Mexico Way, page 19
He was also conscious that to proceed without any paperwork could generate infinite complications. He therefore filed a standard request to headquarters for "provisional operational approval" for recruitment. Under this low-key procedure, he was not obliged to spell out specific details. He commented only that the proposed recruitment would assist the station in "improving coverage of business circles in northern Mexico."
Since thousands of similar requests flowed into the Mausoleum from stations around the world every year, Kreeger did not expect any adverse fallout.
2
Linda Ronstadt, singing a charro ballad in flawless Spanish, flowed from the Kreegers' hi-fi. The room contained a mixed group of diplomats and Mexican officials, all accompanied by their wives. The occasion was Jim and Karla's wedding anniversary.
“How long has it been?" Nigel Yarrow, the Kreegers' friend from the British Embassy, asked Karla.
“Twenty-three years."
“Good God! You must have been a child bride!"
“Come off it, Nigel. I'm heading for the Big Five."
“I brought you a present. I'm sorry about the wrapping. Standard Yarrow issue."
She took the gift. It was a book, still in the store's paper bag. Karla looked at the title: Coping with Difficult People.
She glanced at her husband, who was methodically working the crowd.
“I think you're a saint," said Yarrow, pecking her cheek.
“I think you're right."
“Hello, here's Fausto. You are honored. He's brought his wife."
Karla glanced over toward the door. Indeed, there stood Fausto, resplendent in a violet Gucci tie, with a tiny, doll-like woman who might have stepped straight out of a Velazquez portrait.
Karla greeted Gabriela García as an old friend. Fausto's abrazos were so ardent Karla felt her ribs creak. He thrust packages into her arms, boxes wrapped in gold paper, and tied with red velvet ribbons. Karla added them to the pile of gifts that was rising from an old blanket chest by the door. In the swirl of the party, she forgot about the packages until the last guests had left and she went to inspect the loot.
Angie Yarrow had brought her a big box of Bendick's bittermints, for which Karla had developed a passion in London.
“You can have the book," she told Kreeger. “I'm putting these in the refrigerator, and I'm keeping track of every one."
Kreeger was not listening. Instead, he was brooding over something Fausto had whispered to him, information that earlier that day an American citizen using a passport in the name of Cantwell had checked into the Maria Cristina, a discreet hotel on the Calle Lerma, a short jog from the Embassy. Kreeger was debating whether to instruct Eddie O'Brien to assign a surveillance team, or to go over and confront Colgate in person. He was leaning toward the latter idea—he had a lot of unfinished business with Art Colgate.
Karla tore open another package, and gasped.
She tripped out into the hall, and Kreeger followed. He found her admiring herself in the mirror. She was holding a diamond and emerald necklace against her throat.
"Look, Jim. It's magnificent."
Kreeger did not need to look at the card. Only one of their guests handed out presents like that. Kreeger was no expert on jewelry, but he guessed that the necklace must be worth at least fifteen thousand dollars.
Karla asked him to help her with the clasp.
"Sorry," Kreeger said firmly. "It's beautiful, but it's going back. You know the rules."
"I know. But let's pretend, just for one night."
Kreeger sighed and fixed the catch. He had to give Fausto credit for trying. One day, a man like Kreeger—or his wife—might forget to return one of Fausto's gifts. Kreeger wondered if that had happened with any of the previous Station Chiefs.
"Fausto didn't forget you," said Karla. "You got two boxes."
He took them from her and tore off the paper. The first offering was vintage Fausto: a diamond-encrusted money clip. Kreeger could picture the chief of SIN handing them out to his favored lieutenants like Halloween candy. The second gift was more personal: a gold-plated Colt .45. It was like the one El Loco Quintero had been carrying that night at the Fantasma Club. Maybe it was the same one. Quite a souvenir.
Kreeger felt the beginnings of temptation, but resisted, shoving the gun back into the box. "Come on," he said to his wife, holding out his hand. "Showtime is over."
