Trinity's Child (55 page)

“So much for that,” Kazaklis said.

“Good God, man,” Moreau said, shaking her head in amazement, “is that how you racked up all those scores in the Boom-Boom Room?”

“Wel-l-l-l,” Kazaklis drawled, “in the Boom-Boom Room the four-inch gun helped.”

“Alice here.”

Sweat poured off the general, soaking through his clothing. He had steeled himself, the way a strong man does, for the ultimate moment. If the last-minute reprieve was a blessing, his bodily functions did not accept it. The tension release had been too sudden. All his systems seemed ready to fail now, almost as surely as they would have flooded in release with the snap-lock opening of a hangman's trapdoor. His hand shook, his breathing came in short gasps, his voice quavered, or so it seemed to him, and he was certain that was why he received no instant reply.

“Alice here,” the general repeated, a trifle louder, a touch more stridently. He had every excuse to feel paranoid, and fleetingly it occurred to him that he had been had.

“This is the President speaking,” a voice said. It was a familiar voice, with a resonance he had heard hundreds of times. Alice drew a deep breath, trying to pull his rebellious bodily functions back into harmony. He instantly fell back on his training. A familiar voice was not enough in his world.

“Day word?” Alice asked automatically.

“I don't think we have time for that, general,” the voice said.

Dammit! The unexpected response jarred Alice, steadying him as it also angered him. Now what the hell was going on? Anyone could fake a voice. The President of the United States would know better.

“Listen, pal,” Alice barked caustically into the phone, “we haven't had a President since Calvin Coolidge who would've tried that line of shit. I don't know what you are, but you give me the day word. Now. Or you'll find yourself alone in a phone booth.”

Alice heard a slight, appreciative—and familiar—chuckle. “Day word's Cottonmouth, general,” the voice said. “The command word's Trinity, and the action word's Jericho, bless our tumbling walls. Now you'll ask for the authenticator codes, right?”

“Bet your ass, buddy,” Alice said, fingering the small card in front of him.

“I don't have my authenticator card, Alice. It's lost and you either trust me or more than Jericho's walls will come tumbling down.”

Alice sagged. “Without that card, you're a phony,” he said wearily. “I don't know who you are.”

“So what do we do now, general? Check my baseball averages? Play the old Brooklyn Dodgers game? You want Betty Grable's measurements? Or is it Bo Derek this time around? What do we do?”

“We hang up,” the general said flatly. “I won't talk to you. I'm disconnecting.”

“You . . . hold . . . on . . . general.” The sweat from Alice's forehead dripped off his eyebrows, stinging his eyes. He
wanted
to believe. “This is the President of the United States calling you. Authenticator card or no authenticator card. We can play it by the book and blow the world to smithereens. That's what the book calls for. That's where it's taking us. Is that where you want to go?”

Alice didn't answer. The irony of being accused of playing by the book was lost on him, his mind darting down too many deadend alleys. The perspiration was causing his hand to slide down the receiver. It fleetingly occurred to him—a bolt out of nowhere and departing just as fast—that their greatest mistake had been to expect anyone to act rationally under this pressure. He wanted a cigarette.

“I need a patch through to the
E-4,”
the voice said. “I know you can talk to them. We can hear you. We can't reach them from Olney. I know where the plane is. I know who's aboard. The Secretary of the Interior is aboard. He thinks I'm dead. He thinks he's the President. I must talk to him. Fast. About the submarines. Do you understand?”

Alice still said nothing.

“General, for Christ's sake, do you want the precise location? The
E-4's
flying over Paducah, Kentucky. You're also flying over Paducah, Kentucky. You're damn near on his ass! As your Commander-in-Chief, I'm telling you you're too fucking close to him! One spooked Soviet submarine commander decides to take a potshot, and neither of you will be worrying about goddamned authenticator cards! There won't be any cards! Then where the hell will we be? Answer me, damn you!”

“Where is your card?”

