The Cutout (32 page)

“This thing intrigues me. A keepsake, Akbar says. Something you treasure of Michael’s.” He snorted derisively. “A
grenade
pin?”

She could no longer see for the black dots dancing before her eyes. In a second she would pass out. She reached up with both hands and dug her nails into his wrist. His eyelids flickered, but otherwise, he regarded
her steadily. The pressure of his thumb against her windpipe increased. Flames flared inside her head. Panic imploded like a screaming child. Her fingers went slack.

And then he released her.

“I confess I do not comprehend the grenade pin at all.”

Caroline drew a shuddering breath. “People … attach importance to all kinds of things.”

“Women, in my experience, attach none whatsoever to the instruments of war.”

“Then you and I know very different sorts of women.”

“Perhaps. But even if we allow for the differences between Western and Arab women, Miss Hathaway— even if we suppose for an instant that any number of bankers in London carry such things in their purses— even then, the grenade pin does not fit. You were sent by your organization to discover this man’s whereabouts. Correct?”

Caroline did not reply.

“An organization such as yours does not think in subtle terms. It offers up the sentimental things: a high-school ring, a cherished love letter. It does not make a keepsake of a grenade pin.”

“Then perhaps, praise be to Allah, your assumptions about me are false.”

“My assumptions are never false,” Sharif said softly. “The day that I am wrong is the day that I shall die.”

The bomb maker’s margin of error.

“So,” he said briskly, “I must conclude that there is more to this matter than appears to the eye. You are unable or unwilling to be truthful; I cannot force you to be otherwise. But you know something more of this
Michael than merely his false name. I will not tell you where he is. That I cannot do for anyone. But because of this—because of the grenade pin—I shall undertake to pass a message.”

“Thank you,” Caroline said faintly.

“It will not be this silliness about the dead father,” Sharif continued. “We both know that Michael was raised by vermin…. Do you stay in Berlin long?”

“In a day or two I will go to Budapest.”

“Then I shall inform Michael that he may find you— Jane Hathaway of the cunning and unlikely grenade pin—at the Budapest Hilton. You know it?”

“Yes.” She had had afternoon tea there once. The ruins of a monastery were built into the walls. The hotel, however, was anything but ascetic, and quite beyond a State Department stipend.

“Very well, then. We are done. Akbar! The blindfold!”

They drove her to the Spandau S-Bahn station and left her at the foot of the platform stairs. They returned her purse and her belongings, so that she was able to purchase a ticket from one of the automated machines. The next thing, of course, was to mount the stairs and await the train; but she knew that if she attempted the steps, her legs would fold up beneath her, and all her delicate subterfuge would come to an end.

But for a grenade pin—

She had never felt so callow, so outmaneuvered.
So goddamn stupid.

The steps rose up before her. A man in a black felt hat edged around her with a curious look, hastily averted, and clattered up to the platform. She had less than ten minutes to reach Potsdamer Platz and her hotel. She would have to change out of her clothes and
wig before meeting Wally Aronson. And yet she lacked the will to move.

It was as she was standing there, surveying her ticket, that a white Trabant pulled up to the curb a few feet away.

“Hiya, doll,” said Tom Shephard. “Need a lift?”

FIVE
Berlin, 10:15
A.M.

Y
OU,” CAROLINE SAID BRIEFLY
.

“I might say the same,” Shephard replied, “only I’d be lying. Who are you trying to be, anyway? Liza Minnelli does Sally Bowles?”

“You were following me.”

“Right again. Boy, you Agency broads are quick.”

She didn’t move.

“Oh, for crying out loud, get
in.
We’re due at the Interior Ministry in fifteen minutes, and unless you want to sing ‘Cabaret’ for all of Voekl’s boys—which I don’t think is politically correct, frankly—you’re going to have to change your clothes. Which means we have no time at all.”

Caroline got in.

Shephard peeled away from the curb, leaving tire tread in his wake. Not bad for a Trabant.

