“What's the new location?”
“Jeff will be driving a different cab – it will be a beige Mercedes and will pass by the same location at 7:45 P.M. He'll take you to the meeting.”
“I'll be there,” I said. I hung up, then dialed another number at random and hung up once more. Just to keep any follower off the track.
I glimpsed at my watch; it was 2:20 P.M. I had a few hours to kill. I hailed a cab and went to the Oplatka Travel Agency. Even if the Iranians were following me, it could easily be explained as my effort to find DeLouise for them.
When we got there I asked the driver to park and wait in a nearby lot; a twenty-mark bill did the trick. There were five workstations in the street-level store with clients talking to the agents at four of them. I went to the only available desk, operated by a woman of indeterminate age; she could be a young-looking fifty-year-old or an old-looking thirty-five-year-old. I was never good at determining a woman's age. She raised her head and flashed a pretty smile.
“Good afternoon. I called this office earlier concerning flight reservations for Mr. Raymond DeLouise for Moscow?”
“Just a minute,” she said and clicked on her computer.
“Yes, I see the reservation,” she said.
“Has the ticket been issued?” I asked.
“No. It was never picked up, so we canceled. It also says here that a Mr. Wooten called concerning your flight and promised to get back to us on the delivery of the ticket. Apparently he didn't,” she said, turning back to me. She must have thought I was DeLouise.
“I apologize,” I said, hoping to sound embarrassed. “I'm Mr. Wooten. Raymond DeLouise is my partner. He couldn't make the flight; he is in the hospital even now as we speak.” Alex's words were in my mind. “Be humble, show human emotions, give your subject some information to convince her that it's OK to give you the information. Make it sound like it's only a technicality that you don't have the correct account number or the information you are seeking. Don't sound conniving or sleazy. The door will be slammed in your face.”
“I'm sorry to hear that,” she said. “Is he all right?”
“Not quite,” I said, remembering how pale and motionless he had been, stretched out on that slab in the city morgue.
“What can I do for you?” she asked.
“Well, since Mr. DeLouise is not in a condition to speak, I wonder if you could help me. I need some information.”
“Sure,” she said, waiting for me to continue.
“Did he pay for the ticket?”
“Yes, he used his American Express credit card, but we credited his account after the cancellation of the ticket.” Seeing me holding my pen and a pad, she gave me the credit card number. I wrote it down.
“Did you also make a copy of his card?” I asked. “May I see it? We have several subaccounts of this card and I want to see to which one the credit note was sent to.”
She went to the file cabinet and gave me the copy. “You may have this, I suppose, since we canceled the transaction.”
“Thank you,” I said, putting the copy in my pocket.
“Come to think of it,” I said nonchalantly, “Did Mr. DeLouise make reservations for any connecting flights from Moscow? I may have to cancel them too.”
“Yes,” she said looking at her monitor, “I see here that after a three-day stay in Moscow he was booked on an Aeroflot flight to Baku, Azerbaijan, and from there back to Leningrad. We canceled these tickets as well.”
“How about hotel reservations – did he make any? I'd like to avoid a late cancellation fee if at all possible.”
“Yes, but only in Moscow, at the Cosmos Hotel. You'll have to send them a fax to see if they charged you any cancellation fee.”
“You're very helpful,” I said. “Our business is in such chaos ever since Mr. DeLouise was taken to the hospital. I have one final question. There is a young lady associated with our company who was working with Mr. DeLouise on their project; I don't know whether she also made the reservations through this office.”
“Do you have her name?”
“Yes. It's Ariel Peled.” I had my fingers crossed.
She clicked the computer's keyboard and said, “Yes. Ms. Peled booked the same flight number to Frankfurt connecting to Moscow, but it was not on Mr. DeLouise's scheduled flight date.”
“Really?” I said, sounding surprised. “I thought they were traveling together.”
“No, she booked it to leave just four days ago.”
“Bingo!” I shouted in my head.
“Of course,” I nodded, “I see. I should get in touch with her and tell her that Mr. DeLouise won't be coming to Moscow. She must be looking for him. Did she also reserve a room at the Cosmos?”
“Yes.”
“When did Ms. Peled make the reservations?”
“Oh, it was a night before her departure. I see that the ticket was picked up here.”
I thanked the agent and left.
This was my lucky day. I had a lead on Ariel. I went over the dates in my head. Had she been kidnapped at all? Maybe she'd been kidnapped and released. Maybe she'd escaped. Why did Ariel go to Moscow? Was she still there? Was the person traveling under Ariel's name in fact DeLouise's daughter or was it someone else assuming her identity? I didn't have a clue. At least not yet. As I walked down the street, I reviewed my findings.
First, I knew that there was a vault in Guttmacher's office. I suspected that the Iranian file – and there was probably more than just one file – might be in the vault, and I suspected that Guttmacher's office did not have an independent alarm system or monitoring cameras, but I had nothing to corroborate either assumption. I needed to find out the identity of the woman who'd left the bank with the UV powder marks on her hands; she might get us access to the vault's keys. Second, a smoker had paid a visit to my room and had gone through my things and might have planted something in my luggage. Third, from my visit to the travel agency I'd learned that DeLouise had never made the flight to Moscow. Well, I'd already known that. Also, Ariel may have taken the flight to Moscow and stayed at the Cosmos Hotel. She could still be in Moscow. Finally, as a small prize, I had a photocopy of DeLouise's American Express card. I pulled out the photocopy of the card. It was a Platinum Corporate American Express card issued to Triple Technologies and Investments, Ltd. The name of the cardholder was R. De Louise. The first four digits of the card showed that it was issued by an American Express center in Europe, but to derail a computer search he'd made it De Louise, in the French style.
I stopped at a stationery store near the travel agency and faxed the copy of the credit card to Lan, asking her to have the U.S. Attorney's Office issue a subpoena to American Express for the records of the card. Since there were pending proceedings in California against DeLouise, the government could exercise its subpoena power and force American Express to disclose all the transactions made with the card. Hopefully it would also lead me to Triple Technologies and Investments Ltd. and to the nature of its relationship with DeLouise; it could be his company but it could also be a company owned by a friend who let him use the company's name.
I went back to the parking lot and the waiting taxi. “Take me to the Sheraton Hotel. And go the long way. I'd like to be late for a meeting.” I wanted to be sure I wasn't being followed. Driving through residential areas would make it easier for me to detect unwanted company.
I called Ron Lovejoy from the hotel lobby and told him about the search of my hotel room. “Did you report it to Eric?” Ron asked.
“Well, I called him earlier so he moved our meeting to another location. I don't even know where it is.” I told Ron briefly that I might have traced Ariel's footsteps to Moscow. “Either she was kidnapped and escaped or was released, or the whole thing was a hoax. I don't even know by whom and for what purpose. We should also be prepared for a more sophisticated twist.”
“What do you mean?”
“Someone could be traveling under Ariel's name. How do we know that this person is in fact Ariel Peled?” That was a conversation stopper, and I hung up.
