by Gulvin, Jeff
As it turned out, he was it in its entirety. He thought there would be two of them, as there normally was for overseas stuff, but they were up to their necks in London, with Operation Flight and the other things that were happening. He had called Cheyenne Logan, who told him that a team from Washington had already been dispatched to New Orleans. Swann had got the first flight he could. Now they were trying to land at Dulles Airport in this storm. Logan should be waiting for him and he had a little tingle in his stomach when he thought about her. They would collect his luggage, then ride to the National Airport and fly on to New Orleans. He sat there now, with the panic-stricken woman next to him, as the pilot brought them in low, the rain lashing against the window.
Logan was waiting for him as he came through customs. He spotted her immediately—jet-black hair, ebony skin and a red two-piece suit. She smiled widely at him, lips parted, showing the brilliant flash of her teeth.
‘Hi, Jack. How you doing?’ She kissed him lightly on the cheek and he could smell her perfume, rich in his nostrils. She took his small briefcase from him with long-fingered hands, and guided him outside.
The rain beat against the earth with a vengeance. Fortunately, her car was parked in the lot directly across from the main terminal building, but his hair was still plastered to his scalp when they got there. He stowed his luggage next to hers in the trunk and then they left Dulles for the National Airport.
‘We coulda flown from here, but the connection’s better at National,’ she told him. ‘It’s only about forty-five minutes’ drive. This evening we’ll be in New Orleans, honey.’
Swann shook the rain from his clothes and settled into the passenger-seat as they headed towards Washington D.C. on Highway 261. The rain battered the windshield and the wipers were clicking back and forth at maximum speed. Spray hissed from passing vehicles, making the wipers work that much harder. Swann shivered and Logan turned the heating up higher.
‘Bad flight?’ she asked. ‘Was it like this all the way?’
‘Just when we got here.’
‘I know. It’s been steel-rod raining for days. Cold too. Still, the weather’s so messed up these days, it could be eighty in the shade tomorrow.’
Swann smiled to himself. A long time since he had ridden in a car with a woman. He glanced at her as she drove, skirt riding up her thighs as she worked the brake and accelerator pedals: he could hear the faint rustle of her stockings. Her legs were long and black and shapely, her face strong. He had noticed her before, of course, when they worked together the previous year, but then he had been blissfully ensconced with Pia.
Maybe Logan perceived his thoughts because she suddenly looked sideways at him and smiled. ‘So, how’ve you been, Jack?’
‘I’ve been OK,’ he said. ‘We’ve been busy since Boese escaped.’
‘I bet you have, baby.’
‘I still can’t quite believe it,’ he said. ‘Twenty-two people killed. It was an outrage, Chey. A total fucking outrage.’ He shifted round then and laid his arm across the back of her seat. ‘Tell me what happened down in New Orleans.’
She told him again as they drove, about how Harrison had received the feather and the photograph with the bullet hole in his head. Swann recalled the day when he had received the same package, and how he had carried a sidearm for weeks afterwards. ‘That was the day before yesterday?’ he asked.
‘February 16th, yes.’
‘And you’ve heard nothing since?’
‘Zilch, hon. Silence. Everyone’s on high alert down there. But we’ve heard or seen nothing of him since.’
They got to the National Airport and parked the car before checking in their bags. Swann had been given one week initially by SO13, and was booked to fly back directly from New Orleans. They ate a meal in the airport restaurant, sitting across from one another, making small talk. Logan told him that she was originally from Alabama; her father had been a working man, two jobs to put herself and her brothers through college. She was the youngest of four, and two of her three brothers were cops in Birmingham. Her third brother, the youngest apart from her, was living in New Orleans, and she hoped to see him while they were down there. Unlike the rest of them, he had avoided law enforcement and worked with the Kingsley House project as a social worker.
