“Yes. We muss the bed and make it look like it should.”
“Maybe he—”
Yazov, feeling like an uncle again, patted Kurpanov on the knee and said, “My father told me the proverb ‘Maybe and somehow never make anything happen.’ No maybe, no somehow. We have a good plan. We will make it happen.”
21
Paul Sprague had always prided himself on his ability to remain completely calm, his emotions under iron control, however dire the circumstances. But self-doubts now fluttered about in his mind like trapped bats as he approached the police barricade at the Sullivan & Ford Building. Asked for photo identification, he showed his driver’s license. An officer checked his name against a list, and he was admitted. An officer in the lobby advised that the elevators had been “cleared,” meaning probably that the body was gone. He slipped his S&F entry card into the express elevator slot and ascended.
Questions roiled through his mind: What have you gotten yourself into? How could you have let your ambitions go unchecked? His answers were hazy. He first tried to rationalize that it was his wife, Sarah. The Middleburg estate. The home in Palm Beach. It was her desire to play among the elite, to be the glamorous hostess who entertained the rich and famous. But that was a lie. He wanted the prestige, the associations, the reputation to be the man to see, to be the first name on the Rolodex of the corporate giants who were intent upon gobbling up their competitors.
And the Ritz condo in Georgetown? That was his idea. He could have rented a unit in the building that housed the Newseum on Pennsylvania Avenue for a fraction of what he paid at the Ritz. But he wanted the strange kind of notoriety that came from owning one of the most expensive apartments in Washington. His success—or perceived success—could only embellish the image of Sullivan & Ford as being the indispensable law firm in Washington. At least, that was why he had seen to it that the firm picked up some of the condo expenses.
His mind kept drifting back to that first day of law school at Yale. Dean Suskind issued a warning: “Just remember, don’t ever sell your integrity to a client no matter how much he offers to pay you because you’ll never become rich enough to buy it back.” Well, he was certainly rich, but … Suskind’s words haunted him as he reached his corner office.
Ursula appeared, and he told her, “I need to make a few calls. Please make sure that I’m not interrupted.”
“Yes, sir. Can I get you coffee in the meantime?”
Stroking his temples, Sprague said, “That would be great. I have a bit of a headache. The coffee will help.”
Ursula dutifully retreated to a small room that contained a large soft-drink machine and a metallic marvel that brewed espresso, cappuccino, and drip coffee from a selection of the finest brands of coffee beans from Kenya, Colombia, and Jamaica. Ursula selected a dark French roast that was strong, her boss’s favorite. She set a paper cup under the brewing nozzle rather than one of the law firm’s branded ceramic ones. She had read somewhere that these paper cups and their plastic linings posed a long-term hazard to one’s health. But the coffee stayed hot longer in them, and Sprague preferred heat more than health.
After setting the coffee on Sprague’s desk, she asked, “Can I bring you anything else?”
“Thank you, Ursula. No. Nothing more. Just remember, no interruptions until I finish my calls.”
“Shall I place them for you, sir?”
“No, I’ll make them.”
Unusual, Ursula thought. Sprague had almost always asked her to place his calls. Her soft voice, with just the right tone of Southern gentility and Germanic efficiency, broke through the barriers of the most unreachable CEOs. Well, he probably wants to convey his deepest grief to the bereaved relatives and that would be signified by a call dialed by him personally.
As soon as Ursula departed, Sprague unlocked the middle drawer of his desk and took out what looked like an ordinary landline phone and dialed a number. After a moment of silence, a series of beeps danced in his ear. And then an annoying buzz signaled that he was connecting to his designated recipient.
On the third ring, a man answered in a voice that was high-pitched and abrupt: “Yes? What is it?” The telephone’s security-system electronics produced the high pitch; the hasty words conveyed the intended perception that the caller had interrupted important business.
“‘Yes? What is it?’ That’s all you have to say?” Sprague asked, the words tumbling out with rage and without thought. He had been instructed to never use the client’s name on the phone and to call the client only on this security system, which had been installed in Sprague’s office by a silent young man who did not give a name, merely identifying himself as Hamilton’s personal communications-security supervisor.
