by Clancy, Tom
“Maybe.”
Kat reached for her luggage. Rodgers helped her with both bags. His own followed quickly. They went to the taxi stand and stood under a cloudless, rich blue sky. A cool wind blew from the harbor. Rodgers looked toward it. He saw the statue of Charles Lindbergh that stood outside the terminal. It was ironic: a bronze statue of an aviator, and it was free of birds. The world surely was out of kilter.
The line was short, and they were hotel bound within a few minutes. Kat did not speak, and Rodgers did not push her. He would rather have a willing ally than a reluctant one. Five minutes later, they were at the Bay Grand, a mile from the convention center. The lobby was crowded with conventioneers and press. Rodgers and Kat went to the USF registration table and picked up their keys and ID at the VIP station. They were on the same floor, just below Orr’s penthouse. The elevator was packed, and the silence between Rodgers and Kat continued. A young reporter from the Washington Post recognized the general from the coverage of the United Nations attack. Rodgers said he was here in an advisory capacity to Senator Orr. The reporter asked for a comment about the attack on Op-Center. Rodgers said it was abhorrent. He declined to say more. It was fascinating to him how the other conversations in the small carriage winked out as the journalist asked his questions. The delegates did not handle eavesdropping with the slick, multitasking skill of a Washingtonian. A veteran politician or journalist or society kingpin could be at a restaurant or party and not miss a syllable of his own conversation while skimming half a dozen others that might be going on around him. It was not a talent Rodgers had ever admired. He preferred the wide-eyed silence of his fellow passengers.
Kat turned to him when they reached her door. Rodgers’s room was two doors beyond it.
“I still think this whole thing is ridiculous. There is some other, very simple explanation,” Kat told Rodgers. “But if you want to go through my luggage, I won’t stop you.”
“Thanks. But there is something I want more than that,” he replied. “I want your help. I want to find out if anyone on the USF team is behind these crimes.”
Kat laughed humorlessly. “General, I just said I thought this was ridiculous. Why would I want to be part of it?”
“You’re already part of it,” he pointed out.
“Because some former G-man busted into my apartment and found blue ice?” she asked. “Because the police may have been following him and are likely to arrest him? Detective Howell is a friend of our office. He was not happy to see the case turned over to Op-Center.”
That remark took Rodgers by surprise. “What do you mean, he’s a friend of your office?”
“The detective admires Senator Orr. He did not approve of the way hearsay had become Op-Center’s marching orders,” she said.
“Has Howell been promised anything?” Rodgers asked. “Directorship of the FBI, anything like that?”
“No, though the defense secretary post might be vacant real soon.”
Rodgers ignored the dig. “Are you sure he has been offered nothing?”
“Yes. Some people do things out of principle.”
“In D.C., very few. You happen to be talking to one of the two I know.”
“Am I?” She inserted the key card in the lock. “The man I’ve gotten to know, General, is suspicious bordering on paranoid. I’m beginning to wonder how you ever passed the Op-Center psych evaluation.”
“We’re paid to be paranoid,” he replied. “That’s what allows people like you to sleep nights.”
“I sleep fine,” she said as the green light flashed. She opened the door.
“How is Howell when he calls? Comfortable? Surreptitious ? Vague?”
“Cautious,” she replied. “That is certainly not uncommon in Washington.”
“I’m missing something here,” he said. “Some connection. Was Howell in the navy?”
“I don’t know,” Kat said as she hefted her bags into the room. She turned on the light and held the door open for a moment. Kat had obviously had enough. “Was there something else?” she asked. “You want to frisk me, go through my luggage?”
“You have anything to hide?” he asked, nodding at the bags.
“I’m not hiding anything from you right now,” she said contemptuously.
Rodgers hesitated. Even if he found the dress it wouldn’t prove anything. The luggage was brought to the airport in one van. Someone could have placed it there. “General Rodgers, please call if you need something. Something that has to do with the USF. That is, if you’re still interested in working with us.”
