Try Try Again (28 page)

One way or another, however, having a tail was a very bad
thing, even if no harm was intended. If Al-Ma‘raka wasn’t behind her follower /
detective – and if they found out she was being tailed, no matter by whom if it
wasn’t them – there would be nowhere to hide and she would soon go permanently
missing. She made plans to move out of her apartment soon, and to discontinue
the “Sally Netherton” identity with extreme prejudice.

Twelve days later, P.J. Portney informed his client Sally
Netherton didn’t seem to be employed, even though she lived in a pricy
apartment building. That he had found no connection between her and ConDyne,
although some of their work was highly classified and he hadn’t been able to
get to it. She didn’t seem to have any friends or anyone who might be in a
relationship with her on a regular basis, sexual or otherwise. As to habits,
she seemed to have none other than Starbucks and a local gourmet delicatessen.
And she kept to herself aside from occasional visits to the Hill and
Administration offices. She stayed in at night. She had no police record.

Marie Conning was somewhat comforted by learning Netherton
was such an ordinary person, but still annoyed that her husband was risking his
career, and what was worse, her own.

About the same time Haskin became aware she was being
tailed, Malcolm Chukash, having seen P.J. Portney’s e-flier with a picture of a
woman of interest to him, called Portney and asked him who this person was.

Portney responded by saying Chukash should tell Portney
everything he knew about the woman, and then they could discuss business.

Chukash said fuck that, I won’t tell you fucking anything
unless you give me some fucking info I can use. Portney responded by saying,
fuck yourself, you want my help, I want money up front
.

Malcolm Chukash called Hub Landon that evening, and informed
him another PI firm had been circulating a photo of the woman the Agonauts had
been referring to as ‘Stephanie Bloomberg,’ asking for an ID. Malcolm was
prepared to respond if Hub said OK. Hub said OK, reveal what you have to and get
what they know and get me a quote before you do that.”

More negotiations ensured, including a mutual exchange of insults
and information, which resulted in Chukash’s calling Hub and saying he needed twenty
thousand dollars to pay for information.

Hub called Jill and Liv and the three agreed to extract twenty
thousand dollars from Jill’s credit union account and send it to Portney via
Chukash.

Chukash sent Portney the agreed ten thousand dollars and
kept the rest as his fee.

Meanwhile, Portney called the burn-phone, saying a west
coast outfit knew something about Sally Netherton but they wanted money to say
anything more. Marie Conning said hell yes, pay what you have to. Portney made
up a large number, and Marie said WTF that is a very large number do you think
I’m made of fucking money, and Portney replied yes, I actually do think that.

Thirty thousand dollars arrived the next day at the office
of P.J. Portney, which he kept. Displaying some level of honesty, he and
Chukash did complete the information exchange and now both parties had new
information about Sally Netherton aka Stephanie Bloomberg.

P.J. Portney chortled. No one, he mused, had “chortled” in
many years; but making a profit of thirty grand for ten minutes’ work, forty
overall? – yeah, that was to chortle for.

Now, the known relevant facts and surmises as provided to
the Agonauts, as summarized in a conference call among the principals the next
day, were:

.. The woman’s name was Sally Netherton or Stephanie
Bloomberg or something else.

.. She had an apartment in Northwest D.C.

.. She was thought by Portney’s client to work for a major
defense contractor, probably ConDyne, but Portney had not verified that, especially
as ConDyne had refused to provide access to its employee roster.

.. She had been spotted at a Presidential event. (Marie had eliminated
her husband’s image from the photos, but the background was unmistakable to
anyone familiar with the White House.)

.. She had been very much interested in the webV show “Try
Try Again,” to the extent of speaking about the show with its producer and the
tech group responsible for the final cut, and making certain statements that
were very probably untrue.

.. She had attended the trial of Charley Dukes for the
murder of Ezra Barnes.

P.J. Portney left a message on the burn-phone the next day
and related what he had found out from the Coast. His feeling, he summarized to
Marie Conning’s electronic surrogate, was that Sally Netherton might be engaged
in questionable activities and should not be trusted. They had not yet observed
any of her sexual activities, but they were watching for any such with interest.

