Devereaux said, “Hello.”
Rita Macklin turned, startled, saw him in the shadow of the back of a bakery, next to the bar and grill. It was just before noon. He stepped out of the shadow. He was eating a bagel. “Want a bite?”
“I’m starving.”
He gave her half.
They ate the bagel quietly, a little apart, staring at each other in the bright morning light. Their breath puffed on the cold breeze.
“You been here long?”
“Half an hour or so. Securing the alley.”
“Is it secure?”
“I suppose so.”
“I got my hair done.”
“Everything worked all right.”
“How did they find you?”
“Melvina sent me a letter. They were at her house. I told you about her.”
Rita nodded.
“I went there. Got involved in something. One of their operations.” He smiled, almost gently, a smile for the season, warmth edged with cold. “I’m afraid I screwed them up.”
Rita grinned suddenly. She dropped the remains of the bagel on the bricks of the alley. She grabbed him hard, and kissed him hard. For a long time. He held her just as hard. They didn’t speak. They smelled each other, they felt their bodies beneath too many layers of clothing press at each other.
“God, I miss you.”
“I love you, Rita.”
Okay. They broke. Touched hands. Stood apart. Stared at each other.
“Want a story?”
“I’m on vacation.”
“Okay. Get a freebie to California.”
“Are you coming?”
“For a while,” he said, still smiling at her. “I love you, babe.”
“You have a funny way of showing it.”
“I thought they’d let it go. The other side. I thought I could keep you out of it.”
“Two goons from our side came last night and worked me over.”
“I saw them go in.”
“Why didn’t you do something?”
“Save you, you mean? That wouldn’t have worked. They weren’t going to hurt you.”
“The guy slapped me around.”
“I’ll challenge him to a duel,” Devereaux said.
“Bastard.”
“There’s a woman. With a kid in Poland. She’s safe now, a little while. I’m working on Hanley, trying to tie the loose pieces down. Before.”
“Before what?”
“What have I been telling you?” He frowned. “Game’s over, Rita. They won.”
“Don’t say that.”
“All right. I won’t say it.”
“Dev. Hold me.” Little girl. He wrapped his arms around her. She pressed her face against his chest. She felt so frightened.
“A Polish woman. She worked here for KGB. She was forced. It’s complicated, big, sort of crude, a typical Russian operation. They have the sophistication of farts in a crowded theater.”
Tears in her eyes but she smiled.
“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you on the way to California. Right now, we see the man.”
“What man?”
“Shh. You’ll see in a little bit,” Devereaux said. Gently again. As gently as he had ever spoken to her, with an edge of sadness to his words, as though they were all precious, said for the last time.
Hanley and Mrs. Neumann left separately but met a block away from the Department of Agriculture building on Pennsylvania Avenue and continued along Fourteenth Street to the little bar and grill.
Hanley wore his brown fedora and brown overcoat. Mrs. Neumann said he looked like Fozzie Bear in the Muppets in that overcoat. He was vaguely aware of the Muppets but had never seen their program.
He carried a briefcase. Carefully assembled contents.
“I think this is exciting, much more exciting than computer searches,” Mrs. Neumann said as she took his arm. He couldn’t remember the last time a woman had taken his arm. It felt strange.
“I don’t like it.”
“You don’t like anything.”
“Every name flagged in the NSA computer. Mrs. Krakowski, Teresa Kolaki. And Felix Krueger.”
“And Melvina. Don’t forget Melvina Devereaux.”
After a moment, Mrs. Neumann said, “What do you suppose our part is in this?”
“You mean the Section?”
Mrs. Neumann frowned and gave Hanley’s arm a squeeze. “Don’t be parochial. I mean us, the big US.”
“I don’t know. I don’t know that we have a part. I don’t even know why I’m involved in this, why the Section is involved.”
“Go on. You do, too. Devereaux.”
“Why didn’t he stay in New York where he belonged?”
“Would that have made it better?”
“I don’t know. I just know it couldn’t be worse than it is.”
It had been bad. Yackley, the New Man (to distinguish him from the Old Man, Admiral P. G. Galloway), had called Hanley in at ten. He had a probe from the National Security Adviser. Was R Section poaching on NSA turf? And what about this agent, November? Had he slipped the traces? Yackley gave it to Hanley and Hanley, with no alternative, lied. The lies satisfied Yackley for the moment; they would satisfy the Adviser temporarily.
But the Adviser had only asked his questions at the urging of NSA. The Puzzle Factory was doing a move on R Section, covering up for screwing up the Devereaux reprocessing. So Hanley believed. And he would be caught in the middle again.
“After you,” Hanley said.
They pushed into the bar. It was dark and dirty as always. They edged behind the people who sat on the barstools, hunched over their luncheon drinks. Strangers, Hanley thought. And what am I? I’ve come here for thirty years and I don’t know anyone in the place.
Mrs. Neumann was ahead of him. They pushed through the bar to the back room where Hanley always ate. The Greek owner, in white shirt, black tie, and perpetual smile, looked up at him. “Good to see you, sir.”
“Yes, uh, hello.” He always felt embarrassed. Not that Sianis greeted him every day. Just some days when he least expected human contact.
Devereaux and Rita Macklin were at the table he usually occupied. He sat down and Mrs. Neumann, a bit startled, sat opposite. She stared at Devereaux and then smiled. “Nice to see you,” she said in her raspy half-whisper. Then to Rita, “We’ve never met, but I know you.”
