“Come on up, dear boy. Come up immediately!” He buzzed me in, and I creaked up the circular stairwell.
The old man ushered his friend to the living room.
“Your new ‘friends’ said I would be seeing you, but I didn’t think it would be so soon.”
That surprised me. “Well, that was thoughtful of them. I wouldn’t reveal to your Israeli contact that you’ve seen me, however. The Mossad might not like it if they knew I was here right now.”
“Hmph!” Volodya sank heavily into a chair, waving me to sit opposite. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that.” He smiled. “Regardless, I’m happy and relieved to see you again, but I suspect it must be something more than your desire to see this old wreck of a Russian that brought you here.”
“I need your help. There’s no one else I can trust.”
When I explained what was needed, Volodya regarded me unhappily.
“Are you sure of this? It will change your life forever.” His eyes strayed to his dagger icon on the wall.
“It’s a little late for that. My life is already changed forever.”
“It will take several days to make the arrangements. Excuse me for a moment.”
With a grunt, he stood and left the room, returning a moment later holding an envelope that he handed over. “In the meantime, you might want to see this.”
Non-plussed, I tore it open. Inside was a three-by-five card with some handwriting: Do what you must and return to us safely. If you fail, we never heard of you. The signature was Ronan’s.
So Sasha had been unable to conceal from her mentor that she had told me about Maurice and Hélène’s deaths, and Ronan had guessed that I would turn to Volodya. The Mossad bachir was full of surprises.
Volodya’s arrangements consumed an entire week. All the while I lodged with him to avoid registering in a hotel. There would be no trail anyone could follow.
I left the Irish documents with Volodya for safekeeping and boarded a non-stop flight from Charles DeGaulle to Chicago, armed with a French passport that identified me as Thierry Reynard, a matching driver’s license, and a sheaf of American Express traveler’s checks. In Chicago, after completing passport control and Customs, I used a key that had been couriered to Paris to retrieve a package from a locker in the main terminal at O’Hare. The package contained a Glock-17, a full clip of ammunition, and a silencer. In a few days, if all went well, I would return the items to a locker in the same airport before boarding a flight back to Paris. I would mail the locker key to a local address provided by Volodya.
Using the French alias driver’s license and a wad of travelers’ checks I rented a car from Hertz and began the long drive eastward across the Midwest – towards Washington.
CHAPTER 63 – Full Circle
There had been an early frost that year, and the blazing colors of autumn accompanied me across the flat American heartland and over the mountains into Maryland. The long drive down Interstate 270 left behind, I crossed the Potomac into Virginia via the American Legion Bridge, only a few miles away from the sprawling campus of CIA Headquarters around which my life for so long had revolved. Its long, antiseptic corridors had led to a dead end. Had it all been illusion? The man I had been had ceased to exist as surely as any chimera of the imagination.
I spent the night at a chic boutique hotel within easy walking distance of the charming Old Towne Alexandria shops and restaurants. I had refined the plan over and over during the long drive, but the anticipation of carrying it out permitted only fitful sleep. Morning and afternoon were spent walking the familiar streets.
Through the deepening dusk I navigated the tree-lined residential streets of Annandale, Virginia. Leaving the car several blocks away from my first stop, I took a path through a heavily wooded park familiar from past jogs, arriving finally at a well-maintained backyard that bordered the park where I settled down to wait, hidden in the gloom under the trees.
An outside light flashed on illuminating the yard, and the figure of a woman I recognized as my former neighbor, the same neighbor who had discovered Kate after her aneurysm, appeared briefly as a door was opened. The tiny, black figure of a Scottie coursed into the yard for his evening outing as the door closed behind him.
I waited a few moments before softly calling, “Angus!”
Ears erect, the dog skidded to a halt and cocked his head.
“Here, boy. Come here.”
With a yelp of recognition Angus raced toward the trees and propelled himself into his master’s arms. The normally reserved dog whimpered softly as he licked my face. Ten minutes later we were in the rental car heading out of the neighborhood. It was an irrationally sentimental act, but I needed to salvage something positive from the past.
The next stop would not be so pleasant.
*****
Jake Liebowitz had been at home for less than a half-hour when the phone rang. His house, modest by suburban Washington standards, still was quite nice and in an upscale neighborhood in Potomac, Maryland. He still drove the same old Volvo he had had for years. He and his wife, Sophie, had raised their daughter in this neighborhood, between tours abroad, and with Jake now In such a senior position, Sophie did not expect to be uprooted again. Their daughter, Rebecca, had just begun her sophomore year at Georgetown. As far as Sophie was concerned, their life was idyllic. She had no idea that her husband was a monster.
The phone rang just as she was mixing their pre-dinner cocktails. Jake answered. “Yes?” He did not try to conceal his annoyance.
“Jake, we need to talk.”
Liebowitz froze. “Who is this?”
“You know who it is, Jake.”
Liebowitz shot a quick glance at his wife. He didn’t want to alarm her. A call from the long missing Harry Connolly was the last thing he had expected.
