“I have my plate full reviewing current personnel,” she said. “Talking to a former employee about another former employee is not at the top of my to-do list. Do we have an understanding or not? I have a lot to do.”
“Of course we do,” Rodgers said. The security of the rocket had to come first. “But I can help them.”
“I believe that is why the messenger is there—”
“Would you leave this up to him?” Rodgers asked suddenly.
“No,” she answered.
General Carrie hung up. Rodgers closed the phone and slowly tucked it in his pocket. He had a hand on the white porcelain sink. His fingertips were white. He had not realized how tightly he was squeezing the rim. He released it and flexed his fingers. He glanced at the door. He thought he saw a shadow move on the highly polished parquet floor. Rodgers did not know if the marine had been listening. Nor did it matter. There was nothing to hear. Rodgers considered calling Hood to try to rescind their agreement. But he had probably already told the prime minister. In any case, Rodgers was unsure of his own motives. At this moment he did not know whether he wanted to protect the rocket or whether he wanted to go just to shout a big “screw you” at General Carrie. He turned off the shower and went back into the room. Rodgers stood beside the TV, facing the marine. The former general’s eyes were on the floor.
“Is everything all right, sir?” the marine asked.
Not entirely, Rodgers decided. He wanted to be there to look after the Unexus payload, and he wanted to teach Carrie manners. He understood her protectiveness but not her intransigence. Military protocol gave leeway for civilian involvement. At Op-Center he had often worked with outsiders on missions. In Vietnam, he had helped to recruit them as guides. Even though Rodgers no longer wore the uniform of his country, he had served it with his life and his blood, his mind and his soul, for decades. He deserved better than Carrie’s cool dismissal.
What was worse, he needed a place to put the increasing anger he felt about it. But that was not this marine’s problem.
“Let me go over the data with you,” Rodgers said.
“Yes, sir.”
“And let me ask you something,” Rodgers said. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-six, sir.”
“I was a soldier for more years than that.”
“I know, sir.”
“They gave you a file on me?”
“Yes, sir,” the marine said.
“What was your impression?”
“Sir, it’s not my place—”
“I asked,” Rodgers said.
“Sir, I’m humbled by your question,” the young marine replied. “If I serve half as well as you did, I will consider my life very well spent.”
That was a surprise. “You’re not just blowing sunshine?”
“I took your request as if it were an order, General. May I add, sir, that for someone who wasn’t a marine, you surely kicked some tail.”
Rodgers could not help but smile at that. He felt the sword leave his hand. It was not yet sheathed, but he did not feel the need to lop heads.
“Are you sure you wouldn’t like some food, a beverage?” Rodgers asked.
“Thank you, no.”
“Then let’s go to my command center,” Rodgers said, patting him on the shoulder as they walked to the papers that lay on the bed and floor.
FORTY
Washington, D.C. Wednesday, 12:00 P.M.
Liz Gordon left General Carrie’s office to check her E-mail and her voice mail. She had her PowerBook under one arm and her coffee mug in the other hand. Between them was a heart that was drumming just a little more than she would have liked, and a shortness of breath that alarmed her.
Liz did not know whether the cause of her anxiety was the topic of her own employment or something else. Liz knew that she would have to undergo the same kind of scrutiny the others were getting. What the psychologist did not know was whether she would be part of that selfevaluation process or not. It would be interesting to see how the general handled that.
Interesting and possibly humiliating, she thought.
Liz had never seen her own dossier. The file was only available to the director of the NCMC and to the head of Human Resources. But Liz knew one thing that had to be there. Because of the potential one-strike nature of the offense, Paul Hood would have been obligated to record it.