Rita nodded, grinned, looked at Hanley. She had spoken to him once, on a phone line from Paris, where Devereaux had sent her during the Helsinki business. Devereaux’s control, his master’s voice. She watched him with naked curiosity while he removed his hat and coat. His face was pinched, pale, his nose waxen, his blue eyes watery from the cold. His hair was almost gone. She had met bureaucrats like him all her life.
“I didn’t… expect Miss Macklin to be here,” Hanley said.
“Life is full of surprises. Did you bring everything?”
“I’m not in the habit of taking a briefcase to my lunch on normal occasions.”
“Rita?”
She handed him a check. She had withdrawn $2,000 from a savings account and $643 from her checking account.
“Get her money, send it to the drop,” Devereaux said.
“I didn’t know she was going. With you.”
“It’s always best not to give too much away,” Devereaux said. “Melvina had a visitor last night. A Russian.”
Damn, Hanley thought.
“You want menus?” The waitress smiled at them. Nice little office group, divide the check, did you have the spinach salad, who had the second soup?
“Martini, perfect, straight—” Hanley began.
“Oh, we know, Mr. H. After all this time. One check or—”
“One check,” Devereaux said and smiled. “Mr. H. is paying.”
The waitress smiled wider. “What d’you want, hon?”
“Draft beer,” he said. As did Rita. Mrs. Neumann ordered a Coke.
“The Russian,” Hanley said.
“Identification with the embassy. My… friend removed him.”
“We could have provided—”
“No. You couldn’t have. Not without making this more complicated for the Section.”
“Your concern for the Section seems late,” Hanley said.
“I don’t give a goddam about the Section. Just about you, right now, Hanley. Just about keeping you from getting too rattled.”
Mrs. Neumann looked from one man to the other. “You know everything, every name you gave us, is flagged in the NSA computer? I can’t get it out without revealing myself. I may have given myself away just by probing.” She smiled. “I said I was with State Department special intelligence. That’ll give those Harvard boys fits.”
Devereaux returned the smile. “Only for a little while. Until they figure out we’re the only other game in town.”
“Tell me something.” It was Hanley, staring hard, his face fixed in a frown. “Why am I doing this for you?”
“You aren’t. I wouldn’t have put it on that thin a line. I tumbled to this Opposition network. And it turns out that NSA knows all about it. And wants to mess you around for even knowing that they know. And me. And Rita. And it makes you a little mad, a little defensive. All the true instincts of the bureaucratic infighter.”
“Why?”
“You told me once you’re all pigs eating out of the same trough. The Puzzle Factory wants a bigger portion of slops. Maybe that, maybe something else. This is a domestic operation, it ought to be under the G-men, right?”
“Right.”
“Is it?” Devereaux turned to Mrs. Neumann.
“No,” she said. “I went to the cupboard and it was bare. They don’t have a clue in Hooverville.”
“This is empire building in its primal stages,” Devereaux said. “NSA is stretching its legs.”
“That’s crazy.”
“The FBI is still shaky from the seventies. You know it and so do I. A nice domestic operation and why is the Puzzle Factory not doing a cooperative act with the G-men?”
“You never used slang—”
It was true. Devereaux said, “I’ve slipped into bad habits. I’m trying to communicate with you. You’re a bureaucrat. I’m selling you a product. A new weapons system, direct dial, a new way to scramble eggs in your microwave. I find I need you right now, Hanley.”
The martini arrived. Hanley drank half of it and it didn’t taste good to him.
“Lunch?” said the waitress.
“Cheeseburger,” Hanley said.
“Cheeseburger,” Rita said.
“Nothing,” said Devereaux.
“Do you have a salad?” asked Mrs. Neumann.
“No,” the waitress said.
“Chili,” Mrs. Neumann said.
She went away.
Hanley put the briefcase on the table. Devereaux took it and slipped it under the table, next to his chair. “The money? Passports? Addresses.”
“Levy Solomon picked Teresa Kolaki up this morning in Los Angeles. The black fellow is going back.”
“You didn’t use your own phone.”
“No.”
“How does Levy feel about this?”
“He likes it. The payment for him is in a separate envelope.”
“I thought he’d like it.”
“I didn’t even know you were aware of him.”
“We worked together once in Germany. How long’s he retired now?”
“Three years.”
“And the other address?”
“Yes. I got everything. They’re going to trace this sometime.”
“By then, it shouldn’t mean anything. I just need time.”
“And then you come back in.”
“No. Then I…” Devereaux paused. “Well, we’ll see what the Opposition has in mind.”
Rita Macklin said, “Are you going to let them kill him?” To Hanley.
Mrs. Neumann stared at Hanley.
“Do I have a choice?”
“No,” Devereaux said.
“The New Man. He’s come down on me,” Hanley said. “NSA knows something’s up. You know you’re putting Miss Macklin at risk.”
Devereaux frowned, did not look at her. “She was dead,” he said. “Maybe there’s some way to keep her alive. Other than trusting to your good intentions.”
“Damn you.”
“Yes. Damn me and you and everyone but it’s still the way it is. Hanley, the fucking KGB has an open contract. I’m tagged. And all the king’s horses and all the king’s men are not going to stop them. I’ve stopped putting my faith in governments. Or the Section.”
“Who did you… put in Chicago?”
“A friend.”
“I didn’t know you had so many friends.”
“He was someone I knew. A long time ago.”
“A friend,” Hanley repeated, turning the foreign word over in his mind.
“Yes,” Devereaux said. “Who would have thought it?”