"I wouldn't dare. You might spike my food with jelly beans."
She pulled him closer, wrapping him in her cloak. "I'm not quite that cruel."
"Airborne?" Stephens shook his head. The man was looking a little sickly, probably from his vegetarian diet. How the Scandinavians hadn't died of malnutrition, let alone had the strength to go off on Viking raids was something of a puzzle to Liz. Still, this presumably was their winter diet, and the fact that they ate whole-grain cereals and a lot of fish probably helped. In spring and summer some fruit and green things must have found their way into the meals, surely? But even here in a sheltered cove next to the moderating sea, this "Fimbulwinter" was robbing people of any other harvest. It was supposed to be summer. Global warming was a problem, but global cooling like this was a much faster disaster. It was supposed to continue, from what Thor said, for three years.
"But tell us about your plans," said Bott. "We are experienced men. We can probably help."
"Yes," nodded Stephens, like a mechanical doll. "Fill us in on the details. You are the experts at all this mythology stuff."
"Unfortunately, my knowledge of Scandinavian myth is a little scanty," said Jerry. "Basically, we need to capture Odin. I wanted to find a way in past Asgard's walls. Last time we used hot air balloons as a feint. This time I thought we might just be able to do it for real."
"Do you really think you could make a balloon?" asked Bott.
Jerry nodded. "We've got a secret weapon. Lamont Jackson. He's got more practical skill and obscure knowledge than is fair to have in the possession of any one man. And we've done it before. Asgard has pretty solid walls, which are certainly high enough to hold off most siege attacks, but a balloon doesn't have to fly that high to get over them. It's silent. It's an unknown concept here."
Bott looked thoughtful. "But what are you going to do when you're on the other side of the wall? A balloon is very visible, and it can't carry many people."
"We'll do it at night. Paint it black," said Liz. "On a cloudy night, it would be easy. No one would have a clue we'd arrived."
"Yes, but what are you going to do once you have arrived?"
"I thought you were going to advise us instead of just asking questions," said Liz irritably. "What do you think we should do?"
Someone bellowed off down the passage. "That's Thor," said Liz. "We have to go, Jerry."
"That's it," said Stephens, when the door was closed. "All we have to do is get it all set up. They'll walk right into it."
Bott nodded. "Now we know what they're planning and who they're in bed with, yes."
"Do you know something I don't?" asked Stephens, for the millionth time fiddling with his helmet radio.
"Well, I know enough to know that Odin was the main god of this Norse stuff. And this Loki they've sided with was the bad guy."
Stephens nodded. "The sort that has no respect for authority."
"Now we just need to get this information through to Harkness," said Bott.
"And start arranging for a bolt-hole if this bunch gets wind of it all."
PART IV: When Hel freezes over
Chapter 30
The senior CIA official looked at the list and frowned. "Remember, Miggy, I never said this to you. But, these men . . . three of them were ours. They were . . . well, we were trying to get rid of them. They should never have made it through training. We had a bad patch a few years back."
He made a face. "The truth is the agency was furious when the PSA was formed. We were asked to second some staff." He pointed to the list. "Guess who."
Tremelo nodded. "Was Megane one of yours?"
"Sad to say, he was. There's a story—I've never tried to confirm it, but I know the agents involved swear it was true—that when he was stationed in Venezuela he got the bright idea of publicly embarrassing the Venezuelan government. We haven't had good relations with them in a long time, as you know. So, the screwball put sugar in the gas tanks of several official limousines which were to be used in an official motorcade the following day."
Miggy winced. "Oh, Lord. He got caught, I assume?"
"No. But when the motorcade got stalled in Caracas, the Venezuelan government was not amused. Neither was the special U.S. envoy who was making a semi-secret visit to see if we could iron out at least some of the controversies. Not only was he stalled in one of the vehicles himself, but the Venezuelans immediately accused us—the CIA, I mean—of being responsible for the affair, and broke off the talks as a result."
The official sighed. "Of course, we denied it vigorously. Even after we found out it was true. That was Megane's last overseas assignment. We were in the process of figuring out how to quietly ease him out of the company, when the PSA got set up and Garnett demanded that we provide her with some agents."
He leaned back in his chair and gave Tremelo a considering look. "You'd better know one thing, though, Miggy. Whatever else he is, Megane's not a stoolie. Even if you nail him for something, I doubt you'll be able to follow it up any further. He's the kind of person who can get the goofiest notions of what constitutes his duty, sure enough—but he also takes it dead seriously. I guess you could call it part of the syndrome. He'll clam up and take the rap himself, even if it means a long prison sentence."
"I can live with that. In a perfect world, I'd be able to get rid of Garnett and the PSA altogether. But I'm sure the best I can hope for is a much muddier conclusion. Garnett aside, there are a lot of powerful people and special interests who are backing the PSA for their own reasons."
