Agent Orange

by Langford, Stephen

  “Stay still, sir,” Lionel told Davies. “I’ll give covering fire; you get him to the front room!” he said to Keeton.

  “Shots from above,” Keeton said. “Probably the fourth floor of the building across the street. It’s another set of apartments.”

  Lionel raised himself up and looked in the direction Keeton had indicated. The next shot hit the frame of the window and sent wood and plaster flying at them. Lionel had seen the sniper’s position. He knelt with both guns trained on the window across the street and began firing. Keeton leaped over to Davies, grabbed him under the arms, and pulled him into the hallway until he fell into the sitting room. In the meantime Lionel had followed them along the smeared trail of Davies’s blood, walking backward, while emptying both magazines.

  “How are you doing, sir?” Lionel asked as he changed magazines for his own automatic.

  “I’ve been better,” Davies answered. “What do you think, Keeton?”

  Keeton opened Davies’s jacket to find the sniper’s bullet had traveled through the left side of the body. He couldn’t tell what organs might have been hit. “I can work to stop the bleeding, but we need medical help fast.”

  Lionel handed Keeton the gun and told him to cover the open front door. Then he raised his left hand up to his mouth. “Eddy, come in,” he said into the miniature microphone concealed within his sleeve cuff. He listened via a wired earpiece. “Activate the team; we’ve got heavy fire from a sniper in the apartment across the street. From my vantage point, leftmost window, fourth floor. Right. Surround the building, and don’t let the bastard get away. Also, call in a civilian ambulance; boss has been shot. What’s that? He’ll bloody well live if you hurry. Yes, the American’s fine. Right, my receiver is open, so keep me posted. Out.”

  They traded places so Keeton could tend to Davies’s wound while Lionel kicked the front door shut and waited. It was obvious that Davies was fading.

  “Hold on, Allen,” Keeton urged him. “Help is on the way.”

  Davies took his hand away from his side—it was drenched in his own blood—and reached up to clutch the back of Keeton’s neck. “I’m sorry, Andrew,” he said.

  “No, don’t be. What is it?”

  “We were following this girl since you left London for the mission, for her safety. Then we got suspicious, bugged the place, and realized she was dirty. I made the call to keep it from you. I’m sorry.” He winced in pain.

  “Allen,” Keeton said. “It’s part of our job.”

  “Today was the day we were going to nab her—this evening,” Davies continued, weakening the more. “Then we heard the call she made to her handler, and we decided to move in right away.”

  “What about the sniper?” Keeton asked. “Who?”

  Davies motioned to Lionel, who knelt at his superior’s side opposite Keeton. Davies reached up with his other hand to clutch Lionel’s shoulder. “Both of you—listen. The sniper knew we were coming to grab the girl, so they killed her. It makes sense that the other side’s been getting our intel. The girl was working on us from outside, but…there has to be someone on the inside, too.”

  Lionel supported Davies’s head as his breathing became faster and shallower. Finally they heard the sound of the ambulance siren approaching.

  “Just heard from Eddy on the radio,” Lionel said, touching his ear. “He’s coming up to the door.”

  There was a coded knock, and Lionel called Eddy into the room. Two other agents were with him.

  “Bloody bugger escaped,” Eddy announced. “He was already packed up when we got there, and we caught sight of him fleeing the building. Patrick thought he had him cornered but then got a shot through the leg—he’ll live; it passed through part of his calf. But he lost pursuit. The sniper had a getaway accomplice. We’ve notified the whole alphabet, for what good it’ll do now.”

  Keeton felt a tug from Davies’s hand, so he lowered his face close to the Brit’s. Keeton heard the supreme effort each breath took, along with the gurgling from the blood-filled airway.

  “Andrew,” Davies whispered, just barely loud enough for Keeton to hear. “There are sleepers…Morrison doesn’t know that I know, and I think one of them…it’s him.” Davies’s grip tightened on Keeton’s neck. He gave a last long sigh and died.

  “Who, Allen?” Keeton whispered, too late.

  Eddy knelt down next to them a moment later. Lionel arranged Davies’s hands across the body’s torso. The three of them stayed like that for a minute, and then Keeton stood up and looked back at the bedroom door. The two agents who had accompanied Eddy had gone back to examine the scene. Each of them uttered an angry oath when they came upon the body.

