by Stuart Woods
“Good morning, Stone,” the old man said, “or good afternoon, if you’re still in London.”
“I’m still in London, sir, and I wanted to ask for some more advice.”
“Go right ahead.”
“Bartholomew is Hedger, as you suspected, and he and I have parted company.”
“Why?”
“I’ve come to the attention of the local police on a related matter, and that put him off.”
“I can see how it might,” Bernard said.
“I had thought that Hedger was working outside his agency, for personal reasons, but today I was followed by a four-man team who seem to be either British or American, probably American.”
“It’s unlikely that he would have so many people at his disposal, if he were working on his own,” Bernard said.
“That’s what I figured. Now I have another problem: I’ve learned about something that I think should be brought to the attention of some authority, but I don’t trust Hedger. Is it possible that you could connect me with someone at your former employer’s that I could talk to without Hedger finding out?”
“I think that would be very dangerous, Stone; I don’t know what’s going on internally at the Company at this moment, so it’s difficult to ascertain how much official support Hedger has. Even if I found someone for you to speak to, there’s no guarantee that he wouldn’t go straight to Hedger. And he wouldn’t be in London, either. If anything happens in the London station, Hedger is going to know it, because if he’s not actually station head, he’ll be very close to whoever is. Why don’t you want to go directly to Hedger?”
“I just don’t trust him; he’s lied to me a lot.”
“That’s what agents do; it’s not surprising.”
“I don’t yet know enough about what’s going on to know whether I might be hurting someone who’s innocent of any wrongdoing.”
“Can you give me a general idea of what’s happening?”
Stone recounted his conversation with Lance, without mentioning names.
“It sounds as if your acquaintance is going to sell something important to a foreign government or more informal organization, that our government, or at least Hedger, doesn’t want them to have. Are you actually going to put up this money?”
“I don’t know.”
“I warn you, if you do, you may involve yourself in this matter in an inextricable way.”
“I’d much rather contact some agency that could support me in this.”
Bernard was silent for a moment. “If you don’t trust Hedger, then I think you should go to the British.”
“Can you give me a name?”
“I’ll give someone yours,” Bernard said. “If you get a call from someone who says he’s a friend of Sam’s, see him.”
“Thank you, sir,” Stone said.
“Keep me posted,” Bernard replied. “I’m beginning to enjoy this.”
Stone hung up the phone, laughing.
44
STONE HAD EXPECTED TO GET A CALL from someone soon, but it didn’t come. He didn’t see any point in going out, just to be followed, so he stayed home, looking in on Dino to find him snoring away. Maybe he wasn’t immune to jet lag, after all. Stone found a movie on TV and settled in.
Early in the evening, Dino came into the suite, rubbing his eyes. “I don’t know what happened,” he said. “I was watching cricket, and then I practically passed out.”
“Jet lag.”
“If you say so. You hungry?”
“Almost. You want to order dinner now, or wait for a while.”
“You don’t want to go out?”
“Not really.”
Stone heard an odd noise, and he turned to see an envelope being slid under the door.
“Looks like a message for you,” Dino said.
“That’s not one of the Connaught’s message envelopes,” Stone said, staring at it.
“Well, are you going to open it? The suspense is killing me.” Dino yawned.
Stone retrieved the envelope, which had nothing written on it. He opened it and took out a single sheet of paper. Written in block capitals was a message: AFTER TEN MINUTES TAKE THE WEST LIFT UP ONE FLOOR, TURN LEFT OUT OF THE LIFT, AND WALK TO THE END OF THE CORRIDOR. THE DOOR WILL BE AJAR. It was unsigned. He handed it to Dino, who read it and smiled.
“I love this kind of stuff,” he chuckled. “You have any idea who it’s from? A woman, I’ll bet.”
“I don’t think so,” Stone said. “I called a friend and asked to be introduced to somebody on this side of the water. I think this is it.”
“Whatever you say; I still think it’s a woman. It always is with you.”
After ten minutes, Stone did as he was told. He figured out which sides of the hotel the two elevators were on, then took the west one up a flight and walked down the corridor. A door at the end was ajar. He rapped lightly and walked in. “Hello?”
He was standing in a small vestibule with three doors. One of them opened and a woman smiled at him. “Mr. Barrington?” She was of medium height, wearing a gray business suit and lightweight horn-rimmed glasses, dark hair. Stone thought she’d be quite pretty without the glasses and with a little more makeup. “Yes,” he said.
She opened the door to reveal a large sitting room. “Please come in and have a seat; he’ll be with you shortly. May I get you something to drink?”
“Some fizzy water would be nice,” he replied.
She went to a cabinet at one side of the large room, opened it to reveal a full bar, and poured two glasses of San Pellegrino mineral water.
She returned to where Stone was sitting, handed him a glass, and sat down. “My name is Carpenter,” she said. Her accent was clipped, of indistinguishable class, at least to him.
“How do you do?”
“Very well, thank you.”
“For whom are we waiting?”
