something and a civilian to get it. Forget the Kennedys. Find me somebody else.”
“Well, so far anyway, I haven’t read about any other world leader Frederick Lacey assassinated.”
“Don’t be a smart ass, Harry.”
“How did Dooley know where we were staying?”
“I don’t know, yet. I have a few ideas. Your list might help me. Harry, let me ask you a question.”
“Shoot.”
“Why didn’t you go to Scotland Yard or the Police? Why didn’t you just walk into the American Embassy and give yourself up? You could have. You hadn’t committed a crime of any kind. Screw Lacey’s confession. Hand it over. Wash your hands of the whole mess. Why not?”
“I did what Devereaux told me to do.”
“And you never thought about what I just asked? Never occurred to you?”
“I suppose not. The President of the United States told me to listen to Devereaux. I suppose I never thought of doing anything different. Should I have?”
“Not for me to say,” Walter said. “Not for anyone to say, except you. Anyway, we should look ahead of us, not behind.”
“What about you?” Harry asked. “What are you going to do while I try to make a definitive list of the people who want to kill me?”
“Kill us, you mean.”
“Us? Why us?”
“Recall what happened to McHenry Brown’s companion?”
“Oh, I forgot. Sorry about that. You’re right. I really am sorry. I know you’re in danger just being around me. However, I’ll ask you again, Walter, what do we do next?”
“I don’t know yet,” Walter answered. “You’re safe here and,” he added, “for now that’s good enough. I can’t stay here with you. You know that?”
“I guessed as much.”
“I have work to do, Harry. People to see and places to go. But you’re safe here.”
Walter’s cell phone rang at seven-fifteen the next morning. It woke him from his hard, wooden sleep, but whoever was calling would have had a hard time figuring that out from his voice. Decades of such calls had fine- tuned his senses. He sounded like the middle of the afternoon.
“Hello,” he said.
“Abby O’Malley. How are you doing?”
“Fine. Just fine. And yourself, Ms. O’Malley?”
“I like a man who’s up early, Mr. Sherman. Especially a man who sounds like it.”
“So you woke me,” he said, surprised she caught it. “It’s okay. And please call me Walter.”
“Very well, Walter. Where do we begin?”
“I’ll be home in the next day or two. What day is it today?”
“Thursday. I know, it gets a little confusing when you fly halfway around the world, doesn’t it?”
“Come see me Sunday. You know where I live?”
“I do. St. John.”
“Good. Get off the ferry, walk across the square to a place called Billy’s. Look for an old black man sitting at a table closest to the front. He’ll tell you where to go. See you Sunday?”
“See you Sunday.”
“Dress comfortably,” he said before cutting the connection.
Harry had been given very specific instructions. Walter wanted everything understood. No screwups. He was to use the prepaid, use-and-lose cell phone to call Walter every day. “I have to assume someone is bugging my phone. You call me with that prepaid phone and there’s no way to trace it back here. Just remember not to ever say anything about where you are. Not a word. Call me at eight o’clock in the morning on the first day,” Walter told him. Then he was to add an hour for each day thereafter. “So, four days from now you’ll call me at noon. And, on the fifth day-at one o’clock. Got it?” Harry assured him he knew how to tell time. “Don’t call at any other time, unless it’s an emergency.”
“An emergency?”
“Someone shows up. And if that happens you know what to do?”
“You think I can get away with it?”
“It’s been done before,” said Walter. “Remember Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man? Just act like him and say your name is Michael DelGrazo.”
A layer of gray winter clouds obscured the ground from Boston to the Carolinas. After that, it was clear skies, bright blue and sunny all the way to St. Thomas. Flight time was nearly four hours, and Abby had been awake since before five o’clock. The American Airlines plane lifted off from Logan at 7:40 am. After a pretty decent breakfast, she considered taking a short nap, but Devereaux had sent her too much material to sleep. Instead, she opened the large envelope and removed a single, full file folder. It was unmarked. His brief cover note was signed with a simple LD. Very much in the Kennedy style, she thought, and wondered if he signed all his papers that way or if he did it only for her. Louis had a sly side, a dry sense of humor meant as much to entertain himself as for anyone else’s benefit. Maybe this was his way of telling her he knew.
Early on she learned the Kennedys communicated, in writing among themselves, with initials- RFK being the first ones she saw. Later she had the President’s personal memos Bobby gave her to read. They were each initialed JFK. Whenever Abby received something from Rose Kennedy, all there was to show Rose had sent it was a little RK at the bottom. Like a good soldier, she assumed the position, took the Kennedys as Romans, and began signing her memos, letters and longer papers AO. The current generation of Kennedys, even those bearing the names of their Kennedy sons-in-law’s fathers, were never entirely sure what Abby O’Malley did. She had little to do with them, but when they were called upon, they were attentive and responsive, deferential. Abby O’Malley was a force to be reckoned with within the family. Among those younger Kennedys, she was referred to as AK, not meaning Abby Kennedy, as Abby first thought, but rather “Almost Kennedy.” Abby never minded. She decided early on that they used it, if not as a true compliment, certainly as a sign of respect. Going over Devereaux’s gift package, she recalled her conversation with him a few days earlier.
“Are you taking your bathing suit?” he asked.
“I’m sixty-eight, Louis.” Boston was freezing, but she was, of course, aware that summer never vacated the Virgin Islands.
“I didn’t know there was an age limit, Abby. I hear the beaches on St. John are among the world’s best.”
“You haven’t said ‘you’re still a beautiful woman, Abby O’Malley.’”
“Self-evident,” said Devereaux. “What are you going to offer him?”
“Money,” she said. “I find that usually works quite well.”
“Usually,” he replied. “But not always. Sherman’s as close to unbuyable as I’ve ever seen-for a sane man, that is-and Harry Levine. ..?” He left the question hanging there. “There will be other buyers, you know that. Not to mention those who might see no reason to pay for something they can just take. You’re not the only player on this field.”
“We know that. I’m fully cognizant of the damage already done. I can’t worry about that. I need Lacey’s confession. Until I have it I can’t be concerned about protecting it, or him. There is nothing I can do to help Walter Sherman, except take it off his hands as soon as possible.”
“Sunday?”
“I hope so.”
“I hope so too. But it doesn’t seem likely, does it?”
“He’ll be ready, I believe. He thinks it was us-me-who ordered the killings in England-Sir Anthony Wells and McHenry Brown. That will help. It always does when you think you’re dealing with someone serious. Do I need to convince him we…”
“He already knows Abby.”
“Knows? Knows what, Louis?”
“That you are not responsible for the killings.”
“Not responsible? Why do you say that?”
