Nothing but Trouble (25 page)

“Finally we get to meet,” he said, shaking her hand. “At the award ceremony I was warned to stay away. Garda business and all that. Are you really an American army officer?”

Sara smiled back at the boy. “I am.” No more than nineteen or twenty, Sean had his father’s wide shoulders, large hands, and blunt fingers, and his mother’s eyes and mouth.

“Leave her alone, Sean,” Fitzmaurice called out as he carried in the wineglasses. “The colonel is a married woman. Wife and mother, to be exact.”

After a glass of wine Sara helped Edna put the finishing touches on dinner, while Sean and Hugh set the table. Father, mother, and son were convivial company. Edna had bought the lamb-done to perfection-from a butcher who raised and slaughtered his own sheep on a farm in County Roscommon. A bowl of fruit topped off the meal, and it was then that Sean asked her if she’d read the works for which Brendan Coughlan had been honored at the National University.

“I have not,” Sara replied. “But he’s now on my personal short list of writers to read.”

Sean nodded with great seriousness. “He has a lyrical flair and a wonderful way of describing characters and settings. Did you ever hear of Finley Peter Dunne, a late-nineteenth-century Irish-American journalist?”

Sara’s eyes widened in surprise. For an American Studies class at West Point she’d written a research paper on Dunne, a Chicago columnist who had created a comic Irish saloonkeeper named Mr. Dooley, a character with strong anti-imperialist tendencies who tenaciously criticized the Spanish-American War.

“Did you know he was great friends with Teddy Roosevelt, in spite of his opposition to the Spanish-American War?” Sara asked.

Sean beamed with pleasure. “I did. What was Mr. Dooley’s given name?”

Sara laughed. “I don’t remember.”

“Martin,” Sean replied. “And the customer who most often had to endure Dooley’s social commentary was named Hennessy.”

“That’s right,” Sara said. “Did you know that before he moved to New York City, Dunne wrote articles on women’s issues for the Ladies’ Home Journal magazine?”

Sean nodded. “He was one of the most popular muckraking reformers of his day.”

“How did you come to discover him?” Sara asked.

“I’m reading Irish-American Literature at Trinity,” Sean replied. “Do you know Thomas Flanagan’s works?”

“I’m afraid not,” Sara said with a shake of her head.

“You’re missing one of America’s great writers. He wrote a trilogy set here that reads like the work of a native son. Would you like me to write the titles down for you?”

“Yes, please.”

“Enough about books,” Fitzmaurice said as he pushed his empty fruit bowl away, “otherwise we’ll be sitting at this table long into the wee hours of the night.”

After the table had been cleared, Sean retreated to his room to study, and Sara helped Edna scrape and stack the dishes in the galley kitchen. As they stood at the sink, Edna turned to her and said, “I do hope you don’t think I invited you over to see if my husband was planning to take you away on a dirty little weekend.”

“I think he’ll be glad to see the last of me,” Sara replied with a smile.

“You’re welcome in this house anytime you decide to return.”

Impulsively, Sara hugged Edna as though she were an old and dear friend.

Fitzmaurice arrived to find the two women chatting like magpies, which continued over coffee in the living room. When he was finally able to suggest that it was time to take Sara back to her hotel, she reluctantly agreed.

She left Edna on the front stoop with thanks for a scrumptious meal and a promise to visit again, then climbed into Fitzmaurice’s car and waved good-bye.

Fitzmaurice started the engine, beeped the horn, and drove away. “The text messages Spalding sent to Paquette’s computer don’t help us one bit,” he said. “They were all about small changes he wanted the builder to make to the architect’s blueprints.”

“That’s it?”

“Afraid so.” He glanced at Sara. “I think we need to agree upon a plan of action in the morning. I can’t keep the number of people assigned to the case working any longer than that. Orders from the higher-ups.”

“Okay,” Sara said. “We’ll figure something out in the morning.”

At the hotel she thanked him for the wonderful evening, complimented him on his delightful family, and took the lift to her room, wishing Kerney and Patrick had been with her to meet Clan Fitzmaurice.

