Hot Ice (13 page)

Sometimes, though, they spoke clearly. That was even more confusing. Things about attacks on Japanese whaling fleets, cutting long lines in the Bering Sea, or sabotaging lumbering equipment in Brazil. Who cared about things so far away?

GrünWelt, GreenWorld, the international society publicly and politically dedicated to stopping the supposed rape of Planet Earth. That’s who, although the name meant nothing to Francisco.

Its world headquarters were ostensibly located just down the street from the US embassy to Switzerland and Liechtenstein at 19 Sulgeneckstrasse, Bern. An impressive building had been purchased and renovated with sums donated by concerned conservationists from around the world. The society’s announced policy was to fight whatever it saw as destruction of the environment with whatever peaceful means might be at hand.

That was the public persona.

Activities that might not stand the scrutiny of the authorities, or that skirted local or international law, were planned and put into practice here in San Juan, away from the hordes of well-meaning, if ill-informed, members whose dues and contributions provided the only source of income. At least, as far as the public knew.

Like many parts of the world lying between the tropics, Puerto Rico’s police had the laissez-faire attitude common to those latitudes plus the unique Anglo concept that, no matter how suspicious, premises could not be entered by authorities without some form of probable cause. In short, as long as the inhabitants of Number 23 caused no problems in San Juan, they were left alone.

Francisco was aware of little, if any, of this. He did know Pedro was talking to someone in the States, because he had been behind him and seen the 202 area code on the screen of the cell phone.

“I am relieved to hear if our problem has not been solved, it has been located there. Are you sure you can handle it?”

His silence while the question was answered implied satisfaction. “It is imperative you recover the objects. Yes, I understand it may not be easy. Dispose of the carrier. If you need assistance, call.”

Francisco thought that odd too. For an organization concerned about faraway whales and Brazilian rain forests, recycling would seem to make more sense.

The Gulfstream’s tires kissed the runway an instant before Jason was shoved against his seat belt by howling twin Rolls-Royce BR 725 engines in reverse thrust. Had Momma not permanently sealed the windows, he would be getting his first view of his native land in … what, three years?

He thanked the flight crew and accepted a ride to customs and immigration in the main terminal, general aviation’s version not opening for an hour yet. As the shuttle rumbled across taxi and runways, Jason looked beyond the perimeter fences at what he could see of the western Virginia landscape. It could be anywhere: Europe, Asia, the Middle East, venues where he had arrived and departed so frequently that such facilities and their surroundings took on a certain anonymous sameness. That was both curse and blessing. Blessing because it lessened the acute awareness of how many times he had landed here and over at Reagan National when he had a wife and home to go to. Curse because landing at either reminded him Laurin would not be waiting with cold drinks and the latest neighborhood or office gossip. Now being in the land of his birth had no significance other than the fact he had to leave Iceland and had nowhere else to go. He was as effectively homeless as those mendicants one sees on the streets of major cities. The only difference was that, for some of those, choices made in their lives rendered them financially and emotionally unable to sustain permanence. The choices made in Jason’s had made a permanent residence a liability.

“Where to?” the cabdriver wanted to know as Jason tossed his single bag into the backseat and climbed in.

“The Pentagon,” Jason replied automatically. “With one stop in between.”

The Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project had not visibly progressed since Jason’s last trip in from the airport. A section of Highway 123 between Scotts Crossing Road and the I-495 Beltway was still closed, forcing more traffic onto highways designed to carry far less. Like most residents of DC and northern Virginia, Jason had long ago despaired of the project’s completion within his lifetime—or, for that matter, his grandchildren’s lifetime had he any grandchildren. Between cabdrivers’ vociferous objections to loss of fares inflated beyond reason, local residents’ fears that rail service would spread Washington’s crime into their suburban communities like some deadly virus, and labor unions’ constant push to sup at this trough, the rail line had become a political football in which the spectators, not the players, were the losers.

Nearly an hour later, the cab pulled up to the Pentagon’s south parking lot. Jason, two dozen white roses in the arm not in a sling, climbed out.

