“Just a stakeout!” Cowley qualified hurriedly.
“That’s all,” assured the woman. “A look-see, then back to us. You organized Standing?”
“Yes.”
She grinned at him. “We work as well out of bed as we do in it.”
“Keep your mind on the job,” he said, but still smiled. For the first time he thought they really had a reason to smile.
Danilov expected a telephone call to be sufficient, but Georgi Chelyag insisted on seeing him.
“It’s not just the arrests that have got to be simultaneous,” said the chief of staff. “The president doesn’t want to follow any American announcement. He wants to make it and he wants it to be at precisely the same time—unarguable proof that it really has been a totally joint and coordinated investigation.” The man paused. “It’s as important to you as it is to us that it’s seen to be so.”
“I haven’t discussed that sort of detail with Cowley,” admitted Danilov. “I’m not even sure he knows the official thinking about public communiques; he’s not in Washington.”
“The alternative is for us to time our statement with the arrests here,” declared Chelyag.
“That’s not an alternative,” rejected Danilov. “The arrests are to be coordinated but unannounced, to ensure we get everyone. It won’t be simultaneous; logically it can’t be. If we go public too soon, we could ruin everything in America.” He hesitated, seeing how to strengthen the objection. “It wouldn’t achieve what you want if America publicly complained we wrecked the cooperation and the investigation, would it?”
“That argument applies equally here.”
“Isn’t it one you should be making politically? That’s what we’re talking: politics, not criminal investigation.”
The presidential advisor managed a bleak smile. “It is being made. But I want you to press it, as hard as you can, at your working level. It would be understandable for America to want to take all the credit.”
As you are straining to do, thought Danilov. “There’s going to be a lot more conversation tonight. I’ll talk it through as much as I can.”
“Could it all be over by tonight?” asked Chelyag.
“It’s possible,” said Danilov.
In Chicago the approaching Cidicj Star was being pointed out to Cowley and Pamela on a radar screen.
They saw it as a ship, although indistinctly, through binoculars from the top of the Customs tower, a black smudge at first, gradually forming into a recognizable vessel. Cowley had imagined everything would be in the holds but when it was clearly in view he saw a lot of containers were strapped on the deck, making the freighter appear top heavy.
They were back in the converted conference room, with its closer view of the dockside, for the arrival of the shipping agents. The two from OverOcean were identified by the two FBI agents who followed them from the importer’s office. Neither was Ivan Guzov or Yevgenni Leanov.
Pamela said, “This is clerks’ stuff. They don’t need to show until tomorrow.”
It took a long time to reach the OverOcean shipment. It wasn’t part of the deck cargo, which had to be cleared before the holds could be opened, and it wasn’t in the first of those. It was sevenfifteen, although still light, before the containers were finally swung clear, already identified by a Customs officer inside the ship. Forklifts driven by bureau men materialized and were loaded. Other agents dressed as stevedores and dock workers watched the two importers briefly inspect the shipping documents. One agent was close enough to hear the arrangements made to collect from the bonded warehouse by eleven the following morning. Neither of the OverOcean clerks showed particular interest in either of the containers, apart from ensuring their storage.
It was another hour before they ventured into the warehouse. They used the rear corridor entrance. Schnecker implacably refused the police chief’s protests (“It’s live and dangerous and I’m responsible for everyone’s safety”) and limited those present at the container opening to just the two Customs officers who were going to do it without detection in addition to Cowley.
Schnecker also insisted on hand testing the heat of the steam gun intended to sweat off the container seals and ensured that no electrical drill would be used. He also made the two men wear face shields and body armor.
To Cowley’s unasked question the bearded team leader said, “We didn’t have time in Moscow. Here we work by the book.” He handed Cowley his protection. “It’s the biggest we’ve got.”
They all waited until the last-minute warning from the rummage team that the first container was about to be opened before putting on the protective gear.
Neil Hamish said, “If it’s the right one, we’ll be upstairs partying in an hour.”
It wasn’t. Each compartment inside the container held genuine American-manufactured engine parts for overhaul and reconditioning. The Customs experts were already working on the second container with their steam-hissing gun before Schnecker’s team completed their fruitless search.
“If at first you don’t succeed,” said Hamish, turning to the other container. He didn’t finish.
“They’re not in here, either,” declared Schnecker, who was directly in front of the crate.
The only noise was the shuffling forward of the encumbered Cowley. “They must be!”
Schnecker stood back for Cowley to see fully inside. The container was packed exactly like the first. Cowley said, “It’s hidden under all the other stuff! Has to be!”
It took another hour to search each interior compartment before he accepted it wasn’t. As he reentered the upstairs conference room, Pamela said, “Neither Peter nor Jake Barrymore has been seen in the area in which they live for the past four days. Each drove away packed as if he was going on a trip.”
The OverOcean container had been offloaded in Toronto during a three-hour, 1:00 A.M. to 4:00 A.M. stop five days earlier and collected later that same day. The delivery note was signed in the name of Ivan Guzov. All the official documents were in perfect order. Canadian Customs had released the shipment—again described as engine parts—without examination.
