Balance of Power o-5 Read online

  “Thank you, no. I’m all right.”

  The inspector nodded. He paced for a moment, staring at the floor, before looking back at Aideen. “Señorita, ” he said, “do you believe that you and your companion were the gunman’s targets?”

  “I believe we were,” she replied. She had expected the question and now she wanted to be very careful about how she answered it.

  “Do you know why?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  “Have you any suspicions? Are you involved in any kind of political activity? Do you belong to any groups?”

  She shook her head.

  There was a knock on the door. The inspector ignored it. He regarded Aideen harshly and in silence.

  “Señorita Temblón,” he said, “Forgive me for pressing you at this time, but a killer is free in the streets of my city. I want him. Can you think of no reason that someone would want to attack you or your friend?”

  “Comisario,” she replied, “I have never been to Spain nor do I know anyone here. My companion was here years ago but she has — she had—no friends or enemies that I know of.”

  There was a second knock. The inspector went to the door and opened it. Aideen couldn’t see who was standing outside.

  “Sí?” the inspector asked.

  “Comisario, said a man, ”Deputy Serrador wishes for the woman to be brought to his office at once.“

  “Does he?” the inspector asked. He turned and looked at Aideen. His eyes narrowed slightly. “Perhaps, señorita, the deputy wishes to apologize in person for this terrible tragedy.”

  Aideen said nothing.

  “Or perhaps there is some other reason for the audience?” the inspector suggested.

  Aideen rose. “If there is, Comisario Fernandez, I won’t know that until I see him.”

  The inspector folded away his notebook and bowed courteously. If he were annoyed with her he didn’t show it. He thanked Aideen for her assistance, apologized again for what had happened, then extended an arm toward the open door. Aideen left the room. The sergeant who had brought her inside was waiting. He greeted her with a bow and they walked down the corridor together.

  Aideen felt bad for the inspector. He had an investigation to oversee and she hadn’t given him anything to go on. But as Martha had pointed out, there were rules for every society and for every stratum of that society. And whatever the country, despite the constitutions and the checks and balances, the rules were always different for government. Phrases like “need-to-know” and “state secrets” effectively shut out otherwise legal inquiries. Unfortunately, in many instances — this one among them — the obstructions were necessary and legitimate.

  Deputy Serrador’s office was located a short walk down the corridor. The office was the same size and had largely the same decor as the room Aideen had just left, though there were a number of personal touches. On three walls were framed posters of the bullring of Madrid, the Plaza de las Ventas. On the fourth wall, behind the desk, were framed newspaper front pages describing Basque activities during the 1980s. Family photographs were displayed on shelves around the room.

  Deputy Serrador was seated behind the desk when Aideen entered. Darrell McCaskey was sitting on the sofa. Both men rose when she entered. Serrador walked grandly from behind the desk, his arms outstretched and a look of deep sympathy on his face. His brown eyes were pained under his gray eyebrows. His high, dark forehead was creased beneath his slicked-back white hair and his wide mouth was downturned. His soft, large hands closed gently around Aideen’s.

  “Ms. Marley, I am so, so sorry,” he said. “Yet in my grief I am also relieved that you are unharmed.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Deputy,” Aideen said. She looked at McCaskey. The short, wiry, prematurely gray Deputy Assistant Director was standing stiffly, his hands folded in front of his groin. He was not wearing the kind of diplomatic sympathy that was all over Serrador: his expression was grave and tight. “Darrell,” she said. “How are you?”

  “I’ve been better, Aideen. You all right?”

  “Not really,” she said. “I blew it, Darrell.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I should have reacted… differently,” Aideen said. Emotion caused her to choke. “I saw what was happening and I blew it, Darrell. I just blew it.”

  “That’s insane,” McCaskey said. “You’re lucky you were able to get out of the way at all.”

  “At the expense of another man’s life—”

  “That was unavoidable,” McCaskey said.

  “Mr. McCaskey is correct,” Serrador said. He was still holding her hands within his. “You mustn’t do this to yourself. These things are always much clearer in — what do you call it? Hindsight.”

