The Minotaur (10 page)

After Jake entered this code, a long list of documents appeared
on the screen. “Of course, if you already have the document num-
ber, you can type it right in and not bother calling up the directory
with the matriarch code word. Got it?”

” ‘Reverberation,’ ‘fallacy’ and ‘matriarch.’ What was the first
go-around on the code words?”

Kleinberg laughed. “Well, we used computer-generated random
series of letters. They weren’t words, just a series of letters. But
people couldn’t remember them and took to writing them down in
notebooks, checkbooks and so forth. So we tried plan two. This is
plan three.”

Kleinberg took a lighter from his pocket and held the flame
under the piece of paper on which he had written the code words.

It flared. Just before the fire reached his fingers, he dropped the
paper on the plastic carpet protector under the chair and watched
the remnant turn to ash, which he crushed with his shoe. Klein-
berg rubbed his hands and smiled. “Now we begin.” He spent the
next hour showing Jake how to create, edit and access documents
on this list. When he had finished answering Jake’s questions, he
flipped the machine off and gave Jake one of his cards. “Call’ me
when you have questions, or ask one of the guys here who’s been
around a while.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Welcome to Washington.” KIeinberg shook hands, hoisted his
leather bag and left.

Jake began to lock away the papers on his desk. While he was
here he might as well look again at that two-year-old book of
Harold Strong’s.

He opened the upper left drawer. The matohbooks and rubber
bands and other stuff were still there, but the book wasn’t. He
looked in every drawer in the desk. Nope. It was gone.

Henry Jenks dropped Toad at the BOQ at 11 P.M. After he filled
out the paperwork at the desk. Toad went up to his room and
crashed.

The following day was a copy of the previous afternoon: an hour
in the simulator, an hour at the blackboard, then back to the simu-
lator. By noon he was navigating from one large radar-reflective
target to another. In midaftenoon he ran his first attack.

During all his hours in the simulator the canopy remained open
and Jenks stood there beside him talking continuously, prompting
him, pointing out errors. Running the system in the simulator
wasn’t too difficult with Jenks right there.

Toad wasn’t fooled.

At five hundred feet above hostile terrain on a stormy night with
the tracers streaking over the canopy and the missile warning
lights flashing, this bombardier-navigator business was going to be
a whole different ball game. The pilot would be slamming the plane
around, pulling on that stick like it was the lever to open heaven’s
gate. And the BN had to sit here delicately tweaking the radar and
infrared and nursing the computer and laser while trying not to
vomit into his oxygen mask. Toad knew. He bad been there in the
backseat of an F-14. The best way to learn this stuff was by repeti-
tion. Every task, every adjustment, the correction for every failure

—it all had to be automatic. If you had to think about it you didn’t
know it and you sure as hell wouldn’t remember it when you were
riding this bucking pig up the devil’s asshole.

At five in the evening Jenks drove him back to the BOQ. ‘To-
night you study the NATOPS.” NATOPS—Naval Air Training
and Operating Procedures—was the Book on the airplane, the
navy equivalent to the air force Dash One manual. “Learn the
emergency procedures. Tomorrow you and Moravia will be in the
simulator together. We’ll run some attacks and pop some emergen-
cies and failures. The next day you fly the real airplane. Study
hard.”

“Thanks, sadist”

“You’re all right, Tarkington, even if you are a fighter puke.”

Toad slammed the car door and stomped into the BOQ. He was
whipped, drained. Maybe he ought to go jogging to clean the pipes.

In his room he changed into his sweat togs. The wind coming in off
Puget Sound had a pronounced bite and the sun was already set-
tling, so he added a second heavy sweatshirt.

He was leaning into a post supporting the roof over the walkway
leading to the officers’ club when a gray navy pickup pulled up in
front of the BOQ and dropped Rita Moravia. She was wearing an
olive-drab flight suit and flight boots.

“If you’re going running,” she called, “will you wait for me?”

“Sure.” Toad continued to stretch his right leg, the one with the
pins in it. He hopped around and trotted in place a few steps. The
leg was ready. On the grass was a bronze bust: Lieutenant Mike
McCormick, A-6 pilot killed over North Vietnam. The BOQ and
officers’ club were named for him.

Toad was standing beside the bust watching the A-6s in the
landing pattern overhead and listening to the throaty roar of their
engines when Moravia came out. She had her hair pulled back into
a tight ponytail. “Which way do you want to run?” she asked.
“I dunno. How about north along the beach?” They started off.
‘••Were you flying today?”

