The Casanova Embrace

by Warren Adler

  The second trip to Miami was even less eventful than the first. The plane was half empty and no one sat beside her. Again, she affected a southern accent in reply to the stewardess' question about having a cocktail.

  "Ah don't reckon ah would lak one now," she said, and the stewardess passed on.

  The Miami airport was routinely familiar now and she immediately walked to the Pan American area, bought a copy of Vogue, and sat down in the waiting room. Even the Vogue pictures were familiar. It was the same issue. The pages blurred and she lifted her head to watch the people passing through the waiting room. A plane had just arrived and she could see the anxious faces of the people searching the crowd of arrivals as they came through the security area. A young mother held her baby. An old man, bent and gnarled, watched myopically through thick lenses. A tanned couple in bright costumes stood on tiptoes for a better view of the oncoming crowd. An aged woman embraced a young man as he eagerly passed through the gate.

  She shivered now, feeling for the first time the enormity of her act. The tug expanded now and the guilt emerged from under its protective layers. And, although she recognized it and felt the pain of it, she found the acceptance of it in herself galling. Like a suicidal urge, its power gripped her and she knew it was wrong, evil, to be doing this thing. Yet, she pressed relentlessly on. For Eddie, she told herself, her nerve ends alert now to the emergence of a dark-haired woman with heavy makeup, studiously well dressed and carrying a Louis Vuitton brief case. She did not look directly at the woman but could see her clearly through the dark glasses which masked her eyes' sideward glance. The woman moved with a purposeful stride, heading toward where Frederika was sitting. Behind her, near the entrance, two men watched with transparent indifference. Then, for the first time, Frederika felt a sense of personal danger. It washed over her, accelerating her heartbeat. Her fingers shook and she felt a lightheadedness. Actually, she knew, she was exhilarated and the danger gave her courage which had waned in the face of the onrush of guilt.

  The woman sat down beside her, crossed her legs, began to light a cigarette, then punched it out in the ash tray at her elbow. She sprang up as if she had forgotten something, and in that split second made the brief case switch. Frederika closed her eyes, waiting for the two men to descend on her. I understand, Eddie, she screamed inside herself, absorbing the fugitive feeling of alienation and fear, savoring it, welcoming it, because it was bringing her closer to the core of her man.

  But when she opened her eyes, the men had disappeared and she was sitting alone on the row of seats. She must have sat, there blankly for longer than she imagined; for when she recovered her sense of time, her plane's departure was imminent and she had to run down the long corridor to catch it. Only when she had already boarded, did she remember that she had not changed her disguise and the stewardess was the same one she'd seen on the plane that brought her to Miami less than an hour ago.

  "I'll bet you enjoyed your Florida stay," the stewardess said, smiling mechanically.

  "I don't understand.... "Frederika mumbled, turning her head away with obvious annoyance. The stewardess moved away with practiced delicacy. I've trapped myself, Frederika thought, by my own silly weakness. Turning, she looked about the cabin, which was crowded now, wondering which of the men or women might be working for the enemy.

  During the entire trip, which was uncomfortable and bumpy, she remained in a state of nervous tension, and when finally the plane landed at National Airport and taxied to the gate, she could barely find the strength to stand. Had she betrayed him by her stupidity, she wondered, deliberately waiting while the other passengers filed out of the plane.

  "Sorry," the stewardess said, coming toward her, still smiling, "we don't go back until tomorrow." Frederika ignored the reference as if she hadn't heard and moved out of the plane. By the time she reached the street outside, she had convinced herself that she was, indeed, being followed. Yet she could not bring herself to test the suspicion. Her fear was not for herself, she protested, but for Eddie. Dashing toward the outer circle of the stream of cars, she put herself in the path of an empty taxi and let herself in the door when the cab had stopped.

  "You can get killed like that, lady," the driver said.

  "Statler-Hilton." The idea had come to her from a road sign as she looked through the back window, wondering which of the following cars contained the enemy. Before the taxi pulled up to the hotel entrance, she had paid the driver and opened the door.

  "What's the rush, lady?"

