‘No, Mr Sotelo, I am not. I am not even vaguely interested. All I know is all I need to know. For some reason you have displeased the people that I work for, and in an effort to dissuade your friends from displeasing my employers further I have been sent to deliver a message. The courier does not need to know what’s in the package, nor who sent it, nor why it is being sent. He merely needs to deliver it. That is his job. A good courier does not ask these questions, he merely delivers.’
Francisco Sotelo moved awkwardly in his chair. He drained his glass, reached for the bottle to refill it.
‘You’ve had enough,’ I said.
His eyes widened. ‘One more . . . please,’ he said quietly.
I let him half-fill the glass.
‘Did you know that there are CIA-protected covert drug smuggling operations in Burma, Venezuela, Peru, Laos, Mexico?’ he asked. ‘Did you know that the largest overseas station outside the
U.S. for the CIA is in Mexico City? This is also the case for the FBI
and the DEA. Did you know that more than ninety percent of all
illegal drugs are carried through Mexico into the U.S.? You know
how easy it is to get from Nicaragua through Honduras and Guatemala into Mexico? Why do they let this happen, you might ask. Mexico has an external debt of one hundred and fifty billion dollars, most of it owed to U.S. Citibank. It costs them fourteen billion a year to service the interest alone. And where does that money come from? It comes from the very people that they owe the original debt to. Citibank launders millions of dollars for the Salinas brothers and the Mexican cartels. The money pays the interest. Everyone is happy.’
‘Enough,’ I said.
‘It’s the truth, John. It is the truth, no doubt about it. As soon as it became evident that drugs were being smuggled back through Honduras and into the U.S. your administration closed the DEA office there and moved the agents to Guatemala. The drugs were not coming through Guatemala, they were coming through Honduras, and the U.S. government knew it. And the moment anyone starts to look too closely at Guatemala that office will move again, more than likely to Costa Rica.’ Francisco shook his head. ‘There is no question about the timeline, John . . . the moment the United States got involved in Nicaragua the cocaine started flooding into your backyard through Mexico—’
The sound of the glass shattering on the hard wooden floor was louder than the retort of the silenced gunshot. A small rose of color bloomed just above the bridge of Francisco Sotelo’s nose, and he stared back at me for what felt like an eternity. Much of the contents of his head passed out as a spray through the wrought-iron trelliswork in the back of the chair. It made a symmetrical pattern on the wall behind him.
I sat there for some considerable time. I refilled my glass twice and savored the whisky. I thought about what Francisco Sotelo had told me, and though he had not told me anything that I was unaware of, nevertheless the details surprised me. I had chosen not to pay attention to the things I had heard. A war has to be funded. Arms have to be bought. Lives are spent in a futile effort to instigate or resist invasions, but once the war is over, what then? Did I want to believe that everything we were doing in South America was being funded by drugs? Hell, no. Did I want to believe that the end product of the advance against communist infiltration was simply greater control over the drug-producing capitals of the world? No, I did not want to believe such a thing.
I searched the room for the documentation, the testimony from DEA operatives that Sotelo had spoken about. I found nothing.
I killed Francisco Sotelo because I had been instructed to kill him. I killed him because he possessed information that was being passed into the hands of the Sandinistas, or so I had been informed by Lewis Cotten.
‘The man’s an asshole,’ he said. ’Francisco Sotelo is a lawyer . . . hell, John, what other possible reason could you need for killing the guy? He’s a fucking lawyer for God’s sake. Anyway, whatever might or might not be the case, he cannot be trusted. He has information that is finding its way into the hands of the Sandinistas and this channel of information is being used to disable certain operations that are very necessary in the north. It has been established beyond doubt, reasonable or otherwise, that this is the boy that’s causing the trouble. You go down there, you fix this thing, and everyone’s gonna sleep a whole helluva lot better.’
I fixed the thing.
Whether or not anyone else slept better as a result I had no way of knowing.
I did not sleep better, and that was all that really concerned me.
I left the office unnoticed and crossed the city to Sotelo’s house. I went to find the documents that we believed he possessed. That was all I was required to find.
