Target of Opportunity td-98

by Warren Murphy

  "The theater is in the East Wing," said Smith.

  "Just point the way," said Remo. Smith went to a boarded-up closet door, unlocked it by pressing a corner lintel, then the door clicked open, boards and all.

  Smith beckoned them on.

  They found themselves in a corridor so narrow it had to be a hollow space in the walls. As they squeezed along, Remo noticed Smith reach surreptitiously into the watch pocket of his gray vest. Out came a white coffin-shaped pill. Smith made a protective fist around it.

  Remo eased up and took Smith by the same wrist, twisting it against the natural flex of the joint. Smith clenched his teeth fiercely, and his fingers went slack.

  Remo caught the poison pill in his free hand and released Smith.

  "No poison pill until you find my father for me," said Remo.

  "What if we are caught?"

  "Then it's every man for himself."

  Rubbing his wrists angrily, Harold Smith continued leading the way.

  The White House was strangely quiet. Occasionally footsteps came to their ears. Smith seemed to guide himself by sense of direction and the touch of his hand on the wall. He led them eastward.

  When they emerged into light again, they were standing in an alcove.

  "The White House theater is to our left," whispered Smith. "This is the critical stage." He donned a pair of impenetrable sunglasses, adding, "Follow my lead." Then he stepped out.

  Remo put on his own sunglasses. Unseen, the Master of Sinanju drew on round smoked glasses of his own.

  There was a Secret Service agent standing post before a double set of cream-colored doors.

  Smith showed his Secret Service badge and said, "Has the President arrived yet?"

  "No, sir. The picture is scheduled for seven sharp."

  "The director requested a double-check of the security arrangements," said Smith.

  The Secret Service agent reached for his belt radio, and Remo noticed Smith stiffen.

  "Damn, I forgot."

  "Yes?" said Smith in a too-cool voice.

  "We're on radio silence."

  "I know," said Smith quickly. "And if we're to check the theater before Big Mac arrives, we must move quickly."

  "Right," said the agent, stepping away from the door.

  Then he noticed Chiun regarding him through smoked lenses.

  "Are you Secret Service?"

  Chiun drew himself up proudly. "Better. I am a Secret Servant."

  "Master Chiun is an expert on assassinations," Smith said quickly.

  "Expert assassin," corrected Chiun.

  "His English is not very good," added Smith, who hastily ushered Remo and Chiun into the tiny theater.

  "Big Mac?" said Remo, once they were alone.

  "Secret Service code name for the President," explained Smith.

  "Fits him like a glove," Remo grunted.

  Then, outside the closed doors the sound of running feet preceded a shout.

  "Is the Man here yet?" an out-of-breath voice asked.

  "No," returned the agent on post.

  "Well, I gotta find him quick! We have a problem on the North Lawn. You try the East Wing, and I'll head up to the second floor."

  "Right."

  The rattle of running feet faded down the corridor, and in the White House theater, Remo said to Smith, "What do we do?"

  "You and Chiun look into this. Discreetly."

  "What about you?"

  Harold Smith took a seat in the first row.

  "I intend to await the President's arrival."

  Chapter 18

  Although it was early by Washington standards, the White House began emptying out at 7:00 p.m. Staff were being sent home early under a strict gag order.

  Kirby Ayers of the uniformed Secret Service watched over the turnstiles at the East Gate entrance, where staffers and visitors alike were required to go through the process of inserting their magnetic keycards into a reader machine before walking through the metal detectors.

  The White House press corps, on the other hand, were clamoring to get in.

  "What is the President doing?" one asked from the sidewalk where they had been exiled in blanket punishment for the networks having prematurely reported the President dead and doubting his genuineness upon his return to Washington.

  "You have to ask the President's press secretary that," Ayers said.

  "She won't return our calls."

  "You pronounced her boss dead on national TV. What do you expect?"

  "But we're the White House press corps," another moaned.

  "You have my sympathy," Ayers said.

  In all the commotion, neither the press nor the uniformed Secret Service guards noticed one of the most famous haircuts in Washington crawl out of the back of a TV microwave van on sprawled arms and legs and clump below eye level through the metal detector.

  He got halfway across the North Lawn before he was picked up by the Secret Service surveillance cameras and the alert was sounded.

  By that time he had splashed into the fountain in the center of the lawn.

  That was where the director of the Secret Service found him when he came pounding out of the North Portico, a detail of agents at his heels.

  "He's in the fountain, sir," Jack Murtha said.

  "How did he get through the gate?" the director complained.

  "We think he crawled on his hands and knees while the press had the uniforms distracted."

  "We can't have a security breach like this! Big Mac will have my ass flame broiled."

  When they reached the marble lip of the White House fountain, they saw no sign of anyone.

  "Who's got a damn flashlight?" the director demanded.

  A flashlight was handed over.

  The director beamed light all through the pool. He caught a flash of something lurking under the cold water. It was mottled green and brown.

  "What the hell is that?" he breathed.

  Then a head rose from the water, and two green eyes looked directly at the director of the Secret Service from under a thick thatch of wet white fur.