“Where are you?” The ice that had so suddenly formed in his gut seemed to have melted and flowed to his bladder, and he felt an urgent need to pee.
“I’m right here, Jake, in Virginia. You need to come see me right now.”
“I don’t think I can do that.”
He needed more time to think, to get help, to find a way to control the situation. He would call the Russians.
“My people have your house under surveillance. If you aren’t in your car and on your way within five minutes, I’ll send them in to drag you out. Is that what you want?”
Liebowitz was shaken, but he said, “I don’t believe you.”
Connolly’s voice was diamond hard. “You know what happened in Vienna, don’t you? If you want this to be violent, I can oblige. But you don’t want your family involved in this or harmed, do you? Rebecca is still at Georgetown, isn’t she?”
The implied threat smothered Liebowitz as he struggled to control his fear. Loyalty was a relative value for Jake, but family mattered to him.
Sophie, drinks in hand, came out of the kitchen. “What’s wrong? Who’s calling?”
He made up his mind.
“Something’s come up at the office, honey. I’m afraid I have to go back in.”
*****
I was more than entitled to lie to Jake, and the bluff was working. Success depended on his believing every word I said. In the end, Jake had to believe there was a chance he would live through the night or the plan I had conceived would not work.
“That’s good, Jake. There’s no need to alarm Sophie. Remember, my people are watching, and I have your phone line covered, as well. Listen carefully, and don’t deviate from my instructions.”
The instructions were precise. Liebowitz would not be sure he could believe me and would consider calling for help, but he also knew I had survived the best the Russians could throw at me and left such a trail of mayhem in my wake that it was impossible to believe I had acted alone.
He would reason that I could not have entered the United States without professional help because my name figured prominently on every watchlist. Jake couldn’t ignore the possibility that everything I said on the phone was
true.
The CIA’s new Russia Section Chief would come, albeit reluctantly, to the designated spot at the far edge of the huge shopping center parking lot at Tyson’s Corner in Northern Virginia.
He would wonder how much I only suspected and how much I really knew. We had been friends for a long time. I had trusted Jake, and he would know that he was the only person who could exculpate me. What else could possibly have tempted me out of hiding?
I watched as his car slowly entered the parking lot and rolled to a stop. He killed the engine and lights as I had instructed. Jake did not see me as I swiftly approached the passenger side of the car, and he was startled when I rapped on the window. He made a visible effort to remain calm and leant over to unlock the door. The unfamiliar face startled him further.
“Hello, Jake. How’ve you been?”
In the dim light of the car’s interior he finally recognized me through the slight facial modifications. I had been his friend, the man he had so effortlessly manipulated just a year and a half ago because he knew me so very well, knew precisely which buttons to push.
“Jake, old buddy. I’m sure you thought you’d never lay eyes again.”
“I’m glad to see you, Harry, really glad. Now we can get all this silliness straightened out, clear your name.”
“How long have you worked for the Russians?”
The verbal jab was brutal, and his face crumpled with the realization that I had figured it out.
“What are you talking about? That’s crazy!”
“You sent me to Vienna to die. Did you really believe I wouldn’t put it together? It could only have been you who set me up. The visit by that death squad to my hotel was a pretty strong clue. You told them where to find me, didn’t you? No one else knew where I was.”
“How can you say that? I did everything I could to bring you in. Someone must have leaked it when I tried to set up your exfiltration! We’ve known each other too long for his, Harry.”
He sat very still with both hands on the steering wheel, struggling to remain calm. There was sweat on his face now.
“Do you know how many bodies I’ve left bleeding because of you? Have you counted all the deaths, beginning with Thackery?”
Jake tried to make himself smaller in the cramped space of the car. His protestations of innocence weren’t working. This was a war of wills, and he might think he could still best Harry Connolly. He tried another tack.
“I thought you had just gone berserk in Vienna. You can’t blame me for wanting to distance myself from you. Now that you’re back, I can help you. I can fix everything.”
“I don’t need any help from you or anyone else at the CIA. I can never come back. You made certain of that. And now you’re Chief of Russia Section. Life never looked so good, did it? Well, I’m doing OK too. I only have one problem – you.”
I slid into the car beside him and closed the door. I could almost smell his fear.
“I never meant it to go this far.” He let his voice crack and managed to fake a sob. “I never wanted to see you hurt. It was the Russians who did all the wet work.”
“Don’t bullshit a bullshitter. You knew exactly what you were doing. I was the perfect fall-guy: a disgruntled officer who had been shunted to the sidelines. You set things up so everybody would think I was the mole, an accusation that my death in Vienna would make impossible to refute.”
His eyes told me I was right. It was time to open act two.
“But maybe there IS something in what you say.”
He was ready to grasp any straw, and now I had given him hope.
“Just tell me, Harry. Anything you want.”
He would be thinking that if he could get away, the Russians would give him asylum. He might still be valuable to them, even as a defector.
Anger rendered my voice into a harsh rasp.
“I know what you’re thinking, Jake. But consider this: here I am, in spite of all your efforts, in spite of being hunted all over the world and labeled a murderer and a spy. No matter where you go, no matter what you do, you should know that I can get to you.”
