Shoot Him if He Runs (6 page)

“Lady I used to go out with has a place here, so I dropped in to see her, thought I’d rest up for a week or two. Where you from?”

“New York.”

“I’m from a little town in Virginia you never heard of. What business you in?”

“Attorney. You?”

“I had a very nice home improvement business; sold it a couple of years ago and retired. Bored out of my skull, until I went sailing. A friend took me out on the Chesapeake, and I kind of went nuts about it. Excuse me.” He picked up the glass, drank the fizzy liquid, belched, and set the glass down. “Nice to meet you,” he said. “I’d better rejoin my lady. If you’re around later, I’ll buy you a drink.”

“I’d like that,” Stone said.

“You staying here?”

“Yes, cottage number one, down on the beach. Why don’t you both join us for a drink around six?”

“That’s mighty nice of you; let me check with Irene, and I’ll get back to you.” He gave a little wave and went back to his table.

“What do you think?” Stone asked.

“He’s not Teddy, but that was good about asking them for a drink; at least we’ll get to talk to Irene. He’s waving at you.”

Stone looked over at the table. Harry Pitts was making a circle with his thumb and forefinger and nodding, then held up six fingers.

Stone gave an acknowledging wave and turned back to his piña colada. “It would be a plus if they didn’t turn out to be awful bores,” he said.

“I don’t see how anybody who rose as far in the Agency as Irene could turn out to be a bore,” Holly replied.

“Any way you slice it,” Stone said, “she was a bureaucrat.”

10

T
heir guests arrived at ten minutes past six, laughing. It seemed that they had already had at least one drink, but Stone poured vodka gimlets that he had made the night before and stored in the freezer. Introductions were made.

“So,” Stone said, “are you both from Virginia?”

“How did you know that?” Irene Foster asked.

“Harry said he was from a small town in Virginia that I never heard of.”

“Well, I’m from Virginia, but not from a town you never heard of, or from any other town,” Irene replied, taking a big sip of her gimlet. “I’m a country girl.”

Harry Pitts laughed. “She’s the slickest country girl you ever met,” he said. “She worked for the CIA for more than twenty years.”

“
Harry!
” Irene exclaimed.

“What’s the matter? Is it still a secret?”

“Sort of,” she muttered.

“It wasn’t a secret when you worked there,” he said. “Why is it a secret now?”

“I’m sorry,” Stone said. “I didn’t mean to pry.”

“You’re not prying,” Irene said. “It’s just that when you work for the Agency for so long, you get used to not discussing your work. I used to tell people I worked for the Agriculture Department; that usually stopped the conversation in its tracks.”

Everybody laughed.

“This is one hell of a good drink,” Harry said, taking another sip and savoring it. “How do you make it?”

“Pour six ounces out of a fifth of vodka, replace it with Rose’s sweetened lime juice, and put it in the freezer until it hurts to hold the bottle. If you make it in a cocktail shaker, you just water it down.”

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Harry said. “So easy!”

“Certainly is.”

Dino jumped in. “What part of the CIA did you work for, Irene? Were you a spy? Or is my question a no-no?”

“It’s not a no-no,” Irene said. “I worked in the operations section, but I wasn’t a spy; I just worked with spies. I was an administrator.”

“Was it exciting?” Genevieve asked.

“Sometimes it was dull as dishwater,” Irene replied. “And sometimes it was way too exciting. It was kind of fun doing work that nobody knew about, only the people you worked with. It was sort of like a club.” She held up her glass. “May I have another of these?”

“Of course,” Stone said and went to the freezer for the bottle. He came back and poured both Irene and Harry a drink.

“Did you ever work with that guy who killed all those people?” Holly asked. “I forget his name; something about a Teddy Bear.”

Stone tried to keep a straight face. “I know the one you mean,” he said. “He got blown up in an airplane explosion.”

“Oh, yes,” Irene said. “Teddy Fay. Teddy worked with people all over the Agency; he was a technical expert. I knew him, but mostly ten or fifteen years ago.”

Harry chimed in. “What does a technical expert do?”

“All sorts of things: communications, documentation, weapons—you name it.”