“Excuse me?” the voice asked.
“What in hell have you done?” Sprague shouted, momentarily losing control of his storied calmness.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Turn on GNN, for Christ’s sake! There’s been a shooting, a goddamn massacre.”
“I’m truly sorry to hear that,” Hamilton said. “But I still don’t understand why you’re calling me.”
“Stop bullshitting me! We spoke two nights ago. I told you—”
“Yes, and I said I would handle everything.”
“Well, I guess somebody else decided they were going to handle it.…”
“Paul,” Hamilton said, adding a calming tone. “Seriously, I have nothing to do with whatever happened today. So why don’t—”
“Because I have something that may belong to you. And—”
“You have it?”
“Yes, and I’m about to turn it over to certain authorities.”
“But it’s my property, Paul.”
“That may be so, Robert. But it’s potential evidence in a crime investigation.”
“But, please do me a favor and be discreet. First of all, have you tried to open it?”
“Yes. But I couldn’t. All I got was a warning that I had no right to open it.”
“Paul, listen carefully.” The man’s voice suddenly turned solicitous—insincerely solicitous, Sprague easily sensed. “Turn the computer on.… Incidentally, did you type anything on the keyboard when you attempted to open it?”
“A couple of keystrokes. I didn’t know whether it belonged to my partner, and I tried to enter the law firm’s code numbers. Others may have tried. I don’t know—”
“Okay, it’s important to get this right. Type in—”
“Is this going to be complicated?” Sprague asked, suddenly sounding nervous.
“Well, it’s just a series of strokes. Nothing complicated.”
Sprague hesitated, saying, “Hold on. I need to get it and put it on my desk.”
He put the phone down, opened the door, and gestured for Ursula. “I think I’m going to need some help,” he said softly. “But don’t speak.”
Ursula nodded. This had happened before. It began when a client on the telephone or a client wanting an immediate e-mail response assumed that Sprague could at least operate a computer. Then she had to be a stand-in because her boss was computer-illiterate. She entered his office, saw the laptop, and signaled to Sprague to speak into the phone.
“Okay. I’m ready,” Sprague said, moving to allow Ursula to sit before the laptop.
Following a routine she had for this situation, she pushed the speaker button on the phone as the unknown caller said, “First, type the word ‘oracle,’ followed, without space, by a dash and then the numeral two. That should lift the initial barrier.”
Ursula followed the directions and looked at Sprague, who said, “Right. It did.”
“Now enter the following numbers: zero, eight, two, eight, four, zero, one, two, two, two, two, four, one.”
Ursula nodded and Sprague spoke, sounding convincingly surprised: “Okay. Got it.… There’s a blank screen.”
“Good. Now, this is very, very important. Strike the Microsoft symbol key at the bottom left.”
Ursula did so, and Sprague said, “Okay,” while looking at a string of symbols and a list of words that he did not understand.
“Next, hit Default Programs and choose Change AutoPlay Settings. Got it?”
Ursula nodded her head vigorously and Sprague said, “Got it.”
“Now, type this,” Hamilton said, speaking slowly: “lowercase ‘f,’ lowercase ‘r,’ six, eight, four, nine.”
“Done,” Sprague said when Ursula finished.
“Now, insert a thumb drive and strike the Caps Lock key.”
“What?” Sprague said inadvertently. Ursula smothered a laugh.
“For heaven’s sake, Paul. This isn’t rocket science. Strike the Caps Lock key and insert a thumb drive.”
“Wait. I need to get one,” Sprague said, his headache pounding, his voice wavering. Ursula hit the mute button, went to her desk, and swiftly returned with a small box containing several thumb drives. She took the top off a black thumb drive labeled DataTraveler, inserted it, and struck the Caps Lock key. PRIVATEDATA.DOC appeared on the screen for an instant and then vanished. A green light blinked in the thumb drive.
“I don’t see anything,” Sprague said, as much to Ursula as to Hamilton.
