“That’s the plant. Winfield’s office is outside the wire.”
“And even closer to downtown Luanda, a capitol crawling with soldiers,” said Bourne.
Chester spread his hands. “So this couldn’t have happened?”
A sigh. “It clearly did. Please continue.”
“They hit the office, they get Kruger and Winfield. Say they hit just when Winfield is packing these coolers. They also see that he’s packing those diamonds you’re missing. They’re a bonus. They think they’re entitled. Winfield would have wet his pants in a second. He’d have told them anything they wanted to know including your address here at Briarwood.”
“So this is what happened?”
“This is just my scenario.”
“Before taking their leave, they would have rummaged, would they not? Winfield’s clinicals should have been part of this shipment. They’re missing. They’ve been taken. We must assume that a great deal more has been taken. This could be a catastrophe, Chester.”
“Winfield didn’t keep that much in his office. What was there, he kept in a safe.”
“I’ll point out that a little goes a very long way. And Cecil, no doubt, would have opened the safe in the hope of not emulating Bobik.”
“Yeah, I guess,” opined Chester. “Except they still wouldn’t know what all that stuff was. Yeah, Winfield could have told them, but then they’d be scared to touch it. Winfield would have warned, one whiff, they all die. And they wouldn’t have hung around very long anyway. Not after hacking off two more heads.”
“They’d have dashed away, you think.”
“I would. Wouldn’t you?”
“Chester…they lingered. You are looking at the evidence. They took the time to pack them and ship them.”
Chester stared at the containers. He said, “Yeah, they did. But you’re looking for the worst case of what could have happened. I still think revenge was all they were after. I still think they wouldn’t have taken the bugs. They’d need biohazard space suits to open that stuff. Winfield didn’t keep any space suits in his office and I doubt that Alameo showed up equipped.”
“That’s your ray of hope?”
“Seems likely to me.”
“Seems likely. My scenario,” Bourne said to him icily. “You guess, you hear, but you never seem to know. My own guess is that you could have kept this from happening. How am I to have confidence in your judgement?”
Chester didn’t answer. He looked at the stacked heads. He reached for the two that he’d piled on the third and put them back in their respective containers.
At last, he said quietly, “I’ll fix it.”
“You will? By what means?”
“I’ll come up with something.”
“You are to do nothing.”
“We just let this pass?” Chester glanced toward the containers. “They hack off three heads and send them here to your house. Don’t you think some kind of payback is called for?”
Bourne pointed to the heads. He said, “Chester…this is payback. You are talking escalation. I intend to respond, but in my way, not yours. I would prefer to defuse our situation over there before it gets any farther out of hand.”
“Like how?”
“By neutralizing our uniformed friend. I have asked you to locate Elizabeth Stride. I want and need her now more than ever.”
“I keep trying to tell you,” said Lilly, “Stride’s dead.”
“So you have,” Bourne answered, “and I don’t believe it. She’d be how old now?”
“Thirty five…thirty six. That’s if she’s still alive and she isn’t.”
“Well, I think she is. And that she’s somewhere in this country. I want you to find her, and quickly.”
Chester Lilly sighed. He threw up his hands. “You’ve got the FBI…who owes you. You’ve got the CIA…who needs you. If both of them say that this woman is dead, the way to bet is that she’s dead.”
“You say you’ve personally seen their files?”
“At the CIA, I did. They let me sit at their computer. All the FBI had were some references to her that were three or four years out of date.”
Bourne asked, “Did those files contain photographs?”
“The CIA’s did. Except none were her. They were pictures of other Elizabeth Strides. All too young, too old, too ugly, wrong race. I looked at every one. Maybe twenty.”
“And so no photos of her corpse, no dental records or the like. No DNA matches from a set of remains that would prove that she’s no longer with us.”
“They have other sources. All those sources say she’s dead.”
