Currency War

by Lawrence B. Lindsey

  Wei smiled. “Spycraft.”

  “That’s a dangerous game,” Hector said.

  “You think they wouldn’t do it to us if they had the chance?” Bernadette said. “They’re probably doing it anyway; we just haven’t kenned to it yet.”

  “What do you propose?” said Hector.

  That wicked smile came back. “One thing communism does extraordinarily well is produce corruption. Not merely among the leadership. It’s pandemic right down to the street level.”

  Wei said, “I don’t think our network of assets over there is in a place to start throwing bribes around. And time is an issue if we were to develop more.”

  Now Hector Lopez smiled. “I don’t think she’s talking about bribing.” He turned to look at Bernadette. “Are you?”

  “This is why I love working here,” she said. Then, to Wei, “We don’t have to undermine them with our money. We let them undermine themselves. By exposing corruption. Not to the world, but within the party, and at such a level that they start chasing their own tail. Infighting. An internal power struggle.”

  “An operation like that would still take time I don’t think we have,” said Wei.

  “Maybe,” said Hector, “we don’t need to undermine the entire infrastructure. When Samson destroyed the Philistine temple, he only had to push down two pillars. We might not need to bring the whole house down. One rotten beam might provide enough weakness in the overall structure to give us needed leverage.”

  Bernadette narrowed her eyes at him. “You have something in mind.”

  “I might,” said Hector Lopez.

  * * *

  At eleven-thirty Bernadette walked out of the CIA briefing to see Bob Franks waiting with a handful of pink phone message slips. He handed two to Richard Wei, and as she walked past, he said, “Mrs. Coleman. For you.” She took it, thinking Ben was calling to touch base, and saw Franks try to hand the remainder of the slips to Lopez. But Lopez didn’t seem interested in the messages. He put his hand on Franks’s shoulder and led him into the conference room.

  She looked down at the message and saw that the box beside Call Back ASAP was checked and that the phone number was one she didn’t recognize. She took it with her outside to a place where her cell phone worked and dialed the number.

  “White House operator. How may I direct your call?”

  The breath caught in her throat. “Uh—this is Bernadette Coleman. I was asked to return a call—”

  The voice brightened from being businesslike to friendly. “Yes, Mrs. Coleman. Thank you for calling back. The First Lady would like to speak with you. Please hold and I will connect you.”

  The telephone clicked. “Bernadette, this is Cynthia. I know this is short notice, but do you think that you and Ben could join Will and me for dinner tonight at seven-thirty?”

  “Of course, Mrs. Turner.”

  “Don’t you dare Mrs. Turner me. Remember, I’m desperate for real friends, not the toadies who dominate this town. I said it was ‘Cynthia’ from now on, and I mean it.”

  “Of course, Cynthia. Ben and I would be delighted to join you. Can we bring the wine? You and the President are always hosting, and we would at least like to do a small part.”

  “To tell you the truth, Will set this up, God love him. Our dinner went so well last weekend that he is using it as the model for how to run an administration. We make it social to camouflage the real purpose. We’ll handle everything. We’re always hosting because we are who we are. If we were to come to your house, they would have to close half the roads in northern Virginia and we can’t have that, can we? You know how much Will hates inconveniencing hundreds of thousands of people, especially at rush hour.”

  Bernadette realized Cynthia had not given the real reason they couldn’t meet at the Coleman’s. Was it possible the President hadn’t told her? “Cynthia, Ben has a bottle from a vineyard a friend of his owns. Would you mind if he brought it along?”

  “If it helps with getting him to dinner, then of course.” The short notice defined the conversation topic. Better tell Ben we have plans for tonight.

  Peggy helped her locate him. He was in front of the computer reading the Bloomberg website.

  “Don’t tell me,” he said, picking up. “Dinner with the Turners, right? Say tonight at seven-thirty?”

  “Well done, you,” said Bernadette. “How’d you do it?”

  “I have my sources,” Ben said. “I’m trying hard to catch up with you.”

  “Well, Mr. Chairman, you seem to be well informed. Have you been spying? Truth be told, Cynthia invited me and suggested that you might come along if I wanted your company.”

  “Do you?”

  “Only if you promise to behave.”

  “In truth, the President invited me and figured Cynthia would be inviting you. So he asked me to come along and make sure that he’d behave and promised to keep an eye on me as well. If I can get out of here early, do you suppose we’d have time to misbehave before we go? Get it out of my system so I can be on my best behavior.”

  “What did you have in mind?” Bernadette let a smile come to her lips. “If you leave now, you’ll be home by three. I already know which dress I want to wear, so that’ll give us a chance to get everything done. I have a long list of chores for you.”

  “A long list, huh? Well, if you put it that way, I’d better get in my car right away.”

  “By the way, this does not include carrying me up the stairs. I know you can, but your war wound needs a little more healing time. Besides, I want you at full strength for your other chores.”

  “An offer I can’t refuse.”

  “You’d better not,” she said. “Come straight upstairs. I’ll be waiting.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “SHUT THE DOOR,” SAID HECTOR Lopez. “I’ll try and make this quick.”

