“Very clearly,” replied the ambassador.
Bousikaris knew they needed time. Of course it was blackmail, of course the Chinese wanted something, but to reject it capriciously would be disastrous. He doubted the PRC would think twice about revealing its complicity in sabotaging a U.S. election. Whatever their game, the stakes were high.
“However,” Bousikaris said, “just so there’s no misunderstanding … Can we assume your government is looking for some kind of … reciprocation?”
“Yes. Reciprocation. Friends helping friends — that’s what we have in mind.”
Arms crossed, Martin glared at the ambassador.
Bousikaris said, “Mr. President, I think we’ve misunderstood the ambassador’s intent.”
“Exactly so,” replied the ambassador.
Martin stared hard at Bousikaris and then, like the chameleon Bousikaris knew him to be, smiled. He carefully smoothed his tie. “My apologies, Mr. Ambassador. Sometimes my temper gets ahead of me. That’s why Howard is so valuable; he keeps me from making a fool of myself. So, tell me: What is it you need help with?”
“Terrorists, Mr. President.”
“Uncle Briggs, why don’t fish drown?”
Crouched down to rinse his hands in the surf, Briggs Tanner looked up and shielded his eyes from the setting sun. “What’s that? Why don’t what?”
With one tiny hand wrapped around her fishing pole, the girl pointed to the water. “They live underwater all the time, so there’s no air, right? How come they don’t get drownded?”
Uh-oh, Tanner thought. Lucy Cahil, five-year-old daughter of his best friend Ian Cahil, had finally asked the kind of question Tanner dreaded. As her adoptive uncle and godfather, Tanner loved Lucy as his own, but was never sure how to handle such queries. Serious answer, or funny one?
Lucy solved the problem for him. “And don’t say ’cuz they’ve got tiny scuba things. My dad already tried that.”
Tanner laughed. Translation: I’m young, not stupid. “Okay. Fish don’t drown because they have gills. Gills absorb oxygen from the water, and the fish breathe that”
“So, if there’s ox … oxi … air down there, how come we can’t do it?”
“We’re just not built that way, I guess.”
Lucy considered this for a moment. “Okay.” She returned her attention to her pole.
Tanner patted her on the shoulder and walked over to Cahil, who had been watching the exchange from his lounge chair. Behind him, up a set of long, winding stairs set into the wooded embankment, sat Tanner’s home, an old spruce and oak lighthouse he’d purchased from the Virginia Historical Commission. The narrow-mouthed, tall-cliffed cove the lighthouse guarded sat well back from the Rappahannock’s main channel. Tanner’s closest neighbor was a mile away.
“See, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” Cahil asked.
“No.”
“I’m telling you, bud, you’d make a great father.”
“I seem to recall getting the same pitch from your wife last week.”
Cahil’s bearded face split into a grin. “Maggie loves lost causes.”
“There’s still plenty of time for kids.” Saying the words, Tanner suddenly realized it didn’t sound so bad. On the other hand, how would he balance a family with what he did for a living? How did Bear do it? Until he figured that out, playing uncle would have to suffice. Truth was, he liked it.
“Briggs, you’re forty.”
“I plan to live to be a hundred and twenty.”
Cahil laughed. “Oh, well, in that case … How, may I ask, do you plan to do that?”
“Clean living and an apple a day.”
“An apple a day keeps the grim reaper away?”
“That’s the theory I’m going on.”
Good ol’ Bear, Tanner thought. He and Cahil had been friends for nearly fifteen years, having first survived Navy Special Warfare training together, and then ISAG, or Intelligence Support Activity Group selection. In those early days, Cahil’s fiercely loyal and ever-reliable nature had won him the nickname “Mama Bear.”
After IS AG’s disbandment due to Pentagon politics, he and Cahil — who were only two of the sixty operators to survive ISAG training’s 90 percent attrition rate — were recruited by former spymaster Leland Dutcher to join a Reagan-era experiment called Holystone Group.
In the intelligence community, Holystone was called a “fix-it-shop”, a semiautonomous CIA-fronted organization that handled tasks that were deemed too delicate for direct government action. Since Holystone worked outside normal channels — or, “on the raw”—it was completely deniable. In short, if a Holystone employee got caught doing something he or she shouldn’t be doing, somewhere he or she shouldn’t be, they were on their own. As Dutcher was fond of saying, “It’s a brutal necessity. Brutal for us, necessary for the job.”
For all that, for all the ups and downs he’d seen since joining Holystone — including losing his wife, Elle, in a skiing accident — Tanner counted himself lucky to be working with people like Dutcher and Cahil. They were family.
“Speaking of wives and children and such,” said Bear. “Have you heard from Camille lately?”
“We talked last week. She’s in Haifa.”
“You’re kidding?”
“Nope. Mossad hired her as a security consultant.”
Up until six months ago Camille had been a Mossad katsa, or case officer. Her career — and nearly her life — had been cut short when she bucked her superiors to save Tanner’s life aboard a ship bound for Tel Aviv. Thanks to the intercession of then-President John Haverland, Camille had been allowed to retire with honor and impunity from Mossad service. That the Israelis had even allowed her back into the country was extraordinary: Mossad was not known for its magnanimity.
Though neither of them had said it aloud, Tanner knew he and Camille had reached the same conclusion about their relationship. Given their respective careers and given the fact that neither was ready to quit, the best they could hope for was an on-again off-again romance. It could be worse, Tanner realized. He could not have her in his life at all. Camille was a wonderful woman, and if the circumstances were different … Well.
“Whoa!” Cahil called. “Looks like our girl’s got a bite.”
Tanner looked over his shoulder. Lucy Cahil was sitting on her haunches, feet dug into the sand, her fingers white around the jerking pole. She was losing the battle. Whatever was on the other end was more than a match for her — and still she wasn’t calling for help. Stubborn like her father.
Cahil’s cell phone started ringing; he tossed it to Tanner, then jogged over to Lucy. Tanner flipped open the phone. “Hello?”
“Briggs, its Leland.”
“Evening, Leland.”
“Have you got some time?”
“Sure, when?”
“Right now.”
Tanner hesitated; there was an unaccustomed hardness in his boss’s voice. “What’s going on?”
“You remember Treble?” Dutcher asked.
Tanner remembered; for twelve years it had never been far from his mind. “I remember.”
“We just got word: He may be alive, Briggs.”
3
Though he would never admit it publicly, Special Agent Paul Randall revered his boss. Charlie Latham was a near legend, the Bureau’s top CE&I expert since the early eighties, but that kind of blatant veneration didn’t play well in J. Edgar’s house. Besides, Latham himself would never stand for it. “Do your job, do it discreetly, and let glory worry about itself” was one of his favorite aphorisms.