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| CIA defector Edward Lee Howard in his dacha near Moscow editing his memoir Safe House, 1994 |
Flash-forward three years, to the last day of September 1993.
The
bar inside Montgomery's Grille in downtown Bethesda, Maryland is quiet when I arrive to nail a
stool and order a vodka martini.
Wayne
the barkeep, a character out of Animal
House, says they're out of olives.
Out of olives? What kind of bar was this, anyway?
"Okay,
make it a Beefeater, rocks, lemon twist."
Joel
Joseph of National Press Books was late for our five 0'clock rendezvous.
Truth be known, I didn't care if he'd
forgotten. I was in the mood for a quiet
cocktail, which I'd savor this warm afternoon and be gone.
But
as I sipped my martini, Joseph appeared with his partner, Alan Sultan.
The specialty of this duo's ten year-old
publishing house was political intrigue.
They had, most recently, published a book by James Earl Ray, the convicted
killer of Martin Luther King.
Joseph
was mid-40s, graying mustache, with a paunch exaggerated by tight blue
jeans. A lawyer by training, Joseph was
civil-liberties-minded and a devotee of the first amendment. Years earlier, he had been part of a legal
team that defended conspiracy theorist Lyndon LaRouche.
Sultan
was about fifteen years younger than Joseph; slim with a swarthy complexion,
thick jet-black hair and trimmed beard.
He was the bean-counter at National Press, and its conscience.
Months before, I'd jocularly suggested to this publishing pair that they create an
imprint called Ball & Chain Books as an outlet for celebrity prisoners around
the world.
They
had been trying, for several years, to lure me into their mix as an
investor. (How do you make a small
fortune? Invest a large fortune into
book publishing.)
I'd explained my
philosophy about the book biz:
Each book
is a business unto itself. Bring me a
single book that has serious money-spinning potential, maybe I'll pitch in.
So
Joseph had telephoned me a few days earlier to say he had found such a book, was I
still interested?
"Sure,"
I said. "What is it?"
"Arafat,"
Joseph replied. "We have a
writer from Penthouse magazine who
knows his people."
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Gdansk, Poland, 1984
Interviewing Lech Walesa (under house arrest)
for the (UK) Sunday Mirror, Toronto Globe, and Toledo Blade |
I'd
been through this kind of publishing quagmire once before, with Poland's Lech
Walesa, whose disparate representatives had made three simultaneous exclusive deals, including one with me.
Strike for Freedom: The Story of Lech Walesa and Polish Solidarity by Robert Eringer (1982-11-03): Amazon.com: Books
But
I like good yarns.
So there we sat in
Montgomery's Grille, Joseph and Sultan sipping white wine.
"Did
Joel tell you about our new book project?" asked Sultan.
"Yeah,"
I said. "Arafat."
"No,"
said Sultan. "Something a lot
better came in yesterday." He cued
his business partner with a glance.
"Have
you ever heard the name Edward Lee Howard?" asked Joseph.
"Sure,"
I replied. "The only CIA guy ever
to defect to Moscow."
"He
wants to write a book," said Joseph.
"We have his proposal."
"How
long is it?" I asked.
"Forty
pages," said Joseph. "You
interested?"
Yep. I was interested.
But not for the same reason as Joseph or
Sultan.
I was interested in nailing this traitor and putting his butt behind bars.
After all, a much worse fate had befallen Adolph Grigoryevitch Tolkachev, the
Russian scientist and invaluable CIA asset whom Howard had maliciously betrayed to the
Russians.
Tolkachev had been executed.
"Maybe."
I feigned nonchalance. "Tell me more."
"Howard
says it wasn't his fault that he ran to the KGB," said Joseph. "The CIA put him in a corner and he had
no choice. He says he's the only guy
who's ever been trained by both the CIA and the KGB in spy tradecraft. And get this, the KGB chief who took Howard
under his wing, Vladimir Kryuchkov? He's the same
guy who led the putsch against Gorbachev in 1991. You've got to see the proposal."
Next
morning, Friday, October 1st, I telephoned Clair George, the former CIA spymaster.
We had known each other for over five years by this time and had been working closely, for the past three, as independent contractors on several private-sector
intelligence projects.
"You
know the name Edward Lee Howard?" I asked.
"You
kidding?" Clair was DDO in 1985, the so-called Year of the Spy, when Howard defected to Moscow, leaving CIA headquarters in turmoil.
"He
wants to write a book."
"Really?" This intrigued Clair.
"Not
only," I said. "I've been
invited to participate." I paused. "You see the
potential for L.Q. here?"
