Ride a Pale Horse (32 page)

He reread the notes, slowly, carefully, and marked a few points that might need more investigation. Pitifully few, he realised: Menlo had done a complete job. Still—for his own peace of mind, he’d check them out. And then he thought of the discrepancies in the accounts of Saturday night given by Fairbairn and Shaw. Check these, he told himself, check these thoroughly; trap the mole with his own lies. A long chance, he knew, but worth a try. Once more, he played the two taped interviews.

Voices in the corridor warned him: the beginning of the day’s work. He gathered notes and tapes and locked them in his safe. He left the office in search of either Fairbairn or Shaw.

Fairbairn was at his desk. “Hello!” he said in surprise as Bristow entered his room. “That was a short vacation. When did you get back?”

“This morning.”

“Just in time for the bad news. Or is it good? Menlo’s in the hospital. An accident, I’ve heard. Happened last night. Fell down in his own home, cracked his head. But if I know Menlo, he’ll be up and around in a few days. He’s on the warpath, Pete, and he won’t give up until he’s added another scalp to his belt.” Fairbairn was nervous and tense. Bitter, too. He looked as if he hadn’t slept much last night. “My scalp, I think. And God knows why. I didn’t take those damned cassettes. I was there, sure, just before the guard was doped. But I swear to you, Pete—” He stopped. “You heard about the cassettes?”

“Yes. Menlo telephoned me.”

“He probably gave you the story, too.”

“Some of it. Why don’t you give me the rest? Where’s Shaw, by the way?”

“He’ll be here this afternoon. He has a dentist’s appointment at eleven.”

“Did he call you about that this morning? Or was it a long-standing appointment?”

Fairbairn looked in surprise at Bristow. “Sure, he called. Reached me at home before I left.” Then Fairbairn’s surprise vanished. “Are you stepping in where Menlo left off? What in hell is so important about a couple of damned cassettes? Shaw couldn’t steal a run at a softball game. I didn’t take them, either. So why the devil are you—”

“Wallace—stop talking and listen, will you? Let’s clear this thing up together. You and Shaw are in deep trouble, and you know it. All I’d like to do is prove you didn’t take the cassettes.”

“Prove innocence? And how do you do that?” Wallace shot back at him.

“By finding the man who is guilty.” Bristow watched a struggle of emotions on Fairbairn’s face: anger, anxiety, hope. Hope seemed to win. At least, Fairbairn calmed down. Bristow said, “But I need your help. Come on, let’s walk in the fresh air. You can fill in some of the details for me.”

“Do you think I have this office bugged? God, you’re as suspicious as Menlo.”

“Not bugged by you,” Bristow said quietly and led the way into the corridor.

“I could use some coffee,” Fairbairn said. “Didn’t feel like breakfast this morning. The Commissary’s quiet at this hour.”

And more private than being in public view. “Coffee sounds good.”

There was no more talk until they had settled at an isolated table with a pot of coffee. Bristow studied his friend’s face, a handsome face that appealed to a lot of women with its thin features, tanned skin, hazel eyes that usually seemed amused, fair hair that fell into a wave no matter how hard it was brushed. Today, Fairbairn’s tan looked grey, his eyes were shadowed and didn’t find life so comic, his hair was unkempt. Even his well-fitted seersucker jacket was crushed and dejected.

Bristow said awkwardly—this conversation would be as embarrassing for him as it was disturbing for Fairbairn—“Wallace—just give me straight answers, will you? Cut out the humour and your throwaway remarks and understatements. Give me the facts, even if they bore the hell out of you.”

“But Menlo heard everything. There’s nothing to add.”

“I wasn’t there to hear it,” Bristow reminded him. “So let’s get started—shouldn’t take long—just a few points that puzzled me.”

“I was clear enough, I thought.” Fairbairn was annoyed.

“Then I’m stupid.”

Fairbairn’s laugh was forced. It broke off abruptly. “Sorry. I guess you’re right. I’ll be dead serious. No flippancy. Okay?”

“Okay. For starters—you told Menlo you had no idea when Coulton and Shaw had met.”

“But I have no idea. They knew each other before Shaw ever introduced me to Coulton.”

Bristow’s voice sharpened. “Shaw introduced you? When?”

