interest in. It gave his address and everything.”
“Is that unusual?”
“Lew seemed to think so.” Lew now, not Lewis. “Said it was almost like someone upstairs was letting it be known that Trefimov was there for the taking, because this sort of cable traffic-excuse me, this sort of email traffic, old habits die hard-always leaks like a sieve. He said it was as if someone had declared open season on the fellow. And sure enough…”
He showed me the story. Trefimov had been murdered at his apartment on Kollnerhofgasse. Beneath the headline was a mug shot of a younger, cleaner Vladimir.
“Someone killed him?” I asked, trying to inject a note of innocence. My mouth was dry, so I sipped coffee. Dad watched closely.
“You forgot to put milk in.”
“So I did.” I knew my cheeks were reddening as I reached for the milk.
“Not just killed him. Shot him in the face. The way the KGB used to do it.”
“In Smiley’s People, anyway.” I couldn’t resist.
“Yes. Poor old Vladimir Miller.”
“Who sent the email?”
“Lew’s people in Washington.”
I wondered what to say next. I was wondering a lot of things, such as who “Lew’s people” were, and which of them had released the information. Did Lew’s people also know what Litzi and I were up to? Or the Hammerhead? Had one of them made the pickup at the dead drop? And was Dad privy to more than he was saying? Was he in fact baiting me? He seemed to have zeroed in on the story pretty quickly. Maybe he’d seen it before I arrived, and had been planning to spring it on me from the moment the bacon hit the skillet.
God, but I was getting paranoid. Mistrusting Litzi, now my dad. Maybe David would be next. Except I’d already done that, however fleetingly, when I’d wondered at Martin’s if he had helped someone break into my townhouse.
“What else does the story say?”
“That Trefimov was believed to be a former KGB agent, stationed in Prague. Doesn’t say when.”
Early seventies, I could have told him. Code name Leo, most likely, reporting to someone named Oleg. Had to be. And I now wondered what the relationship had been between Oleg and the Hammerhead, or if they might even be one and the same, since “the Hammerhead” was just a nickname. I nodded but said nothing.
“Lately he’s been associated with organized crime. Human trafficking, drugs, and-now, this is interesting- peddling old KGB secrets, it says. Probably his own, don’t you think?”
“Probably.” My palms prickled with sweat.
“Here’s something else. ‘Police are seeking the whereabouts of a man and woman who may have visited the victim a few hours before the murder. A spokesman described their appearance as white, slender, middle-aged, modestly dressed, and of average height.’”
“That could be just about anybody.”
“Not really.”
My cell phone rang. I was so startled that I banged the table with a knee. I answered while Vladimir’s photo stared at me upside-down from across the table.
“Yes?”
“Dad?”
“David! Good to hear from you. Isn’t it kind of early over there?”
“Late, you mean? It’s almost two in the morning.”
“Is everything all right?”
“Actually, no. I’m at your place. And, well, I think someone’s broken in. But I’m not positive, so I’ve spent an hour looking for other stuff that might be missing, and wondering if I should call the cops.”
“Other stuff? What’s missing? What makes you think somebody’s been there?”
“Well, I know this’ll sound, like, weird, but…”
“Just say it, son.”
“Books. Three whole shelves, it looks like. Unless you took them with you, or boxed them up somewhere.”
“No. I didn’t. Which ones?”
“The ones I came looking for. Your spy novels. I was going to borrow Lemaster’s A Spy for All Seasons, but they’re all gone.”
“Were the doors locked?”
“Every single one. Windows, too. And I don’t think they took anything else. I’ve checked pretty carefully.”
“Is there… Is there any kind of message for me?”
“On the answering machine?”
“No. This would be written. On the floor with the mail, maybe.”
“Hang on.”
He put down the phone. I listened to his footsteps. Dad, following the gist of the conversation, looked concerned, brow creased. His spotty hands rested on the table as if he was poised to leap into action. David came back on the line.
“No. Nothing. There was one thing earlier, but I’m not even sure it’s worth mentioning.”
“Tell me anyway.”
“One of the books, a Lemaster, was open facedown on the couch. I assumed they missed it because you left it there.”
“Which one? Open to what page?”
There was a brief pause as he stepped to the couch.
“ A Lesson in Tradecraft. Page one-nineteen. Did you mark it up like this?”
“You know me. I don’t mark them, and I don’t bend the pages.”
“It says ‘Find his work’ at the top of the page. Below, they’ve drawn lines around a paragraph.”
“Black ink? Block letters?”
“How’d you know?”
“Read me the paragraph.”
“Now? It’s kind of long.”
“Yes. Slowly, please.”
“Okay. Here goes:
“Folly looked across the tearoom and recognized his old agent right away. Heinz Klarmann was a wiry man who, to judge from his bloodshot eyes, might have just emerged from some all-night competition-seven-card stud, boozing, computing prime numbers on an abacus; any and all of them seemed plausible. A tired brown hat slouched on his head like a deflated balloon, lending him the air of a failed artist. He looked more Bohemian than German, although the moment he opened his mouth it was plain to everyone that Klarmann was Berlin to the core. An elaborately carved cane which he tapped as frenetically as an SOS from a sinking ship helped disguise a slight limp of unknown provenance. Barroom scuffle? Childhood illness? Drunken fall? No one knew, and Klarmann wasn’t saying. All that Folly cared about was that once you gave him an assignment you could consider it done, no matter how many shots of Schnapps or doses of dubious pharmaceuticals Klarmann consumed along the way. The man was a mercenary at heart, and would always finish the job, a professional to the core. This is why Folly was forever worried that someday, somehow, some other service would steal him away.”
And that’s it.”
“You sure there’s nothing else? Flip the pages.”
I heard a shuffling sound.
“Doesn’t look like it. No, nothing. ‘Find his work.’ What does it mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“Does this have anything to do with that assignment you’re on?”
“Possibly. Which is why I wouldn’t advise you to stick around there any longer than you have to.”
“Awesome. Should I call the police?”
