End of Enemies

by Grant Blackwood

  “You can see the possibilities,” he said.

  Secondary to the pursuit of paper trails, however, was the hunt for Tsumago. To this end, Mason ordered the NRO to retask an additional two satellites, a Keyhole and a Lacrosse. Armed with her approximate sailing date and cruising speed, the satellites began scouring millions of square miles of ocean.

  Bay Ridge

  Henry Tanner was under no illusion: searching for a lone OSS operative who may or may not have existed was a daunting task. During the war, the OSS was known to reconnoiter enemy territory via submarine, but such excursions were rarely documented. Finding a name would mean wading through the CIA’s archives; if it came to that, he wanted to be armed with the name of the sub.

  He got his wish later that afternoon. “A man from some company in Wisconsin called for you,” Irene said when he got home. “Coltech, I think. He wants you to call him.”

  Henry did so. “I’m short on details, Mr. Tanner, but I can tell you the numbers match a pair of engines we delivered to the Charleston Yard in July of 1942.”

  “I appreciate your work. Have you got a name?”

  “You bet.” Henry heard keys clicking. “Here we go: According to our records, those engines were put aboard a boat called Stonefish.”

  Falls Church, Virginia

  The safe house to which Vorsalov was taken was more a well-disguised prison than a house. Surrounded by acres of woodland in rural Falls Church and staffed by specially trained HRU guards, it was reserved for the most prized catches.

  Fayyad’s disappearing act notwithstanding, the simultaneous assaults on Greenbelt and Glen Echo had gone well. How Fayyad managed to slip the net was still a mystery, as were his actions in Greenbelt. None of the Arabs had survived the assault, and Fayyad was at Bethesda Naval Hospital, still unconscious from surgery to repair his shattered hip. It had not been until Randal discovered Smith’s mistress in the upstairs bedroom that the Jordanian’s actions made sense. But why had he done it? Latham wondered. Why try to save a woman he’d never met, a woman Smith had sent to slaughter to cover his own butt?

  “That son of a bitch,” Latham said when he heard. “He served her up!” The U.S. attorney was considering rescinding Smith’s deal, which was dependent upon the senator’s full cooperation. Maybe Smith and Vorsalov would end up cellmates. Doubtful, but he enjoyed the thought.

  Latham stared at the Russian through the holding room’s one-way glass. “Has he said anything?”

  “Not a word,” said Randal. “I think it’s finally hit him.”

  “Good. Bring him to the interview room.”

  Once Vorsalov was seated and handcuffed, Latham sat down opposite him.

  “Hello, Yuri. It’s been a while.”

  “Yes, it has, Charlie.”

  “Ten years.”

  “I know.” Vorsalov held up his cuffed hands. “Can we please—”

  “They stay on.”

  “Charlie, I … what happened with your man—”

  “I don’t want to hear it.”

  “It was a mistake, you know. It was dark, I was running, and then he was there in front of me—”

  “He was twenty-three years old, Yuri. His parents have never gotten over it.” Stop it, Latham commanded himself. “I’m not here to talk about that.”

  “You want to talk about Senator Smith.”

  “No. I’m here to give you your options. You’ve got two. One, you give us your full cooperation—”

  “Which means?”

  “Every detail of every operation you’ve worked since leaving the KGB. We want the who, what, when, where, and how of every group you’ve ever dealt with.”

  “And if I do this?”

  “You spend the rest of your life in a federal prison.”

  “You’ll forgive me if I’m not thrilled by your offer,” said Vorsalov.

  Latham shrugged. “Option two: We wash our hands of you and put you on the next plane back to Moscow.”

  The Russian went pale. “Charlie, you know what Moscow would do to me.”

  Latham said nothing.

  “You are lying. You do not have the power to arrange any of this.”

  “The U.S. attorney does. One signature and it’s done. You killed a federal agent, Yuri. That comes with an automatic life sentence.”

  “I’ve never been tried. I know your law. You can’t—”

  “You were convicted in absentia nine years ago; you’ve been a fugitive since then. Throw in your extortion of Smith, the kidnapping and attempted murder of the girl, and your link to Fayyad, who killed five people on that Delta flight …”

  Vorsalov blinked hard, looked away.