It took Cowley only a few minutes and one telephone call to the Toronto harbor authorities to establish all that. Pamela, on another telephone, took longer trying—but failing—to trace the container’s entry into America through any of the Lake Ontario ports or across the Welland Canal and Niagara River land routes.
Throughout the recriminations and attempted avoidances swirled around the room, Samuels insisted he’d ordered liaison with the Canadian authorities to prevent just such a thing happening but the Chicago office chief claimed no knowledge—or written proof—of any such instruction. On the telephone from Washington Leonard Ross said, “I didn’t think it was possible for anything more to go wrong.”
Cowley said, “Neither did I.”
“What leads we got left?”
“Brooklyn, Trenton, and Bella Atkins.”
“And you’re going to tell me we can’t bring any of them in?”
“Yes.”
“No,” refused the director. “I want everyone we’ve still got a trace on picked up—carefully orchestrated seizures. Lose just one more and the bureau loses you.”
41
Bella Atkins called in sick at 8:45 the following morning, two hours after Cowley and Pamela got back to the J. Edgar Hoover Building. They’d driven directly from the airport to coordinate the scheduled 9:00 A.M. seizures and stood listening to Bella’s croaked explanation that she had the flu.
Leonard Ross answered his home phone on the second ring. Cowley said, “Just give me a few more hours! See what she’s going to do!”
“What if she is sick? We know what they are going to do and we haven’t got any way of stopping it.”
“We might find out if we wait a little longer.”
“And we might not, and by waiting a little longer we give the bastards time to commit more mass murder.”
“Midday,” pleaded Cowley. “There’s
got to be a reason for her staying at home, and whatever it is we’ll hear it. If there’s nothing by noon we’ll round them up. Just three hours is all.”
“You haven’t forgotten what I told you last night?”
“No, sir.”
“I meant it.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Noon,” agreed Ross.
Cowley replaced the receiver to see—and hear—Pamela replaying Bella’s call to the Pentagon. Pamela said, “She’s trying to sound sick. It’s the sort of voice she used for the New Rochelle call.”
“And sixteen guys died,” reminded Terry Osnan, immediately wishing he hadn’t from the look on Cowley’s face. “Sorry.”
Cowley shook his head against the apology. “We’ve got a postponement.”
“Flu would keep her off for more than a day,” Pamela pointed out.
Cowley said, “Let’s get people out to Reagan and Dulles. And to Union Station if it’s a train, not a plane.”
“Including females,” said Pamela. “If she goes into a washroom, we need to go with her.”
“I’ll wake Schnecker; maybe we’ll need his input,” said Cowley. The Fort Detrick team had returned from Chicago on the same Bureau plane and gone straight to the Marriott where Dimitri Danilov had stayed.
“We’ve got Bella under a microscope. If this is prearranged, why didn’t we hear the conversation?” queried Pamela. She was probably under the same threat from the director as Cowley, and she was damned if she was going to lose everything. They—she—had to second-guess everything.
“They’ve had the shipment for six days; we’ve only had Bella for two days,” reminded Osnan. “They’ve had plenty of time.”
“If she’s going anywhere she’s not going far,” estimated Cowley. “In those six days they could have driven that stuff anywhere in America. And if it was Midwest or West, they’d have offloaded it in Chicago. It’s East Coast.” To Osnan he said, “Go sit on that telephone monitor.”
As Osnan moved into the incident room, Pamela said, “You all right?”
“What’s that mean?” Cowley regretted the stiff scotches he’d had in front of her after the Chicago debacle, although everyone had gone to the improvised Customs bar—including Pamela—and he hadn’t by any means had too much.
“It means are you all right.”
Now Cowley regretted the defensive sharpness. “I’m impatient and I’m nervous: He’s given us three hours. If there’s nothing by then, we move.”
Pamela shrugged. “What the hell can we do in three hours, even if there is some contact! You know what you’ve done! You’ve made yourself the scapegoat for anything that goes wrong.”
Cowley recognized she was probably right. So he’d hammered yet more nails into his own coffin. But there were so many already it hardly mattered anymore. “If we get a lead we can get another extension. I want the Watchmen as well as the rest.”
He personally called the FBI chiefs in Trenton and Manhattan, explaining the delay. In New York Harry Boreman said there’d been no movement from Bay View Avenue, but it was early for them. Everyone was in place, ready to go.
“We’ve got them boxed,” he guaranteed.
In New Jersey John Meadowcraft said they hadn’t heard any movement from inside the Kabanov home, either. Usually the Russian was up by now. Kabanov’s car was in the driveway. Guzov’s was still in the station parking lot. From Albany Anne Stovey said the state attorney was still objecting to any requestioning of Robert Standing. The bureau lawyer was considering an application to a judge in chambers.
It was nine-twenty when Cowley finished all the calls. He told Pamela, “I think you’re right. There wasn’t any point in my arguing the postponement.”
“Don’t wait then,” she urged at once, seeing escape for both of them. “Whatever happens after the arrests won’t be your fault. You’ll be following Ross’s instructions.”