The general heard a pained sigh. “Damned if I know, general. On the South Lawn, which I crawled across on my belly. In the back end of
Nighthawk,
which got blown down in a gully, me in it. Lost in the rubble of somebody's front yard when a kid packed me five miles on his back to this godforsaken hole. In the Olney incinerator with the bathrobe I was wearing when Icarus called.” The voice drifted, as if the man were in great pain. “Damned if I know.”

“Without the card, the
E-4
won't give you the time of day.” Alice looked at the clock. It read 1925 Zulu, one hour and thirty-five minutes to go.

“You let me worry about that, general. That's what I get paid for. I think it's time to earn my pay.”

Alice stared into the hands of the clock. “The risk . . .” he mumbled, more to himself than the man on the phone.

“Risk?” the voice bellowed into Alice's ear. “This is a bad time to be talking about risk, general. I'm not asking you for information, though God knows I could use some. Do you think I'm a Russian, spoofing you? Good God, man, they would have read you the numbers so fast your head would spin. They probably have more of our goddamned cards than we do. I just talked to the Soviet Premier. You want me to call him back and ask
him
for the numbers?” The voice shook, wavered, and then returned very wearily.

“Fucking little credit card. Charge-a-war. Damn, it's probably the one thing we did keep secret from the Russians. Or I
would
get it from the Premier. Hell's bells, man, I couldn't read you the numbers if I had the card in my hand. I’m blinder than a bat.”

Alice slumped over the phone, rocking slowly.

“It's a bad day for book players, general. I guess orders won't do any good, but I'm asking you to patch me through. Will you do it?”

Alice pulled himself back up to an erect and militarily correct posture. He reached in search of a cigarette. In the private niche the pack of Pall Malls lay crumpled and empty. “Yes, sir, Mr. President, of course I will. I should brief you on a few matters first.”

Over the next five minutes, while the clock spun toward 1930 Zulu and Smitty dropped slightly off the tail of the
E-4,
Alice told the President about the extent of the damage to the world, about
Polar Bear One's
unprompted turnabout made for reasons known only inside the B-52, about his own decision to turn the remaining bombers, about the Soviet response and Condor's reaction, and, most important, about the timing of the submarine attack just ninety minutes hence. The President did not interrupt once.

As Alice concluded, the President let out a low, long whistle and asked, out of genuine curiosity, “What made you believe me, general?”

The general stared into his small countdown watch, brushed at a forehead now dry of sweat, and replied: “Believe you, sir? I'm not sure I do.”

“Yes,” the President pondered. “I thought as much. Please patch me through now.”

“Certainly, sir. I wouldn't count on much, though, with the radio relay coming from the
Looking Glass.”

“General?”

“I was just about to ram him, Mr. President.”

“Ram him?”

“Ram him.”

The mood inside the B-52 had moved from giddily rambunctious to eerily introspective. Little conversation took place between the two survivors of the flight of
Polar Bear One.
Kazaklis flew directly toward the dark and roiling wall of clouds, but he knew they were out of reach. The storm had edged around the three sides of their visibility and the cockpit had grown dark again. It was not the total darkness of night-light red, but worse—gray and gloomy and foreboding. The light lay behind them, as did their pursuers.

The F-18's had broken off several minutes ago and it would take several more for them to complete the attack run. It would not require more than one pass. The only human noise in
Polar Bear One
was the occasional crackling sound of the two Navy pilots coordinating their maneuvers. Kazaklis had tapped into their radio frequency, wanting to give Moreau time to eject. He had not made the decision for himself.

“Red Fox One,
this is
Red Fox Two,
into the turn . . .”

“Lost you in the sun,
Red Fox Two . . .”

In his mind Kazaklis could see the two deadly jets—F-18's were top of the line—sweeping into majestic arcs away from each other to swoop back together behind him.

“About two o'clock. . . . You'll pick me up in a second. . . .”

“Roger,
Two.
Got you now. Let's not get a bloody nose out of this. . . .”

