by Tom Clancy
“Right about here, I think,” Miller said.
“Yeah, it’s the best place,” Alex agreed.
“Escape route.” Sean clicked on a stopwatch.
“Okay.” Alex changed lanes and kept heading west. “Remember, it’s gonna be slower tonight.”
Miller nodded, getting the usual pre-op butterflies in his stomach. He ran through his plan, thinking over each contingency as he sat in the right-front seat of the van, watching the way traffic piled up at certain exits off the highway. The road was far better than the roads he was accustomed to in Ireland, but people drove on the wrong side here, he thought, though with pretty good traffic manners compared to Europe. Especially France and Italy ... he shook off the thought and concentrated on the situation at hand.
Once the attack was completed, they would reach the getaway vehicles in under ten minutes. The way it was timed, Ned Clark would be waiting for them. Miller completed his mental run-through, satisfied that his plan, though a hasty one, was effective.
“You’re early,” Breckenridge said.
“Yeah, well, I have a couple of mids coming in this afternoon to go over their term papers. Any problem?” Jack took the Browning from his briefcase.
The Sergeant Major grabbed a box of 9mm rounds. “Nope. Mondays are supposed to be screwed up.”
Ryan walked to lane three and pulled the gun from the holster. First he ejected the empty clip and pulled the slide back. Next he checked the barrel for obstructions. He knew the weapon was fine mechanically, of course, but Breckenridge had range-safety rules that were inviolable. Even the Superintendent of the Academy had to follow them.
“Okay, Gunny.”
“I think today we’ll try rapid fire.” The Sergeant Major clipped the appropriate target on the rack, and the motorized pulley took it fifty feet downrange. Ryan loaded five rounds into the clip.
“Get your ears on, Lieutenant.” Breckenridge tossed the muff-type protectors. Ryan put them on. He slid the clip into the pistol and thumbed down the slide release. The weapon was now “in battery,” ready to fire. Ryan pointed it downrange and waited. A moment later the light over the target snapped on. Jack brought the gun up and set the black circle right on the top of his front sight blade before he squeezed. Rapid-fire rules gave him one second per shot. This was more time than it sounded like. He got the first round off a little late, but most people did. The gun ejected the spent case and Ryan pulled it down for the next shot, concentrating on the target and his sights. By the time he counted to five, the gun was locked open. Jack pulled off the ear protectors.
“You’re getting there, Lieutenant,” Breckenridge said at the spotting scope. “All in the black: a nine, four tens, one of ’em in the X-ring. Again.”
Ryan reloaded with a smile. He’d allowed himself to forget how much fun a pistol could be. This was a pure physical skill, a man’s skill that carried the same sort of satisfaction as a just-right golf shot. He had to control a machine that delivered a .357-inch bullet to a precise destination. Doing this required coordination of eye and hand. It wasn’t quite the same as using a shotgun or a rifle. Pistol was much harder than either of those, and hitting the target carried a subintellectual pleasure that was not easily described to someone who hadn’t done it. His next five rounds were all tens. He tried the two-hand Weaver stance, and placed four out of five in the X-ring, a circle half the diameter of the ten-ring, used for tie-breaking in competition shoots.
“Not bad for a civilian,” Breckenridge said. “Coffee?”
“Thanks, Gunny.” Ryan took the cup.
“I want you to concentrate a little more on your second round. You keep letting that one go off to the right some. You’re rushing it a little.” The difference, Ryan knew, was barely two inches at fifty feet. Breckenridge was a stone perfectionist. It struck him that the Sergeant Major and Cathy had very similar personalities: either you were doing it exactly right or you were doing it completely wrong. “Doc, it’s a shame you got hurt. You would have made a good officer, with the right sergeant to bring you along—they all need that of course.”
“You know something, Gunny? I met a couple of guys in London that you’d just love.” Jack slipped the magazine back into his automatic.
“Ryan is rather a clever lad, isn’t he?” Owens handed the document back to Murray.
“Nothing really new in here,” Dan admitted, “but at least it’s well organized. Here’s the other thing you wanted.”
