The Threat (37 page)

He crossed the corridor. Ouderkirk muttered, “You on duty right now?”

“Yeah. I am. What do you want?”

“We need you to come by 303 once you get off.”

“Counterdrug? Why? What's the problem?”

“No problem. Just that we need you to sign the debrief forms. You went over to the East Wing so fast we never got you signed out.”

Dan said he'd be off in six hours and would come by then. Ouderkirk nodded and turned away.

The president was still outside the Oval Office, talking loudly to Ringalls, Weatherfield, and now his other old Nevada buddies too, Gino Varghese and Happy Harry Hedley. De Bari sounded angry. Looking to his left, Dan noticed a man in a gray suit heading down the corridor away from him. The corner of a large file box he was carrying was just visible. But he couldn't quite tell who it was, and the man didn't look back, so Dan went back into the secretary's office.

Then they were coming toward him, the same way he'd first seen De Bari, months before, flanked by the agents of the protective detail. He was still chewing out his cronies as he came. Weatherfield looked sick. The president's gaze slid past Dan as if he were greased. By now, so did the Secret Service's. Only Barney McKoy nodded. Dan hefted the satchel and fell in at the rear.

He was fastening the security strap when three hands rose simultaneously to three left ears. McKoy said, gaze darting down the corridor as his hand slid inside his jacket, “Anarchy. Anarchy!”

Dan went taut too. “Anarchy” meant an assassination attempt was under way. The detail contracted like the spiny shell of some primitive animal around the man they protected. Whose voice rose, demanding to know what was going on.

McKoy: “The control room says someone just called the switchboard, Mr. President.”

“You get crank calls all the time,” De Bari shouted. “What's the big goddamn deal all of a sudden?”

“This didn't sound like a crank, Mr. President. He had a strong foreign accent. He said truck bomb. Now. Headed for the West Executive gate.”

De Bari's tone changed. He asked where his wife was. McKoy, brow furrowed, was listening to his radio. He made a hand signal to his team. To De Bari he said, “We're going to evacuate you both, sir. Then everyone one else on the Eighteen. This way. Through the Residence.”

“Why not just out the—”

“If it's coming in West Executive, sir, we need to get you as far away as we can.”

All this time they'd been hiking along. Now the retinue broke into a not-quite-in-step trot along the corridors. Dan kept up. The case jolted his arm. It seemed heavier than usual. Probably just because he was trying to run with it. But the unsecured pistol was working its way out from under his belt. He grabbed it just as it started down his pants leg, and wedged it under his belt, rather than his waistband. They hurried down a flight of stairs, then turned into the mansion.

“A truck bomb?” De Bari wheezed. “Can't you stop it at the gate?”

“They go right through gates, Mr. President. And if it's a truck bomb, it'll be big.”

A group of donors, or maybe just better-dressed-than-usual tourists, were having their pictures taken in front of the Library fireplace. They gasped at De Bari's sudden appearance. Cameras came up as the president, ever the campaigner, waved and grinned without breaking stride. McKoy made a hand signal to the docent. A moment later she was herding the tourists out, disregarding their protests that they'd not yet seen the whole White House.

Under an arched entrance into the ground-floor corridor. The parquet floor creaked as they hammered over it. The agents' faces looked ever more grim. Dan wondered what they were hearing through those flesh-colored earpieces.

He felt his heart skipping beats, and not just from running. A truck bomb. Of course. How else to get through the pat-downs, briefcase scanners, bomb-sniffing dogs, metal detectors, uniformed security. A truckload of explosive would take out the whole West Wing and half the Old Executive. McKoy was probably heading for the PEOC. That deep in the ground, even tons of explosive would be just a rumble overhead.

But the protective detail had other plans. McKoy led them up a flight of marble steps toward the South Lawn. As they emerged onto the portico the marines were falling in to line the path.

Marine One
had landed. Its turbines whined hot smoke as it squatted. Another party emerged from the East Wing. Dan caught a glimpse of Letitia De Bari. Not far behind came a scramble of photographers and videocam crews.

