Hunter

by Andrew Macdonald

  XXVIII

  Oscar wasted four hours the next day looking without success for a delivery van or a light truck he could steal for his bomb, but he did manage to round up all of the other supplies he needed. He also studied his sheaf of Mossad dossiers again and began thinking about later targets.

  He had dinner at Adelaide’s apartment, then left at ten o’clock and resumed his search for a truck. Finally, around midnight, he spotted a suitable van in the parking lot of a shopping mall with a 24-hour supermarket. Leaving his own car several rows away and using the set of master keys Ryan had provided him, he quickly entered the van and drove away. The space in the back was adequate for his need, but the garish, red lettering on the side of the bright-yellow truck — “Dino’s Specialty Wall Coverings” — made him feel self-conscious. He decided to drive immediately to Manassas rather than take the risk involved in leaving such a conspicuous vehicle parked in the open overnight.

  In his rented garage he removed several five-gallon cans of wallpaper adhesive and dozens of rolls of wallpaper from the back of the van, replaced them with four 40-gallon plastic trash barrels he had purchased earlier in the day, and spent the next three hours emptying sacks of ammonium nitrate into the barrels and stirring a fuel-oil sensitizer into the white pellets. The barrels were closely grouped around one of his 50-pound cases of Tovex. It was after four o’clock in the morning when he finally was ready to place a time-delay detonator in the Tovex.

  He lay down as well as he could in the front seat of the van and slept fitfully until 8:30 AM. Then he drove out of the garage and joined the tail end of the stream of rush-hour traffic headed into Washington. At 9:50 AM he turned into the alley which ran behind George’s Stationery. He pulled up as close to the bricks as he could, directly outside two of the tightly curtained windows in George’s rear wall. He leaned back into the cargo area just long enough to set the detonator for five minutes and start it counting down. Then he stepped out into the alley, locked the door of the van, and made his way back to the busy sidewalk. He turned the corner and walked back toward the front entrance of George’s, stopping two doors away to watch the traffic go by.

  The explosion came at 9:57 according to his watch. The shock was stronger than he had expected, and he staggered, nearly falling before recovering his balance. George’s plate-glass windows had been transformed into a deadly hail of glittering shards, which had cut down four pedestrians on the sidewalk in front of the store. Dense smoke poured from the interior of the building. No one could survive inside, he realized with a sinking heart; if the blast had not killed them already, the smoke soon would. How many were there? If Monday had been typical, there would be about a dozen customers and clerks in the store.

  The smoke and dust were still heavy in the air in the alley, and even with a handkerchief over his nose and mouth he coughed and gagged as he made his way back to the blast site to survey the damage. Where the van had been was a gaping crater a dozen feet across. Apparently there had been a basement of some sort under the store which had extended out beneath the alley. About 40 feet of the rear wall of the store was gone, and most of the interior walls of the Mossad offices were gone as well. He counted the remains of six, maybe seven, persons in the wreckage of the offices. Undoubtedly others were buried under the rubble.

  Papers were floating down from the sky and fluttering about in the alley. He picked up one and noted that it was typed in Hebrew characters. With the metropolitan police as well as the FBI and the Agency involved in the investigation of the bombing, it would be hard to hush up the nature of the business which had been conducted in George’s rear offices. Another little embarrassment for those who believe that the “chosen people” can do no wrong.

  A second blast rocked Oscar, and he felt a flash of heat on his back. The fuel tank of a burning truck about 30 yards away had exploded. Still coughing, he stumbled back out to the sidewalk and walked rapidly away from the devastated area. He hailed a taxi. During the ride back to the shopping mall in Virginia where he had left his car he found himself appalled at what he had done. He had not regretted the bombing of the People’s Committee, but here, in contrast, many of the victims were innocent bystanders. He knew that in every war most of the victims were non-combatants, but he still did not like it. Ryan, on the other hand, probably would be very pleased.

  What, he wondered, had the crews of the bombers which had carpet-bombed German cities during the Second World War felt? Were they pumped so full of Jewish hate propaganda that they were happy for all the White civilians they were killing, or did they instead hate themselves for what they were doing: for obeying orders they knew were immoral and for not having the courage to speak out against them? On the other hand, perhaps Ryan and Keller were right: perhaps nearly all of them were simply animals and were unmoved by ethical questions; perhaps they were only concerned with how their fellows regarded them and had no moral compasses of their own. Perhaps the more sophisticated of them just memorized one of the clichйs of justification the Jews provided them with — “No, I didn’t hate the German women and children I was killing and maiming with my bombs, but we had to do it to stop Hitler” — while the less sophisticated didn’t even worry about the pretense of justification.

  At home Oscar slept until mid-afternoon. Over a late lunch he thought about his various responsibilities. Although he was spending about a dozen hours a week on their television project, for the time being Saul seemed to be in good hands with the Kellers. It would probably be another six or eight weeks before he would need to become much more closely involved in that project again.

  It was five weeks until Adelaide would be moving in; she was a well-organized girl and was handling most of the logistics of that task quite well by herself. She had even told him which pieces of his own furniture would have to go. He would hardly have to do more than provide the muscle when the time for moving the heavy things came.

