The Spy I Loved (19 page)

“
Here’s another one that seems very interesting.” Marinaro
clicked on an icon, and Frank took a look at a simple
device.

It was a
camera, complete with swiveling head, zoom and focus, which
required a two-way signal. Since such signals were directional,
sometimes going straight up, they were notoriously hard to detect.
The device had been picked off by sharp eyes on the ground. The
camera itself was stapled to a tree using a plastic tab. It had
been discovered a few feet off the ground on a tree trunk. Once
activated, the lens was adjusted by remote control and the camera
head was swiveled around to the desired view.

Men and
women in a control room would sit and watch.

“
How much did that cost to build?” Frank was shaking his head.
“Crikey.”

“
Near as we can make out, about four bucks.”

It wasn’t
just superpowers now. It wasn’t just rogue states, with a tax base
of millions in terms of population. It wasn’t just the
international terror groups, funded by oil, anti-Semitism and
hatred for America.

“
We’ll be looking for them now. Even so, they could have put
hundreds out—even last year, and then just sat back and
waited.”

Like the
boat and its launch system, this one had an uplink.
Battery-powered, it had a remote solar cell for recharging. The
wires were camouflaged, grey, moss-green and brown. Stapled to the
tree, the coloured staples quickly rusting, the solar cell’s lower
or visible side was also camouflaged.

It was
draped over a heavy spruce bough a couple of metres up and held in
place with plastic ties. A couple of boaters, or a small party of
hikers, could put out a dozen of them in an hour.

“
It’s elegant.”

Little F
was forced to agree, and at that price, they could afford to
scatter them all over hell’s half-acre.

Marinaro
had a thought. It wouldn’t take long to whip out a few of these
little babies for their own use. Frank’s eyes gleamed at him from
the screen, a sly grin tracing across his bland
features.

“
Right, then.”

The men
rang off, each intent on their own business, which was extensive
enough outside of this particular file.

Marinaro
had one more call to make. This one would be to his counterpart at
the Department of Homeland Security. He had good relations with the
C.I.A. as well. And they were as interested as all hell.

***

When
Lindsey knocked at his door, his dinner sizzling on the grille out
back, Liam hesitated to answer. All she had to do was walk around
to the back and wait a few minutes. He would hardly let the steak
burn. Knowing Lindsey, she would just pick up a fork and turn it
over anyways

Sighing,
he bowed to the inevitable Fates.

She came
in, looking nervous but determined. At first she had trouble
meeting his eyes, and then her face came up. There was that cold
rush of adrenalin again.

He wished
she would stop doing that. She wanted him real bad and he just
couldn’t do it.

“
Who
are
you?”

“
Er…Lindsey?”

“
Those men. You sabotaged their boat.”

He
couldn’t help the guilty smirk, but desperately tried to
cover.

“
What—what are you talking about?”

She’d
seen the gun of course. He’d had about three stiff whiskeys and let
her in on some mad impulse that had quickly come back to haunt him.
She knew he had it with him on the island, at the
campfire.

“
I saw you that morning. I was opening up. Most of the
die-hards had gone off at dawn, but you were futzing around down
there in good light. They couldn’t see you—you’re down the bank a
ways and the angle’s all wrong. They were across the road and there
are trees. A man like you would have known that.” They had come
down with their tackle and cooler just about the time Liam fired
up. “It’s not that hard to figure out, Liam Kimball.”

They were
timing it just as much as he was. They’d been watching each other.
They were the only people in the camp not intent having a good time
and minding their own business, first and foremost.

She was
convinced she’d seen him do something to their boat. Although, at
the time, she didn’t think much of it, now she was sure. She’d had
a little time to think. Now there were all these goings-on.
Helicopters, people talking about explosions upriver, strange men
coming and going…and Liam, imperturbable, clearly not really
belonging there no matter how well he could cast a line.

Liam, who
had people sneaking around his back door late at night.

“
Lindsey. Why would I ever want to do such a thing? Uh,
whatever you think it was?”

“
You mean like pulling the baler plug and giving it a good
yank? Or maybe loosening up the spark-plug connector with a bit of
a hard side-ways pull on the wire? Pull the spark-plug cap and spit
in it when it’s another man’s boat? Don’t forget, we have our
little fishing tournaments around here and there are some real
big-money prizes. Yeah, eh. Some real professionals, too—and some
real cheats. Yes, Liam Kimball. That is what I would very much like
to find out.”

“
Honestly, Lindsey. I have no idea what you are talking
about.”

She
stared for a moment. She bit back tears. Then she turned around and
walked out the door, leaving him with a terrible sinking
sensation.

This
definitely wasn’t over.

She was
so beautiful when she was angry.

Chapter Thirteen

Liam
thought an apology might be in order. He went to the store and
picked up a bag of chips and one or two other small items. They had
little wire baskets, and Liam had always enjoyed a good mosh-down
on junky foods. The place was typical of many small town and
village grocery stores and it was almost impressive when he
realized that this was private enterprise—good people making a real
go of it.

She was
alone behind the counter. His luck was in.

“
I’m terribly sorry if I have offended you,
Lindsey.”

“
Oh, no. Not at all. It’s just that this is my home.” Her face
worked. “It’s just that we’d kind of like to know what’s going
on.”

She
glared at him in real anger.

He hung
his head and shuffled his feet, trying to think of what to
say.

There are so many things you can’t know.

