The Minotaur (49 page)

The place was packed with tourists standing in knots of thirty or
more, cameras clicking, guides roaring their patter over the hub-
bub, the noise echoing in the huge open space above. The two
naval officers in service-dress blue uniforms threaded their way
through and turned right, passing between the statues into the
main corridor.

They went up one flight of stairs and stopped finally beside a
door manned by armed security guards, where they showed their
passes. The guards consulted a list and said they could go in.

“You ready?” Knight asked again.

“Let’s go to the head first.”

“Good idea.” Knight asked a guard for directions to the nearest
men’s.

Standing shoulder to shoulder at the urinals. Knight said,
‘Think of all the great men who have relieved themselves here—
senators, congressmen, generals, tycoons, kings. Makes you hum-
ble, doesn’t it?”

The hearing room was a disappointment to Jake. He had ex-
pected some spacious room richly decorated in a courtroom motif,
but what they got was another drab, windowtess hearing room that
needed paint and more lights. He and Knight took a seat against
the back wall and watched the elected persons make their way in.
They conferred with one another and found chairs on the dais that
dominated the room. Duquesne came in, nodded at Jake and
placed his briefcase at the speaker’s stand in the center of the dais.
Then he went from political person to political person shaking
hands, murmuring softly.

“It never stops, does it?” Knight whispered.

“They’ll be shaking hands and kissing babies at their own funer-
als,” Jake agreed.

Dodgers didn’t even glance around when he was led in by two
men that Jake assumed were senatorial aides. They placed him at
the little witness table and sat down on either side of him.

With a glance at the clock, Duquesne took his seat. “By mutual
agreement, this is a meeting of the Senate and House Armed Ser-
vices Committees’ joint subcommittee on stealth projects. Dr.
Dodgers, I understand you are here by subpoena. Please pass it to
the clerk, and state your full name.”

“Samuel Brooklyn Dodgers.”

“Is that his real name?” one of the congresswomen asked Du-
quesne, who repeated the question to Dodgers.

“Yes. I had it legally changed some years back.”

“Do you wish to make a statement to the subcommittee?”

“Yes, I do.”

Duquesne looked surprised. “Is it written? Do you have copies
with you?”

“No, sir. I just have a few preliminary remarks.”

“Go ahead then. You have five minutes.”

“As you know, I am the inventor of a radar suppression device
that the U.S. Navy has licensed and is putting into production
under the code name Athena. I have been working closely with the
navy on my invention, and I must say, they are very enthusiastic,
as I am. My invention renders radar obsolete, makes it useless,
which will revolutionize warfare as we know it. I feel my invention
is the greatest instrument for God’s peace ever invented. It will
give the United States an insurmountable military advantage that
will allow us to lead the world to God’s new kingdom here on
earth. We can once and for all demand that the heathen nations—“

Senator Duquesne interrupted as his colleagues began whisper-
ing among themselves. “Please limit your remarks to the subject at
hand. Dr. Dodgers.”

“Yessir. Athena will allow us to convert the Jews and Moslems
and pagans to God-fearing, righteous Christians who won’t start
wars or—“

“Dr. Dodgers,” Duquesne said, “I must insist. Your invention is
not the only matter before this joint subcommittee. We are short of
time. We have another witness to follow you.” Duquesne gestured
at Jake. For the first time Dodgers turned and saw him. “We could
get right to the questions, if you don’t mind.”

“One more point, sir. The naval officer who is in charge of
Athena is here today. Captain Jake Grafton. I see him sitting back
there against the wall. I wish to say here and now that he is a
godless sinner, a mouther of obscene blasphemies, an agent of Sa-
tan. I have complained to the navy and various members of Con-
gress to no avail. I am a man of God and a man of peace. I cannot
continue to work with this—“

Duquesne whacked his gavel. ‘Time! Thank you. Dr. Dodgers.
We’ll get right to the questions.”

The aides whispered fervently in Dodgers’ ear. Duquesne gave
them the time. When Dodgers seemed to be settled down, Du-
quesne led him through a set of simple questions about Athena:
what it was, how it worked, what Dodgers projected its capabilities
as being.

“Dr. Dodgers, does the Athena device have to go on a stealth
airplane?”

“No. sir. It would work on any airplane, stealth or not. It would
work on a ship, on a building, on a tank, a truck—anything that
has a fixed set of radar-reflective properties that the computer can
be programmed to nullify.”

