Ride a Pale Horse (11 page)

Yet, as a Communist, he believed that truth was whatever was good for Communism, just as a lie was anything that was bad for it. And he obviously saw now that world chaos would not—in the long run—be good for Communism. Conquests were not successful or long-lasting if they had only ruins to dominate. A new Dark Ages, that’s what he was afraid of; and weren’t we all? It took Europe almost a thousand years to climb back to sanity and civilisation once Roman law and inventions and culture had been ravaged by hordes of barbarians. In a new Dark Ages, we’d all be lost—Communists along with the rest of us. It took centuries to put civilisation together again once it had been smashed.

Yes, everything depended on Farrago’s escape—including Karen Cornell’s own security. We’ll get the FBI to keep a close watch over her, Bristow decided grimly, and even if that most independent lady didn’t like it, he wouldn’t be too far away, either. He had still two weeks’ leave due him this year. Once this crisis was over—no one would drag his feet on this Kremlin meeting—once the threat was obliterated, he would have every logical excuse to take a couple of weeks off the chain and concentrate on Karen’s safety.

He walked smartly into the hall, met two unexpected escorts to accompany him through the miles of corridors to that safest of safes. They weren’t Secret Service, just two from his own unit: Denis Shaw and Wallace Fairbairn.

“Hey!” Fairbairn said, noting Bristow’s face. “Ease up, old boy.” To Shaw he said, “He’s probably hungry.” It was almost eight o’clock. “A good meeting?”

“The usual talk. Words, words and more words.”

Shaw’s eyes widened with excitement. In a whisper he asked, “Was it really about Guatemala?”

“It’s in one hell of a mess.”

“Isn’t everywhere?” Fairbairn asked. “Where do we go for dinner?”

Bristow looked at Fairbairn’s face, handsome as always, but too expectant as he waited for acceptance. Damned nonsense, Bristow told himself—since when did he start guarding his answers to someone who was an old friend? Since that old friend had seen him together with Karen last Saturday and never even cracked a joke about it? “Not tonight. What about tomorrow?” And no evening stretching before him now, with questions coming at him like bazooka shells from Shaw.

“Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow,” Fairbairn said with resignation. “Okay. Denis and I can take a hint. See you in the slave pen in the morning.”

“See you.” Bristow walked on. Their departure had been abrupt; his fault, he blamed himself. Too edgy, too quick to question small reactions that were as innocent as they always had been. If he had dinner with anyone tonight, he would have opted for Karen Cornell. She would be the right companion for the end of this day.

Ten o’clock on Monday morning, and Karen Cornell was waiting at her desk in the
Spectator’s
staff room, ready for her command appearance in Schleeman’s office. He was there but on the telephone. A call from Italy, his secretary told Karen; please wait. Twenty minutes later, he had another call. And another. This time she was given the message: Mr. Schleeman has several scheduled appointments, and he is running late; he would like to see you at five o’clock. “Of course,” Karen had said to his white-haired secretary, overweight by fifty pounds and permanently bent from the shoulders by too much sitting over her desk. The humpbacked whale, the younger staff members called her, but only when she was well out of earshot. Her hearing and eyesight, like her work, were exceptionally keen.

The Austrian interview with a possible chancellor had been written yesterday, so Karen’s morning was spent on working over her notes on Czechoslovakia with occasional breaks—everyone had questions about Prague, which she fended off without rousing extra curiosity. Lunch was a sandwich with Jim Black. He also had questions about her trip, but she could give him the Austrian interview to edit and that diverted talk about the Czechs she had met.

As five o’clock approached and the staff room gradually emptied, she began to worry over quite another set of questions that faced her. Vienna, she kept thinking, how do I deal with Vienna? Hubert Schleeman was a bulldog once he bit into a subject. Vasek’s name must not be mentioned. Nor the letters. Oh, Peter Bristow, why aren’t you here to help me out? And what are you doing at this moment? Persuading the high brass that I’m really quite a credible witness even if I am a writer, and one of the Fourth Estate at that? They probably think we all belong to the second-oldest profession, if not kissing cousins to the first.

The humpbacked whale, poor old dear—did she never exercise beyond walking to the bathroom?—announced in her frostiest manner, “Mr. Schleeman is available now, Ms. Cornell.” She even opened Schleeman’s door with a flourish. (God, how can he stand her? But the answer to that was efficiency: the woman had never misfiled one letter or forgotten an instruction.)