  “That’s what we call it,” McCaskey said with barely concealed irritation. “Everything is always much clearer after the fact.”

  Aideen gave McCaskey a questioning look. “Darrell, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. Nothing except that Deputy Serrador is disinclined to hold any discussions at the moment.”

  “What?” Aideen said.

  “It would be most inappropriate,” Serrador stated.

  “We don’t agree,” McCaskey replied. He looked at Aideen. “Deputy Serrador says that the arrangement was made with Martha. That it was her experience and her ethnic background that enabled him to convince the Basques and Catalonians to consider possible U.S. mediation.”

  Aideen regarded Serrador. “Martha was a respected and highly skilled diplomat—”

  “A remarkable woman,” Serrador said with a flourish.

  “Yes, but as gifted a negotiator as Martha was, she was not indispensible,” Aideen went on.

  Serrador stepped back. His expression was disapproving. “You disappoint me, señorita.”

  “Do I?”

  “Your colleague has just been murdered!”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Deputy,” Aideen said, “but the issue is not my sense of occasion—”

  “That is true,” said Serrador. “The issues are experience and security. And until I’m convinced that we have both, the talks will be postponed. Not canceled, Señor McCaskey, Señorita Marley. Merely delayed.”

  “Deputy Serrador,” McCaskey said, “you know as well as I that there may not be time for a delay. Before Ms. Marley arrived I was telling you about her credentials, trying to convince you that the talks can go ahead. Ms. Marley has experience and she isn’t timid, you can see that.”

  Serrador looked disapprovingly at the woman.

  “We can carry on,” McCaskey said. “As for security, let’s assume for the moment that word of this meeting did get out. That Martha was the target of an assassination. What does that mean? That someone wants to scare away American diplomats. They want to see your nation come apart.”

  “Perhaps the goal isn’t even a political one,” Aideen said. “Martha thinks — Martha thought that perhaps someone is hoping to make money on an armed secession.”

  Serrador cleared his throat. He looked away at his desk.

  “Mr. Deputy, please,” McCaskey said. “Sit down with us. Tell us what you know. We’ll take the information back with us and help you put a plan in place before it’s too late.”

  Serrador shook his head slowly. “I have already spoken with my allies in the Congress. They are even more unwilling than I am to involve you now. You must understand, Señor McCaskey. We were talking with the various separatist parties before this — and we will do so again. It was my personal hope that if the United States could be brought into the discussions unofficially, and the leaders of both sides could be persuaded to make concessions, Spain could be saved. Now I’m afraid we’ll have to try and solve the problem internally.”

  “And how do you think that will end?” Aideen demanded.

  “I don’t know,” Serrador replied. “I only know, regrettably, how your association with this process must end.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Thanks to the death of one who was brave en
ough to lead… and the retreat of one who wasn’t.”

  “Aideen!” McCaskey said.

  Serrador held up a hand. “It’s all right, Señor McCaskey. Señorita Marley is overwrought. I suggest you take her back to the hotel.”

  Aideen glared at the deputy. She wasn’t going to be bullied into silence and she wasn’t going to do an end run. She just wasn’t.

  “Fine,” she said. “Play it cautiously, Mr. Deputy. But don’t forget this. When I dealt with revolutionary factions in Mexico the results were always the same. The government inevitably relied on muscle to crush the rebels. But it was never enough to destroy them completely, of course, and the insurrectionists went underground. They didn’t flourish but they didn’t die. Only people who were caught in the crossfire died. And that’s what’s going to happen here, Deputy Serrador. You can’t tamp down centuries of resentment without a very big boot.”

  “Ah. You have a crystal ball?”

  “No,” she replied sharply. “Just some experience in the psychology of oppression.”

  “In Mexico,” Serrador pointed out. “Not in Spain. You’ll find that the people are not just — what do you call them? Haves and have-nots. They are also passionate about their heritage.”

