My stay in Washington was becoming more and more unreal. I had a hankering to go into a house or flat where someone really lived and to see somebody do something that could be called normal work. This time I plunged back into the institutional world January had been visiting. The world of desk attendants, silent elevators and plush carpets. It was a vast steel and glass building with tinted windows and concealed interior lighting. I had the feeling that all the mirrors were two way and all the glass was bullet-proof, but that was probably just because I was getting the Washington blues.
After being cleared and checked and re-cleared, we were admitted to a room full of screens and consoles and whirling discs. It was like a computer warehouse with little bunches of salesmen and customers clustered around in certain spots. The air conditioning seemed a trifle high and I sweated. My suspect eye didn’t like the fluorescent light. A white-coated man introduced himself, in a thick Southern drawl, as Heseltine and took the cassette from Spinoza.
‘Be careful,’ Billy said.
‘I’m always careful… sir.’ He was pale and soft-looking with pinkish eyes behind tinted glasses.
‘We’d also like to do a description ID, Heseltine,’ Spinoza said. I thought I caught a flash of antagonism in the White Rabbit face. Maybe I did, because Spinoza added with a touch of acid: ‘If that’s all right with you?’
Heseltine checked on the clipboard he was carrying, nodded and became super-efficient. ‘We’ll do the lift from the tape first. Over here, please.’
He walked to a long, low-slung machine, put the cassette into a slot, pressed a button and an image appeared on a screen. The picture was just like on a large TV set, thinned out with a grainy quality. Heseltine fiddled with knobs and switches and the picture cleared suddenly.
‘We can freeze, magnify, alter the colour balance. Do jus’ about anything you want…’ He checked the clipboard. ‘Mist’ Hardy.’
‘Run it,’ Spinoza said. ‘Let’s see if you can run it.’
Klip was a pretty good hand with a video camera; the high elevation of the camera made the film hard to adjust to at first, but he had used the zoom to good purpose and he’d moved about on the balcony, getting different angles on the throng below.
‘That’s him. Hold it!’ I pointed to a man behind the table; he was tall and blonde, wearing a cream-coloured suit. His hair fell forward over his forehead and he tended to keep his head down. Heseltine advanced the picture frame by frame and he eventually got a fairly clear shot, almost front on with the head almost up.
‘Will that do?’ Heseltine said.
‘Sure,’ Spinoza said. ‘That’s fine.’
Heseltine flicked switches and pressed buttons. Nothing happened on screen but there were deep stirrings in the heart of the machine. When he was happy, Heseltine released the film and it moved on.
‘I take it these two weren’t the same guys as in the car?’ Spinoza took off his jacket and draped it over the back of a chair. Heseltine moved the chair away with his foot.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Quite different.’ I kept my eyes on the screen as the courtyard buzzed. I saw Trudi whisper in January’s ear. The Minister nodded and smiled. ‘There, but it’s not good.’ I saw the sound technician half-concealed behind a tall woman in a flowing silk dress. The film crept forward and some of the billowing material fell away.
‘You got lucky,’ Heseltine said. ‘Well, almos’ lucky.’
Just as the man came into view behind the dress he moved which threw a shadow across the lower part of his face.
‘Mark it,’ Spinoza said. ‘Let’s see if there’s anything better.’
There wasn’t. I saw myself move towards the technician and confusion break out among the VIPs, then the film jerked and shook and there was a shot of trees and sky as the cameraman reacted to the flash. Heseltine went back; he enlarged the image until it disappeared into a blur and then went back searching for the clearest definition. Eventually he got
a clear view of the upper part of the face and an impression of the rest. ‘Doubtful, but it’s the best we’ll do. I’ll cut and print. You can use the computer over there for the description ID.’
He got busy with his toy and Billy sat me down behind a keyboard and monitor. He punched some keys over my shoulder and a series of questions came up. The computer asked me to describe the men I’d seen in the car according to various categories. I tapped in the answers as best I could. Spinoza tapped ‘Send’ and the computer hummed softly.
‘What now?’ I pushed my chair back and stretched.
‘We wait. The brain sucks in the pictures from the film, does a sort of identikit on your pathetic descriptions and tries to get a match with the zillions of pictures it has on file.’
‘Of Americans?’
‘Of everybody.’
‘How long will it take?’
He yawned. ‘Shit, it could be minutes. You got anything at home like this?’
‘If there is they haven’t told me about it. What is this place exactly?’
‘It’s a clearing house, a memory bank, a filing system, whatever you like to call it. They’ve got army records here, prison and police records, immigration…’
‘Tax?’
He grinned. ‘Ain’t nobody saying.’
‘What about intelligence files?’
‘That’s what you think, huh? That this is some kinda spook plot against your boy? Ours or yours?’
‘Who can say. They probably don’t know which side they’re on themselves half the time. I’m sorry if I’m offending your professional pride.’
