The Mark of the Assassin Page 16

  She hung up, thinking, Dammit, where the hell is she?

  She thought of the phone call from Susanna last night. She was about to break a big story about Mitchell Elliott and Samuel Braxton. Maybe she was on the phone, working the story. Maybe she was talking to her editors.

  She turned and jogged up 34th Street. At Volta Place she turned right and then made another right into Pomander Walk. She bounded up the steps to Susanna’s house and rang the bell.

  There was no answer.

  She hammered on the wooden door with the side of her fist. Again, there was no answer and no sound from within the house. Carson was ever vigilant; he usually started barking before Elizabeth knocked on the door. If the dog were inside he’d be barking his head off.

  She turned around and saw lights burning inside Harry Scanlon’s house. She crossed the walkway and knocked on the door. Scanlon answered in his bathrobe.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, Harry, but Susanna and I were supposed to go for a run, and she stood me up. It’s just not like her. I’m worried. Do you still have her key?”

  “Sure, hang on a sec.”

  Scanlon disappeared into the house and came back a moment later with a single key.

  “I’ll give you a hand,” he said.

  They went back to Susanna’s front door. Scanlon shoved the key into the lock and pushed open the door.

  Elizabeth called out, “Susanna!”

  There was no answer.

  She looked around the living room and the kitchen. Everything seemed normal. She started up the stairs, calling Susanna’s name, Scanlon behind her.

  When she reached the landing she saw the dog.

  “Oh, God! Susanna! Susanna!”

  She stepped over the body of the dog and looked in the bathroom. The white tile floor was covered with glass where a beer bottle had fallen and shattered. Elizabeth walked a few more steps down the hall and looked into the study.

  She turned away and screamed.

  Elizabeth sat on the front steps of Harry Scanlon’s house, a woolen blanket wrapped around her shoulders. A half dozen Metropolitan Police cruisers, red and blue lights flashing, choked Volta Place. The crime scene truck had arrived, and the technicians were poring over the inside of Susanna’s house. She tried to call Michael, but he had not answered his phone. She left an emergency message with the operator and Harry Scanlon’s number.

  She thought, Dammit, Michael, I need you.

  Elizabeth pulled the blanket about her tightly, but the shaking wouldn’t stop. She closed her eyes, but she saw Susanna’s shattered body sprawled on the floor, and she saw the blood. God, so much blood! She realized someone was calling her name. She opened her eyes and saw a tall fair-skinned African-American with striking green eyes standing before her. His police shield hung from the pocket of his blue double-breasted suit coat.

  “Mrs. Osbourne, I’m Detective Richardson, Homicide. I understand you discovered the body.”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “What time?”

  “Between seven-fifteen and seven-twenty, I believe.”

  “You knew the victim?”

  Elizabeth thought, The victim. Susanna had already been robbed of her name. Now she was just the victim.

  “We were best friends, Detective. I’ve known her for twenty years. We were supposed to go running this morning. When she didn’t show up, I came looking for her. I got the key from the neighbor and went inside.”

  “Anything look out of the ordinary to you?”

  “Except for her body, no.”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Osbourne. Where did she work?”

  “She was a reporter for the Washington Post.”

  “I thought the name sounded familiar. Worked at the White House for a while, right? Used to be on the round-table show on TV.”

  Elizabeth nodded.

  “This may sound like a strange question, but do you know anyone that would want to kill her?”

  “Not a soul.”

  “Anything unusual going on in her life?”

  “No.”

  “Any angry boyfriends? Jilted lovers?”

  Elizabeth shook her head.

  “Husband?”

  “He’s remarried.”

  “How’s their relationship?”

  “I work with him, Detective. He’s a partner at my firm. He’s a shit, but he’s not a murderer.”

  “We can’t find a purse. Did she carry one?”

  “Yes, she always left it on the kitchen counter.”

  “It’s not there.”

  “Who did this?”

  “Impossible to say. Looks like someone was inside the house and she surprised him. She had jogging clothes on, but one of her shoes had been removed. Looks like she may have twisted her ankle. Dog was wearing a leash.”

