“So all other intelligence agencies have to go to NIC for that information?”
“Yep. And that way NIC knows what everyone else is working on.”
“But by law, NIC oversees all that anyway, Reuben.”
“Hell, who cares what the law says? Do you really think the CIA’s going to be absolutely truthful about what it’s doing, Oliver?”
“No,” Stone admitted. “Telling the truth would be counterintuitive for it as well as having no historical basis. Spies always lie.”
“Is the meeting tonight still at Caleb’s?” Reuben asked.
“I’m not sure that Caleb’s . . .” Stone’s voice trailed off. “Caleb?” he said slowly.
“Oliver?” Reuben said. “Are you still there?”
“Oliver? Are you all right?” Milton asked in a worried tone.
Stone spoke quickly. “Reuben, where are you?”
“At the disgusting shack I call my castle. Why?”
“Can you pick me up at Union Station and take me to my storage place?”
“Sure, but you didn’t answer me. Is the meeting still at Caleb’s?”
“No, I think instead . . .” Stone looked around. “We’ll meet here at Union Station.”
“Union Station,” Reuben repeated. “That’s not exactly private, Oliver.”
“I didn’t say we were holding our meeting here.”
“You’re not making much sense,” Reuben said grumpily.
“I’ll explain it all later. Just get here as quickly as you can. I’ll be waiting out front.” Stone clicked off and looked at Milton.
Milton said, “What are you going to your other place for?”
“There’s something I need from there. Something that might finally make sense out of all this.”
CHAPTER
35
“NO ONE SEEMS TO BE HOME,” Tyler Reinke said as he watched the front of Milton’s home from the car outside. He glanced at a file on Milton Farb. “Threatening to poison President Reagan’s jelly beans sort of tanks your career opportunities,” Reinke added wryly. “That may be why they didn’t come forward. Because of his record.”
Peters said, “What I want to know is, what was he doing on Roosevelt Island in the middle of the night?”
“I say we wait until later and then go exploring. If he’s in hiding, chances are he left something behind at his house to show us where he is.”
“In the meantime I think we should take another trip to Georgetown. Somebody might have seen something that night that could be helpful,” Peters said.
“And it might not hurt to take another look at the boat while we’re there,” Reinke added.
Captain Jack adjusted his hat and rubbed a finger against the yellow rose sticking out of his lapel as he surveyed the inside of his new property. The garage was large with three expansive work bays. However, the place was empty now except for one vehicle that was receiving the complete attention of his “mechanics.” Ahmed, the Iranian, wiped his brow as he came up out of the oil pit cut into the floor of the garage.
“How’s it coming?” Captain Jack asked.
“We’re on schedule. Have you talked to the woman?”
“That piece is in place and ready,” Captain Jack said. “And don’t ask again, Ahmed,” he added, looking stonily at the man. The Iranian nodded curtly and swung himself back down into the pit. Soon the sounds of power wrenches filled the space, and Captain Jack stepped out into the sunshine.
Ahmed waited a few more minutes, and then he reemerged from the pit, walked quickly to the worktable and slid out a long-bladed knife from an oily cloth that he’d hidden under some tools. He placed the knife under a piece of carpeting in the back of the vehicle and then popped the carpet back into place.
Outside, Captain Jack climbed into his Audi and drove to the apartment across from Mercy Hospital. One of the Afghans let him in.
“Are the weapons here?” Captain Jack asked.
“Carried them up piece by piece in paper grocery bags like you said to.”
“Show me.”
The man led him over to the large-screen TV set up in one corner of the room. Together they moved the TV out of the way, and the Afghan used a screwdriver to pry up the carpet, exposing the padding and subfloor. Here the subfloor had been cut away and replaced with plywood. Under the plywood Captain Jack could see that short lengths of rope had been attached to the floor joists in six-inch intervals. Lying on top of the ropes were two assembled sniper rifles with high-powered scopes.
“I’ve heard of the M-50s but I’ve never used one,” Captain Jack said.
“It’s got digital optics so no visible signature; it chambers the twenty-one-millimeter cartridge with environmental sensors built in, together with multithermal detection.” The Afghan knelt down and pointed to one part of the rifle. “It’s also got a neural feedback system that cancels muscle twitch.”
“I never needed that to do the job,” Captain Jack said matter-of-factly.
“And it’s coated with advanced Camoflex so it blends in with its surroundings with a push of this button. Its barrel is nanotechnology-refined and can place a round at less than .00001 minute of angle at one thousand meters. Overkill for this job, but so what. We’ve also got a couple of MP-5s with about two thousand rounds. ”
Early in his career Captain Jack had made the inexcusable error of inputting the barometric pressure after the adjustment for altitude had been made, the number typically given by weather forecasters. However, shooters needed the actual barometric pressure without regard to altitude adjustment. It had been a huge mistake because cold air was denser than warm, and the speed of sound was also lower in cold air, which was critical when one was chambering supersonic ammo. That mistake had caused his bullet to wound instead of kill, not an acceptable result when one was attempting to assassinate a head of state.
“Where have you hidden the ordnance?” he asked.
The Afghan went around to the back of the big-screen TV and unscrewed the rear panel. Neatly stacked inside were dozens of fully loaded MP-5 mags and boxes of M-50 rounds. “As you can see, we don’t watch much TV,” the Afghan said unnecessarily.
“How about the other two rifles and ordnance you’ll be using? They’re the most important of all.”
“They’re under the other floorboards. They’re ready to go. We’ve practiced over fifty hours with them. Don’t worry, we won’t miss.”
“The weather looks good for game day, but it can change quickly around here.”
The Afghan shrugged. “It’s not that difficult a shot at this distance. I’ve easily hit the target at three times this range at night with people shooting back.”
Captain Jack knew this was not mere bravado on his part, which was one of the reasons the man was here in the first place.
“But you’ve never done it quite this way before,” he said. “The range and flight path are a little different.”
“Believe me, I know.”
Captain Jack went into the bathroom and looked at his disguise in the mirror. He took off the hat and examined his thick hair shot through with gray and a mustache and short beard of the same coloring. He took off his tinted glasses, and blue eyes looked back at him. A small scar rested on the side of his nose, which was long and thick. In reality the beard and hair were fake. He was actually bald and clean-shaven with brown eyes and no scar, although his nose was long, but thin.