The Watchmen (14 page)
“If the distribution is anything like you say it’ll leak to the media,” Cowley predicted wearily.
“It already has,” said the man. “It was a flash on the six A.M. radio and television news, right on top of what you’ve been doing all night out there in the Mall.”
“What about tracing them, through however it is they got into the Pentagon system?”
“Forget it,” advised the man. “The military will try, obviously. Got to. But guys this clever will have come in from another unsuspecting cuckoo’s nest. We’re in shit, Bill. And sinking.”
“I knew there was something wrong,” said Cowley, matching the cynicism. He said to Pamela: “The Watchmen?”
“Never heard of them,” said the woman.
There was a downside to every move they made. Switching the crisis venue to Pennsylvania Avenue because of its more guaranteed security was at once picked up by the vulture-hovering media as yet another example of the bureau’s reactive instead of proactive helplessness, but so overwhelming were the attacks that Cowley relegated them to the farthest edge of his consideration. At its forefront, while the conference was being organized, was the persistent nag that something had still been overlooked.
After suggesting the obvious additional people necessary that day, Cowley left the actual organization to the bureau director’s assistant and Pamela Darnley at her own computer to return alone to the still-sealed Mall.
Washington was virtually gridlocked by the closure of its very heart, so the only way to move was on foot. And that was like edging, with wincing nervousness, through a Super Bowl crowd so big it was virtually shoulder to shoulder by the time Cowley got to 14th Street. There was, fortunately, a barricade-free lane for official vehicles, which Cowley walked along after identifying himself at the police line. He was almost into the park before he was recognized by anyone in the crowd. At once his name began to be called and there were a lot of camera clicks and flashes. He ignored it all.
Nelson Tibbert and his team were still there, although there were some new armor-shielded men just going into the obelisk when Cowley reached the scanner.
Tibbert recognized him and said, “Your guys have gone, with all they want. This is our fourth sweep. It’s a bastard, trying to climb that high in this sort of gear. I’m sure there’s nothing on the stairway itself. We’re concentrating on the electrics, stuff like that.”
“You know what’s worrying me?” Cowley said, rhetorically. “Something going off when the elevator’s run, full of people: a charge big enough to bring the whole fucking monument down.”
“Ahead of you,” assured the team leader. “The elevator is the most obvious. After this final sweep I’m going to crank the doors open manually, go through the shaft and the cabins. Actually using electricity is the last thing I’m going to do, and then by remote control. Take the elevator up and down, an itty bit at a time, in the hope of localizing any explosion.”
Tibbert really did bear a remarkable resemblance to Jefferson Jones, thought Cowley. “How long?”
The man gestured uncertainly. “Couple of days from now. I ain’t in no hurry.”
“I don’t want you to be.” Looking at the solid mass of people lining every edge of the cordon he said, “If there is something in there the size of New Rochelle, those people going to be safe?”
“The monument’s marble. Hard. If there’s a blow it’ll most likely be brought down, but the force will be contained. Maybe make their ears ring a little. Could do some damage to the White House glass.”
A throwaway line to be taken seriously, recognized Cowley. “You got any kids?”
Tibbert frowned. “Four. Why?”
“Don’t want any more orphans.”
“Don’t plan for there to be any more.”
“You and me both,” said Cowley. He stood on the knoll upon which the monument was built, looking around again, guessing the faraway crowd had to be a thousand strong, maybe more. Where was it? Where the fuck, what the fuck, was it that had to be as obvious as the arrow-straight marble dart pointing up into the clear morning sky but which he couldn’t see, couldn’t realize?
He accepted the offered ride from the crew of the police car on the perimeter, forcing himself into a gossiping conversation about bastard lunatics and agreeing it was good New York State had reintroduced the death penalty for crimes like New Rochelle and promising to take care when he got out at the J. Edgar Hoover building. He felt the sweep of dizziness as he walked into the enclosed forecourt dominated by the inscription of the bureau’s credo. He grabbed the wall and covered the stumble by feigning problems with a shoe, lifting and easing his foot experimentally. The moment passed almost immediately, and he continued on to more glad-handing in the foyer.
