Ben smiled in return and waved him off, returning to his computer console in the cabin in mild alarm.
What does he mean, “immediately”? I thought we’d have several weeks to clean up any remaining problems with the program. The mere thought of a software problem suddenly activating a Boomerang black box in an Air Force bomber during a routine flight was beginning to haunt him almost as much as the presence of the commercial airline data he’d discovered.
A half mile from the Uniwave hangar, General Mac MacAdams’s arrival back on the Elmendorf flight line had been carefully coordinated with a staff car to whisk him back to his office in the project headquarters building for several urgent meetings, the last of which had been postponed until nearly 5:30 P.M.
“General, a Sergeant Jacobs dropped a package by for you,” his secretary announced as he came in the door. Mac nodded to a man in a gray business suit and gestured for him to wait a minute as he took the small rectangular box from her and leaned over her desk to scribble a note:
Please erase from your memory and any logs the fact that Jacobs brought this. And shred this note.
She read it quickly and nodded as he turned to the seated man. “Come on in, Dan,” Mac Adams said as the security chief moved into the office and closed the door behind him before picking up a small portable control device.
“May I turn on the bug neutralizer General?”
Mac nodded, and Dan Jerrod punched the appropriate button, inundating the office with a wild array of silent radio signals designed to foil any clandestine listening device.
“Jon passed on your cryptic message, Dan. Our Dr. Cole is becoming a problem?”
“He’s a smart man, General, and a loyal one. He not only found renegade computer code and commercial airline information embedded within, he figured out what the code was, and I have no doubt his mind is working away right now on the question of what possible explanations there are.”
“And what are the possible explanations?”
“Dangerous. Some of them. If he goes down the wrong track, he could conclude all sorts of things that could cause us real security problems; and if he panics and goes outside the fold, the damage could be monstrous.”
Mac sank into one of the chairs arrayed around a coffee table and sighed. “We’re going to be airborne for the last run-through here in two hours or less. Any worries about Dr. Cole holding up?”
“No,” Dan Jerrod said. “I’m far more worried about how he works this out in his head later on. He’s not the type of guy to sit back and shut up, General. He’s the careful type of whistle-blower who makes sure he’s got the case nailed down first, then will not be silenced — except physically.”
“Our best, worst nightmare always in military and government. Precisely what we fear, and precisely what keeps us free as a people.”
“Yeah, weird, isn’t it? And they say the Chinese have a ying and yang ability to tolerate dissimilar realities.”
“How loose a cannon is he? And, with this information he has, precisely what kind of threat are we looking at?”
“I, unfortunately, didn’t help much when I told him to talk only to me because there could even be moles in the organization.”
“Nothing like planting ideas, Dan.”
“I know it. I’ll consider myself spanked for bad judgment.”
“You’re aware of the Rosen situation, by the way?”
“The lost Albatross, the daughter, and the angry FAA? Oh yeah. That’s another volatile mix I’m watching, although I think we’ve got it contained — thanks to your help with those radar tapes.”
“He found civilian airline data embedded in that so-called renegade code, Dan,” Mac was saying as he watched the security chief’s eyes for a reaction. “That really has me worried.”
“Me, too.”
“And, you’re working on it?”
“As best I can.”
“I don’t have to tell you, I’m sure, that the project is paramount, or that the urgency comes all the way from the White House.”
“Sir?”
Mac shifted uncomfortably in his chair, very glad the anti-bug device was busily blocking any possibility of his words being emblazoned on what could otherwise end up being the tombstone of his career.
“If we should be unfortunate enough to end up in a contest between Dr. Cole and what we’re trying to accomplish…”
“Yes, sir. I understand. The project comes first.”
TWENTY EIGHT
FRIDAY AFTERNOON, DAY 5 VALDEZ, ALASKA
April could read the defeat on Jim Dobler’s face before he hung up the phone. He sighed and turned to her, shaking his head.
“April, I’m truly sorry, but the only way I can take you back there on the surface is through a line of Coast Guard pickets, and they won’t be amused.”
“The area’s still restricted, then?”
He nodded, sitting back in the faded cocoon of his time-worn desk chair to the sound of creaking springs and squawking imitation leather. A pleasant aroma of wood smoke hung in the thick air of the office, giving it more the feel of a tiny rural country store than a dockside office, but the trappings of a waterfront operation were all around, including a large aluminum fishnet hanging on the wall.
A burst of static filled the room suddenly, coming from one of the active two-way base station radios he kept on the side of the desk, but Jim ignored it as he continued the explanation he needed to give her.
“I know where we could get a miniature submarine with a couple of grappling devices on the front, but they’d charge a fortune, and it would take weeks to get it here.”
“Frankly, I don’t have either the fortune or the time.”
“Well, the other problem is… whatever they’re doing out there, they don’t want any of us watching, and even if we could get the sub, they’d probably detect it and go nuts.”
“‘They’ meaning…?”
“The Navy. I’ll bet Scott was right about that.”
Another burst of static, irritating in its intensity, filled the overheated room again. Jim reached for the volume control and cranked it down slightly.
“What’s the radio for?” April asked.
“One’s a standard marine band, for anyone inbound who needs fuel or the other services we can provide. The other’s an aviation radio tuned to the common channel out here.”
She looked at him with a puzzled expression, prompting more.
“Seaplanes land here, too, just like you and Scott did the other day, and they can call me on that to—”
An irritated voice cut through the channel at the same moment. “Dobler, will you please come out here and tie me up!”
Jim smiled as he got to his feet and grabbed his parka.
“I don’t see anyone out there,” April said.
“When it’s low tide, this part of the dock isn’t floating, so the fuel dock sinks out of sight.”
April pulled on her parka and followed Jim out the door and onto the ramp down to the floating dock, where a Grumman Widgeon was floating motionless, the engines already stopped. She watched the nose hatch open and Scott McDermott appear, nodding to April as he focused on Jim and held up his hand to catch the mooring line. The two men secured the Widgeon before Scott stepped onto the dock. She could see he was working hard to make the arrival seem routine, but the way he began fumbling for words as he saw her waiting with folded arms told the tale.
“Hello, again,” Scott said.
“Hello. Forget something?” she said, keeping her expression carefully neutral. There was no point in reigniting the morning’s unhappy exchange.
He snorted and looked skyward, as if checking an inbound storm.