“Oh, our friends in Boston. How is Paddy O‘Neil doing?” Owens was more than just annoyed at this. Padraig O’Neil was an insult to the British parliamentary system, an elected mouthpiece for the Provisional IRA. In ten years of trying, however, neither Owens’ Anti-Terrorist Branch nor the Royal Ulster Constabulary had ever linked him to an illegal act.
“Drinking a lot of beer, talking to a lot of folks, and raising a little money, just like always.” Murray sipped at his port. “We have agents following him around. He knows they’re there, of course. If he spits on the sidewalk, we’ll put him on the next bird home. He knows that, too. He hasn’t broken a single law. Even his driver—the guy’s a teetotaler. I hate to say it, Jimmy, but the bum’s clean, and he’s making points.”
“Oh, yes, he’s a charming one, Paddy is.” Owens flipped a page and looked up. “Let me see that thing your Ryan fellow did again. ”
“The guys at Five glommed your copy. I expect they’ll give it to you tomorrow.”
Owens grunted as he flipped to the summary at the back of the document. “Here it is.... Good God above!”
“What?” Murray snapped forward in his chair.
“The link, the bloody link. It’s right here!”
“What are you talking about, Jimmy? I’ve read the thing twice myself.”
“‘The fact that ULA personnel seem to have been drawn almost entirely from “extreme” elements within the PIRA itself,’ ” he read aloud, “‘must have a significance beyond that established by existing evidence. It seems likely that since the ULA membership has been so recruited, some ULA ”defectors-in-place” remain within the PIRA, serving as information sources to their actual parent organization. It follows that such information may be of an operational nature in addition to its obvious counterintelligence value.’ Operational,” Owens said quietly. “We’ve always assumed that O’Donnell was simply trying to protect himself ... but he could be playing another game entirely.”
“I still haven’t caught up with you, Jimmy.” Murray set his glass down and frowned for a moment. “Oh. Maureen Dwyer. You never did figure out that tip, did you?”
Owens was thinking about another case, but Murray’s remark exploded like a flashbulb in front of his eyes. The detective just stared at his American colleague for a moment while his brain raced down a host of ideas.
“But why?” Murray asked. “What do they gain?”
“They can do great embarrassment to the leadership, inhibit operations. ”
“But what material good does that do for the ULA? O’Donnell’s too professional to screw his old friends just for the hell of it. The INLA might, but they’re just a bunch of damned-fool cowboys. The ULA is too sophisticated for that sort of crap.”
“Yes. We’ve just surmounted one wall to find another before us. Still, that’s one more wall behind us. It gives us something to question young Miss Dwyer about, doesn’t it?”
“Well, it’s an idea to run down. The ULA has the PIRA penetrated, and sometimes they feed information to you to make the Provos look bad.” Murray shook his head. Did I just say that one terrorist outfit was trying to make another one look bad? “Do you have enough evidence to back that idea up?”
“I can name you three cases in the last year where anonymous tips gave us Provos who were at the top of our list. In none of the three did we ever learn who the source was.”
“But if the Provos suspect it—oh, scratch that idea. They want O‘Donnell anyway, and that’s straight revenge for all the people he did away with
within the organization. Okay, embarrassing the PIRA leadership may be an objective in itself—if O’Donnell was trying to recruit some new members. But you’ve already discarded that idea.”
Owens swore under his breath. Criminal investigation, he often said, was like doing a jigsaw puzzle when you didn’t have all the pieces and never really knew their shapes. But telling that to his subordinates wasn’t the same thing as experiencing it himself. If only they hadn’t lost Sean Miller. Maybe they might have gotten something from him by now. His instinct told him that one small, crucial fact would make a complete picture of all the rubbish he was sorting through. Without that fact, his reason told Owens, everything he thought he knew was nothing more than speculation. But one thought kept repeating itself in his mind:
“Dan, if you wanted to embarrass the Provisionals’ leadership politically, how and where would you do it?”
