The Cabal (46 page)

The main computer on the desk was in standby mode, but Whittaker’s Toshiba laptop on the credenza was closed. Adkins sat down, opened the laptop, and powered it up. As he’d suspected it was password protected. Whittaker wasn’t a complete idiot.

Using his cell phone he called the number McGarvey had given him, and Otto answered after the second ring.

“Oh, wow, I know where David is right now, so this has gotta be Dick Adkins calling from the DCI’s office.”

The man was a genius, but he was spooky. “Mac told me to call if I ran into trouble getting into David’s laptop.”

“Did it boot up?”

“No. All that’s on the screen are two boxes: User ID and password.”

“It’s a Toshiba, right?”

“Yes.”

“Look on the bottom and give me all the numbers you see.”

Adkins turned the laptop over. “There’s a bunch of them.”

“Find the Toshiba pin number. It’ll be printed right under a bar code.”

“Got it,” Adkins said and he read it.

Otto laughed. “I built that machine. Okay now find any label that says service.”

“There’s only one. Two sets of numbers.”

Otto laughed even harder. “Dumb,” he said, and he read off both set of numbers.

“That’s it,” Adkins said.

“My service numbers. He hasn’t changed a thing.”

“Mac said he’s been distracted.”

“He’s going to get even more distracted any minute now,” Otto said. “User ID, whittakercia. Password: tk%//7834ps.”

Adkins entered both, and the computer booted up. “Okay, it worked.”

“Of course,” Otto said. “If Mac gave you this number he must have given you my e-mail address. Get online, type in my address, and hit send, and then get out of there. But leave the machine turned on.”

“First thing in the morning somebody—his secretary at least—will come in here and find out someone hacked his computer.”

“It’ll be all over by then, Mr. Director, and you’ll have a bunch of work to do, ’cause the president is going to reinstate you. Honest injun.”

“Jesus,” Adkins muttered, but he did as Otto had asked.

“Good work. I’m in. Now beat feet.”

By the time Adkins shut off the desk lamp and opened the curtains every file on Whittaker’s laptop was being downloaded at lightning speed.

He let himself out into the still-deserted corridor, and hesitated for just a second before he headed down the hall to the Watch, which was housed in a long room, one end of it glassed in for added security. Manned 24/7 by a watch commander and five people, including a National Geospatial Analyst, anything that was happening anywhere in the world that had any effect or even the possibility of an effect on U.S. interests was monitored here. With direct links to the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, and just about every other surveillance system, the people who worked here considered themselves to be information junkies. They had an almost compulsive need to know what was happening on a real-time basis everywhere.

And like air traffic controllers who never saw the light of day during their long shifts, and who had the indoor palor and thousand-yard stare of people who’d worked too long and too hard at something that was nearly impossible to comprehend, analysts in the Watch always looked as if they were on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and loving it.

Adkins swiped his pass on the reader, entered his code, and the lock clicked softly. Everyone looked up from what they were doing, and all the wide-screen monitors on the walls above each position went blank, and a red light on the ceiling began flashing.

Ron Loring, the watch commander had been leaning against his desk, his jacket off, his tie loose, and he immediately came over before Adkins could take more than two steps into the room. “What are you doing here, Mr. Director,” he said softly, but urgently. “You have to leave, immediately.”

“McGarvey sent me to talk to you. It’s important.”

Loring shook his head and stepped back. “I’ve got to call security. You know the drill, sir.”

“Something big is about to go down. Maybe even tonight. And it has something to do with the Chinese.”

A flicker of interest crossed Loring’s eyes. “What are you talking about?”

“I don’t know for sure, but Mac has made a connection between what happened last year in Mexico City, and a few months ago in Pyongyang, with China. And with the Friday Club here in Washington.”

Loring turned away for a second. All his analysts were looking at him and Adkins. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr. Director. But I’ll give you a head start before I call security.”

“You know damned well what I’m talking about. Goddamnit, I can see it all over your face. What is it? What’s happening over there?”

Again Loring shook his head, trying to come to a decision. “You never heard this from me. But we’re getting set to send a courier over to the White House.”

“Why?”

“China has been warming up its short-range missiles since about sixteen hundred zulu.” Loring looked up at one of the wall clocks. “Almost two hours ago. Then, at about seventeen thirty, Taiwan started doing the same thing with their missiles, and placed their armed forces at Defcon two.”

“They’re seriously expecting that China is going to attack them?”

“It’s a possibility. We’re starting to get inputs from the Pentagon and State and we’re putting the package together for the president.”

“What’s Dave Whittaker’s input?”

“We haven’t reached him yet. Apparently he’s not at home, and his cell doesn’t pick up.”

“Christ.”

“Now get the hell out of here, please,” Loring said. “We need to get back to work.”

“Right,” Adkins said, and he felt a little sick to his stomach.

“Tell Mac good luck,” Loring said.

“Security wants to know what’s going on up here,” one of the analysts called out across the room.

“Use the VIP elevator, I’ll stall them for as long as I can,” Loring told Adkins.

