by Walter Wager
An inch away, they still showed astonishment and pain. Staub studied them curiously. He had never had the time or reason to peer closely into his victims' eyes before. There wasn't a hint of anything resembling a soul, the man who liked killing noted with satisfaction. He loathed the very idea of souls.
Now Staub heard that sound again. This time he recognized it. Yes, kissing. The men whose shoes he could barely discern out of the corner of his eye were kissing. Now they were whispering to each other. Staub didn't even try to make out the words, for these lovers were of no interest to him. All he wanted was for them to leave.
When they walked out twenty seconds later, he pushed the corpse up and back onto the toilet seat. Then he pulled a long strip of paper from the roll, dried his face and glanced around for somewhere to dispose of the wad of damp tissue. He couldn't just toss it on the floor. Unlike so many Americans, Willi Staub was no litterer.
So he crammed the balled-up toilet paper into the open mouth of the dead man. That would show his contempt for all religion, he thought bitterly. He listened again . . . heard nothing. He took off his jacket, removed the bulletproof vest and tried again to get out of the booth.
This time he succeeded. He tugged out the coat, suit jacket and protective vest and put them on as fast as he could. He glanced in the mirror, cursed and reached back into the cubicle for the black hat. He donned the fedora, adjusted the angle and strode from the chamber.
When he was thirty yards away, Staub looked at his wrist-watch.
He saw that it was 8:56, and nodded in contentment.
They probably wouldn't find the corpse until morning, when he'd be an ocean away.
23
THIS WASN'T the worst job in the Soviet Navy, Grilov thought. But it was probably one of the dreariest.
His ears hurt from the headset, his stomach was queasy and he missed his wife back in Leningrad. For two and a half months, the eleven-hundred-ton fishing trawler had been slowly circling a point eighty miles northeast of New London, Connecticut.
Around and around at six knots.
Through choppy seas and steadily deteriorating weather.
Going nowhere.
This trawler wasn't here to fish, and a lot of people in the U.S. Navy knew it. With all the antennas and other electronic gear that adorned the deck and masts, it was obvious that the vessel was one of the scores of "spy trawlers" that the U.S.S.R. operated around the world. Smaller than the other intelligence gathering ships of the Okean, Lentra, Mayak, Primorye and Nicolai Zubor classes, the trawlers did their jobs.
Some of the fake fishing craft tracked NATO naval exercises. Others monitored radio traffic out of major U.S. and British bases or stalked the Western powers' submarines to record their sonar "prints" while studying their speed and tactics. New London was one of the home ports for the most heavily armed American undersea raiders, submersible battleships that could each throw enough nuclear-tipped rockets to kill a dozen cities.
Petty Officer Third Class Sergei Grilov was no missile expert. He wasn't one of the trawler's eighteen electronics warfare specialists either. He was a competent radio technician with a working knowledge of English. His job was to monitor—from four P.M. to midnight, six days a week—the frequencies used in this region by the U.S. Navy and Air Force.
Operating an efficient computer-controlled scanner like those that served the electronic eavesdropping unit at the embassy in Washington, Grilov systematically patrolled the airwaves and taped the American transmissions. The work was strictly routine, often boring.
The significance of the messages was not his responsibility. The trawler carried a team of cryptographers and analysts, all officers of the Glavnoye Razvedyvatelnoye Upravlenie—the Chief Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff. Those GRU specialists decoded and evaluated the transmissions for daily reports radioed home. They were probably being recorded and deciphered by the Americans, Grilov told himself. He was right.
Most of the messages that Grilov's scanner detected did not deal with anything important. Aware that the trawlers were listening, the Americans were cautious. All the U.S. missile submarines and some aircraft operated under radio silence, receiving coded communications but barely replying. Messages were often squirted by ultrafast transmitters in five- or six-second bursts of garbled sounds.
Tonight there wasn't much radio traffic at all.
Another dull evening, Sergei Grilov thought wearily.
There were at least ninety more ahead before a replacement trawler arrived and he could start home. It was wiser to take it step by step. It was now 8:57, so his shift would end in three hours and thirteen minutes. That was easier to face than ninety days.
Then he heard the voice.
"Tomahawk to Hot Rod Four."
Staring at the dial, Grilov saw that he was tuned to this month's U.S. Air Force command frequency.
"Tomahawk to Hot Rod Four. Tomahawk to Hot Rod Four."
The Russian radio operator listened intently, waiting for Hot Rod Four to reply.
Not a word.
"Five seconds to Blue Button," the metallic voice continued. "Commencing countdown. Five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . . one . . . now."
All Grilov heard after that was clatter, electronic garbage. Blue Button apparently meant switching to scrambler. After twenty seconds, even that jumble of sound disappeared.
They had changed frequencies.
The trawler's scanner chased and found them. Another torrent of distortion poured through Grilov's earphones, confirming that the American scrambling equipment was still in use. The experts at GRU headquarters might be able to make sense of this noise, the radio operator told himself. They had some very sophisticated machines there.
