“Anybody we know?” his partner Phillip Joyce asked. They were set up across the street in a GMC conversion van with smoked-glass windows and civilian plates.
“The tall, skinny dude looks vaguely familiar. I don’t know about the other one.” McLaren fired off three rapid shots as the two men came through the iron gate and started toward the van. “Take a look,” he said, and he moved away from the camera.
Joyce took his partner’s place and snapped a half-dozen shots. “He’s in the file, but I don’t know about the little guy.”
They passed within five feet of the van, and the shorter one looked directly at Joyce for a second as if he could see through the one-way glass. Joyce had the feeling that he’d seen that face before, although where or in what context he couldn’t remember. It was bothersome. He took two more shots.
“All right, I’ve got them,” McLaren said from the back of the van.
Joyce returned his attention to Tallerico’s house. This was only the second day of their surveillance so no true pattern of behavior had been established. The man had been investigated on a similar charge of industrial espionage five years ago, but after three months of surveillance in which nothing had been found, the case was dropped. He was either innocent, or very good, although John Whitman, the chief investigating officer on the case, was convinced he was guilty of something. “Why else install the sophisticated anti-surveillance equipment he’s got over there?”
“They’re crossing the street,” McLaren said.
Tallerico was at home. They’d watched him answer the door. He’d been upstairs when the two men arrived. He’d flipped on the front hall light, had come downstairs, and had let them in. He’d not come to the door, however, when they’d come back out.
“Did you see Tallerico when those two left?” he asked McLaren.
“No,” his partner said. “They’re definitely heading down Pomander.”
Joyce continued to watch Tallerico’s house. The visitors were gone, so why wasn’t he turning off the hall light and going back upstairs?
“They’re gone,” McLaren said.
“Call it in, Al. I want a runner out here to pick up the film.”
“Did you recognize either of them?”
“Yes and no,” Joyce said. He dialed Tallerico’s secured number with one of the cellular units.
“What are you going to say when he answers?”
“I got a wrong number,” Joyce said, but the telephone rang twenty times before he hung up.
“Nothing?”
“Get Whitman. I want to go in.”
The Russians made no special preparations for the arrival of the Guerin flight from Portland, except that upon landing the aircraft was directed away from the civilian international terminal to the VIP apron and debarking area. Visiting foreign dignitaries were met here where a more positive crowd control was possible. But this morning there was no red carpet, only a half-dozen black limousines for the passengers and two vans for their luggage. Of the Guerin staff the only person other than McGarvey who’d ever been to Russia was Kennedy on a five-day astronaut exchange program at Baikonaur. The others were excited and nervous, except for the dour Soderstrom who had predicted disaster from day one. Vasilanti had insisted the CFO come along to make sure the entire company wasn’t handed over to the Russians.
“There’ll be no danger of that,” he’d assured the old man.
Glancing over at him now, McGarvey could see that he was tense almost to the breaking point. He would be an ideal candidate for an entrapment scheme. He had an abundance of nervous energy and naivete. His turning would be routine. Kennedy would have to be warned. Actually, all of them would have to be warned to keep on their guard and say nothing about the Japanese threat, especially not the Russians’ part in spying on the Japanese for Guerin.
“They’re going to want to start the meetings right away this morning,” McGarvey told Kennedy when they came to a complete stop.
Kennedy was reaching for his bag in the overhead. “We need a couple hours, but I don’t see any reason not to get started this morning before lunch.”
“No,” McGarvey said, and the tone of his voice caught Kennedy’s attention.
“What’s the problem?” Kennedy asked, leaning over the aisle seat next to McGarvey. Boarding stairs were being trundled over, and three men got out of the limousines, one of them Yemlin’s boss, Colonel Lyalin.
“No one got any sleep last night, which puts us at a disadvantage. Their negotiators will be fresh and very good. They’ll know everything there is to know about you, but you’ll know next to nothing about them, except that some of them will be professional negotiators and others will be intelligence officers.”
“What do you suggest?”