‘That’s all right. Speaking of professional pride, couldn’t you have found something less dangerous than a bottle to throw?’
‘I didn’t have time to take off my shoe.’
Heseltine approached us with a fistful of photographs and computer print-outs held out in front of him like the infant Jesus. ‘Would you draw me up a chair, Mr Hardy?’
Spinoza hooked a chair with his foot and flicked it into place. Heseltine sat down. ‘Thank you.’ He glanced at Billy and they exchanged grins. ‘You think we fooled him?’
‘He was all ready to write a report on unstated racial invective within the US Security Services.’
Heseltine laughed and took off his glasses. The eyes were very pink but had lost their furtive look. ‘Have to have some fun in this fuckin’ place,’ he said. ‘You should see Billy with the South Africans.’
‘And you should see him with thah British,’ Spinoza said.
‘Very droll,’ I said. ‘You Yanks have such a great cultural mixture to play around with. You know why we call you Yanks, don’t you?’
Spinoza spread his hands. ‘Man’s getting anxious. What’ve we got, honky?’
Heseltine stifled his laugh by putting his glasses back. ‘Some, not a hell of a lot. Positive on one of them-the blonde guy at the party.’
‘Political meeting,’ I said.
‘You could’ve fooled me. Well, he’s Arthur Udino, Italian.’
Billy peered at the glossy print Heseltine held. ‘Looks about as Italian as me.’
‘That’s his ace in the hole, or one of them. He’s aka James Swanson, George White, the list goes on.’
‘I’ll bet,’ Spinoza said. ‘So what’s his field of activity?’
‘Hard to say. He’s not a real heavy; it’s more like he’s happened to be around when heavy things are going down. Like today.’
‘Yeah,’ Spinoza said, ‘but around in what capacity. Sight-seeing? What?’
‘Contracts for the supply of military equipment,’ Heseltine said. ‘In his time Arthur’s been known to help people who want to supply guns to other people to get their ideas across.’
‘What people?’ I said.
Heseltine rustled his papers. ‘Various. It wouldn’t help you to know. And it’s just that that’s the kinda area he hangs around in.’
‘Great,’ I said. ‘What about the electrician?’
Heseltine shook his head. ‘Nothing on him and nothing on your descriptions. But we went around you a little there and might have got something.’
‘Don’t keep it all to yourself,’ Spinoza said.
‘A description of the guy who mugged the
Australian near the hotel fits Mr Hardy’s ah, rough impression of one of the men in the car.’
‘I was wondering whether to shoot out a tyre or jump onto their bonnet,’ I said. ‘Which one fits?’
‘The stocky one. It’s not positive but he was seen in town and he’s a car and street specialist. He doesn’t kill people.’
‘Oh, good. I’d love to meet him. Who is he and is there any chance?’
‘Hot shot, eh?’ Heseltine said. ‘Sorry, you’re not likely to run into “Sunny” South.’
‘“Sonny” as in Liston?’
‘No, man. As in bright an’ clear. When he was seen he was seen leaving. Now, I don’t know if the two are connected or what. Like I say, “Sunny” isn’t a killer but…’
Spinoza spread his hands as if he was going to receive a pass. ‘He made a death threat on the phone.’
‘That’s a long way from trying to put a few thousand volts through a man.’
I got a feeling now that the faked antagonism between the two was shifting towards something real. Spinoza looked almost embarrassed and Heseltine fiddled with his papers defensively.
‘You may as well tell him, Mr Heseltine, sir,’ Spinoza said.
‘Tell me what? What’s “Sunny’s” field of activity, to coin a phrase.’
Heseltine was happy to answer that. ‘Communications.’
‘You mean he talks to people?’
‘No.’ Spinoza looked around the room. It was full of white coats and white shirts and blue suits. If he felt anything like me he wanted to see some T-shirts and sneakers and smell sweat.
‘Where’s my goddamn coat?’ He stood up in one easy movement, retrieved the coat from the chair and slung it over his shoulder. ‘What you should know, Cliff, is that South works for some of the corporations here. He’s a sort of advance man who, ah, clears obstacles.’
‘Obstacles to what?’
Heseltine coughed as if he was about to start a lecture. ‘To installing the right kinds of communications facilities. The kind that can’t listen in when they’re not invited and the kind that we can listen in on if…’
‘We?’ I said.
‘The USA,’ Spinoza said. ‘The land of the free.’
‘I don’t quite get it. You mean this guy has got some protection? I don’t care. I’m not Dirty Cliffy. I don’t want revenge.’
‘You’re missing the point, Cliff.’
Heseltine carefully removed a strip of paper along the edge of one of his sheets; he slid a broad, pink thumbnail along the serrations. ‘Hell,’ he said. ‘We use “Sunny” ourselves. Sometimes.’