Marie studied the information she’d received; didn’t amount
to much, she thought. Nothing she could confront her husband with except Sally
Netherton used a pseudonym somewhere in the West. But Tom might have known that
already, or wouldn’t care.

It occurred to Marie she hadn’t thought as far ahead as she
should have. Tell Tom? But then she’d have to admit she’d been snooping, had
even hired an investigator. But if she didn’t tell him, who knew what kind of
trouble Netherton could get him into? Hard to say. Her attention drifted from
sex, which Netherton apparently did not believe in except with Marie’s husband,
to undue influence, perhaps secret payoffs.

Anyway, Netherton didn’t seem to be much of a threat to her
marriage; Marie might just have to tolerate Tom’s apparent interest in her. She
decided to sleep on the problem. Once again, Tom Conning was elsewhere that
night. With
Her
, Marie thought.

But of course that wasn’t the case. If all of Washington’s
messes were about sex, little actual harm would have been done. There was a
moral here, as a webV commentator in Grantwood, Pennsylvania mused some time
later.

The next morning, Marie called P.J. Portney and told him to
stop work on her assignment and destroy all evidence of same. Portney sent a
note to Malcom Chukash that “Client X” had dismissed them, and so there was no
longer an opportunity or need to share information.

JILL

That night, Hub and Liv and Jill had a long-distance
discussion. What, if anything, should be done now?

“We still don’t have proof that Stephanie / Sally has broken
any laws,” said Liv. She could be an industrial spy, or an agent of a friendly
government – or a spy for our side.”

“So what do we do now?” asked Hub. “I think we should turn
our information over to the FBI, in case they might have an interest in her now
or later, and just get on with our lives.”

“You know they won’t do anything,” said Jill, “just rumors.”

“Probably not,” Hub acknowledged.

“Look,” Jill said. “We have her linked to Charley Dukes –
attending his trial, I mean – and linked to President Conning – being at one of
his public events.”

“What are you getting at? said Hub. “Do you think she was
behind the Barnes assassination?”

“Could be,” Jill said. “I can’t think of any other way to
put those two appearances together.”

“So are you saying she had Barnes killed so Conning could be
re-elected to the Senate? Why?”

“Perhaps she does work for a big government contractor and
has Conning in her pocket. She got rid of Barnes so her influence over Conning
would still be valuable.”

“For that to work,” Hub said, “she’d have to be blackmailing
Conning.”

“Could know something from his past.”

“Not likely. You know how Presidential candidates are vetted
by the press. It’s hard to believe that any fatal flaw hasn’t been revealed by
now.”

The two were silent for a moment. Then Hub spoke.

“One thing,” he said, “really a last straw. I want to find
out who hired that other PI firm to check up on our suspect. Whatever his or
her connection to Bloomberg, I’d like to know about it.”

“Think they’ll tell you?”

“Not directly, but their client has dismissed them; if we
hire Portney to tail this former client and report on him or her to us, Portney
wouldn’t be directly breaching any business ethics, because they wouldn’t be
revealing any information they were told in confidence.”

Jill thought she could almost hear Liv frowning deeply over
the phone, but neither said anything.

“OK!” said Hub. “I’ll call Malcolm Chukash tomorrow and work
through him. Jill, get your checkbook ready. What we’re asking won’t come
cheap.”

Coldly, Jill said “Checkbooks don’t exist anymore, but I get
what you mean. Perhaps my days of having to deal with being rich are about to
end.”

Later that evening, Hub talked it over with Malcolm, who
told Hub his idea was too damn complicated: Malcolm would just offer Portney a
bribe to rat out his client. Hub asked Malcolm if Portney would go for it.
Malcolm said, “I would.” That statement did not leave Hub with an easy feeling.

However, when Malcolm called Portney with the offer, Portney
told him that the client was unknown, had never given Portney her name and had
been careful not to be traceable.

“Her?”

“Yeah, she was a her. Pretty sure. Ya get a feeling for this
shit. And sounded like it on the phone.”

“Interesting. But I have an idea.” He continued talking.

