Agent X (6 page)

Vail said, “You got to love a communist who appreciates capitalism more than we do.”

“Exactly.”

Vail asked, “Well, let me ask you—hopefully for the last time—why me?”

“The only ones who know about this are the people in this room. If we gave this to any of our agents, I guarantee it would leak out. Your discretion has been established more than once. You have a certain reputation for getting things done despite obstacles that our agents would find . . . well, procedurally insurmountable.”

Vail laughed. “You mean none of you want to get caught.”

The director said, “The rest of us here are not exactly street-ready, and this has the potential to get
challenging.
The men in this room haven’t been out there in decades.” Lasker glanced around to see if anyone objected. “Sorry, guys.”

Vail glanced at Kate and then back at the director. “When you offered me this kind of arrangement before, I said no.”

The director pursed his lips. “That was because I thought your not being an agent was a waste of talent and I was hoping you’d eventually realize it. When you were vehement, I accepted it. But this is different. This is vital.”

Vail got up and walked over to the window. He raised the shade and stared at the old Russian embassy across the street. “Funny, five years ago I thought this was exactly what I’d be doing right now. Instead I’m a bricklayer.” He turned back and looked at the men. “While you may find that ironic, I find it unjust.”

“Steve, we have to assume that Calculus is being interrogated in Moscow right now. If the Russians break him, there will be no list and all those spies will go on selling our secrets.”

“I’m sorry. I’m going home.”

Everyone in the room was silent. Finally the director said, “Could you come with me for a minute? There’s something you need to see.”

Vail followed him downstairs and then through a series of small, unfurnished rooms.

Once Lasker was satisfied they were completely out of earshot of the others, he said, “Did Kate tell you what happened to her just before Thanksgiving?”

“No.”

“She almost died.”

“What?”

“She left her car running at her place as well as the door to the garage open. She’d been drinking. Wound up in the hospital for a couple of days.”

“You think it was a suicide attempt?” Vail’s voice was accusatory.

“No, I don’t. But it was a couple of days after she’d gone to see you in Chicago, which OPR tells me did not go well.”

“Kate’s way too strong for anything like that. And as up and down as we’ve been, I’ve never seen her depressed for a second.”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

“She dumped me. I’m the one who’s supposed to be suicidal.”

“I thought you guys made up. Isn’t that why you’re here?”

“That was a lie. She didn’t know I was coming. I was trying to patch things up. She was driving me back to the airport when she got the kidnapping call.”

“Like I said, I know it wasn’t a suicide attempt, but I can’t call off the OPR investigation just because I think so. I’m sure you can remember how petty people can be in this organization when it comes to someone else’s problems. When somebody is as successful as Kate is, they want to believe it. She’s got people looking at her like she’s a time bomb. I want her to work with you on this Calculus thing. If you two did half the job you did in L.A., all that petty whispering would come to a screeching halt.”

Vail laughed. “Are you blowing this out of proportion to hook me?”

“When you and she walked into that room upstairs, did you notice that none of those men would look at her? When’s the last time you saw that happen?”

Vail took a moment to consider what Lasker had said. “I’d be a fool to say yes to this.” There was something in Vail’s tone that told the director that was exactly what he was about to do. “Fortunately for you, it’s not exactly construction weather in Chicago.”

Lasker clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks.”

When they walked back into the upstairs room, the director said, “Steve’s decided to give us a hand, and Kate will work with him.”

Kate’s eyes locked onto Vail. She had heard the surety in his tone when he’d said no to the director. She’d never seen him change his mind once it was so firmly set.

Vail looked back at her. “However, this time, if you’re going to saddle me with Deputy Assistant Director Bannon, she has to understand that I am working
with
and not
for
her?”

Kate took a moment to recover and then said, “Yes, those were the two big disruptions in L.A., me giving orders and you following them.”

The director looked slightly distracted by what he was about to say, missing the humor in Kate’s response. “I know how you feel about answering to anyone, Steve, but because this is so potentially explosive, I’m going to need you or Kate to report to Bill at least once a day so he can keep me advised.”

