Dead Zero (44 page)

“Prelim,” said Chandler, reentering. “Jesus Christ, turns out Dixson grew up in Braintree, Massachusetts, where Hollister lived when
he was teaching at Harvard, same street, two houses apart. Dixson’s father, Roger, was at Harvard and Harvard Law with Hollister in the sixties. They were both on
Law Review
. Dixson later got his master’s at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. International Law, taught by none other than his dad’s old friend, classmate, and neighbor Ted Hollister. Immediately after, he joined the Agency—”

“Yes!” said Susan, in a squirt of zeal. “Yes! In those days you only got in with the recommendation of a senior Agency official or ex-official. Someone in the extended family. Jared Dixson was Ted Hollister’s legacy, as we call them in the shop, protected by Hollister’s rep and charisma. Dixson wasn’t working for Jack Collins, not really. He was working for Ted Hollister.”

“Chandler, sit down, catch a rest. Someone else under the age of thirty, call Secret Service White House right this second, see if Hollister’s at the event, he should be.”

“That old man’s in this up to his eyeballs,” said Susan. “And, ahem, allow Princess Perfection to point out to the monster Swagger, he’s
not
Agency.”

“Once again, you kick my ass, Okada-san.”

“He’s there,” came the call.

“We ought to talk to him. Now, not tomorrow, not next week.
Now,
” said Bob.

“We should,” said Nick.

Memphis rose, yelling at Chandler, “Get an SUV outside fast, clear us at the White House. I don’t know how this is shaping up but I think I might need a sniper. Get me a goddamned sniper fast.”

“Nick, they let SWAT go this morning. They’re all home in Virginia resting from the gunfight in Georgetown. I could get you one from DC metro in about twenty minutes.”

On all the screens, the president of the United States came to the podium.

“Hey,” said Swagger, pointing at Cruz, “there’s the best sniper in the world.”

THE IWO JIMA MEMORIAL

ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA

1850 HOURS

The six bronze men were gigantic. They struggled with the flag, its three primary colors flapping in a wind, cross-illuminated by many beams of light that illustrated the whole piece, the ripples of muscle, the rents in the metal clothing, the hobnails in the worn combat boots, the twelve-foot rifles, all in the muted, fading green of military glory, its tarnish eroded by the ages.

“Warriors,” said Professor Khalid. “You must honor their bravery.”

“Infidels,” said Dr. Faisal. “Brigands, crusaders, invaders, rapists, and scum.”

“You haven’t learned a thing, have you?” said Khalid.

“The Koran contains all the information I need to know. Other than science, the rest is delusional self-hypnosis on the part of the enemy.”

“Even now, can’t you control your enmity?” said Bilal.

They leaned against the van, which was in the parking lot of the Marine Corps memorial on a hill overlooking the river and the spotlit city that was Washington, DC. If anything, it was more beautiful and beguiling on this warm, comfortable, clear evening than any other. Above, pinwheels and novas blinked across cosmic nothingness, and below the city was a shimmering plain of white buildings, flags flying on many of them, the whole forming a kind of horizontal fusion of light and dark, patterns broken here and there by something of specific edge and shape, such as the spire in the center, and beyond it, the vast dome.

“Bah,” said Faisal. “He talks too much. He enjoys his little epiphanies, his ironies. He is vain and prissy. He has a Western mind. He is not one of us. He thinks too much. He has no internal discipline. He has not learned the fundamental lesson, which is submission.”

“You call it vanity, I call it individuality. Until we learn to value individuality, we will lag behind the West in all things and—”

“If you kill them all, there is nothing to lag behind,” said Faisal.

A few other vehicles dotted the lot, and a U.S. Park Service police car had passed through a few seconds ago, noting nothing, not stopping, and it had then disappeared toward Rosslyn, a banal assortment of skyscrapers that loomed behind them. Up at the monument, a few kids scrambled around, supervised loudly by a father.

“The journey is almost over,” said Bilal. “Are you prepared for what comes next? Have you accepted it?”

“Completely,” said Faisal. “Never for a second did I have a doubt.”

“I am without doubt too,” said Khalid. “The religious subtext here means nothing to me, it’s all mumbo jumbo, but I embrace the political one. My hand shall not pause, my heart shall not fail.”