“Yes- Twice” She picked up the pace to a fast trot.

“How’d you like it?”

“Old airframe, not as fast and agile as the Hornet, of course, but
with better range and more lifting capacity- More complex.” An
A-6 went over and she waited for the roar to fade. “It’s a nice
plane to fly.”

On the western side of the road was a beach littered with drift-
wood and, beyond, the placid surface of the sound. Just visible in
the fading glow of the sunset was an island five or six miles away—
it was hard to tell. Silhouettes of mountains stood against the sky
to the southwest. “It’s pretty here, isn’t it?”

“Oh yes. Wait till you see it from the air.”

“Why’d you get into flying anyway?”‘

She shot him a hard glance and picked up the pace. He stayed
with her. She was going too fast for conversation. The paved road
ended and they were on gravel when she said, “Four miles be
enough?”

“Yep.” Well, he had stepped on it that time, got it out and
dragged it in the din and tromped all over it. What’s a pretty girl
like you doing in this dirty, sweaty business anyway, sweetie? Ye
gods. Toad, next you’ll be asking about her sign.

On the inbound leg they stopped running several blocks short of
the BOO and walked to cool down. “I got into flying because I
thought it would be a challenge,” Rita said, watching him.

Toad just nodded. In the lobby she asked, “Want to change and
get some dinner?”

“Thanks anyway. I gotta study.”

As he showered Toad realized that somewhere on the run he had
jettisoned his nascent plan to bed Rita Moravia. The Good Lord
just doesn’t have any mercy for you. Toad, my man. Not the tiniest
pinch.

6

The admiral can see you in thirty
minutes, sir.”

“Thanks.” Jake Grafton cradled the phone and doodled on his
legal pad. It was almost 10:30 and Smoke Judy was at his desk. He
had said good morning to Jake and spent an hour on the phone,
and now seemed to be busy on the computer with a report, but he
hadn’t mentioned his sojourns of yesterday. Jake had toyed with
the idea of questioning Judy about where he was yesterday, then
decided against it. Whatever answer Judy gave, truth or lie, what
would that prove? Would a lie incriminate him? In what? A mur-
der? Espionage? If Judy told the truth, what would the truth be?
That he went to West Virginia yesterday—so what? And if he
denied it—what then? No, Jake didn’t know enough to even ask an
intelligent question.

Vice Admiral Henry, however, was in a more interesting posi-
tion. His fairy tale about deflecting a murder investigation left him
vulnerable. Vulnerable to what? To more questions. He would have
to answer reasonable questions or . . . ? Or?

I can’t recognize truth when I hear it, Jake mused. What the hell
kind of job is this? Can I trust the admiral?

Do I have a choice? He tossed the pencil on the desk and rubbed
his eyes. He knew the answer to that one. He had no choice at all.
He stood and stretched. His doodles caught his eye. Airplanes.
Gliders. Long wings.

In front of the breezeway between JP-1 and JP-2, he caught the
shuttle bus and rode it over to the Pentagon. The chief offered him
a cup of coffee, which he accepted. Then he waved him in to see
Henry, who was busy locking his desk and office safe.

“Good morning, sir.”

“Morning. Don’t sit. We’re going to a meeting with SECNAV.”

“Okay.” Jake had never met F. George Ludlow, but he had
heard a lot about him. Scion of an old New England family—was
there any other kind?—Ludlow was in his early forties, a Vietnam
vet with a B.S. from Yale and a business doctorate from Harvard.
He had spent ten years knocking around the gray-suit defense
think tanks before being tapped as Secretary of the Navy three
years ago by his father-in-law, Royce Caplinger, the Secretary of
Defense. Nepotism, fumed the Senate Democrats, but they con-
firmed the nomination anyway: Ludlow’s credentials were as
bluechip as his family connections and dividends from the family
investment trusts.

“What this meeting about, sir?” Jake asked as he and the admi-
ral walked the outer ring of the Pentagon—the B-ring—toward
Ludlow’s office.

“Don’t know. When Ludlow wants you, he summons you—
now.”

