Conspiracy

by Stephen Coonts

  “Guess they never have fires in Vietnam, huh?” He slipped the pick in, pushed up gently, then stepped into the darkened hallway.

  Thao Duong’s office was near the end of the hallway. Surprisingly large, it had a simple metal desk and a comfortable chair, but no other furniture, not even a bookshelf or a place for a visitor to sit. Papers were stacked along the left wall, some as high as Karr’s waist.

  “Single computer on the desk,” Karr told the Art Room as he checked the sole drawer. It contained only two pens. “PC. No network card that I see.”

  “Wireless network?” asked Rockman.

  “Not sure.” Karr took out his PDA and tapped the screen, bringing up a simple wireless detection program. The dialog button on the screen remained brown—no wireless signal. “Nada.”

  Karr inserted a small electronic dongle into one of the computer’s USB ports at the rear, then booted the computer. Karr’s dongle, about the size of a lipstick, allowed him to bypass the computer’s normal operating system, making it easier to upload its contents to the Art Room. As the machine came to life, he took a wire from his pocket and inserted one end into a second USB port, then connected it to his sat phone. When that was done, he went over to the papers.

  “This is all Vietnamese to me,” he told Rockman, removing his PDA from his pocket. He slipped a camera attachment on it and began beaming images of the stacked pages to the Art Room.

  “Agricultural reports,” said Thu De Nghiem.

  After a couple of stacks, Karr realized that each pile represented a different province. The stacks contained an assortment of agricultural information dating back six or seven years.

  Not exactly what he’d hoped to find.

  “How’s that download coming?” he asked Rockman.

  “We’re about halfway done.”

  Karr sat down in front of the desk, considering where he should plant the audio bug he’d brought. Given the lack of furniture, the most logical place was in the computer, but that also meant it would be the most likely place anyone would look for it.

  Under the pile of papers?

  Hard to tell when they might be moved.

  There was a thermostat on the wall.

  Karr decided there was no sense being too cute and decided to simply stick the bug under the desk. Since he was already sitting on the floor, he leaned back and crawled under. But as he started to put the bug in place he saw a large envelope taped to the bottom of the desk in his way.

  “What have we here?” he said, pocketing the bug. He undid the tape and took the envelope down.

  “Tommy—Thao Duong is walking toward the building.”

  “No shit? My building?”

  “Get out of there.”

  “You finished with the download?”

  “No.”

  “Then what’s your hurry?”

  Karr undid the clasp on the envelope. There were newspaper clippings inside, and a small key, the sort that would be used for a locker.

  Karr took out his video bug and scanned the key.

  “You got all this?” he asked Rockman.

  “Of course we got it,” said Rockman. “Get out of there, Tommy. Out. He’s in the lobby.”

  Karr put the key back in the envelope and returned it to its hiding spot.

  “Done with the download?” he asked, climbing back to his feet.

  “We’re done—go. Go!”

  Karr turned off the computer and pulled his gear away, trotting to the door. As he was about to open it, he realized he’d forgotten to plant his bug. Necessity being the mother of invention, he decided the top of the doorjamb was a perfect place not only for an audio bug but for a video one as well.

  “Pictures with the words,” he told the Art Room, starting to turn the doorknob.

  “The elevator is opening on your floor,” hissed Rockman. “It’s Thao Duong. Get out of there.”

  “Great advice,” said Karr, taking his hand off the knob and stepping back into the room.

  38

  ONCE HE MADE contact with the Vietnamese official, Dean’s job at the reception was over. He had to stay to maintain his cover, however, so he did his best to make small talk with the Vietnamese agricultural officials, bureaucrats, and other foreign salesmen at the gathering. Never good at mingling, Dean found it even more perplexing with the accented English that was used as the common tongue. The “conversations” generally consisted of vague questions answered by nods and half smiles.

