‘Right,’ Thompson noted. ‘He studied law at Yale at the same time he turned into a valuable resource for the CIA. He left the service in ’ninety-two and traveled around the world. Ah, and do you want to know something interesting?’
‘That’s what we’re here for. For tragic events I could have stayed home.’
‘He was a member of Skull and Bones. Initiated the same year as Bush the father.’
‘What an SOB.’
‘Who?’ Thompson asked curiously.
‘Neither. It’s just an expression,’ Staughton explained, always prepared to save Barnes from his own mouth. ‘If I say you’re an SOB, I’m not insulting you really. Understand? It’s just an expression.’
‘Okay.’
‘A member of Skull and Bones,’ Barnes repeated thoughtfully.
‘What is Skull and Bones?’ Staughton asked. ‘Some club? A fraternity?’
‘What do you mean, what is Skull and Bones?’ Barnes was scandalized by such ignorance.
‘I wasn’t hired for my knowledge of culture,’ Staughton replied by way of excusing himself.
‘Skull and Bones is a secret society. Or better, the secret society of our country,’ Thompson explained.
‘Like P2?’
‘No, not at all,’ Barnes answered. ‘No. P2 is different.’ He reflected for a few moments. ‘If we ranked every secret society, P2 would command them all, including Skull and Bones.’
‘But, according to Thompson, Skull and Bones has influential members. I heard talk of a president,’ Staughton argued, truly curious.
‘Yes. In truth there are two. Bush the son has been a member since ’sixty-eight,’ Thompson added.
‘Let me see if I can make myself understood.’ Barnes stopped to moderate the question.
The allusion to P2, the Italian Masonic lodge whose complete name was Propaganda Due, had to do with a case that occurred a year earlier that brought together these three men in a massive investigation that ended in nothing, according to Barnes. Propaganda Due was one of the most cited special collaborators with the agency, and the millions in funds they had received from Langley for more than thirty years gave their leaders a privileged relationship, often confusing as to which one was in charge of the other. The power of this lodge was enormous, greater than some presidents, prime ministers. In reality P2 had enough power to install governments or bring them down when they didn’t serve their interests. They disposed of lives as it served them, including popes, as John Paul I would testify, if he were still with us. Skull and Bones was a minor league club, a game for rich students, compared with P2, even though it consisted of influential members always under the control of those who really gave the orders. And those people didn’t appear on television reports.
‘But the chief said P2 commands almost all the rest,’ Staughton interrupted. ‘The “almost” is missing.’
Barnes looked down on the two men from his imposing height. They resumed walking to the place where the crime was committed eighteen hours ago. Dutch police tape set off the area, including the door to the bathroom. A uniformed officer was on guard at the door to ensure that only those authorized entered.
‘All right, you fools, who orders everything and everyone?’
‘Who?’ Thompson asked, unable to answer.
‘Opus Dei,’ the chief concluded.
He showed his FBI badge to the guard and entered the crime scene, leaving his subordinates with their mouths open looking at each other.
‘Opus Dei?’ they both said at once.
They finally joined Barnes moments later, not knowing if what he had said was true or not. It was time to set aside the general subject of power and concentrate on finding the assassin or assassins of Solomon Keys.
‘Here we are,’ said Barnes, looking at the ample space. Urinals to the right, stalls with doors to the left. A passage separated them. The yellowish tiles couldn’t hide the passage of time. Once they were pure white, an indisputable choice for bathrooms, a symbol of health and luxury at the same time. They found the objects of their investigation in the fourth and fifth stalls. Blood spread from the walls to the floor, more in the fourth than the fifth. The door of the fifth had three bullet holes that formed an irregular triangle. A bloodstain lay over the wall that supported the water tank. A few tiles were broken on the left side of the same wall.
‘This is where they killed our man,’ Thompson informed them.
They all stared in silence, looking for clues. The smallest detail spoke to them, intent on answering their questions. Who? Why?
‘What a shitty way to die,’ Barnes vented his feelings.
‘Yeah, it is. And, according to the Dutch report, with his pants around his ankles. Literally,’ Thompson added.
‘You can’t even shit in peace,’ Barnes said, closely examining the place.
‘Here in the other stall was an English couple. Like our man, they were waiting for the train to Hoek van Holland.’
‘When I die, I want to go like that,’ Barnes joked, flashing a sarcastic smile.
‘How do you know that’s what they were doing?’ Staughton asked.
‘I’m a quick study,’ Barnes advised. ‘There aren’t any same-sex bathrooms here.’
A light went on in Staughton’s mind. Of course, it was obvious.
‘And these shots in the door?’ Barnes questioned Thompson.
‘It seems Keys was killed with the door closed. At least it was found locked from inside. One shot hit his chest, the other his head, and the third buried itself in the tiles.’
Barnes looked at Thompson and then at the doors.
‘The door was closed?’ He shut the door with the bullet holes and analyzed it more carefully. Then he passed to the other door. ‘Where did the other two get the shots?’
‘Oh, one shot each in the head. Very clean,’ Thompson told him.
An open door, a shut door. Barnes’s mind seethed with equations and hard thinking. Things were never what they appeared. There were always variants and exceptions, accidents and imponderables, things difficult to connect and understand.
‘What are you thinking, Staughton?’ his chief asked him.
A professional, Staughton was unfazed. With Barnes he always had to be on top of things, fearlessly decisive, prepared to take the shots, figuratively of course. Field work had never been Staughton’s strong suit, and his contribution was to present solutions without having to be in the place where they were worked out in concrete detail. Obviously he’d prefer never to leave London, the Center of Operations. But excursions like this to Amsterdam didn’t bother him. There were much more dangerous things in this world.
‘If the report is correct, and everything happened as we hear-’
‘Don’t bullshit,’ Barnes interrupted. He had no patience for playing around.
‘I’d say Mr. Solomon Keys was collateral damage,’ he concluded.
‘He was what?’ Thompson said, astonished.
‘It looks like it to me, too,’ Barnes supported his associate.
‘How can you come to that conclusion?’ Thompson insisted, still stunned.
‘Staughton, do us the favor…’ Barnes authorized his subordinate to present the theory.
‘It’s not a conclusion, obviously, just a theory,’ Staughton cautioned. Things should always be explicit in order to avoid confusion and mistakes. ‘If the facts you’ve given are correct’ — he looked at Thompson, who affirmed with a nod the trustworthiness of his facts — ‘we are dealing, almost certainly, with collateral damage. The door of the toilet where the couple was found was open and doesn’t show bullet holes. Besides it doesn’t show any signs of being forced. The lock is intact, as it should be.’ He pointed at the catch on door number four, which showed no sign of violence. ‘That is, whatever they were doing…’