When Duquesne had finished, he opened the floor to questions
from other members. The chairman of the House Armed Services
Committee, Representative Delman Richardson, from California,
went first.

“I take it. Doctor, that you are convinced your device can be put
into production cheaply and in a timely manner?”

“Yessir.”

“And it will work? It will do what you and the navy say it will
do?”

“Yes. That is correct. It will prevent the object that it is placed
upon from being detected by radar.”

“Yet, if I understand your earlier statement correctly, you think
we should use this military advantage to convert the peoples of the
world to Christianity?”

An uproar ensued as Duquesne tried to rule the question out of
order and various members all tried to talk at once. The issue
seemed to be whether the members from the House could ask the
questions they could have asked had they not agreed to a joint
hearing to save time. While all this was going on Rob Knight
nudged Jake. “Best show in town,” he whispered.

On the threat of being abandoned by the House subcommittee
members, Duquesne caved in. Dodgers was given free rein to state
his views on religion, sin, and conspiracies by each and every mi-
nority he could readily recall. Duquesne took it like a man, Jake
thought. He should have known better. Other committee members
took it less well, seeming to take offense that they had to sit
through a recitation of Dodgers’ poisonous inanities.

Dodgers was finally silenced by mutual consent and shown the
door. After a ten-minute recess, it was Jake’s turn. Gazing upward
at the legislators on the dais, he immediately understood the psy-
chological advantage the raised platform conferred on his interro-
gators.

“Do you have a statement to make?” Duquesne asked him when
the preliminaries were completed.

“No, sir.”

A chuckle swept the room- That’s a good start, Jake thought.

A committee staffer passed out copies of Jake’s report and led
him through it, page by page, conclusion by conclusion. It took the
rest of the morning. When Duquesne announced a lunch break,
Jake was surprised at how much time had passed.

He and Knight walked back to the bagel place for a tuna salad
sandwich.

“How am I doing?”

‘They haven’t even started on you yet. Ask me at five o’clock.”

“Are we going to be here that long?”

“Maybe. Depends on Duquesne.”

After lunch the senator resumed his questioning. “Tell me. Cap-
tain, just what were your orders when you were given your present
assignment?”

“I was told to evaluate the two prototypes and prepare a recom-
mendation as to which one I believed the navy should select for
production as the A-12 medium attack bomber.”

“Did Vice Admiral Henry or Secretary Ludlow tell you—let me
rephrase that—did either of them suggest which prototype you
should recommend?”

“No. They didn’t.”

“They didn’t even hint at which one they wanted?”

‘They discussed the navy’s requirements for a new medium at-
tack bomber on numerous occasions with me, sir, and they did
make it clear to me that the plane had to be able to meet the needs
of the navy. But they did not tell me which plane they thought
would best meet those needs. Determining that was the whole pur-
pose of the fly-off.”

“So the conclusions stated in this report and the recommenda-
tions made are yours?”

“Yessir. And the admirals wrote endorsements, and the Secre-
tary of the Navy wrote one when he forwarded the report to
SECDEF.”

“Did you tell your superiors what the substance of your report
would be before you wrote it?”

“Yessir. I kept them fully informed about my activities and my
opinions as I reached them.”

“Did they suggest changes to the draft document.”

“Yessir. That is normal practice. We were under a time crunch,
and I circulated a summary of the report and they commented
upon it and I made certain changes to the report that I felt were
necessary based on their comments. But this is my report. I could
have refused to make a suggested change and they could have
commented on the matter in their endorsement. That, too, would
be normal practice.”

“Did you refuse to make any changes?”

“No, sir.”

“So this report is now the way your superiors in the chain of
command want it to be?”

“I believe the endorsements speak for themselves, sir.”

“You recommended the navy purchase the TRX plane in spite of
the fact that the prototype crashed during evaluation and you
failed to complete all the tests you had planned?”

“That is correct.”

“Why?”

“Senator, I think the report addresses that point much better
than I could orally. I felt that the TRX plane had fewer technical
problems than the Consolidated prototype and was a better coro-
promise of mission capability and stealthiness. I also felt it was
better suited to carrier operations. I thought that it would require
less preproduction modifications to achieve the performance goals.
All this is in the report. In short, I thought this plane gave the
navy the most bang for its bucks.”

“Did you personally fly either plane?”

“No, sir. A test pilot did.”