“Sir? Sir?” The cabbie asked nervously. “I can’t park here, not without a permit. There is no public parking.”

Jason didn’t even turn around. “So, circle the building a couple of times. I’ll meet you right here.”

“Er, sir, I can’t do that. Company regulations require I collect the fare when you exit the cab.”

Jason stopped, turned, and walked back to the waiting taxi.

He lowered his face until it was even with the driver’s. “I know you don’t make company policy. I also know it’s not your fault that the idiots who designed the memorial I’m about to visit didn’t provide parking. If you do not allow me to deliver these flowers to the site dedicated to my wife, that
will
be your fault. Do we understand each other?”

The cabbie took one look at Jason’s scowl, weighed the possibility of the mayhem implicit therein against an enhanced tip, and said, “Yessir, yessir. Perfectly. I don’t know how long I can stay here before they make me move but—”

Jason was already striding away.

At the southwest corner of the Pentagon, slightly fewer than two acres were dedicated to those who perished there on 9/11. Crape myrtles in their summer splendor were scattered about the gravel lot as were 184 terrazzo-finished sculptures that resemble diving boards over small lighted pools. Each sculpture bears a name and is arranged in a timeline from the youngest victim of a few months to the eldest in his seventies. If the person was one of the eighty-eight who were aboard the ill-fated aircraft that crashed into the building, the viewer looks skyward to read the name. If inside the Pentagon, one faces the building.

It took Jason only a few steps to stand beside Laurin’s memorial. He had first seen it on that mournful afternoon in September 2008, when the little park was dedicated in front of family and friends of the victims.

Kneeling, he placed the roses beside the small pool. He was fully aware that the park’s keepers would remove all flowers when they shut down for the evening, but he didn’t care. For a few hours, visitors would know someone had cared for Laurin Peters very much. She had no other site to deck with flowers on her birthday or special occasions, no gravestone memorializing the dates of her life. Only this, an abstract sculpture among many abstract sculptures, a pool among many pools.

He stood, his vision blurred. He made no effort to wipe away the hot tears coursing down his cheeks as he turned and walked to the waiting cab without a look back.

“Now where?”

Jason had to think a moment. He needed someone to look at the stick, the piece of metal, and the pictures from the phone’s camera, someone who might have an idea of their significance, of why they were worth killing for. What better place than DC with its universities, government-funded research centers, and laboratories both civilian and military?

“Thirteenth Street, Bolling Air Force Base.”

Between the Potomac and I-295, Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling was the base for the Air Force’s honor guard and band. There were no flight operations there. In fact, its tree-lined streets housed far more dependents than service personnel. The BOQ (bachelor officer quarters) just off Luke Street were spacious, anonymous, and usually with vacancies the command support staff would be delighted to have filled by transient service veterans.

An hour later, Jason had checked into a small suite, showered, changed clothes, and made an appointment with the base clinic to have his bandage changed the next day. He was ready for something to eat. The clerk in the lobby directed him to the officers’ club, barely two blocks away. Twice, women pushing baby carriages passed him on the sidewalk, each wishing him a cheery good morning. The tidy individual base housing units with their neat lawns, many displaying Big Wheels, tricycles, and swing sets, gave the impression more of a small town rather than a military base.

Jason would be comfortable there. Better yet, he wouldn’t be there long enough to get bored.

The man called Pedro scowled as he looked at the message on the computer screen dated the previous day: “Package arrived per flight plan. Temporary help in place. Smith.”

The obtuse language was a precaution against possible interception by ECHELON, even though the practice was under attack by the European Parliament as an instrument of industrial espionage. Whether the outrage was warranted or the result of the system’s exposure of six billion dollars in graft paid by an aircraft manufacturer to French officials, Pedro neither knew nor cared.

Behind him a younger man also watched the screen. “Package?” he asked in Russian. “I do not understand, Colonel.”

Pedro whirled around, snarling. “Better you should stumble than misspeak! Do not ever refer to me so! My name is Pedro!”

