The base of the bottle slammed squarely into the left side of Ramesh’s face, just below his eye, knocking him unconscious. There was a moment of visible disorientation as he lost the neural connection with his legs, and then he went down backward on his right side, like a boxer caught with a vicious hook. Charles Mallory scrambled to his feet, braced for whatever came next.
But there was nothing to brace for.
It had been a perfect pitch. The batter hadn’t even seen it coming.
John Ramesh lay on his side. Mallory approached him, breathing heavily, feeling another rush of adrenaline. Already there was a swelling around his left eye. Charlie removed the pistol from the grip of his right hand. He stood directly above him, aimed carefully and shot John Ramesh once in the chest, killing him.
FORTY-SIX
CHARLES MALLORY SURVEYED THE countryside, listening to the wind above the pit, the fading echo of the gunshot. There was no road beyond the pit, just craggy rolling woodlands. The perimeter of the property on the eastern and southern sides was bounded by metal mesh fencing, topped with concertina wire, and he suspected the rest of it was, too. He could hide in the woods, he supposed, and try to find a way through the fencing, but he knew they would eventually come for him. Any way he figured it, that didn’t seem like a good option.
He could try to drive the truck back out himself, but he’d have to go through two checkpoints and there wasn’t much chance they would just let him pass, no matter what he told them. If he tried to bust through the barriers, he would only set off alarms.
That limited his alternatives pretty severely.
The only viable option, he decided, was for John Ramesh to drive the truck back through the checkpoints. This option presented a few challenges, of course.
Charles Mallory studied Ramesh’s crumpled body. A little shorter than he was, maybe five ten, but with an enormous upper torso. Arms almost as big as his legs. He probably weighed 210 pounds, he guessed. Charlie walked back to the pick-up, turned the ignition key, and drove it over the rocky pavement to where Ramesh had fallen. He crouched beside Ramesh’s body, undid the shoelaces on his work boots, and stripped them out. He lifted him up under the armpits and dragged his body to the truck. Heavy, but not impossible. He yanked him up to the level of the seat. Shoved his butt inside the cab, then twisted him into a seated position, folding his legs in sideways and tucking them under the steering column. Then he adjusted the body so that Ramesh was facing forward, his head slumped against the steering wheel. Closed the door and propped his lifeless left arm on the top of the door. Manually opening the small vent window, he tied one end of Ramesh’s shoelace around his left thumb, the other end around the vent window column. Then he bent the elbow out the window, so it appeared that he was leaning it on the outside of the door. Charlie walked around to the passenger side, then, and got in. Pulled Ramesh’s head back, so he was flush against the seat, then placed the lifeless right hand on the top of the steering wheel, curled his fingers. Using the other shoelace, Charlie tied Ramesh’s wrist to the top of the steering column. Then he broke one of his discarded toothpicks into thirds and used two of the pieces to prop open Ramesh’s eyes.
He slipped the truck into gear and let it coast back down the path away from the pit. Charles Mallory was six-foot-two. If he leaned forward, sitting on the front edge of the seat, he could reach the pedals with his left leg and steer with his right hand, turning the wheel so that for someone looking at the oncoming truck, Ramesh’s hand would appear to be steering. It wasn’t perfect, by any means, and there wasn’t any guarantee that he was going to get through the gate. But it beat trying to force his way out.
Most of the drive to the second gatehouse was downhill, over a dirt road. Mallory pumped the brake repeatedly, letting the truck coast, getting a feel for the pedals and the steering. When the road evened out, he pressed the accelerator, let it pick up speed, touched the brake. Back and forth.
As they neared the fence, Mallory lifted the radio. He pushed the “Speak” button, as Ramesh had done, said, “8-C 13 coming through.” Whatever that meant.
He held Ramesh’s head back by his ponytail as the truck came toward the gate. Pumped the brake with his left foot.
But the gate remain closed. Charlie saw a heavyset, crew-cut guard emerge from the gatehouse, standing there, waiting for them. A man wearing some sort of uniform—light blue shirt, navy slacks, gun holstered at his waist. About forty feet away. Thirty-five. Thirty.
