Rockets' Red Glare

by Greg Dinallo

  “Pisses me off!” Hilliard exploded. “All these years, these damn heads of state have failed to sell the need for deployment to their people; the very people who put ’em in office to protect ’em! If we hadn’t been deploying all this time, where the hell would they be now?! I’ll tell you where—looking at a stockpile of Russian SS-20s planted throughout Eastern Europe with nothing in the West to force the Soviets to the table. No deterrent—no disarmament. Why is that so hard to understand?”

  Keating shrugged.

  The President shook his head from side to side despairingly and took a moment to settle himself. “Any problems?”

  “A little wrinkle with the Swedes.”

  “Oh?” Hilliard wondered, smoothing his beard.

  “Seems they broke some KGB people who infiltrated their peace movement,” Keating responded. “Organizing rallies, pumping in money, the usual agit-prop stuff. The Swedish government wanted to declare ’em persona non grata, and boot ’em. But we convinced them this is not the time to embarrass Moscow.”

  “Good going. Can’t say I blame them. They’ve had it with Russian subs plying their waters. What else?”

  “Nicholson’s been kicking up a little dust. Nothing major.”

  “Nicholson?” Hilliard responded, surprised. “Christ, sixty, sixty-five percent of his suggestions ended up in our disarmament package. Find me another former chief negotiator who’s had that kind of input in a succeeding administration. What’s his beef?” the President asked, feeling slighted.

  “His book,” Keating replied, smiling.

  “His book?”

  Keating nodded. “I told him I’d mention it to you. Seems it was about to go to press and Boulton’s censors deleted half of it.” Keating let the sentence hang, heightening the President’s curiosity, then added, “For reasons of national security.”

  Hilliard broke up with laughter. “Half of it?” he asked thoroughly amused.

  Keating nodded again, and smiled.

  “Those two have been banana peeling each other’s paths since Nixon was a choirboy,” Hilliard chortled. “Their battles on the golf course alone are—”

  The intercom buzzed, interrupting him. He chuckled to himself and scooped up the phone.

  “Yes?—Send him right in, Cathleen. Thanks.” Hilliard hung up, and said, “Jake.”

  The door to the Oval Office swung open, and Jake Boulton, DCI, popped through it.

  “Mr. President. Phil,” he said rapid-fire.

  “Thanks for coming by, Jake,” Hilliard said. “What can you tell me about this damned Heron?”

  “The SS-16A,” Boulton said crisply.

  “Whatever the hell the numbers are,” the President said impatiently. “The one they supposedly tested and scrapped.”

  “Right,” Boulton said, “the SS-16A. NATO code name Heron after the ornithological species of waterfowl. Initially developed for submarine launch. Design goal—solve chronic, unacceptable guidance system performance.” The data came from Boulton in clipped, high-pitched bursts.

  “What was its problem?” Hilliard asked.

  “Best we can determine—” Boulton began.

  Hilliard and Keating exchanged glances.

  “—the Heron took its namesake too seriously,” Boulton went on. “The bird is a patient, tenacious hunter. It waits unmoving for hours, locks onto prey the instant it appears, and—whammo—the target never gets away.”

  “And the missile?” the President prodded.

  “No powers of discretion,” Boulton replied. “It locked onto everything and anything. Tendency acutely manifested over water where distracting targets are isolated and clearly defined. Ships, rowboats, buoys, metallic debris, a floating beer can, in one instance, even a fellow missile, and whammo!” He made a diving motion with his hand. “Problem magnified as range increased.”

  “So it was never deployed, right?” Hilliard asked.

  “Right. NIE confirms,” Boulton replied smartly.

  “Is that an—absolutely right? Or an—as best we can determine right?” the President jibed.

  This stopped Boulton. He hesitated briefly, feeling suddenly unprepared. “The second, sir,” he replied with diminished fervor, anticipating the President’s reaction.

  “Well, what the hell does that mean, Jake?” Hilliard pressed. “That we have doubts? I mean, how the hell can we start horse-trading with the Russians in Geneva next week if we aren’t positive we know about every system they’ve deployed?”

