“It’s a sensible rule,” Alicia said. “We must have ten different nationalities aboard.”
“But I thanked him in Russian, and he said, ‘You’re welcome,’ in Russian.”
“Okay, so he was being nice.”
Irina shook her head. “But his accent was all wrong. Sounded like he was from Tajikistan or someplace like that. But that’s not right either. It’s driving me crazy.”
“Come on, kiddo, you’re just tired and you’re imagining things.”
“Just before I left his cabin, I said something else to him in Russian. If he’d understood he would have fired me on the spot.”
Alicia shrugged. “What’d you say?”
“Yob tvoyu mat …”
“In English.”
“I said, ‘Fuck your mother, but I think you’re a prick,’” Irina said.
NINE
McGarvey, carrying only an overnight bag, emerged from the American Airlines jetway at La Chinita Airport a few minutes after four in the afternoon. Katy had driven him over to Miami’s International Airport, where she made him promise to take care of himself.
“I’m not going to try to talk you out of this,” she’d said. “It’s what you do, and there doesn’t seem to be anyone else with the guts to step up to the plate. They’re all hiding behind their bureaucracies, and whatever the politically correct flavor of the month happens to be.” She was bitter.
He’d taken her in his arms outside the security check-in area. “It’s not all that bad, Katy. There are some good people doing the best they can under the laws they have to deal with.”
“It never stopped you.”
“No,” McGarvey said heavily. Following the letter of the law, and especially political correctness, had never exactly been one of his priorities. He’d always done whatever was needed to be done at the time it needed doing, and damn the consequences. Depending upon whatever administration was in charge he’d either been admired or reviled all his career.
But no matter the administration, he’d always been called into action whenever his particular expertise was needed. He was an assassin; the means of last resort to reach a political goal, especially one in which a war could be avoided.
Lawrence Danielle, an old friend in McGarvey’s early days with the CIA, had told him that had we known in the mid-thirties what we know today, we would have been more than justified in sending an assassin to kill Adolf Hitler. “Eliminating that one man might have spared us World War Two,” Danielle said.
But there’d been some unintended consequences, what in the intel business were called blowbacks, to some of his missions. Instead of killing bin Laden he’d tried to negotiate with the man to give up a suitcase-size nuclear demolitions device. That al-Quaida mission to strike the United States failed, because of McGarvey’s intervention. But the ultimate consequence was 9/11.
There’d been other smaller blowbacks, none as spectacular as the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, but McGarvey remembered each of them in full detail; they were etched into his brain, like acid designs were etched into glass.
“Take care of yourself, darling,” Kathleen told him. “I’ll be watching for you to come up the driveway.”
Her words had stuck with him on the three-hour flight, but once they’d touched down, he’d put all of his thoughts about her into another, safe compartment in his mind, freeing his total concentration for the job at hand. Anything less could be fatal.
McGarvey followed the other passengers down a long, filthy corridor and around the corner to passport control where two lines formed, one for Venezuelans and the other for everyone else. The afternoon was much hotter and more humid than in Florida.
A slender, handsome man with long black hair, intense coal-black eyes, and a swarthy complexion that reminded McGarvey of the actor Antonio Banderas was waiting to one side. Like McGarvey he was dressed in an open-collar shirt and a light sport coat. He looked like a cop.
“Mr. McGarvey,” he said in good English.
“I am if you’re Juan Gallegos.”
“At your service, señor,” Gallegos said. Otto had assured McGarvey that Gallegos was a friend of the CIA, and although what help he would be allowed to give was limited, he would not tie Mac’s hands. But he seemed a little nervous.
“I sent a small package under diplomatic seal as checked baggage,” McGarvey said.
“Sí,” Gallegos said. He eyed McGarvey’s single carry-on bag. “Do you have any other luggage?”
“No.”
“Then if you’ll come with me, we’ll retrieve your package and go to the hotel. We can talk on the way into town.”
McGarvey followed the intelligence officer around passport control, a few of the passengers glancing at them curiously, then down another filthy corridor to a large hall where luggage from the Miami flight was already showing up on the carousel. An airport employee in dark coveralls came from the back and handed a small leather bag to Gallegos, who had to sign for it.
When he was gone, Gallegos handed the bag to McGarvey and they headed toward the customs counters beyond which were the doors out to the Departing Passengers exit, where several buses and taxis were waiting.
“I assume this contains your pistol,” Gallegos said. “If you fire it on Venezuelan soil, and especially if you injure or kill someone, there will be a very thorough investigation with possibly harsh consequences. Be very certain that your reasons are compelling and necessary.”
“I don’t think it’ll come to that,” McGarvey said, which was a lie. If he found Graham and if he could tie the man to an al-Quaida mission, he was going to take him out.
Gallegos stopped and gave McGarvey a harsh look. “Then why are you here?”
“To find a man.”
“And if you find him?”
McGarvey shrugged. “We’ll have to see.”
Gallegos nodded. “Yes, we’ll have to see.”
None of the three customs officers even looked up as McGarvey followed the CID agent out of the terminal to a waiting Toyota SUV with big off-road tires and splattered, mud-caked fenders and doors. A fair amount of traffic had built up from a couple of earlier flights.
“I spent the last week in the north outside of Paraguaipoa, in the rain,” Gallegos explained. “It’s on the border with Colombia.”
“Drugs?” McGarvey asked, tossing his bags in the back, and climbing up into the passenger seat.
Gallegos gave him another less-than-friendly look. “The U.S. market is never-ending and the money is very good. It’s a powerful aphrodisiac for poor farmers and fishermen. They can make a year’s wages for one night of work.”
“Maybe we should legalize drugs, and regulate them like we do alcohol,” McGarvey said.
Gallegos laughed, and pulled away from the curb ahead of a bus heading into town. The day was very hot and humid, and the air stank of crude oil, natural gas, and other petrochemicals. Oil pumped out from beneath the lake was a major contributor to Venezuela’s economy, and the people along the lake paid for it with lousy air.
“Otto sent me a file, which included a couple of decent photographs of the man you’re looking for,” Gallegos said. “If he came here within the past thirty days it had to be under a false passport, and possibly in disguise. The name Rupert Graham doesn’t show up on any list — immigration, customs, or hotel registrations. I had one of the photographs distributed to every port of entry official in the entire country, not just here in Maracaibo, but so far I’ve received no hits.”
“Thanks for the effort, but I don’t think he’s traveling under his real name. He’s on Interpol’s most wanted list—”