by Tom Clancy
POTUS nodded. “Yeah, it’ll make the Israelis nervous, and the Saudis have always worried about having too strong a military, for domestic reasons.”
“You could tell them the story about the three little pigs. It might not fly with their culture, but the big bad wolf just moved in next door to them, and they’d better start paying attention before he starts a-huffin’ and a-puffin’”
“I hear you, Robby. I’ll have Adler and Vasco think that one over.” Ryan checked his watch. Another fifteen-hour day. One more drink would have been nice, but as it was, he’d be lucky to get six hours of sleep, and he didn’t want to wake up with a larger headache than necessary. He set his drink down and waved for the other two to follow, down the ramp and out the door.
“SWORDSMAN heading to the residence,” Andrea spoke into her radio mike. A minute later, they were in the elevator and going up.
“Try not to let the booze show,” Jack remarked to his principal agent.
“What are we going to do with you?” she asked the ceiling, as the doors opened.
Jack walked out first, leaving the other two behind as he took his jacket off. He hated wearing a jacket all the time.
“Well, now you know,” Robby said to the Secret Service agent. She turned to look in his eyes.
“Yeah.” Actually she’d known for quite a while, but she kept learning more and more about SWORDSMAN.
“Take good care of him, Price. When he escapes from this place, I want my friend back.”
THE VAGARIES OF winds made the Lufthansa flight first to arrive at the international terminal in Frankfurt, Germany. For the travelers it was like an inverted funnel. The jetway was the narrow part, and on entering the concourse they all spread out, checking the video monitors for their gates. The layovers ranged from one to three hours, and their luggage would be automatically transferred from one aircraft to another—for all the complaints about airport luggage-handlers, 99.9 percent is a passing grade in most human endeavors; and the Germans were notoriously efficient. Customs control points didn’t worry them, because none of them were spending any more time in Europe than was necessary. They studiously avoided eye contact, even when three of them entered a coffee shop, and all three, on reflection, decided on decaf. Two walked into the men’s rooms for the usual reason, and then looked into the mirrors to check their faces. They’d all shaved just before leaving, but one of them, especially heavily-bearded, saw that his jaw was already shadowed. Perhaps he should shave? Not a good idea, he thought, smiling at the mirror. Then he lifted his carry-on bag and walked off to the first-class lounge to wait for the flight to Dallas-Fort Worth.
“LONG DAY?” JACK asked, after everyone had gone home, and just the usual squad of guards patrolled outside.
“Yeah. Grand rounds tomorrow with Bernie. Some procedures the next day, though.” Cathy changed into her nightgown, as tired as her husband was.
“Anything new?”
“Not in my shop. Had lunch with Pierre Alexandre. He’s a new associate professor working under Ralph Forster, ex-Army, pretty smart.”
“Infectious diseases?” Jack vaguely remembered meeting the guy at some function or other. “AIDS and stuff?”
“Yeah.”
“Nasty,” Ryan observed, getting into bed.
“They just dodged a bullet. There was a mini-outbreak of Ebola in Zaire,” Cathy said, getting in the other side. “Two deaths. Then two more cases turned up in Sudan, but it doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere.”
“Is that as bad as people say?” Jack turned the light off.
“Eighty percent mortality—pretty bad.” She adjusted the covers and moved toward him. “But enough of that stuff. Sissy says she’s got a concert scheduled for two weeks from now at Kennedy Center. Beethoven’s Fifth, with Fritz Bayerlein conducting, would you believe? Think we can get tickets?” He could sense his wife’s smile in the dark.
“I think I know the theater owner. I’ll see what I can do.” A kiss. A day ended.
“SEE YOU IN the morning, Jeff.” Price went to the right for her car. Raman went to the left for his.
A mind could be dulled by this job, Aref Raman told himself. The sheer mechanics of it, the hours, the watching and waiting and doing nothing—but always being ready.
