McGarvey said nothing, and after a moment Rudolph nodded.
“Can’t blame you, Mac. We screwed it up for your guys, but I’m not going to worry about that right now. First we have to catch the people who did this. Has the CIA come up with anything?”
“Not yet. But we’re working on it. Have you found Sandy Patterson?”
Rudolph shook his head glumly. “She’s disappeared without a trace. But we found the helicopter that pulled them out of here, which means they’re still in the area.” His jaw tightened. “We’ll find them.”
“Any IDs on the bodies they left behind?”
“Asians. Maybe Japanese, but hell, there’s no way of knowing that for sure yet. They were well equipped. Night glasses, radios, silenced weapons. They knew the layout here, and they timed their attack to take out every outside guard at the same moment. Some of your guys just got lucky and shot back.”
“Yeah,” McGarvey said. “Real lucky. Now they’re dead.” He turned away from the FBI special investigator and walked across the lawn, his marine contingent surrounding him.
The house smelled like a gunpowder factory, and blood was splashed against the stairhall wall and the destroyed remnants of the front door. It was where Isaacson had died.
Kathleen and Elizabeth were seated at the dining room table in the makeshift operations center, drinking coffee. Several Company men were standing by with them. McGarvey motioned for them to get out and join his marine guard in the hall. Kathleen and Liz looked up, and they both managed to smile. Outwardly they looked no worse for the wear, but Kathleen had been crying and Liz looked shell-shocked.
“Hi, Daddy,” she said in a small voice.
McGarvey kissed his daughter on the cheek, then sat down and took Kathleen’s hand. “Are you okay?” he asked his wife.
She looked into his eyes, and he could feel her strength. She nodded almost imperceptibly. “We were lucky this time,” she said simply. She studied his face as if she’d not seen it for a long time. “I don’t think I’ll ever feel safe again. But as long as I have you and our daughter, I’ll be able to live with it.”
“I’m sorry, Katy.”
She squeezed his hand, a new intensity in her eyes. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“It’s going to be okay now,” McGarvey said. “They won’t be coming after you again. We’re very close to catching them.”
“They were good, Daddy,” Liz blurted. “Better than we expected. But if it wasn’t for Paul we wouldn’t have made it. And Todd — the medics say he’ll be okay — God, he was fantastic. He saved our lives too.”
Kathleen reached out and touched her daughter’s cheek. “You were rather fantastic yourself.”
Liz smiled, then started to cry, big tears that slid down her cheeks. Kathleen began to cry, and McGarvey’s eyes filled as he held his family, the black rage inside him doing a slow fade to a temporary corner of his mind where he could pull it out when it was time to pay back the people who were responsible. And that would happen very very soon, he promised himself.
Rencke was set up in a small office down the hall from the DDO’s suite that was used by temporary research assistants the CIA brought in from time to time. He’d been going without sleep or anything decent to eat for a couple of days himself, but he was feeling no fatigue now.
“Bingo,” he said, staring at one of the computer monitors that showed a stream of information scrolling up on a lavender background. Whoever had set up what amounted to a triple blind was very good, but not nearly good enough, Rencke told himself, grinning from ear to ear. “The magic,” he whispered, excitedly tapping his feet like a kid getting a birthday present. “Oh, boy. I got the magic.”
He activated a search program that would find and telephone McGarvey wherever he was. Five days ago Far East had given Digital Systems Engineering a contract to gather and collate information on the worldwide development of new satellite data transmission technologies. Digital Systems in turn subcontracted to Quantum Research the task of purchasing the latest equipment for study and evaluation. In turn Quantum subcontracted the job of transportation and storage of the equipment to Microchip Applications, which had done exactly that. At least for the record. The only flaw was that companies like Quantum and Microchip didn’t do that kind of work, renting vans and arranging for warehouses.
The call went through to McGarvey. He was still at Cropley. “Can you talk?”
“Just a minute,” McGarvey said. He said something indistinct in the background, and half a minute later he came back. “Okay, have you found something?”
“They’re using two Dodge vans and a Ford Taurus. Government surplus. I came up with the license plate numbers, but what’s better than that is where they’re staying. It used to be a Kmart store in Morningside, Maryland.”
“Did Far East set it up?”
“Last week, through a triple blind. But they used their own dummy organizations. Dumb, dumb, dumb.”
McGarvey was silent for a moment. When he came back his voice was changed, lower, more precise. “I’m bringing Katy and Liz to my office for a couple of hours, maybe for the night. My secretary will take care of them until I get back.”
“Do you want to talk to her?”
“No, I’ll take care of it,” McGarvey said. “In the meantime I want you to load everything you’ve come up with on a disk and give it to Liz. Everything, do you understand, Otto?”
“Gottcha,” Rencke said. “Do you want me to tell the Bureau about Kmart?”
“No,” McGarvey said flatly.
“Come on, Mac—”
“No, Otto. I’m going to take care of this myself.”
“Oh, boy,” Rencke whispered. “Oh, boy, Mac. Watch your ass. Big time, watch your ass.”
“Now tell me exactly where this place is,” McGarvey said.
“Okay, there’s nobody aboard,” the FBI special agent radioed.
“Maybe it broke loose from its dock and drifted downriver,” Rudolph replied. He was outside at his car.
“No, sir. They definitely ran her up on the bank. Looks like our perps. Some civilian clothes below. They probably changed into their black gear down there. And there’s some kind of a cable tow arrangement on the stern. Could have been used to lift them airborne on their hang gliders.”
“Secure the site and don’t touch anything. I’m sending the second evidence van down.”
“Yes, sir.”
Rudolph turned to look as McGarvey, surrounded by his contingent of marines, came out of the house with his wife and daughter and headed toward the helicopter. He tossed the microphone on the seat and walked over to them.
“Are you going into town?” he asked.
“We’re heading to Langley,” McGarvey said. “Won’t be very comfortable, but it’s safe.”
Rudolph nodded. “We found a boat pulled ashore just across the highway. Looks like they might have come in that way and then got out by helicopter.”
“Any idea where they got the helicopter?” McGarvey asked, and there was something in the way he asked the question that bothered Rudolph. He suspected that McGarvey knew something he wasn’t telling. And Rudolph already knew the man well enough not to bother asking.
“We’re checking on it.”
McGarvey glanced toward the end of the driveway, which was lined with television vans, satellite dishes on their roofs. “Keep us out of it,” he said.
Rudolph followed his gaze. “I’ll do what I can.”
McGarvey gave him a last look. “Keep me posted.”
“You too,” Rudolph said.
NINETEEN