He gestured toward the campus buildings. “I got my master’s here, modern history. Fresh out of college, third in my class, I became the wonder boy of CSIS, one of their best field men. I worked the Balkan desk in the nineties; heck, I ran it. I was barely thirty years old. I got commendations. Then they dumped on me.”
“We read about it,” Margaret said. Arthur cautioned her with a look.
DiPalma began chewing on something, candy or gum, maybe a breath mint. “I have no idea why I left the car unlocked, other than … well, there’d been some marital issues, I was anxious, distracted. There was nothing on the computer, no analysis, no secrets. A few awkward sites I’d bookmarked. Personal stuff … No need to get into that.”
The continued silence from the front seat seemed to unsettle DiPalma, who apparently had trouble getting to the point. Arthur couldn’t guess what that might be: some manner of discreet advice or friendly warning? Maybe something more significant, a political bombshell.
“Let me do the talking, that’s the idea, isn’t it? Often the best technique in dealing with a subject who so obviously needs to unload. Where does one begin? I suppose by saying I regard you, both of you, as incredibly fine people. There’s no one classier in the courtroom than you, Mr. Beauchamp, that’s what your biographer says. I saw an interview with him on TV. And no one has shown more political integrity than you, Mrs. Blake … Ms. Blake.”
“Margaret.” This offering of her given name seemed to come from habit, a politician’s habit.
“I’m sympathetic to your goals. I’m more than sympathetic, I am firmly in your camp. I follow organic practices. I recycle, I avoid the trap of consumerism. I have my lapses, but we all err. Was it politically wise of you to hire Zack Flett and Savannah Buckett? Probably not, but it was generous, it’s the way you are, doing what feels right, not cynically calculating the main chance.”
“Have you been tapping my phone?” she asked, calm but assertive.
“Absolutely not, it’s illegal. That’s so, isn’t it, Mr. Beauchamp?”
Arthur felt forced to speak finally. “Yes, absent judicial consent.”
“Do I understand you were assigned to follow me?” Margaret asked.
“Do you think I asked to take on this stinking file?” A sudden burst of temper. “You’re harbouring terrorists, that’s their concept, not mine, it’s as if you’re a danger to the nation.” A deep breath, and his voice softened. “My instructions were simply to execute follows — that’s spy jargon, sorry — to shadow you, Margaret, to see who you’re in contact with, collect names, create target profiles.” He was still low in the back seat, shaking from the cold — or from something else, Arthur wasn’t sure. A need, nicotine, alcohol.
“Do you mind if we take a little drive, Ray?” Arthur asked.
“No, let’s go.”
Margaret wheeled onto University Drive, then south on Colonel By, away from the crime-scene roadblocks still slowing traffic at the bombing site.
“Who instructed you to do this, Ray?” Arthur asked. “To target my wife.”
His response was circumspect. “Have either of you met Anthony Crumwell?”
“We know who he is,” Margaret said.
“Old school. Commies under beds. Enemies of the state lurking behind lampposts.” DiPalma drew close to Arthur, who got a whiff of spearmint over stale tobacco breath. “Is this conversation safe, Mr. Beauchamp? Is it covered by solicitor-client privilege? Other-wise, they’ll throw the book at me. Treason. Sedition. I need to talk to someone I can trust.”
“Has it to do with what happened this morning?” Arthur asked. “The bombing?”
“Can we go somewhere comfortable and private? Is your apartment free?”
“You would risk being seen with us,” Arthur said.
“Let me out a block away, and I’ll join you in five minutes. If this does get back to CSIS, I’ll explain I was infiltrating you.” A rare smile from this sombre man.
For all Arthur knew, DiPalma was infiltrating them. But he sensed that was neither likely nor a concern, given that he couldn’t conceive they had anything to hide.
They stopped on Bronson, not far from where police were still combing through rubble under searchlights. DiPalma got out clumsily, dug hungrily into a pack of cigarettes.
As Margaret pulled away, she said, “How unbalanced do you think this guy is? Or is he conniving at something? ‘Carbon emissions are out of control.’ Thanks for telling us, Ray, we had no idea. I think the klutzy thing might be an act. I don’t trust him.”
“Let’s hear him out. The priest may not have given him the hearing he’d hoped for in the confessional, and I have a sense of a dam about to give way. He shows all the indications of a man falling apart.” During his several decades as a trial lawyer, Arthur had learned to make quick and accurate appraisals of witnesses, their body language, speech inflections, eye movements. He was willing to gamble — cautiously — on his reading of this fellow.
“Well, it’s obviously your ear he wants, with all your solicitor-client privileges, so you entertain him.”
Arthur was distressed that she seemed aggrieved by that. But they shouldn’t risk compromising her — M.P.s and even priests were compellable witnesses, and Arthur had a sense that DiPalma’s secrets could ultimately be tested in a courtroom. An interesting character, and whether real or a fraud or a nut, he represented a chance, finally, for Arthur to elevate his role from that of loyal sidekick to his life partner.
Dear sweethearts,
We got split up from the group again, because of some mix-up, and, boy, they happen a lot here. We got to departures late, Ivy was throwing up, something she ate, and there were only two seats left on the direct flight from Tashkent to Almaty so the three of us were put on this grungy prop plane to someplace called Igorgrad so we can make connections. I swear, we’ll NEVER do business with Exotic Tours ever again. The old man next to me said, “Why you go Bashtan?” I said, “What’s Bashtan? We go Almaty.” He says, “Good luck.”
So that started us worrying and we checked with the flight attendant and he didn’t speak any English, but he did have some Russian and all we could figure out is there’s some kind of trouble and the connecting flight will be delayed or something. Well, it’s another adventure, I guess.
Hank, I hope you got Ruffy to the vet so he could be fixed. (Don’t try to do it yourself, I don’t care if you are a surgeon. Have the girls got their flu shots?) I’ll try to slip this into an envelope and mail it from Bashtan, but the way things work around these parts I’ll probably be back home before it arrives. If it arrives.
I hope I can find something lovely in Bashtan for Katie for her thirteenth.
Weather’s been great, but we seem to be heading north, so I’m glad we brought our parkas. Maxine says hi. A year after Wally’s funeral, and she’s only now climbing out of it. Ivy is hopeless, still pining for that loser of a boyfriend, Maxine is sure he’s into drugs. Her idea was that a few weeks away would cure all her hopeless moping, but I don’t know. When I think we’ll be dealing with three teenagers in a few years, I go, “Yikes!”
Love you and miss you. Love you all. I’m going to come back with stories.
Jill XOXO
8
Returning from his third trip to the can, feeling a little rosy, Huck Finnerty nodded in passing to Anthony Crumwell, operations head of CSIS, who was going over his reports, waiting for his turn in the war room, as the cabinet room had been dubbed. The P.M. always got a chill just looking at this cold fish, Canada’s sphincter-eyed head spy, with his maimed right hand — he’d lost three fingers to a letter bomb. An import, a Brit, former head of MI5’s anti-terrorist wing.