Covenant

by Jeff Gulvin

  ‘No, sir. No later.’

  ‘Is it just you and Dylan sharing the room, Mr Patterson?’

  ‘There’s four bunks, sir.’

  Weir looked at the sheet of paper on the desk. ‘Of course there is. Who else is with you?’

  ‘Dyer and Williams, sir.’

  Weir was quiet for a moment, then he smiled and stood up. ‘Thank you, Mr Patterson. That’ll be all for now. But we might need to speak to you again.’

  Patterson nodded, working his beret between his huge, pink-palmed hands. He glanced once more at Carragher and left. Webb closed the door, turned and stuffed his hands in his trouser pockets.

  Weir was sitting on the edge of the desk with his arms folded. ‘He’s lying,’ he said. ‘Stoval was in Camden at eight-thirty, so if Patterson did go to the pub when he said he did, it was not with Dylan Stoval.’

  ‘What do you wanna do, Frank?’ Carragher asked him.

  ‘I want covert surveillance in their billet.’

  At the field office on 4th Street, they sat and waited for Harada to call. Kovalski had come back from the Old Executive building and was at his desk, drinking coffee out of a massive polystyrene cup. Outside, the office was buzzing with task force agents, still following up the sightings. All morning, Swann and Logan had been helping them, along with every other available person. Logan had a whole stack of report sheets on the table and they had been through their share, contacting the callers by phone and then visiting various business and private addresses. They had been concentrating on business addresses: a number of callers from the Chinatown area claimed that various people working within the Chinese business district were Fachida Harada. They interviewed or tried to interview three Chinese waiters and two hotel porters, before Logan shook her head and they went back to the field office. ‘This is ridiculous,’ she said. ‘We’re just wasting our time.’

  ‘It’s how he planned it, Chey,’ Swann said. ‘He forced Kovalski’s hand, made him go public, when it was probably better not to. Harada will have known this would happen—the world and his wife calling in. He knows how much manpower the subsequent investigation takes.’ He shook his head. ‘For one man, he’s stretching the response every which way he can.’

  Kovalski was in conference with the chief of the metropolitan police department, but he waved Logan and Swann in. ‘Close the door, Cheyenne,’ he said, and he indicated for Swann to sit down.

  Swann looked at his watch: six minutes before the 2 p.m. deadline. ‘What are you going to say to him?’ he said.

  Kovalski pursed his lips. ‘I’m going to tell him we need more time. See if I can stall him a little.’

  ‘And if you can’t?’

  Kovalski scowled at him. ‘Let’s just see if we can.’

  ‘Tom,’ Swann said. ‘Everybody says they never negotiate with terrorists, but everybody always does.’

  ‘Not on this occasion. There’s no way they’re going to release Shikomoto. And they’re right. We’d just be setting ourselves up.’ He sat back. ‘If Harada won’t stall, then so be it. We’ll get him in the end and in the meantime we try to contain any militia activity.’ He looked across the desk. ‘In your experience, what d’you think he’d do next?’

  Swann pondered for a moment. ‘I think he’ll really try and bring the city to a complete standstill,’ he said. ‘If I were him, I’d target the main roads in and out of Washington. Like he did with 395 and 66, only more effectively. He did those two in the way he did just to let you know that he could.’ He paused then. ‘The other thing I’d do is go for public buildings. He’s already done the Smithsonian and National Airport. I’d go for more. The devices in the toilet areas had been there for a while. He may well have sited more.’ Swann lifted his shoulders. ‘The other thing he could go for is power stations, that kind of thing. The IRA tried to do it to us, black out London for a couple of weeks.’

  ‘You really think one man can do all this on his own?’ Logan butted in.

  ‘Yes, I do. If he’s been here long enough.’

  Kovalski looked at his watch. ‘Two minutes,’ he said.

  ‘D’you want me to talk to him, Tom?’ Logan asked.

  ‘No. I’ll do it.’ Kovalski looked at her. ‘You just pray I keep him going long enough for Triggerfish to click in.’

  Exactly two minutes later, the phone rang. For a second or so they all looked at it, then Kovalski pressed the speaker button. ‘ASAC Kovalski,’ he said.

