Red Horseman

by Stephen Coonts

  “We didn’t—”

  “Harper found that the money went through CIA dummy corporations, didn’t he? That’s why you killed him.”

  “You make it sound as if we’re the bad guys. We aren’t. We’re trying to keep the peace in an unstable world. Surely you can see that? We had no choice. Yeltsin is failing: he’s doomed. He can’t possibly succeed, not a chance in a million. Either we have an in with his successors or we get the door slammed in our faces. That’s the only goddamn choice we have.”

  “How long have you and Schenler been running your own foreign policy?”

  “Huh?”

  Jake’s voice was almost a whisper. “How long has the CIA been running its own foreign policy? That’s a simple question.”

  Tenney looked bewildered, as if he didn’t understand what was being asked. And then the truth dawned on Jake. Presidential administrations came and went but the professional spies soldiered on regardless. The CIA had been doing what the CIA leaders believed necessary for as long as there had been a CIA, almost fifty years. It still was.

  “All you people, you bottle-sucking lollipop amateurs—fucking around in national security matters,” Herb raved, becoming more and more infuriated. “You’re all gonna die! This ain’t a fucking football game. This is real, for keeps. America is at stake here.”

  He’s coming apart, Jake Grafton decided. He’s been through too much.

  Jake averted his eyes as Tenney ranted on: “Those ten-cent codes you use on the scramblers—they’ve been reading the messages thirty minutes later. They even fax me hard copies. They know what the fuck you traitors are up to. They know!”

  Jake and Toad taped Herb Tenney’s mouth and put him in the bedroom. When the door was closed, Toad asked, “So he wasn’t trying to poison us?”

  “Sure he was,” Jake muttered. He put the tablets into the bottle and dropped it into his shirt pocket.

  “What are those tablets, some kind of suicide pills?” Spiro Dalworth asked.

  “Binary poison,” Toad told him. “It’s medicine for people you don’t want to see anymore.”

  Jack Yocke sat over in the corner with his chin resting on one hand. He glanced at Jake Grafton, who was staring at the floor, then leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

  Toad reached under the couch for the cassette recorder and pushed the rewind button. When the rewind was complete, he placed the recorder on the table and pushed the play button. He thumbed up the volume. Several minutes went by as they listened to feet shuffling, someone coughing, then finally Jake Grafton’s voice: “General Shmarov died last night. Tell us about that.”

  The little machine had caught it all. The confusion and muffled comments as they poisoned Tenney were brutally plain, as was the sound of Tenney retching afterward. The listeners studiously avoided looking at one another.

  When Tenney got out Harvey Schenler’s name, Jake motioned to Toad to turn off the tape. “Get the senior chief and fire up the TACSAT,” Jake told him. “Send that tape to General Land.”

  “You heard Herb, CAG. They’ll crack the code.”

  “Send it. Use the TACSAT. In the meantime we’ll deliver a message of our own to Harley McCann.”

  “What about the ambassador? He wanted to see you.”

  Jake glanced at his watch. “The night’s young.”

  Jake was still in his flight suit when he entered the ambassador’s outer office and encountered Agatha Hempstead. She sniffed gingerly, no doubt slightly appalled at Jake’s aroma, then opened the door to Lancaster’s office.

  The ambassador looked coldly across the top of his glasses at Jake Grafton and said, “I asked to see you when you returned to the embassy, Admiral.”

  “Yessir. I apologize. I didn’t have much to tell you two hours ago, except to report that Lieutenant Moravia destroyed the weapons at the Petrovsk facility and a transport that was probably Iraqi. We were intercepted by four Russian fighters on the way down there.”

  “But you evaded them. Obviously.”

  “Yessir. Is Senator Wilmoth still in Moscow?” Wilmoth was the U.S. senator who wanted a peek at the KGB files.

  “He’s staying at the embassy, but he’s leaving tomorrow. The KGB slammed the door today after Shmarov died. I’m afraid Yeltsin doesn’t have a lever big enough to pry it open.”

  “I might be able to help. Could you ask the senator to come here to your office now? I have a tape I would like for you both to listen to. Then we’re going to have to have a lengthy chat.”

