The Ultimatum: A Jeremy Fisk Novel

by Dick Wolf

  “Have you received threats?” Chay asked.

  “Hundreds if you include anonymous Internet trolls.” Verlyn sighed. “Of greater concern to me is the member of the National Security Council who said, according to your newspaper, that he would like to take me out into the desert and put a bullet in my head. Incidentally, there is a drill sergeant at Fort Hood who is already doing that, almost literally. He posted my photograph on targets at the pistol range there. Also one of the Marines who guarded me after I was apprehended, while jabbing me in the kidney, so as not to leave a mark, told me, ‘I’m gonna volunteer’”—here Verlyn pantomimed punching someone, speaking a word with each punch—“‘to be on the firing squad after they convict you of treason.’ There was no heed to due process, from any of these individuals, not even an iota of consideration that I’d done the right thing.”

  Petulance often went hand in hand with deception. Fisk judged Verlyn’s indignation to be genuine, though. His naïveté too. He reminded Fisk of the kid who snuck into the zoo after-hours to free the animals, opened the lion’s cage, then was surprised when the lion attacked him.

  Time for the change of pace, Fisk thought. “Maybe there’s something we can do about that,” he said. “First, I need to ask you one question: How much do you know about Yodeler?”

  The question presumed Verlyn knew something about Yodeler, although the pseudonym had been made public in the past hour, while Verlyn was alone in his cell without access to media. If Verlyn knew nothing, he would say as much—I don’t know him. When lying, people take pains to avoid direct answers.

  Verlyn hesitated before answering, “Is Yodeler a website?”

  Fisk couldn’t tell whether the man’s confusion was genuine. “No, I’m talking about the person responsible for the drone killings at the Museum of Natural History, Chelsea, and Central Park and Battery Park.”

  “Of course that’s all anyone here was talking about today,” Verlyn said. “I hadn’t heard anything other than conjecture about the killer. The person’s name is Yodeler?”

  Truthful, Fisk thought. Or demonstrative of a talent for deception. Or a sociopath—Verlyn had offered plenty of substantiation for that diagnosis this evening.

  “Is there any reason that you would have been in communication with this person recently?” Fisk asked him. This was an interrogation technique known as “baiting”—you tried to hit the subject with new concerns, in this case that there existed, somewhere, some record of his being in contact with Yodeler. If he hadn’t been in contact, he wouldn’t take the bait; he would simply say no or shake his head.

  Verlyn pivoted in his chair, angling away from Fisk, then uncrossed his legs. “Are you asking me this because he’s rumored to be seeking my release?” He looked to Chay, as if in search of a clue. She remained oddly silent.

  Fisk lamented that a coin toss stood as good a chance as he did of determining whether Verlyn was being honest. Verlyn could still be of help, however. Fisk looked to Chay, imploring her to speak. Verlyn would be more likely, he’d thought, to cooperate with her than him, the NYKGB agent.

  She said, “Merritt, we’re here because this Yodeler is murdering innocent people.”

  “Ah!” He brightened. “I think I can be of help. As much as I like it here, I will leave.”

  “It’s possible,” Fisk said. Anything was possible. “In the meantime, how about releasing a statement via the New York Times asking Yodeler to stand down?”

  Verlyn edged forward in his chair, locking his eyes on Fisk’s. “This is because you don’t want innocent people to die?”

  “That’s why I’m here.”

  “Is it really?” Verlyn sat taller. “So the Police State has a new game plan, then?”

  Fisk needed this nut to utter just a few words—as simple as Yodeler, man, please hit the pause button. “I can’t really speak for the ‘Police State,’ but the mission of the New York Police Department is—”

  “Oh, please!” Verlyn swatted the air, as though dispelling a bad odor. “One of the documents I saved from the NSA X Keyscore burn bag was the nondisclosure agreement Commissioner Bratton forced your public relations firm to sign. I know that, as a result of the publicist’s coaching, the members of your department are quite adept at spin and doublespeak. What I want is for everyone to see that nondisclosure agreement.”

