The Cabal

by David Hagberg

  “The Germans have released you into my custody,” Whittaker said. “As you might guess a lot of strings had to be pulled at the highest levels.”

  “Thanks.”

  Whittaker gave him a bleak look. “So far this incident has not reached the White House. At least not officially—”

  “Which incident is that, Dave?” McGarvey interrupted sharply. “My arrest here or Todd’s assassination?”

  “The Bureau has identified Todd’s killers. They were Muslim extremists, members of one of al-Quaida’s splinter cells in Laurel, Maryland.”

  “Bullshit,” McGarvey said. He was trying to put a cap on his almost blind anger, and it was taking everything in his power.

  Whittaker overrode him. “They were targeting CIA officers. It was the same group who made the hit just outside our main gate a few years back. Todd just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “Arrests are expected any time now?”

  “No,” Whittaker said. “One of their bomb makers apparently screwed up yesterday and blew up the storefront mosque where they were at afternoon prayers. The rubble is being sifted for clues as to who was directing them.”

  “What about Givens?”

  “He and his wife and child were killed in a home invasion, a simple robbery.”

  McGarvey tried to interrupt, but Whittaker held up a hand. “Two pairs of fingerprints were found in the apartment and the suspects are already in custody.”

  “They admitted it?”

  “Not yet.”

  “They have alibis?”

  Whittaker conceded the point. “It was to be expected. But they’ll eventually come around.”

  “Unless they die under mysterious circumstances,” McGarvey said. “Maybe they’ll hang themselves in their cells.” He shook his head. It was worse than he expected. “Christ.”

  “Todd’s funeral is the day after tomorrow at Arlington. You’ll be allowed to attend, of course, but before and afterward you’ll be kept in custody.”

  “What am I being charged with?”

  “Treason,” Whittaker said, solemnly. “And that comes from the Justice Department.”

  McGarvey almost laughed.

  “I’m told that President Haynes tried to hold you back; he even warned you. More than once. And he liked you. The new president does not.” Whittaker shook his head. “Sorry, Mac, it’s out of my hands.”

  “Are we talking about North Korea?” McGarvey asked. Last year a high-ranking Chinese intelligence officer had been assassinated, apparently by North Korean police in Pyongyang. China was threatening to attack, and Kim Jong Il was promising to launch three of his twelve nuclear weapons on Beijing, Seoul, and Tokyo. Millions of people would have died.

  In desperation a North Korean intelligence officer had been smuggled into the U.S. where he’d come to ask for McGarvey’s help proving that North Korea didn’t order the assassination. And McGarvey had done just that, despite warnings from the White House not to get involved.

  Whittaker nodded. “You made a lot of enemies.”

  “I stopped a war.”

  “That’s up to the diplomats. It was felt at the time, and still is, that had you not interfered, our position in the region would have been strengthened.”

  “They were willing to risk a nuclear war for the sake of points?”

  “Some of the president’s advisers made a case for it.”

  McGarvey nodded after a long moment. “At least I’ll get my day in court.”

  “In camera with no jury because of the sensitive nature of the material.”

  “What about Katy and Liz?”

  “They’re safe at the Farm,” Whittaker said.

  “Safe from who, Dave,” McGarvey shot back. “Todd’s killers were blown up, and the guys who killed Givens and his family are in jail. Who’s left?”

  Whittaker sidestepped the question. It was clear that he was extremely uncomfortable. He was doing his duty; he didn’t have to like it. “Otto and his wife have disappeared; nobody knows where they are.”

  Somewhere in or near Washington, McGarvey guessed. With his laptop and a secure access to the web. Otto would want to stick around in case Mac needed help.

  “Did you bring someone from housekeeping with you?” McGarvey asked, his anger rising. “Do you want to take me back in cuffs and shackles?”

  Whittaker almost stepped back. “No,” he said.

  “They’ll never prove treason against me, and you know it. In the meantime we still have a problem that’s somehow connected between Mexico City and Pyongyang.”