Hmph. Why should he complain about that? It was the story of his adult life. He drove north, waited for the security gate to open and headed northwest. The empty streets made it go quickly. By the time he got to his home, the bled-off stress of working the Detail in the White House had him nodding, but there were still mechanics.
Unlocking the door, he next turned off the security system, picked up the mail that had come through the slot in the door and scanned it. One bill, and the rest was junk mail offering him the chance of a lifetime to buy things he didn’t need. He hung up his coat, removed the pistol and holster from his belt, and walked into the kitchen. The light was blinking on the answering machine. There was one message.
“Mr. Sloan,” the digital recorder said to him in a voice that was familiar, though he’d only heard it once before, “this is Mr. Alahad. Your rug just came in, and is ready for delivery.”
37
DISCHARGES
AMERICA WAS SLEEPING when they boarded their flights in Amsterdam, and London, and Vienna, and Paris. This time no two were on the same aircraft, and the schedules were staggered so that the same customs inspector would not have the chance to open two shaving kits and find the same brand of cream and then wonder about it, however unlikely that might be. The real risk had been in placing so many men on the same flights out of Tehran, but they’d been properly briefed on how to act. While the ever-watchful German police, for example, might have taken note of a gaggle of Middle Eastern men huddling together after arriving on the same flight, airports have always been anonymous places full of semi-confused wandering people, often tired and usually disoriented, and one lonely, aimless traveler looked much like another.
The first to board a transatlantic flight walked onto a Singapore Airlines 747 at Amsterdam’s Schiphol International Airport. Coded as SQ26, the airliner pulled away at eight-thirty A.M. and got into the air on time, then angled northwest for a great-circle course that would take it over the southern tip of Greenland. The flight would last just under eight hours. The traveler was in a first-class window seat, which he tilted all the way back. It was not even three in the morning in his next destination city, and he preferred sleep to a movie, along with most of the other people in the nose of the aircraft. He had his itinerary memorized, and if his memory failed, with the confusion of long-distance travel, he still had his tickets to remind him of what to do next. For the moment, sleep was enough, and he turned his head on the pillow, soothed by the swish of passing air outside the double windows.
Around him, in the air, were other flights, with other travelers heading for Boston, Philadelphia, Washington-Dulles, Atlanta, Orlando, Dallas-Fort Worth, Chicago, San Francisco, Miami, and Los Angeles, the ten principal gateway cities into America. Each of them had a trade show or convention of some sort underway now. Ten other cities, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Nashville, Atlantic City, Las Vegas, Seattle, Phoenix, Houston, and New Orleans, also had events, and each was but a brief flight—in two cases, a drive—from the nearest port of entry.
The traveler on SQ26 thought about that as he faded off. The shaving kit was tucked in his carry-on bag under the seat in front of him, carefully insulated and wrapped, and he made certain that his feet didn’t touch, much less kick, the bag.
IT WAS APPROACHING noon outside Tehran. The Movie Star watched as his group conducted weapons practice. It was a formality really, designed more for morale than anything else. They all knew how to shoot, having learned and practiced in the Bekaa Valley, and though they weren’t using the same weapons they’d have in America, it didn’t really matter. A gun was a gun, and targets were targets, and they knew about both. They couldn’t simulate everything, of course, but all of them knew how to d
rive, and they spent hours every day going over the diagram and the models. They would go in during the late afternoon, when parents came in to pick up their children for the daily trip home, when the bodyguards would be tired and bored from a day of watching the children doing childish things. Movie Star had gotten descriptions of several of the “regular” cars, and some were common types which could be rented. The opposition was as trained and experienced as they had to be, but they were not supermen. Some were even women, and for all his exposure to the West, the Movie Star could not take women seriously as adversaries, guns or no guns. But their biggest tactical advantage was that his team was willing to use deadly force with profligate abandon. With over twenty toddlers about, plus the school staff, and probably a few parents in the way as well, the opposition would be greatly hampered. So, no, the initial part of the mission was the easiest. The hard part would be getting away—if things got that far. He had to tell his team that they would get away, and that there was a plan. But really it didn’t matter, and in their hearts all of them knew it.