He kept following the man who was the nucleus of that moving circle, that self-sacrificial wall of flesh. In public view, they'd slowed to a brisk walk. With his free hand, the one not locked to his responsibility, Dan put his cap on and tugged his service dress blouse down over the pistol.

The scrum reached the landing pad and parted, falling back to let the president and first lady board.

De Bari ushered his wife inside. Then turned on the topmost step, the presidential seal behind him on the gleaming fuselage. He lifted a fist to the cameras, looking stern and resolute. The crowd noise swelled as the protesters caught sight of him. Bottles and cans bounced on the grass. Dan caught the flash of annoyance on De Bari's face.

Above him, in the cockpit window, the commanding officer of HMX-1 was looking down anxiously at the boarding ladder, headset clamped to his ears. The engine noise rose, like an impatient cabdriver gunning his engine.

De Bari ducked inside. Dan glimpsed him at the big side window making his way aft. The secretary of defense was still with him, and by the way he was moving his hands, still talking.

McKoy stood by, hand to his ear. His gaze examined Dan, dropped to the satchel. He gave the briefest of micronods:
Go on, board
.

Dan went up the ladder, turned right, and found himself alone with the De Baris and Weatherfield in the passenger compartment. He slung the satchel under the bench seat as McKoy and another agent, the female one, the minimum protective detail, pounded in after him. They dropped into seats opposite Dan and buckled in.

Through the window he saw photographers falling to one knee, aiming lenses like snipers. Past them, more trash was sailing over the fence. The video crews were getting that as well, then panning to the helo. Zooming in on what was probably Robert De Bari's frown, framed in the big window.

The blades had been revolving. Now he heard the transmission whine and then the chop of the blades going to positive pitch. The lift pressed him into his seat, harder than usual. Dan wondered who exactly had called about the truck. “A strong foreign accent.” It didn't seem logical to go to all the trouble and risk to build a bomb, then phone in a warning.

As the ground dropped away he caught a glimpse of the roof. A countersniper looked up from the balustrade, rifle lowered, shielding his eyes from the sun as the helo climbed into it. The gardens and lawn spread in the tentative green of late winter. A nimbus seemed to hover amid the treetops, and below them glowed the bright yellow buds of the first daffodils.

It looked so grand. Again he felt the glory and power, gazing down at the sheer classic beauty of this building, knowing all it meant to the country. For all the tawdry doings and the failed men who'd passed through its doors, it was the stage of history. Whatever else happened, he'd remember the time he'd served here. From this height the crowd might have been festive, tossing not debris but brightly colored flowers. The walls and columns shone in the sun.

The horizon tipped and wheeled. A heaving sea of car glass, car metal, glittered Ellipseward. The white shaft of the Washington Monument rammed into the sky. The Tidal Basin shone like just-poured lead. Beyond it a speedboat unzipped the Potomac's gown. They were headed south, but he didn't know where. There were no plans for travel this afternoon, so they couldn't just advance the schedule.

He leaned to see past McKoy, who looked more relaxed now they were off the ground. Weatherfield was still talking, wincing and jerking his shoulders the way the guy always did. Dan wondered what they were discussing. The concerted refusal of the Joint Chiefs to make plans for the Palestinian occupation, most likely. You could argue that as a good thing or a bad thing. He wasn't sure himself which way the truth lay.

He suddenly wondered, the question coming from nowhere: Why had
Marine One
been waiting, if no travel was scheduled?

They droned over the Potomac, still gaining altitude. Above them passenger jets chalked contrails on blue velvet. Once again, as he had on the flight to Camp David, he thought how easy it would be to assassinate the president in the air. Any of the light planes that were probably all around them, in the crowded airspace of northern Virginia, could fly into them. It would be suicide, but there seemed to be more and more fanatics these days. He looked at McKoy again, then at the other Secret Service agent. Her name was Lee, Leigh, something like that. Blond. She looked back from behind dark wraparounds, expressionless as a death mask.

The PES crept out from beneath the seat, walked across the floor by an invisible hand. Despite meticulous maintenance,
Marine One
still had a chopper's inherent vibration. He stretched out a shoe, hooked it, and pulled it back. Looked up to find Leigh's eyes still on him. He gave her a smile but got only that flat stare.

