“It is my intention to make this agency, the watchman for our country. Our job will be first, to keep watch over all of our national borders; second, when necessary, to warn our government of any threat; and third, in any instance where we, in this room, believe that our country is not acting to protect American citizens, American property and American territory … we will do whatever is necessary to protect and to defend our nation and its citizens.”
“Ladies and gentleman, we are not here to replace the military and civilian law enforcement agencies of our country. We are here primarily to advise them and to serve them in whatever capacities we can … but in any case; we will NOT ALLOW … another 9/11! We will NOT ALLOW another terrorist attack on American soil, not if we can help it, not if we can do something about it!”
“If any of you have a problem with anything I just said, speak now or come to me after this meeting ends. We’ll do all we can to find you a job with someone else. There will be no hard feelings, but for the rest of you who feel up to the challenge … Godspeed and God Bless! ”
Everyone in the room stood and applauded, including Pastak, but his only reason for standing was so as not to be the only person left sitting. Pastak was fuming from what he considered to be a major snub and demotion, so much so, that he hardly heard anything De Niro had said.
“I would like to invite Captain Ricci to step up here and say a few words, Mugsy?”
De Niro shook his brother-in-law’s hand then took a seat at the head of the table as Ricci stepped up to the podium.
“Thank you Cris and God bless you and everyone in this room. Ladies and gentleman, I’ll make this one short and to the point. I’m honored to be chosen for this position with this agency and to lead what I believe to be the finest staff that I have ever commanded.
“Over the next days and weeks we’ll get to know one another and we’ll get a feel for how we all do our jobs. Please feel free to come to me anytime, day or night, if you need any assistance, advice or guidance. Those who know me know that I’m not a micro-manager, neither is Cris. We both believe in choosing the right people for the job and then letting them do their jobs. We’ve chosen you and now I’ll leave it up to each of you to choose your staff. Please have everyone in place by Friday and notify Les’s HR department with any new appointments, so they can make the necessary pay-grade changes. Please also submit your new department roster to Debbie as soon as possible.”
“I’ve never been one to like to sit through long meetings so I’m pleased to announce that everyone in this firm will begin using our proprietary project management system. You may be asking yourself, ‘what proprietary project management system?’ Well, by the time this meeting adjourns every member of this firm will have The Watchman PMS, otherwise known as ‘Big Brother,’ running on every one of their desktops, laptops, notebooks and handheld devices. Johnny-F, our new head of IT didn’t waste any time ‘… bringing us into the 21st century,’ as he put it.”
The room filled with laughter.
“The IT department will immediately train everyone on the use of Big Brother, but in a nutshell, it keeps us all connected and informed. Everyone, I mean everyone is mandated to update Big Brother with their status and location at all times. There will be tiered security levels built into the system, so no one need fear disclosing top secret and covert operation status. New SOP1’s are contained in Big Brother. Please become familiar with them. That will be all for now, again, thank you – now let’s protect our country!”
“Mugsy, John and Charlie, I’ll meet you in Mugsy’s office in five, Michelle would you stay a moment?” De Niro added as everyone stood up, a few shaking hands and making small talk.
Everyone left the room except for De Niro and the VP Intelligence Services. De Niro closed the door to the soundproofed room. Both remained standing.
“Michelle, I’d like you to do me a favor, if you would.”
“What do you need, Mr. De Niro?”
“Please … call me Cris. Michelle, is there a way for you to monitor large withdrawals from overseas banks and/or deposits into domestic banks?”
“It depends on a number of things, including the size of the transactions, the nature of the transactions …whether the money is being wired or withdrew and deposited in cash or check, and on the banks themselves, among other things. I should also point out that it’s a relatively easy thing to do if we have legal grounds and a court order. Then we can compel the banks to comply. Why, what’s up?”
De Niro reached his hand behind his neck, as if he were reconsidering his request.
“Well, the fact is there’s no real reason. I mean no tangible reason … I’m not making any sense, am I?”
Wang smiled warmly, “Mr. De Niro … Cris, you’d make more sense if you just spit it out and told me, what’s on your mind?”
De Niro continued to rub the back of his neck then stopped and looked into Wang’s eyes.
“Okay, I’m sure you know about my … wife dying on 9/11.”
“Yes sir, I do.”
“Well, I became close friends with the fireman, Keith Jenkins that saved my life that day.”
That caught Wang by surprise.
“Sir, I didn’t realize … were you also at the World Trade Center that day?”
De Niro hesitated then replied.
“Yes … I was. Anyway, Keith came to me with a request and like I said, we’re close friends. You heard about the mosque they want to build near Ground Zero being back in the news?”
“Yes, something about they’re trying new ways to raise money for it.”
“Well, Keith and a number of other survivors and friends and family of victims are against a mosque being built anywhere near Ground Zero … and so am I.”
“I can understand that.”
“Well then, here it is. I want to look into any funding of the mosque.”
“Look into the funding … why?”
“Well, like I said, there’s really no material reason, just suspicions … perhaps fears, that the Park51 project may be funded by … Islamic radicals.”
