The Rendition (8 page)

Something else about Shenlee: I've never seen him smile. On this day, he appeared particularly grim. He was wearing a gray sports jacket, open collar, khaki-colored pants, and, on his wrist, a G-Shock digital watch. As I silently watched, he pushed aside his cup of cold tea, reached down and pulled some colored folders out of his briefcase, a couple of which had “CONFIDENTIAL” stamped across the top. The folders were filled with forms, letters, printouts, and who knew what else. I assumed that Shenlee had my 201 personnel jacket, evaluations, and detailed reports on some of the “special projects” I've been involved with over the years.

When they say “special projects,” think “special ops.”

As he leafed through his folders, he shook his head. “If our government is good at anything, Klear, it's creating paper and keeping tabs on people.”

“Tell me about it,” I said as I poured out some more coffee, resigned to the fact that this was Shenlee's little party and he was calling the shots.

It was Friday, already a nice day, and the sun was slanting through the restaurant's big front window. Since it was mid-January, Smith's was close to full, jammed with skiers eager to get out on the slopes. I live in Saranac and with my business partner occasionally drop into Smith's for lunch, almost never for breakfast.

“When did you get in?” I asked.

Without looking up, he said, “Yesterday, late afternoon. Flew up from McGuire on a Cessna 35A, real comfortable. Stayed the night in the Saranac Inn. Nice place.”

“I was surprised to hear from you.” When Shenlee asked why, I said, “I'm retired.”

“Who told you that, Klear? Who ever said you were retired?”

“I decided to retire. Bought into a business. It was a personal decision. Anything wrong with that?”

Ignoring my question, he went back to reading for a minute, then said, “You were in the Balkans. That wasn't so long ago.” He fixed me with an accusing stare.

“Sure. I was there—let's see—five times in all. The first time, as I
recall, I was on vacation—saw the sights, went to the beach, that sort of thing.”

“Where in the Balkans? If I may ask.”

“Croatia, mostly.”

“Split's in Croatia, right?” When I nodded, he said, “I hear they have quite a few nude beaches there, with nice lookin' babes strollin' around.”

“I wouldn't know.”

“I'll bet. And you were involved in the Milosevic rendition. The best renditions are the ones that no one knows are renditions. What did you do on that one?”

As Shenlee polished his glasses with a napkin, I said, “I was part of an eight-man team. We waited around in Bosnia till Special Ops got things organized.”

“Where in Bosnia?”

“On Eagle Base. You know it?”

Shenlee put his glasses back on. “Sure. Near Tuzla. Okay, what I'm most interested in is this other thing—this Kosovo rendition last year. March, am I correct?” When I nodded, he said, “From what I'm reading here, things didn't go so well on that one.”

“They could have gone better,” I said, taking a last bite from my plate of toast and trying to be noncommittal.

Shenlee pointed to something in one of his folders. “It says here your partners in Kosovo were Angel and Scott.”

“We could've used another guy over there.”

Shenlee looked irritated. “How's Scotty doing? Has he settled down?”

“He's doing fine, Jerry. He's married again and he says he's never been happier.”

“I'm sure.” At that moment Jerry and I were thinking the same thing. One of my two partners on the Kosovo operation, Larry Scott, had been fired from the Company years before when the details of his private life became fodder for a supermarket tabloid. He'd had two girlfriends, one of them a fellow Company employee, both of whom
he'd made pregnant, a circumstance that didn't go down well with his wife, who at the time was also pregnant.

But the fact was, Larry had been a fine and dependable operations officer, the kind of low-maintenance operative who's hard to replace. Once the smoke from the tabloid affair cleared, he found he was still in demand, which I suppose was fine with Larry since by that time he had so many mouths to feed.

Shenlee said, “So what happened? That op sounded like a piece of cake.”

“We flew into Skopje, stayed the first night at the Alexander. We originally thought Nadaj was down in Macedonia, somewhere in the hills in the Albanian sector. Scotty had arranged for a van in Skopje and for Nadaj to be extracted with a chopper out of Kosovo.”

Shenlee nodded. “What went wrong?”

