Joshua`s Hammer (59 page)

"I know you can't. But listen to me."

"I'm listening."

"Come back to me, Kirk. Bring Elizabeth with you. Just come back."

"Promise," he said.

M/V Margo West of Los Angeles

Green came onto the bridge out of breath as if he had run up the stairs from the engine room two at a time. He was a mess, Bahmad saw, his eyes were bloodshot, he had a serious five o'clock shadow, his uniform was dirty with blood or oil stains and his complexion was sallow. But the navigation he'd worked out that would take them north to the Farallon Islands where they would turn east into the Golden Gate was already entered into the autopilot. If they did not touch the controls the Margo would sail on her own into San Francisco Bay.

"Something's happening with one of the engines," Green said.

Bahmad had been dozing in a chair he'd brought from the captain's cabin. The afternoon sun slanted at a low angle through the bridge windows. For as far as the eye could see the electric-blue ocean and pale blue sky were clear of all traffic. Only a high contrail marked the passage of a Hawaii-bound jet.

"What's the problem?" Bahmad asked languidly.

"There's some kind of a vibration in the shaft bearings. They're starting to heat up. Lazlo traced it to the port engine. The gearbox may be frying itself. He wants to shut down the engine and take the cover off the heat exchanger."

"What will that do to our speed?"

"It'll cut it in half unless we push the starboard engine. But if we do that we could end up a shit creek. Both engines could go down."

"Is Schumatz an engineer?"

"You don't have to be a fucking engineer to read a temperature gauge."

"For all he knows the temperature of the gearbox could be well within normal operating limits--"

"The dial is marked red."

"And the mechanism could run for a week, perhaps cross an ocean before it had to be tended to. But we need less than twenty-four hours."

"I'm not going to get stuck out here with a locker full of dead men. I say we take the helicopter and the three of us fly to Los Angeles."

"We need to get to San Francisco."

"The ship will make it on its own. It's even programmed to make the turn at the Farallon buoy."

"But you said the port engine might not make it."

"So we won't be on schedule. I don't give a shit, do you understand, you fucking wog?"

Bahmad suppressed an evil grin. People were so easy. "Why didn't Schumatz come up here and tell me himself? Or pick up the ship's phone and call me?"

"How the hell should I know? Why don't you go down there and ask him yourself?"

"I think I'll do just that," Bahmad said. He got up, turned slightly as if he was heading for the door, pulled his pistol, thumbed the safety catch off and turned and shot Green in the forehead at a range of less than five feet.

The first officer's head snapped back, his arms shot out and he was flung to the deck, killed instantly. Bahmad cocked an ear to listen to the sounds of the ship now that Green had stopped complaining. They were still making fifteen knots, which would put them in the Golden Gate around ten in the morning, two hours before the runners were expected to be on the bridge. Everything was going as planned.

He stuck the Glock 17 in his belt and headed down to the engine room. From what he personally knew about the Sulzer diesel engines there was nothing to worry about. As long as they had sufficient fuel and air they would run practically forever. It would take a catastrophe to stop them. Such as something a motivated man might do.

His step lightened. First he would take care of Schumatz, then he would get something to eat and finally get a few hours' sleep. The radar's proximity alarm would warn him of any impending obstacles in their path. He needed to be alert. Tomorrow promised to be a long, interesting day.

Golden Gate Bridge

It was ten o'clock already and the lights of the city were on. Traffic on the bridge was heavy, made more difficult for the motorists because a half-dozen highway patrol cars blocked one lane for fifty yards at the crown of the span. McGarvey stood at the rail. He'd had a hell of a time convincing Dick Yemm to stay behind, but he had more freedom of movement without a bodyguard. He'd already managed to check out the security arrangements at the park and on the bridge, though he'd missed Liz who'd gone with the President's daughter to a welcoming ceremony in the Olympic Village.

More than three hundred city, state and federal law enforcement officers aided by Golden Gate Transit people were searching the bridge as unobtrusively as possible. But passing drivers couldn't help but notice so they slowed down to gawk, which further snarled traffic.