  “The material on the disk we found in Todd’s car was simply too fantastic to believe. You saw it; you can’t tell me that you put any validity to what Givens was claiming.”

  “It wasn’t the disk Givens gave my son-in-law.”

  “That would admit a conspiracy—”

  “Right,” McGarvey said, but suddenly he was tired, and he didn’t give a damn. All he wanted now was to get back to Washington for Todd’s funeral, to be with Katy and their daughter, Liz, and with their granddaughter, Audie.

  It was obvious that Whittaker felt essentially the same; he, too, was tired of this assignment, which probably seemed to him to be a waste of time.

  “If it’s any consolation, the Company will do everything within its power to defend you. I’m behind you, and so is most of the senior staff.”

  McGarvey nodded. “What does Carleton think about my chances?” Carleton Patterson was the CIA’s general counsel and had held that position for at least ten years. His was always a reasoned opinion.

  Whittaker shook his head. “Not good.”

  Left unsaid was that this was a hell of a way to end a distinguished career.

  SEVENTEEN

  At Andrews Air Force Base the CIA’s Gulfstream with the same crew that had brought McGarvey over to Frankfurt in the first place taxied over to the government hangar and inside and the engines spooled down.

  “Good luck, Mr. Director,” Debbie said as McGarvey hesitated for just a moment at the hatch.

  He nodded to the pilot and copilot and winked at the girl, then went down where a pair of U.S. marshals was waiting for him, badges hanging out of the lapel pockets of their suit coats. They were large men, alert, their jackets unbuttoned, earpiece comms units and sleeve mics.

  For an awkward second or two the four of them, including Whittaker, stood at the bottom of the stairs. It wasn’t every day that a former director of the CIA was taken into custody, and especially not a man of McGarvey’s experience and reputation, and everyone was taking this seriously.

  The larger of the two—square-jawed, with a no-nonsense look about him—stepped forward. “Mr. Director, I’m Deputy U.S. Marshal Ansel.” He nodded toward his partner. “Deputy Marshal Mellinger. Sir, at this time we are placing you under arrest on a federal warrant on a charge of treason. Do you want your Miranda rights explained to you?”

  “No.”

  “If you’ll give us your word that you’ll cooperate, there’ll be no need for handcuffs.”

  “You have my word. Where are you taking me?”

  “To the D.C. Superior Courthouse annex for booking,” Ansel said. “Afterward you’ll be transported to Langley until your trial.”

  “We need to finish your debriefing,” Whittaker explained.

  And it was about what McGarvey figured. He would be treated with kid gloves until after the funeral, everyone knew that he wouldn’t make a move until then. “Whatever I tell you will be used against me at my trial. That about it, David?”

  “You know the drill, Mac. You’ve been in these sorts of situations before. The more you tell us the easier your life will be.”

  “I don’t think you’re going to like what I tell you. And it’s not very likely Dick will pass my version along to the White House. It’s something none of them will want to hear.”

  He and Whittaker had spoken only a few words on the long flight back from Germany, amounting to l
ittle more than conveying the entire Company’s sympathies about Todd’s death.

  “He was a good man, Mac.”

  “Too good,” McGarvey had said, and after a moment Whittaker had turned away to stare out the window at nothing.

  After a dinner of lobster, a light salad, and French bread with a good pino grigio, and coffee and brandy, McGarvey had gotten a few hours of sleep, waking only briefly when they’d landed at Prestwick, Scotland, to refuel, the sun chasing them as they headed west.

  Standing now in the hangar at Andrews, McGarvey turned to tell Whittaker that none of this was the CIA’s fault, but the DDCI had walked away to an armored Cadillac limousine, at least in a symbolic way washing his hands of the entire affair for the moment.

  “Sir?” Ansel said, politely.

  McGarvey went with the two deputy marshals and got into the backseat of a Cadillac Escalade SUV, with no access to the door locks, which snapped into place once they headed out.

