The Minotaur

by Stephen Coonts

  After a thorough scrutiny of the engine compartment and the trunk cavity, he attacked the door panels and rockers with a Phillips-head screwdriver. How many possible places were there? The backseats? Could he get them loose and look under them? The odds of a bomb being there were small, of course, but there was a chance. Just how big a chance, Camacho didn’t know. Peter Aleksandrovich Chistyakov was not a man to take unnecessary risks. That double-agent discussion yesterday had frightened Camacho, coming as it did from a man who owned an assassin’s pistol and had enough gadgets in his attic to blow up half the cops in Washington.

  To assess just how likely it was that good ol’ Harlan Albright had decided to eliminate a possible threat, one would need to know just what it was that was being threatened. How many other agents was he running? What kind of information were they getting?

  Of course, Albright could slip a bomb under the car any night while Camacho snored in his own bed. Risky, but feasible. But perhaps he had planted a bomb with a radio-actuated device as insurance, hoping he wouldn’t have to use it, but with it already in place should the need arise. A careful man might do something like that, right?

  Apparently Albright was a careful man. The bomb was in the driver’s door, behind the panel, below the window glass when it was rolled completely down. It had been carefully taped in place so it wouldn’t rattle.

  At a glance it appeared to contain a couple pounds of plastique. One fuse stuck out of the oblong mass. A wire ran from the fuse to a servo and from the servo to a six-volt battery. A little receiver was wired to the servo and four AA batteries were hooked up to power it. A tiny wire attachéed to the receiver was routed all along the inside of the door. It was a simple, radio-actuated bomb. Simple and effective.

  Luis Camacho pulled the fuse from the bomb and used a penknife to cut the wire. The plastique and the rest of it he left in place.

  Sweating in spite of the fifty-five-degree weather and fifteen-mile-per-hour wind, he replaced the jack in the trunk. The door panel he put in the backseat.

  Had he figured it right? Was this merely insurance? Or had Albright-Chistyakov already decided to push the button?

  Standing there beside the car, he looked around slowly, checking. A lot of good that will do you, Luis. Cursing under his breath, he got behind the wheel and started the car.

  There was a little hardware store in the shopping center, right between a gourmet food store and a factory fabric outlet. Inside Camacho bought a small flashlight, a coil of insulated wire, and some black electrician’s tape.

  Out in the parking lot he used the knife and screwdriver to disassemble the flashlight. The bulb he mounted with tape on a hole he carved in the door panel. Fifteen minutes later he had the last screw back in place and the crank for the window reinstalled.

  There! Now if Albright pushes the button, instead of a big bang, this flashlight bulb will illuminate and burn continuously until that six-volt ni-cad battery in the door is completely discharged. Assuming he sees the illuminated bulb—and the unsoldered wire connections don’t vibrate loose—our saintly hero Luis Camacho, FBI ace spy catcher, will then have time to bend over and kiss his ass goodbye before the bullets from the silenced Ruger .22 send him to a kinder, more gentle world.

  What more could any man ask?

  He sat behind the wheel staring at the storefronts. After a moment he got out of the car and walked back across the parking lot to the gourmet store, the Bon Vivant. The place smelled of herb and flower leaf sachets. The clerk, a woman in her forties with long, ironed hair, was too engrossed in a book to even nod at him. He wandered through the aisles, looking at cans and jars of stuff imported from all over the world. Nothing from Iowa here. If it’s green or purple and packed in a jar from Europe or the Orient, with an outrageous price, you know it’s got to be good.

  He selected a jar of blue French jam, “Bilberry” the label said, paid $4.32 plus tax to the refugee from Berkeley, and walked back across the empty, gray parking lot to his car.

  The flight surgeon at the China Lake dispensary pronounced Rita fit to fly on Friday afternoon. Jake Grafton spent Saturday in the hangar with Samuel Dodgers and Helmut Fritsche going over the computer program and modifications to Athena that were needed.

