“He’s coming, sir. Let me have the travel plans. He’s waiting by the phone.”
This took another twenty minutes, but one day later, at 8:30 A.M. on Sunday, the Bank President drove to work at his regular high-rise off Union Street at 6th Avenue. Waiting in the lobby were two uniformed Naval officers who escorted him to the wide flat roof of the building, thirty floors above street level. And there, its rotors running, was a big Navy helicopter, a Bell AH-1Z Super Cobra, which in less peaceful time carries eight Hellfire missiles for regular strike/assault, and in air warfare is equipped with two killer AIM-9L heat-seeking guided missiles.
This morning, the air was clear, the helicopter was unarmed, and it was already hot. Tony Tilton was the only passenger, aside from the three-man crew. They lifted off almost vertically, then clattered their way north up Puget Sound, about 3,000 feet above the water, for the ten-minute journey.
They descended gently through windless skies and put down on the helicopter pad at the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station, around 30 miles north of the Seattle downtown area, the same distance from the sprawling U.S. Naval Base at Everett.
One crew member disembarked immediately and assisted their civilian passenger down the steps to the area beside the runway. Less than 30 yards away stood a Lockheed EP-3E Aries Naval jet, its engines running, steps down, ready for Mr. Tilton’s arrival.
He climbed aboard, a young officer came back to ensure that he was strapped in, and they moved forward to the takeoff area immediately. One half-minute later, they were in the air, screaming off the runway, scything into the hot, muggy air above the calm U.S. Navy waters of the Juan de Fuca Strait.
Fourteen minutes earlier, Tony had been standing on the sidewalk on 6th Avenue, right outside the National Bank Building.
“Christ, I’ve waited up longer than this in Boston just for a shuttle ticket,” remarked Tony, as the aircraft made a steep left-hand turn, and, still climbing, headed resolutely inland, east, making 450 mph over the rapidly disappearing ground.
The Navy Lieutenant sitting next to him laughed. “Guess so, sir,” he said. “It’s just that in our game, we don’t usually have a lot of time to fuck about. We’re very big on speed. Would you like some coffee?”
The Bank President gratefully accepted, as they set off over the high peaks of the Cascade Range. Their route would take them southeast across Montana and Wyoming, over the Rockies, along the Nebraska-Kansas border, then due east, south of Cincinnati, into Washington, D.C.
During the six-hour journey, the Navy Lieutenant came up with more coffee and a beef sandwich, and they touched down at Andrews Air Force Base, southeast of the capital, at 6 P.M. local.
A black Navy staff car awaited them and the driver took Tony’s bag, slung it on the front seat, and opened the rear door for the man who had escaped the wrath of Mount St. Helens.
Moments later, they were headed fast up to Route 95, and on to the beltway. They drove all around the north side of the city, got off at Exit 33, and into the tony suburb of Chevy Chase. The remainder of the journey took five minutes, and Admiral Morgan’s agents met them inside the gateway of the grand Colonial-style house where the former National Security Adviser lived with his new(ish) wife, Kathy.
It was just 6:45 on a hot summer evening, and the Admiral was dressed in white Bermudas with a dark blue polo shirt and straw panama. He greeted Tony Tilton warmly and thanked him for coming. Harry came over and volunteered to take the visitor upstairs to his room, and Arnold told Tony to come back down right away so they could have a couple of drinks.
Tilton changed out of his blazer and tie, put on a dark green polo shirt, and headed back out to the wide patio by the pool.
The Admiral was sitting in a big, comfortable chair and he motioned for Tony to join him. The drinks were on a table between them, and both men took a man-sized swig at the cool, relaxing Scotch whisky.
“I expect Lieutenant Commander Ramshawe filled you in on why we wanted you in Washington?”
“He did…the meeting tomorrow morning in the Pentagon, I believe.”
“Correct. But I should give you some more info…and first I better know, if you don’t mind…May I presume you’re a Republican?”
“You may.”
“Thought so. West Coast banker. Capitalist. Red in tooth and claw. Would you say you’re rightish, or leftish?”
“Rightish. We have a very Republican State these days. Full of independent people, entrepreneurs and dyed-in-the-wool, self-sufficient country boys wary of Washington, paranoid about the present Administration. East Coast liberals don’t play well out where I live. No sir.”
“That’s awful good to hear,” replied the Admiral. “You can imagine what it’s like in the Pentagon right now?”
“Sure can.”
“Which bring us right back to Mount St. Helens. Can I call you ‘Tony’?”
“Of course.”
“I’m a civilian now. So that’ll be Arnie to you…anyway, Lt. Comdr. Jimmy Ramshawe tells me you understand perfectly well we have the gravest suspicion about that particular eruption.”
“Well, he was on the line from one of the most important government agencies in the country, asking me in great detail about those two blasts of wind on that still morning by the lake…I mean, there must be suspicion…It’s difficult to arrive at any other conclusion…”
“Not if you work in the Oval Office,” growled the Admiral.
Tony Tilton chuckled. “I should tell you, Lieutenant Commander Ramshawe did not reveal anything else about his investigation. I merely surmised what he was getting at.”
“I understand,” said the Admiral. “But because I believe you’re someone we can trust, I’ll give you a little more background, and then have you explain to me, all over again, exactly what you observed on that Sunday morning. Then I shall request you tell precisely the same thing to the meeting tomorrow morning.”
“No problem.”
“Okay, Tony Tilton. Have another slug of that Dewars and pay attention…”
“Lay it on me, Admiral.”
“Arnie.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Tony, shaking his head. “These habits of formality…hard to shake in my trade…May I have your account number…?”
This was too much for the Admiral, who burst into laughter, and then had another slug of Dewars himself. A few minutes later, Morgan finished by concluding:
“A submarine. Do you follow me?”
“I surely do, Arnie. And you think what I heard were those missiles?”
“Yes, I do, Tony. That’s precisely what I think.”
“Can you launch them from below the surface? More than one at a time?”
“Oh, sure. They’re called SLCMs — submarine-launched cruise missiles. You can get ’em away one at a time, but close together, separated by perhaps less than a minute. They make a heck of a speed, well over 600 knots, flying maybe 500 feet above the ground.”
“How come they didn’t crash into the mountains up there?”
“They self-adjust to the contours of the earth, rising and falling on the instructions of their own altimeter.”
“And you think I heard them come in?”
“I think you heard the first two…”
“If it’d been the last two, I don’t think we’d have made it out of there.”
“Can you tell me exactly what you heard?”
“I’m afraid it can’t be much more than I told Don McKeag or Lt. Comdr. Jimmy Ramshawe…”
And just then the French doors slid open, and Mrs. Kathy Morgan made her entrance, walking briskly, wearing a pink floral Italian cotton skirt with a pink summer shirt, no shoes, and a gold anchor pendant on a chain around her neck. Her lustrous red hair was worn loosely and she carried a large platter that, still marinating boldly, held a large butterflied leg of lamb.