“Ancient history,” said Rubino. “We have work to do.” It was obvious he wasn’t a big fan of Frank’s. It was after 5:00, and I was exhausted. I asked if it could wait, but he said no, we had to do it then.

He went over the operational plan he had prepared with the FBI. The National Security Agency would be monitoring Bézy from the moment he left for the airport in Paris. They would know when his plane took off and would track it over the Atlantic, collecting any in-flight communications sent along the way. Once the plane landed, the bureau would take over. They would have people on the ground at the airport, and a small army at the designated meeting site. It all sounded smooth and seamless, as he described it, but Rubino still seemed worried about the possibility of a “flap”—the agency’s all-purpose term for anything that went bad in public. Anything was better than a flap.

“If we run into any problems,” he said, “we abort the whole thing. Are we clear on that?” That was the message he really wanted to convey. It was obvious that someone at the agency had gotten nervous and screamed at Rubino, making him nervous, and now he was making me nervous. I felt sorry for him: he had to worry about an inspector general, congressional investigating committees, federal prosecutors. “Listen to me, Eric!” he said. “This is serious. If anything goes wrong—anything—that’s it. Coitus interruptus. We don’t try to be heroes. We bail out. Understood?”

“Sure. I don’t want to get in trouble. But why did Frank give me the poison pen?” I showed him the armed Mont Blanc.

“Shit! Did he give you that? Well, he’s crazy. Just don’t use it. Now when you get the call Sunday night, I want you to meet me at the safe house so we can go over the details one last time.”

“Not there. I hate that place. Can’t I go to your house?”

“Oh, I suppose so. It’s not secure. I could get in trouble. So don’t tell anyone.”

It was the first time I had seen Rubino look so nervous. He was running a complicated interagency operation, with multiple layers of paperwork and coordination and ass-covering. And he was clearly afraid that I was going to screw it all up.

37

37

On Thursday night, four days before I was supposed to meet Bézy, I received an agitated call from George Dirk. I was sitting on my balcony, reading a book and watching the sun go down. I was trying to chill out—to avoid “thinking” about what I would be doing on Monday. Dirk was red-hot. “I got it!” he screamed into the phone. “You wanted an example that their operation is crooked? Well, I got it. It’s going down tonight. You have to come over to my office and watch it happen.”