A profound quiet settled around Gabriel. Startled tourists, some with small children, rose in shock. And then the knob in his brain that controlled hearing turned up and everywhere anguished faces screamed and stared. Gabriel had lost his glasses, and he crawled on his hands and knees, searching the sidewalk. His blurred vision amplified the chaos and confusion around him. His hands found the glasses in the grass and put them on, turning to look at the blast’s origin.
Flames coming from the Volkswagen bus made thick, acrid black smoke. Windows had been blown out by the bomb, and the vehicle had risen in the air and come down in the opposite lane, stopping traffic in both directions. Stunned drivers stood outside their cars, gaping.
Weisenthal had returned to the Volkswagen and fought flames to pull his wife from the driver’s-side door. A second blast came, creating a fireball, and engulfed Weisenthal in flames. He fell to the road, writhing horribly in a lake of burning oil until life left him and he was motionless, blackened, and smoldering. Flames continued to consume the scorched and mangled vehicle.
21
P Street
Even in the shade of the mature oak trees on P Street, the heat of early afternoon was sweltering. Casey fanned himself with his snap-brim fedora and watched as Gabriel’s daughter locked the front door and proceeded down the sidewalk to walk her dog.
After parking two blocks away, Casey had come opposite Gabriel’s home, and to avoid drawing attention, he had Barber and Martinez take up positions across the street on either side of the house. The call to visit the house had come shortly after 11:00 a.m. Casey had been in his office in downtown Washington when his secretary said a man needed to speak to him urgently. Not much was said in the telephone call. An understanding had been reached and the decision had been taken. New qualms about the old business. It was time to act, the caller had said. Casey put a service revolver in his holster, took a false identification for himself, and gave FBI badges to Barber and Martinez. “Just in case,” he’d said.
Casey waved the two men to converge at Gabriel’s front door. All three climbed the curved cast-iron steps, and Martinez quickly had his pick in the lock. Patient, expert probing opened the door in under a minute. The three men entered.
Casey assessed the challenge from the vestibule and turned to Barber and Martinez. “Fifteen minutes. That’s all you’ve got. We’re looking for stolen documents, a gun, anything to use against him.”
Casey directed Martinez to the master bedroom upstairs, and he assigned Barber to Gabriel’s study. He gave himself the task of looking in the kitchen and the living room. He knew that everyone had their own eccentric ideas about where to hide things—and often it was counterintuitive. The amateur sleuth looked for hidey-holes or false bottoms, when in fact the psychology of the sophisticated criminal would hide things in plain sight. Casey surveyed the living room, testing his theory, but there were no suspicious files on the credenza, no envelopes slipped into a magazine, no paper taped to the pictures hanging on the wall. Casey kicked the dog’s chew toy and watched it roll under the sofa. He knelt and looked under the box springs. Where does a man in the business of espionage put something he doesn’t want found? Casey lifted a glass vase and looked inside. He opened the freezer. He unzipped a pillow.
Casey made his way upstairs, bringing to mind the profile he’d created on Gabriel—intelligent, clever, and arrogant.
Casey stood in the master bedroom’s doorway and glanced around the room. Martinez had a burglar’s expert touch. The dresser’s rank of drawers was tipped fully open. Burglars opened bottom drawers first so they didn’t have to waste time shutting one drawer to get to the next. He was on his knees at the vanity, and his fingers moved quickly along the edges, feeling for a hidden panel. When he was done, he looked in the boxes that filled the top shelf of the clothes closet.
Martinez nodded at Casey, but he focused on the work. Casey’s eyes settled on the obvious in case Martinez missed something. The room had the color and smell that Casey associated with a woman—lavender fragrance, hints of perfume, and matching pale green pillows on the perfectly made bed. Casey looked at the framed photograph of a younger, happy Gabriel and wife at the helm of a large sailboat. There was nothing taped to the back of the photograph. He poked through the trash in the wicker wastebasket, unfolding a scrap of paper, then checking an envelope’s return address.
