by Bob Mayer
Roosevelt spread his hands as an innocent man would. “Would you have preferred I had not done those things?”
Marshall pulled a lighter out and lit the President’s cigarette as he brought it to his lips. “No, sir. They were necessary to win the war.”
“And I told Ed that I’d restore all our liberties as soon as the war is over.”
“Yes, sir,” Marshall agreed. “And that is why the Philosophers have not taken action despite the unconstitutionality of many of your actions. The Jefferson Allegiance remains in check.”
“So what is the problem?” Roosevelt asked, more sharply than he intended.
Marshall went over and swung open one of the small portholes to let fresh air in. “The recent conferences, sir.”
“I thought they went quite well.”
Marshall blinked. “Sir. Stalin is a thug. A despot. You and Churchill handed him Eastern Europe on a platter.”
“He promised to hold elections,” Roosevelt said. “More importantly, even you agreed that we need the Russians for the final invasion of Japan.”
“I do agree with you on that,” Marshall allowed. “But it went too far. You gave up Poland. You agreed that citizens of Poland and Russia would be repatriated whether they wanted to or not. You gave Stalin practically everything he wanted.”
“Stalin agreed to join the United Nations once we form it,” Roosevelt countered.
Marshall appeared not to hear. “And the meeting with King Ibn Saud. Sir, there are great strategic implications in the Middle East for the future. Both in terms of the displaced Jews, but more importantly the oil. Japan went to war with us when we embargoed their oil. The Germans went into Russia for the oilfields. Oil is the key. I fear we’re setting up problems that are going to take generations to untangle.”
“You say ‘we’,” Roosevelt noted, “but you mean me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Roosevelt nodded ruefully. “Do you think I don’t know that?” He nodded toward the comatose General in the bed. “I hope I go quickly.”
“Sir, Stalin took too much away from Yalta. And Ibn Saud too much from the Great Bitter Lake conference.”
“We need the Russians for Japan—“ Roosevelt began, but Marshall leaned forward and whispered.
“Sir. We have the Manhattan Project.”
“If it works,” Roosevelt replied. “That’s a mighty big if to roll the dice on the lives of millions of American servicemen. Frankly, I’d rather it be Russian blood spilled in Japan than American.”
“Sir, we must look beyond the end of the war and—“
“Please,” Roosevelt said in a low voice. He pulled the remnants of his cigarette out of the holder and slid another in, then extended it to Marshall who dutifully lit it. “I can’t see beyond the end of war, George. It’s been thirteen years. I’m tired. I’m sick. My friend is lying here dying. I’ll be gone soon enough. Enact your Allegiance if you want, but by the time you do, I doubt there will be a need.”
Roosevelt leaned his head back against the rear of his wheelchair. “I am looking behind me. And I am but a man.”
Chapter Thirteen
They drove around the West Point Plain. Cullum Hall on the right. Followed by a statue of a Revolutionary era soldier on a pedestal overlooking the Hudson.
“Is that Kosciuszko?” Evie asked, looking up from the book.
“Yeah,” Ducharme waved a hand, his thoughts elsewhere, muddled, confused and with a growing sense of the beast rebelling in his chest.
“Can we stop?” Evie asked.
“This isn’t a damn sightseeing tour,” Ducharme snapped. Still, he halted the Blazer and Evie hopped out.
Ducharme looked at Kincannon. “She’s holding something back.”
“No shit.”
“Why?”
Kincannon shrugged. “Probably doesn’t trust us. I get the feeling the only person she trusted was that McBride fella.”
“Great.”
“You trust her?” Kincannon asked.
“No.”
“There you go.” Kincannon had his commando knife out, spinning it around on his palm absent-mindedly. “I think she’s okay, though. It’s not about us—it’s the way she views the world.”
Ducharme blinked. “Why do you think she’s okay?”
“Aint like we got a whole lot of people on our side right now. Plus, I remember her father as a division commander at Fort Hood. A good man. Came up through the ranks through a battlefield commission. Gave a shit about the troops. Rare in a general. Some of that stuff gets passed down.”