Pamela was already in the conference room, waiting. He said at once, “Who are the Watchmen?”
She shook her head. “Not listed in any of our records. Got a help call out. What about you?”
“Our guys got all they wanted inside the monument apparently.”
“The director’s asked forensic to attend if they’ve got anything this soon.”
“Who else, additionally?”
“Poulson, the parks guy who was in the truck with us. A general from the Pentagon with one of their computer guys. Some people, I don’t know who or how many, from D.C. police. Al Hinton, our public affairs guy. That’s all I know.”
“Anything from Moscow?”
She shook her head.
“We’re missing something, Pam. I know we are.”
“What you’re missing is the night’s sleep you never got and the week extra you should have stayed in hospital.” She paused, deciding not to let it go. “I called you because you’re the case officer, not to come to the scene. That wasn’t part of the deal.”
“Couldn’t sleep after I woke up.”
The rib strapping made it difficult for Cowley to lean forward sufficiently to wash his beard-rasped face over the toilet washbasin. He did so frowning at his own reflection in the mirror. He
did
look like shit on a plate. Worse. He’d always had a heavy beard, and the unshaven growth made a black-and-white comparison against his deathly pallor. His eyes were sunk into his head and black rimmed, and the clothes he’d hurriedly grabbed—a sweatshirt and jeans—hung on him, sweat-wrinkled and baggy. Two cups of cafeteria coffee didn’t give him the lift he’d hoped for, but they made swallowing the Tylenol easier.
did
look like shit on a plate. Worse. He’d always had a heavy beard, and the unshaven growth made a black-and-white comparison against his deathly pallor. His eyes were sunk into his head and black rimmed, and the clothes he’d hurriedly grabbed—a sweatshirt and jeans—hung on him, sweat-wrinkled and baggy. Two cups of cafeteria coffee didn’t give him the lift he’d hoped for, but they made swallowing the Tylenol easier.
The hastily arranged conference room—normally the biggest lecture hall in the building—was already filling. He was curious at what had been discovered forensically so quickly for Paul Lambert to be already there. The Pentagon general wore his uniform, complete with the name plate identifying himself as Sinclair J. Smith. There was a thin, nervous civilian with him. The bureau director’s assistant bustled around the table, seating everyone, putting Cowley and Pamela together. From the arrangement Cowley saw that on FBI territory Leonard Ross was assuming the chairmanship.
Pamela leaned close and said, “We stink.”
Cowley said, “That’s what all the papers say. You want to bat first?” She smelled and looked early-morning fresh, not like someone who’d been up all night.
She turned more fully toward him. “You feel all right?” A genuine offer of a place center stage or a curve she couldn’t see?
“You know as much about it as I do. I’ll pick up as we go along.” Cowley wanted to listen, hear what other people said, still searching for the trigger.
Leonard Ross was the last to enter, with the secretary of state and Frank Norton, the president’s chief of staff. Al Hinton, the fat and balding public affairs chief, was in attendance, shepherding the three men ahead of him. Cowley realized gratefully that today’s media coverage was limited to a press pool of one television and one still photographer and a solitary reporter. Cowley was conscious, too, of far less—in fact, scarcely none—posturing than before. The identification of Cowley was even quicker this time and the concentration on him just as immediate, but again he refused all questions beyond saying he’d recovered more than sufficiently to resume as case officer. As Hinton led the pool away, Norton said it was good to see him back and Cowley thanked him, conscious of the director’s frown.
Leonard Ross showed no surprise, though, when Pamela responded to the update request, which Cowley at once decided she did brilliantly. She smoothly took everyone through a selection of still photographs of the scene inside the monument, even itemizing the electrical circuits and boxes that the disposal team had initially cleared, but stressed that the examination was continuing.
“And we’ve drawn a total blank on any protest or radical group calling itself the Watchmen. We’ve already asked friendly services—England and Israel—to check. Nothing back yet.”
She looked invitingly at Cowley, who remained silent, although he was conscious of another frown from the director.
It was the president’s chief of staff who spoke. Frank Norton said, “You got anything to tell us about this computer intrusion, General?”