The next day, Malcolm called Hub and told him Portney was
indeed willing to earn a very large retainer, especially since his client had
just fired him, but the sad fact was his client’s identity was still unknown.
Calls from a burn phone, never met in person, anonymous money transfers, and so
on.

Hub said, “Lean on him, Malcolm.”

“Already did,” said Malcolm. “And anticipating your
authorization, I floated the idea of a tail. Portney agreed to set up a kind of
sting so they could ID their client, or at least grab a photo. They’d tell her
that too bad she’d cancelled their agreement because just then vital new
information had come to light. She needed to meet Portney on a certain Washington
street corner at a certain time, very urgent, new info, too risky to say
anything on the phone, very hush-hush national security and assorted other
bullshit.”

“And?”

“Tomorrow, one p.m. their time. Portney won’t show his face,
of course, but he’ll have someone across the street from the meeting place with
a camera. If the client shows, he’ll get some pix and then so will we, and
he’ll tail her, too. If she doesn’t show, well, we just blew some more money.”

Hub was glad, at that moment, that Jill hadn’t been on the
call.

At 10:37 L.A. time, Hub’s phone hummed, and displayed
“Malcolm.” “Hi, Malcolm,” Hub said. “Any news.”

“Hey, Hub, this is a real Hollywood cliché, but are you
sitting down?”

Hub, annoyed, didn’t respond. Hollywood clichés? How about
Washington D.C. clichés? That’s where people ought to sit down more often.

After a second, Malcolm continued. “I just got a call from Portney.
Their ex-client showed, right on time. She was standing on that damn corner for
a good ten minutes, looking around constantly.”

“She wouldn’t make a very good spook,” Hub said.

“You’re telling me,” said Malcolm. “Anyway, Portney’s guy
got a few sneak photos.”

“And tailed her when she left?”

“Nope,” said Malcolm. “No need to. Dark glasses, a hood for
the late spring chill, not much face showing, but what our guy was pretty sure
of at the time turned out to be true. Looking at all our photos, the client was
clearly Marie Conning.”

“The President’s wife?”

“You bet.”

“Didn’t she have an army of Secret Service around?”

“A couple. Oh they were there, standing a little back and
trying not to look like who they were. But in any case, after ten minutes she
and the agents left.”

“Wow,” said Hub.

“Sitting now?” asked Malcolm.

That night, Jill and Liv and Hub had a long conference call.
Hub caught them up with the news.

“So where are we now and what do we do?” asked Jill.

“Marie Conning obviously suspects our ‘Stephanie Bloomberg’
of something,” said Hub, “and the only reason she’d care enough to hire a PI
instead of just informing the Feds or the local cops is if that ‘something’ directly
affected the President, or her relationship with him.”

“An affair?”

“That may be the First Lady’s concern; but given what we
know or suspect about what Bloomberg was up to here in L.A., I doubt if sex was
the main event. And I doubt Bloomberg’s been screwing Conning anyway – too big
a risk to her real plan, whatever it was, and a danger for the President.”

“Bloomberg, or Netherton, or whoever she is, knows something.”

“Obviously. More likely, she’s done something herself.”

There was a moment of quiet.

Liv said, “Are you thinking of…”

“Yeah,” said Hub. “Here’s what I think: Bloomberg was behind
the murder of Ezra Barnes, using ‘George’ as her point man, who in turn used
Charley Dukes. She had Barnes killed so Thomas Conning would be sure to be
re-elected to the Senate, and be in position to win the White House two years
later.”

Jill said, “Why would she.,,”

“It has to be something very big, considering all that time and
effort and risk and cost, and especially all the planning and years-long patience,”
Hub said.

“Who?” Liv asked.

Hub thought for a moment. “A chancy two-year plot before it
even begins to pay off that could blow up and ruin everybody? Doesn’t sound
like Wall Street, or a defense contractor, or the U.S. military, or any
military for that matter. Perhaps a foreign government. Russia, for example, or
China. I can’t think who else it could be. At least the Chinese would have the
patience to pull something like this off.”

Jill said, “What do you suppose they were hoping to get out
of it? And what kind of pressure could they put on Conning?”