MacAvoy looked doubtful. “I don’t know, Mr. Murphy. I’d hate for anything to happen to you.”
“One of us should stay with you,” said Luigi.
“No need. I’ll be fine.”
MacAvoy was unconvinced so Harry feigned emotion. “I need a little time alone,” he said quietly. “I don’t know when I’ll be able to come back here. After all, this is my home.”
Luigi was moved by his performance. “Come on, Marty; give the man a break. He swam out of the Hudson for God’s sake! And he’s right. Who knows when the hell he’ll be able to come back here.” Reaching into his back pocket, he pulled out a well-worn wallet and handed Harry one of his cards. “If you hear or think you hear anything, call my cell. We’ll come running. And for that matter anytime in the future when you need help, give me a call. Twenty-four-seven.”
“Thanks,” said Harry, and put the card in his pocket. “Tell me, Lou,” he asked, “why don’t you carry a gun like these guys?”
“But I do!” The IRS agent pulled up a pant leg. “I keep it strapped to my ankle so I get to duck when the shooting starts!”
“Okay, Lou, you win,” said MacAvoy. “Right, Mr. Murphy. Thirty minutes. But to be on the safe side I’m going to have Frank here wait for you downstairs and keep an eye on the entryway. You can let him know when you’re ready to leave.”
As the trio headed for the door Harry called out, “What exactly is Detective Carswell doing here in the States?”
They all stopped. MacAvoy turned. “I thought you knew. The Brits have made a direct link between a possible sleeper cell group in the UK and a terrorist organization in Yemen.”
“Al-Qaeda?”
“Most likely. Detective Carswell told us she is here to gather evidence. She said that with your help she would be able to prove conclusively that money donated by individuals here in the United States is going directly to purchase arms and ammunition which are then used to assassinate both British and American targets.”
“That was why she came here? The money is for an arms deal?”
“That’s what they told us. You know different?”
“No. Thanks. I’ll see you in thirty minutes.”
Harry shut the door and sat down on the floor.
Lizzie had lied to him. Her beekeeper boss had lied to him. All that talk of the IRA when it was all about weapons going to Al-Qaeda. Or was it?
His watch told him he had twenty minutes to pack up if he was going to leave by himself and thirty if he was going to capitulate and go with Marty and his boys. Did he really want to become a part of the Witness Protection Program? To disappear? To start life anew in Butt-fuck Idaho? It would mean quitting acting. His face was much too recognizable. They might have to surgically change it. Well, there was no fucking way he would ever do that.
To hell with the program. His salvation and the truth lay with Lizzie and she was probably in the hands of the bad guys. Well, he knew as much as anyone else as to where she might be. Perhaps it was up to him to go out and get her back.
With nineteen minutes to go he scrambled to his feet. Digging out a box of lawn-size garbage bags, he threw it on the living room table and strode into the bathroom to collect some toiletries. As he did he caught sight of himself in the mirror. His hair was a wild tangled mess and he needed a shave. But the image gave him an idea.
Every so often Harry was asked by friends if there was any special role that he would like to play. Along with Hamlet, Sam Spade and Scrooge was a desire to play a vagrant. If the part called for him to be mentally impaired, so much the better. Such parts were Oscar or Emmy shoo-ins.
On the walk from the Intrepid museum back to his apartment he had experienced firsthand what it was like to be a drifter on the streets. If he adopted such a character and found a place to live rough he could virtually disappear.
Into a black garbage bag he stuffed his oldest shirts and an old tweed jacket that had seen better days. Then he added his raincoat and folding umbrella. In case he needed to look clean and respectable, he threw in a Windbreaker, a clean pair of pants and a couple of button-down shirts. On these he laid his passport, a sharp knife, a spoon, a fork, a can opener and the portable radio he used at baseball games.
Changing into a pair of well-worn blue jeans and a faded “I Love NY” T-shirt, he checked to see if his ATM and credit cards were still in his wallet. They were sticky but usable. Back in the bathroom he climbed on the edge of the tub and reached up to ease aside a panel in the ceiling.