  Lancaster looked dubious, but he picked up the telephone. Jake took the cassette player from his pocket and sat it on the desk. Hempstead helped him find a plug.

  When Wilmoth arrived, Jake started the tape. He had to stop it at numerous places and explain. Lancaster wanted to know what in the world Admiral Grafton was forcing into Herb Tenney’s mouth, so Jake displayed the two pill bottles, even dumped the tablets onto Lancaster’s polished mahogany.

  After the first run-through, Jake played the tape again without interruptions. Then a third time at Senator Wilmoth’s request.

  It took some digesting. The fact that the Old Guard junta had blown up the Serdobsk reactor infuriated Wilmoth, who swore in a manner that Jake Grafton found most gratifying. Finally he said, “Wait until the president hears this!”

  “I suspect he’s listening to it right now, sir,” Jake told him. “I’ve already sent this via a TACSAT unit to General Land at the Pentagon. He said he would take it to the White House immediately.”

  “What about Harley McCann?” the ambassador said. “Was he in on this?”

  “Captain McElroy has him outside in your waiting room. Why don’t you ask him?” McElroy had taken four marines with him to the CIA spaces. They had found McCann and his deputies merely sitting at their desks, waiting. “Apparently after Toad snatched Herb Tenney this morning, they talked it over and decided that they didn’t want any part of whatever was going down. They appear to be quite ready to talk.”

  “I have a few questions to ask them,” Wilmoth said heatedly.

  “I suggest, Senator, that you send a team of your investigators to the CIA office and impound the files. I don’t know what the CIA puts on paper, but some of that stuff might be interesting reading.”

  Wilmoth grabbed for the telephone.

  Lancaster reached for the white tablets on the desk and examined them. Finally he put them back on the desk next to the pill bottle.

  When Wilmoth got off the phone, Jake said, “Perhaps, Mr. Ambassador, tonight would be a good time for President Yeltsin to call on the American Embassy. We can make a duplicate tape for him to keep. He might be able to find a good use for an artifact like that.”

  Lancaster nodded. “And?”

  “Well, I need a plane to get to Saudi Arabia. I need to get there without being intercepted and attacked by Russian fighters. Perhaps after Yeltsin listens to the tape, we can discuss that problem with him.”

  “On the tape you said you killed four men today. Who?”

  “We were intercepted by fighters. Rita and I are still alive.” Jake Grafton shrugged.

  Lancaster grinned wolfishly. “I’m beginning to understand why General Land holds you in such high regard, Admiral. Agatha, while we’re talking to Mr. McCann, would you see if you can get President Yeltsin on the telephone?”

  “Start scribbling.”

  “Scribble what?” Jack Yocke was down on his hands and knees with a sponge and a bucket trying to clean Herb Tenney’s vomit from the carpet. He leaned back on his heels and looked up at Jake Grafton.

  “How the Old Guard blew up the Serdobsk reactor and murdered a half-million human beings. How the Old Guard sold nuclear weapons to Saddam Hussein. How they used the money to bribe elected Russian politicians to vote Yeltsin out. That story. Write it.”

  “An agent of the U.S. government tortured for information can hardly be quoted as a ‘reliable, high-placed government source,’ ” Yocke pointed out acidly. He dabbed at the wet
place in the rug. “I don’t know if there was a single word of truth in what he said.”

  “I thought you were a red-hot reporter.”

  Yocke threw the sponge in the bucket and got to his feet. He sat down in the chair he had occupied during Tenney’s interrogation. He dried his hands on his trousers. “I don’t want to write it.”

  Grafton gazed at Yocke for a moment, then found a chair. “Maybe you’d better explain.”

  “The world is full of bad people. I write about them every day. They rob, steal, cheat, take drugs, bribes, beat their kids to death, kill their spouses in drunken rages or gun the bitches on the courthouse steps when they’re stone-cold sober. Those people I can understand. They’re human. These people here, people like Tenney, Shmarov, Yakolev…” Yocke’s voice trailed off.

  “They’re human too. Their crimes are just worse.”

