Dead Simple (26 page)
Authors: Jon Land
“This is the last picture of Queen Mary taken prior to the Mercantile Bank bombing. It always bothered me that she wasn’t around that day. I think I finally realize why.” Will Thatch glanced at the clipping one more time. “I think she was pregnant.”
J
ack Tyrell moved about the windowless room, stopping before each of a dozen television monitors even though none was currently switched on.
ack Tyrell moved about the windowless room, stopping before each of a dozen television monitors even though none was currently switched on.
“Sony … I see you went with the best, Marbles,” he said to the pudgy man with thick glasses he’d found working on cable television boxes a month before.
“You give me money, Jackie, I figure you want it spent.”
“We gonna be watching all those movie stations you were telling me about?”
“We’re gonna be watching twelve different views, most of them courtesy of the city’s traffic control bureau. Great views. You wanna check ’em out?”
“Later,” Jack Tyrell said, looking in amazement at the high-tech consoles and computer equipment Marbles had managed to get completely installed in less than a month’s time. “I guess you could call this the nerve center.” He counted four chairs set before the display. “You been in touch with the men who’ll be sitting in these?”
“One more training session and they’ll be ready.”
Jack smiled broadly and thought of Mary, how much she would have loved to see this. All their dreams at last about to be realized.
“You ever wonder, Marbles, what it woulda been like to have had this stuff our first time around?”
“Way I got it figured, we were ahead of our time, Jackie. Wasn’t enough
room in the world for all we wanted to do. Information superhighway opened up all these new roads.”
room in the world for all we wanted to do. Information superhighway opened up all these new roads.”
“Whatever you say.” Tyrell paused, his mind veering in a different direction. He walked about, surveying the remainder of their plain, dilapidated surroundings. “I don’t want to sound ungrateful, Marbles, but is this place the best you could do?”
“I had my reasons.”
“Sure, but I was thinking some luxury high-rise apartment. You know, watch it all happening out our window.”
“Windows pose a big problem, Jackie. Percussions from the initial blasts are gonna pack a helluva wallop. Lots of glass in the city’s gonna be airborne in a bad way.”
Tyrell pictured thick, daggerlike shards of it flying over the city, claiming anyone in its path. His eyes glistened. “I get the point.”
“There’s more. Down here they won’t be able to trace any of our signals. I’ve rigged up parabolic dishes on the surface to channel and diffuse all the electronic waves we send out of here. That includes the detonation signal codes.”
“Othell was talking about going timer.”
“Can’t with this kind of noisemaker. No wires or fuses with this stuff. Got to use a high-frequency radio signal.”
“What about the tanker itself?”
“Another reason for basing ourselves down here,” Marbles told him. “Gives us easy access to it, which we may need. See, with the tanker we gotta go with timer detonation, and that might mean making some adjustments as the day goes on.”
“You find the place to plant it?”
Marbles started for the door. “Next stop on the tour, Jackie.”
“
F
irst time I’ve ever been in your office, Hank,” Blaine said, looking around.
F
irst time I’ve ever been in your office, Hank,” Blaine said, looking around.
“I got another one at State, a little bigger. Sometimes I forget where I am, have to figure out which receptionist’s voice it is coming over the intercom.”
“You ready to tell me who you figure Jack Tyrell was working for?”
Belgrade looked away briefly. “The phrase Black Flag mean anything to you?”
“No.”
“I need to tell you how this government runs? There’s light and dark; light that everybody thinks they see and dark that most can’t see. Then there’s operations like Black Flag that nobody’s allowed to see.”
“That include you?”
“That includes
everybody,
MacNuts, and with good reason. Black Flag got its start in the heyday of covert ops. We were ready to flush Vietnam down the toilet, and the Cold War was about as frigid as it ever got. Intelligence wasn’t about to let us lose another war or let the Soviets expand westward through Europe one block at a time. They had a free hand to do pretty much anything they wanted, so long as participation could be easily denounced later.”
everybody,
MacNuts, and with good reason. Black Flag got its start in the heyday of covert ops. We were ready to flush Vietnam down the toilet, and the Cold War was about as frigid as it ever got. Intelligence wasn’t about to let us lose another war or let the Soviets expand westward through Europe one block at a time. They had a free hand to do pretty much anything they wanted, so long as participation could be easily denounced later.”
