‘Measured and fitted and one foot in the door,’ Howe said. ‘A week before reporting for duty, some reckless son of a bitch shot me in the spine. A hunting trip dawn in Georgia. Told me I’d never stand again. The hell with doctors. Three things I have no use for, Lieutenant: doctors, cowards and crooked politicians. And nothing I respect more than a damn good reporter. It’s an honour to have you aboard, sir.’
He toasted O’Hara with his coffee mug and took a sip, staring across the brim with his relentless black eyes. O’Hara nodded, raised his mug and stared back. ‘I assume,’ he said finally, ‘that you didn’t bring me halfway around the world just to have breakfast with you.’
‘A proper assumption. I’ve heard you’re quick to get to the point.’
‘Oh?’
‘I’ve also heard that you’re tough, that you’re naive, that you’re relentless, that you’re a pussycat, that you can be difficult, that you’re a dream to work with, that you’re honest to the bone, and that you’re a miserable, lyin’, no- good son of a bitch.
O’Hara laughed. ‘Well, either you’ve talked to a lot of folks or one poor slob who can’t make up his mind.’
It was Howe’s turn to laugh. ‘Also that you have a sense of humour. Three things that are real, sir: God, human folly and laughter. The first two are beyond our comprehension, so we must do the best we can about the third.’
‘I thought John Kennedy said that.’
Howe leaned across the table and winked. ‘I gave Johnny the line.’
Breakfast came, and when the steward had returned to the galley, Howe said, ‘You know a gentleman name of Anthony Virgil Falmouth?’
O’Hara laughed. ‘I didn’t know his middle name was Virgil. There’s a certain irony to that.’
‘How so?’
‘Well, Virgil was a poet. Tony Falmouth is an assassin. Somehow they just don’t equate.’
‘An assassin, you say?’
‘One of the best.’
‘You know that for a fact?’
Pause. O’Hara stared at Howe across the table, and finally said, ‘Yep.’
‘I see. And d’you trust him?’
‘Falmouth? Why?’
‘Believe me, I have good reason, Lieutenant. I appreciate the fact you might have some previous loyalties...’
O’Hara glanced at the letter and then looked down at his plate, moving things about, absently, with his fork. ‘There are no loyalties in Falmouth’s business,’ he said finally. ‘I suppose I trust Tony as much as anyone in the Game.’
‘The Game?’
‘The intelligence game.’
‘You think of it as a game, then?’
‘It’s what they call it. The Game. When you’re in it, it’s the Game. And he’s up to his ass in it. He’s a British agent. M16, Her Majesty’s Secret Service.’
‘Not anymore,’ Howe said.
He reached out and handed the letter, somewhat grandly, to O’Hara.
‘Good,’ O’Hara said, ‘I was wondering when we were getting around to this.’
It was addressed to Charles Gordon Howe, Esq., WCGH, Channel 6, Boston, Mass. And in the lower right hand corner, below the address: ‘For his eyes only.’ The back had been sealed with blue candle wax. There was no stamp.
‘Falmouth always did have a flair for the dramatic,’ O’Hara said.
Howe leaned across the table, his black eyes twinkling, and chuckled. ‘Did anyone ever call him Foulmouth? I can’t help thinking of the reference every time I hear the name.’
O’Hara continued to examine the letter. He said, without looking up, ‘I don’t think anyone’ sever said it out loud. It might be a bit reckless, insulting one of the most efficient killing machines on two legs.’
‘Oh?’ Howe leaned back, and after a moment he added, ‘Sounds like we’re talking about Billy the Kid.’
‘Tony Falmouth makes Billy the Kid look like Little Lord Fauntleroy.’
‘Oh?’ Another pause. ‘And yet you’d trust him?’
I’d trust him as much as any in the Game, which is a long way from saying “I trust him.” Trust is a negligible word in the Game. They buy it, sell it, trade it, negotiate it.’
‘And yet Falmouth gave me what I needed to get this Winter Man off your back,’ Howe said.
‘He wants something.’
‘You think that’s the only reason?’
‘I know it. Look, Tony saved my ass once. No reason for it. Except he earned himself some Green Stamps.’