“Chester, she’s been killed at least six times that I know of by people hoping to claim the reward. Now we’re told that she died on an exercise bike the same year she came back to the States. An old bullet fragment worked loose. Is that the story?”
Chester nodded. “From a time when she get shot years before. It moved, cut into an artery and killed her. Everybody I’ve asked says it happened that way. You’re the only one who doesn’t believe it.”
“Too convenient.”
“No one’s seen her or heard from her since, Mr. Bourne.”
“She came back to this country to get lost, to disappear. She must have had a plan and a place to go. That’s why I think she’s here somewhere.”
Lilly answered with a shrug. “If you say so.”
“Stride had a million dollar price on her head. Try putting yourself in her place. Would you revel in the honor of being so valued or might you consider faking your death if being hunted grew to be tiresome?”
“I might,” Lilly answered. “But I would have been smarter about it.”
“Meaning?”
“Do you think she called some friends and said, ‘Tell everyone I’m dead?’ Do you think she’s so dumb that she thought that’s all it takes? Myself, I’d have done it so nobody would wonder.”
“For example?”
“There are ways. I’d have planted a body.”
“You have found one that’s a perfect DNA match and with teeth that are identical to your own?”
Once more, Chester Lilly threw up his hands. “The whole world says she’s dead. You say she’s alive. Say she is. What good is she to you?”
“Find her for me and I’ll show you. Nothing from State Department Intelligence?”
“Same thing. Drew a blank. Our people there don’t have a thing.”
“Did you speak to Roger Clew?”
“I spoke to someone else pretty high up in Intelligence. I couldn’t get as high up as Clew.”
“You tried?”
“He wouldn’t see me.”
“He wouldn’t? Even knowing that you work for me?”
“That cut no ice. He doesn’t like you very much. That’s why he won’t come here for your brunches. ”
Bourne scowled. He’d forgotten. Twice now, he’d sent an invitation to Clew. In fact, he’d tried to get Clew there today, even offering an added incentive. Clew had not had the grace to respond. “Mr. Clew is in need of a lesson in manners. And a lesson on where his bread is buttered.”
“You got something on him?”
“Not at the moment. But I shouldn’t need to. His boss, for God’s sake, the secretary of state, is a regular attendee at my brunches. He was to have been here this morning.”
“I know,” said Lilly. “I saw his chopper turning back.”
“And Roger Clew is one of hundreds of public officials who serve at the pleasure of the president. Does he realize that I could pick up the phone and…”
Chester shook his head wearily. “Mr. Bourne…don’t even start. You can’t touch Clew and the president won’t either. The word is that Clew could make calls of his own. He’s been at this too long; he knows too much shit. No one can even get into his files and those files are what everyone’s afraid of.”
Bourne suddenly turned thoughtful. “His files, you say.”
“He has something on everyone. You included,
I bet. Maybe nothing he could do much about, but enough that he’s not about to party with you.”
“Collected through his network of informants and such?”
“Other governments, too. He knows everyone.”
“So if anyone could tell me where to find Stride…”
“Mr. Bourne…he wouldn’t even tell me she’s dead. Will you tell me what makes her so important?”
“That can wait. You can wait. I’m disappointed in you, Chester.”
“Okay,” he said, “I’m sorry. And okay, say she’s alive. I still don’t see what good she is to you. I know you don’t care about the million dollar bounty. It’s not as if you’re hurting for cash.”
“She’d be worth more than that just in terms of good will. If I handed her over to the people who want her, no favor that I’d ask would be too great.”
“So that’s it? That’s why?”
“I might do that down the road.”
“But in the meantime, you want her to come work for you. Aside from why should she, why would you want her? Is it just because she’s cut a few throats? There’s no shortage of people who can do that, Mr. Bourne.”
“Stride is special. Believe me. And it’s more than a few.”
“What’s special is that Stride was a psycho, Mr. Bourne. She didn’t work for hire. She hated those people. You heard what they did to her? You heard how she got started?”