“Black Flag?”
“The files of prisoners, parolees, Section Eights, and residents of the stockade with the right specialties were reviewed. The ones of special interest were flagged with a black stamp for subsequent recruitment.”
“Recruitment?” Blaine repeated, feeling his pulse quicken.
Belgrade nodded. “Obviously extended further than we thought, extended to
fugitives
whose expertise they wanted to utilize. Men like Jack Tyrell.”
fugitives
whose expertise they wanted to utilize. Men like Jack Tyrell.”
“Proven psychos.”
“And specialists.”
“Explains why they’re protecting him, doesn’t it?”
“Protecting their own involvement with him, more likely. Trying to keep themselves covered, now that he’s on the loose.”
“Their specialty.”
“For decades now. Strictly routine.”
“And is it strictly routine for them to play terrorist on American soil?”
“Maybe he took the Monument on his own. That would explain why Black Flag decided to go after him.”
“Six months after the fact?” Blaine challenged. “I don’t think so.”
“Why?”
“Follow the chronology. Four of Black Flag’s soldiers follow Tyrell to a cemetery, end up in a grave, and all of a sudden he’s putting Midnight Run back together again. Six months go by since the Monument, but he waits until three weeks ago to dip into the past? I don’t think so.”
Belgrade flashed Blaine an uneasy glance. “And I don’t like where this is going … .”
“What if Thatch is right about Queen Mary being pregnant? What if she and Tyrell had a kid?”
Belgrade had no response.
“Make some calls, Hank. Get me a meeting.”
“You don’t want to touch these people, MacNuts.”
“Maybe I’ll just wait around for them to go after another American target.”
“They’ve been in the dark too long.”
“Then they’ll be afraid of someone turning a light on them, especially someone who can link them to the Monument.”
“Are you fucking crazy? You can’t take these people on, I’m telling you!”
“Jack Tyrell pulled your tanker of Devil’s Brew out of the ground because he’s got big plans for it,” Blaine responded quite calmly. “You want to sit around and wait to find out what they are?”
“Listen to me! The people you’re talking about don’t work for anyone officially, don’t even
exist
officially. They’re fucking ghosts, MacNuts, and they can make you disappear as easily as they can make themselves disappear.”
exist
officially. They’re fucking ghosts, MacNuts, and they can make you disappear as easily as they can make themselves disappear.”
Belgrade’s phone beeped before McCracken could respond, and Hank snatched the receiver to his ear, listening without response. He replaced the receiver and looked back at Blaine.
“It’s ready.”
“What’s ready?” Blaine wondered.
“As soon as you called me from that police station, I put out an alert on the tanker. Tollbooths, police and traffic choppers, state police, even construction crews got nothing better to do than to watch what’s whizzing by them down the road. Add to that any surveillance satellites that happened to be in the area over the last few hours and, if we’re lucky, we get an indication of where Tyrell’s headed. First batch of material just got collated. Let’s take a look.”
Belgrade moved to his desk and pressed a button on a built-in control panel. Instantly the room darkened and a red-tinted, three-dimensional map of the United States appeared where a wall mural had been just seconds before.
“I’m impressed,” Blaine said.
“You ain’t seen nothing yet. Watch.” Hank worked another series of buttons, and the three-dimensional map changed as quickly as he could press them, finally settling on a close-up of the mid-Atlantic region. “So far there’ve been twenty-one possible sightings.” Another press of a button brought twenty-one lights flashing. “Eliminating those of low probability, we can cut that number down to eight.” Just like that, thirteen of the lights disappeared.”And if we eliminate these two, we’re left with a pretty clear trail.”
Blaine studied the screen. With only the six lights left flashing, the direction Jack Tyrell had headed in after pulling the tanker out of the ground in central Pennsylvania was clear:
Northeast.
Blaine snatched Belgrade’s phone from its cradle and thrust it across the desk.
“Make the call, Hank.”
“
I
get the feeling you’re not comfortable in here,” the man said, as he walked slowly next to Blaine through the reptile house in Washington’s National Zoo.
