'The airport,' said Adam.
'Anybody know you're going?'
'Who's going to tell them?'
Frankie looked in the rear view mirror and saw the Browning in Adam's hand and the lop-sided grin on his face. He was some crazy son of a…'Not me,' he replied emphatically, putting the car into gear and joining the traffic flow. 'I owe you, anyway. I mean, they made me tell them about Fruit Juice. Didn't want to, but I had to.'
'Just get to the airport.'
'No sweat. Where's she going?'
'With me.'
'They gonna ask why.'
'Because she's my security.'
'Is that right?' Frankie asked Billie.
'Yes,' she replied, joining in the charade. 'Bastard forced me. With his fucking gun.'
‘Like hell. But I’ll play along.'
‘Come on, we need to get out of here,' snapped Adam.
'Who the hell are you? You more than you seem.'
'So are you, Frankie. Just shut up and drive.'
The rest of the trip was made in silence, though Billie did ask Frankie how his leg was.
'No problem. Just dug the bullet out and bandaged me up. Wanted to give me a fucking anaesthetic. When I said no, they insisted on giving me a local one. In my damn leg. Shit, I've had no feeling in that leg for ten years. And they give me a fucking anaesthetic.'
‘Why’dyou do it, Frankie?’ Adam said.
‘Goat Face? Guess I just didn’t like him.’
Adam directed Frankie to park in the C long-term park area, at the farthest corner under the flyover. He took the key out of the ignition, disarmed the cab driver and took his other weaponry from the glove compartment. Then he opened the bonnet and ripped out the carburettor head. As he pulled out Frankie's wheelchair and crutch he told Billie to get the bags. He tied Frankie's hands behind him with his necktie. Frankie didn't say a lot, didn't shout in protest. The handkerchief stuffed in his mouth ensured that. It would be a long time before anyone found Frankie.
Using the wheelchair as a trolley, they took their luggage to the main terminal where they hailed another cab.
The cab dropped them at the entrance to New Orleans station, in front of the big AmTrak sign, and Adam led Billie to the booking office. There were two queues formed, one for all the local commuting traffic and the other for the Eastern Regional Pass, the routes that covered the East and Central areas from Grand Rapids to New York, from New Orleans to Miami. The long distance queue comprised four people and Adam and Billie joined it.
'New York. Two, please,' said Adam to the booking clerk five minutes later.
'You got reservations?'
'No. We only just decided to go by train.' As Adam replied, Billie smiled, impressed with his Deep South accent.
'You need a reservation.'
'Don't you have any cancellations?'
'You gotta wait. Train for New York don't leave till seven in the morning. Won't know till then.'
'That's ten hours away. We can't just hang around till then.'
'Train's only just got in from New York. It's gotta be cleaned and readied for the return trip.'
'Are you sure it's fully booked?'
'Won't know till everyone turns up. People could be booking outta town now. We have no way of knowing, not at this time of night.'
'Can I reserve two. In case someone doesn't turn up.'
'Yeah. We can do that. But you can't board till five a.m.'
'Okay.'
'Good hotels round about. Should find a bed. You want bedrooms?
'Yes.'
The clerk reeled off the various coaches and Adam standby-booked a deluxe double Superliner bedroom. The clerk wrote out a Pass and handed it over. 'Pay here at five. If there's any cancellations for a Superliner room, that is.'
They found a small hotel, Beiderbeck's, in the next street and booked in as Mr and Mrs Archer from Des Moines, Idaho. Billie giggled as Adam signed the register for the receptionist behind his steel meshed counter. This was a working hotel for working girls. The clerk insisted they pay $20 in advance. It wasn't the type of establishment where guests spent a whole night.
'What's so funny?' he asked as they climbed the stairs to the first floor.
'I've never booked in to a whorehouse before,' she said.
'Don't worry. I won't ask you to earn the fare to New York.'
The room was small, the walls dark. The bed was a cot and the mattress had long since given up its firmness. There was one wooden backed chair and a cheap dressing table with a small cracked mirror standing on it. It was the pits, but it was safe.
'Why we going to New York?' she asked, settling onto the end of the bed. He took a cigarette out, but she stopped him. 'Can you not do that? In a room this small…'
He shrugged and put the cigarette away. 'Because we can't just catch a plane to Germany. They'll be watching for us.'
'So why New York?'
'To get north. We won't be stopping there.'
'Are you going to tell me how you plan to cross the borders and get over to Europe?'
'Trust me.'
'It could all go wrong.'
'That's what makes it so exciting.'
Billie curled up on top of the bed and eventually snoozed, uneasy in their unfortunate resting place. Adam settled into the chair to pass the night away.
At four thirty he woke her and, after the most rudimentary of toilet preparations, they left for the station. They were lucky. and they climbed on the Crescent train just after five thirty. Their bedroom far exceeded the hotel room they had just left and Billie settled down gleefully on the single swivel window seat. Adam leant over and drew the curtains shut. He didn't want to be discovered by Carter and his people. She grumbled, but knew he was right. They were fugitives now and Billie enjoyed the sense of adventure that tingled her.
The room, as it was called, was designed for two adults, with a large sofa and a swivel chair. It converted to a bedroom with two fold down berths, one of which was the sofa, the other folded into the wall. There was also a shower, toilet, sink and cupboard area. It would be a fun way to spend the thirty hours it took to travel to New York. Billie wondered how they would be travelling after that.
'All aboard,' she heard the conductor shout as he walked along the platform, hurrying his charges along. This was his fiefdom, his area of total authority. 'All aboard for Birmingham, Atlanta, Charlotte, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newark and Penn Station, New York. All aboard.'
The Crescent pulled out of the station on time at seven a.m.
Billie finally opened the curtains and settled back to enjoy the view. She had never travelled on a train before.
Frankie, now released from his uncomfortable entrapment, watched the Crescent rattle out of New Orleans. It hadn't taken him long to trace them; he knew his way round the Big Easy better than most. The cab driver who'd fared them to the station had been traced by a radio call and the rest had been simple.
So long sucker. You wuz easier than I thought.
BOOK FOUR
Ch. 51
Sorge had never been to Langley before. It was not something a Russian expected to do.
It was after nine a.m. when Nowak drove him through the gates, past the guards, and into the vast underground car park.
'Why Langley?' Sorge had asked him on the way out of Washington.
'They want to show you that they trust you.'
'I don't expect I'll see much.'
Nowak laughed. 'Damn right. We park in the underground car park, catch a special lift to the fifth floor and walk across the corridor into a special conference room.'
'That's trust?'