Sergant Schilling came to the living room door at the same moment Whittaker was trying to reach his pilot by cell phone. It had to have been McGarvey’s doing, sending the helicopter away. But Cardillo was one of them, ferrying members of the Friday Club with no questions asked.

“The two cameras in front went down, and the lights are going out one at a time,” Schilling said.

“Something wrong with the power?” Foster asked.

Cardillo’s cell phone rang.

“I believe Mr. McGarvey shot out the cameras and is doing the same with the lights.”

“He’s right outside the house, then.”

“Yes, sir. But the only way in is through the front door, which I’ll cover.”

Cardillo’s cell phone rang a second time.

“Let Boberg know what’s going on.”

Cardillo’s phone was answered on the third ring. “Yes.”

“Why the hell did you leave?” Whittaker shouted, but all of a sudden he realized that he wasn’t hearing the helicopter’s cabin noises.

“Because I didn’t want you to get away before I had a chance to talk to you and Foster,” McGarvey said.

Whittaker was shaken, but not surprised. “The FBI is on its way out here in force,” he said. Foster and Schilling were staring at him.

“Not yet, David,” McGarvey said after a slight delay. “We’re monitoring calls from the house, including your cell phone.”

Whittaker held his hand over the cell phone microphone. “It’s McGarvey on my pilot’s cell phone. Can he get inside the house?”

“Only with explosives,” Schilling said.

“Unless you brought some Semtex you’re not getting in here.”

“I saw the bars on the window,” McGarvey said. “Makes you wonder what Foster is trying to protect. But I don’t need to blow my way inside, because you and Foster are going to let me in.”

“The hell you say.”

“We deciphered a flash drive that Remington gave to us before he was gunned down by his own people. It’s a Friday Club membership list. Impressive.”

“You’ve got nothing, you son of a bitch. You’re a traitor to your country.”

“We have the information on your laptop. Stupid to leave it in your office for just about anyone to grab. Otto told me that he built the machine, and he knew your user ID and password. Whittakercia? Come on, David.”

Schilling had stepped out into the stair hall, and he came back. “Boberg is on the way. Keep McGarvey talking.”

“All you have are the names of a number of American patriots who love their country enough to form a club, just like Kiwanis or Rotary.”

“Except Rotary wasn’t involved in Mexico last year or in Pyongyang a few months ago. Rotary hasn’t involved the Chinese in some kind of plot.”

“You’re talking nonsense,” Whittaker practically shouted, but he was rocked to the core. He knew what McGarvey was capable of. He had tried to warn Foster and the others, but none of them would listen, and now it was too late, unless McGarvey could be killed.

“There never was any polonium in Mexico, and none ever came across the border in Arizona. And we know that the shooters who took out the Chinese general in Pyongyang were South Koreans working for a Russian expediter in Tokyo who’d been hired by Howard McCann. And Howard was getting money from your club of patriots.”

Schilling switched off the living room lights and those in the stair hall. He was armed with a Franchi SPAS-12 automatic shotgun capable of firing four rounds per second. It was a devastating weapon at close range. “Stay in this room,” he said, and he disappeared into the darkness in the stair hall.

“Even if what you’re telling me was only partially true, it still proves nothing. How do we know this flash drive you mentioned was Remington’s?”

“I think Otto could make a case for it,” McGarvey said. “The only thing we haven’t figured out yet is what you people are really up to. Whatever it is involves the Chinese, of course. But to what purpose?”

Whittaker said nothing.

“So here’s what we’re going to do. If Mr. Boberg manages to kill me in the next few minutes, you will have won. But if I survive, I’m coming inside and you and I and Foster will have our little chat. Fair enough?”

Whittaker broke the connection. “He wants us to let him in so he can ask us about China.”

Foster was unfazed. “Fine.”

“Don’t be a fool,” Whittaker said, and he speed-dialed the CIA’s on-duty security officer, and he didn’t give a damn if McGarvey’s freak friend Otto Rencke was somehow monitoring his call.

The number didn’t answer until the fourth ring. “Security, Donald Briggs.”

“This is David Whittaker. I want someone to go up to my office right now, and check my computers.”

“Somone’s already on the way up, sir.”

“Why? What’s happening?”

“I’m not sure, Mr. Director. But one of the watch officers called and said there might be a security issue.”

“What sort of an issue?”

“Unknown.”

“I’ll hold,” Whittaker said, but then he knew what the issue was, and he knew that it had been his own sloppiness that made it possible. “Have there been any visitors to the building tonight. Within the past half hour or so?”

“Other than Mr. Adkins, I don’t know. But his passes were all still valid. I’ll have to check the log at the Reception Center.”

“Is Adkins still in the building?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

“Well, find out, you idiot! And if he’s still there, arrest him!”

“I’m on it, sir.”

Whittaker broke the connection. “Dick Adkins was in my office and it’s unlikely, but possible, he managed to get into my private laptop.”

Foster nodded. “Anything that would hurt us?”

“Names, dates.”

“No manifesto, I would hope, David.”

“No.”

“Well then, I think it’s time we telephone our friends at the FBI and the Marshal’s office,” Foster said. “Let them know that Mr. McGarvey is here to assassinate me, and that you came to warn me, and protect me. With your life, if need be.”