“Must have been six weeks ago. A Saturday evening. Emma and I had been at a cocktail party in Georgetown and went on to dinner at a French restaurant in M Street. Shaw and Coulton were there. As we passed their table, Shaw rose and stopped me. I had to introduce him to Emma, and he introduced me to Coulton. But how long they had known each other, I haven’t the foggiest notion. Never asked Shaw. Why should I?”

“No reason.” Not until now, thought Bristow. “Was Shaw using the extra desk in your office at that time?”

“Oh, he had been dotting in and out for some weeks. Questions, you know. Always eager for my advice.”

“When did he move in?”

“Last week, when we were working on the same problem but from different angles. It seemed simpler to me to have him there—it’s a double office, actually, and his was only a cubicle.”

“It seemed simpler to you... Do you mean you suggested the change, or did he suggest it and you agreed?”

“I agreed. I was tired of having him bouncing in and out.” Fairbairn was puzzled. “Just where is this getting us?”

“A little deeper into the picture. So tell me—when the cabinet in the file room jammed on Saturday night, you stood at the door and watched the corridor. Why?”

“No need for me to stay with Shaw and the guard. I thought someone ought to keep an eye on the corridor and on—” Fairbairn halted abruptly.

“And on what?”

“Coulton. I don’t really cotton to the guy. I couldn’t understand why the hell he hadn’t waited in our office until we had finished with the file room. In fact, he and Shaw could have left, let me handle the Greek files alone.”

“Did he make any move while you watched the corridor?”

“None.”

“Just stood there?”

“Just stood. I felt like an idiot. So when he wanted to find the washroom, I showed him the way—being extra polite to make up for my rudeness.”

“Rudeness?” Bristow smiled. “Never heard you being rude to anyone in my life, Wallace.”

“Well, I had a strange feeling about the guy—the way he arrived and needed a lift home and all that. I didn’t say much on our way to the file room, cut him down a bit. What else is rudeness?”

So Fairbairn had a stirring of suspicion, but then dismissed it when he felt it was unwarranted. As most of us do, thought Bristow. “When the guard, O’Donnell, came out of the file room, did he go straight to his table?”

Fairbairn frowned. “He came out first—Shaw with him—I think.”

“Come on, Wallace. You can do better than that.”

“I spoke to him. Yes, I asked about getting the lock fixed and what did we do with the Greek files. Would I have to wait with them until Maintenance got the lock working?”

“And he reassured you he’d call Maintenance and keep an eye on the files for the time being?”

“That’s about it. He’d ’phone Menlo and have him lock them up, once the cabinet was fixed.”

“How long did you talk—a minute or two?”

“Could be. I joked a little.”

“And where were the files? With Shaw?”

“Yes.”

“And where was he? Standing at the table?”

Fairbairn stared at Bristow. There was a long silence. “Yes,” he said at last. Then, quickly, “Not Shaw—it couldn’t be Shaw.”

“Take it easy. We aren’t saying it was Shaw who dropped something into O’Donnell’s coffee cup.” Until this moment, I thought—as Menlo had thought—it was Coulton who had that assignment. Then why was Coulton present? Just to receive the cassettes after they were stolen? He could have waited in the car park for that, never needed to show his face. Or was he there to give an appearance of complete innocence? Lurking around a car park where he didn’t belong would be hard to explain if he were seen. Or was he making sure that the job of drugging O’Donnell was efficiently done—no hesitation, no mistake, no rousing of any suspicion?

“But there was only Shaw and Coulton and myself in that corridor. And Shaw was close to that table longer than I was. If it wasn’t Shaw, then who—”

“Easy, Wallace,” Bristow cautioned again. “We don’t know yet. It’s your word against his, and he may not have the same story to tell.”

“But that’s what happened!”

“Let’s go back a little earlier. You visited the file room for twenty minutes that evening. Alone.”

“I was consulting material from several files, but not in the Greek cabinet, if that’s what you’re driving at. I didn’t go near it.”

“Did Shaw know you were consulting other files?”

“Sure. We were working on the same problem—tracing that Athens-to-London route of the
Blitz
disinformation.” Fairbairn’s face was tense as he remembered another detail. “Later, when we both visited the room at ten o’clock, I left Shaw to replace the Greek files and went to the Austrian cabinet.”

“Why?”

“Following a hunch—a vague memory. There’s a Graz newspaper that might be a transmission belt from Athens to West Germany. It did act as that a couple of years back.”

“So you opened the Austrian cabinet.” And that was on the opposite side of the room. Fairbairn’s back would be turned to Shaw.

