Gideon’s Sword

1

Nothing in his twelve years of life had prepared Gideon Crew for that day. Every insignificant detail, every trivial gesture, every sound and smell, became frozen as if in a block of glass, unchanging and permanent, ready to be examined at will.

His mother was driving him home from his tennis lesson in their Plymouth station wagon. It was a hot day, well up in the nineties, the kind where clothes stick to one’s skin and sunlight has the texture of flypaper. Gideon had turned the dashboard vents onto his face, enjoying the rush of cold air. They were driving on Route 27, passing the long cement wall enclosing Arlington National Cemetery, when two motorcycle cops intercepted their car, one pulling ahead, the other staying behind, sirens wailing, red lights turning. The one in front motioned with a black-gloved hand toward the Columbia Pike exit ramp; once on the ramp, he signaled for Gideon’s mother to pull over. There was none of the slow deliberation of a routine traffic stop — instead, both officers hopped off their motorcycles and came running up.

“Follow us,” said one, leaning in the window. “Now.”

“What’s this all about?” Gideon’s mother asked.

“National security emergency. Keep up — we’ll be driving fast and clearing traffic.”

“I don’t understand—”

But they were already running back to their motorcycles.

Sirens blaring, the officers escorted them down Columbia Pike to George Mason Drive, forcing cars aside as they went. They were joined by more motorcycles, squad cars, and finally an ambulance: a motorcade that screamed through the traffic-laden streets. Gideon didn’t know whether to be thrilled or scared. Once they turned onto Arlington Boulevard, he could guess where they were going: Arlington Hall Station, where his father worked for INSCOM, the United States Army Intelligence and Security Command.

Police barricades were up over the entrance to the complex, but they were flung aside as the motorcade pulled through. They went shrieking down Ceremonial Drive and came to a halt at a second set of barricades, beside a welter of fire trucks, police cars, and SWAT vans. Gideon could see his father’s building through the trees, the stately white pillars and brick façade set among emerald lawns and manicured oaks. It had once been a girls’ finishing school and still looked it. A large area in front had been cleared. He could see two sharpshooters lying on the lawn, behind a low hummock, rifles deployed on bipods.

His mother turned to him and said, fiercely, “Stay in the car. Don’t get out, no matter what.” Her face was gray and strained, and it scared him.

She stepped out. The phalanx of cops bulled through the crowd ahead of her and they disappeared.

She’d forgotten to turn off the engine. The air-conditioning was still going. Gideon cranked down a window, the car filling with the sounds of sirens, walkie-talkie chatter, shouts. Two men in blue suits came running past. A cop hollered into a radio. More sirens drifted in from afar, coming from every direction.

He heard the sound of a voice over an electronic megaphone, acidic, distorted. “Come out with your hands in view.”

The crowd immediately hushed.

“You are surrounded. There is nothing you can do. Release your hostage and come out now.”

Another silence. Gideon looked around. The attention of the crowd was riveted on the front door of the station. That, it seemed, was where things would play out.

“Your wife is here. She would like to speak to you.”

A buzz of fumbled static came through the sound system and then the electronically magnified sound of a partial sob, grotesque and strange. “Melvin?” Another choking sound. “MELVIN?”

Gideon froze. That’s my mother’s voice, he thought.

It was like a dream where nothing made sense. It wasn’t real. Gideon put his hand on the door handle and opened it, stepping into the stifling heat.

“Melvin…” A choking sound. “Please come out. Nobody’s going to hurt you, I promise. Please let the man go.” The voice over the megaphone was harsh and alien — and yet unmistakably his mother’s.

Gideon advanced through the clusters of police officers and army officers. No one paid him any attention. He made his way to the outer barricade, placed a hand on the rough, blue-painted wood. He stared in the direction of Arlington Hall but could see nothing stirring in the placid façade or on the immediate grounds cleared of people. The building, shimmering in the heat, looked dead. Outside, the leaves hung limply on the oak branches, the sky flat and cloudless, so pale it was almost white.

“Melvin, if you let the man go, they’ll listen to you.”

More waiting silence. Then there was a sudden motion at the front door. A plump man in a suit Gideon didn’t recognize came stumbling out. He looked around a moment, disoriented, then broke into a run toward the barricades, his thick legs churning. Four helmeted officers rushed out, guns drawn; they seized the man and hustled him back behind one of the vans.

Gideon ducked under the barricade and moved forward through the groups of cops, the men with walkie-talkies, the men in uniform. Nobody noticed him, nobody cared: all eyes were fixed on the front entrance to the building.

And then a faint voice rang out from inside the doorway. “There must be an investigation!”

