First Thrill Page 11

  If any electronic surveillance were to be conducted, it would have to be as a covert operation. The best thing to do right now was to get the ball rolling following the protocol. Once back in his office, he called a high-level employee he knew over at CSIS.

  The Canadian Security Intelligence Service operated on a domestic level. It was on the front lines of national security as it handled counterterrorism, counterespionage, and security screenings. It was them who were in charge of rooting out foreign elements operating from within the borders of Canada. The man Bellamy talked to agreed to open a file on Hingle and to see what he could do, but he couldn’t promise anything.

  What worried Bellamy the most wasn’t that Hingle was part of an operation that transcended borders. It was scary that he had been a former employee of his. His knowledge as an intelligence officer would make him a very commendable foe.

  If they weren’t careful, Hingle could disappear forever.

  Jeff sat outside G.M.’s bungalow. Once he had finished everything he had planned to do, he had checked out of his hotel room and gathered his things. He didn’t know what his mark’s plan was and he wanted to be ready for all eventualities.

  He was concealed between some bushes on the property and he had a great view of the entrance. His laptop bag was at his feet and he was leaning back against his suitcase. The gadget case was his chair. The bugs were eating him alive and he had no insect repellent. He considered going out to buy some, but the man was due back any minute now. He was hungry and all he had to munch on was half a roll of Lifesavers. And all the red ones were gone.

  The sound of tires made him forget his condition. A taxi went up the driveway and he saw the Hispanic man he was waiting for climb out.

  “Wait for me a moment please.”

  G.M. glanced at his watch and jogged up to his door. The nervousness came back to Jeff; he hoped he hadn’t forgotten anything. The man returned two minutes later with his suitcase. The driver got out of his car and helped his customer put the case in the trunk.

  “The airport.”

  As soon as the cab was out of sight, Jeff stood up, grabbed his things, and ran out to the street. Bermuda had six hundred and fifty taxis for its twenty-two square miles so Jeff was confident he would find one within a minute. It took in fact two minutes, but once he was in he told the driver he would miss his plane if he didn’t hurry. An extra twenty dollars convinced him.

  Jeff arrived at the airport at the same time as his mark. He took his time taking his bags out of the car to allow the tall Latino to get a head start. Jeff’s driver was puzzled by the fact that his customer had mentioned the possibility of missing his plane and now he was acting like he had all the time in the world. It wasn’t his business.

  Jeff followed G.M. inside and saw him heading toward the US departure lounge on the second floor. Jeff glanced at the TV monitor and saw that the flight was heading to Atlanta. He bought himself a ticket.

  Two hours later he was in Atlanta. He had eaten on the plane and he was once again ready to take the world head on.

  He went to pick up his luggage at the carousel but from the corner of his eye he saw that the man he knew as G.M. didn’t bother to. This could only mean one thing, that he was waiting for another plane.

  He followed him to a gate on the other side of the airport. The man was going home to Caracas. Jeff rushed to the Delta counter.

  “I need to be on that flight to Caracas.”

  The woman typed on her keyboard. “I’m sorry sir, it’s full.”

  “No no no, you don’t understand. I need to be on this flight. I’ll take first class, I’ll take business. I’ll sit in the cargo bay if I have to. I need to be on this plane.”

  “It’s really totally booked, sir. But I can get you a flight to Caracas from Mexico City if it’s urgent.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “You’d better hurry, it’s in twenty minutes.”

  If Jeff wasn’t on the same plane as his mark, then there wasn’t any point in checking with other airlines for availability. He decided to fly to Mexico. He would call the office from there and see if there was a possibility of somebody from the embassy tailing him until he got there, like they had done in the Bahamas. There really wasn’t much time to think.

  AUGUST 7

  WEDNESDAY

  Chapter 25

  Luckily for him, Jeff was to be in Mexico City for a few hours. It was after midnight when he called the office and discovered that Bellamy had already gone home.

  He was expecting to have to argue with the lady who had answered, but as soon as he had told her his name the line started to ring; he had been transferred to his boss’ home. Bellamy told him about Hingle’s identity.

  And then came the bad news.

  What ruined Jeff’s night was what a spider had done two days ago. Lucy Zimmer was a botanist working on her PhD thesis. She was roaming through the jungle east of San Fernando, collecting samples of epiphyte flowers. She was climbing up to a canopy where she spotted a glorious specimen of bromeliad when the little arachnid snuck up on her and bit her calf as her pants rose up against the tree.

  She fell down and felt incredible pain from her arm. She knew she had broken it. But then pain of a different nature seized her. It came from her leg and it was promptly spreading to the rest of her body. She radioed for help and the people she was associated with at the Universidad del Zulia quickly found her with the help of her GPS locator.

  The matter was further complicated by the drug wars that plagued Venezuela. That very morning, a cocaine trafficker was going about his usual business, having coffee with his brother-in-law before attacking his daily chores.

  As his driver picked him up, a car stopped five hundred feet down the road. The man that stepped out was the nephew of a Columbian drug lord. It was his first hit and that would assure him a place at his uncle’s table. Using a rocket launcher, he blew the cocaine trafficker to kingdom come. And half the street along with him.

