Clear and Present Danger

  “What about the weather?” he asked PJ.

  “That fucking storm’s jinking around like a Weasel on a SAM hunt. Nobody knows where the hell it’s going, but it ain’t there yet, and I’ve flown in weather before,” Colonel Johns replied.

  “Okay.” The pilot walked off. There were some cots set in the next room. He landed on one and was asleep in a minute.

  “Going in on the ground?” Ryan asked.

  “What do you expect me to do—leave them there? Ain’t we done enough of that?” Clark looked away. His eyes were red, and only PJ knew that it wasn’t from strain and lack of sleep. “Sorry, Jack. There’s some of our people there. I have to try. They’d try for me. It’s cool, man. I know how to do it.”

  “How?” PJ asked.

  “Larson and I’ll fly in around noon, get a car and drive down. I told Chavez—that’s the kid I talked to—to get around them and head east, down the mountain. We’ll try to pick them up, drive ’em to the airport, and just fly them out.”

  “Just like that?” Ryan asked incredulously.

  “Sure. Why not?”

  “There’s a difference between being brave and being an idiot,” Ryan said.

  “Who gives a fuck about being brave? It’s my job.” Clark walked off to get some sleep.

  “You know what you’re really afraid of?” Johns said when he’d left. “You’re afraid of remembering the times that you could have done it and didn’t. I can give you a play-by-play of every failure I’ve had in twenty-some years.” The colonel was wearing his blue shirt with command wings and all the ribbons. He had quite a few.

  Jack’s eyes fixed on one, pale blue with five white stars. “But you...”

  “It’s a nice thing to wear, and it’s nice to have four-stars salute me first and treat me like I’m something special. But you know what matters? Those two guys I got out. One’s a general now. The other one flies for Delta. They’re both alive. They both have families. That’s what matters, Mr. Ryan. The ones I didn’t get out, they matter, too. Some of them are still there, because I wasn’t good enough or fast enough or lucky enough. Or they weren’t. Or something. I should have gotten them out. That’s the job,” Johns said quietly. “That’s what I do.”

  We sent them in there, Jack told himself. My agency sent them in there. And some of them are dead now, and we let somebody tell us not to do anything about it. And I’m supposed to be ...

  “Might be dangerous going in tonight.”

  “Possible. Looks that way.”

  “You have three minis aboard your chopper,” Ryan said after a moment. “You only have two gunners.”

  “I couldn’t whistle another one up this fast and—”

  “I’m a pretty fair shot,” Jack told him.

  28.

  Accounting

  CORTEZ SAT AT the table, doing his sums. The Americans had done marvelously well. Nearly two hundred Cartel men had gone up the mountain. Ninety-six had returned alive, sixteen of those wounded. They’d even brought a live American down with them. He was badly hurt, still bleeding from four wounds, and he hadn’t been well handled by the Colombian gunmen. The man was young and brave, biting off his screams, shaking with the effort to control himself. Such a courageous young man, this Green Beret. Cortez would not insult his bravery with questions. Besides, he was incoherent, and Cortez had other things to do.

  There was a medical team here to treat “friendly” casualties. Cortez walked out to it and picked up a disposable syringe, filling it with morphine. He returned and stabbed the needle into a vein on the soldier’s uninjured arm, pushing down on the plunger after it was in. The soldier relaxed at once, his pain extinguished by a wonderful, brief sensation of well-being. Then his breathing just stopped, and his life, too, was extinguished. Most unfortunate. Cortez could really have used men like this one, but they rarely worked for anything other than a flag. He walked over to his phone and called the proper number.

  “Jefe, we eliminated one of the enemy forces last night.... Yes, jefe, there were ten of them as I suspected, and we got them all. We go after another team tonight.... There is one problem, jefe. The enemy fought well, and we took many casualties. I need more men for tonight’s mission. Sí, thank you, jefe. That will do nicely. Send the men to Riosucio, and have the leaders report to me this afternoon. I will brief them here. Oh? Yes, that will be excellent. We’ll be waiting for you.”

  With luck, Cortez thought, the next American team would fight equally as well. With luck he could eliminate two-thirds of the Cartel’s stable of gunmen in a single week. Along with their bosses, also tonight. He was on the downslope now, Cortez thought. He’d gambled dangerously and hard, but the tricky ones were behind him.

