I hadn’t questioned the timing of Willy’s visit to the Windham Hill Inn. If Olivia Kidder had indeed just arrived from DC after a long drive, it seemed unlikely she’d still be up. But he and Sammie had done their homework. As we crested the peak of the driveway and coasted into the parking lot with the engine turned off, I saw that while most of the inn’s lights were extinguished, the same was not true of the room to the far right, a one-story wing that, through the window, looked like a piano-equipped library.
We’d barely eased out of the car and softly closed its doors before Sammie appeared out of the night like a breeze, her clothing dark, her eyes gleaming.
“They’ve been talking for hours, sitting about two inches apart like a couple of conspirators.”
She gestured to us to follow and led the way under the stinking ginkgo tree to a large bush planted near the inn’s far corner. From there, we had a clear view into the lighted room and could see John Rarig, as described, with a small, snow-capped, animated woman. From both their expressions, I could tell their topic was not a happy one.
Sammie pointed to a narrow set of stairs leading to a back porch. The door connecting it to the inn led directly into the library. “What do you say we invite ourselves in?”
I laid a hand on her forearm. “Hang on a sec. As soon as we go in there, we’re opening ourselves to some serious problems. If these people choose to react like Alonzo did, Coffin’ll land on us like God Himself. I’ll end up in the slammer, and you two could be suspended.”
“Fuck Coffin,” Willy said without hesitation. “That bastard made me look like an idiot, saying you ripped off that brooch under my nose. He can drop dead, for all I care.”
“I’m not worried, either,” Sammie chimed in. “Besides, we got nothing to worry about.” She pointed at the window. “They’re up to something. They’re not going to squawk.”
Willy looked at me suspiciously. “You covering your butt all of a sudden?”
I smiled back at him. “Little late for that. But loyalty should have its limits. This is not a great career move for you guys.”
His face soured predictably. “Loyalty? Spare me. You think you’re doing me a favor, running interference so I don’t get fired? I’m pissed off is all, and I’d love to shove something up Coffin’s nose. I could care less about some stupid career.”
I nodded. “Okay. Lead on.”
We filed quietly up onto the porch. Sammie tried the doorknob, found it unlocked, and preceded us into the room.
Rarig and Kidder deserved credit. They didn’t bat an eye-merely stopped speaking, sat back, and watched us line up before them.
Rarig smiled thinly, recognizing me. “Ah, Lieutenant. I thought you weren’t supposed to be seen in such company.”
“This is not an official visit,” I answered, struck by his knowledge of my legal standing. I nodded to the woman by his side, hoping to throw them off balance. “Ms. Kidder. Nice to meet you.”
Her face lit up with pleasure. “Very good. Trace my plates?” Her voice was clear and youthful, touched by a slightly ironic inflection. A successful veteran, I thought, of many a mental contest-and certainly no janitor.
“I did,” Kunkle admitted. “And your place of employment.”
Rarig addressed me again. “If not official, then what is this?”
I settled into an empty armchair. After a slight hesitation, my two companions did likewise.
“We thought it was time to clear things up a bit. Till now, we’ve been sticking to the legalities, like warrants and what-have-you. But as you implied, I’m working a little more independently at the moment, so I thought we might cut the crap and try being honest with each other.”
Rarig raised his eyebrows. “I haven’t been honest?”
Willy scowled at him. “Don’t be cute.”
Olivia Kidder was taking us in with the interested eye of a birdwatcher-silently waiting, I thought, for things to become more clearly defined.
“Your real name’s not John Rarig,” I said, gambling a bit to win her respect. “He probably died on the Normandy beaches in ’forty four, or in a hospital back home as a result of his wounds. You weren’t born in Ames, Iowa, and you haven’t spent your whole career as a State Department paper pusher. You and Ms. Kidder came up together inside the CIA, which probably has a room full of identities like the real John Rarig’s, just so guys like you can operate in daylight. You were a spook specializing in Soviet affairs, based in Austria, at least in the early years. What do you do for the Company, Ms. Kidder?”
She nodded slightly. “Please call me Olivia. I’m a glorified file clerk, really.”
“Which is no doubt belittling both your talents and your position. Mr. Rarig, what was Sergei Antonov doing spying on you?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Who is he?”
Willy muttered, “For Christ’s sake,” and Sammie shifted restlessly in her chair.
Rarig clarified his statement. “Lieutenant, if I was what you say I am, wouldn’t you think me a little simpleminded to suddenly spill the beans just because you’d like me to? For all I know, your whole embarrassment with the attorney general is just a ploy to get me to trust you.”
His patience exhausted, Willy launched himself from his chair and stood glaring down at John Rarig. With one lame arm dangling and his powerful right fist bunched up before him, he presented a conflicted image of impotence and fury-much more threatening than just an angry man. Rarig and Kidder watched him closely and, I noticed for the first time, with something approaching fear.
“You and Joe can play footsie all you want,” Willy said in a low, tight voice, “but I’m not much of a bullshitter. You’re dicking us around, maybe ’cause you whacked that Russian, or maybe ’cause you’re a smoke screen for someone else. But our jobs are on the line, and I don’t need some smartass fuck like you telling me fairy tales so you can pretend you’re a virgin.”
He leaned forward, placing that large, muscular hand on the arm of Rarig’s chair, his face inches away from the older man’s. “It wasn’t all that tough digging up what we got on you, and it’ll be easy to dig up more. The CIA are a bunch of fuckups. I saw it in ’Nam, and I’m seeing it now. So if you want to do this the hard way, that’s fine with me. Sam and I are still legit, even if Joe’s on thin ice, so we’ll get the hell out of here, do our pissant paperwork, and come back to hang your balls from that vomit tree out there. Is that the way you wanna go?”
His speech was all the more impressive considering he’d just told me he didn’t care about his job. And it obviously had an effect. Rarig sat blinking, pressed back against the cushion of his chair, even after Willy had straightened up.
Rarig glanced at Kidder, who nodded. He then smiled uneasily at Willy. Spook or not, he was in his mid-seventies-no longer capable of slugging it out, even with a one-armed man. But Willy could affect people that way in any case. It was the anger he carried within him-and the clearly feeble restraints containing it-that remained his most eloquent ally. And Rarig seemed to be a good listener.
“I wasn’t saying we couldn’t find some middle ground,” he conceded uncomfortably. “But given the accusations you just made, I stand to lose quite a bit if I’m not careful. Isn’t that reasonable?”
It was clear Willy would have been just as happy beating his brains out, but he looked over at me instead, sighed slightly, and sat back down.
I tried to keep the conversation moving our way. “It’d be reasonable if you made us some gesture of good faith. That’s how middle ground is reached.”
There was a long, thoughtful silence in the room.
“When you went down to Langley,” Rarig finally asked me, “what were your impressions of Gil Snowden?”
I didn’t ask how he knew about that, guessing Kidder had been his source. “That he knew more than he admitted, like you.”