Jimmy didn't take the briefcase but asked, "Tom's estate lawyer? What happened to him? Did something happen?"
James: "Yes, the estate lawyer. The lawyer said that Tom's family received a notification from a government department that Tom had died on a mission.
According to the will he left beforehand, his estate was left to his family, but there was a wooden box for me. Your briefcase is in that box, and it has your name on it."
Jimmy looked down at the briefcase; there was a distinct mark etched with a utility knife blade or something similar on one corner of the black briefcase, To Jimmy.
James took a bottle of wine and two glasses from the shelf, set them on the table, opened the bottle, poured two glasses of wine, and handed one to Jimmy.
With his right hand, James picked up his own glass, looked down at it, and said, "Tom and I come from two families that have been on good terms for generations. Our fathers served together, and I knew Tom for decades.
I knew he was an Agent, and even though we rarely saw each other, I was aware that his job must be dangerous. I just never imagined this day would come so soon."
James wiped the corner of his eye with his left hand, looked up at Jimmy, and lifted his glass, "To Tom."
Jimmy stood up, clinked glasses with James, "To Tom." Then the two of them drained their glasses in one go.
James set down his glass and continued: "I haven't opened this briefcase. I don't know its combination, so you will have to take it back and open it yourself."
Jimmy put down his glass, took the briefcase, and reflected that the last time he was in contact with Tom was several months ago, and Tom hadn't given him anything related to a password.
Jimmy: "Did Tom leave a message for me?"
James: "No, he didn't leave any message for me either. Perhaps the mission came too abruptly. He just made a will in advance and left me a collection of prized weapons; there was no last word.
I will be leaving for Tom's hometown in Kentucky tomorrow and won't return until after his funeral. I won't be going to the police station for a while. Deputy Chief Martin will take over my duties during that time."
Jimmy: "James, may I come with you?"
James: "There's no need; I can handle it."
Jimmy remained silent for a while then said, "Thank you, James, for letting me know. I'll be going then. Goodbye."
After bidding farewell to James and picking up the briefcase, Jimmy left the study. James didn't come out but instead poured himself another drink. After saying goodbye to Mrs. Baldwin in the living room, Jimmy left James's house.
Driving back to his apartment, Jimmy placed the briefcase on the coffee table and began guessing the combination. This briefcase wasn't the typical three-digit combination lock but was a six-digit one. If he couldn't guess the combination, he would have to break it open physically.
From 000000 to 999999, then his own birthday, he tried for only a moment before the briefcase opened.
The combination was the birth date of Jimmy's new identity, 180176. He didn't open it right away because, out of habit, he had used China's date format, 760118, year-month-day, while in the United States, it is generally month-day-year, 011876. Both of these were wrong; Tom had set it using the day-month-year format.
Jimmy opened the briefcase to find only a brown file folder with no markings inside; the folder contained several documents, two cards, and a cell phone.
The cell phone battery wasn't installed inside the device; instead, it was placed outside, with a SIM card already inserted into the phone.
Jimmy picked up a card, a CIA identity card with his name and photo, and his position listed as an Agent in the operations division.
Tom really is a professional at forging documents; not only did he create a new identity for himself, but he could also fake a CIA identity.
Another card had only a phone number on the front and a pattern of an eagle on the back.
Jimmy set the card aside and continued to go through the other contents of the document folder, which included four pages of documentation clipped together with a photo of Jimmy.
The first page was a copy of a CIA agent's information, complete with all of Jimmy's details, naturally all the fake data created when Tom had made his identity; the recruiter's signature at the bottom was that of Veronique Durand.
The only anomaly was that the signature date was July 22, 1996, five years earlier, which, unsurprisingly, also seemed to be fake. Jimmy's false identity was made in 2000; it couldn't possibly have a signature from 1996.
It must be said, when it comes to fakery, the CIA are true experts, whether it's fabricating external documents or their own.
The information below detailed the training Jimmy had undergone and a mission he had taken part in, with the mission date listed as December 15, 1999.
It seemed that during this mission, the original owner of the identity must have died, after which Tom needed someone to take over, and so he turned to his friend James, the police chief. James just happened to have an Asian drifter under observation for two months, a restaurant waiter, who had a police record at the station, Jimmy.
Finally, the whole story came together, and Jimmy could breathe a sigh of relief. For more than a year, he had been through a lot for this inherited identity. Now, it seemed like everything was sorted; even his only contact, Tom, was dead. And for over a year, no one had used this information to contact him; there probably weren't any loose ends left.
Jimmy looked through the training and mission details again. Strange, by the timeline, recruitment in '96, and the first mission not until the end of '99. Does CIA training take three years? That seemed a bit beyond the pale.
According to the movies he'd watched before, there's usually a period of training followed by simple missions to determine if the training is effective, and the main character typically completes the tasks perfectly, graduating smoothly.
It seemed like what Tom had said before was true; the original holder of the identity was a big shot's descendant. The so-called training was probably just a formality, a way to bide time. The fact that he died on his first mission showed the training didn't do much.
Now there was just one question left: who was the original holder, the descendant of which big shot? Given the original holder was Asian, and even Japanese, who were favored by the United States in the '80s and '90s, it's unlikely they would have reached the upper echelons, right?
Also, the recruiter on the papers, Veronique Durand, even if Tom was forging documents, she must be aware of her involvement. It's implausible that she just signed a blank recruitment form and let Tom do whatever he wanted. Of course, the other possibility is that Tom forged the signature himself.
Jimmy put the documents back in order, returned them to the folder, and then picked up the two cards again.
The CIA identity card should be fine; there was a black magnetic stripe on the back. Since Tom had prepared an identity for himself, this card must be valid.
As for the card with only a phone number, it's very likely the backup plan Tom left for Jimmy. This number should be able to reach someone at the CIA, perhaps even a direct line to the agency itself.
If something were to happen to Jimmy or he needed to verify his identity with other departments, this number could prove useful.
As for the possibility of Tom providing a trap number which could lead to Jimmy being captured and killed upon dialing, that seemed unlikely. Otherwise, he wouldn't have gone through so much trouble just to procure an identity for an Asian.
Jimmy noted down his CIA number and the phone number from the card, then placed both cards into the document folder.