  He avoided Tang. It was a good bet that at least some of the Vietnamese suspected she was CIA, though he noticed that didn’t stop them from talking to her. She may not have been extraordinarily pretty, but she was one of the few women and by far the youngest at the gathering, and that definitely worked in her favor.

  “You were here during the war?” a bespectacled Vietnamese man asked Dean just as he was getting ready to leave.

  “Yes,” said Dean.

  “Where?”

  “Quang Nam Province, mostly.”

  “You were a Marine, then,” said the man. It was a reasonable guess; for much of the war the Marines had been the primary American force in Quang Nam, with a large base at Da Nang.

  “Yes, I was.” Dean looked at him more closely. The man had brown splotch marks on his face and wrinkle marks at the corners of his eyes, half-hidden by the glasses. He was a few years older than Dean. Though thin, he had broad shoulders and a substantial chest; if he were a tree he would be an oak.

  “I was with the Army of the Republic of Vietnam,” said the man. He made no effort to lower his voice, though he was referring to the South Vietnamese Army—in theory an enemy of the present government. “A lieutenant and then a captain.”

  “I see.”

  “We worked with Marines. Very good fighters. Loyal.”

  “Thank you.”

  Curiosity roused, Dean asked the man how he came to be part of the present government.

  “I was not a spy or a traitor,” the former Army officer told Dean. “I’ve been rehabilitated. Connections help.”

  “Charlie, Tommy’s in trouble,” said Rockman in his ear. “We need you to back him up now.”

  Dean made a show of glancing at his watch.

  “I have to make a phone call back to one of my accounts at home,” he told the former ARVN soldier. “I’m sorry to have to leave.”

  “My card,” said the man, reaching into his pocket. “If you have some free time, call me.”

  “I’ll try,” said Dean, taking the card, though he knew it was doubtful he’d use it. “I’d like that.”

  39

  EVEN A MAN half Tommy Karr’s size could not have found a place to hide in Thao Duong’s office. So Karr found one outside the office—he opened one of the windows directly behind the desk.

  The ledge was all of four inches thick, but Karr didn’t have much choice. He pushed the window down behind him, then began making his way to the next window, gripping the gaps in the bricks as firmly as he could.

  The light in the office came on just as Karr reached to the window of the next room. He pulled himself across, then felt his right toe start to slip on the greasy stone ledge.

  This way, this way, he told himself, trying to balance his momentum forward. He did a little slide step and pinched his fingers tighter, pushing himself close to the window. His left foot sailed out over the pavement and his hand lost its grip. Just in time he grabbed the upper part of the window, rattling the jamb but keeping himself on the ledge.

  “Tommy, are you all right?” asked Rockman. “Where are you?”

  “Getting some air. What do you see with that video bug I left in the office?”

  “Just sitting at his desk. We’ll tell you when he’s gone.”

  “What’s he doing?” Karr asked.

  “Working. He went to the pile and took a report out.”

  “Come on. You’re telling me he’s a dedicated bureaucrat?”

  “I’m just the messenger. Wait a second—he’s reach
ing for that envelope you found.”

  “You ID the key?”

  “Looks like the type used in a firebox or trunk. Do you think you can follow him when he leaves the building?”

  “If I can grow wings in the next five minutes, I’ll be happy to,” said Karr. “Where’s Dean?”

  “He’s on his way. But he’s never going to get there in time. Looks like Thao’s getting ready to go—he put the envelope back.”

  Karr tried opening the window, but it was locked from the inside. Breaking it would make too much noise while Thao Duon was next door, but if Karr waited until he left, it would probably be too late.

  Karr glanced toward the ground and then back at the building, trying to see if it might be possible to climb down. There was decorative brickwork at the corner that he could use as a ladder, but that meant going past three more double sets of windows. He was bound to slip sooner or later.