“Define ‘report to,’ ” Vail said.

“This is extremely complicated, so I need everyone to work together. Whatever other intelligence agency might be involved, add in the Russians and our own State Department and it’s going to be a diplomatic high-wire act. The potential for disaster is incalculable. You have to keep Bill advised.”

“Is that actually what you want us to do, or are you giving me one of those orders that when you’re called in front of some congressional subcommittee, you can say I disregarded your instructions? If it’s the second, I have no problem with it.”

“I’m sorry, Steve, I need you to report daily. I wouldn’t be much of a director if I didn’t keep a very close eye on this one.”

Vail knew that because of Kate he had no choice. “You do realize how this is going to end.”

“I’m hoping it doesn’t.”

“Which means you can see exactly how it’s going to end,” Vail said. “Kate, I’ve got to tell you that this is the worst date I’ve ever been on.” She just shook her head. “Guys, consider yourselves warned: This is not who I am, but I’ll do what I can.”

“Thank you,” Lasker said.

Vail turned to the assistant director. “Bill, I don’t know you at all. What I’m about to say is based on my personal history with Bureau bosses. If it doesn’t apply, ignore it.”

His face expressionless, Langston said, “Go ahead.”

“If you try to obstruct me simply because of your ego, I’ll be on the first available flight to Chicago, and I’m going to guess that won’t make the director happy.” Langston still showed no reaction. Vail turned to the others. “Okay, then, does anybody have any ideas where to start?”

The deputy assistant director, John Kalix, said, “The second time we met with Calculus, we had finished analyzing the documents that he had turned over to us and knew that he was legit, so we gave him a special phone. He was supposed to use it only to contact us. It’s a miniaturized satellite phone, very ordinary-looking. That’s all we told him about it. It had other capabilities, one of which was to constantly track his position, even when it was supposedly turned off. He used it only once, to text us about being recalled to Moscow. Six words, that’s all. That was the last time we heard from him.” Kalix got up and tapped the computer keyboard. A photograph of the message appeared.

To Moscow unexpectedly. Find CDP now!

“We’re guessing ‘CDP’ are the initials of the first person on his list,” Kalix continued. “We’ve checked them through every available database, most of which don’t have middle initials, and have no clue who it is. Not everyone lists a middle initial. There could be hundreds, even thousands of them across the country. It’s not much to go on. The only other thing we have is where he traveled. It’s all documented in the dark blue file on the table there.”

Vail took a moment to process what he’d been told and then looked over at the folder and nodded. “And where is the phone now?”

“As soon as that message was sent, we could no longer determine where it was. Somehow the GPS must have been disabled.”

“The last location?”

“Inside the Russian embassy.”

“That doesn’t sound promising. Anything else that might help us?”

“That’s it. Like I said, it’s not much to go on.”

The director stood up. “Thank you, guys.” The men understood that the meeting was at an end and they were to leave.

After everyone filed out, the director closed the door behind them. “Steve, you two should probably work out of here. It’s secure, and there’s some equipment you might be able to use. The computers are current and have complete Bureau access. The building is alarmed, and there’s a stocked kitchen, a shower, and some cots for sleeping. The briefcase on the table is for you. Gun, credentials, credit card, cell phone are all inside. Parked out front is a blue Chevy sedan. The keys are in the case, too.” He took out a blank business-size card and wrote down a number on it. “If you need anything else—
anything
—call this number.”

Vail said, “Any objections if I move in here?”

The director glanced at Kate. “If that’s what you prefer, sure.”

“It’ll eliminate travel time from the hotel,” Vail said, and Kate understood that he had offered the reason so she wouldn’t be embarrassed at whatever way the director interpreted their relationship.

“And I’m only about fifteen minutes away,” she said.

Vail said, “If we round up any of these people, aren’t you afraid it’ll point the Russians in Calculus’s direction? If they’re not already onto him.”

