In seven minutes Marine One would land on the South Lawn of the White House, to be met by Andy Lloyd and the White House senior staff.
Connor flicked off the three televisions, rewound the tapes and began considering the alternatives. He had already decided not to go to New York. The United Nations and the Metropolitan Museum offered virtually no possibility of escape. And he was aware that the Secret Service were trained to spot anyone who appeared on more than one occasion during a visit such as this one, including journalists and television crews. Added to that, at least three thousand of New York’s finest would be guarding Zerimski every second of his visit.
He would use the time while Zerimski was out of town to check out the two most promising venues. The Mafya had already arranged for him to be a member of the catering team that would visit the Russian Embassy that afternoon so he could be taken through the details of Saturday night’s banquet. The Ambassador had made it clear that he wanted it to be an occasion that neither President would ever forget.
Connor checked his watch, put on a coat and went downstairs. The BMW was waiting for him. He climbed into the back seat.
‘Cooke Stadium,’ was all he said.
No one in the car commented as the driver eased the car into the centre lane.
As a transporter laden with new cars passed on the other side of the road, Connor thought of Maggie and smiled. He had spoken to Carl Koeter earlier that morning, and had been reassured that all three of the kangaroos were safely in their pouches.
‘By the way, the Mafya are under the impression that they were sent straight back to America,’ Koeter had told him.
‘How did you manage to pull that one off?’ asked Connor.
‘One of their guards tried to bribe a customs officer. He took the money and informed him they’d been caught with drugs, and had been “returned to their port of embarkation”.’
‘Do you think they fell for it?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Koeter. ‘They were made to pay a lot of money for that piece of information.’
Connor laughed. ‘I’ll always be in your debt, Carl. Just let me know how I can repay you.’
‘That won’t be necessary, my friend,’ Koeter had replied. ‘I will simply look forward to meeting your wife again in more agreeable circumstances.’
Connor’s watchdogs had made no mention of Maggie’s disappearance, so he couldn’t be certain whether they were too proud to admit that they’d lost her, Stuart and Tara, or whether they were still hoping to catch up with them before he found out the truth. Perhaps they were afraid he wouldn’t carry out the job if he knew his wife and daughter were no longer in their hands. But Connor never doubted that if he failed to honour the agreement, Alexei Romanov would eventually track down Maggie and kill her, and if not Maggie, Tara. Bolchenkov had warned him that until the contract had been completed - one way or the other - Romanov wouldn’t be allowed to return to his homeland.
As the driver swung onto the beltway, Connor thought about Joan, whose only crime was to have been his secretary. He clenched his fist, and wished that his contract with the Mafya had been to take out Dexter and her conniving Deputy. That was an assignment he would have carried out with relish.
The BMW passed the Washington city limits, and Connor sat back, thinking about just how much preparation still needed to be done. He would have to circle the stadium several times, checking every exit, before deciding if he would even enter it.
Marine One landed gently on the South Lawn. The two Presidents stepped out of the helicopter, and were greeted by warm applause from the six hundred assembled White House members of staff.
When Lawrence introduced Zerimski to his Chief of Staff, he couldn’t help noticing that Andy seemed preoccupied. The two leaders spent an unusually long time posing for the photographers before retiring to the Oval Office with their advisors to confirm the subjects that would be covered at the later meetings. Zerimski put forward no objections to the timetable Andy Lloyd had prepared, and seemed relaxed about the topics that would come under consideration.
When they broke for lunch, Lawrence felt the preliminary discussions had gone well. They moved into the Cabinet Room, and Lawrence told the story of when President Kennedy had dined there with eight Nobel Laureates, and had remarked that it was the greatest gathering of intellect there since Jefferson had dined alone. Larry Harrington laughed dutifully, although he had heard the President tell the story a dozen times before. Andy Lloyd didn’t even attempt a smile.
After lunch Lawrence accompanied Zerimski to his limousine, which was waiting at the diplomatic entrance. As soon as the last car of the motorcade was out of sight - once again Zerimski had insisted he should have one more vehicle than any past Russian President - Lawrence hurried back to the Oval Office. A grim-faced Andy Lloyd was standing by his desk.
‘I thought that went as well as could be expected,’ said the President.
‘Possibly,’ said Lloyd. ‘Although I wouldn’t trust that man to tell the truth even to himself. He was far too cooperative for my liking. I just get the feeling that we’re being set up.’
‘Was that the reason you were so uncommunicative during lunch?’
‘No. I think we’ve got a far bigger problem on our hands,’ said Lloyd. ‘Have you seen Dexter’s latest report? I left it on your desk yesterday afternoon.’
‘No, I haven’t,’ the President replied. ‘I spent most of yesterday holed up with Larry Harrington in the State Department.’ He flicked open a file bearing the CIA emblem, and began reading.
He had sworn out loud on three occasions before he had reached the second page. By the time he’d come to the final paragraph, his face was drained of colour. He looked up at his oldest friend. ‘I thought Jackson was supposed to be on our side.’
‘He is, Mr President.’