Suddenly there was silence. Grilov swept up and down the dial, and found nothing. The incident was finished. He glanced at his watch, and saw that it had lasted forty-nine seconds. Tomahawk? Of course, Tomahawk was the code word for the headquarters of the U.S.A.F.'s Tactical Air Command, he recalled.
Petty Officer Grilov did not remember what Hot Rod Four was.
It wasn't his fault.
Neither he nor anyone else on the trawler had ever heard of it before.
24
THE STORM continued to scourge the great city.
In fact, the snow was falling more rapidly now.
Even in good weather, the streets of lower Manhattan around the Municipal Building and City Hall were practically deserted in the evening. Tonight only a few taxis floated by like ghosts, carrying home late workers from Wall Street offices. There were no pedestrians at all.
That was good, the watchers thought.
They didn't want anyone to see what they were about to do.
There were eight sedans near the rear entrance of the modern brick building at 150 Park Row. Six were lined up in the back alley. The others flanked the alley's exit onto Pearl Street. All eight had their headlights out, their motors running. The exhaust fumes swirled in odd stunted curves as the icy gusts caught them, but the men standing beside the cars didn't notice it.
With eyes as cold as the night, they were waiting and watching. Some looked north up Pearl. Half a dozen peered south. The drivers in the alley stared at the door to 150 Park Row. No one spoke. The only sounds were the wind and the rumble of automobile engines.
The men standing near the cars were armed and angry. Each had a .38-caliber pistol in a shoulder holster, and seven carried submachine guns. They were FBI agents. Their grim faces showed concern and bitterness.
They didn't want to be here.
They didn't want to do this.
The building at 150 Park Row housed the Metropolitan Correctional Center, the New York City facility of the Bureau of Prisons of the goddam Department of Justice. The Department of Justice of the United States of America, not some puny banana republic or one of those weak sister governments in Europe. A major unit of the U.S. Department of Justice itself, the FBI was supposed to put criminals into jails like the Met
ropolitan Correctional Center—not let them out.
This thing tonight was disgraceful.
Every agent in the street and in the cars knew it.
Sooner or later, somewhere, somehow, the terrorists who were forcing them to do this would pay. No one and no organization could humiliate the Bureau. No matter what or how long it took, the bastards would be identified and hunted down. It was more than a question of proper law enforcement. It was a matter of professional pride.
And male dignity, too. More than a little.
The rear door to the jail opened. Two more special agents stepped out, submachine guns at the ready. After they scanned the alley for several seconds, they gestured to someone inside the doorway. Now four men—all in handcuffs— walked out into the snowstorm.
Carlos Arroza.
Ibrahim Farzi.
Arnold Lloyd.
Julio Sanchez.
Another five FBI men hurried out behind them. While several of the agents who had been watching raised their eyes and weapons to cover nearby roofs, others opened the curbside rear doors of four of the sedans. The handcuffed prisoners shuddered under the impact of the snow and cold wind.
"Get in. Get in," an impatient FBI inspector ordered.
Federal agents swiftly separated the prisoners, guided them to the automobiles and nudged-helped them inside. Then the FBI operatives took their assigned places in the cars. It had all been planned in detail. Four sedans would each carry three agents and one of the handcuffed men. The other vehicles would ride shotgun, two in front and a pair behind.
The inspector scanned the alley and walked to Pearl Street. He looked north and south for several seconds before he nodded.
"Seems okay," he said.
"It's wrong," the tall agent beside him disagreed harshly.
The inspector understood what he meant.
"The order came from the White House," he reminded.
"It's wrong and you know it's wrong."
The inspector shrugged.
"I didn't hear that, Tom," he replied and pointed at the first sedan. The angry operative got into the back as the inspector slid in beside the driver. Then the convoy commander picked up the radio.
"Communications check," he said into the instrument.
Each of the sedans reported in curtly.
"Good. Drive carefully and stay alert. Let's roll."
The drivers turned on their headlights. A few moments later they put their cars in gear and started out for John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Other men were also preparing to go there.
They weren't enthusiastic about the idea either.
They weren't starting from Manhattan. They were fourteen miles on the far side of Kennedy at the Coast Guard air base at Floyd Bennett Field. Trudging through the slashing storm, they approached the twin-rotor H-65 helicopter.
"In this weather?" Ensign Vincent Babbitt asked. "With all those damn jets tearing around up there, blind as bats? You really think it's a good idea?"
"It's a terrible idea," Lieutenant Ernesto Saldana replied. "You got a better one?"
Babbitt shook his head.
"I'm not scared, you know," he declared loudly.
"I am, Vince. Anyone with half a brain would be. Get in the chopper."
They climbed up into the search-and-rescue helicopter, brushed the snow from their faces and saw that Aviation Survivalman Luther King was already at his post beside the hoisting gear. When Saldana flashed him a thumbs-up greeting, King nodded and returned it silently. Then the two pilots made their way to their seats up front.
"Shit," Babbitt said gloomily as he began to buckle his harness.
"Cheer up, Vince," Saldana urged. "We're going to be heroes."
"There was a fuel line problem with this bird last week," the uneasy junior officer replied. "Christ, I hope they fixed it."
"Here's where we find out," Saldana answered.
