by Tom Clancy
“That program has already been validated. They’ve taken tapes from six different aircraft and smoothed out the noise. It’s never taken them more than two or three hours to do an hour of tape.”
“Mexico City to D.C. is ...”
“Depending on weather, just under four hours, max. Doing the full tape will be an overnighter,” Clark estimated. “The President’s schedule is what?”
“Arrival ceremony is Monday afternoon. The first business session is the following morning. State dinner Tuesday night.”
“You going?”
Ryan shook his head. “No, we’re going to the one a week earlier—geez, that’s not too far off, is it? I’ll call the 89th Wing at Andrews. They do training hops all the time. Getting your team aboard won’t be hard.”
“I have three capture teams selected. They’re all ex-Air Force and -Navy elint spooks,” Clark said. “They know the business.”
“Okay, run with it.”
“You got it, doc.”
Jack watched him leave and lit up another.
29
CROSSROADS
MV Carmen Vita cleared the Strait of Gibraltar right on schedule, her Pielstick diesels driving her at a constant nineteen knots. The crew of forty officers and men (this ship did not have any women in the crew, though three of the officers had their wives with them) settled down for the normal sailing routine of watch-keeping and maintenance. They were seven days out from the Virginia Capes. On her deck and stowed below were a goodly number of standard-sized container boxes. These actually came in two sizes, and they were all loaded with various types of cargo which the captain and crew neither knew nor cared very much about. The whole point of containerization was that the ship was used exclusively as a contract-hauler, much as a trucker was used by various businesses. All the ship’s crew needed to worry about was the weight of the containers, and that always seemed to work out rather uniformly, since the containers themselves were always loaded to reflect what a commercial truck could legally pull along a public highway.
The ship’s southerly routing also made for a fairly sedate and uneventful passage. The really bitter winter storms followed a more northerly track, and the ship’s master, a native of India, was happy for it. A youngish man for such a substantial command—he was only thirty-seven-he knew that good weather made for a fast and fuel-efficient voyage. He aspired to a larger and more sumptuous ship, and by keeping Carmen Vita on schedule and under budget, he’d get that in due course.
It was the tenth day in a row that Clark hadn’t seen Mrs. Ryan. John Clark had a good memory for such things, honed by years of field operations of one sort or another in which one stayed alive by keeping track of everything whether it seemed important or not. He’d never seen her more than twice in a row. Jack worked an inconvenient schedule—but so did she, with early-morning surgery at least twice a week ... and she was awake this morning. He saw her head through the kitchen window, sitting at a table, probably drinking coffee and reading the paper or watching TV. But she hadn’t even turned her head to look at her husband when he left, had she? Ordinarily she got up to kiss him goodbye like any wife. Ten days in a row.
Not a good sign, was it? What was the problem? Jack came out to the car, his face dark and looking down. There was the grimace again.
“Morning, doc!” Clark greeted him cheerily.
“Hi, John,” was the subdued reply. He hadn’t brought his paper again, either. He started reading from the dispatch box as usual, and by the time they reached the the D.C. Beltway, he’d just be staring, a grim thousand-yard stare in his eyes as he lit a continuous chain of cigarettes. Clark decided that he just couldn’t stand it anymore:
“Problem at home, doc?” he asked quietly, watching the road.
“Yeah, but it’s my problem.”
“Guess so. The kids are okay?”
“It’s not the kids, John. Leave it, okay?”
“Right.” Clark concentrated on his driving while Ryan went through the message traffic.
What the hell is the problem? Be analytical, Clark told himself, think it through.
His boss had been depressed for over a month now, but it had really gotten worse—the news article, that thing from Holtzman? A family problem, not involving the kids. That meant trouble with the wife. He made a mental note to recheck that piece and any subsequent pieces when he got into the office. Seventy minutes after picking Ryan up—traffic was light this morning—he headed for CIA’s rather impressive library and got the staff there busy. It wasn’t hard for them. The Agency kept a special file for all the pieces that concerned it, arranged in folders by the authors’ by-lines. The problem, Clark thought, was immediately clear.
