“Not a thing,” she answered.
“How soon can you talk to him?”
“I have to be in St. Louis tonight. I could fly up to Chicago on the way and have a talk with him.”
“Sooner the better. This is Monday. Can we have him here for a meeting at, say, nine Wednesday morning?”
Her expression did not change. “Yes, sir, if he’s interested in the job,” she replied.
Pennington smiled. “If he proves difficult, tell him the President has a favor to ask.”
CHAPTER 7
JANUARY 13, 4:46 A.M., CST
The cellular phone rang a second time before Vail turned over with a groan and felt for it in the dark, groping for the power button.
“Hello.” Sleepily.
“Mr. Vail?”
“Yeah?”
“Sorry to awaken you at this hour. This is Margaret Castaigne, the Attorney General.”
He did not answer for a few seconds. He raised up on one elbow and turned on the lamp. Jane made a noise and turned on her side, facing away from the light. The dog didn’t move.
Margaret Castaigne?
Attorney General?
Of the United States?
Nah.
“Who is this, really?”
“I know this is rather unorthodox, Mr. Vail. This is Marge Castaigne. If you want to check it, you can get the number of the White House switchboard and call me back.”
“Uh… okay… I’ll call you right back,” he said, and hung up. He sat up in the bed and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. Jane turned back over and peered at him through sleep-swollen slits.
“Who was that?” she asked grumpily.
“Margaret Castaigne,” he said.
Her eyes popped open. “The Margaret Castaigne?”
“That’s what she said.”
“The Attorney General?”
“Yeah,” he said. He got the number from information and, punching out the number on his cell phone, said, “I’ve got to call her back at the White House.”
“The White House? Martin, are you dreaming? Why would the A.G. be calling you at this hour?”
“Tell you in a min— Yes, good morning, this is Martin Vail. I have instructions to call— Thank you…” He cupped the mouthpiece with his hand. “I think it’s really her. The White House switchboard answered and they’re— Hello, this is Martin Vail.”
“I like a man who’s cautious, Mr. Vail,” Marge Castaigne said. “Well, uh, one can never be too cautious, can one?”
Jane squinted at him, rolled her eyes, shook her head, and buried her face in a pillow.
“Mr. Vail, I’ll be in Chicago in about ninety minutes. I was wondering if you can join me for breakfast?”
“Breakfast? In ninety minutes?”
“I know this is very short notice. I’m sorry about that.”
“I, uh, I can’t get into town in ninety minutes, Ms. Castaigne.”
“Yes, I know. I understand you have a large open yard between your cabin and the lake. I can have a chopper set down there in, say, an hour?”
“Can you tell me what this is about?”
“Rather not on the phone. Do you have other plans?”
“Ms. Castaigne, I’m on vacation. The only thing I do before noon is take my dog for a walk.”
“One hour, then? You can still work in a short walk with Mister Magoo.”
“Right. Thank you, sir.”
“Thank you, sir. See you in about ninety.”
Vail turned off the phone and laid it on the night table.
“Well… ?” Venable said.
Vail got out of bed and pulled on his bathrobe. “It was her all right.”
“Martin, you called her sir.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes I’m sure.” She waited for an explanation. “Well?”
“We’re having breakfast in town.” He headed toward the shower. “When?”
“Hour and a half. She’s sending a helicopter to pick me up. God, it’s cold in here.”
“Is this a joke? It’s always cold in here first thing. I always get up first and turn on the heat.”
“Oh. Thanks.”
“Marty? Are you serious?”
“Yes, it must be forty in here.”
“I mean about the A.G.?”
“Yup.” He got up, stepped over the dog, who was sound asleep on the floor beside him, and went into the bathroom. A moment later he stuck his head back out and pointed to the dog. “That’s a pedigreed, pure-bred white German shepherd, distant relative of the wolf, which is the smartest animal on four legs. You’d think the phone would wake him up, maybe get a bark or two out of him, wouldn’t you?”