It was his father’s voice. Gideon paused, his heart in his throat.

“I demand an investigation! Twenty-six people died!”

A muffled, amplified fumbling, then a male voice boomed from the sound system. “Dr. Crew, your concerns will be addressed. But you must come out now with your hands up. Do you understand? You must surrender now.”

“You haven’t listened,” came the trembling voice. His father sounded frightened, almost like a child. “People died and nothing was done! I want a promise.”

“That is a promise.”

Gideon had reached the innermost barricade. The front of the building remained still, but he was now close enough to see the door standing half open. It was a dream; at any moment he would wake up. He felt dizzy from the heat, felt a taste in his mouth like copper. It was a nightmare — and yet it was real.

And then Gideon saw the door swing inward and the figure of his father appear in the black rectangle of the doorway. He seemed terribly small against the elegant façade of the building. He took a step forward, his hands held up, palms facing forward. His straight hair hung down over his forehead, his tie askew, his blue suit rumpled.

“That’s far enough,” came the voice. “Stop.”

Melvin Crew stopped, blinking in the bright sunlight.

The shots rang out, so close together they sounded like firecrackers, and his father was abruptly punched back into the darkness of the doorway.

“Dad!” screamed Gideon, leaping over the barrier and running across the hot asphalt of the parking lot. “Dad!”

Shouts erupted behind him, cries of “Who’s that kid?” and “Hold fire!”

He leapt the curb and cut across the lawn toward the entrance. Figures raced forward to intercept him.

“Jesus Christ, stop him!”

He slipped on the grass, fell to his hands and knees, rose again. He could see only his father’s two feet, sticking out of the dark doorway into the sunlight, shoes pointed skyward, scuffed soles turned up for all to see, one with a hole in it. It was a dream, a dream — and then the last thing he saw before he was tackled to the ground was the feet move, jerking twice.

“Dad!” he screamed into the grass, trying to claw back to his feet as the weight of the world piled up on his shoulders; but he’d seen those feet move, his father was alive, he would wake up and all would be well.

2

Gideon Crew had flown in from California on the red-eye, the plane sitting on the LAX tarmac for two hours before finally taking off for Dulles. He’d hopped a bus into the city, then taken the Metro as far as he could before switching to a taxi: the last thing his finances needed right now was the unexpected plane fare. He’d been burning through cash at an alarming rate, not budgeting at all​—​and that last job he’d done had been higher-profile than usual, the merchandise difficult to fence.

When the call came he’d hoped at first it was one more false alarm, another attack of hysteria or drunken plea for attention. But when he arrived at the hospital, the doctor had been coolly frank. “Her liver is failing and she’s not eligible for a transplant because of her history. This may be your last visit.”

She lay in intensive care, her bleached-blond hair spread over the pillow, showing an inch of black roots, her skin raddled. A sad, inept attempt had been made to apply eye shadow; it was like painting the shutters on a haunted house. He could hear her raspy breathing through the nasal cannula. The room was hushed, the lights low, the discreet beeping of electronics a watchful presence. He felt a sudden tidal wave of guilt and pity. He’d been absorbed in his own life instead of tending to her. But every time he’d tried in the past, she had retreated into the bottle and they’d ended up fighting. It wasn’t fair, her life ending like this. It just wasn’t fair.

Taking her hand, he tried and failed to think of anything to say. Finally he managed a lame “How are you, Mom?”—hating himself for the inanity of the question even before he’d finished asking it.

She just looked at him in response. The whites of her eyes were the color of overripe bananas. Her bony hand grasped his in a weak, trembling embrace. Finally she stirred weakly. “Well, this is it.”

“Mom, please don’t talk like that.”

She waved a hand dismissively. “You’ve talked to the doctor: you know how things stand. I have cirrhosis, along with all the lovely side effects — not to mention congestive heart failure and emphysema from years of smoking. I’m a wreck and it’s my own damn fault.”

Gideon could think of no response. It was all true, of course, and his mother was nothing if not direct. She always had been. He found it puzzling that such a strong woman was so weak when it came to chemical vices. No, it wasn’t so puzzling: she had an addictive personality, and he recognized the same in himself.

“The truth shall make you free,” she said, “but first it will make you miserable.”

It was her favorite aphorism, and it always preceded her saying something difficult.

“The time has come for me to tell you a truth—” She gasped in some air. “—that will make you miserable.”

He waited while she took a few more raspy breaths.

“It’s about your father.” Her yellow eyes swiveled toward the door. “Shut it.”

His apprehension mounting, Gideon gently closed the door and returned to her bedside.

She clasped his hand again. “Golubzi,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry?”

“Golubzi. A Russian salt-cabbage roll.”

