Unofficial and Deniable. John Davis Gordon

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ because of her access to the media and because of her influential social connections, particularly in New York and Boston.

      CAMs: Her sexual appetite generally can be portrayed as promiscuous – father is high-profile Catholic and subject could possibly be prevailed upon to spare him embarrassment. Best CAM is probably evoking scandal by planting evidence of criminal activity such as drug-dealing, paedophilia, pornography, shoplifting …

      ‘Jesus!’

      Harker had tossed the report aside. Jesus – ‘CAMs’, Character Assassination Methods. Christ, did he really have to soil his hands with this sort of thing? Did South Africa’s military defence really require spending taxpayers’ money on an investigator to search back into the woman’s girlhood to find possible sexual peccadilloes? It would be laughable if it wasn’t so awful. And her sex life looked pretty average – could he really be expected to plant evidence of criminal activity on her? Ruin her life with a smear campaign because she organized protest rallies against apartheid? No way would he obey such an order.

      And there was another reason for his truculence: although he didn’t admit it to himself, Harker felt possessive towards Josephine Valentine. Goddammit – he had saved her life!

      Harker turned back to the large colour photographs of her taken with a telephoto lens when she was on the tennis court: and, Lord, she was beautiful. There were about a dozen shots of her in a variety of poses, bending, stretching, swiping, jumping, volleying, her blonde hair in a long pony-tail whipping dramatically around her face, her eyes flashing. Look at those long golden legs, look at that glorious ass, look at that bust …

      He wondered where she was now. What wars were there, apart from the Angolan conflict? Plenty – Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Middle East, not to mention Northern Ireland, Cyprus, Tibet, Pakistan, Burma, Indonesia. He could easily find out her whereabouts by putting some of his salesmen on to making discreet enquiries. He could telephone her magazine publishers and ask. And she was a member of the New York Yacht Club – Harker had joined when he first arrived a year ago, maybe he would meet her there one day …

      And then, that very week, Felix Dupont telephoned him on the scrambled line and said: ‘I see your girlfriend’s back in town soon.’

      ‘Which girlfriend?’ Harker really did not like his boss. ‘I have so many.’

      ‘The one you gave mouth-to-mouth to, old man. Just got a signal from our man in Angola, spotted her at Luanda airport, or what’s left of it, boarding a Russian transport flying to Cuba, onward destination New York via Mexico City. Our man in Havana will let us know her arrival details. I want you to have a salesman at the airport to tail her, then get on to her.’

      This was interesting news. ‘Get on to her?’

      ‘Figuratively – but if you can do so literally so much the better, of course. Fuck the information out of the bitch.’

      Oh, Harker really didn’t like his boss – and it sounded clear that the man was drinking, at seven o’clock in the morning. ‘What information in particular are you looking for?’

      ‘Any information, old man, you know that, don’t you remember anything they taught you at Intelligence School? Any fucking information is important in this dog-eat-dog world of espionage, these veritable valleys of dust and ashes in which there are so few oases of hope – any fucking information even if it’s what she has for breakfast or how she likes blow-jobs, because we never know when the info will become useful. But what we really want to know urgently is what Castro’s knuckle-dragging, tree-dwelling generals are planning in Angola, and we figure that your girlfriend may have some clues from all the pillow-talk she has out there.’

      ‘Is it known that she’s got a new lover in Angola?’

      ‘Of course she’s had another lover out there, how else does she get her free ride back to Havana? So get on to her and find out what she knows.’

      ‘Any specific orders about how I achieve that?’

      ‘The Three Bs – don’t they teach you anything at spy-school? Burglary, Bonking, Blackmail. Burgle her apartment, of course. Don’t do it yourself – send Clements in. She’s sure to come back with all kinds of film, notes, computer disks and so on – make microfilm and computer copies of everything. And you should also burgle her Anti-Apartheid League’s offices; it’s about time we dry-cleaned them to find out what they’re up to. You never know what snippets our lady may have sent back to them from sunny Angola.’ Harker heard Dupont take a swallow of something. ‘And then there’s bonking. Pillow-talk. Give her some of her medicine, old man. Swear undying love, tell her you want to publish her innermost memoirs, particularly what the generalissimos told her over the vino and cigars. That shouldn’t be too much of a hardship.’

      Harker grinned to himself. Jesus, did Dupont really think that what this left-wing adventuress might know was worth all the effort?

      ‘And then,’ Dupont continued, ‘if all else fails, blackmail her. But that’s only as a last resort. And don’t you do it personally, get Clements on to it – but consult me first.’

      Harker smiled. ‘Okay, send me her flight details.’

      After Dupont hung up, Harker looked at Josephine Valentine’s file again. He turned up a colour photograph of her. Yes, she was beautiful … So, she was a member of the famous New York Yacht Club. He should try to meet her there before she started dating somebody seriously.

4

      The following day Derek Clements checked out her apartment. The locks were standard; he picked them, made impressions, got keys cut. The next day he was at Kennedy Airport to tail her. That night he met Harker in a bar near Union Square.

      ‘How do you know it was her father who met her?’ Harker asked.

      ‘I heard her call him Dad.’ Clements was a tough, wiry little man with a ferrety face. He had been a US marine before showing up in the Rhodesian army as a mercenary.

      ‘What is the father like?’

      ‘About sixty. Stony-faced sort of guy. Grey hair. Good-looking. Nice suit, obviously lots of dough.’

      ‘How much baggage did Josephine have?’

      ‘One big holdall, one rucksack, sleeping bag. Camera box, video case, one camera around her neck.’

      Harker was making notes. ‘And then?’

      ‘They took a taxi into Manhattan. I followed. They went straight to her apartment block on East Eightieth Street. It was now lunchtime, five-past-one. While she entered, the old man went to the delicatessen on the corner and came back with a package. He went inside. I went to the same deli, bought a coffee and sat and observed her apartment block. At two-thirty a taxi arrived, the old man emerged, got in and drove off. I waited another hour – had another coffee – waited to see if subject came out. She didn’t. I took a taxi home.’ He pulled out a wad of receipts. ‘Bureau owes me over a hundred and fifty bucks.’

      ‘Put it on the monthly sheet. Okay, you said you’d give me a plan of her apartment.’

      Clements pulled an envelope from his pocket, took out a sheet of paper and unfolded it.

      ‘Small two-bedroom СКАЧАТЬ