‘Then how come Dexter claims she can prove that he was responsible for the assassination in Colombia, then went to St Petersburg intending to kill Zerimski?’
‘Because that way she clears herself of any involvement, and leaves us to explain why we hired Jackson in the first place. By now she’ll have a cabinet full of files to prove that it was Jackson who killed Guzman, and anything else she wants the world to believe about him. Just look at these pictures she’s supplied of Jackson in a Bogota bar handing money over to the Chief of Police. What they don’t show is that the meeting took place almost two weeks after the assassination. Never forget, sir, that the CIA are unrivalled when it comes to covering their asses.’
‘It’s not their asses I’m worried about,’ said the President. ‘What about Dexter’s story that Jackson’s back in America, and is working with the Russian Mafya?’
‘Isn’t that convenient,’ said Lloyd. ‘If anything goes wrong during Zerimski’s visit, she already has someone lined up to take the rap.’
‘Then how do you explain the fact that Jackson was recorded by a security camera in Dallas a few days ago buying a high-powered rifle of near-identical specifications to the one used to kill Guzman?’
‘Simple,’ said Lloyd. ‘Once you realise it wasn’t actually Jackson, everything else falls into place.’
‘If it wasn’t Jackson, then who the hell was it?’
‘It was Connor Fitzgerald,’ said Lloyd quietly.
‘But you told me Fitzgerald was arrested in St Petersburg, and then hanged. We’d even discussed how we might get him out.’
‘I know, sir, but that was never going to be a possibility once Zerimski had been elected. Unless …’
‘Unless?’
‘Unless Jackson took his place.’
‘Why on earth would he do that?’
‘Remember that Fitzgerald saved Jackson’s life in Vietnam, and has the Medal of Honor to prove it. When Fitzgerald returned from the war, it was Jackson who recruited him as an NOC. For the next twenty-eight years he served the CIA, and gained the reputation of being their most respected officer. Then, overnight, he disappears and can’t be traced on thei
r books. His secretary, Joan Bennett, who worked for him for nineteen years, suddenly dies in a mysterious car accident while she’s on the way to see Fitzgerald’s wife. Then his wife and daughter also vanish off the face of the earth. Meanwhile, the man we appoint to find out what’s going on is accused of being an assassin and double-crossing his closest friend. But however carefully you search through Helen Dexter’s numerous reports, you’ll never find a single reference to Connor Fitzgerald.’
‘How do you know all this, Andy?’ asked Lawrence.
‘Because Jackson called me from St Petersburg just after Fitzgerald had been arrested.’
‘Do you have a recording of that conversation?’
‘Yes, sir, I do.’
‘Goddamn it,’ said Lawrence. ‘Dexter makes J. Edgar Hoover look like a Girl Scout.’
‘If we accept that it was Jackson who was hanged in Russia, we have to assume it was Fitzgerald who flew to Dallas, with the intention of buying that rifle so he could carry out his present assignment.’
‘Am I the target this time?’ asked Lawrence quietly.
‘I don’t think so, Mr President. That’s the one thing I think Dexter’s being straight about - I still believe the target’s Zerimski.’
‘Oh my God,’ said Lawrence, slumping into his chair. ‘But why would an honourable man with a background and reputation as good as Fitzgerald’s get involved in a mission like this? It just doesn’t add up.’
‘It does if that honourable man believes that the original order to assassinate Zerimski came from you.’
Zerimski was running late when his plane took off from New York to fly him back to Washington, but he was in a good mood. His speech to the United Nations had been well received, and his lunch with the Secretary-General had been described in a communique issued by the Secretariat as ‘wide-ranging and productive’.
During his visit to the Metropolitan Museum that afternoon, not only had Zerimski been able to name the Russian artist who had been given an exhibition in one of the upper galleries, but when he left the museum he had abandoned his itinerary and, to the consternation of his Secret Service minders, walked down to Fifth Avenue to shake hands with Christmas shoppers.
Zerimski had fallen an hour behind schedule by the time his plane touched down in Washington, and he had to change into his dinner jacket in the back of the limousine so that he didn’t hold up the performance of Swan Lake at the Kennedy Center by more than fifteen minutes. After the dancers had taken their final bow, he returned to spend a second night at the Russian Embassy.
While Zerimski slept, Connor remained awake. He could rarely sleep for more than a few minutes at a time during the build-up to an operation. He had cursed out loud when he’d seen the early evening news coverage of the walkabout on Fifth Avenue. It had reminded him that he should always be prepared for the unexpected: from an apartment on Fifth Avenue, Zerimski would have been an easy target, and the crowd would have been so large and out of control that he could have disappeared within moments.
He dismissed New York from his mind. As far as he was concerned, there were still only two serious venues to consider.
At the first, there was the problem that he wouldn’t have the rifle he felt most at ease with, although with a crowd that large the getaway would be easier.
As for the second, if Romanov could supply a modified Remington 700 by the morning of the banquet and guarantee his getaway, it seemed the obvious choice. Or was it a little too obvious?