Realizing the greater part of his anger was the result of several shots of vodka, not the other man’s indiscretion, he relented slightly. He produced a pack of Russian cigarettes, black tobacco with cardboard filters, and offered one to the other man. “Is better we speak Spanish. Or better yet, English.”

The other man shook his head in a polite “no thanks” to the tender of the cigarettes. “I still do not understand. I was sent out here by my commander… .”

Pedro struck a match and inhaled hungrily. The odor reminded the younger man of the smell of silage on his family’s farm near Kiev.

“You
volunteered
to serve the cause of saving the planet.” Pedro corrected. “And I am glad to see you, Sergi, er, Carlos. We worked well together in the past.”

Carlos smiled. “I am flattered you remember. You were
polkovnik,
a colonel. I was a mere
mladshiy leytenant,
a junior lieutenant. But our mission here is not clear to me. I do not understand Russia’s interest in such matters as saving species such as the little fish, the snail darter, in the United States, or preserving the range of the Arctic polar bear.”

Holding the cigarette between his lips, Pedro turned off the computer, thankful for an excuse not to have to deal with others for the moment. He put an avuncular arm around Carlos’s shoulder, leading him into what served as the house’s living room: cheap chairs made of canvas slung over metal frames. “Come, share a vodka, and I will explain what our superiors in Moscow did not.”

Moments later each man stood, glass in hand.
“Tva-j
ó
zda-ró-vye!”
they said in unison, tossing down the liquor in a single gulp.

The older, Pedro, refilled the glasses while the foul-smelling tobacco smoldered in an ashtray. “Most of the world believes Marxism is dead,” he began. “At least in the West. But it is not. It has simply changed names and methods.”

Carlos said nothing, a questioning look on his face.

“That is why GrünWelt and related entities exist, my young friend, to continue the struggle against the capitalist oppression of the working classes.”

The younger man ignored his refilled glass. “I do not see what attacking Japanese whaling vessels has to do with Marxism.”

Pedro had tossed back his drink and was refilling. “It may or may not. That is not the point. The point is that by embracing and furthering the cause of saving the planet, we weaken the industrialized Western imperialists.”

Carlos started to ask a question, but Pedro held up a restraining hand. “For instance, just here in Puerto Rico we and our allies forced the closing of a US naval gunnery range on the island of Vieques, insisting it was creating an environmental disaster even though only a small part of the island was involved. A few years ago, our protests forced the US Navy to quit testing antisubmarine sonar off the coast of California because we claimed the sound disturbed whales. One does not pull a fish out of the pond without effort, eh?”

Carlos was impressed. “Surely no sane nation would compromise its defenses for the sake of a few whales?”

Pedro started to pour him another vodka, stopping when he saw the previous glass was untouched. “It gets better yet. Our friends in America have so far prevented or severely limited new offshore drilling, increasing America’s dependence on foreign oil, a source we hope to cut off with the help of our Arab friends.”

“Arab friends?”

“The Arab nations.”

“Nations? More like tribes with flags!” Carlos snorted derisively. “We have allies in America?”

Pedro shrugged. “They are unwitting allies, people devoted to green causes even at the expense of their own country. Each year they protest the building of nuclear power plants. Or any power plants, insisting electricity can be generated by windmills and solar power panels sufficient to run the industry of the land. They scream that dams that generate hydroelectricity prevent the spawning of salmon. Or will cause the demise of the small fish you mention.”

“The snail darter.”

“Yes, that is it.” Pedro, his face becoming flushed, laughed loudly. “When American industry shuts down for lack of fuel, perhaps the people can eat snail darters, eh?”

“Global warming has become an issue,” Carlos observed. “I suppose we oppose carbon emissions.”

His hand wavering, Pedro filled his own glass again. “Absolutely. But we have to do little. The American people fear world industrialization has caused the problem. In fact, one of their former vice presidents flies about the world in a private jet preaching just that. He also heats and cools several homes.”