  As he worked Jake became even more impressed with Dodgers’ technological achievement and even more disenchanted with Dodgers the human being. Like every fanatic, Dodgers thought in absolutes which left no room for tolerance or dissent. On technical matters his mind was open, inquiring, incisive, leaping to new insights regardless of where the leap took him or the hoary precedents shattered by the jump. On everything else, however, every aspect of the human condition, Dodgers was bigoted, voluble, and usually wrong. It was as if his maker had increased his scientific talents at the expense of all the others, thus creating a mean little genius who viewed the world as a collection of wicked conspiracies hatched by evil, godless agents of the devil. His opinion of most of his less gifted fellow men was equally bleak. And he did believe in the devil. He waxed long and loud on Satan and his works whenever he had a half minute that was not devoted to the task at hand.

  How Fritsche tolerated these diatribes Jake couldn’t fathom. He found himself increasingly irritated, and retreated to the head or the outside of the building when he had had all he could stomach.

  “How can you listen to that asshole without choking him?” Jake asked during a brief interlude when nature called Dodgers to the head.

  “Whatszat?” Fritsche asked, raising his eyebrows curiously.

  “These endless scatterbrained rantings,” Jake explained patiently. “In the last hour he’s slandered every racial and ethnic group on the planet and denounced everyone in government as thieves and liars and worse. How can you listen to this?”

  “Oh. That. I never listen. I’m too busy thinking about Athena. I shut out all that other stuff.”

  “Wish I could.”

  “Hmmm,” said Fritsche, obviously not paying much attention to Jake either.

  “If he doesn’t cool it some, I’ll probably strangle him by dinnertime. Better learn all you can this afternoon.”

  “Uh-huh,” said Fritsche, who was bending and reexamining the cooling unit that kept the computer temperature down. It was certainly a marvel of miniaturization and engineering. “How this man made this in a backyard workshop just boggles the mind. Look here, the craftsmanship of these welds, the way he polished this forging with acid to minimize heat loss. Look here! See how he built this to maximize cooling and shorten the wire runs. And he didn’t even use a computer to design this!”

  “Instinct. The troll’s a genius,” Jake Grafton admitted reluctantly.

  The other shoe fell on Sunday morning, when Jake received a telephone call from Washington. George Ludlow was on the other end of the wire. “Royce Caplinger’s flying out to see you this afternoon. He’s bringing Senator Hiram Duquesne with him. Each of them will have an aide along. Get them rooms in the BOQ.”

  “Jesus, Mr. Secretary. This project’s got a security lid tight as a virgin’s twat. We don’t need any godda—any senator—”

  “Duquesne had to be told, Captain. He’s the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. I’m not asking your opinion. I’m informing you. Got it?”

  “Yessir. I got it. Have you also informed Admiral Dunedin?”

  “Yes.” The connection broke. Jake cradled the phone. He soon learned there were but two empty rooms in the BOQ, so he sent the two junior members of his party to a motel off base. Those two were Toad and Rita, neither of whom looked very distressed when they tossed their bags into the back of a navy station wagon and drove away.

  He wore his only clean white uniform and was standing in the sun in front of the terminal when the T-39 taxied up and Royce Caplinger stepped out. The CO of the base was standing beside Jake. Both officers saluted smartly. They also snapped a salute to Senator Duquesne, who was dressed in slacks and pullover shirt and looked like he had had a couple snorts on
the trip. As Duquesne blinked mightily at the bright light, a woman descended the little stair from the plane.

  Jake recognized her even as Caplinger said her name. “Ms. DeCrescentis. She’s a guest of Senator Duquesne.”

  “Consolidated Technologies. She’s a vice president, isn’t she?”

  “Yep,” said Duquesne. “Good to see you again, Captain,” he said in a tone that implied just the opposite.

  “Hitchhiking today, Ms. DeCrescentis?”

  “She’s here to take the tour with us,” Caplinger said.

  “Could I talk to you privately for a moment,” Jake said, not a question, and walked away from the group.

  Twenty paces or so away Jake turned around. Caplinger was right behind. Jake let him have it: “Ludlow said you were coming for a briefing with a senator, even though this project is classified to the hilt. But I’m not about to let a vice president of a defense contractor that is going to be bidding on the ATA have a look at Athena or be a party to any conversation on the subject. She has no bona fide need to know at this stage of the game. She doesn’t have access. Not only no, but hell no. Sir.”