  “No. They aren’t human. They are evil. They have no humanity.” Jack Yocke shuddered.

  “They’re human all right,” Jake Grafton told him. “If anything, too human. What you don’t want to face is that everyone has a little Hitler, a little Stalin in him. Given the means and motive, a lot of people could become absolutely corrupt. What’s the difference between killing a man and ordering his death? What’s the difference between ordering one death or a half-million? Or a million? Or five million. Or ten million. With a stroke of a pen you can kill all the Jews—all the educated people—all the rich people—all the poor people—all the homosexuals…whoever. Evil and sin are exactly the same thing—you just need to convince yourself that the ends justify the means. Every human alive is capable of that little trick.”

  “I don’t want to write it.”

  “You don’t have a choice. I’m making the decisions around here. Get out your computer and plug the damn thing in. If necessary, I’ll write the story for you.”

  “Just who the fuck do you think you are, Grafton?”

  “I’m a public servant trying to do his job. You are a newspaper reporter who wants to get famous by writing the truth. We’ve got a bucketful of truth here and you are going to write it because people need to come face-to-face with it. What they do with the truth is beyond my control: I’m not taking responsibility for the human condition. But by God they are going to see it smeared all over the front page of every newspaper in the world. Then if they refuse to face it they are just as evil and just as guilty as the men you’re writing about.”

  Jake Grafton stood. “You’re going to have to name names. Lancaster is in his office right now playing the tape for Yeltsin. Put that in your story.”

  Jack Yocke gnawed on a fingernail as he thought about it. Finally he said, “You want me to say how you got the information from Tenney?”

  “You can do it like an interview, if you want. Don’t mention binary poisons. I think that little problem is going to solve itself. Just quote Herb. Don’t forget to mention that the interview was recorded and the president got a copy of the tape.”

  “ ‘That little problem is going to solve itself.’ Goddamnit, Admiral, shit is shit! If we’re going to nail the Commies to the cross we ought to nail our own bastards up there with them.”

  “Oh, we will, Jack. We will. But one set of bastards at a time.”

  “Who authorized you to release this story? The president?”

  “I authorized myself.”

  Yocke couldn’t think of a reply, which infuriated him since he had known what Grafton’s answer would be before he asked the question.

  “Wake me up in two hours,” the admiral said, “and let me read your story. I’m not much of a writer but maybe I can help you with the commas.”

  And with that Jake Grafton stretched out on the couch. He turned so his back was to Yocke. In moments, as Jack Yocke stared, he was breathing deeply and regularly. By the time Yocke got his computer plugged in and running, Jake was snoring lightly.

  22

  Boris Yeltsin was a bear of a man, a burly, fleshy Russian with a bulbous, veined nose that one hoped did not indicate the condition of his liver. He shook Jake Grafton’s hand and waved toward a chair as he traded Russian with an aide who didn’t bother to translate. The interpreter who had led Jake into the room also remained silent.

  The sun streamed between the drapes of the tall window on Yeltsin’s left. Blinking in the glare, Jake Grafton looked around curiously. It was a good room, a man’s room, tastefully decorated and heaped with piles of paper.

  Yeltsin kept glancing at Grafton as he spoke. Finally one of the aides said, “President Yeltsin wishes to thank the American government for its help in this crisis.”

  Jake Grafton nodded pleasantly and glanced at his watch. The first edition of the Post carrying Jack Yocke’s story was probably hitting the streets of Washington just about now. If the Post editors placed the story on the wires it was going to be on CNN and every other television and radio station in the Western world within an hour. Yeltsin’s phone should start ringing in very short order.

  After Yocke sent the story to the Post in the wee hours this morning via modem, his editor, Mike Gatler, called back and questioned him for ten minutes. When Yocke was about to lose his temper, he passed the telephone to Jake Grafton, who told Gatler, “Yeah, I read the story. Every word’s true.”

  “Saddam Hussein has two dozen nuclear weapons?”

  “At least that.”

  Gatler whistled. “Can this CIA source—what’s his name?—”

  “Herb Tenney.”

  “Yeah. Can Tenney be trusted?”