De Niro noticed Wang’s eyebrow rise.
“I know. Sounds like a conspiracy theory raised by folks who are still very angry and hurt. To tell you the truth, it’s difficult for me to use pure reason without emotion when it comes to anything about 9/11. I’ll tell you this though, if there’s even a small chance that Islamic radicals are intending to fund that mosque, I want to know about … and I’ll take it from there!”
Wang remained where she stood, crossing her arms in front of her.
“We’d have no legal grounds to get a court order, Cris.”
De Niro continued to look into Wang’s eyes.
“I know.”
After a moment, Wang softened her stance. There’s something about him that’s … sincere, not vindictive. I’d probably investigate on my own, if it were my husband who died. I won’t do less for him.
“How far do you want me to go to investigate?”
“I don’t want any laws broken … at least, I don’t want us to get caught, if we did happen to break one … and I want the minimum amount of people involved. I’d like to keep this between you and me for now. I was hoping there might be a technological, passive way to handle this.”
Wang put the tip of the back of her pen in her mouth and strolled a few steps.
“There might be. I’m not totally up to speed on the full capabilities of Big Brother, but from what I already understand about the system is that Johnny-F enabled it to do dynamic and robust data mining. Perhaps, after he shows me how to set up my own queries, I can have double-B help us … follow the money.”
De Niro smiled, “Excellent, but Michelle, really, err to the side of caution. Don’t do anything too intrusive … and try not to let this favor of mine take you away from the other things you have to do around here, for too long … understood?”
Wang followed De Niro to the door and just before he opened it, replied, “Got it!”
As De Niro made his way out of the room he was intercepted by Pastak.
“Mr. De Niro, may I speak with you?”
“Sure Les, but if this has to do with your new position here, you need to speak with Captain Ricci, he’s in charge here now.”
“But sir, I … didn’t get off to a good start with Captain Ricci and—”
“Les let me stop you there. First, let me repeat, Captain Ricci is in charge here, not I. I’m aware of your initial introduction with Captain Ricci and I want you to know that, despite it, Captain Ricci still suggested that not only you stay with the company but he insisted that you keep your pay grade. Under the circumstances, I think that’s fair, don’t you? In any case, if you have a problem with your new position, let Captain Ricci know as soon as possible. If you don’t Les, I suggest you just get on with it. Do your job and I’m sure things will be fine between you and him.”
Pastak could see that the conversation was over. It was obvious to him that he was being conspired against. They probably think I’ll leave, but I won’t give them the satisfaction. I’ll do my job alright; just enough to keep everyone off my back. That is, until I can figure away to get ahead, here or somewhere else!
“I’ll … do that. Thank you, sir.”
De Niro sighed with a deep breath as he watched Pastak disappear into his office then he walked into Mugsy’s office. Ricci and Santappia were already there, Mugsy sitting behind and Santappia sitting on one of the two chairs in front of his desk. De Niro took a seat in the other chair.
“Mugs, Les just approached me. I’m still not sure he’s happy with his new situation here.”
“What did he say?”
“I didn’t give him a chance to say anything. I told him to talk to you. Are you sure about him?
“No, I’m not Cris, but the bottom line is that, with all the changes we’re making here, replacing him could severely impede our ability to get everyone settled in their new positions, on our timeline. He is competent running human resources. I’m not sure how good he is as our corporate counsel, but I’m hoping we won’t need legal counsel to get this ship sailing.”
De Niro didn’t reply, so Ricci went on.
“Listen, once we get everyone in place and up and running, if he’s still not with the program, I’ll get him replaced. Who knows, we didn’t cut his pay and there aren’t many places he can go and get paid the same, so maybe, he’ll just fall in line.”
There was a knock on the door and then Debbie Lynch walked in followed by John Francis.
“Can I get anyone anything?”
Ricci answered, “No thanks Debbie, just hang the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on the doorknob for a bit. We’ll need a few minutes without interruption.”
“Got it,” Lynch said as she closed the door behind her.
Francis spoke up.
“Sorry I’m late; there was a small line of people waiting to talk to me outside the conference room.”
“I bet half wanted to shake your hand and probably the other half wanted your autograph,” De Niro quipped.
“Only two wanted my autograph, for your information, the rest wanted me to walk them through Big Brother. It looks like we have an aggressive team here; everyone wants to get right to work. I had to grab a few of my managers and get them to start the training with the department heads.”
De Niro got up and took a seat on the couch next to Santappia. Ricci and Francis joined them. De Niro started.
“John, how far along are you with the new security measures here?”
“I haven’t started them. Cris, give me a break, I haven’t even hung my hat yet in my office here. I thought the first priority was to get Big Brother installed.”
“It was, but we’re gonna need at least this office and maybe the conference room sound-proofed, bug-protected and secured a.s.a.p.”
Francis nodded.
“Understood, I’ll get on it right after we break here.”