“I would have liked to do something like that,” Harry said wistfully. “After you’ve been in the home improvement business for a few years, there aren’t any surprises; one kitchen or bathroom looks pretty much like all the others.”

“You make it sound boring, Harry,” Stone said. “Was it?”

“Well, not really. Once I was doing well enough to hire people it wasn’t so repetitive. After that I just went around and worked up estimates, then inspected the work. I like to think I had a reputation for quality.”

“That’s hard to come by these days,” Stone said. “I did most of the work on the renovation of my house, and every time I hired somebody else, I had to watch them like a hawk to make sure the work got done right.”

“You’re good with your hands, then?” Harry asked.

“You’re pretty good with your hands, too, Harry,” Irene said, leering at him.

Harry seemed embarrassed.

“My father was a carpenter and a cabinetmaker and a furniture builder, to his own designs,” Stone said. “I worked in his shop part-time as a kid.”

“You can learn a lot from the right man,” Harry said.

“He started out by slinging his tool kit over his shoulder and going around, door to door, in Greenwich Village, asking people if they had any odd jobs. He could fix anything. I still have some of the furniture he made.”

“I would have liked to know him,” Harry said. “I admire people like that.”

“Irene,” Genevieve said, “is it true that the CIA can listen in on just about anybody’s phone conversations and read their e-mail?”

“You’re thinking of the National Security Agency,” Irene said. “They’re the electronics wizards. Most of what the Agency does is just collect information, sort it and analyze it. Of course, there are actual spies, some of them in embassies around the world, pretending to be diplomats, others out on their own spying on people and cultivating sources in foreign governments and societies.”

“I would have liked to be a spy,” Genevieve said.

“Well, you’re beautiful enough,” Dino responded.

“What kind of law do you practice, Stone?” Harry asked.

“I’m of counsel to a large law firm in New York, but I work out of a home office.”

“Why is that?”

“I handle the stuff the firm doesn’t want to be seen to handle, a lot of it personal, for their clients.”

“That sounds as interesting as the CIA,” Irene said.

“Probably not. I had a cousin who was in the CIA, but I didn’t know that until after his death.”

“Who was that?” Irene asked.

“His name was Dick Stone.”

“Jesus, I knew Dick; everybody knew Dick. He had just been appointed deputy director for operations when he was killed. A lot of people who should know thought he was on track to be the next Director of Central Intelligence when Katharine Rule Lee retires, which she probably will do when her husband leaves office.”

“I didn’t know that,” Stone said.

“You must know Lance Cabot,” she said. “He led the investigation into Dick’s death.”

“Yes, we, ah, worked together on that. I used to be a homicide detective on the NYPD; Dino still is.”

“You were up in Maine, then?”

“Yes.”

“Then you probably met Ed Rails, who’s retired from the Agency.”

“I did.”

“How did you meet Lance?”

“He came to see me when he heard that I was Dick’s cousin, told me Dick was dead. I was also the executor of his will.”

“So you only met him recently, then.”

“Yes,” Stone lied, “last summer, for a couple of weeks.”

“Who’s Lance Cabot?” Harry asked.

“He’s just a guy at the Agency who wants Dick Stone’s job,” Irene said. “He might even get it.”

“I didn’t know that, either,” Stone lied again. He raised his glass. “Well, good luck to him.”

Irene did not raise her glass. “Fuck him,” she said.

11

T
he following afternoon, while the others were napping, Stone took a stroll down to the marina. The place had been expanded since his earlier visit; there were probably three dozen berths, as opposed to the previous dozen, but there was only one Hinckley Bermuda 40. He walked down the pontoon and looked her over.

Harry said he had changed the deck layout, and Stone saw that the halyard winches had been moved to the top of the coachroof, a sensible change, since it allowed sails to be hoisted from the cockpit, and two large electric winches had replaced the original equipment. A windvane self-steering system was attached to the stern, with its attendant lines, and both the headsail and main were roller reefing.

“Hello there,” a voice behind him said. Harry had appeared with a couple of shopping bags.

“Hello, Harry; I was just looking over your boat.”

“Come aboard, then,” Harry said. Yachtsmen were always anxious to show off their boats. Harry unlocked the hatch, set the shopping bags below and waved Stone down.