“How much experience did this test pilot have?”

“I believe she has about sixteen hundred hours total flight time.”

“That isn’t much, is it?”

“Everything is relative,”

“How much flight time do you have. Captain?”

“About forty-five hundred hours.”

“Do you have any previous experience testing prototypes?”

“No, sir.”

“Did your test pilot have any previous prototype testing experi-
ence?”

“No, sir.”

“Yet you used her anyway. Why is that?”

“She had an outstanding record at the Test Pilot School at Pa-
tuxent River. She finished first in her class. My predecessor was on
the staff at TPS and picked her for this project. I saw no reason to
fire her and get someone else.”

“Yet she crashed the TRX prototype?”

“It crashed while she was flying it. The E-PROM chips in the
fly-by-wire system were defective.”

“Would the plane have crashed with a more experienced pilot at
the controls?”

“Well, that’s impossible to say, really.”

“You, for instance?”

“Senator, any answer I gave to that question would be pure
speculation. I feel Lieutenant Moravia did a fine job handling that
plane before and after it went out of control. There may be a pilot
somewhere on this planet who could have saved it, but I don’t
know.”

Duquesne led him into the buy-rate and cost projections for the
A-12. “I see here that you recommend a total buy of three hundred
sixty planes: a dozen the first year, twenty-four the second, then
forty-eight each year subsequently.”

“That’s correct.” Jake went into the cost equations. Before he
could get very deep into the subject, Duquesne moved on.

Finally Duquesne got down to it.

“Captain, you have also been in charge of the Athena program,
have you not?”

“Yes, sir.”

“This morning Dr. Dodgers testified that this device would be
cheap to build”—he gave the figures—“could be in production in a
year or fifteen months and could protect any object it was placed
upon. In view of that, why does the navy want a stealth attack
plane?”

“Athena can be made to work, with enough research, time and
money. But it’s not going to be easy. Right now the only way to
determine the radar-reflective characteristics of an object is to test
the entire object on a specially constructed range. And these char-
acteristics change based on the frequency of the radar doing the
looking- So every frequency must be tested. Consequently the data
base that the Athena computer must use is very, very large. That’s
why we need a superconductive computer to perform all the calcu-
lations required in a minimum amount of time. Still, it is impossi-
ble to build a system that could effectively counter every conceiv-
able frequency. Athena will counter every frequency the Soviets
are known to use. Yet if they shift frequencies quickly enough, with
a semi-stealthy aircraft design we would not lose all our airplanes
before Athena could be modified.

“Secondly, Athena will not be ready for the fleet in a year. More
like three or four. Third, new technology may be developed to
counter Athena. We believe, based on what we know now, that we
need an attack plane with at least A-6 performance and payload
capabilities, state-of-the-art avionics, and stealthy characteristics.
That’s the A-12. The TRX plane is the best that American indus-
try can give us now, and now is the time when we need to put this
airplane into production.”

“Why not kill the A-12 program and build a conventional attack
plane that uses Athena to hide?”

“As I mentioned, Athena is added protection for our aircraft.
but not the sole source, due to the limitations inherent in the tech-
nology. Quick change is the rule in electronic warfare, not the
exception. The Israelis almost lost their 1973 war with Egypt due
to advances in electronic warfare made by the Soviets and supplied
to Egypt of which the West was not aware. The United States
cannot afford to lose a war with the Soviets, Senator.”

Jake reached for his briefcase. Knight had it ready. “My staff
has done some calculations. To kill this program now and start all
over again on another one, writing off all the development money
spent to date and adding the inevitable inflationary factor, I figure
it will cost just about the same per plane. Assuming Athena works
well enough to become operational. If it doesn’t, we’ll have a
brand-new, obsolete airplane. Regardless, in the interim we’ll have
to make do with the A-6, which is not aging gracefully. We may
even need to fund the A-6G program, just to keep the A-6s in the
air until the follow-on airplane arrives.”

An aide passed a copy of Jake’s figures to every member. Jake
spent the next hour defending the methodology and the numbers.

Duquesne opened the floor to questions from other members,
who had a variety of concerns. One of them asked, “I understand
you were awarded the Medal of Honor by this Congress, Captain?”

“That’s correct, sir.”

“Why aren’t you wearing it now?”

“It’s a little gaudy, don’t you think?”

Another congressman asked, “Why is the navy going to name
the A-12 the Avenger?” The propeller-driven Grumman TBF
Avenger was the plane the President flew during World War II.

