“You’ll have to start from the beginning again; my head’s shredded. The telephone number in New York, the license plates—”
“The body, Alex! Flannagan and the general’s wife! They’re on their way; that was the deal and you’ve got to cover it.”
“Just like that? Swayne kills himself and the two people on the premises who can answer questions, we say Ciao to them and let them get away? That’s only slightly more lunatic than what you’ve told me!”
“We don’t have time for negotiating games—and besides, he can’t answer any more questions. They were on different levels.”
“Oh, boy, that’s really clear.”
“Do it. Let them go. We may need them both later.”
Conklin sighed, his indecision apparent. “Are you sure? It’s very complicated.”
“Do it! For Christ’s sake, Alex, I don’t give a goddamn about complications or violations or all the manipulations you can dream up! I want Carlos! We’re building a net and we can pull him in—I can pull him in!”
“All right, all right. There’s a doctor in Falls Church that we’ve used before in special operations. I’ll get hold of him, he’ll know what to do.”
“Good,” said Bourne, his mind racing. “Now put me on tape. I’ll give you everything Flannagan gave me. Hurry up, I’ve got a lot to do.”
“You’re on tape, Delta One.”
Reading from the list he had written down in Flannagan’s cabin, Jason spoke rapidly, enunciating clearly so that there would be no confusion on the tape. There were the names of seven frequent and acknowledged guests at the general’s dinner parties, none guaranteed as to accuracy or spelling but with broad-brush descriptions; then came the license plates, all from the far more serious twice-monthly meetings. Next to last were the telephone numbers of Swayne’s lawyer, all of the estate’s guards, the dog kennels and the Pentagon extension for assigned vehicles; finally there was the unlisted telephone in New York, no name here, only a machine that took messages. “That’s got to be a priority one, Alex.”
“We’ll break it,” said Conklin, inserting himself on the tape. “I’ll call the kennels and talk Pentagonese—the general’s being flown to a hush-factor post and we pay double for getting the animals out first thing in the morning. Open the gates, incidentally.… The licenses are no problem and I’ll have Casset run the names through the computers behind DeSole’s back.”
“What about Swayne? We’ve got to keep the suicide quiet for a while.”
“How long?”
“How the hell do I know?” replied Jason, exasperated. “Until we find out who they all are and I can reach them—or you can reach them—and together we can start the wave of panic rolling. That’s when we plant the Carlos solution.”
“Words,” said Conklin, his tone not flattering. “You could be talking about days, maybe a week or even longer.”
“Then that’s what I’m talking about.”
“Then we’d better damn well bring in Peter Holland—”
“No, not yet. We don’t know what he’d do and I’m not giving him the chance to get in my way.”
“You’ve got to trust someone besides me, Jason. I can fool the doctor perhaps for twenty-four or forty-eight hours—perhaps—but I doubt much longer than that. He’ll want higher authorization. And don’t forget, I’ve got Casset breathing down my neck over DeSole—”
“Give me two days, get me two days!”
“While tracking down all this information and stalling Charlie, and lying through my teeth to Peter, telling them that we’re making progress running down the Jackal’s possible couriers at the Mayflower hotel—we think … Of course, we’re doing nothing of the sort because we’re up to our credentials in some off-the-wall, twenty-year-old Saigon conspiracy involving who knows what, damned if we know, except that the who is terribly impressive. Without going into statuses—or is it statae—we’re now told they have their own private cemetery on the grounds of the general officer in charge of Pentagon procurements, who just happened to blow his head off, a minor incident we’re sitting on.… Jesus, Delta, back up! The missiles are colliding!”
Though he was standing in front of Swayne’s desk, the general’s corpse in the chair beside him, Bourne managed a tentative, slow smile. “That’s what we’re counting on, isn’t it? It’s a scenario that could have been written by our beloved Saint Alex himself.”
“I’m only along for the ride, I’m not steering—”
“What about the doctor?” interrupted Jason. “You’ve been out of operation for almost five years. How do you know he’s still in business?”