  The President got up out of his chair, almost charged out of it.

  “The concept of negotiating is based on total, total knowledge of the other side’s arsenal, dammit!” he continued heatedly. “YOU know that, Jake! Geezus, I’ve got Phil here massaging the hell out of the NATO people, convincing them we’re on solid ground; and before he even gets into it, the Germans drop the Heron right in our laps!”

  “Fortunately,” Keating interjected, “it was handled privately, and Pomerantz has agreed to keep it that way until we can get a fix on the facts.”

  “But if we can’t, Jake,” the President said, still charged up, “and she drops that tidbit on the other NATO representatives—” he let the sentence trail off, emphasizing the gravity of the situation. “And who would blame her?” he added. Then lowering his voice but maintaining his intensity, he said, “There’s no way we can back out of the talks now. None. Not after pushing so hard for them. Even a stall would be unacceptable. It’s tightrope time—no matter which way we fall we get screwed.”

  He moved around the desk, and approached Boulton.

  “I want this, Jake. I want it badly,” the President said with obsessive fervor.

  “Yes, sir. I know,” Boulton replied contritely.

  “Good,” Hilliard said. “Now, these talks are going to go on for months. Use the time. Juice your people. Fine tune your antenna. Wind up a couple of dozen more spooks and turn ’em loose. The Heron may be a dead duck, but—as best we can determine, just doesn’t cut it. I want to close the loop on this, Jake. Top of the shopping list!”

  “Our prime KIQ, Mr. President,” Boulton said, smarting, but knowing Hilliard was right. This was a key intelligence requirement if ever there was one.

  He did a crisp about-face and headed for the door.

  “Jake?” Hilliard called out.

  Boulton stopped on a dime and turned. “Sir?”

  “Do me a favor, Jake,” the President said. “Ask your boys to back off Nicholson, will you?”

  “Nicholson?” Boulton broke into a boyishly innocent smile. “I’m not aware of a problem there.”

  “Glad to hear it,” the President said. He knew Boulton’s answer was his way of indicating he’d take care of it, without admitting it was necessary.

  Boulton exited the Oval Office thinking about the round of golf he and Theodor Churcher had played at Eagle Rock a few months earlier. The solid thwack of driver against ball blasted thoughts of The Heron, and Nicholson, from his mind as he pictured his old friend’s perfect swing that the DCI had long envied.

  Churcher had always been a hell of an athlete Boulton recalled—a physical fitness maniac forty years before it had become fashionable. They had run cross-country together at Rice in the late thirties. And it was Churcher who, though totally exhausted and near collapse, would dig down inside himself and prevail through sheer will and determination. They had been close all their adult lives, and Churcher’s disappearance at sea had unsettled the DCI. He blew past the President’s secretary without even a nod.

  The President waited until the door had closed behind the DCI. “I’d say he got the message.”

  Keating nodded.

  “Brief Pomerantz,” the President said. He turned to the window. The face he had drawn earlier on the frosted pane was still visible. He put his fingertip to the glass, and drew a hard, straight line for a mouth. “And make sure she stays zipped.”

  “You realize that directly contradicts your last order,” Keating said with a
lascivious smile.

  The President burned him with a look. “Dammit, Phil!” he replied. “This is no time for jokes. The whole thing could blow up in our faces. And there’s too much at stake to let that happen!”

  Keating nodded contritely, and left.

  The President angrily spun his chair and strode from the office. He had a half hour before a National Security meeting, and he knew just how he’d spend it.

  “Arlington, sir?” Cathleen asked, sensing his mood.

  Hilliard nodded tensely.

  Cathleen called the White House garage.

  The President had lost his temper, and it bothered him—not because he’d blasted Keating unjustly, but because whenever the frustrations became that overwhelming, Jim Hilliard knew he’d lost his perspective. A walk through the National Cemetery always helped him regain it.

  A light rain was falling as the stretched Lincoln proceeded up Memorial Drive.

  President Hilliard got out and, declining raincoat and umbrella, walked alone amidst the identical limestone slabs that marched over the undulating terrain to every horizon.