“In a survey of A-6 flight crews conducted navy-wide, that was
the most popular suggestion. The people in the navy are very
proud of the navy’s tradition and history.”

“The choice of that name looks a little like bootlicking, don’t
you think?”

“Sir, I happen to like that name. The Avenger torpedo-bomber
was a fine airplane in its day, with a proud name and a great
combat record. We’ve named other jets after prop planes—Phan-
tom and Corsair are two—so it’s a choice popular with the people
in naval aviation. Should Avenger get derailed somewhere along
the way, my personal second choice would be Hellcat, another
good old navy name.”

“That choice wouldn’t be popular with Dr. Dodgers,” the con-
gressman said dryly.

“I doubt if it would,” Jake agreed.

And then it was over. He was excused. It was 4 P.M. Out on the
steps Knight said, “One down. two to go.”

That was right. Assuming the Armed Services Committees au-
thorized some airplanes and the full House and Senate agreed, then
the battle would begin to convince the appropriations committees
to provide the dollars to pay for them.

Jake groaned.

“Relax. You did very well.”

“C’mon. Let’s go get a beer somewhere. I’m dying of thirst.”

On Sunday morning as they walked on the beach and Amy played
in the surf, Jake and Caltie talked again about X. “As I
understand it,” Jake said, “he’s not a mole in the usual sense of the
word. He’s not a Russian who slipped in years ago and worked his
way into a position of trust. He’s an American. A traitor.”

‘This world of espionage and counterespionage,” Callie said, “it
reminds me of Alice in Wonderland. Nothing is ever as it seems.”

“What made you think of that?”

“Ifyou lose something and look for it in all the usual places and
you don’t find it, what conclusion do you reach?”

“It isn’t in a usual place.”

“Precisely. And if the FBI has been looking for a mole for three
years, then the mole is not in the usual place.”

“But the usual places are positions where a person would have
access to the information being passed.”

“Perhaps the mole was never there at all.”

Jake stared at her.

“How do you know the FBI has been looking?” she asked.

“Henry said so. Camacho said so.”-

“Henry merely repeated what he was told. Camacho told you
what he wanted you to hear. What if there is no mole at all? What
if X is merely a character, an actor assigned to play a part?”

Amy called her to look at something that had washed up on the
beach during the night, and she went. Jake stood and watched
them. The surf broke and swirled around their ankles as the sea-
birds circled and called.

“You are a very smart woman,” he told her when she rejoined
him,

“Oh, I’m glad you noticed. What did I say that was smart?”

On Monday morning at the office Jake stopped by the copy ma-
chine and helped himself to twenty or so sheets of paper. In his
office he closed the door and pulled on a pair of gloves he had
brought from home. Spreading the pile of paper gingerly, he se-
lected a sheet from the middle of the pile and slid it away from the
others. It should be free of fingerprints. From his pocket he took a
black government pen. He clicked the point in and out a few times
as he stared thoughtfully at the paper.

In block letters in the center of the page he wrote: “I KNOW
WHO YOU ARE.” He put the words all on one line.

He inspected it carefully, then folded the sheet and placed it in a
blank letter-sized envelope he had removed from a box at home
this morning.

There was a pair of tweezers in his desk, in that vanity case
Callie got him for Christmas a year or so ago. He found them and
dropped them in his pocket.

He took the gloves off. With the envelope inside his shirt, he
went to the men’s head. There he used the tweezers to put the
envelope on the counter. Holding his shin pocket open, he used the
tweezers again to fish a stamp from the interior. He moistened it on
a damp place on the sink, then affixed it to the envelope.

Back in the office, trying very hard not to touch the envelope at
all, he dug through the classified Department of Defense directory
until he found the address he wanted. This he copied onto the face
of the envelope in block letters.

He put the envelope back into his shirt, put on his hat and told
the secretary in the outer office he would be back in ten minutes.

He dropped the envelope in a mailbox on the plaza near the
entrance to his building, then retraced his steps back to the office.

29

Vice Admiral Henry’s funeral was
on Wednesday in Arlington National Cemetery, held outdoors on
the grass at the request of his eldest daughter. Everyone who was
anyone in the Department of Defense was on hand, so Jake Graf-
ton ended up seated among the rank and file. The politicians who
ruled the armed forces sat on the right-hand side of the aisle, while
on the left were the admirals and generals, who had been carefully
seated in order of seniority as protocol demanded. A band played
funeral airs and Royce Caplinger, George Ludlow, and CNO deliv-
ered short eutogies.