“I run into him now and then; we’re both museum mavens. A couple of months ago at the Corcoran Gallery he complained that he wasn’t given much to do these days.”
“Change that tonight.”
“I’ll try. What are you going to do?”
“Delicately pull apart everything in this room.”
“Gloves?”
“Surgical, of course.”
“Don’t touch the body.”
“Only the pockets—very delicately.… Swayne’s wife is coming down the stairs. I’ll call you back when they’re gone. Get hold of that doctor!”
Ivan Jax, M. D. by way of Yale Medical School, surgical training and residency at Massachusetts General, College of Surgeons by appointment, Jamaican by birth, and erstwhile “consultant” to the Central Intelligence Agency courtesy of a fellow black man with the improbable name of Cactus, drove through the gates of General Swayne’s estate in Manassas, Virginia. There were times, thought Ivan, when he wished he had never met old Cactus and this was one of them, but tonight not-withstanding, he never regretted that Cactus had come into his life. Thanks to the old man’s “magic papers,” Jax had gotten his brother and sister out of Jamaica during the repressive Manley years when established professionals were all but prohibited from emigrating and certainly not with personal funds.
Cactus, however, using complex mock-ups of government permits had sprung both young adults out of the country along with bank transfers honored in Lisbon. All the aged forger requested were stolen blank copies of various official documents, including import/export bills of lading, the two people’s passports, separate photographs and copies of several signatures belonging to certain men in positions of authority—easily obtainable through the hundreds of bureaucratic edicts published in the government-controlled press. Ivan’s brother was currently a wealthy barrister in London and his sister a research fellow at Cambridge.
Yes, he owed Cactus, thought Dr. Jax as he swung his station wagon around the curve to the front of the house, and when the old man had asked him to “consult” with a few “friends over in Langley” seven years ago, he had obliged. Some consultation! Still, there were further perks forthcoming in Ivan’s silent association with the intelligence agency. When his island home threw out Manley, and Seaga came to power, among the first of the “appropriated” properties to be returned to their rightful owners were the Jax family’s holdings in Montego Bay and Port Antonio. That had been Alex Conklin’s doing, but without Cactus there would have been no Conklin, not in Ivan’s circle of friends.… But why did Alex have to call tonight? Tonight was his twelfth wedding anniversary, and he had sent the kids on an overnight with the neighbors’ children so that he and his wife could be alone, alone with grilled Jamaic’ ribs on the patio—prepared by the only one who knew how, namely, Chef Ivan—a lot of good dark Overton rum, and some highly erotic skinny-dipping in the pool. Damn Alex! Double damn the son-of-a-bitch bachelor who could only respond to the event of a wedding anniversary by saying, “What the hell? You made the year, so what’s a day count? Get your jollies tomorrow, I need you tonight.”
So he had lied to his wife, the former head nurse at Mass. General. He told her that a patient’s life was in the balance—it was, but it had already tipped the wrong way. She had replied that perhaps her next husband would be more considerate of her life, but her sad smile and he
r understanding eyes denied her words. She knew death. Hurry, my darling!
Jax turned off the engine, grabbed his medical bag and got out of the car. He walked around the hood as the front door opened and a tall man in what appeared to be dark skintight clothing stood silhouetted in the frame. “I’m your doctor,” said Ivan, walking up the steps. “Our mutual friend didn’t give me your name, but I guess I’m not supposed to have it.”
“I guess not,” agreed Bourne, extending a hand in a surgical glove as Jax approached.
“And I guess we’re both right,” said Jax, shaking hands with the stranger. “The mitt you’re wearing is pretty familiar to me.”
“Our mutual friend didn’t tell me you were black.”
“Is that a problem for you?”
“Good Christ, no. I like our friend even more. It probably never occurred to him to say anything.”
“I think we’ll get along. Let’s go, no-name.”
