Under Siege (34 page)

“Cuba, right? Did you tell him to read my stuff”

“That car-bus wreck and the Bush initiatives. God, what a mess! Half the country is screaming that Bush is overreacting and the other half is screaming that he hasn’t done enough. He’s getting it both ways, coming and going. Why any sane man gets into politics, I’ll never know.”

“Any line on who the ten pounds of dope belonged to?”

“No, but funny thing. Cherry implied that the government knows all about it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he’s on the Oversight Committee and presumably has been briefed, and he just shrugged off the question of how the investigation is going. Muttered something like, “That’s not an issue.””

“What d’ya mean, that’s not an issue? They know and aren’t telling?”

“Yeah. Precisely.” Ott Mergenthaler raised his eyebrows. “Normally you gotta watch Cherry like a hawk. He likes to pretend he knows everything, has a finger in every pie.

Sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn’t. Now at lunch today he didn’t say so directly, but he left me and the other two reporters with the impression that the feds had a man on the inside. And he knew that was the impression he was creating and he could see by our reaction that we thought this was very important.”

“on the inside. Undercover?”

Mergenthaler nodded.

“You’re not going to print that, are you?”

“I have to. Two other reporters were there.” He named

them. “They’ll use it. You can bet the ranch on that.

“You can’t attribute this to Cherry.”

“That’s right. But this is an answer of sorts to a legit question. What is the federal government doing to bring to justice the people who indirectly caused eleven deaths in the heart of Washington? Cherry’s answer-that’s a nonquestion.”

“And if Cherry has said that to three reporters, who else

has he said it to?”

“Precisely. Hell, knowing Cherry, he’s … And lknow him. What I can’t figure out is, did he spill the beans on his own book or was he told to?”

“If you knew that,” Jack Yocke mused, “you might get a better idea of whether Or not ” it’s true.”

“Wonder what the government’s told the Japs.”

“Call the Japanese ambassador and ask.”

“I’ll do that.” Mergenthaler made a small ceremony of maneuvering himself out of the chair and strolling off toward his office.

Jack Yocke watched him go, then jerked the Rolodex around and flipped through it. He found the number he wanted and dialed. one ring. Two. Three. C’mon, answer the damn phone!

“Sammy.”

,jack Yocke. You alone?”

“Just me and Jesus.”

“Your phone tapped?”

“How the fuck would I know, man?”

,Ah, what an affable, genial guy you are. Okay, Mr. Laid

iLike

Back Bro, a U.s. senatorjust hinted to one of our columnists that the government knows all there is to know about that car-bus wreck. Our guy was left with the clear impression that the feds got somebody undercover.”

“Give me that again, slower.”

Yocke repeated his message.

“That’s all?”

“Isn’t that enough?”

“Who was the senator?”

“Bob Cherry.”

“Thanks, man.”

“It’ll be in tomorrow’s paper. Just thought you’d like to know.”

“Thanks.”

Harrison Ronald Ford hung up the phone and went back to his crossword puzzle. He stared at it without seeing the words. Then he went over to the sink and vomited into it.

It’s out! The word’s out. Hooper-that asshole!

His stomach tied itself into a knot and he heaved again.

He turned on the water to flush the mess down the drain. Saliva was still dripping from his mouth.

He heaved again, dry this time. He looked at the telephone on the table, tempted. No way! That fucker Mcationally had too goddamn many people on his payroll.

When the retching stopped, he grabbed his coat and slammed the door behind him.

“Hooper, you fucking shithead! Whatre you trying to do 10 me?” Harrison Ronald roared the words into the telephone. “Calm down. What’re you talking about?”

Ford repeated his conversation of six minutes ago with Jack Yocke.

“Gimme your number. I’ll call you back in eight or ten minutes.”

“This is a fucking pay phone, you shithead! Nobody can call this fucking number because Marion fucking Barry doesn’t want fucking dope peddlers taking orders on this fucking phone.”

“So call me back in ten minutes.”

“In ten minutes I may well be as dead as Ma Bell, you blathering shithead. If I don’t call the funeral will be on Wednesday. Closed casket!”

He slammed the phone onto its hook and looked around to see who had been listening to his shouting. No one, thank God!

