Sedition (A Political Conspiracy Book 1) Read online

  “What did she say she does for a living?” Sir Spencer kept his eyes across the room.

  “Translator.”

  “Hmm.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Translator is a typical job for CIA or even FBI operatives. NSA sometimes,” Sir Spencer replied. He bit his lower lip. “They’ll generally tell you they work for the State Department or the Department of Defense. Did she say where she works?”

  “No.” Thistlewood’s head was on a swivel as he looked at the translator and then looked at Sir Spencer watching her. Was he right? Was she really a spy?

  “Which one of us do you think is responsible?” Sir Spencer shifted his weight from one foot to the other and clasped his hands behind his back. The button on his jacket pulled on the cashmere, stretching it unattractively against his gut.

  “You mean the traitor?”

  It was an interesting choice of words.

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t know.” He was hesitant to tell Sir Spencer who he thought might be the double agent. “It’s hard to say.”

  “Take a guess.”

  “Well, George was acting unusual this morning.” He winced, waiting for the knight to immediately, loudly refute his theory. Sir Spencer said nothing; he was watching Edwards interact with the translator.

  Edwards seemed too comfortable, the knight thought. He was too relaxed around this gorgeous woman. Edwards usually didn’t have that sort of game.

  The knight checked himself. Were his thoughts tainted by Thistlewood’s ideas? He wasn’t certain what to think. He needed more information.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “He came to see me at my office on campus,” began Thistlewood. “We both agreed that someone could be following us. When I suggested that we tell you about it, he was hesitant. It just seemed odd.”

  *

  George Edwards leaned onto the bar. “So where do you work as a translator?” he asked.

  Matti smiled. “The State Department.”

  “I imagine that’s an interesting job.” He swirled the ice in his cranberry vodka. It was a feminine drink, but he liked the taste. He crunched a piece of ice between his teeth. “What do you translate?”

  Matti hesitated and then answered, “Whatever needs translating.”

  “What languages?”

  “Romance.” She raised her eyebrows and blinked. Matti didn’t know where her flirtatious inclinations were coming from, but she enjoyed surprising herself.

  Edwards lifted his glass to his mouth and caught another ice cube in his teeth. He put the drink on the bar and used his thumb and index finger to wipe the corners of his mouth.

  “Excuse me for just a minute.” He raised his finger to hold her there at the bar while he walked over to speak with Sir Spencer and Art Thistlewood.

  Matti turned to speak with Thistlewood’s girlfriend, Laura.

  “So you’re Laura, right?”

  “Uh-huh.” Laura was spinning the gulp of wine left in the bottom of her glass. She was drunk.

  “So how did you two meet each other?” Matti knew the answer. She wondered how forthcoming the coed might be.

  “A funeral.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.” She nodded and took the last swig of merlot. It was bitter and she closed her eyes as she tossed her head back. “My father owns a funeral home. I was there helping. Art’s friend had died, and he was there to pay his respects. We saw each other and had this instant connection.”

  “Sounds romantic.”

  “Oh, he is.” Laura motioned to the bartender. He was hesitant to give her another refill until she shot him a look that pushed him to oblige. “You’d think the age difference would be a problem, but it’s the opposite. He’s not immature like so many college boys. He’s smart. He gets me. He’s taught me so much about wine.” She lifted her glass before taking the first sip of her fourth glass.

  “What does your father think?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Oh, he doesn’t care. He’s too busy with work to notice.”

  “He works a lot?”

  “Yes.” Laura put her hand on top of Matti’s and squeezed it. “Can I tell you something cool?”

  “Sure.”

  “He’s handling the president’s funeral,” she said above a whisper.

  Matti looked around to see who was within earshot. Nobody. Even the bartender was preoccupied. “What do you mean?”

  “My dad knows people.” Laura cupped her right hand along the side of her mouth as if she were telling a secret. “He’s providing the casket and flowers for the president’s funeral. Amazing, huh?”

  “Yeah.” Matti was floored. “Amazing.”