Stone climbed down the companionway ladder and looked around. He had never seen a more neatly kept vessel; the yacht was the very definition of “shipshape.” “I’m impressed,” he said.

“Thank you, Stone, I’ve done a lot of work on her.” He began showing Stone his stowage plan, his tool locker and his central heating system. Finally, they sat down, and Harry produced a pair of bloody marys.

“Thanks for the drink last night,” Harry said. “I’m sorry Irene got a little snockered; we had a drink before we left the house, and it was all on an empty stomach.”

“We enjoyed having you. It was interesting hearing about her work at the CIA.”

“Yeah, she’s gotten so she likes to talk about it, if she has a good audience. Funny, your cousin being employed there.”

“Yes; as I said, I didn’t even know that until he was dead. Our respective sides of the family didn’t talk much, but the summer I was eighteen, his folks invited me up to Dark Harbor, in Maine, to spend a few weeks. Dick and I got fairly close at that time, but I didn’t see him again until eight or nine years ago, when he took me out to dinner in New York. I thought he was working for the State Department. Then, all of a sudden, he sent me a retainer and his will and appointed me his executor. A few days later, he was dead, murdered.”

“And you never talked in all those years apart?”

“Just that one dinner.”

“What does your girlfriend do?”

“Ginny? She has a little flying school in Florida. We met when I bought an airplane in Vero Beach from Piper some years ago, and we’ve seen each other once in a while since then.”

“And Dino?”

“Dino’s a cop, a detective; we used to be partners when I was on the force. His girl, Genevieve, is an emergency room nurse at a hospital in New York.”

“You’re a mixed group.”

“I guess we are at that. Tell me, how is it you have enough power for those electric winches?”

“I put in larger batteries and a second alternator; I never did like grinding winches.”

“I’m with you there. Did you enjoy your solo time on the way down here?”

“I did, though I have to admit, I got a little horny.” He grinned. “I was glad to see Irene when I got here.”

“So you were close back in Virginia?”

“I wouldn’t say close; she seemed to work constantly and didn’t have a lot of free time, but we got together now and then.”

“Did she talk about her work in those days?”

“Not a peep. I didn’t even know what she did, until one of my other customers, her neighbor, told me.”

“How’d she end up here?”

“Well, when she retired she went to St. Barts, but she didn’t like it much. She likes it better here; less highfalutin and they speak English. Real estate prices are lower, too.”

“Did you do any of the renovation on her place?”

“No, I just got here a couple of days ago; she hired a local firm, and they did a pretty good job. I’m cleaning up their work here and there and doing a couple of little things for her.”

“I’m sure she’s glad to have you here. How long are you staying?”

“Oh, a few weeks, I guess; until the wanderlust bites again, or until Irene and I can’t stand each other anymore.”

“Were you ever married, Harry?”

“Nope; lifelong bachelor.”

“Me, too,” Stone said. “Not a bad life.”

“Not bad at all.”

They seemed to have run out of things to talk about. Stone glanced at his watch. “Well, I’d better get back to the cottage; the others are napping, but there was talk of an afternoon swim.”

“I hear that’s a nudie beach down there.”

“I can confirm that.”

“I’ve gotta have a look at that; Irene would probably like it, too. By the way, she’s looking forward to having you all for dinner; she’s cooking up a storm. I don’t think she knows all that many locals, so she’s glad of the company.”

“We’re looking forward, too,” Stone said. They shook hands, and Stone walked back to the cottage.

Holly came out of the bedroom, yawning. “Hey, where you been?”

“I took a walk down to the marina; saw Harry’s boat, and we had a nice chat. He pumped me a little, but not enough to be unseemly.”

“Did you pump him, too?”

“Not much; didn’t want to seem too curious.”

“Just as well.”

“Something interesting, though; Harry turns out to be a neat-freak. I’ve never seen a boat that well put together: a place for everything, and everything in its place.”

“You know, when Teddy got away from New York, we found the place he had used as a workshop. It was cleaned out, but I remember one thing: there was a lot of pegboard on the walls, where tools had been hanging, and he had painted the outline of every tool, so he’d know where to replace it after he’d used it. That’s being pretty neat.”