“We do have an obligation to try to protect him as best we can, but we have a greater duty to protect this country. Actually, we have discussed our options for keeping this quiet as long as possible. Through legal and bureaucratic foot-dragging, we figure the whole thing could be kept quiet for about ten days. So if you do bring someone in, that ten-day clock will start ticking. After that, I’m afraid Calculus’s anonymity could become tenuous.”

Kate said, “Ten days isn’t much time to get from A to Z. Especially since we’re not sure where A is or how many letters there are in the alphabet.”

“No, it’s not. And to compound the problem, we don’t know if we’ll get any more information from Calculus. Steve, you have no idea how much I appreciate this. Between keeping everything secret and the idea of a bunch of traitors running around Washington, it was an impossible challenge. But now we have you. I’m sorry about handcuffing you with reporting daily, but this is a completely different situation from Los Angeles. If you have any problems, you’ve got my number.”

“ ‘Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!’ ”

The director smiled. “Dante, right?”

“Rather than who wrote it, it’s more important to know where it was posted.”

“Which is?”

“It was the inscription at the gate to hell.”

3

After Kate had walked the director out, she came back upstairs. “Thank you for doing this. And for protecting my reputation with the director.”

“Oh, how I wish your reputation actually needed protection.”

“Me, too, Vail.”

He stared at her for a few seconds and then went back to the window, again staring at the old embassy across the street.

She said, “What exactly did the director show you downstairs that changed your mind?”

“A large sum of money.”

“Vail.”

“Okay, he played ‘America the Beautiful.’ ” She scowled at him. “Metaphorically. He knew that if he got me out of that room, and away from all that
management,
my decision would be less knee-jerk. For being the big boss, he gets a pretty good read on people.”

Kate studied Vail’s face for a few seconds, looking for deception. “I wish I could get a good read on you.”

“That’s the other reason we have trouble getting along. You think I always have a secret agenda.”

“Where would anyone get an idea like that?”

“See, that’s why I think there’s hope for us. If our relationship didn’t have a healthy foundation, you would’ve taken a cheap shot right there.”

Kate smiled and shook her head. “Where do you want to start?”

“It’s been thirty-six hours since either of us slept. I’m going to get a few hours’ sleep. I suggest you do the same.”

“I need to change, too. I’ll take the car back to my place. I’ll bring up your suitcase when I come back.”

“I’m starving. Let’s see how we’re set for food first.”

As he started for the kitchen, she said, “This time I need to be on the inside of the investigation, Steve.”

“Okay, but just remember it comes with a lot of liability.”

“Have I ever denied you when you wanted to commit a felony?”

“I said you’re in, Deputy Assistant Director Bannon.”

“Then explain your question about the classified documents Calculus gave up. What was that about? And don’t give me that ‘curious’ stuff. I’ve seen that look before.”

“Well, isn’t this getting off to a familiar start?” Vail said, laughing for a moment. “Sometimes in the spy business, your opponents will run a game on you. They’ll salt the mines with borderline information to convince you that they’re on your side. It’s just something to be wary of. And if they’re good, they can wind up getting more information from you than you get from them.”

She stared at him for a few seconds. “That
sounds
like a reasonable explanation, but it always does—and then suddenly I’m being shot at.”

“There are worse things than being shot at.”

“Like . . . ?”

“Living a life where you’re never shot at.” He went into the kitchen and yelled out to her. “These are spies. They don’t shoot at people. But I’d be careful what I ate.” The refrigerator was stocked with food, including a carton of eggs. He took them out and checked the date. “These eggs are fresh. How about I make some breakfast?”

“I assume that you have no desire to poison me.”

“Sure, we’ll say that.”

“Do you want me to do that?” she asked.

“I’m just going to scramble some eggs. Why don’t you have a look through those files they left us.”

Ten minutes later he walked out with two plates loaded with eggs and toast balanced on top. She looked at the plate he set in front of her. “Make enough?”

