“Our blonde’s a terrorist groupie; we all know the type,” he said. “Into bad boys and pretty things. She’s been detained for questioning by everyone from Europol to the Canadian Duddlies, but nothing’s ever been pinned on her. More often than not, she’s stayed under the radar. The FBI’s tracked her movements with some degree of consistency, but they’ve kept her dossier restricted. Who knows why. Maybe the usual proprietary reasons, distrust of other agencies-”
“They’ve shared it with us, Pete,” Megan said. “We shouldn’t forget that.”
Nimec made a slight face. “No, we shouldn’t,” he said. “Anyway, the feebs figure her for a runner of supplies and messages. When she first caught their eye in ’99, she was running with Amir Mamula, an Algerian resident of Montreal who’s been connected to the Grou- pes Islamique Armes, or GIA. That’s the same group that did the Air Paris hijack in Morocco a year later, where the Wildcat got vogued by the French diplomat.
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After Mamula lost his shine, our gal was scoped loving the nightlife with a parade of other top-dog narcos and terrorists. Changed her hair color, visited the plastic surgeon for some fine-tuning on her facial appearance. Boob job, needless to say. And those pseudonyms on the chalkboard are only the latest in an ongoing series. About a month ago, she went on a romp around the world using the Melina Laval handle. Europe, Latin America, Canada. I should mention that there have been a lot of hops to Canada. Eight, ten over the past half year.”
“Whereabouts?” Nordstrum asked.
“Mostly western Ontario. Quebec once … days before she showed in San Diego,” Nimec said. “That’s when she dropped off the screen again. Probably also got finished being Melina Laval.”
Nordstrum’s brow furrowed.
“Tell us what’s brewing, Alex,” Megan said.
His eyes traveled around the conference table. “Is it fair to say everyone here’s thinking we should look very closely at Canada as the site of the bioagent production facility?”
Nods.
“Okay,” he said. “Back when I was with the State Department, what made it difficult or impossible to prove foreign governments or militant groups were involved in the manufacture of biological weapons was the dual-use applications of the production technologies. Centrifugal separators, fermenters, freeze dryers, BL4 containment equipment, even known pathogens and toxins, are all readily available on the export market for legitimate medical, agricultural, and industrial purposes. We knew who was buying the stuff for the wrong rea386
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sons. But you can imagine the problems we confronted trying to argue our case before the UN Security Council, some of whose member nations were among the very ones hiding bioweapons programs.”
“Sounds like a joke,” Ricci said.
“Yes.” Nordstrum shrugged. “It was really a procedural formality anyway. We didn’t expect cooperation but wanted our findings on record if we needed to take unilateral action, as in the airstrikes against Osama bin Laden’s supposed pharmaceutical plant. And of course we continued tracking the flow of equipment. It isn’t too hard. There’s a short list of bioprocessing equipment manufacturers worldwide. And that’s for materials used to proliferate naturally occurring germs or toxins. With a microorganism that’s the product of genetic alteration, the associated technology becomes increasingly use- specific and gets easier to chase. Our government keeps routine tabs on its acquisition and shipment.”
Megan looked at him. “Government’s a big word,” she said. “Can we go to the FBI for the information?”
“They’ve got the take-charge law-enforcement role in a chemical or biological incident on national soil and would have good intelligence, but it’s the Nonproliferation Center at the CIA that’s chiefly responsible for gathering the flow data and making it available to the State Department and DOD.”
“Can you check out what’s been moving into Canada? I mean check right away?”
“I’ll try,” he said. “You may recall that I’ve incurred the lasting disfavor of the current White House administration from President Ballard on down. But there are back doors that might still open to an old government bureaucrat.”
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That, Megan thought, was a curious way for a former deputy secretary of state who’d served as acting head of the department to refer to himself. “Don’t hesitate to mention what’s at stake while you’re knocking on them,” she said.
There was a brief silence in the room.
“We should get one of the Hawkeyes into orbital position over our northern neighbor,” Nimec said. “If Alex is successful in getting the dope from his contacts, it can help us choose the areas to target for GIS passes.”