Ducharme got out of the Blazer. Evie was staring up at the statue of Kosciuszko like a groupie at a rock star.
“Yeah, yeah,” Ducharme said. “Polish guy. Helped design the fortifications here. Can we go?”
“Thomas Jefferson considered Kosciuszko the purest son of liberty.” She shifted her gaze from the statue to him. “He truly understood the concept of democracy. After the Revolution he went back to Poland and led a revolt against Russia. He might have won if the politicians hadn’t screwed up. He was imprisoned by Catherine the Great, but was finally released when the Emperor Paul took the throne. Gave him a nice sable coat and even offered him his own sword out of respect. Kosciuszko declined. You know what he said?”
“No, but you’re going to tell me.”
“Kosciuszko said: ‘I no longer need a sword—I no longer have a country’.”
Ducharme squinted up at the statue, impressed.
Evie continued. “I’m telling you this because I’m not sure you really understand the implications of what we’re doing. Our country—the United States as we know it—is on the brink of being gone. We’ve been sliding so long, people don’t realize there’s a point of no return if the Cincinnatians achieve complete, unfettered, power. And what’s going to replace it—well, I don’t think you’re going to be allowed your sword to protect the Constitution, never mind not need it.”
With that she turned and walked back to the Blazer. She slammed the door after she got in.
Ducharme clenched his fists, took a couple of deep breaths. Then he got back in the driver’s seat and continued around the Plain. Next on the right were Trophy Point and Battle Monument. He pulled to the side, jumped the curb near the monument and slammed on the brakes. He twisted toward Evie who was reading the book she’d stolen. “What the fuck aren’t you telling us?”
Evie looked up, startled by his voice, the sudden braking having passed un-noticed. “What?”
Ducharme spoke slowly, each word hard-edged. “What-the-fuck-haven’t-you-told-us?”
“I’ve told you what I know and what I can deduce—“ she began, but Kincannon’s drawl cut through from the back-seat, low but commanding, the edge there, quivering on the brink of darkness.
“Evie. Listen up. We know you know more than you’re telling us. Maybe you aren’t sure of something and worry we’ll misinterpret. Maybe you don’t trust us. Maybe you were so used to keeping secrets in the CIA. I damn sure aint certain what it is. But you’re holding something back, and that for damn certain could get us all killed. We’ve crossed into bandit country now and it’s us against everyone. We’re either a team or we aint. And if we aint, we’re fucked.”
Ducharme’s harsh breathing echoed inside the Blazer and the cold wind howling off the Hudson and Storm King Mountain battered against the outside of the Blazer.
Evie reached into her pocket and unfolded a piece of paper. “This.”
Ducharme and Kincannon read:
FIND THE CIPHER, FIND THE ALLEGIANCE
ONE PHILOSOPER CHAIR, THREE PHILOSOPHERS
YOU ARE NOW THE CHAIR
A PHILOSOPHER WILL MEET YOU HERE
They both looked at her and waited.
“That’s McBride’s handwriting,” she said. “He left that note for me in his briefcase along with his first cipher disk. It confirms that there were four: a Chair from the American Philosophical Society and three Philosophers.”
“Yes.”
“Fuck,” Ducharme slammed a fist into the steering wheel.
“And this Allegiance?” Kincannon asked.
“We’re looking for the Jefferson Cipher in order to find something called the Jefferson Allegiance.” She glanced at Ducharme. “I’m sorry.”
Ducharme said nothing for several long moments, then he gave a slight nod. “All right.”
“And this Allegiance is?” Kincannon asked.
“I don’t know.” She held up a hand as Ducharme started to say something. “I really don’t know for sure. Some say when Jefferson was President he brokered a secret agreement with Alexander Hamilton.”
Kincannon nodded. “What kind of agreement?”
Ducharme was now rubbing the back of his head, trying to forestall the pounding.