“Not so fast,” replied De Niro, “I need you, Mugsy and Charley to fly home with me. I have something to show you and we can talk safely once we get there. We take off at noon. We’ll have lunch on the plane. Why don’t you gentlemen go get things squared away, here, with your staff – my car is waiting outside to take us to the airport whenever all of you are ready. ”
Francis smiled.
“Vegas huh, I haven’t been there since the last Comdex show. Guys, I gotta tell you, I met the finest-looking ladies over at Wynn after the first night of the conference—”
“So that’s why you couldn’t come and visit with me and the boys?” De Niro interjected. “I thought you told me you were ‘all tied up’ when I called you, at your hotel room?”
Francis blushed, “Well I was… literally. You see, one of them, this pretty-little oriental … she was an acrobat in one of those Cirque De Soleil shows. Anyway, she was showing me one of the illusions they do in the show with these ropes—”
All three men laughed.
Chapter 9
Aboard De Niro’s privately-owned QSST (Quiet Supersonic Transport)
At 60,000 feet south of Jefferson City, MO cruising at 1,056 mph (Mach 1.6)
12:00p.m. (local time), Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Co-pilot Doug Miller collected the empty food trays from De Niro, Mugsy Ricci and Charley Santappia as they sat in the high-tech cabin section of De Niro’s new aircraft, the QSST. John Francis’s lunch still sat on his tray though, untouched.
De Niro patted the uniformed co-pilot on his back.
“Thanks Doug. Captain Douglas ‘Charger’ Miller, USAF, retired, I’d like you to meet Captain Louis Ricci, USN, retired and Major Charles Santappia, USMC, retired.”
“You make us sound like a bunch of geriatric patients with all those ‘retired’ after our names, ” Ricci gibed as he shook Miller’s hand.
“Doug and the Captain, Colonel O’Rourke, USMC retired have just joined our team. The colonel will take charge of all of our flight operations.”
“Wait a minute; did you say O’Rourke, as in Colonel James O’Rourke? You mean Duke’s flying this plane? Santappia asked with excitement in his voice.
“You two know each other?” asked De Niro with a little disbelief in his voice.
“Let’s just say that we were roommates back in the day.”
“More like brig-mates. How the hell are ya, Charley?” O’Rourke said as he entered the cabin from the cockpit, offering his hand to Santappia first, then the others.
“Duke!” cried Santappia as he shook the big man’s hand with vigor.
“Brig-mates?” asked Ricci.
Santappia’s face turned a shade red.
“Well, I was fresh out of boot camp and on weekend liberty from Lejeune2 and ended up in this longshoreman’s bar in Baltimore when a bunch of their rank and file decided to see for themselves if Marines were as tough as the movies make them out to be. I’m embarrassed to say that I wasn’t living up to the Marine Corps image, partially because there were six of them and partially because I had two single-malt scotch highballs in me.”
Everyone laughed.
“Well, just as one of the larger ones was about to perform oral surgery on me with his knuckles, Duke here came barreling over like John Wayne himself and proceeded to toss all six of them out of the bar – three through the door and three through the bar’s storefront window.”
O’Rourke took over.
“Word got around about it and suddenly everyone was calling me ‘Duke,’ all because of Charley here.”
“Wait a minute, what about the brig?” asked De Niro.
Both men smiled as Santappia replied.
“Oh yeah, well, right after Duke tossed the last one out the window, I decided to thank him by buying him and me, another round of that single-malt I was drinking. Before we finished it though, Baltimore’s finest burst through the doors and arrested us. The sergeant was an old jarhead so he decided to contact Lejeune and the next thing we knew, we were both thrown into the b
rig.”
“What are the odds you two would meet up here in the clouds,” De Niro asked rhetorically.
“It’s a small corps, Cris,” Santappia replied as he winked at O’Rourke.
“Can I ask another question, if you’re back here, whose—“
“…Flying the plane? Mr. Francis sir, he insisted and he said it would be alright with you.”
“So that’s what he’s been doing up there in the cockpit,” replied De Niro. “Can he fly my $80 million baby?”
“To tell you the truth, I’m not sure what kind of pilot he is, but he sure does know everything about this aircraft.”
“That’s Johnny-F. He knows everything about … everything,” replied De Niro.
“Well, if you gentlemen will excuse us, Doug and I will get back to driving this plane. That is if Mr. Francis will allow us to.”
De Niro, Ricci and Santappia all walked to the back cabin where they sat around a small conference table and after a few minutes Francis joined them from the cockpit.
“Man-oh-man that was fun … I gotta get me one of these. How much did you say you paid for it?”
“$80 million, but it’s not being offered to the public yet. My friend owns the company that built it.”
“Well, tell your friend that I want one … of course, I’ll expect a big discount for being one of your friends…”
De Niro ignored Francis, directing the rest of what he was saying to Ricci and Santappia.
“I had to get a bunch of clearances to fly it over the U.S. because it flies faster than the speed of sound. The government is afraid it’ll shatter windows, but the truth is it’s got the sonic signature of 1/100th that of the 'Concorde. ’”
The Watchman of Ephraim (Book Club Edition) Page 7