I resisted the urge to say “Everything.” Instead I said, “I landed in the military hospital in Camp Bondsteel, Jerry. From there I was medevaced to the military hospital in Landstuhl. It was nearly three weeks before I was well enough to fly back to the States. I spent nearly three weeks as an outpatient at Walter Reed.”

“From what I understand, Klear, Nadaj's still on the loose. If you guys had done that job right, he'd be in The Hague now, on trial. Or else in jail.” Shenlee took another sip of tea. “Talk about your screw-ups—”

“What did he do that deserves a trial in The Hague?”

Like I said, we'd taken Slobodan Milosevic out of circulation. That one had gone down without a hitch, and I knew Jerry had the account of that operation in his folders. But the Ramush Nadaj rendition turned out to be a greater challenge than the Milosevic rendition.

Anyway, the truth was we'd blown the Nadaj mission—and that in combination with the fact that I hadn't heard anything from anyone in the last half year, led me to think I was out of the picture, and that I was retired.

Maybe I wasn't yet a candidate for a psychiatrist's couch, but a couple more experiences like the one in Kosovo and I definitely would be.

I'd concluded that I wouldn't be hearing from anyone anymore. In one of my evaluations, an Air Force colonel who didn't appreciate my original way of thinking had referred to me as a “loose cannon to end all loose cannons.” The way the intelligence brass thinks, that kind of remark can be a career killer. Anyway, after the First Gulf War I decided it would be a wiser career move to submit my resignation and, like Larry Scott and a bunch of other guys and gals, move over to working on a contract basis. I thought I would like the idea of being able to say yes or no to a job.

Mostly I said no, not that there were that many offers. Things were pretty quiet on the special ops front for a while, at least until some explosive-laden trucks destroyed our embassies in Nairobi and Kenya. I only began receiving calls after the civil war heated up in Bosnia and the UN decided to intervene. I would have said no to the Kosovo operation if it hadn't been Buck Romero who'd asked me.

But now I definitely wasn't going to accept any more contracts. My experience with so-called special operations, which had begun with a long-ago interview in a Fayetteville, North Carolina, cafeteria, was officially over. “So long, guys. It was nice knowing you.”

“What's this business you've got?” Shenlee asked suddenly.

“I supply ice to restaurants and hotels.”

He made a wry face, showing he was unimpressed. “Klear, I'll be candid. You're going to have to put your ice business on hold. Someone very high up picked out your name for this assignment.”

“I'm retired, Jerry.”

As he studied the check, Shenlee said, “You look okay. You work out regularly?”

“Sure. I haul a lot of ice. What do you people want me to do anyway, climb the Matterhorn?”

On the way to the door, I thanked him for breakfast.

“Thank the American taxpayer, Klear.” Out on Main Street we made room on the sidewalk for a young couple, each with skis on their shoulders, and an attractive young mother, slim and brunette. As she pushed a stroller with one hand and led a youngster eating an apple with the other, she smiled a “Good morning.” I smiled back.

At that moment, a husky blond guy wearing a blue pullover over a flannel shirt, jeans, and brown work boots tossed down his newspaper, gave us a wave, a loud hello, and climbed down from the cab of a refrigerator truck parked at the curb. It was my partner, Gary Lawson, and the truck was one of the two we owned. I'd told Gary to pick me up at Smith's after breakfast.

After I'd introduced Gary to Shenlee, Gary looked at me. “I just got a call. The country club's lookin' to throw a party tomorrow night, Alex. All kinds of food deliveries will be coming in, and they'll be wantin' a full load, three o'clock at the latest.”

Shenlee's mouth was set in a grim line. When I glanced toward him, he frowned, shook his head, then drifted up the sidewalk to where he was out of earshot.

At that moment I was reminded of a long-ago barroom conversation with a veteran spook, a guy we called Bud, who was already well into his cups. “Once you're in,” Bud said, slurring his words ever so slightly and raising his bourbon glass, “you'll never again be out.” Bud's observation was based on experience, his own no doubt. When he put down his glass, he grimaced. You were so right, Bud.

Quietly, I said, “I have a feeling I'm going to be tied up for a day or two, Gary. Can you get Ross to help out on the delivery?” Ross is one of the more dependable locals, a retired New York City cop who we call whenever things get busy.

