“No, sir,” Ryan responded. “What we need is a major intelligence investigation into Tarankov’s chances for success, and exactly how deep his power base runs not only in the military and old KGB and Militia, but in the rank and file population as well. The people of Dzerzhinskiy cheered him when he destroyed the power station.
“I think we need to give Prime Minister Kabatov as much help as possible, but only in the form of assurances until we have more information. The Prime Minister is ordering the very same thing that resulted in President Yeltsin’s death.”
“What happens if we find out that Tarankov will be successful?” Secor asked evenly. “Do we step in with force?”
“In that case it would be a political decision. But if the man has popular backing he’ll become president of Russia, and we’ll end up having to deal with him. Perhaps it would be better to start hedging our bets now.”
The President eyed Ryan coolly. “As you say, Mr. Ryan, the decision would be a political one. But I’m curious. What do you mean by hedging our bets?”
“We should send out feelers to him. Might kill two birds with one stone.”
“How so?”
“Whoever we send as an unofficial envoy from this government would in reality be one of my people. He’d be instructed to explore possible future relations, while keeping his eyes and ears open to learn what he could.”
“In effect we’d be stabbing Prime Minister Kabatov’s democratic reform government in the back,” the President said, his voice dangerously soft.
Ryan didn’t miss the warning signals, but he was in too deeply now to back out. He chose his next words with care. “Not exactly, Mr. President. But we would be protecting our own interests, because short of sending direct military help to Prime Minister Kabatov there is very little of a substantive nature that we can do. If Kabatov’s government falls, not because of anything we’ve done or not done, and Tarankov takes over, we should be prepared for him.”
The President sat back in his rocking chair. “I want to disagree with you, Mr. Ryan. But the hell of it is, I can’t.” He looked at Secor for help, but his National Security Adviser shook his head. “Do you have someone in mind for this … diplomatic mission?”
“Not at the moment, Mr. President.”
“How soon could you work up a proposal?”
“Within twenty-four hours, sir.”
“Very well, do it, Mr. Ryan,” the President said. “In the meantime I’ll telephone Prime Minister Kabatov and tell him that he has my complete support. If there’s anything we can do for him outside of Russia’s borders, we’ll do it. If possible Tarankov should be arrested and placed on trial.”
“Yes, sir,” Ryan said.
On the way out of the White House Murphy chuckled wryly. “I hope you know that you were had back there.”
“What?” Ryan asked.
“The President set you up, Howard. He has a habit of doing that. But you’ll learn.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You’ve named your own poison, man. If the President goes for your proposal you’d better pack your long underwear, because you’ll be the envoy.”
Ryan’s blood ran cold. “I’m a desk officer.”
“You just graduated.”
NINE
Traffic along the Boulevard Haussmann was intense as it was on every weekday except in summer.
McGarvey sat in the shade beneath an umbrella at a sidewalk cafe across the street from the huge department store Printemps, waiting for Jacqueline to come out. The law offices where she worked were in the next block. He’d expected her to return to work after lunch, but instead she’d come here. To do some shopping, he hoped, though he doubted it.
She’d been jumpy all weekend no doubt because of his own strange mood. Yemlin’s information about his parents had deeply disturbed him, and he’d been unable to hide it from her. Each time she’d asked what was wrong he told her that he always got this way in the spring in Paris.
“Then let’s leave the city,” she said.
“What about your job?”
“I’ll cut my summer vacation short. We could go to Cannes, or St. Tropez. It would be nice, I promise you.”
“No.”
“Pourquoi pas?” she cried.
“I have something to take care of, that’s why. I don’t ran away from my obligations.”
She’d shaken her head. “You’re a strange American.”
He’d laughed. “We all are.”
Jacqueline emerged from the department store, and McGarvey was about to get up and pay his bill, when something struck him as wrong. She turned in the opposite direction from her office, and headed off in a rush. McGarvey sat down. She’d been inside for nearly an hour but she’d bought nothing. She carried no shopping bags.
Ten minutes later he spotted another person he knew emerging with the crowds from the store, Colonel Guy de Galan, chief of the SDECE’s Division R7, in charge of gathering intelligence from and about America and the Western Hemisphere. McGarvey had had a brief run in with the man a couple of years ago.
Galan stepped to the side, and pretended to look at the displays in one of the windows while he lit a cigarette.
It was a standard tradecraft procedure, but it would be impossible for him to spot McGarvey here. The point was, however, that he was taking precautions. He expected someone might be watching him.
After a few moments, Galan turned, scanned the traffic in the street and looked over in McGarvey’s direction. But then he tossed his cigarette aside, and headed in the same direction Jacqueline had gone.
“How about that,” McGarvey said, even more depressed than before. He’d been ninety-nine percent sure that Jacqueline worked for the SDECE. But there’d been that tiny one percent that he’d been able to delude himself with. Gone now, and it saddened him.
Time to get out, finally, like he’d been trying to do for any number of years. Each time he thought he had it made, though, someone came for him. Each time they came he jumped through the hoops.
“Maybe it’s what you are, Gompar,” an old friend had told him once. They’d been drinking, and saying anything that came into their heads. “Maybe the leopard doesn’t like its spots, but tough shit. They’re his and he’s got to live with them.”
“Gee, thanks, Phil, that helps a lot,” McGarvey said. They’d just been bullshitting each other. But sometimes the truth came out like that. And sometimes it wasn’t so pleasant to face.
McGarvey paid for his coffee and went in search of an imported food shop and then a car rental agency, not yet certain what he was going to do, but at least sure what his next move would be.
The thirty-five-mile drive out of Paris on the N13, which for short stretches followed the banks of the Seine, was quite pleasant in the afternoon sun. He’d taken a direct route not bothering to watch for a tail until he was clear of the heaviest traffic. Twice he’d turned off the main highway, and once he stopped at a service station to check his oil, so by the time he reached the small town on the Seine he was sure that he was clean.
On the other side of the town he got off the main highway again, and followed a series of increasingly narrower roads that wound their way through the farmlands along the river, until he came to an old farm cottage in a valley at the edge of a woods overlooking the Seine. He parked in the protection of the trees five hundred yards from the house, and went to the edge of the field on foot.
