Robert Baer - Blow the house down

"Come with me."

We walked across the house, through the living room, until we were standing directly in front of the Modigliani. Like the frieze, it was lit to perfection: a raw, sensual nude recumbent on a daybed, meat-red pillows behind her.

"You heard about this?" Frank asked. He had a look of absolute contentment on his face.

"They couldn't talk about anything else for days out at headquarters."

"So I gathered. See anyone you know in that painting?"

I saw it immediately: the curve of the neck; eyes like little sky-blue diamonds; the button mouth, knowing, ironic, and kind.

"India."

"Amazing, isn't it? I don't particularly like Modigliani, but when this came up on the block I had to have it."

We stood there a moment in silence. Behind us, Simon was busying himself in the hallway.

"Listen, Max, here's what I learned in Brazzaville way back when. You can go for truth, you can go for duty, or you can go for money. I went for the money, and this is what it got me."

He swept his hand around the room: the nude, the frieze, the everything.

"You can, too."

He pulled two business cards out of his billfold and handed me one of them: Marc Rousset, Bonnet et Cie, 27 Bahnhoff Strasse, Zurich, Schweiz.

"He's looking for someone to hand-hold some Middle Eastern clients. With Arabic and Farsi, you're a lock."

"He's a slimy fuck, and that's it. You know it, Frank. Everyone does. Didn't Rousset come within an inch of being indicted in France? Bangkok, too."

"And do you think you're going to land a job with Northrop or Boeing now that Webber's lifted your security clearance? Forget it. You're blackballed from coast to coast."

We'd gotten to the heart of the evening. I'd sat through the same thing a dozen times when Frank was on the seventh floor, simultaneously lecturing me and extricating me from some flap. He'd even once hung up on an assistant secretary of state who wanted me fired.

"It's an eat-what-you-kill deal," he continued. "Rousset will carry you initially, but you've got to bring in new clients."

"Why would anybody want to park his money with me? If someone's already got it, he's already got someone to watch it."

"Where do you think I got all this?" Frank said. "I used my Rolodex. The day I retired, I called every contact I'd made during the past thirty-two years. And trust me, more than one panned out."

"That's not the way it's supposed to work."

"Cut out the Boy Scout bullshit, Max. I need someone I trust to handle a couple new clients. One's a Saudi billionaire. He's needy and will suck out your lifeblood. But it's a good place for you to start."

Frank handed me the other card, engraved with the name Michelle A. Zwanzig. In the bottom corner was a Geneva number.

"Michelle's my Swiss fiduciary. Call her in the morning-her morning, not ours. When you get to Zurich, you'll drop down to Geneva and she'll

arrange for you to meet the Saudi. Pretend to be obsequious and you'll do just fine."

"It's not going to work. They'll say I'm running. Bailing to Zurich is all the proof Webber will need to make real whatever they've trumped up against me."

"For crissake, Max, no one said you couldn't leave the country. You're not going to ground. Call Webber every day if you want to, make him your pen pal, send fan mail. He used to work for me. I know what makes him tick. He'll be thrilled. You're throwing your hands up in surrender, moving to Zurich. Get off his screen, and this all goes away."

"But the Agency-"

"Don't you get it? The place is over, done with. It's not the Agency you and I joined. You might as well be flipping burgers at McDonald's. Flush every memory of the place you have."

Frank paused a moment and continued. "Grow up, Max. Stop trying to belong. They never liked you, anyhow. You're the lone wolf. The pack hates it when one of their own isn't running along with it."

Frank was picking at scabs, trying to recruit me into his little business empire, whatever that was. He must have seen my face cloud over because he stopped and flicked off the lights on the Modigliani.

"We're still on the truth, are we?" he said, switching tactics. "Haven't you heard the news? People prefer a bad case of the clap to the truth. The polis cut Socrates's throat because he wouldn't lay off it."

"He was poisoned."

"As I was saying."

Frank put his arm over my shoulder, backing me out of the living room, edging me toward the front door. He gave my arm one last squeeze and turned back up the hall.

"It's a lot easier to make enough money to buy a world-class portrait of your daughter than it is to find an honest man," he said from the bottom of the staircase. "Just think about it, okay? You've got the numbers. And, Max, by the way"-the third time's the charm-"trot out the paranoia bullshit, your hunt for Buckley's killer, or your truth in front of the Saudi, and he'll drop you like a steaming turd. Copy?"

"Got it."

He had his back to me now, heading up the stairs.

"There are a lot of crazy people out on the streets who look more together than you, Maxie boy."

And with that, he rounded the landing and was gone. Simon had run my Levi's jacket, sneakers, and socks through the drier, my watch cap also. The wool was warm, tight against my scalp. He stood with his hands clasped behind him as I pulled my shoes on.

"Cheerio," I said as I opened the door. He was probably holding a.38 behind his back in case I decided to clarify one more point with his master. He slammed the door behind me and double-locked it before I'd hit the first step. I could hear the camera whirring again above me, recording my exit.

I crossed the street, walked east for a few houses until I was half hidden by the trunk of an ancient gingko tree, then turned back to have a look at Frank's house. A light was on in the bedroom above the library. It threw a shadow against the curtain, too thin for Frank, too tall for Simon. I thought I saw a corner of the curtain move, a hand wave. For a moment I had the impression of one of those fairy-tale princesses trapped in the top of a golden tower. Something scuttled in the ivy behind me. I saw a tail darting for cover. When I looked back up at the window over the library, the shadow was gone, the light out.

The rain was over. Stars had come out. It had turned cool while I was inside. To the north a mile or so, at the zoo, some creature let out a horrible, night-rending bellow. An elephant, maybe. Or a rhino or hippo. Some major quadrapod. It was the weirdest thing about living in this part °f D.C.: Africa roared all night just around the corner.

I checked my watch. I'd asked Willie to call me in two hours. It was a half hour past that now. I found a pay phone that actually worked at Connecticut and Florida avenues and dialed him. The phone rang and rang. I hung up and punched in his number again. He finally answered.

"You didn't call." It wasn't like Willie.

"Couldn't," he said. "A funny thing happened. I stopped by a place I know on Fifteenth Street on the way home for a piece of pie and a cup of-"

"Willie."

"Bottom line, when I came back out, the front passenger window was smashed and your phone number gone. Who breaks into a cab to steal a goddamn phone number?"

Now I had to assume two things: I didn't have a sterile phone and, two, I was still of interest to someone.

I returned to my apartment the same way I'd left it. The El Salvadoran kid was slumped by the Dumpster, asleep or dead. I held a finger under his nostril until I felt him breathe. God knows what he'd been given to desert his post across the street, but he seemed to have swallowed it or smoked it or snorted it all at once. Next door, inside the Dumpster, the rats were jammin'.