From where he sat Jake could see the backs of the heads of some
of the heavyweights. Off to his left were the rows and rows of white
monuments, marching across the green rolling terrain with fault-
less precision.

To his right was the low bulk of the Pentagon, only the top of it
visible between the heads of the people and the uniformed ushers at
parade rest.

Tyler Henry had spent his adult life in uniform, and Jake had no
doubt that interment at this cemetery, with all those who had also
served, would have met with Henry’s approval. After all. Henry
had died in combat, fighting for something he believed in.

Half listening to the speeches, Jake Grafton once again consid-
ered all he knew about X affair. It was precious little,
yet it seemed to him he could see the underlying structure. Per-
haps, he mused, even that was an illusion.

The funeral was real enough. Henry was truly dead. The people
involved were real, the information passed to the Soviets was real,
Smoke Judy’s attempt to steal the Athena file was real. And
yet …

When he got back to the office, he made another trip to the copy
machine for paper. This time he wrote: “I KNOW YOU ARE THE
MINOTAUR.”

He addressed the envelope as before and deposited it in the plaza
mailbox when he went down to catch the shuttle to the Pentagon
for another round of meetings.

On Thursday the announcement was made that the various com-
mittees of congress had authorized the navy to purchase the TRX
plane as the A-12. Although the buy schedule was lower than
planned, which would raise the cost of each plane by five million
dollars, a general celebration was in order. That afternoon Jake
and Admiral Dunedin treated everyone in the office to a beer bash
at Gus’s Place, a beanery on the lower floor of Jefferson Plaza 1.

“If you had any class, Grafton,” Rob Knight told him, “you’d
have taken us to Amelia’s in the Underground.”

“No class. You got that right.”

‘Two more hearings to go,” Rob said. “Without an appropria-
tion of money, all we have is a piece of paper to frame.”

Dunedin was in a cheerful mood. He laughed and joked with the
troops, seemingly glad to once again, if only for a little while, be
just one of the guys. He never could be, of course. The officers he
had spent his career with were all retired, except for those precious
few who were also vice admirals. All the others were playing golf
in Phoenix and Oriando, selling insurance in Virginia Beach or
boats in San Diego, or were working for defense contractors.

At one point Dunedin ended up at Jake’s table. When they were
temporarily alone, he said, “Really a shame about Tyler Henry. He
was going to retire in three months, you know.”

No, Jake didn’t know.

“Had a little cottage up in Maine, right near the beach. Owned it
for years. Was going to spend the rest of his life there, he told me,
and if he never heard the sound of freedom again he thought he
could live with that.” “The sound of freedom” was a public rela-
tions euphemism for jet noise.

“I guess you burn out after a while,” Jake said.

“I guess. You win some, lose some, hope for the best. Even the
politicians, they try to do that.”

Jake remembered that comment the following week after he
watched Royce Caplinger sweat in front of a Senate Appropria-
tions subcommittee. They kept him going over numbers for most
of the day. Although he was subpoenaed, Jake never took the
stand. He was delighted.

Caplinger stayed afterwards for private conversations with the
senators. Jake left with Toad Tarkington, who had accompanied
him. As they were leaving, Caplinger and Senator Duquesne were
shaking hands. It was then that Jake remembered Dunedin’s com-
ment

A week later the House Appropriations Committee held their
closed-door hearing. Caplinger spent three hours on the stand,
Ludlow two hours. After lunch came Jake’s turn on the hot seat.
Three hours later Congresswoman Samantha Strader cleared her
throat.

Strader was in her early fifties, her hair penned, her eyes
screwed up in a characteristic squint. One of only two Democrats
in her state’s congressional delegation, she represented a district
carved from the core of her state’s capital city, the only area of the
state with a significant minority population. She had one of the
safest Democratic seats in the country and had been elected pro
forma a dozen times, yet until the last election she bad been almost
unknown outside her state. Prior to that election she had publicly
entertained the idea of entering the presidential primaries as the
only woman in the field. Her short-lived quest came to grief on the
shoals of political and financial reality, but not before her name
and face had been splashed coast to coast by the media. She had
jabbed and pricked the real contenders during her moment in the
spotlight, had a delightful time, and squinted all the while.