Karen entered.

“Sorry for this delay,” Schleeman said, and pointed to the chair in front of his desk.

Karen took heart. He was in excellent humour, or else there would have been no hint of apology. She waited for Vienna to raise its head. Instead, Schleeman began talking about quite another subject.

“I had a ’phone call from Rome this morning. You’ve met Aliotto, haven’t you?”

“Aliotto? Oh, yes—Luigi Aliotto.” He had been one of the Western group of journalists in Prague. “I met him once or twice. Briefly.”

“What d’you think of him?”

“A good reporter, I heard. He’s attractive, lots of charm. Even the tight-faced females from the Eastern bloc succumbed to it.”

“I’ve been checking up on him today. He is a freelance reporter who is published in several reputable papers. He’s good, as you said. How would you like a week in Rome?”

She stared at him, blue eyes incredulous.

“Yes, Rome. It would be your first trip there and worthwhile, I think.”

Not her first visit. After their honeymoon in Venice, Alan and she had travelled back to New York by way of Rome. She sat very still, realising that this was the first time she had thought of Alan in days, feeling a stab of wonder along with that small shock. She recovered and paid attention to Schleeman’s rapid words explaining Aliotto’s morning telephone call to the
Washington Spectator.

Aliotto had been offered the opportunity, along with three other Italian journalists, to attend a private session with two terrorists of the Red Brigade. There had been a lengthy trial, and now—after two years in jail—they were sentenced to twenty-five years in prison. Suddenly, they had decided to talk. Aliotto had the idea of inviting an American to be present when the talking began. The prisoners had no objection, possibly wanted their views to be known to a wide public; the authorities had no objections, either—the more that was known about the history (and mentality) of two young terrorists who had been connected with murder and arson the stronger the general support for the government’s firm action would be. Aliotto had suggested that Schleeman send one of his reporters and thought Karen Cornell, whom he had met, might be a suitable choice.

“An interview?” Karen sounded doubtful.

“Not exactly. There will be questions and answers, of course. Aliotto’s idea is that it would be interesting for you and him to write your separate accounts of the talk session. Yours would be as a foreigner sees it; his would be as a journalist closely involved with the terrorist scene in Italy. Both your columns would be published side by side in
Domani,
a magazine he writes for, and in the
Spectator.
Appropriately translated, of course.” Schleeman laughed. “I think he wants to outdo the three other journalists: his idea of two reports—one from the American point of view, one from an Italian who has had to live with constant terrorism—is original enough to make their newspaper columns seem run-of-the-mill. But whatever lies behind his proposal, it’s still a first-rate idea.” Schleeman studied her expression. It was indecisive, slightly doubtful, even troubled. “Well?” he asked sharply to force a reply.

“There are just so many things happening at the moment—” she began, thinking of Bristow and the cassettes, and what would their result be? And had Vasek been accepted as a defector? So many things she wanted to hear as soon as Peter Bristow could tell her. His ’phone call could come next week; or would it be two weeks, three? “When would I have to go to Rome?”

“Why not on Wednesday? The session with the terrorists—a young man and his girl, by the way—is scheduled for next Monday. But a few days earlier are always useful. It lets you have a chance to soak up some background.” She always liked to do that before approaching any strange assignment.

“This
Wednesday?” She was aghast.

“Now what have you got to do here that can’t be done by Wednesday?” he demanded. Schleeman was definitely in favour of Aliotto’s idea. It was too good to let slip to some other magazine or a daily paper. “Jim will have both your pieces by tomorrow, won’t he?”

She nodded. Jim Black already had one of them, and Schleeman knew that.

“What’s so important to keep you in Washington?”

The whip was cracking: she could hear it sing around the room. “Not Washington, New York. I haven’t been there for two weeks, and there’s war between one of the tenants and Max. He’s the caretaker, handyman, general factotum. I’d never run the place without him. I had him on the ’phone yesterday, threatening to quit. I told him I’d be at the house on Wednesday if he’d just be patient.” And remember his ground-floor apartment with the yard behind it as his own private garden. Karen sighed. “I’ll straighten out the quarrel. Oh, Lord, why don’t I sell that house anyway?”

The whip had stopped cracking. Schleeman was looking at her with a touch of amusement. “Why don’t you? Get rid of it. Settle in Washington in a place of your own. Easier for everyone.”