“That was very good ice cream,” said Faisal.

“Another thing he said with which I agree. Yes, it was very good ice cream.”

They had stopped at a Baskin-Robbins on the way over, three men of obvious Middle Eastern persuasion, in fresh new dishdashas with prayer caps on, waited patiently in line among the moms and dads and squealing children, some in dirty baseball uniforms, some mere babies, and each had gotten a special treat. Khalid had double strawberry in a cup; Bilal a straight sundae with walnuts, whipped cream, and a cherry; and Faisal maple praline and mint chocolate chip in a waffle cone, but with a dish beneath so that when the cone could no longer support the ice cream, the whole confection would not disintegrate in his hands.

Now, finally, they were where they should be at the time they should be there.

PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE

FROM THE HOOVER BUILDING TO THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON, DC

1932 HOURS

Memphis, Swagger, Cruz, and Okada raced through the hallway to the exit dock, where a black FBI Explorer, its blue-red lights already flashing, its engine running, waited. Memphis got behind the wheel, and Cruz went to the rear of the vehicle, opened the tailgate, removed a gun case, opened it, and pulled an H-S .308 sniper rifle from it, and a red box of Black Hills 168-grain Match ammo. He went to the driver’s side and climbed in.

Memphis was saying, “I will designate target. You listen to nobody but me if it comes to that. And you do
not
fire unless I give you the green, you have that, Sergeant?”

“Yessir,” said Cruz, who at the same time was reading the rifle’s logbook, maintained shot by shot by its original assignee. He learned it had been fired 2,344 times, all with Federal Gold Tip 168-grain Match ammunition, for an average five-shot group from 100 yards of .56 inches. It was, of course, an H-S Precision rifle built from the design of a Remington 700 action, trued and bedded by the H-S custom shop, a Jewell trigger installed, with a Broughton barrel; its last 200-yard group, shot three weeks ago at Quantico, had been 1.06 inches, and the shooter, Special Agent Dave McElroy, had readjusted the zero to 100 yards, cleaned it, fired one fouling shot, and put it away for deployment. He had been on the perimeter of the convenience store on Wisconsin Avenue, but had not gotten a shot.

Chandler leaned in.

“Okay, you’re cleared through the southeast gate. Then you can pull around past the big house to the right and take the roadway to the right straight to the Rose Garden. Secret Service has been briefed and will greet you.”

“Good work,” he said. “Okay, let’s go.”

The SUV pulled out, scooted around the block, passed several vehicles that maneuvered out of the way, hit Pennsylvania’s broadness, turned right, and Nick accelerated.

The vehicle ate up the eight blocks of government architecture and hotel frontage that dominated Pennsylvania, slowing only to weave its way through the traffic at cross streets. It reached the White House southeast gate below the Treasury Department’s Doric immensity. The gate to the White House, nestled in a bank of trees, loomed just ahead. A red light and too much oncoming traffic momentarily halted them just a few yards shy of the goal.

“Where’s the goddamn siren?” Nick cursed.

Bob leaned forward to help him find it.

“Wait,” said Susan. “Jesus, look. That’s him. That’s
him
.”

Indeed it was. Stepping out of the pedestrian gate, a short, furtive figure paused for the same light that halted the SUV. Yes indeed, clutching his ever-present professorial briefcase, it was the director of National Intelligence, Ted Hollister. He checked his watch, looked both ways impatiently, and realized he had to wait for the shift to green like all ordinary mortals. They saw him exhale a large breath in frustration.

Nick found the siren. Blaring, he pulled ahead, as the cars before him parted awkwardly to clear a path. Nick took the left, pulled across traffic, and halted two feet from Ted Hollister.

“Mr. Hollister, sir, where are you going?”

In seconds Nick was next to him, Bob flanking the other side, and Ray close at hand. The car’s blue-and-red pumped color into the scene, and around them at the juncture of 15th and Pennsylvania, traffic piled up.

“He’s bugging out,” said Bob.

Susan came to them.

“Mr. Hollister,” said Nick, “you remember me, Nick Memphis, FBI?”

“I do. What is this about?” said the old man curtly. “I have an
important appointment.”