“For me, old chap,” a voice said from behind him. He turned to find a man in his mid-thirties entering the room, apparently from the bedroom. He was dressed in a severely cut pin-striped suit, and what Stone imagined was a club tie, though he didn’t know which club. It was dark blue or black, with a single sky-blue stripe.
“Thank you for coming up,” he said briskly. “Sorry to be so cloak-and-dagger, but from what our mutual friend, Sam, told me, you’ve picked up a rather elaborate tail.” His accent was terribly upper-class.
“It seems so.”
“My name is Mason.” He didn’t offer to shake hands. Instead, he went to the bar, poured himself a Scotch, no ice, then sat down opposite Stone. “Sounds as though you’ve gotten yourself mixed up in something.”
“How much did our friend tell you?”
“Why don’t you tell me the whole thing from the very start?”
“Why don’t you tell me what you already know? It would save me repeating myself.”
Mason smiled tightly. “You’re a cautious chap, aren’t you?”
Stone shrugged.
“Apparently, you think somebody wants to sell something he shouldn’t be selling to someone who shouldn’t be buying it. That sum it up?”
“Pretty much.”
“And you’ve fallen out with Stan Hedger, whom you don’t trust anymore, right?”
“Pretty much.”
“But you came to London at his request.”
“Yes.”
“And you’ve attracted the attention of the police. How, may I ask?”
“You may have read in the papers about two gentlemen found dead in the trunk of a car in Hyde Park?”
“I heard of it less than an hour after they were discovered. Are you connected to that incident in some way?”
“One of them was wearing my raincoat.”
Mason burst out laughing. “Goodness, that would put the coppers onto you, wouldn’t it. Who’s the man in charge, if you know his name?”
“Detective Inspector Evelyn Throckmorton.”
“Oh, yes, he’s all right.”
&
nbsp; “I was already acquainted with him.”
“How?”
“I used to be a police detective in New York; a friend of mine on the force introduced me to him.”
“Nice to have an introduction in a strange city, isn’t it? Well, I think you should forget about the detective inspector and put your trust in me, from here on in,” Mason said. “Sam thought so, too.”
“All right.”
Carpenter got up, went to a briefcase on a table, took out a small tape recorder, set it on the coffee table, and switched it on; then she sat back and prepared to listen.
Mason made a motion that Stone should continue.
Stone looked at the recorder, then at Carpenter, then Mason. He shook his head slowly.
Mason leaned forward and switched off the recorder. “My, my, you are cautious, aren’t you?”
Stone nodded. “I wouldn’t like to hear this conversation played back to me in a courtroom someday.”
“Entirely understandable,” Mason said. “You’re a lawyer, Sam tells me.”
“Right.”
“Well, let me put your mind at rest, Mr. Barrington; Carpenter and I are not the police; the organization we work for conducts its business without reference to the police, unless we need them for some small chore or other. Tell me, just between us. Do you believe that you may have committed a crime while in Britain?”
“I didn’t shoot those two men, if that’s what you mean.”
“Anything else? Drug smuggling? Rape? Incest? Cross the street without looking both ways?”
“No, nothing.”
“You didn’t boot poor James Cutler off that yacht, did you?”
“No.”
“That’s what I heard; heard you did your damnedest to save the poor chap.”
“I got wet.”
Mason leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, and his voice changed, lowered, became friendlier. “Relax, Stone,” he said. “We’re here to help. Start at the beginning, now.”
Stone took a deep breath and, once more, started at the beginning.
45
WHEN STONE HAD FINISHED TELLING them everything, Mason just stared at him for a long moment. “Extraordinary,” he drawled.
Stone looked at Carpenter; she nodded.
“Rather,” she said.
He wasn’t sure whether this meant they didn’t believe him. “Do you have any questions for me?”
“Well, let me tell you a few things: First, David Beth Alachmy is the new Mossad station chief in London; old Stan was right about that; second, the two chaps in the car were Beth Alachmy’s men; third, the abduction and interrogation of you by Beth Alachmy and his thugs was way, way out of bounds, and I will see that he is suitably punished for it.”
“Thank you, but I don’t really care about that,” Stone replied. “I just want to get this thing over with and get back to New York.”
“Our sentiments exactly,” Mason said. “I hope we can have you out of here in just a few days.”
“Thank you.”
“We’re aware of Lance Cabot and his little consulting business, but this is the first we’ve heard of Ali and Sheila; we’ll be looking into them.”
“Fine.”
“Oh, I assume you do actually have the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars that Cabot wants for his project?”
“Well, yes, in a brokerage account in New York.”
“I think the very first thing you’ll want to do is have that transferred to the offshore account, as Cabot requested.”
“But—”
“Oh, don’t actually give it to him; just let him confirm that you’ve got it in the account. When we’re done, you can wire it back to your brokerage account.”
“I suppose—”
“Now, the first thing we’ve got to do is to get you out of this hotel.”
“Why?” Stone asked plaintively. “I like it here.”
“Because Stan’s people know where to find you, and they can follow you anywhere from here,” Mason said, as if he were explaining things to a child. “Do you have somewhere you can go?”
Stone thought for a moment. “Let me make a phone call.”
