“Should have that done by tomorrow. Looks like a decisive power struggle is going on inside Russia.” He always told her what was occupying his attention and she had a way of keeping him focused on what was important. “Lots of turmoil inside the Kremlin.”
“Will that affect what’s going on in the Middle East?” He had shared Melissa’s memo with her the night before.
“Hard to say. It does look like Rokossovsky is in deep trouble. The old guard is fighting his economic reforms tooth and tong.”
“Tooth and toenail,” she corrected him. They both laughed although it was far from a laughing matter for Viktor Rokossovsky, the young and energetic Soviet premier.
“We got a letter from Matt,” he announced, handing her the envelope. “He’s in Marbella on vacation, whooping it up, I expect.”
“Just like his father,” she said. Pontowski waited while she read the rare note from their grandson. It was an occasion when he wrote, for Matt was like his father — an unrestrained fighter pilot, eager to party, chase women, and fly whenever he got the chance. Zack Pontowski and his wife both shared the unspoken hope that he would not die in a fiery crash like his father did — that combat would not claim the last male descendant of the Pontowski clan. “Now this is different,” she said. “He mentions a girl, a Rose Temple from Canada. Do you think our ne’er-do-well grandson may be getting serious for the first time in his life?”
“Well, he did write a letter.” Again, they both laughed.
Patience was not part of Fraser’s personality and the delay ate at him. Still, he forced himself to sit quietly in the receiving room of the mansion in the rolling hills of western Virginia that B. J. Allison called home. Even for a private dinner at home, Fraser knew that B.J. liked to make an entrance. Some “home,” Fraser decided, calculating its worth at around $19.5 million. He had missed it by less less than $200,000.
He was not disappointed by her entrance. Five minutes later, B.J. Allison swept down one of the spiraling staircases wearing a simple floor-length gown and a single diamond pendant with matching earrings. Fraser was impressed, not by the gown or diamonds, which he correctly estimated to be worth $2 million, but by the five minutes. B.J. kept governors and senators waiting seven minutes and was on time only for the President of the United States or royalty.
“Tom!” she sang out, her voice a beautiful contralto. “You do avoid me too much.” Fraser couldn’t help but smile as she took his arm and escorted him into the drawing room, the first stage in the journey to dinner. Only the eccentric with strong self-destructive tendencies or the extremely powerful willfully avoided Barbara Jo Allison. Charles de Gaulle had reportedly managed it successfully.
No one knew B.J.'s exact age, nor did they discuss it publicly, for it was the one thing the petite and elegant woman was sensitive about. Reporters could describe her as a witch, bitch, or anything else within the realm of journalistic decency with impunity. One young reporter had mentioned the rumor that she was so politically conservative that she considered Attila the Hun a flaming radical and that she had a swastika tattooed on the right cheek of her fanny. B.J. had sent a note to the reporter’s publisher telling him that the swastika was tattooed on the left cheek because it was a liberal philosophy, however misguided and amusing. The reporter’s reputation and career were made.
The one TV commentator who had speculated about her age had disappeared into obscurity within three days and later committed suicide. Fraser was wildly off when he estimated her age at sixty-six.
B.J. led Fraser through dinner with the grace and charm she had learned from her mother in Tidewater Virginia and regaled him with Washington gossip and delightful rumors. It was only in the intimacy of the library over coffee that B.J. turned to what interested her the most — oil and politics. “They tell me the President is going to press Congress to reduce the offshore oil depletion allowance. Now I think that would be most unwise, don’t you?” He readily agreed and promised that he would do what he could to change Pontowski’s mind. Neither of them mentioned that, thanks to Fraser, Allison had thrown her weight, influence, and campaign contributions behind Pontowski in the recent election.
“And the Middle East, I do find that worrisome, don’t you?” Again, Fraser agreed, wondering what she was leading to. “Is it true that someone is telling the administration that the Syrian-Egyptian treaty is more than an agreement to spur on economic development in those two poor countries?”
Fraser almost dropped his cup. How had she learned that? What were her sources? The briefing the CIA had given Pontowski the day before was classified top-secret. He knew better than to lie. “Yes, that’s true. The Israeli secret service—”
“Yes,” she interrupted, “I know about the Mossad. I do wish they would quit meddling in my business. Secret agents, penetrations …” She stomped her foot in frustration. “Why, you’d think I was a foreign power threatening those poor unfortunate people.”
“What nonsense. If you want, I’ll tell the President that the Israelis are harassing American companies.”
“I wouldn’t trouble him for the world.” She laid on her soft southern accent, creating an illusion of helplessness. “You mustn’t listen to the ramblings of a silly old woman.”
“I should be so old,” Fraser lied and quickly changed the subject. “Mossad did pass a warning to us that the treaty is a cover for a military alliance between Egypt and Syria with a possible link to Iraq. Some of our analysts think Israel is the only logical target.”
“Ridiculous,” she snorted. “I know many Arabs and they all want peace. Why just the other day I was talking to Sheik Mohammed al-Khatub, you know, that charming man from OPEC, and he assures me that they all want peace. The Israelis are using that as a scare tactic to get more money and arms out of us.” She paused before continuing. “Tom.” She laid her hand on his arm. They had come to the crux of the meeting. “I do wish that President Pontowski and Congress would recognize that we have many other friends in the Middle East besides Israel. And I do think it’s time we let Israel sink or swim on its own, don’t you?”
Gad Habish was tired when his flight from Amsterdam landed at Málaga. The return journey from Israel had been an ordeal and he had spent hours transiting through four different airports in four countries as he switched passports and changed identities. “All for twenty minutes with the Ganef,” he complained. The team’s number two man, Zeev Avidar, who had met him at the airport said nothing; he understood only too well Habish’s feelings. Everyone in the Mossad knew their leader was habitually ill-tempered and irascible, but they also knew he was a genius who had learned his craft in the Warsaw ghetto as a teenager in World War II.
“What horse is the old Ganef riding these days?” Avidar asked.
“Money. What else. Claims we’re spending too much of it. He had a fit over the dress until I showed him the pictures.” Habish gave a snort that passed for a laugh. “That shut him up. I think the old bastard actually got a hard-on.”
“Impossible.” They were quiet for the rest of the ride into Marbella.
Shoshana was following the routine Habish had established for her to make contact. She started out by visiting a certain gift shop downtown and then pausing for a late-morning coffee on the main square. After that, she would visit a few more shops before dropping into Gabriella’s dress boutique thirty-five to forty minutes after she had finished the coffee. Someone was always there to meet her. This time, it was a red-eyed Habish who was waiting.