Liz swung into her sparse office. The safe, familiar surroundings allowed her to relax a little. Liz did not have, nor require, nor want a human assistant. The Chips Family did everything for her. That was how she anthropomorphized her computers. Her former roommate, an artist, drew little Post-it faces for her to affix to her office equipment. The blue pen drawings were the various foodlike avatars of the microprocessor. Potato Chip stored her audio messages, Corn Chip stored her E-mails, Paint Chip managed her calendar, and the infamous Buffalo Chip held sway over her personnel files. Blue Chip kept track of her budget here, which was easy. Except for occasional outside consultants, there was no budget beyond her salary. Black ops files, including profiles of foreign and domestic leaders, were the province of Chocolate Chip. Those files were comaintained by her and Bob Herbert.
The Chip Family did their work without prompting and without taking time off. They even replied with a variety of messages, spoken and typed, when Liz was away from her desk.
For a psychologist it was a mixed blessing. There were never any disputes, just an occasional ailment that Matt Stoll and his team could easily repair. But there was also no human interaction, no laboratory experiment she could follow day after day. When she was a student coming to terms with her own nontraditional life, Liz would turn outward and watch others as if they were a living soap opera. The drama was satisfying, and her prediction rate for how people would react and how situations would evolve was exceptionally high.
Liz would be returning to General Carrie’s office for a working lunch. She was happy for this respite, not because she needed a break from the profiling and reviews, but because she needed more coffee and her nicotine gum.
She also needed a short break from Morgan Carrie. Thinking about the general caused her breath to shorten again. And this time it had nothing to do with whatever was in Liz’s dossier.
Damn that, she thought.
The thirty-five-year-old woman put the PowerBook and mug on the desk and plopped into her swivel chair. She landed harder than she expected and nearly fell backwards. Her arms shot out in front of her.
Balance, the woman thought as she sat up. She pulled a square of gum from its wrapper and pushed it into her mouth. She did not have equilibrium at the moment. She took a breath, brushed curly brown hair from her forehead, and tried to distract herself by scanning her E-mail. The words flashed by without registering. Her heart began to speed again.
The general was an impressive woman. After Paul Hood and his dull consensus management style, Carrie’s ability to make a strong decision, whether informed or intuitive, was refreshing.
Is that all it is? Liz asked. Refreshing?
Liz stopped going through the E-mail. She would only have to do it again later. She poured black coffee from the pot behind her. The morning brew was bitter. She did not care. She winced as she took a sip, then resumed chewing her nicotine gum. Feeding one habit while crushing another.
Shit, Liz thought angrily. Her life made no sense. She had ended one relationship because it was too much to handle. Now her imagination was flashdancing into another that would never be. And even if it could, it would be a professional disaster. As a psychologist, she knew she was being reckless. Unfortunately, she was also a human being. Understanding the problem and being able to do something about it were very different things.
Liz grabbed her mug and went back to the general’s office. The only way through this was straight ahead. She once had a fast crush on a teacher at college. She would deal with this as she dealt with that: as long as she did not think about anything but her job, she should be all right.
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Bugs had sent out for sandwiches. Liz sat back down and opened her egg salad. Carrie had selected roast beef. Liz’s heart had slowed, but not much. The general was looking at the computer monitor when Liz arrived. Liz poked her gum on the edge of the wrapper before she ate.
“There is only one person we have not talked about,” Carrie said.
“I know,” Liz said. Her heart was at maximum. She felt exposed, not just because of whatever Hood had written but where the questions might lead. She had to trust that Carrie would recognize and respect the boundary between the professional and the personal.
“Paul Hood had very little to say about you,” Carrie pointed out.
“As I said, Paul did not think much about what I had to contribute,” Liz replied. But “very little” was not “nothing.” The psychologist was anxious as she waited for what had to be coming.
“He does mention a conflict between you and the late Martha Mackall,” Carrie said.
There it is, she thought with an anxiety that settled in the small of her back. “What did Paul say?”
“That Ms. Mackall formally requested you and she attend separate briefings,” Carrie said. “She rescinded the request the same day.”
“There was a little accidental tension between us.”