  How about going up? There was only one floor between him and the flat roof. A row of bricks ran just above the windows, a decorative bump-out thick enough to grab on to. He wrapped his fingers around the bricks and pulled himself up as if doing a reverse chin-up. He put his right boot against the window casing for more leverage. He started to pull himself up, then realized it wasn’t going to work; the window ledge above the row of bricks was too far away to reach. But it was too late; he couldn’t get his feet down without risking a fall.

  A SHORT LINE of taxis waited at the curb of the hotel. Dean got in the first one, and with the aid of the Art Room translator gave the driver an address a half block from the office building where Karr was. It was less than four miles away, and there was very little traffic on the streets at night, but Dean found himself bouncing his foot up and down on the floor in the backseat, anxious to get there.

  “Wait for me here,” he told the driver when they were about a block from the destination. Dean threw a twenty-dollar American bill on the front seat and bolted from the cab.

  “Tommy’s around the back of the building,” Rockman told him. “Thao Duong is still in his office. We want you to trail him if you can.”

  “Tommy, can you hear me?”

  “He’s on the window ledge,” said Rockman.

  “Connect us.”

  The op-to-op mode on the communications gear could be activated either by the operatives themselves or by the Art Room. Dean heard Karr’s heavy breathing and asked if he was OK.

  “Uh, yeah,” grunted Karr. “Just busy.”

  “I’ll be there in a second,” said Dean, starting to run.

  IF HE WAS going to fall anyway, Karr decided it would be better existentially to fall while going up rather than down. He gritted his teeth and jerked his right leg upward, swinging it up and over the ledge above him—and into the window glass, which shattered above him. He pushed up with his hands, curled what he could of his foot inside the building, and then for a moment hung suspended in mid-air.

  “Hang on!” yelled Dean in Karr’s ear.

  “Oh yeah.”

  Upside down, Karr struggled to get a grip on the side of the window. He was now draped halfway in and halfway out, part of him inside the room and the larger part out. Blood rushed to his head. His face swam in sweat.

  Karr had just enough of his calf inside the window to leverage himself upward. The rest of the glass broke and fell into his lap as he pulled himself up. Hands bleeding, he managed to maneuver himself around into a seated position.

  Shouldn’t have done that, he told himself. It was OK to be negative once he’d succeeded.

  Something smacked the side of his face. He looked up but couldn’t figure out what it was. All he could see in his night glasses was a black blur.

  “Grab the rope,” said Charlie Dean. “It’s by your head.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Grab the damn rope before you fall,” said Dean. “I’m on the roof. I don’t know if this rig is going to hold long enough to pull you up.”

  “Nah, I’m OK,” said Karr. “Is there a door up there?”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “I’ll meet you on the sixth floor,” he said, slipping inside.

  40

  SINCE THE ASSASSINATION attempt, reporters always began interviews with Senator McSweeney by expressing concern for his continued well-being. Some were sincere, some sounded sincere; few were both. McSweeney played a private game with himself, trying to predict beforehand the sort of expression he would receive. In this case, the reporter had the bad taste to suggest that getting shot at had helped McSweeney tremendously in the polls.

  “I wouldn’t recommend it,” said McSweeney tartly.

  The reporter was correct; McSweeney had vaulted from also-ran to the odds-on favorite not only for Super Tuesday but also in the round of primaries the following Thursday and Tuesday. If the trend continued, he would wrap up the party nomination within a month.

  The pollster worried that it was just a temporary bump. Jimmy Fingers pointed out that as long as “temporary” got them through Tuesday, it might as well be permanent. Sympathy vote or not, McSweeney’s aide added, the effect had helped Reagan during his first term when Hinckley tried to kill him. “It gave him space for his first-term agenda. This time, it’s going to get you elected.”

  McSweeney preferred to think that people would vote for him based on his record. But if they pulled the lever because he had the good sense to duck when someone shot at him, so be it.

  “Why do you want to be President?” asked the reporter from the Times-Union, starting the interview with a softball question.