She paused for more air. “That was the Soviet code name for the operation. The Roll. In one night, twenty-six deep-cover operatives were rolled up. Disappeared.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Thresher.” She closed her eyes, breathing rapidly. It was as if, having decided to take the plunge, she couldn’t wait to get out the words. “That’s the other word. The project your father was working on at INSCOM. A new encryption standard…highly classified.”

“Are you sure you should be talking about this?” Gideon asked.

“Your father shouldn’t have told me. But he did.” Her eyes remained closed and her body looked collapsed, as if it were sinking into the bed. “Thresher needed to be vetted. Tested. That’s when they hired your father. We moved to DC.”

Gideon nodded. For a seventh grader, moving from Claremont, California, to DC had not exactly been fun.

“In 1987, INSCOM sent Thresher to the National Security Agency for final review. It was approved. And implemented.”

“I never heard any of this.”

“You’re hearing it now.” She swallowed painfully. “It took the Russians just months to crack it. On July 5, 1988—the day after Independence Day — the Soviets rolled up all those US spies.”

She paused, releasing a long sigh. The machines continued beeping quietly, mingling with the hiss of the oxygen and the muffled sounds of the hospital beyond.

Gideon continued to hold her hand, at a loss for words.

“They blamed your father for the disaster—”

“Mom.” Gideon pressed her hand. “This is all in the past.”

She shook her head. “They ruined his life. That’s why he did what he did, took that hostage.”

“What does it matter now? Long ago I accepted that Dad made a mistake.”

The eyes opened suddenly. “No mistake. He was the scapegoat.”

She pronounced the word harshly, as if she were clearing her throat of something unpleasant.

“What do you mean?”

“Before Operation Golubzi, your father wrote a memo. He said Thresher was theoretically flawed. That there was a potential back door. They ignored him. But he was right. And twenty-six people died.”

She inhaled noisily, her hands bunching up the bedcovers with the effort. “Thresher was classified, they could say whatever they liked. No one to contradict. Your father was an outsider, a professor, a civilian. And he had a history of treatment for depression that could be conveniently resurrected.”

Listening, Gideon froze. “You’re saying…it wasn’t his fault?”

“Just the opposite. They destroyed the evidence and blamed him for the Golubzi disaster. That’s why he took that hostage. And that’s why he was shot with his hands up — to silence him. Cold-blooded murder.”

Gideon felt a strange sense of weightlessness. As horrifying as the story was, he felt a burden being lifted. His father, whose name had been publicly vilified since he was twelve, wasn’t the depressed, unstable, bungling mathematician after all. All the taunting and hazing he’d endured, the whispering and sniggering behind his back — it meant nothing. At the same time, the enormity of the crime perpetrated against his father began to sink in. He remembered that day vividly, remembered the promises that were made. He remembered how his father had been lured out into the sunlight only to be shot down.

“But who…?” he began.

“Lieutenant General Chamblee Tucker. An INSCOM deputy chief. Group leader of the Thresher project. He made a scapegoat of your father to protect himself. He gave the order to fire. Remember that name: Chamblee Tucker.”

His mother ceased speaking and lay in the bed, covered with sweat, gasping as if she had just run a marathon.

“Thank you for telling me this,” he said evenly.

“Not finished.” More labored breathing. He could see her heart monitor on the wall, registering in the one forties.

“Don’t talk anymore,” he said. “You need to rest.”

“No,” she said with sudden forcefulness. “I’ll have time to rest…later.”

Gideon waited.

“You know what happened next. You lived through it, too. The constant moving, the poverty. The…men. I just couldn’t pull it together. My real life ended that day. Ever afterward I felt dead inside. I was a terrible mother. And you…you were so hurt.”

“Don’t you worry, I survived.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course.” But deep within, Gideon felt a twinge.

Her breathing began to slow, and Gideon felt her grasp relax. Seeing she was going to sleep, he eased her hand from his and placed it on the bedcovers. But when he bent down to kiss her, the hand shot up again, grasping his collar with claw-like fingers. Her eyes pinned his and she said, with manic intensity: “Even the score.”

“What?”

“Do to Tucker what he did to your father. Destroy him. And in the end, make sure he knows why — and by whom.”

“Good God, what are you asking?” Gideon whispered, looking around in sudden panic. “Mom, you don’t know what you’re saying.”

Her voice fell to a whisper. “Take your time. Finish college. Go to graduate school. Study. Watch. Wait. You’ll figure out a way.”

Her hand slowly relaxed and she closed her eyes again, the air seeming to run out of her forever, like a final sigh. And in a way it was; she lapsed into a coma and died two days later.