Mallory pressed his foot on the brake. This wasn’t going quite as smooth as the entry. Maybe 8-C 13 was the wrong code for coming back. Maybe they recognized the voice was not John Ramesh’s.
He shifted into neutral and gunned the engine. Honked the horn twice. Then shifted back into drive, moving the wheel slightly side to side as the truck drifted forward. The man lifted his eyes, then turned back to the gatehouse. Looked once again at the truck. Charlie gunned the engine again, readying to slam through the gate. But then the guard motioned with his left hand. Mallory pulled his foot off the brake, grabbed Ramesh’s ponytail to hold up his head. The gate rose and Charlie pushed down on the accelerator pedal. Coasted ten feet and then shot through, lowering and lifting Ramesh’s head, as if he were nodding a thank you. The guards raised their hands without looking.
The first guard station was maybe three quarters of a kilometer farther down the road. But the gate there had been opened when they came in and it was open as they approached going out. Mallory didn’t brake. He just let his foot off the gas for a moment as they went through, turning Ramesh’s head slightly and punching the horn. There were two armed Jeeps there still, along with a military vehicle parked on the other side of the road. Four men standing outside, talking. They lifted their hands in a greeting.
After that came a winding stretch of road, through slightly rolling country. Mallory looked for a pull-off to get rid of Ramesh’s body but didn’t see one. At the fork off the property, he turned right, back toward the city, seeing small clusters of mud huts in the fields to his right.
Several minutes later, a truck came speeding up behind them. Charles Mallory gripped the handgun against the wheel, keeping his foot on the pedal. He was going forty-five, the other truck maybe sixty. Mallory maintained his speed. The truck began to move into the right passing lane. He let his foot off the gas as it approached behind him, ready to fire through the open window. The truck drew even with them but didn’t slow down.
After another half kilometer he came to a turn-around and a trail into the woods on the left side of the road. Charlie coasted to a stop. He pulled John Ramesh out and dropped him behind the truck. Checked his pockets: no identification, just some cash and a cell phone. About $300 in American currency. Charlie took it and dragged his body by the arms into the woods. Covered him with leaves and loose dirt and branches. Then he got behind the wheel and followed the road back toward the city, pushing his foot down on the accelerator, watching the needle climb to sixty, seventy, seventy-five.
It was 12:47, according to his watch.
IN THE SHANTY towns, his eyes watered with the scents of cooking meat and human waste. He parked beside a giant village of tin and cardboard lean-tos and left the truck, with the keys in the ignition. Began to walk, passing a football-field-sized pit latrine and another sprawling neighborhood of shanties. In all directions, makeshift hovels without electricity or running water or flush toilets. He heard radios, children shouting. Saw a group of women lined up in the midst of all the people. Two boys had come here on bicycles, and they were rationing out water into people’s cupped hands from two-gallon plastic jugs.
He continued in the direction of the city. Before long the shanties were replaced by crude mud-brick buildings and then white-washed storefronts, and he began to feel less conspicuous. He stopped and checked the address book on Ramesh’s cell phone. Saw several sets of initials, and names he didn’t recognize. One that was marked “P.”
Mallory pressed it. After two rings, someone respon
ded.
“Hello.”
He listened.
“Hello.”
An American accent, it seemed. Mallory began to walk. He heard someone breathing on the other end. Tried to make out the background noise. He stopped again.
“Priest?” he said.
The other man said, “You’re making a mistake. You know that.”
“Tell me about it.”
“I will.”
The other man hung up. Mallory felt a kick of adrenaline. He kept walking through the busy streets, past a row of bicycle taxis, vegetables lined up on blankets, sidewalk BBQs, knowing that Priest would be able to identify his location by the cell phone. He came to a small corner café, which smelled of porridge and grilled fish, and he stood at the counter, waiting beside a line of other men. He studied the menu on the wall behind the counter, then turned and walked away, as if changing his mind, and re-entered the pedestrian traffic, leaving the cell phone on the counter.
