by Stuart Woods
“All right,” Kinney said, “we’re the Group, that’s the only name we’ll have. We’re an informal task force and we’ll have priority for any technical services we require.”
Someone raised a hand. “Sir, is there some relationship between the two cases? They seem very different on their faces.”
“There are two connections: One, the two victims were spokesmen for the same set of political views; two, I think both murders were committed by the same man.”
“Any suspects?”
“No, and we’re not likely to have one anytime soon. The man we’re looking for is extremely proficient in at least two disciplines—shooting and bomb making—and probably in many more. He leaves as little as possible behind, and we’re not going to apprehend him unless we get lucky. Of course, the harder we work, the luckier we’ll get.
“Harry,” he said to the man who had asked the question, “it occurs to me that the sort of man we’re looking for might very well work or have worked at a place like the FBI. I’d like you to take charge of investigating every retired technical officer who might have the skills exhibited in these two murders. Any one of them who isn’t in a hospital bed is a suspect, until he’s cleared. You can pick two agents attached to headquarters to help you.”
“Yes, sir,” Harry replied, taking notes. “Should we investigate retirees from other agencies, as well?”
“First us, then them. Start with Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms when you’re done here. Tommy, you’re in charge of coordinating technical reports, starting with the Vandervelt killing. We’ve got all we’re going to get from the Wallace case, and it’s next to nothing, but this bomb investigation should turn up some bits and pieces for us to took at”
“Yes, sir,” Tommy replied.
“The team at Burning Tree will be back in-house by the end of the day. Don’t wait for their report to get involved. Look over their shoulders.” “Yes, sir.”
“That’s all for the moment. I want to hear from anybody with a theory or an idea on how to proceed. This is wide open, and you’re all invited to contribute in any way you can.”
Everybody shuffled out. “Helen, would you stay for a moment, please?”
“Yes, sir.” She stayed in her chair.
When the room had been cleared he got up and opened his safe. “You and I are going to work together on a special part of this investigation,” he said, placing Senator Wallace’s index cards on his desk. “In addition to my other duties?” she asked. “Get somebody to cover the phones and do the ordinary secretarial work.”
“All right. May I ask why you chose me instead of an agent for this assignment?”
“You’re near retirement, and you have no political ax to grind. You’re not bucking for promotion, and you won’t take this to the tabloids. Frankly, I expect you to take it to your grave, and I think, based on past experience, you’re perfectly capable of doing that.”
Something like a blush appeared on Helen’s face. “Thank you, sir. What are these files?”
“These are index cards kept by Senator Frederick Wallace for, I don’t know, forty years. They are the equivalent of Director Hoover’s fabled files, and I’m sure they contain dirt on many prominent people. I know you understand how explosive these files could be if anyone in the press became aware even that they exist, let alone their contents.”
“Of course,” she said.
“I’d like you to begin by making a written summary of the cards, in the order that the senator kept them, so that I can refer quickly to various people and to what the senator thought was important about them.”
“Where shall I work?”
“Lock the outer doors to my conference room next door and work on the table there. I don’t want even the cleaners in there, so you’d better have the locks rekeyed. You keep one key, and I’ll keep the other.”
“All right. Am I to draw any conclusions from what I learn?”
“I’ll go over your summary myself. Until I do that, if you discover anything that you think might make one of these people a suspect in either of these two murders, I want to know about it immediately.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Thank you, Helen, now you can get to work.”
He watched her ramrod-straight back retreat from his office, then returned to work.
14
James Heller, bone-tired, dragged himself out of his car and into the kitchen through the door from the garage. His internal security people insisted that he never get into or out of a car at his home, except in the garage.
His wife was not in the kitchen, and her car was not in the garage, so he assumed she was out. He hoped to God she would bring something home for dinner, because he loathed her cooking, not that she cooked very often. He walked into the central hall of the house and stopped, listening. The only sound in the house was the clicking of a keyboard, and it came from the little room under the stairs, where his fifteen-year-old son James Jr. had made himself a computer room. He walked down the hall, stopped at the open door and looked inside. For the life of him, he could not understand why a teenager would need three computers, two printers, a scanner, and God knew what else, all crammed into the tiny space. It was much neater than the boy’s room. “Hi, Jimmy,” he said.
“Hey, Dad,” the boy mumbled, not looking up from the monitor.
“What’s up?”
“Not much.” He began typing very fast.