  It was an early funeral. Greer had been a widower, and estranged from his wife long before that. The reason for the estrangement was next to the rectangular hole in Arlington, the simple white headstone of First Lieutenant Robert White Greer, USMC, his only son, who’d graduated from the Naval Academy and gone to Vietnam to die. Neither Moore nor Ritter had ever met the young man, and James had never kept a photo of him around the office. The former DDI had been a sentimental man but never a maudlin one. Yet he had long ago requested burial next to the grave of his son, and because of his rank and station an exception had been made and the place kept available for an event that for all men was as inevitable as it was untimely. He’d indeed been a sentimental man, but only in ways that mattered. Ritter thought that there were many explanations before his eyes. The way James had adopted several bright young people and brought them into the Agency, the interest he’d taken in their careers, the training and consideration he’d given them.

  It was a small, quiet ceremony. James’ few close friends were there, along with a much larger number of people from the government. Among the latter were the President—and, much to Bob Ritter’s rage, Vice Admiral James A. Cutter, Jr. The President himself had spoken at the chapel service, noting the death of a man who had served his country continuously for more than fifty years, having enlisted in the U.S. Navy at seventeen, then entered the Academy, then reached two-star rank, achieving a third star for his flag after assuming his position at CIA. “A standard of professionalism, integrity, and devotion to his country that few have equaled and none have excelled” was how the President summarized the career Vice Admiral James Greer.

  And that bastard Cutter sat right there in the front row as he said it, too, Ritter told himself. He found it especially sickening as he watched the honor guard from the 3rd Infantry Regiment fold the flag that had been draped over the casket. There was no one to hand it to. Ritter had expected it to go to—

  But where was Ryan? He moved his head, trying to look around. He hadn’t noticed before because Jack hadn’t come from Langley with the rest of the CIA delegation. The flag went to Judge Moore by default. Hands were shaken, words exchanged. Yes, it really was a mercy that he’d gone so rapidly at the end. Yes, men like this didn’t appear every day. Yes, this was the end of the Greer line, and that was too bad, wasn’t it? No, I never met his son, but I heard.... Ritter and Moore were in the Agency Cadillac ten minutes later, heading back up the George Washington Parkway.

  “Where the hell was Ryan?” the DCI asked.

  “I don’t know. I figured he’d drive himself in.”

  Moore was not so much angered as upset by the impropriety. He still had the flag in his lap, holding it as gently as a newborn baby without knowing why—until he realized that if there really was a God, as the Baptist preachers of his youth had assured him, and if James had really had a soul, he held its best legacy in his hands. It felt warm to the touch, and though he knew that it was merely his imagination or at most the residual heat absorbed from the morning sun, the energy radiating from the flag that James had served from his teens seemed to accuse him of treachery. They had just watched a funeral this morning, but two thousand miles away there were other people whom the Agency had sent to do a job and who would not receive even the empt
y reward of a grave amidst others of their kind.

  “Bob, what the hell have we done?” Moore asked. “How did we ever get into this?”

  “I don’t know, Arthur. I just don’t know.”

  “James really was lucky,” the Director of Central Intelligence murmured. “At least he went out—”

  “With a clear conscience?” Ritter looked out the window, unable to bring himself to face his boss. “Look, Arthur—” He stopped, not knowing what to say next. Ritter had been with the Agency since the fifties, had worked as a case officer, a supervisor, station chief, then head of section at Langley. He had lost case officers, had lost agents, but he’d never betrayed them. There was a first time for everything, he told himself. It had just come home to him in a very immediate way, however, that for every man there was also a first time for death, and that to meet that final accounting improperly was the ultimate cowardice, the ultimate failure of life. But what else could they do?

  It was a short drive to Langley, and the car stopped before that question could be answered. They rode the elevator up. Moore walked to his office. Ritter walked to his. The secretaries hadn’t returned yet. They were in a van. Ritter paced around his office until they arrived, then walked over to see Mrs. Cummings.

  “Did Ryan call in or anything?”

  “No, and I didn’t see him at all. Do you know where he is?” Nancy asked.

  “Sorry, I don’t.” Ritter walked back and on impulse called Ryan’s home, where all he got was an answering machine. He checked his card file for Cathy’s work number and got past the secretary to her.

  “This is Bob Ritter. I need to know where Jack is.”

