He saw I didn’t understand what he was talking about.
“Certain Bostonians got tagged with that nickname around the middle of the nineteenth century, Nick. That’s when Boston considered itself the intellectual hub of the universe. Emerson, Thoreau, and Longfellow were their literary and philosophical leaders. Old Yankee families had a pretty high opinion of themselves. So much so that Boston society looked down on New York society as Johnny-come-latelies. Like high-caste Hindus, they got to be known as Brahmins. The man we want is a Bostonian, Nick. You’ll find him there.”
I got to my feet. It was time to go. I’d been given my assignment. As I put on my jacket, I said, “Hawk, are you going to let the White House know about this?”
David Hawk looked at me strangely. He came over and put his hand on my shoulder in a rare gesture of warmth.
“Nick, so far you’ve done a fine job. You just haven’t thought far enough ahead. If I tell the White House, word will get to the Treasury Department in minutes. What makes you believe that this organization hasn’t got someone in there at the top level?”
He was right. I hadn’t thought it through. Well, I wasn’t in the think-tank group at AXE. I was Killmaster N3. My forte was action.
“How do you want it handled?”
“The quickest way. Eliminate the top man,” Hawk told me grimly. “Find him and get rid of him!”
“Any way I want?”
“No,” Hawk shook his head. “Definitely not! If he’s that big a man, who knows what would happen if he died under extraordinary circumstances? No, Nick, it’ll have to be an ‘accident.’ A believable accident,” he stressed. “The kind no one will ever question — or investigate.”
I shrugged. He knew he was cramping my style.
“That’s an order, Nick,” Hawk said quietly. “It’s got to be an accident.”
Chapter Four
The 727 tri-jet came winging in to Boston from Washington on a long, swooping curve from the southwest, its wing tilting down like a giant aluminum finger to point out the thin five-mile peninsula of Hull that served as an enormous breakwater for one of the great natural harbors of the world.
From my seat in the midsection of the plane I could see the sparse modern skyline of the city rising bravely in the crisp, bright air. There were the tinted glass and steel towers of the Prudential Insurance Building, the John Hancock Insurance Building and the First National Bank Building. In their midst, almost overwhelmed by them, yet catching your eye before all else, was the round, gleaming gold-leaf dome of the State House rotunda.
Like Virginia and Pennsylvania, Massachusetts isn’t a “state.” It’s a Commonwealth and very proud of it. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Boston, its capital, is a bankers’ town. A town where old money has had more than 300 years to grow and spread its influence throughout the rest of the world, let alone the rest of the United States. And it’s quiet about its money. It doesn’t like to talk about it. Banks and insurance companies and enormous investment funds have quietly taken a firm grip on our economy.
The more I thought about it, the more I believed the Russian was right. If money is the basis of a capitalistic society, then it’s the most vulnerable part of our society. The wonder of it is that it hadn’t been subject to an onslaught by the Soviets long before now.
Or maybe it had been. The gold crisis of a few years back shook our economy to the core. First, we had to get off the gold standard, and then we had to devalue the dollar. The repercussions were international. Were they also plotted — by the Kremlin?
Calvin Woolfolk was waiting for me at the Eastern Airlines arrival gates at Logan International Airport. I had no trouble recognizing him, even though all Hawk had said was, “Look for a Yankee lawyer.”
Woolfolk was in his seventies, tall and lean, with the spare, gaunt look of a Maine farmer. His hair was white, thick and uncombed. The lines on his face had been carved one by one over the years, each experience deepening a line or adding a new one. When we shook hands, I felt callouses on his palm. His grip was as tight as if he were more accustomed to hefting the helve of an axe than gripping a pen to write torts. The creases on his face split slightly to show the thin line of his lips. I guess you could call it a smile.
“David Hawk said you could use my help,” he said abruptly in a frosty voice as he fell into step beside me. “You want to talk in my office, or somewhere else?”
“Somewhere else,” I said.
He nodded. “Makes sense.” There’s something about a New England accent that sets it apart even more than its nasal tone. It fits the region’s terse, no-nonsense, taciturn way of communicating. Woolfolk reached into his pocket and took out a single sheet of paper.
“Five names there,” he said. “Man you’re looking for could be any one of them.”
I put the paper in my pocket.
“You got any baggage?” Woolfolk asked as we came down the escalator to the lower level. The baggage turntables spun slowly and aimlessly, parading a variety of boxes, luggage, knapsacks and travel cases like horses on a carousel.
“It was sent directly to the hotel,” I told him. Automatically I looked around, trying to spot anyone who might be following me. Sometimes a tail gives himself away by showing too much interest in you — or too little. Only experienced pros know how to strike the right balance. There didn’t seem to be anyone.
By this time we were outside the glass doors. A cab pulled up. Woolfolk climbed in, and I followed him. The cab took us through the Sumner Tunnel under the Charles River, up onto the Expressway, and then curved off onto the Drive. We exited at Arlington Street.
Woolfolk insisted on paying for the taxi We strolled across the intersection of Arlington and Beacon Streets and turned into the Public Gardens, walking along a path until Woolfolk spotted an empty park bench. He sat down, and I sank onto the bench beside him. Across from us, on an hourglass-shaped lake, floated the swan boats. Forty to fifty feet long, some ten to twelve feet wide, each boat held rows of slat benches, each bench wide enough to seat four or five people. Most of the passengers were children, well-dressed, wide-eyed with delight.
At the stern of each boat was a carved, larger-than-lifesize, white-painted swan. Between its wooden wings, sitting on a bicycle seat was a teenager, who foot-pedaled away to provide the power for the small paddle wheel at the stern. By pulling on tiller ropes he guided the boat as it glided gently, silently on the calm water, circling the tiny islands at each end of the lake. It was all very quiet and very peaceful and very clean.
“Read the list,” Woolfolk said sharply. “I haven’t got all day.”
I opened the paper. Woolfolk’s handwriting was as crabbed and compact as the man himself.
Alexander Bradford, Frank Guilfoyle, Arthur Barnes, Leverett Pepperidge and Mather Woolfolk. Those were the five names.
I tapped the paper.
“This last one,” I said. “Mather Woolfolk. Is he any relation to you?”
Calvin Woolfolk nodded. “Yup. He’s my brother. We’re not close, though.”
“What can you tell me about these men?”
“Well,” said Woolfolk, “from what little information I got from David Hawk, I understand you’re looking for someone with a lot of influence in financial circles.”
“Something like that.”
“They all fit,” said Woolfolk. “That is, if you’re looking for a man with real power.”
“I am.”
“They’ve got it. So much that most people don’t know they have it. The only ones who really know how much power these men have are the people they let deal with them directly. And I can tell you they let damn few people deal with them directly!”