  She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Did the agency know about this? Was she the only one who knew that a conspirator was dating the daughter of a man connected to the president’s funeral? She needed a moment alone to process that.

  “Excuse me, Laura. I need to use the restroom. I’ll be back in a moment.” Matti asked the bartender for directions to the bathrooms and then walked off. Laura took another sip of her wine, not thinking twice about what she’d just revealed to a spy.

  *

  “So she works for the State Department,” Edwards was rationalizing. “It doesn’t mean she’s a spy.”

  “No,” agreed Sir Spencer. “But it is curious.”

  “I don’t know…” Edwards was trying to convince himself as much as the others that his new friend was a legitimate fan.

  “George,” Thistlewood questioned, “why is she here? You’ve never seen her at an event before. Look around. Other than some old-money patrons and some young peaceniks, who is here? I’m telling you. Something doesn’t add up.”

  “I don’t know that I agree…”

  “What about us being followed this morning? What about the woman with the purse earlier tonight? Very odd. Plus, she told you that she doesn’t really like your politics.”

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  “I think we need to talk to her,” Thistlewood stated. He looked at both men for approval.

  “I agree,” said Sir Spencer. He was beginning to wonder about the woman. He didn’t so much agree with Thistlewood’s assessment of Edwards’s complicity in leaking information, but he agreed that Matti Harrold did not fit the profile of a George Edwards fan. The incident with the pantsuited woman was troublesome. There was too much at stake to risk it.

  “How do we approach her?” asked Edwards.

  “Politely,” Sir Spencer said. “If that doesn’t work, we’ll have to press her a bit. There’s a room upstairs in the back. It’s quiet.”

  The men silently agreed and then walked over to the bar, where they found Laura standing alone. Edwards turned to look around the room. He didn’t see her anywhere.

  “Where is Matti?” Thistlewood asked Laura.

  “She went to the ladies’ room.” Laura placed her hand flat on the professor’s chest and rubbed, pouting. “Can’t we leave? I’ve had a little too much to drink. We’ve seen George’s work. Let’s go.”

  “In a minute,” he answered and moved her hand from his chest. “We need to talk to Matti. Just wait here.” The three men looked at each other and purposefully walked toward the bathrooms in the back hallway of the first floor.

  *

  Matti found the men’s and women’s restrooms in a hallway that ran along the entire back side of the first floor of the building.

  She pushed on the door to the ladies’ room. It was locked. She knocked. There was no answer. She walked back to the other end of the hallway, closer to the reception, and pushed on the men’s door. It opened.

  “Hello?” she called into the room. “Anybody in here?” No reply. Matti had to go. She slipped inside and turned the lock on the inside of the door.

  After using the toilet, she stood at the wall-length mirror that sat above the trough of sinks. Above the mirrors were air-conditioning returns blowing cold air into the room. She noticed
little strings of dust flapping against the vents. They needed to be cleaned.

  Matti washed her hands and stood in front of the mirror. She wondered what connection there might be between the president’s funeral and the conspirators. It was too much of a coincidence.

  She snapped open the latch on her clutch and pulled out a tube of lip gloss. Matti was rubbing the open tube against her bottom lip when she heard voices outside the door of the bathroom.

  “How do we get her upstairs?” said a man’s voice.

  “We ask her first. Then we persuade.” The second voice was British. Matti recognized it as Sir Spencer’s. The talking continued, but Matti couldn’t discern what the men were saying as they walked farther down the hall.

  She quickly replaced the cap on the lip gloss, slipped it back into her clutch, and smacked her lips. She then quickly moved to the door, unlocked it quietly, and slowly cracked it.

  Matti peeked around the door toward the women’s bathroom. She could see Sir Spencer, Art Thistlewood, and George Edwards huddled at the door. Edwards stepped to the door and knocked.

  “Matti?” He pressed his side against the door. They wanted her! Had they figured her out? Did she tip herself off by approaching the woman with the bag? Rookie mistake, she chastised herself.

