Wall of Night

by Grant Blackwood

  “What do you want?” Martin growled, his smile gone. “What’s your game?”

  “No game, Mr. President. My government would be as embarrassed as you by this. We have no desire to see this information made public. The People’s Republic is eager to take steps to ensure this information never becomes—”

  Martin bolted upright. “You sons-of-bitches. You’re … you’re trying to blackmail me. Me!”

  Bousikaris said, “Mr. President—”

  “You heard the bastard, Howard—”

  “What I heard,” Bousikaris replied, “is the ambassador offering his country’s help. Am I reading the situation clearly, Mr. Ambassador?”

  “Very clearly,” replied the ambassador.

  Bousikaris knew they needed time. Of course it was blackmail, of course the Chinese wanted something, but to reject it capriciously would be disastrous. He doubted the PRC would think twice about revealing its complicity in sabotaging a U.S. election. Whatever their game, the stakes were high.

  “However,” Bousikaris said, “just so there’s no misunderstanding … Can we assume your government is looking for some kind of … reciprocation?”

  “Yes. Reciprocation. Friends helping friends—that’s what we have in mind.”

  Arms crossed, Martin glared at the ambassador.

  Bousikaris said, “Mr. President, I think we’ve misunderstood the ambassador’s intent.”

  “Exactly so,” replied the ambassador.

  Martin stared hard at Bousikaris and then, like the chameleon Bousikaris knew him to be, smiled. He carefully smoothed his tie. “My apologies, Mr. Ambassador. Sometimes my temper gets ahead of me. That’s why Howard is so valuable; he keeps me from making a fool of myself. So, tell me: What is it you need help with?”

  “Terrorists, Mr. President.”

  Rappahannock River, Virginia

  “Uncle Briggs, why don’t fish drown?”

  Crouched down to rinse his hands in the surf, Briggs Tanner looked up and shielded his eyes from the setting sun. “What’s that? Why don’t what?”

  With one tiny hand wrapped around her fishing pole, the girl pointed to the water. “They live underwater all the time, so there’s no air, right? How come they don’t get drownded?”

  Uh-oh, Tanner thought. Lucy Cahil, five-year-old daughter of his best friend Ian Cahil, had finally asked the kind of question Tanner dreaded. As her adoptive uncle and godfather, Tanner loved Lucy as his own, but was never sure how to handle such queries. Serious answer, or funny one?

  Lucy solved the problem for him. “And don’t say ’cuz they’ve got tiny scuba things. My dad already tried that.”

  Tanner laughed. Translation: I’m young, not stupid. “Okay. Fish don’t drown because they have gills. Gills absorb oxygen from the water, and the fish breathe that”

  “So, if there’s ox … oxi … air down there, how come we can’t do it?”

  “We’re just not built that way, I guess.”

  Lucy considered this for a moment. “Okay.” She returned her attention to her pole.

  Tanner patted her on the shoulder and walked over to Cahil, who had been watching the exchange from his lounge chair. Behind him, up a set of long, winding stairs set into the wooded embankment, sat Tanner’s home, an old spruce and oak lighthouse he’d purchased from the Virginia Historical Commission. The narrow-mouthed, tall-cliffed cove the lighthouse guarded sat well back from the Rappahannock’s main channel. Tanner’s closest neighbor was a mile away.

  “See, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” Cahil asked.

  “No.”

  “I’m telling you, bud, you’d make a great father.”

  “I seem to recall getting the same pitch from your wife last week.”

  Cahil’s bearded face split into a grin. “Maggie loves lost causes.”

  “There’s still plenty of time for kids.” Saying the words, Tanner suddenly realized it didn’t sound so bad. On the other hand, how would he balance a family with what he did for a living? How did Bear do it? Until he figured that out, playing uncle would have to suffice. Truth was, he liked it.

  “Briggs, you’re forty.”

  “I plan to live to be a hundred and twenty.”

  Cahil laughed. “Oh, well, in that case … How, may I ask, do you plan to do that?”

  “Clean living and an apple a day.”