“
Lindsey—”

At that
point their awkward little conversation was cut short by the
ringing of the door-bell on the front of the store, and Liam handed
over a ten-dollar bill. A mother and three young daughters crossed
the intervening space, the girls’ faces intent on the candy in the
racks.

Taking his cold cans of Coke and a handful of chocolate bars,
he shoved them into his shoulder bag. She was so angry even the
kids noticed it, and he was the only one there. The gun was still
tucked into his pocket too. There were times when you walked and
your head sort of pounded,
squish, squish,
squish…

He really
had been working too hard.

A
thoughtful, perhaps even slightly abashed Liam Kimball left the
store and headed for the docks. The motor fired on first pull,
drowning out one of their resident gulls, who seemed a friendly
sort.

At last.

Something
that makes sense.

Yon seagull still loves me.

It’s better than nothing.

Liam
headed straight for the farthest end of the lake where there were
extensive areas still not surveyed, the hard pounding roar of the
motor at his back not interfering with thought but aiding it
instead.

Slowing down well away from the dock, he took a moment to
turn on and calibrate the scanners. He dropped the metal
fishy
over the gunwale.
He was looking for aluminum, high-temperature alloys, looking for
traces of radioactivity of a certain type at a certain level (and
hopefully, no more) above the background count. He was looking for
hard metallic sonar reflections, using the full suite of underwater
electronic detection measures. Luckily the average mass of
individual beer cans, soup cans, pop and juice cans was known.
Those hits could be held within parameters and filtered out. But
the bottom was an extensive bed of all kinds of metallic
objects.

His best
cruising speed with the paravanes out was about two-thirds
throttle. Shoving it wide open did nothing but burn fuel faster.
Once she was warmed up, the automatic choke came off. The thin
puffs of blue smoke cleared and she was heading up the river with a
bone in her teeth as the real sailors liked to say.

This was
no time for gut instinct or trying to throw off the enemy. He would
sweep his areas systematically, without motoring long distances
between grid-sections. The footprint of his sensors was a hundred
metre radius, no more. This necessitated going up and down, back
and forth. With substantial overlap, this would take time. Off in
the east, a dark, dragonfly shape flew low over the hills. His
heart picked up a beat or two, but settled quickly. The Canadian
military was taking the request for some presence
seriously.

There was
still a chance of some other operative finding something somewhere
else.

I’m in no
danger. There’s nothing here anyways.

He had
always admired clear thinking.

He was
right in the middle of Goddawannapiss Lake, a good eight or ten
kilometres from the camp. Liam decided to check the level in the
fuel tank. The nearest shore was a half a kilometre to the
northeast, the calm surface and balmy air presaging another fine
morning and a hot, humid afternoon. There might be thunderstorms
later, going by the bank of cumulus down low on the southwestern
horizon.

With the
motor switched off, he unscrewed the lid on the boat tank and had a
quick look. There was still a good one-third left, sloshing around
in aromatic wetness. He pulled out a twenty-five litre red plastic
Jerry-can of petrol. Liam topped it up, cursing when it
overflowed.

He put
the petrol back in its snug berth, no sense in having it bouncing
around too much, and screwed the cap back on the fuel tank. He
mopped up a little fuel with a rag. Liam was just easing himself
back into a comfortable seat, the boat gently rising and falling
under him. He became aware of a persistent buzz from off to his
left.

Looking
up, he smiled at first to see a white radio control model speed
boat, racing out from shore, front end bobbing up and down with its
progress. It was weaving back and forth. The steering was very
responsive on those little babies. One of his adolescent nephews
had one.

Shading
his eyes, he looked for kids or somebody on shore with a radio
control box. There should be at least one boy and his
dad.

It was a
good long ways off, and he hit the starter. The motor burst into
life. Steering again on his original course, Liam kept watching the
thing. There was a shot of adrenalin when he saw it was heading
straight for him. As he watched, it didn’t deviate. It was
definitely headed this way.

Shit.

Opening
up the throttle, he kept to his course, reaching for his bag on the
floor beside him. He pulled out the small but powerful binoculars,
quickly taking a look at the toy boat. It was closing fast. His
guts turned to ice. He was in trouble again. He rammed the throttle
full open, scanning the shoreline. He swept back and forth, seeing
nothing that corresponded to a human being. There was nothing light
or colourful, nothing moving, no sign of camps or docks, no buoys,
boathouses or other signs of human habitation.

This was
definitely a bad scene.

Liam was
going top speed at full throttle, leaning forward as far as he
could to help trim the boat for speed. He grabbed all loose stuff
from around his feet and tossed it forward. It didn’t make much
difference. The machine was catching him from behind although there
was time yet. It was three hundred metres back. He was surprised.
They were usually much faster, although rough water would be the
thing’s downfall. Liam focused on the end of the lake where it
narrowed. It was coming up fast.

Whoever
was controlling the boat was far away somewhere. Either that or it
was pure robot. A loon pulled up off the lake ahead of him, after a
long, splashing take-off run, which was literal in every sense of
the word. Their legs went full blast, providing much of the power.
It crossed in front of him, two feet off the water and fifty metres
out.

“
Yeah, get out of here!” His words were lost in the roar of
the wind and the howl of the motor. “Crazy bird.”

The thing
was still back there, whining away.

Where the
lake narrowed the river hooked left. There would be shoals, rocks,
the tips of dead trees just breaking the surface with their gnarled
and waterlogged root-balls holding bottom.