Holtzman had talked about financial and sexual misconduct. Right after that article came out ...
“Aw, shit,” Clark whispered to himself. He made copies of the various recent pieces—there were four of them—and went for a walk to clear his head. One nice thing about being a SPO, especially a SPO assigned to Ryan, was that he had very little work to do. Ryan was a homebody while in Langley. He didn’t really move around all that much. As he took a quick walking tour of the grounds, he reread the news articles and made another connection. The Sunday piece. Ryan had gone home early that day. He’d been upbeat, talking about getting away right after the Mexican job, taking John’s advice for a trip to Florida—but the next morning he’d looked like a corpse. And he wasn’t bringing the paper out with him. His wife must have been reading it, and something had gone very bad between Ryan and his wife. That seemed reasonably clear. Clear enough for Clark.
Clark came back into the building, going through the normal routine of passing through the computer-controlled gates, then setting off to locate Chavez, who was in the New Headquarters Building. John found him in an office, going over schedules.
“Ding, get your coat.” Ten minutes later they were on the D.C. Beltway. Chavez was checking a map.
“Okay,” Chavez said. “I have it. Broadway and Monument, up from the harbor.”
Russell was dressed in coveralls. The photos of the ABC vans in Chicago had turned out very well, and he’d had a lab in Boulder blow them up to poster size. These he compared to his van—it was exactly the same model of utility van—to make precise measurements. What came next wasn’t easy. He’d purchased a dozen large sheets of semirigid plastic, and he began carving them to make an exact match of the ABC logo. As he finished each, he taped it to the side of his van and used a marker pencil to scribe in the letters. It required six attempts to get it right, and Russell next used the knife to make reference marks on the van. It seemed a pity to score the paint on the van, but he reminded himself that the van would be blown up anyway, and there was no sense in getting sentimental about a truck. On the whole, he was proud of his artistic talents. He hadn’t had a chance to exercise them since he’d learned a trade in the prison shop, many years before. When the logo was painted on, black letters on the white-painted truck, nobody would be able to tell the difference.
The next job of the day was to drive to the local motor-vehicle agency to get commercial tags for the van. He explained that he would use it for his electronics business, installing and servicing commercial phone systems. He walked out with temporary tags, and they promised delivery of the real ones in four working days, which struck Russell as unnecessarily efficient. Getting the license was even easier. The international licensing documents that Ghosn had provided to go along with his passport were honored by the State of Colorado, after he passed a written test, and he had a photo-certified license card to go along with the tags. His only “mistake” was messing up one of the forms, but the clerk let him sign a fresh one while Russell dumped the first in the trash can. Or appeared to. The blank form slid into the pocket of his parka.
Johns Hopkins Hospital is not located in the best of neighborhoods. As compensation for that fact the Baltimore City Police guarded it in a way that reminded Clark of his time in Vietnam. He found a parking pla
ce on Broadway, just across from the main entrance. Then he and Chavez went in, walking around the marble statue of Jesus which both found rather admirable in size and execution. The large complex—Hopkins is a vast facility—made finding the right part difficult, but ten minutes later they were sitting outside The Wilmer Eye Institute office of Associate Professor Caroline M. Ryan, M.D., F.A.C.S. Clark relaxed and read a magazine while Chavez cast his lecherous dark eyes on the receptionist whom Mrs. Ryan evidently rated. The other Dr. Ryan, as Clark thought of her, showed up at 12:35 with an armful of documents. She gave the two CIA officers a who-are-you look and breezed into her office without a word. It didn’t take much of a look on his part either. She’d always appeared to him a very attractive and dignified female. Not now. Her face, if anything, was in worse shape than her husband’s. This really was getting out of hand, John thought. Clark gave it a ten-count and just walked past the open-mouthed receptionist to begin his newest career, marriage counselor.
“What is this?” Cathy asked. “I don’t have any appointments today.”
“Ma’am, I need a few minutes of your time.”
