CIA.”
“So why are they here?” I asked as naively as I could manage.
“I’ll bet you know already.”
“No, I don’t. Really.”
“You’re going to make me say it, aren’t you?”
“Yep.”
“Okay.”
Nok raised her chin slightly and shifted her eyes first to Anita and then back to me. I could have sworn I actually saw them glitter, possibly with dollar signs.
“They’re getting the house ready for Barack Obama. It’s going to be his secret retreat.”
I burst out laughing. I couldn’t help it. Anita looked embarrassed and a suspicious look crept over Nok’s face.
“Say…you’re not one of
For one wild moment I thought about confessing I was actually the Director of the CIA and then telling Nok I would have to kill her now that she knew, but I let it slide.
TWELVE
In the car on the way back to the hotel Anita floated the topic of the house a couple of times, but I absolutely refused to bite. My guess was she was working up to a suggestion we put in equal amounts and buy the house together in spite of its cost, but there was no way in hell that was going to fly with me. Tennis court or not, a three-million-dollar house in Phuket was a long way out of my league.
Still, Anita’s radar must have been at full power, or maybe she just saw something in my face that I hadn’t realized was there, but it wasn’t very long before I realized I was getting the hard eye from her. That was when she dropped the subject of the house and focused her full attention on wheedling out of me what was really on my mind.
I didn’t even try to resist. It would have been useless.
Taking a deep breath, I told Anita about Marshal Ward and how he had accosted me back in Patong when she was off exploring real estate offices. I omitted only the part about the pictures Ward had left on the table. Somehow announcing to my wife that people were following us around and clandestinely taking pictures seemed to me to be unduly alarmist. Of course, that one photograph of me waving like a madman in front of Karsarkis’ front door would probably have made me look like a real asshole to her, too, but I told myself that had nothing to do with why I was keeping quiet about the pictures. Nothing at all. Really.
“And he wants you to go back to Patong and meet him tonight?” she asked.
“I don’t have to go.”
“But you
“Well…I guess I’m curious.”
That was embarrassingly lame, of course, but there it was.
“Are you at least going to call somebody and check on him before you go?” Anita asked after she had thought about that for a moment. “Maybe he’s not who he says he is.”
“Oh, I think he is.”
“And this you know exactly how, Sherlock?”
I thought back to the way the man had examined me appraisingly with his flat, cop’s eyes.
“I’ve had a lot of experience with guys like this, Anita. I know a Fed when I see one.”
Anita looked at me and raised her eyebrows.
“You were a corporate lawyer in Washington, Jack. Your idea of life on the streets was walking to the garage to get your Mercedes instead of calling somebody to deliver it to you. Don’t let your romantic fantasies get the better of you.”
That brought on a few minutes of silence, as I su ~ippouasispected Anita intended for it to.
“What do you suppose this man wants with you?” she resumed, ignoring the third-degree burns she had just inflicted.
“I think he just wants to be certain I’m not one of Karsarkis’ lawyers.”
“Why would he care if you were?”
Anita had a very good point there, it seemed to me. Why indeed?
The only role the marshals would have in a matter like this would be to transport Karsarkis back if the State Department could convince the Thai government to agree to his extradition. Who Karsarkis’ lawyers were, or who they weren’t, didn’t offhand seem to me to have much to do with that.
“Maybe he wants you to spy for him,” Anita said.
“Oh, come on,” I snorted. “Now who’s having romantic fantasies?”
“No, Jack, really. Maybe he wants to ask you what the inside of Plato’s house looks like, how many guards he has, things like that.”
“And why would he want to know about any of that?”
“Well. . maybe he’s planning a snatch.”
“A
“I don’t know. You heard what that real estate woman said. What would the Secret Service, the military, the FBI, and the CIA be doing here on Phuket all at the same time if there wasn’t something big planned?”
“Getting a secret hideaway ready for Barack Obama?”
“Be serious, Jack. There’s something going on here, and if this man wants anything from you, he’s part of whatever it is.”
Now I knew I was the poor guy who had been handicapped for life by three years of legal education and Anita was the freethinking artist here, but sometimes it seemed to me she was still the one of us more likely to view the world from deep inside a bunker of suspicion. I was generally the one who took what I saw pretty much at face value unless there was some obvious reason not to. Maybe, I thought to myself, having the soul of an artist wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
“You want my advice?” she asked.
Anita didn’t wait for me to tell her whether I did or not, but I wasn’t about to point that out.
“Stay out of this, Jack.”
“Look, Anita-”
“This isn’t the kind of stuff you’re used to. I know you flushed out a money launderer or two and exposed a couple of banking scams, but don’t start thinking you’re Indiana Jones. These are big guys. Stay out of it, Jack.”
“All the fellow wants to do is talk to me, Anita. I think you’re making way too much out of this.”
“Do you?”
Anita examined the nails of her right hand as if they had just become inordinately interesting.
“You had a taste of something dangerous with that Asia Bank of Commerce thing, didn’t you, Jack? And, as much as I hate to say it, I can see that life won’t ever be the same for you again.”
Off toward the east a thick line of black cloud etched cl I cathe sky along the horizon. Above the line everything was serene. The sky was clear and puffs of white cloud drifted peacefully across it. Below the line, however, it was another story altogether. The sky first went light gray and then purplish-black, and then just at the horizon it turned into a malevolent greenish-black hole that looked like a deep, ugly bruise. It was as if a window into the abyss was slowly opening in front of us and we were driving straight into it. Those puffy little billows didn’t have the slightest idea what was coming at them, I mused, and I knew exactly how they felt.
Anita and I made the rest of the drive back to the hotel in silence. I was thinking about what she had just said to me. I couldn’t even imagine what she was thinking about. We spent the rest of the day on the beach ignoring the subject of my approaching get-together that night in Patong with Marshal Ward. Then we had an early dinner at the hotel and ignored it some more.