  Ignoring him, she ran into the lobby, then up the stairs to the mezzanine, which contained the public rooms and the women's lavatory. In a toilet stall, she quickly changed her clothes. Then, when the room had emptied, she rummaged in the waste bin for something to cover the brief case. She found a newspaper, inserted the brief case between the pages, and sure of its concealment, strolled casually into the corridor, then down the back stairs to the street, where she hailed another taxi and gave the driver her own address. It was paranoia, she knew, but if her stupidity betrayed him ... She could not bring herself to complete the thought.

  Once she was in her own apartment, she was certain the insecurity would dissipate. It is an anxiety fit, she observed about herself. There had been other occasions in her life when something like this had occurred and she had searched for some reason for its happening. Now, she stood in the quickening darkness of her apartment, her hearing alert, her heart pumping, unable to assuage her fears. After a while, she found the courage to move to the window. The blinds had been drawn and she picked up a single slat and looked downward into the street. Traffic moved thickly, south and north on Wisconsin Avenue.

  She was looking for something, she knew. A stationary figure, relentlessly patient, like an unused chess piece in a swift game. A number of people on the street below seemed to fit that category. A man, brief case in hand, slumped against a hydrant. There was another figure, a woman--it was the way she held herself, stiff, straight, with an air of determination, her eyes fastened on the front of the building, that prompted Frederika's suspicion. Perhaps that woman was watching her at this moment, although only a tiny portion of Frederika's eye was exposed through the thin opening in the blinds. If she was being followed, if there was someone out there waiting, it would have to be that woman, she decided. Then she admonished herself for such lack of control, glad that her rationality was taking over again, her anxieties dissipating. Looking around her apartment, she discovered that nothing had changed. She flipped on the lights and started to change her clothes, preparing to leave for work.

  But something prompted her to periodically peek through the blinds. The woman was still there, tenacious in her stiffness, a sentinel. She is waiting for someone, Frederika decided, preparing to leave the apartment. We shall see, she told herself, as she went down the elevator. Her courage was returning now.

  She deliberately crossed the street at the corner so as to get a close view of the woman, Tall, middle-aged, with straight features in a bony face, she wore a cloth coat over gray slacks, and her concentration on the facade of the apartment building was so intense that her eyes did not seem to flicker as Frederika passed. Relieved, she hurried on to work, searching the faces in the crowd, as she always did, looking for Eddie.

  Having lived through the ordeal in the aftermath of her last mission, she knew what to expect, although this knowledge was not enough to give her tranquility. She had, she suspected, bungled the assignment and endangered Eddie, as well as the others involved with him. If any harm came to him or the others, she would never forgive herself. Forgive? Could the relatives and friends who died in the plane crash ever forgive her? She shivered, stepped up her pace as if greater speed would put distance between herself and her guilt.

  When she thought in these terms, she would force herself to imagine terrible atrocities committed at Benotti's behest--tortures, killings, brutalities beyond even her ability to conceive. But Eddie hadn't told her what they were.

  She was th
ankful that Clyde's was crowded. It helped her keep worrisome thoughts out of her mind.

  When she returned to her apartment after work, the old chain of disturbing thoughts began again. She lay in bed, wide awake, unable to assuage her physical fatigue while her mind spun like a top. Then she remembered the woman across the street. She had not noticed her when she entered the building. This is ridiculous, she told herself, as she sprang out of bed and padded across the cold floor to the window. Opening the blind a crack, she looked out. The woman was still there, watching, alert, as consumed as ever. Couldn't be, she decided, and when she looked again after an hour or two of additional tossing, the woman was gone. Relieved at last, she felt her body relax, grow drowsy. The last thing that passed through her mind was a picture of Eddie, coming toward her, his arms outstretched. It was only an image, an apparition.

  She managed to get through the next day by expending enormous energy cleaning her apartment. She scoured the kitchen, crept around on her hands and knees and scrubbed the floors. Then she washed down the walls and polished the wood furniture to a bright sheen. When she got to the windows, she pulled the blinds and sprayed the glass with cleaning fluid. It was only then that the memory of the woman came back, and looking downward into the street again, she saw her. It was cold, and vapor came out of the woman's mouth, but she seemed alert, watchful, driven. The sudden opening of the blinds seemed to have caught her attention. She looked upward briefly, then turned her eyes away.