That’s when Casey heard his name called. Urgency in Barber’s voice brought Casey to the study at the end of the hall. He saw a large combination safe against one wall, but this wasn’t what had excited Barber. The man was at the window, standing to one side so that he couldn’t be seen from the street. He pointed down the block. “She’s coming back.”
Casey looked at his watch. Twelve minutes had gone by.
Barber leaned forward to get a better angle on the sidewalk. “She’s not alone.”
21
Escape
Gabriel sat in the back of a taxi, his eyes closed in exhausted shock at the spiraling implications of another murder. Repeating patterns of danger settled in like rude relatives. He tried to bring shape to the threat, but no matter how he explained the bombing, a line was drawn from one murder to the next, connecting Wilson to Ainsley to Kelly, and now to Weisenthal. In the dark corner of his imagination that processed fear, he saw a labyrinth leading to a castle courtyard never penetrated by a ray of light. He turned one way, then another, and he saw that the door he’d entered was now a stone wall. He was surrounded by skeletons.
He opened his eyes. Searing memories of the blast dissipated, and suddenly he was aware he was in the back of a taxi, driving through Washington’s traffic. He looked back and heard the sirens of police cars headed in the opposite direction.
GABRIEL STOPPED THE taxi when he spotted Sara walking Molly a half block from home. He paid the ten-dollar fare with a twenty, foregoing change, and jumped out. He approached her quickly and tried to look calm.
“What’s up?” Sara greeted. “Home early?” Then she caught herself and stared.
Gabriel knew that his shirt was spotted with bomb ash, and he saw her glance at his torn pant leg and bloody knee. Pebbles had embedded in his palm when he’d been thrown to the pavement by the blast.
“What happened to you?” she asked.
“I’ll explain later. Let’s go inside.” Gabriel allowed Molly to jump on his chest in a sloppy greeting, and he gently petted the dog’s head.
Sara pulled hard on the leash, scolding the dog and pulling her off. “I’m trying to train her.”
“Is your mother home?”
“Her beeper went off. There was an emergency at the clinic.” Sara looked at her father. “Is something wrong?” Her voice deepened. “What happened?”
“Car bomb.”
Sara’s face blanched.
“Two people died on Arlington Bridge.” He stopped himself from giving more details. One answer would lead to another question, and other questions would follow. He had not yet tempered his mind to the implications of telling his daughter of their jeopardy.
Danger announced itself without warning. Gabriel saw three men emerge from his home’s front door. He didn’t recognize the first man—tall, in a dark suit, wearing aviator glasses that reflected the merciless sun and giving a hint of menace, but he did recognize the two middle-aged men who followed. Gabriel stared at the stranger—he was certain he’d seen the man’s face before.
“Quiet, quiet,” Sara said to Molly, who barked excitedly and strained at her leash. To her father, “Who are they?”
“Stay here,” he said.
Sara shortened the leash on Molly and put her hand on the dog’s head.
“Can I help you?” Gabriel shouted, assessing the men.
“You live here?” the man asked.
“Yes. Who are you?”
“We got a complaint of a theft,” the man said brusquely. “We’re investigating a break-in.”
The two men took a measure of each other.
Gabriel nodded at the open door. “A burglary? Here?”
“I locked the door,” Sara said. She had followed her father and offered her judgment, defensively. “I always lock it when I go out with Molly.” She petted the dog’s head. The Malamute bared her teeth.
“It’s okay, Molly.”
“Let’s go inside,” the man said. “We have a few questions for you.”
Gabriel glanced down the empty street and then looked at the three men, searching for their intentions. He faced the stranger in aviator glasses. “And who are you?”
“Federal Agent Casey. FBI.” A wallet appeared in his hand, which he flipped open to reveal a shield. “Inside, please.”
Gabriel felt a tremor of doubt. Had his face been recognized from the National Archive’s surveillance video? He looked at the man. He could make a scene, but that would give them the excuse they wanted. Or, he could cooperate and hope for an opportunity to talk his way out of the jeopardy. His mind was already forming a plan.
