“Too soon old, too late smart,” Jack quoted from the Old West.
“Indeed. The whole business can be so bloody sad.”
“What about this Strokov guy?”
“Different color of horse, entirely,” Thompson replied. “You don’t see many of those. For them it’s part of the job, ending a life. No motive in the usual sense, and they leave little behind in the way of physical evidence. They can be very difficult to find, but mainly we do find them. We have time on our side, and sooner or later someone talks and it gets to our ear. Most criminals talk their own way into prison,” Nick explained. “But people like this Strokov fellow, they do not talk—except when he gets home and writes up his official report. But we never see those. Getting a line on him was plain luck. Mr. Markov remembered being poked by the umbrella, remembered the color suit the man was wearing. One of our constables saw him wearing the same suit and thought there was something odd about him—you know, instead of flying right home, he waited to make sure Markov died. They’d bungled two previous attempts, you see, and so they called him in because of his expertise. Good professional, Strokov. He wanted to be completely sure, and he waited to read the death notice in the newspapers. In that time, we talked to the staff at his hotel and started assembling information. The Security Service got involved, and they were helpful in some ways but not in others—and the government got involved. The government was worried about creating an international incident, and so they held us up—cost us two days, I reckon. On the first of those two days, Strokov took a taxi to Heathrow and flew off to Paris. I was on the surveillance team. Stood within fifteen feet of him. We had two detectives with cameras, shot a lot of pictures. The last was of Strokov walking down the jetway to the Boeing. Next day, the government gave us permission to detain him for questioning.”
“Day late and a dollar short, eh?”
Thompson nodded. “Quite. I would have liked to put him in the dock at the Old Bailey, but that fish got away. The French shadowed him at De Gaulle International, but he never left the international terminal, never talked with anyone. The bugger showed no remorse at all. I suppose for him it was like chopping firewood,” the former detective said.
“Yeah. In the movies you make your hit and have a martini, shaken not stirred. But it’s different when you kill a good guy.”
“All Markov ever did was broadcast over BBC World Service,” Nick said, gripping the wheel a little tightly. “I imagine the people in Sofia were somewhat put out with what he said.”
“The people on the other side of the Curtain aren’t real big on Freedom of Speech,” Ryan reminded him.
“Bloody barbarians. And now this chap is planning to kill the Pope? I am not a Catholic, but he is a man of God, and he seems rather a good chap. You know, the most vicious criminal hesitates before trifling with a man of the clergy.”
“Yeah, I know. Doesn’t do to piss God off. But they don’t believe in God, Nick.”
“Fortunate for them that I am not God.”
“Yeah, it would be nice to have the power to right all the wrongs in the world. The problem is, that’s what Markov’s bosses think they’re doing.”
“That is why we have laws, Jack—yes, I know, they make up their own.”
“That’s the problem,” Jack agreed as they came into Chatham.
“This is a pleasant area,” Thompson said, turning up the hill on City Way.
“Not a bad neighborhood. Cathy likes it. I would have preferred closer to London, but, well, she got her way.”
“Women usually do.” Thompson chuckled, turning right onto Fristow Way and then left on Grizedale Close. And there was the house. Ryan got out and retrieved his bags.
“Daddy!” Sally screamed when he walked in the door. Ryan dropped his bags and scooped her up. Little girls, he’d long since learned, gave the best hugs, though their kisses tended to be a little sloppy.
“How’s my little Sally?”
“Fine.” It was oddly like a cat, coming out of her mouth.
“Oh, hello, Dr. Ryan,” Miss Margaret said in greeting. “I didn’t expect you.”
“Just making a low pass. Have to change cleans for dirties and head back out.”
“You going away again?” Sally asked with crushing disappointment in her voice.
“Sorry, Sally. Daddy has business.”
Sally wriggled out of his arms. “Phooey.” And she went back to the TV, putting her father firmly in his place.