“Who are you? Are you going to ask me about Jack?”
“Ma’am, my name is Clark.” He reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out the card-sized CIA photo-pass, attached as most were, to a metal chain that went around his neck. “There may be some things you need to know about.”
Cathy’s eyes went hard almost at once, the anger taking over from the hurt. “I know,” she said. “I’ve heard it all.”
“No, ma’am, I think that you do not know. This isn’t a good place to talk. May I invite you to lunch?”
“Around here? The streets aren’t all that—” “Safe?” Clark smiled to show just how absurd her observation was.
For the first time Caroline Ryan applied a professional eye to her visitor. He was about Jack’s height but bulkier. Whereas she had once found her husband’s face manly, Clark’s was rugged. His hands looked large and powerful, and his body language proclaimed that he could deal with anything. More impressive was his demeanor. The man could have intimidated almost anyone, she realized, but he was going out of his way to appear gentlemanly, and succeeding, like the ballplayers who sometimes came here to see the kids. Teddy bear was what she thought. Not because he was, but because he wanted to be.
“There’s a place right down Monument Street.”
“Fine.” Clark turned and lifted her overcoat from the clothes tree. He held it almost daintily for her to put it on. Chavez joined them outside. He was much smaller than Clark, but more overtly dangerous, like a gang kid who was trying to smooth off his edges. Chavez, she saw, took the lead as they walked outside, preceding them up the sidewalk in a way that was almost comical. The streets here were not what she thought safe—at least not for a woman walking alone, though that was more a problem at night than during the day—but Chavez moved like a man in battle. That, she thought, was interesting. They found the small restaurant quickly, and Clark steered everyone into a corner booth. Both the men had their backs to the wall so that they could stare outward at any incoming threat. Both had their coats unbuttoned, though they both seemed outwardly relaxed.
“Who exactly are you?” she asked. The whole affair was like something from a bad movie.
“I’m your husband’s driver,” John replied. “I’m a field officer, paramilitary type. I’ve been with the Agency for almost twenty years.”
“You’re not supposed to tell people stuff like that.”
Clark just shook his head. “Ma’am, we haven’t even started breaking laws yet. Now I’m mainly a Security and Protective Officer, a SPO. Ding Chavez here is also a SPO.”
“Hello, Doctor Ryan. My real name is Domingo.” He held out his hand. “I work with your husband also. John and I drive him around and protect him on trips and stuff.”
“You’re both carrying guns?”
Ding almost looked embarrassed. “Yes, ma’am.”
With that, the adventurous part of the meeting ended, Cathy thought. Two obviously very tough men were trying to charm her. They had even succeeded. But that didn’t change her problem. She was about to say something, but Clark started off first.
“Ma’am, there seems to be a problem between you and your husband. I don’t know what it is—I think I know some of it—but I do know that it’s hurting the guy. That’s bad for the Agency.”
“Gentlemen, I appreciate your concern, but this is a private matter.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Clark responded in his eerily polite voice. He reached into his pocket and pulled out Xerox copies of the Holtzman articles. “Is this the problem?”
“That’s not any of your ...” Her mouth clamped shut.
“I thought so. Ma’am, none of this is true. I mean, the sexual impropriety part. That’s definitely not true. Your husband hardly goes anywhere without one of us. Because of where he works and who he is, he has to sign out for every place he goes to—like a doctor on call, okay? If you want I can get you copies of his itinerary for as far back as you want.”
“That can’t be legal.”
“No, it probably isn’t,” Clark agreed. “So?”
She so wanted to believe, Cathy thought, but she couldn’t, and it was best to tell them why. “Look, your loyalty to Jack is very impressive—but I know, okay? I went through the financial records, and I know about that Zimmer woman, and I know about the kid!”
“What exactly do you know?”
“I know that Jack was there for the delivery. I know about the money, and how he tried to hide it from me and everybody else. I know that he’s being investigated by the government.”
“What do you mean?”
“A government investigator was here at Hopkins! I know that!”