  When Frederika went to work in the early evening, the woman was still there. Later, preparing for bed, Frederika again glanced through the blinds. The woman persisted in her vigil. Perhaps she is mad, Frederika thought. But the idea quickly left her consciousness. It was Eddie that rose again to dominate her mind. No. She was not quite the disciplined soldier she was expected to be.

  She must have dozed off. The telephone rang, shrill, demanding. Eddie. She reached for the phone.

  "I have wonderful news."

  "Oh, Eddie!" Hearing his voice left her speechless with emotion.

  "I will be there shortly." He hung up and Frederika felt renewed again, on the verge of happiness, the sense of expectation delicious. Her body began to focus on her lover.

  He must have been close by. Hearing his key in the door, she bounded out of bed and switched on the lights. He was there, his skin chilly against hers as she held him in her arms, reveling again in the taste of him. Kissing her deeply, he lingered, then moved her away as he began pacing in agitation.

  "Carlos Lantissa in London." He made a motion with his hand, slicing it sideways across his throat. "Another beast struck down in the jungle."

  "London!"

  He stopped pacing and slapped his thigh.

  "We got him in a restaurant. Poison. It was magnificent. The information was letter perfect."

  "Anyone else?" she asked, feeling her chest constrict.

  "I don't understand."

  "It was not like the plane crash?"

  He moved toward her and held her in his arms, patting her hair.

  "One other." He paused. "We had to be certain. It was necessary. In a war, innocents are exposed."

  "I know." She did not want him to see her courage falter.

  "Besides, they killed many of us in their prisons. After torture. Three of our people were gunned down in Caracas yesterday."

  She wondered if they were the men she'd seen at the airport, but she dared not say that she had observed them. Only that he was here with her now--that was all that mattered. The rest was part of some bad dream. She debated telling him about her mistake, her forgetfulness, but she held off. Not now. She drew him toward the bed, watched him as he undressed, and soon she was locked in his arms, pinned to him, shuddering with the joy of his nearness, knowing that what she was doing was worth the effort ... for this.

  "I love you, I love you," she whispered, endlessly repetitive, like a mantra. Then later she told him about her mistake. He listened quietly, without emotion.

  "I was sick with apprehension."

  "You must steel yourself," he said as he lay back looking into the ceiling. "We must assume the worst."

  "I already did that."

  "It is a game of great tensions, great dangers. Sometimes one wonders if they know all the time what is happening."

  "Who?"

  "The CIA. Perhaps the DINA."

  "And they simply let it happen?"

  "It might serve their sense of expediency."

  "Then what is the point?"

  "I don't think about anything beyond the destruction. The objective is to kill as many of the butchers as possible, as quickly and efficiently as possible."

  She shivered. He is bloodthirsty, she thought. She looked at him. And beautiful. Being with him reassured her, although his objectives were sometimes murky, at least to her.

  "The problem is to sustain one's alertness," he said suddenly. "It is very tiring. Paranoia is a double-edged sword."

  She held his face in her hands and kissed him. As she had learned, paranoia could be painful. Then she remembered the woman in front of her building.

  "There is one thing." She pictured the woman outside, the relentless vigil. "An odd detail. Perhaps it is purely my imagination. There are two hundred tenants in this building."

  She could feel his sudden alertness, a reflex.

  "There is a woman watching this building," she said.

  He jumped out of bed, moved toward the blinds, and lifting a slat, his eyes searched the street.

  "Where?"

  Frederika got up and stood behind him, pointing to the spot where the woman had stood.

  "She is gone now. She does not usually stay this late." She looked at the radio with its luminescent clock. It was four A.M.

  "Usually? Then it has been a regular routine?"

  "Why, yes." She hesitated. "You might say that."

  "What does she look like?"