Rodgers looked at her. Her bright eyes were sad as she shut the door. He started toward his own room. He noted the stairwell was right beside his room with a security camera above it. He wondered if Link had put him here on purpose, so the admiral could watch him.
Rodgers hoped not. He hoped a lot of things. He hoped he was wrong about Howell. Maybe the Metro Police detective was just sucking up to someone in power. That was prevalent in D.C. But then why would he have been watching McCaskey? Professional jealousy? A turf war? Or maybe he was just watching Kat’s apartment and happened to see McCaskey go in. Howell may have known about the reporter being at the hotel that night.
Chances were good he would not be able to talk to McCaskey. Instead, Rodgers went to his room, sat on the bed, and entered a stored number on his cell phone. There was only one person he trusted to figure this one out.
The other man of principle Rodgers knew.
FORTY-THREE
Washington, D. C. Wednesday, 3: 44 P.M.
Bob Herbert was delighted to hear from Mike Rodgers. It was the only familiar aspect in a suddenly surreal situation, and for a moment, just a heartbeat, it sounded and felt like old times.
“How am I?” Herbert said in response to Rodgers’s question. “I’m sitting in the parking lot, breathing non–machine-filtered air, which I happen to prefer to that dry, metallic-tasting crud in the Tank, working on a laptop I borrowed from—get this—the head cook in the Andrews commissary cafeteria. I had to create my own files between the Tuesday lunch menu and the recipe for Brigadier General Chrysler’s favorite pie. Which is cherry, if you were wondering. My calls are being routed to a cell phone belonging to Jason Shuffler in accounting. He was parked outside the hit zone, and it was in his car. A bonus to being a peon.”
Herbert was rambling, and he knew it. But it had been a long, rough day with no time to vent. Under the best of circumstances there was no one he felt completely comfortable with other than Mike or Darrell, and Darrell was not available. So Mike got the first big hit. Herbert took a short breath to calm himself, sucked his self-styled debriefing back down, and went to the above-the-fold news.
“Meanwhile, the cops have Darrell and Maria at the precinct,” Herbert told Rodgers. “They were arrested for breaking and entering.”
“I heard.”
“Darrell made his one call to Paul, who shipped Lowell over there to get him out. Paul briefed me. Anything new out there?”
“My sixth sense is tingling,” Rodgers said. “I need to know more about Detective Robert Howell.”
“Funny you should ask.”
“Why?” Rodgers asked.
“I happen to have his dossier on the computer,” Herbert said. “I was looking for something in his background, something we might use to help get Darrell and Maria out of the cooler.”
“What possible tie could he have to Link or the senator?”
“Maybe he’s just a senate groupie,” Herbert suggested.
“That’s what Kat said,” Rodgers told him.
“But you don’t believe her because—?”
“She said it.”
“Great. But do you have a better reason?” Herbert asked.
“No. Like I said, just a feeling.”
“Okay,” Herbert said. He adjusted the screen so it was angled away from the sun. “The detective is not married, he did not come from Texas, he has a record that would make Baden-Powell jealous. He serv
ed in the coast guard and—”
“Not married,” Rodgers said. “Is he divorced?”
“No.”
“Girlfriend?”
“There’s nothing in the file,” Herbert said.
“Shit,” Rodgers said.
“What?” Herbert asked.
“I wonder if it could be blackmail.”
Herbert scowled. “That’s a pretty big leap.”
“I’ve been told I make a lot of those,” Rodgers said. “Is there anything in the dossier that is listed as eyes only?”
“No.”
“So it may not be part of his civilian record. Can you get Howell’s military records? If I go through channels, it will take days.”
“I can probably go through Andrews—”
“That will take time,” Rodgers said. “We don’t have that.”
“—or I can ask Matt,” Herbert replied. “He’s working on getting things running downstairs.”
“Please do,” Rodgers said. “This is important.”
“I’m all over it, like ugly on an ape,” the intelligence chief told him. “I’ll call you back.”
“Thanks.”