So much for the father-son relationship, Heller thought. He walked back down the hall and into his mahogany-paneled study, opened a cabinet door designed to look like a bookcase, filled a glass with ice, then filled it with twelve-year-old Scotch. He sank into a leather armchair, propped his feet up on the ottoman, found the remote control, and switched on the TV.
“FBI sources tell us that the Bureau believes that the murders of Senator Frederick Wallace and talk-show host Van Vandervelt may have been committed by the same man. Asked what the connections between the two killings were, a spokesman declined comment. The investigation is being run by the Bureau’s top investigator, Deputy Director for Criminal Investigations Robert Kinney, who has assembled a small group of senior agents who will work only on the two murders.”
“Jesus,” Heller muttered. “I didn’t know that, but CNN has it?” He switched off the set in disgust and pulled on the Scotch, closing his eyes and leaning his head against the rear cushion. He had just dozed off when he jerked awake. “What?” he said.
“You gotta see this, Dad,” Jimmy was saying.
Heller leaned his head back again. “Not now, Jimmy, I’m really beat.”
“Daaad,” the boy whined. “This is important. It’s Bureau stuff.”
Heller didn’t understand. “On the computer?”
“On the Internet. Come on, you gotta look at this.”
“Jimmy, can you give me just fifteen minutes to get my strength back?”
“Is that what whiskey does? Gives you your strength back? Forget it.” The boy left the room in disgust.
Heller tried to go back to sleep and failed. The tone of his son’s voice had cut him like a knife. “Oh, all right,” he said, struggling out of the chair and bringing along his Scotch. He walked down the hall to Jimmy’s computer room. “What is it?” he asked.
“I don’t want to bother you,” Jimmy replied. “Maybe tomorrow you’ll feel up to it.”
“Come on, Jimmy, I got up and came down here. What’s going on?”
“Just something I came across on the Internet.”
“And what would that be?” He pulled at the Scotch.
“Just something about those murders you guys are trying to solve.”
“Murders? You mean Senator Wallace and… that other guy?”
“Van Vandervelt. He was cool. I listened to his show all the time.”
It irked Heller that his son thought a jerk like Vandervelt was “cool,” but he tried not to show it. “Doesn’t his show come on when you’re in school?”
“Yeah,
but I record it every day. I’ll miss the guy.”
“Well, I’m sure that by tomorrow they’ll have another jerk to replace Vandervelt.”
“He’s not a jerk. He’s right.”
“Right-wing, maybe. He’s wrong about everything else.”
“Then I guess you wouldn’t be interested in seeing his picture on this website with a big X drawn through it.”
“What website is that, Jimmy?” Heller just barely knew what a website was. His secretary had to print out his email for him.
“It’s called ACT NOW,” Jimmy said. “Just a minute: I’ll bring it up for you.” He tapped the keys madly. “There you go.”
Heller walked over and stood behind his son. There, on the monitor before him, were photographs of Senator Wallace and Van Vandervelt, both with big Xs drawn through them. “Just a sec, I’ll zoom out for you. There you go.” Now Heller could see the whole page. There were at least twenty photographs, many of faces Heller knew or recognized from the news.
ACT NOW!!!
These men and women are all part of the vast right-wing conspiracy that is eating away at the heart of our democracy, with their constant attacks on civil liberties and any federal spending programs that help people instead of the rich. It’s time right-thinking people stood up to them and held them accountable for the destruction they have and are causing. Each of them is now a legitimate target for the wrath of any American with the guts to do the right thing. ACT NOW!!!
“Holy shit!” the director of the FBI said.
“You told me not to use that word,” Jimmy said.
15
Heller went into the president’s national security briefing with a confidence he had never before felt. He set his briefcase down beside his chair, sat back, and listened to the presentations of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the director of Central Intelligence, and the national security advisor.
“Jim?” the president said finally. “You’re awfully quiet this morning. Do you have anything for us?”
“Yes, I do, Mr. President,” Heller replied, setting his briefcase on his lap and opening it. He handed copies of the documents to the president and the others.
“What’s this?” the president asked.
“It’s a website run by the murderer of Senator Wallace and Van Vandervelt. As you can see, he’s marked off those two, but there are a lot of other candidates whose photographs are displayed.”
“Good God,” Will Lee said. “You think he plans to kill everybody whose picture is here?”
“I think that we have to consider that a possibility,” Heller replied.