  “So they shot her.”

  “A lot of people in this town would rather kill someone than leave a witness behind who could identify them later.” He said this matter-of-factly. He reached out and put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m very sorry, Mrs. Osbourne. Here’s my card. If you think of anything else, let me know.”

  Elizabeth heard the telephone ringing inside the house. Harry Scanlon came to the door, eyes red. “It’s Michael,” he said.

  Elizabeth rose and walked inside, unsteady on her feet. “Michael, come home quickly. I need you.”

  “What happened? Why are you at Harry’s?”

  “Susanna’s dead. Someone shot her in her house. I found her. Oh, God, Michael—” Her voice choked with tears. “Please come home, Michael. Please hurry.”

  “Stay there. I’ll come get you.”

  “No, meet me at home. I need to walk. I need some air.”

  She looked out the window and saw Susanna’s body, wrapped in a white sheet, being taken from the house on a stretcher. She had maintained her composure until then, but the sight of Susanna like that broke down the last of her strength.

  “Elizabeth, are you there? Elizabeth, talk to me.”

  “They’re just taking her away. Oh, God, poor Susanna! I just keep thinking about what she must have gone through before she died. I can’t stop thinking about it.”

  “Get out of there. Go home. It will make you feel a little better. Trust me.”

  “Hurry.”

  “I will.”

  She hung up the telephone. Scanlon was holding a floppy disk. “Well, I guess she won’t be needing this.” He paused, his eyes filling with tears. “God, I can’t believe I said that.”

  “What is it?”

  Scanlon explained their system—how Susanna always made extra copies of her work and left them through his door slot. “She was paranoid about it.”

  “I know. In law school, she kept her papers in the refrigerator because she read somewhere that refrigerators could withstand fire.” Elizabeth smiled at the memory. “God, I miss her so much. I can’t believe this is happening.”

  Scanlon laid the disk on the kitchen counter.

  “I found it when I came home last night. She must have slipped it through my door when she went out for her run. Funny, I always told her she was a fool to run at night, but she got killed in her own home.”

  Elizabeth thought about the call from Susanna last night. She had been working on an important story all day. Whatever she was writing was probably on that disk.

  Elizabeth said, “Can I have that?”

  “Sure, but you’ll never be able to read it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she used encryption software. Like I told you, she was paranoid about people reading her stuff.”

  “You don’t know the password?”

  “No, she never told me. I would have thought she’d tell you.”

  Elizabeth shook her head. “What about her editors at the Post?”

  “No way. She distrusted everyone, especially the people she worked with.”

  “Let me have it,” Elizabeth said. “I have a friend who knows something about these things.”

&
nbsp; Elizabeth showed Michael the disk as they lay in bed, surrounded by tousled linen. Michael lit a cigarette and turned the disk over in his hand. Elizabeth laid her head on his tan stomach, trailing a finger through the patch of dark hair at the center of his chest. She felt guilty about making love at a time like this. When he came home she wanted to be close to him. She wanted to hold him and never let him out of her sight. She was frightened, scared to death by what had happened to her friend, and she was afraid to let go of him. She held him; she kissed his lips and his eyes and his nose. She undressed him and made love to him, slowly, gently, as if she never wanted it to end. Now she lay close to him, watching rain streaming down the bedroom windows.

  “Harry says it’s encrypted.”

  “That’s not a problem. All we need to do is figure out the keyword.”

  “How do you intend to do that?”

  “People are lazy. They use birth dates, addresses, all sorts of words and numbers that they can remember easily. You know more about Susanna than anyone alive.”

  “Do you need special software?”

  “I have it on my computer.”

  “Let’s go.”

  They put on bathrobes and walked down the hall to Michael’s study. Michael sat down at the desk. Elizabeth stood behind him, hands draped over his shoulders.

  “Birth date?”

  “November seventeenth, 1957.”

