“Yeah, I know a guy in that station. He was fairly senior in Paris when I first got here.”

“You trust him?”

“I know he’s not a bad guy.”

“Can he keep his mouth shut?”

“Yeah, I believe he can.”

“Then get ahold of him, and the two of you find out who Simpson was working for and what he was sent here to do. I’m forwarding you an e-mail from one of my research people in New York that will give you some early background on the guy. It’s not pretty. You and your buddy fill in the time since.”

“I’m on it,” Rick said.

24

Ron Spencer got off the C17 at Andrews Air Force Base and pulled the plugs from his ears, which were still ringing. He had reposed on web seating for the ten hours from Berlin, and his back ached almost as much as his ears. There was a car, or rather a ratty van, waiting for him. He threw his duffel into the rear seat and was driven directly to Langley.

“No time for a shave and a shower?” he asked his driver.

“My orders are straight to Langley, no stops. You’ll be met.” He made a cell call. “One hour,” he said, then hung up.

Spencer was met in the big entrance hall to headquarters, walked past the wall of stars, representing CIA officers killed in the line of duty, and taken down to a sub-basement, to a small, bare room with a large mirror covering most of one wall. He had no doubt that this was going to be an interrogation, and that observers sat on the other side of the one-way mirror.

He was kept waiting there for a long time, no coffee, no chat, no toilet. He checked, and the door was locked. Forty minutes later a tall, gray-haired mustached man in an ill-fitting suit walked into the room, dropped a thick file—his, he assumed—on the steel table with a thump, and started talking before he was in the opposite chair.

“Who the fuck is John, no middle initial, Simpson, and why the fuck did you hire him?”

“Who are you?” Spencer demanded.

“None of your goddamned business. Answer the question.”

“What question was that?”

“Don’t annoy me, son, or you’ll spend the next week in this room.”

“I didn’t hire Simpson. He turned up on the list of station employees I was given on my third day as chief.”

“Who hired him?”

“I’ve no idea. He was assigned—I assumed from Langley.”

“Assumed? Is that how you ran the station? Assuming?”

Spencer noticed that he had spoken in the past tense. “Did you ever run a station?”

“Three of them, and I’ll ask the questions here.”

“Did you interview every man and woman on the station staff?”

“I did, and I said I’ll ask the questions. Why didn’t you interview him?”

“Because he was a handyman, and I was a station chief. It was my deputy’s job.”

“What did your deputy tell you about Simpson?”

“That he was good at doing what he was told.”

“Did you ever send Simpson to Paris for any reason?”

Spencer opened his mouth to say no, then reconsidered. “I sent a four-man team to Paris once—a handyman was among them, and it could have been Simpson.”

“Who was the team leader?”

“A Frenchman named Jean-Noël Ragot.”

“Why was a Frenchman working Berlin?”

“He was raised in the States since childhood: French father, German mother. He was trilingual and good at his work. I relied on him.”

“And he took Simpson to Paris?”

“Maybe. I didn’t ask. Why don’t you ask him? He’s still in Berlin.”

—

ON THE OTHER SIDE of the mirror, Lance Cabot picked up a phone. “Get me the Berlin station,” he said. “I don’t care what time it is, I want to speak to an officer named Jean-Noël Ragot, wherever he is.”

—

“WHAT WAS the purpose of sending a team to Paris?” the interrogator asked.

“I don’t know that you’re cleared to know,” Spencer replied.

“I’m cleared to know whatever you know.”

“I worked in the Paris station for fifteen months, ten years ago. While I was there I got friendly with a source in the Paris police.”

“Friendly? Did you recruit him?”

“Sort of.”

“What the fuck does that mean?”

“He was never on the books. I never wrote down his name, we exchanged information when it was good for both of us.”

“Did you record or make notes on your meetings with him?”

“I made notes, but without mentioning his name. He was too smart to let himself be recorded.”

“What was his rank and name?”

“He was a capitaine, and I promised him never to reveal his name to anyone.”

“Don’t hand me that horseshit! Don’t you know where you are and how much trouble you’re in?”

Spencer slammed a palm down on the table. “I know exactly where I am, who I am, and what I’m going to tell you, if I feel like it. What I don’t know is who you are and on what authority you’re asking me to blow a man I gave my word to.”

The man opened his mouth to speak, but a buzzer went off, and he stopped. He got up, took the file on the table, and, without another word, walked out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Spencer leaned back in his chair and yelled at the mirror: “I want to see the director now, and I want some coffee, black!”

Nothing happened for five minutes, then Lance Cabot walked into the room with a coffee mug in his hand, set it on the table, and arranged himself in the chair opposite. “Good morning, Ron,” he said pleasantly. “Did you have a good flight?”

Spencer picked up the mug and sipped the coffee before he replied. “Good morning, Director. No, I did not have a good flight.”

“Let’s talk a little about your old job in Paris,” Lance said.

—

HALF AN HOUR later Lance said, “There’s a car waiting for you downstairs that will take you to the Four Seasons Hotel, in Georgetown. Get some sleep, have something to eat, get laid, if you can. You have a business-class seat to Berlin on the ten A.M. Lufthansa flight from Dulles tomorrow morning. Go back to work, and tell everyone in the station I said hello.” Lance got up and left the room; a moment later, the escort took Ron Spencer downstairs and put him in the rear seat of a Lincoln Town Car.

Spencer was shaking as he got into the car. He did deep breathing exercises all the way to the hotel.

25

Stone awoke to the sound of the shower running, then he dozed off again. When he came to, Holly was bending over him, and she was, disappointingly, dressed. “You were just what a girl needed last night,” she said.

“Always glad to be of service,” he replied. “Why are you dressed so early? Are my services no longer desired?”

“They are, but Rick LaRose called, and I’ve got to run over to the embassy for a while,” she said. “I’ll be sure and be back for dinner. Book us somewhere special.”

“Done,” he said, then went back to sleep.

—

HOLLY TOOK a cab to the embassy and let herself in through the side door with her ID card. She identified herself to a guard in a glassed-in cage, then entered the Paris station of the Central Intelligence Agency and walked briskly to the station chief’s office. “He’s with someone,” Rick’s secretary said, then Rick opened his office door and waved her inside.

“Good morning.” he said. “Thanks for coming over. Holly Barker, meet Jean-Noël Ragot of the Berlin station.” A tall, heavily built man in his forties stood. “Hi, Holly,” he said.

“Jean-Noël is the man I told you about,” Rick said. “We served together in this station some years ago.”

“Hello, Jean-Noël,” Holly said. “What brings you to Paris?”

“I don’t know,” Ragot replied.

Rick spoke up. “Jean-Noël got a call from Lance Cabot yesterday, ordering him here.”

“He didn’t say why,” Ragot added.

“Do I detect an accent?” Holly asked.