“How do you run this down?”
“I’m already on it. I cross-referenced ROTC against schools with theater arts departments. I was amazed at how many smaller arts colleges have military programs. About eighty-five schools out of more than seven hundred.”
“Pretty daunting,” he offered.
“Damned straight. I started limiting the years, sending out e-mails to each of the schools, and lighting candles every night.”
“At first?”
“I didn’t get very far. But I realized I was going at it ass-backwards. I needed to run a military search on theater majors who entered through ROTC.” She clicked her mouse on an on-screen icon, and her computer took her to the first of ten pages of names.
“Jesus!” he exclaimed as she quickly scrolled through the pages.
“About twenty-five hundred names in the last fifteen years. From there, it’s just a process of elimination. “I adjusted the search to match your estimates for height and weight.” She went to her pull-down menu and clicked onto another file. The list got shorter.
“Next, I entered tighter age factors. No one younger than thirty, no one older than forty-two. You’ve run into the guy. Safe enough?”
“Safe enough.”
She clicked again, another page came up with fewer names.
“Caucasian.” Another mouse click.
Now there were only a few dozen names. “Still a lot. So I went one by one. I tossed out the upstanding citizens in the group who had a day job and a solid record. I eliminated anyone living at the poverty level, and I chucked the NASCAR driver in the group.”
Roarke gave her a glance that asked why?
“Not available for hits on most weekends.”
Walker clicked on the menu a final time. “Here’s what I ended up with: eight strong possibilities. I sent pictures of seven of them over to your buddy Parsons for further analysis.”
“What about the eighth?” Roarke asked.
“No need. He looked good until I found out the guy died in Iraq.”
This was better news than Roarke expected. Seven solid leads. He was about to congratulate her when he thought of a question.
“Did you cross-check their acting experience in school? Any idea what their teachers might remember about them?”
“Very good question.” Penny paused, then added sarcastically, “Of course I did!”
“Care to tell me?”
“Most of them did better in the theater of battle. A couple had some promise. But what do I know? I always fall asleep at plays.”
Hickam Air Force Base shares landing strips with the adjacent Honolulu International Airport. It suffered extensive damage and losses, both personnel and equipment, when Japanese planes rained bombs on December 7, 1941. In October 1980, Hickam AFB was designated a National Historic Landmark for its significance in the first day of World War II, and as a staging area for the ultimate defeat of Japan.
Air Force One was on its final approach, two miles out from Runway 4R, the 9,000-foot runway at Hickam that handled wide-bodied jets. Colonel Lewis was in communication with Honolulu Tower. All other traffic was held up as he gently landed SAM 28000. Nothing took off or landed until the president’s escorts were also safely down.
Once on ground, Air Force One taxied to the Hickam side of the airport and came to a stop. A gangway was rolled up. The presidential retinue quickly appeared at the door. They took in the fresh salt air, then walked down the steps to meet the base commander. After the perfunctory salutes and greetings, the commander ushered them into two waiting limos for a short drive to Pacific Air Force Headquarters. While they made the ride, another 747 landed. Prime Minister David Foss and key members of his government were onboard.
Taylor chose the location — a mid-point, accessible on short notice, with none of the security risks that accompanied a more public visit. The plan was to talk about their next meeting. The one scheduled in Australia.
They all sat at one table. No one wore ties. There would be no photographs to record the session.
The president asked the leading question. “Are you positive it’ll be safe?”
Prime Minister Foss, a veteran like Taylor, was not thrown by the directness.
“I cannot guarantee that, Mr. President. But I recommend that we make no public announcement about a change in venue. We simply make a last minute switch, passing up the pre-announced location for a secondary destination.”
Taylor looked around the table. J3 agreed. The same for the secretary of state. “One you can guarantee?”
“One that we are able to completely sweep. Believe me, this incident has taught us a great deal.”
“It’s taught all of us, David.” It was the first sign that the session was going to be productive. “No chances anymore.”
“Just about fueled up,” Rossy said over the field phones from under the plane.
“Roger,” Lewis replied. He wanted to stay close to his bird until fueling. Only then would he try to catch a little rest. The president’s primary pilot would be back at work in two hours, checking every compartment. Rossy would be on the line with him. The two of them were a team. They relied on each other to make Air Force One work. No chances was also Lewis’s rule. No chances.
Lt. Ross believed in the same thing.
Chapter 48
“Here’s what I want you to do, Touch. Add a sandy brown ponytail to each of these guys. Give ‘em all tans, and narrow their eyes. Make them colder. Can you do that?”
“I can do anything, Roarke. But if you’re trying to turn these guys,” he pointed to the computer screen, which had snapshot-size photos of the seven “into your suspect, then you’re going at it ass-backwards. The whole idea behind FERET is not to turn someone into the person you want. We try to find a match for the person he could be like we were doing before. Then you throw this stuff away and get real evidence.”
“I got that, but this time I saw him. As close as I am to you right now.” Roarke stood beside Duane Parsons, who was at his console. “His guard was down, and he sure didn’t expect to be recognized.”
Roarke leaned into the screen. He rested his left hand on the photo analyst’s chair, and pointed with the right to the eyes. “It’s in the eyes. Fix that, and we might get closer to knowing who this guy is.”
“I can make his damn dick three inches longer if you want, but like I said, it’ll mean diddly squat if you get to court.”
Roarke stepped back. He was getting worked up, and he was pushing too hard. “Sony.”
Parsons swiveled his chair around. He felt Roarke ease up a bit. “Look,” he offered, “you want him. He’s bad news. He kills people pretty artfully. But because I don’t have a real picture to go on, we won’t get much more than false positives, matches that look promising but don’t deliver. So here’s what I’ll do. I’ll make the changes you want and give you the prints. Then go do your thing. If you do some good surveillance work and e-mail me good pictures—”
Roarke completed the sentence. “Then you’ll be able to run a real match. I know. I know.”
Parsons laughed. “Well, well, you are learning. It’s only taken you a year.”
“Right.”
“I’m not telling you it’s unreliable. But it comes down to photographs. Take the Pakistan program, for example. In ’04 they issued readable passports and national IDs that utilized finger and face biometric technology. They could ensure proper identity verification with a swipe of the card and see if it set off any alarms in counter-terrorism databases. Viisage got the contract. They’ve been able to use face-recognition technology to conduct one-on-one searches against forty million archived images. Forty million, Roarke. But real pictures as the base line.” He turned his chair back toward the computer. “I’m still making cartoons for you.”