About two years earlier Harry had been hanging up a pair of his socks to dry when a drop of water hit him on the head that wasn’t from his socks. Unable to locate the leak or the building superintendent, he called a stage manager friend who was good at plumbing. To reach the pipe the friend cut a square hole in the center of the ceiling. When the repair was done Harry had covered the hole with a panel of thin plywood. Once painted it was hardly noticeable. Now it was the perfect place to hide the money.
Back in the kitchen he took out the camera and sound equipment and sliced away the linings of the three cases. The bundles of notes fitted neatly back into the suitcase. The clock on the microwave showed he had five minutes left. He quickly replaced all the gear, closed the cases and put them back under the table.
Balancing precariously on the edge of the bathtub, he slid the leather case through the opening, pushed it back out of sight and replaced the panel.
Opening the kitchen window, he climbed out onto the fire escape with the plastic bag over his shoulder. Below, the alley was deserted.
As he walked along the road, he realized he had to make himself very scarce while he planned his next move. MacAvoy would come looking. The first rule of battle is know your enemy. Harry had scant knowledge of any of his adversaries. The second rule was to have overwhelming superiority. That was a joke. The third called for an overall strategy. That would have to come later. The fourth demanded he have an exit strategy when everything went wrong. That he had. He would crawl back to MacAvoy, beg his forgiveness and ask for a ticket to Idaho. But first he had to find a secluded spot where he could set up home.
From outside the Food Emporium he purloined the oldest functioning shopping cart he could find. Dumping in his bag, he trundled off along the sidewalk taking deep breaths of the early-morning air.
Harry had spent most of his daily life uptown and had missed the urban change that had taken place along the lower shores of the river. What he remembered as an area of abandoned piers and broken-down warehouses was now gentrified with luxury apartments, office buildings, green grass and wide paths for running, jogging and biking.
The neighborhood may have been cleaned up but not the natives. At Twelfth Avenue and 34th Street Harry was accosted by a vagrant with primeval smells emanating from every pore and orifice. Harry was surprised to see him panhandling so early in the morning.
“Can you spare some small change please!” the man wailed. “I need to get something to eat.”
“Where do you sleep?” asked Harry.
The man extended a shaky hand. With glazed eyes he swayed from side to side like a metronome. “Can you spare some small change?” he repeated loudly. “I just need something to eat.”
“Yes, I know that’s what you need,” said Harry. “But I need to know where you sleep.”
The bum’s demeanor changed “What the fuck are you talking about?” he said angrily, dropping all pretense. “I just want some fucking small change, man! Are you crazy?!”
“No. I am not,” replied Harry forcefully. He pulled out his money clip. “I’ll pay you.”
At the sight of money the man stopped walking and his shoulders jerked. Harry peeled off a bill and tore it in two.
“Shit, man!” he yelled. “What are you doing? That’s a fucking fifty!”
Harry held out one of the halves. “Show me where you sleep and you get the other half.”
The proposition was considered and after more bodily spasms was accepted. A sooty hand thr
ust the torn piece into a pant pocket. Muttering something about man’s inhumanity to man, the bum walked fast to the end of a narrow alley that led away from the river. On either side were the back walls of the few remaining derelict buildings. The bum pointed up the alley and held out his hand.
Harry said quietly, “Show me.”
They trudged to the far end past piles of discarded cardboard boxes, where the bum pushed aside a rusty sheet of corrugated iron to reveal a vertical slit that had been hacked through the wall. Both men edged through the tiny opening. In what had once been a kitchen were signs of recent habitation. Beer cans, piles of newspapers and empty food containers littered the floor. Harry’s reluctant companion pointed to an exact spot in one corner.
“There,” he said pointing. “I slept right fucking there! Okay? My head was there and my feet was there. Okay? Are you satisfied now?”
Harry looked around. The space was dry and comparatively secure. What had once been the inner door to the rest of the building was nailed tight shut. The narrow hole in the wall was the only way in and out.