Harrison sat in the conference room with Mayer, Fitzpatrick, Byrne and Kovalski. Initially, the terrorism people had restricted their liaison to just those two, technically Byrne’s remit rather than Kovalski’s, because, as yet, Boese had committed no crime on US soil. Kovalski had come down too, though, as a link with Jakob Salvesen and his now-disbanded group of followers could not be discounted. Byrne was speaking and Harrison stared at him across the table. They had never met in person. Lucky Louis Byrne, the apple of the Director’s eye. Tall and slim, still under forty, and the most famous special agent since Joe Pistone. Byrne had ridden the promotion train without pissing off the suits at the zoo. He was a fast tracker, a ‘blue flame’ promotion boy, but still had the respect of the hump agents out on the street. He had done his share in the field, before this Storm Crow thing had blown up. Yet there was something about him that got under Harrison’s skin. Maybe it was the fact that he was a GS15 at thirty-nine and his wife one of the top defence attorneys in D.C., earning upwards of a million dollars. Harrison had heard through the grapevine that they lived in a million-dollar home in old town Alexandria, and were invited to some of the White House parties. Angie Byrne’s law firm represented the President.
‘Mexican?’ Byrne was saying to him.
Harrison studied his face and nodded. ‘I think so. Same size, same build. He just came outta the rain on Frenchman Street and bought a beer in the Apple Barrel.’
‘Did he say anything to you?’
‘Just about the rain and shit.’
Byrne glanced at Kovalski and then at Mayer and Fitzpatrick. ‘It’s certainly his style,’ he said. His jacket was over the back of his seat and his sleeves were pushed up, revealing Caribbean-tanned forearms. ‘Mexican is easy for him. Half-caste skin, short-cut hair. He’s used it many times. Fort Bliss, we think. Certainly in London last year.’
Mayer sat forward. ‘What I want to know is, what’s he doing here in New Orleans. Mardi Gras is less than a week away. This city’s gonna be bursting at the seams with tourists.’
Byrne breathed out heavily, his closely shaven jaw flecked with red dots of concentration. He lifted his shoulders. ‘I wish I knew. We’ve got the Scotland Yard liaison flying in this evening,’ he went on. ‘Maybe he can tell us more.’
‘Just the one of them?’ Fitzpatrick said.
‘Yes. Detective Sergeant Swann. He knows the case better than anyone else over there.’
Harrison sat very still, his hands held loosely together on the tabletop in front of him. The conversation dulled into the breaking of blood at his temple. Suddenly, he was back in Jake Salvesen’s courtroom, when the militia passed their death sentence on him. He saw again the red madness in Salvesen’s eyes, the cold stare of Jesse Tate, the former Green Beret; and then he was underground, crawling for all he was worth, with the gunfire booming behind him.
‘He’s flying in with Logan,’ Kovalski said. ‘Can somebody meet them from the airport?’
Harrison thinned his eyes. ‘I’ll do it,’ he said.
Downstairs in the squad room, he sat with Penny and John Earl Cochrane, spat tobacco juice into an empty Coke can, and told them about Swann flying in from London. ‘I don’t want this guy knowing that I know about him,’ he said. His voice was low and his eyes hard. ‘Tell the other guys who know about it to keep their traps shut, will you, Matt. I don’t want any fucker letting this guy know I got his marker.’
Swann and Logan stood in the cool of the evening, outside the lower baggage claim section of New Orleans Airport, with the roadway raised above their heads and the line of airport shuttle buses getting shorter. ‘Where’re we staying, Chey?’ Swann asked her.
‘The French Quarter, a hotel
Tom Kovalski always uses. The Bureau likes us in the Hilton or the Holiday Inn, but New Orleans is New Orleans and you can walk to the Mobil Oil building in less than twenty minutes from the quarter.’
A car drew up then, a big grey Ford which bumped against the kerb. Swann looked at the driver as he got out—not very tall, with a tanned and beaten face, grey hair tied in a ponytail dangling from under his faded baseball hat. He stared first at Logan, then at Swann and his eyes were cold as steel. ‘You Logan?’ he said, glancing back at her.
‘Yes.’
‘Harrison,’ he said and picked up her bag. He looked at Swann then. ‘You gotta be the limey.’
Swann smiled and offered his hand. ‘You the Harrison that was undercover in Idaho?’
Harrison looked him deep in the eyes and nodded.
‘Good to meet you.’
Harrison squeezed his hand tightly. ‘Likewise, duchess. Likewise.’
Harrison opened the trunk of the car and moved his MP5 and pump-action shotgun to one side, together with his SWAT body armour and gear belt. ‘Not much room in the back,’ he said. ‘I got more shit stowed on the back seat, so y’all have to shift up.’