  The base was fairly busy this afternoon, and Air Force One had been trundled out to the apron, where people were beginning to gather. Mellinger was driving and he stayed well away from the security zone around the blue and white 747.

  “Where’s the president heading off to?” McGarvey asked.

  Ansel half-turned in his seat and looked back. “I don’t know, sir,” he said. But then he shook his head, his face long as if he’d just thought of something disturbing. “Some of us had a lot of faith in you.”

  “Maybe the charges against me are wrong.”

  “Personally, I hope so. But the consensus is otherwise.”

  “Guilty till proved innocent, that it?” McGarvey asked. He was on the verge of lashing out, but he held himself in check. Consensus was almost always more important than just about anything else. It was the basis for nearly all the principles of a democratic government. Except that an important lawyer of the sixties and seventies once said that the Constitution hadn’t been written to protect the masses from the individual, be he a criminal or not, but to protect the individual from the masses.

  “We’re just doing our jobs,” Ansel said, and turned forward.

  And that was the problem, McGarvey thought, too many people just doing their jobs and nothing more. It was a philosophy he’d never understood. It was, in his estimation, a coward’s way out.

  They were admitted through the sublevel sally port into the booking and holding area of the courthouse, where McGarvey was taken directly into a small room where a technician took his fingerprints with an electronic reader under the watchful eyes of Ansel and Mellinger who were behind a bulletproof window.

  Afterward he was stood against a wall with inches and feet marked on a scale and photographed in right profile, face on, and left profile.

  In an adjacent room he turned out his pockets onto a counter where a uniformed clerk inventoried his things—wallet, watch, some money, and a compact, razor-sharp knife in an ankle holster, which the Germans had not caught, and which raised an eyebrow here. His things were bagged in a large manila envelope, but instead of being logged into the property room the bag was turned over to Ansel.

  “Anything else we should know about?” the deputy marshal asked.

  “I gave you my word, and that’ll have to be enough, unless you want to do a full cavity search,” McGarvey said.

  “No, sir,” Ansel said, but he was wary and it was obvious he wanted nothing better than to get rid of his prisoner.

  Mellinger had stood to one side through all this, his hand inside his jacket.

  McGarvey looked over at him. “Tell your partner to take his hand off his pistol. It makes me nervous.” He looked into Ansel’s eyes.

  “Listen here, pal—” Mellinger said, but Ansel cut him short.

  “We don’t want any trouble, believe me.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  Twenty minutes after they arrived, they were back downtown and headed across the Roosevelt Bridge and north up the busy Parkway toward the entrance to the CIA campus.

  “What have you heard?” McGarvey asked, breaking the silence once they were across the river.

  “Treason,” Ansel said. “Something to do with an incident in North Korea a few months ago. Apparently you went head-to-head with President Haynes over it, and he may have backed down, but President Langdon doesn’t agree.”

  “No, I didn’t expect he would,” McGarvey said. “What else?”

  “The word on the street is that your people are going to the mat for you.”

  “You mean the CIA?”

  “Yes, sir,” Ansel said. “We were given word that you were to be treated with kid gloves, and that was at the request of Langley. Specially Mr. Adkins.”

  Dick Adkins had been promoted to DCI by President Haynes after McGarvey had left, and he’d been kept on an interim basis by the new president until a replacement could be found. In the past six months no one suitable had been named. And in fact a lot of high-level staff positions in Washington had yet to be filled.

  “It’s shaping up to be a fight between the CIA and the White House.”

  “Right,” McGarvey said. “And we know who’ll win that one.”

  They were stopped at the main gate where the CIA’s general counsel Carleton Patterson was waiting in the parking lot with his white Mercedes S550. He got out when the U.S. marshals pulled up, and walked over.

