The Firefly

by P. T. Deutermann

  “Not like there’s going to be a court case,” Bertie’d said, and Swamp had smiled, remembering what Jake had said earlier. Then they’d arrived at the station, where there were still squads of cops milling around out front and within the great hall. Bertie had ushered Swamp through the security cordon with the help of some Secret Service agents, handed Swamp a ticket to Harpers Ferry, and then suggested coffee, as they had about a half hour to kill.

  “We’re going to need a full-scale deposition for the classified case record,” Bertie told him, lowering his voice as the passenger lounge filled up now that the station was coming back to life. “That will include input from Special Agent White, of course, and the District police and Arson officers involved.”

  “And your own case executive, Lucy VanMetre? Gonna depose her, too?”

  Bertie’s eyebrows rose. Swamp told him what Hallory had said earlier. Finally, Bertie nodded. “That’s probably more than you needed to know.”

  “‘Liaison officer’ to the fusion committee? That could mean anything at all, Bertie.”

  “As you should know, Swamp. Anyway, we’ll have a full-scale deposition team out there later today. Get it all on tape. Then you’re expendable.”

  “Again.”

  “Like you told the Man, you take the king’s shilling. We’re all expendable in this business.”

  “Back there in the Situation Room,” Swamp said. “You said you people had surveillance set up in that duplex. So you guys had to know that Heismann looked like that banker.”

  Bertie took a sip of coffee. “Not really,” he said. “We had no phone line in there. We could listen via a radio device, but video requires a much bigger pipe. Besides, we had no reason to know what he looked like.”

  “But you owned Mutaib from the time his German went under reconstruction. Mutaib’s bank owned the Paki doctors. You could have followed every procedure done on the German.”

  Bertie’s face hardened. “And your question is?”

  “You knew I’d go after that guy.”

  “Yes, we suspected you might.”

  “The cop car, the one that crashed into Lucy’s official car down on the Mall—accident?”

  “Looked like one to me,” Bertie said.

  “And yet their seat belts failed, while mine worked.”

  “Government cars. What can I say? Maintenance often isn’t what it’s supposed to be. The front ones get a lot more use.”

  “And the car was hit hard enough to hurt the people in the front seat, and yet it was still drivable.”

  “Swamp,” Bertie said patiently, “you’re starting to bore me.”

  “Who were the shooters at the town house, Bertie? Right after the attack?”

  “Shooters?”

  “Yeah. Long guns. When I tried to get out of the burning building. On the front side.”

  “This is news. Did you report this to Lucy when she picked you up?”

  Did I? Swamp asked himself. No, he had not. He’d been deaf and his adrenaline had been crashing. He said as much.

  Bertie gave him an elaborate shrug. “And your real question is?”

  “You knew I’d go after him, and that Mutaib might get killed in the process, especially after what I’d seen on television.”

  “Perhaps.” Bertie sighed. “There was also the chance that he’d just put up his hands and surrender. He was our Arab, after all. He didn’t have to admit that in front of all those people, but he could have just gone along quietly when you showed up.”

  “Until his security guys drew down on me. Who were they really working for, Bertie?”

  “Oh, c’mon, Swamp.”

  “They working for you, too?”

  “Listen to you.”

  “But if he did try to escape, there was a pretty damn good chance his ass’d be a grape. As, in fact, it turned out.”

  Bertie looked around to make sure no one was eavesdropping. “What’s your real problem here, Swamp?”

  “Two problems: One, you let your pet Arab authorize a fire that killed four innocent people. Okay, maybe two not so innocent. But two were. And second, I think you used me to take your Arab out. Something I suspect you were going to have to do, one way or another.”

  Bertie shrugged again, but he said nothing.

  “I didn’t sign on to be one of your executioners, Bertie.”

  Bertie’s face settled into a cold mask. “Correct,” he said. “You were Mutaib’s executioner. And we, of course, don’t employ executioners.”

  “Oh right.”

  “We don’t,” Bertie insisted. He looked around for a moment. “They’re all contractors.”