  The blast took out a Red Cross convoy. It was carrying medication to the hospital which had been running low for weeks. When Lucy Zimmer got to the hospital, the medical staff apologized to no end, but it didn’t change the fact that they had no means to treat her against the deadly poison that was making its way through her body.

  Her husband was Lieutenant Zimmer, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police liaison at the embassy in Caracas. He pulled some strings and arranged her to be airlifted to Panama City.

  “The bottom line is,” Bellamy finally said, “nobody can follow your G.M. guy when he gets off the plane.”

  “Whoa whoa whoa here, you’re saying we lose him just like that?”

  “There’s no one associated with the CSE in Venezuela. We conduct our operations out of Columbia and Brazil. There’s no one from the Department of National Defense in the country either.”

  “What about our allies? Can’t they cover for us?”

  Jeff was tired and he didn’t care if his voice made him sound short-tempered. He was. What was happening here anyway? He had never felt so alone. Even on the ship as a hostage, he had been surrounded by other people. Now he had the weight of the world on his shoulders and he felt ill-equipped to handle it by himself.

  “No, this is our deal, this is our operation. The minute we let the CIA or MI6 in on this they’ll push us to the sideline. No way.”

  “So what now? Do I go back to Ottawa?”

  “No, you go to Caracas. Look for the guy, try to pick up his scent.”

  “Pick up his scent? What am I, a fucking dog? How am I supposed to do that?”

  “Use your inexhaustible supply of talents.”

  Jeff couldn’t see Bellamy grin on the other side of the line. But he could feel it.

  Jeff ate breakfast at the airport after stepping off the plane. His body was disoriented from jetlag, lack of sleep, and malnutrition. He could barely believe that a few days ago he was eating elaborate French cuisine.

  He had some work to d
o in this airport, but at the moment he was too tired to think coherently. He hailed a cab and, in Spanish, instructed the driver to go to the nearest Days Inn. He was told there weren’t any in Venezuela. He then instructed him to head for a Holiday Inn. The driver smiled and shook his head.

  “Is there a Hilton in this town?” he asked in English this time.

  He was wary of local accommodations if they didn’t have a recognized banner.

  “Si señor!”

  They drove by a Best Western on their way to the Hilton and Jeff realized it might be cheaper for his government for him to lodge there, but he didn’t care. He didn’t want any hassles.

  He let the driver take him to the hotel and overcharge him for the ride.

  Jeff slept until noon. He looked around his room and felt somewhat disturbed by the familiarity of it. He almost regretted not having stayed in an authentic Venezuelan dwelling. The greatest asset of a traveler was that he could bathe in different cultures. Then he reasoned that sleep would have been hard to come by with cockroaches crawling across his face.

  He had eaten breakfast before going to bed and he still hadn’t digested it. He thanked God he wasn’t a coffee drinker; it would be even worse. He changed his clothes and wondered if he should buy new underwear or wash the ones he had in the sink. He hated shopping, but he hated cleaning even more. He rode the elevator down to the lobby.

  At the concierge’s desk, Jeff had to wait more than a minute for the man with the plastic smile to appear.

  “Buenos dias, señor.”

  “Buenos dias,” Jeff quickly spat out. “I’m looking for maps of the city.”

  “Certainly, señor.”

  “And I’d like a phone book also.”

  “I see no problem.”

  “Great. And do you guys have a laundry service?”

  Now the monumental task began.

  Chapter 26

  It took five minutes before a bellman delivered what Jeff had asked for. He left with most of Jeff’s clothes. The CSE agent sat down at the table with the phone book and he flipped to the M section.

  He ripped all the pages from the book and began scanning first names. He highlighted every male first name that started with G. The city counted two million inhabitants and it took Jeff over an hour to reach the end. He was aware that this research didn’t mean much; for all he knew his mark wasn’t even listed. But it gave him something to do.

  Venezuela had, for a long time, been ruled by a military regime. The masses were poor and there hadn’t really been any wealthy suburbs. Development of the oil industry, however, had seen the country bloom.

  Industrial growth brought in new money and those who benefited built themselves mansions and villas. Jeff spotted the affluent parts of town on the map; they were the areas that were less densely populated.

  He went back over his list and pulled every name that he had highlighted and checked them relating to where they lived. He kept those who lived in the wealthy suburbs, but did not dismiss those who made downtown their home. He had eleven names left. He copied them along with the addresses on a blank sheet of paper.

  Jeff found a taxi and offered its driver a hundred American dollars to hire him for the afternoon. He was low on cash but he made a note to have Bellamy wire him some later in the day.

  He went to every address on his list and showed a photograph of G.M. to the neighbors asking, “Is this man your neighbor?”

  The answer was always the same, “No.”

  Jeff returned to the airport and began the daunting task of showing the picture to every employee he bumped into. “¿Tiene usted visto este hombre?” he asked a hundred times. The clerks, janitors, waiters, barmen, pilots, flight attendants all shook their heads.