An unmarked Chevy van with federal government plates came up and stopped in the far right-hand lane behind a GOT maintenance truck. Jay Villiard got out and came over.

"How does it look?"

"Hello, Jay." McGarvey said. They shook hands. "If you can't search the city you might as well search the bridge."

"That's what we figured." He bummed a cigarette from McGarvey. "Lousy habit. Maybe I'll give them up again next week." "How'd you do it last time?" McGarvey asked. He was ready to pull the pin himself, mostly because Kathleen had taken up smoking because of him, and he hated to see her with a cigarette in her hand. "Cold turkey. It's the only way. Tried and true," Villiard answered. "Why is it that I don't think you brought good news with you. God only knows we need some, because we haven't turned up a thing."

"We thought we had a pretty good lead in New York," McGarvey said, and he briefly explained what had happened. "We're back to square one, right here."

"The President won't quit."

"I know, I've tried, and so has Murphy."

"Bin Laden won't quit either," Villiard said glumly. They leaned against the rail watching the night deepen. "I met your daughter; pretty sharp kid. My people are already in love with her."

"That's nice to hear."

"Are you pulling her out?" Villiard asked.

A genuine pain stabbed at McGarvey's heart. "No," he said. "She wouldn't go if I ordered her out anyway." He turned to face Villiard. "You have kids, Jay. Do they always listen to you?"

Villiard laughed. "I have a fourteen-year-old daughter who hasn't listened to me since she was ten. I was trying to tell her something, you know, something to help. Anyway, when I was all done she put a hand on her hip, raised an eyebrow, and said: "Obviously." " Villiard laughed again. "I told my wife that maybe we should just kill her and make a new one."

McGarvey had to smile. He knew the feeling. He flipped his cigarette over the rail, then looked up at the towers soaring high overhead, the cable bundles tracing perfect arches. "If I were going to do it, this would be the place."

Villiard followed his gaze. "It'd be a triple play if he could take out the President, the President's daughter, and the bridge. Not to mention your daughter and a couple of thousand runners and spectators." He paused. "There won't be a non secure aircraft of any type within five miles, or a boat we don't know about within three miles. No cars, trucks or buses. Nobody on foot with any kind of a package bigger than a purse. Every television van will be assigned a cop. We've searched the bridge and everything around it three times and we'll do it twice more before the race tomorrow. We'll have sharpshooters in the towers, Coast Guard helicopters overhead, Coast Guard cutters in the water on both sides of the bridge, and even though you're not supposed to be able to launch this thing on a missile, we'll have men watching every place from where a missile could be launched." He shook his head. "Goddamnit, we've got it covered. Just like in the textbooks. Just like every time before. Tried and true. It works. But I'm real scared."

"It'd have to be pretty close to take the bridge out," McGarvey said.

"A plane right overhead or a boat under the span, we've got them covered."

"Someplace on the bridge."

"We've searched every square inch of it from both ends and top to bottom."

"How about inside the concrete?" McGarvey asked. "Have there been any repairs in the past six or eight weeks? New concrete poured on the roadways, maybe in the piers? Someplace the bomb could be buried?"

A startled expression crossed Villiard's face. "I never thought of that," he said softly. He was the expert and he'd been caught flat footed It showed in his eyes. "I'll get on it right now." He started to go, but McGarvey stopped him.

"Better put some divers in the water around the base of the towers too. Bin Laden's chief of staff is an inventive bastard."

Villiard nodded tightly. "Anything else?"

"Not for now."

"I'm going to get my people together. We're going to rethink this thing from the get-go."

"It's not the stuff that we think of that gets me worried," McGarvey said.

"Yeah," Villiard replied. "It's the shit that we don't think about." He studied McGarvey's face. "Where you going to be?"

"Around."

"Sleep?"

"Later."

"I know what you mean," the Secret Service agent said, and he left.