Jack took the cue to go upstairs. Three—no, four—clean shirts, five sets of underwear, four new ties, and . . . yes, some casual wear, too. Two new jackets, two pairs of slacks. His Marine tie bar. That about did it. He left the pile of dirties on the bed and, with his bags packed, headed back down. Oops. He set his bags down and went back upstairs for his passport. No sense using the fake Brit one anymore.
“Bye, Sally.”
“Bye, Daddy.” But then she thought again and jumped to her feet to give him another hug. She wouldn’t grow up to break hearts, but to rip them out and cook them over charcoal. But that was a long way off, and for now her father had the chance to enjoy her. Little Jack was asleep on his back in the playpen, and his father decided not to disturb him.
“See ya, buddy,” Ryan said as he turned to the door.
“Where are you going?” Miss Margaret asked.
“Out of the country. Business,” Jack explained. “I’ll call Cathy from the airport.”
“Good trip, Dr. Ryan.”
“Thanks, Margaret.” And back out the door.
“How are we on time?” Ryan asked, back in the car.
“No problem,” Thompson thought out loud. If they were late, this airliner, too, would have a minor mechanical problem.
“Good.” Jack adjusted his seat to lean back and get a few winks.
He awoke just outside Heathrow Terminal Three. Thompson drove up to where a man in civilian clothes was standing. He looked like some sort of government worker.
He was. As soon as Ryan alighted from the car, the man came over with a ticket envelope.
“Sir, your flight leaves in forty minutes, Gate Twelve,” the man reported. “You’ll be met in Rome by Tom Sharp.”
“What’s he look like?” Jack asked.
“He will know you, sir.”
“Fair enough.” Ryan took the tickets and headed to the back of the car for his bags.
“I’ll take care of that for you, sir.”
This sort of traveling had its possibilities, Jack thought. He waved at Thompson and headed into the terminal, looking for Gate Twelve. That proved easy enough. Ryan took a seat close by the gate and checked his ticket—1-A again, a first-class ticket. The SIS must have had a comfortable understanding with British Airways. Now all he had to do was survive the flight.
He boarded twenty minutes later, sitting down, strapping in, and turning his watch forward one hour. He endured the usual rigmarole of useless safety briefing and instructions on how to buckle his seat belt, which, in Jack’s case, was already clicked and snugged in.
The flight took two hours, depositing Jack at Leonardo da Vinci Airport at 3:09 local time. Jack walked off the aircraft and looked for the Blue Channel to get his diplomatic passport stamped after a wait of about five seconds—one other diplomat had been ahead of him, and the bonehead had forgotten which pocket his passport was in.
With that done, he retrieved his bags off the carousel and headed out. A man with a gray and brown beard seemed to be eyeballing him.
“You’re Jack Ryan?”
“You must be Tom Sharp.”
“Correct. Let me help you with your bags.” Why people did this, Ryan didn’t know, though on reflection, he’d done it himself often enough, and the Brits were the world champions at good manners.
“And you are?” Ryan asked.
“Station Chief Rome,” Sharp replied. “C called to say you were coming in, Sir John, and that I ought to meet you personally.”
“Good of Basil,” J
ack thought out loud.
Sharp’s car was, in this case, a Bentley sedan, bronze in color, with left-hand driver’s seat in deference to the fact that they were in a barbarian country.
“Nice wheels, fella.”
“My cover is Deputy Chief of Mission,” Sharp explained. “I could have had a Ferrari, but it seemed a little too ostentatious. I do little actual field work, you see, just administrative things. I actually am the DCM of the embassy. Too much diplomatic work—that can drive one mad.”
“How’s Italy?”
“Lovely place, lovely people. Not terribly well organized. They say we Brits muddle through things, but we’re bloody Prussians compared to this lot.”
“Their cops?”
“Quite good, actually. Several different police forces. Best of the lot are the Carabinieri, paramilitary police of the central government. Some of them are excellent. Down in Sicily they’re trying to get a handle on the Mafia—pig of a job that is, but, you know, eventually I think they will succeed. ”
“You briefed in on why they sent me down?”
