A Death in Sweden(45)

“Eliot Carter? I’ve never heard of him. Who is he?”

Florian responded with a look of mixed disappointment and superiority, and said, “An American, living here in Paris, in Le Marais. He was CIA a long time ago, but his special skill was forgeries, documents, passports. He did a lot of work for Redford, but they were good friends too.”

Dan checked his watch, conscious that his own time had a limit set to it, and said, “You think I could see him now, tonight?”

Florian smiled, took his phone out and put in a call. He kept his seat this time, which made Dan wonder why he’d wanted to shield the other call from him. A brief exchange followed and he ended the call.

“He’s expecting you.”

“Good, thanks. What’s the address?”

“It’s on the back of the piece of paper I gave to you. Almost like the old days, no?” He looked lost in thought for a moment, the appearance of someone remembering his own past, then seemed to come back to himself, and said, “Is Habibi dead or hidden away in Guantanamo?”

“He’s dead. His heart gave out under interrogation. Romania.”

Florian shrugged and said, “Just curious. He wasn’t a French citizen. It’s only that he was in Paris when he disappeared.”

“A lot of people seem to disappear in Paris.”

“That’s true. And, Dan, if this doesn’t work out, you should make yourself one of them.”

He knew Florian was right, and he’d spent his whole life disappearing, but it felt desperate now, as if the stakes were much higher. And it wasn’t even the fantasy of there being a possible relationship with Inger to consider—if anything, it was because he knew it was a fantasy that he now so urgently wanted to change his life.





Chapter Twenty-seven


He jumped in a cab not far from the bar and traveled the short distance to Eliot Carter’s apartment, conscious of having left Inger alone too long already, not knowing how safe she would be. He was buzzed up but had to ring the bell when he got to the third floor. He could hear some sort of North African music playing inside.

The door was opened by a young and skinny Arabic guy in a tight T-shirt that looked three sizes too small, and low-slung white jeans, a stretch of midriff visible between the two. His features looked incredibly delicate and feminine, and then Dan realized it was because they’d been subtly highlighted with makeup and eye-liner.

At first he thought he’d got the wrong apartment, but after looking him up and down the young guy smiled and said, “Are you Eliot’s friend?”

Dan guessed the answer was yes so he nodded and was shown in. Eliot was lounging in a Moroccan-themed sitting room, as if modeling his expat existence on the life of Paul Bowles, and when he spoke he had the same slightly arch, over-fussy American accent.

“How do you do, Mr. Hendricks? Do excuse me not getting up. Georges tells me you want to talk about Jack.”

“I do. I won’t keep you very long.” Carter looked ready to dismiss the suggestion, but Dan added quickly, “I’m afraid the same people who were after Jack all those years ago are after me now.”

Carter responded to the seriousness of that statement by sitting up and plumping the cushions behind him. He looked to the door but the young guy had left them alone.

“Not even time for a drink?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t.”

He produced a tired little laugh and said, “Jack was always the same, rushing off here or there, but, oh, he was such a decent man. A terrible shame the way it happened.” Dan’s heart sank as he took on board that Carter didn’t know about the most recent developments, that he probably still assumed Redford had died years before. “You want to know about the last job, of course.”

“Yes, did he tell you about it?”

“In passing. He needed some paper and needed it quickly.” With a flourish, he said, “I obliged, of course.”

“Did he tell you what the job was?”

“Well, naturally, given what he was asking of me, I knew it was DGSE headquarters—La piscine, they call it. I remember complimenting him on how audacious it was. But that’s about all I can tell, other than what I knew of him . . . what I mean is, what I knew of him instinctively. You see, he wasn’t quite himself, if I might put it like that. He was preoccupied.”

“Worried about the job?”

“Possibly. I believe he never had any fear in his life, but I suppose it’s conceivable he knew something wasn’t quite right about the job. Of course, it’s also entirely feasible that this is just me using hindsight to create a completely false impression. As I said, jobs never troubled him like that, and there were other things.”

Dan waited for him to continue, but Carter simply stared at him, eyebrows raised, inviting Dan to play his part.

Dan obliged, saying, “What do you mean by that, what other things?”

“He’d had a letter a little while before, someone he knew from Beirut—the previous year he’d spent six months there, relaxing, having fun. Whether the letter was a billet-doux or something else entirely, he wouldn’t say, but he did tell me he’d received it and that it was weighing on his mind in some way. You see, what I’m saying, Mr. Hendricks, is that the air of preoccupation might have been nothing to do with the job, it might have been the letter. Nobody sends letters anymore, do they? Such a shame.”