The Matarese Countdown (18 page)

The descending helicopter yackety-yacked its way into the Chesapeake compound’s circled touchdown. Deputy Director Frank Shields, his creased, narrow eyes practically shut tight repelling the sunlight, emerged from the glistening white metal door only to be verbally assaulted by Brandon Scofield, Cameron Pryce at his side. Fortunately, much of the former intelligence officer’s shouting was obscured by the whirling rotor blades, and by the time the two men walked away from the overpowering sound to join Pryce, Scofield was partially out of breath.

“Since you figured out what I was doing, why did it surprise you, much less make you angry?” asked the abused deputy director.

“That’s the dumbest damn question you’ve ever asked, Squinty!” roared Scofield.

“Why?”

“Stop repeating yourself!”

“Hey, you’re the one who practices that habit, Brandon, not me. And look at it this way. As you obviously understood that I might employ the L-Factor and you passed—you’re clean and
I
don’t have to wonder if I missed something.”

“It was the Matarese’s offer to me, wasn’t it? The millions and the ranch somewhere—”

“That was a throwaway line,” interrupted Shields, “but it stuck for a while.
You
yourself made a President of the United States pay you off twenty-five years ago. The answer’s yes.”

“How do you know I didn’t accept?”

“Because you never would have brought it up with Denny, especially with such specificity.”

“You’re
impossible!
”

“Maybe, but remember Prague. By the way, where
is
Denny?”

“I ordered him to stay away until I was finished with you, since, as we agreed, I’m running this operation. I
do
have that authority, don’t I?”

“Are you finished with me, Brandon?” asked the deputy director without answering the question.

“Hell, no! Your idea of shutting down this place and moving to North Carolina is out! We’re staying right here.”

“You’re certifiable. The Matarese know where we are—where you are. They know you survived the trawler, and by flying up here to join us you threw down the gauntlet. They won’t stop until they kill you.”

“Tell me, Squinty, why do they want to kill me?”

“For the same reason we wanted to find you—for what may or may not be in that concrete head of yours. Years ago your initial debriefing was hardly illuminating, but in your own words, you know more about the Matarese than anyone else on our side does.”

“What’s to prevent me from giving you everything I know on paper?”

“Not a thing, but there are laws and we’re dealing with powerful interests, presumably very rich, very influential people in and out of government.”

“So what?”

“So typewritten statements—depositions—from a dead, discredited deep-cover agent with a record of flagrant abuse of conduct, including misinformation, disinformation, and consistent lying to his superiors, isn’t the sort of file you present to the courts, much less a congressional hearing.”

“Tear up the file, burn it! That was ancient history and has nothing to do with the present circumstances.”

“You’ve been away too long,
Beowulf Agate
. This is the nineties. Files aren’t neatly inserted into manila folders, they’re computerized, and any senior department head with the proper codes throughout the entire intelligence community can access them. And you may be certain a few already have.”

“You’re saying that my cold corpse can’t be interrogated, and all that’s left is a record of necessary actions I took that label me a lying loose cannon.”

“That’s precisely what I’m saying. You’d be posthumous rotten meat for the Matarese grinders.” Shields paused, then gestured for Scofield and Pryce to move with him away from the now-silent aircraft and its bustling crew. “Listen to me, Brandon,” he continued out of the crew’s earshot, “I know Cameron’s put you through an interrogation wringer, and I will too. But before we go any farther, I’ve got to come clean with you. There can’t be any secrets between us.”

“Squinty has a confession to make to little old
me?
” said Bray mockingly. “I didn’t think we prehistoric dinosaurs had any secrets left worth talking about.”

“I’m serious, Brandon. It’ll explain how far I got—I think I got—and it may even bring you a degree of relief, if you had any qualms talking about it.”

“I can’t wait.”

“When you left years ago, there were so many questions left unanswered, things you simply refused to clarify—”

“I had a goddamned good reason,” broke in Scofield quietly, harshly. “Those debriefing clowns were looking six ways to hell and back to pin the whole mess on Taleniekov. They kept repeating the words ‘enemy’ and ‘Commie bastard’ to the point where I could have wasted them. They wanted to paint Vasili as the whole evil empire, all by himself, when nothing could have been farther from the truth.”

“Only the hotheads, Brandon, only the hotheads. The rest of us didn’t say those things or believe them.”

“Then you cooler fellows should have put out the fires! When I told them that Taleniekov had to get out of Moscow because he was under a death sentence, they kept saying ‘a setup’ and ‘a double agent’ and other stupid clichés they knew nothing about!”

“But you knew that if you told the whole truth, Taleniekov would go down in history as the madman who brought the superpowers to the edge of nuclear war, possibly over it.”

“I’m not sure what you mean, Squinty,” said Scofield cautiously.

“Of course you do. You couldn’t state for any official record that the United States of America was about to elect a President who was heir to the most vicious organization the world has ever known outside of the Nazis. Only it wasn’t a Communist Hitler, it was an elusive man only whispered about in the geopolitical cellars. The son of the Shepherd Boy.”

“What the
hell
—” choked Brandon, turning to an astonished Pryce, who shook his head. “How did you
know?
” he said, addressing Shields. “I never mentioned the son of the Shepherd Boy. He was dead, the whole damn bunch was dead! And yes, one of the reasons I kept quiet
was
Taleniekov, but there was another, whether you’ll believe it or not. Our country, our whole system of government, would have become the laughingstock of the civilized world. How did you find
out?
”

“The Leviticus Factor, my old friend. Remember what I once told you about the L-Factor?”