I
get the feeling you’re not comfortable in here,” the man said, as he walked slowly next to Blaine through the reptile house in Washington’s National Zoo.
“I’ve known my share of snakes in my time,” McCracken told him.
It was hours past the zoo’s closing time by the meeting’s start, but as promised, a car had been parked by the front gate to take Blaine to the reptile house, where the man from Black Flag had been waiting. He was an older man, in his seventies at the very least, with silvery hair plastered to his skull and a withered, cadaverous face. But his deep-set eyes were a piercing shade of blue, a young man’s eyes, as comfortable in the dark as some of the creatures lurking in the glass exhibits around them.
“Mr. Belgrade suggested you had a matter of some urgency to discuss,” the man said, still having not introduced himself. “Concerning Jack Tyrell.”
“He was part of Black Flag, wasn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“And you’ve lost control of him.”
The man from Black Flag sighed. “In retrospect, I’d say we got greedy.”
“You would’ve been happier if he had succeeded in blowing up the Washington Monument?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. Such an action was required in order that we retain our efficacy.”
“Hell of a way to justify your own existence.”
“Raising funds has become more difficult for us of late. We’ve found ourselves in need of new allies.”
“So taking over the Monument, blowing it up if necessary, was meant to make you some new friends.”
“A small price to pay, in the long run.”
“Sorry I got in the way.”
“No matter,” said the old man. “I’m prepared to let you make up for it.”
Blaine caught the implication in his words. “I get the impression you haven’t exactly gone out of your way to get Tyrell back.”
“Because doing so would mean risking exposure. We consider Tyrell’s unexpected freedom to be an acceptable loss, under the circumstances.”
“Maybe that’s because you don’t know what he’s up to.”
“So Mr. Belgrade informed us.”
They stopped before an illuminated glass case where a Burmese python was slowly digesting a mouse, the last bit of a tail disappearing into the snake’s mouth. Blaine studied the man from Black Flag’s reflection. His slightly sallow skin had a shiny, waxlike quality to it, making it easy to view him as an exhibit every bit as dangerous as any tucked safely behind the barriers.
“During business hours, people flock to the cages where something’s about to die,” the man from Black Flag said suddeny. “Why is that, do you suppose?”
“Morbid fascination, I guess.”
“Only in part. The truth is people are comfortable watching because they can’t really see anything. Just a bulge in the snake’s skin moving slowly downward. If they could see the mouse being slowly digested, nobody would last long in front of the glass.”
“Except you.”
The man kept his eyes on the snake. “They can’t see what we do at Black Flag, either, and they’re just as comfortable for the same reason. People don’t want to know what the mouse looks like on the way down, and they don’t want to know how we keep their little worlds safe for them.” The man moved a little closer to the glass, placed his hand upon it. “You understand this meeting is most unusual, even unprecedented.”
“So are the circumstances.”
“Meaningless to us. The truth is I agreed because I wanted to meet you. Give you my thanks in person.” He paused, studying the snake. “You didn’t know that you’ve worked for us from time to time, did you? We retained you for the same reason we retained Tyrell: because rules don’t matter, only stakes do. The higher the stakes become, the more likely we are to make up our own rules. All of us.”
“Don’t lump me in with men like Tyrell. Please.”
“Would you like to compare your body counts to those he recorded on
our behalf? Of course, in your mind the people you killed deserved it, the world is better off without them. It was no different for us.”
our behalf? Of course, in your mind the people you killed deserved it, the world is better off without them. It was no different for us.”
“Yes, it was,” Blaine said surely. “Otherwise, you never would have resorted to Black Flag. You couldn’t ask people like me to do your dirty work for you, because you knew what our answer would be.”
“Do you really think you had any more of a choice then than you do today?”
“Am I missing something?”
“You’re here now because we want you to be here.”
Blaine tensed slightly. “If this is a trap—”
“I know your Indian friend is in the vicinity, Mr. McCracken. I know what his course of action would be should you not leave here exactly as you came in.”
“That much we agree on.”