JON MALLORY FELT the cold concrete against his face and arms, and a throbbing in his head. A horrible, pounding pain. He opened his eyes again, had no idea where he was. His pupils tried to widen again, but there wasn’t enough light for him to make out anything. He heard something, though: a faint echo, of wind. Or breathing. Everything felt dreamlike, disconnected from reality, except for the odor and the pain in his arms and his ribs. As he tried to sit up, he became dizzy. Closed his eyes and tried to remember what had happened. Imagined he was at home in Washington. Knew that if he stood and walked left, feeling his way along the wall, he could find the front door.
But he wasn’t in Washington. And he wasn’t in the chalet where he had slept the first night, either. This was concrete, cold and dirty, the air damp and rank.
Sitting in the darkness, Jon conjured a jumbled recollection: an explosion, a sudden bright flash. Gunshots. Someone pulling back his arm, shoving his face into carpet. Smells of gunpowder, leather. Screams. A scream. No, that was what had wakened him. A scream. He heard it in his memory and knew it: a strained, agonizing sound, echoing off these stone walls. Had it been him, or part of the dream? He didn’t know. His head felt thick, as if he’d been drugged. His brain wasn’t working right.
And then later, much later, it seemed, he heard the footsteps. Solid heels on stone, coming closer in the darkness. Toward him. He tried to sit up again and felt the pain as he breathed, as if his ribs had been broken. The sound stopped, and when it started again, it seemed to be moving in a different direction. Away from him. Step, step. Step, step. Becoming fainter. Fading to nothing. To darkness.
FORTY-SEVEN
CHARLES MALLORY TOOK A cab across town to Stamford Park, a neighborhood of two- and three-story apartment houses, many with shops and food stalls on the ground floors. He asked the driver to let him out a half block from where Joseph Chaplin was staying.
He paid the driver with John Ramesh’s money and began to walk, scanning the windows and roofs for anything unusual. Young mothers and children were in the yards, a few older people sitting on porches. Nothing suspicious. Mallory knew Chaplin’s location was but was not supposed to go to him. Not unless there was an emergency. That was the directive Chaplin had given. Sometimes, he was not as adaptable as Mallory would have liked. But this time he would have to be.
Chaplin’s apartment today was a second-floor unit, in the rear of a concrete block building. Charlie knocked twice on the sturdy wooden door, waited, and knocked three times. Listened. “It’s me,” he said. Mallory saw the peephole darken. The door opened a crack and Chaplin looked out, a Glock in his left hand.
“Where have you been?”
“Unforeseen problem,” Charlie said. “Can I come in?”
Chaplin opened the door, closed it behind him, and latched the chain.
“What happened?”
“Ramesh. The good news is we don’t have to worry about any him anymore.”
“Why?”
“It was self-defense,” Mallory said, walking into the kitchen. “But they’re going to be after me now. I’m sure it was caught on cameras. Out near the pit. We may need to change plans again. To go after Priest earlier.” Chaplin frowned. “I know why Ramesh looked familiar, by the way. I’m pretty sure he used to work for Black Eagle Services, the American military contractor. He was one of the ones who got Landon Pine in trouble.”
“Really,” he said neutrally.
“I think so. He had a different name then. I can’t remember what it was. But I recognized him. I don’t think Priest is African, either, by the way. I just talked with him on the phone. He has a Southern U.S. accent. This is starting to make strange sense to me. Anyway, I need to see Nadra and Wells. We’ve got to change strategies. Where are they right now?”
Chaplin looked at the floor.
“I can’t,” he said.
“I know. But this qualifies as an emergency. Right?”
Chaplin hesitated. Mallory watched him deliberate, his chest rising and falling. Finally, he told him.
Mallory turned to leave.
“Oh, and here. This was hand-delivered,” Chaplin held out a well-worn, nine-by-twelve envelope. “Okoro gave it to me, to give to you.”
Mallory unclasped the envelope and glanced inside. More papers from Peter Quinn, in Asheville, North Carolina, as he had promised. Delayed a day. Hand-delivered from Switzerland, most likely. Not something he needed to worry about right now. He debated leaving it, decided not to.
