“Did you ask?”
“Not directly.”
“Have you talked to GSA to see if there have been any audits?”
“See, that’s why you’re the expert. I didn’t even think of that.”
“Do we have grounds to look at their books?”
Fisher shrugged.
“That means no. This is a lot of work, Andy. Even without going in and looking at their books.”
“I’d also be interested in whatever else they’re doing, what other project they’re tied into. Also, I’m looking for real estate records. I’ve hit a dead end on that side.”
She tried to hand the paper back to him. “This isn’t really accounting, Fisher. This is something you should be doing yourself.”
“You know me and numbers,” said Fisher.
Betty turned aside to one of the three computers lined up on the side of her desk — she had a laptop and a PDA on the desk itself — and pressed a few buttons.
“Hmmmm,” she said.
“See. I knew you could do it.”
“It’s going to take longer than I thought. No way.”
“Great,” said Fisher, jumping up. “Call me, okay?”
“Andy. Andy!”
In retrospect, Fisher realized that he had made a tactical mistake in managing his exit, for undoubtedly Betty’s rather sonorous voice had set off some sort of deep vibration within the Bureau’s clandestine internal security system. Nonetheless, he almost succeeded in escaping completely from the complex — but then,almost only counts in horseshoes and grenades.
Actually, the latter would have been an appropriate metaphor.
“Andrew Fisher!”
When faced with a difficult situation, Fisher knew, there were only two possible ways of dealing with it. The first was to face it bravely. The second — infinitely preferable — was to run away as fast as you could.
Given that his way down the hall was barred by several security types, Fisher chose the former.
“Hey, boss,” he said, swirling around. “What’s happening?”
Jack Hunter’s red face glowed in the corridor, his mouth open while his brain worked to string together a sentence of passable coherence. Hunter was executive assistant director for National Security — Special Projects, a kingdom that had been carved out of Counterintelligence when no one was looking. It was often said that Hunter was old-school Bureau, though no one could figure exactly what school that might have been. In any event, he was among the most deliberate speakers in Washington; several field agents believed that talking to Hunter was the best way to prepare for a lifetime as a Zen Buddhist monk.
Fisher, for one, had never put much store in Eastern religion and believed that patience was overrated. Still, with no avenue of escape open, he waited for his boss to get to the point.
“A camel, Fisher? A camel?” said Hunter finally.
“Yeah, bit me,” said Fisher. “Ain’t that a bitch?”
“It should have bitten your head off. And what was this about water?”
“Hey, Egypt’s in the middle of a desert. Had to buy water.”
“Five trainloads of water?”
“I think it was only four. You better send somebody over to check that one out.”
Hunter’s face shaded even redder. “Why does Colonel Gorman want to talk to me?”
“Sounds like a personal matter,” said Fisher. The way was now clear, and so he hustled toward it.
“Fisher! Stop this instant.”
Fisher obeyed, but only because he could no longer afford to waste time discussing Bureau finances. He pulled his cigarettes out.
“You can’t smoke in here. It’s a federal building!”
“Right, chief,” he said, turning and heading toward the doors.
“Fisher!”
“I’m going, I’m going.”
Chapter 3
The transmission clearly belonged to a Russian aircraft. Even Luksha, no expert, could see from the graph how the query to the Russian satellite for its position matched the pattern of a dozen other aircraft, including his own. Luksha could also see that the geopositioning gear that made the query had once been in a Tu-160; this match was also perfect.
But according to the three intelligence people fidgeting before him, no Tu-160 had been flying to make the query. The few currently operating with Voyenno-Vozdushnyye Sily’s Long-Range or Frontal Aviation units — officially there were six of the aircraft the Americans dubbed the Blackjack, but in reality only two had actually flown in the past six months — had both been grounded when the query was made.
“So is this a Tu-160, or just the GPS system?” asked the general.
“It is impossible to know for certain, of course.” Chapeav nestled his hands on his potbelly. “Several Tu-160s from the Ukraine were sold for parts some years ago. It is likely that this came from that lot. Some airframes were sold in those transactions, but given the location over the Pacific, we rule this out as an actual Tu-160. It’s simply a GPS unit, and perhaps related avionics, that’s been placed in another aircraft.”
“We rule it out because it’s not the answer we’re seeking,” said Luksha, as usual becoming impatient with Chapeav’s know-it-all manner.
It was possible that one of the Russian military’s development commands or even an aircraft factory was operating a Tu-160 for test purposes or covert missions that his people were not privy to. The bomber, though oldish, was a large, relatively stable platform that was quite usable if kept in good repair. But Chapeav dismissed this with a wave of his hand, claiming that his impeccable sources would have made it clear already if this were the case.
“It is possible that one of the Middle Eastern governments — Iran, I would think — has refurbished an aircraft or two and is conducting long-range testing over the Pacific,” conceded Chapeav, almost as an afterthought. “But our inquiries have not lent support to that theory. That is why we believe the GPS unit itself is all that is involved.”
“Why would the Americans use our satellites?” asked Luksha.
“Assuming it is the Americans, it would make it harder to detect or defeat.”
“By them, not us.”
Chapeav smiled faintly, then turned to the short bearded man on the right, a specialist who had worked for the PVO. The man reached into a folder and laid out a set of satellite images showing a bare island near the water.
“Among the islands included in the agreement with Japan for oil exploitation in the Kuril’skije Ostrova was one once intended as a relief base,” said Chapeav. His right hand began to shake; it occurred to Luksha that were it not for this physical disability, the intelligence expert would be intolerable. But the disease softened his hard opinion of him.
“This is a photo of the island,” added Chapeav, pushing the picture at the far right of the series in front of the general, “taken within the past week. And this one is from an aircraft before the leases to the private companies, some years ago.”
As Luksha compared the two photos, Chapeav spoke of the island. It had been used during the 1950’s and sixties as a base for spy flights over Japan and the Pacific, gradually falling out of use during the 1970’s. A brief round of activity in the 1980’s brought improvements to the base under a plan to operate long-range bombers with cruise missiles in answer to the American deployment of the B-1B. The bunkered hangar, cut into the rock, could hold six aircraft, and the access was angled in such a way as to avoid exposure to American satellites then in use — an advantage, Chapeav noted, that continued to this day.
There were obvious differences in the photos Luksha was examining. The older one was black-and-white, and taken at a slightly different angle. A rectangular patch of metal and machinery, which appeared to be an oil rig, sat at the right side of the island in the new photo. But Luksha could not see anything else of significance. He put them down and held out his hands. “The oil derrick?”