Those were her last words, words that would resonate endlessly in his mind. You’ll figure out a way.

3

Gideon Crew emerged from the ponderosa pines into the broad field in front of the cabin. In one hand he carried an aluminum tube containing his fly rod; a canvas bag was slung over his shoulder, two trout inside, nestled in wet grass. It was a beautiful day in early May, the sun mild on the back of his neck. His long legs swept through the meadow, scattering bees and butterflies.

The cabin stood at the far end, hand-adzed logs chinked with adobe, with a rusted tin roof, two windows, and a door. A rack of solar panels poked discreetly above the roofline, next to a broadband satellite dish.

Beyond, the mountainside fell away into the vast Piedra Lumbre basin, the distant peaks of southern Colorado fringing the horizon like so many blue teeth. Gideon worked on “the Hill”—up at Los Alamos National Lab — and spent his weeknights in a cheesy government apartment in a building at the corner of Trinity and Oppenheimer. But he spent his weekends — and his real life — in this cabin in the Jemez Mountains.

He pushed open the cabin door and entered the kitchen alcove. Shrugging off the canvas bag, he took out the cleaned cutthroat trout, rinsed them, and patted them dry. He reached over to the iPod sitting in its dock and, after a moment’s reflection, dialed in Thelonius Monk. The percussive notes of “Green Chimneys” floated from the speakers.

Blending lemon juice and salt, he beat in some olive oil and freshly cracked pepper, then basted the trout with the marinade. Mentally, he checked off the rest of the ingredients of truite à la provençale: onions, tomatoes, garlic, vermouth, flour, oregano, and thyme. Gideon usually ate only one real meal a day, of the highest quality, prepared by himself. It was an almost Zen-like exercise, both in the preparation and the slow consumption. When further sustenance was necessary, it was Twinkies, Doritos, and coffee on the run.

After washing his hands, he walked into the living area and placed the aluminum fly-rod case into an old umbrella stand in one corner. He flopped down on the ancient leather sofa and kicked his feet up, relaxing. A fire, lit for cheeriness rather than warmth, crackled in the large stone fireplace, and the afternoon sun threw yellow light across a pair of elk antlers hanging above it. A bearskin rug covered the floor, and old backgammon and checkers boards hung on the walls. Books lay strewn about on side tables and stacked on the floor, and a wall of shelves at the far end of the room was crammed with volumes stuck in every which way until no space remained.

He glanced toward another alcove, covered by an improvised curtain made from an old Hudson’s Bay point blanket. For a long moment, he didn’t move. He hadn’t checked the system since last week, and he felt disinclined to do it now. He was tired and looking forward to dinner. But it had been a self-imposed duty for so long that it was now a habit, and so at last he roused himself, raked back his long straight black hair with one hand, and slouched over to the blanket, from behind which came a faint humming sound.

He drew back the curtain with some reluctance, the dark space releasing a faint smell of electronics and warm plastic. A wooden desk and a rack of computer equipment greeted his eye, LEDs blinking in the dimness. There were four computers in the rack, of varying makes and sizes, all off-brand or generic, none less than five years old: an Apache server and three Linux clients. For what Gideon was doing, the computers didn’t need to be fast; they just had to be thorough — and reliable. The only brand-new and relatively expensive piece of equipment in the alcove was a high-performance broadband satellite router.

Above the rack was a small, exquisite pencil sketch by Winslow Homer of rocks on the Maine coast. It was the one remaining artifact from his previous profession: the one he simply hadn’t had the heart to sell.

Pulling back a ratty office chair on an octopus of wheels, he seated himself at the small wooden desk, kicked his feet up, dragged a keyboard into his lap, and began typing. A screen popped up with a summary of the search results, informing him he had not been in attendance for six days.

He drilled through to the results window. Immediately he saw that there had been a hit.

He stared at the screen. Over the years, he’d refined and improved his search engine, and it had been almost a year since the last false positive.

Dropping his feet to the floor, heart suddenly hammering in his chest, he hunched over the desk, banging furiously at the keys. The hit was in a table of contents released to the National Security Archives at George Washington University. The actual archival material remained classified, but the table of contents had been released as part of a large, ongoing declassification of Cold War documents under Executive Order 12958.

The hit was his father’s name: L. Melvin Crew. And the title of the archived, still-classified document was A Critique of the Thresher Discrete Logarithm Encryption Standard EVP-4: A Theoretical Back-Door Cryptanalysis Attack Strategy Using a Group of φ-Torsion Points of an Elliptic Curve in Characteristic φ.

“Mother of God,” Gideon murmured as he stared at the screen. No false positive this time.

For years, he’d been hoping for something. But this looked like more than something. It might be the brass ring.