“No matter what happens, insist on taking today and tonight off. No negotiations until morning. And for every hour after 8:00 P.M. they want to keep you up eating and drinking, insist on postponing the morning meeting for one hour later than 8:00 A.M.”
“We came here to talk about building a wing factory.”
“We came here to ask them to spy for us,” McGarvey said. “Insist on having a full twenty-fours hours of rest including twelve hours of sleep before you start. Trust me on this one, David.”
Kennedy nodded after a slight hesitation.
“You’re going to have to trust me on something else as well. No matter what I do or say, no matter how odd or even outrageous it seems to you at the time, I don’t want you to react at all. Don’t say a word, don’t make a move, just act as if whatever is happening is completely normal.”
“I don’t understand …”
“You don’t have to, just go along with me no matter what I do.”
Again Kennedy nodded after a slight hesitation. He pulled back, but McGarvey stopped him.
“I may drop out of sight at some point. If they ask you where I am, stonewall it.”
A look of consternation crossed Kennedy’s features. “What the hell are you talking about? For how long? What are we supposed to do when it’s time to go and you’re nowhere to be found?”
“Inform the embassy that I’m overdue, and then go home.”
“What do I tell the Russians?”
McGarvey shook his head. “If I’m gone that long they won’t ask you about me. They’ll know.”
Lieutenant Commander Seiji Kiyoda, dressed in his winter blue uniform and lightweight windbreaker, waited on the ladder below the conning tower hatch for the Samisho to surface. They had entered the Sagami Sea early this morning and were now just a few miles south of the long entrance to Tokyo Bay, the peninsular city of Misaki well off their port bow. A cold front had settled over the area, and meteorology predicted twenty-five- to thirty-knot winds from the northwest, with seas running three to four meters. It would be sloppy until they reached the protection of the bay.
A Klaxon sounded throughout the boat. Kiyoda climbed up the ladder, spun the wheel, and pushed the hatch open on its hydraulically sprung hinges. He lowered his head as a bucket of cold seawater cascaded down on him, and then scrambled outside onto the bridge. His XO, Lieutenant Minori, came up behind him, followed by a communications man. All three of them scanned the horizon for traffic.
The weather was cool, with low dark clouds scudding across from the land, but it felt good to be in the fresh air again. Kiyoda was a dedicated submariner, but he appreciated times like these.
“I have the sea buoy three miles off our starboard bow,” Minori said.
Kiyoda swung his binoculars right, picking it up immediately. “Come right five degrees.”
“Turn right five degrees, yo-so-ro, Kan-cho,” the comms man repeated the order and relayed it below. Their bow came right.
“Secure electric motors, engage diesels ahead one-half.”
The rating relayed the order, and by the time they passed the red sea buoy, its bell clanging erratically in the chop, they were settled on their course and speed. Yokosuka, barely fifteen miles into Tokyo Bay
, was home not only to the MSDF’s Escort Fleet Command and two of its flotillas plus the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force Academy, but to the U.S. Seventh Fleet as well. Since before he’d given the order to shoot at the Russian destroyer, Kiyoda had pondered his reception at home.
Yesterday, after they’d safely made their way to the east coast of Honshu through the treacherous Tsugaru Strait and were making their best speed submerged south, he’d brought the boat to periscope depth, raised the main radio mast, and sent the “patrol terminated” message to flotilla headquarters. The reply had been nothing more than the “message received” code.
In one respect headquarters’s silence was understandable. U.S. and Russian naval intelligence units routinely listened to MSDF traffic. What Flotilla Command had to say to him was properly for Japanese ears only, so it would wait until they docked.
In another respect, however, their silence was ominous. ELINT had detected nothing in the past twenty-four hours. Nor, now that they were this close and running on the surface, had any ship or aircraft come out to meet them as often was the case at the end of a delicate or troubled patrol. Secure communications could have been established with a dipping buoy or light signals.
Kiyoda expected that he would be relieved of his command, so he had made certain that everything he’d said and done during the attack would appear in the log as unilateral decisions that had been opposed by his officers. The blame would rest squarely on his shoulders.
