Nom de Guerre

by Gulvin, Jeff

  ‘Well, baby doll, the D.C. contingent have gone back to D.C. The Reno people have homes to go to and who gives a shit what Harrison thinks? Besides, I can sleep with who I like, just as long as it doesn’t interfere with my work. Jack, we got agents married to each other who work in the same office, some on the same squads. We call them GS26s.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Hump agents are mostly GS13 in service grade.’

  ‘And two together is 26.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  She pushed her plate away and took his hand. ‘How long they gonna let you stay over here, d’you think?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ll have to call in again and check.’

  ‘You been in touch though, huh.’

  ‘Oh yes.’ He looked beyond her and saw Harrison walking purposefully towards the table. ‘I’m going to sort this thing with him,’ he said. ‘One way or the other.’

  ‘Watch yourself, baby.’

  Swann leaned over and kissed her. ‘I’m tougher than I look, sweetheart.’ He got up from the table. ‘You fancy a game of pool somewhere, Harrison?’

  Harrison looked in his eyes. ‘Why not,’ he said.

  They left Logan and walked three blocks down the street to a small, dimly lit bar in a side street. Harrison pushed open the door and Swann followed him inside. A group of bikers sat at one table, some women with them. Working men lined the barstools, in checked shirts and baseball hats and grubby-looking jeans. Swann felt various sets of eyes on his back. He still wore his suit and tie and felt distinctly out of place. Two pool tables were set back-to-back on a raised section away from the bar. Harrison tossed him two quarters and jerked his thumb at the table. ‘Rack ’em,’ he said.

  Swann walked past the table where the bikers were sitting and placed the money in the slots. Then he racked for a game of eightball. Harrison dumped his jacket over Swann’s, where he had laid it on a chair, and selected a cue from the wall. He rolled it on the table under the flat of his hand, then did the same with another. Satisfied, he chalked the end and nodded to the twin bottles of Coors he had brought over from the bar; then he settled himself to break. ‘We play for a beer a stick,’ he said.

  Harrison broke and dropped both a striped and a spotted ball. ‘Still open,’ he said. ‘One ball, right here.’ He slapped the pocket next to him and played a double off the top rail. Swann watched the ball drop into the hole. Harrison lit a cigarette and did not remove it from his mouth as he bent for the next shot, which rattled into the middle pocket. Swann sat down with his beer. One of the bikers, big-bellied and bearded, was watching him. Harrison hit three more down before Swann got to play a shot.

  They played four games and Harrison won them all. ‘You’re not very good at this, are you, limey?’ he said, as Swann went to the bar for more beer. Swann just smiled at him. He bought another round and carried the bottles back to the table. One of the bikers was on his feet, talking to Harrison.

  ‘He challenged, bubba,’ Harrison told him. ‘You got to sit this one out.’

  The biker was big and tattooed and mean-looking. Swann watched the way he watched Harrison closely with each shot, looking for some sign of cheating. Harrison beat him easily.

  ‘Another,’ the biker said.

  Harrison shook his head. ‘Play somebody else, bro. I’m all done here.’

  ‘I wanna play you or him.’ The man staggered a little as he jerked his thumb over his shoulder.

  ‘Listen, partner. He don’t wanna play, and I don’t wanna play. You understand?’

  ‘Son-of-a-fucking-bitch.’

  Harrison was suddenly in his face, FBI shield in his hand. ‘Go away, asshole.’

  The biker blinked and looked at him, then at the badge. ‘Fuck it,’ he said, turned on his heel and left the bar. Harrison sat down with Swann and tossed the shield on to the table.

  ‘Has its advantages,’ he said. ‘FBI, can’t lie to get in, gotta lie to stay in.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Forget it. Just an old cliché.’

  Swann stared at him. He looked beaten and tired, and unimpressed with his life. ‘You better get whatever it is that’s bugging you off your chest, Harrison,’ he said. ‘Because it’s eating you up.’

  Harrison poked a finger at him. ‘You, brother. You are on my chest.’

  ‘So, what’re you going to do about it?’

  Harrison lit a cigarette and blew smoke at him. ‘Last year, I nearly got my ass burned for good because of you.’

