Friday, June 21, 1987, 9:00AM
Billy was sitting at the head of the table in the agency's conference room listening with a bemused expression on his face as Dr. Smyth continued to lecture the rookies on the importance of keeping secrets.
"We gave you each individual assignments that were to be worked separately and I seem to recall making it abundantly clear that they were not to be discussed with each other or with anyone else. Perhaps none of you have ever heard the term "secret agent." I know that most of you have never met me before this week, but let me assure you that as your Director of Covert Operations, when I assign a covert mission to anyone, I expect it to be carried out covertly and that any secrets gathered stay just that. You children instead used those secrets to open Pandora's Box. Now, your section chief and I have to do some damage control. I can only hope for all of your sakes, that this didn't get outside the agency. Scarecrow and Mrs. King..." he paused for a moment, fixing them all with a steely gaze, "...correction, Mrs. Stetson are the most efficient team that this agency has and I won't have their reputations tarnished by all of you idly gossiping about them as if you're nothing more than nosing neighbors peering through window blinds. Do you have any idea how much damage you could have done if it gets outside the agency that the infamous Scarecrow is a married man? Do any of you have any idea how many villains out there would love to take a potshot at his wife or worse, her offspring, just to get to him?"
Dr. Smyth's tirade was interrupted by a voice at the door saying, "Excuse me?"
Billy and Dr. Smyth both turned at the intrusion. "What is it, Shelby?" Billy said to the woman in the doorway who'd been filling in for Francine in her absence.
"I'm sorry to interrupt, but Miss Desmond's on the phone for you, line one and she says it's urgent, alpha one priority."
"Thank you, Shelby. I'll take it in my office," Billy replied with a nod. "You can handle this by yourself for a moment, can't you?" he said to his superior with a grin.
"Certainly," Smyth said grinning back as he chomped down on his cigarette holder. "In fact, I think it's high time that I started flying solo on this." He then turned to the group assembled there with a malicious grin.
Billy chuckled as Dr. Smyth began lecturing the newbies again and exited the room to take the call from Francine. A few minutes later, he returned looking full of purpose. "Newton, Grayson, you two, my office now. I have a job for you."
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While Billy was getting the rookies started on the research Francine had asked for, Lee, Amanda and Efraim were approaching the Chambers' cabin just as Mrs. Chambers was exiting it. "Ok, Efraim, you're up," Lee said.
Efraim quickly intercepted Candace Chambers. "Candace, hello," he said with a warm smile as he turned on the charm.
"Why, hello, Mr. Bormann. How are you?"
"Not doing very well, I'm afraid. It's my wife, you see. I was hoping that this retreat would help us to rekindle the old flame, but I'm afraid it's only made things worse between us," He said laying it on thick playing the hen-pecked husband to a tee. "I so enjoyed talking to you the other night and I was wondering if you might have a moment or two to talk again. I could really use a sympathetic ear."
"I'm dreadfully sorry to hear that," Candace Chambers replied. "I was just going to head into town to grab some breakfast. Perhaps, you'd liked to join me and we could talk?"
Perfect, Lee thought as he and Amanda watched from the shadows while Efraim let Mrs. Chambers lead him to her car. As soon as the car was out of sight, he nodded to Amanda who said, "Let's go."
They quickly made their way to the cabin they'd been watching and Lee rapped firmly on the door. As soon as David Chambers answered, he pushed on the other man's chest to urge him back into the main room of the cabin and said, "We need to talk."
As soon as they were all gathered in the main room of the Chambers' cabin with the door firmly closed behind them, Amanda pulled the snapshots Francine has taken out of her pocket and asked, "Do you know this woman?"
The man's eyes widened as he gazed at the photo and nodded numbly.
"How exactly do you know her?" Lee queried. "You said last night that you were just a victim in all this and were being blackmailed, so how do you know an international spy?"
"She's a spy," Chambers questioned, the shock on his face evident.
"Yeah, and the worst kind," Amanda answered. "The kind we can't catch. She's been responsible for a lot of deaths."
"Oh my God," Chambers said in horror.
"Answer my question," Lee demanded. "How do you know her?"
"In the biblical sense, I'm afraid," Chambers answered looking ashamed.
