All told, an easy day.
The three men who made up Turner’s Policy Review Committee and Mazie Hazelton were waiting for her. Since the attorney general had asked for the meeting, he sat on the end of the couch closest to Turner’s rocking chair. He nervously fingered his notes as she sat down. Madeline Turner was famous, or infamous, depending on the point of view, for galloping through meetings.
The attorney general cleared his throat and began. “Special Services claims Yaponets is a bigger problem in prison than on the outside,” he said. Special Services was the Department of Justice’s spy system inside the federal prison system and Yaponets, Russian for Japanese, was a senior godfather from eastern Russia and the leading member of the Russian Mafiya currently in an American jail. He was a burly, sixty-four-year-old man and anything but Japanese.
“What’s the problem?” Turner asked.
“He’s organizing crime on the outside from the inside,” the attorney general answered. “He’s using our prisons as a command center, a recruiting ground, and as a graduate school for criminals.”
“Isolate him,” Turner said. “Take his telephone away. Throw him in solitary.”
“We would if we could,” the attorney general said. “But the ACLU and prisoners-rights organizations would be on our case in a flash. Not to mention some of the highest-priced legal assassins in the country.” Silence. A fact of life in the United States was that ROC, or Russian organized crime, had bought access into every aspect of American life through large charitable donations, political campaign contributions, and astronomical retainer fees paid to some of the craftiest lawyers in the United States.
“What happened to deportation?” the president asked.
“That’s what I was going to recommend,” the attorney general replied.
Now it was Richard Parrish’s turn. As Turner’s chief of staff and primary political advisor, he was always looking for hazards. “That’s political suicide. Senator Leland will beat us silly claiming we’re soft on crime and that we caved in to ROC.”
“So by being tough on crime and throwing the bastards in jail,” the attorney general added, “we actually help ROC achieve its ends.”
“It makes you long for the Cosa Nostra, doesn’t it?” Sam Kennett, the vice president, said. “At least the ‘men of honor’ were American.”
“And not too bright,” the attorney general said.
“Don’t sell them short,” Mazie Kamigami Hazelton said. She sat motionless in her chair, a petite beauty whose dainty feet didn’t quite reach the floor. Her words were so soft and low that it was hard to hear her. But they all fell silent when she spoke. “I agree with DOJ.” The attorney general beamed. Too often, the national security advisor was on the other side of the fence from the Department of Justice and time had a perverse way of proving her right. “We need to export our problems, not warehouse them. Exchange him.”
“For who?” This from the attorney general.
“Not for a who,” Mazie said. “For a what.”
“What do you have in mind?” Turner asked.
“Exchange him for a nuke,” Mazie answered.
The immaculately restored blue-and-white T-34 Mentor approached from the north. It was flying at exactly 500 feet above the ground and 140 knots indicated airspeed as it crossed the green fairways of New Mexico Military Institute’s golf course. Pontowski rocked the wings of the old Air Force trainer he and Little Matt had lovingly rebuilt as he pulled up and headed for the airport to the south of town. The few golfers, all alumni and their guests, looked up. “Jet jockeys,” one of the golfers muttered, ignoring the fact the T-34 had a propeller.
In his office on the second floor of Lusk Hall, Lt. Gen. (USAF ret) John McMasters sat at his desk and shook his head. “That will be Matt Pontowski,” he told the commandant who stood at the big windows overlooking the NMMI’s campus. “He likes to make an entrance.”
“Nice airplane,” the commandant replied. “But he looked kind of low. Do you want to report him for buzzing?”
“Matt Pontowski knows the limits,” McMasters replied. “He was at the minimums.”
“Still,” the commandant persisted, “it might be setting a bad example for the cadets. And what will the Secret Service say?” With Brian Turner on campus, the concerns of the Secret Service were a fact of life.
McMasters sat back in his chair. He needed to make a point to both the cadets and the Secret Service. “Get the word out that Pontowski did it by the rules and was at the legal minimum altitude. If the minimums weren’t good enough, they wouldn’t be the minimums.” The commandant nodded and headed for the door. McMasters waited until he had left before calling his residence. His wife answered on the second ring. “That was Matt’s plane,” he told her. “I told the driver picking him up to drop him off at the quarters. He’ll probably want to change and you can soften him up before sending him over.”
Lenora McMasters knew exactly what to do.
Forty minutes later, a female cadet saluted Pontowski when he emerged from the car depositing him at the superintendent’s quarters. “Mrs. McMasters is waiting for you,” the cadet said as Pontowski returned the salute. Pontowski was impressed with the girl’s presence and appearance. She was neatly turned out in a Class-E BDU, battle dress uniform, with rolled-up sleeves and brightly shined boots. She was five feet six inches tall, on the husky side, and her blond hair was pulled into a tight French braid. “She’s baking cookies for the Rats,” the cadet said, a pretty smile playing with the corners of her mouth.
Pontowski glanced at her name tag. “Thank you Miss Trogger.” She held the door for him and pointed him toward the kitchen. “Now that smells good,” he said. The cadet led the way, moving with the coordination of a well-trained athlete.
Sarah Turner saw him first. “I hope you know how to bake cookies,” she said, taking the newcomer in. She examined him with a wisdom far beyond the average eleven-year-old and knew the single star on each shoulder meant he was a general. She put his age at about the same as her mother’s, forty-six. He was tall, a little over six feet, and his gray-green flight suit hung on his lanky frame. His hair was brown, the cowlick at the back barely controllable, and his blue eyes were set close together. She didn’t like his prominent, hawklike nose and didn’t know it was a Pontowski trademark his grandfather had made famous.
“Sarah,” Maura O’Keith said, “be polite.” She held up her hands in resignation. They were covered in cookie dough. “Maura O’Keith. Glad to meet you.”
Pontowski gave a low laugh and rather than attempt to shake hands, gave her a light kiss on the cheek. “I never baked a cookie in my life, but I’m willing to learn.”
Lenora McMasters came across the kitchen, wiping her hands on a towel. They embraced. “Welcome back to NMMI, Matt.”