“I asked what the problem was,” Lambert said.
“I want to explain it all so you’ll get the true picture, so that you’ll understand,” O’Farrell said. “It’s important that you understand how it all fits together.”
Lambert grinned openly at him. “Why not stop trying to think for me?” the man suggested. “I’ve got degrees that say I can understand things pretty well.”
“I wasn’t being offensive.”
“Just let it come out whichever way it comes.”
Which was what O’Farrell did, and he wasn’t happy with how it sounded. Several limes he backtracked, explaining parts of the meeting with Petty and Erickson quite differently on the second attempt than on the first; at other times he petered out in the middle of a sentence, unable to find an ending. At last he stumbled to a halt and said, “I didn’t get that across at all, did I?”
“I got most of it,” Lambert assured him. “It certainly looks like an ultimatum. I just can’t believe anyone could make it as awkwardly as that.”
“That’s something I find hard to believe,” O’Farrell agreed.
“He’s your boss; you’ve worked for him for a lot of years,” the psychologist said, “Is he normally as half-assed as that?”
“The opposite,” O’Farrell said. “Ours isn’t a division that can allow any misunderstanding.”
“So let’s turn it over the other way,” Lambert said. “If it’s not an ultimatum, then Rivera and Madrid don’t matter. And you’re still in line for the promotion.”
“Unless the panel or the director or whoever is making the final decision change their minds because of my refusal.”
“Good point,” Lambert agreed. “This promotion means a lot to you?”
O’Farrell paused before replying; he wouldn’t try to explain it because he was unsure if he could. He said, “A hell of a lot.”
“All the hidden extras, able to go on supporting everyone in the family and no longer having to be the executioner?” Lambert offered.
How was it that Lambert could sum it all up in about twenty words when he’d thrashed about for hours and still couldn’t put it in a comprehensible sentence? O’Farrell said, “I hadn’t thought about it as simply as that.”
“You’d still be involved, of course,” Lambert pointed out. “You wouldn’t be pulling the trigger or whatever, but with Petty and Erickson you’d be agreeing to the targets and initiating the operations.”
“I know that,” O’Farrell said.
“Still killing, then?” Lambert pressed. “The only difference would be that you wouldn’t be doing it yourself. You don’t find any difficulty there?”
“I thought we agreed on the need—and the justification—when I was here after the London mistake?”
Lambert nodded. “I thought we did, too. I was curious whether you’d changed your mind.”
“No,” O’Farrell said. “I haven’t changed my mind.”
“Not easier, perhaps, to be the judge rather than the man carrying out the sentence?”
Lambert hadn’t summed it all up, not in those first twenty or so words. It had taken him just a few more. Now he’d succeeded: everything laid out in the open, like items on a display stand. With that realization came another, the awareness of why he’d had so much difficulty expressing himself. It had all been so much bullshit the previous night, slumped in the den, pretending to examine all the options. He hadn’t examined anything, apart from the bottom of his martini glass. He’d refused to let himself think the thoughts that Lambert was making him examine now. O’Farrell said, “I would think both are equally difficult. It isn’t easy to kill a man. Or deciding if he should be killed.”
“I never supposed it was,” Lambert said.
The other man appeared briefly discomfited, and O’Farrell couldn’t understand why. As if in reminder, O’Farrell said. “I’ve definitely told them I wouldn’t do it: go to Spain and eliminate Rivera.” He detected an old petulance in his voice.
“You’ve already told me, several times,” Lambert said.
It seemed to be a moment—and a matter—for long and heavy silences, thought O’Farrell. As with Petty the previous day, it was Lambert who broke it.
The psychologist shook his head and said, “I’m not going to do it.”
“Do what?” O’Farrell asked. Now it was he who was discomfited.
“Make your decision for you. That’s what you want me to do, isn’t it? Tell you what to do. And I won’t do that.”
There was the temptation to argue, to insist that wasn’t why he’d sought the meeting, but O’Farrell knew it would have been a hollow protest, impossible to maintain. His reliance upon Lambert, a man he scarcely knew, was something else he had refused to admit to himself until this very moment, and he was disturbed by the awareness. It was a reversal of everything to which he was accustomed. Everyone—all the family—relied upon him. He was the strong one, the person who provided the guidance and the answers. He didn’t like the opposite, the implied weakness. He said. “I wanted to talk through the options. You were the only person I knew with sufficient clearance.” He even sounded reliant!
“And we’ve done just that, talked through the options. All of them,” Lambert said. “Now it’s time to decide. For you to decide.”
“I told you—” O’Farrell began, but Lambert interrupted him.
“If it were an ultimatum, absurdly put though it was, you can change your mind,” the psychologist said. “Petty’s meeting isn’t until Friday. And Petty can’t have given the assignment to anyone else, because you told me yourself there isn’t time to brief anyone else.”
“You sound as if you think I should do just that: change my mind,” O’Farrell said.
Lambert shook his head. “I told you I’m not going to do it, not decide for you,” he said. “It doesn’t matter a damn to me whether you change your mind or not. My official association with you ended when you left here the last time. What I am trying to do, because you asked to see me, is show you the way to face up to the reality of the situation. You’ve already made it clear you’re not going to do it, which would normally effectively retire you from the department. Fine, if that’s what you feel like doing. But there’s the promotion possibility. And I know all the reasons why that’s personally important. Petty says he’ll do his best for it not to be affected. I don’t know him well, but from what I do know he seems to be a pretty straight guy. So let’s trust him. Again, fine. You wanted all the options? There they are, spelled out for you again.”
O’Farrell used the psychologist’s phone to call Lafayette Square, using Petty’s direct and unlisted line. “I’m prepared to do it,” he announced.
“I’d hoped you would be,” Petty said.
“Amsterdam!” Rivera echoed, to the arms dealer’s announcement.
“And I want the money,” Belac insisted.
“You know it’s available,” the ambassador assured him. “Are you there now?”
“Not yet,” Belac lied. “Listen carefully: take a note. Six-eight, three-two, four-four.”
“What’s that?” Rivera asked, although he already guessed.
“A telephone number you are to ring, in three days’ time,” Belac said. With the City of Athens and its load of shit still miles from anywhere on the high seas, the Belgian thought, gloating.
“What’s wrong with an address?” Rivera queried.
“I told you already,” Belac reminded him. “I’m not having you lead the Americans to me.”
He’d questioned sufficiently, Rivera decided. Belac was on the hook once more and he didn’t want the man slipping off. “In three days,” he agreed.