  "Tall, thin. A rather bony face. Middle-aged. You might call her..." She searched for the right word. "...patrician. She was dressed rather mannishly, in a trench coat and pants."

  She watched his face, observing the gathering concern, the beginnings of agitation.

  "Do you think she was out there when I arrived?"

  "I don't know." Then she checked herself quickly. "She was there earlier. She would have been there at that time. Yes." He looked into the street again, narrowing the blinds. Touching his bare shoulder, she felt his tension.

  "What is it, my darling?" she asked gently. He remained silent for a long time, although the tightness of his shoulder muscles indicated that he was reacting. "What is it?" she repeated.

  "How was her hair cut?" he asked, his voice clipped, businesslike.

  "Short, like a man."

  "And the color?"

  "Graying."

  "And the color of the trench coat?"

  "Navy." She was surprised that she had absorbed so much detail.

  He turned, let the slat fall, and began pacing the room. The apartment was chilled and she slipped back into bed, watching him as he walked about.

  "What is it?"

  He didn't answer.

  "It is my fault," she said, feeling the whole facade of this new life crumbling.

  "What have I done, Eddie?" He stopped briefly, looked at her, his face drawn, his lips tight. "Please, Eddie." Then he turned away.

  In his look, she read her own fate. I can't bear it, she told herself.

  "I'll do anything, Eddie. Anything. I'm such a fool."

  But he continued to ignore her, his mind elsewhere. Occasionally, he would peek through the slats again.

  "Is she one of them, the enemy? I should have warned you."

  He stopped his pacing and began searching for his clothes, saying nothing, his anger controlled, although she felt it in the room, the heaviness palpable, overwhelming.

  "Eddie, please." She ran out of bed and grasped him in her arms, holding him tightly, kissing his face, the tears beginning. He made some
halfhearted efforts at placation, but his response was cold. She felt his indifference and saw whatever emotion he might have felt suddenly lost, squandered by her absent-mindedness.

  "It's my fault, Eddie. My stupidity."

  "No." She sensed his bitterness.

  "I can correct it, Eddie. You'll see. I'll do whatever you tell me has to be done." She released him and he continued to dress. "Don't hate me, Eddie. I'll make it up, you'll see, Eddie." She swallowed hard, the bile boiling in her throat.

  "It has nothing to do with you," he said.

  "No. You're trying to humor me. I've endangered everything, right, Eddie? She is the enemy. She has found out. I've bungled it." She jammed a fist into her palm. "Please, Eddie. Give me the chance. I'll make it right. I can do it. I have the courage to do it." A panic was gripping her. I must not lose him, she told herself. I cannot lose him.

  "It's not what you think," he said gently.

  The thought confused her.

  "You mustn't lie to me, Eddie. I know what I have to do. I can do it. I know I can do it." He had finished dressing. He turned to her.

  "Do nothing," he said. "Nothing." His eyes narrowed. She imagined she could see his contempt for her. "Please, Frederika. Do nothing."

  "And you? What will you do?"

  "I'll be back," he said, moving toward the door.

  "No!" she said. "You won't! You are leaving me! You are going away!" She was losing control now, feeling the weight of hysteria. "I'll kill her!" she cried.

  His slap hit her sharply across her cheek, the sound almost as painful as the blow. Then he was gone.

  XI

  Dobbs pushed away the file, first extracting the color Polaroid photograph of Miranda Ferrara Palmero, holding it out between his thumb and middle finger. He slanted it in the direction of the window light, as if the natural, now fading light might offer more insight than the yellowish lamplight that arched over the table.

  Perhaps he was missing something, he asked himself, although the question had become the essence of his enigma. He was a fish in strange waters. The truth of that undermined all of his previous self-praise about his professionalism, his thoroughness. His superiors had cited him again and again for what they believed was his instinctive understanding of human frailty, human motivation, human psychology. And he had accepted these honors, believing them. This Palmero case only reinforced what he had secretly begun to believe about himself--his own ignorance, his incompetence. It was, he knew, a strong condemnation. But no one was bugging his brain and he could afford to be honest with himself. No textbook could provide more than surface answers to human passions.