  The green eyes were so cold and inhuman the director almost dropped his light. "What in God's name is that?" he said hoarsely.

  Another flash came into play.

  "That hair sure looks familiar," Jack Murtha muttered.

  "Look at those eyes. Like a snake's. They don't even blink in the light."

  "You! Come out of there with your hands up," Murtha commanded.

  The baleful green eyes continued to regard the cluster of agents with cold menace. Bubbles began to appear in the area of his submerged mouth.

  Then slowly and deliberately the head lifted into view.

  "Holy Hell!" Murtha blurted. "That's Gila!"

  "What?"

  "Congressman Gila Gingold, minority whip in the House of Representatives."

  "My God! It is him. But what the hell is he doing here?"

  The question hung in the air less than five seconds. Without warning, the figure in the pool gathered itself and came splashing out of the pool on clumsy arms and legs, head held high like a turtle, jaws snapping angrily.

  Delta Elites snapped in line.

  "Hold your fire!" the director cried. "You can't shoot him. He's a member of Congress and the opposition party to boot. Think of the stink."

  Hastily the Secret Service beat a retreat to the North Portico, heads turning often.

  It was a frightening sight. Gila Gingold, dressed in jungle fatigues, slithered along the winter brown lawn on his belly. He charged up to the North Portico, where the director promptly slammed the door in his pugnacious face.

  Gila Gingold flopped around the doorway, threshing like a bull snake and snapping his jaws angrily. He growled once but didn't say a word otherwise.

  "What the hell is wrong with him?" the director wondered aloud in a horrified voice.

  "You know what a pit bull he is where Big Mac is concerned."

  "Looks like he wigged out completely-"
<
br />   "We'd better inform the Man," the director said.

  "How? We're on radio silence."

  "I'll do it personally," said the director.

  He withdrew into the White House proper.

  "You know," Jack Murtha said to his fellow agents as the House minority whip paced on all fours back and forth before the entrance to the executive mansion, "he kinda reminds me of something."

  "Yeah, I know what you mean," said another. "But I can't put my finger on it."

  After five minutes the camouflaged figure slithered back to the fountain and slipped from sight.

  THE PRESIDENT of the United States was in the family quarters waiting for the First Lady when the director of the Secret Service walked in unannounced.

  "Why Mr. Smith Goes to Washington?" she was asking the President. "Is there a secret message in the sound track?"

  "If I knew, I'd tell you."

  The director cleared his throat. "I'm sorry to barge in like this, Mr. President. But we have a little problem on the North Lawn."

  "If it's little, you deal with it," the First Lady snapped.

  "Well, perhaps 'little' isn't the correct word."

  They both looked at him questioningly.

  The director drifted up to the President and whispered into his ear, "We have a man in jungle fatigues crawling along the North Lawn on all fours."

  The President ran to a window.

  "Is that him down in the fountain?" he asked.

  The director looked. "I'm afraid so, Mr. President."

  The First Lady joined them, peered down and asked impatiently, "What's that lizard doing in my foun-"

  "Lizard?" the director asked.

  "If that mop of white hair doesn't belong to Gila Gingold, I'm Eleanor Roosevelt."

  "That's who we think it is, too."

  "Let's deal with this quietly," the President told the director of the Secret Service.

  "No," countered the First Lady. "Let's call in the press. If the Republican whip has gone off his rocker, it should lead the evening news."

  "Not on your life," said the President.

  "Who wears the pants in this family?" the First Lady said.

  "That doesn't matter. I wear the Presidential pants."

  The First Lady stormed away, muttering, "Wait until I'm President."

  "Where are you going?" the President called.

  "To get my Nikon. If I can't have this on the news, at least I'll get snapshots for my White House scrapbook."

  Rolling his eyes for the director's benefit, the President repeated, "Deal with this as quietly as possible."

  "That will be difficult, sir. He tried to bite us. Snapped at our heels like a junkyard dog."

  "Now you know how the First Lady and I feel," said the President. "Come on. Maybe I can talk sense into him."

  "I don't recommend this. It could be a trick to lure you out into the open."

  "If the Republicans want me out of office that badly, they're welcome to take their best shot."

  The director turned green as he followed the President to the narrow White House elevator.

  "GILA, IS THAT You?" the President called uneasily as he approached the fountain gingerly.

  From the vantage point on the second floor, the House minority whip had looked absurd. Now, face-to-face, the President found himself shivering under the baleful, unwinking glare of one of his chief political adversaries.

  "Gila, whatever's troubling you, I think we can talk it out, just you and me."

  The green eyes continued their unnerving unwinking staring.

  "Whatever our differences, we both want what's best for this country. Why don't you come out before you catch your death?"

  The half-submerged head dropped lower in the cold water until only the eyes peered out from the wet white mop. Slow bubbles formed.

  "Better step back, sir," warned the Secret Service director. "Last time he bubbled like that, he took a run at us."

  "Good idea," said the President, taking a step backward.

  The green eyes narrowed suddenly.

  With a ferocious flailing, the white-haired man surged up out of the water. On all fours, he cleared the space between the pool and the Chief Executive too fast for anyone to react.