“Hello, this is Doctor Ryan.”
“This is Bernice Wilson at Johns Hopkins. Your wife asked me to tell you that she’s in an emergency procedure and she’ll be about a half hour late tonight.”
“Okay, thank you.” Jack replaced the phone. Mondays, he told himself. He went back to discussing the term paper projects with his two mids. His desk clock said four in the afternoon. Well, there was no hurry, was there?
The watch changed at Gate Three. The civilian guard was named Bob Riggs. He was a retired Navy chief master at arms, past fifty, with a beer belly that made it hard for him to see his shoes. The cold affected him badly, and he spent as much time as possible in the guardhouse. He didn’t see a man in his late twenties approach the opposite corner and disappear into a doorway. Neither did Sergeant Tom Cummings of the Marine guard force, who was checking some paperwork just after relieving the previous watch-stander. The Academy was good duty for the young Marine NCO. There were a score of good saloons within easy walking distance, and plenty of unattached womenfolk to be sampled, but the duty at Annapolis was pretty boring when you got down to it, and Cummings was young enough to crave some action. It had been a typical Monday. The previous guard had issued three parking citations. He was already yawning.
Fifty feet away, an elderly lady approached the entrance to the apartment building. She was surprised to see a handsome young man there and dropped her shopping bag while fumbling for her key.
“Can I help you with that, now?” he asked politely. His accent made him sound different, but rather kind, the lady thought. He held the bag while she unlocked the door.
“I’m afraid I’m a little early—waiting to meet my young lady, you see,” he explained with a charming smile. “I’m sorry if I startled you, ma’am—just trying to keep out of this bitter wind.”
“Would you like to wait inside the door?” she offered.
“That’s very kind indeed, ma’am, but no. I might miss her and it’s a bit of a surprise, you see. Good day to you.” His hand relaxed around the knife in his coat pocket.
Sergeant Cummings finished going over the papers and walked outside. He noticed the man in the doorway for the first time. Looked like he was waiting for someone, the Sergeant judged, and trying to keep out of the cold north wind. That seemed sensible enough. The Sergeant checked his watch. Four-fifteen.
“I think that does it,” Bernie Katz said.
“We did it,” Cathy Ryan agreed. There were smiles all around the OR. It had taken over five hours, but the youngster’s eye was back together. He might need another operation, and certainly he’d wear glasses for the rest of his life, but that was better than having only one eye.
“For somebody who hasn’t done one of these in four months, not bad, Cath. This kid will have both his eyes. You want to tell the family? I have to go to the john.”
The boy’s mother was waiting exactly where the Jeffers family had been, the same look of anxiety on her face. Beside her was someone with a camera.
“We saved the eye,” Cathy said at once. After she sat down beside the woman, the photographer—he said he was from the Baltimore Sun—fired away with his Nikon for several minutes. The surgeon explained the procedure to the mother for several minutes, trying to calm her down. It wasn’t easy, but Cathy’d had lots of practice.
Finally someone from Social Services arrived, and Cathy was able to head for the locker room. She pulled off her greens, tossing them in the hamper. Bernie Katz was sitting on the bench, rubbing his neck.
“I could use some of that myself,” Cathy observed. She stood there in her Gucci underwear and stretched. Katz turned to admire the view.
“Getting pretty big, Cath. How’s the back?”
“Stiff. Just like it was with Sally. Avert your gaze, Doctor, you’re a married man.”
“Can I help it if pregnant women look sexy?”
“I’m glad I look it, ’cause I sure as hell don’t feel like it at the moment.” She dropped to the bench in front of her locker. “I didn’t think we could do that one, Bernie.”
“We were lucky,” Katz admitted. “Fortunately the dear Lord looks after fools, drunks, and little children. Some of the time, anyway.”
Cathy pulled open the locker. In the mirror she had inside, she saw that her hair did indeed look like the Medusa’s. She made a face at herself. “I need another vacation.”
“But you just had one,” Katz observed.
“Right,” Dr. Ryan snorted. She slid her legs into her pants and reached for her blouse.
