by Tom Clancy
“He’s definitely not here,” she said.
Battat squatted behind her and looked into the mirror. Odette wondered if the feverish man had really seen anyone or if he had been hallucinating.
“Wait a second,” Battat said. “Move the mirror so we can see the head of the bed.”
Odette did as he asked. The drapes were moving there. It looked as if they were being stirred by a gentle wind.
“The window’s open,” Odette said.
Battat rose. He entered the room cautiously and looked around. “Damn.”
“What?” Odette asked as she stood.
“There’s a rope under the drape,” he said and started toward it. “The bastard climbed—”
Suddenly, Battat turned and hurried back into the bathroom.
“Down!” he shouted and shoved Odette roughly to the floor. He dove down beside her, next to the fiberglass bathtub. Quickly, he pulled her jacket over their heads and lay beside her, his arm across her back.
A moment later, the hotel room was lit by a yellow red flare. There was a whooshing sound as the air became superheated. The flare died after a moment, leaving a sickly sweet smell mixed with the stench of burning fabric and carpet. The room smoke detector was squealing.
Odette whipped her jacket from them and knelt. “What happened?” she shouted.
“There was a TIC on the desk!” Battat yelled.
“A what?”
“A TIC,” Battat said as he jumped to his feet. “Terrorist in a can. Come on — we’ve got to get out of here!”
Battat helped Odette up. She grabbed her jacket and the two of them swung into the hallway. Battat shut the door and staggered over to room 312. He was obviously having difficulty staying on his feet.
“What’s a terrorist in a can?” Odette asked.
“Napalm with a benzene chaser,” Battat said. “It looks like shaving cream and doesn’t register on airport X-ray machines. All you have to do is twist the cap to set the timer, and blam.” The main fire alarm began to clang behind them. “Give me the master key,” he said as they reached 312.
Odette handed it over.
Battat opened the door. Smoke was already spilling through the door that connected the room to 310. Battat hurried past it and ran to the window. The heavy drapes were open. He edged toward the window, standing back just enough so that he could see out but not be seen from below. Odette stepped up behind him. Battat had to lean against the wall to keep from falling. They looked out at the empty parking lot.
“There,” Battat said, pointing.
Odette moved closer. She looked out.
“Do you see him?” Battat asked. “In the white shirt, blue jeans, carrying a black backpack.”
“I see him,” Odette replied.
“That’s the man I saw in the room,” Battat said.
So that’s the Harpooner, she thought. The monster cut an unimposing figure as he walked unhurriedly from the hotel. But his easygoing manner only made him seem even more noxious. People might be dying in the fire he set to cover his escape. Yet he did not care. Odette wished she could shoot him from here.
“He’s probably going to keep moving slowly so he won’t attract attention,” Battat told her. He gave the gun back to her. He was panting, having trouble standing. “You’ve got enough time to catch up to him and take him out.”
“What about you?”
“I’d only slow you down,” he said.
She hesitated. An hour ago, she had not wanted him to be part of this. Now she felt as if she was deserting him.
“You’re wasting time,” Battat said. He gave her a gentle push and started toward the door. “Just go. I’ll get to the stairwell and make my way back to the embassy. I’ll see if I can do anything from there.”
“All right,” she said, then turned and hurried toward the door.
“He’ll be armed!” Battat yelled after her. “Don’t hesitate!”
She acknowledged with a wave as she left the room.
The hallway was filling with smoke. The few guests who had been in their rooms were filing into the hallway to see what was happening. Housekeeping staff and security personnel were beginning to arrive. They were helping everyone toward the stairwell.
Odette told one of the security men that someone needed help in 312. Then she rushed ahead to the stairwell.
In less than a minute, she was in the street. The parking lot was on the other side of the building. She ran toward it.
The Harpooner was gone.
FIFTY-TWO
Washington, D.C.
Tuesday, 3:13 A.M.
Paul Hood returned to the Cabinet Room and shut the door. He took a calming breath. The room smelled of coffee. He was glad. It covered the stink of treason. Then he took out his Palm Pilot, looked up a number, and went to the phone to enter it. This was not something that Hood wanted to do. It was something he had to do. It was the only way he could think of to prevent what was effectively shaping up as a coup d’état
The phone was answered right after the second ring. “Hello?” said the voice on the other end.
“Megan, it’s Paul Hood.”
“Paul, where are you?” asked the First Lady. “I’ve been worried—”
“I’m in the Cabinet Room,” he said. “Megan, listen. Fenwick is definitely involved in a conspiracy of some kind. My feeling is that he, Gable, and whoever else is in this have been trying to gaslight the president.”
“Why would anyone want to make my husband think he’s lost his mind?” she asked.
“Because they’ve also set in motion a confrontation with Iran and Russia in the Caspian Sea,” Hood told her. “If they can convince the president or the public that he’s not equipped to handle the showdown, he’ll have to resign. Then the new president will either escalate the war or, more likely, he’ll end it. That will win him points with the people and with Iran. Maybe then we’ll all divide up the oil wells that used to belong to Azerbaijan.”