  Strong white teeth clamped over the President's right ankle. He let out a howl of pain.

  "Shoot him! Shoot him!" the director cried, hoarse voiced.

  "Don't you shoot anyone!" the President, recognizing through his pain that he was in the line of fire.

  Secret Service agents staggered back, trying to get a clear shot, their faces going ghost white.

  On the dry grass, the President and the minority whip were threshing and struggling madly. The President slapped at his tormentor's hair with no effect.

  "Shoot to wound!" the director ordered.

  "Stay still! Stay still, Mr. President," Jack Murtha pleaded.

  "Get him off me!" the President howled, eyes wide with horror.

  Up above, the First Lady was snapping pictures with a flash camera as fast as she could press the shutter release.

  Fingers tightened on triggers, but before a hammer could fall, the agents suddenly felt their spines fill with ice. They thought it was a symptom of their own horror. But their weapons fell to the ground a half beat apart.

  The director demanded, "What's wrong with you two?"

  "I am," a squeaky voice said from behind the two agents.

  And while the director's attention was distracted, Remo Williams swept down the darkened lawn and brought the side of his hand down on the back of the minority whip's threshing neck.

  Gila Gingold relaxed immediately.

  Pulling the President out from under his dead weight, Remo whispered, "Smith sent us."

  "Thank God. I thought he was going to tear my foot off."

  "Who spoke? Who said that?" the director said, trying to see past his frozen agents.

  "I did," said the President.

  The director whirled. He saw the President getting to his feet unsteadily and the minority whip out cold on the lawn. No one else.

  "What happened?"

  "Never mind," the President bit out. "I have a movie to catch."

  "At a time like this?"

  ''Definitely at a time like this. Have Gila sent to St. Elizabeth's, and for God's sake keep this quiet."

  "Sir, I wouldn't know how to explain to anyone what just happened here."

  "Best thing I've heard all day," said the President, limping back into the executive mansion.

  While he was doing that, the director walked around his paralyzed agents and demanded, "What got into you two?"

  The two agents just keeled over, seemingly under the force of their boss's shouting.

  From the East Gate the press corps called out pleading questions that were met by a cold silence.

  THE PRESIDENT of the United States found no one on post at the entrance to the White House theater.

  He hesitated. Then a Secret Service agent came hurrying down the hall. It was Special Agent Vince Capezzi, much to the President's relief.

  "Sorry, sir. I was called away to look for you."

  "I'm going to watch this movie," he told Capezzi, "and I don't want to be disturbed by anything short of a nuclear alert."

  "Yes, sir," Capezzi said.

  The President entered the theater, which was so small that during state dinners it sometimes doubled as a cloakroom. The lights were already down. And down in the tiny first row a man sat. He didn't turn around when the President entered.

  The President hesitated. He felt a sudden chill. Straightening his coat, he advanced.

  The man simply sat there like a tailor's dummy.

  Taking the seat beside him, the President undertoned, "Smith?"

  "Of course, Mr. President," said the familiar lemony voice.

  Only then did the President truly relax. "How did you get in?" he asked.

  "The Treasury tunnel."

  "You know about that?"<
br />
  "Unimportant. You wished to see me?"

  The screen turned white, and the film began to roll. Over the opening credits, they spoke in clipped sentences, the President stealing the occasional sideways glance at Harold Smith's patrician profile. The man looked utterly ordinary, the President thought.

  "What happened to the hot line?" he asked Smith.

  "The mind behind the banking crisis of last Labor Day apparently severed the line. I have been unable to locate the break and repair it."

  "Then we have no direct line of communication?"

  "A minor inconvenience at a time like this."

  "I need your help. We just had an incident on the White House lawn."

  "I notice your ankle is bleeding."

  The President looked down at his right shoe. His sock was mangled.

  "The House minority whip bit me on the ankle."

  Harold Smith seemed not to have a response to that, so the President went on. "I think one of your people saved me."

  "He saved you from the rabid cat, as well."

  "The cat tested clean for rabies, according to the FBI testing lab."

  "Strange."

  "Someone is trying to kill me, or embarrass me, or both."

  "I agree with that assessment," said Smith as the film continued rolling. Both men watched every frame, but none of it registered.

  Smith said, "I assume you wish the organization to continue, at least through the present crisis."

  The President sighed. "I know we've had our differences. But your handling of the banking crisis was exemplary. The economy had a near miss the nation might not have survived."

  "The other problems have been dealt with," said Smith. "We have recovered the lost operating funds and are fully funded once again."

  "Good. You can assume a clean bill of health from me, and sanction to continue operating."

  "I accept that," said Smith.

  The President turned. "You don't sound very happy about it."

  "It is duty we are talking about, Mr. President, not pleasure. I have served seven Chief Executives before you. None of it involved pleasure."

  "I hear you."

  "My people will be stationed here for the duration of the crisis. Meanwhile, I must have access to all Secret Service findings."

  "I'll arrange a briefing."

  "My identity must be held in the strictest confidence."

  "We'll work out the details," said the President.

  The film continued rolling. After a while the President asked, "The President I most strive to emulate was the one who started all this, wasn't he?"