They were all willing to become sacrifices in the unannounced jihad, else they would never have joined Hezbollah in the first place. They were also willing to see their victims as sacrifices. But that was just a convenient label. Religion was really nothing more than a façade for what they did and who they were. A true scholar of their religion would have blanched at their purpose, but Islam had many adherents, and among them were many who chose to read the scriptures in unconventional ways, and they too, had their following. What Allah might have thought of their actions was not something they considered very deeply, and the Movie Star didn’t trouble himself to think about it at all. For him, it was business, a political statement, a professional challenge, one more task to occupy his days. Perhaps, too, it was a step toward a larger goal, the achievement of which would mean a life of comfort, and perhaps even some personal power and stability—but in his heart he didn’t really believe that, either. At first, yes, he’d thought that Israel might be overthrown, the Jews expunged from the face of the earth, but those careless beliefs of his youth had long since faded. For him, it was all mere process now, and this was one more task. The substance of the task didn’t really matter all that much, did it? he asked himself, watching the team’s grimly enthusiastic faces, as the men hit the targets. Oh, it seemed to matter to them. But he knew better.
THE DAY BEGAN at five-thirty A.M. for Inspector Patrick O’Day. A clock-radio roused him from his bed, then off to the bathroom for the usual start-up functions, a look in the mirror, and off to the kitchen to get the coffee going. It was the quiet of the day. Most people (the sensible ones) weren’t up yet. No traffic on the streets. Even the birds still slumbering on their perches. Outside to get the papers, he could feel the silence and wonder why the world wasn’t always this way. Through the trees to the east was the glow of a coming dawn, though the stronger of the stars still burned overhead. Not a single light showing in the rest of the houses in the development. Damn. Was he the only one who had to work such punishing hours?
Back inside, he took ten minutes to scan the morning Post and Sun. He kept track of the news, especially crime cases. As a roving inspector working directly out of the office of the Director, he never knew from one day to the next when he might be sent off on a case, which often meant calling in a sitter, to the point that he sometimes thought about getting a full-time nanny. He could afford it—the insurance settlement for his wife’s death in the plane crash had actually given him a measure of financial independence, though its circumstances seemed altogether blasphemous, but they had offered it and he, on advice of counsel, had taken it. But a nanny? No. It would be a woman, and Megan would think of her as Mommy, and, no, he couldn’t have that. Instead, he did the hours and denied himself so that he could be both parents, and no grizzly bear had ever been more protective of a cub. Maybe Megan didn’t know the difference. Maybe kids thrived under the care of a mother and bonded firmly to her but could as easily bond to a father. When asked about her mommy by other kids, she explained that Mommy had gone to heaven early—and this is my daddy! Whatever the psychological circumstances, the closeness of the two which seemed so natural to Megan—she’d scarcely had the chance to know anything else—was something that occasionally brought tears to her father’s eyes. The love of a child is ever unconditional, all the more so when there is but one object for it. Inspector O’Day was sometimes grateful for the fact that he hadn’t worked a kidnapping in years. Were he to do so today ... he took a sip of coffee and admitted to himself that he might just find himself searching for an excuse not to bring the subject in. There were always ways. He’d worked on six of those cases as a young agent—kidnapping for money was a very rare crime today; the word had gotten out that it was a losing game, that the full power of the FBI descended on such cases like the wrath of God—and only now did he understand how hateful such crimes were. You had to be a parent, you had to know the feel of tiny arms around your neck to understand the magnitude of such a violation—but then your blood turned to ice, and you didn’t so much turn off your emotions as block them out for as long as you had to before letting them free again. He remembered his first squad supervisor, Dominic DiNapoli—“the toughest wop this side of the Gambino family” was the office joke—crying like a baby himself as he carried the living victim of such a crime to see her parents. Only now did he understand how it was just one more sign of Dom’s toughness. Yeah. And that subject would never get out of Atlanta Federal Penitentiary.