“With you I never know when I’m going to get to eat again.” He picked up his fork. “Anything in the files?”

She took a bite of toast and pulled a photograph from the back of the file. “Here’s that shot of Calculus’s message.”

She watched him carefully as he laid it on the table next to his plate and studied it while he continued to eat.

To Moscow unexpectedly. Find CDP now!

Finally she said, “Do you think CDP is our ‘little fish’?”

Vail continued to eat, staring at the message. “It has to be. He uses only three words to notify us of his possible impending death: ‘To Moscow unexpectedly.’ Someone that economical wouldn’t waste the last three words on something meaningless. He used exactly the same number of words to indicate that they’re as important as the first three.”

“Why would he care whether we found the spies if he knew he was going to be taken back there and tortured, and probably worse?”

Again Vail was lost in thought. She took a mouthful of eggs and watched him as he ate absentmindedly. Finally he said, “This is good. Very, very good.”

“The eggs?”

“Your question about him caring. It could be the key to unlocking this. He shouldn’t care. Yet he sent us the first mole’s initials. Why?”

“Maybe he figured since he was being sent back to Moscow, he’d give us the first name hoping we’d send the money to the Chicago bank and it would get to his family or whoever.”

“That’s a possibility. Here’s another one: What if he planned for this contingency? He knew that if the Russians get it out of him about the list and recover what he’s hidden for us, they’ll have all they need to convict him of treason and execute him. But if he can get us to whatever evidence he left for us, before the Russians can recover it, they won’t be able to prove a thing. Maybe he’s in Moscow right now enduring torture to give us whatever head start he can.”

“It’s urgent, I get it. But first we have to find this CPD. How do we do that? Like Kalix said, there’s got to be a lot of people with those initials.”

“Another good question. Unfortunately, one that is going to require a little sleep to answer. I hate to waste the time sleeping, but it’ll be a good investment.” Vail picked up his plate and asked her, “Are you done?”

“Yes, thanks.”

“Can you be back here in four hours?”

“Seeing how the alternative is to let you go wandering off with a new set of credentials and a gun, and then having to answer to the director, I guess I’ll have to.”

Almost to the minute, four hours after leaving him, Kate pulled up in front of the old Bureau observation post. It was midafternoon, but the temperature was still near freezing. She took his suitcase out of the trunk and carried it upstairs. He was in the room where the meeting with the director had taken place. He had shaved and showered and was reading one of the files that had been provided.

“It didn’t take you long to get back at it. Anything in there?” she asked.

“There is one interesting thing. The cell phone they gave Calculus, it tracked him twenty-four hours a day. We have detailed coordinate charts telling us where he went and when.”

“Nothing else?”

“Not yet, but I’m already getting the feeling I’m missing something.” He stood up and went over to a computer that was on. “Take a look at this. You’ve probably seen it before.”

She peered over his shoulder. “Sure, that’s a spy satellite we have access to. How’d you know about it?”

“I kept reading in the file about transverse tracking. When I turned on the computer, I saw the icon on the desktop.” She sat down in a chair next to him. “I looked through those cell-phone GPS logs. I think they’re important.”

“Important how?”

“Take a look at his message again.” He handed her the file. “How do the last three words differ from the first three?”

To Moscow unexpectedly. Find CDP now!

“The exclamation point?”

“And . . . ?”

She looked for a few seconds and then shook her head in frustration. “I don’t know, what?”

“Look at my hand,” he said, holding it with the fingers spread as wide as possible. “Now look at the message again.”

She did and then said, “It looks like there’s an extra space between the ‘CPD’ and the word ‘now.’ ” She thought about it a little longer. “I still don’t get it.”

“I made some coffee. Would you mind getting me a cup?” His voice was more instructional than demanding.