“Sir, late last night we arrested Jared Dixson and he’s now confessed to assigning a contractor team to take out Whiskey Two-Two, and to authorizing a smart munition into a nonmilitary target in Qalat. There is more collateral that will have to be answered for as well. We’ve seen the records and clearly he is connected to you and—”

“I will be happy to discuss this with you at length in my office. Simply schedule an appointment and I will—”

“Sir, why are you leaving the White House now?” Bob said. “Ain’t this your big night? Seems odd—”

“I do not intend to stand in the street and discuss matters of national security with sergeants and low-ranking agents. I warn you, gentlemen, I will take severe action against you and I have considerable influence. Now, let me go—”

“Why are you in a panic to leave now? What’s happening in two minutes that you have to be far away from it?”

“I will not stand for this. I will call a policeman.”

“You ain’t calling no one, goddamnit,” said Bob.

“I will destroy you,” said Hollister. “You have no idea who you’re dealing with.”

But then Bob pulled Nick aside.

“This ain’t getting us nowhere,” he said. “Y’all take a little break. You go take a walk or something, whatever. You trusted me, I’s just an old fool, said I was too tired to go with you. You’re all off the hook. You leave. I guaran-fucking-tee you that in three minutes this weasel tells me everything. And I mean
everything.
”

“No,” said Nick. “Swagger, this is the United States. We do not—”

“Ticktock, ticktock. It’s happening now. The one they said wouldn’t never happen, the ticking-bomb deal. You’d risk all them lives and the morale, the humiliation, the degradation of this country because you want to feel good about yourself tomorrow morning? That’s a pretty high price for feeling good about yourself, Nick, and I have to say, it’s not your ass on the line, it’s theirs.”

“I want this off the table,” said Nick. “It is not to be discussed anymore.
Instead, I want—”

“He’s right,” said Susan. “Ticktock, ticktock. It has to be done.”

Nick shook his head. He could not believe he was having this discussion, but he was.

“Then I should be the one who—”

“No,” said Bob. “Everyone here is young and has way more to contribute. Me, I’m done, there’s nothing left for me. Lay it off on me, I’ll go to prison, I’ll be the torturer, the one everybody can hate. I’ll break every one of his goddamned fingers and he’ll sing before I reach number three.”

Then Susan said, “Wait.”

“Look, I know this guy,” she said. “You’re right in thinking that if this thing is going to happen, it’s going to happen tonight, in a very few minutes. He is not afraid of pain or of disgrace or of failure. He is not an Islamist. He doesn’t believe in seventy-two virgins. He believes in nothing, and that being the case, only one thing can frighten him and you see it in his flight. He is afraid of death. If there’s death anywhere tonight, it’s at the White House. Take him to the White House. What happens to them happens to him. That takes it all from him, and that and that alone frightens him.”

“She’s right,” said Nick. “Get him in, let’s get in the gates and see what we get.”

They loaded the squirming old man into the front, wedged between Nick and the stoic Ray. Nick punched the siren again, pulled back, rotated the vehicle to the gate.

“Jesus Christ,” he said as the gate rose, taking an agonizing three seconds. The two uniformed White House cops on duty waved the vehicle by, and it slipped into White House territory, and began to wind on the circle around Executive Drive that would deposit its travelers at the Rose Garden, in the lee of the West Wing extension. The big white mansion, with its curving Harry Truman balcony dominated by vast columns, stood out white and immaculate in the spotlights, but more to the point, through a light screen of trees to the left of the portico,
nestled in the crook of the much larger building, a ceremony was clearly transpiring, and a well-illuminated crowd of people could be seen standing before a podium on which stood the distinctive figure of the president of the United States, among other men of power and prestige.

“Stop, stop,” Hollister suddenly cried.

Nick halted the car.

“You have something to say?”

“Look, can we go somewhere and—”

“Yeah, the Rose Garden. That’s the only place we’re going.”

Hollister twisted, in some kind of further existential agony, licked his lips, swallowed hard. Nick looked at him, then turned, dropped the car into gear, and began to ease forward.

“Stop,” the old man said. “Oh Christ, stop.”

Nick looked at his watch. It was almost 7:45.

The thing was scheduled to end at 7:45.

“Talk to us or I will drive us there in ten seconds.”

Hollister swallowed again. Then he said: “They have a missile. It’s a Hellfire.”