“No thanks,” McAllister called. “We’re just fine. I think we’ll turn in now.”
“Yes, sir,” the porter said after a hesitation.“What time will we reach Chicago?”
“Eight-fifteen, sir. In the morning.”
“Will we be on time?”
“I expect so, sir.”
“Thanks,” McAllister said.
“The dining car will be serving until ten, and the club car until two. Are you folks sure you won’t be needing anything tonight?”
“We’re tired, we’ll be going to sleep now. Thanks again.”
“Yes, sir,” the porter said, and he sounded disappointed. Moments later they heard him knocking on the door of the next cabin, and Stephanie let out the breath she had been holding.
“We’re all right,” McAllister said softly.
Stephanie glanced at him, but she cocked an ear to listen to the exchange between the porter and the passengers in the next cabin. After a while they heard him knock on the next door down the line and she finally relaxed, tossing her gun down on the couch. She looked as if she were on the verge of collapsing.
“They would have stopped the train if I’d been spotted, wouldn’t they?” she asked.
“Probably,” McAllister said, but again he was thinking ahead. They’d be in Washington within the hour where they would meet their first big test. If Stephanie had been spotted entering the station, and if the ticket clerk had remembered him, they might be putting it together now. Someone would be coming aboard when they pulled into the station and there would be no escape for them.
He looked out the window again. They had continued to pick up speed. If they were going to jump, it would have to be now. But then what? Where would they go? It was possible that one of them would be injured in the fall. If that happened they would have lost. There were four names on the list he had taken from the Agency computer. Only one of them, Kathleen O’Haire would be easily accessible. The others, by virtue of their jobs and their locations, would be difficult if not impossible to approach. Was she the weak link? Or would they have someone watching her around the clock, expecting him to show up sooner or later. It was very possible, he thought, that they could be walking into another trap.“They must have thought my father had some answers for them,” Stephanie said.
He turned back to her. “They were sending us another message.”
“What message, David?”
“Just how important they think we’ve become.”
“By killing him? By torturing him?” Her voice was rising. She was working herself up.
“let it go,” McAllister said gently. “There’s nothing we can do about it.”
“Oh yes there is,” she said, her nostrils flared, color coming to her cheeks. “Oh yes there is, David. Only now they’re going to have to kill me, and it’s not going to be so easy.” He went across to her and tried to take her in his arms, but she pushed him aside.
“Do you remember when we went to my father’s house this morning and you told me that if the FBI or the Agency or anyone in authority showed up, I was to lay down my gun and give myself up?” Her lips compressed. She shook her head. “I’m not going to do it. I’m not. Anyone who gets in my way-anyone, David-I’m going to kill without hesitation.”
“Stephanie..
“Kill or be killed, that’s the routine isn’t it? Well, I’m waiting for the opportunity. I’m waiting!” She turned away raising her hands to her face.
He took her shoulders. For a moment she resisted, but then she allowed herself to be drawn back against him, her body still tense. He thought he understood why she had gone back to see her father’s body, but it had not done her any good. She had turned her own morality corner, as a result. It was the first major crisis that any field operative had to face sooner or later. The point came when the agent suddenly saw that what he was doing, the actions he was taking fighting the enemy, were no different from the actions his enemy was taking.
There came the time when the good operative began to have difficulty seeing any difference between his country and the enemy’s. For a lot of operatives it was their first and last crisis; many of them quit at that moment. Others got past it somehow. While still othersbecame tainted. Their hands were dirty and they could never get them clean. They were the ones who ended up being fired in disgrace, committing suicide, or being shot down in some alley somewhere.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly into her ear.
She pulled away and looked at him, her eyes filled with anger. “So am I,” she said. “For you, for me, for everybody.”
“But it doesn’t change anything.”
“No,” she said. She glanced toward the window. It was already very dark outside. “We’ll be in Washington soon.”
“Yes.”
“Go wash your hair,” she said, pulling off her coat and dropping it over the chair. “What?”
“I said wash your hair, we don’t have much time.” She opened the bag she’d brought with her and pulled out a pair of scissors, a small hair dryer, and a frosting kit.
“Now,” she said looking up at him. “Unless you want to spend all night at this.”
At that moment McAllister didn’t think he knew her.
Stephanie was in the tiny bathroom when they pulled into the station in Washington to pick up passengers. McAllister sat in the dark compartment, his gun beside him, the window shade open a crack so that he could see the platform. “Are we there?” Stephanie asked, opening the door. “Turn out the light,” McAllister said without looking up. She did it, and he felt her come across to him. She perched on the edge of the couch. “How does it look?”
“Busy, but there are no cops,” he said. “At least not yet.”
“If they had spotted us in Baltimore they would already be here.”
“You’d think so,” he said absently. There was a lot of activity on the platform, people coming and going, most of them carrying suitcases, some of them with little children, several of them military men in uniform toting duffel bags. He let the window shade fall back, picked up his gun, and moved silently to the corridor window, where he parted the curtain slightly. The porter stood with his back to the window, talking to a man and a woman. McAllister could hear the voices but not the words. They seemed to be arguing about something.
He let the curtain fall back. Everything was normal. No alarms had been raised, no men rushed across the platform, guns drawn. Nor had the platform been emptied of passengers. Was it too normal out there, or was he imagining things? Something whispered at the back of his head. Some undefined danger signal was ringing. He could see Stephanie’s silhouette outlined by the light filtering through the window shade. She was looking at him.
“What is it?” she asked softly. “I don’t know,” he said. “Nothing.”
“No one got a good look at us as we boarded,” she said. “Not even the porter. He won’t notice the change.”
The gun still in his hand, he went back to the outside window and looked out on the platform. Stephanie stood beside him. He could smell the lingering odor of the strong chemical solution she had used to streak her hair. She looked different. Aged by twenty years. She stood with a stoop and tottered a little as she walked. The change was startling in her. There’d not been enough time to dye his hair, but she had cut it very short, and with a little pancake makeup and the glasses he looked different enough from the photographs being published in the newspapers that no one would be likely to give him a second glance. Already the crowds had begun to thin out. The train would be pulling out very soon. What was it? he thought glumly. What was he missing? What if they had been spotted in Baltimore? What if it had taken this long to question the ticket clerks to find out what train they had boarded? Someone would be meeting the train farther west. As far as Chicago.