“I’ve found nothing solid in my research,” Evie said. “But I think it’s something so powerful it’s kept the government from sliding into an Imperial Presidency for over two hundred years; and kept wealthy groups like the Cincinnatians from becoming overt in their push for power. Pretty remarkable that it hasn’t happened, so, as I told Agent Burns, when something is obvious, accept the obvious. Before all this, from all I’d read, I believed there was a good chance the Jefferson Allegiance existed but there was nothing conclusive.” She tapped the page. “With this, I know for certain it does.”
“So it’s a document of some sort?” Kincannon clarified.
“I would say so,” Evie replied.
Kincannon shook his head. “I can’t imagine a document that powerful.”
“Wouldn’t you say the Declaration of Independence was pretty powerful?” Evie asked.
Kincannon nodded. “Yes, but everyone knows about it. You’re talking about something that’s secret.”
“We’ll learn how powerful it is when we find it,” Evie said.
Ducharme took a deep breath and let it out. “So this killer is ultimately after the Jefferson Allegiance?”
“Yes.”
“Through the Jefferson Cipher.”
It wasn’t a question, but Evie answered anyway. “Correct.”
“To use it or destroy it?” Ducharme asked.
“Good question,” Evie said. “I’d say primarily to keep us from getting it. So if push came to shove, I’d say the killer might destroy it.”
Ducharme mulled that over. “But she wouldn’t want to destroy the Cipher. Because that means the wild card of the Allegiance would still be out there and there’s no guarantee the Cipher is the only way to find it. She’s got to get her hands on the Allegiance.”
“That’s logical.”
“Now that we’re truth telling, do you have the encryption thumb drive for the computer?”
“No.”
Ducharme took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. He turned and looked at Kincannon. The Sergeant Major nodded. Ducharme looked at Evie. “All right. We’re in. But no more keeping things back from us any more. Got it?”
“Got it.”
They pulled back out into the road. They left the Plain behind and passed the Superintendent’s house on the left. Another stonewall to the right. Old houses went by on the left: the quarters for the heads of the various academic departments at the Academy. The cemetery came up on the right, across the street from the firehouse.
“Where are you going?” Evie asked as Ducharme drove past the entrance.
“Never take the direct route,” Ducharme said. “One of Rogers’ Rules of Rangering.”
“Right,” Evie said, looking back down at the book she was thumbing through. “You’re big on rules. Rogers who?”
“Major Robert Rogers,” Ducharme said. “Led Rogers’ Rangers during the French and Indian War. His first rule was: ‘All Rangers are to be subject to the rules and articles of war; to appear at roll call every evening on their own parade, equipped each with a firelock, sixty rounds of powder and ball, and a hatchet.’”
“Where’s your hatchet?” Evie asked.
“I’ve got a knife,” Ducharme said
He turned right, into the old Post Exchange parking lot, which bordered the cemetery. He parked at the edge of the lot. The cemetery was on the same level as the Plain, a hundred feet above the Hudson. Along the river side of the cemetery, was a low stone wall, then a precipitous, wooded drop to Target Hill Field on the edge of the river. The Academy’s sewage treatment plant was also down there—right where the two mile run course for the cadets’ annual physical fitness test began and ended. He checked his MP-5. “Let’s go.”
Evie marked a page and put the book in McBride’s briefcase. She exited along with Kincannon. She carried the briefcase with her.
“Wait one,” Ducharme said. He opened the tailgate and pulled out a small electronic device that looked like a TV remote. He ran it around the Blazer. He stopped when a light blinked red near the front right quarter-panel. Reaching into the wheel well, he felt around. He pulled out a cockroach-sized transmitter and put it in the same pocket the bullet-transmitter was in. He completed his circle of the Blazer without another alert. While he was doing that, Kincannon was on his satphone.
Ducharme stowed the electronic device. “Ok. It’s clean now.” He tossed the bugs underneath the truck since they already had transmitted this location. He looked at Kincannon. “Let’s gear up.”
