He was as good as his word. He took his elderly car, drove sedately up to Washington, and visited his daughter at her apartment without announcement. As briefed, he kept the conversation to small talk and handed her the single sheet first. It said simply: “Keep talking naturally. Open the envelope and read it at your leisure. Then burn it and obey the instructions. Quinn.”

She nearly choked when she saw the words and realized Quinn meant her apartment was bugged. It was something she had done in the course of duty to others, but never expected for herself. She gazed into the worried eyes of her father, kept talking naturally, and took the proffered envelope. When he left to drive back to Rockcastle she escorted him to his car and gave him a long kiss.

The paper in the envelope was just as brief. At midnight she should stand next to the phone booths opposite Amtrak boarding platforms H and J in Union Station and wait. One phone would ring; it would be Quinn.

She took his call from a booth in St. Johnsbury exactly at midnight. He told her about Corsica, and London, and the phony letter he had sent her, convinced it would be redirected to the White House committee.

“But, Quinn,” she protested, “if Orsini really gave you nothing, it’s over, just as you said. Why pretend he talked when he didn’t?”

He told her about Petrosian, who even when he was down, with his opponents staring at the chessboard, could persuade them he had some master stroke in preparation and force them into error.

“I think they, whoever they are, will break cover because of that letter,” he said. “Despite what I said about not contacting you anymore, you’re still the only possible link if the police can’t find me. As the days pass they ought to get more and more frantic. I want you to keep your eyes and ears open. I’ll call you every second day, at midnight, on one of these numbers.”

It took six days.

“Quinn, do you know a man called David Weintraub?”

“Yes, I do.”

“He’s the Company, right?”

“Yeah, he’s the DDO. Why?”

“He asked to meet me. He said something’s breaking. Fast. He doesn’t understand it, thought you would.”

“You met at Langley?”

“No, he said that would be too exposed. We met by appointment in the back of a Company car at a spot near the Tidal Basin. We talked as we drove around.”

“Did he tell you what?”

“No. He said he didn’t feel he could trust anybody, not anymore. Only you. He wants to meet you—your terms, any time or place. Can you trust him. Quinn?”

Quinn thought. If David Weintraub was crooked, there was no hope for the human race anyway.

“Yes,” he said, “I do.” He gave her the time and place of the rendezvous.

Chapter 18

Sam Somerville arrived at Montpelier airport the following evening. She was accompanied by Duncan McCrea, the young CIA man who had first approached her with the Deputy Director of Operations’ request for a meeting with her.

They arrived on the PBA Beechcraft 1900 shuttle from Boston, rented an off-road Dodge Ram right at the airport, and checked into a motel on the outskirts of the state capital. Both had brought the warmest clothing Washington had to offer, at Quinn’s suggestion.

The DDO of the CIA, pleading a high-level planning meeting at Langley that he could not afford to miss, was due the next morning, well in time for the roadside rendezvous with Quinn.

He landed at 7:00 A.M. in a ten-s

eater executive jet whose logo Sam did not recognize. McCrea explained it was a Company communications plane, and that the charter company listed on its fuselage was a CIA front.

He greeted them briefly but cordially as he came down the steps of the jet onto the tarmac, dressed in heavy snow boots, thick trousers, and quilted parka. He carried his suitcase in his hand. He climbed straight into the back of the Ram and they set off. McCrea drove, Sam directing him from her road map.

Out of Montpelier they took Route 2, up through the small township of East Montpelier and onto the road for Plainfield. Just after Plainmont Cemetery, but before the gates of Goddard College, there is a place where the Winooski River leaves the roadside to make a sweep to the south. In this half-moon of land between the road and the river is a stand of tall trees, at that time of year silent and caked with snow. Among the trees stand several picnic tables provided for summer vacationers, and a pull-off and parking area for camper vehicles. This was where Quinn had said he would be at 8:00 A.M.

Sam saw him first. He emerged from behind a tree twenty yards away as the Ram crunched to a halt. Without waiting for her companions she jumped down, ran to him, and threw her arms ’round his neck.

“You all right, kid?”

“I’m fine. Oh, Quinn, thank God you’re safe.”

Tags: Frederick Forsyth Thriller
Source: readsnovelonline.net