Card Sharks Read online

RAMBLUR: With friends. You want alibis? I can give you a dozen people who'll say they saw me.

  DAVIS: Would any of your friends be jokers or aces?

  RAMBLUR: (laughs) Not a fucking chance, lady. I don't have garbage for friends.

  DAVIS: Do you burn your garbage or just throw it out on the street?

  RAMBLUR: (laughs) You're a pretty fucking clever bitch, ain't you? Bet you're real popular back at the office with a mouth like that. Well, let me tell you something ... (pause) I ain't gonna cry over that church burning. I ain't sorry at all it happened. Fire is clean. Fire purifies. And there ain't no place that needs purifying more'n Jokertown.

  "Hannah?"

  The voice caused Hannah to drop the transcript. Quasiman was standing in her cubicle. He seemed to have all his body parts today, at least the ones she could see. "Damn," she muttered. "You are just about the sneakiest SOB ..." To cover her embarrassment, she straightened a few of the papers on her desk. Quasiman took a step toward her. Hannah scooted her chair back until it hit the wall.

  The hunchback noticed, and the open hurt in his twisted face brought red-faced guilt to Hannah's face, but she didn't move back. "I remember you," he said. "I know that doesn't sound like much, but you don't understand how difficult ..." Quasiman sighed. "I made Father Squid write everything down. I make him read it all back to me every night, just so some of it stays. I keep saying your name, trying to keep your face in my mind. I even pray -"

  "Stop," Hannah said. "Just stop. I don't want to hear any of this. You need to leave."

  "I just wanted to know," Quasiman said. "If you'd found out anything?"

  Yes, I've found out that I'm not in love with the man I moved here for. I've found out that I don't really like him or what he believes in. How's that for a revelation? "Nothing I can tell you," she said. "I'm working on it, okay? Now let's get you out of here before Security throws a fit. You don't have a pass."

  "Will you find out soon?" Quasiman persisted. "I'm worried, Hannah. I can't keep holding things together much longer. What I've seen ..." A look of pain crossed his face.

  Hannah sighed. "I'm sorry -"

  "But you believe me. You do." The earnestness in the hunchback's voice was almost painful. "You're still looking."

  Hannah shook her head. "I'll admit that I'm disgusted and surprised by some of what I've learned. I won't say that I'm convinced there's anything to your conspiracy. I'm willing to go a little further, okay? It's just that following up isn't easy. You need to be patient, Qua -" She stopped. "You wouldn't happen to have a regular name, would you? I feel really dumb calling someone 'Quasiman'."

  The joker shrugged. With his distorted back, it was an ugly gesture. "If I have, I've forgotten it. And whoever I was before, I'm not exactly that person anymore, am I?"

  "I'm sorry," Hannah said. The words seemed wholly inadequate. Quasiman nodded and shrugged again. "All right," Hannah continued. "Just so you know, just so I can get you out of here, let me tell you why I'm stymied. I'd like to get some information from what used to be Vietnam. The trouble is I'm not getting any cooperation. We've opened tentative diplomatic relations with Free Vietnam in the last month, but the Feds have been no help. The UN's stonewalling, sending me from department to department. I've talked to Dr. Rudo at WHO, who said he'd see what he could do, but I haven't heard from him yet. There's actually a Free 'Nam delegation in town trying to get emergency funding from the UN - I've sent messages to them but I'm getting no answers there either: I haven't got the pull to get through the buffers to a decision-maker. If I can get to someone there before they leave ..."

  A slow smile had come over Quasiman's face during Hannah's explanation. He was positively grinning at her. "What?" she asked.

  "Mark Meadows," he said.

  "Who?"

  Quasiman just grinned. "Right at the moment, we jokers have good relations with Free 'Nam."

  ***

  "Agent Davis?"

  Hannah rose from her seat in the anteroom of the Free Vietnam suite in the Washington Omni. The man standing at the entrance to the room could have been thirty-five or fifty-five. He was caucasian, not Vietnamese; in excellent physical shape, not much taller than Hannah, but muscular. His face had a weather-beaten quality, as if he'd spent much of his time outdoors, and the aquiline nose had been broken, bending just slightly to the right over a gray walrus moustache. His hair was crewcut, the light brown brush sprinkled generously with gray. Hannah liked his eyes best of all: they were a pale, almost colorless blue, striking in the tanned face. "Minister Belew? Thank you for seeing me."

