L.A. acknowledged there was no direct, iron-clad proof the Petrevich operation resulted from Ana Koronis’s treason, but showed that the timing was right. The circumstances were ideal. The principal characters were in place. Was Ana Koronis guilty? Could it be mere coincidence that the terrorist behind it all had a sister who had access to the innermost records of the CIA? A sister who was bitter against the United States for killing her son and her husband? A sister named Ana Koronis?
Harriman thanked the jurors for their attention and returned to the prosecution table.
Warfield looked over at Ana. Except when Harriman described the hostage scene, she had shown no emotion throughout the trial. Now she locked her black eyes on the jurors, one by one. Warfield thought she did herself no favor. She looked menacing enough to convince any fence-sitters on the jury that society needed to be protected from Ana Koronis.
Warfield had been certain it was Harvey Joplan who’d provided the terrorists with the names of the questionable Russian nuclear scientists. Now he wasn’t so sure.
In the course of the thirty-three years United States Senator Ferguson Luke Abercrombie had been in the Senate, his office became an antiques showplace, thanks to Bernice Abercrombie’s insatiable habit of shopping for antiques with the taxpayers’ money. Bernice made regular stops at antique shops in northern Virginia and Maryland, and Ferguson Luke and Bernice sashayed across Europe or Asia or Africa every year to pick up a few more prime specimens. When Abercrombie’s office could hold no more of the government’s select purchases, Bernice began to keep the overflow in their Washington condominium or at home back in Taylorville.
Angie, the Senator’s primary assistant, stuck her head inside his office as he was hanging up the phone. “FBI director’s here, Ferguson Luke.”
“So, anything seem unusual? He appear to be upset?”
“The director? Well, he never sat down the whole ten minutes he was waiting, going from one of your art pieces to another. Picked up a few things and scrutinized them. Took some pictures.”
“Pictures!”
“With his cell phone. Is he a little creepy, or is that just the FBI in him?”
“Creepy, honey.”
“Security video was on all the time. He didn’t seem to notice it.”
“Show him in.”
Abercrombie took in Angie’s tanned legs as she walked away. He knew his colleagues suspected Angie was more to him than an assistant and he enjoyed the oblique remarks they made after walking behind her down to his office. He would smile at them. When Bernice would complain about the way Angie dressed he explained that he didn’t much like it either but couldn’t afford to lose her — depended on her too much. If his wife thought there was more to it than that, she let it go, but then they had little time for conversation anyway, he with his committees and other official obligations and Bernice with her bridge and antiquing.
Earl Fullwood jumped as if he’d been caught stealing and almost dropped the ebony chimp he was holding when Angie greeted him with a touch on the sleeve. “The senator asked me to apologize to you in advance for not having as much time as he would like. Has to be on the Senate floor for a vote in a few minutes. If you’d like to follow me, Director Fullwood.”
“It’s aw’right, little lady. That’ll be fine.”
Abercrombie saw and heard it all via the ubiquitous security cameras piped into his computer monitor. The irony of snooping on the FBI chief amused him. He turned it off as Angie and Fullwood entered. Fullwood scanned the furnishings and accessories. Abercrombie knew he was envious. No FBI office was like this. Certainly not Fullwood’s.
“Welcome, Earl, glad you came by! Coffee, Coke? Little cocktail, maybe? Angie can get whatever you’d like.”
Fullwood was looking out the window at the Capitol, right across the street. “Nothing, thanks.”
“How’re things in the crime business?”
Fullwood didn’t seem to know how to make small talk. “You…you’ve seen the numbers, crime is down.”
“Earl, Earl, Bureau’s doing a superb job!” Abercrombie said, waving the question away. “No doubt about that.” Abercrombie leaned back in his leather executive chair and propped his feet on the corner of his desk. “This a business call, or social, Earl?”
Abercrombie almost laughed at his own question. Fullwood had never made a social call in his life. He was there looking for a pay-back of some kind. No doubt about that. Abercrombie had called on Fullwood to assist in a committee hearing a year ago. The senator himself was not a member of that committee but the future of one of his big contributors, a statewide banking company, rode on the outcome of the hearing. He suggested to the committee chairman, a crony of his, that he take testimony from the FBI in the matter. A large national banking firm was attempting to break into Abercrombie’s state and Abercrombie needed the Bureau to present the banking firm in a bad light in order to keep them out.
“That Cloudland Banking outfit will run our established banks out of business if we let ’em in,” Abercrombie had told Fullwood. “I’m sure there’s something in all those files you got over there at the J. Edgar Hoover Building you can use to discredit Cloudland.”
When Fullwood’s assigned agents came up with nothing, Abercrombie called Fullwood and made it clear he expected better cooperation. “Appropriations is looking into ways to reduce budgets, Earl. As it stands now, I’ll have to do battle to preserve even the Bureau’s current funding level. Don’t want you to have to cut back,” he’d said.
A month later at the committee hearing, a young FBI Agent testified his investigation determined Cloudland Banking had on at least one previous occasion used “unethical and marginal legal practices” to overrun smaller banks in its path. The committee chairman then said a full investigation would be required before the committee could go further. Next day, Cloudland’s attorneys read the tea leaves and withdrew their application to move into Abercrombie’s state. That had been the end of it.
Fullwood pulled the worn-out cigar out of his mouth. Abercrombie’s Persian rug caught his eye as he composed his opener. “It’s about that counterterrorism camp at Lone Elm, Fuggason. It’s a army operation and—”
Abercrombie guessed where Fullwood was going. “Yeah. I’m familiar with Lone Elm. Cam Warfield runs Lone Elm more or less as a service to the army. Heard good things about it, too. Always liked Warfield.” He knew that was the last thing Fullwood wanted to hear.
“Well, Fuggason, maybe you’re not familiar with some of the recent activities of Cameron Warfield. The Pres’dent brought Warfield in like some kind of private detective to work for him out of the White House and Warfield ended up interferin’ with one of the Bureau’s operations, pretty near blew it. Had to do with a Russian tryin’ to cross into I-raq. Think it was a real embarrassment to the Pres’dent.”
“Yeah, something about that came out in that Koronis trial couple weeks ago. In the papers, too. I didn’t connect Warfield with that operation.”
“Then you already know about it. The kunnel left the White House after that border screw-up, but who the hell knows what he’s doin’ out there at that army-subsidized Lone Elm of his. My guess is that he’s doin’ the same thing the CIA and the Bureau do at our trainin’ centers. Pure and simple duplication. Waste of the taxpayers’ money, Fuggason! The place is nothin’ but a retirement program for that would-be-hero Warfield, and he needs to be put outta binness before he does some real harm to our country here.” Fullwood punctuated his rhetoric by banging his fist on the lamp table next to his chair.
Abercrombie thought for a minute. How bad did the director want Warfield out? He looked at Fullwood over the top of his glasses. “Well, Earl, I see what you mean, but there might be a small problem. It’ll be impossible for my committee or the whole Senate to take any direct action about Warfield since he’s more or less a contractor to the army. Pentagon would accuse us of micro-managing one of the military services, you see. The army has a history of a certain amount of autonomy. You know that, Earl. Besides, a lot of people in the Senate are right fond of Warfield.”