  ‘It’s two o’clock. The twenty-four hours are up and I see nothing on the television, no announcement concerning the release of Tetsuya Shikomoto.’

  ‘Fachida, listen,’ Kovalski said. ‘We’re working on it. I’ve just come from a meeting with the National Security Council. But these things can’t be done in a hurry.’

  ‘Of course they can.’ There was almost a note of weariness in Harada’s tone. ‘They can, if there’s enough will.’

  ‘Fachida, there is a will. It’s just that we need more time.’

  ‘There is no more time.’

  ‘Please. Don’t do this. Your beef is with us, the establishment. If you make a public announcement now, you’re going to create chaos.’

  ‘I know.’ Harada laughed lightly. ‘Your militia—your Tatenokai—think I’m a government agent. How ironic.’

  Kovalski sat back then. ‘You betrayed Shikomoto, didn’t you? Gave him up to the CIA.’

  Harada faltered and Kovalski was watching the seconds ticking away. ‘Listen, I understand why. And, believe me, I’m trying to get agreement to release him. But I need more time.’

  ‘There is no more time.’ Harada put down the phone. At the same moment, an agent from the Triggerfish team burst through the door. ‘Got him,’ he said. ‘He’s within four hundred yards of the Annalee Heights beacon.’

  Logan was on her feet at the wall and running her finger over the street map. ‘There,’ she said. ‘Between highways 50, 649, 613 and probably 244.’

  Kovalski was already on the radio.

  Harada, dressed as Chiang Soo Li, was in the grey sedan heading for home when he heard the first siren. They had picked up the electronic serial number from the phone. He thought they might this time and the phone had been discarded. He did have a cellphone in the car, but a different one, one that he had not used before. It was good to have had so much money at his disposal. He drove with both hands on the wheel, false nails polished crimson, and headed for the Leesburg Pike. Police cars were converging from everywhere and roadblocks were going in. He had talked to Kovalski for too long. There was the chance of capture now and that was something he could not afford. He had two guns with him, each one set in a false shelf, which slid out from under the seats. If they really took the car apart, they might find them. He glanced at the street map and ducked off the main road. Then he heard the whirr of rotor blades and realised they had a chopper up. He turned north again and came back on to 613, just north of Belvedere. Ahead of him, a single white Ford from the Fairfax County police department blocked the road. Harada was the third car back. He debated what to do. His ID should be good enough, but in his heart he already knew the FBI would not let Tetsuya go. He was only putting off the inevitable and perhaps it was time for more direct action. Reaching down, he slid the gun from under his seat.

  The trooper had stopped his car as soon as he got the call from the terrorism task force: all roads in the immediate vicinity of the Annalee Heights beacon to be blocked, suspect Fachida Harada believed to be in the area. They rode these units alone, but he had already called headquarters for back-up. He had nosed his car across the street and drivers in both directions had to ease their way round him. He needed somebody for the southbound carriageway, but in the meantime he would do the north.

  The first two cars carried white Caucasian males. He looked at the third car, a grey sedan with an Asian female behind the wheel. He held up his hand and she stopped, rolled down the window and smiled at him. ‘Good afternoon, mam,’ he said.

  She
smiled and reached for her driver’s licence. He had his radio to his lips and was about to walk round the front of the car.

  ‘Officer.’

  ‘Yes, mam.’ He came back to the window and the smile died on his face. Harada pointed the black automatic and fired. The trooper lifted both hands to his face, reeled a few paces and fell with a scream caught in his throat. Harada put the shift in drive and drove right over him.

  22

  SWANN WENT BACK TO see Dr Habe at the faculty of Japanese history at George Washington University. Logan had remained behind at the field office, co-ordinating the fresh hunt for Harada. Dr Habe was teaching a class, but when Swann explained the situation to her assistant, she met him in her office.

  ‘What can I do for you, Mr Swann?’ she asked him.

  Swann sat down opposite her. ‘It’s about Fachida Harada,’ he said. ‘A Fairfax County police officer has just been shot dead and the FBI know Harada was in the vicinity.’ He broke off for a second. ‘The witnesses said the killer was an Asian, but a woman.’