“Paul wrote that Ms. Mackall initially found your presence a ‘complete and irreconcilable distraction,’ ” the general replied. “Those are strong words for a little accident.”
“Martha was a strong woman.”
“Paul writes that he denied her request, which resulted in her withdrawing it,” Carrie said. She looked at Liz. “Do you want to tell me what that was about? It’s your call.”
“I believe in full disclosure,” Liz said. She set her sandwich down and hunched forward. “Martha was convinced that I had made an amorous advance toward her.” The word amorous snagged in her throat, a lump of truth she could not easily get around.
“Did you?”
“No. But there was a moment, General—it was stupid, I admit,” Liz said, “and it was completely inadvertent. We were all about to go upstairs to Andrews to greet Striker’s plane from North Korea. Martha and I had been working very closely for—Christ, it was about thirty-six hours straight. What happened was that I forgot myself. I blanked, literally. There was a woman standing next to me, I was tired, and I thought she was my roommate. I put my arm around her waist and pulled her toward me the way I do—did—with Monica. Martha freaked.”
“Did you explain?”
“Of course, and I apologized. But we were with Bob and Darrell and others, and Martha was very image conscious.”
“Was Paul there?”
“No. She went to him when we got back. Paul smoothed it over, but Martha still wanted it recorded as a one-strike situation. Paul refused.”
“Kind of him. He could have used it to close down your position.”
“I know. I always appreciated that,” Liz said.
“But I understand Martha’s point of view, too,” Carrie acknowledged. “Her complaint was her form of cover your ass. The glass ceiling for women is tough enough. For gay women, it’s worse.”
“Yes,” Liz said. She wanted desperately to ask how Carrie knew that. Maybe another time.
Carrie closed the file and took a bite of sandwich. “Okay. HR says there has been no change in your personnel file for seven months.”
“Correct.”
“That was when you changed your insurance form from a domestic partnership to a single.”
“Right,” Liz replied quietly. The alarm in her back was now a small tickle.
“In other dossiers you remark on the impact of marriages and divorces—extensively in the case of Paul Hood. But there is nothing about yourself.”
“There was nothing to say.”
“Nothing that would affect your work, the way you wrote about Paul’s divorce or Darrell’s marriage?”
“No.”
Carrie regarded her. She chewed slowly, her mouth closed, her jaw making strong, purposeful motions. It seemed connected to the general’s thought process, as if she were mulling something over.
“All right,” Carrie said. She clicked the file shut.
That’s it? Compared to the scrutiny the others had received, Liz felt she was getting off easy.
“Are you sure you’re all right with this?” Liz asked as her heart slowed.
“I wouldn’t have said so if I weren’t,” Carrie assured her. “Are you?”
“Sure,” Liz said.
“If you’re concerned, I do not think there was anything wrong with what you did. In fact, I am a bit resentful that it is in your file at all. If you had put your arm around Lowell or Matt, no one would have mentioned it.”
Liz appreciated the support, though it missed the point. She would not have put her arm around any man by accident.
It also did not change the fact that there was something about General Carrie that Liz found very appealing. The confidence was a large part of that. Monica Sheard had been an extremely insecure, anxious woman. Liz had been drawn to her talent and her sensitivity, but the artist’s low self-esteem and jealousy drove them apart. Since the breakup, Liz had not dated and, like Hood and Herbert, had spent most of her time at Op-Center. She had once remarked, not in jest, that the intelligence community would benefit if it were comprised entirely of people who had lost their significant others.
Carrie shifted the subject to the second tier of workers, men like Bugs Benet and Kevin Custer in Elec-Comm. Part of Carrie’s goal was to find individuals who could multitask in a crisis, such as the EMP bomb attack on Op-Center. Liz’s profiles of the team during that crisis were a valuable guide for Carrie. Former serviceman and MIT graduate Custer—a distant relative of General George Armstrong Custer, through the general’s brother Nevin—seemed in particular to catch and hold Carrie’s eye.
