Gideon’s Sword

by Douglas Preston; Lincoln Child

  Using the tip of his shoe to pin down the top corner of the paper, Lowell slid the section out from under the stall. The back page was wet, making it stick slightly as he tried to pull it toward him. Lowell tried not to think about it, focusing instead on using the side of his foot to wedge open the front page. But just as he nudged his foot inside, the door to the bathroom swung open, smashing into the wall. Lowell spun around, pretending to be busy by the hand dryer. Behind him, his assistant darted inside, barely able to catch his breath.

  “William, what’s—?”

  “You need to read this,” he insisted, shoving the red file folder toward Lowell.

  Watching his assistant carefully, Lowell wiped his hands against his slacks, reached for the folder, and flipped it open. It took a moment to scan the official cover sheet. Lowell’s eyes went wide—and within thirty seconds, the gossip column didn’t matter anymore.

  68

  HOLD ON,” I SAY. “You’re telling me people could smash some neutrinos against some…”

  “Neptunium…” Minsky says.

  “… neptunium, and suddenly create a batch of plutonium?”

  “I’m not saying they’ve done it—at least not yet—but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone was working along those lines… at least on paper.”

  He’s speaking with the calmness of someone who thinks it’s still theoretical. Viv and I know better. We saw it with our own eyes. The sphere… the accelerator… even the tetrachloroethylene… That’s what Wendell’s building down there—that’s why they wanted to keep it so quiet. If word got out they were trying to create plutonium… there’s no way it’d make it through the process.

  “But no one can do that yet, right?” Viv asks, trying to convince herself. “It’s not possible…”

  “Don’t say that in these halls,” Minsky teases. “Theoretically, anything’s possible.”

  “Forget whether it’s possible,” I say. “Assuming you could do it, how feasible is it to pull it off? Is neptunium even accessible, or is it just as hard to find?”

  “Now that’s the vital question,” Minsky says, knighting me with his paperclip. “For the most part, it’s a rare earth metal, but neptunium-237 is a by-product from nuclear reactors. Here in the U.S., since we don’t reprocess our spent nuclear fuel, it’s hard to get your hands on. But in Europe and Asia, they reprocess massive amounts.”

  “And that’s bad?” Viv asks.

  “No, what’s bad is that global monitoring of neptunium only began in 1999. That leaves decades of neptunium unaccounted for. Who knows what happened during those years? Anybody could have it by now.”

  “So it’s out there?”

  “Absolutely,” Minsky says. “If you know where to look, there’s lots of unaccounted-for neptunium that’s there for the taking.”

  As the consequences hit, I squirm in my seat, wiping my sweaty hands against the sides of the seat cushion. Minutes ago, I was pretending to be uncomfortable. I’m no longer faking it. Whatever branch of the government Wendell Mining really is, the news isn’t gonna be good.

  “Can I just ask one question?” Viv says. “I heard what you said—I know it’s possible, and I realize you can get neptunium—but for one second, can we just talk about the likelihood? I mean, studying neutrinos—that’s a small field, right? There can only be a handful of people who are even capable of putting something like this together… So when you add that all up, and you look around the neutrino community, wouldn’t… wouldn’t you know if something like this were going on?”

  Minsky again scratches at his beard. His social skills are too off to read Viv’s panic, but he understands the question. “Have you ever heard of Dr. James A. Yorke?” he finally asks. We both shake our heads. I can barely sit still. “He’s the father of chaos theory—even coined the term,” Minsky continues. “You’ve heard the metaphor, correct?—that a butterfly flapping its wings in Hong Kong can cause a hurricane in Florida? Well, as Yorke puts it, that means if there’s even one butterfly you don’t know about, it’s impossible to predict the weather on a long-term basis. One tiny butterfly. And, as the man says, there’ll always be one butterfly.”

  The words collide like a sack of doorknobs. I talked Matthew into flapping his wings… and now Viv and I are swirling through the hurricane.