  “I was carrying Agency contractor credentials when I did that,” Swamp said.

  “Actually, you weren’t. You left them back in your apartment, remember? Where I suspect they’ve since gone astray.”

  It was Swamp’s turn to stare. “Look,” Bertie said. “Okay, you were used. To very good effect, as it turns out. We’ve bagged the heart and soul of Al Qaeda and split OPEC right down the middle. Prices are going to fall like a stone. If your conscience is really bothering you, balance one turncoat Arab banker, two shady foreign doctors, and two—okay, three—innocent American women against all those folks in the World Trade Center back on nine eleven. That do it for you?”

  “I can’t believe I’m hearing this, Bertie. This is America, for God’s sake.”

  “It’s America at war, Swamp. Wake up and smell the body bags. War’s hell, just like Sherman said.” He sat back in his chair. “If it’s any consolation, the German told Mutaib he was going to kill the next-door neighbor, and we did get her out of there. But that’s not what you’re really worried about, is it?”

  Swamp stared down at his coffee cup for a moment as the first departure calls of the morning echoed through the cavernous station. “No, that’s not what I’m really worried about,” he said finally.

  “You have to say it.”

  “The Arab banker’s dead, which solves one of your problems. The mortar man’s dead and his face is conveniently gone, which solves another problem. Which leaves me. I’m the only outside guy left alive who knows what actually happened here.”

  Bertie smiled then and patted Swamp’s hand reassuringly as he got up to leave. “You just get on your train and go home, Swamp Morgan. The deposition team will be up shortly.”

  “How do I know it’s a deposition team,” Swamp said, “and not a disposition team?”

  “Because you’re the eyewitness. That committee tape this morning was nice, but a live agent will be better, you know, once Congress really gets rolling.”

  “Hallory said this morning that I wouldn’t be needed on Capitol Hill.”

  “He was probably trying to make you feel better. Of course you’re going to be going back there. We all are. You’re our only inside guy.”

  “Would that be the case if Mutaib were still alive?”

  “But he isn’t, is he?”

  “Hell, I don’t know,” Swamp said. “That body at the nurse’s house had no face. Who’s to say that wasn’t the German at the bank? Who’s to say you and Lucy don’t have Mr. Mutaib squirreled away in a safe house somewhere?”

  “So who was the guy at the nurse’s house, then?”

  “Some body you planted?” Swamp said. “Shit, Bertie, which guy did I kill, and which guy did she kill?”

  Bertie just shook his head. “You’re tired and you’re getting paranoid in your old age, pardner. You’ll be just fine. Just catch your train. We’ll talk later, when you’ve had a chance to rest up a little, get your head right.”

  Swamp couldn’t think of anything else to say, so they shook hands and Bertie left. Swamp exhaled forcefully as he watched Bertie walk across the concourse, and then he saw Bertie acknowledge the three large men who came out of nowhere to assume protective flanking positions around him. Swamp wondered how long they’d been there while he and Bertie had been having their little talk. Or who else was still in the great
hall, watching him.

  He got out his ticket and then looked up at the scrolling arrival and departures board for his train time. The train to Harpers Ferry always went through Baltimore, and the next train to Baltimore was boarding in eight minutes on Track 9. He finished his coffee, left a tip, and headed for the bathroom. From there, he went out to Track 9, walked up the line of cars until he finally saw some empty seats through the windows, and slipped into the lead car.

  Once in his seat, he tried to reassure himself that everything was going to be all right, despite his many misgivings. This wasn’t Russia. The Agency wasn’t the KGB, or whatever it was called these days. Yes, there would be hell to pay from several quarters, but the timing had been pretty clever—precisely at the change of administrations. If any truly ugly stuff came out, the new people could always blame the previous people, which probably had been the original agreement. And, yes, there were still lots and lots of Muslim and other terrorists out there bent on the destruction of Western civilization in general and America in particular, but the United States had stabbed the Arab piece of the puzzle right in the heart. Take down the terrorists’ brains and money, get your hands around the oil monster’s neck, if only temporarily, and you’d done a good day’s work.