Ricci gestured toward the blackboard.
“And help Meg work her pointer up to those three big question marks at the top of her list,” he said.
She turned to him, held his gaze a moment, and nodded. “That’s the idea,” she said.
“Alex, your request is way out of line. I’m very uncomfortable with this entire conversation-”
“Come on, Neil,” Nordstrum said into his cell phone, Neil being Neil Blake, one of his former students and presently an assistant secretary of state, Foreign Affairs Bureau. “Just fax me a copy of that BW tech flow list. You’ve done bigger favors before. Without blinking.”
“That’s right. Before. But right now I’m at my desk looking over my shoulder. I swear to God, Alex. If you were a fly on the wall you’d see that I’m serious. Over my shoulder. Somebody overhears me talking to you on the phone, I’m in the shit. At 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue your name is an unwelcome utterance. And will be until the current administration leaves office.”
“Because I opted to attend a press conference that the president felt might have stolen some of his bill-signing thunder,” Nordstrum said. “Are you listening to your388
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self? I was a journalist. And I’m still a free citizen. Ballard’s executive powers do not extend to canceling my First Amendment rights. I’m surprised he hasn’t just ordered me thrown into a dungeon somewhere.”
“Let’s not get hyperbolic-”
“I don’t have to. Or I shouldn’t. We’re potentially talking about Roger Gordian’s life.”
Blake sighed. “Nobody holds him in higher regard than I do,” he said, easing into a semiofficial tone of voice. “And you know he’s got a legion of supporters here in the capital. Give me a day or two. I’ll figure out how to handle your request, work it through the appropriate channels.”
“What kind of ridiculous phrase is that? It can’t wait. Not an hour or two. I need what I need. Right away.”
“Alex, please, I’m trying to explain-”
“Never mind,” Nordstrum kept his voice level. “How’s the new bride, Neil?”
There was an instant’s silence.
“Cynthia’s fine,” Blake said, thrown off stride.
“What is it now, a year that you’ve been married?”
“Yeah. Well, close. We celebrate our first anniversary the day after Christmas-”
“You plan on taking her to that cozy little apartment on Euclid Street for the romantic occasion?” Nordstrum asked. “Or is it still set apart for your independent use?”
This time the silence was much longer.
“How come you ask, Alex?”
“No reason in particular. I just remembered that you never let go of the place. Must have a sentimental attachment after all those good times you had there in the heyday of your bachelorhood.” It was Nordstrum’s turn to pause. “But listen, you can forget about my request.
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I know you’re under constraints. I’ll try some of my old pressroom cronies at the Washington Post instead. You never know, they might have something for me. With them, it’s always give and take.”
“Alex-”
“I need to hang up-”
“Alex, wait, damn it.”
He waited.
“Give me that fax number at UpLink,” Blake said.
In his Sacramento office, Eric Oh listened intently as Todd Felson, his colleague at Stanford, offered him the details of the initial tests he’d performed on the food samples taken from Roger Gordian’s office.
“You know those wafers we found on his desk? Three of them are impregnated with polymer coacervates in the fifteen to twenty-micron range,” he said. “There’s a tremendous amount of the stuff.”
For the third time in a seventy-two-hour period during which he’d been swept along like a man on a whitewater run, Eric was caught breathless.
“Microencapsulation,” he said. “Todd, I think we’ve found our activator.”
“Looks like it,” Felson said. “The particle walls are an ethyl cellulose/cyclohexane gelatin. Highly soluble in liquids at body temperature. And very susceptible to breakdown under the high pH levels in a person’s digestive system. Or mucous membranes, for that matter.”
“Have you gotten to examine the core material at all?”
“Coming up next.”
It was ten o’clock in the morning, just two hours after the closed conference room meeting adjourned, when
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Megan answered her office phone to hear Alex Nordstrum’s excited voice on the line.
“Meg, I’ve got news,” he said.
She sat up straight behind her desk
“I’m waiting,” she said.