“Why? He doesn’t have to answer it.”
“I didn’t think of that.”
He went back in the bathroom and then stuck his head around the corner again.
“She knew his name.”
“Who?”
“The Attorney General. She knew Magoo’s name.”
“She’s the Attorney General, for God’s sake. The FBI works for her.”
“Oh. That explains it. On the other hand, maybe it’s a joke. Maybe I’m going to get up and dressed and whoever called is going to call back at six and say something like, ‘Happy January Fool’s Day.’”
“Go take a shower.”
“Right.”
She stood by the kitchen window, nursing a cup of coffee, watching Vail and Magoo playing down by the lake. He had never owned a dog in his life and was obviously skeptical when she gave him Magoo for his birthday, a twenty-pound bundle of white fur with gold eyes and enormous pointed ears. Now the two were inseparable and Vail was suggesting they get a mate for him. He was nine months old, ninety pounds and still growing. He looked like a ghost, trotting through the trees, his pointed ears moving to the side and back at every sound, his nose raised and sniffing the cold morning air for the scent of a rabbit or a stoat. She heard Vail whistle, saw Magoo turn sharply and gallop back to his side, and they headed across the snow-encrusted yard toward the house.
Vail admired the house, as he always did when he walked up from the lake. It was a two-story converted barn that Jane and an architect had fashioned into a perfect getaway house. On the first floor there was a guest bedroom, which no one had ever used, and an enormous living room, which towered to the peaked roof of the old barn. There were two fireplaces, one in the living room and one in the corner of the sprawling kitchen. On the second floor, their bedroom and Jane’s bath were on one side of the house, and their office on the other side. The rooms were connected by a bridge across the back side of the living room. Vail had his own bath adjacent to the office.
“Know how lucky you are?” he said to Magoo, who was trotting beside him, his nose to the ground. “Think about it, what a deal you’ve got. A nice cabin by the lake, great apartment in town with a view of the lake. A rich, beautiful mistress. Me.”
Magoo stopped and checked out a hole in the snow, then trotted on. “Until Janie and I decided to live together, I never gave a second thought to owning a dog or a country place. Never gave it a first thought. You could’ve ended up in some dinky house with a little fenced-in backyard, you know. Think about it.”
Magoo looked up at him and yawned.
“Know what I think, buddy?” Vail said, his breath condensing into swirls of steam. “I think you need a girlfriend. Every man needs a little love in his life.”
He stamped snow off his boots before he entered the kitchen. Magoo scooted ahead of him and went straight to his food dish. Jane handed Vail a cup of coffee.
“You two make a beautiful pair.”
“He keeps getting smarter and smarter.”
“Are you going like that?” she asked casually.
“Why not?”
“You’re having breakfast with the Attorney General of the United States. Don’t you think a jacket and tie might be more appropriate than corduroys, a flannel shirt, and a bomber jacket?”
&n
bsp; “She probably wants to raise hell with me about stealing the Grand County case from her department,” he said, sipping his coffee. “Why should I dress up for that?”
“I’m sure she has better things on her agenda.”
“I really don’t know that much about her. Wasn’t she a judge down in the second circuit?”
“Yes, darling. And a former fed prosecutor, and before that a demon in the defense community—like someone else I know. You two have a lot in common.”
“The only time I ever worked for the government was in the Army, not a pleasant experience.”
“She’s tough, Marty. I hear she kicks ass all over the Hill. When she first took the job, a bunch of decrepit congressmen decided to whip her into shape, walk all over her, teach her the Washington way, whatever the hell that is. She did the whipping and still does. You know about her husband, don’t you?”
“Died, didn’t he?”
“He was defending a lawyer friend in a money laundering case two doors down from where she was holding court, dropped dead cross-examining a witness.”
“Not a bad way to go.”
“I wouldn’t tell her that.”
“I’m sure her husband’s nose dive in court won’t come up.”