  He’s afraid, Charlie thought. Probably for the first time in his miserable life. “We’ve got you, Yuri. You’re finished. All that’s left to decide is whether you go to prison here or back to your buddies in the basement of Lubyanka.”

  Vorsalov’s shoulders slumped. The prospect of months of torture in the dungeons of Lubyanka followed by a summary execution had suddenly become an all-too-real possibility. The Russian stared at his hands.

  Ten seconds passed.

  Latham stood up. “Okay, have it your way.” He was halfway to the door when Vorsalov called, “All right. All right! What do you want to know?”

  Langley

  Tanner and Cahil sat through yet another update meeting on DORSAL. Aside from answering occasional questions—most of which they couldn’t answer because of Mason’s gag order—neither of them had much to contribute.

  After the meeting, Tanner spent an hour with Ezoe, who was fully enjoying the CIA’s hospitality, then returned to the op center, where he and Ian wandered around, listening to discussions and looking at photos.

  Oaken saw them and walked over. “How’s it going?”

  “You mean aside from feeling like a fifth wheel?” said Tanner.

  “Come on, this might interest you.” Oaken led them to the audio room. “Latham and his people recorded a call between Fayyad and another man. We think it’s the big boss. The call was traced to an exchange in Cyprus, but we’re pretty sure it originated in Beirut.”

  Tanner felt his stomach tighten. Beirut. Some things never got easier, he thought. He and a four-man team had gone into the city, and only two came out. It had been a rude awakening for Tanner. No matter how well-trained and well-prepared you were, an operation can go catastrophically bad in a matter of seconds.

  They had spent four months chained to that basement wall, listening to the sounds of Beirut: the crump of distant artillery, the clatter of automatic weapons, the haunting voices of muezzins calling from their mosques. And always the sound of boots clumping down the stairs, and wondering which one they were coming for.

  Tanner slipped on the headphones. “How sure are we this is the boss?”

  “Listen for yourself.” Oaken nodded to the audio technician. “The first voice.”

  “ ‘You met with our friend?’”

  “ ‘Yes. You approve of his plans?’”

  “ ‘I do. You will assist him, I assume?’”

  “ ‘If it is what you want, I will, of course.’”

  Oaken said, “That’s the gist of it.”

  Tanner was frowning. “Run it again, will you?” The technician did so. And then a third time.

  “Something?” asked Cahil.

  “I don’t know. Is that all of it?”

  “There’s another thirty seconds or so, but it’s small talk. We think it’s just padding.”

  “Can I hear it all?”

  From behind Tanner a voice said, “Well, well, if it ain’t Briggs Tanner.” Tanner turned.

  “Hello, Art. I didn’t know you were here.”

  “Near East Division. Marcus was my agent.”

  “Bad break,” Tanner said, meaning it.

  “Shit happens.”

  It had been over a decade since Tanner had last seen Stucky. Time had not b
een kind. Liquor and cigarettes had turned his complexion pasty and thick. His hair, which he still wore in a crew cut, was a yellowish gray, and his nose was lined with broken blood vessels. Despite the paunch around Stucky’s middle, Tanner could see solid muscle beneath. Still dangerous, he thought. Still the same cruel SOB.

  “See you around, Art.” Briggs started to turn back around.

  “So, did you retire?”

  “Pardon me?”

  “From the Navy,” Stucky said. “Did you retire?”

  “I resigned my commission.”

  “Nice to have the option. I was just shy of my twenty, you know.”

  Enough of this, Briggs thought. “We all make our choices, Art.” Tanner turned his back on him. There was a long five seconds of silence. Briggs could feel Stucky’s eyes on him.

  Stucky laughed, a bark. “You know, some things never change. You were an asshole back then, and you’re an asshole now.” He walked away.

  Once he was gone, Cahil muttered, “What the hell was that?”

  “Art doesn’t like me.”

  “So I gathered. What’s the deal?”