Then it was time to get Megan up. She was curled up in her full-body sleeper, the blue one with Casper the Friendly Ghost on it. She was outgrowing it, he saw. Her little toes were pushing at the plastic feet. They did grow so fast. He tickled her nose, and her eyes opened.
“Daddy!” She sat up, then stood to give him a kiss, and Pat wondered how kids woke up with a smile. No adult ever did. And the day began in earnest with another trip to the bathroom. He noted with pleasure that her training pants were dry. Megan was catching on to sleeping through the night—it had been a struggle for a while—though it seemed a very strange thing to be proud about, he thought. He started to shave, a daily event that utterly fascinated his daughter. Done, he bent down so that she could feel his face and pronounce it, “Okay!”
Dinner this morning was oatmeal with sliced banana and a glass of apple juice, and watching the Disney Channel on the kitchen TV while Daddy returned to his paper. Megan took her bowl and glass to the dishwasher all by herself, a very serious task which she was learning to master. The hard part was getting the bowl into the holder properly. Megan was still working on that. It was harder than doing her own shoes, which had Velcro closures. Mrs. Daggett had told him that Megan was an unusually bright child, one more thing to beam with pride about, followed by the sadness, always, of remembering his wife. Pat told himself that he could see Deborah’s face in hers, but the honest part of the agent occasionally wondered how much of that was a wish and how much fact. At least she seemed to have her mother’s brains. Maybe the bright expression was what he saw?
The ride in the truck was routine. The sun was up now, and the traffic still light. Megan was in her safety seat, as usual looking at the other cars with wonderment.
The arrival was routine also. There was the agent working in the 7-Eleven, of course, plus the advance team at Giant Steps. Well, nobody would ever kidnap his little girl. At the working level, rivalry between the Bureau and the Service largely disappeared, except for the occasional inside joke or two. He was glad they were there, and they didn’t mind having this armed man come in. He walked Megan in, and she immediately ran off to hug Mrs. Daggett and put her blanky in her cubby in the back, and her day of learning and play began.
“Hey, Pat,” the agent at the door greeted him.
“‘Morning, Norm.” Both men enjoyed an early-morning yawn.
“Your schedule’s as screwed up as mine,” Special Agent Jeffers replied. He was one of the agents who rotated on
and off the SANDBOX detail, this morning working as part of the advance team.
“How’s the wife?”
“Six more weeks, and then we have to think about shopping for a place like this. Is she as good as she seems?”
“Mrs. Daggett? Ask the President,” O’Day joked. “They’ve sent all their kids here.”
“I guess it can’t be too bad,” the Secret Service man agreed. “What’s the story on the Kealty case?”
“Somebody at State is lying. That’s what the OPR guys think.” He shrugged. “Not sure which. The polygraph data was worthless. Your guys picking up on anything?”
“You know, it’s funny. He sends his detail off a lot. He’s actually said to them that he doesn’t want to put them in a position where they’d have to—”
“Gotcha.” Pat nodded. “And they have to play along?”
“No choice. He’s meeting with people, but we don’t always know who, and we’re not allowed to find out what he’s doing against SWORDSMAN.” A wry shake of the head. “Don’t you love it?”
“I like Ryan.” His eyes scanned the area, looking for trouble. It was automatic, just like breathing.
“We love the guy,” Norm agreed. “We think he’s going to make it. Kealty’s full of crap. Hey, I worked his detail back when he was V.P., okay? I fuckin’ stood post outside the door while he was inside boffin’ some cookie or other. Part of the job,” he concluded sourly. The two federal agents shared a look. This was an inside story, to be repeated only within the federal law-enforcement community, and while the Secret Service was paid to protect their principals and keep all the secrets, that didn’t mean they liked it.