A second later, the screaming intensified on Columbia Road far below.
52
The office of CIA Director Aaron Stallings was spacious and infused with an old-money, country-club stuffiness. Leather-bound volumes filled oak bookshelves lining the walls from floor to ceiling. A small television set mounted in one corner of the office had been tuned to CNN, volume muted, and was broadcasting three-day-old footage of the events at the Minuteman Insurance Building in a continuous silent loop. A massive walnut desk dominated the room, and the carpeting was plush and thick, serving to deaden sound so completely that voices seemed to struggle into the air and then vanish.
The overall theme of the office seemed to be one of stern intimidation, Stallings making the pecking order clear to visitors: he was important and they were not. The effect was wasted on Tracie. Her future with the agency would be determined by this meeting, but she wasn’t at all certain she wanted to continue, anyway.
She had been overcome by depression since watching Shane Rowley tumble over the roof of the Minuteman Building three days ago, an ennui that seemed to have clamped onto her heart. She wondered if it would ever ease. Shane had sacrificed his own life to save hers, somehow struggling to his feet after being shot in the chest, then still managing to pack enough of a punch to overcome a trained and armed professional assassin, despite being weaponless and suffering numerous bullet wounds.
Shane was being hailed as a hero, lauded on television and in the worldwide press as an ordinary man who had stumbled onto a plot to assassinate the president of the United States, and then foiled that plot at the expense of his own life.
All of which was true, of course, as far as it went. But the authorities were releasing few details of how this “ordinary citizen” had single-handedly taken down the lone gunman, or even how he had managed to uncover the plot while working as an air traffic controller and living his life far off the beaten path in Bangor, Maine. His escape from the massacre at the Bangor Airport was receiving airtime as well, its link to the assassination attempt still unclear.
For now, the compelling human interest angle was dominating the news cycles, and Tracie knew that by the time it occurred to the networks and reporters to dig below the surface, a bland cover story would have been concocted, one which would satisfy the public while simultaneously avoiding any possibility that embarrassing details might be leaked involving potentially treasonous activity by long-time CIA officials.
No doubt a team of agency psychologists and spin-doctors was hard at work right now, doing exactly that. Just another day at the company.
Of the assassin Shane had thwarted, little was known, officially or otherwise. His broken body had been found on the sidewalk outside the Minuteman Insurance Building bearing no identification, and Tracie knew the few details that would eventually emerge regarding the man would bear little more than a passing resemblance to the truth. They certainly would not include the fact that the gunman was working for the KGB with the tacit approval of at least one high-ranking CIA official — that information would be buried so deep it would never see the light of day. She pictured Winston Andrews smiling in approval.
Tracie sat up as straight as she could, no easy feat with both shoulders wrapped heavily in gauze and surgical bandages. Her arms were immobilized in slings, crossed over her chest, making her look like an angry housewife confronting an errant husband. The wounds throbbed incessantly, and doctors had told her to expect more of the same for the foreseeable future, although a full recovery was expected.
Stallings gazed at her, saying nothing. He had been silent since summoning her into his office and gruffly instructing her to take a seat in a chair placed directly in front of his desk. Tracie knew he was using silence as a weapon, an obvious attempt to draw her out, to encourage her to try and fill the emptiness with words.
She wasn’t having any of it. She was very familiar with the tactic — had used it herself many times in interrogations. She knew she could outwait him and assumed he would reach the same conclusion eventually.
Besides, she was used to silence, comfortable with solitude. She sat quietly.
Finally Stallings gave up and cleared his throat officiously. “So,” he said, “regarding the Gorbachev communique…,” and waited.
She said nothing. No question had been asked so there was no reason to speak.
She had been rescued by a Secret Service agent, who sprinted to the roof of the Minuteman Building just seconds after the bodies of Shane and the assassin crashed to the sidewalk below it.
Upon her arrival at the hospital, a young CIA operative she didn’t know took possession of the wrinkled envelope containing Gorbachev’s letter, shortly before Tracie was rolled into surgery to repair the damage done by the two 9mm slugs. The letter had disappeared into the massive chasm that was CIA officialdom, and she knew she would never see it again. She didn’t care.
Stallings continued, a hint of annoyance creeping into his voice. “Some in positions of authority in the administration — myself included, if you’re curious — believe you should be placed under arrest and charged with treason for opening that envelope. Its contents were classified Top Secret and, as you know, opening the letter is antithetical to every single operating principle at this agency.”
Tracie had told herself she was not going to give Stallings the satisfaction of a response, no matter how vicious or unreasonable the attack, but she couldn’t help herself. She shot back, “Really? And what about the real treason — the activity of Winston Andrews? What about that?”
“That is all hearsay, unprovable charges made by an unreliable witness against a dead man who served his country honorably for more than four decades and is not here to defend himself.”
Tracie barked a bitter laugh and Stallings said, “But in any event, let’s not get off track here. The subject is your malfeasance.”
“Malfeasance? Is that what you’re calling it? The president is alive right now because I opened that envelope.”
“Yes, well, you could argue that, I suppose—”
“It’s not an argument, it’s a fact.”
“Just the same,” Stallings said. He was a large, jowly man, with fleshy pouches below his jaw that jiggled when he talked. “There’s another fact to consider, one of the utmost importance: we cannot set the precedent of allowing operatives to handle classified information in any manner they see fit during a mission. Were it up to me, and many others, you would become an object example to every agent, now and into the future, of that concept.
“This scenario was not typical,” she said angrily. “It was one in a million, not likely to be repeated in our lifetimes, if ever.”
“However,” he continued, talking over her as if she hadn’t even spoken, “President Reagan refused to allow the issue to drop. He threatened to replace the entire management team at CIA if we took any action against you. The upshot,” he said reluctantly, bitterness creeping into his voice, “is that your job is safe. You’re welcome back to the operations branch as soon as you are physically able to return.” He scowled, looking as though he had just gotten a whiff of rotting meat.
“What about Andrews?” Tracie asked, pressing the issue, refusing to allow Stallings the satisfaction of seeing any relief on her face. She wasn’t sure she felt any.
Stallings spread his hands in exasperation. “What about him?”
“Come on,” Tracie snapped. “You know damned well he couldn’t have been the only one at CIA who was working with the Soviets. What is being done to flush out the rest of them, to ensure nothing like this fiasco ever happens again?”