  Bertie was right: He was exhausted, and his physical exhaustion was making him paranoid. And he was not the only one who knew what had happened—everyone involved in the planning of this thing knew it. Those security guards in the bank couldn’t have been working for Bertie, because that would mean the Agency had put out orders to kill him.

  The train lurched into motion and began to gather speed. But something Bertie had said was still nagging at the back of his mind—some phrase. He closed his eyes and thought about it.

  What had Bertie said about the deposition team? “Get it all on tape.” Right. “And then we’re all expendable.”

  No, wait—he actually said, “Then you’re expendable.”

  And they already have me on tape. Saying the most important thing anyway. And not saying anything about what happened later, or why. Surely they’re going to explain, or are they just going to hunker down and make inquiring minds find out?

  “Get it all on tape. Then you’re expendable.” That’s what he’d said. Right out loud.

  He opened his eyes as he felt the train slowing. Why are we stopping? he wondered. And then he remembered. The commuter trains always stopped at the New Carrollton Metro station, out along the Capital Beltway, en route to Baltimore and the northeast corridor.

  But wait a minute, he thought. Not going this way. Not outbound in the morning. They stop at New Carrollton on the way in, but not on the way out. They only do that at night, to pick up outbound passengers.

  In fact, he thought as he looked at his watch, this can’t be a commuter train to Harpers Ferry. It’s too late in the morning. It might be going to Baltimore, but it sure as hell won’t be going over to Harpers Ferry. He shook his head to clear the cobwebs. He knew he was still missing something important here.

  And then it hit him: It wasn’t a workday. This was Saturday. There weren’t any commuter trains to Harpers Ferry on Saturday.

  So why had Bertie put him on this particular train? Maybe he’d forgotten it was Saturday, too?

  The train slid into the New Carrollton station and squealed to a stop. On impulse, Swamp got up, walked quickly to the back of the car, and got off. He saw the backs of a few people as they climbed into the train but otherwise the upper station platform appeared to be empty. The train’s doors remained open.

  What am I doing? he thought, even as he acknowledged a strong and certain urge to get off that train. He couldn’t have put it into words, but he just knew.

  Get out of here. Move.

  He walked quickly over to the down escalator, which would take him to the tunnel leading over to the Metro side of the station. He caught a glimpse of some other men getting off at the far end of the upper platform, but right now he was unwilling to turn around and show his face.

  Move. Get off this platform.

  He kept his face averted and started down just as he heard the train doors close behind him. As the train began sliding out of the station, his head was just about to descend below the escalator’s threshold. He chanced a look just as the sixth and last car pulled abreast. The train was accelerating, going fast enough to blur the faces visible inside the windows. Which is when, just as his head submerged below the platform, he caught one quick glimpse of a woman sitting all the way in the back, next to the very last window. A woman whose hair looked like a glowing mass of spun gold in the midmorning light.

  Lucy?

  He felt his pulse begin to pound and his face flush in fear. He started to trot down the descending escalator. As he stepped off at the bottom, his mind was already arguing with itself. Couldn’t have been. Sure looked like her. You couldn’t see her face. That hair. Had to be. Couldn’t be.

  He turned right and headed for the street-level tunnel that went under the tracks for the main line. There was no one else about, and he hesitated as he got to the entrance. It was a short tunnel, maybe a hundred feet, but brightly lighted, with clean white-tiled walls. Nothing in the least sinister about it. But still he hesitated. Tunnels were traps, and if that had been Lucy in the train, he needed to watch his ass here. He was physically and mentally exhausted, so he really had to concentrate.

  He glanced around one more time, but there was still no one in the lower station, not even an Amtrak attendant in the ticket kiosk.

  That’s strange, he thought. There’s always—no, not on Saturdays. On weekends, they check the tickets on the train. Right.

