Jeff Abbott - Panic

T he London-based CIA field officer – his name was Pettigrew, he didn’t offer a first name – picked them up at a private airstrip in Hampshire. He carried himself with an impatient air. Pettigrew was closemouthed as he hurried them to a car, driving them himself to a safe house in the London neighborhood of St. John’s Wood. He took his time, circling in roundabout routes, and Evan, who only knew London well enough to find Soho and the London Film School, got lost along the drive.

Pettigrew didn’t speak a word to them on the way.

It was early afternoon in London, and they had, to Evan’s surprise, left the rain in Ohio. The sky was clear, the few clouds thin cotton. Pettigrew shut a wrought-iron gate behind them as they went up the house’s front stairs.

Pettigrew escorted them to tidy, unadorned rooms, with private baths, and they both showered. A doctor waited to change Carrie’s bandage and inspect her healing wound. When they were done, they followed Pettigrew into a small dining room where an elderly woman brewed strong tea and coffee and served a lunch of cold meats, salad, cheese, pickles, and bread. Evan drank down coffee with gratitude.

Pettigrew sat down, waited until the elderly lady had bustled back into the kitchen. ‘This is all damned odd. Being ordered to dig up Scotland Yard files with cobwebs on them. Taking orders from a man with a code name.’

‘My apologies,’ Carrie said.

‘I have top clearance,’ he said. Almost peevishly. ‘But I live to serve. We didn’t have much notice’ – his tone held the acid of the long-suffering – ‘but here’s what we found.’

He handed them the first file, squiring the remaining two close to his chest. ‘Alexander Bast was murdered, two shots, one to the head, one to the throat. What makes it interesting is that the bullets came from two different guns.’

‘Why would the killer need two weapons?’ Carrie said.

‘No. Two killers,’ Evan said.

Pettigrew nodded. ‘Vengeance killing. To me it speaks of an emotional component to the killing. Each killer wanting to put his imprint on the act.’ He slid them a picture of the sprawled body. ‘He was killed in his home twenty-four years ago, middle of the night, no signs of a struggle. Entire house wiped down for prints.’ Pettigrew paused. ‘He worked for us for twenty-three years before he died.’

‘Can you give me more details about his work here?’ Carrie asked. She and Evan agreed that she, being a CIA employee, would drive the questioning. An ID Bedford had provided named Evan as a CIA analyst, but he stayed quiet.

‘Well, among Bast’s many creative sidelines, he dabbled in art, he dabbled in sleeping with celebrities who frequented his nightclubs. Drug arrests at one of his clubs lost him his cachet, and he burned thousands of pounds trying to keep them afloat. We looked hard at him then, we don’t want agents involved with illegal narcotics, but the drug dealing was simply a few of his regular customers abusing his hospitality. After the clubs closed, he focused all his energies on his publishing firm, which he owned for quite a while but had been his most neglected business. He published literature in translation, especially Spanish, Russian, and Turkish. Imported permitted books back into the Soviet Union, translated underground Russian literature into English, German, and French. So he was a valuable contact, given that he could reach into the dissident community in the Soviet Union and that he could travel somewhat freely back and forth. At first his handlers suspected he might be a KGB agent, but he checked out clean and got cleared on every follow-up. We watched him closely during his financial troubles; that’s a time when an operative might be bought. But he always came out clean. He was popular with the dissident Russian community here in London.’

‘So what exactly did he do for the CIA?’ Carrie asked.

‘Couriered data from his contacts’ contacts in and out of Berlin, Moscow, and Leningrad. He was handled by American embassy officers under diplomatic cover. But he was low-level. He didn’t have access to Soviet state secrets. And the dissident community was not particularly useful to the Agency at that point in time – they might give us names of people who had critical access and would spy for us, but dissidents were too closely watched by the KGB. Too easy, frankly, for the KGB to infiltrate.’

Evan studied the picture of Bast, murdered. Bast’s eyes were wide in horrified surprise. This man had known Evan’s parents. Played an unseen role in their lives. ‘No suspects?’

‘Bast lived a high life, even after his fall. A few husbands were rather unhappy with him. He owed money. He broke business deals. Any number of people might have wanted him out of their lives. Of course, Scotland Yard didn’t know about Bast working for the CIA, and we didn’t tell them.’

‘Rather important information to withhold,’ Carrie said.

‘I didn’t personally. You needn’t sound peevish.’

‘Of course you didn’t,’ Carrie said with a laugh, trying to defuse the sudden tension. ‘You’re not even forty, right? It just surprises me.’

Pettigrew’s voice took on a peppery tone of disapproval. ‘It’s not good advertising for recruitment to have your assets murdered.’

Carrie paged through the murder-scene photos. ‘The CIA must have suspected Bast was identified as a CIA agent and killed by the Soviets?’

‘Naturally. But the murder looked like it coincided with a robbery, and that simply wasn’t the KGB’s style. Remember, Bast was a low-level asset at best. He never was an original source of valuable information. He never fed us disinformation originating from the KGB. He was just a very reliable courier and gatherer of contacts. You know, a lot of KGB archives have come to light since the fall of the USSR. There’s no record that the KGB ordered him killed.’

‘Could we talk to his handler?’ Carrie asked.

‘Bast’s case officer died ten years ago. Pancreatic cancer.’

‘The robbery,’ Carrie said. ‘What was taken? Could the killer have discovered anything that pointed to Bast’s connection to the CIA?’

Pettigrew pushed another file toward them. ‘The Agency had an operative sweep Bast’s apartment after the murder and after the police had gone through. He found Bast’s CIA gear all properly hidden. Undiscovered by the police, who of course would have confiscated the stuff.’

‘What about his personal effects or his finances?’ Evan asked. ‘Anything unusual?’

Pettigrew flipped through the papers. ‘Let’s see… a friend, Thomas Khan, supplied information.’ He ran a finger down a list. ‘Bast had two separate bank accounts, he had a lot of money tied up in his publishing concern…’

‘You said Khan? K-H-A-N?’ Evan said. Same last name as Hadley Khan. Here was the connection from Evan to Bast. Carrie shook her head. Say nothing.

‘Yes. I have a file on Thomas Khan as well.’ Pettigrew fingered the file, pulled out a sheet of paper. ‘Mr. Khan said Bast kept a fair amount of cash on hand and none of that was found in the house. Khan was a rare-book dealer and said Bast often paid him for volumes with cash’

Carrie took the paper and read aloud from the report as she scanned it: ‘Born in Pakistan to a prominent family. Educated in England. His wife had been an English-woman, a high-ranking political strategist and academician who worked on defense initiatives. No trouble with the law. Conservative in political leanings, served as a director on a British foundation that pledged financial support to the Afghani rebels against the Soviet invaders. Worked in international banking for many years, but his real passion is Khan Books, a rare-book emporium, on Kensington Church Street, which he’s operated for the past thirty years. He retired from banking ten years ago and put his entire focus on the bookstore. Widowed twelve years ago. Never remarried. One son, Hadley Mohammed Khan.’