"Why doesn't that surprise me," Lee grumbled.
Amanda glared at Lee and said to Chambers and asked, "So, you slept with her? Is that all?"
"No, that's not all. The photos that Steve had, they...they're of her...or I should say...me with her."
"Ah," Lee said as the pieces all fell into place. "So, how did you meet her?"
"At once of Candace's charity functions," Chambers replied. "It was at the Potomac Plaza. I was there playing the doting husband like I always do at those things while Candace was running around hobnobbing and trying to raise donations. I was bored to tears and drinking too much because of it. She introduced herself to me as Emily, we started talking and before I knew it we were in her hotel room. That was about a month ago."
"And it never occurred to you that you might be being set up," Lee scoffed at the man's utter stupidity.
"Look, you don't know what my life is like. You have no right to judge me," Chambers said hotly.
"The hell I don't after the stunt you pulled last night," Lee said as he glanced with a nod at the bruise on his wife's face.
"Like you have any room to talk," Chambers said. "Have you taken a good look at what you did to her?" He then nodded himself toward the very obvious purplish mark on Amanda's neck.
"There's a big difference, Pal, she wasn't objecting to what I was doing to her," Lee said smugly as he recalled their passionate encounter in the shower that had led to it.
"Lee, Sweetheart, this isn't going to get us anywhere. We need to stay focused on the investigation," Amanda said as she laid a soothing hand on his arm.
"You're right," Lee said with a sigh. He still wasn't at all happy with the situation. He would like nothing more that to throttle Chambers within an inch of his life, but he knew that they needed him to solve their case. He then turned his attention back to their quarry and said, "So, you let her seduce you, never once thinking that she might be setting you up and your buddy, Klein, uses it against you. You, my friend are an idiot who walked right into the perfect blackmail setup all because you can't keep it in your pants."
"Don't you think that's a little harsh," Amanda said.
"Do you? How would you feel if I ran around on you like that?"Lee asked her.
"Point taken," Amanda said before turning her attention back to Chambers. "So, what was the deal with you getting those pictures out of their hands? I assume there had to be some arrangement for it."
"There is," Chambers answered. "As long as I didn't interfere with whatever it is that they're doing out there in the woods, I'd get the pictures and the negatives once their task was completed and nobody else would have to know about it. We're supposed to meet tomorrow morning before the obstacle course starts."
"Tomorrow morning?"Lee questioned. He and Amanda exchanged knowing looks. That meant whatever was going down was happening today, not tomorrow, as they'd thought.
"Of course," Amanda said realization dawning. "Billy said the intel he had indicated that the attack by the Brigade in West Germany was planned for Sunday so that means they'd have to have time to get the info to their sources before then."
"Good, we should get back to Francine and see if she's found out anything from Billy yet," Lee said.
"Wait, Francine?" Chambers said. "She's an agent too?"
"Yes, and Efraim, only unlike us, they're not actually married."
"Well, that explains why all of you joined this retreat at the last minute," Chambers said thoughtfully.
"Well, you just keep your mouth shut and let us do our job. If you're lucky, we might even be able to get you out of the mess you made for yourself."
"We should go," Amanda said. "Since we now know that the exchange is going down today, we need to get cracking on this."
"Right," Lee said as he placed his hand on the small of Amanda's back and led her out of the cabin. "We should go find Francine."
As Lee and Amanda made their way back to their cabin, she asked worriedly, "Do you think we can trust him to keep his mouth shut?"
"I don't know. Guys under pressure like that are bound to do anything to keep their secrets from being exposed," Lee said with a scowl as he thought about the words he'd just spoken and how just the opposite had made him act a little crazy. He wanted his and Amanda's secrets exposed and had been pissed that she didn't. He would just be glad when this case was done and they could get back to the idea of completing the job they'd started on revealing their secrets to everyone.
Unknown to them, two cabins away, Robert Murdoch had been listening intently to every word spoken between them and David Chambers, courtesy of the bug he'd planted in Chambers' cabin before the retreat had ever started. "Agents," he muttered to himself as he quickly made his way out of the cabin toward the one next door occupied by the Kleins to tell his partner what he'd learned so they could formulate a plan of attack.
