O'Farrell's Law

too much money outstanding. Rivera had to be told, told the VAX was impossible. He. Belac, would agree to refund the sum advanced for its purchase if Rivera would agree to a settlement for everything. And that would be the end.

Belac tried to make the telephone conversation fittingly businesslike. Overwhelming problems had arisen, he said, when he was connected to Rivera in London. They had to meet at once, and Rivera had to come to him in Paris; Belac was confident he’d escaped surveillance, but was unsure about the other man. Rivera attempted to question but Belac refused to answer, repeating the need for a personal meeting. Rivera stipulated the George V and the still nervous Belac agreed at once, despite the price.

“And be careful about being followed,” he warned.

Rivera took no precautions at all, angrily suspicious of Belac’s melodramatic approach, but the CIA watch had already been suspended, on orders from Washington. The flight was on time and Rivera entered Paris against the outflow of rush hour and reached the hotel ahead of the hour arranged. They met in the ground-floor bar.

The ambassador sat without drinking, letting Belac recount what had happened over the preceding few days, his disbelief becoming positive conviction. Clearly unimpressed, Rivera said when Belac finished, “So where does that leave us with our arrangement?” without any expression of concern.

“The VAX is impossible,” Belac said. “I’m not sure now about the tank auction—”

“I must have the tanks!” Rivera cut in. The indispensable middleman who always delivered ahead of time, he thought. He wasn’t that anymore. By relying absolutely on Belac, who’d failed him, he had no way now to buy elsewhere and still meet the deadline, even the Havana schedule of six months. The fucker of pigs!

“I’ll try for the tanks,” Belac said. “I have fifteen Stinger missiles.… The third ship, the City of Athens, is chartered to pick up from San Diego, if the tank deal comes off.” For a brief moment Belac was warmed by a private thought.

“So I don’t get the VAX!”

“That’s all,” Belac agreed, hurriedly. “But there’s the money you’re keeping back. As well as the percentages; and there’s four million I’m owed on the transportation costs. It comes in total to fifteen million. At the moment I am something like five million out of pocket—my own money.” He felt something like heartburn having to say the words.

“And three million in pocket from the money already advanced for the VAX purchase,” Rivera pointed out.

“No!” tried Belac, reluctant to sacrifice anything. “I had to pay that for the portions of the system that were supplied, before the ban.”

“Rubbish,” Rivera said. “You might have had advances and staged payments to other dealers, for most of the stuff, but the VAX was from a bona fide supplier and you would have dealt with them in the normal way, payment on completion at ninety days.”

“I have a proposal,” Belac said, retreating. “I will refund the VAX money, as a gesture of good faith. In return I ask you to relax this penalty situation; release the other money.”

Rivera did not respond at once. It was unthinkable that he should trust the man. Thank God he had withheld the money and retained a lever to gel the tanks. Just yesterday he’d received detailed delivery instructions. He said, “We had a deal. You broke it.”

“I didn’t know I was under investigation, did I!” Belac said, exasperated.

“Are you under investigation?” Rivera asked quietly.

It was Belac’s turn briefly to remain unspeaking. “I see,” he said, controlled himself. “Let me return your question. Where does that leave us, with our arrangement?”

“Short of forty tanks, fifteen Stinger missiles, and a computer,” Rivera said.

“I will supply the tanks and the missiles,” Belac said.

“I have specific instructions,” Rivera insisted. “After loading in San Diego, the City of Athens has to sail direct to Lobito; it’s a port in Angola, West Africa. The American departure must be reported by the master direct to Havana. When I receive confirmation of the sailing, I’ll release the money you are owed. Less the VAX payment. So, how long?”

“A week,” said Belac. He knew the way to screw the bastard! Screw him and end up with more profit than he’d imagined possible!

“The fifteenth, then,” Rivera said. “On the fifteenth I shall have the final money transfer ready, awaiting my authorization, into your account. If I do not receive that sailing confirmation, no money will be transferred. Is that all fully understood?”

“You won’t be able to contact me,” Belac said. “I’ll know where to contact you.”

“Have you ever heard of such a screw-up!” Sneider demanded.

“Not for a long time,” McCarthy agreed, accepting the sixth coffee of the day. “We didn’t actually emerge smelling of roses in Brussels, though, did we?”

“There seems to be enough to move against Shepherd.”

“Small change,” McCarthy said. “Little more than petulance.”

“O’Farrell goes ahead?”

“Petty wants to talk. But I think so. I’d still like it to be the other way.”

“Can we afford to take any more chances?”

“I’d go for it if I thought it stood a chance.”

TWENTY

THE TRAINING—the professionalism—was there when O’Farrell called upon it, and he hoped it would last. There was a long day and an even longer evening to get through, but he didn’t have a drink. He concentrated on his surroundings, satisfying himself that the surveillance had been withdrawn. He kept one boardinghouse reservation, as insurance, but canceled the rest, as he did the remaining rental cars. Desperate as he was to get back to America, he booked a flight for the following afternoon, nonstop to Washington. He wouldn’t have to cancel it, he knew. Everything was going to go fine.

The urge to go ahead—to get it over with and get out—had been enormous the day Petty said okay. But he hadn’t. Just. There’d been the necessary break in his intense surveillance and the pattern he’d established, so O’Farrell forced the self-control and checked again that what was important to know hadn’t changed. He watched Rivera go in and out of the Hampstead house, confirming by the continued casualness that neither the gate nor the front door was alarmed. The BMW was as usual parked outside at night, and the police foot patrol went by at predictable forty-five minute intervals. The night of the clearance, a police car surprised him by passing in between the regular patrols. It appeared to slow outside Rivera’s house as well. Of course, O’Farrell had to guarantee over a further two nights that the car’s presence was an accident and not an increase in police presence. The car didn’t appear again. He spent the days shopping for the necessary, disposable equipment, always in crowded supermarkets where there was no chance of his being remembered: rubber gloves, electrical leads and clamps, magnetic-headed screwdrivers, adhesive tape, a penknife, and a small, concentrated-beam flashlight. The final purchase was a cheap, cardboard briefcase to carry everything. The other things he needed had arrived from Washington.

And now he was ready. Tonight. After tonight it would all be over. Finished. Thank God.

Incredibly, after all the inner turmoil, he felt no apprehension and he was actually surprised. He felt the heightened awareness there always was when the moment came close, the adrenaline surge he positively welcomed because it made him more alert, but none of the gut-churning emotions of the previous weeks, which had, he accepted, brought him close to collapse. And he seemed to have succeeded in putting aside in his mind and consciousness the wife and the child as well, so they were no longer a factor in his reasoning.

Now, he thought again. Tonight. Still no apprehension. The uncertainty, the self-doubt, had to have been a passing phase then, brought on by God knows what. O’Farrell was glad it had passed. He hoped it didn’t come again.

O’Farrell set out late, past midnight, allowing time for Rivera to be home and for the BMW engine to be cold.