It seemed incredible, unbelievable: could this be the very memo his father had written criticizing Thresher, the memo that General Tucker had supposedly destroyed?

There was only one way to find out.

4

Midnight. Gideon Crew slouched down the street, hands in his pockets, baseball cap turned backward, filthy shirt untucked beneath a greasy trench coat, baggy pants hanging halfway down his ass, thinking how lucky he was that today was trash day in suburban Brookland, Washington, DC.

He turned the corner of Kearny Street and passed the house: a shabby bungalow with an overgrown lawn surrounded by a white picket fence only partially painted. And, of course, a lovely overflowing trash can sat at the end of the walkway, a fearful stench of rotting shrimp hovering in the muggy air. He paused at the can, looking about furtively. Then he dove in with one hand, digging deep, groping among the garbage as he went. His hand encountered something that felt like french fries and he pulled up a handful, confirmed they were fries, tossed them back.

He saw a flash of movement. A scrawny, one-eyed cat came slinking out from a hedge.

“Hungry, partner?”

The cat made a low meow and crept over, tail twitching warily. Gideon offered it a fry. It sniffed at it suspiciously, ate it, then meowed again, louder.

Gideon tossed the cat a small handful. “That’s all, kiddo. Any idea how bad trans-fatty acids are for you?”

The cat settled down to nosh.

Gideon dove in again, stirring the garbage with his arm, this time turning up a wad of discarded papers. Quickly sorting through them, he saw they were some little child’s math homework — straight A’s, he noted with approval. Why were they thrown away? Should be framed.

He pushed them back in, dug out a chicken drumstick, and set it aside for the cat. He reached in again, both hands this time, wriggling downward, encountering something slimy, fumbling deeper, his fingers working through various semi-solid things before encountering more papers. Grasping them and working them to the surface, he saw they were just what he was looking for: discarded bills. And among them was the top half of a phone bill.

Jackpot.

“Hey!” He heard a shout and looked up. There was the homeowner himself, Lamoine Hopkins, a small, thin African American man, excitedly pointing his arm. “Hey! Get the fuck outta here!”

In no hurry, glad of the unexpected opportunity to interact with one of his targets, Gideon shoved the papers into his pocket. “Can’t a man feed himself?” He held up the drumstick.

“Go feed yourself somewhere else!” the man shrilled. “This is a decent neighborhood! That’s my trash!”

“Come on, man, don’t be like that.”

The man took out his cell phone. “You see this? I’m calling the cops!”

“Hey, no harm done, man.”

“Hello?” said the man, speaking theatrically into the phone, “there’s an intruder on my property, rifling my trash! Thirty-five seventeen Kearny Street Northeast!”

“Sorry,” Gideon mumbled, shambling off with the drumstick in one hand.

“I need a squad car, right now!” shrilled the man. “He’s trying to get away!”

Gideon tossed the drumstick in the direction of the cat, shuffled off around the corner, and then picked up his pace. He quickly wiped his hands and arms as thoroughly as he could on his cap, discarded it, turned his Salvation Army coat inside out — revealing an immaculate blue trench coat — and put it on, tucked in his shirt, then slicked back his hair with a comb. As he reached his rental car a few blocks off, a police cruiser passed by, giving him only the briefest of glances. He slipped in and started the engine, rejoicing at his good fortune. Not only did he get what he’d come for, but he’d met Mr. Lamoine Hopkins in person — and had such a lovely chat with him.

That would come in handy.

From his motel room, Gideon began cold-calling the numbers on Hopkins’s phone bill the next morning. He worked his way through a succession of Hopkins’s friends until on the fifth call he struck pay dirt.

“Heart of Virginia Mall, tech support,” came the voice. “Kenny Roman speaking.”

Tech support. Quickly, Gideon turned on a digital recorder plugged into a line-splitter on the phone line. “Mr. Roman?”

“Yes?”

“My name is Eric, and I’m calling on behalf of the Sutherland Finance Company.”

“Yeah? What do you want?”

“It’s about the loan on your 2007 Dodge Dakota.”

“What Dakota?”

“The loan is three months overdue, sir, and I’m afraid that Sutherland Finance—”

“What are you talking about? I don’t have any Dakota.”

“Mr. Roman, I understand these are difficult financial times, but if we don’t receive the amount currently overdue—”

“Look, buddy, dig some of the wax outta your ears, will you? You’ve got the wrong person. I don’t even own a pickup. Suck​—​My​—​Dick.” There was a click as the line went dead.

