Four thousand genuine U.S. passport blanks would be worth more than two million dollars on that market.
* * *
THE STATION STRINGER in Algiers was a passed-over veteran named Atherton who had no image left to polish. He was contentedly serving out his last hitch before retirement.
In Atherton’s travel-agency office I went through the station’s files of known dealers in black-market documentation. After several hours of it Atherton gave me a bleak look. “Is this getting us anywhere, Charlie? There’s just too damned many of them.”
“We can rule out the small ones. Whoever bought the shipment had to put up cash. Probably half a million dollars or more. It’s got to be a big dealer.”
“That still leaves a dozen names or more. You want to pin the list on the wall and throw a dart at it?” He made a face and pushed the files aside. “It won’t work. Hell, we’d do as well to canvass the fishing docks. The shipment had to come into Algeria somewhere — if it’s here at all. It could just as easily be in Marseilles or Alexandria or —”
“If I don’t tumble the goods here I’ll go to Marseilles next and then Alexandria and then etcetera. But my nose tells me it’s here. The odds are on Algiers.”
“If I had four thousand blanks to sell I’d bring ’em here,” he agreed. “But it would require an impossible amount of legwork to find them in this maze. The population of dealers is too big, Charlie. We haven’t got a hundred investigators on this staff.”
“What about Bertine? Has the trace come up with anything?”
“Bertine flew out of Gibraltar two days ago. By now he’s in Zurich.”
“Gibraltar — that’s another clue in favor of Algiers,” I said.
He sighed. “Twelve, fourteen, maybe sixteen dealers big enough to handle it. Well, I guess we can go to the cops and start having them tossed.”
“Canvassing won’t do it,” I said. “After we hit one or two of them the rest will get the word. They’ll all go to ground. No — we’ve got to hit the right target with our first shot.”
“That calls for fancy shooting.”
I said, “We’ll need a Judas goat.”
* * *
I WENT through all the station’s Immigration Surveillance Reports for the past week and selected a card from the stack:
Andrew Grofield — entered Algiers 10/17 via GibAir #7415, carrying U.S. Passport #378916642393 in name of Alan Kelp. Passport presumed forgery. Inquiry forwarded to Washington to dip bag 10/18. Algeria authorities not informed. Ident Grofield made by Peter McKay, personal observation airport. File #78BV8.
Atherton said, “Grofield. Yeah. Ran some small arms into the Philippines while I was on station there. We had to chase him out. He was supplying guerrillas with AK-47s. He’s a petty crook, not a big shot.”
“Does he know your face?”
“We never met. I know him from photographs.”
“He ought to do,” I said.
* * *
ATHERTON SENT four men out in two cars to look for Grofield. On the second day one of them found him. Atherton said, “It’s a girl’s flat in the casbah.”
“Has he got a hotel booking?”
“No. Staying with the girl. She’s a professional. He’ll be paying for the time. It suggests he doesn’t plan an extended stay in town.”
“Good. If he’s got appointments in another country he’ll be anxious not to be delayed.”
“When do we hit him?”
“After I have my dinner.”
* * *
WE SENT the two stringers around to cover the rear and posted ourselves in a cramped 2CV at the curb across the street from the stucco warren in which the Turkish call girl had her flat. Lights burned in her windows and I was hoping they’d soon emerge to go somewhere for a late supper; it was about ten o’clock. The street was emptying of pedestrians: burnoused bedouins, besotted beggars, business-suited bwanas. We were on the edge of the casbah, its tortuous passages winding away over cobblestones. The smells were pungent, the air heavy. One wonders if the Arab cities attract miscreants and evildoers because of their rancid foetid atmospheres or whether it’s the other way round.
They didn’t come out that night. We wasted it in the car, talking about the old days. Another team took over during the day and we were back the next evening at sundown.
Finally the girl and our mark emerged from the narrow dark entrance. Atherton said, “That’s him. Grofield.”
The man was burly in white seersucker; he walked like a sailor, a belligerent thrust to his shoulders. The girl had the opulence of a belly dancer: she’d soon be fat.
We gave them a lead and I got out to follow them on foot. Atherton trailed along at a distance in the car in case they snagged a taxi.
* * *
WE WERE at the bar when Grofield came away from his table to seek the men’s room. He was a little drunk; that was an aid to me. I stepped back from the bar talking heartily to Atherton with wide gestures: “So would you believe the lousy crook tried to sell me Cianti for Bardolino?”
My gesticulating arms made Grofield hesitate and then Atherton stepped out from the bar toward me: “Come on, Joe, you’re blocking traffic.” In reaching for my arm Atherton lost his balance and blundered against Grofield. I steadied Grofield and leered at him drunkenly, brushing him off. “S’all right, buddy, sorry, these freeways are murder, ain’t they.”
Atherton blurted apologies to Grofield in French and English. Grofield brushed us off with a stony glare and squeezed past and went on toward the gents. I had my hand in my pocket; I turned and walked out of the place. A few minutes afterward, having paid the tab, Atherton followed me out. “Okay?”
“Sure,” I said. “I missed my calling. I should have been a dip.”
* * *
IN THE morning I went into Atherton’s office and reclaimed the passport from his desk. “Did you get a report on it yet?”
“It’s phony all right. But a good forgery.”
“Then he’ll insist on the best when he goes to buy a replacement.”
Atherton and I exchanged smiles.
* * *
SINCE HIS original passport was a phony Grofield couldn’t go to the Embassy for a replacement of the one I had stolen from his pocket. That was what we were counting on. He’d have to buy a replacement from an under-the-counter dealer. He wouldn’t settle for the kind of counterfeit that most ignorant fugitives would buy; Grofield knew the ropes. We were counting on that.
Atherton’s four operatives kept a tight tail on Grofield. He emerged that morning from the call-girl’s flat with rage on his face and went around Algiers by taxi from one shop to another. All together he visited five of them. We kept records of all five addresses. Four of them were on Atherton’s list of known dealers; the fifth was added to it.
“We hang back,” I said. “At the moment he’s just shopping. Looking for the best paper. Keep the reins loose but don’t lose him.” I wasn’t interested in how many dealers he visited; the one who concerned me was the one to whom Grofield would return.
* * *
HE GAVE US a scare that night: he disappeared. He must have used the back door of the girl’s building and slipped away into the shadows. When the girl emerged alone from the building in the morning one of Atherton’s men went in wearing the guise of a municipal electric-service repairman and the flat was unoccupied. We did quite a bit of cursing but Grofield returned to the flat in the afternoon, using a key the girl must have given him. He was fairly well drunk by his walk. We sent the electrical repairman back in. He knocked at length and there was no reply so he got through the lock again and found Grofield happily passed out; he went through Grofield’s clothes and found no passport and reported back to us.