  Secret Service personnel followed on foot, maintaining a respectful distance.

  The President paused solemnly at one of the water-stained headstones, and bent to straighten the small bouquet of violets that lay beneath the inscription which read:

  JANET DAVIDSON HILLIARD

  Janet Hilliard had never served in the military, but she had died in the service of her country.

  And these were the times the President missed her most—when he needed to confide his fears and cope with his frustrations. And at these times, he would relive that tragic day in Chicago.

  The Hilliards had just arrived in his hometown to kick off the campaign for his second term. Jim Hilliard was an extremely popular president. But the latest national polls had shown an unexpected surge for his opponent. And the President and his wife found the tumultuous crowds at O’Hare heartening.

  They were acknowledging the cheers when the Secret Service agent saw the swift movement in the crowd, the sudden thrust of hands forward, and the deadly glint of blued metal. He dove at the President, knocking him to the ground an instant before the first sharp crack.

  Janet Hilliard was standing directly behind her husband. The action that saved his life exposed her to the assassin’s fire. Not for long. Perhaps an eyeblink or two passed before another Secret Service agent had bear hugged her to the ground. But the pistol had kept firing throughout that immeasurable interlude. And Janet Hilliard had been mortally wounded.

  The President won the close election that followed.

  And voices on the Hill soon began whispering that the tragedy, not his record, was his edge.

  The President didn’t like it; but he was enough of a realist to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, they were right. And he privately dedicated his second term to his wife’s memory, and made arms control his number one priority so that nations wouldn’t one day do to each other what a crazed American did to Janet Hilliard. Nuclear disarmament was to be her legacy, not his, and it was being endangered.

  * * * * * *

  Chapter Seventeen

  On an autopsy table in Forensic Center, the Harris County coroner’s offices on Old Spanish Trail near the Astrodome, a man’s hand, the skin bleached to an opalescent gray, stuck out from beneath a shroud. The highly reflective surfaces intensified the light, which placed an eerie, surrealistic emphasis on details.

  The time was 11:22 A.M., Sunday.

  Doctor Tom Almquist, M.E., observed as a Houston Police Department fingerprint specialist took the hand and rolled each of the swollen fingers first across an inked pad, then across a preprinted record card.

  When finished, he studied the prints, and nodded to Almquist, pleased. “Better than I expected. A couple of them are real clean. Floaters can be a bitch.”

  The officer packed his equipment and left, taking the prints with him.

  Almquist, a rotund black man with a bushy moustache and patient eyes, thought for a moment, then pulled the green shroud from the table and set it aside. A lower left arm, severed just below the elbow, was all that lay on the cold stainless top. Almquist hovered above the limb, studying the ragged stump.

  Shredded tissue, ligaments, tendons, muscle, and blood vessels mushroomed around the crudely snapped radius and ulna bones of the forearm.

  Almquist tore the wrapper from a disposable scalpel and leaned to the table. He placed the laser-honed blade on the inside of the forearm and pulled it the entire length, continuing down the wrist, palm, and center of the middle finger to the tip, splaying the tissue. Then, carefully excising the flexor carpi and the extending sheath of muscles beneath, he revealed the radial artery, and went about removing it and the branching digital vessels of the hand and finger—a lengthy, tedious process.

  Almquist spent the afternoon completing the procedure and running laboratory tests on the tissue sections and blood samples he’d prepared for analysis.

  One result had surprised and baffled him. He ran the test again with the same result, which prompted him to call Houston Chief of Police Hedley Coughlan.

  Now, Coughlan, a well-groomed man in a knife-creased suit, was rapping a knuckle on the glass partition to get Almquist’s attention.

  Almquist pulled the green shroud over his work and, peeling off his surgical gloves, entered an anteroom joining Coughlan, Andrew Churcher, and Ed McKendrick.

  While Coughlan made the introductions, Andrew fought a fast-rising nausea brought on by the odor of cold flesh, chemical disinfectant, and death that had followed Almquist into the room—an odor that Andrew Churcher would never forget.