Like ugly on an ape? Herbert thought as he clicked off and called downstairs to the Tank. Either he was severely overtired or the fresh air was doing funny things to his head.
Herbert asked Bugs Benet to send Matt Stoll up to parking spot 710. Stoll was upstairs in five minutes. He was grateful for the fresh air.
“The smell of fried copper wire is still pretty thick down in the sulfur pit,” the portly scientist complained.
Stoll accessed the United States Coast Guard secure personnel files in ten minutes. Shortly after that, he pulled up an eyes-only file for Lieutenant Robert Howell. It was from 1989, a formal report by a hearing officer regarding an incident on the newly commissioned cutter Orcas stationed in Coos Bay, Oregon.
“Holy Christmas,” Herbert said as he read the file.
“What have we got?” Stoll asked.
“A Get Out of Jail Free card for the McCaskeys, for one thing,” Herbert replied.
The intelligence chief thanked Stoll and sent the reluctant wunderkind back to the sulfur pit. He immediately got on the phone with Mike Rodgers. The “suspicious” Mike Rodgers. The big-leap-taking Mike Rodgers.
The correct Mike Rodgers.
FORTY-FOUR
San Diego, California Wednesday, 1:00 P.M.
Eric Stone had told the reception desk to let him know when Mike Rodgers arrived. Stone had not met Rodgers. But Kat had called to say she was concerned about his loyalties. That amplified the discomfort Stone felt over the fact that the general was still working with the people who were investigating the USF. Rodgers was a patriot, but not of the extremist mold like Senator Orr. Stone wanted to have a talk with him. More importantly, he wanted to look into Rodgers’s eyes and see where his loyalties lay. Stone was very good at reading expressions. It was a talent he discovered while working as a waiter. He knew the exact moment there was an opportunistic break in a conversation so he could offer a tray of hors d’oeuvres. He knew from partygoers’ expressions, from the way their eyes moved, who liked their egg rolls crispy, their meat skewers rare, and who did not like sushi. He could tell from the vaguely embarrassed manner who was going to take more than one or two cocktail wieners. He evolved those skills working for Admiral Link, watching the fearful or indignant or occasionally dangerous expressions of the servicemen and dignitaries, politicians and civilians who came to visit. Mike Rodgers was an unknown quantity to him.
Until Stone saw him in the corridor of the hotel. The general was just leaving his room. Stone wanted to get a quick sense of what he was about. From appearances, Rodgers was one hundred percent military. Admiral Link was that way, too. But the admiral was offense, and this man was defense. Stone could tell from the set of his head. It was not upright but tilted back slightly, presenting the chin. He was expecting a blow, yet the square set of his shoulder said he was ready for it.
“General Rodgers?” Stone asked as he approached.
“Yes?”
“Eric Stone,” said the young man.
“Pleased to meet you, Eric,” Rodgers said.
Stone offered his hand. The general shook it firmly though not too hard. He was a man who did not have to prove his strength.
“Did you have a good trip?” Stone asked.
“Yes, thank you.”
Rodgers is formal, guarded, Stone thought. He wondered why. “You know, General, I have a bunch of steaks on the grill right now, so I can only stay a minute. But I hope we will have a chance to talk before things get under way.”
“I look forward to that,” Rodgers replied.
“I also hope all of this will be a positive experience for you, a welcome distraction,” Stone went on. “I heard what happened at Op-Center. Just terrible. How long before operations can be resumed?”
“They’re running now,” Rodgers replied.
“At full capacity?”
“Full enough,” Rodgers replied. “Op-Center has always been about the people, not the technology.”
“Heart, not hardware,” Stone remarked.
Rodgers nodded once in agreement.
“That’s good to hear. We believe in that, too,” Stone said, raising a fist in a show of solidarity, “which is why the senator and the admiral are convinced you will be an enormous asset to the party and to a future Orr administration. I hope you are still enthusiastic.”
“More than ever,” Rodgers replied.
“Truly?” The general’s tone seemed a little too affirmative. It almost seemed like a challenge or a threat.