Swann climbed in the back and Logan got in the front. Harrison got behind the wheel, rolled the window down and pinched a cigarette from his shirt pocket. He pressed the lighter button on the dashboard and accelerated away from the kerb. ‘Where ya staying?’ he asked. ‘Hilton?’
‘Hotel Provincial,’ Logan told him.
Harrison squinted at her. ‘Down there on Chartres? Right on.’
He drove them in on Highway 10, then pulled off by the Superdome and headed down Poydras, before cutting across Camp to Canal Street and finally along Chartres. Swann had never seen anything like it: the town was lit up in the darkness, with raised concrete carriageways and buildings scraping the skyline, great wide roads and honking cars. Then all of a sudden the buildings receded and the streets narrowed, and he could have been in some French port at the turn of the century. The hotel was in classic Napoleonic-style and there was even a picture of the old emperor in the lobby. They checked in and Harrison parked his car in the lot, telling the bellboy that he would leave it there till the morning.
‘You live here?’ Swann asked him.
‘Burgundy and Toulouse.’ Harrison placed a fingerful of chew under his lip. ‘Don’t go up there at night.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because this is New Orleans, duchess. Someone’ll have your kidneys.’
The receptionist smiled at them across the counter. ‘You’re from England?’ he said.
Swann nodded.
‘He’s right. Stay on Bourbon or below. Stay with the crowds. There’s nothing but residential places up there, nothing for you to see. New Orleans is a great city,’ he said. ‘But it’s like anywhere else, there’s places you don’t go at night.’
Swann eased the breath from his cheeks. ‘You ever been to London?’ he said.
They met up with Byrne and Kovalski, and ate dinner at Irene’s on the corner of St Philip, reputedly the best restaurant in the French Quarter. Swann liked Kovalski immediately; an easy-faced man in his mid-forties who, despite his senior position, seemed to have lost none of his street sense. Kovalski told him that he had been a helicopter pilot with the 82nd Airborne Division and, after that, briefly a lawyer, before joining the FBI in 1981.
Harrison lit a Marlboro after the meal and told them a bit about New Orleans, mentioning, amongst other things, the fact that the law in Louisiana was different from the rest of the United States. All the other states based their statutes on English common law, whereas Louisiana had its legal roots in the Napoleonic Code.
‘Has Boese shown up since the feather?’ Swann asked him. He could sense something in the man, some hint of hostility, but he ignored it.
‘Nope.’
‘But you recognize him as this Mexican?’
‘Maybe. I wouldn’t put my life on the line for it, but I figure it makes sense.’
‘Boese’s hard to recognize.’ Swann looked at Byrne as he said it. ‘He walked right past me once, in the middle of London.’
‘I’ll bet he did,’ Harrison said, with no hint of a smile in his face.
After dinner, Byrne and Kovalski had things to do, and Logan was going to telephone her brother. Harrison told Swann to take a walk up Bourbon Street, and have a look at the titty bars. ‘You not coming?’ Swann asked him.
‘I live here, bubba. I got other places to go.’
‘Whatever.’ Swann stuffed his hands in his pockets and headed for the door.
Harrison scratched one unshaven cheek. ‘Good place to grab a beer is the Café Lafayette in Exile,’ he said. ‘You’ll enjoy it in there.’
‘Thanks.’ Swann opened the door and walked up St Philip.
‘Dumb limey fuck,’ Harrison muttered, and headed for Frenchman Street.
Swann got to Royal, and then another block and he was on Bourbon Street—the name that was known all over the world. Jean Lafitte’s bar was across the street, dimly lit, all but dark inside. He thought of the shadows and he thought of Boese and he headed left on Bourbon. The street was narrow, with two- or three-storeyed buildings on either side. One-way traffic, and further up, the road was cordoned off with bollards, for pedestrians only. Here the crowds swelled; one week to Mardi Gras and already the people were in party mood. Jazz music and Cajun music rebounded from open bar doorways, electric guitars and violins.
Swann saw the bar that Harrison had mentioned. Men crowded the doorways and looked at him strangely as he went inside. And then the darkness opened up and he saw the bald-headed bartender swinging his arms over his head to the music. Swann was crowded, jostled against the bar, and as he looked around his worst fears were confirmed, not a woman in the place and all eyes on him. The bartender was right in his face now, all smiles and gold teeth, and he had no option but to order a beer. Mercifully, it was poured in a ‘to go’ plastic cup. Swann paid his two dollars and felt someone run fingers over his buttocks.
