Time to Hunt Part 44

He waited two full days. The house was absolutely empty. Even the livestock had been sent elsewhere. In the middle of the second night, he came down off the ridge and penetrated, using a lock pick to spring the locks. Then, making certain the shades were drawn, he explored the house using a powerful flashlight for six hours, a thorough, professional examination as he sought some clue as to where the Swagger family had gone to cover. But on the first pa.s.s, the house yielded nothing. The Swaggers had vanished.

The home was orderly, jammed with books on the subject of war, very clean. The little girl's room was the messiest, but only by a small margin. The living room was messy too, but it was a superficial mess, a one-day job, not the accrual of weeks of untidiness, and he could see where someone had spent a long night on the sofa. He found an empty bottle of bourbon in the garbage under the sink.

One ordinary hunting rifle, a Model 70 in .308, more a useful tool in this part of the country. A lightly customized .45 Colt Commander. No precision rifles. Swagger had seemed to leave that behind him. There was a study, where someone had done a lot of reading, but that was about all. He looked for family account books or financial files, in hopes that such would yield another possibility, but again, he found nothing.

It appeared to be hopeless. He was wondering what to do next. He went outdoors, carefully locking the door behind him, and went over to the garbage cans by the side of the house, still in the cart by which they would be hauled to the road twice a week. He opened one can and found it empty, but the second produced a last green plastic bag, knotted with yellow plastic ribbon at the top; it hadn't been picked up or even set out. Perhaps the garbage contract had been cancelled when the family decamped.

He took the bag to the barn, sliced it open with his Spyderco, and went through the materials very carefully. Not much: old yogurt cups, the bones of steaks and chops and chickens eaten carefully, used paper towels, tin cans, an ice cream package, very sticky, coffee grounds, the usual detritus. But then: something crinkled, a yellow Post-It tab. Very carefully he unrolled it and saw what it revealed.

"Sally M.," it said. "American 1435, 9:40 A.M." A.M."

CHAPTER F FORTY.

Bob took his time driving back from the McDonald's, letting his baby-sitters enjoy their presumed advantage over him. He went back to his motel room just outside the airport, called Mrs. Carter and told her that he hadn't found anything at the site but that he had some other ideas to pursue and he would certainly keep her informed.

He went out, got some dinner and caught a movie at a suburban mall, a stupid thing about commandos who fired and never missed and who took fire and never got hit, just to eat up the time. When he got out of the film it was 2300, which meant in London it was 0600 tomorrow. That was fine. Instead of returning immediately to his car, he walked around the strip mall until he found a pay phone, well aware that at least two cars of watchers were in the lot, eyeballing him.

Using his phone card, he placed an overseas call to the American emba.s.sy in London, getting a night-s.h.i.+ft receptionist; he asked to be transferred to the emba.s.sy Marine guard detachment, was pa.s.sed on to the duty NCO and asked for the NCOIC, Master Sergeant Mallory, who should be up and about, and in a few seconds Mallory came to the line.

"Mallory, sir."

"Jack, you remember your old platoon sarge, Bob Lee Swagger?"

"Jesus Christ, Bob Lee Swagger, you son of a b.i.t.c.h! I ain't spoke to you in thirty years, since I medevaced out of the 'Nam. How the h.e.l.l are you, Gunny? You done some great things in your third tour."

"Well, I am okay, still kicking around on a pension, no bad problems."

"Now what in h.e.l.l is this all about? You bringing a missus to London and want a place to stay? I got an apartment and you can camp there all you want."

"No, Jack, it ain't that. It's an S-2 thing."

"You name it and it's yours."

"It's not a big thing, a little favor."

"Fire when ready, Gunny."

"Now, I'm thinking that with your emba.s.sy security responsibilities, you have probably made contact with folks in the British security apparatus."

"I deal with Scotland Yard and the two MI's all the G.o.dd.a.m.n time. We got two officers over here, but, s.h.i.+t, you know officers."

"Do I ever. So, anyhow, you got a good NCO-type in Six or Five you know?"