But he’d expected to be met out here, his boat taken away from him before they docked. He was not afraid, just wary.
“Courage,” his sensei taught, “is a virtue only in the cause of righteousness.” In this instance Kiyoda knew that what he’d done was correct not only for himself and his boat, but for Nippon as well. It was honto, fact, that Japan’s time had come again. Chi-jin-yu. Wisdom, benevolence, courage. It was time the world knew these things.
His father and mother were both dead, which was too bad, because they would have been pleased by what happened, and what would undoubtedly happen in the coming months if Kamiya had his way. Which Kiyoda believed the old man would. “It’s our time,” Kiyoda mumbled.
“Did you say something, Kan-cho?” Minori asked respectfully.
Kiyoda smiled wanly. “It’s good to be home.”
“No parades this time, I think,” Minori replied, averting his eyes politely.
“You were obeying the orders of your lawful superior, Ikuo. Do not forget it.”
The XO looked up. “We were with you, Kan-cho.”
“No.”
“I beg your pardon, Kan-cho. I have spoken about this with the other officers, and we all know exactly how you administrated the attack, to insulate us.”
“I forbid this,” Kiyoda said sharply, but inside he was bursting with pride. A magnificent crew such as his could go anywhere, accomplish anything.
“I’m truly sorry, Kan-cho, but we are agreed.”
Kiyoda glanced at the rating who was mutely scanning the horizon with his binoculars. “Listen to me very carefully, Iuko. I forbid you and the other officers to come forward with your demands. No doubt I will be placed under arrest the moment we dock …”
“We will go with you.”
“No, my old friend, you will not. In fact you will remain here with the Samisho and keep the crew intact.”
Minori’s eyes narrowed. “What are you thinking, Kan-cho?”
“I must do this alone, if there’s to be any hope for us to regain the sea. Do you understand this?”
Minori nodded uncertainly.
“If you are assigned another captain you will delay the boat’s departure for as long as possible. The main bearings on number two are dangerously worn, and our weapons, fuel, and consumables all need replenishing.”
A slight smile curled the edges of Minori’s mouth. “It shall be as you order, Kan-cho. If need be this boat will remain in port until Mount Fuji has eroded to sand hills.”
“Well, perhaps not that long,” Kiyoda said, his smile warming. He turned to the rating. “Engines ahead two-thirds.”
“Engines ahead two-thirds, yo-so-ro,” the rating relayed, but then he put a hand over his mouthpiece. “Kan-cho, dono we enlisted men also have spoken of this. Your crew is behind you. There is not one dissenting voice.”
“Very well,” Kiyoda said, his voice wanting to catch in his throat. “I will do everything in my power to deserve your trust.”
Clearing the tip of the peninsula to the west, they suddenly saw the naval vessels docked at Yokosuka in the distance.
“Bridge, ELINT,” Lieutenant Kawara called from below. “I’m picking up a powerful surface search radar.”
Kiyoda took the bridge telephone from the rating. “Who is looking at us?”
“It’s coming from the U.S. side, Kan-cho,” the ELINT officer said. “Seventh Fleet Intelligence. Shall I burn them?”
“No. We shall remain passive. Let them look all they want.” The Samisho was equipped with a newly designed anti-radar weapon that took an incoming radar signal, amplified it, narrowed the beam, and sent it back to the sending station with such force that the receiver burned out.
“Hai, Kan-cho.”
“We’re home and everybody knows it,” Minori said.
“It would appear so,” Kiyoda said, but he was lost in his thoughts for the moment.
The Guerin team, including the flight crew, numbered eighteen men and five women. The entire nineteenth floor of the Rossiya Hotel had been set aside for their exclusive use. More than two hundred people could have slept there, and Topper called it their “splendid isolation.” Having all that room to rattle around in made Kilbourne nervous. And Soderstrom, fearful of listening devices, had difficulty in speaking above a whisper. He felt most comfortable talking in low tones in his bathroom with water running in the tub and sink and the toilet constantly flushing.