“Can you trace this website back to its source?”
“I have a tech consultant working on that right now.” Heller replied. He had told his son he could stay home from school that day.
“I’ll get the NSA working on it, too,” Kate said. “They’ve got more computer firepower than any of US.”
“I don’t think that will be necessary, Kate,” Heller said. “We’ll run this down.”
“I want everybody who can help with this working on it,” the president said, “and the NSA seems like a very good idea.”
Heller flushed a little. The president was obviously covering his ass with his wife. “As you wish, Mr. President.”
“Jim, I’m sure it has occurred to you that the existence of this website could benefit us.”
“How do you mean, Mr. President?”
“Well, first of all, it gives us a possible opportunity to locate the killer. You got that, didn’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” Heller said, reddening even more.
“And second, it gives us a list of possible targets, if he should strike again. I mean, the speaker of the House is on this list, for God’s sake!”
“Yes, sir, I understand that.”
“Well, you’re going to have to arrange some protection for these people, aren’t you?”
“Protection?”
“Jim, the killer has given you a list of people he wants to kill. If you fail to protect them and more are killed, well, the public is going to want your head. Not to mention the Congress.”
Heller gulped.
“I’ll speak to the head of the Secret Service about getting you some help. I want the two of you to coordinate personal protection for everyone on this list.”
“Yes, Mr. President. I’ll speak to him this morning.”
“And the next time you have new information about these killings, bring along that fellow you told me about—your deputy— what’s his name?”
Heller had to think for a moment. “Kinney, sir?”
“Yes, Robert Kinney. I want to meet the man.”
“Well, sir, he’s pretty busy right now.”
The president took off his reading glasses and massaged the bridge of his nose. “I’ll try not to take up too much of his time, Jim.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Unless anyone else has something, we’ll adjourn,” the president said.
The group stood as one and walked toward the door.
“Oh, Jim,” the president said, “I think we’d better keep the existence of this website quiet for the moment—at least until we have protection for these people in place.”
Heller winced. “Ah, Mr. President, I’m afraid…” He stopped.
“Jim, have you already released this to the press?”
Heller whipped out his cell phone. “I’ll cancel the press release,” he said, and he kept walking, not waiting for the president’s response.
Bob Kinney looked at the material his secretary had just handed him.
“I got it from the director’s secretary,” Helen said. “It’s already gone out.”
Kinney groaned. The phone on his desk rang, and Helen picked it up.
“Deputy Director Kinney’s office,” she said. She listened then pressed the hold button. “It’s the director,” she said, handing Kinney the phone.
“Yes?” Kinney said into the phone.
“Good morning, Bob,” Heller said. He sounded as if he were on a cell phone.
“Good morning, Director.”
“I’ve got some great news.”
“I’ve just seen it. Did you really release this to the press?”
“I’ve put out word to cancel the release.”
“Good.”
“Now, Bob, I want you to call Ed Levy at the Secret Service and coordinate protection for all the people whose pictures are on that website.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but my function on this case is to supervise the investigation, not to guard bodies. I believe you want to speak to personnel about that. Good morning, sir.” He hung up.
Helen, who had been listening on an extension, hung up, too. “Are you trying to hurry along your retirement?” she asked Kinney.
“Helen, I don’t much care if he fires me or not, and I’ve already told him that. Until he does, I’m going to run this case as I see fit, and I’m not going to be sidetracked by having to round up two hundred agents to act as bodyguards for”—he ran his finger down the rows of photographs—“conservative columnists and TV preachers.”
“As you wish.”
“He said he’d canceled the press release.”
“He was too late. It had already been emailed to the whole media list.”
“Where the hell did he come up with this website?” Kinney asked. “Who told him about it?”
“His fifteen-year-old son,” Helen replied. “He’s apparently a computer whiz.”
Kinny began to laugh; he couldn’t help himself. Helen laughed, too.
16
Ted parked the RV near a commuter bus stop in New Jersey and walked toward the waiting bus, swinging his umbrella. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky.
He rode into Manhattan and got off at the Port Authority Bus Terminal. From there, he walked to the New York headquarters of CNN, near Perm Station. It was getting dark outside.
He checked out the lobby and noted the security gua
rd; no good, he didn’t want to be inside. He crossed the street and walked into a bar facing the CNN building. “Gimme a beer,” he said, glancing at his watch. There was a tennis tournament on the TV over the bar, and nobody was watching it.