Ли Чайлд - Persuader

“Hope you like it,” he said. “I thought you might feel at home with it. Duke was into the exotics, like that Steyr he had. But I figured you’d be more comfortable with the Beretta, you know, given your background.”

I stepped forward. Put my coffee on the table. Took the gun from him. Ejected the magazine, checked the chamber, worked the action, looked down the barrel. It wasn’t spiked. It wasn’t a trick. It was a working piece. The Parabellums were real. It was brand new. It had never been fired. I slapped it back together and just held it for a moment. It was like shaking hands with an old friend. Then I cocked it and locked it and put it in my pocket.

“Thanks,” I said.

He put his hand in his own pocket and came out with two spare magazines.

“Take these,” he said.

He passed them across. I took them.

“I’ll get you more later,” he said.

“OK,” I said.

“You ever tried laser sights?”

I shook my head.

“There’s a company called Laser Devices,” he said. “They do a universal handgun sight that mounts under the barrel. Plus a little flashlight that clips under the sight. Very cool device.”

“Gives a little red spot?”

He nodded. Smiled. “Nobody likes to get lit up with that little red spot, that’s for sure.”

“Expensive?”

“Not really,” he said. “Couple hundred bucks.”

“How much weight does it add?”

“Four and a half ounces,” he said.

“All at the front?”

“It helps, actually,” he said. “Stops the muzzle kicking upward when you fire. It adds about thirteen percent of the weight of the gun. More with the flashlight, of course. Maybe forty, forty-five ounces total. Still way less than those Anacondas you were using. What were they, fifty-nine ounces?”

“Unloaded,” I said. “More with six shells in them. Am I ever going to get them back?”

“I put them away somewhere,” he said. “I’ll get them for you later.”

“Thanks,” I said again.

“You want to try the laser?”

“I’m happy without it,” I said.

He nodded again. “Your choice. But I want the best protection I can get.”

“Don’t worry,” I said.

“I’ve got to go out now,” he said. “Alone. I’ve got an appointment.”

“You don’t want me to drive you?”

“This sort of appointment, I have to do them alone. You stay here. We’ll talk later. Move into Duke’s room, OK? I like my security closer to where I sleep.”

I put the spare magazines in my other pocket.

“OK,” I said.

He walked past me into the hallway, back toward the kitchen.

It was the kind of mental somersault that can slow you down. Extreme tension, and then extreme puzzlement. I walked to the front of the house and watched from a hallway window. Saw the Cadillac sweep around the carriage circle in the rain and head for the gate. It paused in front of it and Paulie came out of the gatehouse. They must have dropped him there on their way back from breakfast. Beck must have driven the final length of the driveway himself. Or Richard, or Elizabeth. Paulie opened the gate. The Cadillac drove through it and away into the rain and the mist. Paulie closed the gate. He was wearing a slicker the size of a circus tent.

I shook myself and turned back and went to find Richard. He had the kind of guileless eyes that hide nothing. He was still in the kitchen, drinking his coffee.

“You walk the shoreline this morning?” I asked him.

I asked it innocently and amiably, like I was just making conversation. If he had anything to hide, I would know. He would go red, look away, stammer, shuffle his feet. But he did none of those things. He was completely relaxed. He looked straight at me.

“Are you kidding?” he said. “Seen the weather?”

I nodded.

“Pretty bad,” I said.

“I’m quitting college,” he said.

“Why?”

“Because of last night,” he said. “The ambush. Those Connecticut guys are still on the loose. Not safe to go back. I’m staying right here for a spell.”

“You OK with that?”

He nodded. “It was mostly a waste of time.”

I looked away. The law of unintended consequences. I had just short-circuited a kid’s education. Maybe ruined his life. But then, I was about to send his father to jail. Or waste him altogether. So I guessed a BA didn’t matter very much, compared to that.

I went to find Elizabeth Beck. She would be harder to read. I debated my approach and couldn’t come up with anything guaranteed to work. I found her in a parlor tucked into the northwest corner of the house. She was in an armchair. She had a book open on her lap. It was Doctor Zhivago, by Boris Pasternak. Paperback. I had seen the movie. I remembered Julie Christie, and the music. “Lara’s Theme.” Train journeys. And a lot of snow. Some girl had made me go.

“It’s not you,” she said.

“What’s not me?”

“You’re not the government spy.”

I breathed out. She wouldn’t say that if she’d found my stash.

“Exactly,” I said. “Your husband just gave me a gun.”

“You’re not smart enough to be a government spy.”

“Aren’t I?”

She shook her head. “Richard was desperate for a cup of coffee just now. When we came in.”

“So?”

“Do you think he would have been if we’d really been out for breakfast? He could have had all the coffee he wanted.”

“So where did you go?”

“We were called to a meeting.”

“With who?”

She just shook her head, like she couldn’t speak the name.

“Paulie didn’t offer to drive us,” she said. “He summoned us. Richard had to wait in the car.”

“But you went in?”

She nodded. “They’ve got a guy called Troy.”

“Silly name,” I said.

“But a very smart guy,” she said. “He’s young, and he’s very good with computers. I guess he’s what they call a hacker.”

“And?”

“He just got partial access to one of the government systems in Washington. He found out they put a federal agent in here. Undercover. At first they assumed it was you. Then they checked a little further and found out it was a woman and she’s actually been here for weeks.”

I stared at her, not understanding. Teresa Daniel was off the books. The government computers knew nothing about her. Then I remembered Duffy’s laptop, with the Justice Department logo as the screensaver. I remembered the modem wire, trailing across the desk, going through the complex adapter, going into the wall, hooking up with all the other computers in the world. Had Duffy been compiling private reports? For her own use? For postaction justification?

“I hate to think what they’re going to do,” Elizabeth said. “To a woman.”

She shuddered visibly and looked away. I made it as far as the hallway. Then I stopped dead. There were no cars. And twelve miles of road before I would even begin to get anywhere. Three hours’ fast walk. Two hours, running.

“Forget it,” Elizabeth called. “Nothing to do with you.”

I turned around and stared in at her.

“Forget it,” she said again. “They’ll be doing it right now. It’ll be all over soon.”

The second time I ever saw Sergeant First Class Dominique Kohl was the third day she worked for me. She was wearing green battledress pants and a khaki T-shirt. It was very hot. I remember that. We were having some kind of a major heat wave. Her arms were tanned. She had the kind of skin that looks dusty in the heat. She wasn’t sweating. The T-shirt was great. She had her tapes on it, Kohl on the right and US Army on the left, both of them kicked up just a little by the curve of her breasts. She was carrying the file I had given her. It had gotten a little thicker, padded out with her notes.