Dark Harbor (Stone Barrington 12)

“How does it work?”

“We find out who gave the order, and after a while, we make something happen to him in such a way that doesn’t seem connected to the Stone murders.”

Stone noted the “we.” “And how do we make that happen?”

“Oh, somebody has an auto accident on an icy road, or maybe he has a few sips of a dioxin cocktail. Satisfaction comes slow in this game.”

Stone looked at his watch. “I’d better be going; I have to make some calls, and I still have quite a lot of work to do on Dick’s estate.”

“Tell you what, let’s play golf tomorrow morning—nine holes at, say, ten and then I’ll take you to lunch at the yacht club. Pick you up at Dick’s at nine-forty-five?”

“Sounds good,” Stone said. He shook hands with Rawls and went to his car. As he drove back up Ed Rawls’s drive, the gate was open again. Then, in his rearview mirror, he saw it close behind him.

Chapter 11

STONE DROVE BACK TO the house and called Lance’s cell phone. “Yes?”

“It’s Stone.”

“Everything all right?”

“So far. Tell me about Ed Rawls.”

There was silence for a moment, while Lance thought about it. “Oh, God,” he said. “Ed lives up there, doesn’t he? I’d forgotten.”

“Tell me about him.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Everything you’ve got time for.”

“All right. Ed was a second-generation guy; his father worked for Bill Donovan in the OSS during World War Two and was with Dulles when the Agency was created. Ed became a star in Operations; he initially made his name as a new agent in Viet Nam. He had a talent for recruiting, even people whose language he didn’t speak, but it didn’t take him long to learn the language. He ran teams of South Vietnamese into Laos and the North to gather intelligence, take and interrogate prisoners and destroy weapons stockpiles; he jumped out of airplanes into the jungle, got what he was after and walked home if a chopper couldn’t get to him without attracting too much attention..

“By the time the war was over, he was a near-legend, and by the time I met him, when I was in training, he was the actual thing. He was a great mentor, and everybody loved him, except the colleagues who had to compete with him.

“After the Farm, he was posted to Berlin and made a whole new name for himself then. He preceded Dick in running the London station, then he got caught in bed with somebody’s wife and got sent to Stockholm, which was a demotion. Ed never could keep his cock in his pants, and the cold winters didn’t slow him down.

“Unfortunately, one of his girls was a setup of the Soviets, and they took the usual embarrassing photographs. He was up against it, due to retire in a couple of years, and exposure would have gotten him fired, after his debacle in London. He began feeding them information, probably harmless stuff. Two of our people were designated to follow him to a possible meet with the Soviets, and they were both shot. Kate Rule, herself, found him out and got him sent to prison. He spent four or five years in the Atlanta Federal Prison, until the Agency got some backdoor information from a former source that seemed to clear him. ”He was also the source of a tip that put somebody we were looking for in a cottage on North Islesboro. That, apparently, tipped the balance, and the top echelon at Langley, including Kate Rule, recommended a presidential pardon. He also got a million-dollar reward and repaired to his ancestral home in Dark Harbor to amuse himself as best he could and await death. That’s about it.“

“Is he somebody I can trust?”

“Trust to what?”

“Tell me the truth.”

“Probably, especially if it’s in his interest to do so. Why do you ask?”

“Rawls told me he thinks Dick’s death was work related.”

A brief silence. “Did he give you any details?”

“He said he had some feelers out, and I’d have to be patient. He’s also afraid whoever killed Dick and his family may have a go at him as well, and he’s taken security precautions at his house. I wandered down his drive, exploring, and he trapped my car and drew down on me.”

“Well, assuming prison didn’t send Ed around the bend, there may be something to it. We all have a certain amount of paranoia trained into us, and Ed would be no exception. Did he seem to make sense to you?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’d take ham seriously and find out what, if anything, he has to offer. How could it hurt?”