  “I don’t know that I trust him, but I think he told the truth on this matter.”

  “Can we quote you on that?”

  “If you spell my name right.”

  “Rear Admiral, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you and Yocke both saw the base where Hussein got the weapons? Weapons sold to him by the Russians?”

  “Yes. Name of the place is Petrovsk. Yocke has it in the story. We went there in a helicopter.”

  “This is a big story,” Gatler said.

  “That’s what Jack said.”

  “Put him back on, please.” Jake held out the telephone.

  “This story just scratches the surface,” Gatler complained to Yocke.

  “I know that, Mike. I’m getting all I can. I’ll send you more as soon as possible.”

  “I want you to work with Tommy Townsend on this. Call him at his hotel.”

  Yocke decided to call Townsend in the morning. He went to the bathroom, washed his face and hands, and was just stretching out on the floor with a pillow when Gatler called back. “The State Department refuses to confirm or deny this story.”

  “Nothing I can do about that,” Yocke said, waving frantically to Jake Grafton. The admiral sat up on the couch and rubbed his head.

  “Yocke, this is the biggest story since the Japs hit Pearl Harbor,” Gatler said. “Our White House guys can’t get any confirmation, State refuses to confirm or deny, the people at the Pentagon refuse to comment, the CIA press people refuse to confirm that they’ve ever even heard of this Tenney guy. And CIA says that none of their people would ever talk to the press—violation of security regs and all that crap. So we’ve got your story and a voice on the telephone who claims he’s Rear Admiral Jake Grafton. That’s all.”

  “I heard the Tenney interview, Mike. I was there in person. I saw the tape being made. I saw the rubble of the Serdobsk reactor, I visited the base at Petrovsk. I saw some bodies. I saw some weapons. I talked to Jake Grafton on the record—he’s the deputy director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, for Christ’s sake! He explicitly agreed to be quoted. I talked to an Israeli Mossad agent who’s now dead—she was shot in my presence. I’ve got all that I can give you. If you haven’t got the balls to run the story, then don’t run it.”

  “Don’t get testy with me, Jack. I’m just explaining how far out on the limb we are with this story.”

  “I’m sorry, Mike, but it’s a good story. Every
fucking word is true. I guarantee it. I don’t give a shit what anybody else says, General Shmarov sold Saddam Hussein those bombs and blew up the Serdobsk reactor to cover up the fact that the weapons were gone.”

  “Shmarov is dead.”

  “I know that, Mike.”

  “Heart attack.”

  “No, he was poisoned by Herb Tenney.”

  “What?” Gatler roared. “Poisoned! By a CIA agent? That isn’t in this story!”

  “I know that too, Mike. I can’t get any confirmation for that from anybody. But Tenney confessed to the killing in my presence. I didn’t put that in this story because I don’t know that anyone will ever confirm that Shmarov was even murdered, much less that Tenney did it. I’m telling you that the stuff that is in that story is confirmed gospel. I’ve got a mountain of stuff that isn’t in there because I haven’t yet got it confirmed.”

  Gatler thought that over for five seconds, then said, “I want a copy of the tape of Tenney’s confession.”

  “Grafton won’t release it. The White House might, but I doubt it. It covers a lot of ground, all of it classified up the wazoo.”

  “I want more stories when you get confirmations.”

  “I understand. When and if, you’ll be the first to hear.”

  They said their good-byes and Yocke told Jake, “He’s gonna print it.”

  Jake Grafton had grunted from his position on the couch and pulled his jacket around him. He was asleep again in minutes.

  This afternoon Jake idly wondered what Boris Yeltsin would do when he heard the story was out. Oh well, he was a politician, experienced in converting lemons into lemonade.

  He settled back into the chair and crossed his legs. This afternoon President Clinton was supposed to call to talk to Yeltsin about the mess in Iraq. Last night Yeltsin invited Jake to come here to answer any questions his staff might have.

  Now the telephone rang. One of the aides picked it up, said something, then Yeltsin took the other line. Jake looked at his watch. He wondered if the airplanes coming in from Germany would be on time.