Hooper used the government directory to look up the number, then dialed. “Senator Cherry, please. This is Special Agent Thomas Hooper.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” the woman said. “Senator Cherry is on the Senate floor. What is this about?”

“I’m not at liberty to say. When could I expect a return call?”

“Well, not today. Perhaps tomorrow morning?” The pitch of her voice rose slightly when she said “morning,” making it a question and a pleasantry at the same time.

“I suggest you send an aide to find the senator. Tell the aide that if the senator does not telephone Special Agent Thomas Hooper at 893-9338 in the next fifteen minutes, I will send a squad of agents to find him and physically transport him to the FBI building. See that he gets that message or he is going to be grossly inconvenienced.”

“Would you repeat that number?”

“893-icch.”

The next call went to The Washington Post switchboard. “Jack Yocke, please.” After several rings, the reporter answered.

“Mr. Yocke, this is Special Agent Thomas Hooper of the FBI. I understand we have a mutual friend.”

“I know a lot of people, Mr. Hooper. Which mutual friend are we discussing?”

“The one you just talked to, oh, ten or fifteen minutes ago-,, “You say you’re with the FBI?”

“Call the FBI building and ask for me.” Hooper hung up. In half a minute the phone rang. “Hooper.

“Jack Yocke, Mr. Hooper. Trying to be careful.”

“Our friend tells me that you discussed with him a conversation that one of your colleagues had over the lunch hour with Senator Cherry. Who is the colleague?”

“Ott Mergenthaler.”

“And who else was a party to that conversation?”

Yocke gave him the names and the newspapers they worked for.

“Mr. Yocke, is my friend a good friend of yours?”

“Yes.”

“Then I suggest you not mention that luncheon conversation, this conversation, or his name to another living soul. You understand?”

“I think it’s clear.”

“Good. Thanks.”

..‘Bye.” Hooper walked from his office to his secretary’s desk. “Is Freddy back yet?”

“From Cuba? He got in about seven a.m. He’s been over at Justice most of the morning.”

“See if you can find him.”

While Hooper was waiting he carefully and legibly wrote the three reporters” names and the newspapers they worked for on a blank sheet of paper. Freddy came in about five minutes later. “How’d it go in Cuba?” “We got Zaba. And enough evidence to fry Chano

“Great. But we have a more pressing problem. Senator Bob Cherry had lunch with these three reporters.” He shoved his note across the desk. “Cherry hinted that the government knew everything it wanted to know about that car-bus crash the other night because it had an undercover agent in place.”

“A, damn,” Freddy said. “He was just briefed on that this morning and he’s spilled it already!”

“Go to the director’s office, tell the executive assistant what the problem is, and see if the director will telephone the publishers of those newspapers and kill the story. Report back to me as soon as possible.”

“That may keep it out of the papers for a day or two, but that won’t cork it. It’s out of the bottle now, Tom.”

“I’ll talk to Cherry.”

“Good luck. He’s probably told a dozen people.” Hooper rubbed his forehead. “Go see the director.” He was still rubbing his forehead, trying to think, when the phone rang non, the direct line. “Hooper.”

“Okay, it’s me. I’ve calmed down a little. Sorry.”

“Forget it, Harrison. Where are you?”

“Why?”

“I’m sending an agent in a car to get you. You’re done.”

“How’d the word get out?”

“We told the President and briefed key members of the congressional Oversight Committees. One of the senators then had lunch with a team of reporters and dropped some hints.”

“Awww, fuck!”

‘Where are you?”

“Now you calm down. Freeman patted me on the head after that incident. I’m in real tight now, man. He’s got a meeting sometime tonight with Fat Tony Anselmo. Something heavy’s going down. We’re cunt-hair close, Tom. No shit$1”

“You are done, Harrison. I don’t want to see you a corpse. Not only would death be bad for your health, it’d leave me with no case. We’ve got enough to take Freeman and his associates off the street for a few years, and I’m not greedy. You’re done. his

“Now look, Tom. I’m a big boy and I stopped wearing diapers last year. I’m not done until I say I’m done.”

“Harrison, I’m in charge of this case. We can maybe keep Cherry’s little luncheon chat out of the papers for a few days, but he’s probably already run off at the mouth all over town. I don’t know. He’ll probably lie to me about it. This is your life you’re betting.”