“And when that fetus decides to become a baby, you’ll have another. ”
The jacket came, next. “Bemie, if you were in OB, your patients would kill you for that sort of crap.”
“What a loss to medicine that would be,” Katz thought aloud.
Cathy laughed. “Nice job, Bern. Kiss Annie for me.”
“Sure, and you take it a little easy, eh, or I’ll tell Madge North to come after you.”
“I see her Friday, Bernie. She says I’m doing fine.” Cathy breezed out the door. She waved to her nurses, complimenting them yet again for a superb job in the OR. The elevator was next. Already she had her car keys in her hand.
The green Porsche was waiting for her. Cathy unlocked the door and tossed her bag in the back before settling in the driver’s seat. The six-cylinder engine started in an instant. The tachymeter needle swung upward to the idle setting. She let the engine warm up for a minute while she buckled her seat belt and slipped off the parking brake. The throaty rumble of the engine echoed down the concrete walls of the parking garage. When the temperature needle started to move, she shifted into reverse. A moment later she dropped the gear lever into first and moved toward Broadway. She checked the clock on the dashboard and winced—worse, she had to make a stop at the store on the way home. Well, she did have her 911 to play catch-up with.
“The target is moving,” a voice said into a radio three levels up. The message was relayed by telephone to Alex’s safehouse, then by radio again.
“About bloody time,” Miller growled a few minutes later. “Why the hell is she late?” The last hour had been infuriating for him. First thirty minutes of waiting for her to be on time, then another thirty minutes while she wasn’t. He told himself to relax. She had to be at the day-care center to pick up the kid.
“She’s a doc. It happens, man,” Alex said. “Let’s roll.”
The pickup car led off first, followed by the van. The Ford would be at the 7-Eleven across from Giant Steps in exactly thirty minutes.
“He must be waiting for somebody pretty,” Riggs said when he got back into the guard shack.
“Still there?” Cummings was surprised. Three weeks before, Breckenridge had briefed the guard force about the possible threat to Dr. Ryan. Cummings knew that the history teacher always went out this gate—he was late today, though. The Sergeant could see that the light in his office was still on. Though the duty here was dull, Cummings was serious about it. Three months in Beirut had taught him everything he would ever need to know about that. He walked outside and took a place on the other side
of the road.
Cummings watched the cars leaving. Mostly they were driven by civilians, but those driven by naval officers got a regulation Marine salute. The wind only got colder. He wore a sweater under his blouse. This kept his torso warm, but the white kid gloves that went with the dress-blue uniform were the next thing to useless. He made a great show of clapping his hands together as he turned around periodically. He never stared at the apartment building, never acted as though he knew anybody were there. It was getting dark now, and it wasn’t all that easy to see him anyway. But somebody was there.
“That was fast,” the man in the pickup car said. He checked his watch. She’d just knocked five minutes off her fastest time. Damn, he thought, must be nice to have one of those little Porsches. He checked the tag: CR-SRGN. Yep, that was the one. He grabbed the radio.
“Hi, Mom, I’m home,” he said.
“It’s about time,” a male voice answered. The van was half a mile away, sitting on Joyce Lane, west of Ritchie Highway.
He saw the lady come out of the day-care center less than two minutes later. She was in a hurry.
“Rolling.”
“Okay,” came the answer.
“Come on, Sally, we’re late. Buckle up.” Cathy Ryan hated to be late. She restarted the engine. She hadn’t been this late in over a month, but she could still make it home before Jack if she hustled.
The rush hour was under way in earnest, but the Porsche was small, fast, and agile. In a minute from sitting in the parking lot she was doing sixty-five, weaving through traffic like a race driver at Daytona.
For all their preparation, Alex almost missed her. An eighteen-wheeler was laboring up the hill in the right lane when the distinctive shape of the Porsche appeared next to it. Alex floored the van and darted out onto the road, causing the semi to jam his brakes and horn at the same time. Alex didn’t look back. Miller got out of the right-front seat and went back to the window on the sliding door.