“I’ll take it,” he said. “Here’s the first month’s rent.” The man snatched the other half of the fifty and scrambled away.
Harry followed him outside. Folding up the roomiest cardboard box he could find, he dragged it back through the hole and set it up in the corner. Retrieving the bag with his belongings from the cart, he pushed it into the far end of the box. As he did this his stomach rumbled. Five minutes later at an all-night delicatessen on Ninth Avenue he bought a bacon-egg roll, some cookies and a large cup of coffee and took them back to his new home. The bag made a comfortable rest for his head. Stretching out his legs he ate his breakfast to the sounds of Mozart on his little radio. As he ate the cookies he was reminded of the last time he had tea with the Colonel’s wife in London. Later perhaps he would call Rhonda Villiers and tell her where her husband had been taken into custody. It might be productive to put the cat among the pigeons back where it all began.
But where and how to begin in New York?
The contact number Lizzie had given him would allow him to call Max and make threats, but what would be the point? It could endanger Lizzie all the more. The taxi repair garage? If he could locate it he could follow the people who came in and out. No good. That would take too much time.
The label on the box of groceries had told him the Gazelle was berthed at the Port Imperial Marina, which was on the other side of the river in New Jersey. If his memory was right it was directly across from his present accommodation. He could go over to the Marina, locate the boat and keep an eye on it until someone came. Again, what was the point? He hadn’t the means to follow the boat and it could be days before anyone turned up.
What would they do in the movies? What would George Clooney or the indestructible Harrison Ford do in his place?
Simple. They would blow the boat to bits.
Harry had once played an assistant district attorney on a miniseries. With all the car chases, shootings and pyrotechnics, the special effects department was strained to the limit. Marcel “More Smoke” Forestière was considered one of the best in the business.
A scene in one episode called for a limousine to be blown up on a railway bridge as a train passed beneath. Five cameras were set up to get several diverse points of view. Setting up the shot took all morning and part of the afternoon. Finally the old Mercedes was winched across the bridge on a cable with two lifelike dummies in the front seats. As it reached the center span Marcel hit the switch. Later that evening he admitted to Harry that he made a mistake in his calculations and multiplied when he should have divided. The detonation was so powerful that the huge car rose up high into the sky, spewing smoke and flame but disappearing out of view of all the cameras. All five had been locked off and none of the operators could react fast enough to release the wheels to allow them to tilt up. Fortunately, no one was hurt and the paint department was able to make the Mercedes look like new. Three hours later, the second explosion worked to perfection.
Harry chuckled to himself. If he could blow the boat up at its moorings EB would come running like a gazelle! With any luck Harry could follow the dapper little man when he left the Marina.
Before departing for the Jersey shore Harry put on socks, shoes and a clean shirt, zippered all his valuables into his Windbreaker pockets and slipped it on. With the plastic bag tucked in a dark corner he slid out into the alley and replaced the sheet of metal over the hole.
At the NY Waterway terminal he bought a round-trip ticket to New Jersey and stepped aboard. Standing in the stern of the ferry he watched as New York receded beyond the churning white wake. A little upriver he could just make out the forest of pilings sticking out of the water that had recently saved his life.
The Port Imperial Marina was a short walk from the ferry terminal. Access was through a narrow gate at the far end of a short concrete bridge. At the entrance two security guards kept watch from a small shed. A little way past this was the Marina office and store. The whole dockyard was protected by a chain-link fence.
On the far side was a repair and storage facility. Everywhere Harry looked there were square floodlights on the top of high poles, so it would not be easy to get to the target unobserved. But on the downriver side of the boatyard he came across a section of wall that had crumbled with age. At night it would be in shadow and the river was only a few yards from the other side. Harry ran his eyes down the lines of boats tied up on either side of the jetties. Almost immediately he spotted the Gazelle and saw that the distance from the shore to the boat was easily swimmable.