  “My responsibility,” Caplinger said, then clamped his lips into a thin line.

  “No, sir. Ludlow didn’t mention any defense contractors, and even if he had, I’d have to clear this with Admiral Dunedin. I take orders from him. He’d probably have to talk to CNO. Her presence would violate a couple dozen reg—”

  “Call him.”

  “Now?”

  “Yes, goddamnit, right fucking now. We’ll wait in the lounge.” Caplinger stalked for the blue carpet that led inside, followed by Jake Grafton. The base CO led the others inside.

  Jake used the phone in the operations officer’s office on the second deck.

  He reached Dunedin at his office in Crystal City on the first try and outlined the situation. “Fuck!” said the admiral.

  “Yessir.”

  “I’ll call Ludlow. If that goes sour I’ll call CNO.”

  “Okay.” Jake gave him the phone number where he could be reached.

  “You’re really sticking your neck out, Jake.”

  “So fire me.”

  “I’ll call you back.”

  Thirty minutes went by. Jake stared out the window at the little passenger jet and watched the men with the gas truck refuel it as heat waves rose off the tarmac. Blue mountains lay on the horizon. Not a single airplane stirring this Sunday morning. After a while he examined the photos and mementos the ops boss had arranged on his walls. He recognized some of the names and faces in the group pictures.

  He was sitting behind the desk with his feet propped on it and doodling on a scratch pad when the phone rang. “Captain Grafton.”

  “George Ludlow. Admiral Dunedin tells me there’s a problem.”

  “Yessir. Caplinger and Duquesne arrived here a while ago with a vice president of Consolidated Technologies tagging along. They want her to see Athena. It’s classified special access, above top secret, and she’s getting an unfair advantage over the other contractors. I said no.”

  “What did Caplinger say?”

  “He wasn’t happy.”

  “Do you understand that Hiram Duquesne is chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee? We have to have his support if we’re going to get a replacement aircraft for the A-6. Without it we’re pissing up a rope.”

  “I understand that. And I understand that you chose me for this job because I can wear a Medal of Honor on my shirt and because I’m expendable. You’re going to have me make a recommendation on which plane to buy based on a short operational evaluation fly-off, and if you like it, I’ll have to go over to Congress and defend it. You can disavow me anytime. I understand all of that. I took the job anyway. Now I’m telling you, I can’t go over to the Hill and make a recommendation if five or six senators and congressmen are out to cut my balls off with a scalping knife because I let Consolidated in on the ground floor in violation of the law and DOD regulations. I won’t be able to hide behind Royce Caplinger over there. That little shit is too goddamn small to hide behind.”

  Ludlow chuckled, a dry sound that lasted three or four seconds. “Go get Caplinger. I’ll talk to him.”

  Jake left the phone lying on the desk and went downstairs to the VIP lounge. “Mr. Secretary, you have a phone call upstairs.”

  Duquesne’s face was still red and mottled. DeCrescentis looked like she could chew up all of them and spit hamburger. The base CO was nowhere in sight. He had probably attacked in another direction, maybe toward the golf course.

  Jake followed the Defense Secretary back up the stairs.

  As soon as Caplinger recognized his son-in-law’s voice, he shooed Jake from the office. Jake could hear his voice booming through the door. It wasn’t just the Advanced Tactical Aircraft he was concerned about—it was the entire defense budget. As he roared at Ludlow: “…you and I both know that Grafton will probably recommend the TRX plane. With Athena, it’s the obvious choice. But that leaves Duquesne in political trouble at home and we need his support. Jesus fucking Christ George, you people have an aircraft carrier up for funding, three Aegis cruisers, two boomer boats, the air force wants more F-117s and some B-2s, the army wants more tanks. SDI is desperate for money. And Congress is trying to cut the deficit! Don’t tell me to tell Duquesne to fuck off!”

  He was silent for a moment, and when he spoke again his voice was low and Grafton couldn’t hear the words. He knew Ludlow well enough to know how it was going, however. Let Grafton take the heat the Secretary of the Navy was probably saying. Make Grafton the villain.