  “Aideen,” McCaskey said, his voice stern, edgy. “That’s enough. No one knows what’s going to happen anywhere. That’s what these meetings were supposed to be about. They were supposed to be fact-finding, sharing ideas, a chance to find a peaceful resolution to the tensions.”

  “And we may yet have those explorations,” Serrador said, once again the diplomat. “I mean no disrespect to the loss of your colleague but we’ve lost just one opportunity. There will be other ways to avoid spilling blood. Our immediate concern is to find out who was responsible for this crime and how the information got out of my office. Then — we will see.”

  “That could take weeks, months,” McCaskey said.

  “While haste, Señor McCaskey, may cost us more lives.”

  “I’m willing to take that risk,” Aideen muttered. “The cost of retreat and inactivity may be much higher.”

  Serrador walked behind the desk. “Prudence is neither of those.” He pressed a button on the telephone. “I sought the help of the distinguished Señorita Mackall. She has been taken from us. I sought and may still seek the help of the United States. Is that still available, Señor McCaskey, should I call on it?”

  “You know it is, Mr. Deputy,” McCaskey answered.

  Serrador dipped his head. “Gracias.”

  “De nada,” McCaskey replied.

  The door opened. A young aide in a dark suit took a step into the office. He stood with his arms stiffly at his sides.

  “Hernandez,” said the deputy, “please take our guests out through the private entrance and tell my driver to see that they get safely back to their hotel.” He looked at McCaskey. “That is where you wish to go?”

  “For the moment, yes. If possible, I’d like to go wherever the investigation is being handled.”

  “I see. You have a background in law enforcement, I recall.”

  “That’s right,” said McCaskey. “I spent a lot of time working with Interpol when I was at the FBI.”

  Serrador nodded. “I’ll look into it, of course. Is there anything else I can do for either of you?”

  McCaskey shook his head. Aideen did not move. She was seething. Again, politics. Not leadership, not vision. Just a cautious “T-step,” as they used to call a little dance move back in Boston. She wished she’d saved some of the mierda de perro for this meeting.

  “My automobile is bulletproof and two of the guards will accompany you,” Serrador said. “You will be safe. In the meantime, I will speak with those of my colleagues who were scheduled to participate in today’s meeting. I will contact you in a few days — in Washington, I imagine? — to let you know how and if we wish to proceed.”

  “Of course,” McCaskey replied.

  “Thank you.” Serrador smiled thinly. “Thank you very much.”

  The deputy extended his hand across the large mahogany desk. McCaskey shook it. Serrador swung his hand toward Aideen. She shook it as well, very briefly. There was no warmth in the short look they exchanged.

  McCaskey had eased his hand onto Aideen’s back. He half-guided, half-pushed her out the door and they walked the corridor in silence.

  When they were inside the deputy’s limousine, McCaskey turned to Aideen. “So.”

  “So. Go ahead. Tell me I was out of line.”

  “You were.”

  “I know,” she replied. “I’m sorry. I’ll take the next plane home.” This was becoming the theme of the day. Or maybe it was something larger, the wrong fit of Aideen Marley and ivory tower diplomacy.

  “I don’t want you to do that,” McCaskey said. “You were out of line but I happen to agree with what you were saying. I don’t think our accidental good-cop, bad-cop routine worked, but it’s got potential.”

  She looked at him. “You agreed with me?”

  “Pretty much. Let’s wait until we can call home and see what the rest of the clan has to say,” McCaskey continued.

  Aideen nodded. She knew that that was only part of the reason McCaskey didn’t want to talk. Limousine drivers were never as invisible as passengers presumed: they saw and heard everything. And putting up the partition wouldn’t guarantee privacy. Chances were good that the car was bugged and their conversation was being monitored. They waited until they had returned to McCaskey’s hotel room before continuing. He’d set up a small electromagnetic generator designed by Matt Stoll, Op-Center’s technical wizard. The unit, approximately the size and dimensions of a portable CD player, sent out a pulse that disrupted electronic signals within a ten-foot radius and turned them to “gibberish,” as Stoll described it. Computers, recorders, or other digital devices outside its range would be unaffected.