"Jim Bryant, used to be a color sergeant in SAS. He now handles emba.s.sy coordination in security for MI-6. I meet with him all the G.o.dd.a.m.n time, especially when we have people coming in that present security problems."

"Good, counted on that. Now, here's the thing. In 1970, a guy named Fitzpatrick operated in Great Britain, but I think he was a Russian agent, or a Russian-hired agent. I don't know who the h.e.l.l he was or what he did or what became of him, but it would be G.o.dd.a.m.ned helpful for me to find out. Could you run that by your pal and see what shakes out? Their intel people would have the s.h.i.+t on him if anybody did."

"Gunny, what's this all about?"

"Old business. Very old business that's come around and is biting me in the a.s.s."

"Okay, I'll give it a run. If it's in there and it ain't real top-secret or whatever, Jim Bryant can nose it out for me. I'll get back to you soonest. What's your time frame?"

"Well, I'm about to sack out now. It's getting close to midnight over here."

"I'll give Jim a call and get to him as soon as possible. You got a number?"

"Let me call you. What's a good time?"

"Call me at 1800 hours my time. That would be, what, 1100 yours?"

"That's it."

"Get me direct at 04-331-22-09. Right to my office; don't go through the emba.s.sy switchboard."

"Good man."

"You got me on that chopper, Gunny. Wouldn't be here if you hadn't. I owe you this one."

"Now we're even, Jack."

"Out here."

"Out," said Bob.

He went back to his car and drove to the motel. His room had been expertly tossed and everything replaced neatly, including the cap on his toothpaste tube. But they'd been here, he could tell. They were watching him.

He undressed, showered and turned the lights out. It would be more comfortable in here than out there.

He went to breakfast at a Denny's the next morning, went for a little walk, watching the campers struggle to stay unseen, and precisely at 1100, put his long-distance call through to London.

"Mallory here."

"Jack."

"Howdy, Gunny."

"Any luck?"

"Well, yes and no."

"Shoot."

"This Fitzpatrick is more rumor or innuendo than actual operator. The Brits know he operated here around that time, but that info came late, from decoded radio intercepts after he'd gone on to his next duty station, wherever the h.e.l.l that was. But there was no way of covering him through their regular ways of watching, which means he didn't operate out of an emba.s.sy or a known cell."

"Is that strange?"

"As in, very strange."

"Ummmm," said Bob.

"So they have no photos. n.o.body knows what he looks like. n.o.body really knows who he was, whether he was a recruited Irishman or a native-born Russian citizen. They do say that when the Russians go abroad, they tend more than not to impersonate Irishmen, because there's a correspondence between the accents. In other words, a Russian can't play an Englishman in England or an American in America, but they've got a good record of playing an Irishman in England or America. The Russian phonetic ah ah sound is very similar in tongue placement to the sound is very similar in tongue placement to the ae ae of the cla.s.sic Irish accent." of the cla.s.sic Irish accent."

"So they think he's Russian?"

"Ah, they can't say for sure. That seems to be the best possible interpretation. The file has been dead for nearly fifteen years. Poor Jim had to drive all the way out to a records depository to even find the G.o.dd.a.m.n thing."

"I see."

"They only have some radio transmissions and some defector debriefings."

"What would they be?"

"Ah, a guy came over in seventy-eight and then another came over in eighty-one, both low-level KGB operatives, in political trouble, afraid they were going to get an all-expenses-paid TDY to the gulags. They gave up everything they had: a funny thing, you know, the Russians are all worried about confusing issues so they 'register' work names, code names, the like; they got so many agencies, they want to make sure n.o.body uses the name and things get all fouled up. The work name 'Robert Fitzpatrick' was one item in the registry that both these guys gave up. But here's the odd part."

"Okay."

"According to these guys, to both of 'em, he wasn't in the First Directorate. That's the KGB section that specializes in foreign operations, recruitments, penetrations, that sort of thing."

"The straight-up spies."