  He wondered if people were saying no just to get away from him. The heat had gotten to him and he was sweating like a hog. He conceded that he must have looked scary.

  He exited the building and jogged to the other side of the row of taxis waiting for customers. One by one, he bent down to show the photograph to the drivers.

  “¿Visto este hombre?” was what he was asking now to save time.

  They paid more attention than the airport employees, but the answers were the same. Jeff considered that his mark must have had a car so he went to the parking garage. There had been a shift change since the man’s plane had landed, but Jeff was desperate. As he had expected, his queries produced nothing.

  While he had studied some of the best techniques in electronic surveillance, his textbooks had said nothing about tracking down people. He had read many detective novels, but there was a mammoth gap between reading about a piece of fiction and applying it to a concrete situation.

  Authors usually built their stories around the techniques they wanted the characters to use. Jeff didn’t know where to go from there. He had to act fast because every minute that went by his chances of finding the man decreased twofold. An experienced investigator would know exactly how to proceed, but he did not.

  What he saw as his next natural move disgusted him not so much because of fundamental beliefs, but rather because he knew he had run out of options.

  Driving around the city today, he’d had the opportunity to locate the seedy neighborhoods. He’d eventually rented a car at the airport and parked five blocks away. Even away from home he was scared of being seen in such a place. On the sidewalks ahead of him he saw more prostitutes than his country had soldiers.

  “¿Visto este hombre?” he asked a woman who was old enough to have breastfed him.

  “No,” she responded.

  It seemed to Jeff that she had paid more attention to him then she had to the photograph. Did he appear that wealthy? He didn’t think so but figured his accent must have been terrible.

  “You want some company, stranger?”

  Jeff wasn’t quite sure how to retort. Should he be flattered? It was more interest he had gotten from a woman in the last two years. There was no doubt she was after his money and nothing else and yet Jeff felt butterflies in his stomach.

  While he had a loud mouth, an asset that had always allowed him to make friends easily, he had always felt uncomfortable around members of the opposite sex, those he was keen on anyway.

  When he was attracted to a woman, all the saliva ran out of his mouth and is tongue sank down behind his teeth. The blood would start to rush out of his hands, sweat bubbles would form against his scalp, and his brain would stop functioning properly. He would mumble and stutter as his self-confidence was flushed out. While he felt no particular attraction to this woman of loose morals, he still couldn’t dismiss her like that.

  He looked past her and noticed that some of the other prostitutes were actually much more attractive. Would he feel the same way about them? He thought so. He could still remember the last time he had sex and he recalled how every stroke had felt.

  He had been in a club, something that was rare for him, and this woman had approached him. She had been quite nice to look at, especially if her face was hidden under a mask, and Jeff suspected she’d been drunk.

  He hadn’t felt he was taking advantage of her, but she’d been much more forward than him. Later that evening, he had wanted to locate the inventor of the push-up bra and hack him to a slow death with a serrated machete. It was just cruel for a woman to deceive men this way. This was the kind of disappointment Jeff couldn’t stand. Still, he took what he could get.

  He smiled to excuse himself from the woman and moved on to the next. He regarded this trek as nothing else than business and was able to forego any emotions he might have had toward these females.

  It took nearly two hours for Jeff to go through these three hot streets of Caracas. A few women commented on how attractive the man in the photograph was, and a few more commented on Jeff’s own appearance, but no one admitted to recognizing him.

  Desperate, Jeff was ready to give up.

  He walked to the first clean restaurant he came across and sat down to have supper. He again
showed the picture to some employees, but his food captivated him more. He was halfway through his second cachapas when a sight triggered an idea.

  He noticed a man sitting at the counter reading a newspaper. Jeff smiled as he experienced a wave of triumph. There was still an option and it could very well work.

  Chapter 27

  El Universal was the leading newspaper in Venezuela. The period after dinner was the busiest for all newspapers. The reporters hustled to commit their stories to paper, the editors had to decide whose story was to get printed, and everyone fueled up on Maalox. There would definitely be someone competent enough to answer Jeff’s question.

  Anticipating problems with the receptionist, Jeff had come prepared. He had bought a copy of El Universal before coming in and had flipped to the political section where he had selected the name of a reporter.

  In the lobby, he mentioned that name and was careful to say he had important information about the story the man was writing about. The young receptionist called up and related what Jeff had just told her. Although Jeff had no experience dealing with reporters, he was sure that no competent journalist would ever turn down an opportunity to meet with a source.

  A copy boy directed Jeff to the reporter’s desk in the newsroom. The man was waiting for him sitting on the edge of his small table.

  “Are you the one who has information about the president’s wife?” The man was eager to get into the conversation.

  Suddenly, Jeff realized that perhaps the man wouldn’t consent to help him once he found out that he had lied to him. But he didn’t have much of a choice.

  “I’m sorry,” Jeff said in English. “It was the only way I knew you would agree to talk to me.”

  He hoped that he had talked slowly enough for the man to understand him.

  “You have no information?”