“But with you and the Indian here, you see, Mr. Belgrade and Mr. Thatch—both threats to us—are left alone, without any comparable form of protection, since I believe your Mr. Belamo is elsewhere as well.”
Blaine’s stomach tightened.
“But our concerns about Mr. Tyrell, regrettably, have come to mirror your own. He’s become a nuisance for us that needs to be dispatched with all due haste.” The man shook his head almost sadly. “I’ll have to show you his active file sometime. Even you’d be impressed.”
“How’d you track him down?”
“After the Mercantile Bank bombing, he needed to disappear. The people waiting to help him belonged to us.”
“Providing you access to all kinds of people with reasons to disappear.”
“Only the best and brightest. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have employed you.” Blaine could see the man’s frown reflected in the glass. “Of course, unlike Mr. Tyrell, we deactivated your file some time ago.”
“A lot can change in six months.”
“It was considerably before that, I’m afraid. Your approach died with the Cold War, when everything was black and white, before the gray set in. How are you to define yourself in a world without enemies. That world has downsized significantly, and there’s no place left for you.”
“Then why am I here?”
“Because there’s no place in it left for Tyrell, either.”
“You want me to go after him … .”
The old man nodded. “But if your efforts were to somehow lead back to Black Flag, well, your friends would have to pay the price for your indiscretion.”
“Then you’ll answer my questions?”
“Only those pertaining to Tyrell.”
“Let’s start with Queen Mary. She wasn’t with Tyrell at the Mercantile Bank bombing because she was pregnant: right or wrong?”
The man from Black Flag looked unmoved. “Actually, she gave birth the week before. A son.”
“That’s how you controlled Tyrell, isn’t it? You used his son as leverage to make him work for you.”
“We placed the boy in a good home, made sure he had all conceivable comforts.”
“But the threat was always there, what you would do if Tyrell didn’t cooperate.”
“A remarkable equalizer, I must say.”
“What about Mary?”
“Tyrell convinced her he had made all the arrangements himself. For the child’s own good, of course. And he continued cooperating, for his son’s sake, for all these years.”
“Until he killed four of your men when they came to pick him up at a cemetery in New Jersey. What changed? What made him break security and come back to the world?”
The man from Black Flag finally turned away from the glass, back to McCracken. “The one thing we could not prepare for … .”
“
J
esus Christ,” Hank Belgrade muttered, looking up from the dog-eared obituary caught in the light of his computer screen. “Looks like you were right,” he said to Thatch.
J
esus Christ,” Hank Belgrade muttered, looking up from the dog-eared obituary caught in the light of his computer screen. “Looks like you were right,” he said to Thatch.
Will hovered over his shoulder, trembling. “I never thought …”
“It’s all here, as close to proof as we’re gonna get.”
They both turned when the door started to open.
B
laine pulled the cell phone from his pocket the moment he emerged from the reptile house. Hank Belgrade had two offices but only one number, and it rang wherever he was. Blaine heard a distinctive click as the line was answered, the call already being routed.
laine pulled the cell phone from his pocket the moment he emerged from the reptile house. Hank Belgrade had two offices but only one number, and it rang wherever he was. Blaine heard a distinctive click as the line was answered, the call already being routed.
It rang and rang, went unanswered.
Blaine tried again. After a dozen rings, he hung up and dialed a different number.
“Hello,” Liz Halprin answered groggily, in her father’s hospital room.
“Where’s Sal?” Blaine demanded.
“He just went down to—”
“When he comes back, tell him you’ve got to get out of there. All of you!”
“But my father—”
“There’s no choice. You’re not safe. Neither is he. Sal will know what to do.”
“What’s happened?” she asked, the fatigue gone from her voice.
“I know now where Tyrell’s headed with the Devil’s Brew,” McCracken told her as calmly as he could manage. “He’s going back to the place
where one part of his life ended, at the Mercantile Bank building twenty-five years ago, and where another finished when his son was killed after taking a classroom hostage at an elementary school last month … .”
where one part of his life ended, at the Mercantile Bank building twenty-five years ago, and where another finished when his son was killed after taking a classroom hostage at an elementary school last month … .”
Liz felt the fear pour through her like a cold rush, as Blaine finished.
“New York City.”
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