“Of course.”
He picked up a phone and called Sarah at her London flat.
“Hi.”
“Well, hello; I was wondering when I was going to hear from you.”
“Have our mutual acquaintances cleared out of James’s house?”
“Yes, all gone.”
“Do you mind if Dino and I move in there for a few days? I’ve got to get out of the Connaught; they’re booked up, apparently.”
“Dino’s in London?”
“Yes.”
“Well, of course you can stay there; when do you want to go?”
“Immediately.”
“All right; why don’t I cook us all some dinner over there? James has a decent kitchen, and I can pick up some things on the way.”
“That would be wonderful.”
“See you in an hour?”
“That’s good. Bye.” He hung up and turned to Mason. “We can go to James Cutler’s house in Chester Street.”
“Ah yes, good,” Mason said. “Who is Dino?”
“Dino Bacchetti, my old partner at the NYPD. He got into town yesterday.”
“All right, then; you go and get packed up, and I’ll send someone for your luggage. I believe your bill is going to Stan Hedger?”
“Yes.”
“Good, that solves that. We’ll be taking you out of the hotel by a rear exit.”
“Fine.”
“Oh, by the way, Sam asked me to ask you if Hedger ever gave you any sort of electronic device—a radio, a pager, a clock—to carry around with you?”
“Yes, he gave me a satellite telephone.”
“You’ll want to give that to me; he’s been using it to track your whereabouts.”
Stone felt like a complete ass. “All right.”
“I’ll come and get you in, say, three-quarters of an hour.”
“Good.” Stone left the suite and went back to his own.
Dino was still watching cricket. “You know, I think I’m beginning to get the hang of this game.”
“It’s an illusion; no American will ever understand it.”
“You ready for some dinner?”
“Yes, but Sarah is cooking it for us; get packed, we’re moving out of the hotel.”
“But I like it here,” Dino said. “It’s nice—you push a button and somebody comes to take care of you.”
“I’ve just had a meeting with some British intelligence people, and they want us out of here; they say it’s the only way we’ll ever lose the tail that Hedger put on us.”
“We’re going right now?”
“Very shortly; just get your luggage ready to go.”
Dino switched off the cricket match with reluctance.
At the appointed time, the porter rapped on their door. “Good evening, Mr. Barrington. I’m to take your bags down to the kitchen.”
“There they are,” Stone said, pointing to the pile. “Mr. Bacchetti’s, too.”
“There’s a lady waiting for you at the lift.”
Stone and Dino walked to the elevator, where Carpenter was waiting for them, the door open. He introduced Dino.
Once in the elevator, Carpenter inserted a key into a lock and turned it. “This will get us to the lower level,” she said.
Stone watched her on the way down; she really was very attractive, in her muted way. The lift doors opened, and Carpenter led them down a hallway, past the kitchens, and out a rear door. There were three identical gray vans waiting outside, and the porter was loading their luggage into the middle one.
Mason appeared from behind them. “Give me Hedger’s phone,” he said.
Stone took the phone from an inside pocket and handed it to him.
Mason looked around him, then spotted a truck unloading seafood for the hotel. He tossed the phone over the crates of fish into t
he rear of the truck. “There,” he said. “That will keep your tail busy. Get into the center van.”
Stone and Dino climbed into the rear seat with Carpenter, while Mason got into the front.
“We’ll wait until the fish lorry goes,” he said.
As if on command, the truck started up and moved out of the mews, then turned right at the street.
“Wait,” Mason said. “Let them register the move.” He glanced at his watch. Two minutes passed, then Mason said, “Now; turn left at the end.”
The three vans moved out.
“Why do I feel like a load of laundry?” Dino asked.
“This would be your policeman friend?” Mason asked.
“Yes,” Stone said. “This is Lieutenant Dino Bacchetti, of the New York Police Department.”
“Enchanted,” Mason drawled, without turning around.
“Yeah, me too,” Dino said.
The three vans drove into Grosvenor Square and at the next corner, each went in a different direction, none of them toward James’s house.
“The house is in Chester Street, off Belgrave Square,” Stone reminded Mason.
“I know, old chap,” Mason said. “We’re just going to lead any possible tail on a merry chase before we turn for home. I’ve visited the house, actually. James Cutler and I were at Eton together a couple of hundred years ago. He was a good chap, and I’m grateful to you for what you tried to do for him.” He paused. “I’m not so sure about this Miss Sarah Buckminster.”
Dino dug Stone in the ribs.
46
THEY ARRIVED AT THE CHESTER STREET house, and the van’s driver set Stone’s and Dino’s luggage on the sidewalk.
“We won’t come in,” Mason said. He handed Stone a tiny cellphone, its charger, and an extra battery. “If anyone asks, you rented this through the concierge at the Connaught.” He handed Stone an index card with a list of numbers written on it. “These are my and Carpenter’s cellphone numbers,” he said. “If there’s no answer, you’ll have an opportunity to leave a message, and one of us will get back to you quickly. I suggest you memorize them and destroy the card. Your number is there, too.”