The message was not in code. That was why it couldn’t be broken. The message had been composed, not sent. The dead agent had written out the message to be transmitted later, by someone else.
That was it.
Hanley stood for a moment in the half-darkened hall. Several doors away, Hallman was culling the list of employment recommendations and recruiting comments on new agents. He had been at it all night.
Hanley thought he should tell Hallman, to buck him up. But the secret was too important for that.
He went back into his office and closed the door and sat down at the desk.
E TRAYS D VERDANT YGER.
E for Elizabeth.
TRAYS for…
D for Devereaux.
VERDANT YGER for…
He pondered it again, penciling in the new words beneath the original letters. If it was a message to be sent, then the words were in a sort of rough code at first and then were translated into a number code for transmission.
Elizabeth TRAYS Devereaux VERDANT YGER.
Hanley got up and went to the coffeepot plugged into the wall. He poured a cup with shaking hands and dropped two small saccharin pills into the black liquid. He sipped at it. How much coffee had he consumed since it began? His hands were shaking, he realized suddenly.
Betrays.
Betrays. Elizabeth betrays Devereaux.
He pushed the cup down onto the counter and went back to his desk. Elizabeth betrays Devereaux VERDANT YGER.
Green yger?
Tyger. VERDANTYGER was green tyger.
There was something there, at the edge of consciousness, shyly peering at him. Waiting for discovery. He mustn’t frighten it or it will run away; he must let it come of its own accord, like a fawn in the woods investigating a salt lick.
Come, come.
Hanley waited, stared at the paper.
He saw the eyes of the beast in his mind, flashing in the darkness. Like a tyger.
Saw the tiger.
Burning.
And then it was in the light and Hanley knew:
Tyger.
He got up and raced to the door, opened it and called down the hall. He understood the code now; he knew who the traitor was.
So, with some satisfaction, he had awakened Galloway before dawn and was soon on his way to the Chief’s residence.
He turned off Wisconsin Avenue onto Old Georgetown Road into residential Bethesda. The trees were droopy in the still air of morning but they carried their colors like flags. Leaves littered the lawns; autumn in Washington was eternal. In the distance, he could see the bare outlines of the naval hospital.
The Chief had instructed him to tell no one. Hanley had complied; he had merely told Hallman to go home, that the matter was closed. Hallman had been disappointed not to learn Hanley’s secret.
It wasn’t quite eight A.M.
Morning birds continued their songs as the sun began to filter through the trees.
Chief of Section lived in a comfortable house off the main road, back in the trees, surrounded by green privacy. There was a little turning circle in front of the impressive brick home. Hanley left his car there and went up the stone steps. But the door was open before he rang; the Old Man was waiting for him.
“Good, Hanley,” Galloway said at last as Hanley entered the hall of the immense old house.
But no praise could take the heaviness out of him. With the end of the chase, there came an end to the excitement of the hunt. There was a traitor in the Section and Hanley felt it as personally as if someone had struck him. He did not even try to smile in return.
The Old Man closed the door as though he understood Hanley’s private grief. He led the way into the library; the house was dark; there were people still sleeping within, upstairs, beyond the lights of the book-lined room.
Hanley took the proffered chair. The Old Man stood by the window, waiting.
Hanley cleared his throat. And then began:
“Green. In our London safe house. He’s the traitor.”
“Ah.” The old man waited.
“Verdant Tyger. Green is obvious for verdant. Tyger. Why the old spelling for tiger — with a Y instead of an I? It was just their little game over at Langley, inventing a funny code name for Blake House.” Hanley paused; in that moment, he hated the CIA as though it was not a rival agency but the enemy of the nation. “Tyger, sir. From William Blake’s poem.
“Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”
Again, Hanley paused. The Old Man shook his head. “Such a simple code.”
“It wasn’t the code, sir. It was merely the preparation for a code, with bogus names. And then it would be translated into a code for transmission. Devereaux killed their agent before the message was sent.”
“I see.” The Chief gazed out the window at the limp, lush trees. There was an awkward silence for a moment, as though both men were suddenly embarrassed by the fact of the CIA’s mole in their operation. Hanley knew that the Chief was considering not only the next move but the move after that, was weighing not only the operational danger to R Section but the political danger as well. R Section must survive; to survive, there must be a demonstrated confidence in it. Would the existence of a CIA mole in R Section hurt the CIA — or the Section? The Old Man weighed it all and then gave Hanley his instructions.
Hanley sat and listened and did not take notes. He never took notes. He remembered everything.
Nothing must be done at the moment, the Chief explained.
Hanley pointed out that an agent from the Section could be sent to London immediately, to clear up the matter with Green. Ericson was available, stationed for the moment in Berlin.
The Chief nodded but rejected Hanley’s plan. There might still be other leaks in the Section. Ericson might be a CIA mole as well; the Section was small, all jobs must be considered vital. They must run a careful clearance check on everyone, including secretaries. Hanley must return to headquarters and carry on and wait.
But what if Green moved in the meantime to eliminate Elizabeth Campbell, since she had betrayed the CIA mirror game to Devereaux?
The old man lit his pipe then and went to his desk and sat down and blew puffs of smoke at the ceiling. Yes, he said. That would be a difficulty. It would be a problem. It was too bad.
Hanley understood: The retired Navy admiral had to be a little careless of life for the sake of the action, for the safety of victory.
Hanley understood everything.
The Section had to be protected. It was presumed — strongly so, based on everything that Devereaux had reported — that the CIA had created the ghost Section and that Green was a part of the CIA operation. But what if Green worked for another agency? For the Soviets? He could not be given a chance to bolt. The Old Man explained patiently.
Another scenario: If Green worked for the CIA, he must not be given a chance to inform them that the Section was totally aware of their game. The CIA must be caught in an embarrassment. So Hanley must wait upon contact from Devereaux and then Hanley must instruct Devereaux to go to London and eliminate Green. There must be no public notice of what took place within R Section and no warning given to Green.
“But how can we embarrass the CIA with that?” Hanley asked.
“Leave two exits open,” the old man explained. Depending on how it turned out, expose the CIA to the President or make a deal with the CIA to quietly fold their ghost operation against R Section. Exchange that for R Section’s silence. Blackmail the CIA, in other words.
“Is the existence of the Section in danger, then?” Hanley asked at last.