  Coughlan noticed, and wrapped an arm around the young man’s shoulders. “You all right, son?” he asked compassionately.

  Andrew nodded and swallowed hard.

  “I’m real sorry about this,” Coughlan continued in a paternal tone. “Your father and I—well, you know how close we were, Drew. What-ever I can do.”

  “Thanks,” Andrew said, regaining his composure. “Do we know what happened, Hed?” he asked.

  Coughlan lifted a shoulder in a half shrug.

  “We do and we don’t,” he replied. “At first, we figured his chopper went into the drink, but now—”

  “Wait a minute,” McKendrick interrupted. He was glad Andrew had asked the question; he didn’t want to appear overly concerned with how Churcher had died, but it was important he know. “You have Mr. Churcher’s corpse out there, but don’t know what happened to him?”

  Almquist and Coughlan exchanged uneasy looks.

  Coughlan sucked it up. “We have a—piece of him,” he said. “A small piece. Part of an arm.”

  When he called Andrew earlier, Coughlan said there had been a development, but avoided the details. These weren’t the kind he covered on the phone.

  McKendrick winced at Coughlan’s answer.

  Andrew felt bile rising in the back of his throat.

  Coughlan pressed on, to get past the moment. “Way it lays out,” he began in as professional a tone as he could muster, “yesterday afternoon, on a beach in Louisiana, some kids spotted an arm floating in the surf and notified authorities. The Louisiana State Police fished out that severed limb. There was a watch still in place on the wrist. Turned out to be a Rolex.”

  Coughlan produced a plastic evidence bag, opened it, and removed the watch.

  “As you may know,” he resumed, “Rolex watches are collector’s items. Each has a registration number with the name of the owner on file. The LSP contacted the Rolex corporation, and were informed"—Coughlan paused, and grasped an evidence tag affixed to the watch—“that number 28900371 was registered to one Theodor Scoville Churcher of Houston, Texas. That’s when they called us.”

  Andrew stared at the precisely machined luxury timepiece Coughlan held. It was his father distilled to his essence, he thought.

  “We had the limb and watch airfreighted in this morning,” Coughlan resu
med. “Checked fingerprints first thing, just to be certain. A match beyond any doubt,” he added emphatically. “Then, Tom began his work-up. That’s when the flags started popping.”

  “We’re looking at a number of confusing discoveries here,” Almquist said, taking over. “The dismemberment for one. It could’ve happened in a crash. That’s what we thought after talking to the LSP. But this isn’t the pathology we usually see. Impact dismemberment most often occurs at joints, not between them as in this case. Shark attack’s a possibility. Boat propeller’s a third. We think he might have been alive when it happened because very little blood remained in the limb. In a corpse, it would’ve been congealed, and not spilled from veins and arteries so readily. Nevertheless, the pressure of the watchband around the wrist trapped enough blood in the vessels of the hand for me to run some tests.”

  Almquist paused, and turned to a table behind him to get something.

  Andrew was feeling detached, almost as if he was standing outside himself watching through the glass of the anteroom. He had heard Almquist’s and Coughlan’s words, and had formed appropriately bizarre images in his mind. But the full force of their meaning had yet to register.

  Almquist turned back to the three men with a printout he’d slipped from a file on the table.

  “This is a computer-generated profile of blood gases,” he resumed. “This line here represents nitrogen—an unusually high percentage of nitrogen. And that’s what really puzzles me. The only way this happens is via—”

  “Rapid underwater ascent from great depth,” McKendrick interjected. “I dive,” he added in explanation.

  Almquist nodded. “Right. Commonly called ‘the bends.’ This percentage isn’t necessarily fatal, but there’s no other explanation for its presence. I treated a number of cases in the Navy during the war—mostly frogmen in trouble who came up too fast.”

  “Doesn’t make sense,” McKendrick said.

  “I agree,” Almquist replied. “I’m just telling you what I found.”

  “We were hoping one of you might shed some light on it,” Chief Coughlan said. “Any idea what your father was doing out there that might have put him a couple of hundred feet beneath the surface?”