  Dr Habe nodded. ‘What is it you want to know exactly?’

  ‘Doctor, I’ve got no jurisdiction here. But I do observe and I do have time to think. I’ve done some more reading on the samurai, and sometimes they painted their faces in battle, didn’t they?’

  She nodded. ‘Like women. To show their disdain for danger.’

  ‘That’s what I thought.’ Swann sat back again. ‘The whole thing with the samurai was about honour. We discussed it, remember?’

  She nodded.

  ‘I want to ask you a question. If a samurai warrior’s honour was truly compromised, what would he do about it?’

  ‘He would kill himself. The sepukko, Mr Swann, ritual suicide.’

  ‘Like Yukio Mishima.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ he said. ‘Thank you.’

  He took the metro back to 4th Street and went up to the field office, where he could almost taste the excitement in the air. Logan was in the squad room, studying the large-scale map of the city on the wall. She had ringed the section where the cellphone’s electronic serial number had been picked up and marked off highways 50, 649, 613 and 244. Kovalski was standing at her elbow and he looked round as Swann came up.

  ‘We’re positive he was dressed as a woman,’ Kovalski said. ‘Driving a grey Chrysler sedan.’

  Swann nodded.

  ‘The picture we’ve got must be a very good likeness.’

  ‘That and the samurai in battle.’

  Kovalski arched one eyebrow at him. ‘Excuse me?’

  Swann leaned against the desk. ‘Tom, I think you should go public about Harada’s CIA involvement.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He’s going to. Right now, he’s probably e-mailing Carl Smylie.’

  Logan was staring at him. ‘What are you saying, Jack?’

  ‘I’m saying, get in before he does. Explain the situation to the public before he does. Create the advantage.’ Swann folded his arms. ‘This whole thing is allegedly about Harada’s honour, or fall from it, or whatever the expression is.’ He looked Kovalski in the eye. ‘Call him on it, Tom. Make him look silly. Go public about him and Shikomoto, make a big deal about them being gay. It’s not politically correct, but, right now, who will give a shit. Tell the newspapers about his work for the CIA, how he betrayed his past, betrayed his alleged Communist ties, the North Koreans, his colleagues in the JRA. Talk about his criminal links with the yakuza. But most of all, major on how he stitched up Shikomoto.’

  ‘And the militia reaction?’

  ‘It’ll be what it’ll be. But if you tell the public before Harada does, the full story can come out and not just the bits he wants them to hear.’ Swann looked at them both. ‘The point is Harada’s honour. If you call him on it, he’ll know there’s no way Shikomoto will be released and therefore no way he can win.’

  Kovalski frowned. ‘So what happens then?’

  Swann licked his lips. ‘With any luck, he’ll kill himself.’

  Harada stood under the shower and let hot water ease the tension from the muscles in his shoulders. He had taken cream to his face and removed the bulk of the make-up, but now tiny rivers of lipstick-red water rolled down his chest. He stood with his head bowed, the force of the water on the back of his neck, and chewed over the events of the morning. They had held him on the phone for too long. He probably had been safe with that police officer, dressed as he was like a woman, and yet he had shot him dead. The battle was intensifying in his head; he could feel it, building with the frustration. How he longed to stand toe to toe with his enemy, his sword an extension of his arm. The FBI were stalling. They were bound to stall: a classic western tactic, no honesty in their warfare.

  He dried himself, wrapped the towel round his waist and went through to the bedroom where his computer was housed. He sat on the edge of the bed, towelled his hair until it stuck straight up, then he took the ceremonial short sword from the casket and practised a series of moves, watching the fluidity of motion in the full-length mirror. Replacing the sword, he lit incense sticks and knelt for a while, meditating before his Shinto shrine. Then he took the laptop computer downstairs and switched it on. While it was booting up, he turned on the television news and, with the volume mute, considered how he would word the message to Smylie and fuel the militias’ worst fears.

