“If it’s a steak, I want it well-done,” said Glendenning. “Goddamn frogs gave me an entrecôte for lunch that I swear was still alive and quivering. They call it ’bleu’ and sneer at you if you don’t think it’s the damn best thing since Escoffier created béarnaise.”
“How’s chicken fried steak with buttered carrots and mashed potatoes sound?”
“As long as there’s a mug of coffee to go with it, why, just about perfect.”
“A mug? I’ve got the Mr. Coffee boiling over.”
“Maxwell House?”
“Nothing but the best.”
Glendenning chuckled for the first time that day. “I knew there was a good reason we transferred FTAT from Treasury.”
The drive to Langley took fifteen minutes. After clearing security, the two men took the staff elevator to the sixth floor and proceeded directly to a conference room at the end of the east wing. The table was set with place mats, cloth napkins, and silver cutlery. Silver warming trays adorned a sideboard. A lone man waited inside, cleaning off his plate with a last chunk of cornbread.
“Hey, Glen,” said Sheldon Sykes, shooting out of his chair, wiping his mouth with a sleeve. “Didn’t know when you’d get here, so I went ahead and helped myself.”
Sykes was the Bureau’s technical liaison to the Agency, half scientist, half bureaucrat, the kind of perpetually smiling face Glendenning could do without.
“No problem,” said Glendenning, though privately he was miffed at the Bureau man’s piss-poor manners. “You need to get moving anyway. Here’s what we got.” Opening his briefcase, he removed a DVD and explained that it held a copy of the video found in Mohammed al-Taleel’s apartment. “At the end of the tape there’s a chance these jokers inadvertently captured the image of a third party. It could be one of their buddies. As the speaker comes toward the camera, I want you to check his sunglasses. We’re fairly certain that there’s a reflection of someone standing inside the room. Enhance the images, do your magic, until you can tell me who or what it is.”
Sykes reached for the DVD, but Glendenning held it in his fingers a moment longer. “This is white-hot, you understand me. You are to personally supervise the men examining this. Not a word of its contents is to get out.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And, Sykes? It doesn’t do to keep the President waiting.”
As Sykes pulled on his coat and rushed from the room, Glendenning pondered the fact that his mere presence at Langley was a minor miracle. It had been a long time since the two agencies had worked hand in hand. As a result of the Church Commission’s investigations in the mid-1970s into abuses by the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover, and an endless string of CIA provocations abroad, laws had been put on the books preventing the two from anything more than a vestigial collaboration. FBI was domestic. CIA was foreign. And never the twain shall meet. The Patriot Act had changed that, and with the creation of a department of Homeland Security, it looked like cooperation might be institutionalized in the form of a new agency for domestic intelligence, something akin to Britain’s MI5.
When he was gone, Halsey took a seat on the edge of the table. “You staying much longer?”
“Another hour or so. Got a powwow with the barons of the banking committee tomorrow morning. The good Senator Leach wants to cut our purse strings in return for some of that ‘soft money’ we hear so much about these days from his benefactors at the money center banks. The old boy’ll have a heart attack when he hears how much Blood Money is costing us.”
“He’s serious about cutting back?”
“Serious? The man wants to halve our budget. Says the money’s better spent with the frontline troops. The Pentagon or Homeland Security’ll suit him and his pals just fine. They’re against everything we’re doing. Too much disclosure, they cry. Too much oversight. A violation of their customers’ rights. Truth is, they don’t give a damn about their customers’ rights. They’re just pissed about the extra cost of filling out all those SARs and CTRs. Don’t want to admit it’s their job as much as ours to keep an eye out for the bad guys.”
“You set ’em straight. Tell ’em to leave our funding alone. If Hijira turns out to be the pain in the ass I’m guessing, it’ll cost Leach’s money center banks a damn sight more than what they’re forking over now.” Halsey turned to leave, but hesitated at the doorway. “Say, Glen, mind if I ask you something? Off the record?”
“Shoot.”
“What the hell happened over there?”
Glendenning looked up uneasily. “Don’t know yet. On the surface, it looks like the Frenchies slipped up, called in the cavalry before the trap was set. Only one problem…”
“What’s that?”
“Doesn’t explain why Taleel didn’t have the money.”
If Halsey caught a whiff of Glendenning’s suspicions, he made no show of it. “Hijira’s a clever bunch, eh?”
The deputy director of operations for the Central Intelligence Agency felt himself drifting and strangely ill at ease. His eyes wandered the room, unable to settle anywhere for more than a second. “Maybe,” he said. “Maybe more than that.”
Finally at home and ensconced in the warmth of his study, a second brandy in his hand, Glen Glendenning picked up a telephone and dialed a number in Geneva, Switzerland. For once, he was not thinking about Adam Chapel or Sarah Churchill or any member of the Blood Money task force currently searching for Hijira. It was one A.M. It was his private time.
“Allo,” answered a graceful female voice.
“ ‘Morning, love. I trust I didn’t wake you.”
“Glen-you are back already? I told you not to call me. It is too dangerous. Not now.”
“To hell with it, Claire. If Maggie’s lawyers are going to tap my phone, let ’em. What are they going to discover that they don’t already know?”
“But you are so close to the court date. It could make things much more complicated.”
“That’s hard to imagine. She’s already getting all my money, what there is of it, at least. I decided to say screw it. If the President doesn’t understand, he can have my resignation.”
Glendenning closed his eyes, and pictures of Claire Charisse filled his mind and warmed his body as no amount of brandy could. She was French, a petite brunette of thirty-five possessed of a dancer’s lithe figure, inquisitive black eyes, and a sarcastic smile. She was stubborn as a mule and could swear like a Marine. She knit him wool sweaters that were far too large and cooked him gourmet meals that would feed an army. “Mais manges, mon petit,” she would urge him, scooting her chair next to his and watching his every bite like an adoring mother. Once Glendenning had asked her what a beautiful gal like her was doing with a broken-down racehorse like himself. She’d grown furious on the spot. “I have the best man in the world,” she’d answered. “I would settle for nothing less.”
“Did you make some progress while you were in Paris?” Claire asked.
“Not exactly progress, but we came up with some interesting stuff.”
“All of Europe is afraid. The security at the office was terrible. Seven years I worked for the United Nations. This morning they treat everyone at the door like they are terrorists. Another threat, they said. I say I have work to do. Medicine that must be shipped out. Children are waiting. Today. This morning. But no one cares. Security, they say. The queue was so long, I had to wait an hour to get in.” Suddenly, she broke off her speech. “Oh, Glen, I am so sorry to think about myself. Did you know these men?”
“Not personally, but it looks like”-He cut himself off. “I’d love to tell you more, but you know I can’t.” Rousing himself, he adjusted his frame so that he sat up straighter in the leather chair. A reading light burned over his shoulder, but the rest of the room was dark. He pulled a blanket over his legs to warm himself. “Anyhow, I can’t tell you how difficult it was to be so close to you and not be able to come see you.”