Within a couple of months he was throwing his own lavish parties all over Mexico City, and at a CIA-run house on the Pacific Coast. His target was Evita Perez, twenty and beautiful. Her mother was the third daughter of the governor of the state of Hidaglo, and her father was the assistant secretary of finance for the federal government. They were an old, prestigious Mexican family, with important contacts throughout the country. After their wedding and honeymoon, Yarnell surrounded himself with a crowd at their palatial home outside Mexico City and at other times at their mountain home, or at the seaside CIA house. Darby’s mob, as he called them, were mostly Mexican and Latin American high government officials, and the product he was sending back to Langley was nothing short of stellar. But Baranov’s, and therefore Yarnell’s, chief target (an operation that ruined the poor young Evita) was another rising star within the CIA. Donald Suthland Powers, who would later become the Director of Central Intelligence. Yarnell, under Baranov’s expert direction, set up a series of sophisticated honey traps for Powers, in which Powers would appear to be in Yarnell’s debt. The operation was a lengthy one, and extremely delicate.
Powers, who trusted Yarnell until the very end, never suspected that he was being manipulated. But step by step he was placed in incriminating circumstances showing up at a nightclub known to be a communist hangout; driving through a communist neighborhood at the young hours of the day, and too often, being photographed time and again in the vicinity of known KGB agents. All of it was staged, of course, and to Powers’s discredit, he never once bothered to take a good look around him. That operation did not come to fruition until years later, well after Yarnell quit the CIA, and even after he’d given up his Senate seat to become a lobbyist for a number of powerful multinational corporations and adviser to the President of the United States. The other shoe fell when Powers was appointed to run the CIA by a president who, like everyone else, had been dazzled by Yarnell. McGarvey was called out of retirement in Lausanne, Switzerland by a fantastic tale of betrayal supposedly leaked by Artime Basulto, a Cuban who had supported Batista until the revolution. Basulto, by then living in the States as a drug dealer, was, like everyone in the charade, being manipulated indirectly by Baranov. The target was Powers, of course, as well as the credibility of the entire Central Intelligence Agency.
An incompetent president and an out-of-control Congress had hired Powers, supposedly a traitor to run the CIA. The weapons were Powers’s indiscretions in Mexico City and the dogged determination that McGarvey had shown in Vietnam and later in Chile and Germany. McGarvey was sent to investigate Yarnell, and in so doing unwittingly forced Yarnell into killing Powers, which in turned forced McGarvey to put a bullet into Yarnell’s brain. Neat and tidy. Except that in the end, Donald Powers, who was an innocent man and an outstanding DCI, was dead. Poor Evita, who had learned to believe in Baranov, shot herself to death.
And as a bit of insurance, as a backstop against future events, Baranov arranged to make McGarvey witness Darby Yarnell’s seduction of McGarvey’s ex-wife. Was it happening again, Rencke wondered, sitting back and closing his eyes. Baranov had guessed that someday Powers would rise to head the CIA, so he had sown the seeds of the man’s destruction years earlier. Had he also seen McGarvey’s rise and sown the seeds of his destruction? All the clues were there. Everything that he needed to know in order to unravel the problem was in front of him, and yet he was blind. He got up and began hopping from foot to foot, the rhythmic motion keeping time with his thoughts.
Putting a bullet into Powers’s head in Mexico City in the early days would not have been the Baranov style. The Russian had never been interested in merely bringing down a single individual, because he understood that when one man fell there was usually another to take his place. Instead, Baranov chose to bring down as many people as possible with one stroke, even bring down entire organizations. Not only kill the man, but kill the idea, kill the confidence in the institution.
That would help explain all the targets this time: Kathleen and Yemm in the USVI, Elizabeth in Vail, and even himself on the Parkway. But he couldn’t see it. He could not see the whole picture. Something was missing. Something vastly important. Something that he should know.
Otto stopped. Christ. Goddamn hell. Most of the people Baranov manipulated did not know that they were being managed. They had no idea. They were never allowed to see the whole picture. Network Martyrs was at least twenty years old. Its trigger point was probably the same kind of trigger that had led to Donald Powers’s downfall.
McGarvey had been appointed to head the CIA, that was the opening bell.
It was something that Baranov could not allow, and he would stop, even from the grave. Still, that was only a part of the structure. Who was the Darby Yarnell this time? Who was the catalyst? Who would actually hold the gun to McGarvey’s head and fire the shot? Nikolayev? An old Russian Department Viktor psychiatrist? Possibly. He went back to his laptop and restarted his search, this time widening the base to include all of Baranov’s Department Viktor personnel and activities.
THIRTY-TWO
HE KEPT COMING BACK TO THE SAME CONUNDRUM: WHO CAN A SPY TRUST? WHO CAN HE BELIEVE IN?
McGarvey walked back to his office after the five o’clock staff meeting, the tall, ascetic DDO David Whittaker beside him. Since Adkins’s forced leave of absence, Whittaker had agreed to temporarily fill in as acting Deputy DCI. He had shown his abilities at the meeting. His was a steady hand, and being number two wasn’t such a huge leap from being boss of Operations, which was the CIA’s largest directorate. But he wasn’t happy with the promotion. Adkins was a friend. “I didn’t know that Ruth was that sick. It’s got to be hitting him pretty hard.” “He didn’t call you?” McGarvey asked, walking into his office. Ms. Swanfeld handed him several phone messages. “No. When did he leave?” “Earlier this afternoon. I had to practically call Security to drag him out of his office.” McGarvey took a critical look at Whittaker. “His wife’s in the hospital, but he didn’t want to be with her. Does that make any sense to you, Dave?”
“The girls are here.” “That’s what he said.” They went into McGarvey’s private office and Whittaker closed the door. He seemed sheepish. “You probably don’t know Dick’s situation. At home. He loves Ruth, there’s no doubt about that. And she loves him. But they’re not really friends, like Sandy and me. Since the girls were old enough to go shopping it was Ruth and them in one camp, and Dick in the other. They treat him like gold when he’s home. But to them he’s more like a … guest in his own house.” “I see,” McGarvey said. It explained Adkins’s reluctance to leave. He had more friends here than at home. And his wife would find more comfort with her daughters than with her husband. “Sometimes the world’s a bitch.” “The arrangement worked for him,” Whittaker said. “Until now.” McGarvey felt sorry for Adkins. It was one more bit of bleak news. “Does Security know about his home life?” “No, and it’s none of their business.” “Bullshit,”