  Bob Franks pushed the door to the meeting room until it clicked shut. “What can I do for you, sir?”

  “You talked about the proclivities of a certain general who is behaving in an unfriendly fashion toward our country,” said Hector.

  “Yes.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to have any photos of Deng in action, would you?”

  “My friend does. On his phone. Well, not exactly. Not in flagrante delicto, anyway. There are some of him outside the hotel and a couple in the lobby. He used the fake selfie method. You know, someone at a bar you think is cute, want to get a picture without them knowing. So you take a selfie but the focus is on them in the background. A nice ruse.

  “Anyway, anything more explicit would have been problematic. Deng’s aide does all the soliciting, but Deng sits in the lobby inspecting the merchandise. But the way a spy would. No one would notice unless they had the right training. I can have what my friend has for you tomorrow, such as they are.”

  “That probably won’t be enough,” Hector said. “What about something that would carry more weight?”

  “Sir, you’re the one who would know what assets we have deployed in the area. I’d be happy to do the research if you give me permission.”

  “I’ve already checked. No usable assets in the area, and this is not something that can be outsourced. The Agency has to have full control. I guess we’re going to be shit out of luck.”

  “Sir, I hope you don’t think this is out of line. You do have an outsourcing option that would still be totally under Agency control.”

  “What would that be? Sounds like an oxymoron.”

  “Me and my friend Tom.”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “Sir, Tom and I are very motivated. We hate everything about what Deng is doing. We’re a few years out of the army and have been keeping fit enough to qualify for field work. Tom’s been there and knows the area. We’d travel together. Might need some help with expenses though.”

  “Expenses are not the issue, we’ve got plenty of dark pools. What did you have in mind?”

  “Well, sir, I’m thinking on the fly, but whateve
r it takes. We’d probably have to decide when we get there. But once there we’d be all in to get the most compromising stuff on Deng we could. Pictures of victims, for example.”

  “Bob, I can’t ask you to do that. Deng is well protected. You might end up being victims yourselves and get tossed into the Mekong.”

  A light went on in Bob’s head. “Sir, if you give us carte blanche to run our own operation I think that we might be able to get you something quite usable.”

  Lopez said, “And what would that be?”

  “Sir, I just asked for carte blanche to run our own operation on the ground. And if something bad should happen you would need plausible deniability. All you did was give me some much-needed time off. And the money for the trip, of course, but that wouldn’t come from you directly, now would it?”

  Lopez came back, “I can see your mind at work. You’ve got an idea and you’re probably right that I don’t want to know. This all sounds a bit like Mission Impossible. Should anything happen to you or your team the Secretary—that’s me, by the way—would disavow any knowledge of your activities.

  “Still, even under Mission Impossible” rules I can arrange a little assistance for you on the ground to get you in and out; that’s it. Otherwise, you call the shots. And we will keep our ears open to get a sense of when Deng might be looking for some R&R. I will put Monica on it right away.”

  A huge smile crossed Bob’s face. He loved his job, but he’d been behind a desk too long and wanted something that tested him physically. He had just turned twenty-nine and the dreaded three-oh was constantly on his mind. “Sir, thank you for giving me this opportunity along with your trust. It means a lot.”

  Lopez said, “Bob, what I am about to say is critically important. I want you to know that you should feel free to back out at any time. There is no obligation for you to do this in your current job. This is strictly volunteer. And it is almost certain to be dangerous. I will not think any less highly of you if you tell me you want out at any time. You also need to know that this has to be as operationally clean as possible but done as safely as possible. There’ll never be any public glory or parades in your honor.

  “You know those stars down in the lobby? The medals those men got never left this building. They were presented, then locked away. The agent and their family can come view them by appointment. That’s it. That’s how little public recognition you will get for taking on this kind of job.”

  “Sir, I understand,” said Franks. “Let me double-check with my buddy, but consider me in. I’d love to get that bastard for a lot of reasons.”

  “Once this is over, I’ll make sure you get some comp time off the books. If this goes well, you’ll have more than earned it. It’s the least I can do.”

  “And if it doesn’t?”

  Hector shook his head. “We never talk about that. It’s the number one rule of my job.”

  * * *

  The Colemans arrived at the East Executive entrance. They breezed through security and were met at the door by one of the Secret Service detail.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Coleman, would you follow me.”

  It really wasn’t a question but an order, delivered politely. This time they skipped the staircase to the state floor and continued on to the elevator to the family quarters just before the covered walkway to the West Wing.

  The agent motioned them. “The President and First Lady are expecting you.” He pressed the button for the family level and stood outside the elevator, looking quite stoic as the door closed.

  The Turners were standing at the elevator. Cynthia spoke first.

  “Bernadette, Ben, so glad you could come on such short notice. I see Bernadette decided to let you accompany her this evening.” She gave a knowing smile coupled with a wink.

  “Mrs. Turner, my wife is always quite generous in this regard. Lord knows she dragged me to most of London’s high society back in her days as a wedding planner. I think she likes me as an escort. It gives her cover.”

  “Well, Cynthia,” Bernadette said, “he is rather distinguished looking, don’t you think? Don’t think any of the escort services around town could provide anything comparable unless I wanted to be a complete cougar.”

