pretty well in the Los Angeles drug trade and had a lot of very nasty people on his payroll, but there’s no way we can hunt down all of his connections. Every piece of paper he and his friends owned has been examined, and none of it is worth anything. We did get a hell of a haul in weapons and cash, and quite an assortment of drugs, of course.”
“Just what we need.”
“There’s no sign of the papers, no sign that he ever had a van rigged with a twenty-millimeter automatic cannon. We thought that somewhere he might have some ammunition for it, a few spare parts, something.”
Porterfield sighed. “I keep wondering about all this. Grijalvas doesn’t fit.”
“Maybe someone he met in the drug trade, somebody big enough to think there was a point to this, just hired him to handle the dirty part of it. He must have had some pretty serious international transactions.”
“All along they wanted money instead of political concessions but were willing to let a man like that get his hands on the cash.”
“If they were big enough to hire him, they’d be big enough to make sure he didn’t rob them. They’re capable of shutting down the city of Los Angeles when they feel like making a point.”
“And yet they needed to send him to Palm Springs, and without the papers to trade, not so much as a photocopy. If they had any notion there was a possibility we’d pay off, wouldn’t they have given him that much? It might have helped him and would actually strengthen their bargaining position.”
“With us, not with him.”
“Exactly.”
“He was just a sucker?”
Porterfield leaned back in Theophilus Seyell’s chair and gazed at the vaulted ceiling. “He’s dead, isn’t he?”
The telephone on the desk buzzed and Porterfield leaned forward to pick up the receiver. “Yes?”
Mrs. Goode’s voice said, “I think it’s the call you were waiting for. When I asked who it was, he said, ‘Captain Greed. Put Porterfield on.’”
“Thanks, I’ll take it.” Porterfield pushed the button on his telephone and said, “Hello, Captain. This is Ben Porterfield.”
The voice sounded young, the accent flat, maybe Californian and maybe Midwestern but definitely American. “No time for amenities. Do you really have five million dollars in cash?”
“Yes.”
“Bring it with you to Washington National. I’ll expect you within a half hour, alone.”
“See you then,” said Porterfield, and hung up the telephone.
“Who was that?” said Kearns.
“Nothing very important, I suppose, but I’ve got to keep seeing these damned professors or people are going to wonder if the Seyell Foundation is what it appears to be. I’ve got to meet one of them at the airport in a half hour.”
“He calls himself Captain?” said Kearns as he stood up.
Porterfield chuckled. “If that were the worst thing about him he’d be practically normal. I’ll talk to you in a day or two.”
As soon as Kearns disappeared, Porterfield buzzed Mrs. Goode. “Please get me a taxi. And don’t tell anyone about that telephone call for twenty-four hours. If I haven’t gotten in touch by then, tell Goldschmidt. Meanwhile, tell Alice I had to go to London and I’ll call her.” He put on his suitcoat and straightened his tie, then went to Theophilus Seyell’s closet and pulled out the two large suitcases. They were heavy, but with the small casters on the bottoms he could wheel them most of the way, he thought. It would have been easier if he could have afforded some help, but he’d have to manage. He couldn’t take the chance that someone in the Company would change his mind without warning and see a chance for another trap. This time it had to be ended. Goldschmidt and Kearns, at least, were old guard. He’d sometimes trusted his life to their decisions. But they’d both been in Langley too long. There was no way to tell how they would react when it actually came down to experiencing the feeling of losing.
The pneumatic doors hissed and admitted Porterfield to the lobby. He made his way to a row of plastic seats along the window and sat down, his knees pressed against the two suitcases. He was sweating from the exertion, and his wristwatch had worked its way around to the inside of his wrist. As he adjusted the watch he confirmed that time was still with him. He had two minutes to spare, enough time to reach a telephone and call Langley. Porterfield let the thought exist for a moment, then dismissed it. Nothing had changed except that his fifty-nine- year-old body was preparing to remind him that it wasn’t in its prime. The quick reactions, the flexibility and force were gone, and now the way to stay alive was to think farther ahead.
The air was filled with the constant murmur of voices and the hum of conveyor belts and the rumble of baggage carts, but when the public-address system was activated there was an immediate change, a low hiss that seemed to muffle the random sounds and swallow them up. “Mr. Porterfield,” said the calm, unchanging female voice, “please pick up a white courtesy phone. Mr. Porterfield, please pick up a white courtesy phone.”
He stood up and looked around him. There was a white telephone a few yards away on a counter that jutted from the wall. He considered pushing the suitcases over to it but decided not to. They were so big that he’d attract attention pushing them around the lobby, and if they announced his name enough times someone who knew him might hear it. He rushed to the telephone and turned to face his suitcases as he said, “This is Mr. Porterfield.”
The telephone sounded dead. A second later there was a ringing. He waited, and it rang three times before there was a click. There was faint music and a recorded male voice said, “Please stand by.”
Porterfield watched as a young blond woman and three small children walked up and sat down behind the suitcases. He found himself humming along with the recorded music. The male voice came on again. “Please stand by.”
The middle child, a fat little boy wearing a T-shirt that said “Redskins,” straddled one of Porterfield’s suitcases as though he were riding a horse, jumping up and down and slapping the side with his hand. Porterfield winced. “Please stand by.” The mother looked on with bovine serenity as the little boy discovered that the suitcase had wheels under it. He leaned forward like a jockey and pushed off the floor with his feet, coasting a yard into the middle of a passing family of Japanese tourists, who eyed him with benevolent amusement. The smallest child, a little girl in a bright red dress that had a bow in the back, tried to climb onto the second suitcase.
“Please stand by.” Porterfield’s jaw tightened. The little girl’s legs weren’t long enough to mount the suitcase. She struggled to get on, beginning to whine. The oldest child, a boy about ten who had reached the age where his body was thinner and longer than his little brother’s, lifted his little sister and set her on the suitcase, then began to push the suitcase along the row of seats, barely missing the feet of an elderly man who was studying his ticket with a fretful look on his face.
“Please stand—” There was another click, and the female voice said, “May I help you?”
“I’m Mr. Porterfield.”
“Please hold on.” The three children were now riding the suitcases back and forth over the floor, their mother laughing and clapping her hands. Porterfield felt his collar beginning to tighten. The telephone clicked again. “Mr. Porterfield?”
He tried to sound calm. “Yes?”
“Your ticket is waiting for you at the American Airlines counter. Please don’t wait in line, go directly to the check-in area. You only have a few minutes.”
He hung up the phone and walked toward his suitcases. As he approached the nearest one, the oldest boy pushed the suitcase too hard. His little sister glided along for a few feet, then the case turned abruptly and toppled over. The little girl’s eyes widened as she fell off, and Porterfield saw her knee hit the floor. She lay there for a