“Don’t interpret quiet observation as disinterest,” Rodgers said. “Contemplation moves power from here,” he held up a hand, “to here,” he touched a finger to his temple. “It does not lessen a man’s strength.”
“Ah. That is the scholar talking,” Stone observed. He knew that Mike Rodgers held a doctorate in world history. The general had obtained it after two combat tours of Vietnam.
“To tell the truth, Eric, it’s more of the soldier in me,” Rodgers said. “I have participated in a number of wars and conflicts. I learned that if one moves too enthusiastically, he could put his foot on a land mine.”
“I guess I was lucky,” Stone said. “When I wore my country’s uniform, we were at peace. We were always wary but unafraid. We were also optimistic, whatever the situation, whatever the alert status.”
“I am always optimistic,” Rodgers assured the younger man.
“Really?” Stone clasped him on the shoulder and laughed. “Forgive me, General, but you look as though you came for a funeral.”
Rodgers fixed his eyes on Stone. “Actually, this is not my funeral face,” he said. “If you want to see that, you will have to be with me on Saturday.”
“Saturday? What is happening then?” Stone asked.
“We bury Mac McCallie,” Rodgers said. “He died in the e-bomb blast at Op-Center.”
“Oh. I am sorry,” Stone said, removing his hand. “I have been rather tied up here. I had not heard there were casualties.”
That was a lie. Stone knew everything about the explosion he had ordered. And he was furious at himself for the funeral comment. It proved Rodgers’s point about careless haste causing problems. It gave the general a moral victory.
It gave Mike Rodgers first blood.
“As for being unafraid, Eric, fear has never driven me to be cautious or watchful,” Rodgers went on. His tone was more aggressive now. What had begun as Stone sizing up the general had been turned around, like a classic military counteraction. “The apparent lack of chaos does that. It is always there, hidden. Disraeli said that peace has occasioned more wars than the most ruthless conquerors. Peace makes us complacent. We stop looking over our shoulder. One job of any leader is to sniff out that lurking danger. To stir it up if necessary, to free it so it can be crushed.”
“That sounds like warmongering,” Stone
said.
“It is,” Rodgers replied proudly. “I have always felt it is better to flush out the enemy before he has a chance to power up.”
“While you are sniffing and flushing, do you also look over your shoulder?” Stone asked. “Do you know what is behind you right now?” His own tone was slightly confrontational now, but he did not care.
“I do know what is there,” Rodgers said. “A fire escape and a hotel security camera.” He smiled. “I like to know where the exits are.”
Stone did not like this conversation or the turn it had just taken. He could not tell if Rodgers was still being philosophical or whether he was baiting Stone with references to the chaos of the past few days. What Rodgers did not say was also informative. He had mentioned nothing about Op-Center’s investigation or the arrest of Darrell and Maria McCaskey. He knew, of course. When Detective Howell arrested the couple, he noted that the last number dialed on McCaskey’s cell phone belonged to Mike Rodgers. Stone wanted to find out more about that if he could.
Quickly.
“You know, General, this is not the conversation I expected to have the first time we met.” Stone laughed. “But it does interest me. In fact, if you have a minute, all I need to do is grab my laptop from the room. Then we can go over to the convention center together. I would appreciate your input.”
“I would prefer to meet you there,” Rodgers said. “There are a few things I have to do first.”
“I can wait if you’d like.”
“Your steaks will burn,” Rodgers said. “I’ll catch up with you. Maybe we can have a drink later.”
“I would like that,” Stone replied.
The convention manager continued down the corridor to his room. As he opened the door, he glanced to his left. Rodgers went to Kat’s door and knocked. He did not attempt to conceal it. Was that innocent or meant to inspire concern? Stone could not be sure, and that frustrated him. More than the conversation, Stone did not like the man himself. Rodgers had launched salvos from his moral high ground. When Link spoke, it was with persuasive authority. This man lectured, as if there was no correct opinion other than his own.