“I get the sense your minority element isn’t very large.”
Harper smiled soberly. “He’s six foot three and weighs about a hundred eighty pounds,” he said. “And amiable.”
“Will he admit to having a coffee jones?”
“I think you’d have to ask him in the capacity of his analyst,” Harper said. “Given a choice right now, though, I’m very certain his preference would be to speak to you as a friend.”
Allison sat looking thoughtful for a full thirty seconds. “I’m listening, John,” she said then.
He took a long, deep breath. Allison noted that he had his hands on the hard-shell briefcase on his lap, his fingers spread out atop it, lightly pressing down on its black leather surface.
“You’ve heard of Ryan Kealey,” he said.
“Of course,” she said. “If memory serves, you recruited him, isn’t that right?”
“Memory serves,” Harper said.
Allison was nodding. “I was at Langley for nearly a decade,” she said. “In all that time, I can think of only one operative who managed to become the lead story on the evening news. Although it’s understandable how getting into a shoot-out on the streets of New York City can have that rather exceptional result.”
Harper had to chuckle. “Kealey admittedly had a flair for the dramatic,” he said.
“Past tense?”
“In terms of the Agency, yes,” Harper said.
Allison raised an eyebrow. “I’ve been out of the loop, granted. But somehow I’m surprised to hear that.”
“If you knew him, you wouldn’t be,” Harper said. “Kealey is…I suppose the word would be unorthodox. That’s sometimes brought attention to him. But he’s never gone looking for it. Or frankly even been keen on taking credit.”
“Can you tell me why he pulled out of the game?”
“He’s mostly been a reluctant player from the beginning, “Harper said. “And he’s been through a lot of things. Carries a lot around with him.”
“That isn’t so unusual,” Allison said. “The majority of my time at the Agency was spent trying to lift unnecessary burdens from people’s shoulders. But I suppose that’s true of any clinician.”
Harper sat a moment, crossed his ankle over his knee. “A question, Allie…Why did you pull out?”
“Is it really important?”
“It might be for your understanding.”
“Of Kealey?”
“And the reason I came here to talk to you this morning.”
“Which is presumably tied to Kealey.”
He gave a slow nod, waited, meeting her gaze with his own. After a while Allison shrugged.
“Every mind is a complicated piece of machinery,” she said. “If there’s one that isn’t functioning to optimal performance, and you’re going to muck around inside, you’d damn well better have steady hands. It’s serious business, whether someone comes to you because he or she has intimacy issues, problems with self-worth, or is phobic about crowds, clowns, riding in a car, or chickens.” She linked her fingers together more tightly on the desk. “But I didn’t mean to switch metaphors, John. So getting back to yours…At the Agency every game is high risk. I just felt that I was wearing down. And that’s when people make mistakes.”
Harper watched her in silence for a moment, lightly drumming his fingers on the case. “Did you lose someone?”
“Bad guys get away. Patients die. Loss comes with the job when you’re in the business of saving lives.”
“That doesn’t exactly answer my question.”
Allison gave a fleeting smile. “I guess you’ll have to settle, bub.” She nodded her chin at the briefcase. “So what’s in there that’s got you tapping out finger rolls, and how’s it related to the favor you’ve come to ask?”
Harper snapped his eyes down at his hands, frowning as if they’d been guilty of insubordination. Then he raised them back to her face.
“It goes back to what we were talking about when I walked in here. Sudan, President Brenneman, and your observation that retaliatory action may be imminent,” he said. “I’ve already told you I believe it would be a mistake at this point. I can’t tell you why I believe it, and I can’t tell you what I think is necessary to forestall that course of action…”
“But you’re hoping to find a way do it.”
He sat quietly again, his forehead seamed with concentration, the crow’s-feet Allison had noticed around his eyes spreading and deepening. “I’m going out on a limb telling you this, Allie. But there are things that need to be looked into under certain people’s radar. And I’m convinced Ryan Kealey is the only person capable of pulling off the job.”
“Have you asked him if he’s interested?”
“Not yet. And I can guarantee he won’t be. But I’m going to try to persuade him. It means flying fifteen hours and eight thousand miles, and that’s okay. When I reach him, though, I’m going to have only one crack at it.”
Allison sat there thinking. She was no mathematical whiz. But basic addition wasn’t a problem for her.
“You want me to profile him for you,” she said, pointing her chin at the briefcase. “Based on…what information?”
“His psych workups and personal history. Files going back years before he was Agency. Everything about everything in Ryan Kealey’s life.” He lifted the case off his lap and placed it on the desk. “It’s all in there for you to read and evaluate. And just to be harshly explicit, Allie, I’m requesting more than another psychological profile. What I want to know from you is how to push his buttons. Pull his strings. Manipulate him by any and all means possible. Whatever it takes to get him to come aboard.”
She went bold straight in her chair, eyes widening, boring into him, her shoulders as stiff as wooden pickets.
“My God, John…this is beyond unprincipled. Do you realize how many ethical codes you’re asking me to violate?”
Harper met her stare and didn’t blink. “I’d be breaking a few myself,” he said. “In fact, I’ve blown a few to smithereens just getting hold of his files. And probably more coming here to discuss them with you.”
Silence.
“If I agree to do this,” Allison said, “it would be done without conscience.”
“No, Allie. It wouldn’t. For a couple of reasons. The first is Kealey. It isn’t as if we just lost him at the Agency. He’s lost himself. I don’t know how else to put it. But the course he’s on right now isn’t a good one. Or the kind that lasts long before there’s a major train wreck.”
The Downbound Express. Allison looked at Harper as if he’d prepared for their conversation by wiretapping her earlier thoughts.
“And your second reason?”
“If I’m right in what I’m doing-and successful-you might be helping to prevent a tremendous, unnecessary amount of destruction. Americans’ lives are my primary concern. But we’re talking about people in Africa and elsewhere. And about possible escalation on a level I don’t even want to contemplate.”
She was shaking her head with a mix of incredulity and denial. “John…I wish you could be more specific.”
“I don’t have to be,” Harper said. “Look at the foreign governments with vested interests in Sudan. China. Russia. The old tried-and-true biggies. And then, of course, you have Bashir’s Moslem brethren who are on the cusp of supporting him.” He paused. “You used the word ‘retaliate.’ By definition that means hitting back. But contemplate for a minute what it would mean if the United States picked the wrong target for its vengeance.”
The renewed silence between them surpassed the previous one in its length and weight. Allison could feel it pressing on her like the compounded gravity inside some inescapable black hole. She willed a breath into her lungs, trying to absorb everything Harper had told her, struggling to put it into some sort of order and context.
It seemed forever before she managed to exhale.
“I’m not a world rescuer-not in the sense you are,” she said. “I take it one person at a time, you understand?”
Harper looked at her. “Yes,” he said. “I understand.”