He was in no position to argue, so he stayed silent. Kelly was doing what he wanted so little reason existed to complain. He stared past the deck at the town on shore. A few people moved across the dock near the marina. Headlights passed back and forth on a street that paralleled shore, then turned inland illuminating buildings on either side.
The United States of America.
It had been a long time since he last visited.
“How do we get onto those highways and head south?” he asked. “Stealing a car could be a problem.”
“That’s why we’re going to do this the easy way and rent one. I’m a U.S. citizen with a Canadian driver’s license. It shouldn’t be a problem. Is anyone in America aware of you?”
He shook his head. “Not that I know of. Apparently, Moscow is watching, but they have no idea where we are now.”
He wondered about Anya and how she was doing. He still carried the mobile phone that matched hers and would try and make contact tonight.
“What about the SVR?” Kelly asked. “They obviously knew you were coming to me.”
Which made him wonder again about Belchenko. Had what the archivist said in the black bath been repeated to Moscow? “You’re right. They knew.”
“Then why haven’t they made contact until now?” Kelly asked.
“Because there was no reason, or maybe they simply did not know everything until now.”
“Do they know of Fool’s Mate?”
“It’s possible. Those old records I found, they could find, too. Other archivists could know what I was told. But you said you told no one of your success. No report was ever made. Was that true?”
Kelly nodded.
He still could not believe Belchenko had talked. “They have to be grasping in the dark, hoping you and I will lead them to the cache.”
Another look across the water. Eastport had a somber, eerie quality—inviting, tranquil, yet ominous.
And he wondered.
Was the SVR here?
Waiting?
* * *
Malone slowed the car as he and Cassiopeia entered Eastport, Maine. The town sat on Moose Island, connected to the mainland by a causeway. They’d kept watch from St. Andrews on the sloop as it dipped and rose across the swells, wind nudging it forward, the water giving way as it heeled over slightly to the pressure of its sail. Once it was no longer in sight they’d fled the Canadian side of the bay and driven south, entering the United States on U.S. 1, passing through a border station, then paralleling the St. Croix River even farther south. Cassiopeia had determined from her smartphone that Eastport would give them the farthest point east.
Then they’d caught a break.
The drone, which had kept the sailboat under surveillance, revealed that it was now anchored in the lower reaches of the bay just off Eastport.
All in all they’d made good time and kept up.
Eastport’s central downtown was small and eclectic, its main street lined with squatty wood buildings, some with black ironwork railings and decorative grilles. A Stars and Stripes on an eagle-topped pole blew stiff in the cold wind. The place seemed like one of those perfect weekend escapes, with Portland less than 250 miles south. Edwin Davis had just reported that all was quiet on the boat, its two occupants still aboard.
“How do they get into the country?” Cassiopeia asked.
“Believe it or not, up here this time of year it’s the honor system. Somewhere down near the docks will be a video telephone booth. You’re supposed to stand there so your image can be sent back to inspectors. Then you dial the phone inside and they ask you some questions. If it looks good you’re given permission to enter, if not you’re supposed to go back where you came from. The inspectors rely on the locals to police things for them and report problems.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“I’ve made that call myself a couple of times in other places. Guarding a 5,500 mile border is tough and expensive. I imagine Kelly knows how loose things are with Canada. After all, he came straight here.”
He eased the car to a stop in front of a bed-and-breakfast. “Zorin knows me, so I have to be scarce. But you’re a different story. We’ll let the drone do the seeing, until we need the personal touch. That’ll be you.”
She gave him a mock salute. “Yes, Captain. I’m ready to serve.”
He smiled. “I’ve missed that attitude.”
“Good thing.”
Her cell phone buzzed.
She answered on speaker.
“They’re leaving the boat in a dinghy,” Edwin Davis said.
“Is everything clear here? If anyone calls anything in, Border Patrol will squelch it.”
“All done. They should have an open-field run. I’m told we do have hidden cameras all over that dock. It’s a busy place in the summer.”
“Have you found out anything about Fool’s
Mate or zero amendment?”
“Oh, yes, and you’re not going to like either one.”
CHAPTER FIFTY
WASHINGTON, DC
8:05 A.M.
Stephanie left the White House and rode in a cab back to the Mandarin Oriental where she showered, changed clothes, and grabbed something to eat. She’d managed just a few hours of sleep, her mind reeling from what she’d read in the file Danny had provided.
The Soviet Union had been intently interested in the 20th Amendment to the Constitution. So intent that they’d even provided it with a nickname.
The zero amendment.
What that meant the old memo had not explained, but other memos in the file noted that references to the term appeared repeatedly in Soviet communiqués back in the late 1970s and into the 1980s, all linked directly to Yuri Andropov himself.
Then in 1984 references to the term vanished.
American intelligence paid close attention to when subject matters blossomed and wilted, as both events were significant. Analysts spent whole careers pondering why something started, then equally as much time on why it may have stopped. Linking subject matters was the Holy Grail of intelligence work and here the connection had been provided to Cotton when Vadim Belchenko, in his dying breaths, said “Fool’s Mate” and “zero amendment.” Stephanie needed to know more about the term Fool’s Mate, and knew exactly where to go.
Kristina Cox lived within sight of the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and St. Paul in the city and diocese of Washington, DC. Most people simply called it the National Cathedral, as most called Kristina, Kris. Her husband, Glenn, had been an Episcopal canon, a towering man with a booming voice. For thirty-one years he’d served the church, eventually rising to bishop of the DC diocese, working from the cathedral. But one sad Sunday he’d dropped dead at the pulpit from a heart attack.
In gratitude for his long service, a small house had been provided to Kris for life, a two-story cottage that sat back from the street, its cream-colored façade dominated by tall windows whose symmetry was marred only by an air-conditioning unit set into the bottom left one. No one had thought it strange that the wife of the Episcopal bishop of DC had also been a spy. In fact, no one had ever even questioned it, her professional and personal lives never mingling. That separation was one of the first things she’d learned from Kris Cox, and only once had Stephanie ever violated that rule.