Where could he get plastic explosive, a detonator and a timing device that would allow him to swim clear before it went off? The answer was he couldn’t. So what else could he do? Set the boat on fire? Gasoline and matches were readily available and easy to transport. But he might set himself on fire or the blaze could spread to adjoining boats. Harry had no desire to punish the innocent.
Could he sink it?
The hulls of most modern boats are made of some form of fiberglass. Plastic laid over a nylon web of sorts. All it would take would be a few holes below the waterline. A portable drill would do the job nicely and the latest models made very little noise.
The ferry was about to return to Manhattan. Harry ran back and jumped aboard. On the return crossing he made his way inside, and settling down on the wooden seat, he congratulated himself on his creative brilliance.
51
The morning when someone had tried to assassinate her husband, Rhonda Villiers had prepared his breakfast and had just put on the kettle when she heard the staccato sounds of the bullets. Running rapidly up the stairs to the bedroom window she was just in time to see Murphy clamber into the Jaguar before Charles pinned the leather-clad motorcyclist to the wall. As the man’s weapon hit the ground and the bullets flew she ducked to avoid being hit.
It was not unusual for Charles to disappear for short periods of time. But when they grew longer he always managed to get in touch and reassure her of his health and safety. This time he hadn’t called and she had become worried that he might have been wounded.
When the phone on the kitchen wall rang she hurried over and took down the receiver, assuming it would be her husband.
But it wasn’t.
“Mr. Murphy, what a pleasant surprise! How good to hear your voice. I’m glad you called. I’m a little worried about Charles. I haven’t heard from him. Do you know where he might be? Oh, really. Yes, yes, of course. Just a moment.”
She pulled out a notepad from a drawer and rummaged around until she found a pen. Once ready she said, “Yes, Mister Murphy. I’m ready. Taunton.” She wrote on the pad. “Yes. I have that. Who? Sapinsky. Yes. And Carswell, Elizabeth. When was that? I see. Yes I most certainly will. Thank you. I will see what I can do.”
Moments later Directory Enquiries gave her the number of Taunton Police Station and she added it to her notes. Before calling she decided it would be prudent t
o consider everything she had just heard and why Murphy had chosen this particular moment to call her. The gas popped as she put on the kettle. Once the tea was made she settled herself on the living room sofa.
Her basic problem was whether a call to the authorities would help or hinder Charles. Rhonda had a great mistrust of anything that involved the government, both local and national.
Perhaps this would be a good time to ask her father. He always gave her good advice. In fact, he had never failed her. Not once. Bless his heart. Not since that devastating day at Ainsley House Boarding School for Girls when she had been summoned from class and sent up to the see Miss Weatherly.
The headmistress had stood stiffly behind her desk and given an awkward cough before she spoke. “I’m sorry, Evans, but I have some bad news. Your father has died. Quite suddenly, I am told. The funeral will be on Saturday. I’ve arranged for a taxi to take you to the station so you can catch the next train to London.”
Rhonda Evans had fainted on the parquet floor. Matron was summoned and told to cope.
Two days later Rhonda watched as her father’s casket was lowered into the cold ground of Highgate Cemetery. The young girl, still in her school uniform, waited until everyone had left and then knelt down on the fake grass that covered the mound of dirt.
“It’s me,” she whispered. “I only have a moment. I know who they are. I promise I will see that they pay for what they did. No matter how long it takes. I have to go back to school now, Daddy. I’ll visit soon. I promise. I love you, Daddy.”
Gareth Evans had been a gentle soul, unlike his father before him. Rhonda’s grandfather was a Sergeant Major in the Welsh Guards and constantly lectured his son on honor and military tradition. He naturally assumed the boy would follow him into the army. When young Gareth became a chartered surveyor and joined a small architectural firm in Hampstead, communication between them ceased. They met only once when Gareth married his secretary, Elsie.
The newlyweds set up home in a tree-lined street in the suburbs of Golders Green in North London, where they raised first daughter Rhonda and then son Julian. When both children grew up and left home, Gareth and Elsie moved to a mews cottage in Kensington.
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