The Payback. Mike Lawson

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      Emma and Christine were sitting in white wicker chairs on Emma’s patio drinking mimosas and reading the morning papers. They were a portrait of domestic contentment. Beyond the patio was Emma’s English garden. DeMarco knew it was an English garden because Emma had told him so, and an English garden, as far as he could tell, was one in which the gardener planted a thousand long-stemmed flowers in no discernible pattern, all clustered together.

      Emma was wearing white linen pants and a blouse that DeMarco thought of as Mexican – an off-the-shoulder number embroidered with small red-and-orange flowers. Christine, a thirty-something blonde who played cello for the National Symphony, wore a tank top and shorts. Christine had the most beautiful legs that DeMarco had ever seen, but since Christine was Emma’s lover he made a point of not staring at them. In fact, his eyeballs were getting cramps from the strain of not staring.

      Emma was tall and slim. She had regal features and short hair that was either gray or blond, depending on the light. She was at least ten years older than DeMarco but in much better condition. She looked over the top of her newspaper as DeMarco approached. Her eyes were the color of the water in a Norwegian fjord – and usually just as warm. ‘Well, you’re a mess, Joseph,’ she said when she saw the condition of his clothes. ‘What on earth have you been doing?’

      ‘Golfing with the leaders of the free world,’ DeMarco said.

      ‘Yes, that makes sense,’ Emma said. ‘Would you like something to drink? Mimosa, perhaps?’

      ‘Orange juice would be great. No bubbly.’

      DeMarco took a seat next to Emma at the patio table, a seat where Emma blocked his view of Christine’s legs. He thought this seating arrangement most prudent. He and Christine exchanged how-are-yous, then Christine went back to reading her paper, ignoring DeMarco as she usually did. Maybe if he played an oboe she’d find him more interesting.

      ‘What do you know about the navy, Emma?’ DeMarco asked.

      ‘A lot, most of which I’d just as soon forget,’ Emma said.

      DeMarco had known this before he asked the question. Although she never discussed it, Emma had worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency and she had worked at a level where the word ‘classified’ didn’t come close to defining the degree of secrecy that had applied to her activities. She claimed to have retired from the agency a few years ago, but DeMarco wasn’t certain that this was really the case. Emma was the most enigmatic person he’d ever encountered – and she delighted in being so.

      ‘How ’bout navy shipyards?’ DeMarco asked.

      ‘A little,’ Emma said. ‘Now would you like to tell me why you’re asking silly questions?’

      DeMarco told her about Frank Hathaway’s problem and asked her a few questions about shipyards and the people who worked in them.

      ‘I didn’t know the navy had its own shipyards,’ DeMarco said.

      ‘The navy operates four major shipyards in this country,’ Emma said in her most pedantic tone. ‘Most of the employees are civil service and their primary function is to overhaul and refuel nuclear-powered warships.’

      ‘Well I’ll be damned,’ DeMarco said.

      ‘Most assuredly,’ Emma muttered and poured another mimosa for herself and Christine. These girls were going to have a pretty good buzz on by lunchtime, DeMarco was thinking.

      ‘Why’s Mahoney loaning you to Hathaway for this thing anyway?’ Emma asked as she handed Christine a glass.

      ‘I dunno,’ DeMarco said. ‘He plays golf with the guy; maybe they’re pals. But more than likely he wants something out of the navy for his district and figures doing Hathaway a favor can’t hurt. With Mahoney, you never know. A man who drinks beer at nine in the morning is hard to predict.’

      ‘Humph,’ Emma said, the sound reflecting her opinion of Mahoney. ‘What shipyard does this engineer work at, by the way? The one in Norfolk?’

      ‘No,’ DeMarco said. ‘One out in СКАЧАТЬ