Murder in the CIA by Margaret Truman Read Free Book Online

had told her friend, to which Mayer replied, “You’re not supposed to like your shrink.” Mayer had been his patient for a year before hooking up with Central Intelligence.
    Árpád Hegedüs was a nervous little man, forty-six years old, who wore shirt collars that were too tight and wrinkled suits that were too large. He was married and had two children. Most of his training in psychology had been gained at the Neurological and Psychiatric Clinic on Balassa utca, near the Petöfi Bridge linking the Pest and Buda sides of the Grand Boulevard. He’d come to the attention of Soviet authorities after he’d developed and instituted a series of psychological tests for workers in sensitive jobs that were designed to flag personality traits that could lead to dissatisfaction, and perhaps even disloyalty. He was taken to Moscow, where he spent a year at VASA, the Soviet military intelligence school that constitutes a special department of the prestigious Military Diplomatic Academy. His intellect shone there and he was brought into the Sovietskaya Kolonia, the KGB’s arm responsible for policing the loyalty of the Soviet’s colonies abroad, in this case its Hungarian contingent. That was the job he held when Cahill met him at the reception, although his official position was with the teaching staff of his Hungarian alma mater.
    Cahill bumped into him a few more times over the ensuing months. One night, as she ate dinner alone in Vigadó, adowntown brasserie on Vigadó Square, he approached the table and asked if he might join her. They had a pleasant conversation. He spoke good English, loved opera and American jazz, and asked a lot of questions about life in the United States.
    Cahill didn’t attach any significance to the chance meeting. It was two weeks later that the reason for his approach became obvious.
    It was a Saturday morning. She’d gone for a run and ended up at the former Royal Palace on Castle Hill. The palace had been completely destroyed during World War II. Now the restoration was almost completed and the baroque palace had been transformed into a vast museum and cultural complex, including the Hungarian National Gallery.
    Cahill often browsed in the museum. It had become, for her, a peaceful refuge.
    She was standing in front of a huge medieval ecclesiastical painting when a man came up behind her. “Miss Cahill,” he said softly.
    “Oh, hello, Mr. Hegedüs. Nice to see you again.”
    “You like the paintings?”
    “Yes, very much.”
    He stood next to her and gazed up at the art work. “I would like to speak with you,” he said.
    “Yes, go ahead.”
    “Not now.” He looked around the gallery before saying so softly she almost missed it, “Tomorrow night at eleven, at the St. Mary Magdalene Church in Kapisztrán tėr.”
    Cahill stared at him.
    “In the back, behind the tower. At eleven. I will wait only five minutes. Thank you. Goodbye.” Cahill watched him cross the large room, his head swiveling to take in the faces he passed, his short, squat body lumbering from side to side.
    She immediately returned to her apartment, showered, changed clothes, and went to Stan Podgorsky’s apartment.
    “Hi, Lil,” Cahill said to his wife when she answered the door. “Sorry to barge in but …”
    “Just a typical Hungarian Saturday at home,” she said. “I’m baking cookies and Stan’s reading a clandestine issueof
Playboy
. Like I said, just your run-of-the mill Hungarian weekend.”
    “I have to talk to you,” Cahill told him in the crowded little living room. “I’ve just had something happen that could be important.”
    They took a walk and she told him what had transpired in the museum.
    “What do you know about him?” he asked.
    “Not much, just that he’s a psychologist at the hospital and …”
    “He’s also KGB,” Podgorsky said.
    “You know that for certain?”
    “I sure do. Not only is he KGB, he’s attached to the SK, the group that keeps tabs on every Russian here.