  Michael typed in the numerical version: 11-17-57. The screen read:

  ACCESS DENIED—INCORRECT PASSWORD.

  Michael said, “Birth date backward.”

  The computer made the same response.

  “Address. . . . Address backward. . . . Telephone number. . . . Telephone number backward. . . . Work phone. . . . Work phone backward. . . . First name. . . .First name backward. . . . Middle name. . . . Middle name backward. . . . Last name. . . . Last name backward. . . .”

  Elizabeth said, “This could take forever.”

  “Not forever.”

  “I thought you said it was going to be easy.”

  “I said it wouldn’t be a problem. Parents’ names?”

  “Maria and Carmine.”

  “Maria and Carmine?”

  “She’s Italian.”

  “She was Italian.”

  Michael worked steadily for the next two hours. He learned more about Susanna’s life than he ever thought possible: boyfriends, hometown, bank, favorite movie, favorite book. He tried them all—forward, backward, and sideways—and nothing worked.

  “What was the dog’s name?”

  “Carson.”

  “Why Carson?”

  Elizabeth smiled. “Because she was an insomniac, and she loved The Tonight Show.”

  Michael typed CARSON. Nothing. He tried JOHNNY. Nothing. He tried DOC and ED. Nothing.

  “She had the last two shows on tape. She watched them a hundred times.”

  “Who was on the last show?”

  “It was just Johnny, remember? He just talked to the audience.”

  “What about the show before?”

  “Bette Midler. Jesus, she was crazy about Bette Midler.”

  Michael typed BETTE. Nothing. MIDLER. Nothing. He typed them backward. Nothing.

  He slammed his palm on the desk.

  “Move out of the way,” Elizabeth said.

  She leaned over his shoulder, typed THE ROSE, and struck the ENTER key. The computer hesitated for a few seconds, and then the last thing Susanna Dayton ever wrote appeared on the screen.

  Michael said, “Jesus Christ.”

  19

  AMSTERDAM

  The houseboat on the Prinsengracht had taken on the appearance of a military operations room. Delaroche briefly considered returning to Brélés, but it was a village, with a village’s inclination to gossip, and he knew the presence of a tall blond woman would arouse unwelcome interest among Didier and his cohorts. Besides, the Krista provided a relaxing and secluded atmosphere to plan the assassinations. On the walls he hung large-scale street maps of the cities where he would carry out the killings: London, Cairo, Washington. He rose early each morning and worked while Astrid slept. Then they spent two hours together, talking and planning, before she left for the bookshop at ten o’clock.

  By the afternoon the walls would close in on him, so he would borrow Astrid’s appalling bicycle and pedal the narrow streets of the canal rings. He found an art supply shop, purchased a small watercolor kit, and produced several fine paintings of the bridges and the boats and the gabled houses overlooking the canals. On the fourth day a bitter cold front pushed in from the North Sea. For the next two days the Krista was filled with the playful screams and shouts of hundreds of skaters gliding over the frozen surface of the Prinsengracht.

  Each evening he would collect Astrid from the bookshop and take her to a different restaurant. Afterward they would stroll the windswept canals and drink De Koninck beer in the cannabis-scented bars of the Leidseplein. She made love to him for two nights, then turned her back to him for the next two. Her sleep was fitful, troubled by nightmares. On the night before their departure she awoke in a panic, bathed in sweat, grabbing for the small Browning automatic she habitually kept on the floor next to the bed. She might have blown off Delaroche’s head had he not wrested the gun from her grasp before she could release the safety. She made frenzied love to him and begged him never to leave her.

  The following morning broke cold and gray. They packed in silence and padlocked the Krista. Delaroche destroyed his paintings. Astrid telephoned the bookshop. She had a family emergency and needed a few days off. She would be in touch.

  They took a taxi to the Centraalstation and caught the early-morning train to the town of Hoek van Holland. They took another taxi to the ferry terminal and had a late breakfast of bread and eggs at a small waterfront café. One hour later they boarded the car ferry for Harwich, across the North Sea, in Britain.