“Two nights. Two more nights and then we bust “em.”

“You are a flaming idiot.”

“That’s what everybody says. Talk to you tomorrow.” The phone went dead.

Hooper hung the instrument up and sat staring at it.

When it rang again he let the secretary in the outer office take it” She buzzed him. “Senator Cherry, sir.”

He pushed the button. “Senator, this is Special Agent Hooper. We need to have a talk. Immediately.”

“I understand you made some threatening remarks a few minutes ago to one of my staff, Hooper. What the hell is going on over there anyway?”

“I really need to see you as soon as possible on a very urgent matter, Senator. I’m sorry if your secretary felt I was threatening.”

The senator buffed and puffed a bit, but Hooper was willing to grovel, and soon the feathers were back in place. “Well,” Cherry agreed finally, “I’m going out to dinner before I attend a reception at the French embassy. You could come by about sixish?”

“Senator, I know the unwritten rules, but I just can’t come over. You’ll have to stop by here.”

The senator gave him a few seconds of frosty silence. “Okay,” he said with no grace.

“The guard at the quadrangle entrance will be expecting you and will escort you to my office.”

Special Agent Hooper was staring at the classified file on this operation when his assistant, Freddy Murray, returned from the director’s office. Freddy pulled up a chair and reported:

“The director made the calls. The publishers agreed to kill the story unless it runs elsewhere, then they’ll have to run it. That leak’s plugged, at least for a little while.”

“Thanks, Freddy.”

“We got to wrap this operation up, Tom, and make some arrests. The pressure is excruciating and it’s gonna get worse. While I was in the director’s office he was on the phone to the attorney general. The AG has been talking to the President. Did you see this morning’s paper?”

Hooper laid three documents on the table. “Why’d we start this operation, anyway?”

Hooper knew the answer to that question, of course, but he liked to think aloud. Freddy Murray thought this quirk of

Hooper’s a fortunate habit because his subordinates then “knew where the boss’s thoughts were going without having to ask. So he willingly played along. ‘To find out who in the bureau is on Mcationally’s payroll.”

And what have we discovered?”

“Nothing.”

“correct.”

“S.” Hooper used the eraser on a pencil to scratch his head. “S.”

“We’ve got enough to put Mcationally out of business,” Freddy pointed out. “It’s not like this operation hasn’t home fruit Ford has filled our stocking with goodies. And the people in the front office are getting more desperate by the hour.”

“Who are the three guys we thought might be dirty?”

“Wilson, Kovecki, and Moreto.”

“Aren’t these documents still on the computer?” Hooper pointed to them. Freddy looked at them. They were weekly progress reports to the assistant director. Harrison Fbrd’s name was contained on each.

“I think so.”

“Let’s rewrite these reports. We’ll construct four files, one for each of Mcationally’s chief lieutenants, naming each of them in turn as our undercover operative. Then we let each man get an unauthorized peek at one of the files. What d’ya think?”

Freddy sat silently for a minute or so, turning it over and looking under it. “I think we’re liable to get somebody killed.”

“Listen, Harrison’s dangling over the shark pit on a worn-out, fraying rope and blood is dripping into the water. The word is out-the feds have somebody inside. If Mcationally hears this rumor he’ll be looking for the traitoryou can bet Harrison Ronald FD-RD’S ass on that. Our first duty is to keep our guy alive, and our second is to find the rotten apples around here. We’re about out of time, Freddy.”

“I don’t like it.”

“You got a better suggestion?”

‘Four files. Three suspects. Who’s the fourth file for?”

“Bob Cherry.”

Freddy scratched his crotch and picked his nose. “You’re not playing by the rules,” he objected, finally.

“There ain’t no rules in a knife fight,” Hooper growled. “Ask Freeman Mcationally.”

“Why Cherry?”

“Why not? The shit started the rumor. Let’s give him something to season it with. A name.”

“What if our little conversation this evening goes well and he shuts up?”

“You had any dealings with this guy? He thinks he’s one of the twelve disciples.”

“Okay, so we let him get a sneaky peek at a bogus file. Then we talk to him? He’ll come unglued-we call him in so we can bitch at him about his loose mouth and we leave secret files lying around unattended? He’ll latch onto that like a pit bull with AIDS. He’ll crucify us.”