Gideon hung up. He snapped off the digital recorder. Then he listened three times to the exchange he’d just recorded. What are you talking about? I don’t have any Dakota, Gideon mimicked aloud. Look, buddy, dig some of the wax outta your ears, will you? You’ve got the wrong person. I don’t even own a pickup. He repeated the phrases many times, in different combinations, until he felt he had the inflections, tone, rhythms down just about right.

He picked up the phone and dialed again: this time, the IT department at Fort Belvoir.

“IT,” came the response. It was Lamoine Hopkins’s voice.

“Lamoine?” Gideon said, whispering. “It’s Kenny.”

“Kenny, what the hell?” Hopkins sounded instantly suspicious. “What’s with the whispering?”

“Got a fucking cold. And…what I got to say is sensitive.”

“Sensitive? What do you mean?”

“Lamoine, you got a problem.”

“Me? I got a problem? What do you mean?”

Gideon consulted a sheet of scribbled notes. “I got a call from a guy named Roger Winters.”

“Winters? Winters called you?”

“Yeah. Said there was a problem. He asked me how many times you’d called me from work, that kind of shit.”

“Oh my God.”

“Yeah.

“He wanted to know,” Gideon-as-Kenny asked, “if you’d called me on your office computer, using VoIP or Skype.”

“Christ, that would be a violation of security! I’ve never done that!”

“Man said you had.”

Gideon could hear Lamoine breathing heavily. “But it isn’t true!”

“That’s what I told him. Listen, Lamoine, there’s a security audit going on over there, I’ll bet you anything, and somehow they’re on your case.”

“What am I going to do?” Hopkins fairly wailed. “I haven’t done anything wrong! I mean, I couldn’t make a VoIP call from here even if I wanted to!”

“Why not?”

“The firewall.”

“There are ways to get around a firewall.”

“Are you kidding me? We’re a classified facility!”

“There’s always a way.”

“For Chrissakes, Kenny, I know there isn’t a way. I’m IT, remember? Just like you. There’s only one outgoing port in the entire network, and all that it allows past is passphrase-​encrypted packets from specific nodes, all of which are secure. And even then the packets can only go to certain external IPs. All the classified documents in this archive are digitized, they’re super-paranoid about electronic security. There’s no way in hell I could call out on Skype! I can’t even send out e-mail!”

Gideon coughed, sniffed, blew his nose. “Don’t you know the port number?”

“Sure, but I don’t have access to the weekly passphrases.”

“Does your boss, Winters, have access?”

“No. Only, like, the top three in the organization get the passphrase — director, deputy director, and security director. I mean, with that passphrase you could pretty much e-mail out any classified document in here.”

“Don’t you guys in IT generate the passphrases?”

“You kidding? It comes down from the spooks in a secure envelope. I mean, they walk the sucker over here. It never enters any electronic system — it’s written down by hand on a piece of frigging paper.”

“Problem is that port number,” said Gideon. “Is that written down?”

“It’s kept in a safe. But a lot of people know it.”

Gideon grunted. “Sounds to me like you’re being framed. Like maybe one of the top guys screwed up and is looking for someone else to take the fall. ‘Let’s pin it on Lamoine!’”

“No way.”

“Happens all the time. It’s always the little guys who get shafted. You need to protect yourself, man.”

“How?”

Gideon let the silence build. “I have an idea…it might be a really good one. What was that port number again?”

“Six one five one. What’s that got to do with anything?”

“I’ll check some things, call you back at home tonight. In the meantime, don’t say anything about this to anybody, just sit tight, do your job, keep your head down. Don’t call me back — they’re no doubt logging your calls. We’ll talk when you get home.”

“I can’t believe this. Listen, thanks, Kenny. Really.”

Gideon coughed again. “Hey, what are friends for?”

5

Hanging up the phone, Gideon Crew began flinging off his clothes. He slid open the closet door and laid a garment bag on the bed. From it he removed a fragrant, custom-cut Turnbull & Asser shirt, shifted his lanky frame into it, and buttoned it up. Next came a blue Thomas Mahon bespoke suit. He pulled on the pants, belted them, whipped on a Spitalfield flower tie (where did the English get those names?), tied it with a crisp tug, shrugged on the jacket. He massaged some hair gel between his palms and used it to slick back his floppy hair. As a final touch, he combed a smidgen of gray into his sideburns, which added an instant five years to his age.

He turned to look at himself in the mirror. Thirty-two hundred dollars for the new persona — shirt, suit, shoes, belt, tie, haircut — twenty-nine hundred for travel, motel, car, and driver. All on four brand-new credit cards obtained and maxed out for just this purpose, with virtually no hope of being paid off.

Welcome to America.