He began to write out lists of pros and cons for each site. By two o’clock the next morning, exhausted, he realised he would have to visit both venues again before he could make his final decision.
But even then he had no intention of letting Romanov know which one he’d chosen.
29
‘PUG‘ WASHER - no one knew his real name - was one of those characters who is an expert on one subject. In his case it was the Washington Redskins.
Pug had worked for the Redskins, man and boy, for fifty years. He had joined the ground staff at the age of fifteen, when the team was still playing at Griffith Stadium. He had started life as a waterboy and had later taken over as the team’s masseur, becoming the trusted friend and confidant of generations of Redskins players.
Pug had spent the year before his retirement in 1997 working alongside the contractor who was building the new Jack Kent Cooke Stadium. His brief was simple: to make sure that the Redskins’ fans and players had every facility they would expect of the greatest team in the country.
At the opening ceremony, the senior architect told the assembled gathering that he would be forever indebted to Pug for the role he had played in the building of the new stadium. During his closing speech John Kent Cooke, the Redskins’ President, announced that Pug had been elected to the team’s Hall of Fame, a mark of distinction normally reserved only for the greatest players. Pug told the journalists, ‘It doesn’t get any better than this.’ Despite his retirement, he never missed a Redskins game - home or away.
It took Connor two phone calls to track Pug down at his little apartment in Arlington, Virginia. When he explained to the old man that he had been commissioned to write an article for Sports Illustrated on the significance of the new stadium to Skins fans, it was like turning on a tap.
‘Perhaps you could spare an hour or two to show me around “the Big Jack”,’ suggested Connor. Pug’s monologue dried up for the first time, and he remained silent until Connor suggested an honorarium of $100. He had already found out that Pug’s usual fee for guided tours was fifty.
They agreed to meet at eleven o’clock the following morning.
When Connor arrived at one minute to eleven, Pug ushered him into the stadium as if he were the owner of the club. For the next three hours he regaled his guest with the complete history of the Redskins and answered every one of Connor’s questions - from why the stadium had not been completed in time for the opening ceremony to how the management went about employing temporary labour on the day of a game. Connor learned that the Sony JumboTrons behind the end zones made up the largest video-screen system in the world, and that the front row of seats had been raised nine feet above the field of play so the fans could see over the television cameras and the bulky players roaming restlessly up and down the sidelines in front of them.
Connor had been a Redskins fan for almost thirty years, so he already knew that all the season tickets had been sold out since 1966, and that there was currently a waiting list of fifty thousand. He knew because he was one of them. He also knew that the Washington Post sold an extra twenty-five thousand copies whenever the Skins won a game. But he didn’t know that there were thirty-five miles of steam-heated pipes under the field of play, that there was parking space for twenty-three thousand vehicles, and that a local band would be playing the national anthems of Russia and the United States before tomorrow’s kick-off. Most of the information Pug came up with would be of no practical use to Connor, but he still produced a gem every few minutes.
As they strolled around the stadium, Connor could see the tight security checks that the White House advance staff were carrying out for the following day’s game. The magnetometers through which everyone who entered the ground would have to pass, and which would detect if they were carrying anything that could be used as a weapon, were already in place. The nearer they got to the owner’s box - from where the two Presidents would be watching the game - the more intense the checks became.
Pug was irate when he was stopped by a Secret Service agent guarding the entrance to the executive boxes. He explained forcefully that he was a member of the Redskins Hall of Fame, and that he would be among the guests who would meet the two Presidents the next day, but the agent still refused to let him in without a security pass. Connor tried to assure the furious Pug that it wasn’t that important.
As they walked away, Pug muttered under his breath, ‘Do I look like the sort of person who would want to assassinate the President?’
When the two
men parted at two o’clock, Connor handed his guide $120. The old man had told him more in three hours than an entire Secret Service detail would have divulged in a lifetime. He would have given him $200, but that might have aroused Pug’s suspicions.
Connor checked his watch, to find he was running a few minutes late for his appointment with Alexei Romanov at the Russian Embassy. As he was driven away from the stadium he switched on the radio, tuning in to C-SPAN, a station he rarely listened to.
A commentator was describing the atmosphere on the floor of the House, as the members waited for the Russian President to arrive. No one had any idea what Zerimski was going to say, as the press had not been issued with advance copies of the speech, and had been advised to check against delivery.
Five minutes before the speech was due to begin, Zerimski walked out onto the floor of the House, accompanied by his escort committee.
‘Everyone present,’ announced the commentator, ‘has risen from their seats and is applauding the guest from Russia. President Zerimski is smiling and waving as he makes his way down the aisle through the packed House chamber to the dais, shaking outstretched hands.’ The commentator went on to describe the applause as ‘warm rather than rapturous’.
When Zerimski reached the podium he carefully placed his papers on the lectern, took out his spectacle case and put on his glasses. Kremlin-watchers immediately knew that the speech would be delivered word for word from a prepared text, and there would be none of the off-the-cuff remarks for which Zerimski had become notorious during his election campaign.
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