Fairbairn nodded. “I had just found the Graz folder when Shaw called for help with the lock that was stuck. I closed the cabinet and went to help him.”

Bristow lit his second cigarette. “Have one?” He offered his pack. “Or are you still refusing them?”

“Gave up the habit for good.” Fairbairn watched him anxiously. “Well? Or is the jury still out?”

“Has to be until I talk with Shaw, too.”

“His word against mine. That’s what you said. Hopeless. Who can prove whose word is false?”

Bristow ignored that little outburst. Very quietly, he said, “Whoever removed the cassettes waited until you had left the corridor and O’Donnell had collapsed. Did Coulton stay with you all the way to the front entrance?”

“Yes. And Shaw left ahead of us—so that lets him off the hook, too, doesn’t it?” Fairbairn was embarrassed. “Guess I was too quick to judge him,” he admitted.

“You were defending yourself.”

“At his expense.” Fairbairn drew a long deep breath. “When you talk out of fear—well, you never make a pretty picture, do you?”

“Fear?”

“Fear of this shadow forever hanging over my head. But I have nothing to confess, Pete. Nothing. Except blindness, perhaps. There must be more involved in all this than just the theft of two cassettes.”

“Much more.”

“I feel I’m—I’m trapped. How or why, I don’t know. I could lose my job—my career—my family. My whole life, in fact. Pete—what do I do?”

“Ignore it.”

Fairbairn’s laugh was short and sour.

“Say nothing to anyone. Talk to no one about our meeting today. Keep your cool, play it loose.”

Fairbairn asked slowly, “Do you believe me?”

“Enough to try and find the whole truth.”

“I’ll settle for that.”

“Let’s get back to the office,” Bristow said.

There was a considerable walk ahead of them, and Bristow used it to say, “By the way—a week ago last Saturday, when I ’phoned you to meet me and take an envelope to the vault—”

“I remember. When I went to get my car, I found it had a flat—must have been a slow leak.”

“So you went back to the office to ask Shaw for a lift?”

“No, no. He was already in the parking lot. He was on his way home.”

“He offered you a lift?”

“And I took it gladly.”

“You arrived at the gas station ahead of time.”

“Well ahead. Shaw’s a wild driver. It would have been too noticeable to keep his Honda waiting in front of the gas station, so he parked it among some other cars close to the cafeteria.”

“With a clear view of me when I arrived?”

“Yes. But I didn’t notice you arriving—you weren’t driving your own car, and I was watching for the blue Camaro.”

“Did Shaw notice me?”

“Don’t think so. Didn’t say anything, at least.”

“Why did he suddenly shoot out of the parking space?”

Fairbairn was baffled by that question. “Guess he was a bit speedy in reaching the gas station. But it was twelve thirty, you know.”

“He knew of our appointment?”

“I—I may have mentioned it. He was in the office when you telephoned.” Fairbairn was embarrassed. “I suppose I talked out of turn. Sorry. Didn’t think it was any state secret we were dealing with. You were pretty casual about that envelope, you know.”

“Was I that good?”

“You fooled me.”

But not Shaw, Bristow thought. And then wondered if he were too quick in judgment. He’d have to talk with Shaw, too, hear his story... “See you around,” he told Fairbairn as they reached their floor. “And not one word about this discussion,” he added quietly.

“Not even in my sleep.”

He’s recovering, thought Bristow as he entered his office. Did I give him too much hope? It is one thing to believe a friend, another to prove he is innocent. I’ll have to do more than convince myself. And I doubt if I’m qualified for this job; I’m not objective enough. So why the hell did Menlo entrust me to take over his investigation? Perhaps I’d better choose someone to follow me—in case of an accident. Such as being eliminated as Menlo was.

Abruptly, he switched his mind away from that unpleasant idea. Shaw, he considered now—Shaw had longer access than anyone else to the guard’s table and his coffee cup. But Shaw had left ahead of the other two, and Fairbairn backed Shaw’s statement on that point. So where did that leave us—with some third party, who didn’t belong to this unit and yet knew the combination of the Farrago file, knew that the Vienna cassettes were there for the stealing? Coulton? But the time of his leaving the building was definite. He accompanied Fairbairn out. Accompanied or escorted? To make sure Fairbairn was safely and quickly away from the corridor when the Farrago file was opened and the cassettes lifted?