  And that was how it went. When Caplinger came out of the office he buttonholed Jake. “You’re going downstairs and explain to the senator that you personally must put DeCrescentis back on that plane. You will brief me and the senator this afternoon on Athena and we’ll see it in operation tomorrow. But you are going to insist that woman goes home now, and you are going to make Duquesne like it. Got it?”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  The senator didn’t like it of course, and DeCrescentis liked it even less, but when Grafton made it clear that the law was going to be obeyed regardless and he was the man insisting, both of them gave ground with what grace they could muster. Duquesne had more of it than the corporate vice president did, perhaps because he knew that even Caesar had to retreat occasionally.

  After an hour with Samuel Dodgers in the hangar, it appeared Hiram Duquesne wished he had joined DeCrescentis on the plane.

  Dodgers gave Athena no more than half his air and used the rest to blast away at Congress, corporations and the communist-Jew-nigger conspiracy. Finally Jake told him to shut up. It didn’t take. Jake told him again in terms and tones that would have stopped a rock band in full screech. Dodgers stormed off, leaving Caplinger and Duquesne gaping foolishly at each other.

  Jake Grafton took a deep breath, made his excuses to the two politicians, and left them in the care of a stunned Helmut Fritsche.

  In the parking lot he caught up with Dodgers, trembling with outrage. “You owe me an apology,” the scientist spluttered, holding himself rigid, his fists clenched.

  “No, sir,” Grafton said in a normal voice. “You owe me one. And you owe apologies to all three of those men in there.”

  Dodgers was speechless.

  “You have inflicted yourself on everyone within earshot since the day I met you. Now there’s not going to be any more of that while I’m around. Do you understand?”

  “How dare you talk to me like this!” When Dodgers got it out, it came out loud.

  Jake lowered his voice still more. “I’m the officer responsible. That’s it as far as you’re concerned. You do your work and keep your personal opinions to yourself, and you and I will get along.”

  The scientist spluttered. “I don’t want to get along with you, you…” He couldn’t find the word.

  “You’d better reconcile yourself to it if you want this project to go anywhere.”

 
“…sinner. Agent of Satan.”

  “You want money for your church, right? I’m the man.” With that Jake turned his back on Samuel Dodgers.

  The little neighborhood bar was fairly well lit and not very fancy, with cheap furniture and oilcloth table covers. A television high in one corner was tuned to a ball game, one of the NCAA tournament semifinals. Smoke Judy slid into an empty booth and ordered a draft. The waitress flirted for a moment when she brought it, then skipped away.

  Smoke sipped his beer and watched the body posture of the men leaning against the bar and sitting on the stools. Some were absorbed in the game, some were talking to a buddy. Most of them were doing a little of both.

  This was Smoke Judy’s favorite weekend beer spot, only a mile from his place. He knew the bartender casually and they often exchanged pleasantries on slow days. There were a lot worse ways to make a living, Smoke decided, than running a neighborhood bar where the guys could stop in after work or take a break from lawn mowing and garage cleaning. The crowd was nice and the work pleasant, although the money wouldn’t be great.

  Maybe he would get a place like this when he retired next year. He had dropped a hint to the bartender—who also owned the place—a few weeks back, trying to find out if he had ever thought of selling, but the man didn’t get his drift, or pretended he didn’t.

  He was going to retire next year, with twenty-two years in. By law, as a commander he could stay in the navy until he had completed twenty-six years of service, but he wasn’t going to endure the hassle of staff job after staff job with no chance of promotion.

  The end of the line had been a tour in command of a training squadron in Texas. Four of those damn kids had crashed, three fatally. Hard to believe. He had worked hard and flown hard and done it by the book, and still those goddamned kids just kept smashing themselves into the ground like suicidal rats. The accident investigators had never said or even implied he was at fault. Yet every crash had felt like God whacking him on the head, compressing another two vertebrae. He had gotten punchy toward the end, a screamer in the cockpit, afraid to certify any student safe for anything. He left that for the lieutenants.