Bourne stood ten feet to the right of the desk as Jax swiftly, expertly tended to the corpse, mercifully wrapping the head in gauze. Without explaining, he had cut away sections of the general’s clothing, examining those parts of the body beneath the fabric. Finally, he carefully rolled the hooded body off the chair and onto the floor. “Are you finished in here?” he asked, looking over at Jason.
“I’ve swept it clean, Doctor, if that’s what you mean.”
“It usually is.… I want this room sealed. No one’s to enter it after we leave until our mutual friend gives the word.”
“I certainly can’t guarantee that,” said Bourne.
“Then he’ll have to.”
“Why?”
“Your general didn’t commit suicide, no-name. He was murdered.”
12
“The woman,” said Alex Conklin over the line. “From everything you told me it had to be Swayne’s wife. Jesus!”
“It doesn’t change anything, but it looks that way,” agreed Bourne halfheartedly. “She had reason enough to do it, God knows—still, if she did, she didn’t tell Flannagan, and that doesn’t make sense.”
“No, it doesn’t.…” Conklin paused, then spoke quickly. “Let me talk to Ivan.”
“Ivan? Your doctor? His name is Ivan?”
“So?”
“Nothing. He’s outside … ‘packing the merchandise’ was the way he put it.”
“In his wagon?”
“That’s right. We carried the body—”
“What makes him so sure it wasn’t suicide?” broke in Alex.
“Swayne was drugged. He said he’d call you later and explain. He wants to get out of here and no one’s to come into this room after we leave—after I leave—until you give the word for the police. He’ll tell you that, too.”
“Christ, it must be a mess in there.”
“It’s not pretty. What do you want me to do?”
“Pull the curtains, if there are any; check the windows and, if possible, lock the door. If there’s no way to lock it, look around for—”
“I found a set of keys in Swayne’s pocket,” interrupted Jason. “I checked; one of them fits.”
“Good. When you leave, wipe the door down clean. Find some furniture polish or a dusting spray.”
“That’s not going to keep out anyone who wants to get in.”
“No, but if someone does, we might pick up a print.”
“You’re reaching—”
“I certainly am,” concurred the former intelligence officer. “I’ve also got to figure out a way to seal up the whole place without using anybody from Langley, and, not incidentally, keep the Pentagon at bay just in case someone among those twenty-odd thousand people wants to reach Swayne, and that includes his office and probably a couple of hundred buyers and sellers a day in procurements.… Christ, it’s impossible!”
“It’s perfect,” contradicted Bourne as Dr. Ivan Jax suddenly appeared in the doorway. “Our little game of destabilization will start right here on the ‘farm.’ Do you have Cactus’s number?”
“Not with me. I think it’s probably in a shoebox at home.”
“Call Mo Panov, he’s got it. Then reach Cactus and tell him to get to a pay phone and call me here.”
“What the hell have you got in mind? I hear that old man’s name, I get nervous.”
“You told me I had to find someone else to trust besides you. I just did. Reach him, Alex.” Jason hung up the telephone. “I’m sorry, Doctor … or maybe under the circumstances I can use your name. Hello, Ivan.”
“Hello, no-name, which is the way I’d like to keep it on my end. Especially when I just heard you say another name.”
“Alex?… No, of course it wasn’t Alex, not our mutual friend.” Bourne laughed quietly, knowingly, as he walked away from the desk. “It was Cactus, wasn’t it?”
“I just came in to ask you if you wanted me to close the gates,” said Jax, bypassing the question.
“Would you be offended if I told you that I didn’t think of him until I saw you just now?”
“Certain associations are fairly obvious. The gates, please?”
“Do you owe Cactus as much as I do, Doctor?” Jason held his place, looking at the Jamaican.
“I owe him so much that I could never think of compromising him in a situation like tonight. For God’s sake, he’s an old man, and no matter what deviant conclusions Langley wants to come up with, tonight was murder, a particularly brutal killing. No, I wouldn’t involve him.”
“You’re not me. You see, I have to. He’d never forgive me if I didn’t.”