  "Minister-Without-Portfolio," Belew corrected. "I haven't the foggiest idea what that means, but it sounds official. You have some identification?" He made the request like someone used to such precautions. Hannah handed him the leather case. He looked over the photo more carefully than most, glancing back at her once and running his thumb over the state seal to make sure it was raised and embossed.

  "Department of Justice, eh? State, not Federal. You have a nice drive down from New York?"

  He handed the case back to her and pulled a chair over so they faced each other over a small lacquer table. Hannah saw him look at the tape recorder she'd placed on the table alongside her purse. "Do you mind?" she asked.

  "Yes. But since Mark's asked me to cooperate with you ..." He shrugged. "Can I call you Hannah, by the way? And I'm a lot more comfortable being J. Robert than 'Minister.' I'm from the military; this diplomacy business is still foreign to me. The first thing you need to know is that I'm only a small fish in our group. Ambassador Ngu makes all the decisions, he and President Moonchild back in Saigon."

  Hannah had the feeling that Belew was being deliberately casual. She also decided that it didn't matter as long as he was willing to talk. "I understand. Still, I appreciate your seeing me on short notice." Hannah turned on the recorder and noted the date and time. Before she could ask the first question, however, Belew spoke again. "I guess you know Father Squid called Mark Meadows in Saigon yesterday. Mark spoke to President Moonchild, and he's instructed me to make arrangements for you to fly to Vietnam and perform any investigations you need to make there, if -" Belew paused for a long breath. "- I think it's necessary. I understand you believe the Jokertown fire was more than just simple arson."

  "It's something I'm checking out."

  "Just who is it that you're investigating in Vietnam?"

  "A Dr. Etienne Faneuil. Also a nurse with him: Margaret Durand."

  Belew frowned, but his eyes never left their appraisal of her face. Hannah had the odd feeling that the man was almost flirting with her. There was nothing overt, but the undertone was there in his intense scrutiny, nonetheless. Hannah had been hit upon enough to know the signs: Belew was interested, if in a distant way. "I don't know either of them," Belew said. "May I ask you why someone half the world away is connected with a fire in New York?"

  "It's possible that several people were involved, that's all. It may be that this was a hate crime against jokers."

  Belew smiled. He had a dangerous smile, one that Hannah unwillingly found attractive. The man definitely had charm. "That's hardly surprising."

  "It is if it's been going on for years. It is if this is just the latest in a long line of incidents caused by one particular group of people."

  Something moved behind Belew's eyes. Suddenly he was distant, no longer so intent on Hannah. He'd put himself on guard.

  "What?" Hannah asked quickly, trying to get past that reserve before he realized that he'd thrown up the barrier. "I just reminded you of something."

  Belew gave a short chuckle. "All of us jokers and aces have seen things like that, Hannah."

  Hannah sat back hard against her chair. "You're ... ?"

  "... an ace," he finished for her, and laughed. "J. Robert Belew. Also known as the Mechanic. If I'd known it would impress you that much, I'd've mentioned it before."

  Hannah ignored the warmth of her cheeks. Damn it, quit acting like a schoolgirl. He's t
rying to deflect you from something. "Minister ..."

  "J. Robert." A beat. "Without-Portfolio."

  She ignored that. "Why'd you react when I said this might be just the latest incident?"

  "Mind if I ask you something?" Belew looked away for a moment, then back. "I've done a lot of interviewing myself and I know you're supposed to stay in charge of the questioning and all. I promise to be a good boy and let you do your job afterward, but I'm curious about one thing."

  His smile forced her to smile in return. "All right," she said. "Since you promise."

  And with that, Belew's smile vanished like a conjurer's rabbit. He leaned forward toward her. "Just why's a nat concerned about this? Pardon my blatant sexism, but why's an attractive, young woman getting involved with a bunch of ugly, nasty jokers?"