  “It’s a big world out there,” Minsky adds, staying with Viv. “I can’t possibly account for everyone in my field. Does that make sense, Miss—I’m sorry, what was your name again?”

  “We should get going,” I say, hopping to my feet.

  “I thought the Congressman was on his way?” Minsky asks as we head for the door.

  “We’ve already got what we needed.”

  “But the briefing…”

  It’s amazing, really. We just dropped poorly hid hints about a government project that could create plutonium, and he’s still worried about face time. God, what’s wrong with this town? “I’ll be sure to tell him how helpful you were,” I add, whipping the door open and motioning Viv outside.

  “Please send him my best,” Minsky calls out.

  He says something else, but we’re already up the hallway, running for the elevators.

  “So where’re we going?” Viv asks.

  The one place Janos thinks we’ll never go. “The Capitol.”

  69

  I DON’T UNDERSTAND,” William said as he raced down the circular stairwell. “Where’re we going?”

  “Where do you think?” Lowell asked, leading them past the sign for the first floor and continuing toward the basement.

  “No, I mean beyond the parking garage. Where we going after that? Shouldn’t we tell someone?”

  “Tell them what? That we know who really owns Wendell? That they’re not who they say they are? Sure, they’re linked to Janos, but until we get the rest, it doesn’t do us any good. There’s nothing to tell.”

  “So where does that leave us?”

  “Not us,” Lowell said. “Me.” Leaping down the last few steps and shoving open the door to the basement, Lowell plowed into the parking garage. He didn’t have to go far. Deputy Attorney General gets a spot right in front. If he wanted, he could’ve been in his car within four seconds. But he still paused, searching to make sure Janos wasn’t waiting for him.

  The silver Audi was empty.

  With the push of a button, Lowell unlocked the car and slid inside.

  “What’re you doing?” William asked as Lowell tried to shut the driver’s door.

  “I’m going to see a friend,” Lowell said, starting the engine.

  It wasn’t a lie. He’d known Harris for over ten years—since they both worked in Senator Stevens’s office. That was why Janos came to him in the first place.

  He’d already tried Harris at work, at home, and on both his cell phones. If Harris was in hiding, there was only one place he’d be—the one place he knew best. And right now, finding Harris was the only way to get the rest of the story.

  “Why don’t you at least bring some backup?” William asked.

  “For what? So they can interrogate my friend? Trust me, I know how Harris thinks. We want him to talk, not panic.”

  “But, sir…”

  “Good-bye, William.” With a hard tug, Lowell slammed the door and punched the gas. The car peeled out of the spot. Refusing to overthink it, Lowell reminded himself who he was dealing with. If he showed up with armed agents at the Capitol—even forgetting the scene it would make—there’s no way Harris would ever go for that.

  Switching on the radio, Lowell lost himself in the mental massage of talk radio. His grandmother used to love talk radio, and to this day, Lowell still used it to, in his grandmother’s words, catch his calm. As the car was filled with the top news stories, Lowell finally took a breath. For one full minute, he forgot about Harris, and Wendell, and the rest of the chaos circling through his head. But as a result, he missed the black sedan that was trailing a few hundred feet behind him as he pulled out of the parking garage
and into the daylight.

  70

  TRUST ME, I know how Harris thinks. We want him to talk, not panic.”

  “But, sir…”

  “Good-bye, William.”

  Tucked back among the rows of cars and hidden by nothing more than a nearby parking spot, Janos watched the exchange from the front seat of his black sedan. The crinkle in Lowell’s forehead… the desperation on his face… even the slant on his assistant’s shoulders. Lowell asked William to stay quiet, but he was still protesting. Janos narrowed his eyes, focusing intensely on William’s slouched shoulders. From this distance it was hard to get a read. The creases in his white, wrinkled button-down said he was still wearing his shirts twice to save cash. But his brand-new belt… Gucci… Mom and Dad bought that. The kid’s from cash—which means he’ll follow his boss’s directions.