“Some people think Yuriy Vladimirovich wants to kill the Pope? That’s what my telex said.”
“Yeah. We just got a defector out who says so, and we think he’s giving us the real shit.”
“Any details?”
“ ’Fraid not. I think they sent me down here to work with you until somebody figures out the right thing to do. Looks to me like an attempt might be made Wednesday.”
“The weekly appearance in the square?”
Jack nodded. “Yep.” They were on the highway from the airport to Rome. The country looked odd to Ryan, but it took a minute to figure out why. Then he got it. The pitch of the roofs was different—shallower than what he was used to. They probably didn’t get much snow here in winter. Otherwise the houses looked rather like sugar cubes, painted white to reject the heat of the Italian sun. Well, every country had its unique architecture.
“Wednesday, eh?”
“Yeah. We’re also looking for a guy named Boris Strokov, colonel in the Bulgarian DS. Sounds like a professional killer.”
Sharp concentrated on the road. “I’ve heard the name. Wasn’t he a suspect in the Georgiy Markov killing?”
“That’s the guy. They ought to be sending some photos of him.”
“Courier on your flight,” Sharp reported. “Taking a different way into the city.”
“Any ideas on what the hell to do?”
“We’ll get you settled at the embassy—my house, actually, two blocks away. It’s rather nice. Then we’ll drive down to Saint Peter’s and look around, get a feel for things. I’ve been there to see the artwork and such—the Vatican art collection is on a par with the Queen’s—but I’ve never worked there per se. Ever been to Rome?”
“Never.”
“Very well, let’s take a drive-about first instead, give you a quick feel for the place.”
Rome seemed a remarkably disorganized place—but so did a street map of London, whose city fathers had evidently not been married to the city mothers. And Rome was older by a thousand years or so, built when the fastest thing going was a horse, and they were slower in real life than in a John Ford Western. Not many straight lines for the roads, and a meandering river in the middle. Everything looked old to Ryan—no, not old but old, as though dinosaurs had once walked the streets. That was a little hard to reconcile with the automobile traffic, of course.
“That’s the Flavian Amphitheater. It was called the Coliseum because the Emperor Nero had built a large statue of himself right there”—Sharp pointed—“and the people took to calling the stadium by that name, rather to the annoyance of the Flavian family, which built the place out of proceeds from the Jewish rebellion that Josephus wrote about.”
Jack had seen it on TV and in the movies, but that wasn’t quite the same as driving past it. Men had built that with nothing more than sweat power and hemp ropes. Its shape was strangely reminiscent of Yankee Stadium in New York. But Babe Ruth had never spilled a guy’s guts out in the Bronx. A lot of that had happened here. It was time for Ryan to make an admission.
“You know, if they ever invent a time machine, I think I might like to come back and see what it was like. Makes me a barbarian, doesn’t it?”
“Just their version of rugby,” Sharp said. “And the football here can be pretty tough.”
“Soccer is a girl’s game,” Jack snorted.
“You are a barbarian, Sir John. Soccer,” he explained in his best accent, “is a gentleman’s game played by thugs, while rugby is a thug’s game played by gentlemen.”
“I’ll take your word for it. I just want to see the International Tribune. My baseball team’s in the World Series, and I don’t even know how it’s going.”
“Baseball? Oh, you mean rounders. Yes, that is a girl’s game,” Sharp announced.
“I’ve had this talk before. You Brits just don’t understand.”
“As you do not understand proper football, Sir John. In Italy it’s even more a national passion than at home. They tend to play a fiery game, rather different from the Germans, for example, who play like great bloody machines.”
It was like listening to the distinction between a curveball and a slider or a screwball and a forkball. Ryan wasn’t all that good a baseball fan to be able to grasp all the distinctions; it depended on the TV announcer, who probably just made it up anyway. But he knew that there wasn’t a player in baseball who could smack a good curveball on the outside corner.
Saint Peter’s Basilica was five minutes after that.