Gabriel entered first. Sara followed with Molly, who paced anxiously on her shortened leash when she saw the men come inside. Sara had gone to the kitchen and commanded Molly to sit, but the dog was up again in a moment, nervously eyeing the strangers. Sara spoke again, but the pattern of rebellion and command repeated itself.
The kitchen’s bay window looked onto the lovingly tended flower garden separated from adjoining yards by a tall lattice fence, and a graceful oak shaded the plantings. Bright afternoon light warmed the immaculate room. Everywhere order and cleanliness. Everywhere the loving touches of a happy kitchen.
Gabriel led Casey through the living room, and he kept an eye on the other agents loitering by the kitchen, keeping their distance from the nervous dog.
“Lived here long?” Casey asked.
“Two years. How can I help you?”
“What’s upstairs?”
“Bedrooms. A study.”
“Can we look?”
Stay polite, Gabriel thought. He glanced at Sara, who had managed to calm the dog. Don’t leave her.
“I’ll be okay,” she said.
“We need a few minutes with your father,” Casey said, taking hold of Gabriel.
Gabriel pulled his arm away and clenched a fist.
The men’s hands were on their holstered pistols.
“I’ll be okay,” Sara said. “Molly’s with me.”
GABRIEL’S STUDY DOOR at the top of the stairs was open, and he never left it open. Gabriel followed Casey inside, looking to see what they had already searched, and his eyes were drawn to the large combination safe, which held the Wilson documents. First editions and mystery paperbacks overflowed floor-to-ceiling bookcases, and texts that no longer fit on shelves were stacked on the floor. Framed photographs of visits to an old French plantation in the Mekong Delta hung on one wall, and there was memorabilia from his years of service—the Luger acquired in Vienna, vintage bolt-action Springfield rifles from Cuba, and a sheathed Montagnard long knife.
Gabriel watched Casey poke through his desk, but his ears were tuned to sounds from the kitchen.
“Telephone work?” Casey asked, lifting the rotary phone. He listened for a moment and placed the receiver off the hook, producing the static hum of a disconnected line. “What’s in there?” Casey said, pointing to the combination safe. “You keep files in there? Documents?”
Gabriel heard the dog bark. “It’s locked.”
“Can you open it?”
“Do you have a search warrant?”
“What about this?” Casey opened the desk’s drawer. “It’s not locked.”
Gabriel’s fist clenched, and he abruptly closed the drawer. “Let’s stop this, okay. What’s going on? What are you looking for?”
Casey pushed Gabriel’s hand aside and opened the drawer again, removing Gabriel’s 9mm Glock. “Whose is this?”
“Mine.”
“Do you have a permit?”
“I’m with the CIA.”
“Can I see your ID?”
Gabriel hesitated. “I left the Agency last week. They haven’t sent anyone to collect the gun yet.”
Gabriel heard the dog growling in the kitchen, a threatened animal baring its fangs. Snarling barks followed in a loud confusion of sounds and above it all Sara’s screaming pleas. Gabriel took the staircase three steps at a time.
Gabriel found Sara in the kitchen struggling to restrain Molly, who lunged at the thinner man, snapping viciously. The white-tile kitchen floor was stained with a wide arc of scalding blood. The Cuban’s face was mortally gray, and his hand was limp and had a deep gash that bled profusely.
Martinez stood just beyond the perimeter of the dog’s leash, numbed by the sight of his wound. White tendons were visible inside the torn, gaping flesh. Violent energy disturbed the kitchen’s peace.
Gabriel was at his daughter’s side, lending a hand on the leash. “What happened?”
Sara struggled to hold her dog, working hard against the force of her agitated pet, and her face was alive with dread.
“Fucking dog,” the Cuban said.
“Hold still,” Barber said, binding his belt on the wounded man’s arm to form a makeshift tourniquet. He had taken a kitchen towel to stanch the flow, but blood continued to pulse from a vein on the wrist. “You need the emergency room.”
