“You may recall that I am still under contract to the Agency as a consultant,” Stone said, “and I have the appropriate security clearance-in spite of my friendship with you.”
“But do you have a need to know? I believe that’s the phraseology they use.”
“I have a very definite need to know,” Stone said, “since a substantial chunk of my inheritance from my late wife and of my son’s trust fund are invested in the hotel mentioned in the signals you referred to.”
“Oh, all right, I suppose you’re not a security risk.”
Their dinner arrived, and the subject changed.
“How are you… coping since becoming a widower?” she asked.
“You needn’t be so delicate,” Stone replied. “I plan to take you home and ravish you as soon as you’ve finished your Dover sole.”
She giggled. “Oh, good. But where is your son?”
“He occupies his own flat on the top floor of the house,” Stone said, “and he’s probably there, in the sack with his girlfriend, as we speak.”
“Goodness, his generation starts young, don’t they?”
“How old were you on the occasion of your first time?” Stone asked.
Felicity blushed deeply.
“Oh, come on, you can tell me. Official Secrets Act, remember?”
“Sixteen,” she said. “With a young gamekeeper on my father’s estate.”
“Shades of Lady Chatterley!”
“It was only afterward that I read the novel,” she said. “But he was very sweet. He was twenty-two, and he seemed like much the older man. What about you? When was your first time?”
Stone laughed. “I was sixteen, too, and she was nineteen. Much the older woman, and I was grateful to her for her experience.”
“So we were both precocious.”
“And will be again,” Stone said. He waved at a waiter. “Check, please!”
31
There was sunlight filtering through the shutters in Stone’s bedroom when he looked over and found Felicity next to him. Their hips were touching, and she had a wisp of her red hair across her face. Gingerly, he brushed it away, and she opened her eyes.
“My goodness,” she said, turning toward him. “How long it’s been since I awoke to find a man in my bed!”
“In actual fact,” Stone said, “you awoke to find yourself in a man’s bed.”
“Even better,” she said, placing a hand on his cheek and kissing him lightly.
“More, please,” he said, and they did it again. From there it was but a short hop to an embrace and a joining of flesh.
When they had finished and lay panting in each other’s arms, Felicity said, “What will your sleeping arrangements be at the hotel?”
“I’ll be staying in a four-bedroom cottage with its own garden and pool that was part of the original deal for the building of the hotel. The master bedroom, where I will sleep, has a private, walled patio off the back garden, to which I will give you a key, so that you may steal in and out at will.”
“What a lovely arrangement,” she said.
“Of course, you may encounter a Secret Service agent or two along the way, since we’re next door to the presidential cottage, but they are very discreet people.”
She sighed. “From what you’ve told me, I won’t be able to move without rubbing elbows with either the Secret Service, the Mexican protective detail, a team of Strategic Services guards, or all of the above.”
“That’s about the size of it, but as long as you don’t come to me naked, there shouldn’t be a problem.”
“I suppose I can stand to wait until I’m in your bedroom before disrobing.”
“A good policy. How many other Brits will be in residence?”
“I’m the only one, except for a few private citizens and one journalist,” she said. “I’m meant to be consulting with Kate Lee on some security matters, among them the signals you and I talked about last night.”
“I’m reliably informed that Kate already knows about the signal traffic. The NSA figure in charge of all that, Scott Hipp, is politically connected, and he just loves sending little items like that to the White House.”
“To which Kate is well connected,” Felicity said. “I wonder what it would be like if I were married to the prime minister.”
“Does he interest you?”
“Oh, no, I was just talking about having that connection. I wonder if Kate and her husband talk about work in bed.”
“You’ve got me there,” Stone said. “Would you like some breakfast?”
“May I have a full English breakfast?” she asked. “Eggs over easy, sausage, bacon, grilled tomato, tomato juice, and very strong coffee?”
Stone picked up the phone, buzzed Helene in the kitchen, and placed their orders.
“May I have a bath while we’re waiting?” Felicity asked.
“Of course. May I watch?”
“That might get dangerous,” she said, getting out of bed and walking across the bedroom to her bath. “I won’t be long.”
Stone’s phone rang. He looked at his watch: seven-thirty. Who the hell? He picked up the phone. “Hello?”
“It’s Mike.”
“Good morning, Mike. You’re an early riser.”
“I’m getting reports that someone has completed the computer work that High Cotton’s Mr. Chang began, and that it’s in use.”
“Anything specific?”
“Someone called Algernon is communicating with the three men in a shoe or a boat, or whatever they’re in.”
“What sort of communications?”
“They’re meeting-we don’t know where.”
“This is the first we’ve heard of an Algernon, isn’t it?”
“It is. It sounds as though he’s running the three, and I’ll bet he’s hot off a plane from the Middle East.”
“Maybe you should speak with the Secret Service about this.”
“I have already done so, directly to Rifkin, who’s the AIC at The Arrington. Are you still on schedule to arrive tomorrow?”
“We’re wheels up at ten o’clock Teterboro tomorrow morning.”
“Good.”
“Oh, one other thing,” Stone said. “MI-6 is picking up the same traffic NSA is.”
“And you know this because?”
“I had… dinner with Felicity Devonshire last night.”
“Ah, Felicity!”
“She’s flying out with us to take a meeting with Kate Lee.”
“I wonder if she knows anything else of interest to us.”
“I wonder, too. I’ll press her on that subject.”
“Never hurts to triangulate on something like this.”
“I guess not.” The bell rang that signaled that the dumbwaiter was on the way up from the kitchen. “I gotta run,” Stone said.
“I’ll see you at the hotel.” Mike hung up.
Felicity came out of the bathroom in a terry robe with a towel around her hair. “I smell sausage,” she said.
Stone took the tray from the dumbwaiter, set it on the bed, and whisked away the covers.
“This is the best hotel I know,” Felicity said, picking up a sausage with her fingers and biting into it.
“Mike Freeman just called,” Stone said. “There’s further news of Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.”
“Do tell.”
Stone told her about the defection of Chang from High Cotton and the work he did in Palo Alto. “His work has now been completed, and someone code-named Algernon is communicating with the trio, setting up a meeting. Mike thinks Algernon may have arrived in California to run the trio.”
“I think that’s a sensible conclusion to draw,” she said. “I’ll check with my people this morning to see if they have anything new to add.”
“We would all appreciate that,” Stone said.
She set the plate of eggs and bacon in her lap and started to work on it. “One way we might be able to help is to go back into our files and see if we’ve ever had an Algernon operating anywhere.”
“Excellent idea. If we knew who he was it might be easier to track them all down.”
“I think we can guess where they’re heading,” Felicity said.
32
When Hamish went to the kitchen for breakfast, Mo was looking very nervous. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing is wrong, it’s just that the material has arrived, and I’m excited. The doctor has been working most of the night.”