“Damn!” Jack breathed.
“Big, isn’t it?”
It wasn’t big; it was vast.
Sharp went to the left side of the cathedral, ending up in what looked like an area of shops—jewelry, it seemed—where he parked.
“Let’s take a look, shall we?”
Ryan took the chance to leave the car and stretch his legs, and he had to remind himself that he was not here to admire the architecture of Bramante and Michelangelo. He was here to scout the terrain for a mission, as he had been taught to plan for at Quantico. It wasn’t really all that hard if you spoke the language.
From above, it must have looked like an old-fashioned basketball key. The circular part of the piazza looked to be a good two hundred yards in diameter, then narrowed down to perhaps a third of that as you got away from the monstrous bronze doors to the church itself.
“When he sees the crowd, he boards his car—rather like a cross between a jeep and a golf trolley—just there, and he follows a cleared path in the crowd along this way,” Sharp explained, “around there, and back. Takes about, oh, twenty minutes or so, depending on whether he stops the car for—what you Americans call pressing the flesh. I suppose I shouldn’t compare him to a politician. He seems a very decent chap, a genuinely good man. Not all the popes have been so, but this one is. And he’s no coward. He’s had to live through the Nazis and the communists, and that never turned him a single degree from his path.”
“Yeah, he must like riding the point of the lance,” Ryan murmured in reply. There was just one thing occupying his mind now. “Where’s the sun going to be?”
“Just at our backs.”
“So, if there’s a bad guy, he’ll stand just about here, sun behind him, not in his eyes. People looking that way from the other side have the sun in their eyes. Maybe it’s not all that much, but when your ass is on the line, you play every card in your hand. Ever been in uniform, Tom?”
“Coldstream Guards, lef tenant through a captaincy. Saw some action in Aden, but mainly served in the BOAR. I agree with your estimate of the situation,” Sharp said, turning to do his own evaluation. “And professionals are somewhat predictable, since they all study out of the same syllabus. But what about a rifle?”
“How many men you have to use for this?”
“Four, besides myself. C might send more down from London, but not all that many.”
“Put o
ne up there?” Ryan gestured to the colonnade. Seventy feet high? Eighty? About the same height as the perch Lee Harvey Oswald had used to do Jack Kennedy . . . with an Italian rifle, Jack reminded himself. That was good for a brief chill.
“I can probably get a man up there disguised as a photographer.” And long camera lenses made for good telescopes.
“How about radios?”
“Say, six civilian-band walkie-talkies. If we don’t have them at the embassy, I can have them flown in from London.”
“Better to have military ones, small enough to conceal—we had one in the Corps that had an earpiece like from a transistor radio. Also better if it’s encrypted, but that might be hard.” And such systems, Ryan didn’t add, are not entirely reliable.
“Yes, we can do that. You have a good eye, Sir John.”
“I wasn’t a Marine for long, but the way they teach lessons in the Basic School, it’s kinda hard to forget them. This is one hell of a big place to cover with six men, fella.”
“And not something SIS trains us to do,” Sharp added.
“Hey, the U.S. Secret Service would cover this place with over a hundred trained agents—shit, maybe more—plus try to get intel on every hotel, motel, and flophouse in the area.” Jack let out a breath. “Mr. Sharp, this is not possible. How thick are the crowds?”
“It varies. In the summer tourist season, there are enough people here to fill Wembley Stadium. This coming week? Certainly thousands,” he estimated. “How many is hard to reckon.”
This mission is a real shitburger, Ryan told himself.
“Any way to hit the hotels, try to get a line on this Strokov guy?”
“More hotels in Rome than in London. It’s a lot to cover with four field officers. We can’t get any help from the local police, can we?”
“What guidance on that from Basil?” Ryan inquired, already guessing the answer.
“Everything is on close hold. No, we cannot let anyone know what we’re doing.”
He couldn’t even call for help from CIA’s local station, Jack realized. Bob Ritter would never sanction it. Shitburger was optimistic.
CHAPTER 31