  McCaskey and Aideen sat on the side of the bed with the Egg, as they’d nicknamed it, between them.

  “Deputy Serrador thinks that there isn’t much we can do without cooperation on this end,” McCaskey said.

  “Does he,” Aideen said bitterly.

  “We may be able to surprise him.”

  “It might also be necessary to surprise him,” Aideen said.

  “That’s true,” McCaskey said. He looked at Aideen. “Anything else before I call the boss?”

  Aideen shook her head, though that wasn’t entirely true. There was a great deal she wanted to say. One thing Aideen’s experiences in Mexico had taught her was to recognize when things weren’t right. And something wasn’t right here. The thing that had pushed her buttons back in the deputy’s office wasn’t just the emotional aftermath of Martha’s death. It was Serrador’s rapid retreat from cooperation to what amounted to obstruction. If Martha’s death were an assassination — and her gut told her that it was — was Serrador afraid that they’d target him next? If so, why didn’t he take on extra security? Why were the halls leading to his office so empty? And why did he assume — as clearly he did — that simply by calling off the talks word would get back to whoever did this? How could he be so certain that the information would get leaked?

  McCaskey rose and went to the phone, which was outside the pulse-radius. As Aideen listened to the quiet hum of the Egg, she looked through the twelfth-floor window at the streetlights off in the distance. Her spirit was too depleted, her emotions too raw for her to try to explore the matter right now. But she was certain of one thing. Though these might be the rules by which the Spanish leaders operated, they’d crossed the line into three of her own rules. First, you don’t shoot people who are here to help you. Second, if shooting them is designed to help you, then you’re going to run into rule number three: Americans — especially this American — shoot back.

  FIVE

  Monday, 8:21 P.M. San Sebastián, Spain

  The hull of the small fishing boat was freshly painted. The smell of the paint permeated the cramped, dimly lighted hold. I
t overpowered the bite of the handrolled cigarette Adolfo Alcazar was smoking as well as the strong, distinctive, damp-rubber odor of the wetsuit that hung on a hook behind the closed door. The paint job was an extravagance the fisherman couldn’t really afford but it had been necessary. There might be other missions, and he couldn’t afford to be in drydock, replacing rotted boards. When he’d agreed to work with the General, Adolfo knew that the old boat would have to last them for as long as this affair took. And if anything went wrong, that could be a while. One didn’t undermine one takeover and orchestrate a counterrevolution in a single night — or with a single strike. Not even with a big strike, which this one would be.

  Although the General is going to try, Adolfo thought with deep and heartfelt admiration. And if anyone could pull it off, a one-day coup against a major world government, it was the General.

  There was a click. The short, muscular man stopped staring into space. He looked down at the tape recorder on the wooden table beside him. He lay his cigarette in a rusted tin ashtray and sat back down into the folding wooden chair. He pushed PLAY and listened through the earphones, just to make sure the remote had picked up the sounds. The General’s technical officer from Pamplona, the man who had given him the equipment, had said the equipment was extremely precise. If properly calibrated, it would record the voices over the slosh of the ocean and the growl of the fishing boat’s engine.

  He was correct.

  After nearly a minute of silence Adolfo Alcazar heard a mechanical-sounding but clear voice utter, “It is accomplished.” The voice was followed by what sounded like crackling.

  No, Adolfo realized as he listened more closely. The noise wasn’t static. It was applause. The men in the yacht were clapping.

  Adolfo smiled. For all their wealth, for all their planning, for all their experience at managing their bloodthirsty familias, these men were unsuspecting fools. The fisherman was pleased to see that money hadn’t made them smart — only smug. He was also glad because the General had been right. The General was always right. He had been right when he tried to arm the Basques to grease the wheels of revolution. And he was right to step back when they began fighting among themselves — the separatists battling the antiseparatists. Killing themselves and drawing attention from the real revolution.