“Good Lord,” Hamilton said, “that’s why it’s called private. It’s going directly from the computer hard drive to the thumb drive.”
“Oh, no, I can’t get the top off the thumb thing,” Sprague moaned, scrawling a note and holding it in front of Ursula’s spectacled eyes: Make copy.
She nodded, swiftly removed the thumb drive, plucked a white one out of the box, removed the top, and, smiling at Sprague, held it at the ready.
“Paul! You’re acting like an idiot. This is very important to me. Okay. Just do it again. The system allows one bad try.”
“Great. Here goes,” Sprague said.
“Come on, Paul. I haven’t got all day.”
“Okay. Done,” Sprague said, giving Ursula the “OK” hand signal as soon as Ursula removed the second thumb drive.
“Okay. Now turn the computer off and then restart it again. This time, when you get the warning, just type in any six random numbers. Anything but the ones I gave you previously. Then hit Enter.”
Ursula followed the instructions and the laptop screen went completely blank. Then a long, thin oblong window opened at the bottom of the screen. After the empty window filled, it quickly became empty again, indicating that all of the data in the computer was being deleted.
22
As Sprague watched the screen go blank, a sudden thought came from the deepest brain cells, the ones that had to do with survival: If Davidson was taken out, what about me?
Sprague motioned Ursula to leave the room and switched off the speaker. She closed the door silently behind her.
“Jesus!” he exclaimed. “You’ve just destroyed evidence in a—”
“I didn’t destroy anything. I simply—with your assistance—retrieved information that was illegally taken from me. You’re free to turn over the computer to whomever you think has a right to my property.”
“I’m going to turn it over to the police. And what am I supposed to say when they see that everything is gone?”
“You can explain that you simply wanted to see if this was your firm’s computer and when you tried to log in, whatever was in it was deleted. Someone must have programmed the computer to self-destruct.”
“Jesus … Okay.”
“Please, Paul, do not blaspheme.”
“Yes, sorry. But…”
“Now just hold on to that thumb drive. A messenger will pick it up.”
For a long moment, Sprague stared at the screen. What have I done? He took a deep breath. “No,” he said. “Security is needed. I will deliver it to you in person.”
There was a short pause.
“You’re the one with the passion for security,” Sprague said. “Remember what I told you about government eavesdropping on face-to-face conversations? Government interceptions of those oral conversations are in violation of the Wiretap Act and cannot be used against you as evidence in a criminal trial.”
“What about those NSA data sweeps?”
“Another issue. Court orders for bugs or telephone taps run to more than one hundred to one over face-to-face conversations. If you’re feeling the government is tracking you, it’s highly unlikely that you are actually being followed and having your oral conversations bugged.”
The man on the phone waited a second before he said, “As you know, I have been summoned—”
“Asked,” Sprague said, “you have been asked—not summoned or subpoenaed, asked—to appear at Collinsworth’s hearing on NASA’s budget on the twelfth. The boys out at Goddard are trying to get back into the business of setting up a little colony on the moon. Next thing, it’ll be asteroid mining. You need to be there.”
“Right, we could have our face-to-face then. And besides there’d be a client-lawyer privilege. right?”
“That’s nearly three weeks off,” Sprague said. “What if—”
“I don’t deal in ‘if’s. A face-to-face handoff is the absolute best choice.”
Sprague smiled at a familiar maneuver: taking someone else’s idea and making it sound as if it had originated in the mighty brain of Robert Wentworth Hamilton.
“At that fancy place you have in Georgetown,” Hamilton said, pausing to check his cell-phone calendar. “Three p.m.”
“And in the meantime?”
“I’m sure that Sullivan and Ford—or, I mean, you—have a way to keep a thumb drive safe.”
“Are you sure?”
Another pause, then: “I am always sure about my decisions. This object has no time aspect. I merely want to have it for what you might call assurance. There is no need to move quickly. Or to panic.” A click and the call was over.
Sprague put the white thumb drive into his shirt pocket and leaned back, his head still pounding.