“So explain this to me.” She was controlling her anger with difficulty. “You just happened to be driving by Alexanderplatz this morning and knew in an instant that the dark-haired woman reading the paper by the
television tower was in fact
me.
Is that what I’m supposed to believe?”

“You’re not supposed to believe anything. I’m not as devious as your employers. I’m quite happy to offer you the truth.”

“You know the bartender at the Tacheles.”

He shot her a glance. “The Tacheles? You do get around. The only bartender I know runs a dark little hole near my house in Dahlem.”

“How, then?”

“I stopped by the Hyatt this morning to invite you to breakfast,” he replied. “I thought we could talk about the Brandenburg Gate without the entire embassy listening in. I wanted to hear what you had to say about 30 April. Guesstimate where they might be headed.”

Caroline studied him. “You’ve hit a wall, haven’t you? The bomb crater isn’t giving up its secrets.”

“Not a wall,” he corrected, “a minor plateau. Nothing we couldn’t surmount given a normal pace of investigation. But normal doesn’t apply to this baby. Normal is when the Veep is having breakfast in bed in D.C. instead of in somebody’s trunk. The entire weight of Washington is sitting on my shoulders right now, and I need a lead worse than a drunk needs detox.”

“You should write this stuff down. It’s pure Hammett.”

He ignored her. “It was clear from your cloak-and-dagger getup that you were already booked this morning. As I was pulling up to the hotel, you were walking out.”

She glared at him.

“You can change your hair and you can change your clothes, darlin’, but the walk’s a dead giveaway. Some legs I don’t forget.”

The anger fused.

“What in the hell were you doing following me? And don’t give me that bullshit about hoping for a
lead
.”

“I thought I was doing you a favor,” he said piously.

“A favor? You nearly got me killed. Shephard, you can’t even surveil somebody discreetly. My friends spotted you the minute you pulled out behind them.”

“Your
friends
, as you choose to call them, would think a day without surveillance was like a day without sunshine. They’ll get over it, believe me. And I had no intention of being discreet. That would have destroyed the purpose.”

“Which was?”

He swerved to avoid a furniture van parked in the middle of Grunerstrasse. “I wanted them to know you were being tailed. Maybe they’d think twice before they killed you.”

“Oh, right,” Caroline said dryly. “Thanks.”

“Now, if you’re done having a hissy fit,” he continued, “it’s my turn. Why the clandestine meeting with a bunch of rag heads? Does Wally Aronson know about this?”

Shephard, Caroline noticed, had yet to mention Sharif’s name. He had no idea whom she had met with, or why.

She began to relax.
“Should
Wally know?”

“That’s not for me to say. I’m not exactly in the Agency loop.”

“How true. End of interrogation.”

“Look.” He pulled the Trabant over to the curb and slammed on the brakes. Now he was angry. “I enjoy the repartee, Carmichael, as much as anyone. It helps me hone my dating skills—”

“What skills?”

“But I haven’t slept in thirty-six hours, and I’ve had
about enough of the attitude. I’m the head of this investigation.” Shephard’s hand was on her arm. “The Vice President is missing. You fly in as the 30 April expert. And next thing I know, you’re wearing a wig and getting into a car with three men of Arab extraction. I don’t think it was a social call. I think it was an agent meeting. And I’m certain you’re holding out on me.”

“I’ll see you at the Interior Ministry,” Caroline said, and shook him off. She reached for the door.

“I have their license plate number, you know,” he shot back as she got out of the car. “All I have to do is call one of my friends in the Berlin police, and I’ve got an ID.”

“Call away, Shephard.” She slammed the door shut and leaned through the open window. “I’ll be making a few calls myself. The Bureau might wonder why you wasted two hours trailing an Agency colleague this morning instead of supervising the crater.”

“Oh, I’m
scared,”
he deadpanned.

“Well, I’m not,” she said, and walked away.

“Good morning, Mr. Aronson.”