It was common knowledge that Ludlow had vigorous hands on
the throttle and helm of the navy. He had firm ideas about what
ships and weapons systems the navy needed, how they should be
acquired, how they should be employed. With his insider’s knowl-
edge of Washington and the upper reaches of the defense establish-
ment he outargued most admirals. Those he couldn’t win over he
shuffled off to sinecures or retirement. Unlike the usual dilettante
who spent a year or two as a service secretary on his way to a
bright political future or the vice presidency of a major defense
contractor, Ludlow behaved exactly like a man whose present job
was the fulfillment of a lifelong quest. If Ludlow had any other
political or business ambitions, no hint of them had percolated
down to Jake’s level. His saving grace, or so it appeared to the rank
and file, was his strong commitment to the navy as an institution,
to its people and its traditions. This was probably one of the rea-
sons for unease at the flag level, since the admirals were unwilling
to defer to anyone as keeper of the faith, the role in which they cast
themselves.

The corridor in which the secretary’s office was located was dec-
orated for the general public. Large oil portraits of naval heroes of
the past were prominently displayed; Farragut, Dewey, Halsey and
many others. The old admirals stared dourly at Jake and Vice
Admiral Henry as they went to their appointment to discuss the
navy of the future.

Ludlow’s large office was paneled in dark wood, the real thing,
not veneer, Jake noticed as he took his first, curious look—and
nautical memorabilia were everywhere, on the desk, the credenza,
the little sitting desk. Oil paintings of famous naval scenes—also
original, Jake noted—adorned the walls. The chairs were black
leather. One of them was occupied by a fat gent in his mid-sixties
whose skin looked as tough as the chair covering. Jake recognized
him from his picture—Senator Hiram Duquesne, chairman of the
Senate Armed Services Committee. Ludlow was behind his desk
and didn’t rise from his chair.

“You gentlemen know the senator,” Ludlow said after Admiral
Henry had introduced Jake-

Duquesne eyed Jake speculatively. “Aren’t you the pilot that
strapped on El Hakim last year?”

“Yessir.”

“Sit down, gentlemen. Please.” Ludlow gestured to the chairs.
Jake ended up on Henry’s left, Duquesne on the admiral’s right
Ludlow’s executive assistant sat on the sofa with a legal pad on his
lap, ready to take notes.

The senator and the two naval officers faced the secretary across
his massive mahogany desk strewn with paper. Ludlow had one leg
draped over his chair arm, revealing hairy skin in the gap between
the top of his sock and his trouser leg. In his hands he held a rifle
cartridge that still contained a bullet He worked the cartridge
back and forth between his fingers as he spoke to Jake- “Senator
Duquesne wanted to meet you when I informed him you would be
doing the testing and evaluation of the ATA prototypes.”

“Now, as I understand it, George, you people are not going to
do your usual T and E routine,” Senator Duquesne said. T and E
was Test and Evaluation.

“No way to keep the lid on or meet our time goals if we did it
the usual way.”

“You a test pilot?” Duquesne shot at Jake.

“No, sir.”

Ludlow’s leg came off the arm of his chair. “He’s an attack
pilot,” the secretary said mildly, “one of the very best we have. He
knows carrier aviation as well as anyone in uniform.”

“What d’ya know about stealth?” the senator demanded.

“Very little, sir, but I’m learning.”

“Horse puckey! What does the navy need for an attack plane at
the turn of the century? What about range, payload, survivability,
maintainability? How much should the navy pay?” ‘”

“I—” Jake began, but Ludlow was also talking: “Senator, policy
is my—“

Senator Duquesne raised his voice. He thundered at Ludlow:

“I’ll say this again with these gentlemen present. I’m not happy
about this whole thing, George. Not happy- You have a program
here that you will want funded for three hundred and fifty air-
planes at about fifty million each, seventeen and a half billion dol-
lars worth, and you intend to make the decision on which proto-
type to buy based on Captain Grafton’s quick and dirty
recommendation?”

“You overstate it, Senator. We—being me, CNO, Vice Admirals
Henry and Dunedin—we propose to make a recommendation to
SECDEF based on the needs of the navy. We will look closely at
Captain Grafton’s evaluation to help us determine which of the
two prototypes best meets those needs. And his evaluation will be
quick but it won’t be dirty.” The senator twisted in his chair. The
secretary continued, relentless. “No captain determines the needs
of the navy, Senator. I do that. The President and SECDEF—“

Duquesne stopped him with an upraised palm. “Don’t lecture
me, George. And don’t patronize me! Major weapons systems pro-
curement gets shrouded in secrecy, taken out of the normal chan-
nels where Congress can look things over, and major decisions get
made on the basis of one document generated by one of your junior
subordinates which no one can confirm or refute. And you tell me
to relax? Seventeen billion dollars for a plane that may or may not
be adequately tested, that may or may not do what we’re buying it
to do? Plus ten more billion for spare parts and simulators and all
the rest of it. No dirt, huh? Goddamnit, Ludlow, I don’t trust you
any further than I could throw a scalded cat! You’re trying to make
Congress a goddamn rubber stamp!”