“I don’t know why.” She met his eyes. “Yes, I do. That house holds a lot of memories.” Good memories that had kept her going when she was engulfed by loneliness. In spite of work, of travel, of a hundred acquaintances and a dozen friends, there was always that swamp of loneliness ever pulling her into its depths. Not even four affairs along the way gave any escape. She had broken them off after a week or two of high hopes that ended in disappointment and anguish. No one she had met in these last years seemed able to replace the happiness she once had known.

“Memories,” Schleeman said quietly, “can make you a prisoner, Karen. Don’t let them tie you down.” He and Jim Black had talked about that: her five years of marriage to Alan Fern shouldn’t close out the rest of her life. Her work hadn’t suffered, in fact it had improved, but a young woman with Karen’s astonishing good looks who suddenly cut off promising affairs with marriage proposed—it wasn’t right, it wasn’t fair. Indeed, it was a complete waste. “Well,” Schleeman added, suddenly brusque, “when do you leave for Rome?”

“Friday?”

“Thursday evening it would have to be: night flights only. You’ll be there Friday morning. Good. I’ll alert Aliotto, and he can book a room for you at the Imperial. Might as well be comfortable. That will give you three days to get the background from him. Enough?” Three days would be sufficient. She was a quick study.

“Possibly.”

“Of course, I could send someone else from the
Spectator,
but Aliotto seemed intent on you. Perhaps a woman would be best—might help put the girl more at ease, loosen her tongue. Seemingly, it’s the young man who has been doing most of the talking so far. She just follows along.”

“As she did when she killed with a machine pistol? Or was it a grenade?”

That’s better, that’s much better, thought Schleeman, watching Karen’s eyes. “You’ll do a good job. By the way—how’s your interest in disinformation coming along? Did Pete Bristow give you any leads?”

“I don’t think he can. No more than has been already published.”

“I expected that, but you can give it another try when you come back from Rome. What was his reaction about the defector? Interested or indifferent?”

“Interested.”

“That all?”

“Well, we talked about several things.”

“Prague, of course. Vienna, too?”

So I’m not escaping so easily, Karen thought. “Vienna, too.”

“You said last Friday night that you were followed. Were you being serious?”

“Yes.”

“But why?”

“Perhaps anyone who was seen in contact with that defector was put under surveillance. But it has stopped now—I haven’t noticed any quiet little man following me around. So I’m in the clear. Don’t you think?” she added nervously.

“First, tell me about the surveillance. I’d be a better judge then.”

So she told him about the middle-aged man in a brown suit who had followed her into a café on Kärntnerstrasse.

“He left after he telephoned?”

“And saw I was settled at a table, meeting no one. Not then, certainly. Later, Sam Waterman and two friends—a man and a girl—drifted in.” She had kept her voice light, so as not to worry him, which in turn would have stirred up more of her own anxieties. She paused. He kept silent. “Now it’s your turn, Hubert. You made me a promise.”

“I did, didn’t I?” He wasn’t eager to keep it. “I really would like to know why you promoted me instead of Waterman. He holds it against me, you know.”

“Did he show it when he joined you in the cafe?”

“There were several poisoned darts flicked in my direction.”

“Brush them off, Karen. He’s the one to be blamed if he didn’t get the job you have now. This is between us, you understand. I don’t add to his troubles.”

She nodded. What troubles? Waterman had seemed carefree. If he could travel abroad, he certainly had enough cash flow.

“Sam Waterman used his own name to write for us. Then I discovered he wrote as Steven Winter for the
People’s Incentive,
a Marxist weekly spawned in northern California. It’s virulent, full of polemics, and far to the outer left.”

“Steven Winter?” She was astounded. “I never knew!” “No one was supposed to know. A well-hidden secret. That’s why he never got the job he was aiming at. Of course, I don’t think he expected me to accept his resignation—he made an effort to apologise two days later—but he saved me the task of telling him he wasn’t wanted around here. That could have been a problem. I couldn’t fire him without disclosing what I knew. Couldn’t give away my source of information, could I?” There was a brief smile. (Menlo, for once, had been in total agreement with that. He had his own source to protect: an FBI agent had infiltrated the
People’s Incentive,
and his safety would be at stake. Menlo had been alerted because Winter’s articles were a constant pipeline for disinformation.) “There was no choice: I had to get rid of him. I trust no man who hides his politics so carefully when he has the power to influence minds.”