In addition, Devereaux’s activities — approved fully by Chief of Section and Hanley — had resulted in the arrest of one Dmitri Denisov, a Soviet agent. He had been expelled to Moscow.
And there was the matter of Michael Pendurst, recruited by the CIA, who had been arrested at the launch of the hovercraft Brianna. He was currently awaiting trial in London on charges of attempted murder.
At that point, the CIA man denied Pendurst worked for them.
Hanley quietly passed a report from the Ministry for Interior Affairs (Extraordinary) across the table. The President did not glance at it but kept his gray eyes fixed coldly on the flustered CIA man. He had seen the report based on the interrogation of Pendurst.
Finally, there was the matter of the attempts to kill the heads of two great allied powers, Eire and Great Britain.
The CIA had known all along about the IRA plot (another protest from the CIA man at the table, but the President told him to shut up) and had helped finance it in hopes of blaming the IRA when they made their move to murder the leftist Prime Minister of Great Britain.
“Leftist” was Hanley’s touch; it turned the dagger. The President himself was considered a “leftist” by some.
Hanley recited the proof of CIA funding for the IRA — or for some elements of it. Again, British Intelligence had gained the proof from certain tapes, equipment, and notes of agents of other countries which had come into their possession.
“Goddam,” said one of the men at the table in a deep Southern accent. “Gawwwwwwwwdam!” He was one of the President’s internal security advisors. “Them English boys really got something on the ball, ain’t they?”
And Hanley wanted to say, Yes. His name is Devereaux.
Hanley did not speak of that, however; he continued to recite the events of the morning of December first in Liverpooclass="underline" How Chief Inspector Cashel of Special Branch, Dublin, was shot to death by the terrorists as he entered the hovercraft; how the terrorist named James Faolin was killed by Devereaux at the last moment and of the later discovery of five hundred pounds of gelignite aboard the craft; of the wounds inflicted on passengers and crew — six dead and nineteen wounded, among the wounded Brianna Devon, daughter of Lord Slough, who suffered partial vocal paralysis from a bullet in the throat.
The President listened to it all thoughtfully, and his eyes never left the CIA man. Hanley was aware of that but he did not look up; he spoke confidently and slowly, precisely and without emotion. He knew how to make a report.
The British and Irish governments had protested, formally and quietly, to the President concerning the illegal activities of the Central Intelligence Agency in their countries. The President of the United States had been forced to apologize.
“Apologize,” he repeated now, as he stared at the CIA man.
Hanley waited but the President had no more to say.
When it was over, Hanley and the Old Man walked back to the Agriculture building from the Executive Office Building. It was a pleasant walk, because, again, winter had been stayed by the gentle winds from Virginia. Only the trees of Washington seemed a little more bare, a little sadder.
They did not speak at first; it was late afternoon.
“We weren’t wrong, you know, about Devereaux. He should have kept us informed,” the Old Man said at last.
Hanley nodded but did not speak. They walked on in silence.
“We’ve got our opening to Brit Intell,” Galloway said. “It was what we wanted.”
“British Intelligence,” Hanley said. “I detest slang.”
And the old man glanced at him curiously as they walked along.
Of course, Green had been the key to Devereaux’s plan to survive and to sabotage the CIA at the same time. It was Green who finally convinced British Intelligence that Devereaux was correct and that the whole wild story was plausible and even true. It was Green who, indirectly, moved C (as the British Intelligence commander was still called) to order the extraordinary alert of police and special-branch forces during the night which had resulted in the capture of the CIA hit man from Hamburg.
Green trusted Devereaux and followed his instructions. He told British Intelligence the truth to save his life.
They had taken him — the night before the Brianna launch — to the police station in Dale Street at Hatton Gardens in the center of the old city of Liverpool. He told them alclass="underline" About Operation Mirror and about his part in it; about the attempt on the life of Elizabeth Campbell on the Dover train (and his part in it); and about Devereaux’s mission to Scotland and Ulster. He told them about the tape-transmitter box in Blake House. Yes, he knew about Hastings’ death, from Ruckles.
They had been very quiet and polite. Ruckles?
Green was expansive. They were treating him famously, in the finest British manner. These were his people, the sort of civilized men he felt at home with. They offered him tea. He did not notice that their faces had become drawn and their eyes become small and cold.
Ruckles was the CIA man. He told them about Ruckles.
When had he last seen Ruckles?
Not seen, actually. Heard. On the telephone. Sunday night.
Come now. He had seen Ruckles on Monday certainly.
Not at all. He was in Cambridge on Monday.
Really? For what purpose?
Devereaux had told him to wait in Cambridge.
The three men from the Ministry for Interior Affairs (Extraordinary) glanced at each other and then again at Green, who sat smiling in the corner of the small room in the basement of the central police station.
The tea was cold and Green put down his cup.
“We put it to you that you murdered Ruckles,” one said quietly.
“What?”
“This belongs to you.” And they produced a black gun — Devereaux’s gun, Green realized — the gun he had pointed at Green that Sunday night he came to kill him at Blake House.
“Not mine, no—”
“It was in your room at the Adelphi Hotel.”
“Now—”
“Ruckles was found murdered in the gents at Euston Station on Monday afternoon. He was shot once. With this pistol. And you knew him well.”
Green looked from face to face and saw only hard men.
“That’s Devereaux’s gun—”
“Nonsense. You had it. In your room. You knew Ruckles. He was your contact. You said you had been angry with Ruckles because the company wouldn’t take you in after Operation Mirror was blown.”
Green frowned.
“You are an espionage agent, operating outside your embassy in Great Britain, and you have admitted complicity in one attempt at murder, knowledge after the fact of a second murder — that’s Hastings — and now you wish to deny your involvement in the murder of Ruckles?”
Green opened his mouth to protest but no words came. He suddenly understood that Devereaux kept his bargain — his bargain with R Section and his bargain with Green. As he promised, Green would not die. He would live. But he would be eliminated.
He tried to laugh.
There were no public executions in Britain any longer. Green would live. Safe. In Her Majesty’s prisons. For the rest of his life.
27
A cover of snow lay lightly on the mountains. And there was mist as well, so thick that they closed Skyline Drive along the Blue Ridge Mountains.
You could not see to the top of the Blue Ridge Mountains south of the little town.
They bought groceries in the little store where Devereaux always went, and the owners said it had been a long time no see, and was he stayin’ a while?
Devereaux nodded then and the grocer looked at the woman with her pale face and dark, luminous eyes. Because Virginians form a polite society in the mountains, the old man did not ask about her but merely smiled and nodded to her.