“They were quite an item. The tough federal judge married to the hard-boiled lawyer.”
“How come you know so much about her?”
“She’s the top lawyer in the country. I like to know about my competition.”
“You planning to enter government service?”
“I mean, I like to see a woman rise to the surface in D.C. Some of those old bastards in Congress can’t stand it when one of their cronies gets passed over, particularly by a… woman” She made quotation marks with fingers when she said “woman.”
“I’ll give you an in-depth appraisal when I get back,” Vail said. “By the way, the guy her husband was defending got a mistrial when Castaigne died. Made a deal and never served a day. Some people think Castaigne dropped dead just to win the case. I always did appreciate a man who’ll do anything to win. Of course, dying was a bit extreme.”
He stepped over and kissed her. “Let’s have corned beef hash and eggs for lunch. I’ll cook.”
“You won’t be back for lunch.”
“How do you know?”
“Woman’s intuition.”
“Well, I’ll tell Ms. Castaigne you’re a fan.”
“And don’t call her Ms. Castaigne.”
“What do I call her?”
“General, of course. How quickly you forget.”
“It always made me uncomfortable when people called me ‘General.’ I think of a general as, you know, standing in the back of a jeep waving at all the people he just liberated. Patton, Eisenhower, Stormin’ Norman, now those were generals.”
“Martin?”
“Yeah?”
“Call her General.”
“Right.”
“Gonna change clothes?”
“Nope.”
Magoo heard the chopper first, its blades beating the air. He walked to the picture window in the living room, stared across the lake for a moment, and then growled.
“The phone rings in his ear and he sleeps right through it. But he hears a helicopter ten miles away.”
“I told you why. He doesn’t have to talk on the phone.”
“What’s he going to do, fly the chopper into town?”
“Wouldn’t surprise me at all.”
He put his arm around her and they stared at the sky.
“What the hell do you think this is about?” he said, half to himself. Jane did not answer him. But she knew in her heart that their life was about to change.
Radically.
Lawrence Pennington stood at his desk, running his finger down the appointments list for the day. His secretary, Mildred Ewing, waited patiently.
“What’s this Missouri delegation coffee at seven-thirty?”
“It’s the entire congressional delegation. The veteran’s thing?”
“Oh, right. What time is it?”
“Seven twenty-three, Mr. President.”
“They here?”
She nodded.
“Give me five minutes.”
“Yes sir.” She turned and left the Oval Office, and Hooker came in the room.
“Got a minute, Mr. President?”
“What is it, Claude?”
The security adviser walked around the desk and stood behind him. He leaned over and whispered in the President’s ear. He always whispered when they were alone, fearing tape recorders might pick up his words.
“This is a risky trick, General. This RICO thing.”
“How so, Claude?” the President said without turning around.
“If this man doesn’t deliver…”
“Everything’s a risk in politics, Colonel.”
“But if he doesn’t bring this case in…”
“Don’t worry about it, Claude, that’s Marge Castaigne’s problem.”
“If this doesn’t work, it could backfire in the next campaign.”
He turned and faced Hooker. “I know the risks,” he said flatly. “He’s not a player, Mr. President. This Vail’s a real wild pony.”
“Oh?” the President said curtly. “I’ll tell you what, Claude. Stay out of his way, but keep an eye on him. Since you’re so concerned, Mr. Vail will be your responsibility. If he is a wild pony, he’s your wild pony.”
BOOK TWO
WILD PONY
For one who has been honored,
Dishonor is worse than death.
—Bhagavad Gita
CHAPTER 8
The helicopter settled gently in a remote corner of O’Hare. A tall black man who appeared to be in his early thirties was standing nearby, his hand stuffed in a fur-lined jacket. There was a badge on the collar of the jacket. Vail jumped out and, as he ran in a crouch under the blades, the man came up to him and offered his hand.
“Mr. Vail?”
“Yes.”
“Roger Nielson, FBI,” he said. “Follow me, please.”