  “An apple a day keeps the grim reaper away?”

  “That’s the theory I’m going on.”

  Good ol’ Bear, Tanner thought. He and Cahil had been friends for nearly fifteen years, having first survived Navy Special Warfare training together, and then ISAG, or Intelligence Support Activity Group selection. In those early days, Cahil’s fiercely loyal and ever-reliable nature had won him the nickname “Mama Bear.”

  After IS AG’s disbandment due to Pentagon politics, he and Cahil—who were only two of the sixty operators to survive ISAG training’s 90 percent attrition rate—were recruited by former spymaster Leland Dutcher to join a Reagan-era experiment called Holystone Group.

  In the intelligence community, Holystone was called a “fix-it-shop”, a semiautonomous CIA-fronted organization that handled tasks that were deemed too delicate for direct government action. Since Holystone worked outside normal channels—or, “on the raw”—it was completely deniable. In short, if a Holystone employee got caught doing something he or she shouldn’t be doing, somewhere he or she shouldn’t be, they were on their own. As Dutcher was fond of saying, “It’s a brutal necessity. Brutal for us, necessary for the job.”

  For all that, for all the ups and downs he’d seen since joining Holystone—including losing his wife, Elle, in a skiing accident—Tanner counted himself lucky to be working with people like Dutcher and Cahil. They were family.

  “Speaking of wives and children and such,” said Bear. “Have you heard from Camille lately?”

  “We talked last week. She’s in Haifa.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “Nope. Mossad hired her as a security consultant.”

  Up until six months ago Camille had been a Mossad katsa, or case officer. Her career—and nearly her life—had been cut short when she bucked her superiors to save Tanner’s life aboard a ship bound for Tel Aviv. Thanks to the intercession of then-President John Haverland, Camille had been allowed to retire with honor and impunity from Mossad service. That the Israelis had even allowed her back into the country was extraordinary: Mossad was not known for its magnanimity.

  Though neither of them had said it aloud, Tanner knew he and Camille had reached the same conclusion about their relationship. Given their respective careers and given the fact that neither was ready to quit, the best they could hope for was an on-again off-again romance. It could be worse, Tanner realized. He could not have her in his life at all. Camille was a wonderful woman, and if the circumstances were different … Well.

  “Whoa!” Cahil called. “Looks like our girl’s got a bite.”

  Tanner looked over his shoulder. Lucy Cahil was sitting on her haunches, feet dug into the sand, her fingers white around the jerking pole. She was losing the battle. Whatever was on the other end was more than a match for her—and still she wasn’t calling for help. Stubborn like her father.

  Cahil’s cell phone started ringing; he tossed it to Tanner, then jogged over to Lucy. Tanner flipped open the phone. “Hello?”

  “Briggs, its Leland.”

  “Evening, Leland.”

  “Have you got some time?”

  “Sure, when?”

  “Right now.”

  Tanner hesitated; there was an unaccustomed hardness in his boss’s voice. “What’s going on?”

  “You remember Treble?” Dutcher asked.

  Tanner remembered; for twelve years it had never been far from his mind. “I remember.”

  “We just got word: He may be alive, Briggs.”

  3

  FBI Headquarters, Washington, D.C.r />
  Though he would never admit it publicly, Special Agent Paul Randall revered his boss. Charlie Latham was a near legend, the Bureau’s top CE&I expert since the early eighties, but that kind of blatant veneration didn’t play well in J. Edgar’s house. Besides, Latham himself would never stand for it. “Do your job, do it discreetly, and let glory worry about itself” was one of his favorite aphorisms.

  Having followed Latham’s career since he was a brick agent in Robbery, Randall knew his boss’s CV backward and forward. He’d been involved in most of the big ones—Kocher, Pollard, Walker, and just six months ago, the capture of former-KGB illegal and fugitive Yuri Vorsalov. But what impressed Randall most when he finally got his long-awaited transfer was that Latham was a regular guy—a “stand-up guy” in FBI parlance.