  The Air Force was satisfied for now and wouldn’t be expecting anything else from him until mid-August. He would start worrying about that around August 10. God, what a cozy setup it was being a Defense Department consultant, he thought. If he wanted, he could work a lot harder, get more contracts, and make more money, but as long as he was satisfied with the $50,000 or so per year he was getting now, he had 90 per cent of his time free to spend on other things.

  Ryan’s assignment still was his most immediate concern. More than that, it was his one responsibility which worried him. The danger of the work was a consideration as was the problem involved in keeping it secret from Adelaide, but the real worry was that it was not under his control, and he had serious misgivings about the motivation behind it and where it was leading him. Still, his admiration for Ryan’s abilities, already substantial, was growing, and he sympathized with the man to a degree.

  Killing Mossad agents, for example, certainly was something that needed to be done. Even Ryan’s strategy of provoking a terrorist war between the Arabs and the Israelis on American turf seemed justifiable: tough on the poor Arabs, of course, but after the Israeli problem was solved the Arabs needed to be booted out anyway. He would be happy to see all of those greasy, Middle Eastern types go.

  After having time to think about it and become accustomed to the idea. he even found himself with a certain grudging sympathy for Ryan’s program of reform-through-trauma for improving the character of the American people.

  The arrangement between himself and Ryan had undeniable value for his work with the League — not to mention the extra $200,000 he had just received — and it might become even more valuable in the future. Nevertheless, the man made him uneasy. For Oscar to be comfortable with their relationship he needed to have a clearer idea of just where Ryan was headed and whether or not he really wanted to go along on that particular ride.

  For now, however, he was inclined to push ahead with the Mossad project and get it done as soon as he could. He had tentatively selected as his next target one Sheldon Schwartz, a Congressional aide, the
chief of staff for the Senate minority leader. The man was an American-born Jew, but he had lived in Israel for five years during the 1970s. He was believed to carry the rank of colonel in the Mossad.

  His nominal superior on the U.S. government’s payroll, Senator Howard Carter, was a WASP from an immensely wealthy and prominent New England family. He also was one of the country’s most powerful politicians, heading the Senate Foreign Relations Committee among other things. He had declared himself unavailable as the Republican candidate for the Presidency in next year’s elections but was considered the most likely choice five years from now. His public image was a dignified one, as befitted the power he wielded, but his FBI dossier revealed that although married he was a homosexual and a pederast.

  Oscar was shocked by this revelation. No wonder Ryan was such a cynic!

  Carter was very careful to keep his perversions from becoming public knowledge, but he apparently was ruled by them. Schwartz served him not only as a legislative aide, but also as a discreet procurer of young boys. This dual role undoubtedly gave Schwartz a strong hold on Carter and put the Mossad agent in a position where he was privy to the nation’s most closely guarded secrets of state and could exert decisive influence on key legislation of interest to Israel. Perhaps in this lay the explanation for Carter’s 100 per cent rating with the Israeli lobby.

  Oscar studied Schwarz’s own dossier attentively and considered the ways in which the man might be killed. After today’s bombing the Mossad would be taking extraordinary precautions to protect its key people, and so Schwartz’s residence probably would be under observation. Perhaps it would be easiest to get at him while he was at work. He could hardly risk calling attention to himself by having his fellow Mossad agents guarding him in his Senate office. Or could he? With the Israelis no degree of arrogance seemed excessive.

  Oscar noted that it was nearly 3:30 PM — a bit late to make a trip over to Capitol Hill today. On the other hand, he hated to waste even part of a day. It took three telephone calls, posing as a newspaper reporter, to find out that Schwarz’s office was on the third floor of the Senate’s Hart Office Building, that Schwarz had stepped out for a moment but would be back shortly, and that he was expected to be in until six o’clock.

  Oscar spent half an hour arranging his wig and applying his facial makeup; then he put on a suit, slipped his silenced pistol into its holster, and headed for Capitol Hill. There he observed that most of the people going into the Hart Office Building were either wearing plastic identity badges or were fumbling in their purses or pockets for them at the doors.

  To get a better look at the security arrangements, Oscar walked up to a door and asked the two Black guards seated at a table just inside, “Excuse me, but is this the Dirksen Office Building?” He noted that there was a metal detector that all persons entering the building had to walk through. The guards were talking with each other and seemed bored and inattentive. One of them pointed vaguely to the west and said impatiently, “Next building on Constitution Avenue,” then returned to his banter with his fellow.

  During the time Oscar was at the door three persons edged their way around him and walked through the metal detector. Their badges got only cursory glances from the guards. One woman who entered was carrying a purse, which she merely held open where the guards could look into it if they bothered to do so as she walked by.

  Oscar had a hunch that if he could get inside the building it would be easy to get to Schwarz with no further interference. But how to get in? There was another entrance being used at the other end of the building, but it undoubtedly had the same security arrangements as this one. He walked the three blocks back to his car to consider the matter. On his way he observed the stream of vehicles coming from the parking area under the building and being directed into the rush-hour traffic by policemen. That must be where all the VIPs parked their cars, and it looked like it wouldn’t be easy to get in there.

