The prodigal spy

“I’m serious. If they start tailing us, it’s like handing them the list. You know that.”

Nick nodded. “They have to find us first. Anyway, they’re not watching now. You want to take Mother Brown?”

Ruth Silberstein went to the movies. While Molly was parked in Chevy Chase, waiting for Brown, Nick trailed the Volkswagen to a suburban shopping mall. Her friend, a woman waiting at the box office, handed her a ticket and began a conversation that would last off and on through the show and into dinner afterward. They both chose the chef’s salad. Ruth drank several cups of coffee, her friend shared an envelope of snapshots-relatives or an office party, Nick guessed, when he passed by the table to look-and Ruth picked up a pint of ice cream on her way home. Then he saw the blue glow of the television set upstairs, the bathroom light as she got ready for bed, a small reading lamp for twenty minutes, and darkness. Nothing. It occurred to Nick as he sat smoking in the car that the only exciting thing about being a spy was the end, the final adrenalin jolt of exposure.

John Brown hadn’t returned.

“Just an evening with Mom,” Molly said, weary.

“One of them’s the connection,” Nick said. “It’ll happen.”

“I hope so. Who’s on tomorrow?”

“Try Irina again. I’ll do the Navy. Then I think I’ll take the Bureau’s advice and go see Welles.”

“Why?” Molly said, looking up.

“I want to know how it started, why she talked to him. It’s important.”

“Is it?” Molly said quietly, watching him.

“Silver didn’t start this. He just did what he had to do. Once it did. I want to know who started it all.”

“Who did it to you, you mean.” Her voice still quiet.

“Not just to me,” he said quickly, disconcerted. To all of us.

Molly started to say something, then backed off. Instead she went over to the mirror and started brushing out her hair.

“What makes you think Welles will talk to you?” she said. “You’re the last person he’d want to see.”

“I’ll use Larry’s name,” Nick said, thinking of Lutece. “It’s a real door-opener.”

Chapter 18

He drive to Anacostia the next morning was as uneventful as before, a careful swing southeast through the back streets, toward the sun and the crisp sentries’ uniforms. When the black officer’s car slid through the gates, barely pausing for its badge check, it seemed to melt into the lot in the slow motion of a dream. Navy whites. A few official cars. What did he do here? Nick watched his dark face move toward the building, unhurried. He decided to take a chance on the guard.

“That guy who just came in? I think he put a dent on my car.”

“Lieutenant Williams?” the guard said, amazed.

“I guess. How do I get in touch with him?”

“You can’t. Not without a pass.”

“You have an extension? I just want to call, for the insurance.”

The guard checked a clipboard. “5207,” he said. “Big dent?”

“No, just a scratch. Thanks.”

Nick pulled away, the guard not even bothering to look at the car, turning his face to the sun. The whole base was dozing, far away from the war.

The Senate Office Building, on the other hand, bristled like a command post, phones ringing, secretaries’ heels clicking along the halls, busy with itself. Nick dialed the Anacostia number from a pay phone in the lobby. A girl’s voice. “Naval intelligence.” Nick put the receiver back, nodding to himself, and went to find Welles’s office.

There were two secretaries, both with beehive hairdos, both wrapped in sweaters against the air conditioning. A leather couch, piled with unopened mail, the walls filled with photographs of Welles shaking hands with everybody in the world. A portrait of Nixon. A framed campaign poster. Peace With Honor. Nick heard voices coming from the inside office, laughter.

Now that he was here, he felt a quiet panic at the ordinariness of it all, that the demon swirling through years of his imaginative life would be reduced to a man making jokes in an office, harmless, like a funhouse ride after the doors open. Welles belonged in the newsreel, gavel banging, cowing them into silence, always oversize, his malevolence so large it needed an expanse of screen or it would become invisible, too large to be seen in a small room with posters and crank mail. His father had said that when you shook hands with Stalin, the act itself was a violation of scale, allowing you to believe he was just a man.

The inner door swung open. No longer screen-size but still large, grown fat, his bulk filling the door frame. Everything the same, the straight nose and square face softened by the years of extra flesh. He was wearing a bow tie and red-white-and-blue suspenders, sweating a little in the cool room. His arms were draped around a middle-aged couple whose faces had the pleased look of pilgrims granted an audience. When he saw Nick, his smile froze for a second, then spread back across his face.