“I’m fully aware of her history, Chester.”
Again, Chester gestured toward the figure in the poster. “You think she’ll take out this guy, Alameo? She’d do it for you? Is that what you think?”
You’re getting warm, thought Bourne. But he said nothing.
“Say you found her,” said Chester. “Why would you think she’d do it?”
“Trust me. She’d be put to good use.”
“You’d send her over to Angola? Into the bush? Don’t you think she’s stand out just a bit over there?”
“Stride would stand out just about anywhere, Chester. Which is why I can’t believe that she’s so hard to find.”
“Same reason your wife hasn’t been spotted lately. Same reason she’s not doing much talking.”
The remark angered Bourne. It wasn’t the same. And he knew that he was being near-obsessive on the subject. It was possible, even probable, that Chester was right. But if Stride were alive, and if he could find her, oh, what an advantage he might have.
“It seems,” he said, “that I must speak to Clew directly.”
“You can try. But I don’t think he’ll see you.”
Bourne stepped to the cooler that contained Bobik’s head. “Oh, he’ll see me,” he told Chester. “I’ll have something to trade. That’s the business he’s in, is it not?”
“Trade what?”
“The late Mr. Bobik has given me a thought. He’s a major arms dealer, you say?”
“And drugs. Not your kind. The feeling good kind. Chances are, that shipment includes a few kilos. Mobote likes to keep his top people addicted. It keeps them from getting ambitious.”
Bourne sniffed. “Arms and drugs. Why not women while he’s at it?”
“He does. But not this time. At least not for Mobote. Bobik also deals in slaves, but they’re going somewhere else. A bunch of young girls from…”
“Chester…don’t say it.”
“Don’t say what? From what I hear? I was not going to say that”
“Forgive me. From what, then?” asked Bourne.
“Not from what. It’s from where. These young girls were supposed to be picked up in Cabinda which is his last stop in Angola. Bobik has a dealer there who snatches them for him. They’re all street kids and orphans, kids no one would miss and Cabinda’s glad to get rid of them. Bobik sells them to plantations up the coast.”
Bourne closed one eye, not sure that he grasped this. “You’re…telling me that the arms ship is also a slave ship, not to mention a drug ship. What else might it be carrying?”
“Guys like Bobik will deal anything you want.”
Bourne stared at Bobik’s head. “What a loss to the world. A pig, but an undoubted entrepreneur. The slaves,” he said, “might be just the right touch. They’ll appeal to Mr. Clew’s sense of outrage.”
“You going to call him direct?”
“The sooner the better. In the meantime, there’s the matter of these heads.”
“I’ll take them. I’ll dump them where they won’t be found.”
Bourne nodded his assent. But then he seemed to change his mind. He said, “You know…this sending of heads…it’s really quite an effective device.”
Chester shrugged.
“These might come in handy. We’ll freeze them.”
FOUR
Three days had passed since Bourne’s aborted Sunday brunch. Roger Clew had begun his customary morning jog.
Dressed in a Notre Dame sweatshirt and shorts, he’d left his Georgetown apartment house a few minutes past sunrise. In past weeks, he’d been leaving through the basement garage in order to avoid being logged by the doorman. The building had several high officials in residence. The doorman was suspected of tipping reporters as to certain of their personal activities.
He’d had jogging partners, but not any more. Too many saw it as a chance to have private time with him in which to advance some agenda of theirs. Clew saw running as his own private time. Fitness was part of it. He was forty-five years old. He’d reached the age at which most men become invisible to women who are twenty years younger. Until, that is, they’d find out who he was. Whoever said that power was an aphrodisiac knew what he was talking about. It certainly made for an active enough sex life, but not one that was long on romance. Lately, he preferred to be invisible.