Terry Osnan began waving exaggerately from the incident room. As they hurried into it he said, “Bella’s got a caller. So has Orlenko, in person! Brooklyn surveillance has positively IDed him as Yevgenni Mechislavovich Leanov!”
“We’re sure where everybody is?” demanded Georgi Chelyag.
“Absolutely,” said Danilov.
“And the spetznaz are in place?”
“They have been for two hours.”
“Briefed?”
“Fully.”
“No risk of a leak?”
“My deputy is personally going to arrest Mizin—had already summoned him for a conference, about the murder he’s supposed to be investigating.”
“Were you surprised at the American openness?”
“No,” said Danilov. “I always expected it to be this way.” Cowley had sounded crushed when they’d talked the previous night from Chicago. With every reason. There wasn’t any germ or bacteriological danger, but the explosives could still cause a catastrophe.
“There’s no way the Americans can turn the loss of the shipment into a Russian mistake?”
“No,” agreed Danilov. It was the third time the chief of staff had asked the same question.
“You think there’s any likelihood of Ivan Guzov trying to get back here? If we got him we’d be clearing up American’s mistakes, wouldn’t we?”
“If the terrorists have got the weapons, Guzov’s got the money. Some of it at least. It wouldn’t make sense his trying to get back here after the publicity there’s going to be.”
“I want to hear the moment we make the last arrest. The announcement will be in the president’s name, with another televised address to follow.”
As the recognizable voice of Bella Atkins’s caller echoed into the totally silent Washington incident room Pamela said, “It just might work.”
Cowley said, “Fuck! I didn’t tell Dimitri!”
The man said, “Ready?”
Bella said, “And waiting. How’d it all go?”
“Looks like there’s changes. A new Russian.”
“What about Gavri?”
“Disposed of. Seems he cheated with the money. Tried to cut Moscow out for a new supplier.”
“That going to be a problem?”
“Theirs, not ours. Our problem is that son of a bitch of a bank guy. Won’t respond.”
“What can we do?”
“Hit the banks he gave us access to a second time.”
“Where’s Jake?”
“With me. And the missile.”
“So we’re hearing Peter. Peter’s the General,” breathed Pamela. She looked sideways at Cowley’s return.
Cowley said, “I can’t reach Dimitri. He’s going by the old time.”
Before Pamela could respond Osnan declared, “He’s using a cell phone. We’re getting a scan intermittently. So they’re moving, like they did in Chicago.”
“But somewhere in D.C.!” seized Cowley. “Surely we couldn’t pick it up outside the district!”
“Affirmative,” confirmed Osnan.
“Get guys out to the obvious places. The monuments and memorials again. White House. Emphasize the maroon Land Cruiser.”
“What are you going to do about Dimitri?” asked Pamela.
“Nothing I can do.”
“It going to go off this time?” Bella was saying.
There was a muffled exchange away from the mouthpiece and the sound of laughing. Peter Barrymore said, “The detonator pins are intact. Jake says something that big, a monkey could hit it. He’s going to get a window, like before.”
“We going to be OK?”
There was another laugh. “Of course I checked. Wind’s southwest. Property’s going to be as cheap as hell in Crystal City and Arlington by tonight.”
“Where are you?”
“In traffic, on the bridge. You leave now, it should work out fine.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
The line went dead.
“Windows!” seized Cowley. “Not a monument.”
“The White House!” said Pamela. “It�
�s going to be the White House!”
“From around Lafayette Square, with the wind behind them,” said Osnan.
“Switch from the monuments. Concentrate on the White House. Bring in the SWAT teams. Use Bella as a marker … .” There was a general movement throughout the room, and Cowley turned to see Leonard Ross entering.
The director said, “I overheard enough. We need to evacuate?”
“The missile’s empty,” reminded Cowley.
“What about the explosives?”
“We’re not hearing anything about those,” admitted Cowley.
Ross found James Schnecker. “The stuff’s still got explosives in it, right?”
The bearded expert moved forward. “It’s the timers, detonators, and the fuses we’ve fixed. It can’t be rigged and left.”
“What happens if they don’t try until they get to the target? Nothing sophisticated like the Lincoln Memorial: just a crazy car bomb?”
“It’ll go at the first attempted connection. That was all we could do in Moscow, anticipate their trying to assemble a lot in advance, like they did for the memorial.”
“We get the president out,” decided Ross, hurrying from the room.
“Bella’s moving, on foot,” came the voice of an observer. “Walking nice and easy down York. We’re by the Civic Center.”
“It’s a straight line to Lafayette,” said Pamela.
“Everything’s in place around the White House: virtually sealed,” reported Osnan. “She’s going directly to us. Everyone’s watching for a maroon Land Cruiser.”
“They could get at least half the explosives in a vehicle that big,” estimated Schnecker. “But there’s got to be more than just two of them.”
“She’s changed direction!” the observer said urgently. “Made a left on Massachusetts … now she’s hailing a cab, going toward Union …”
“Surely it’s not a train,” said Cowley. He looked toward Osnan. “We still got people there?”
The Watchmen Page 46