Jake nodded and refused to meet my eyes. “What do you want?”
“I want you to go on working for the Russians just like you are now. Only you'll really be working for me. You'll enjoy it; you'll be working for the CIA, the Russians, AND for me – a triple agent. What do you think?”
Now he would be thinking he could play along, and on his next trip to Moscow he would ask for asylum. He would be safe. At the end of the day there was no way that I would be able control him. Jake Liebowitz, master manipulator, would wriggle out of this and triumph. They would write books about him.
I watched him closely, calibrating his reactions.
“I’ve done a terrible thing, I admit it.” He hung his head and continued to avert his eyes in mock contrition. It was all I could do not to slap him. “I’ve got to make it up to you somehow. This will be a big risk, but I’m willing to take it. But I don’t see what good the information would be to you. Who are you working for now?”
“First, tell me everything about your collaboration with the Russians - from the beginning.” I withdrew a small recorder from my jacket pocket and placed it on the dashboard.
He spilled it all: that first trip to Moscow and his unsolicited proposition to the Russians, how he had revealed the identities of the few remaining assets the CIA was running in Russia, how he had manipulated the entire Russia Section at Langley, and finally the actions he had taken in the Stankov affair. He confessed to informing the Russians of Thackery’s meeting with Stankov, an act that ultimately led to that young man’s death, as well as how he had set me up.
The longer he talked the more relaxed he became, as though it were cathartic to share his story with someone who could appreciate its beauty and complexity, revealing how brilliantly he had played the role, how he had set everything up and achieved his goals. By the end of his recitation he had regained a measure of composure and some braggadocio crept into his voice.
“That’s it, Harry. I think you and I will work very well together, don’t you? Just like the old days, sort of.”
I pocketed the recorder and opened the car door. It was almost over now.
Jake’s relief was palpable but short-lived.
I leaned back through the open door. It was time for act three -- the final act.
“In the end, Jake, it all boils down to trust and loyalty.”
He looked up to find the business end of my silenced pistol pointed directly at him. Mesmerized, he could not tear his eyes from the pistol that loomed huge and black and deadly less than three feet from his face. He cringed against the driver’s side door, putting as much space between his body and the gun as possible.
I had played this out so many times in my mind that I felt detached, like a theater-goer watching a familiar scene. I heard myself say, “I’m going to shoot you now.”
Jake’s eyes widened. He raised his arm instinctively as I fired, and it was shattered by the impact of the bullet. Before he could scream, the second shot struck his forehead, and a crimson spray washed over the inside of the windshield as his body slumped against the driver’s side door. A look of disbelief lingered on the dead face.
More than hot, expanding gases from the explosion of gunpowder propelled those bullets. Betrayal by a trusted friend gives birth to powerful emotions. It is a loss that can never be recovered. Jake’s perfidy had cost me an innocence of spirit that somehow had survived baptism into the world of espionage -- a faith that there still was some goodness in the world.
This was not self-defense. It was murder pure and simple -- an execution no different from Ronan killing Yudin in Marbella. But there could be no legal justification for the crime, and by its commission I had placed myself beyond the pale.
I contemplated the corpse of my erstwhile friend Blood is viscous and emits a hot, coppery odor. It stains everything it touches, including men’s souls. As Lady Macbeth discovered, the
stain is indelible. Some can accept the burden; others cannot.
Harry Connolly had become a ghost, erased as thoroughly now as the dead man in the car. The man who had taken his place was still a stranger.
As I turned away and walked back to my car a venerable Bolshevik expression came unbidden to mind: “Smert’ shpionam,” Death to spies.
I was now truly a man without a country.
CHAPTER 63 – Aftermath
The unsolved murder of senior CIA officer Jacob “Jake” Liebowitz still cropped up in the Washington press from time to time, and at least two books were being written by well-plugged-in members of the press corps. The CIA itself was reeling from the published revelation that Liebowitz had been living a double life as a spy for Russian Intelligence. This information had come to light as the result of a tape recording sent anonymously to the “Washington Post.” Technical analysis revealed that the recording had been edited to remove some of the information, leaving only Liebowitz’ voice detailing his crimes. While there was considerable speculation regarding the source of the recording, there was no doubt that the voice was his.
The American authorities still sought traces of Harry Connolly. There was strong suspicion that he had somehow been involved in Liebowitz’ death, although concrete evidence was lacking. Regardless of the contents of the tape, Connolly was still wanted for questioning concerning the deaths in Vienna, Austria.
Two Congressional and one Senate committee would resume investigations following the Christmas recess. In Moscow, the American Ambassador delivered a strongly worded protest to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the SVR Rezident in Washington was expelled. The Russians steadfastly denied any knowledge of the matter.
In Moscow, Stefan Sergeyevich Stankov and his mother received notification that $500,000 had been deposited anonymously into a numbered Swiss bank account in their name. In Paris, Maurice and Hélène’s daughter was informed that the future of her children was secure.
EPILOGUE – Republic of Ireland
Harry's Rules Page 23