The Mark of the Assassin

snapped the handset back into place. Elizabeth said, "What's the
    problem?"
    "You know that feeling you get when someone's looking at you?"
    "Sure."
    "I have it right now. I can't find him, but I know he's out there."
    Michael stared into the rearview mirror for a moment. "I have good
    instincts," he said distantly, "and I always trust my instincts." Five
    minutes later Logan walked out the front door of the Post building.
    Logan was tall and bald, and the wind was playing havoc with his fringe
    of overgrown graying hair. He wore no overcoat, just a crimson scarf
    wrapped around his thin neck, and his hands were jammed in the pockets
    of wrinkled gray flannels. Osbourne reached back and threw open the rear
    door. Logan climbed in and said, "God, I love the weather in this town.
    Seventy degrees yesterday and forty today."
    Michael pressed down hard on the accelerator, and the Jaguar leaped from
    the curb into the heavy traffic of downtown Washington. Logan buckled
    his seat belt and clutched the armrest. "What do you do for a living,
    Mike?"
    "I sell computer equipment to large clients overseas."
    "Ah, sounds interesting."
    Michael turned left on M Street and sped west across downtown. He turned
    right on New Hampshire, raced around Dupont Circle, and accelerated west
    along Massachusetts Avenue. He expertly weaved in and out of traffic and
    spent more time looking in his rearview mirror than at the road ahead of
    him. Logan had by now nearly torn the armrest from the rear door. "I
    didn't catch the name of the company you work for, Mike."
    "That's because I didn't tell you. And I prefer Michael, Tom ."
    Elizabeth turned around and took a long look over her shoulder.
    "Anything?" she asked. "If anyone was there, they're gone now."
    He slowed down and fell into pace with the rest of the traffic. Logan
    let go of the armrest and relaxed. "Computer salesman, my ass," he said.
    HENRY RODRIGUEZ HAD BEEN ASSIGNED to watch Elizabeth Osbourne that day,
    but he broke off the chase along M Street. Michael Osbourne, a former
    field officer, was trained to recognize sophisticated physical
    surveillance. One person crudely disguised as a Chinese food deliveryman
    could be spotted in a matter of minutes. He pulled to the curb and
    telephoned Mark Calahan at the command post in Kalorama. "He was
    definitely trying to shake a tail," Rodriguez said. "If I tried to hang
    with him, he would have made me."
    "Good call. Go back to Georgetown. Wait for them to show."
    Calahan walked into the library to break the news to Mitchell Elliott.
    "Logan must need help," Elliott said. "Why else would he be meeting with
    her now?"
    "She's in a position to do serious damage. Perhaps we should tighten
    things up a bit."
    "I agree," Elliott said. "I think it's time Henry went back to work."
    "He's not going to like being a janitor again. He feels we're
    discriminating against him because of his Hispanic heritage."
    "If he doesn't like it, let him file a complaint with the EEOC. I pay
    him well to do what he's told."
    Calahan smiled. "Yes, sir, Mr. Elliott."
    MICHAEL FOUND A PARKING SPOT on East Capitol Street. He dug an old
    windbreaker from the trunk for Tom Logan, and they walked in Lincoln
    Park beneath cold, slate-gray skies. Logan said, "How much of Susanna's
    original material did you read?"
    "Enough to get the picture," Elizabeth said. "Let me refresh your
    memory," Logan said. "In the early eighties, Beckwith wanted out of
    politics. More specifically, Anne Beckwith wanted out of politics. She
    wanted her husband back in the private sector, where he could earn some
    serious money before he was too old. Both of them had a little family
    money, but not much. Anne likes nice things. She wanted more than what
    they could get on a government paycheck. He'd done two terms in the
    Senate, and she told him it was politics or her."
    A pair of joggers approached them from behind, each with a dog straining
    at the end of a leash. Logan, like a good field man, waited for them to
    pass out of earshot before resuming. "Beckwith is a lot of things, but
    he's totally devoted to Anne, and the last thing he wanted was to lose
    her. But he also enjoyed politics and wasn't particularly thrilled about
    practicing law again. He called his advisers and money boys together in
    San Francisco one night and broke the news. Needless to say, Mitchell
    Elliott was apoplectic. He'd invested a lot of time and money in
    Beckwith over the years, and he didn't want that