  “I told you Lowell wouldn’t sit still… he won’t focus on anyone but himself,” Barry said through the cell phone.

  “Quiet,” Janos warned. He didn’t like talking to Barry—the paranoia was always too much, even if it was a perfect button to push. Still, he had to admit, Barry was right about Lowell.

  In the distance, Lowell slammed the car door shut. His tires howled as he pulled out of his parking spot. For a few seconds, William lingered, craning his neck as he watched his boss disappear… then finally headed back toward the stairs.

  With a twist of his wrist, Janos turned the key in the ignition. The sedan coughed awake, but Janos quickly looked down, putting his open hand on the dashboard. Typical, he thought. Bad idle. The cam needed more lift.

  “You should’ve called me in earlier,” Barry said in his ear. “If you came to me before you went to Pasternak—”

  “If it weren’t for Pasternak, Harris would’ve never been in the game.”

  “That’s not true. He’s more jaded than you think he is. He just wants you to think—”

  “Keep believing that,” Janos said, giving Lowell just enough of a lead. As the silver Audi turned the corner, Janos hit the gas and slowly pulled out after him.

  “Any idea where he’s headed?” Barry asked.

  “Not yet,” Janos said, leaving the parking lot and turning onto the street. Directly in front of him was a classic orange Beetle. Four cars ahead of that, Lowell’s Audi wove in and out of traffic. And a mile or so beyond them all, at the end of Pennsylvania Avenue, the dome of the Capitol arched toward the sky.

  “I wouldn’t worry about it,” he said to Barry. “He’s not going very far.”

  71

  NEXT GROUP, PLEASE! Next group!” the Capitol policeman calls out, waving us toward the visitor’s entrance on the west front of the Capitol. Shuffling behind the twenty-person group of high-schoolers armed with Future President baseball caps, Viv and I keep our heads down and our government IDs hidden beneath our shirts. On average, the west front handles four million visitors a year, making it a constant crowded mess of map- and camera-wielding tourists. Most days, staffers avoid it at all costs. That’s exactly why we’re here.

  As the group shoves its way inside, I’m once again reminded that the Capitol is the only building in the world with no back—both the west front (overlooking the Mall) and the east front (overlooking the Supreme Court) claim to be the true front. Mostly, it’s because, with so many self-important people in one place, they all want to think their wonderful view is the best. Even the north side and south side get into the act, calling themselves the Senate entrance and House entrance. Four sides of a building, and not one of them is the back. Only in Congress.

  Lost amid the tour groups, we’re in the one place where no one checks our ID or looks at us for more than a second. With this many people moving, all we can do is blend in.

  “Put all cameras and phones on the X-ray,” one of the guards says to the group. It’s a simple request, but the students turn it into the final moments on the Titanic. Talking, bitching, moving—everything a fuss. As the kids make their usual scene, Viv and I slip through the metal detector without a second glance.

  We stay with the group as they make their way under the grand domed ceiling of the rotunda and directly below to the Crypt, the circular room that now serves as an exhibition area for blueprints, drawings, and other historical Capitol documents. The guide explains that the rounded shape of the Crypt structurally supports not only the rotunda but also the Capitol dome directly above it. On cue, the entire group crane their necks up to the ceiling—and Viv and I slip out to the right, through the doorway next to the Samuel Adams statue. Racing down a wide set of sandstone stairs, I reach into my shirt and pull out the chain with my ID. Behind me, I can hear Viv’s jingling around her neck. From tourists to staffers in one minute or less.

  “Narcs…” Viv whispers as we hit the bottom step. She motions to our far right. Up the hallway, two Capitol police are headed our way. They still don’t see us, but I’m not about to take a chance. Grabbing Viv’s wrist, I twist around the marble banister and tug her to the right, off the main hallway. A freestanding sign reads, No Tours Beyond This Point. I blow past it so fast, I almost knock it over. I’ve been back here before—it’s still open to staff. The hallway dead-ends at a black wrought-iron gate with a slight arch on top.