  As Oscar approached his car, parked illegally beyond the last metered space before an intersection, he saw that the car ahead of his, against whose rear bumper his own front bumper was tightly pressed, was trying to get out. The driver had his head out the window and was looking back at Oscar’s car as he jockeyed his own car back and forth and swore to himself. Oscar walked up to the other driver’s window to tell him that relief had arrived: “Hey, sorry I blocked you. I’ll move my car now.”

  The other man glared up at him from a sallow, pockmarked face, and Oscar suddenly noticed that he had a plastic badge clipped to his breast pocket. Under the photograph the legend “U.S. Senate Staff” caught Oscar’s eye. “You work in the Hart Building too?” Oscar asked in a friendly manner. “Parking around here’s a bitch, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah,” the other replied, somewhat mollified by the impression that Oscar was a fellow Senate staffer. “I’m new here, but next month I’ll get a spot in the lot over on Third Street.”

  Having quickly noted that there were no other pedestrians on his side of the street at the moment, Oscar made an instant decision. While he opened the car’s door with his left hand, he drew his pistol with his right hand and, pressed in close to the car so that his action could not be seen from the street, shot the man in the forehead twice. As the driver slumped silently over his steering wheel, Oscar deftly unclipped his badge, then pushed his body down in the seat, with his head under the glove compartment where it would be less visible.

  Oscar moved his own car to a metered space which had opened up at the other end of the block. He stashed his holstered pistol under his seat and reached up to his sun visor for a long, plastic letter opener which was clipped there. It actually was a razor-sharp knife made of a tough, hard, fiber-reinforced resin. He tucked the knife into his belt where it would be hidden by his coat, then headed back toward the Hart Office Building. On the way he looked at the identity badge he had taken. The slain man’s name was Joseph lsaacson, and his accent had sounded New Yorkish. Did that mean he was a Jew? Oscar didn’t know. He had had to force himself to kill the fellow, and he probably would have done it in any case — but the man’s appearance and his accent probably had made it a little easier.

  He looked at his watch as he went through the metal detector. It was exactly 4:30, and the hail was full of people headed toward the exit. He did not look directly at the guards, but he could see from the corner of his eye that they gave him no more than a cursory glance as he went by.

  By the time Oscar had made his way to the third floor and oriented himself, the hallways were nearly empty, except for a group waiting for the next elevator. Schwarz’s office, unfortunately, was part of a large suite assigned to Carter. The main door from the hail was open, and two women were at desks in the palatial anteroom. Three other doors led from the anteroom to inner offices. One was open, but from the hail Oscar couldn’t see into it. He didn’t know what else to do, so he stooped and pretended to be tying his shoelace in order to gain a few seconds to think. As he rose again a man about 30, obviously not Schwartz, came out of the open office and closed the door behind him as he put on his coat. Oscar saw him nod his head toward one of the other closed doors and heard him ask one of the women, “The Senator left yet?”

  “No,” she answered, “he’s still in conference with Shelly.”

  “Well, good night. Don’t let him make you work too late,” the man said cheerfully as he stepped into the hail.

  Oscar already was walking toward a side corridor which intersected the main hall about 50 feet from the entrance to the suite. Surely a big shot like Carter didn’t have to come and go from his office through the front door, where he would be forced to rub elbows with the hoi polloi. There must be a private rear door.

  Sure enough, a dozen yards or so around the corner there was an unmarked door in the wall of the side corridor, which bounded the Carter suite. Just beyond was an elevator door bearing a placard which read, “For Senators Only.”

  Did he dare? Oscar felt the icy perspiration in his armpits. He stepped
up to the unmarked door and tried the knob. It was locked. He slipped his lethal letter opener from his belt and rapped on one of the solid, oaken panels with his knuckles.

  There was no immediate response. He spotted a trash receptacle a few yards away and filched an empty envelope from it. He rapped on the door again and immediately slid the envelope under it. That should catch someone’s attention, if there were anyone in the room beyond the door. Within a few seconds the door swung inward, and Oscar found himself looking into the annoyed and suspicious eyes of a man whose features were familiar to him from the photograph in the dossier he had been studying very recently.

  The knife slipped easily into Sheldon Schwartz’s belly, and Oscar ripped savagely upward with it, spilling the man’s entrails onto the carpet. The eviscerated Schwartz could utter no more than a long, wheezing gasp as his knees buckled and he fell forward.

  Oscar reached out with his left hand to ease the dying man to the floor, but he was not fast enough to avoid getting the front of his trousers smeared with gore. He quickly stepped into the room and closed the door behind him, at the same time calling out, “Give me a hand, will you, Senator. I believe Shelly is sick.”

  The door was in an alcove concealed by a pair of strategically placed flag stands. Oscar brushed aside the flags and saw Carter’s back as the legislator rose from the chair behind his desk about 30 feet away. Carter was a tall, heavily built man with a large head of silvery hair and sagging jowls. He moved his bulk with slow, imperial dignity. He and Oscar were only a dozen feet apart when he saw the knife in Oscar’s hand. The questioning smile on his august face turned to an expression of horror, and he froze in mid-stride. His last words were, “Oh, shit!”