It was eleven p.m. in Dublin, and four in the afternoon in Santa Fe, but Sara was too drained to call Kerney or even check her e-mail for messages. She got ready for bed, her thoughts firmly fixed on Spalding and what to do about catching him come morning.

As Brigadier General Stuart Thatcher saw it, he’d risen through the ranks because he was objective, ambitious, and maintained a healthy skepticism about other people’s motives. Accordingly, he was constantly on guard for any sign of disloyalty from his subordinates or any outside threats to his authority.

On Friday, as he was about to leave the office at the end of the day, a memo from the vice chief of staff had been hand-delivered by his aide, advising Thatcher that Lieutenant Colonel Sara Brannon had been tasked to carry out a special courier assignment effective immediately. The memo contained no specifics as to the whys or wherefores, nor had Thatcher been consulted on the matter. His authority had been undermined, and he was desperate to know why.

Officially there wasn’t anything Thatcher could do about it other than defer to the vice chief. Still, he fumed that Clarke had not even given him the courtesy of a call about needing Brannon for a special detail. Because Henry Powhatan Clarke was clearly Brannon’s mentor and protector, Thatcher couldn’t help but wonder if hidden motives were in play.

Since her arrival at the military police directorate, Brannon had caused Thatcher nothing but trouble. It had started with her assignment to revise sexual-assault criminal investigation protocols and procedures, which she’d turned into an indictment against the army for failure to prosecute offenders and adequately protect victims.

Her findings had reached the halls of Congress, and it had taken a concerted effort to keep the situation from becoming an embarrassment to the service while preserving the careers of several ranking, highly connected officers. Fortunately, Thatcher’s second cousin, U.S. Senator Howard Ballard Rutledge, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, had buried Brannon’s report under the provisions of the National Security Act. But from that moment on Thatcher had kept a watchful eye on Brannon and her work, reviewing it in exhaustive detail.

Thatcher had hoped to quash Brannon’s chances for promotion by holding her back from accepting a plum temporary duty assignment with the training branch, and giving her a less than exemplary efficiency rating prior to her departure from his command. But General Clarke had outmaneuvered Thatcher and quashed his plans.

He wondered what Clarke and Brannon were up to and had spent the last two days discreetly trying to learn the nature of Brannon’s assignment. People he could usually rely on for information had professed no knowledge, and all his attempts to tease out any particulars from collateral sources failed.

Alarmed and convinced he was a target of some scheme hatched by Clarke and Brannon to ruin him, Thatcher decided to uncover the threat on his own and counteract it. Late Tuesday evening, after the personnel in Brannon’s section had left for the day, he exercised his authority to conduct a security audit of her workstation and began going through her files, paperwork, and notes in minute detail, searching for anything that would confirm his suspicions and reveal the nature of the plot against him.

In the top drawer of Brannon’s desk he found a file containing computer printouts of her outgoing telephone calls. Some time back Brannon had placed a number of calls to the Quartermaster Corps and the army forensic lab. He knew of no reason for her to do that. Additionally, over a considerable period of time, Brannon had also telephoned the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. One call had been made the day before Clarke had cut her special orders. What was that all about?

Thatcher decided to dig deeper and began dialing the numbers. Within short order he had duty officers at the Quartermaster Corps and the forensic lab scrambling to locate any documents or memorandums to or from Brannon. Then he phoned the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and spoke to a supervisor, who told him his department routinely kept in contact with Brannon regarding the status of an army deserter named George Spalding.

“What is the current status of the case?” Thatcher asked.

“Spalding is still at large,” the officer replied. “But based on a close watch list of one of Spalding’s known friends, we now have reason to suspect that he may be in Ireland.”

“Was this information shared with Colonel Brannon?” Thatcher asked.

“Yes, the colonel was advised.”

Thatcher thanked the officer and hung up. Well over a year ago the Spalding case had been transferred from Brannon to army CID. Yet Brannon had continued to follow up on the investigation without his knowledge or authorization. What was she up to and why all the secrecy?

He called back the duty officers and told them to concentrate on looking for specific information to or from Brannon that pertained to the Spalding investigation.