The car was already waiting for him in front of the motel, a black Lincoln Navigator; he slipped into the back and handed the driver the address. Gideon settled himself into the soft kid leather as the car pulled away, arranging his face, composing himself, and trying not to think of the three-hundred-dollar-an-hour price tag. Or, for that matter, the much higher price tag attached to the scam he was about to perpetrate, if he were to get caught…

Traffic was light and thirty minutes later the car pulled into the entrance to Fort Belvoir, which housed INSCOM’s Directorate of Information Management: a low, 1960s-modern building of exceptional hideousness set amid locust trees and surrounded by a huge parking lot.

Somewhere inside the building sat Lamoine Hopkins, no doubt sweating bullets. And somewhere else inside the building was the classified memo written by Gideon’s own father.

“Pull up to the front and wait for me,” said Gideon. He realized his voice was squeaky with nervousness, and he swallowed, trying to relax his neck muscles.

“I’m sorry, sir, but it says No Standing.”

He cleared his throat, producing a smooth, low, confident voice. “If anyone asks, say Congressman Wilcyzek is meeting with General Moorehead. But if they insist, don’t make a scene, just go ahead and move. I shouldn’t be more than ten minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Gideon exited the vehicle and headed down the walkway; he pushed through the doors and headed for the reception/information desks. The broad lobby was full of military personnel and self-important civilians briskly coming and going. God, he hated Washington.

With a cold smile, Gideon went up to the woman at the desk. She had carefully coiffed blue hair, neat as a pin, clearly a stickler for procedure — someone who took her work seriously. Couldn’t ask for better. Those who followed the rules were the most predictable.

He smiled and​—​​speaking into the air just a few inches above her head​—​​said, “Congressman Wilcyzek here to see Deputy Commander General Thomas Moorehead. I’m…” He glanced at his watch. “…three minutes early.”

She straightened up like a shot. “Of course, Congressman. Just a moment.” She lifted a phone, pressed a button, spoke for a moment. She glanced at Gideon. “Excuse me, Congressman, can you spell your name, please?”

With a sigh of irritation he spelled it out, making it abundantly clear that she should have known the spelling already—​​indeed, he was careful to cultivate an air of someone who expected to be recognized, who had only contempt for the ignorance of those who did not.

She pursed her lips, got back on the phone. A short conversation followed, and then she hung up. “Congressman, I’m terribly sorry, but the general is out for the day and his secretary has no record of the appointment. Are you sure…?” She faltered when Gideon fixed her with a severe look.

“Am I sure?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

Her lips were now fully pursed, her blue hair beginning to quiver with suppressed offense.

He looked at his watch, looked up at her. “Mrs.…?”

“Wilson,” she said.

He slipped a piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to her. “You can check for yourself.”

It was an e-mail he had concocted, allegedly from the general’s secretary, confirming the appointment with the general he’d already known would be out. She read it and returned it to him. “I’m very sorry, he doesn’t seem to be in. Shall I call his secretary again?”

Gideon continued to glare at her, fixing her with a subzero stare. “I should like to speak to his secretary myself.”

She faltered, removed the phone from its cradle, and handed it to him, but not before dialing the number.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Wilson, but this is a classified matter. Do you mind?”

Her face, which had gradually darkened, now flushed rose. She stood up silently and took a step away from her desk. He put the receiver to his ear. The phone was ringing, but turning to block her view, he depressed the button and, almost imperceptibly, dialed another extension — this time, the secretary to General Shorthouse, the director himself.

Only, like, the top three in the organization get the passphrase​—​director, deputy director, and security director…

“Director’s office,” came the secretary’s voice.

Speaking quietly and rapidly, and summoning the voice of the man who’d confronted him at the trash cans the night before, he said: “This is Lamoine Hopkins in IT returning the general’s call. It’s urgent — a security breach.”

“Just a moment.”

He waited. After a minute, General Shorthouse came on. “Yes? What’s the problem? I didn’t call you.”

“I’m sorry, General,” said Gideon, speaking like Hopkins but now in a low, unctuous tone, “about the lousy day you must be having.”

“What are you talking about, Hopkins?”

“Your system being down, sir, and the backup not kicking in.”

“It’s not down.”

“General? We’re showing your whole grid as down. It’s a security violation, sir — and you know what that means.”

“That’s preposterous. My computer’s on right now and working perfectly. And why are you calling me from reception?”

“General, that’s part of the problem. The telephony matrix is tied into the computer network and it’s giving false readings. Log off and log back on, please, while I trace.” Gideon glanced over at the receptionist, who was still standing to one side, making a conscientious effort not to overhear.

He heard the tapping of keys. “Done.”

“Funny, I’m not reading any packet activity from your network address. Try signing off again.”

