Izabel said, “There has been an outbreak of a new, fatal malaria in three of your cities: New York, Philadelphia, and Newark. Many people are dead.”
Eddie and I stared at each other. I felt bile collecting in my belly, rising hotly into my throat.
“Newark,” I repeated. “You said Trenton.”
“Maybe they said Newark, not Trenton. I was hallucinating then,” Eddie replied.
FOURTEEN
The jet had a kitchenette and microwavable meals, and the leather seats folded back into beds. The pilots announced that we were headed to Washington, flight time eleven hours. A flight attendant served coffee and bagels and left. Ray Havlicek appeared on the screen when we reached ten thousand feet, as Izabel Santo and I drank strong Brazilian coffee. Eddie sipped a Jack Daniel’s on ice, despite my warning that he avoid mixing booze with medication.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” Ray said.
On-screen, Ray sat behind his desk in the FBI building, the top of the Washington Monument outside his window, and the faces in a photo visible on his desk: Ray and fiancée, Chris, the public health expert, with my intern Aya, picnicking at Wolf Trap. It was a staged appeal. He’s suggesting that we’re all friends. And telling us that if his career suffers, then these other people, who I care about — Ray’s future family — might, too.
“Everyone here is proud of you,” Ray said.
“Don’t go there,” I said.
“I know you’re angry, Joe.” Ray looked fit in his gray suit and striped tie, his expression neutral. He’d always been an enigma to me: friendly on the surface, but holding things back. He was competent and ambitious, politically shrewd and professionally effective. He was capable of confusing national goals with personal ones, but so is everyone, I guess. If he resented the fact that his fiancée had preferred me over him once, he’d never mentioned it. He knew that his professional fate was in our hands. But at the moment this was still his plane, his staffers, his hands on the levers.
“Us? Mad at you?” Eddie said. “Why would we be mad?”
“You need to understand the big picture,” said Ray. “In twenty minutes we’re going to join the bioterror task force in conference. I can’t tell you what to say, but you can be a huge help. What you saw, what you overheard, what you found on that island may be crucial. There’s no way I can stop you from saying…”
“From saying how you screwed us over?” I suggested.
He sighed. “I won’t try to tell you that you were adequately protected down there.”
Eddie turned even redder as the plane hit an air pocket. “Even you wouldn’t do that, scumbag.”
“But before you make the choice, let me give you an overview. We all want the best for our country, Eddie. So I’m suggesting that we keep individual situations out of this for the present. How to overcome the big problem. How to safeguard the public. And keep rival agencies from infighting instead of cooperating during an emergency. We have a structure in place, and given the chance, other people can wreck it. You never know what other people will do. Turn something smooth into a mess.”
“Don’t listen to this gobbledygook,” snapped Eddie. “I do agree with one thing, Ray. You turned things into a mess.”
“Keep talking, Ray,” I said. I despised his self-serving platitudes. But knew that they were also true.
“I made a mistake, guys. I admit it. I left you in the lurch. But ask yourselves… did I err in asking you to go there? You found the camp. Did I screw up by pointing out where the camp might be? No. I admit we thought we were looking for an embassy attack. And it turned out to be something else. But you found it!”
“This isn’t about what we found. It’s about trust. If it weren’t for Izabel and Nelson, we’d be dead,” Eddie said.
“Nelson is dead,” broke in Izabel, clutching a steaming FBI logo mug of espresso in her hands. There was enough caffeine in there to fuel a SWAT team. Her thin fingers were white on the ceramic, and shook with emotion. They were devoid of rings.
“Yes,” Ray said sadly. “Let me welcome Captain Santo to the U.S. I hope you will accept the FBI’s condolences, for the loss of your personnel, Captain.”
“It was Sublieutenant Salazar’s wife and sons’ loss.”
Ray looked humiliated and ashamed, honest and contrite. But he faced his accusers. He had decided rightly that making threats would be a mistake. He knew he lay on the surgery table, and we stood overhead, looking down at him, judging what to do.
Ray started up again. “You weren’t sent to Brazil to look for lost miners, Joe. And you know it.”
“Then I guess you think we were lucky, finding that madhouse down there,” Eddie snapped.
“That’s not what I meant. We’ve got diplomatic problems with Brazil at the moment, and you know it. We’re not supposed to have people there, and you know it. I fought for you in Washington, and fought when the Brazilians wanted to lock you away. That I didn’t succeed at first doesn’t mean I didn’t try.”
“Call me anytime,” Eddie said in a pretty good imitation of Ray. “I’ll have your back.”
“I’m sorry. And there’s plenty of time later if you want to get into this. But what happens now if you make a stink? What do you achieve? Maybe I’m out, sure, but maybe I’m not. Maybe you’re perceived as getting overly personal. After all, I figured out a way to get eyes in there.”
Eddie looked astounded. “You think you did a good job?”
The audacity of this guy!
“I think the only reason we had anyone there is me. But let’s say Havlicek is out! Who is in? At precisely the moment when we need cooperation between agencies, in the middle of an attack, we’re sidetracked by hearings and finger-pointing and gridlock. You’ve seen it before.”
Ray shrugged, earnest, the truth-telling farm boy. He was George Washington admitting to cutting down the cherry tree. He said, “It’s your call, Joe and Eddie. You’re a key part of the work. And you’ll stay that way if I’m here and you want in. But if someone else takes over, or if you’re perceived as going personal, who knows?”
“Is that a threat?”
“A fact.”
“You’ll take us off if we say anything?”
“That would be stupid. You’re the best I have. You’re civilians and you can leave anytime you want. But the country needs you. I’m saying if you open a door, you never know what crawls out. I’m asking for a chance to lay out the big picture before we get into the meeting. I know you can’t be bought or threatened. Give me five minutes to show you what we are trying to stop.”
“Fuck you,” said Eddie.
“Okay, explain it,” I said, holding back my rage.
He’d had his tech guys make a presentation, maybe to use in meetings. Or maybe he’d had it made just to persuade us. The screen divided in two. A CNN news feed filled the right side, and in it, I saw the President at a podium. On the left, shots of ambulances. Hospital emergency rooms. A New York City mosque.
Izabel whispered, “Dio!” Eddie leaned forward, caught his breath.
A banner across the bottom screen said, Outbreak worsens in three states. The sound was muted since Ray would do the talking, but the President’s words streamed out below.
Stay away from standing water. Cooperate with local pesticide crews when they spray. Call tip lines if you notice a concentration of mosquitoes nearby, especially the species shown a moment ago.