  “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” she murmured under her breath as she watched the men try to open the locked door.

  “Matti? You in there? Are you okay?” Edwards looked back at the other two and shrugged his shoulders.

  It would only be a matter of seconds before they realized she wasn’t in the ladies’ room. They’d come looking for her. She shut the door and locked it, scanning the room. Looking up at the air vent, she had an idea. She’d seen it in a late night movie as a teenager on a night when she couldn’t sleep. She watched a lot of late night movies.

  The lint was no longer blowing. The air-conditioning was off. The vent was on the side of the room such that its ductwork might connect to the women’s room on the other side. She pulled up her dress, slipped off her shoes, and climbed onto the sink trough. Balancing herself against the mirror, she pressed her cheek against the filthy vent.

  “George, is that you? I’ll be just a minute.” Matti stood on her tiptoes and pressed her ear to the vent.

  “Okay. I’ll wait.” She could barely hear him, but there it was. He could hear her. He fell for it and thought she was in the other restroom. It would buy her time.

  She climbed back down and walked back to the door. The floor was damp and it disgusted her. This was reason enough never to wear impractical shoes again.

  Matti opened the door again and peeked down the hall. Edwards and Thistlewood stood at the door with their arms folded. Sir Spencer stood behind them. Matti watched him reach down to his ankle and pull up the cuff of his pants. Around his calf was what looked like a thick black sock strap. She saw him pull a small silver object from the inside of his leg. It was a pistol! He held it behind his back. The other two were oblivious.

  “Matti?” Edwards called again.

  She shut the door, relocked it, and ran over to the sinks. She turned on all of the faucets and then ran to each of the three stalls and flushed each of the toilets. It was loud. Matti hiked up her dress and hopped back onto the trough. She cupped her hands around her mouth.

  “I’m just finishing up. Hang on!” She then hopped down, adjusted her dress, and grabbed her shoes.

  Holding the straps in her left hand, she unlocked the door with her right and opened the door. She quietly stepped into the hall, trying to move past the corner and into the reception hall without the men seeing her.

  She didn’t make it.

  *

  Bill Davidson was late to the party. He walked into the main hall and started looking for the men. He peeked over heads and into the still-gathered groups of people. He didn’t see any of them. No Sir Spencer. No Art Thistlewood. No George Edwards. No Jimmy Ings. Where were they? He couldn’t imagine that they would have already left.

  Davidson mingled with people who recognized him. He was polite but brief as he shook hands and smiled while working the room to find the other Daturans. He checked his watch. He had less than an hour until he needed to meet his girl at the Mayflower.

  Davidson found the bar and ordered a vodka tonic. He was nervous, given what he was about to tell Sir Spencer. He didn’t want to be a part of the plot anymore. It wasn’t that important to him. He took his drink and walked toward one of Edwards’s new pieces. It hung on a wall at the back of the room near the rear hallway. It looked like a Norman Rockwell painting.

  Davidson stepped up to the canvas and looked at the detail. In the foreground of the drawing were two servicemen. The taller was a marine in dress blues. He stood tall, head turned looking over his right shoulder. His hands were placed on the shoulders of a shorter soldier. The soldier was in his desert fatigues and turned to the side. He was looking in the same direction as the marine. The soldier held a small map. On the map, Iraq and Afghanistan were highlighted.

  Both men looked back at a darkened profile of George Washington. Washington sat with his hands held together in prayer, a sword at his feet. Behind him and to the right of the canvas, an unseen man held the reins of a white horse.

  A deep red tear was drawn down Washington’s left cheek from his eye. He was in pain.

  Davidson recognized the work as a famous Rockwell postcard. In the original, Washington sat in the same position, praying. There was no tear. In the foreground, the two men were not military. They were a Boy Scout and a Cub Scout. Rockwell had designed the work as part of a series. The Boy Scouts of America distributed the prints during the 1960s and 1970s.