  “I don’t know,” Dr. Caroline Ryan replied guardedly. “He told me yesterday that he had to go out of town. He didn’t say where.”

  A chill went across Ritter’s face. “Cathy, I have to know. This is very important—I can’t tell you how important. Please trust me. I have to know where he is.”

  “I don’t know. You mean you don’t, either?” There was alarm in her voice.

  Ryan knows, Ritter realized.

  “Look, Cathy, I’ll track him down. Don’t worry or anything, okay?” The effort to calm her down was wasted, but Ritter hung up as soon as he could. The DDO walked to Judge Moore’s office. The flag was centered on the DCI’s desk, still folded into its triangular section, called a cocked-hat. Judge Arthur Moore, Director of Central Intelligence, was sitting quietly, staring at it.

  “Jack’s gone. His wife says she doesn’t know where. He knows, Arthur. He knows and he’s off doing something.”

  “How could he have found out?”

  “How the hell should I know?” Ritter thought for a moment, then waved at his boss. “Come on.”

  They walked into Ryan’s office. Ritter opened the panel for Jack’s wall safe and dialed in the proper combination, and nothing happened other than the fact that the warning light went on over the dial.

  “Damn,” Ritter said. “I thought that was it.”

  “James’s combination?”

  “Yeah. You know how he was, never did like the damned things, and he probably ...” Ritter looked around. He got it on the third try, pulling out the writing panel from the desk, and there it was.

  “I thought I did dial the right one.” He turned and tried again. This time the light was accompanied by the goddamned beeper. Ritter turned back and checked the number again. There was some more writing on the sheet. Ritter pulled the panel farther out.

  “Oh, my God.”

  Moore nodded and walked to the door. “Nancy, tell security that it’s us trying to work the safe. Looks like Jack changed the combination without telling us like he was supposed to.” The DCI closed the door and turned back.

  “He knows, Arthur.”

  “Maybe. How do we check it out?”

  A minute later they were in Ritter’s office. He’d shredded all of his documents, but not his memory. You didn’t forget the name of someone with the Medal of Honor. Then it was just a matter of flipping open his AUTOVON phone directory and calling the 1st Special Operations Wing at Eglin AFB.

  “I need to talk to Colonel Paul Johns,” Ritter told the sergeant who’d picked up the phone.

  “Colonel Johns is off TDY somewhere, sir. I don’t know where.”

  “Who does?”

  “The wing operations officer might, sir. This is a nonsecure line, sir,” the sergeant reminded him.

  “Give me his number.” The sergeant did so, and Ritter’s next call went out on, and to, a secure line.

  “I need to find Colonel Johns,” Ritter said after identifying himself.

  “Sir, I have orders not to give that information out to anybody. That means nobody, sir.”

  “Major, if he’s down in Panama again, I need to know it. His life may depend on it. Something is happening that he needs to know about.”

  “Sir, I have orders—”

  “Stuff your orders, sonny. If you don’t tell me, and that flight crew dies, it will be your fault! Now you make the call, Major, yes or no?”

  The officer had never seen combat, and life-death decisions were theoretical matters to him—or had been until now.

  “Sir, they’re back where they were before. Same place, same crew. That’s as far as I go, sir.”

  “Thank you, Major. You did the right thing. You really did. Now I suggest that you make written note of this call and its content.” Ritter hung up. The phone had been on speaker.

  “Has to be Ryan,” the DCI agreed. “Now what do we do?”

  “You tell me, Arthur.”

  “How many more people are we going to kill, Bob?” Moore asked. His greatest fear now was of mirrors, looking into them and seeing something less than the image he wanted to be there.

  “You do understand the consequences?”

  “Fuck the consequences,” snorted the former chief judge of the Texas Court of Appeals.

  Ritter nodded and punched a button on his phone. When he spoke, it was in his accustomed, decisive voice of command. “I need everything CAPER has developed in the last two days.” Another button. “I want chief of Station Panama to call me in thirty minutes. Tell him to clear decks for the day—he’s going to be busy.” Ritter replaced the phone receiver in its cradle. They’d have to wait for a few minutes, but it wasn’t the sort of occasion to wait in silence.

  “Thank God,” Ritter said after a moment.

  Moore smiled for the first time this day. “Me, too, Robert. Nice to be a man again, isn’t it?”