They went through the preflight routine carefully but more quickly than usual. This was a major and acute emergency. When they'd run down the checklist, the senior pilot started the engines. The rotors began to move slowly, cutting swaths through the tumbling snow like giant scimitars.
The roar of the jet engines grew louder.
They could feel the surge of power.
Now the big blades were whirling faster. The Aerospatiale H-65 was a strong and sturdy machine that could handle bad weather. Everything was all right.
"Here we go, Vince," Saldana said.
Suddenly there was a spluttering coughing sound.
Then both engines died.
25
THE SOUND was unpleasant. It was meant to be. This ugly noise had been selected because it would command immediate attention.
It did. When the special telephone that linked The Cab to the FBI in Manhattan began buzzing insistently, every head in the chamber turned toward the source of the annoying sound. A moment later, Hamilton and the FAA people watched the detective lift the beige receiver.
"Malone," he announced bluntly.
"One moment, please," an unfamiliar voice replied.
As he waited, Malone saw that the others in The Cab were looking and listening. Without animosity, he automatically shifted to face the window so they couldn't hear what he was saying.
Now another voice came from the phone. Malone recognized the accent and the speaker immediately. The voice belonged to the air force general in the command post beneath the Pentagon.
"Is this line secure?" Sloat tested with ritual caution.
"Maybe. Where's the Sentry?"
"We're trying everything. We even called Tinker. That's the main nest for these birds."
Frank Malone shook his head angrily.
Typical military by-the-book crap. It was ridiculous to seek help from distant Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma just because it was the E-3A wing's headquarters. With those heavily loaded Boeings flying at no more than five hundred and ten miles an hour, Tinker was more than two and a half hours from the besieged New York area airports.
"Can't you get a plane from Langley?" Malone demanded.
"We're working on it," Sloat assured. "One should be taking off very soon."
"How goddam soon? When will it get here?"
"We estimate ten sixteen."
Malone flinched.
Not soon enough.
If Annie Green's numbers were right, TWA 22 would run out of fuel at 9:47. Several other airliners would fall within a dozen minutes after that—well before the E-3A arrived.
"One more thing," Sloat continued quickly. "Some woman phoned from ONI to ask about you. She'd already talked to the FBI, but she wanted to double-check. Gave me a message for you."
ONI—the Office of Naval Intelligence—Sea Sweep.
Had they identified the voice on the tape?
"What's the message?"
"It's short—one word. She insisted on spelling it—twice."
"What word?"
"V ... e ... n ... o ... m. Venom."
Frank Malone nodded.
It figured.
Staub.
Venom was the U.S. intelligence community's code name for savage, tricky Willi Staub, a cunning and meticulous monster whose mind was as dangerous as his pistol. He was responsible for hundreds of deaths.
But Malone wasn't the least bit intimidated.
He nodded again, oddly content.
Number One was no longer nameless, faceless, mysterious.
He had an identity, a size, a shape and a past. There were fat files on Willi Staub. They included more than data on his artificial right eye, known associates and usual weapons. They bulged with details of his methods, disguises, language skills and operating patterns.
There was also a special "personality study." A biographical summary, a psychological profile and a motivational analysis of his political views and target selections filled many pages in that inch-thick dossier. It was one of five classified reports on major terrorists that the FBI had secretly dist
ributed to chiefs of key U.S. counterterrorist units twelve days before the bombing of Libya.
Malone had read and reread his copies carefully. He had learned a lot about Willi Staub. While it obviously wasn't everything, it was enough to make the detective feel better about this duel. He knew much more about Staub than the wily terrorist knew about him.
The odds were changing.
But time was running out. It was 9:03 now. Malone had only forty-four minutes to avert a massacre.
"Venom" the general repeated. "She said to call her if you didn't understand."
"Okay," Malone replied noncommittally. "Anything else?"
"Just that I hope our bird does the job for you."
"Me, too," the detective lied.
If Staub had a spy listening, the untruth might convince the eavesdropper that Malone was still counting on the AWACS plane. Maybe an aircraft that couldn't arrive in time would distract or confuse the enemy. Illusion could be just as dangerous as reality in this kind of war, Frank Malone reflected as he hung up the telephone.
Then he saw that Wilber was back in The Cab. Reflected in the window that Malone faced, the FAA executive and Annie Green were speaking earnestly. As the detective turned, they walked toward him.
"Any word from Washington?" Wilber asked nervously.
"Nothing important. Where've you been?"
"My office. Since you think it's safer to phone from there, I went down to call Newark and La Guardia."
It made sense. But that didn't mean it was true.
"Call about what?" Malone questioned.
"The whole situation. Their ILS was blasted at exactly the same time our gear went."
"Of course," Malone said irritably. "Did they get any phone calls?"
"One each. A man who sounded Hispanic said their inbound planes were being held hostage, and he'd get back with his terms. He didn't."
Malone nodded.
Only one call each to Newark and La Guardia—another piece for the puzzle.
Staub was concentrating on Kennedy. JFK International Airport would be the main and final battleground. Malone had suspected that from the moment Staub ordered the getaway jet to be ready there.