Her face shortened into a knot of confusion. “Oooo-kay.” She went into the kitchen and started pouring coffee into a mug. “Black?” she called out to him. Before he could answer, she yelled, “The last sentence contains a message within a message!” Forgetting the coffee, she hurried back into the room. “If he didn’t mean anything by it, the exclamation point would been after ‘To Moscow unexpectedly,’ to emphasize the danger he was in. But using it with ‘now’ and isolating it with an extra space indicates that there are two messages within those last three words: Find CDP and an instruction to do it
now,
at that exact moment.” She grinned, realizing that Vail had sent her to get coffee so she would stop staring at the forest and be able to isolate one of the trees.

“And what are we in possession of that can quantify ‘now’?” he asked.

This time Kate let her mind go blank before trying to figure out the answer. “The exact time he sent the message.”

Vail said, “And since we have his exact longitude and latitude when he sent it, he might have been giving us a clue to who CDP is.”

“But he would have to know that the phone we gave him was capable of tracking his movements.”

“First of all, he’s an engineer, an engineer in the spy business—don’t you think he would assume that? Why would we give him just an ordinary satellite phone? Plus, the phone was turned on. He’d have to know we could track him then.” Vail handed her the file; it was opened to the GPS charts. He turned back to the computer and the satellite imaging. “The call was made on December twenty-ninth at 4:18
P.M.
Give me the coordinates listed for that time.”

As she read them, Vail maneuvered the mouse over a map of the United States until the digits in the small display windows were the same as those she had given him. He locked them in and then used the on-screen control to zoom down to the location, which could be seen with incredible detail, close enough to capture the address from an adjoining map on the screen. “It’s some sort of business. There are dozens of cars in that front parking lot alone.”

“Here, let me,” Kate said.

Vail got up, and Kate sat down at the computer. She went to a different search engine and typed in the address. A corporate profile popped up on the screen. “Alliant Industries in Calverton, Virginia.” She clicked on another icon and was shifted into Bureau indices and searched the name. “There it is, Alliant Industries. They’re in our files because we’ve done quite a few background investigations on their employees for security clearances. Evidently they have some defense contracts.”

“Can you pull up the list of names that we’ve investigated?”

“Hold on.” She typed some more, waited until the results came up on the screen, and then started scrolling through the alphabetical list. “Believe it or not, there are two with the first initial C and last initial P: Claudia Prinzon and Charles Pollock. Let me see if I can find middle initials.”

She started to open the background report on the woman when Vail said, “Don’t bother. It’s Pollock.”

“How do you know?”

“Pollock is a North Atlantic food fish.
Our
little fish.”

She shook her head and laughed. “This isn’t going to make the Counterintelligence Division very happy.”

“Why not?”

“How do you think they’re going to take it when I tell them that you found the first mole in less than four hours, not counting sleeping, showering, and shaving time? I know you’re not trying to make them look like idiots, but . . .”

Vail laughed. “Maybe that’s why I keep getting fired.”

“Maybe?”

“Then let’s not tell them.”

“You know that’s not possible. Now that we know who Pollock is, we’ll have to start twenty-four-hour surveillance and get up on his phones and computer ASAP. And eventually search warrants. Are you going to do all that by yourself?”

“Okay, we’ll wait a couple of days before we tell anyone. That way it’ll look like it was a lot more difficult.”

“Hi, I’m Kate Bannon. We met last year. Apparently you don’t remember me because you’re trying to run the same scam on me as you did then. You’re still trying to end-run everyone. And in case you’re counting, ‘everyone’ includes
me.
”

“It doesn’t include you. Wherever this takes me, it takes us. It’s just that the more
they
get involved, the farther away the answer always seems to get. They’re like moths.”

“Moths?”

“They keep flying into the light simply because it’s the brightest thing in front of them, even though they’re slowly beating themselves—and any chance to solve this case—to death.”

“Give it up, Vail. At some point even you are going to need Bureau help.”

“As clever as Calculus has been with this, maybe he’s hidden evidence somewhere out there, and if we’re equally smart, we can find it without wasting all that time and manpower.”

“You’re not worried about wasting Bureau resources. If anything, you like burning them. You’re just dreaming up excuses to cover up whatever you really have in mind.”