Murder at the Pentagon

by Margaret Truman

  “I heard you were at the Pentagon,” he said pleasantly, narrowing the gap between them and extending his hand. Margit scrutinized his face. He’d grown older—no surprise in that—but was even more handsome than she remembered him to be, tall, imperially slim, a new dash of gray at the temples adding a touch of wisdom to his patrician good looks. Like Margit, Bill Monroney had enjoyed keeping fit, and his sinewy frame attested that he still did. He wore white slacks and loafers, and a shirt the color of Pepto-Bismol with the top two buttons left open. One thing certainly hadn’t changed; his smile was infectious.

  Margit briefly took his hand and then disengaged. “Yes,” she said. “Arrived about a month ago. Funny I haven’t bumped into you in the building.” If I were honest, she thought, I’d admit that I had hoped not to see him. Unrealistic, of course, even in the mammoth complex. Monroney was assigned to the Air Force Directorate of Engineering Services (DE&S). Margit’s assignment to the X-ray laser project ensured that they would come in contact at some point.

  “It’s a big building,” he said. “And I’ve been away most of the month. I suppose that’s why we haven’t run into each other. How have you been?”

  “Fine. Really good.”

  “Still flying choppers as if born to it?”

  “Sure. When I get the chance.”

  “And a lawyer, too,” he said with a sense of slightly exaggerated respect. “What’s next for Margit Falk, brain surgery?”

  “I’ve been considering that,” she said. “Need any work? You look good. The Pentagon must agree with you.”

  Monroney laughed. “As long as you don’t take it too seriously. Actually, I’ve been enjoying the assignment. Nothing like rubbing shoulders with the purple suiters.” Pentagonese for top brass. “Good for the career, if not for the morale.”

  “How’s your wife?” she asked.

  Monroney looked to where his wife was sipping a lemonade while chatting with another woman. He returned his attention to Margit. “Celia is fine. Still living the single life?”

  “Yes, and enjoying every minute of it. Excuse me. It was good seeing you. I’m thirsty.” She resumed her path toward the kiosk, aware that Monroney was watching her every step. She skirted Celia Monroney and reached the kiosk where volunteers wielded long black forks that pierced frankfurter skins and slid easily between charred ribs. Fat dripping from hamburger patties hit the flame of the barbeque pit with the searing hiss of a snake pit. Margit ordered a diet cola.

  Unpleasant memories flooded her, but she willed them away. To her right, lined up along a counter, were military officers who somehow wore their profession and rank even in civilian clothing; lobbyists invited to the picnic by their Pentagon contacts; and a member of the House of Representatives whom Margit recognized from pictures.

  “I know one thing,” one of the military men said in an authoritative, commanding voice (did he sound that way to his wife and children? Margit wondered), “that son of a bitch had better be put in his place now before he takes a notion to use that bomb he’s ended up with.”

  “It sure as hell got Israel’s attention,” said a lobbyist. “What did I hear yesterday, that they’ve voted an emergency two billion for weapons?”

  “Can’t blame them,” another officer in mufti said. “That head case drops one bomb on Tel Aviv, good-bye Jewish homeland, bonds for Israel, and conventional warfare.”

  Margit continued to sip her soft drink and eavesdrop. The demonstration by the leader of an Arab nation that he had, in fact, developed nuclear weapons had dominated virtually every conversation since videotapes of the test were released. Until that fateful moment the world had been drifting, albeit slowly but surely, into a rumbling but comforting peace. Relations between the United States and what had been the Soviet Union had continued to develop into one of mutual cooperation. Gorbachev and his policies of revised glasnost had started the process. The Wall had tumbled in Berlin. Eastern bloc countries had flexed their muscles, to the extent they existed, and sought to enter the mainstream of free enterprise and free elections. Then, the failed coup against Gorbachev and, of all things, the collapse of Communism within the Soviet Union, set in motion the dismemberment of the Russian nuclear superpower itself, at least as it had been known.

  Saddam Hussein’s audacious takeover of Kuwait, and subsequent rout on the battlefield under Stormin’ Norman and the hundred-billion-dollar Desert Storm operation—give or take a billion or two—had rendered Iraq impotent, at least for the time being. Negotiations between Israel and the PLO had taken what appeared to be a few positive steps forward, although they were far from achieving a definitive resolution.