Above them in the flight tower a man scanned the skies with binoculars. He swung them toward the chopper that had just landed and followed Nielson and Vail as they walked across the hard stand to a white 737 parked in a hangar. The jet had a U.S. flag painted on the tail and UNITED STATES JUSTICE DEPARTMENT on the side.
“Afraid I’ll have to pat you down, sir,” Nielson said apologetically. Vail held his arms out to his sides, and Nielson’s hands expertly checked him for weapons.
“Thank you, sir.” He motioned Vail up the stairs, where a younger man, short and dark-haired, in a dark blue suit, was waiting at the top of the staircase.
“Mr. Vail, I’m Paul Silverman,” he said. “I’m the steward. Please come in. The A.G. will be out in a second, she had to take a phone call.” Vail stepped aboard the plane. To the left of the door was what appeared to be a small combination dining and conference room that stretched the entire width of the plane. Ten easy chairs bolted to the floor surrounded an ebony table. A thirty-five-inch TV set was built into the wall of the room, and a door led to the front of the plane. To the right was what Vail assumed to be a sitting room. A large sofa hugged the hull of the plane, with a coffee table separating it from three easy chairs. The twenty-seven-inch TV built into the interior of that wall was tuned to WWN, but the sound was off. A fresh copy of USA Today lay on the coffee table. The plane’s interior color scheme— tan carpeting and royal-blue furniture throughout—was pleasant and unobtrusive.
“Coffee, sir?” the steward asked.
“That would hit the spot,” Vail said.
“Three sugars and one cream, right?”
Vail looked at the steward with surprise and nodded.
“The A.G. took the liberty of ordering breakfast. Cantaloupe, eggs Benedict with hash browns, and rye toast. Will that be satisfactory, sir?”
Vail kept nodding. They knew his dog’s name, how he liked his c
offee, and his favorite breakfast. What the hell else did they know? he wondered.
“Make yourself comfortable, sir.”
“Thank you, Mr. Silverman.”
“Please call me Paul, sir.”
Vail sat in one of the easy chairs, and the steward brought his coffee in a Spode china cup. Vail glanced at the TV and recognized Valerie Azimour, the reporter who had attempted to interview him during the Atlas-Western trial. She was bundled up in a fleece-lined parka, its fur-lined hood framing her face, her breath steamy from the cold. She was standing in the dark, looking serious as she spoke into the mike. Since the sound was off he couldn’t tell where she was or what calamity she was covering now, so he turned his attention to the newspaper and scanned the headlines. A moment later the Attorney General entered the room.
Margaret Castaigne was a little shorter than Vail had imagined, a trim, dark-complected woman with jet-black hair turning gray and dark brown eyes. She was handsome, not beautiful, a well-groomed lady in her mid-fifties. She smiled with her lips, but he could see eyes coolly appraising him.
“Good morning, Mr. Vail,” she said.
“Good morning, General,” he answered.
She had a handshake like a stevedore.
“Welcome to the AMOC,” she said.
“AMOC?”
“Air Mobile Operations Center. Don’t ask me where these acronyms come from, probably some Phi Beta Kappa who does nothing all day long but dream them up. Thanks for getting up at the crack of dawn to join me. I hope it’s worth the trip.”
“We’ll see how the eggs Benedict go before I make a commitment.” She laughed and nodded. “Fair enough. Like to see how the Department of Justice lives?”
“That depends,” he said with a smile. “What’s the tour cost?”
“Not a thing.” She smiled and pointed toward the front of the plane. “Up front is the flight deck, the galley, and the conference room, which doubles as a dining room. This is the sitting room, usually reserved for polite conversation. And this…” She led him into the next compartment. “… is my office.”
It was a simple compartment: a desk with a stuffed chair behind it and two chairs facing the desk. The desk was empty except for a single picture of two young men, its frame anchored to the desktop, and two phones, one black, the other red. There was a thirty-five-inch TV monitor mounted in the wall.
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