Christian Schoettler, the Interior Minister, was a trim man in his late thirties. He rose from his desk chair and offered his hand to Wally “I see that Mr. Shephard is late, as usual.”

“We were hardly on time ourselves,” Wally replied apologetically. “The traffic today—”

“Yes, yes, it is because of the curfew. We have had the very devil of a time enforcing it, I’m afraid. Most of the Turks have been sensible and remained at home. But a few extremists thought to test the government’s resolve.”

He spoke English, Caroline noticed, with a British accent. An old Oxonian.

“May I present my colleague from Washington, Caroline Carmichael?”

“Ah, yes.” Schoettler gave her a smile that failed to reach his eyes. “The Department of State’s terrorism expert.”

“Merely one of them, I’m afraid,” she told him.

“But the one they chose to send
here,”
Schoettler pointed out. “That must mean a great deal. Please have a seat.”

The door behind them burst open under the force of Schoettler’s harried male secretary. “Herr Bundesminister, Herr Shephard is arrived.”

“So I see,” the minister said as Tom Shephard swung into the room. “How are you, Tom?”

“Just fine, Christian. Could use a little coffee, though.”

“Georg, a cup for Mr. Shephard, if you would be so good.”

“Did you hear the news?” Shephard asked the room in general. “We nearly found the Veep.”

Schoettler looked up. It was the first sign of animation Caroline had glimpsed in him. “Where?”

“Bratislava,” Wally broke in. “The raid failed. We lost two embassy officers. Bullets in the head.”

“My deepest sympathies, Wally,” Schoettler said.

Caroline’s mind was racing. Where had Eric called from last night? Not Bratislava. He had killed the child in Bratislava before leaving for somewhere else. Had he sung a lullaby to the embassy watchers before he shot them, too?

“They traced 30 April to an apartment complex,” Shephard explained, “and were trying to locate the actual place where Payne was held. But—”

“But Krucevic moved first,” Wally concluded abruptly. “So we’re back where we started. With the bombing. Christian?”

There was a short silence. Then Schoettler’s aide appeared in the door with a coffee cup, and the minister said, “Why don’t you sit down, Tom?”

Shephard took the coffee and the last available chair.

Schoettler pulled a dark blue file across his desk and opened it. “The Brandenburg bombing. One of the few cases in recent memory to be so quickly solved by the Berlin police.”

“Solved.” Shephard scowled and hunched forward. “That’s news to me.”

Schoettler tossed his file across the desk. “Four Turkish suspects seized in a raid last evening have confessed to the murders of the television crew and the theft of the van. They have confessed to loading that van with a mix of fertilizer and gasoline and parking it near the Brandenburg Gate. They have even confessed to detonating the bomb in the midst of Vice President Payne’s speech. In a matter of hours, they will be charged with all three crimes.”

“But that’s crap,” Shephard burst out. “The chemical residue found in the crater is from a batch of Semtex plastic explosive. We’ve isolated that much. You can’t just—”

“I’m afraid you must have isolated the wrong thing, Tom,” Schoettler interrupted coldly. “Whatever it is, it did not destroy the Brandenburg Gate. The suspects have confessed, you see.”

“Fuck the suspects!”

“Tom—” Wally Aronson half rose from his chair and laid a restraining arm on Shephard’s shoulder. Caroline noticed that the station chief’s manner had altered subtly
since Schoettler’s speech. He was at once watchful and completely at ease, like a snake basking in the sun. “Let’s have a look at the file, shall we?”

He flipped it open and studied the Berlin police report. “I see that all four Turks have previous records.”

“Yes.” Schoettler nodded. “Known anarchists.”

“But none of them has admitted to involvement in the Vice President’s kidnapping.”

The Interior Minister shrugged. “I understand another terrorist group has claimed responsibility for that.”

“And you think 30 April just seized the opportunity of the explosion,” Shephard interjected sarcastically, “to swoop down on the embassy and snatch our Veep?”