  And then, with a push of a button, the world once again faced the prospect of a nuclear outburst. What governments had always feared was now a fact. Not that a superpower would unleash nuclear devastation, but that the technology would end up in the hands of a renegade, a rogue, an uncivilized and unreasonable despot who would view the use of such a weapon not as a threat to humankind but as a means of achieving commanding power. And, of course, depending upon the depth of his religious convictions, a hallowed place in heaven.

  The testing of the nuclear device had detonated the Pentagon into a frenzy of round-the-clock activities. Weapons systems that had been put on hold were dragged off the shelf and viewed as viable again. Members of the House and Senate appropriations committees, who’d pushed hard to turn the world’s calm into a moderate peace dividend—unleashing funds at least temporarily freed from defense to rebuild America’s infrastructure, to help ease the growing, grinding rate of poverty and close the widening gap between rich and poor, and to fund needed educational programs to bring America up to par with its leading economic competitors—now seriously rereviewed cuts in the military budget.

  A crew in a Russian missile silo outside St. Petersburg lounged on couches provided for their long, boring shifts. American and Russian negotiators had made considerable strides in reducing the arsenal of nuclear weapons on both sides, but the day had not yet been reached when all such weapons were abolished. Three members of the crew played cards. A radio broadcast Mussorgsky orchestrations of Russian folk themes into the large, windowless room that was the central control for the launching of the silo’s deadly instrument. The word to launch would come by telephone, a simple black instrument on a desk near the much more complex technological apparatus that, once activated, would send the missile into the sky, across the ocean, and, if everything went right, to a direct hit on its still-designated target, a kiosk in the center of five acres of trees and grass surrounded by five walls, a target consisting at the moment of Coke and Pepsi, burgers and dogs, potato chips and popcorn, coffee and tea. The kiosk had, for decades, been Ground Zero, the chosen target for the first Soviet missile launched in the event of war. The bags of potato chips and the walls around them would become, in a flash, indistinguishable.

  “I have a headache,” one of the Russians said.

  “Too much vodka last night,” a major said helpfully.

  “Deal the cards,” an enlisted man at the table said.

  And so it went, shift after shift, week after week, waiting for a phone to ring that had never rung before, and that was less likely to ring with each passing day of détente.

  Unless, of course, the missiles under the Soviet crew’s control were to be turned, from a kiosk in the center of the Pentagon to a white-walled city in the Middle East.

  Margit continued to wander the park, stopping occasionally to introduce herself to people who looked accessible to overtures from a stranger. A sadness had come over her. It wasn’t profound, just there, a moment of melancholy not unknown to her, usually triggered by being alone in a setting in which families prevailed. Being married and having children certainly appealed to Margit, although she wasn’t driven by that need, as evidenced by the proposals she’d declined in her adult life. Her thoughts went to Jeff. Would their relationship develop to the point that they might marry one day? You didn’t push those
things; at least, you shouldn’t. If it happened, it happened. Meanwhile, she had work to do.

  She noticed another woman who seemed to be alone. Should she introduce herself or leave the picnic, which was her first inclination? She looked a little more closely. The other woman had … well, a sensual aura about her as some women do, not so much a matter of dress or makeup, but through an inherent sense that it is their birthright, almost their duty, to flirt and to be coy, to attract and to seduce, men or women. The woman was approximately Margit’s height and wore beige slacks and a flowered shirt. An abundance of gold hair was loosely curled, the heat and humidity causing it to relax more than it should. Her features were ordinary (in the sense that none stood out as wonderful) except for lips that were fuller than average. Superb, pouty lips. Sexy lips.

  The woman leaned against a tree away from the crowd. Margit approached her. “Hi,” she said, “I’m Margit Falk. New here.” The woman had not seen her coming, and she seemed startled before saying, “Hello. I’m Christa Wren. I’m not.”

  Margit gestured to the picnic. “Fun,” she said.

  “Yes, it has been. Are you going to work in the Pentagon?”

  “I’m an air-force major assigned to the General Counsel’s Office. Do you work here?”

  “No. I’m with someone.”