“Too soon,” said the soldier, who had a shaved marine haircut and a face that looked as if it had been carved from something very hard. He nodded to the civilian beside him. “Maybe you’d better hear from Carl.”
“I’m head of Pentagon computer security, Carl Ashton,” the man introduced himself uncomfortably. “We’ve got more than a thousand computers, terminals, and VDU stations, all at various levels of security, purpose, and program. If someone infects a system with a virus—the most common is one that replicates information until the file is totally filled, when it jams—then the problem’s obvious. But if someone gets in a back door simply to use our machines and our servers as a conduit—giving themselves their own entry code and password—it’ll take time to find them. It’s possible we never will.”
“Have I correctly heard what you’ve just said?” demanded Norton, spacing his words in incredulity. “A bunch of terrorists have gotten into the communications system of the military headquarters of the United States of America
actually to attack us,
and we’re not going to be able to find them! Is that what the Pentagon is going to tell the president and the people of this country?”
actually to attack us,
and we’re not going to be able to find them! Is that what the Pentagon is going to tell the president and the people of this country?”
“I think I should explain more fully—” tried Ashton.
“I really think you should,” cut in Henry Hartz. “I don’t like what I’m hearing at all, after last year. Neither will the American people.” Irritation made the secretary of state’s Germanic accent more pronounced.
Ashton’s color rose and his hands fluttered nervously over the table. “No computer system can be declared totally beyond intrusion. There’s always a back door, either left there by the installer for his personal gratification and amusement …” The man paused at the looks of fresh astonishment around the table. “Yes,” he insisted, “even at the level of people who install at the Pentagon. More so, even: At the highest level of computer expertise a universal arrogance exists: they’re Captain Kirks with their own
Enterprise
space ships, able to go where no man has gone before. There are websites—clubs—on the Internet where such people gather. Not physically or using their own names—pseudonyms by which one recognizes the other. Entry codes and passwords are swopped. All it would have needed in this case is for a disgruntled Pentagon employee to belong to such a club and the door’s open.”
Enterprise
space ships, able to go where no man has gone before. There are websites—clubs—on the Internet where such people gather. Not physically or using their own names—pseudonyms by which one recognizes the other. Entry codes and passwords are swopped. All it would have needed in this case is for a disgruntled Pentagon employee to belong to such a club and the door’s open.”
“There’s a check there!” interrupted the CIA’s John Butterworth. “We need a list—”
“Which we keep, of every Pentagon employee who is dismissed or who leaves in circumstances considered likely to create resentment.”
“This is absurd!” protested Butterworth. “Why don’t we hit these cockamamie clubs, round the bastards up?”
Ashton, embarrassed, looked sideways to the low-profile general, who shrugged. The computer security man said, “Sir, these aren’t places—buildings. They’re websites. They only exist in what you’ve heard described as cyberspace: They have no actuality. We don’t
know
where they are—how to access them. And if we did, we’d be committing a federal offense under the terms of the U.S. data protection legislation.”
know
where they are—how to access them. And if we did, we’d be committing a federal offense under the terms of the U.S. data protection legislation.”
Stunned silence spread throughout the room. The pragmatic Leonard Ross said, “So far you’ve told us what you
can’t
do. What
can
—are—you doing?”
can’t
do. What
can
—are—you doing?”
“I talked about various levels of security,” reminded Ashton. “At its lowest administrative level we’ve got a lot of terminals without either a hard or floppy disk. They’re VDUs operated from a central server. They’re the most likely to have been breached. Those are the servers we’re sweeping now: If our terrorists are there, we’ll find them. Find the intrusion, at least. But we’re assuming that these guys are good, professionals, if that’s an acceptable description. They won’t just have broken in and established their own little cave. They will have established their own burglar alarm when a trace is locked on them. They won’t have come straight into the Pentagon. There’ll be several cutouts in other systems—systems that might be on the far side of the world—and there will quite literally be a burglar alarm that might even ring a bell they can hear. And when they do—before we get close—they’ll close down. That’s what I meant by saying we’ll probably never find them, not from putting on tracers.”
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