  Keeton felt Eddy’s hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, mate.”

  “Yeah, everybody’s sorry I guess,” Keeton answered absently and walked to the bedroom door, passing the agents returning the other way. One of them had pulled the sheet from the bed and covered her from the swell of her breasts to her thighs. Keeton rubbed his forehead and temples.

  “You deserved it, Lyn,” he whispered.

  He meant both the bullet and the sheet.

  ***

  An hour later Keeton sat in the CIA London station, in a small office that had been vacated by its usual occupant for an extended European holiday. There was a bottle of bourbon in front of him—the bottle Davies had sent to the station as a congratulations for bringing back Bleudot—along with a tumbler into which he had just poured two fingers. He had asked the steward for ice, but there was none to be found. He brought the glass up to his lips and hesitated, nosing the liquor while he thought of the right toast.

  To survival. To the fight. To Allen Davies. Then he took a full sip, worked it around his mouth, and finally swallowed.

  “Mr. Keeton, a reply from the Fort,” the young case officer said from the doorway. “On a secure line. I can transfer it to this office if you’d like, sir.”

  Keeton nodded slowly and took another sip, savoring the volatile flavors and the numbing of his tongue. He looked forward to spending the rest of the day numbing the rest of him. He had written a brief scrambler to Morrison explaining the morning’s events, including Davies’s death and his last words. He was not surprised to get the call. When the phone buzzed, Keeton reluctantly put down the glass and answered it.

  “Keeton, I received your report,” Morrison opened with a surprisingly official tone. But then it softened. “I’m sorry to hear about Allen. I knew him, I served with him, and I respected the hell out of him. And the girl…I don’t know what to say.”

  “It was his last assignment,” Keeton said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Sleepers—finding them,” Keeton answered. “Back in Paris Allen told me he was signed up for one last mission before retirement, but he didn’t tell me it was this big. He died without completing it, though.”

  “Listen, we’re in communication with Bleudot and the SDECE and the other companies. Their brass is still reluctant to believe they’ve been infected, but at least we’re getting some cooperation. But you’ve got Cavalry business to attend to—something Daniels had discovered before the poet mission came along. Other intel supports what he’d found. You’ll be getting a scrambler as soon as the boys there can get it decoded. Look it over and start snooping around until you’re fully healed—which I assume will be soon. Then we’ll need to see what to do next. One more thing—are you going to be OK?”

  “I will. Thank you, Director. Good-bye.” Keeton put the receiver back into its cradle and picked up the glass again. He toasted his fortune and Davies twice more before the case officer returned with the decoded message from Morrison. He offered the case officer a drink, which was declined, and then opened the folded Teletype paper. It was from Morrison to Keeton, via their respective temporary code names.

  As he read through the message, his thoughts drifted back to Father Teodor from Czechoslovakia and to the German priest who had ushered Philippe into whatever being there was aft
er the last breath.

  START

  16 NOVEMBER 1964 0813 GMT

  URGENT—IMMEDIATE DELIVERY

  TO RETRO

  FROM CARBON

  RE: POSSIBLE ECA MISSION POLAND

  ADVISED MATERIAL BROUGHT IN BY RED.

  CHARISMATIC POLISH BISHOP CODE NAME SCHOOLBOY UNDER CLOSE ANALYSIS AND SURVEILLANCE BY BIG BEAR. BEAR PSYCH ANALYSIS PREDICTS SCHOOLBOY COULD LEAD A SOFT REVOLUTION IN POLAND, COULD BE STARTER TO LARGER POPULAR UPRISING.

  CAVALRY ANALYSIS INDICATES AGGRESSIVE SURVEILLANCE BY BEAR, WHICH COULD ESCALATE TO HARASSMENT, INTENTIONAL ACCIDENT, OR ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT.

  DIRECTION TO RETRO: RECEIVE SCHOOLBOY INFO PACKET AT STATION LONDON. RESEARCH SCHOOLBOY SITUATION. REPORT ANALYSIS AND ACTION RECO WITHIN 30 DAYS.

  RECO EXTREME CAUTION DURING TRAVEL. NEW ALIAS AND APPEARANCE RECOMMENDED. RECENT MISSION SITUATION INDICATES BOTH DEEP KNOWLEDGE OF PERSONAL ID AND POSSIBLE SLEEPER ACTIVITY.