  “Oh.” Margit didn’t ask who he was, or where he was. Why assume it was a he? Maybe she was with a girlfriend. No, it would be a man.

  Christa offered the explanation Margit hadn’t asked for. “I’m here with Dr. Joycelen. He had to go inside for something.”

  “Dr. Joycelen. I certainly know of him, although I’ve never met him. He’s with DARPA.”

  “Deputy director.”

  “A brilliant man, yes?” Margit said.

  “Very smart. A genius.”

  “So I’ve heard. Well, nice meeting you. Maybe I’ll see you again. At another picnic. Or the Christmas party. Surely we have a Christmas party.” Margit laughed softly.

  “Maybe,” said Christa, who looked back again to a door leading from the center court into a wing of the Pentagon.

  Not a word was spoken where the two of them met by the purple watercooler. One started to speak, but then there was a sound, a ridiculously tiny ‘pop’ considering the damage that followed. The bullet shattered eyeglasses and pierced skin and bone directly between the eyes. A word formed on the dying person’s lips but was never uttered. Sudden. Quick. Dead.

  There was only one witness on the scene. The killer. No one else to see.

  Except for a silent eye, one of hundreds of surveillance cameras peering down. Perpetual, unrelenting vision when they worked, hopelessly blind when they didn’t.

  * * *

  Another fifteen minutes, Margit told herself as she left Christa Wren and watched Bill Monroney step up to a microphone on a small wooden platform near the kiosk. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “time to announce the winners of the athletic competitions. We’ll start with the kids’ events.” A younger man holding a box containing medals and ribbons joined Monroney on the platform. Margit had been introduced to the younger officer during a meeting. Mucci? Yes, she seemed to recall that was his name. A major, like herself. Major Anthony Mucci. All spit and polish, she remembered. An officer out of a recruiting poster, brown hair cropped close; intense, steady eyes; good posture; few words. Even in his civvies, he was the quintessential young military man. Impressive.

  The children who’d won their events proudly stepped up on the platform to receive their recognition. In truth there were medals for every young person—fourth place, sixth place, eighth place, whatever, and it took time to get through them. Once Monroney had, Mucci brought up another box, medals now for the adult competitors. Monroney had started to announce the first few when Margit became aware that two men had come out of the Pentagon and were walking at a brisk pace toward the platform. Others saw them, too, including Monroney and Mucci. Monroney came off the platform, and he and the two late arrivals engaged in an animated, hushed conversation. When they were through, Monroney returned to the platform, took the microphone in his hand, and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, there’s been an accident inside. Sorry to say so, but the picnic is over. Medals for the rest of the winners will be delivered to them on Monday. Please, disperse now. Go home. Thank you for coming.”

  Monroney motioned to Mucci and another staff man to join him, and they followed the two who’d brought news of the accident back into the Pentagon through the same doors.

  The crowd, dispersing, was abuzz. So suddenly. So quickly. What happened? What kind of accident? Who?

  Instinctively, Margit turned to look at the spot where Christa Wren had been leaning against the tree. She wasn’t there anymore. Margit stood on tiptoe and looked over the crowd, saw Christa walking quickly from the center court and through the designated entrance/exit being used by slower-moving picnic-goers.

  Margit joined the crowd as it filed toward the exit, heard the talk around her, the questions, the speculations. She had no one with whom to join in such conversation. No sense in playing the speculative game anyway. She’d find out soon enough—along with everyone else.

  Monroney, Mucci, the third officer who’d joined them, and the two security men looked down on the body. They were in a subbasement of the Pentagon, a storage area reached by a set of stairs and an elevator, both heavily guarded one floor above. Dr. Richard Joycelen was slumped against the watercooler. The bullet that took his life had passed cleanly between his eyes, and blood had drained freely from the wound, over a prominent hump in his nose and down one side of his face. Much of it was already congealed, and was reddish brown rather than oxygen-fired red.

  “Has the building been secured?” Monroney asked one of the security men. “Medics called?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good.” To Mucci: “Let’s go upstairs. Looks like we’ll have the rest of the weekend here, and it sure as hell won’t be any picnic.”

  3

  “Okay if I leave?” Jeff Foxboro asked his boss, Hank Wishengrad.

  “Hell, no.” Wishengrad grinned. “You’ve only been here for three days and nights, and you look it. Go home.”