  The security police brought him in at gunpoint, the man in the tan suit. He said his name was Luna, and the briefcase he carried had already been searched for weapons. Clark recognized him.

  “What the hell are you doing here, Tony?”

  “Who’s this?” Ryan asked.

  “Station chief for Panama,” Clark answered. “Tony, I hope you have a very good reason.”

  “I have a telex for Dr. Ryan from Judge Moore.”

  “What?”

  Clark took Luna’s arm and guided him into the office. He didn’t have much time. He and Larson were to take off within minutes.

  “This better not be some fucking joke,” Clark announced.

  “Hey, I’m delivering the mail, okay?” Luna said. “Now stop playing the macho game. I’m the spic here, remember?” He handed Jack the first sheet.

  TOP SECRET—EYES ONLY DDI

  IMPOSSIBLE TO REESTABLISH UPLINK TO SHOWBOAT TEAMS. TAKE WHATEVER ACTION YOU DEEM APPROPRIATE TO RETRIEVE ASSETS IN COUNTRY. TELL CLARK TO BE CAREFUL. THE ENCLOSED MIGHT BE OF HELP. C DOESN’T KNOW. GOOD LUCK. M/R.

  “Nobody ever said they were stupid,” Jack breathed as he handed the sheet to Clark. The heading was meant as a separate message in and of itself, one that had nothing to do with distribution or security. “But does this mean what I think it does?”

  “One less REMF to worry about. Make that two,” Clark observed. He started flipping through the faxes. “Holy shit!” He se
t the pile down on the desk and paced a bit, staring out of the windows at the aircraft sitting in the hangar. “Okay,” he said to himself. Clark had never been one to dally over making plans. He spoke to Ryan for several minutes. Then, to Larson: “Let’s move ass, kid. We got a job to do.”

  “Spare radios?” Colonel Johns asked him as he left.

  “Two spares, new batteries in all of ’em, and extra batteries,” Clark replied.

  “Nice to work with somebody’s been around the block,” PJ said. “Check-six, Mr. Clark.”

  “Always, Colonel Johns,” Clark said as he headed to the door. “See you in a few hours.”

  The hangar doors opened. A small cart pulled the Beechcraft out into the sun, and the hangar doors closed. Ryan listened to the engines start up, and the sound diminished as the aircraft taxied away.

  “What about us?” he asked Colonel Johns.

  Captain Frances Montaigne came in. She looked as French as her ancestry, short, with raven-black hair. Not especially pretty, but Ryan’s first impression was that she was a handful in bed—which stopped his thought processes cold as he wondered why that had occurred to him. It seemed odder still that she was a command pilot in a special-ops outfit.

  “Weather’s going dogshit on us, Colonel,” she announced at once. “Adele is heading west again, doing twenty-five knots.”

  “Can’t help the weather. Getting down and doing the snatch oughtn’t to be too bad.”

  “Getting back might be kinda exciting, PJ,” Montaigne observed darkly.

  “One thing at a time, Francie. And we do have that alternate place to land.”

  “Colonel, even you aren’t that crazy.”

  PJ turned to Ryan and shook his head. “Junior officers aren’t what they used to be.”

  They stayed over water for most of the way down. Larson was as steady and confident as ever at the controls, but his eyes kept turning northeast. There was no mistaking it, the high, thin clouds that were the perennial harbinger of an approaching hurricane. Behind them was Adele, and she had already made another chapter in history. Born off the Cape Verdes, she’d streaked across the Atlantic at an average speed of seventeen knots, then stopped as soon as she’d entered the eastern Caribbean, lost power, gained it back, jinked north, west, even east once. There hadn’t been one this crazy since Joan, years before. Small as hurricanes went, and nowhere near the brutal power of a Camille, Adele was still a dangerous storm with seventy-five-knot winds. The only people who flew near tropical cyclones were dedicated hurricane-hunter aircraft flown by people for whom merely mortal danger was boring. It was not a place for a twin-engine Beechcraft, even with Chuck Yeager at the controls. Larson was already making plans. In case the mission didn’t go right, or the storm changed course yet again, he started picking fields to put down on, to refuel and head southeast around the gray maelstrom that was marching toward them. The air was smooth and still, deceptively so. The pilot wondered how many hours until it changed to something very different. And that was only one of the dangers he’d face.