  "It's my job."

  Belew shook his head. "I'm sorry, but that won't wash. Your job is to find an arsonist, nothing more. My bet is that you're catching a lot of flack for going about it this way. No, don't answer, I can see that I'm right about that. So I have to ask myself why you're doing this. Maybe you want fame; maybe this is how you're going to climb the ladder, get yourself a promotion."

  "No," Hannah answered.

  "Then why?"

  "Because someone killed far more people than I like to think about - murdered them. And from what I've seen so far, it's possible that the person who set the fire was no more than a match in the hands of someone else. I don't have much interest in a burnt match, Ambassador. I want the hand that dropped it."

  Belew didn't say anything for several seconds. Hannah let him wait, patient. The tape recorder hummed on the table. Finally Belew leaned back in his chair, regarding her with caution. "Mine's a long story and a dozen years old. It doesn't have anything to do with fires. It's also one I won't tell at all unless I know that it's also a story that you need to know. I won't tell it unless I know it's going to lead to something." His gaze was a challenge. "How am I going to know?"

  Hannah stared back at him. "I'm the only one who can answer that question. And I can't be sure I needed to know your story until I've heard it. You either trust me or you don't, Ambassador. It comes down to that. But you obviously think that there's something to what I'm investigating, or you wouldn't have asked all your questions in the first place." She gave him a short-lived smile.

  Belew snorted. "Fair enough. Tell me this, Hannah - when you've got all your facts, what are you going to do with them?"

  "Whatever I need to do," she answered. "And whatever I can."

  Belew continued to hold the stare for several seconds. Finally, he looked away and laughed. "At least you don't make promises you don't intend to keep. That's more than I can say for most of the people I've worked for. All right," he continued, and something in his posture softened. "My story starts with a call from the Oval Office..."

  A Wind from Khorasan

  The Narrative of

  J. Robert Belew

  by Victor Milan

  President Carter's head was sticking out of one of those terrible polyester sweaters of his like a turtle's. He looked at me with his sad Eleanor Roosevelt eyes and said, "I want you to lead a mission to rescue the hostages in Tehran."

  It was April 16, 1980. The sunshine of a pleasant spring morning spilled in through the French windows of the Oval Office. The roses were in bloom.

  I sucked on my moustache. For one of very few times in my life I had nothing to say.

  "It has been decided," said National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, looking as always like a shaved chow dog, "to employ a picked force of aces."

  "It's my understanding, sir," I said carefully, "that Delta Force has been preparing a rescue mission for several months."

  "How did you know about that?" barked the fourth man in the room. He was a little guy, about my own height, but weedier. He had a moustache even bigger than mine, if not quite as splendid, and a balding head shaped like a doorknob. He was no one I expected to see here, and no one I was happy to. "That's supposed to be classified."

  "Mr. Battle," I said, "I'm in the business. I specialized in high-risk operations when I served in Special Forces, and, as you no doubt know, have continued doing so on a contract basis ever since. As a matter of fact, I was hoping to be included in the mission." I thought about it a moment. "If not exactly on these terms."

  "You are perfectly correct, Major Belew," the President said, "Zbig and Mr. Battle have proposed an alteration to the plan which had been decided upon. I know that this is kind of an eleventh-hour thing, but I believe in my heart that it's worth doing."

  "Major Belew," Battle said, pushing his head forward with his eyes shining like anthracite, you're an ace." He said it breathlessly, as if it were a revelation. Since it wasn't to me, I just stood there and waited.

  I still didn't know what he was doing there. I had passing familiarity with his dossier; he'd been a hanger-around the fringes of black ops for years. He'd done a hitch in the Army way back around the time I joined, back in the Fifties, but he had managed to avoid getting into combat. After the Army he got his law degree and joined the FBI. He didn't stick with the Bureau long. He wandered into a succession of official and semi-official government and political jobs - sort of like Cyrus Vance, Carter's Secretary of State, but at a lower level.

  One would not expect him to be doing any jobs for Carter. Battle had been a Nixon man. He got himself into some rather warm water over a certain third-rate burglary back in the early Seventies, and dropped out of sight for a while.