He dropped his gaze. Looked at the satchel again.

Had it really felt heavier than usual?

Yeah, right. He grinned at himself and sat back. Amusing himself with the idea. If you wanted to get something aboard
Marine One
or
Air Force One,
what better way than to give it to the mil aide?

Sure. Who was the only guy the Secret Service couldn't search? Couldn't touch? And wouldn't even suspect? The dude who carried the football.

He sat there for a few minutes. Felt his smile fade, like the Cheshire cat in reverse.

Christ, he
was
getting paranoid. Upshaw had opened the satchel in the secretary's office. Gone through it while he'd looked over her shoulder. Nothing there that hadn't always been there.

He glanced at the agents again. Neither McKoy nor Leigh was looking at him now. The lead agent was gazing out and down to where the Beltway, like a Robert Heinlein roadcity, lay flashing and streaming across the Wilson Bridge.

You are so fucking nuts, he told himself savagely. You really ought to turn yourself in. He'd fought it for too long. Self-loathing overwhelmed him.

He looked at the satchel again. Pulled it out with the toe of his shoe. Bending, he fiddled with the catch, trying to look casual. He set the combination, and popped the first latch.

Only it didn't pop.

He pushed harder, but it didn't move. He frowned. Checked the combo. The numbers were lined up dead center on the indicator marks. But neither latch was opening. He spun it, set it up again, pushed the latch again.

Nada.

He cleared his throat. Glanced at the agents. They were ignoring him, lost in the vibration and noise. De Bari and Weatherfield were in their own world, arguing. Mrs. De Bari stared into eternity somewhere above all their heads.

Why would they change the combo without telling him? The duty dog had to be able to get to the radio. And the handbook, if the warbler went off. Plus the other stuff in there. There wasn't much room, but Jazak sometimes left Power Bars and the small-size Gatorades in there. When he found them Dan had no qualms about drinking the juice, though he drew the line at the Power Bars.

You're around the bend, he told himself. Nutzoid. The lock's jammed, that's all. Or Upshaw had reset the combination by accident.

Only he didn't see how. All she'd done was spin the dials, as they all did when they closed the PES, so that even if it was stolen it'd still be locked.

Son of a bitch! What if that warbler went off right now? Or the president asked to look at the manual? He broke into a sweat, glancing toward De Bari and Weatherfield as if they could read his mind. But the next minute he thought: They don't care. What had Jazak said? Bad Bob didn't have a clue. Had sent the Gold Code to the dry cleaners in his pants.

But even as he thought that, he knew he was skating around the truth and his duty. Because if Robert De Bari didn't give a shit, that was no excuse for Commander Dan Lenson to cut corners or look away.

Moving as casually as he could, he leaned to look down through polished bulletproof plastic. Now forest bordered the gleam of river, and the glowing mercury of the Chesapeake broadened ahead.

He snapped open his seat belt. Took a step forward, toward the cockpit; then, as if he'd forgotten, came back and bent and took the satchel along, and set it casually on the step up to the pilots' compartment. He rapped on the sliding port. A face glanced back. The port slid open.

“Anything from the White House?” he shouted up into significantly louder noise.

The marine shouted back, “Nothing yet.”

“No truck bombs?”

“Not that they've told me about.”

“Where we headed?”

“Oh, we're just flyin' around, down toward Pax River. Looking for a recall any minute, unless they want me to shoot for Thurmont.”

Dan looked past him, into the cockpit, and saw what he'd hoped to. “Can you hand me that?” he shouted, pointing.

“Hand you what? The fire extinguisher?” the pilot yelled, twisting in his seat. The copilot, who had the stick, glanced back too, eyebrows raised.

“No. No!” He didn't dare look back at the agents. “The extraction tool.”

The colonel followed his finger to a steel crowbar-and-cutter on the bulkhead. “What do you need that for?”

Dan patted the satchel. “Fucking latch is jammed.”

He saw the marine's lips purse as he took it in: who Dan was, what he was saying. “
That's
not good.”