“Yes, I do. You said ‘Look at the high priest, and wonder whether under his robes he’s a rat.’ Still, how did you figure it out?”

“We’ll continue this discussion out on the water. Somebody here is another form of rat, and I’ll take no chances on electronic surveillance.… That unit you saw at the helicopter is a team of antiterrorist experts trained and with the instruments to unearth all manner of bugs no matter how well concealed.”

“I’ll say this, Squinty. After all these years, you’ve picked up a field trick or two.”

“Your approval touches me deeply.”

The figure standing in the dark, recessed corner of the boat-house peered around the edge of the open door, the waves below lapping against the sides of the Chris-Craft’s slip. The speedboat was cruising slowly toward the center of the bay, the three occupants in casual conversation, Scofield at the helm, turning constantly to the others and speaking.

Lieutenant Colonel Leslie Montrose withdrew a small portable phone from her tunic, dialed a series of thirteen numbers, and raised the instrument to her right ear.

“Circle Vecchio,” said the male voice over the line. “Proceed.”

“Three major subjects in conference beyond surveillance. Make no moves until situation is clarified.”

“Thank you. The information will be forwarded to our people in London. Incidentally, your new equipment will be on the six
P
.
M
. flight. It’s been cleared for transfer. A package from your son.”

T
he Chris-Craft’s engine was cut to idle as the speedboat bobbed up and down in the gentle waves of Chesapeake Bay, the motor sputtering at the stern.

“I still don’t get it, Frank,” said Scofield at the wheel, turning back to Shields. “I never
mentioned
the Shepherd Boy or the son of the Shepherd Boy in those debriefings. They were dead, the whole damn bunch of them were dead!”

“It was in the notes we found after the massacre at the estate called Appleton Hall outside of Boston. The fragments were badly burned, but they were studied under glass in our laboratories and the name, or partial name, of ‘Sheph-Boy’ kept coming up. Then the Corsican branch of Interpol uncovered the name of Guiderone. It was presumed he was the Shepherd Boy.”

“So where did that take you?”

“For me to a logical search. In one of the fragments, barely legible, was the stilted phrase, ‘he is the
son
,’ repeated twice in two separate memoranda. And in the second, ‘we must obey.’ … Am I reaching you, Brandon?”

“Yes,” replied Scofield quietly. “It’s what Taleniekov and I followed. But how did you?”

“For months, even years, none of us could figure it out. Then finally I did.”

“For Christ’s sake
how?
”

“The Leviticus Factor again—the high priest was a rat.”

“Come
again?
”

“Among those killed that afternoon was the honored guest at the conference in Appleton Hall. He was a true descendant of the Appleton dynasty, brought back to be applauded by the new owners of the estate.”

“You knew who they were then,” said Scofield, making a statement.

“I was getting closer. The honored guest was Senator Joshua Appleton the Fourth, the anticipated next President of the United States. No one doubted it; it was a given. He was the most popular figure on the political landscape. He was about to become the most powerful leader of the free world.”

“
And?
”

“In reality, the honored senator wasn’t Appleton at all; for years he had been someone else. He was Julian Guiderone, the son of the Shepherd Boy, anointed by Guillaume, the Baron of Matarese.”

“I knew it, but how did
you
find out?”

“Your doing, Brandon. Let me take you back, step by step, as I believe you took them yourself.”

“I’m fascinated,” Scofield interrupted. “I wish Toni were here.”

“Where is she?” asked Pryce, leaning against the swaying gunwale.

“Asking questions,” replied Bray without elaborating. “Go on, Frank, what sort of trail did you follow?”

“First, knowing you, I assumed you’d put together some kind of false identification to get you where you wanted to go—that was basic. As I learned, it was up to your creative standards: Your ID officially proclaimed you to be an ‘aide’ to Senator Appleton himself. Then, since you were in the dark about so many things, you went to see Appleton’s mentally disturbed old mother in Louisburg Square.”

“She was an alcoholic, had been for over a decade,” added Scofield.

“Yes, I know,” said Shields. “She was in the same condition twenty-one months later when I saw her.”

“It took you that long?”

“You weren’t any help.… To begin with, she didn’t remember you, but when I was about to leave I got lucky. Out of the blue—I should say the haze—she suddenly said in an eerie singsong, ‘At least you didn’t insist on seeing Josh’s old room.’ My first bingo because I knew her other visitor had to be you.”

“So you did the same thing.”

“I certainly did and it led to bingo two. Especially as she said she hadn’t been there since Joshua had allowed my long-ago predecessor inside.”

“I thought Appleton was dead,” interrupted Pryce.

“Actually, the real Appleton was. The whiskey ghosts had taken over.”

“What was bingo two?” pressed Scofield. “That room was nothing more than a fake shrine with useless memorabilia. Photographs, school banners, and sailing trophies. Fake because Appleton never lived in Louisburg Square. He came out of the Korean War with a few wounds, and after the hospital returned to the family estate.”

“Don’t get ahead of me, Brandon, all that’s part of the trail. However, you did mention the magic word—‘photographs.’ The minute we got inside that room the old girl lurched over to a wall and yelled that one was missing. She started screaming about ‘Josh’s favorite picture.’ ”