'What about it?'
'Why'd you break security and copy it? I was going to come into the office.'
Grainger wiped off his forehead. 'You think I want a record of you looking at that file? You think you want a record of it?”
“Fitzhugh would check the library lists?”
“You can bet he would.'
A frantic golden retriever puppy sniffed at Grainger's foot, pulling at a long lead held by one half of a mixed gay couple. The black man scolded, 'Ginger! Get off him!'
'Sorry,' said his Asian partner, smiling. 'I keep saying he needs training.'
'He needs nothing of the sort,' the first snapped. 'It's all right,' Grainger said, looking very much like an old, confused man.
Milo suddenly wished they were having this conversation in the office, not here among all these families.
'Listen,' said Grainger, watching the couple disappear. 'About your vacation.'
'Don't start.'
'This is about the worst time for you to run off to Florida.'
Milo shook his head. 'Like Fitzhugh says, it's a cold case. Vinterberg's not coming back to the Union Bank of Switzerland, because there's no Tiger left to pay. Angela won't be passing any secrets to the Chinese, because she's dead, and the French can investigate her killer on their own. They can tell us what's going on. I'll look into it again when I get back.'
'What about Janet Simmons?' said Grainger.
'What about her? If she thinks I killed the Tiger, tell her to bring on the evidence.'
Grainger shifted his feet on the concrete, staring at his loafers. 'She's scheduled a meeting with Fitzhugh for tomorrow. She says it's about you.'
'Listen, Tom. Simmons has nothing. She's just angry she didn't get to run an interrogation. She'll get over it.'
Grainger shrugged, as if everything Milo said were, by definition, up for debate. 'Just keep that file safe.'
23
That evening, after Stephanie had gone to bed, Milo took the newspaper-covered file from his sock drawer, where he'd slipped it as soon as he got home. Tina, taking the milk from him, had said, 'How many papers do you need?' Now, as she undressed, she said, 'You're not staying up, are you?”
“Just some reading.'
'Not too late. We'll have to be in the car by six. You know how long it takes to get through security.”
“Sure.'
'Don't 'sure' me, mister,' she said, crawling leisurely onto the bed, naked. 'Give me a kiss.' He did so. 'Now come to bed.'
A half hour later, as she drifted to sleep, he put on his underwear and took the file into the living room, yawning. He poured a vodka, tried to stop thinking of cigarettes, and began to read the file on Benjamin Harris, ex- Company, ex-Tourist, ex-Tiger. Ex-human being.
Benjamin Michael Harris was born on February 6, 1965, to Adele and David Harris of Somerville, Massachusetts. While his parents were noted as members of the Church of Christ, Scientist, Benjamin's religion was marked as 'none.' This was no surprise. If he truly wanted to become a field agent, he would exclude anything that might get him placed behind a desk.
The approach was made in January 1990 by Terence A. Fitzhugh, an Asia specialist who had just taken a new position in the Directorate of Operations (which, in 2005, was absorbed into the National Clandestine Service). Harris had graduated from Boston University the previous year in journalism, with a minor in Asian languages, but the approach was made in New York, where Harris was freelancing for the New York Post. Fitzhugh's initial report on Harris noted 'an unexpected ability to gain confidence, which in this reviewer's considered opinion should be the hallmark of field agents. We have in the past depended too much on technical prowess, and as a result operations have left too many players psychologically devastated. This is best remedied by field agents who can work the psyche as well as the body. Cooperation, not coercion.'
Despite his feelings about Fitzhugh, Milo agreed. It was one of Tourism's flaws, he'd once told Grainger, that Tourists were trained as hammers rather than feathers. Grainger had found the metaphor flimsy, so Milo tried again: 'Tourists should be mobile propaganda machines. Personal and political propaganda.' Unconvincingly, Grainger had said that he would make a note of this.
After an extended training period at the Farm, Harris was sent to Beijing to apprentice under the then-famous Jack Quinn, who, according to Company lore, had carried much of Asia's cold war on his own shoulders, moving people and information in and out of Vietnam, Cambodia, Hong Kong, China, and Malaysia. The only country where he'd stumbled was Japan, where, from 1985 until his death from cancer in 1999, he was persona non grata.
Quinn's early reports on his young recruit were enthusiastic, citing Harris's ability to absorb information quickly, his near-native fluency in spoken Mandarin, and a highly developed sense of tradecraft. Harris had, in the four months from August through November 1991, developed a network of twelve agents from the clerking sections of the Chinese government, which produced information that, when backtracked, led to an average of three monthly reports on the tensions and machinations within the Chinese Central Committee.
By 1992, however, discord had appeared in the Beijing station. Comparing memos written by both Quinn and Harris, the problem was clear. Harris, the rising star, was attempting to gain control of the station, while Quinn, by now past his prime, was doing everything he could to hold on to his position. Langley 's opinion, inferred from additional memos, was that Quinn's position should be inviolable, and they approved disciplinary action against Harris. A three-month forced leave followed, which he spent in Boston with his family.
Here, Fitzhugh reappeared, visiting Boston and making assessment reports on his young discovery. Though he noted Harris's anger about his shoddy treatment, Fitzhugh also pointed out that his protege 'has developed far beyond his years in all areas of tradecraft and mental aptitude. His continued employment should be assured.' Fitzhugh's report ended abruptly at that point, the rest of the text blacked out.
When Harris returned to Beijing in February 1993, there was a month-long honeymoon before trouble reappeared. Quinn complained of a renewed attack on his position, and Langley unhesitatingly suggested disciplinary action, but insisted that under no circumstances was Quinn to send him back. Harris was demoted, his networks taken over by Quinn; according to some hastily scribbled memos, Quinn worried that he'd overdone the discipline. Harris had taken to drinking, appearing late at the embassy, and sleeping with a variety of shopgirls from all around the capital. Twice the Beijing police picked him up for public displays, and once a friendly official in China 's Ministry of Foreign Affairs suggested to Quinn that the young troublemaker be sent to a country 'where such activity is considered more the norm.'
That suggestion was dated July 12, 1993, and followed by a copy and translation of a police report, five days later, of an automobile accident in Guizhou province, along the Guiyang-Bije highway. The diplomatic car, signed out to Harris, plummeted 305 meters off the Liuguanghe Bridge. Upon hearing of this, Quinn demanded that an American team be sent to sift through the wreckage of the car.
China generously acquiesced. The team cleared away the mess, and Harris's remains were transferred to a family plot in Somerville.
The file did not contain Harris's rebirth as a Tourist, nor a list of his works or the Tour Guides resulting from his travels. Such a breach of security was more than even Grainger could have managed. What he included was a report on Harris's 1996 disappearance, though in the report he was referred to by his Tourism name, Ingersoll.
Last known location: Berlin, an apartment on Frobenstrasse. After a week of trying to get in touch about a new operation, Grainger (who had by then been running the Department of Tourism only two years) sent Lacey to track him down. The apartment had been cleaned from top to bottom. Grainger wrote a memo to Fitzhugh, asking if he'd had any word; he hadn't. Lacey, then, was assigned to track Ingersoll/Harris.
It took nearly a week of meetings with Harris's known associates for Lacey to come up with a Trabant stolen by Harris and driven east, all the way to Prague, where it was abandoned. Grainger requisitioned Czech police reports