  “Later. Oaks, can I hear it again?” The tech rewound the tape, and he listened to the conversation twice more before giving up.

  “You think you heard something?” Oaken pressed.

  “No. … No, it’s nothing.”

  44

  Washington Navy Yard

  Armed with a name, Henry returned to Building 57 the following morning. It took ten minutes for John to return with three boxes. “Gotta warn you, it ain’t sorted.”

  “That’s okay, John. Thanks.”

  Over the next four hours, Henry read every scrap of paper in the boxes. Stonefish had a long record, he found. He found lists of patrols, crew manifests, dry dock records, situation reports—everything was there. Finally, at the bottom of the last box he came across a message from COMSUBPACFLT (Commander, Submarine Pacific Fleet) to the chief of naval operations that recounted Stonefish’s fate. He scanned past the header to the text:

  PBY BASED SAIPAN REPORTS USS STONEFISH (COMMANDED IX HUGH CARPEN) SUNK BY ENEMY AIRCRAFT, 30 JULY. APPROX. POSITION 158° 12′ EAST, 27° 14′ NORTH. ONE SURVIVOR RECOVERED, EN ROUTE AUSTRALIA.

  “What the …” Frowning, Henry read it again. He opened his pocket atlas and plotted the coordinates. This couldn’t be right. According to the Navy, Stonefish was sunk not off the coast of Honshu, but almost 500 miles to the south.

  Bethesda Naval Hospital

  Though there would be months of interrogation in Vorsalov’s future, the first questions Latham asked had been assembled by the DORSAL group. Vorsalov’s answers sent Latham directly to Bethesda, where he found Fayyad sitting up in bed.

  Latham introduced himself. “We have Vorsalov in custody. None of your friends from the safe house made it.”

  “They were not my friends, Agent Latham.”

  “So it seems. I read Agent Randal’s report.”

  Fayyad looked at Paul. “Randal. I owe you my thanks.”

  “Why did you do it?” Paul asked. “Why risk your life for hers?”

  “When I saw Ibn run for the stairs, I knew what he was going to do. In that moment, none of it made sense. What they do—what I have done—is no longer about a cause. It’s about hate. Their Islam is not my Islam.” Fayyad smiled sadly. “Perhaps I am getting soft.”

  Despite himself, Latham smiled back. “Well, as it stands now, the charges against you are murder, espionage, and extortion. The U.S. attorney has declined to press accessory to kidnapping charges.”

  “Why?”

  “He also read Agent Randal’s report.”

  “I see.”

  “We also know about the Delta bombing. The girl survived and—”

  “Cynthia. How is she?”

  “She’ll recover.”

  “I’m glad. So what happens now?”

  “That depends. If you help us, they’ve agreed to not push the death penalty.”

  Fayyad nodded, but Latham saw nothing in his eyes. He doesn’t care.

  “Tomorrow will take care of itself,” Fayyad said. “Ask your questions.”

  When they finished, Latham and Randal stood up and headed for the door.

  “Agent Latham.” Fayyad called. “A moment in private?” Latham walked over. “I know I have no right to ask, but … Tell me about Judith. Does she know?”

  “About you? Not yet. We haven’t … We’re still sorting it out.”

  “When you do, please tell her I am sorry. I know she won’t believe me, but I wish … Just tell her I am sorry.”

  Langley

  “There’s two immediate issues we’ve got to deal with,” Latham told Dick Mason. “One, Vorsalov has to contact Beirut with an update. Do we call it quits, or do we spread the net to reach the group that hired him? At most, we have four days before he’s got to report.”

  From Mason’s expression, Latham saw he’d struck a chord. They want the whole bunch, he thought. But how? Hollywood portrayals aside, it was exceedingly difficult to dash into a foreign country, scoop up the bad guys, and dash back out.

  “And the second issue?” said Mason.

  Latham recounted his discussions with Vorsalov and Fayyad. “Their stories match,” Charlie said. “The names, the dates, the places … everything. On top of that, we know Vorsalov has been freelancing for them for years.”

  Coates said, “Even so, we can’t rule out the chance he’s lying.”