“They want the contamination kept to a minimum,” McGarvey explained after lunch. They’d gathered in a corner suite that Kennedy occupied. Everyone was keyed up and nervous.
“If Jeff keeps up his antics, the hotel is going to bill us for excessive water use,” Topper quipped.
“What you’re trying to do just doesn’t work,” McGarvey told the resentful-looking CFO. “If they want to listen to our conversations—which I guarantee they are—there’s nothing we can do about it. At least not with what we brought over. So if you don’t want them to hear something, don’t say it.”
“Hell of a way to play poker, if the other guy is going to know every card in your hand,” Kilbourne grumbled.
McGarvey jotted five words on a yellow legal pad and held it up for all of them to see. IF IT’S IMPORTANT, WRITE IT.
Soderstrom started to say something, but McGarvey held him off, writing out his next instruction. He held it up.
WHEN YOU’RE DONE, BURN THE PAPER AND BURN THREE OR FOUR PAGES BENEATH THE SHEET YOU’VE WRITTEN ON.
“We’ve got nothing to hide,” McGarvey said. “With our union problems in Wichita we need this wing factory. And considering the state of the Russian economy, I don’t see any problem in getting their cooperation.”
Kennedy wrote something and held it up for McGarvey to see. WHAT ABOUT INFO ABOUT THE JAPS ???
“Jeff, what’s the bottom line on financing the wing factory?” Kilbourne asked.
For a second Soderstrom was nonplussed, but then he realized what was going on. “We’re talking nine hundred million, maybe one billion by the time we’re finished here.”
“We’re going to have to sell beaucoup airplanes to recoup that cost,” Topper said.
“We will,” Kennedy said. “But, Mac, what’d you mean they want to keep the contamination to a minimum?”
“Did you spot the Germans and the French in the lobby this morning?”
“I didn’t notice.”
“I think the word might have leaked, somehow, about why we’re here. If the Germans or the French get the opportunity, they’re
going to pitch us. Our hosts would rather that not happen.”
McGarvey wrote on his pad and held it up. THEY’RE SENSITIVE ABOUT THE JAPS NOW.
Kennedy and the others nodded. McGarvey wrote again.
IF OUR QUID PRO QUO BECAME PUBLIC THERE’D BE HELL TO PAY!!!
“Maybe it’d be better if we put the factory in Germany,” Soderstrom suggested with a grin. He was actually starting to enjoy himself.
“Frankly I think the Russians will do a better job,” Kennedy said. “Ukraine was the aircraft manufacturing region for the Soviet Union. Now the Russians have something to prove, and I think they’ll bend over backward to show they’re capable. In fact I think they’ll do just about anything it takes.”
“It’d be profitable for them,” Soderstrom said.
Kennedy held up his note pad. He’d underlined his query: WHAT ABOUT INFO ABOUT THE JAPS???
McGarvey wrote his response and held it up. COLONEL LYALIN SAYS YEMLIN IS IN MOSCOW. WE’LL MEET BEFORE MORNING.
Kennedy reluctantly nodded. It was what they’d come for.
“Speaking of profit, it’ll profit us all if we get some sleep,” Kennedy said. “We’ve got a long day ahead of us.”
It was after 5:00 A.M. before Special Agents McLaren and Joyce made it back to the J. Edgar Hoover Building on Pennsylvania Avenue. They’d managed to secure the crime scene until the Bureau’s forensics team gathered most of what it needed. D.C. police had been brought into the act, and within fifteen minutes of their arrival Volta Place was crawling with newspaper and television reporters. By then the Bureau had slipped away, so the fact that Tallerico had been under federal investigation was still secret.
“We’re going to keep it that way for as long as possible,” Chief Investigating Officer John Whitman told them. He looked like an IBM executive with hair graying at the temples, gold wire-rimmed glasses, and a pinched disapproving expression on his face. But he was a good cop. They met in his small office.
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