“Why?”
“It’s a moral question. We simply don’t do it.”
Again, the DCI coughed for attention. “There’s a very practical reason. They tried it on you and look at the reaction. Do we want to risk getting into the same pickle? I think not.”
Turner leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. “I agree with everything you’ve said. So continue with the investigation for now.” She looked around the room. “Anything else?” The meeting was over.
Outside in the main hallway, Mazie asked the DCI to come to her corner office. Once the door was closed, she said, “I’m worried.”
“That she’ll authorize me to go after Vashin?”
“That she’s even considering it.”
“No one kills an American ambassador and gets away with it,” the DCI replied.
“So what are our options?”
“We don’t have many. Congress has seen to that.”
“So you’re telling me there is nothing more we can do.”
“I didn’t say that. Through its oversight function, Congress sets the bounds for intelligence, especially covert operations. However, they haven’t etched a hard line in concrete but rather laid down a broad chalk line. My shoes are white with dust from standing on that line. There are things I can get away with, but the president cannot.”
Mazie drew into herself. Am I reading the signs right? Maddy wants us to do something, but what? No matter what we do, plausible denial must be the rule.
“This is a tough one,” the DCI said, thinking the same thing.
“If she brings it up again,” Mazie said, “we’ll have to do something.”
For the first time since Mazie had known him, the DCI smiled. “I’ll work on it.”
It was Monday afternoon between the end of classes and supper roll call when a cadet had some time of his own. The time was even sweeter because they did not have to form up to march to supper. Brian almost ran back to their room to change into his gym clothes, looking forward to some time on the basketball court in the Godfrey Athletic Center. Lately, the coach had been talking to him about trying out for the team and some of the older cadets were actually treating him as a species of subhuman, a big improvement over his Rat status.
But before he climbed the stairs to the second stoop, Matt corralled him. “We gotta talk to the Trog.”
“Gimme a break. What’s she want now?”
“She maxed a chemistry test.”
“This is a problem?”
“The teacher says she cheated. No one’s ever maxed it before.”
Brian was dumbfounded. “The Trog, cheatin’? You gotta be kiddin’.” Matt only shook his head. “Come on, we gotta find her,” Brian said, the basketball game totally forgotten.
They finally found her on the parade field. She was running lap after lap, pushing herself to exhaustion. The regimental XO, Rick Pelton, was running with her and on the next lap, he shot them a worried look. “Zeth,” he called, pulling up beside the boys, “I need a break.” Zeth ignored them and continued to run. Pelton bent over, his hands on his knees, gasping for breath. “Wow, is she mad.”
“Is she okay?” Matt asked.
Pelton shook his head. “She’s talking about resigning.”
“That’s dumb,” Brian said. “She loves this place.” He pulled into himself and, for the first time in his life, thought hard about helping another person. “We need to talk to the dean and tell him that Maggot tutored her.”
“Who’s gonna believe a Rat can do that for Third Class chemistry?”
Matt squared his shoulders. “Gimme a chance and I’ll convince ’em.”
“He’ll need proof he did it,” Pelton said.
“Ah, shit,” Matt said, sounding like Brian. “How we gonna get proof?”
Brian almost shouted. “I got it. I was with you most of the time and the Secret Service saw us. I bet they even got a log.” Brian and Matt followed Pelton into the TLA’s office where Chuck Sanford, the lead Secret Service agent, worked.
“Pelton’s okay,” Brian allowed.
“Yeah,” Matt muttered, not so sure he shared Brian’s opinion. But he couldn’t say why.
The telephone call from the brigadier general commanding the 1st Air Regiment came on the last Wednesday in January, exactly two weeks after Pontowski’s flight with Emil. The brigadier was ecstatic; his regiment had received a trainload of JP-8 jet fuel from NATO and for the first time, his fuel dump was full. “And there’s more on the way,” he said. “Thank you.”
“My pleasure,” Pontowski replied.
“Now I have two problems,” the brigadier said. “How to use it effectively and how to keep it from being stolen.”
“I’ve got the man you need to speak to. His name is Peter Duncan and he’s a security expert.” A meeting was quickly arranged and Pontowski thought that was the end of it.
Then, very hesitantly, “My pilots have much to learn. Perhaps you would like to fly with them again?”
“I’d love to. Any time. All we need is good flying weather.”
“If you are available today, we currently have ten miles visibility, broken overcast, clear on top.”
Pontowski felt the old itch and, suddenly, the day got much better.
Pontowski stood in front of the scheduling board in the squadron and tried to pronounce the names of the three pilots who would be flying on his wing. He had serious misgivings about leading a four-ship training mission so early on. But he liked the aggressive spirit behind the idea. “I won’t be flying with you today,” Emil said, obviously disappointed. “My brigadier wants to expose as many pilots as possible to your style of flying.”
“How about scheduling me in a D model and you fly in the pit? That way I’ve got an interpreter and someone who knows the local area.” Emil readily agreed and it was easily arranged. They walked into a small briefing room where the three nervous pilots were standing behind their chairs.
“Sit down and relax,” Pontowski said. He started a standard briefing by listing the sequence of events on the chalkboard. “Since the weather is cooperating, we’ll do a formation takeoff in pairs with twenty-second spacing between elements.” From the worried looks on their faces, he sensed it was wrong, too aggressive. Or perhaps they didn’t trust him. He changed his mind. “Make that single-ship takeoffs with twenty-second spacing. I’ll turn out to the left and hold 350 knots. Join up in fingertip formation, with number two on my right wing.”
“That means I’ll have to cut you off on the inside of your turn and then cross underneath,” his wingman said.
“That’s correct,” Pontowski replied. “Take your time, I’ll give you plenty of throttle. When three and four have joined on my left, I’ll use our radar to clear the airspace and find a break in the clouds to punch through on top.”
The three pilots scribbled furiously as he covered the details of each event. When he was finished he quickly recapped what they would be doing. Finally, they stepped to the waiting aircraft. Emil was quiet as they walked up to the two-place F-16. “Perhaps,” he hedged, “we’re doing too much for the first mission?”
“Then we’ll play it by ear,” Pontowski said.
He found out exactly what Emil meant on takeoff. As briefed, he turned out to the left, carving a graceful arc around the southern part of Warsaw. It took his wingman almost three minutes to cut him off, cross under, and move into place on his right wing. By then, he couldn’t find his second element of two aircraft and wondered where they had gone. He called approach control on the radio and asked for radar vectors for a rejoin. But the ground controller was confused. Finally, Emil had to tell approach control exactly what they wanted him to do. From the tone of Emil’s voice and the brisk flurry of Polish, Pontowski was sure most of the adjectives Emil was using would never be found in a Polish/English dictionary. He made a mental note for the debrief.