Craypool took one of the pens out of his shirt pocket and marked a note in the margin of the yellow legal pad in front of him.
O’Brien made a face and lit a cigarette. “Why do you have so many pens?”
“What?”
“Why—forget it.”
“Pens?”
“Forget it.”
Craypool stared at the sheet. It had been a rebuke; he was sure of it. “We could upset the Numbers ourselves. Turn it over to National Security Council at the next meeting.”
“Give it to the Hooverville crowd.”
“Yes,” Craypool said.
“I’d rather try to contain it. If it’s still possible.”
“Item: Macklin is gone. Item: Devereaux is gone. Item: Teresa Kolaki is gone. Gone where? We ran an airline credit check. Do you suppose they paid cash? If they got cash, who did they get it from?”
“What about the shine?”
“He’s back in his cage in Chicago. Something happened there.”
“Tell me something happened there. We get signals out of the Opposition camp you wouldn’t believe. They don’t even know where Malenkov is.”
“But the shine wasn’t there when it happened. Whatever happened.”
“So what happens now?”
“The shine took Kolaki somewhere.”
“Flights at that time?”
“Early in the morning. Not overseas but anywhere else. New York, D.C., L.A., Frisco. Anywhere.”
“Shit. Doubleshit.”
“I think November has to probe Krueger in Zurich. I told Morgan to stay there.”
“And Krueger?”
“He’s as pissed off as we are. This Rimsky tried to hold him up about the guarantee money. Said Krakowski was back in Poland.”
“Everyone is working a con. We point the finger at November, they can’t waste him. He’s moving. I can feel it. He’s doing something out there and we don’t know what it is.”
“He’s got Kolaki. We have to figure that. But what does that mean to us? Or him? It’s a matter of time for him. Even for his broad.”
O’Brien blinked at Craypool’s sudden vehemence. It was the hour, he decided. Nearly midnight. The days were too long. He’d have to talk to the Director in the morning. What could O’Brien tell him?
“I really don’t want to blow this.”
“Neither do I,” said Craypool. “But how long until the Section tumbles to what’s going on?”
“That depends on November,” O’Brien said. He stubbed out the cigarette. He lit another. “We alerted Morgan, in the clear. KGB has to pick it up. Let’s just wait on it.”
“How long?”
“Forty-eight hours, tops. Then we have to go one way or the other. If they haven’t taken care of our problem.”