He shrugged. "So it goes. I don't really care all that much if the PSA would simply restrict itself to gathering intelligence about the Krim pyramid, even though they'll make a royal nuisance of themselves when they try to insist on their authority to 'coordinate' all intelligence activities. It's when the stupid bastards try to create intelligence that they became a real threat to the nation. Intelligence, yes, so-called 'operations,' no. We simply don't know enough to be trying to conduct operational efforts. None of us—me included—much less people who are so inattentive to the intelligence they're supposed to be 'coordinating' that they send some poor schmucks into the pyramid with fancy technical equipment that won't work."
"Good luck," said his friend.
Common sense would have had PSA headquarters somewhere in Chicago. Political sense had the office exactly where it should be, in Washington. The meeting that was going on there right now was anything but cordial. Agents Reno, Schmitt and Erskine were considerably the worse for wear, still, from the prequel to their visit to the cells at Fort Campbell. Agent Supervisor Megane and his two men were less battered, perhaps because the Greek hoplite outfits had protected them to some extent.
But the only protection that would really have worked against the fury of Ms. Garnett would have been to be like Agents Sternal, Bormann, or Liber—dead.
"This has turned into a complete fiasco," she said coldly, grinding her words out between gritted teeth.
They all stood looking at her, like a bunch of dumb oxen. "Get out," she said. "I'll deal with you later."
After the agents had filed out, Garnett swiveled in the chair behind her desk and looked at Assistant Director of Operations James Horton. She was actually more furious with him than any of his subordinates, and was deeply tempted to order him out of the room also. But, at least for the moment, she still needed him.
She had one satisfaction, though. "You're coming with me, Jim. No way I'm sitting through that so-called cocktail party this evening on my own."
Horton looked alarmed. That made her feel a little better.
After the drinks were served, and the waiter withdrew from the private room in the very exclusive club in the nation's capital, Garnett looked around the table. The expressions on the faces of the four men and one woman who'd joined her and Horton for cocktails were subdued, of course. They were all long-time veterans of the Beltway, and, like experienced poker players, knew better than to wear their sentiments on their sleeves. Still,
only someone a lot more obtuse than Helen could have failed to detect the anger, irritation—and apprehension. The room seemed practically saturated with those emotions, especially the latter.
Nothing for it, as much as Garnett hated doing so. She had to start with an apology. These people were beyond her control, if not her influence, and she had to stay on their good side.
"Sorry about this, everyone. But we'll get it straightened out soon enough."
The secretary of defense exchanged a glance with one of the two senators at the table, Senator Andrews from Texas. Then Secretary Antonelli said, "How soon is 'soon enough,' Helen? I warn you, you don't have much time. Tremelo's already arrived—and don't ever let that tweedy academic image he loves to cultivate fool you any. When it comes to Beltway knife-fighting, he's as tough as anyone."
"Tougher, you ask me," chimed in Senator Andrews.
Roger Delacorte, a lobbyist from the defense industry, made a face. "Yeah, he's a real shithead."
The Texas senator gave him a hard glance. "Cut it out, Roger. I like Miggy Tremelo personally."
His fellow senator from California chimed in. "So do I. And whether you do or don't, Mr. Delacorte, I'd advise you to remember that most congressmen who've dealt with the man like him also—and so does the public. Unfortunately, while I enjoy it in private, Miggy's got a good sense of humor—which means the talk shows love having him as a guest." Senator Martinez took a sip from her cocktail glass. "The problem isn't Miggy's personality; it's his policy. And since he won't budge on it—and, for the moment, has the confidence of the President—we have to do an end run around him." She used the glass to gesture at Garnett. "Hence, APSA and the PSA. But let's not lose the forest for the trees. If we could have persuaded Tremelo, I'd have had no problem at all leaving him in charge. God knows, at least he's competent."
Helen did her best not to stiffen angrily at the sideswipe. There was no love lost between Paula Martinez and her, and never had been—not since they'd first encountered each other years back in the course of a clash over environmental policy, when Helen had been on the staff of one of the senator's opponents. But she simply couldn't afford to lose Martinez's backing. The big money on their side of the dispute came from the defense industry, and no senator in the country had more clout there than the senior senator from California.
Roger Delacorte held up his hands in a placating gesture. "Fine, fine, fine. Professor Tremelo's the greatest guy in the world. He's still got his head up his ass when it comes to dealing with the alien pyramid—and let's also not forget that that's the name of the forest in the first place."
As he listened to the byplay, Melvin Steinmetz found himself wondering whether he'd backed the wrong horse in this race. Unlike everyone else at the table, Melvin didn't really have a personal stake in the outcome. True, if the policy he advocated were to be adopted by the administration in place of Tremelo's, his think tank would land a very juicy contract. So what? The Future Enterprise Institute was one of the three or four most prestigious and sought-after independent research and policy development outfits in the nation. They already had plenty of juicy contracts.