  Quiet, unassuming, and quick to share credit, Latham was not the Hollywood image of a spy hunter: medium height, wiry, and bald save a monkish fringe of salt-and-pepper hair. Latham was an “everyman.” You could pass him on the street and never give him a second glance, which is exactly what so many of his targets had done.

  This morning Latham was preoccupied. Randall knew he’d been called out the night before by Harry Owens, that it involved a homicide, but that was all—almost all, that is. “We’re gonna get a hot one, Paul,” Latham had said upon walking into his office. “Clear your plate.”

  If the “hot one” was in fact this homicide, there had to be a connection to his boss’s past. But what? Randall wondered. What would draw them into the grisly murder-suicide of an entire family?

  Latham was sipping his second cup of coffee when the phone rang. “Charlie Latham.”

  “Charlie, it’s Harry. Come on down, will ya?”

  “On my way.”

  “Owens?” asked Randall. Latham nodded. “You planning to fill me in anytime soon?”

  Latham looked at his partner; the eagerness was plain in his eyes. “Yeah. Later.”

  Latham walked to the elevator and took it up one floor. As he stepped off, a pair of men stepped aboard. Latham recognized both of them: the DCPD police commissioner and the Park Police district commander. Each man gave him a solemn nod.

  Sympathy or anger? Latham wondered. Or a little bit of both?

  They’d just come from Owens’s office and knowing Harry, the turf fight over the Baker murders had likely been short and bloodless. Though each cop probably loathed having his territory invaded, each was probably breathing a sigh of relief as well. If they only knew, Charlie thought.

  He stepped past them into Owens’s office. Owens, a jowly man with bloodhound eyes, was on the phone; he pointed Latham to a chair and kept talking. “Yes, sir, I just met with them. We’ll have their full cooperation. Yes, sir.”

  Owens hung up. “The director,” he explained.

  “Wow, Harry, two ‘yes sirs’ in one conversation.”

  “You only caught the tail end; I was already into the double digits. Wanna trade jobs?”

  “Sorry, I couldn’t admin my way out of a paper bag.”

  “And I couldn’t spot a spy if he were in my bathtub. The Baker case is ours. DCPD and the Park Police signed off.”

  “How much do they know?”

  “Not much. Truth is, I don’t think they want to know.”

  “Any word from the medical examiner?”

  “Tomorrow, probably. Crime scene should have things wrapped up by tonight.”

  “They won’t find much.”

  “I know. Baker’s home computer is already at the lab.”

  “I’m going over to Commerce, talk to Baker’s boss. I want to know what he was working on. Can you put in a call—”

  “Already did. They’re expecting you.”

  “Expecting me, but not happy about it?”

  “They probably thought they’d have a little more time to get their ducks in a row.”

  “I don’t want their ducks in a row.”

  Either way it went, the murders were going to shine badly on Commerce. If Baker was simply a homicidal nut, the media would be asking why Commerce’s screening missed it; if he turned out to be dirty and it had gotten him and his family killed, Commerce would be swarmed by investigators.

  “If they start talking to the press,” Latham said, “it could foul up our case.”

  “Then you’ll have to put the fear of God into them.”

  “Yep. After Commerce I thought I’d drive up to Dannemora and see Cho.”

  Owens frowned. “He’s a tough son-of-a-bitch, Charlie. You think he’ll tell you anything?”

  Latham shrugged. “I’ll plant the seed and see where it takes us.”

  Moscow, the Russian Commonwealth of Independent States

  “National destiny must not be decided by the few!” Vladimir Bulganin shouted, his amplified voice echoing through the square. “The purpose of an election is to make manifest the will of the people! Your will! And I tell you this, my friends: The bond between a public servant and his people is….” Bulganin paused. “To break that bond—that trust!—is nothing short of betrayal!”

  The crowd of ten thousand roared its approval, the cheers drowning out the sounds of the city around them. Spread throughout the crowd were dozens of Bulganin’s security men—“The Guardians” of the Russian Pride Party—all wearing navy peacoats and crimson armbands. On nearby streets, traffic had ground to a halt and drivers stood beside their cars. At the edge of the square, local reporters filmed the event, and beyond them a line of Moscow Militia officers stood at parade rest.