  Fisk inhaled, so as not to groan. “Here’s a bit of perspective. A lot of our officers, especially in the Intelligence Division, could have earned more money in the private sector their first year out of school than they will if, late in their careers, they reach GS-18, the highest government pay grade. They went into public service because they legitimately care. And there’s nothing they care more about than human lives.”

  “I don’t doubt that was true when they signed on, still young and idealistic!” Verlyn sprayed saliva. “The Police State plays on that—it uses the do-gooders as cutouts, in essence. They believe they’re serving the public good, but in reality, their efforts line the wallets of an altogether different master, at a cost that is measurable in human lives—as of my incarceration, the figures were nine hundred and ninety American nonmilitary contractors lost in the nebulous name of national security since 2007, plus another one hundred and seventy-four foreign nationals killed doing our bidding. And those figures don’t include the casualties that conventional records don’t account for, like the cancer patients who lost their chance to live when ten million dollars was diverted from Columbia Presbyterian’s research clinic to bribe a Ministry of Health official in Azerbaijan who had influence on assigning offshore oil-well rights in the Caspian Sea.” He added, as if it were an afterthought, “Or my brother’s death.”

  Fisk sensed that Verlyn had inadvertently revealed one of his cards. “What happened to your brother?”

  Verlyn stared at the floor.

  “Boyden Verlyn was a chemist at Princeton,” Chay said.

  Verlyn shook his head. “No. Boyden’s salary was paid by Princeton—he was on the books as an assistant professor, and he taught a class. But his research was funded by the Department of Defense—although he would have paid for it himself if he’d been able to; he was a patriot through and through. When things went wrong on the project, even though it was no fault of Boyden’s, the generals acted as if they’d never known him. As he saw it, tragically, he had no option but to take his life.”

  “I’m sorry,” Chay said, and Fisk followed suit, meanwhile wondering how Boyden Verlyn might factor into the case.

  Verlyn went on. “If this Yodeler takes a life a day, that will be tragic, of course. However, there are at least twice as many deaths per day as a consequence of U.S. covert actions in sub-Saharan Africa. If Yodeler’s activities bring about my freedom, if the one thing I’m able to accomplish as a result is to bring the sub-Saharan operations to light, perhaps we will come to view Yodeler’s victims as—to use the Gulf War Coalition’s phrase—‘acceptable collateral damage.’ The result will be fewer casualties on the balance, because the generals and their corporate masters will be incarcerated.” Verlyn dabbed at his brow with his sleeve. “The citizens have a right to know what the government is doing in their name, with their tax dollars. That’s what’s right.”

  This had dissolved into a waste of valuable investigation time, Fisk thought.

  For some reason, Chay appeared to hang on Verlyn’s every word. She said, “Merritt, it would seem then that you have the opportunity to be a hero to the citizens twice over.”

  Verlyn perked up. “How?”

  She inched closer to the table. “What if the authorities were to make an arrangement where if you reveal what you know about Yodeler, you are released so that you can upload the remainder of the documents?”

  A hell of a question, Fisk thought.

  Verlyn said matter-of-factly, “I’m surprised a journalist of your repute would pose a hypothetical, Chay.”

  She turned to Fisk. “Would the Department go along with that?”

&nbs
p; “At this point, hell yes,” Fisk said to Verlyn. “You give up Yodeler, we’d let you walk away. Absolutely.”

  Sitting up straight, Verlyn said, “What guarantee could you give me that I wouldn’t walk away, as you put in, and a block or two later, an NSAC or CIA goon puts a bullet in my head?”

  Fisk tried to wave off his concern. “I’m sure we could work out some sort of plan for your approval, some sort of Checkpoint Charlie–type exchange, information for freedom.”

  “And then what if it turns out that I’m wrong about Yodeler?” Verlyn asked.

  A good question, Fisk thought—that is, a good question to ask if you realized you’d said too much and now were trying to minimize the damage. The damage had come thanks to Chay’s question, What if the authorities were to make an arrangement where you reveal what you know about Yodeler? In all likelihood, if Verlyn hadn’t known Yodeler’s identity, he would have simply answered, I don’t know who Yodeler is.