Looking puzzled, Gary glanced toward Shenlee, who was now standing with his back to us and gazing off in the direction of Haystack Mountain, which was silhouetted against the bright sky. Shenlee's greeting to Gary had been true to form, a polite nod, and I had a feeling Gary hadn't exactly taken a shine to my old friend. Who could blame him?

“I don't get it, Alex,” Gary said after a second. “Why pay Ross? What's up that's so goddamned important?” Before I could answer, he shrugged. Maybe he saw an impatient glint in my eye. “Sure, Alex,” he said before I could answer. “No problem. I'll call Ross.”

Gary was too considerate to ask questions, and I was grateful to him for that. Gary is a good guy, hardworking and anxious to succeed,
and Saranac is a friendly town. As I watched Gary climb into the cab and slam the door, I took a deep breath. When I saw him pick up his cell phone, I knew he was punching in Ross's number. He loudly gunned the engine, and a couple of seconds later with the phone at his ear, he had the truck out in traffic and was gone.

I felt a pang of frustration somewhere in the pit of my stomach as I realized I wished I was with him. We'd get our machines working, load up our trucks, haul the ice out to the club, and while the members partied in the club's big ballroom, Gary and I would end the day drinking beer and laughing it up with the club's crew. I didn't like the idea of having to spend time with Shenlee—and discussing the topics I suspected he wanted to talk about. That stuff was all part of my past, and I wanted to keep it there—in the past. But I didn't see that I had a choice.

As we walked down the sidewalk in the direction of Sears, Shenlee said, “Pack an overnight bag. Be at the airport at noon. We'll be taking a ride in that Cessna I mentioned.”

“I have a date tonight. I told my girlfriend we'd—”

“I'm sure your girlfriend has a telephone. Call her. Tell her you're tied up.”

“Suppose I say I'd rather not go? Suppose I say I'm through with special operations?”

Shenlee flashed a disgusted look. “C'mon, Klear, don't play games. You're going. Get packed!”

I felt as if a mule had given me a hard kick in the solar plexus. Shenlee was right. I would be going. There are certain people in our government you don't want to get mad at you, people who you just don't say no to—and Jerry Shenlee was now one of them. He knew that and I knew that.

“I could never get used to living in New York City,” Shenlee said. “Look at this traffic.”

“Is D.C. any better during rush hour?” I asked. “You said you don't like the Beltway.”

We were in a rented Caddy, and headed south on the Van Wyck Expressway, a six-lane highway running through the borough of Queens. Our plane had landed at LaGuardia Airport, and almost immediately after driving out of the airport we found ourselves in a traffic jam.

“Look at this!” Shenlee screamed suddenly while honking his horn at a driver in a blue Lexus who had managed to force her way into our lane. Once the Lexus driver had completed her little maneuver, she grinned, gave Shenlee an unfriendly salute, gunned her engine for emphasis while again changing lanes.

“I oughta—”

“Where are we going?” I asked for maybe the fifth time.

“Like I said, Klear, you're going to be talking to a very important individual. You'd better be on your best behavior.”

When I said, “I always am,” Shenlee said, “Yeah, sure.”

After a while traffic eased up, and we exited onto another highway, this one somewhat less crowded than the expressway. We seemed to be driving in the direction of New York City.

“We're looking for exit eleven,” Shenlee said. “We wanna go south.”

“Where will that take us?”

“We're headed to Floyd Bennett Field. You ever heard of it?”

“Vaguely.”

Shenlee shook his head. “If you knew a little more history, Klear, you'd know Floyd Bennett was New York City's first municipal airport. Famous people took off from there.”

“Like who?”

“Like Amelia Earhart. You've heard of her, I'm sure. How about ‘Wrong-Way' Corrigan?”

“What did he do?”

“Flew to Ireland. I think it was Ireland. Thought he was going to California.”

“Did he forget his compass? Didn't he ever look down? C'mon, Jerry. No one could be that dumb.”

“Maybe he thought his oil-pressure gauge was his compass. How the hell should I know?” With one hand on the steering wheel, Shenlee gestured impatiently with the other. “Anyway, Floyd Bennett was a naval air station. But it's been decommissioned. It sits right on the water, just west of Kennedy. But it still belongs to the government and—”