  “Not directly. A dinner date, but I’ll hit the sack early, unless I fall asleep in my soup. You could use some rack time yourself.”

  The Wisconsin senator sat back in the tall red leather chair and slid his hands behind his head. His hair was silver, and he wore it longer than would be expected of a man in his sixties, a U.S. senator to boot, almost long enough to be termed “flowing.” Coupled with half-glasses that spent most of their time perched on top of his head and a penchant for bow ties, he had the look of a 1960s intellectual, a professor, a radical lawyer, or a senior beatnik, an appearance pundits on the Hill mocked as affectation. Which was only half true.

  The senator closed his eyes and asked absently, “Who you having dinner with?”

  “The woman I told you about, Margit Falk.”

  “The major?”

  “One and the same. Actually, it’s a foursome. Mackensie Smith, my former law professor, and his wife, Annabel, invited us for dinner.”

  Hank Wishengrad opened his eyes, and a smile curled his lips. “Mac Smith. How is he?”

  “Just fine, I hope. Haven’t seen much of him since we graduated. We keep in touch once in a while by phone. Great man, and married to a wonderful woman. Actually, Margit choreographed this dinner. She’s been trying to mount a mini-class reunion ever since she got posted back to Washington.”

  Wishengrad stood, stretched, yawned. “Well, Jeff, if you pick up any pearls from the distinguished professor, or from your Pentagon sweetheart, be sure and pass them on in the morning. We can use all the smart thinking we can get around here. Sometimes I think we gave up thinking after the Marshall Plan.”

  Foxboro took his tan raincoat from an antique coat tree and put it on over his brown tweed jacket. He went to the window and looked outside. A light rain had begun to fall. Ma
ybe it would cool the city, drop it down a few degrees to a slow boil. He saw his image in the glass and patted the top of his head to rearrange hair that was not out of place. It made little difference. Foxboro’s sandy hair had the consistency of brushes used to thin out the undercoat of dogs and cats. Each individual hair made its own statement, pursued the direction it wished to go in, and he’d never been able to properly prune the bush until running across a stylist in Georgetown of the sort who had replaced barbers and who promised to “tame the beast”—and did, sort of. Foxboro carried his five-feet-eleven-inch frame straight-up: oddly, a distinct military posture, although he had not served in any branch of service. His face was squared-off and his brow was usually furrowed, set in an angry look that did not accurately reflect the quick, dry wit that could send that same face into a kaleidoscope of laugh lines. He lifted weights, but only for muscle tone, not for bicep bulge, and he’d developed into a pretty good Chinese cook after taking an extension course in D.C.

  “My best to Mac Smith,” Wishengrad said as Foxboro made for the door.

  “Sure thing, Senator. I’ll tell him you have a new plan to get our nonexistent railroads to run on time—the Mussolini Plan. Have a good night. Get on home. Chances are, the United States government will still be in business in the morning.”

  Foxboro had intended to walk from the Dirksen Senate Office Building to Mackensie Smith’s house on Twenty-fifth Street in Foggy Bottom, but the fact that he was already late prompted him to jump into the rare, blessedly empty, rainy-night cruising taxi.

  As fatigued as he was, the contemplation of an evening with Margit and the Smiths energized him. He grinned as he projected what dinner would be like. While a law student at G. W., he’d been to his learned but streetsmart, practical professor’s home for dinner on a few occasions. Those evenings invariably ended up in raucous debate among the students invited for the evening and their teacher, who seemed very much at ease moderating the conflicting points of view that flew around the table. That Smith had a remarkable mind was without question, but it was often Annabel who capped off an issue with a pointed, insightful, usually witty comment, smiling sweetly at her husband when their viewpoints clashed and his ended up on the floor. Foxboro sometimes wondered after leaving their house whether they continued disagreeing, whether they ever fought. Probably not the latter; the Smiths seemed blissfully suited to each other, to say nothing of looking good together: he a craggy, rugged-looking man behind whose heavy horn-rimmed glasses, the beard-line was always reappearing minutes after a close shave; she a stunning female with a complexion like half-and-half, a thick mane of copper hair, and a figure that left scant doubt to which of the two major sexes she belonged.