Keith Thomson - Twice a Spy

That her boots and socks had been confiscated presented an opportunity. When she stretched, which was only natural after so many hours on a sofa, the men’s attention went to the action of her legs and her feet. Initially, the goons appeared to pay little if any attention to “itches” she simultaneously scratched on her face or behind her ears. Soon they seemed to pay none at all. Moreover, Frank spent a lot of time surfing the Web on his phone. Walt, though he never let go of his Walther PPK, spent hours picking his cuticles. And the third man in the rotation-the Teutonic-looking helicopter pilot Alice nicknamed the Baron-as in Red-sometimes nodded off for a few minutes.

After about thirty hours, the light switch plate was ready for deployment.

And when Frank came on duty in place of Walt, Alice was primed.

The Baron took over the armchair as well as the Walther while Frank disappeared into the kitchen with a bag of groceries. Alice heard him bring a pot of water to a boil, then add a bag of pasta. Warm air, laden with buckwheat and garlic, seeped into the living room.

A few minutes later, Frank brought her a Styrofoam bowl full of steaming macaroni. He’d topped it with grated Romano cheese, very likely an act of kindness. She put his gesture out of mind.

With the Baron’s gun fixed on her, Frank undid the cords around her wrists, enabling her to take the bowl from the floor and use the plastic spoon in it to eat.

When she finished, she set the bowl on the carpet, and Frank kicked it away. The Baron gestured for her to extend her hands. Frank started to reapply the cords to her wrists, staying as far from her as he could, wary of a head butt or a bite. Which was exactly what Alice had been counting on. When he attempted to tie the first knot, she surreptitiously rotated her left forearm in such a way that the cord merely formed a loop. This was the key step in Houdini’s famous rope-escape trick.

Finished, Frank retreated to a chair. Pretending to settle back onto the sofa, Alice worked her left hand free of the loop. It took her about thirty seconds, or about twenty-seven more than Houdini.

When Frank dug his phone from his pants, she swiped at the light switch plate with her freed left hand, dislodging the fixture from the wall. She caught it with her right.

Frank dropped the phone and drew a switchblade, snapping it open, as the Baron leaped up, aiming his gun.

Alice bent her arm ninety degrees at the elbow, drawing the makeshift weapon toward her abdomen. With a motion similar to that of a Frisbee toss, she sent the plate slicing through the air, so fast that it gave off a metallic whip-crack.

As the Baron leveled the gun at her, a corner of the plate sank into his neck as if his muscles were butter.

He plucked it free, but blood poured from his jugular. Eyes white, he collapsed over the armchair. His Walther dropped to the carpet, the powder blue fibers rapidly turning purple from the vital fluid streaming from his sleeve.

Alice needed to get to the Walther before Frank, who no doubt had a few combat tricks of his own. Plus he had a knife. She expected to sustain injuries, but never contemplated any outcome other than success. To doubt is to be defeated before the enemy has thrown a single punch .

She dove headlong for the Walther. Frank slipped on his phone and lost balance.

If not for the cords still restricting her legs, Alice would have fielded the gun, rolled into a kneeling position, and shot him. As it was, she landed on the carpet, her fingers within inches of the gun, as the Baron snatched the weapon off the sticky floor. With what seemed his last gasp, he tossed it over her head, to Frank.

The Baron thumped down from the chair, dead, momentarily pinning Alice to the floor and enabling Frank to get a firm grip on the gun.

“You are lucky we are not allowed to kill you,” he said in a thick Italian accent.

“You have no such luck,” Alice said.

But that was just adrenaline talking. She knew she would be in chains from here on in. At best.

Mountain peaks speared the feathery clouds above Saint Lucia. Through the window by his seat in the DC-3, Stanley could see the entire island, which was about half the size of Martinique. He watched the plane’s shadow pass over verdant mountains and meadows with galaxies of vibrant tropical flowers. He’d thought all Caribbean islands looked alike, but this was Eden with typing-paper-white beaches.

Leaving Hadley to finish questioning Bream, he had initially procured a de Havilland Twin Otter seaplane to fly directly from Martinique to Detention III. He made the mistake of cabling the plan to headquarters. Saint Lucia’s CIA base chief, a man named Corbitt, requested-demanded, really-that Stanley first come to Castries, the tiny capital city of Saint Lucia, to be debriefed. This was the base chief’s right, to an extent. Headquarters needed Corbitt to exert his influence so that the Starfish people would hand the Clarks to the CIA rather than to their primary employer, Martinique’s police department.

Stanley deliberated cabling Eskridge to request that the Europe division chief tell the Latin America division chief to order Corbitt to stand the hell down. Jesus Christ, a base chief on an island with the population of New Haven? His job was to make life easier for operations officers. Ultimately, Stanley decided that he could chat with Corbitt in less time than he would spend waiting for the succession of cables.

At George F. L. Charles Airport, before Stanley was halfway down the plane’s stairs, someone thrust out a right hand. It was connected to a short and doughy fifty-year-old in a just-pressed suit, starched shirt, and gleaming golden 1990s power tie. “Clyde Corbitt,” the man said, the words accompanied by a gust of wintergreen-minty breath.

Although Stanley had read nothing about Corbitt, not even his first name, he suspected he knew everything pertinent. Low rank, to begin with. GS-12, maybe. The “base” of which he was chief consisted of a nothing-special office. Either he was a one-man shop or he was aided only by an operations support assistant-government-speak for “secretary”-almost certainly a local, whose most dramatic clandestine operation would be using the special telephone with the encryption device. And, as sure as the sky was up, this was Corbitt’s first command, bestowed upon the career desk jockey either as a reward for twentysomething years of service or because Langley simply needed a body in Castries. Probably when he received the cable-C/O IN MARTINIQUE ON COVERT OP. GIVE HIM ALL ASSISTANCE HE DESIRES-Corbitt had an inkling that he was about to embark on the most exciting chapter of his tour.

Shaking the base chief’s moist hand, Stanley said, “Great to meet you.”

Corbitt had arranged for a driver and a stretch Town Car with tinted bulletproof windows. He helped Stanley into a cavernous backseat. The air was set to Arctic. Clad only in a polo shirt and chinos, like every other white-collar type in the islands except Corbitt, Stanley labored not to shiver. At least there was no need to worry that the ice in the minibar would melt during the trip to the American consulate, which the driver speculated would be half an hour on unusually congested roads.

Corbitt sat on the opposite leather bench, his back to the Plexiglas divider separating them from the driver. “I took the liberty of scheduling us a lunch.”

“Very thoughtful of you,” Stanley said. “It’s a shame I already ate lunch.” In fact, that had been yesterday.

He just wanted to get to the damned detention facility.

As the limo rolled away from the airport, he asked, “How about saving some time and going straight to the dock?”

“Maybe just a drink then. We’re meeting the CEO of Gotcha-dot-com.” Corbitt’s smile faded when Stanley failed to register recognition. “They’re the world’s largest private manufacturer of electronic surveillance devices.”