The events that transpired that evening, the effect of what I discovered in that house, became so much more significant than anything that had occurred to date. I realized then that the truth was always so much more powerful and pervasive than the propaganda.
It was the beginning of the end, and I knew - as did Catherine - that we had done a terrible, terrible thing.
TWENTY-EIGHT
‘What I have here,’ Frank Lassiter said, indicating a half dozen folders stacked on the edge of his desk, ‘are the final reports from forensics on each of the cases so far. They reviewed the original findings and cross-referenced them against one another.’ He smiled resignedly. ‘I say I have something here, but if you read over them very carefully you’ll find that we have nothing at all.’
Lassiter walked around the edge of the desk and sat down heavily. He looked as exhausted as Miller felt.
The silence in the room was tangible. It stretched itself out between the three of them as if for the duration.
Miller broke it by saying ‘You heard about the diner . . .’
Lassiter nodded. ‘I heard about the diner, about this derelict house where McCullough is supposed to have lived. I also understand we have a waitress who thinks she recognized the guy.’
Miller leaned forward in his chair, rested his elbows on his knees, for a moment buried his face in his hands. There was a darkness in his head, like a swollen thing. As if this was a punishment. A penalty for something. He remembered Brandon Thomas’s face, the expression as he fell backwards and down the stairs. As if he believed that Miller had intentionally pushed him. Miller looked up at Lassiter. ‘We’re doing everything—’
‘You’re doing everything you can,’ Lassiter cut across. ‘I understand that you’re doing everything you can, but everything that you can do isn’t enough.’
‘We need more people—’ Roth started.
‘You know I don’t have more people,’ Lassiter replied. ‘You know how many murders there are in Washington each year?’ He smiled, shook his head. ‘I don’t need to tell you how many murders there are in Washington every year, do I? These five are just a fraction of what we have to handle here, let alone what goes on in the rest of the city. Thirty-eight precincts, and then you factor in the traffic that we share with Annapolis, Arlington, whoever the hell else considers we have more resources than them . . .’ Lassiter’s voice trailed away into silence. He swiveled his chair and looked out of the window behind his desk. ‘You want to know what my wife said to me this evening?’
Miller opened his mouth to speak but Lassiter continued before he had a chance.
‘She said that we were looking too hard to see anything.’
Lassiter turned his chair around suddenly. The smile on his face was one of bemusement. ‘My wife is a fucking Buddhist all of a sudden, eh? What the fuck do you think of that? We’re looking too hard to see anything. You get that? I mean, I don’t even know what that means, but when I have my wife telling me how I should do my job . . .’ Lassiter faced the window again.
Miller cleared his throat. ‘I believe—’
‘I don’t need what you believe, Robert,’ Lassiter said. ‘What I need right now are facts. I need evidence. I need something I can hold up and say “Here gentlemen . . . here we have something that’s worth the taxpayer’s dollar,” and for them to see what I’ve got and say “Yes, Jesus Christ, just look at that will you, that’s something right there . . . something we can hang our fucking hats on and go home and tell our wives and daughters to sleep sound because the almighty Second Precinct police have this asshole of a thing under control.” That’s what I need Robert, and that’s all I need.’
‘And that,’ Miller said matter-of-factly, ‘is something I can’t give you yet.’
‘I know that, Robert, but that’s not what I want to be told. You understand me? I want to be told that you have this thing under control, that you’re making headway, that come tomorrow you’re gonna have this guy in the bullpen and he’s gonna be telling you everything you ever wanted to know about what the fuck in God’s name happened to the Mosley woman and Barbara Lee and . . .’ Lassiter stopped suddenly and started laughing. It was forced and nervous laughter. ‘Oh shit, I forgot to tell you. Jesus, how the hell could I have forgotten to tell you this? This is a fucking masterpiece. This is an almighty fucking masterpiece that we couldn’t have designed if we’d wanted to. The Rayner woman, Ann Rayner . . . legal secretary, right? Well you’ll never guess who the fuck she used to type depositions and summary judgements for?’
Miller shook his head.
‘Retired judge, two-term Washington fucking congressman? ’
Miller’s eyes widened. ‘Bill Walford?’
