Blind Ambition

Chapter 4 Suspicions Aroused

Another week began much as usual. Annie was set to some translation and analysis duties while Auggie handled an agent sent to learn what he could about the leaders of the Arab Spring movement in Egypt.

Annie had picked up the mail from their box when they came in from work. Kept late by a mission debrief, they stopped on the way home and picked up a stir fry of chicken, cashews and snow peas along with a green salad. Annie sat at the table going through the mail, while Auggie poured them each a glass of wine and got out Sunday's leftover boiled shrimp and red sauce.

The mail was so much easier since Annie moved in. Auggie had a device that scanned print material of most any type and read it aloud, but who wanted to listen through sheaves of advertisements and unwanted insurance offers in order to locate the credit card bill. Annie could do a quick sort, take out her mail and pass along anything of his that looked important. Tonight Auggie had heard her toss a number of items in the trash and then rip open an envelope. She fell silent as she read.

"Augs," Annie said, "this is really sort of strange?"

"What is it?" he asked through a healthy bite of shrimp.

"It's a letter from Marge."

"Who?" He washed the shrimp down with a swallow of wine and listened for the microwave to ping.

"You remember I mentioned Marjorie Whitman, the nurse I met in Guam. We got to be friends, went out a few times, and she still emails or writes me now and then."

"Okay, yeah, the one who pulled special duty on Ben Mercer so much?"

"Don't frown at me, Auggie. I'm with you, remember; not out searching for Ben."

"Yeah, okay, sorry, babe." He smiled warmly to make up for his instinctive jealousy. "So what does Marge have to say that's so strange?

"She was transferred to Madigan in Tacoma, Washington. She met a major there she really likes. They went for a little R & R in Las Vegas."

"Sounds like fun; do they want us to join them?" Auggie took the warmed rice and stir fry out of the microwave and put in on the table.

"No, but she saw Ben Mercer there."

Auggie turned from the refrigerator with the salad in one hand and focused his attention on her. "Now, that is interesting. Does she say what he was doing?"

"Yes, she says that he didn't see her in the crowd, but he was with a beautiful Nordic type blonde, and they lost about $200,000.00 at the roulette table while she watched."

"Two hundred thousand! You can't toss around that kind of money on Agency pay."

"No, but maybe he has other income – like you do?"

"Maybe, and maybe he was on an assignment, but it would be interesting to know."

"There's one more thing."

"And that is …?" One eyebrow slid up like a visual question mark.

"Marge says she asked a croupier about the high roller couple, and he told her they were Jason Dourne and Elfe Kappel. Apparently they're well known in the Vegas casinos."

"My, how very careless of them." Auggie's expression was sober and his words dry. "Annie, Elfe Kappel is beautiful, if you like the very pale and clinging type. She is also well known as an enticing contact for a German arms smuggling outfit. Your boy, Ben, seems to be dabbling in dangerous waters."

"He's not 'my boy' and you know it." Annie's brown eyes flashed. "You've seen this Elfe?

"Long ago and far away, in another life, sweetheart. I was far too small game to interest her."

"What should we do?" Annie asked as she scooped a healthy serving of the hot food onto her plate.

"Nothing official right now, but maybe I'll poke around a little. Anything else of interest?" Auggie picked up a spoon. A spoon was about the only hope a blind man had of capturing any rice and conveying it safely to his mouth.

"There's a letter for you from the Building Association. Seems they want to hold a meeting to discuss raising the Association fees."

"Yeah, I've never yet been to a meeting where they wanted to lower them. Put it on my desk after dinner, will you?"

Until now, Auggie had carefully avoided looking into Ben Mercer's background and affairs. Some sense told him that Annie would care deeply if she found he hadn't played fair, but things had changed in the last few months. Annie seemed to have made her choice; his heightened senses told him that a circle of danger was slowly closing around them, and now he had proof that something odd was definitely going on with Ben Mercer. He decided to look long and deep into anything he could find.