The palpitations and self-imposed pressure waned as the day grew older. Carrie and Liz hit a comfortable groove that gave her a good feeling about her future here, and also the future of the NCMC.
It also allowed Liz to focus on professional matters instead of personal issues.
For now, anyway.
FORTY-ONE
Beijing, China Wednesday, 12:33 A.M.
In Chou Shin’s business, two days was a long time.
The head of the Guoanbu lay on the thin cot in the situation room. He was dressed in a silk robe, a fan blowing on his desk. For the second night in a row he did not go home to his wife, their daughter and son-in-law, and their grandchild. Chou Shin missed the little one. He missed the boy’s innocent eyes and gracious smile. He even missed the sincerity of his tears.
His world had been flat and silent since the explosion at the Taipei nightclub. There had been no response to the blast from General Tam Li. The absolute silence alarmed Chou Shin even more than the odd intelligence reports he was receiving about unusual troop allocations along the eastern coast. Surely Tam Li had more than the Durban counterattack prepared. The general had allies in the military, men who would do anything for a price and do it quickly. And he was not the sort of man to back down or allow an insult to go unanswered.
Perhaps Tam Li was waiting for a shot at the enemy himself. That was why Chou Shin did not want to go home. If he were to be the next target, Chou Shin did not want his family to be hurt. He did not think Tam Li would attack his family directly. That would be dishonorable.
The intelligence officer looked at his watch. In less than twelve hours he would be in Xichang alongside General Tam Li and the prime minister. Maybe the general was waiting until after the launch. A successful mission would elevate Tam Li in the eyes of the military. Perhaps he was holding out for retaliation that was less dramatic but far more effective: a high political post.
No doubt it would be the position Chou Shin wanted for himself, the prime ministership. An effective prime minister ran the country. While the president and vice president were concerned with foreign affairs, the
prime minister could make deals with ministers and representatives. He could control banking, communications, utilities, even the military. With his access to information, Chou Shin could woo or blackmail anyone he wanted—provided he had a clear path to a new job. Otherwise, he was just a wooing, blackmailing intelligence chief. That was something that would appeal to Tam Li but not to Chou Shin. The director of the Guoanbu wanted power for Communist China, not for himself.
Chou Shin was outraged that he should have to fight for that. The battle was fought decades before, and won. Tam Li was a traitor.
There were two things Chou Shin did not do well. One of them was to operate in an intelligence vacuum. Information about everyone and everything was out there. If the data were not in his possession, there was something he or his people were doing wrong. The other thing Chou Shin did not do well was wait. The two attacks he had organized were designed to spur an instant overreaction from Tam Li. He did not understand why that had not happened. For Chou Shin that was a double failure: an intelligence vacuum and having to wait.
The intelligence officer rose from the cot. He lit a cigarette and paced the bare tile floor of the basement office. An aide had once warned Chou Shin that this was a dangerous place, a room with just one way out. That was all right with the director. It also had just one way in. He had several handguns and automatic weapons in a locker at the head of the bed, along with a gas mask and rations for five days. It would be difficult for anyone to get to him through the iron door.
It was a spartan room, with bare walls painted green and just a few hanging lightbulbs. There were no electronics down here, and the furniture was sparse. It was a place where strategy and intelligence could be discussed in absolute secrecy. Hiding a bug or Web camera in here would be virtually impossible. Only Chou Shin and two trusted aides had access to the room. During the heyday of Mao Tse-tung, the basement was an interrogation room used to “reorient” dissidents. Their broken spirits gave the place a spiritual character the director could feel. Now and then Chou Shin would take a sketch pad and charcoal from the desk and draw. He sketched images in his mind, odd shapes or scratched shadows that were the outlines of shapes. Sometimes he would look at them and try to figure out what they were, as though they were windows to his subconscious. They were like inkblots to him. And it was only fitting. Others had been interrogated here. Why not himself?
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