DuneMist: There was a man and a woman poking around the Krummel house today.
SABOT: Were they police, FBI, or real estate agents?
DuneMist: Definitely investigators of some kind. They had a police escort.
SABOT: Interesting.
DuneMist: I watched from across the street. They left with a computer from the house.
SABOT: That’s a good point. I shall instruct our members to erase all communications.
DuneMist: That would be a good thing.
SABOT: Thank you for this information.
DuneMist::)
SABOT: Signing off.
DuneMist: TTFN
As Bernard shut down his computer, a flood of thoughts invaded his mind. First, DuneMist must live in Wisconsin because that’s where the Gardening Grandmother lived. Second, if one of his own members had figured that Martha was carrying out his orders, then maybe he should become more proactive.
He rebooted his computer and went to the web site of an Illinois ISP. He decided to open an account and to use the name, address, and credit card number of Terrance Johansen of Decatur, Illinois. Terrance’s letter to the May Company, demanding credit to his card #2314-012312-9090 expiration date 09/30/13, had been mangled and was inadvertently ripped open and resealed with a cellophane tape bearing the words “Received in damaged condition, re-wrapped at Parkerville Station.” It was then sent on its way after Bernard photocopied the letter and the envelope containing Terrance’s return address. The online system required either a phone number for billing confirmation, a debit card, or a credit card. Of those three choices, the easiest identity for Bernard to steal was the credit card. The online registration form accepted the “borrowed” information, and Bernard picked the ISP because they offered a seven-day free trial. Bernard knew that as long as he cancelled the account before the free trial was up, Terrance would never see a bill or even know he had an account opened in his name. Bernard already knew this trial period would last only a few minutes, just long enough to e-mail the chief of police in Madison, Wisconsin, whose address was conveniently located at the bottom of the Madison Police Department web site.
With any international corporation, twenty-four-hour buildings were a necessity. The White House was no exception. Late-night staffers and hangers-on from day shifts, attempting to whittle down the millions of tasks the administration was duty-bound to fulfill, populated the halls and basement apart from the president’s residence. Even chiefs of staff sometimes had to burn midnight oil; it was not unusual for Reynolds to turn off his desk lamp at 12:00 AM. He grabbed his coat and walked down the hall to find Hiccock bent over reams of printouts.
“It’s midnight, Bill.”
Hiccock rubbed his eyes. “There’s something trying to knock on my brain here, but so far …”
“Bill, go home and catch a few winks. Then maybe you’ll hear the doorbell.”
“Do you think this is odd?”
“What?”
“We checked. Martha had a computer. The kid had a computer. Every one of these ‘homegrowns’ had a computer.”
“You think they were all wired up to an organization on the web?”
“No, that goes back to the mole theory. What if they were all recruited, trained, and coordinated on the web?”
“How’s that different from what I said?”
“What if none of them knew it?”
Reynolds sat with his coat over his lap as his mind began to race. “Have you been able to confirm this?”
“That’s going to be tough. Every one of them but Martha is dead.”
“Then where’s this coming from?”
“It’s the only plausible common denominator.”
“Let me see if I follow your thinking. You are alleging that somebody — we don’t know who — is recruiting random people on the web — but we don’t know how. These random recruits are attacking this country — without knowing why. Is that it?”
“Yeah, I know it’s off the charts. But it’s the only scenario that ties together all the loose ends. Could be a whole new method of recruitment, training, and deployment. One that is airtight.”
“So what’s the wife—” Hiccock held up his pointer finger— “ex-wife think about this?”
“She feels there is an external behavioral moderator at work here.”
“Inglese, por favor.”
Just then Janice entered the office rubbing the bridge of her nose and yawning. “I just finished reading all the profiles. These people exhibit a hybrid schism”—she noticed Reynolds and “dumbed down” for his sake—“they all have no connection to their targets and no apparent aptitude in the means of destruction. In my opinion, it’s safe to assume that all these people were aware of their actions but probably would have had no recollection of how or why they did it — or how they knew how to do what they did, for that matter.”
“If that’s true that makes them the perfect operatives,” Reynolds said. “Even if you catch them, they don’t know anything. That only leaves how they are being recruited and trained.”
“That’s why I’ve got that meeting tomorrow with someone who might be able to shed some light on the subject,” Hiccock said.
“Speaking of which, the boss has approved your wild idea of bringing him into this, but for Christ’s sake, Bill, he’s not even in the government. Couldn’t you find a smart guy who’s already on the payroll?”
“Wow, that’s a floater just waiting to be creamed, Ray.”
Reynolds simply smirked. It was too late at night for this.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The exclamation “Pull!” was followed shortly by an ear-piercing shotgun blast that shattered a clay pigeon. The pieces fell serenely into the Chesapeake Bay. The skeeter, in shooting goggles, ear protectors, duck hunter’s hat, and red flannel jacket, was best-selling author Frank Harris. When he was forty-five, he started fooling around with some military-styled video games and a year later wrote his first thriller, which became a huge hit. At the age of fifty-five, the former bank manager was a multimillion-dollar word machine churning out high-tech spy and political novels. Although Harris never served in the military, when his publisher dressed him up in pseudo military casual attire for the picture on his dust jackets, he looked every bit the part of a retired flag officer. He had handsome features, and the peaked cap covering his balding head made him appear years younger.
He was firing from the jetty that extended into the bay from his twenty-five-acre waterfront estate. Hiccock, standing next to him, recoiled from the kickback as the next blast emptied out of the double-barrel shotgun.
“This is about the terrorists, isn’t it?” Harris asked as he removed his ear protectors and walked over to the gun table.
Hiccock smiled. How could he have expected this guy not to figure it out? “Let’s make believe you didn’t ask that and I didn’t nod, okay?”
“Just like in one of my books. What’s the Washington brain trust think?”
“They’re looking for the ghost of cold wars past. They are so inside that box, a light goes on when you open the door. That’s why I’m here.”
“Generals always lose the start of the next war because they fight it like the last war. After a few licks, they’ll catch on.” Harris wiped down the shotgun and placed it on the table.
“Something tells me the clock may run out before we get off the last shot.”
“Well, I think I know what you’re looking for, but it’s going to cost you.”
Hiccock surveyed the vast accumulated wealth of Harris’s surroundings. A quarter of a mile behind him, knights in armor, forever mounted on stuffed horses, stood on motionless display behind the twenty-foot glass windows of Harris’s armaments room. A Sherman tank was propped up like a statue with a landscaped circular garden surrounding it amidst original Remington sculptures with a few Robert