  The passage usually took six hours in good weather, eight or more when the seas turned rough. On that day a cold winter storm pushed down from the Norwegian Sea. Astrid, who was prone to seasickness, spent much of the journey in the lavatory, violently ill, cursing Delaroche’s name. Delaroche stayed outside on the observation deck, in the glacier-scented air, watching the wind-driven rollers breaking across the prow of the ferry.

  Shortly before their arrival, Astrid altered her appearance. She pinned her blond hair close to her scalp and covered her head in a black shoulder-length wig. Delaroche put on a baseball hat bearing the name of an American cigarette and, despite the weather, his Ray-Ban sunglasses.

  The European Community makes the life of the international terrorist much easier because, once inside a member nation, travel to the others is almost free of risk. Delaroche and Astrid entered the United Kingdom on Dutch passports, posing as unmarried tourists, enduring only a cursory inspection of their travel documents by a bored British official. Still, Delaroche knew the British security forces routinely videotaped all arriving passengers, regardless of their passport. He knew he and Astrid had just left their first footprints.

  Night had settled over the English coastline by the time Delaroche and Astrid boarded the train at Harwich station. Ninety minutes later they arrived in London.

  For his base camp, Delaroche chose a small service flat in South Kensington. He rented it for a week from a company that specialized in providing flats for tourists. His first act was to cancel the “service” aspect of the arrangement; the last thing he needed was a maid poking her nose into his things. The flat was modest but comfortable, with a fully functioning kitchen, a large sitting room, and a separate bedroom. The telephone line was direct, no switchboards involved, and there were large windows looking down onto the street.

  They wasted no time. The target was an MI6 officer named Colin Yardley, a fifty-four-year-old former field officer who had served in the Soviet Union, the Mideast, and lately in Paris and was now awaiting forced retirement in a dead-end head-office desk job. He fit the profile of many i
ntelligence officers at the end of their careers—burned out, bitter, divorced. He drank too much and put himself about with too many women. MI6 Personnel had told him in no uncertain terms to knock it off. Yardley had told the flunkies in Personnel to fuck off. It was all in Delaroche’s report. Killing him would be easy. The challenge would be killing him the right way.

  Despite his years in the field, Yardley had grown lazy and careless now that he was back in London. Each evening he took a taxi from MI6’s riverside headquarters to a restaurant and bar in Sloane Square. It was there he did his hunting: young girls attracted by his sturdy gray good looks, wealthy West End divorcées, bored wives looking for a night of anonymous sex. He arrived a few minutes after six o’clock and took his usual seat at the bar.

  Astrid Vogel was waiting for him.

  * * *

  She was not the same woman Delaroche had seen in the Amsterdam bookshop ten days earlier. She had spent the afternoon at Harrods and the glittering shops in Bond Street, armed with a stack of Delaroche’s money. She now wore a black cocktail dress, black stockings, a gold watch, and a double strand of exquisite pearls around her throat. The simple black clasp was gone from her hair, which had been trimmed and blown out by a fussy Italian stylist at a salon off Knightsbridge. Now it fell dramatically about her face and neck. Astrid knew how to play down her natural good looks, but she also knew how to attract attention when necessary.

  Delaroche sat on a bench in Sloane Square, pretending to read a copy of the Evening Standard purchased from a newsstand outside the Sloane Square Underground station. He watched the performance inside the restaurant as pantomime. Astrid sits at the bar alone, the eternal cigarette burning between her long, slender fingers. Yardley, tall, gray, distinguished, asks if the seat next to her is free. A drink appears before Yardley automatically—his regular—and by his expression he thinks she is impressed by this. He gestures to the bartender to bring her another glass of white wine. Astrid, grateful, turns her body to face him, one long leg crossed suggestively over the other, her skirt riding high on her thigh. She belongs to him now. The frightened, lonely woman from the houseboat in Amsterdam is gone. She is a confident and cosmopolitan Dutchwoman whose husband makes money and ignores her too much and, yes, you can light my cigarette for me, darling.