  When I didn't respond, he went on. "It's been decided that the rescue mission presents a perfect opportunity for aces to show how much they contribute to this great country of ours. They - you - haven't been in such a good odor since the '76 riots.

  "One of the major complications to this operation," Brzezinski said in his ponderous Eastern European accent, "has been the number of operators required. The current profile calls for one hundred thirty-two men. A force that size creates logistic nightmares."

  "Makes it a bit hard to be discreet, too," I said.

  "Prezisely."

  The President stood gazing out the window with his hands clasped behind his back. "We reckon using aces will enable us to do the job with far fewer people, he said. "With the help of the Justice Department, we have assembled a team of six. You will make seven, if you agree to go."

  I felt the skin of my cheeks get hot. The President turned back to the room.

  "Also, there seems to be an ugly tide of bigotry rising in this country, against those touched by the wild card. This could be an opportunity to reverse that tide before it gathers momentum.

  He looked me in the eye. "What do you say, Major? Will you lead an all-ace rescue team?"

  It was approximately the craziest idea I'd ever heard in my life. Seven aces against a country full of well-armed religious fanatics, jumping in at the last minute on top of a mission that had been under careful construction for upwards of five months. And aces from Justice, for the good Lord's sake! It was like playing Russian roulette with an autoloading pistol.

  There was only one thing to do. I snapped to attention and saluted.

  "Mr. President," I said, "I'm your man."

  ***

  The sun was already up and hot, eight days later, when our three Sea Stallion helicopters touched down in an abandoned salt-mining district near Garmsar, fifty miles southeast of Tehran. That meant we were already behind schedule. With luck that wouldn't signify, since we had nothing to do but keep out of sight - and keep from suffering sunstroke - until dark.

  "Thanks for the ride, guys," said Jay Ackroyd, dropping to the rockhard yellow ground. The jarhead crewmen squinted at him, suspecting he was being sarcastic. He was, to be sure, but he gave them a big grin and a wave. "It's been real."

  They scowled and turned back to the work of unloading our gear. "Real reminiscent of a root canal," he said, turning away. "Write if you guys find work you're more suited to, hear?"

 
We had flown overnight in a C-130 Hercules from the former Soviet airbase at Wadi Kena in Egypt to a point in the desert two hundred miles southeast of Tehran and ninety miles from the nearest settlement. Desert One was more name than it deserved. A hundred men from Delta Force would hold it while we went in. Our support would be coordinated from there.

  The flight from Desert One, mostly in the dark, hugging broken, tortuous terrain, had not been easy by anyone's standards. Notwithstanding that, I was frankly not impressed. I've been on a lot of heliborne missions, in the Nam and later. The jarheads only got us there by the skin of their teeth.

  "Who picked these bozos for a secret mission, anyway?" Ackroyd demanded of me. "I wouldn't let 'em walk my dog, if I had one. Join the Army and see the Navy not to mention the Marines."

  I gave him a qualified grin. I was also somewhat concerned about the patchwork nature of our supporting elements. It was as if every branch of service wanted to get its oar in, and some of the personnel weren't adequately prepared for this kind of job. The Marine pilots had been so nervous that even our operators right off Civilian Street noticed.

  Ackroyd didn't miss much, in all fact. Have to give him that. He was an ace private investigator. Well, he was an ace, and he was a PI. He was in his thirties, brown and brown, an inch or two taller than I. The sort of man you could never pick out of a crowd, a considerable asset in his line of work. He seemed fit enough, physically.

  He was our ace in the hole, if you'll forgive the pun. The big reason we could dispense with a hundred and eleven of the 118-man strike team Delta planned to take to Tehran. Since there was no way they could hope to keep the whole operation quiet, there had to be enough guns on the line to provide security; and it would take a lot of warm bodies to escort fifty hostages across Roosevelt Street to the Amjadieh soccer stadium where the choppers would pick them up.

  Ackroyd changed all that. He just pointed his finger at you and, pop! you were somewhere else. No muss, no fuss, no noise to alert Student Militants that their hostages were being freed. He was perfect.