Ben thought of Ulrich. Were he and Horton the same team? Is that what all this talk about cooperation meant?
“I went to see Ulrich,” he said. “Just now. Larison said I should.”
Hort smiled, obviously pleased. “I know you did,” he said. “And how was the late Mr. Ulrich?”
Ben looked at him, thinking he must have misheard. “What?”
40. Three Numbers
Ulrich cleaned himself up in the restroom. Now that the shock of the encounter was wearing off, pain was beginning to manifest itself. His jaw hurt, his nose hurt, and two of his teeth were loose. He felt nauseated and shaky.
What was killing him was the way he was being whipsawed. Hope, despair, then back again… you could reach the point where you just wanted it to be over, never mind how.
If what Treven had told him was true, there was still a chance. Talk to Horton, make a deal of some sort. Yes, there would be concessions-painful ones, certainly. But no one wanted those tapes out. In the end, that’s what would matter. He’d call Clements, brief him, coordinate. They’d come up with something.
He walked back to his office. Clements was waiting inside, standing in front of his desk, examining the shattered remnants of the phone. Ulrich jumped when he saw him. “Christ,” he said, “What are you doing here? I was just going to call you.”
Clements looked at him. “The door was open.”
Ulrich walked in. The door closed behind him. He turned and saw two burly men in dark suits that looked like they didn’t get worn very often. He noticed someone had closed the drapes.
“Is this supposed to scare me?” he said.
“Just some private security. We’ve been using Blackwater for a lot of projects lately.”
“What do you want?”
“I want the audiotapes you made.”
“You can’t have them.”
“I need you to open your wall safe.”
“Even if I were inclined to open it for you, and I’m not, and even if the tapes were in it, and they’re not, it wouldn’t help you. I told you, I made copies. They’re with a friend. Who will release them if anything happens to me.”
“The problem is, I don’t believe you. Look at you, you look down your nose at everyone, Ulrich, there’s no one you trust that much. And you had them handy the other day when you were on the phone, right here. Remember? You reminded me recently it was a secure line. I’m calling your bluff.”
Ulrich didn’t answer. The burly guys started to move in. Ulrich opened his mouth to scream for help and Clements nailed him with an uppercut to the solar plexus. Ulrich went down, wheezing.
“It wouldn’t have mattered if you’d screamed,” Clements said. “We’ve checked all the nearby offices. Everyone’s gone home. We checked the soundproofing, too. It’s very impressive.”
The Blackwater guys dragged him over to his desk. Clements watched, flexing his fingers open and closed. “I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted to do that,” he said. “That, and more.”
They pinned him stomach-up against the desk, his feet dangling just above the floor, each Blackwater guy securing an arm and shoulder. Clements opened a case on the floor and took out a battery-operated power drill. “I want that combination,” he said. “One way or the other.”
Panting, Ulrich said, “You’re bluffing.”
To that, Clements only smiled.
“You won’t get away with this,” Ulrich said. “The cameras in the lobby-”
“We’ve taken care of the cameras. When we’re done here, I’m going to call some of my favorite Washington Post op-ed columnists and leak a few choice details about what you’ve been up to, and what terrorist group might have done this to you. Nothing that could be proven, of course, but you know how those columnists like to traffic in rumors. Makes them feel like they’re savvy, isn’t that what you said? And it’s not as though you’ll still be around to set the record straight.”
He fired up the drill and came closer. “The good news, Ulrich, is that you’re going to be seen as a martyr. We’ll use your death to sow public fear and get more of what we want. See what I’ve learned from you? I hope you’re proud.”
Ulrich tried to kick, but the Blackwater guys braced his legs with their knees. He started to tell Clements to wait, just wait for a second, they could figure this out, discuss it, but one of the Blackwater guys covered his mouth with a callused palm. Ulrich struggled desperately, but the Blackwater guys were too strong, and too experienced. He tried to say something, anything, to reason with Clements, to beg him, to get him to just wait, wait, they didn’t need to do this, he could explain, please, just listen to me! But he could only grunt into the meaty hand crushing his swollen lips and loose teeth.
Clements came closer. The sound of the drill was horrifically loud. Nothing was working. He felt a wave of horrible panic. He struggled harder. He began to scream. Clements reached him with the drill. The Blackwater guys pushed down harder. He watched through bulging eyes over the top of the hand smothering his mouth as Clements placed the drill against his left knee. And then the pain was so shocking, so total, that his thoughts were obliterated. The pain consumed him.
It went on for a long time-both knees and his left elbow. Breaks and questioning in between. Ulrich sobbed and begged. But he held on to the number. The one thing he knew was that once he gave it, they would kill him.
By the time Clements moved to do his right elbow, the desk and the floor around it were covered in piss and sweat and blood. The Blackwater guys were barely restraining him now, just keeping him from sliding off the desk. He’d lost his glasses, and the room and the faces were a blur. At some point he’d lost control of his bowels and the room stank from it, stank from shit and the smell of his own singed flesh. He couldn’t even scream anymore. Something in his throat had cracked.
“After this,” Clements said, “we do your face.”
“Please,” Ulrich croaked. “Please.”
“We can’t let those tapes come out,” Clements said. “Think of the way they’d undermine people’s confidence in government. Imagine what that would do to national security. Be reasonable now. Do what’s best.”
The drill came closer. A sound came from Ulrich’s mouth, a sound he’d never heard before, a moan, a whine, the involuntary tenor of absolute despair. Clements paused and watched him.
Crying, Ulrich rasped three numbers, three numbers that a moment earlier had seemed so important to him. But they weren’t important anymore. Nothing was important. Not the tapes, not the Caspers, not anything.
All he wanted was for it to be over.
41. The Oligarchy
Hort hadn’t responded. But he was still smiling, a smile Ben found increasingly chilling.
“What do you mean, ‘the late Mr. Ulrich’? And how did you know I was there?”
Hort took a sip of wine. “I mean ‘the late Mr. Ulrich’ because Mr. Ulrich is dead now. I understand he was alive when you left him. Though I’m not sure the building’s security tapes will reflect that.”
Ben felt the blood draining from his face. “Did you set me up, Hort?”
Hort regarded him calmly. “How? By making you go to his office? Having him argue with you in the corridor, with blood all over his face?”
Ben thought of what Larison had told him. He imagined Hort, or whoever, whispering to a reporter, He’d been under a lot of stress… family problems, an arrest in Manila… a grudge against the former vice presidential chief of staff…
“How do you know this? What happened to him?”
“It turns out he had some damaging information about some people who used to report to him. Those people went and got the information back. They didn’t ask nicely.”