  ‘So I’ve heard.’ Swann could feel a pulse jerking at his temple. He leaned forward. ‘I’m sorry about that. It wasn’t my intention. I went to Paris with Louis Byrne to check on a receipt you got from Salvesen’s office. I told my girlfriend I was going. I had no idea who she really was at that time.’

  ‘You were an asshole.’

  Swann opened his mouth and let the blocked air go. He thought back over the last few years, the dreams, the cold sweats, the fear. All of it topped by Pia and Ismael Boese. He could see Boese’s eyes in his mind. He could see Pia’s eyes, dark and big and looking longingly at him. Even now he wanted to believe her, believe what Webb had told him, that a part of her was genuine. But he could not, not quite. If she had not forced him to talk that night when he had been dreaming of Nanga Parbat, then perhaps.

  ‘You know something, Harrison,’ he said suddenly, ‘you can go to hell for all I care. If I was responsible for getting you compromised, I’m truly sorry. But I never was and never will be an asshole.’

  Harrison was staring at him still, the drink evident in the edge of his eyes. ‘I was almost hanged, Swann.’

  ‘I can’t do anything about it.’ Swann flapped his hands at his sides.

  Harrison plucked a cigarette from his shirt pocket and scraped a match head on the heel of his boot. He flapped it out and ran the burnt end across the back of his hand. ‘Why’d they pick you over somebody else?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s none of your business.’

  ‘Come on, bubba. What was the deal there, why’d Boese pick you out from the crowd?’ Harrison rocked on his stool. ‘Come on, man. Don’t you think I got a right to know? I mean, they got to you, didn’t they. They musta picked you out for a reason.’

  ‘I’m not going into that, Harrison. Just leave it alone.’

  ‘Come on.’ Harrison slapped him lightly in the chest with the backs of his fingers. His eyes were tight and cold. ‘Talk to me, duchess. I got a right to know.’

  ‘Fuck you.’ Swann got up and went for his jacket. Harrison half rose and caught hold of his wrist.

  ‘Let go.’ Swann was tense now—back on the Falls Road, being compromised himself, with only Webb to back him up. Harrison did not let go. And then Swann hit him, a right cross, flush on the jaw. Harrison reeled back over the pool table. The bar was absolutely silent. Swann picked up his jacket and walked across the floor, out of the door and on to the street.

  Harrison got up from the pool table and rubbed his jaw where the blow still sang in his teeth. He shook his head to clear the fog behind his eyes. The other drinkers were looking at him. Ignoring them, he stuffed his shield away and picked up his jacket. When he got to the street, Swann was nowhere to be seen.

  Swann took the elevator to their floor and paused outside his own door. Maybe he just ought to be alone, lie in his own bed and think his own thoughts. But Harrison had rattled him, shaken up all the emotions he was so desperately trying to smother. He knocked on Logan’s door. She answered it with a towel wrapped round her, very white against the black of her skin. She saw his face, the trouble burning quietly in his eyes, and touched his cheek with her palm. ‘Hey, baby doll. What’s up?’

  Swann kissed her, then took her to bed. They made love for a long time, and gradually the tension eased like sweat from his pores. He explored every inch of her body, holding her, breathing her into him, touching her skin with his fingers, his body, his tongue. He drew tight black nipples into his mouth and sucked them till they were hard.
She worked her thighs against him, long fingernails raking his scalp. He spread her legs wide and entered her, resting on his fists, while she held his waist. He closed his eyes and dreams flooded his skull. Back on that mountain. Snow and ice and the wall stretching above him. The Diamir face. The Merkl Gully and Steve Brady’s twisted features. And then the horrible, high-pitched wail, as the snow ledge collapsed and Brady fell to his death.

  Swann cried out as he came, and his eyes were wide and staring. He rolled on to his side with the sweat pouring off him. Logan was up, sitting next to him, her hand on his face, smoothing the crescent of lines in his brow. She touched his hair, brushed his face with her lips, then kissed him gently on the mouth.