“Paul, that’s monstrous,” Megan said. “Is the vice president involved with this?”
“Possibly,” Hood said.
“And they expect to get away with it?”
“Megan, they are very close to getting away with it,” Hood informed her. “The Caspian situation is revving up, and they’ve moved the strategy sessions from the Oval Office to the Situation Room. I don’t have security clearance to go down there.”
“I’ll phone Michael on the private number and ask him to see you,” Megan told him.
“That won’t be enough,” Hood said. “I need you to do something else.”
Megan asked him what that was. Hood told her.
“I’ll do it,” she said when he was finished. “Give me five minutes.”
Hood thanked her and hung up.
What Hood had proposed was a potentially dangerous tactic for him and for the First Lady. And under the best of circumstances, it was not going to be pleasant. But it was necessary.
Hood looked around the room.
This was not like rescuing his daughter. That had been instinctive. He had to act if she were to survive. There had been no choice.
This was different.
Hood tried to imagine the decisions that had been made in this room over the centuries. Decisions about war, about depressions, about human rights, about foreign policy. Every one of them had affected history in some way, large or small. But more important than that, whether they were right or wrong, all of them had required a commitment. Someone had to believe they were making the proper decision. They had to risk anything from a career or national security to the lives of millions on that belief.
Hood was about to do that. He was about to do both, in fact. But there was a proverb that used to hang in the high school classroom where Hood’s father taught civics. It was appropriate now:
“The first faults are theirs that commit them. The second theirs that permit them.”
As Hood turned and left the Cabinet Room, he did not feel the wei
ght of the decision he made. Nor did he feel the danger it represented.
He felt only the privilege of being able to serve his country.
FIFTY-THREE
Baku, Azerbaijan
Tuesday, 11:15 A.M.
It had been a long time since Maurice Charles had to make a sudden retreat from a safe site. It infuriated him to run from a place he had carefully prepared. But it infuriated him even more to run from anyone or anything. It did not even matter to him at the moment how someone had found out where he was. From their accents, the intruders were Russian and American. Perhaps Moscow and Washington had been tracking him without him knowing it. Perhaps he had slipped up somewhere. Or maybe one of his associates had made a mistake.
But Charles did not believe the couple had been there by accident. For one thing, he had taken both of the keys to room 310 when he checked in. The front desk did not have a third key to give out. When the click of the bolt being opened woke him up, he knew something was not right. For another thing, Charles had watched the woman’s feet, listened to her speak as she came in. Everything about her entrance was tentative. If she truly thought this were her room, she would have strode in and turned on the light. Women were always eager to prove things when they believed they were correct.
Yet, as angry as Charles was, he refused to give in to his rage. The immediate task was to cover his tracks so he could get away. That meant eliminating the couple who had come to his room. He had not considered calling the assassins he had used the night before. He did not want it to be known that he had run into trouble. That would be bad for his reputation and bad for business.
He had gotten a good look at the couple’s feet and pants. That would be enough to identify them. He had his gun and his knife. They would not survive the morning.
Charles had walked halfway into the parking lot before turning around. If the couple were looking out a window to find him, he wanted them to see him. He wanted them to come rushing downstairs to stop him from getting away. That would make them easier to spot. It would also tell him whether or not they had backup. If they had called for help, cars or other personnel would converge on the parking lot within moments. If that did not happen, he could dispatch them and then get out of the city by train as he had planned.
After giving the couple a chance to see him, Charles doubled back to the hotel. He entered by the side door, which led past a row of shops. There were fire sirens approaching the hotel but no police sirens. No other cars came speeding into the lot. That did not mean Charles was home free. But it did suggest that the man and woman had been acting without immediate backup near or on site. Losing himself in a crowd that was fleeing a fire should be easy. First, however, he had to finish his business with the intruders.
FIFTY-FOUR
Washington, D.C.
Tuesday, 3:17 A.M.
During the administration of Harry Truman, the White House was virtually gutted and rebuilt due to the weakened condition of its centuries-old wooden beams and interior walls. The Trumans moved across the street to Blair House and, from 1948 to 1952, new foundations were laid and the decaying wooden struts were replaced by steel girders. A basement was also excavated, ostensibly to provide more storage space. In fact, it was created to provide safe areas for the president and members of his staff and family in the event of nuclear attack. Over the years, the basement was secretly expanded to include offices, command headquarters, medical facilities, surveillance posts, and recreational areas. It is now comprised of four levels that go down over two hundred feet.
All four basement levels are only accessible by a pair of elevators. These are located in both the East and West Wings. The West Wing elevator is located a short distance west of the president’s private dining room, in a corner that is halfway between the Oval Office and the vice president’s office. The carriage is small and wood-paneled and holds six people comfortably. Access to the elevator is gained by thumbprint identification. There is a small green monitor to the right of the door for this purpose. Since the White House recreation areas are down there, all the members of the First Family have access to the elevator.