  He started into the tunnel, already planning out his route. He’d take the Metro’s Blue Line all the way over to the Rosslyn station, then transfer for Ballston. Get to his apartment. Get his Rover. No, the Agency had his Rover. Or did they? He’d left it in Arlington, hadn’t he? What seemed like a hundred years ago. He was getting confused.

  When he was three-quarters of the way through the tunnel, he stopped short as four large men appeared in front of him. They were all in suits and trench coats, and all wore mirrored sunglasses. Instinctively, he turned around, but a fifth man was walking into the tunnel behind him, dressed like the others, but without the sunglasses.

  It was Gary White.

  “Gary?” Swamp called, hearing his own voice break in nervous relief.

  “Mr. Morgan, sir,” Gary said as he closed the distance. “You look like hell, if I may say so.”

  “What—”

  “Relax, Mr. Morgan. We’re the good guys. We’ve got cars out front.”

  Swamp didn’t know what to do. The other four had closed in from their end of the tunnel, but nobody was taking a threatening stance. A man and a woman came into the tunnel, saw the group of men in suits, and walked right by them.

  Swamp and Gary ended up in the backseat of a gray Crown Vic; two of the other men sat up front. The other two were in another Crown Vic behind them. Swamp rested his head on the back of the seat as the cars pulled out.

  “Okay,” he said wearily. “Where to this time? And what’s going on?”

  “What’s going on is that Carlton Hallory had some reservations about Mr. Walker sending you on a train ride. So he sent us to ride with you.”

  “I’m really losing my touch,” Swamp said. “I never made a one of you.”

  “You weren’t exactly looking, sir,” Gary said.

  “Been a year or two since I’ve been a street agent.”

  “You never really were a street agent, Mr. Morgan.”

  Very true. Swamp nodded. It hurt his neck. “You said Carlton Hallory.”

  Gary grinned. He still looked like a twenty-year-old to Swamp. “Nothing wrong with your hearing now,” he said. “I didn’t call him Mr. Hallory today because he and I are the same rank.”

  Swamp turned to look at him in surprise. Gary was still grinning. “That’s right. I was part of it. Right from the git-go. When
did you ever get an assistant so easily?”

  “I’ll be damned,” Swamp said. “You never worked Homicide in Fairfax County?”

  “Nope. Been Secret Service for a whole lot longer than my dashing good looks would indicate.”

  “So what’s going on? Where are we going?”

  “You recall when they had your apartment phone up? La Mamba set that in motion, but she ran it out of Hallory’s shop. Even got a warrant, but she used the Secret Service to get it. Secret Service operators, too. Anyway, I was your intercept supervisor.”

  “Cute.”

  “Well, we were keeping it en famiglia. Anyway, after the big op went down, some of the equipment operators came to see me. Said they were concerned because of some things they’d heard Lucy say in Hallory’s office.”

  “They had her phones up?”

  Gary shrugged. “Her office, not her phones. The Agency can always detect shit on their phones. Carlton thought as long as the Agency was going to bug a Secret Service operative, it was only fair that the Secret Service bug an Agency operative in return.”

  “Hallory didn’t trust Lucy?”

  “She didn’t get that nickname working with us,” Gary pointed out. “It was mostly insurance. Anyway, I took their concerns to Carlton early this morning. When Bertie said he was going to get you out of sight after the hearing, Carlton felt uneasy. So did I. So here we are.”

  “And where are we going?”

  “Home, Mr. Morgan. We’re going to take you out to wild and wonderful West Virginia, see you through your front door, and then some guys are going to hang around for a while. Remember the agents who took you back to the apartment the day you were fired? Remember them asking you what was going on? They’re back there in that other car. That’s how the word got around headquarters.”

  “And you’ll do this long enough for Bertie and company to get the message?” Swamp said.

  “That’s right. The director has approved this, by the way. Care to guess why?”

  Swamp thought for a moment. “This whole thing was a very dangerous gambit,” he said finally. “Even though it succeeded, Congress is going to investigate.” He turned to look at Gary. “This was an Agency operation. Lucy’s brainchild. The Secret Service was used. I’m living proof of that.”