“You don’t think much of yourself, do you?”
“Please close the gates, Doctor. There’s an alarm panel in the hallway I can activate when they’re shut.”
Jax hesitated, as if unsure of what he wanted to say. “Listen,” he began haltingly, “most sane people have reasons for saying things—doing things. My guess is you’re sane. Call Alex if you need me—if old Cactus needs me.” The doctor left, rushing out the door.
Bourne turned and glanced around the room. Since Flannagan and Rachel Swayne had left nearly three hours ago, he had searched every foot of the general’s study, as well as the dead soldier’s separate bedroom on the second floor. He had placed the items he intended to take on the brass coffee table; he studied them now. There were three brown leather-bound covers, each equal in size, each holding inserted spiral-bound pages; they were a desk set. The first was an appointments calendar; the second, a personal telephone book in which the names and numbers were entered in ink; the last was an expense diary, barely touched. Along with these were eleven office messages of the telephone notepad variety, which Jason found in Swayne’s pockets, a golf-club scorecard and several memoranda written at the Pentagon. Finally, there was the general’s wallet containing a profusion of impressive credentials and very little money. Bourne would turn everything over to Alex and hope further leads would be found, but as far as he could determine, he had turned up nothing startling, nothing dramatically relevant to the modern Medusa. And that bothered him; there had to be something. This was the old soldier’s home, his sanctum sanctorum inside that home—something! He knew it, he felt it, but he could not find it. So he started again, not foot by foot now; instead, inch by inch.
Fourteen minutes later, as he was removing and turning over the photographs on the wall behind the desk, the wall to the right of the cushioned bay window that overlooked the lawn outside, he recalled Conklin’s words about checking the windows and the curtains so that no one could enter or observe the scene inside.
Christ, it must be a mess in there.
It’s not very pleasant.
It wasn’t. The panes of the central bay window frame were splattered with blood and membrane. And the … the small brass latch? Not only was it free from its catch, the window itself was open—barely open, but nevertheless it was open. Bourne knelt on the cushioned seat and looked closely at the shiny brass fixture and the surrounding panes of glass. There were smudges among the
rivulets of dried blood and tissue, coarse pressings on the stains that appeared to widen and thin them out into irregular shapes. Then below the sill he saw what kept the window from closing. The end of the left drape had been drawn out, a small piece of its tasseled fabric wedged beneath the lower window frame. Jason stepped back bewildered but not really surprised. This was what he had been looking for, the missing piece in the complex puzzle that was the death of Norman Swayne.
Someone had climbed out that window after the shot that blew the general’s skull apart. Someone who could not risk being seen going through the front hall or out the front door. Someone who knew the house and the grounds … and the dogs. A brutal killer from Medusa. Goddamn it!
Who? Who had been here? Flannagan … Swayne’s wife! They would know, they had to know! Bourne lurched for the telephone on the desk; it began ringing before his hand touched it.
“Alex?”
“No, Br’er Rabbit, it’s just an old friend, and I didn’t realize we were so free with names.”
“We’re not, we shouldn’t be,” said Jason rapidly, imposing a control on himself he could barely exercise. “Something happened a moment ago—I found something.”
“Calm down, boy. What can I do for you?”
“I need you—out here where I am. Are you free?”
“Well, let’s see.” Cactus chuckled as he spoke. “There are several board meetings I should rightfully attend, and the White House wants me for a power breakfast.… When and where, Br’er Rabbit?”
“Not alone, old friend. I want three or four others with you. Is that possible?”
“I don’t know. What did you have in mind?”
“That fellow who drove me into town after I saw you. Are there any other like-minded citizens in the neighborhood?”
“Most are doin’ time, frankly, but I suppose I could dig around the refuse and pull up a few. What for?”
“Guard duty. It’s pretty simple really. You’ll be on the phone and they’ll be behind locked gates telling people that it’s private property, that visitors aren’t welcome. Especially a few honkies probably in limousines.”