“I’ll be in touch soon,” Charlie said. And then he left. There was something new driving him now. An energy he had to ride until Isaak Priest was found and killed. Part of it was the recognition that he was out in the open—and part of it was the ticking clock that he could almost hear.
He walked fourteen blocks to the apartment where Nadra was staying. Knocked.
Nothing. He looked up and down the street. Old concrete and brick apartment buildings, some boarded shut. He walked another seven blocks, toward downtown, to the address where Jason Wells was staying. No answer there, either.
Then he walked halfway back to Nadra’s address. Went into a small, open-front bar and found a table in a corner, facing the entrance. He ordered a black tea, needing a few minutes to think.
His eyes adjusted to the dark of the café. The tea relaxed him. A giant fan stirred the air, which was warm and dusty and spicy. After a while, he opened the envelope from Quinn and glanced quickly through the papers. They seemed extraneous now to the operation that was in front of him. He needed to stay focused on what was coming, on the next step. On Isaak Priest. But he also needed to calculate what had changed, what the repercussions would be for taking out Ramesh. He sipped the tea slowly. Watched the bicycles, rickshaws, and pedestrians in the sun. He opened the envelope again and took a closer look at the documents and notes Quinn had sent. A memo from his father to Colonel Dale McCormack. A page of Quinn’s handwritten journal, photocopied, hard to make out. And a copy of the memorandum that had shut down his father’s Lifeboat Inquiry—the same memo that Franklin had given him in Foggy Bottom, although unlike the copy Franklin had provided, this one had not been censored. It was all there. Vogel. Concerns about an “emergency preparedness plan.” His father’s warning about VaxEze. The unregulated trials. All the things that he wasn’t supposed to see.
Charlie read this last memo more carefully. If the report from Franklin had included these details, would he have gotten here in Mancala two or three days earlier? Maybe. What was so sensitive that they didn’t want him to see? Not clear. Then he came to the bottom of the second page. Saw the name of the man who had shut down the Lifeboat Inquiry. Who had signed his name to the memo. A name redacted in the other version, even though he knew who it was.
Colonel Dale McCormack. National Intelligence Director.
The man who had closed down his father’s operation, just days before Stephen Mallory died. Who was “threatened by it,” as Anna Vostrak had surmised.
Except it wasn’t Dale McCormack’s name that had
been typed and signed at the end of this memorandum.
Mallory looked again, staring in disbelief.
He held the paper up to the light of the flickering fluorescent ceiling bulb to make sure he was seeing the words correctly. No. It couldn’t be.
He pulled fifty Mancalan shillings from his pocket and left them on the table, then hurried back into the street. Began to run. I got all of this wrong. All of it!
He needed to find Nadra and Jason. To change up their plans. To find out what had really happened. Two blocks. Two and a half blocks. He stopped. Looked at the memo again, to make sure.
The man who had written the memo shutting down the Lifeboat Inquiry wasn’t Dale McCormack at all.
It was someone he had not even suspected. Couldn’t have suspected.
Someone who had helped create a new identity for his brother just a few days ago, and supplied a passport for that identity. Who had given Frederick Collins a back story and official documents.
How could I not have known?
He looked one more time, then began to run faster through the Mungaza streets.
The man who had shut down his father’s operation. Who had written the memorandum.
It wasn’t Dale McCormack.
It was Richard Franklin.
FORTY-EIGHT
AMONG HIS OTHER TASKS, Chidi Okoro ran the company’s “mobile communications command post,” as he called it, which meant he monitored communications and kept tabs on all members of the team. He had four monitors set up in his rented apartment on 3 Elms Road, a more secure-looking place than any of Mallory’s apartments.
Charlie, sweating in the cool air, his shirt wet, rapped on the door until he answered. Okoro reluctantly opened, looking at him warily through his thick glasses. He latched the door behind him.
Mallory recognized the image on one of the monitors. The chalet. He had already heard, then.
Viral Page 31