  ‘I can never get it out of my system, Chey,’ he said. ‘No matter what I do, I see that hill. I see that fucking ice cliff and I see myself sawing and sawing that rope.’ He sat up, scrabbling for cigarettes. ‘Steve begged me not to kill him, pleaded with me.’ He lit the cigarette with trembling hands. ‘“Don’t kill me, Jack.” That’s what he said. “Please don’t kill me.”’

  Logan got up, poured them both a shot of whisky and handed him a glass. Swann drank, gagged, then pulled her towards him again. ‘If I hadn’t told Pia,’ he said. ‘If I could’ve just kept that bit to myself, they wouldn’t own me like they do.’ He shook his head. ‘When Boese was inside, it was bearable. I had won—at least, I thought I had. I was on tenterhooks all the time he was on remand. I promised him thirty years, and I was desperate to get him away and out of my head. I was dealing with the Pia thing, slowly, in my own way, without getting too fucked up.’ He stopped and sucked on the cigarette. ‘Then Boese gets out and it all goes to ratshit.’ He sat up again, resting his palm on her thigh. ‘Then this thing with Harrison to cap it all.’

  ‘What happened tonight?’

  Swann laughed. ‘He called me out and I hit him.’

  ‘You did what?’ She sat up. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Nothing. That’s it. He called me out, and I whacked him. He went flying. Best punch I ever threw.’ He rubbed at the raised skin on his knuckles.

  They lay together quietly after that and then made love again. Swann got up for a shower and let the hot prickles of water burn the weariness from his skin. He went back to the bedroom, towelling his hair. Logan was sitting up in bed with the sheet below her breasts. ‘God, you are beautiful,’ he said. ‘Will you marry me, Chey?’

  She burst out laughing and he sat down on the bed, laughing himself. ‘Better?’ she said, laying the warmth of her palm on his leg.

  ‘Much.’

  ‘George Webb called while you were in the shower. He wants you to call him back.’

  Webb had gone to see Pia Grava again. Christine Harris had the situation set up with Janice Martin, and GCHQ were monitoring everything that was said in the clubhouse, which was not very much. No business anyway, other than stuff about motorbikes. Collier was careful, very careful. He made sure nothing was said on the telephone when out of town members made their twice weekly phone calls.

  Webb had reread the entire notes made on Operation Stormcloud, right up to where they apprehended Boese. He checked the back files again, then the events leading up to the situation in Rome. It began with the car bomb in Soho, an IRA timing and power unit, but no coded warning, which was something they had not done in years. A successful controlled explosion and then the investigation that followed. Boese led them to a house in West London, where they laid siege only to find him gone; guns set up, the floorboards taken up. The Syrian passport, triacetone triperoxide crystals in felt-tip pens. Boese wanted them to find him, but remained one step ahead of the game right up until the very end, when he allowed himself to get caught. Pia always able to slip him bits and pieces of information because of her relationship with Swann.

  He sat at his desk and checked everything they had on her. They had her cellphone records, and there were two numbers that they had not initially been able to account for. One, they had discovered, was Boese’s cloned mobile, and the other given to her so she could make a return call to him on an aeroplane. Webb looked at that number now and it troubled him a fraction. They had never traced it to its source. There had been no need, with Boese in custody and a full confession from Pia.

  He laid the bills out on the table, as he sat across from Pia one more time. She looked better than when he had last seen her with Swann. Her skin had more of a glow to it and she did not look quite so weary. She asked him about Swann and he told her, gently, that she had to forget about Swann.

  ‘I have, George.’ She drew in her lips. ‘In my way. I saw him. I needed to see him. There was nothing we could say. I feel better for it. But it’s hard, though, especially in here. I got attached to him. I got attached to his children. How are they?’

  ‘Good. He doesn’t see so much of them now, of course.’

  ‘That must be very hard. He got very used to having them.’ She clasped her fingers together. ‘Did you know my trial is set for April 15th?’

  ‘Good.’ He looked at her, his blue eyes soft. ‘Everything you’ve helped us with will go into the file, Pia.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. I mean, Brigitte.’

  She laid a hand on his and squeezed. ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ve been Pia for so long, I think of myself as her.’

  Webb looked at the notes in front of him, the words in his head again: We have been betrayed. ‘I need to ask you some more stuff,’ he said. ‘With Boese getting out we’re back to where we started.’ He tapped the phone bill with one finger and spun the page so it faced her. ‘Can you remember this call?’

