men, two chairs. The only window faced southeast over the street. The
wrong direction. The five men were instinctively glancing at the blank
wall opposite. Through that wall was Holly, two hundred and forty
miles away.
“We’re going to have to move up there,” General Johnson said.
His aide nodded.
“No good staying here,” he said.
McGrath had made a decision. He had promised himself he wouldn’t fight
turf wars with these guys. His agent was Johnson’s daughter. He
understood the old guy’s feelings. He wasn’t going to squander time
and energy proving who was boss. And he needed the old guy’s help,
“We need to share facilities,” he said. “Just for the time being.”
There was a short silence. The general nodded slowly. He knew enough
about Washington to decode those five words with a fair degree of
accuracy.
“I don’t have many facilities available,” he said in turn. “It’s the
holiday weekend. Exactly seventy-five per cent of the US army is on
leave.”
Silence. McGrath’s turn to do the decoding and the slow nodding.
“No authorization to cancel leave?” he asked.
The general shook his head.
“I just spoke with Dexter,” he said. “And Dexter just spoke with the
president. Feeling was this thing is on hold until Monday.”
The crowded room went silent. The guy’s daughter was in trouble, and
the White House fixer was playing politics.
“Webster got the same story,” McGrath said. “Can’t even bring the
hostage rescue team up here yet. Time being, we’re on our own, the
three of us.”
The general nodded to McGrath. It was a personal gesture, individual
to individual, and it said: we’ve leveled with each other, and we both
know what humiliation that cost us, and we both know we appreciate
it.
“But there’s no harm in being prepared,” the general said. “Like the
little guy suspects, the military is comfortable with secret maneuvers.
I’m calling in a few private favors that Mr. Dexter need never know
about.”
The silence in the room eased. McGrath looked a question at him.
There’s a mobile command post already on its way,” the general said.
He took a large chart from his aide and spread it out on the desk.
“We’re going to rendezvous right here,” he said.
He had his finger on a spot northwest of the last habitation in Montana
short of Yorke. It was a wide curve on the road leading into the
county, about six miles shy of the bridge over the ravine.
The satellite trucks are heading straight there,” he said. “I figure
we move in, set up the command post, and seal off the road behind
us.”
McGrath stood still, looking down at the map. He knew that
to agree was to hand over total control to the military. He knew that
to disagree was to play petty games with his agent and this man’s
daughter. Then he saw that the general’s finger was resting a
half-inch south of a much better location. A little farther north, the
road narrowed dramatically. It straightened to give a clear view north
and south. The terrain tightened. A better site for a roadblock. A
better site for a command post. He was amazed that the general hadn’t
spotted it. Then he was flooded with gratitude. The general had
spotted it. But he was leaving room for McGrath to point it out. He
was leaving room for give-and-take. He didn’t want total control.
“I would prefer this place,” McGrath said.
He tapped the northerly location with a pencil. The general pretended
to study it. His aide pretended to be impressed.
“Good thinking,” the general said. “We’ll revise the rendezvous.”
McGrath smiled. He knew damn well the trucks were already heading for
that exact spot. Probably already there. The general grinned back.
The ritual dance was completed.
“What can the spy planes show us?” Brogan asked.
“Everything,” the general’s aide said. “Wait until you see the
pictures. The cameras on those babies are unbelievable.”
“I don’t like it,” McGrath said. “It’s going to make them nervous.”
The aide shook his head.
“They won’t even know they’re there,” he said. “We’re using two of
them, flying straight lines, east to west and west to east. They’re