Back at their cabin, Lee and Amanda arrived to find Francine pacing the driveway where her car and Lee's were parked. "Did you find anything out yet?" Amanda asked her.
"No," Francine said impatiently as she continued to pace. "Billy said he'd call as soon as he had anything. Why do you think I'm still out here sitting on my hands?" She sighed and paused in her relentless pacing. "How'd your interview with Chambers go?"
"Good," Amanda replied and relayed the new information they'd uncovered.
"So, it's going down today," Francine said. "That doesn't give us much time to figure out what we're looking for. I'd better give Billy a call back now instead of waiting for him to call." She slid into the driver's seat of her car, picked up her phone and punched in the direct line to Billy's office to bypass the switchboard.
While Francine spoke to Billy, Lee and Amanda discussed their next move. "Maybe we should try to distract the Kleins and the Murdochs to take another look inside their cabins," Lee suggested. "If we're looking for weapons plans, not actual weapons, then we could have overlooked something last night."
"Why not just wait until the games start today when everybody will be away from their cabins anyway?" Amanda said.
"No, too risky," Lee said. "What if the exchange is going down during today's events and we miss out on it because we're not there? Even if it's not, it would look suspicious if we miss the field games today after missing the scavenger hunt yesterday."
"Ok, so how about this," Amanda said. "Since Efraim and Francine were at the scavenger hunt yesterday, maybe they could search the cabins while we go to the games and keep an eye on things there?"
"That may work," Lee said with a smile, immensely pleased that in spite of their personal problems, they were still able to brainstorm together and come to an agreement. Things were definitely looking up for them.
Francine wrapped up her conversation saying, "Thanks, Billy." She then turned to them and recounted what she'd just learned. "Okay, Billy had some of the newbies researching and found that a research facility in Bethesda was broken into a little over a month ago, a place called New Applied Technologies. They have a multi-million dollar contract with the Pentagon for weapons research and apparently during the break-in, their plan and prototype for a new explosive that leaves virtually no traces behind was stolen."
"That'd be just the kind of thing the Brigade would love to get their hands on," Lee said. "There have been rumors for years that they've been trying to devise a plan to blow a gaping hole in the Berlin Wall without it being traced back to them."
"So, what do we do nest," Francine asked.
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After Billy hung up with Francine, he turned back to the two agents in his office and said, "Alright, you two. You both did an excellent job at the research assignment I gave you. Now, I have another job for you, a real field assignment this time. Our team is going to need some back up. Get out to the state park. Be as unobtrusive as you can and try to stay out of sight. If you get caught, you're just hikers out enjoying the nice weather. Got it?"
"Yes, Sir," Agent Newton replied gleefully at the idea that she was being trusted to back up the best team in the business.
"Grayson?"
"Yes, sir," he said less enthusiastically, not the least bit happy about being forced to work with the belligerent Scarecrow after all he'd heard about his attitude.
His reaction was not lost on Billy. "Problem, Agent Grayson?"
"It's just, I don't know how much good I'll be able to do out there. Scarecrow hates me because of a wisecrack I made about his partner a while back. He's not gonna' want me there."
"Look, you're a professional. He's a professional. You're going to have to learn that in this business, you can't pick and choose your assignments. Either you can take this assignment and act like the professional you're supposed to be or I can send you down to crypto or legal to be a gopher where you'll never see the light of day on the job again? Would you prefer that?" Billy waited for his reply, arms folded across his chest. He hadn't yet told him of his plan to assign him to work with Lee and Amanda full-time. He wanted to see how he performed on this assignment first.
"No, Sir," the younger man replied. "I can be professional."
"Good, go to it," Billy said with a nod toward the door indicating that they were dismissed.
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While Lee and Amanda were filling Francine in on the plan they'd come up with and Billy was sending them backup, Murdoch and Klein were in Klein's cabin, making plans of their own.
"This sounds like a serious problem," Klein said after hearing the news from his partner that they'd been invaded by spies.
"That's why I thought you should know about it right away. The question is what are we going to do about it?" Murdoch replied.
"You leave that to me. If they get in our way, we'll just have to eliminate them and I know the perfect way to do it."