Strapped to his waist was a fanny pack that contained his wallet, a few dollars in cash, his PDA and his Beretta. The PDA was a new one, a prototype really. He had it on loan from its maker. It had a mini-computer that could download large files and among its features were a built-in cell phone and a recording device. He was able to speak into it and record any thoughts that occurred to him while he was jogging. Certain files and certain thoughts were of a sensitive nature. He never let it out of his sight.
He had reached the edge of the Tidal Basin and would make one circuit of its two-mile length. After that, he would stop for some bagels and coffee before returning to shower and dress. His driver- cum-bodyguard would be waiting.
Clew was approaching the FDR Memorial when he spotted the stretch limousine. It was illegally parked on the Tidal Basin path. It had left tire tracks across the lawn. The rear door opened and a man stepped out. Clew recognized him instantly. It was Bourne’s man, Chester Lilly. He’d have known that head of hair a block away. And the figure still seated must be Bourne himself.
Clew turned, intending to reverse his direction when he saw that a second car had pulled in behind him. It had kept its distance, but it, too, blocked the path. Clew emitted a grunt of disgust.
He could scarcely believe that Artemus Bourne would have the gall to force a meeting in this manner. Or that Bourne, for that matter, would come all this way. The man almost never left Briarwood. Clew had thought that he’d made it abundantly clear that he had no interest in seeing him.
Lilly stepped toward him, raising his hands. He said, “There’s no problem. Don’t get bent out of shape.” He then cocked his head toward the limousine door. “Mr. Bourne would like you to get in.”
“Mr. Bourne can kiss my ass and so can you,” Clew replied. “Now get the hell out of my way.”
“See that?” said Chester. “And I’m trying to be nice. Bottom line is you’re not getting past him.”
Here’s a man, thought Clew, who can’t take no for an answer. First came those invitations to Bourne’s Sunday brunches that some columnists called the hottest ticket in town. There were always one or two cabinet members and various congressmen and senators. The Secretary of State was a frequent guest. The Secretary usually dropped in by cho
pper, joined once or twice by the president himself. The place was nearly as secure as Camp David.
Clew’s most recent invitation was for last Sunday’s brunch. The messenger who brought it was a striking young woman. She said her name was Claire, British accent; she was gorgeous. She had porcelain skin and lustrous red hair and a body to make a man weak in the knees. And she knew that damned well. And she used it. She said that Mr. Bourne was especially hopeful that he would be good enough to attend. She said that Mr. Bourne had been made aware that a certain animosity had risen between them. She said that he was hoping that a nice private chat would not only allay any misunderstandings, but perhaps even benefit them both. She offered to drive him down to Briarwood herself. She made it clear, not in words, but with her eyes, her inflections, that if he saw fit to accept Bourne’s invitation, she in turn might see fit to fuck his brains out.
She left after handing him the formal invitation along with a card that bore her telephone number. But not before a final lingering handshake and a throaty, “If you don’t, I’ll be so disappointed. I would really like to know you better, Roger.”
In the past, he’d returned Bourne’s invitations unopened. This time he would not even bother to do that. This time, however, he did open the envelope. It contained not only the embossed invitation, and directions to Briarwood by road and by air, but also a list of those who’d be in attendance. A few legislators, one appellate court justice, several business executives, all from energy firms. The president’s Secretary of Commerce was listed, as were a couple of people from State. He noted with annoyance, but not with surprise, that one of the people attending from State was the head of the African Bureau at State. The hen house was coming to the fox.
He’d been about to drop it into his shredder, but decided to keep it for a while instead. He wanted to remember those names. He did shred the card that held that young woman’s number lest he ever be tempted to call her.
For a day or so he wondered whether he’d behaved rashly. Not so much about Bourne; it was more about Claire. If she was a gift, an incentive, whatever, she might well have been worth the trip. But on the Monday following last Sunday’s brunch, he learned that it had been abruptly cancelled. Bourne’s guests had been turned away at the gate after driving two hours to get there. They probably had to settle for an Egg MacMuffin somewhere. The world was a better place for it.
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