  ‘To an airphone. I think I told you.’

  Webb nodded. ‘It might be important now. It wasn’t before, because we had Boese. But the more this goes on, the more my guts tell me something is wrong. This was Boese you called, yes?’

  She lifted her hands. ‘I assume so, George. Why shouldn’t it be?’

  ‘No reason. It was definitely the man, the voice, that gave you your orders.’

  She nodded.

  ‘Did you speak to more than one person?’

  She took both his hands in hers. ‘George, I can’t tell you that. I don’t know. I spoke to one man or many men, every time a different voice, a different accent. I really couldn’t tell you.’

  ‘OK. Had you received any land-line calls around the time you took and made this one?’

  ‘I don’t remember. I don’t think so.’

  He looked at the phone bill again. ‘All these other numbers are accounted for?’

  ‘Yes. We’ve been through them.’

  ‘Right. I need to find out what flight this was and where, then get the passenger manifest.’ He spoke half as if to himself. ‘I should’ve done it at the time. Maximalist, Webb, remember.’ He smiled at her then. ‘Getting senile, Pia. I’ve started talking to myself.’

  She smiled at him and he stood up. ‘Take care,’ he said. ‘And remember, when that trial comes up, the full facts will be told. Believe me. You’ll do time, Pia, but no one’s going to hang you out to dry as some kind of scapegoat, with Boese over the wall.’ He walked to the door and knocked. ‘Oh, by the way, one thing I meant to ask you. When Jack was in Paris with Louis Byrne, you phoned and told Boese, didn’t you.’

  She bit her lip. ‘I should’ve done. I was supposed to report all Jack’s movements. But I was sick of things then, and, besides, I was at your house with Caroline and the children.’

  Webb felt a little shiver trickle the length of his spine. He sat down again. ‘Tell me that again.’

  ‘I didn’t tell anyone about Jack being in Paris,’ she said.

  ‘No one at all?’

  ‘No one.’

  Webb’s eyes were narrow slits in his head, and he stared through her to the wall. A key rattled in the metal door behind him.

  Swann phoned Webb from the hotel bedroom and listened intently to everything he had to say. His breath got stuck as he learned that he was not responsible for Harrison being
compromised. ‘You’re joking,’ he said at last.

  ‘No, I’m not.’ Webb’s voice was chipped and edgy. ‘Why would she lie, Jack? What could she possibly gain now?’

  ‘You’re right. She wouldn’t lie. There is nothing to gain.’

  ‘Think about it. Whoever called Salvesen was covering his tracks. Harrison got burned at that particular time in order to deliberately implicate you.’ Webb paused for a moment. ‘There’s someone else on the inside, Jack. There always has been. And the only people who knew you were in Paris were people on the team. That’s the security group, Box, and the FBI liaison.’

  Swann was quiet for a moment, then said: ‘Another thing occurs to me, given all of this.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘If you were Storm Crow, would you allow yourself to be caught so you could make one dramatic phone call? Or would you send someone else in your stead?’

  He put the phone down and turned to Logan. For a long moment he looked at her, a mixture of fear and relief in his eyes. He could bury this thing with Harrison. But there was somebody on the inside. Storm Crow had penetrated further than just Jack Swann. It was, as Webb said, either the UK security services or the Foreign Emergency Search Team. Logan had been part of that team.

  ‘Good news?’ she said, with a smile.

  ‘I think so, Chey. I think so.’ He swallowed and looked her right in the eye. Could it be possible for two women to betray him? ‘I didn’t blow Harrison’s cover,’ he said.

  21

  ANGIE BYRNE ATE A breakfast sandwich in the sunshine on the roof of her company’s building on New York Avenue. She sipped coffee and picked at the bagel, letting her gaze wander to the Washington Monument. Her cellphone rang on the glass-topped table and she picked it up.

  ‘Hello,’ she said.

  ‘How’s my attorney today, ready to represent me?’

  ‘How did you get this number?’

  ‘I can get whatever I like. I had a very good teacher. Tell me something. D’you think the jackal and the crow ate at the same time?’