Ludlow leaned forward in his chair. “I never said for you to
relax! You people agreed to the classification level of these black
stealth projectsl You people understood the problems involved and
approved the administrative shortcuts! Now you—“

“I said don’t patronize met And quit pointing that fucking bullet
at me!”

Henry rose nastily and Jake followed. “Talk to you later, Mr.
Secretary,” he said, and Ludlow nodded as he fired another volley
at the senator.

“Jesus.” Jake muttered when they reached the hallway and the
door closed behind them-

“Yeah,” the admiral agreed.

“How come Duquesne is so upset when the decision hasn’t been
made?”

“That’s just it. One of the prototypes was manufactured in his
home state. He’s fought hard on the Hill for stealth and he wants
his plane to be chosen and the air force didn’t buy it. Now, if the
navy doesn’t . . . Well, you get the idea.”

“Uh-huh,” Jake said as the full dimensions of his new position
came into much better focus. So Henry had asked for him to run
the ATA project, eh? No doubt his name had been discussed with
Ludlow and the Chief of Naval Operations as well as Vice Admiral
Dunedin—NAVAIR. They could praise him to the skies for his
report or ease him right out of the navy. They needed a man they
could dispose of if necessary. And they found me, Jake thought
bitterly. A gilt-edge reputation, my ass!

In Henry’s office, Jake said calmly, “Better make sure your anti-
bugging devices are on.”

The admiral did so while eyeing Jake. When he was seated, Jake
said, “I took a little drive yesterday, sir. Saw a state trooper up in
West Virginia named Keadle. Read an accident report.”

“So?”

“Passed one of the guys from my shop on my way back here
yesterday afternoon. He was on his way to West Virginia.”

“Oh?”

“Admiral, why don’t you tell me what really happened in West
Virginia after Harold Strong was killed?”

“Are you suggesting I haven’t?”

“I can’t do my job, sir, unless you play straight with me. I play
straight with you, you have to play straight with me.”

Admiral Henry looked out his window a while, examined his
fingernails and finally directed his gaze back to Jake. “I think you
had better discuss any concerns you have with Admiral Dunedin.”
He picked up a sheet of paper and began to scan it. The interview
was over.

“Aye aye, sir,” Jake said, and left the room. He retrieved his hat
in the outer office and caught the shuttle back to Crystal City.

As the shuttle bus wound its way from the parking lot, Jake looked
back at the Pentagon. It appeared low and massive from this per-
spective. Endless rows of windows. It also looked gray under this
overcast.

Admiral Dunedin was in conference. Jake didn’t get in to see
him until almost 3 P.M. He got right to it. “I went to West Virginia
yesterday to see what I could find out about Harold Strong’s death.
On the way back here I passed one of the people from my shop
heading the other way.”

“Who?” said Dunedin, apparently genuinely curious.

“Smoke Judy.”

“How about that,” Dunedin muttered.

“Admiral, I’m a little baffled. Vice Admiral Henry briefed me on
some of the events surrounding Strong’s death, but this morning
when I mentioned this incident to him, he didn’t even ask who it
was from my office that passed me. I get the distinct impression
I’m being mushroomed.”

Dunedin lifted an eyebrow, then apparently thought better of it
and went back to deadpan. He apparently knew about mushrooms:
you kept them in the dark and fed them shit. “I guess everyone is a
little baffled,” he said carefully. “Strong’s death was a tragedy.
Nothing we can do about it, though.”

“Well, I could sure use a little more infor—“

“Who couldn’t? But I don’t have any information I can share
with you. Sorry.” His tone made the apology a mere pleasantry.
Before Jake could reply, he said, “There’s a meeting at sixteen-
thirty hours in the Under Secretary of the Navy’s office on next
year’s budget. We’ve got a billion dollars for ATA buried in there
under carrier modernization and enhancement You go to the
meeting and represent me. If they try to cut that line item or slice it
down in any way, you call me.”

“Yessir.” The admiral selected a report from his in basket and
began to read. Jake left.