They grabbed bullet-proof vests and put them on. Ducharme crooked a finger at Evie and handed her a vest. She donned it and quickly covered it with her coat. Ducharme and Kincannon put black jackets on over their vests to maintain a modicum of covert activity. Ducharme handed Kincannon an MP-5 and grabbed his own. They slung them on Velcro straps underneath the jackets. He studied the weapons locker, then grabbed a small caliber gun with a long suppressor on the end and offered it to Evie.
She took it, slipped it in a pocket, then asked: “Got anything bigger?”
“Does size matter?” Kincannon asked.
“Funny guys,” Evie said.
Ducharme waved his hand over the locker. “Your choice.”
Evie grabbed an MP-5 submachinegun with a suppressor. She slammed a magazine of nine-millimeter rounds in, pulled back the charging handle, checking the chamber.
“My kind of gal,” Kincannon said. “Don’t suppose you can ride horses?”
“I could learn with the proper motivation,” Evie said.
“And what motivation would that be?” Kincannon asked.
“Would you two stop it,” Ducharme said.
Kincannon ignored him and reached into his pocket and pulled something out. “Here.” He flipped a large coin to her.
Evie caught it, then turned it over. On one side on a scroll on top was inscribed: Quiet Professionals. Below it was a dagger with crossed arrows and a scroll around the base that read: De Oppresso Liber. “To free the oppressed,” she translated.
“Special Forces motto,” Ducharme informed her.
“Interesting.” She turned it over. An eagle was above a space where something could be inscribed.
“Always carry a blank one?” she asked.
Kincannon nodded. “Never know when you have to build a team.”
“Or impress a woman,” Ducharme added.
“I can’t—“ she began, but Kincannon cut her off.
“We’re a team. We count on each other.”
Evie swallowed hard. Ducharme shifted his feet, checked the gun once more. She finally nodded, sliding the coin into her pocket.
“Hold on a second,” Ducharme said. “Do you know how to use the silenced pistol if you have to?”
“I told you tradecraft was more our thing than violence,” Evie said. “I assume, aim and pull the trigger.”
“Not quite,” he told her, reaching in her pocket and pulling it out. “This is a High Standard HDM. .22 caliber, long rifle cartridge. Small bullet, not very powerful. Which means you aren’t g
oing to be able to shoot far and your round isn’t going to knock anyone off their feet as you probably know. But it’s suppressed, it’s quiet, there’s no kick and you’ve got ten rounds. This is a weapon of last resort, when someone’s so close you can feel their breath. Then you shoot them. The eye is best, easy entry into the brain.”
Evie was staring at him.
“What?
“We had a moment there with the coin,” she said. “But—“ she shook her head, and took the gun. She slid it into a pocket on her long coat. “Let’s go visit some graves.”
“Wait one.” Ducharme grabbed some more ordnance, stuffing the pockets on his vest. Kincannon did the same.
“All right,” Ducharme said. They walked past some trees into the cemetery.
A concrete pyramid about 20 feet high was directly in front of them. Walking toward it, Ducharme noted a fresh grave. The marker indicated it was for a member of the class of 2010, killed in Chile. The Long Gray Line was giving more bodies to the country.
The pyramid was a mausoleum. Beyond it was an elaborate marker consisting of several clusters of columns holding up an intricately carved, arched roof, upon which was perched a stone eagle.
“Somebody liked themselves,” Evie muttered, diverting to take a closer look.
Ducharme and Kincannon followed. The marker indicated it was the burial place of Major General Daniel Butterfield. The name triggered something in Ducharme’s mind, reminding him of Arlington for some reason. He struggled to connect the dots, then it came to him in the form of a remembered sound. “Did you know,” he began, earning a roll of the eyes from Kincannon, “that General Butterfield wrote Taps? And that he was awarded the Medal of Honor.”
“Exciting,” Evie said. “Did he get the Medal for writing the bugle call?”
“No,” Ducharme said with exaggerated patience. “For grabbing the regimental colors and rallying his troops during a battle in the Civil War.”
Evie turned to him with challenge in her eyes. “Did you know, if he’s the Butterfield I think he is, that his father started American Express?”
