“I was getting tired of it.”
“Of making money?”
“He saw a better opportunity,” Trotter said. “A chance for a new start in the States. Even with money, Cuba is no place to live.”
“Sooner or later the big connections will get you. Make a little mistake and it’s all over,” Basulto said.
“He was losing his nerve,” Trotter said.
It wasn’t fitting, goddamnit. None of the pieces were in any kind of logical order. Too many holes. When this went sour — and McGarvey was certain it would — someone would be left holding the bag, and it wouldn’t be pleasant.
Day had gotten to his feet, and he motioned for Basulto to get up. “We’re leaving now, Mr. McGarvey. I sincerely hope you’re with us.”
“To do what?” McGarvey said, looking up.
“John will explain our thinking to you. Something will be set up for you in D.C., and this one here will be on call in Miami. Anytime you want him he’s yours for the duration.”
“Get the bastard,” Basulto said with much feeling.
“Why, because he killed your case officer?”
Basulto grinned, his teeth perfectly white and straight. “Maybe you and I will become partners. We will become famous.”
“Get that sonofabitch out of here,” McGarvey growled.
The grin faded from the Cuban’s face. “Goddamnit, you think I’m fooling around here, just trying to make a buck …”
“Yes, well …” Day said.
McGarvey got to his feet, and he and Day shook hands.
“As I said, I hope you are with us, Mr. McGarvey. I sincerely hope so,” Day said. He and Trotter nodded to each other, and then he left with Basulto.
“Another cognac?” Trotter asked.
McGarvey shook his head. “I should be getting back.” He listened and moments later heard the garage door swing open below; the van started up and left.
“As soon as they return, we’ll get you back to Lausanne. Shouldn’t be more than an hour,” Trotter said.
McGarvey didn’t reply. He walked over to the window and looked down into the steep valley across the road. Switzerland was coming to an end for him. He knew it. He had known it for some time now. All the signs had been there for months: his interrupted sleep, his boredom, his sudden fits of anger, his drinking. This time he had hoped it wouldn’t happen. Coming to Switzerland five years ago, he had sincerely hoped he’d be able to settle down.
The service is like a narcotic, someone once told him. Years ago it had been, and although he remembered the effect the words had had on him, for the life of him he could not remember who told them to him.
No matter. Perhaps it was time for another fix. But Christ, it was … what? Juvenile?
He turned back. “What exactly is it you want me to do for you, John?”
“Go after Yarnell. Prove that he worked for the Russians.”
“Is it so important … all those years ago …?”
“Yarnell had lunch with the president last week. He was at a party at the German embassy with Donald Powers a couple of days ago.”
“You think he’s still active, then?”
“I don’t see any reason for him not to be.”
McGarvey thought about that for a moment. This was different now. He glanced toward the doorway. They had pulled Basulto out of here before coming up with this new tack.
“How about the Russian … Baranov?”
“We don’t know where he is, for sure. Probably Moscow, but he could be anywhere.”
“As Yarnell’s case officer?”
Trotter shrugged. But there was something in his eyes. Something that was causing him a lot of trouble.
“What is it, John? You want me to return to the States and find out if Yarnell is still active? Then what?”
Trotter turned away. He poured himself a stiff cognac, and drained the glass. When he looked back, his lower lip was trembling.
“There can’t be a trial, Kirk,” Trotter said. “It would be ten thousand times worse than Watergate. It would tear the country apart. The CIA would go down the tubes, and even the president would suffer. We’d be years recuperating. Perhaps we’d never fully recover.”
“Then what, John? What’s the alternative? Send him packing to Moscow? Why not go to the president with this?”
“That’s the entire point, isn’t it? It’s why we decided to come to you.”
“What am I missing here?”
“Yarnell almost certainly suspects he’s being investigated.”
“How do you know that?”
“We’ve had a tail on him. Routine surveillance. Twice he’s ditched them. Naturally we had to back off.”
“You told me no one else was in on this business except you and Day.”
“I have my leg men, of course. I can’t work in a vacuum. It was to be a routine background investigation.”
“You botched it, and now you want me to pick up the pieces.”
“You’re the unknown element.”
“Yarnell has already gone to Powers and to the president with this?”
Trotter nodded glumly. “I’m sure he hasn’t come right out and said he was being investigated as a spy. But he’s almost certainly worked himself in solid with them. He’ll begin digging in now. But, Kirk, listen to me, the man has his Achilles’ heel. He has a weak side.”
“Don’t we all,” McGarvey muttered.
“Yarnell was married back in the late fifties to a girl in Mexico. Very young, very pretty.”
“I thought he was a bachelor.”
“They divorced a long time ago. She’s living in New York City these days. Her name is Evita Perez. She has a club. In SoHo, I think.”
“Christ,” McGarvey said softly.
Trotter suddenly turned away again. “We’re asking a lot of you, Kirk. I know it; Leonard knows it.”
The house grew very quiet. It was all coming to McGarvey now, and he felt very fragile, as if he were a delicate crystal vase that would shatter at the slightest vibration.
“There cannot be a trial; you can’t or won’t go to the president with this; he’s Powers’s friend; you’re not sure of the bureau. So what, we send him back to Moscow? Is that it, John?”
Trotter shook his head.
“No, it would be another Kim Philby. They’d crow about it for years. The effect would be worse than a trial, wouldn’t it?”
A lot of thoughts came tumbling, one over the other, into McGarvey’s head. The business in Chile was uppermost in his mind. It was still an active file. He could still be prosecuted for murder. Were they holding that over him?
“We’re talking about murder, here, John, aren’t we? About the assassination of a former U.S. senator, one of the most influential men in Washington.”
Trotter held himself very still.
“Does Leonard Day know about this? Has he approved this plan?”
“We didn’t talk about it … not in so many words.”
“But the implication was there between you, goddamnit, wasn’t it?”
Trotter nodded.
God, he couldn’t believe any of this. “What if I do kill him, John? What then? Where would that leave me? No official sanction from the agency, certainly none from the bureau or Justice. We just don’t do those sorts of things, do we? What happens if I’m caught?” He couldn’t believe any of this.
“You would have Leonard’s personal help, as well as mine, all the way.”
“You would take the fall with me if I was arrested?” McGarvey said. “Turn around, for Christ’s sake, and look at me!”
Trotter turned. He was pale. Sweat lined his brow and his upper lip. “I’ve thought the possibility through. Believe me, I have. If that were to happen, we would go to Powers and to the president and lay it out for them piece by piece. Make them understand.”
“If you are willing to do that in extremis, why not now? Go to them now!”