Hood went to the vice president’s office and waited outside. Because the vice president was at the White House, there was a secret service agent standing a little farther along the corridor. The vice president’s office was close to the State Dining Room, where the original White House meets the newer, century-old West Wing.
Hood was there less than a minute when Megan Lawrence arrived. The First Lady was dressed in a medium-length white skirt and a red blouse with a blue scarf. She was wearing very little makeup. Her fair skin made her silver hair seem darker.
The secret service agent wished the First Lady a good morning as she passed. Megan smiled back at the young man and then continued on. She embraced Hood warmly.
“Thank you for coming down,” Hood said.
Megan put her arm through his and turned toward the elevator. That gave her a reason to stand close to Hood and talk quietly. The secret service man was behind them.
“How are you going to handle this?” she asked.
“It’s going to be a tough, uphill fight,” Hood admitted. “Back in the Oval Office, the president was very focused. If your husband has had doubts about his ability to function, then what Fenwick and the others have given him is the perfect remedy. A crisis. They couldn’t have planned it better. The president seemed to be putting a lot of trust in what Fenwick was telling him. He needed to. It was helping him get his confidence back.”
“So you said,” the First Lady remarked. “And they’re all lies.”
“I’m certain of it,” Hood assured her. “The problem is, I don’t have hard evidence.”
“Then what makes you so sure they are lies?” the First Lady asked.
“I called Fenwick’s bluff when we were alone in the Cabinet Room,” Hood said. “I told him we had the terrorist who orchestrated the situation overseas. I told him the terrorist is going to tell us who he was working for. Meaning Fenwick. Fenwick told me I’ll never get the information to the president.”
They reached the elevator. Megan gently put her thumb on the screen. There was a faint hum behind it.
“Fenwick will deny he ever threatened you,” she pointed out.
“Of course he will,” Hood said. “That’s why I need you to get the president away from the meeting. Tell him you need to see him for five minutes. If I did that, Fenwick and his people would chew me up. But they’ll be very reluctant to attack you. That would turn the president against them.”
“All right,” Megan replied. The door slid open. The First Lady and Hood stepped in. She pressed button S1—Sublevel One. The door closed, and the elevator began to move.
“There’s a guard downstairs,” Megan said. “He’s going to have to call ahead. I don’t have access to the Situation Room.”
“I know,” Hood replied. “Hopefully, someone other than Fenwick or Gable will answer the phone.”
“What if I, can only get my husband alone? Just the two of us,” Megan asked. “I get his attention. Then what?”
“Tell him what you’ve noticed over the past few weeks,” Hood said. “Talk to him honestly about what we’re afraid of, that Fenwick has been manipulating him. Buy me time, even if it’s only two or three hours. I need that to get the evidence to stop a war.”
The elevator stopped. The door opened. Outside was a brightly lit corridor. The walls were white and lined with paintings of American military officers and famous battles from the Revolution to the present. The Situation Room was located at the end of the corridor behind two black double doors.
A young, blond, fresh-faced marine guard was seated at a desk to the right of the elevator. There was a telephone, a computer, and a lamp on the desk. On a metal stand to his left were several security monitors.
The guard rose and looked from Hood to Megan. “Good morning, Mrs. Lawrence,” he said. “Up kind of early for a swim,” he added with a smile.
“I didn’t think so, ma’am,” he replied. The guard’s eyes shifted to Hood. “Good morning, sir.”
“Good morning,” Hood said.
“Corporal, would you please phone the president?” Megan said. “Tell him I need to speak with him. Privately, in person.”
“Certainly,” the guard said.
Cain sat and picked up the phone. He punched in the extension of the Situation Room.
Hood did not often pray, but he found himself praying that someone other than one of Fenwick’s people was there to answer the phone.
A moment later, the guard said, “The First Lady is here to see the president.”
The guard fell silent then. Hood and Megan stood still in the quiet corridor. The only sound was a high faint whine that came from the security monitors.
After a moment, the guard looked up. “No, sir,” he said. “She’s with a gentleman. A Mr. Hood.” The guard fell silent again.
That wasn’t a good sign. Only one of Fenwick’s people would have thought to ask that question.
After several seconds the guard said, “Yes, sir,” and hung up. He rose and looked at the First Lady. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I’ve been told that the meeting can’t be interrupted.”
“Told by whom?” she asked.
“Mr. Gable, ma’am.”
“Mr. Gable is trying to keep Mr. Hood from delivering an important message to the president,” Megan said. “A message that may prevent a war. I need to see my husband.”
“Corporal,” Hood said. “You’re a military man. You don’t have to take orders from a civilian. I’m going to ask you to place the call again. Ask to speak to an officer, and repeat the First Lady’s message.”
“If Mr. Gable gives you trouble, I will take responsibility,” Megan said.