It was going to be a long night, McGarvey thought, pulling out another cigarette. He felt battered. He was still on eastern time, so for him it was after two in the morning. Time to sleep. Perchance to dream? It was exactly what he was afraid of, because lately in his dreams he was seeing Sarah bin Laden's bloody body lying in a field of flowers like in the Wizard of Oz. His daughter and the President's daughter were running up the hill toward her when there was a bright flash over the Emerald City and they were torn apart just when they thought that they were home safe.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

M/V Margo Southwest of the Farallon Islands

On the bridge the radar proximity alarm sounded. Bahmad who had been listening to the police, harbor control and Coast Guard frequencies in the chart room came out to see what was ahead of them. The sky to the east was getting light with the dawn. They were still far enough off shore that he could not pick up the coast line, though he could see the smudge of the distant mountains inland. The radar was painting a very large object within the thirty-five mile ring directly ahead. It was the high rock face of one of the Farallon Islands. He checked his watch. They were right on time.

According to the ship's SOP manuals, a Notice to Mariners they'd received yesterday and the radio chatter he'd listened to most of the night, he'd been presented with an apparently insoluble problem. No shipping was to be allowed anywhere near the bridge while the runners were crossing. The separation zone was a minimum of three miles. Ships coming in early were to drop anchor in the holding basin to the west of the center span and wait for the all clear. But then, about an hour ago, the solution presented itself all at once in a neat and tidy package, as these things usually did.

As soon as the Margo cleared the Farallons and made the pre-programmed turn to starboard that would bring them to the holding basin in the Golden Gate, he was supposed to call for a harbor pilot who would be brought out on a pilot boat. It could not have been better. In effect the stupid bastards were going to do his job for him.

His step was light and he whistled a little tune as he went to prepare Joshua's Hammer for the final countdown.

Candlestick Park

McGarvey sat in the stadium a third of the way up at-the fifty-yard line sipping a cup of coffee trying to get rid of a blinding headache. He'd accomplished nothing of any value overnight, and he was frustrated with himself. He was missing something, they all were. But he couldn't put his finger on it. He'd called Rencke twice during the night, but both he and Adkins were coming up empty handed.

"We've still got time, ya know," Rencke said. "It's turning purple."

"What's that mean?"

"I don't know yet," Rencke cried in anguish. "Maybe you should get Liz outta there, ya know. Something."

"Take it easy. We're doing this one step at a time. We've got it covered at this end. All we need now is one thing, how the bomb got here."

"I'm on it, Mac. Holy shit, I swear to God, I'm on it--" Rencke broke the connection, leaving McGarvey very worried about him. He thought about having Adkins pull him out, but that would be even harder on Rencke than leaving him where he was.

The stadium was coming alive with the dawn. A portable stage had been set up in midfield for the opening ceremonies set to start at 11:30 a.m. President Haynes, California Governor Thomas and the International Special Olympics director Octavo Aguilar along with a number of local officials and politicians would officially welcome the athletes and declare that the games were open. The presidential motorcade would lead the half-marathon runners out of the park at noon. And from that point for the next ten days there would be more Secret Service and police activities here than at any other place or time in U.S. history.

Grounds crews were busy making sure everything was set up the way it should be and that the field was in good shape. Workmen were putting the final touches on the stage, and technicians were testing the sound and lighting systems. Some of the coaches and athletes were already starting to drift into the stadium for their workouts, and the news media were busy setting up their equipment. There was an air of nervousness among just about everyone except the athletes. Something was going on. Everybody knew it because of the increased security. The President was here, but nobody had ever seen such stringent measures. It was as if the entire world had suddenly gone nuts.

No one was saying anything out loud about the precautions, but it was clear that bin Laden was on everybody's minds.

"Hi, Daddy," Elizabeth said, dropping into the seat next to him.

McGarvey looked up and gave his daughter a smile. He was glad to see her. " "Morning, Liz. Did you get any sleep?"

"Not much," she said. Her eyes were red, but she looked bright. She was dressed in sweats with a dark blue ISO warmup jacket and cap. "I stayed in the dorm with Deb last night, and those kids are wired. Most of them didn't get to sleep until a couple hours ago." She gave her father a critical look. "How about you? Are you okay?"