  “I’ll take it from here,” he said. He’d been the Company top legal beagle for almost ten years, coming down to Washington from a prestigious New York law firm to help out three presidents ago, strictly on a temporary basis. He was tall, slender, silver-haired, and as well put together as one would expect for a man in his position. He and McGarvey had respect, if not friendship, toward each other.

  “Good luck,” Ansel said.

  But Mellinger shook his head. “Prick,” he said half under his breath, and Ansel shot him a dirty look but said nothing, and the two of them got back in the Escalade and drove off.

  “I don’t think he likes me,” McGarvey said, getting in Patterson’s car.

  “A lot of people in this town don’t care for you,” Patterson said. “You’re old school. Hell, you even approved of Guantánamo.”

  “I even participated,” McGarvey said. “We gave them a better chance than they gave us on nine/eleven.”

  They were waved through the gate and headed up the drive in the direction of the Old Headquarters Building, but turned off before they reached the OHB’s circular drive and parking lot.

  “Say that in front of a judge and you’ll be dead in the water,” Patterson said, eyeing him.

  “If it gets that far,” McGarvey said. “You putting me up in a safe house here on the Campus?”

  Patterson hesitated a moment. “If you promise not to run. Green and Boylan want to finish your debriefing, and Dick would like to have a word.”

  “My son-in-law’s funeral is tomorrow. I’m going nowhere.”

  Until afterward, was the unspoken finish to the sentence, but McGarvey didn’t amplify and Patterson thought it better not to pursue the matter. McGarvey was cooperating, and for now that was enough.

  EIGHTEEN

  The safe house was a small, two-story colonial in the woods away from the OHB, the white paint on the exterior peeling in places, and some weeds growing in spots in the gravel driveway indicating either that the place hadn’t seen much use lately, or that even the Company was lacking in nonessential maintenance tasks because of the economy. McGarvey expected both.

  “Will I have minders?” McGarvey asked when they pulled up.

  “Green and Boylan will be bunking with you for the time being,” Patterson said, and as he said it Pete opened the front door of the house, and smiled.

  “Pretty girl,” McGarvey said.

  “Yes, she is. And bright.” Patterson turned to him. “They have your jacket, your entire file from day one, so it won’t do any good to try to hide some of your . . . more disagreeable . . . outcomes.”

  McGar
vey got out of the car but hung back for a moment. “They were called assignments, and the outcomes were what I had been ordered to accomplish. You might want to get that idea straight in your head, Carleton. Could be important. Soon.”

  Carleton gave him a bleak look, and started to say something, but then thought better of it and drove off.

  “Mr. Director,” Pete said. “They sent your things over from the airport, and we brought some spare clothes for you from your suitcase at the Farm. We want you to be comfortable.”

  “How are my wife and daughter?” McGarvey asked on the broad porch.

  Pete stepped aside to let him go into the house, then followed him and closed the door, making a show of not locking it, which wouldn’t have mattered in any case. “As well as can be expected, sir.”

  “May I call them?”

  “We’d appreciate it if you would hold off. Just until tonight. Dr. Sampson is with them this afternoon.”

  Leonard Sampson was the company’s chief shrink, a bright, dedicated man. McGarvey couldn’t think of many people he’d rather have with Katy and Liz just now. “Anything from Otto yet?”

  Pete’s eyebrows knitted. “We were hoping you might be able to shed a little light on his whereabouts.”

  “I’ve been out of the country.”

  “Yes, sir,” Pete said not pushing the query.

  The house was in much better shape inside than out, with nice furnishings, but it smelled unused and musty, closed in for a long time. To the left was a living room with a river rock fireplace that someone had stupidly painted white, an enlarged inauguration photograph of President Langdon above the mantel, surprisingly with no halo. A dining room to the right was furnished with a cherrywood table, seating eight, and a breakfront filled with nice stemware. A number of thick files had been placed at the head of the table. Beyond the dining room, McGarvey assumed, was the kitchen through swinging half-doors. A guest bathroom was tucked into the stair hall that led back to perhaps the den.