“Fucking beast,” the Cuban snarled. He pulled his holstered revolver and raised the barrel toward the dog’s snapping mouth.
Gabriel saw the drama in slow motion, and his mind imagined the end at the same time that he saw its beginning. He was aware of vague protests, and later he wouldn’t remember if the words he’d heard were an order to desist or an encouragement.
Gabriel stepped forward. His right hand firmly gripped the man’s revolver and twisted sharply, so the gun came out of his hand just as the elbow began to snap. Martinez let out a deep-throated scream, which rose above the dog’s barking and drew everyone’s attention.
Gabriel felt a blow to the back of his head. Stunned and dizzy, he looked into Sara’s face, so full of fear. He thought, I’m okay. I can see you. I’ll be okay. Her scream startled him, and suddenly everything in the room sped up in wild rotation. His legs were weak. He crumpled to the floor.
GABRIEL DIDN’T KNOW how long he was unconscious. He had blacked out, but in the dim, primitive memory that resisted the temptation of death, he had felt his limp body being dragged from the kitchen. Men’s voices above him had been garbled, but he had recognized a pragmatic calm in their instructions.
His first waking moment was uncertain, and dizziness and nausea followed. The pain in the back of his head throbbed and dulled his senses. He blinked against the harsh light, disoriented, and didn’t know where he was, how long he’d been out, and, even for a moment, what had happened. He was on his back, looking into the bright ceiling light that seemed to sway. He sat up. In the course of looking around, he realized he was in the half bathroom off the kitchen. How long have I been out?
He stood unsteadily and tried the door, but found it locked. He stepped back and kicked, but he was weaker now and the door solid, and his second effort also failed, as did his third. Beyond the door there was only quiet.
“Sara?”
He put his ear to the wood, but still no sounds from the kitchen. In the seconds that followed he felt an excruciating uncertainty and an overwhelming need to be reassured his daughter was safe. He could only imagine her fear—but he banished the terrible thoughts that entered his mind.
He felt dull pounding in his ears and dryness in his mouth. His only child in the hands of those men. Nothing in his life had prepared him for this. Without warning or pausing Gabriel threw his shoulder against the door. He saw two degrees of breach and knew the door was not locked. The men had blocked the door from the outside. He kicked the bottom panel twice, but the wood resisted. He ripped the towel bar from the wall and turned it into a fulcrum, leveraging the tool against the narrow gap at the floor. Grit and muscle joined with the laws of p
hysics to snap the door’s panel. He crawled through the small opening.
The dog lay on the tile floor just inside the kitchen. Molly was so still he thought she might be asleep, but then he saw pooled blood under her head. Thick gray fur on her neck was matted and dark where the whetted blade of the Montagnard knife had made its long crescent cut. The dog’s eyes were open and vacant.
“Sara!” Gabriel shouted.
He listened through the silence in the house, hearing only birds chirping in the garden, and the tyrannical ticking of the wall clock. He took the staircase two steps at a time and came to her bedroom. He tried the door, but it was locked.
“Sara? Are you in there?”
His shoulder hit hard against the door, and the mortise lock popped. He found his daughter under her desk, knees wrapped in her arms, quiet and still. Gabriel knelt and took her in his arms. She leaned in and gave a great heaving sob, weeping uncontrollably. He held her tight, and he felt her trembling fear.
“They’re gone,” he said.
Sara let herself be comforted, and she cried on his chest. He held her until she settled, and he remembered how he’d hugged her as a little girl when the adult world disappointed her. Her pain and sadness exhausted themselves in time.
“We have to pack,” he said.
“Where will we bury her?”
GABRIEL COVERED THE dog with a bath towel and carried her to a shallow grave he’d dug in the backyard. When he’d filled in the grave, he laid a flower on the turned soil. Sara watched from the kitchen’s bay window.
Gabriel asked Sara to gather a change of clothing from her room and to pack the book she was reading, her diary, and whatever other important things she could fit into her school backpack. They would be leaving the house for a little while, he said. “Take only what you need and pack quickly.”
The Coldest Warrior Page 17