Kazaklis shook his head at Moreau and broke the silence between them. “Bloody nose,” he said sarcastically. “Buggers are worried about shooting themselves in the foot.”

“Do we have to listen to the play-by-play, Kazaklis?” Moreau's voice was brittle.

Kazaklis shrugged. “You want a black hood?”

Moreau looked at him without replying.

“Have you ever ejected from one of these beauties, Moreau?”

“Uh-uh.”

“You want me to throttle it back to a couple hundred knots?” He asked the question compassionately. They both knew airmen who had become instant vegetables taking the windblast head-on. They also both thought immediately of Halupalai.

“No,” she said. “Are you going to eject?”

“I dunno, Moreau. Right now I feel like riding the old boy down, if I get the chance. It could blow, you know.” He looked at her beseechingly. “Please, Moreau, I'd like you to jump. They'll pull you out.”

Moreau started to speak.

“Okay,
Red Fox Two,
pull it in a little tighter,” the radio crackled. “You see 'em?”

“Roger,
One.
Got 'em. Three miles.” “Okay,
Two.
Let's go for it.”

“Larry?”

“
Two
?”

“Real shit duty, isn't it?”

“Everything's shit duty today,
Red Fox Two.
In we go.”

Kazaklis grunted. “Those guys got a lot of heart.”

“Duty.” Moreau spoke without malice. “Everybody's doing their duty today.”

The two sat silently for a moment, their minds retreating.

“Hey, Moreau?” She turned to find him staring intently at her. “I wish I had come to know you better, too.” His face wore no con.

She smiled. “My knickers, Kazaklis,” she said without hostility. “You wish you had known my knickers.”

He grinned. “Oh, those too,” he said jauntily. “Pretty nice knickers, they are.”

Moreau laughed lightly. “I seem to remember something about better thighs on a Safeway fryer.”

He reached over and patted her thigh. “Did I say that? Feels like triple-A to me.”

She removed his hand. “But attached to a real bitch, huh?” she said sadly.

“Yeah, sometimes,” he said.

“Yeah, most of the time,” she said, and they fell silent again.

“One mile,
Red Fox Two.
Take it up a bit and come down on 'em. . . .”

“Moreau?” The voice was urgent and she turned quickly toward him. “I wasn't talking about your knickers.”

A shiver raced through her. “Thanks, Kazaklis,” she said.

In front of them the black clouds loomed larger, but still out of reach. A flash, like heat lightning, illuminated the leading edge of the approaching storm. A slight shudder rippled through the B-52.
Red Fox One
crackled, “What the hell was
that?”

The
Looking Glass
patched the call straight through to the white phone, so it was President to President immediately, without the preliminary formality of authenticator cards.

“Condor,” the successor said as he lifted the phone.

He heard a vaguely familiar chuckle on the other end. “Good God, is that what they call you?” the undeniably familiar voice asked cheerily. “I don't know if I'd stand for that, Mr. Secretary.”

After his conversation with Alice, the President had concluded that he would have severe problems with his Cabinet secretary. So he had decided to approach him obliquely.

Condor, on the other hand, was suffering less than might be expected from the anxiety of the doomsday chase with the
Looking Glass.
Across from him, the Librarian fidgeted. Condor, however, had resolved, in his own mind, that he had made the right decision, a hard and brutal one in a hard and brutal world. He had concluded that his place in history was assured and, perhaps more important, that the events and his role in them could not be changed even if preceded by his death. He had deduced, without further assistance from the colonel, that the mutual destruction of the two command planes assured that the submarines would fire as he wanted. No one would be left in a position to redirect them. He considered that a Divine Irony, and he rather enjoyed it. Condor had made his peace with his Maker—made it long ago, as a matter of fact. So, while not eager, he was ready. Now, in this suddenly teetering moment of doubt, he wondered if Divine Irony had been supplanted by a Divine Joke. “You're dead, Mr. President,” he whispered.