  “Isn’t it amazing?” I ask Viv, shoving some pep in my voice.

  “Incredible,” she says, following my lead. Behind the gate, under a rectangular glass case, a long black cloth is draped over what looks like a coffin. The plaque on our right, however, tells us it’s the wooden catafalque that supported the bodies of Lincoln, Kennedy, LBJ, and everyone else who has ever lain in state in the Capitol.

  Over my shoulder, the click-clack of boots on the floor lets me know the Capitol cops are just about to pass. Trying to look like staffers but feeling like prisoners, Viv and I hold tight to the bars, staring into the tiny concrete cell. Located at the direct center of the Capitol, the small, dank room was originally designed to be a tomb for George and Martha Washington. Today, their bodies are at Mount Vernon, and this room is just for storing the catafalque. I shut my eyes. The Capitol police are getting closer. I try to stay focused, but even without Washington’s remains, this crouched little space still smells like death.

  “Harris, they’re coming…” Viv whispers.

  Back in the hallway, the footsteps are right behind us. One of them stops. There’s a crackle through his radio. Next to me, I can hear Viv praying.

  “Yeah, we’ll be right there,” one of the cops says. The footsteps pick up—there’s no doubt they’re getting closer—and then, just like that, they’re gone.

  As usual, Viv’s first to react. Spinning around, she slowly checks back toward the hallway. “I think we’re okay,” she says. “Yeah… they left.”

  Refusing to turn around, I still cling to the bars.

  “Harris, we should hurry…”

  I know she’s right—we’re almost there—but as I stare at the dark black shroud… watching it drape lifelessly over the almost hundred-and-fifty-year-old coffin stand… I can’t help but feel that, if we’re not careful, the next bodies around here are going to be our own.

  “You sure this is the way?” Viv asks, running in front of me even though I’m supposed to be leading.

  “Keep going,” I tell her as she follows the hallway to the right, weaving us even deeper through the sand-colored corridors of the concrete basement. Unlike the rest of the Capitol, the halls down here are narrow and cramped, a labyrinth of random turns that’s taken us past garbage rooms, paint storage, HVAC equipment, and every type of repair shop from electrical to plumbing to elevator care. Worst of all, the further we go, the more the ceiling seems to shrink, the headroom eaten up by air ducts, water pipes, and random wiring. When I used to bring Matthew down here, he would bitch because he’d have to duck to get around. Viv and I don’t have that problem.

  “You swear this looks familiar?” Viv asks as the ceiling gets lower.

  “Absolutely,” I tell her. I don’t blame her for bein
g nervous. In the more heavily trafficked areas, there’re signs on the walls to make sure Members and staff don’t get lost. I glance up at the spider web of cracks along the walls. We haven’t seen a sign for at least three minutes. On top of that, as we go deeper, the hallway seems to fill up with stacks of discarded equipment: broken file cabinets, antique upholstered chairs, industrial-sized spools of cable wire, rolling garbage bins, even a stack of old rusted pipes.

  We haven’t seen another human being since we passed the last sign for the elevator. Indeed, the only hint of life is the hum of machinery from the surrounding mechanical rooms. Viv’s still ahead of me, but with a final sharp right, she stops. I hear her shoes skid across the dusty floor. As I turn the corner behind her, the furniture and wiring and pipes are stacked higher than ever. It’s not hard to read her thoughts. Like any other bad neighborhood, the further we go, the less we should be walking alone.

  “I really don’t think this is right,” she insists. “You’re not supposed to.”

  She thinks I’m being glib. I’m not.

  Rushing forward, I pass half a dozen closed doors on my right and left. Most of them, like ninety percent of the doors throughout the Capitol, have a sign out front that tells you exactly what’s inside. Electrical Substation. Senate Daily Digest. Even one that says Designated Smoking Area. One is unmarked. That’s the one I go for—room ST-56, the nondescript, unlabeled door that’s halfway down the hall on my left.