When Kreeger got into the office the following morning, his mind was fully focused on Art Colgate and his possible reasons for being in the Mexican capital. When Kreeger saw Maury Atthowe loitering by the water cooler in the hall, he was reminded that long before coming to work as deputy in the Mexico office, Atthowe had served under Colgate in the Saigon Station.
"In my office," Kreeger greeted him.
Atthowe trailed after him through the outer office, where Peggy was sifting mail.
Kreeger remembered Fausto's gifts. He dug into his briefcase and retrieved the packages, which he set on Peggy's desk.
His secretary inspected the fancy wrapping. "Gee, boss, you remembered my birthday. Only it was last month."
"Sorry. Get hold of George for me, will you, and have him walk this stuff over to Fausto's office before someone reports that I'm on the take."
Maury Atthowe fiddled with the knot of his bow tie.
Inside Kreeger's room, Atthowe arranged himself in a club chair that did not quite face Kreeger's desk.
Kreeger decided to dispense with formalities. "Did you know that Art Colgate's in town?" he demanded.
Maury steepled his fingers, apparently deliberating on the pros and cons of giving a straight answer. He finally said, "We had dinner last night. At the Hacienda de los Morales."
"Nice. Let me guess who was paying."
"Art is on assignment for the Foreign Intelligence Board," Maury sniffed.
"Really? I'm impressed. Especially by the acronym. FIB." It was almost as good as GAS, the initials of Colgate's Arlington-based consultancy firm. The committee that had preceded FIB was the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, or PFIAB. It had done some useful work in second-guessing the intelligence community— which was why it was closed down. FIB, by Kreeger's observation, was one of Admiral Enright's many fiefdoms, which suggested that whatever Colgate was up to, he had a backer in the National Security Adviser's corner of the West Wing.
"Tell me something, Maury. What do you know about Safari?"
"As in clothes, or big game hunts?"
The silly riposte had come too easily. Kreeger's instinct told him that Atthowe must have been briefed by Colgate, at least up to a point. Maybe that would explain some of the curious leaks of station material that kept surfacing in the American media.
"You and Art are asshole buddies, aren't you?" Kreeger pressed his assault. "What are you giving him?"
"I don't understand that question."
"What has Art promised you? Did he tell you he'd get you my job?"
From the rigid stare Maury Atthowe trained on the scruffy car park behind the Embassy, Kreeger guessed he was close to the mark.
He stood up and interposed his bulk between Maury and his view.
"If you're keeping something from me," Kreeger warned, "I'm gonna put your ass in a sling."
"I find your tone both unnecessary and offensive."
"Thank you. I'm going to ask you one more time. I want you to tell me what the fuck Colgate is doing on my turf. For Chrissake, he doesn't even talk enough Spanish to order ham and eggs."
Maury cleared his throat. "I'm not sure I can comment. This is being very tightly held."
"Don't give me that crap!"
"Well, let's say it's all a type of Team B exercise. I've cautioned you before on this. There is a measure of—uh
—dissatisfaction at the top with reporting from this Station."
"You miserable prick!" Kreeger exploded. "I guess I'll just have to screw it out of Colgate myself."
Kreeger grabbed his coat and headed for the door. As he passed through his secretary's room, Peggy was on the phone, apparently talking to George Camacho, the liaison man, about Fausto's gifts.
He was walking briskly down Calle Lerma, toward the Maria Cristina hotel, when Peggy went to the bathroom. When she returned, she noticed that the packages were gone, which surprised her a little, since George had said he would come up at lunchtime. She assumed that George's schedule had changed.
When George dropped by the office at one-thirty, both Peggy and her boss were out. Not finding the packages, George concluded that Kreeger had decided to take care of the errand himself.
3
Kreeger found Colgate breakfasting alone in the hotel! dining room. Wordlessly, the Station Chief lowered his> bulk into the chair on the other side of the table. Looking; up from his paper, Colgate seemed nonplussed for only ai moment.
Then he turned on a smile. "Jim. What a pleasant surprise. It's been a long time. How's your lovely lady?"