He was simply convinced that Tremelo was wrong, dead wrong, and the consequences of his erroneous thinking were likely to be disastrous. As bad and probably worse than any major nuclear exchange—and Steinmetz's think tank specialized in studies of nuclear war. Whether he realized it or not, Tremelo's policy with regard to the Krim pyramid amounted to a revival of the Mutual Assured Destruction policy that had governed relations between the U.S. and the USSR during the Cold War, when it came to all-out war. "You leave us alone and we'll leave you alone, because we can each destroy the other."
For all its somewhat surrealistic nature, MAD had worked pretty well during that era—but only because the "mutual destruction" part had been true. What Tremelo couldn't seem to grasp was that it was not true when it came to the pyramid. Who knew what the Krim could do, or not do—or would be willing to do? What Tremelo advocated amounted to . . .
"We'll leave them alone, and . . . we'll see what they do."
That wasn't good enough, not by a country mile. The United States had to take a proactive stance toward the pyramid. Simply waiting and watching—what Tremelo called "quarantine"—gave all the advantage to the enemy. It amounted to unilateral disarmament.
The problem, unfortunately, was that—so far, at any rate—Tremelo had all the proven and capable experts on his side of the debate. And it didn't help one damn bit that the public doted on them even more than they did on Tremelo himself.
One of Melvin's associates at the institute had called it the American nation's "ingrained Humphrey Bogart complex." Beneath the somewhat rueful whimsy, he had a point. No professional security force had been able to penetrate the pyramid without suffering one hundred percent casualties—all of them fatalities except for a few still listed as missing in action. Whereas the "amateurs" had come out of it unscratched. A professor whose absentmindedness was simply charming, when coupled with the rest—and with a zaftig new blond girlfriend, to boot, who exuded "outdoorswoman" rather than "bimbo." The country had gone even more gaga over her Afrikaans accent than they had over that silly Australian actor's accent a few years back. A black maintenance man. Two paratroopers, one of them Hispanic and the other a Midwestern good-ole-boy.
Racial harmony, even. It was enough to drive you mad—not because the people themselves did, but because they backed Tremelo to the hilt.
So . . .
With misgivings, Steinmetz had been persuaded to throw the considerable if very non-public influence of the Future Enterprise Institute behind the drive by the senators from Texas and California, with the open backing of the defense industry and the covert backing of the secretary of defense, to get APSA enacted and set up the PSA. The defense industry, of course, had its own completely material reasons for opposing Tremelo's policy, which came down to nothing more subtle than that Tremelo's approach didn't produce any big fat defense contracts. With a somewhat less pig-in-the-trough mentality, the secretary of defense and the senators from the nation's two biggest defense-industry states shared their views.
Melvin's misgivings had grown when Helen Garnett emerged as the front-runner for the new post. He'd had to hold his nose at some of the legal implications of APSA, to begin with, figuring you couldn't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. But what he hadn't foreseen was that a vigorous egg-breaker like Garnett would wind up running the show. Yeah, fine, the woman was tougher than nails and was possibly the best political fund-raiser in the country. And . . . this qualified her how, exactly, to oversee setting up a hands-on approach to the pyramid?
The plan she'd developed that had turned into a mare's nest was typical, he thought. Using the "need to rescue Tom Harkness"—who'd been nothing more than a second-rater on the National Security Council's staff—as an excuse to set up an "Operations Directorate" was a scheme right out of the woolliest days of the OSS in World War II. Except that Helen Garnett was no Wild Bill Donovan, and the team of operatives she'd picked bore a lot more resemblance to the Watergate plumbers than they did to OSS agents.
What a mess. Maybe if he bailed out now, he could still get Tremelo to listen to him.
Probably not, though. Miggy and he got along well enough, but Tremelo was just plain stubborn. Always had been.
While he'd been ruminating, the conversation around him had continued. Melvin had paid just enough attention not to lose track of where things were. So, he wasn't taken by surprise when Delacorte—he'd be the one, naturally; the coarse bastard—finally said it out loud.
"All right, Helen. We'll back you in the coming hearings, of course—although you do understand that you're going to have to let some heads roll."
That much was obvious, of course. They could only hope that Agent Supervisor Megane shared G. Gordon Liddy's stubborn sense of honor as well as his screwball cowboy attitudes. If all went well, he'd just take the fall and keep his mouth shut. If he turned
out to be another John Dean, though . . .
Steinmetz couldn't help but wince a little. He didn't know any of the details of what had happened in Fort Campbell—and didn't want to know, either—but he was dead certain there'd be all hell to pay. Just from what he'd learned, he didn't doubt for a moment that the PSA's agents on the spot had grossly transgressed even the wide latitude APSA gave them. Not to mention their grasp of public relations, which made that of the devil look good. What sort of lunatic goes out of his way to infuriate officers and enlisted men in a military unit as well known and well regarded as the 101st Airborne, for God's sake?