  PLEASE STAY SAFE, RETRO.

  END

  Keeton smiled. The last line was a personal message from Morrison, the rare second one he had received amid the usual staid, sterile language reserved for the Teletype. He read it over once more before pushing the paper through the slot of the locked container labeled BURN BOX. The smile, however, had faded.

  Deep knowledge of personal ID. I’m marked. Have been for at least a few months. Damn it all.

  He gulped the bourbon remaining in the glass without ceremony and decided to pour one more generous shot. Lyn, Morrison doesn’t know what to say about you. How the hell am I supposed to say anything? I’m not, except that I was blind and stupid, I guess. I won’t make that mistake again.

  His thoughts then turned to the possibility of a sleeper within one of the agencies. Bleudot certainly believed in it, but even his theory did not specify exactly which organization. Despite the mutual cooperation of the Western spy agencies against the Soviets and their satellites, each country jealously guarded its sovereignty and most of its secrets. With his last breath, Davies had tried to point Keeton in a direction.

  He said, I think it’s him. Lionel was there, and Eddy had just shown up, too. Keeton thought back to the scene. Before that—I knelt down with him, and he said he was sorry about leaving me in known danger. Then he said that Morrison didn’t know. It was the last person he mentioned by name.

  Morrison?

  ***

  At the KGB safe house on the western edge of London, a man whose cover name was Marcus handed his companion a shot glass of vodka. They toasted in Russian and tossed back their drinks. Marcus poured another round.

  “Nice work, Ivan,” Marcus said. At the moment he was Ivan’s KGB handler, although he knew with the agent’s talents and ambition their roles could be reversed someday. He would try to avoid such a fate but would also ingratiate himself to the assassin as a political precaution. “Yes, beautiful. Just in time, before the Brit got there.”

  “I think I killed the Brit, too,” Ivan admitted. “I aimed and saw him go down. That might get me in trouble with Capstone. I heard he was infiltrated close to the Brit and getting a lot of intelligence from him.”

  “Look at it this way,” Marcus answered. “The Brit was a legend and would probably soon be coming after Capstone as a potential…they call it a sleeper spy. You saw the Brit and took the shot—for Capstone, to protect him. Stay with that story, my friend.”

  “Probably good advice. Any other encouraging news?”

  “Only that I’m returning home immediately. We’re killing Marcus and training me on a new cover.” The phone in the room buzzed, and Marcus took the call. After a two-minute conversation, he rang off and raised his glass. “There you go, a development in your favor. Your actions might cause a stir, but it seems you’ve helped Capstone. The Brit was indeed getting too close. But even with the Brit’s death, Capstone’s code name has changed effective immediately—to Waypoint.”

  “My London cover is staying in place?”

  Marcus smiled. “Fortunately, yes. It’s not a bad life, after all. You see—taking out the Brit was exactly the right move!”

  “And then there was the girl,” Ivan mentioned. “That was necessary, too.”

  “Your girl, Ivan,” Marcus said. “You’re a patriot for the motherland. I know you’ll miss her.”

  “She was a good source; that’s all.” Ivan emptied the glass again and pushed it toward Marcus with a nod. “She thought she was serving a greater cause. And she thought we were lovers. Silly bitch.”

  End Notes

  If you enjoyed Agent Orange and wish to continue along with Andrew Keeton’s adventures, please sign up for news and free Cavalry short stories here.

  The Schoolboy, the second book in this trilogy, is expected to be published by November 2017. A dissident Polish bishop has the charisma and courage to foment a soft revolution behind the Iron Curtain, which could very well topple the entire Soviet hegemony in Europe. Andrew Keeton is sent to investigate the danger to the bishop, and if necessary rescue him from it any way that he can. His mission takes him from London to Krakow to Rome. His adversaries include the Polish secret police, a lethal KGB assassin, and hidden sleeper agents lurking deep inside the western spy agencies. Nevertheless, Keeton must strike before the intrepid bishop is cut down.

  About the Author

  Stephen Langford has several fiction projects underway, most notably his inaugural Agent Orange series. He lives a quiet and unassuming life in the midwestern plains of the United States surrounded by his faithful friends and family.

  Website: stephenlangfordbooks.com