  CHAPTER 25

  Fisk wrestled the wind for control of the Metropolitan Correction Center door, pulling it open just enough for Chay to slip out sideways onto a rainy and prematurely dark Park Row. Traffic, like activity in general, was minimal for six o’clock, a function less of the downpour, he thought, than of plans canceled for fear of the drone.

  Chay started to thank him for holding the door when a sheet of rain hit her with a force seldom seen outside of a tsunami—or during routine rainfall within one of downtown Manhattan’s many wind tunnels. Looking back at him, she arched a brow. “You saw that coming, didn’t you?”

  “Don’t tell anybody this,” he said, stepping onto a section of sidewalk sheltered by an overhang. “Intel controls the weather.”

  He’d hoped for a smile, but instead she looked down to avoid the rain, which reflected the glow of a bright, neon-green sign. Before he could get a better look at her, his focus was captured by illuminated medallion numbers on the rooftop sign of a cab, meaning the cab was free—a commodity on a night like this. He started toward it, then watched helplessly as the medallion number stayed lit for only the few seconds it took for its passenger to exit, her place taken by the two businessmen who’d been waiting beneath a newspaper kiosk. The nearest subway, the 4 train at the City Hall station, was a four-block walk, or, effectively, a four-block swim. Up and down Park Row, people huddled in doorways and beneath overhangs, angling themselves so as to keep their phones dry. Another option presented itself to Fisk via the green neon.

  The light was in the shape of a four-leaf clover, part of a sign that protruded from a pub up the block. Fisk was reminded that, other than the Krispy Kreme doughnuts Chay brought to his office, he hadn’t eaten in a day and a half. Pointing that way, he asked her, “Want to shadow me there for a quick bite?”

  She nodded. “I was beginning to think you didn’t do food.”

  They ran. She sprinted and he did his damnedest not to fall too far behind. His coat and dress shirt were almost immediately soaked through, leaving his chest and arms stinging from the chill. Spinning tires raised puddles, soaking the rest of him. He looked up to find her holding the door.

  He tried not to pant. “Thanks.”

  Entering the dark tavern, he was enveloped by warm air. On the blank order form taped above the frosted-glass panel in the door, someone had handwritten sorry folks, no a/c in ink that bled down the glass. Still, the warmth felt good. The hint of stale spilled beer was oddly comforting too.

  He’d never been here, although, in a way, he had. They were a dying breed, these pocket pubs, always called something that included the word “blarney” or “clover” or just the possessive form of an Irish last name, with tables and chairs and walls coated with worn, dark wood, and lit primarily by the brewery promotions. When Fisk first came to New York, pocket pubs were as prevalent as Starbucks. In his opinion, the burgers in these places were the best in the city. Or maybe it was the pints of Guinness that invariably accompanied the burgers.

  “Table or bar?” Chay asked.

  “Up to you,” he said.

  As she led the way, he tried to ignore the way the rain made her skirt conform to her body. She weaved in and out of the light crowd, the government happy-hour celebrants having given way to Wall Streeters whose happy hour began later. Some ate dinner at the copper-plated bar. Most drank in silence, listening to the tinny Sinatra drifting from the jukebox that played 45s. She passed the bar, and the tables too, stopping at the farthest of the four booths, the only one that was free. Fisk peeled off his sport coat and hung it from the thick brass eagle head extending from the high back of the booth. Once he sat down, sinking into the red leather bench, the bar chatter seemed to fade. He had the sense of being transported somewhere else.

  “So did you think he knows who Yodeler is?” Chay asked.

  “I do. Thanks to your question. Until that point, I thought he didn’t, but I was wrong.”

  She looked him over. “I’ve got to hand it to you. You have a rare capacity for admitting when you’ve been wrong.”

  He shrugged. “I’ve had a lot of practice.”

  She sat back, getting comfortable, it seemed. “So do you have ways of making him talk?”

  “I was hoping you might.”