“Dr. Ryan, there is no such investigation at CIA, and no investigation at the FBI, either. That’s a fact.”
“Then who was here?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know that,” Clark answered. It wasn’t entirely true, but Clark figured this lie was not pertinent to the matter at hand.
“Look, I know about Carol Zimmer,” she said again.
“What do you know?” Clark repeated quietly. The response he got surprised him.
The answer almost came out as a scream. “Jack’s playing around, and she’s the one! And there’s a kid involved, and Jack is spending so much time with her that he doesn’t have any time for me and he can’t even—” She stopped, at the point of sobbing.
Clark waited for her to settle down. His eyes didn’t leave her face for an instant, and he saw it all as clearly as though it had been printed on a page. Ding merely looked embarrassed. He wasn’t old enough to understand.
“Will you hear me through?”
“Sure, why not? It’s over, the only reason I haven’t just walked out is the kids. So go ahead, make your pitch. Tell me that he still loves me and all that. He doesn’t have the guts to talk about it to me himself, but I’m sure he had something to do with this,” she concluded bitterly.
“First of all, he does not know we are here. If he finds out, I’ll probably lose my job, but that’s no big thing. I have my retirement. Besides, I’m about to break bigger rules than that one. Where do I begin?” Clark paused before going on.
“Carol Zimmer is a widow. Her husband was Chief Master Sergeant Buck Zimmer, U.S. Air Force. He died in the line of duty. As a matter of fact, he died in your husband’s arms. I know. I was there. Buck took five rounds in the chest. Both lungs. It took him five or six minutes to die. He left behind seven children—eight, if you count the one his wife was carrying. Buck didn’t know about that one when he died. Carol was waiting to surprise him.
“Sergeant Zimmer was the crew chief on an Air Force special-operations helicopter. We took that aircraft into a foreign country to rescue a group of U.S. Army soldiers who were conducting a covert mission.”
“I was one of ‘em, ma’am,” Ding announced, somewhat to Clark’s displeasure. “I
wouldn’t be here if the doc hadn’t put it out on the line.”
“The soldiers had been deliberately cut off from support from this end of the operation—”
“Who?”
“He’s dead now,” Clark answered in a way that left no doubt at all. “Your husband uncovered what was an illegal operation. He and Dan Murray of the FBI set up the rescue mission. It was a bad one, really tough. We were very lucky to get it done. I’m surprised you haven’t noticed something—nightmares, maybe?”
“He doesn’t sleep well—well, yes, sometimes he ...”
“Dr. Ryan missed having a bullet take his head off by ... oh, maybe two inches, maybe three. We had to rescue a squad of soldiers off a hilltop, and they were under attack. Jack worked one machine gun. Buck Zimmer had another one. Buck took hits as we lifted out, went down hard. Jack and I tried to help him, but I don’t even think you Hopkins guys could have done very much. It wasn’t real pretty. He died—” Clark stopped for a moment, and Cathy could see that he wasn’t faking the pain. “He was talking about his kids. Worried about ‘em, like any man would be. Your husband held Zimmer in his arms and promised him that he would look after them, that he’d see they were all educated, that he would take care of the family. Ma’am, I’ve been in this business a long time, back before you learned how to drive a car, okay? I’ve never seen anything better than what Jack did.
“After we got back, Jack did what he promised. I mean, of course. I’m not surprised he kept it a secret from you. There are aspects to the total operation that I do not know myself. But this much I do know: that man gives his word, he keeps it. I helped. We got the family moved up here from Florida. He set them up a little business. One of the kids is already in college, at Georgetown, and the second-oldest is already accepted into MIT. I forgot to tell you, Carol Zimmer—well, Carol ain’t her name. She was born in Laos. Zimmer got her out when everything went to hell there, married her, and they started punching out kids like movie tickets. Anyway, she’s a typical Asian mom. She thinks education is a gift from God Himself, and those kids really study hard. They all think your husband’s a saint. We stop in to see them at least once a week, every week.”