23
The day after the shooting, Dr. Benjamin Franklin Taylor stepped into a taxi at Reagan National Airport and was taken directly to the Air and Space Museum, on the Washington Mall. He had been away on a tour to publicize his latest book, It’s Your Universe, based on his popular PBS show, Your Universe. Taylor seemed always to be in a hurry, but today he was even more so. His wheeled suitcase bounding along behind him, he took the broad museum steps two at a time, nodded to a security guard, and sprinted across the entrance gallery to the staff elevator.
The elevator opened on the top floor, above the museum’s two floors of immense galleries—“Exploring the Planets” directly below him, and Otto Lilienthal’s 1894 hang glider (“Early Flight”) directly below that. Taylor sometimes thought of himself as a gallery, for he was full of information that he dispensed about space, flight, and the universe. Besides being assistant director of the museum, he ran the new state-of-the-art Albert Einstein Planetarium on the museum’s first floor. And there was the monthly television show Your Universe, which combined Taylor’s easygoing, fact-filled commentary with dazzling images of Earth, the solar system, and the Great Cosmic Beyond.
Traditionally, astrophysicists treat the operators of planetariums as entertainers rather than astronomers. But Taylor’s MIT doctorate and his postdoc work at the MIT Center for Theoretical Physics earned him the acceptance of scientists, just as his television fans applauded his approach to astronomy—“a down-to-earth approach,” he called it with a punster’s smile. He maintained a solid reputation with scientists, many of whom vied for guest appearances on his prize-winning television show.
“We all know he has the brainpower of a rocket scientist. And we can see that he still has the physique of a running back,” the secretary of the Smithsonian said eight years before, when he introduced Taylor as the new director of the planetarium. “He was a Heisman Trophy nominee at Michigan. And after graduating at the top of his class, he had a choice: go pro or go for a PhD. We can all be thankful that he chose the Massachusetts Ins
titute of Technology and a doctorate in astrophysics. But he still plays a mean game of touch football on the Mall when Air and Space takes on our other museums.”
Taylor was proud of his ability to compartmentalize his mind and control the time he doled out to his various projects. Thanks to his on-time flight home, he had arrived at the museum earlier than usual, and he looked forward to a time of relative quiet, when he could arrange the day ahead.
But the shootings flared in his mind, and he realized that some days are rearranged by violence and madness. The first he knew about the shootings was a text message he received from his daughter Darlene—SHOOTING AT SEAN’S FIRM. 4 OR 5 DEAD. HE’S OK—while he was waiting to speak at Powell’s Bookstore in Chicago. He hit the app for the Washington Post Web page and saw an account of the shootings.
Two gunmen armed with semi-automatic weapons terrorized the landmark Sullivan & Ford Building near Capitol Hill today, killing four people. One gunman plunged to his death during a desperate struggle with former Senator Sean Falcone, a partner in the firm. “Mr. Falcone risked his life and stopped a massacre,” Detective Lieutenant Tyrone Emmetts said. “Those guys were planning to wipe out the tenth floor.” The second man, who shot at Falcone and missed, fled the scene and apparently escaped.
Police said two men entered the lobby of the ten-story glass building around 11 a.m. and told a lobby security guard they were from a local television station, which police did not identify, and had an appointment to interview a partner on the tenth floor. The partner was identified by police sources as Harold Davidson, a senior partner. He followed procedure by sending a receptionist to the lobby to escort the men to the tenth floor, the so-called senior partner floor. The three got into a private express elevator, which could only be entered via the receptionist’s keycard. One of the men carried a duffel bag supposedly containing a television camera.
Once on the tenth floor, the two men began their rampage, killing the receptionist
Sean Falcone? Hal Davidson? Taylor was stunned. He had been to Falcone’s office a few times and could envision the site of the killings. He remembered the cheery receptionist, and now, from the Post story, he learned her name. Ellen Franklin. In his mind’s eye he saw her lying in her own blood. And Hal. Taylor had known Harold Davidson since they were both in Cambridge, two black strivers getting by on their brains. They lost each other for a while, when Hal finished his studies at Harvard Law, but they had renewed their friendship when Taylor moved to Washington and looked up his old friend.
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