‘On the fucking money,’ Lassiter said. ‘Legal secretary to Judge Walford between June of 1986 and August of ’93. Seven years, for God’s sake. Seven fucking years. I know guys here who’ve done two marriages in less time than that.’
Roth was shaking his head. ‘Walford?’
Miller glanced at him. ‘I’ll tell you later.’
Lassiter laughed again. ‘You never had the pleasure of dealing with Judge Walford, my friend,’ he said to Roth. ‘Of all the people one of these women could have worked for it had to be him.’
‘He’s into this now?’ Miller asked.
‘Jesus no, the guy’s about a hundred years old, but now we have another very good reason to keep it out of the papers. I know that Judge Thorne is very interested, and Judge Thorne happens to be a golfing buddy with the mayor, and Thorne knows Walford . . .’ Lassiter paused for a moment. ‘So far we’ve gotten away light, let me tell you. Amount of noise there’s been in the newspapers has surprised me. This could have been a lot worse, and when the Natasha Joyce thing happened . . . well, you were very fucking lucky that the papers didn’t have anything on this girl. If they’d found out that you were talking to her . . . Jesus, it doesn’t even bear thinking about.’
Lassiter stood up, dragged his overcoat from the back of his chair and folded it over his arm. ‘Right now I need something on this, some movement somewhere that says we’re doing what we’re paid to do. Time does the diner open?’
‘Officially, six-thirty,’ Miller replied.
‘Officially?’
‘The waitress - she’s actually the owner - she’s there at six.’
‘Five forty-five you’re here, both of you,’ Lassiter said matter-of-factly. ‘The button gets pushed and I need you outside that diner within minutes. I’m leaving Metz and Feshbach on the watch tonight, Riehl and Littman take over at four a.m.’ He hesitated, looked at Roth and Miller each in turn, almost as if he was challenging them to say something. ‘I’m giving you everything I can on this, you understand?’
‘I know Captain, I know—’ Miller started.
Lassiter stopped him. ‘I don’t wanna hear anything now except we have the guy. What I don’t want is any more dead women, okay?’ Lassiter did not wait for a reply. He stepped out into the corridor and closed the door noisily behind him.
‘I’ll check on the diner,’ Miller said.
Roth didn’t argue; didn’t challenge Miller. He’d barely seen his family since the first week of the month. This was the life. Amanda knew it, the kids as well, but that didn’t change the tone of voice with which they asked the questions. How long, Dad? When are you gonna come home? Are we gonna see you this weekend?
Roth put on his coat. As he passed Miller he reached out and gripped his shoulder. ‘You’re okay?’
Miller smiled resignedly. ‘I’m okay,’ he said quietly. ‘Now will you leave?’
Roth raised his hand. ‘I’m gone,’ he said.
Miller listened until Roth’s footsteps disappeared into silence, then he stood at the window, looked down into the street, pressed his hand against the glass. Glass was cool, and through the spaces between his fingers he watched the lights flicker as cars passed on the highway, as traffic swarmed across the overpass in a constant stream of brilliance. He tried to concentrate on the dark spaces between, but he was drawn back to the colored neons, the streetlights, the arc-sodium, the fluorescents. He wondered if Lassiter’s wife was right. Looking too hard to see anything . . .
Fifteen minutes later he called the diner. He spoke to Audrey briefly. Yes, the tech guy had come. Yes, the button was in. Yes, they had tested it and it all worked fine, and now she was going home to sleep, and she’d be back in bright and early, six a.m., coffee ready, should she make him a cup?
Miller told her no, but thanks for the invite. Another time perhaps.
He set the receiver down. He left the room, walked back down to the street and hailed a cab. Took a route north along Fifth, left onto P Street towards Logan Circle. Passed Columbia NW as they went, craning his head back toward it as they drove by Catherine Sheridan’s house. Sitting like something quiet and malignant, a dark hollow amidst all the bright lights, and he realized that now, even now, he still had no greater understanding of what had happened there on the 11th.
He closed his eyes, didn’t open them until the cab drew to a stop outside his home. Paid the driver, let himself in, took off his jacket. Made some tea and sat in the kitchen. Wondered if the guy would show tomorrow, and if he did . . . well, if he did, would he be able to give them anything at all?