  “To what end?” said Sylvia Albrecht. “We’ve got him, and he knows it. If I were in his shoes, I could think of a dozen clients I’d rather betray. That’s a pretty strong selling point.”

  Mason stared at the wall. “Charlie, before I ruin a lot of people’s day, I have to be sure, so I’m putting you in the hot seat: Is he telling the truth?”

  “Yes, sir, I believe his is.”

  “Okay.” Mason nodded and pushed his intercom button. “Ginny, call the White House. Tell Jim Talbot I need to see him right away.” He turned to his DDL “Sylvia, I want everything you’ve got on General Issam al-Khatib.”

  Rappahannock River

  When Tanner got home, he found his father sitting on the deck. “Dad?”

  “Nice view you’ve got here. You can almost see down to the bay.”

  “A little farther when the fog lifts. Come on in. You’ve got something?”

  “You could say that.”

  Over coffee they sat down at the kitchen table. Tanner could see the glint in Henry’s eye as he plopped down a stack of photocopies. “You’ve been busy.”

  “You weren’t kidding, y’know,” said Henry. “This is a genuine mystery.”

  It took fifteen minutes for Henry to recount his search. He ended with the report of Stonefish’s sinking. “That can’t be right,” Tanner said. “Five hundred miles south … that’s near the Bonin Islands. I got the serial numbers right; I’m sure of it.”

  “I believe you,” replied Henry. “I did some cross-checking. The report stated she was sunk by enemy aircraft. First of all, there’s not a single documented case of a submarine going down with all hands after that kind of attack. If she sinks on the surface, somebody has always gotten off. Second, I couldn’t find a single reference to a search-and-rescue effort.”

  That got Tanner’s attention. Since its birth, the U.S. Navy had never given up on a missing ship until all hope was lost. “Are we talking about a cover-up?”

  “Maybe. I took a copy of Stonefish’s crew list, and we plugged the names into the computer—”

  “You what?” Tanner asked with a grin. The closest his father came to computer literacy was using a pocket calculator to do his taxes. “You plugged the names into a what?”

  “Well, John did it. I watched.”

  “Dad, are you telling me you hacked into the Navy’s mainframe?”

  “I did no such thing. We checked the names against the Burea
u of Personnel’s listings, then matched those against the VA. I figured if anyone had actually survived, there had to be some record of it: duty assignments, separation date, that sort of thing.”

  “And?”

  “All but one of the crew is dead.” Henry consulted his notepad. “An ensign—a captain, I should say—William Myers, retired.”

  Tanner smiled. “Are you telling me he’s still alive?”

  “Yep. And he’s only a stone’s throw from here: Manassas.”

  45

  Manassas, Virginia

  Having no idea what he would say, Tanner decided against calling Captain Myers in advance. He left Rappahannock early that afternoon and arrived in Manassas by four. He stopped at a café, had a late lunch, and asked for directions to the Myers home. The waitress knew “the Captain,” as did most everyone, she explained. Not only did Myers live in what had been the temporary headquarters of Stonewall Jackson during the Battle of Bull Run, but he also grew the best tomatoes in Prince William County.

  The directions took Tanner to a plantation-style house surrounded by willow trees. If not for the sound of traffic on the nearby highway, he could almost imagine himself in the antebellum South. He knocked on the door and it opened, revealing an elderly woman. “Yes?”

  “Good morning, ma’am. I’m looking for Captain Myers.”

  “Come for the tomatoes?”

  “Not exactly ma’am. Are you Mrs. Myers?”

  “Yes … Peggy.”

  “I’m Briggs Tanner.” Now what? “I was in the Navy, also.”

  With that, Peggy Myers smiled. “Come on in, I’ll take you to him.”

  She led him to the backyard and pointed toward a garden in the corner. “Just go on over.”

  “Thank you.”

  Captain Myers was kneeling in the dirt, tying a tomato vine.

  “I didn’t realize they still grew this late in the season,” Tanner called.

  Myers squinted up at him. “They’re tough. They’ll keep growing until we get a hard frost.” Myers was of medium height, with stooped shoulders and brown eyes. “What can I do for you?”