"Fine."
"Karla's a stand-up girl. Always was. How about the kids? Must be college age by now."
Kreeger was about to say that he was not making a social call, when he thought of an easier way to end Colgate's stream of sham-intimate comments.
"How's your boy?" he said.
Colgate looked vacant.
"I asked about your boy."
Colgate fussed with his tie. "He's a vegetable," he said with sudden viciousness, and mumbled something about a fancy clinic and useless treatments that cost an arm and a leg.
"I'm sorry," said Kreeger, somewhat chastened.
"It's the rest of the family that suffers. In a case like that, the kid ought to be put down."
"You haven't changed much, Art. You never did want to take responsibility for defects."
Colgate did not know how to take this. He started talking about the money he was making, his rolling acres in Virginia.
"I'm happy for you," said Kreeger. "Who takes care of the manse?"
"There's a small staff. Viets, mostly."
"No lady of the manor?"
"Nothing permanent. You know what old soldiers say. It's the third match gets you killed."
You bastard, Kreeger thought. You had your first wife killed. You drove the second one to booze and drugs.
"You must get lonely, walking those empty halls."
"Oh, there's plenty of action for them that want it. We throw parties like you wouldn't believe."
"So what are you doing in Mexico?"
"Oh, just a bread-and-butter job," Colgate said vaguely. "Standard country risk assessment. Nice binding. You know the drill." it "Who's paying?"
" "A Fortune 500 company."
"Maury Atthowe said you're doing something for FIB."
"That too. Mostly because it impresses the hell out of a a button-down business type. Do you mind if I pick your brains?"
"Be my guest."
Colgate seemed to be well briefed. Kreeger quickly realized from the series of questions on both rightists and leftists in Mexico that the visitor was trying to feel out the shape and extent of CIA coverage of the local opposition.
Kreeger played him along, diverting Colgate with a colorful account of peasant uprisings in the state of Guerrero, embarrassingly close to the lush resort town of Acapulco. Kreeger gave names and places. He talked about a dirt-poor village on a deforested mountain where the inhabitants stitched together soccer balls for a living. They had seized the municipal hall, burned down the PRI headquarters, and held off an assault by armed police, all in Miliano's name. Colgate jotted down notes. Kreeger did not inform him that he could have read a fuller account in the Houston Chronicle.
Colgate gave Kreeger a sly, patently false smile. "I guess you know Fausto García pretty well."
"I wouldn't call Fausto a personal friend."
"We got a handle on him, right?"
"I'm not going to answer a question like that," Kreeger snapped.
"Come on, Jim. We're both old hands. So when did we recruit Fausto? About the same time as Noriega?"
"Gail Armstrong's played that line already. On TV. It's getting tired."
"Okay, I won't push." Colgate raised his hands, palms outward. "Let me try a hypothetical. Mexico blows, U.S. lives are at risk, and you're asked to support a viable alternative. What do you do?"
"I don't deal in hypothetical. But it sounds to me like your client is interested in a damn sight more than assembling a cheaper widget." Kreeger added carefully, "You seem to be embarked on quite a safari."
At the mention of the code word, Colgate froze for an instant.
Kreeger gave no indication that he had used it as more than a figure of speech, and Colgate made a brisk recovery. He gulped the last of his coffee and said something about a business meeting downtown.
A question bubbled up in Kreeger's mind. He gave it voice, though part of himself told him not to. "Art. Do you ever think of Val?"
Colgate's eyes went vacant, as if the tenant of the premises behind them had suddenly walked out.
Colgate finally said, "No. Do you?"
"I think of Val a lot. She was one of my first teachers, after I joined the Agency. Did you know that? You know what she told me? She said, unless good people stay on in the Agency—whatever pain it costs them—the bastards take over. She was right, don't you think?"
Colgate's eyes did not change. He opened his mouth and made a sound like a man trying to gargle noiselessly before leaving the room.