"Yeah, you know, hiring informants, getting pictures, running networks, working out of emba.s.sies, that sort of thing. The usual KGB deal."

"So what was he?"

"According to these clerks, the work name 'Robert Fitzpatrick' was the property of GRU."

"And what was that?"

"GRU is Russian military intelligence."

"Hmmm," said Bob again, unsure what this information could possibly mean. "He was army?" he finally asked.

"Well, yes and no. I asked Jim too. It seems GRU was uniquely tasked with penetration of strategic targets. That is, missiles, nuke delivery systems, satellite s.h.i.+t, that whole shebang. All the big atomic spies, like the Rosenbergs, like Klaus Fuchs, all them guys-they were GRU. This guy Fitzpatrick would be interested-I mean, if he existed, if he was Russian, if this, if that-he'd be doing something that was global, not local. He'd be trying to get inside our missile complexes, bomb plants, research facilities, the satellite program, anti-missile research."

"s.h.i.+t," said Bob, seeing the thing just twist out of his control. "Man, I don't know c.r.a.p about that and I'm much too old to learn."

"Plus you got your other problem; the Soviet Union broke up, all these guys went who-knows-where. Some are still working for Russian GRU, some are working for KGB or other competing organizations with different agendas, some for the Russian mafia, some for all these little republics. If it was hard to understand then, it don't make no sense now."

"Yeah. Anything else?"

"Gunny, that's it. It ain't much. A possible name, a suggestion of possible affiliation. Man, that's all they got."

"Christ," said Bob. He searched his memory for anything that he had learned about Trig that touched on any issue of strategic warfare, but came up blank. It was all Vietnam, the war, that sort of thing.

"Sorry I wasn't any help."

"Jack, you were great. I'm much obliged."

"Talk to you."

"Out here."

"Out."

Bob put the phone down, more confused than ever. He felt everything was now hopelessly twisted out of his slender ability to grasp it. The "strategic" business had him buffaloed. Where the h.e.l.l did that that come from? What did it mean? come from? What did it mean?

He called Trig's mother and got her right away.

"Have you learned anything, Sergeant Swagger?"

"Well, maybe. It turns out the fellow's name is Robert Fitzpatrick. The rower."

"Yes. The Irishman."

"Yeah, him. The British think he was a Russian agent, but not the sort that would be interested in the peace movement or anything like that. They think his mission would have been nuclear warfare, missiles, that sort of thing. Is there anything in Trig's life that would touch on that?"

"Good heavens, no. I mean, I a.s.sume the conventional peace movement wisdom on strategic warfare was simply 'Let's ban the bomb and everything will be peachy,' but it wasn't an issue, not at all. They were fighting to stop the war that was going on, the war they saw on television, the war that threatened them." them."

"Your husband was in the State Department. Did he have any connection with any of this?"

"Not at all. He was in the counselor service. We served in a number of emba.s.sies abroad representing American interests but never had a thing to do with the missiles or that sort of thing. He finished up his career managing an economic research project."

"A brother, a sister?"

"My brother is the famous Yale ornithologist; two of Jack's are dead, one a doctor, the other a lawyer in New York; the third, a survivor, manages the family money; my sister is three times divorced and lives in New York, spending money and trying to look younger."

"All right."

"You'll get it. Eventually, Sergeant Swagger, you'll figure it out."

"I think I'm out of my league this time, ma'am. I will keep working on it, though."

"Good luck." "Thanks."

He hung up, stumped. He opened the phone book, found a commercial shooting range called On Target over near the airport. There, he rented a stock .45 and spent an hour shooting holes in a target at twenty-five yards while his campers cooled their heels outside in the parking lot.

When he emerged, the food choices weren't great: Popeyes Fried Chicken, a Pizza Hut, a Subway and, down the road a bit, a Hardee's. He decided on Subway, and was walking toward it when he realized what it had to be and where he had to go next.

Bonson was flagged down after the 3 P.M P.M. meeting by his secretary, who said there was an urgent call from Team Cowboy. He took it in his office.

"He burned us."