‘Just got into town?’
He looked round to find a sandy-haired man in a leather jacket standing behind him.
‘That’s right.’ Swann thought of Harrison and wondered what kind of joke this actually was, good-humoured or cruel. Again he looked at his questioner. ‘I’m a cop,’ he said quietly.
‘Right on.’ The man faltered, then looked beyond him, saw somebody he knew and excused himself. Swann sat on a stool to drink his beer.
The following morning he met Logan in the lobby and they drove over to 1250 Poydras Street in Harrison’s car. He parked in the underground car park and led them upstairs in the freight elevator. ‘Suspect transportation,’ he explained.
‘D’you have cells up here?’ Swann asked as the elevator opened on the twenty-first floor.
‘No. Only interview rooms.’ Harrison led the way to the stairs and the next floor up.
Byrne and Kovalski were already in the conference room. Byrne was on the telephone and Kovalski was working at documents laid out on the table before him.
‘I’ll get the bosses,’ Harrison said, and went in search of Mayer and Fitzpatrick.
When they were all gathered, Mayer briefed them on the situation. ‘Ismael Boese has to be considered public enemy number one,’ he said. ‘So far, we’ve notified no one about what’s happened here, except FBI personnel and you guys in London.’ He glanced at Swann. ‘That was a considered decision. I guess you could argue that we should’ve informed the precinct houses in the city at least, but until we know why he’s announced himself to us like this, there’s little point.’ He paused and sighed. ‘Mardi Gras’s next week and we do not want panic running through the city.’ He looked squarely at Swann again. ‘He’s capable of almost anything, apparently.’
‘He certainly is,’ Swann said.
Byrne then gave them a full run-down on Storm Crow, his activities logged to date. He mentioned everything from the first recorded incident in I
srael in 1989 to Benjamin Dubin’s assertion that he was a protégé of Ilyich Ramirez Sanchez, a.k.a. Carlos the Jackal. He broke off for a moment and looked at Swann. ‘A couple of your boys visited with him again, didn’t they, Jack?’
‘Carlos? They did, but Boese’s name didn’t come up.’
‘OK.’ Byrne rolled up his sleeves. ‘That’s his history. I’m with Dubin on the Jackal theory. Boese was definitely part of the “Friends of Carlos” in 1982. It’s where he learned to master his trade. Our problem is—why has he shown up in New Orleans? But before we can answer that, we need to know the details of how he got here.’ He asked Swann to fill the gathering in on what had happened in London.
Swann stood up and exchanged cool glances with Harrison. Nothing had been said this morning, except the usual pleasantries. Harrison sat a little further down the table from him and Swann could see his gun poking out of the slim-fitting holster in the top of his boot. He told them what had happened, fully briefing them on what Ismael Boese had done in the UK the previous year: how they had discovered him in what looked like an IRA bombing in Soho, and then the investigation which had led them to a house in the west of the city. After that there was the death of an American militia sympathizer, called Bruno Kuhlmann, in Northumberland, and finally the abortive chemical attack in the City of London itself. Here, Swann paused and exchanged a smile with Logan. Harrison caught the look and glanced at her himself.
‘We arrested him on the M1 motorway,’ Swann explained finally. ‘He was making a mobile telephone call and we took him out with a firearms team. We believe that his arrest was at his own instigation. He had every opportunity to get away; he had access to a number of different passports, many of them diplomatic. He’s a master of disguise.’ He looked directly at Harrison now. ‘He makes a good Mexican, for instance. In London, he was a Greek Orthodox priest, a South American businessman, etc. etc. He didn’t get away when he could have—during the evacuation of London, for example. Instead, he hung around till everything died down and returned to a long-term storage car park, and a vehicle he would’ve known we’d track. There never was any chemical in the device in London, but enough panic was created to evacuate huge areas. When he was in custody, he set another ball rolling when he telephoned his lawyer. The next thing we knew, the Rome incident happened. That killed two hundred and eighty people, and the streets round St Peter’s Square are unlikely to be the same again.’ He sat down before he continued. ‘Boese allowed himself to get arrested, because he knew beyond any doubt that he would get out. What happened in West London with the special escort group was planned a long time ago.’