“Well enough, toots,” he said. “Don’t stay up too late. You need your beauty sleep.”
Chapter Eighteen
Hayden Stone phoned his old acquaintance Patience St. John Smythe. After four rings, she answered. He identified himself and following a pause, she asked where he was. She always held conversations on the phone to the minimum. Stone attributed this quirk to the fact that she had been raised in a country that made it a practice to listen to their citizens’ telephone conversations. However, when he had gotten to know her, he found she was smart and kept a tight schedule, only allowing herself to slide into niceties when her calendar permitted.
“Hayden. My, we haven’t talked in ages.”
“Let’s get together.”
Silence, then, “Do you have transportation?”
When he said he didn’t, she told him she’d pick him up in a dark blue Honda in an hour at the corner of Wale and Adderley Streets. In front of the St. George’s Cathedral. End of conversation. Still the professional. Even if the conversation had been overheard, the secret service would have a difficult time setting up surveillance in one hour in the middle of downtown business traffic.
Stone holstered his new Sig Sauer, left his hotel room, and took the stairs up to Sandra’s floor. She waved him in and went back to unpacking her suitcase, laying the clothes on the couch. He told her about the phone call. She showed interest in the details.
“The woman seems pretty savvy. Who does she work for?”
“I’ve always thought the Brits, but I’d noticed in the past a lot of inconsistencies in her stories.”
“What information does the station or Charles Fleming have on her?” Sandra asked. “And how long have you known her?”
Stone looked at his watch. “Look. I have to go. Only have a little more than half an hour before I meet her.”
When he reached for the doorknob, she said, “Fleming doesn’t know about this? You’re playing the lone ranger. This isn’t how we do things. You know that.”
“I’m meeting someone that in the FBI parlance is a hip pocket source.” He detected no reaction from Sandra, so continued, “Basically there’s nothing about her recorded on paper or in a file. I just collect information from her and attribute it to another source.”
“Sounds fishy and not according to the rules. You’re not in the bureau anymore, and if you keep up this shit, you’re not going to be with the CIA either.”
Stone had learned the hard way he shouldn’t argue with a person giving him good advice. As he was about to fall back on old habits and say something dumb, Sandra saved him.
“What’s your relationship with this Patience?”
“I hope we’re still good friends, but the last time we were together …”
Sandra sighed and held up her hand. She reminded him of one of his grammar school teachers having lost patience with him. The “patience” crack made him smile.
“Don’t smile, smart-ass. Give me that gun.” Taking it, she asked, “Are you familiar with this?”
He told her no, that for some reason they hadn’t given him the Colt .45 that he’d asked for. “At least it’s a forty caliber S&W,” he said. “It looks like a pistol, not some high-tech toy.” She took the gun and gave him a thorough rundown on the Sig Sauer. Had she been a firearms instructor at one time?
A taxicab dropped him off at the House of Parliament, and then on foot he took Government Avenue through the extensive gardens to the cathedral. He took in the crisp morning air and walked briskly, glad that he had his leather jacket. He mused about his first meeting with Patience. Two years ago, in June or July, he had visited Salzburg, Austria. The weather was invigorating. Tourists strolled the streets from one music performance to another, and the river Salzach ran fast and cold from the melting snows in the Alps.
As he had sat in an ornate music room waiting for an afternoon string quintet to begin, she slipped in the seat next to him. Rows of empty chairs surrounded the two of them, so it was evident that she wanted to meet him. The encounter was pleasant; the quintet’s set was dreadful.
Their relationship had been semi-intense, platonic. She said she couldn’t help falling in love with a married man, but she didn’t have to bed him. Her words.
Stone made sure that he came to the street corner at the precise time Patience had given. A dark blue sedan approached the curb and the headlights flashed. He went up to the passenger door, looked in, and climbed inside. Patience leaned over halfway to give him a perfunctory kiss on the cheek and sped off. He had forgotten she had a heavy foot on the accelerator. He’d let her get her bearings before making conversation, but a minute later she started in.
“You haven’t changed much.” She glanced over, then up to the rearview mirror. “Put on a little weight around the middle.”
“You, my dear, on the other hand, simply glow.”
She did. Her features had softened. She was on the way to becoming one of those women other women secretly hated — one who improved with age. He expected her to be in a business suit, but instead she wore taupe twill slacks and a cashmere sweater over a turtleneck. Gold flats matched an expensive watch, bracelet on left wrist, and rings on both hands. Causal chic. However, her perfume signaled business office, not boudoir.
“Are you here on holiday?” She looked over. “Of course not. Spying on my country?”
“No. As a matter of fact, I’m working with elements from your local government.”
Stone, at times like this, got a kick out of semantics. He and Dirk Lange did have something of a working relationship. Also, he had to clarify which country he was referring to. She held a British passport as well as a South African one.
“I almost left you hanging there on the corner. You deserve to be stood up.”
“We didn’t part on the best of terms, did we?” Stone knew diplomacy was in order. “The whole thing bothered me. A lot.”
“Let’s get this over with, so we can move on.”
She looked for agreement on his part, so he nodded.
“You are insensitive and in the realm of personal relationships, wholly unreliable.” Once again, she glanced in the rearview mirror. “Now let’s get to whatever you called me about. Shall we?”
Stone felt relieved they had gotten past that hurdle. The car headed out of the city. He needed a safe place where he could question her about Van Wartt. If he was lucky, she might even know something about Abdul Wahab. He suggested lunch.
“We are going to a cheetah sanctuary about forty-five minutes from here. It is located on a wine estate. They have a restaurant.”
“Is it a game park?” Stone enjoyed safaris, but this was not the time to go touring.
“It’s part of the Cheetah Outreach Programme. I’m going to let you pet a real live cheetah. Sometimes they bite.”
They drove through the famed Stellenbosch wine country. Except for the backdrop of jagged mountains, one would believe they had been transported to Napa Valley in California. Hilly, with neat divisions of vineyards interspersed with tidy homes favoring Cape Dutch architecture. This was not the raw Africa of legend. Patience was true to her word, and they arrived at the sanctuary in forty-five minutes.
A regal, lean animal, stretching six feet from head to tip of tail, the young cheetah reclined on top of a three-foot high metal cage. The face with big amber eyes resembled any placid household cat. No sign of an efficient killer, the fastest mammal on earth. So calm and friendly now, but when, like so many of Stone’s quarry in the past, would they turn on you?