  Edwards chose to keep the same name as the original painting. Davidson looked at the white card to the right of the canvas.

  Our Heritage, 2012

  George Edwards

  Digital Sculpture, 11 x 14

  He moved to his left to look at another piece. It was a large vibrant canvas titled Universal Health Care. It was a nearly exact duplicate of Picasso’s 1937 painting called Weeping Woman. Davidson remembered speaking with Edwards about this piece, and it was among his favorites.

  Davidson knew that Edwards was very specific about the paintings he chose to digitally alter. The choice of Weeping Woman was not by accident. It was a painting Picasso created to communicate the pain visible on a human face. The blue, green, and yellow woman depicted in the work was actually a friend and collaborator of Picasso. Her name was Dora Maar. She was close to Picasso during the time in his life when he was most involved in politics. 1937 was also a year in which the United States entered a second depression. It was the year Social Security paid out its first monies and that unemployment insurance became a law in all fifty states.

  Edwards had replaced the colors of Picasso’s original with red, white, and blue. The tears were in the shapes of melting stars. The face was altered just enough to resemble Lady Liberty. She wore a crown.

  Davidson admired Edwards’s work. It was smart and relevant. He wondered why a man with so much talent would decide to ruin it. He was about to go back to the bar for a refill when he heard a commotion coming from the back hallway.

  *

  Matti was about to turn the corner into the main hall and slip out of sight when she heard her name.

  “Matti?” Edwards was calling after her. He’d seen her tiptoeing down the hall. “Matti? Is that you?” He was confused and looked back at the bathroom door. She looked back at him but didn’t speak.

  Quickening her pace and almost losing her balance, she rounded the corner into the main hall. She could hear the men begin to run after her. When she entered the hall, she saw Bill Davidson. He was looking at her bare feet as she scurried by him. She walked quickly past Laura at the bar and then to the front of the room. Matti reached the door and turned to see the men still following her. Edwards was leading the other two.

  Matti could feel the crowd watching her as she pushed past the glass do
or and onto the sidewalk. She looked to her left and then to her right. It was dark outside now. She saw no taxis to either side. She decided to run left. As she sprinted down the sidewalk, Edwards shoved through the door, gaining ground quickly.

  Matti saw a cab ahead. She held up her shoes and waved. The cab slowed at the curb right in front of her. She scrambled for the handle, pulled it, and threw herself into the backseat. Out of breath but full of adrenaline, she slammed the door. Edwards was within a few feet of her but stopped running as if nearing the edge of a cliff and watched the cab pull away.

  “The Metro stop at Reagan National,” Matti huffed. Her feet hurt and she wanted to get as far away from the men as possible. She knew she’d blown it. She might have jeopardized the entire operation. Her supervisor would be incensed. She considered that breaking the rules wasn’t such a good idea after all.

  Rules are there for a reason.

  Matti turned around to see the three men still standing on the sidewalk. Bill Davidson had joined them. They weren’t following her.

  She leaned back against the blue vinyl of the seat. What had she done?

  *

  “What was that about?” Davidson didn’t bother to greet his brethren. “Why were you chasing that woman?”

  “She’s a spy,” Thistlewood blurted out.

  “What?”

  “She’s a spook, Bill,” Thistlewood said, talking with his hands. “We’re being watched and followed. The jig is up.”

  “We don’t know that, Arthur.” Sir Spencer had slipped the pistol back into the ankle strap underneath his pants. None of the others had seen it. “She was suspicious. She’s likely working for some agency, but we don’t know that she’s a spy. And we don’t know what information she has or doesn’t have.”

  “George is the problem!” Thistlewood snarled and pointed his finger at the artist.

  “What are you talking about?” Edwards said in a raised voice. “Why am I the problem?”

  “Lower your voices, men.” Sir Spencer stood between Edwards and Thistlewood. “Let’s go back inside and discuss this privately.” He waved the men inside, and they walked back into the reception hall. A small crowd had gathered at the door. They moved back as the men entered.