After he told the secretary that he was going to a meeting, he
walked to the officer personnel office, where he had to wait until
two other officers had finished before he could talk to the chief
petty officer. “Do you have my service record in here?”

“Last four digits of your social security number, sir?”

“0h-six-oh-seven.”

It took the chief just half a minute to pull it from the drawer.

“Chief, how about you ginning up a request for retirement for
my signature?”

The chief yeoman’s eyes showed his surprise. “Okay, sir, if that’s
what you want. It’s gotta be effective on the first day of a month
between four and six months from now.”

Jake eyed the wall calendar. “September first. When can I sign
it?”

“Monday okay?”

“See you then.”

“Any particular reason you want stated, sir?”

“The usual. Whatever you usually say.”

Dashing the four blocks to Dr. Arnold’s office after her eleven
o’clock class on Friday was always a hassle for Callie. A student or
two usually buttonholed her to clarify a point or comment made
during class and it took several minutes to satisfy them without
being rude. Then came the four-block march which crossed two
avenues hub to hub with noon traffic.

She was perspiring slightly when Arnold’s receptionist nodded
at her. Two minutes early. Of course, a few minutes late wouldn’t
hurt, but Arnold ended the sessions precisely at ten minutes before
the hour and the fee was $105 regardless. She sank onto the couch
and once again tried to decide if the fifty minutes was worth the
cost.

Forget the money. What are the important things to discuss
during this session? She was trying to arrange her thoughts when
the door opened and Dr. Arnold beckoned. He was of medium
height, in his late thirties, and wore a neat brown beard. “He looks
like Sigmund Freud before he got old and twisted,” Jake had
grumped once. Above the beard this morning was a small,
thoughtful smile.

“Good morning, Callie.” He held the door open for her.
“Hello.” She sank into the stuffed armchair across from him, the
middle of the three “guest” chairs. When he used to come Jake
always sat on her left, near the window, while she always used this
chair. For a brief moment she wondered what Arnold made of her
continued use of this chair although Jake wasn’t here.

After a few preliminary comments, she stated, “Jake went back
to work this Monday,” and paused, waiting for his reaction.
Arnold prompted, “How has that gone this week?”

“He seems enthusiastic, and somewhat relieved. They have him
working on a new airplane project and he hasn’t said much about
it. If that’s what he’s working on. I think he’s disappointed, but it
doesn’t show. He’s hiding it well.” She thought about it. ‘That’s
unusual. He’s always been stoic at work—his colleagues have told
me that he usually shows little emotion at the office—but he’s
never been like that at home. I can read him very well.”

Dr. Arnold, Benny to all his patients, looked up from his notes.
“Last weekend, did you threaten him?”

Callie’s head bobbed. “I suppose.” She swallowed hard and felt
her eyes tearing up. She bit her lower lip. “I never did that before.
Never again!” She moved to the chair near the window, Jake’s
chair, and looked out. Trees just budding stood expectantly in the
pale spring sun. Jake had sat here all winter and looked at the
black, bare, upthrusted limbs. And now spring was finally here.

She should never have said those things, about leaving him. She
could never do it. She loved him too much to even consider it. But
it was so hard last fall, after she thought him dead and her life in
ashes. When she heard he was still alive the euphoria swept her to
heights she didn’t believe possible. The subsequent descent from
rapture to reality had been torturous.

An officer from the CNO’s office had escorted her to Bethesda
Naval Hospital the morning after Jake was flown back from
Greece. She had expected—thinking about it now, she didn’t know
just what she expected. But her hopes were so high and the officer
who drove her tried gently to prepare her.

His face was still swollen and mottled, his eyes mere slits, his
tongue raw from where he had chewed on it. His eyes—those
piercing gray eyes that had melted her a thousand times—they lay
unfocused in the shapeless mass of flesh that was his face as IVs
dripped their solution into his arms. A severe concussion, the doc-
tor said gently. Jake had taken a lot of Gs, more Gs than any man
could be expected to survive. Capillaries had burst under the tre-
mendous strain. And he was grossly dehydrated, unable to take
water. Slowly Callie began to understand. Brain damage. Bleeding
in the frontal lobe, where memory and personality resided. Oh, she
assured herself a hundred times that he would be the same—that
life would never play them a dirty, filthy trick like that, that God
was in his heaven, that the man who loved her and she loved with
all her soul would get well and … He had gotten well. Almost—