Within the hour Thatcher hit pay dirt. Long after the case had been transferred, Brannon had requested a handwriting analysis on documents she’d requested from the Quartermaster Corp which showed that Thomas Loring Carrier had, during the Vietnam War, forged signatures on personal-effects release forms.

Brannon had obviously targeted Carrier as a member of the smuggling ring Spalding had operated in Vietnam, which was completely incredible to Thatcher. Tom Carrier was no common criminal. A born-again Christian and a great American, Carrier had the ear of important people in the president’s inner circle. Brannon’s assumptions about him were simply scurrilous.

Had Brannon sidestepped him because of his friendship with Carrier and taken her unfounded suspicions to General Clarke? If so, why now?

He ran a hand through his thinning hair. He didn’t like Brannon. She was an officer who subtly challenged his authority in ways that avoided outright censure, who had a pattern of consistently maneuvering behind his back, and had no allegiance to the command ethics of the army.

Thatcher tapped his fingers on the desktop. Brannon had been tasked by Clarke on a secret assignment one day after she’d learned from the RCMP that Spalding might have surfaced in Ireland. Could it be that was where Clarke had sent her?

Clarke had to know of Carrier’s ties to the White House, how he’d been a media point man to sell the administration’s handling of the war on terrorism. Had Clarke authorized the mission to find evidence that could embarrass the commander-in-chief by raising questions about a man closely associated with his war policies?

Thatcher smiled. As far as he could tell, he wasn’t a target after all, and foiling Lieutenant Colonel Sara Brannon’s mission for General Henry Powhatan Clarke might win him his second star. If he played his hand well, the result would be decidedly less pleasant for Brannon and Clarke. His smile widened in anticipation of the debt of gratitude Tom Carrier would owe him and the good days that loomed ahead.

In the morning Sara met Fitzmaurice in the hotel lobby. On the way to the car he gave her an update on the overnight activity. Spalding had made no new credit-card purchases, his boat hadn’t been spotted by the Irish Coast Guard, and Paquette had spent the evening clubbing with friends before retiring late to her hotel room.

“Is that it?” Sara asked.

“We’ve dropped surveillance on her,” Fitzmaurice said as he opened the car door for Sara. “But I’ve arranged for her hired driver to keep us informed of her whereabouts. All on the QT, of course.”

“Good.”

Fitzmaurice settled behind the steering wheel and handed Sara a file folder. “We have been able to determine the specifics of Spalding’s Irish citizenship claim based on the passport information we got during our visit to the Irish Sailing Association. He was granted citizenship by virtue of descent under the name of George McGuire, but the supporting documentation of his Irish-born grandparents was forged.”

Sara scanned the report.

“Also,” Fitzmaurice said, “we accessed the records of the mobile-phone account Spalding established under the name of McGuire. He’s been using it to communicate with the Dun Laoghaire solicitor who handled the conveyance of the villa. A detective spoke to the solicitor early this morning and learned that Paquette has signed a legal document that will transfer the property to Spalding at the end of the year by private treaty. Paquette stands to receive payment of half a million euros for the property. A far cry from the full value of the house, but a tidy sum nonetheless.”

“So Paquette is looking forward to a very profitable payday,” Sara said.

“In squeaky clean cash.” Fitzmaurice put the key into the ignition but didn’t start the engine. “The text messages he sent to Paquette’s computer are interesting. He gave her very specific instructions on the type of countertops, appliances, and fixtures he wanted installed in the kitchen and bathrooms at the villa and a color scheme for the walls of each room. Apparently, he’s planning to settle permanently in Dun Laoghaire, as you suggested, and live a long and happy life as George McGuire.”

Sara closed the file. “What else?”

“He’s made several recent calls on his mobile to a London telephone number, one of which was placed just before he left Bray on his boat. We’ve asked the London authorities to find out what they can and ring us back.”

“I wonder if he sailed to England,” Sara said.

“He could get to Wales in a matter of hours,” Fitzmaurice replied. “Or, according to the Coast Guard, he could not be at sea at all, but cruising along the mouth of some inland waterway.”