FIFTEEN
□ □ □
1
"I don't buy it," said Paul Milnekoff, the CIA's Deputy Director for Operations. The chief of the clandestine service was a gaunt, immensely tall man, who walked with a stoop, as if reluctant to impose his height on others. He was also totally bald, as a result of chemotherapy after a successful cancer operation.
"I've known Jim Kreeger since he joined the Agency," Milnekoff continued. "He's one of the most dedicated officers I have ever known. I don't believe he's done anything in his whole damn life for personal gain. Why would he risk blowing his career for that shit?" The DDO gestured at the objects on Director Wagoner's desk: a diamond-and-emerald necklace; a stunningly vulgar money clip, studded with diamonds; and a gold-plated .45.
"This shit, as you call it," Director Wagoner said, "is worth over twenty thousand dollars. We had it appraised."
"So it's expensive shit. It still stinks. If Kreeger was into smuggling jewelry out of Mexico, you can bet your ass he'd do it without leaving any fingerprints. This is a set-up, and you know it. The only question is, who's trying to frame Jim Kreeger?"
"And why?" the Inspector General chimed in. The IG was a Yalie, a New England patrician whose clothes never looked newly bought. He was generally respected in the Agency, even among fieldmen, because he was never intimidated by higher authority, and had been awarded a secret medal for conducting a successful exfiltration from China.
The packages had arrived in the pouch from Mexico Station. The pouch had been handled according to standard procedure, its manifest signed by Kreeger, with no reference to any personal effects. The pouch had left Mexico with the diplomatic bag, to conceal the CIA origin. It had been collected from the State Department mail room by a CIA courier who brought it out to Langley, where it had been opened at the Mexico desk. The problematic items had been accompanied by a typewritten note: "To be held for COS."
The use of the CIA pouch for smuggling was a very serious offense.
"Kreeger just isn't dumb enough to do something like this," the DDO insisted. "Even if he were corrupt, which he's not."
"I am inclined to the same view," said the IG, "but I think we are constrained to consider another scenario."
The Director was following this with keen attention. "Which is?"
"Let us assume, as a working hypothesis, that someone is trying to frame Mr. Kreeger. I would presume that person to be one of his colleagues at Mexico Station."
There was no dissent.
"Unless this person is deficient in intellect," the IG continued, "we must further presume that he—or she— will have anticipated the reasoning process we have followed thus far."
"Then why do it?" Paul Milnekoff demanded. "Why do it, if it's bound to be treated as a frame-up?"
"It is possible that whoever planted this—evidence —was trying to draw our attention to a problem. I believe the word for such a person is whistle-blower." The IG said this with evident distaste.
"That's a damn good point," the Director broke in. "Where did these items come from, anyhow?" He toyed with the Colt. 'There are a helluva lot of questions we need answered."
Milnekoff squinted at the IG. "Blowing the whistle on what?"
"That's what we're going to find out!" exclaimed the Director. "Leland, I want you to put your best people on this."
"While Jim's away from the Station?" the DDO croaked, in disbelief. He ran his hand over his bald pate. It occurred to him that there was a simpler, and more disturbing reason why Kreeger might have been set up in such an obvious way: that whoever did it believed that the Director would accept the evidence at face value, because he wanted Kreeger out.
2
The first person at Mexico Station to hear from the IG's chief investigator was Maury Atthowe. He arrived at Atthowe's home unannounced, and explained that, for obvious reasons—"morale in our outfit, not to mention the locals"—the noise had to be kept down. Was Mr. Atthowe aware, strictly off the record, of any improper dealings between his station chief and foreign nationals? Maury Atthowe kept the investigator scribbling in a shorthand notebook for three hours.
The next day, the same investigator intercepted Lois Compton, as she was on her way to a coffee break in the VIPS restaurant on the far side of the Paseo de la Reforma from the Embassy.
"Do I know you?" Lois said coolly, taking in the button-down shirt, the penny loafers, the tortoiseshell glasses.
He gave her his card.
"Your last name seems to be Esq," she observed.