  He glanced at the TV and recognised the black FBI agent, the woman. She was standing in the quadrangle at the Hoover building and hordes of press corps were seated on the fixed benches in front of the ‘Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity’ statue. Harada turned the volume up, as Logan spread what looked like some kind of prepared statement on the lectern before her.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ she was saying. ‘I’m Special Agent Logan, the terrorism response co-ordinator for the District of Columbia. As you all know, this city has been facing a threat over the past few weeks that has murdered, disrupted lives and brought many of our services to a standstill. For the first time, the metro has been bombed, major highways have been sabotaged and federal buildings targeted. The perpetrator has made no secret of his identity. He is Fachida Harada of the Japanese Red Army.

  ‘In 1986, Harada and his accomplice, Tetsuya Shikomoto, attacked the US Embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia, with mortar bombs. It took us ten years, but with the help of the CIA we finally apprehended Shikomoto in Kobe, Japan, in 1996. He was extradited and is now serving life in a federal penitentiary. Shikomoto is the reason Harada is in D.C. right now, and Shikomoto is the reason we are being bombed. We believe Harada has been here for at least six months, which is more than enough time to prepare his assault properly. There is no doubt that this bombing campaign is far more professional than anything we’ve seen from the FALN in the past, or the various right-wing groups based here, or indeed the World Trade Center. However, we need to explode a couple of myths about Harada.

  ‘The reason he wants Shikomoto released is because the two men are lovers. They have been since 1986, yet they both have wives and families in Japan. There is a rumour circulating through the militia groups that somehow we are responsible for what Harada is doing, rather like we were apparently responsible for the Oklahoma City bomb in 1995. Certain people are promulgating the theory that we are controlling Harada or that he is a government agent gone wrong.’ She paused then and looked right into the camera, looked right into Harada’s eyes as he watched the screen.

  ‘After the 1986 Indonesia bombs, Harada and Shikomoto were tracked to North Korea, where the Japanese Red Army had an enclave. Around that time, Harada, whose role in the Jakarta bombings had been secondary, became an agent for the CIA. He agreed to assist them to avoid being arrested for the Jakarta bomb. His job was to gather intelligence in Communist North Korea.’

  A murmur rippled through the gaggle of reporters. One of them called out: ‘So BobCat Reece was right then. Harada is a government agent.’

  ‘No.’ Logan said slowly. ‘Mr Reece could n
ot be more wrong. Harada is his own man. He stopped working for the United States after he gave up Shikomoto to us.’ She paused then and looked at the camera. ‘You see, Fachida Harada wanted to save his own skin after the attacks in Jakarta. He reneged on his agreement with the CIA and gave up Shikomoto in return for his own freedom. Harada claims to be a warrior. He claims to be a man of honour, but any honour he might have had was lost the day he compromised his lover.’ She paused again. ‘He’s demanding we release Shikomoto now, but the only reason he’s in custody in the first place is because Harada put him there.’ Harada stared at the screen and globules of perspiration built on his forehead. He clenched his fists and the sweat rolled into his eyes. He could feel every muscle trembling and the emptiness gnawed at his gut; the emptiness he had suffered since the day they took Tetsuya.

  On the TV, Logan was still talking. ‘It’s important we track Harada down before he does any more damage. We’ve prepared a handout sheet for the members of the press, which details the man and his organised-crime connections in Japan. The militia groups have alleged a connection between the Asians killing militia members and Fachida Harada. Their claim is that Harada is somehow proof that there is an overall federal conspiracy against them. The reality is that the FBI, together with the sheriffs’ criminal investigation divisions and state police, are hunting the killers of Billy Bob Lafitte, Tommy Anderson and the two ladies abducted from Cassity, Virginia. We do not know who the killers are yet, but if there is a connection with Harada, it’ll be through organised crime syndicates like the yakuza.’ She folded the papers. ‘Harada was part of the yakuza in Japan. He is, at best, a criminal. And he has a grudge. It’s manifested as a grudge against the FBI, but in reality it is against himself. We’re dealing with a very mixed-up creature, a man who does not really know his own mind, a man who claims to have the strength of the ancient samurai warrior, but who appears to have lost any sense of the honour that set the samurai apart. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your attention. With the help of the media and the general public, we can catch this man and put a stop to the bombings and, along with them, the rumours.’