Spinelli answered, “We have an all-points out. Bureau is on it. Phil told me you wanted a make on this guy Carbury this afternoon. What the hell’s going down, Abrams?”
“He’s missing. That’s all you have to know.”
“Like hell. I hear noise there. Where are you?”
“Down the block having cocktails with Arthur Goldberg, Bill Casey, and Clare Boothe Luce.”
“You sound drunk… oh, you’re at the armory. Is there a connection there? Is the President still there?”
“He’s gone. There’s no connection except that Carbury was on his way here.”
“What’s the national security angle here?”
Abrams noticed a man behind him who seemed to want to use the telephone. A few other people stood nearby. He spoke to Spinelli in Italian, heavily accented with the Barese dialect, filling him in on some background.
Spinelli cut in, “Your Italian stinks, Abrams. Come down here now and sign this missing person’s report.”
Abrams ignored him and continued in Italian, “Keep me out of it.”
Spinelli in turn ignored Abrams. “Did you or that guy with you — Thorpe — touch anything in the room?”
“No, we floated around. Listen, Thorpe is Company.”
“Company…? Oh, that Company. You sure?”
“Sure.”
“What are you into?”
“Evil things. Proceed carefully with Thorpe. Check him out with whoever is the liaison these days. Watch yourself on this one, Dom.”
“Okay… thanks… ”
“Thank me by keeping me posted.” Abrams hung up and returned to the Colonel’s Reception Room.
O’Brien was there looking for him. He motioned Abrams onto a settee and sat beside him. O’Brien said, “Kate is briefing Mr. Allerton, Peter, and Nick. Let’s talk for a moment.”
“Okay.”
“What do you think of our friends?”
“I had a good time. Thank Miss Kimberly for inviting me. Look, it’s past midnight, and I think I’m going to leave.”
O’Brien didn’t seem to hear. He said, “She thinks very highly of you.”
“Of me personally, or of my work?”
O’Brien smiled. “Your work as a process server is hardly anything to elicit admiration.” O’Brien glanced around the room. “Have you had an opportunity to speak to anyone here?”
“No, but it looks like General Donovan assembled quite a group. Hitler never had a chance.” Abrams lit a cigarette. “It’s too bad the CIA can’t get so much talent.”
O’Brien nodded. “In wartime you can recruit millionaires, superachievers, geniuses in the arts and sciences… but in peacetime, what sort of man or woman do you get for a modest-paying career position in intelligence work? On the opposite side, the KGB are very well paid and enjoy privileges and prestige that exceed those of the average Soviet citizen. They get the best of the best.” O’Brien shook his head. “If one could compare education and IQ levels in both organizations, the CIA would come off second best. That’s a fatal fact that has to be faced.”
“Like our amateur sports teams playing their so-called amateurs.”
“That’s a fair analogy.” O’Brien glanced around the room, then said, “You haven’t changed your mind about your visit to Glen Cove in light of what you’ve learned this evening?”
“I said I’d go.”
“Fair enough. You’ll meet the Edwards and Styler attorneys at their offices at four P.M., Monday, Memorial Day. You’ll be briefed by a friend of mine. You’ll arrive with the attorneys at the Russian estate about seven P.M. George Van Dorn’s party will be in full swing by then.”
“What exactly am I supposed to do once I’m in?”
“You’ll be told that day.”
Abrams looked at O’Brien closely.
O’Brien answered the unasked question. “Even if you’re caught snooping, they’re not going to murder you. It’s Russian territory, but it’s not Russia. But don’t get caught.”
“One more question — something doesn’t add up here. If the Russians have something big in the works, as you obliquely suggested — something that will cancel the July bar exam and, by insinuation, will cancel all of us, then why are they bothering with a petty lawsuit?”
O’Brien replied, “You were an undercover cop. Answer your own question.”
Abrams nodded. “They must appear to be going on with business as usual.”
“Correct. To do nothing about Van Dorn’s or Mayor Parioli’s harassment would be highly suspicious. So we are presented with an opportunity, part serendipitous, part planned, to get a peek inside their command post.”
“I see. And my credentials, my bona fides, are in order?”
“I have never sent a man or woman on a job unless their cover was perfect.”
Abrams knew, as O’Brien knew, that the only perfect cover was the one in your bed that you pulled over your head as a child to make the bad things go away.
O’Brien, as was his habit, made one of his abrupt changes of topic. “I’d like you to stay at the town house tonight. Katherine will call on you tomorrow morning, and you’ll go to the office. There’s a records room there, and you can give her a hand looking for a few things. Wear your gun.”
Abrams looked at him.
“She may be in danger. You’ll watch after her, won’t you?”
This particular shift from the prosaic to the intriguing caught him off guard. “Yes, I’ll look after her.”
O’Brien took two cordials from a passing waiter and handed one to Abrams. He said, “We’d like you to join the firm.”
Abrams stared at him. “I’m flattered.” He recalled very vividly how he felt when he’d been asked to join the Red Devils, and this was not a totally irrelevant thought. He remembered being both flattered and frightened.
O’Brien said, “As you must have surmised by now, the OSS has never really disbanded. And, I assure you, we are not conspiratorial paranoiacs. We don’t promote secrecy for its own sake, like many clandestine societies. There are no secret handshakes, oaths, membership cards, symbols, ranks, or uniforms. It is more a feeling of the heart and mind than an actual organization.”
Abrams lit a cigarette and flipped the match into an ashtray. He realized he was hearing things that, once heard, would put him in a compromising position. He considered leaving, but didn’t.
For the next ten minutes O’Brien described the nature and substance of his group. When he was done, Abrams looked at O’Brien and their eyes met. Abrams said, “Why me?”
O’Brien said, “You understand crime. Find us the murderer or kidnapper of Randolph Carbury, and the things we are interested in will start to fall into place.”
Abrams didn’t reply.
O’Brien looked at his watch, then stood. “There would be a good deal of personal danger. If you want to discuss this further, we can join the others in a private room at the other end of the armory. The room itself is quite interesting. May I show it to you?”
Abrams sat for a long time, then said, “Can I have more time to think about it?”
“You can go home and sleep on it. But I suspect you won’t sleep very well.”
Abrams took a long sip of his cordial and stood. “Let’s see the room.”
23
Abrams followed Patrick O’Brien into a huge columned chamber that was vaguely reminiscent of an Egyptian throne room. Around the upper perimeter of the walls was a running frieze depicting warriors from different periods of history. The ceiling was black, crisscrossed with beams inlaid with silver. Classical statuary stood at intervals around the dimly lit room.
Abrams’ eyes adjusted to the darkness, and he saw a large fireplace made of blue cobalt-glazed tile. In the center of the room was a thick Persian rug, and sitting in the center of the rug was a large ornate table that looked somewhat like a sacrificial altar. Stainedglass windows let in a diffused light from the street.