pacing himself alongside her. They stopped two levels below me and introduced themselves. Mrs Sansom called herself Elspeth, and the guy called himself Browning, and said it was spelled like the automatic rifle, which I guessed was supposed to put it in some kind of a menacing context. He was news to me. He wasn’t in Sansom’s book. He went on to list his whole pedigree, which started out with military service at Sansom’s side, and went on to include civilian service as head of security during Sansom’s business years, and then head of security during Sansom’s House terms, and was projected to include the same kind of duty during Sansom’s Senate terms and beyond. The whole presentation was about loyalty. The wife, and the faithful retainer. I guessed I was supposed to be in no doubt at all about where their interests lay. Overkill, possibly. Although I felt that sending the wife from the get-go was a smart move, politically. Most scandals go sour when a guy is dealing with something his wife doesn’t know about. Putting her in the loop from the start was a statement.
She said, ‘We’ve won plenty of elections so far and we’re going to win plenty more. People have tried what you’re trying a dozen times. They didn’t succeed and you won’t, either.’
I said, ‘I’m not trying anything. And I don’t care about who wins elections. A woman died, that’s all, and I want to know why.’
‘What woman?’
‘A Pentagon clerk. She shot herself in the head, last night, on the New York subway.’
Elspeth Sansom glanced at Browning and Browning nodded and said, ‘I saw it on line. The
‘A little after two o’clock in the morning,’ I said.
Elspeth Sansom looked back at me and asked, ‘What was your involvement?’
‘Witness,’ I said.
‘And she mentioned my husband’s name?’
‘That’s something I’ll need to discuss with him. Or with the
‘Is that a threat?’ Browning asked.
‘I guess it is,’ I said. ‘What are you going to do about it?’
‘Always remember,’ he said. ‘You don’t do what John Sansom has done in his life if you’re soft. And I’m not soft either. And neither is Mrs Sansom.’
‘Terrific,’ I said. ‘We’ve established that none of us is soft. In fact we’re all as hard as rocks. Now let’s move on. When do I get to see your boss?’
‘What were you in the service?’
‘The kind of guy even you should have been scared of. Although you probably weren’t. Not that it matters. I’m not looking to hurt anyone. Unless someone needs to get hurt, that is.’
Elspeth Sansom said, ‘Seven o’clock, this evening.’ She named what I guessed was a restaurant, on Dupont Circle. ‘My husband will give you five minutes.’ Then she looked at me again and said, ‘Don’t come dressed like that, or you won’t get in.’
They got back in the Town Car and drove away. I had three hours to kill. I caught a cab to the corner of 18th Street and Mass Avenue and found a store and bought a pair of plain blue pants and a blue checked shirt with a collar. Then I walked on down to a hotel I saw two blocks south on 18th. It was a big place, and quite grand, but big grand places are usually the best for a little off-the-books convenience. I nodded my way past the lobby staff and took an elevator tip to a random floor and walked the corridor until I found a maid servicing an empty room. It was past four o’clock in the afternoon. Check-in time was two. Therefore the room was going to stay empty that night. Maybe the next night, too. Big hotels are rarely a hundred per cent full. And big hotels never treat their maids very well. Therefore the woman was happy to take thirty bucks in cash and a thirty-minute break. I guessed she would move on to the next room on her list and come back later.
She hadn’t gotten to the bathroom yet, but there were two clean towels still on the rack. Nobody could possibly use all the towels that a big hotel provides. There was a cake of soap still wrapped next to the sink and half a bottle of shampoo in the stall. I brushed my teeth and took a long shower. I dried off and put on my new pants and shirt. I swapped my pocket contents over and left my old garments in the bathroom trash. Thirty bucks for the room. Cheaper than a spa. And faster. I was back on the street inside twenty-eight minutes.
I walked up to Dupont and spied out the restaurant. Afghan cuisine, outside tables in a front courtyard, inside tables behind a wooden door. It looked like the kind of place that would fill up with power players willing to drop twenty bucks for an appetizer worth twenty cents on the streets of Kabul. I was OK with the food but not with the prices. I figured I would talk to Sansom and then go eat somewhere else.
I walked on P Street west to Rock Creek Park, and clambered down close to the water. I sat on a broad flat stone and listened to the stream below me and the traffic above. Over time the traffic got louder and the water got quieter. When the clock in my head hit five to seven I scrambled back up and headed for the restaurant.
TWENTY-TWO
At seven in the evening D.C. was going dark and all the Dupont establishments had their lights on. The Afghan place had paper lanterns strung out all over the courtyard. The kerb was clogged with limousines. Most of the courtyard tables were already full. But not with Sansom and his party. All I saw were young men in suits and young women in skirts. They were gathered in pairs and trios and quartets, talking, making calls from their cells, reading e-mails on handheld devices, taking papers from briefcases and stuffing them back. I guessed Sansom was inside, behind the wooden door.
There was a hostess podium close to the sidewalk but before I got to it Browning pushed through a knot of people and stepped in front of me. He nodded towards a black Town Car twenty yards away and said, ‘Let’s go.’
I said, ‘Where? I thought Sansom was here.’
‘Think again. He wouldn’t eat in a place like this. And we wouldn’t let him even if he wanted to. Wrong demographic, too insecure.’
‘Then why bring me here?’
‘We had to bring you somewhere.’ He stood there like it meant absolutely nothing to him whether I went along or walked away. I said, ‘So where is he?’
‘Close by. He’s got a meeting. He can give you five minutes before it starts.’
‘OK,’ I said. ‘Let’s go.’
There was a driver sitting in the Town Car. The engine was already running. Browning and I climbed in the back and the driver pulled out and drove most of the way around the circle and then peeled off south and west down New Hampshire Avenue. We passed the Historical Society. As I recalled New Hampshire Avenue there wasn’t much ahead of us except for a string of hotels and then George Washington University.
We didn’t stop at any of the hotels. We didn’t stop at George Washington University. Instead we swept a fast right on to Virginia Avenue and drove a couple hundred yards and pulled into the Watergate. The famous old complex, the scene of the crime. Hotel rooms, apartments, offices, the Potomac dark and slow beyond them. The driver stopped outside an office building. Browning stayed in his seat. He said, ‘These are the ground rules. I’ll take you up. You’ll go in alone. But I’ll be right outside the door. Are we clear?’
I nodded. We were clear. We got out. There was a security guy in a uniform at a desk inside the door, but he paid us no attention. We got in the elevator. Browning hit four. We rode up in silence. We got out of the elevator and walked twenty feet across grey carpet to a door marked
I stepped over to the left hand door and knocked and entered.
There were three men waiting for me in the inner office.
