weeks ago when she had placed calls for him all through the night to a suite of rooms at the hotel on Nebraska Avenue.
He rose from the chair and went to his attacb6 case, taking out notes he had written to himself. Notes with names and telephone numbers. He walked over to the bedside telephone, pulled the armchair next to the phone, and sat down. He thought for a moment, composing a verbal shorthand French for what he wanted to say, doubting, however, that it would make any difference. Ambassador Robert Winthrop had disappeared more than a month ago; there was no reason to think he had survived. Winthrop had raised the names of the Matarese with the wrong men-or man-in Washington.
He picked up the phone and dialed; three rings followed before an operator got on the line and asked for his room number. lie gave it and more distant rings continued.
"HelloT' "Listen! There's no time. Do you understand?" "Yes. Go ahead." She knew him; she was with him. He spoke rapidly in French, his eyes on the sweep hand of his watch. "Ambassador Robert Winthrop. Georgetown.
Take two Company men with you, no explanations. If Winthrop's there ask to see him alone, but say nothing out loud. Give him a note with the words: 'Beowulf wants to reach you.' Let him advise in writing. The contact must be sterile. I'll call you back." Seventeen seconds.
"We must talk," was the strong, quick reply. "Call back." He hung up; she'd be safe. It was not only unlikely that the Matarese had found her and tapped her, but even if they had, they would not kill her.
There was nothing to gain, more to learn by keeping the intermediary alive, and too much of a mess killing the Company men with her. Besides, there were limits to his liability under the circumstances; he was sorry, but there were.
It was time for Lisbon. He had known since Rome that he would use Lisbon when the moment came. A series of telephone calls could be placed through Lisbon only once. For once those receiving the calls were listed in the overnight data banks, red cards would fly out of computers into alarm slots, the coded source traced through other computers in Langley, and no further calls permitted by that source, all transmissions terminated.
Access to Lisbon was restricted to those who dealt solely with highlevel defections, men in the field who in times of emergency had to go directly to their superiors in Washington who in turn were authorized to make immediate decisions. No more than twenty intelligence officers in the country had the codes for Lisbon, and no man in Washington ever refused a call from Lisbon. One never knew whether a general, or a nuclear physicist, or a ranking member of the presidium or the KGB might be the prize.
It was also understood that any abuse of the Lisbon access would result in the severest consequences for the abuser. Bray was amused-grimly-at the concept; the abuse he was about to inflict was beyond anything conceived by the men who made the rules. He looked at the five names and titles he was about to call. The names in themselves were not that unusual; they could probably be found in any telephone book. Their positions, however, could not.
The Secretary of State The Chairman of the National Security Council The Director of the Central Intelligence Aaency The Chief Foreign Policy Advisor to the President The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff The probability that one, possibly two of these men were consiglieri of the Matarese convinced Bray not to try to send his indictment directly to the President. Taleniekov and he had believed that once the proof was in their hands the two leaders of both their countries could be reached and convinced. It was not true; Presidents and Premiers were too closely guarded, too protected; messages were filtered, words interpreted. The charges of "traitors" would be dismissed. Others had to reach Presidents and Premiers. Men whose positions of trust and responsibility were beyond reproach; such men had to bring them the news, not "traitors." The majority if not all of those he was about to call were committed to the well being of the nation; any one of them could get the ear of the President. It was all he asked for, and none would refuse a call from Lisbon. He picked up the telephone and dialed the overseas operator.