  McSweeney rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger, an old trick to make it look as if he were giving the question serious thought. In fact, he had a ready answer, a stock rehash of sound bites he knew would play well no matter how the reporter sliced and diced them in his story.

  “It’s time to tap the full potential of the people. The President is the only person—the only real national leader—who can do that effectively.”

  McSweeney continued, citing John F. Kennedy, talking about the contributions and attitude of the World War II generation, and laying out a program that all but the most cynical hack would applaud.

  “But why, really?” said the reporter when McSweeney finished.

  The question threw McSweeney. It wasn’t the words so much as the tone of familiarity. The reporter sounded like a friend who had detected a false note in a casual comment and wasn’t going to stand for bull.

  Why did he want to be President?

  Power, prestige. The ability to do what he wanted to do without being stopped.

  The guarantee that he would be included in history books.

  Who didn’t want to be President, damn it?

  “I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” said McSweeney.

  “Inside,” said the reporter. “Why do you want to be President?”

  McSweeney began recycling his earlier answer. But he got only two sentences out of his mouth before the reporter said, “Ah, come on, Senator. Why do you really want to be in the White House? Ego? The babes?”

  Someone other than McSweeney might have answered the reporter’s poor attempt at a joke with a humorous joke of his own, cementing a favorable relationship for the rest of the campaign. Most of the others would have said something ridiculously stupid meant as a joke, but so inept that it would end up burying them when quoted.

  McSweeney found a third way—he simply didn’t answer.

  “Wanting to make America a better place, help us live up to our potential, can seem corny,” he told the reporter. “But that’s what I’m about. And it’s funny, I’ve always been absurdly idealistic, even as a nine-year-old. My mom has an essay I wrote on how I wanted to be President and how I was going to help the environment and improve schools.”

  “Really? You have it?”

  “She has it. Call her. Between you and me, my spelling was probably atrocious. I still have trouble. Thank God for spell-check.”

  41r />
  “HE’S COMING OUT of the building,” said Rockman as Dean met Karr in the stairwell. “He’s turning right.”

  “You really lost your calling, Rockman,” said Karr as they clambered down to the basement. “You’d be great doing play-by-play.”

  “Very funny. He’s crossing the street. He doesn’t seem to have a car nearby,” added Rockman. “We’ll lose him in a minute.”

  Propelled by the need to rescue Karr, Dean had had no trouble running up the stairs. Going down, though, was a different story. He felt winded, and every step jabbed at his legs. The calf muscle in his right leg cramped while his hamstrings pulled taut.

  “I have a cab waiting about a block to the west,” grunted Dean, losing ground to Karr, who jogged down the steps two or three at a time. The younger man’s pants were red with blood, but it didn’t seem to slow him down.

  “I got something better than a cab,” Karr told Dean, hitting the landing and turning toward the door. “Come on.”

  By the time Dean caught up with him outside, Karr had hopped into the truck behind the building. The truck’s motor coughed to life as Dean pitched himself into the seat.

  “Just turn left on that street behind you,” said Rockman.

  “Got it,” said Karr. He threw the truck into reverse, swerved into the intersection backward, and squealed the tires as he changed direction. The truck tottered sideways, then picked up steam.

  “Keep us in one piece,” said Dean, still out of breath.

  “Oh yeah!” said Karr. It was more a battle cry than an acknowledgment; the truck continued to accelerate.

  Dean slapped his hand on the dashboard as Karr barely avoided hitting a parked car at the next corner. The truck tilted on its left wheels as he veered through the intersection; Dean braced himself, waiting for the crash.

  “That’s him up there, getting onto the Honda ôm. Damn,” said Karr.

  The Honda ôm—the generic name for a motorbike used as a taxi and common in the city—was headed in the wrong direction. By the time Karr found a place to turn around, it was nowhere in sight.

  “Rockman, get us directions to Thao Duong’s apartment,” Dean said. Then he turned to Karr. “Let’s swap places.”