Ryan told his secretary to call Arnie in. He’d want a little political guidance on the ramifications of George’s plan.
“YES, ADMIRAL?”
“You asked for a report on the Elsenhower group,” Jackson said, walking to the large wall map and consulting a slip of paper. “They’re right here, making good speed.” Then Robby’s pager started vibrating in his pocket. He pulled it out and checked the number. His eyebrows went up. “Sir, do you mind . . . ?”
“Go ahead,” Secretary Bretano said. Jackson took the phone on the other side of the room, dialing five digits. “J-3 here… oh? Where are they? Then let’s find out, shall we, Commander? Correct.” He put the phone back. “That was the NMCC. The NRO reports that the Indian navy’s missing–their two carriers, that is.”
“What does that mean, Admiral?”
Robby walked back to the map and walked his hand across the blue part west of the Indian subcontinent. “Thirty-six hours since the last time we checked. Figure three hours to clear the port and form up … twenty knots times thirty-three is six hundred sixty nautical miles, that’s seven hundred sixty statute miles . . . about halfway between their home port and the Horn of Africa.” He turned. “Mr. Secretary, they have two carriers, nine escorts, and
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an UNREP group missing from their piers. The fleet oilers mean they might be planning to stay out for a while. We had no intelligence information to warn us about this.” As usual, he didn’t add.
“So where exactly are they?”
“That’s the point. We don’t know. We have some P-3 Orion aircraft based at Diego Garcia. They’re going to launch a couple to go looking. We can task some satellite assets to the job also. We need to tell State about this. Maybe the embassy can find out something.”
“Fair enough. I’ll tell the President in a few minutes. Anything to worry about?”
“Could be they’re just putting out after completing repairs–we rattled their cage pretty hard a while back, as you know.”
“But now the only two aircraft carriers in the Indian Ocean are somebody else’s?”
“Yes, sir.” And our nearest one is heading the wrong way. But at least SecDef was catching on some.
ADLER WAS IN a former Air Force One, an old but solid version of the venerable 707-320B. His official party comprised eight people, with five Air Force stewards to look after them. For the moment, he looked at his watch, computed the travel time–they had to stop for fuel at El-mendorf Air Force Base in Alaska–and decided he’d catch up on his sleep during the last leg. What a shame, he thought, that the government didn’t award frequent-flyer miles. He’d be traveling free for the rest of his life. For now, he took out his Tehran notes and started examining them again. He closed his eyes, trying to recall additional details as he relived the experience from his arrival at Mehrabad to the departure, visualizing every single episode. Every few minutes, he opened his eyes, flipped to the page in his notes, and made a few marginal comments. With luck, he’d be able to have them typed up and sent by secure fax to Washington for the SNIE team.
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“DING, MAYBE YOU have another career ahead of you,” Mary Pat observed, as she examined the photo through a magnifying glass. Her voice went on in some disappointment. “He looks healthy.”
“You suppose being a son of a bitch is good for longevity?” Clark asked.
“Worked for you, Mr. C.,” Chavez joked.
“I may have to put up with this for the next thirty years.”
“But such handsome grandsons you will have, jefe. And bilingual.”
“Back to business, shall we?” Mrs. Foley suggested, Friday afternoon or not.
IT’S NEVER FUN to be ill on an airplane. He wondered what he’d eaten, or maybe he’d picked up something in San Francisco at the computer show, all those damned people around. The executive was an experienced traveler, and his personal “first-aid kit” never left his side. In with his razor and such he found some Tylenol. He washed two down with a glass of wine and decided that he’d just try to sleep it off. With luck, he’d feel better by the time his flight made it into Newark. Sure as hell, he didn’t want to drive home feeling like this. He eased the seat all the way back, clicked off the light, and closed his eyes.
IT WAS TIME. The rental cars pulled away from the farmhouse. Each driver knew the route to and from the objective. There were no maps or other written material in their vehicles aside from photos of their prey. If any of them had uneasy feelings about kidnapping a small child, none showed it. Instead, their weapons were loaded and set on safe, and in every case sat on the floor, covered with a blanket or cloth. All wore suits and ties so that if a police car pulled alongside, a look would reveal only three well-groomed men, probably businessmen in nice private cars. The team thought that last part amusing. The Movie Star
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was a stickler for proper appearance, probably, they all thought, because of his vanity.
PRICE WATCHED THE arrival of the Mighty Ducks with no small amusement. She’d seen it all before. The most powerful of men walked into this place and were turned into children by it. What to her and her colleagues was just part of the scenery, the paintings and so forth, was to others the trappings of ultimate power. And in a way, she admitted to herself, they were right and she was wrong. Anything can become routine after sufficient repetition, whereas the new visitor, seeing everything for the first time, may have seen more clearly. The processing helped make it that way, as they came through the metal detectors under the watchful eyes of members of the USSS Uniformed Division. They’d get a quick walk-around while the President finished his meeting with the SecDef, which was reportedly running very late. The hockey players, bearing gifts for the President–the usual sticks, pucks, and a jersey-sweater with his name on it (actually they had them for the whole family)–shuffled through the passage from the East Entrance, their eyes sweeping left and right over the decorations on the white-painted walls of what for Andrea was a place of work and for them something else, powerful and special. An interesting dualism, she thought, walking over to Jeff Raman.
“I’m heading over to check out arrangements for SANDBOX.”
“I heard Don was getting a little antsy. Anything I need to know?”
She shook her head. “POTUS isn’t planning anything special. Gallic Weston will be over later. They changed her slot. Otherwise, everything’s routine.”
“Fair enough,” Raman acknowledged.
“This is Price,” she said into her microphone. “Show me in transit to SANDBOX.”
“Roger that,” the command post replied.
The Detail chief headed out the way the Mighty Ducks had come in, and turned left for her personal vehicle, a Ford Crown Victoria. The vehicle looked ordinary, but
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wasn’t. Under the hood was the biggest standard engine Ford made. There were two cellular phones and a pair of secure radios. The tires had steel disks inside so that were one to be flattened, the car could still drive. Like all members of the Detail, she’d been trained in the Service’s special evasive-driving course at Beltsville–it was something they all loved. And in her purse was her SigSauer 9mm automatic, along with two spare clips, plus her lipstick and credit cards.
Price was a fairly ordinary-looking woman. Not as pretty as Helen D’Agustino … she sighed at the memory. Andrea and Daga had been close. The latter had helped her through a divorce and gotten her some dates. Good friend, good agent, dead with all the rest that night on the Hill. Daga–nobody in the Service had called her Helen– had been blessed with Mediterranean features that stopped just short of voluptuous, and that had made for a fine disguise. She just hadn’t looked at all like a cop. Presidential aide, secretary, or mistress, maybe… but Andrea was more ordinary, and so she donned the sunglasses that agents on the Detail adopted. She was no-nonsense, maybe a little strident? They’d said that about her once, back when it had been a novelty for women to join up and carry guns. The system was over that now. Now she was one of the boys, to the point that she laughed at the jokes and told some of her own. Her instant assumption of command on that night with SWORDSMAN, getting his family to safety–she owed Ryan, Andrea knew. He’d made the call because he liked the way she did things. She would never have made Detail chief so rapidly but for his instant decision. Yes, she had the savvy. Yes, she knew the personnel very well. Yes, she genuinely loved the work. But she was young for the responsibility–and female. POTUS didn’t seem to care, however. He hadn’t picked her because she was female and it might therefore look good to the voting public. He’d done it because she’d gotten the job done during a tough time. That made it right, and that made SWORDSMAN special. He even asked her questions about things. That was unique.