  “MICE?” The acronym, which stood for Money, Ideology, Coercion, and Ego, was well known in espionage circles as a summation of individual motives.

  “Maybe.” Fisk had read the FBI dossier, but perhaps not closely enough. “Boyden Verlyn would have been Merritt’s last living relative, right?”

  “As far as I know.”

  “Could Merritt be interested in clearing his brother’s name?”

  “Possibly.”

  “What exactly did happen to his brother?”

  “Boyden Verlyn’s nerve-agent experiments resulted in the death of one of his students, a college junior named Ella Barr, and landed a second student, Darren Draco, in an institution, permanently brain-damaged. Boyden may have been left to twist in the wind by the Defense Department. ‘The generals,’ as Merritt referred to them, asserted that Boyden was grossly negligent. In any case, Boyden faced a civil lawsuit from both the Barr and the Draco families, plus a prison sentence. His solution was to row a boat out into the Atlantic in the winter of 2010. The boat washed ashore three days later, with his suicide note taped to one of the seats.”

  Fisk didn’t immediately see a Yodeler connection. “The answer might be in his past,” he said. “The Bureau is opening leads on anyone who’s bought a Specter drone or as little as a new Specter rotor blade—evidently they require constant replacement. Can you cross-reference that list with everyone Merritt’s been in contact with?”

  “As soon as we have his toll records.”

  “The so-called haystack?”

  “Yes.” Recalling her hostility toward Intel’s data-mining practices, Fisk braced himself for her response.

  She leaned forward, into the plum-orange glow of the fake candle mounted on the wall, and said, “Let’s drink to finding the needle.”

  She’d certainly come around, Fisk thought. It felt like an unexpected victory. He looked to the bar. The waiter, who looked as though he’d been here since the place opened—without taking a day off—stood fixated on a horse race on the chunky TV bracketed to the wall above the liquor bottles. For the first time in an awfully long time, Fisk looked forward to a drink for a reason other than escapism. He wanted to sate his curiosity about Chay. “So where did you say you were from?” he asked.

  “I didn’t.”

  There was only one person Fisk could think of who had a greater aversion to answering personal questions than she did: himself. “I’m wrong again,” he said.

  “You need to ask the right questions.”

  “Please enlighten me.”

  “Okay.” She flicked a wet tendril of hair out of the way of her eyes. “You need to think of this as an interrogation.”

  “Are you a proponent of that sort of thing?” he said, willing to bet against it.
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  “Absolutely. But I mean interrogation, in the original sense of the word. The root of the word is rogare, Latin for ask, and inter, of course, is between. It’s a back-and-forth. If done right, both parties get something.”

  “More tit for tat?”

  “Exactly.”

  Interesting, he thought. He indicated the menu board, a medieval-style scroll cast in plaster and hand-painted with a list of the entrées: hamburger, shepherd’s pie, liver and onions, corned beef, bangers and mash, and the chop of the day. He doubted she would want any one of them. He said, “If you answer my question, dinner’s on me.”

  A glance at the scroll and she said, “As a matter of principle, I would never pass up a burger in a pub like this, so I’d like one of those.”

  Yet another point added to her score, he thought. “Okay.”

  “Along with a couple answers from you.”

  Not more Jenssen. “Great. What?”

  “Where are you from?”

  “Why would I answer now?”

  “Because you want me to tell you where I’m from. While you’re at it, tell me how you got into law enforcement.”

  “You want my origin story?”

  “Please.” She gestured for him to proceed.

  “It’s not much of a story.”

  “Then you can pick up my bar tab too.”

  “I would have done that anyway.” Fisk scanned the bar, hoping for a pint of Guinness sooner rather than later, and a Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7 while he was waiting for the Guinness. The waiter, holding open a copy of the Daily Racing Form, was on the phone.

  “The other condition is you need to answer me today,” Chay said.

  He laughed, then found himself saying, “Actually, I grew up all over the world. We lived in seven countries in eleven years: France, Belgium, Abu Dhabi, Germany, places like that. So how about you?”