  The President decided to join in. “Ben, from what I read in my daily intelligence briefings, those young studs they use to prance around with older women don’t have anything on you. Everything I read says that the term ‘Chairman Stud’ is there for a reason. Chinese intelligence would not simply make something like that up.”

  “Mr. President, I—I don’t understand.”

  Bernadette’s eyes widened. Lopez hadn’t told her that part. But it was obvious now. The Chinese were listening in on her and Ben, but the Agency had tapped into the Chinese bugs and was listening in as well. Everything they intercepted made its way full circle back to the agency. “Cynthia, I think these men are going to get into some salty man talk. Perhaps we ladies should excuse ourselves—”

  “No,” Ben said. “I want you and the First Lady to stay for this. We’re all friends here. Apparently, the President has some information that goes beyond what friends normally share with friends, at least in my circle. Mrs. Turner, I assure you that the President and I have never discussed the intimate details of either your relationship or my relationship with Bernadette. Besides, the President just said something about Chinese intelligence and his daily security briefing.”

  Cynthia sensed there was trouble brewing and guessed that Will had again put his foot in his mouth. “Ben, it’s obvious to both of us that you and Bernadette are madly in love. More power to you.”

  Bernadette realized there was not going to be any soft pedaling about this with Ben. “Mr. President, you are remarkably well informed. I didn’t realize the turnaround from Chinese intelligence to Beijing gave our team time to intercept and write it down in time for your morning briefing memo—let alone in such detail. The way the Agency works, it would seem you have some alternate intelligence gathering capacity in real time.”

  “Mrs. Coleman, I thought that Lopez had briefed you. Apparently, I am being indiscreet and downright rude. We are on the same frequency as the Chinese bugs. The agency decided we needed to know in real-time what the Chinese were hearing in order to coordinate our actions.”

  In as controlled a voice as he could manage, Ben said, “If you’ll pardon my French, would somebody care to explain what the fuck is going on? I seem to be the only one here in the dark, and I don’t appreciate not being in on the joke. I believe I am owed an explanation.”

  Bernadette glanced at her husband. His face was crimson. He was beyond embarrassment and angrier than she had ever seen him. She slipped her arm through his and grabbed his hand.

  The President said, “Ben, I am truly sorry. My comment was absolutely out of line. I meant well, but obviously it seems this has gone too far. Please accept my most humble and sincere apology.”

  Before Ben could answer, he continued. “I owe you the truth. Bernadette is now going high profile as a Western intelligence asset, higher even than when she was at MI6. She is now a back channel to the Chinese.” He held up his hand to make sure Ben didn’t interrupt. “I had to explain that to Dianne. She said, ‘Isn’t that my job as Secretary of State?’ and I explained what I meant by back channel. In her position, Bernadette can say things to the Chinese that I can’t, that Dianne can’t. Your wife is the ultimate speaker of truth in this case. After all, they know she’s the Red Ninja.

  “See, the Chinese know we have hired her for this mission. Now they know, thanks to Drudge, that she is tight with the First Lady. So they assume that there’s a free-flowing conduit of information among the three of us. When we need to send a signal to them, there are two very credible people to do so.

  “You, Ben, are the other one. The Chinese know it and that is why Li is talking to you. Since you’re both from the money end of things the rest of the government—theirs and ours both—think you’re out of the loop on the foreign policy a
nd therefore don’t have an ulterior motive. And they’re kind of right. Obviously, through Bernadette you become a back channel as well.”

  Ben drew a slow breath, trying to rein his temper back and show respect for the office of the man in whose house he now stood. “It’s all James Bond stuff, sure, and I’m just a money guy. But what’s with this ‘Chairman Stud’ bullshit?”

  “I was getting to that,” said the President. “As I said, the primary channel to the Chinese is your lovely wife. We can use her covertly or overtly. So if the Chinese, say, put a bug on her and we know about it, we can arrange for her to give them misinformation.” The President took another long pause, allowing Ben to absorb it all.

  “Sir, am I to understand that the Chinese have bugged our home and that through the Agency, you knew about it? That you listened in on their communication? And if I can put in the rest of the pieces you’ve neglected to give, they have bugged most of our home, including our bedroom?”

  “Yes.”

  “And how far was my privacy invaded? Were the recordings video or just audio?”

  “Just audio. Yes, it included the bedroom. They entered your house on Monday, when you were both at work.” Ben started to speak but the President knew what was coming. “They got past your home security pretty easily. Set up four mics. No cameras we could find. We found them Wednesday. That’s the real reason I asked whether you had discussed your plan with Bernadette during our Oval Office meeting. If you had, the Chinese would have heard. I’m sorry to say—they heard plenty of other stuff.

  “Ben, I was wrong for not having brought you into the loop. I am genuinely embarrassed and deeply sorry. This may not be the right thing to say, but I wanted to lay it on the table. I hope you will take it the right way. And I hope it’s the kind of thing you’ll be able to laugh at someday.”

  “You’re more the optimist than I,” Ben said. “Sir.” He said “sir” in a way that non-coms use to show nominal respect to their immediate superior while making it clear they disagree with what was said.