go on badmouthing the Agency forever. They demanded unconditional total loyalty. But how could he remain loyal to them when it was becoming more and more obvious that they were sleazy bastards, interfering in the internal affairs of governments all over the world, helping assassinate legally elected presidents like Allende, spying on American citizens who expressed unusual views, breaking into people’s homes, supporting dictatorships? Butler had thought there’d be some reform after the scandals of the Nixon Administration, but the Agency only got slicker and continued just as before, with the Angolan follies and various other cruddy operations. Butler had been mixed up in many of them, doing his duty and hoping something would change. Well, something had changed, all right. They had thrown him out on his ass.
The waiter returned with the shot of Old Bushmill’s and Butler took a sip. The essence of Irish peat bogs trickled down his throat smoothly; he helped it along with a drink of soda. Then he slugged down the rest of the shot and asked the waiter to bring him a double next time.
The Oak Room was nearly empty at this time of the morning. Three solitary drunks were at the bar grumbling into their glasses, and a fiftyish man with a twentyish woman were seated in a corner, whispering sweet nothings into each other’s ears. The bartender smoked a cigarette and prayed that the hands on the clock would move faster. A police car with siren wailing sped past on Central Park South.
Butler wasn’t a spy anymore, but he couldn’t help continuing to think like a spy. He reflected that the people in the Agency knew he had a lot of top-secret information, and it would be normal for them to be concerned that he might spill some beans now that he’d been fired. If he were still in the Agency he’d have a man like himself watched carefully for a few months, to make certain that the disgruntled ex-spy wouldn’t run to the Russian Embassy to get even with his former employers.
Butler sipped his Old Bushmill’s and wondered if anybody in the Oak Room was there not to drink but to keep tabs on him. He looked again at the old guy and his young lady friend, the three drunks at the bar, even the bartender. Any or all of them could be working for the Agency. They might’ve planted that bartender there three months ago because they knew the Oak Room was a place frequented by Butler. They probably had a few of his other haunts staked out too.
But that wouldn’t be the most economical way to go about it, he reasoned. The best way would be to have him followed and then send in an agent to observe him surreptitiously. However, you can’t observe someone surreptitiously in a deserted bar at three-thirty in the morning, so Shankham should have fired him earlier in the day. But Shankham was a creature of habit and he loved the mystery of night. Therefore, Butler got fired at night. A problem with the Agency was that the old hands indulged themselves too much, at the expense of operations.
A brunette of about twenty-five entered the Oak Room, and Butler thought to himself, “I wonder if this is the one.” She was just his type, and he had no doubts that the folks at the Agency knew what his type was. She was tall and slim, wore glasses and a high-fashion frilly dress, looked at him, appeared flustered, and sat at a table near the entrance to the bar in a seat that faced him.
Of course her seat also faced the window, so Butler had to figure whether she’d selected that seat to observe him or to look out the window. A more important question was, what was such a babe doing out alone this time of night if she weren’t a spy? If Butler were running this operation he would’ve sent in an ordinary male drunk who’d attract no attention at all. But he wasn’t running this operation—if it was an operation. Well, he’d soon find out.
The young woman had long elegant fingers and she used them to light a long elegant cigarette. The waiter came over and Butler heard her order a Tequila Sunrise, a helluva drink for three-thirty in the morning, he thought. Butler checked her out after the waiter left and wondered how far she’d go with him. Their eyes met and she looked away quickly.
So she’s playing it cool, Butler thought. Doesn’t want to appear overly available. But of course she’s just dying to come over here and start a conversation. The waiter came with her drink and she sipped it daintily, her ankles crossed. Her mouth reminded him of a butterfly. She looked at him, and he met her stare. She smiled awkwardly, stood up, and walked toward him. Here it comes, he thought. I wonder what her opening line will be.
“Excuse me,” she said, standing in front of his table, “but did you ever attend the University of Minnesota? The reason I ask is that you look like somebody I went to school with.”
Butler wondered whether to answer in the affirmative and break her chops a little, or play it straight. He decided to play it straight.
“I’m afraid you’ve got me mixed up with someone else,” he said.
She touched her finger to her jaw. “The resemblance is truly amazing.”
“You don’t say.”
“His name was Turpevich. Freddy Turpevich. Are you related to such a person by any chance?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“My, my, my.”
“I have a common face, I suppose.”
She fluttered her eyelashes. “Oh, I don’t think it’s common at all. It’s a rather nice face, in fact.”
“Thank you. Yours is rather nice too.”
“You’re very kind.”
She stood looking at him, evidently waiting for him to invite her to sit with him. She was gorgeous as a movie star and had every right to expect such an invitation, but Butler elected not to make the offer. He wanted to see how she’d handle it.
“Are you a native New Yorker?” she asked.
“No.”
“Here on business?”
“No.”
She looked puzzled. “Then what are you doing here?”
“I happen to live here.”
She smiled. “Oh, isn’t that nice. Well you’re just the kind of person I’m looking for. I just arrived in town today for the National Computer Show at the Coliseum and I don’t know my way around at all. Would you be kind enough to tell me what’s doing, which shows to see, and so forth?”
“Sure,” Butler replied. “What would you like to know specifically?”
She fluttered her eyelashes again, and Butler wonder
ed where she had learned that ridiculous mannerism. “Would you mind if I sat with you?”
“Of course not. Why not have the waiter bring your drink over?”
“I think I’ll do just that.” She raised her hand and the waiter came running. She told him to bring her drink over, then sat beside Butler. “Do you mind if I smoke?”
“Not at all.”
She lit another of her long cigarettes, inhaled, and looked at him. “You must think I’m awful for forcing myself on you this way, but New York can be simply overwhelming when you don’t know your way around. By the way, what’s your name?”
“Butler.”
“I’m Wilma B. Willoughby.”
“You don’t say.”
“I’m sort of an expert on names, their derivations and such, and I can guess from your name that somebody in your family tree was a butler at one time.”
“If so it was very far back, because I know about my ancestry for as far back as the Civil War, and there’ve been no butlers since then.”
“Must have been before then.”
“Yes.”
“What were they doing at the time of the Civil War?”
“I come from an old Southern family, and my great-great-grandfather owned a plantation in Georgia.”
“You don’t say.”
“And I understand he was a gun runner through the Yankee blockade during the Civil War.”
“Isn’t that interesting!”
“What does your name mean?”
“My name?” She flicked ashes into the tray. “It has to do with willow trees. Evidently my ancestors owned land that had a lot of willow trees on it.”
“Not weeping willow trees, I hope. Because that would give you a tragic background, and that’s no fun.”
“I don’t know what kind of trees they were. At any rate, that’s all history now.” She smiled. “What do you do for a living, Mr. Butler?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“That’s right.”
“But how do you live?”
“I have a small inheritance that produces sufficient income for me to live modestly.”