  Very good, thought Ivan Nochenko. He hit it right this time. Timing was as important as content—perhaps more so.

  If not a perfect pupil, Bulganin had a natural feel for collective emotion. Unfortunately, the man often let passion override craft. Perception was everything; perception always conquered truth. Most people’s decisions were guided by the heart, not by the mind. Win the heart and you can convince any public—especially an impassioned Russian public—to vote a chimp into office.

  Nochenko knew his business. He’d spent twenty of his thirty years in the KGB weaving fiction into propaganda and truth into fiction. The art of propaganda was, after all, nothing more than the blue-collar cousin of public relations.

  Nochenko had seen much in his time: Mine collapses in the Urals, nuclear submarine sinkings in the Chukchi, mini-Chemobyls in the wastes of Siberia, rocket explosions in Yavlosk … Thousands of lives and hundreds of near disasters about which the world had never learned.

  Nochenko had loved his work and occasionally, in moments of private self-indulgence, he understood why: influence. Kings rule countries, but the king who relies on truth is a king soon dethroned. Information is the true power and those who control information are the true kings. Nochenko’s mentor, Sergei Simov, had said it best: “Truth is a lie, a tale told by men frightened by the vagaries of life. Get enough people to believe a lie and it becomes truth.”

  Days gone by, Nochenko thought, watching Bulganin conclude his speech. The days before we started believing the tale told by NATO … Truth was, the Soviet died long before the wall came down; her death rattle began the day the Politburo started believing they were losing the great game.

  He ached for those heady days, and for years after leaving the KGB he’d thought they were gone forever. Then he’d found Vladimir Bulganin. Bulganin would be his final triumph. Cover up the deaths of a hundred coal miners? Child’s play. Erase from history a nuclear submarine lost to the icy waters of the Atlantic? Masturbation. But take a raw, unknown peasant—a goddamned shoe factory foreman!—from Omsk to the grandest seat of power in all of Russia … That was a feat.

  Bulganin was wrapping up: “And so my countrymen, we stand at a precipice. Your votes will decide whether the Motherland plummets over the edge, or she takes wing and soars. I know what I choose. I know what I’m prepared to do for the Motherland, but only you can decide on whom to bestow your faith. I promise you this, my friends: If that per
son is to be me, I will never tire of the burden, and I will never betray your faith!”

  The crowd went wild, ten thousand voices cheering as one, caps flying into the air and scarves waving in the breeze. To Nochenko, the cacophony was a symphony, a perfect blending of frustration and hope. They’re turning, Nochenko thought. They’re almost there.

  White House

  ​To Bousikaris’s surprise, it hadn’t taken much to bring his boss around to his way of thinking. For all his flaws, President Phillip Martin had a well-honed sense of survival.

  Despite the pleasant mask Martin had donned while listening to the ambassador’s “proposal,” Bousikaris had seen the signs: the pulsing jaw, the tapping finger on the chair’s armrest …

  The explosion had come the instant the door closed: “Those sons-of-bitches! Who do they think they’re dealing with? Terrorists, my ass. They’re up to something, Howard! They’re trying to screw me! Well, they’re in for a surprise …”

  Bousikaris let him rant for a few minutes, then said. “Phil, we don’t know anything.”

  “They’re blackmailing—”

  “They’re leveraging. There’s a difference.” Is there! Bousikaris thought. In this case, not really, but the sooner he could get Martin on track, the sooner they could start thinking of a way out. “They’re looking for help. They’re worried we’ll be less than enthusiastic about it.”

  “Bullshit,” growled Martin.

  “Look, it happens in Congress every day. You know that. This is the same thing, just on a larger scale.” Bousikaris stepped forward, placed his fists on the desk, and stared hard at Martin. “Phil.”

  “What!”

  “Listen to me: This is a game you know how to play. This is what you do best. Don’t let anger put you off your game.”

  Martin stared back, then took a deep breath, and nodded. “Okay, right. What do we do?”

  4

  CIA Headquarters, Virginia