More tapping of keys.

“Nothing, General. Looks like your ID might have been compromised. This is bad — it’s going to require a report, an investigation. And it would be your system. I’m so sorry, sir.”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Hopkins. I’m sure we can fix it.”

“Well…we can give it a shot. But I’ll have to try resetting, and then accessing your account from down here. I’m going to need your ID and passphrase, please.”

A pause. “I’m not sure I can give you that.”

“You may not realize this, but in the case of network resets the passphrase is automatically changed, so you’re allowed to release the passphrase internally to IT. If you feel uncomfortable with that, sir, I understand, but then I’ll have to call the NSA for a passphrase override, I’m really sorry—”

“All right, Hopkins. I wasn’t aware of that regulation.” He gave Gideon the passphrase and ID. Gideon jotted it down.

After a moment, with huge relief in his voice, Gideon said: “Whew. That reset did it, sir. Apparently, it was just a hung screen. No security breach. You’re good to go.”

“Excellent.”

Gideon depressed the key and turned to the receptionist. “Sorry to bother you,” he said, handing her the receiver. “Everything’s straightened out.” He walked briskly out of the building to the waiting car.

Thirty minutes later he was back in his motel room, stretched out on the bed, laptop connected to an unsecured computer in the bowels of the General Services Administration that he’d remotely hijacked. He had chosen to target the GSA — the vast government bureaucracy that handles supplies, equipment, procedures, and the like — because he knew it would be a relatively easy mark, and yet one still within the government security perimeter.

Hopkins had explained—​unwittingly, of course—​​that the INSCOM archive could only send documents to previously authorized IP addresses, and unfortunately most of those were also inside classified perimeters…except for one: the National Security Archives at George Washington University. This private archive, the largest in the world outside the Library of Congress, collected vast amounts of government documents, including virtually everything being routinely declassified as part of the Mandatory Declassification Review: the government’s program for declassifying documents under several laws requiring them to do so. A veritable Amazon of information flowed into this archive on a daily basis.

Via the GSA computer, Gideon sent an automated request to the INSCOM secure archive at George Washington via port 6151, directing that a PDF file of a certain classified document be transmitted out through the same port, authorized via General Shorthouse’s passphrase, to be added to a routine dump of Cold War declassified documents headed for the National Security Archives daily batch files. The file was duly transmitted; it passed through the firewall at the sole authorized port, where the passphrase was examined and approved; and the document was subsequently routed to George Washington University and stored with millions of others in one of the archive databases.

Thus, Gideon had successfully arranged for the erroneous declassification of a classified document and hid it within a huge stream of data leaving the secure government perimeter. Now all that remained was to retrieve the document.

The next morning, at around eleven, a certain rumpled yet undeniably charming visiting professor by the name of Irwin Beauchamp, dressed in tweeds, mismatched corduroys, beaten-up wing tips, and a knitted tie (thirty-two dollars; Salvation Army) entered the Gelman Library at George Washington University and requested a slew of documents. His identity was not yet in the system and he had lost his temporary library card, but a kindly secretary took pity on the scatterbrained fellow and allowed him access to the system. Half an hour later, Beauchamp departed the building with a slender manila folder under his arm.

Back in the motel, Gideon Crew spread out the papers from the folder with a trembling hand. The moment of truth had arrived — the truth that would make him either free, or merely more miserable.

6

A Critique of the Thresher Discrete Logarithm Encryption Standard EVP-4: A Theoretical Back-Door Cryptanalysis Attack Strategy Using a Group of φ-Torsion Points of an Elliptic Curve in Characteristic φ.

Gideon Crew had studied plenty of advanced mathematics in college and, later, at MIT, but the math in this paper was still way over his head. Nevertheless, he understood enough to realize what he had in his hands was the smoking gun. This was the memo his father had written to critique Thresher, the memo his mother said had been destroyed. Yet it hadn’t been. Most likely, the bastard responsible — believing it too difficult or risky to destroy the document outright — had stuck it into an archive he believed would never be declassified. After all, what American general in the era of the Berlin Wall would have believed the Cold War could ever end?

He continued reading, heart racing, until, finally, he came to the final paragraphs. They were written in the dry language of science-speak, but what they said was pure dynamite.

In conclusion, it is the author’s opinion that the proposed Thresher Encryption Standard EVP-4, based on the theory of discrete logarithms, is flawed. The author has demonstrated that there exists a potential class of algorithms, based on the theory of elliptic functions defined over the complex numbers, which can solve certain discrete logarithm functions in real-time computing parameters. While the author has been as yet unable to identify specific algorithms, he has demonstrated herein that it is possible to do so.

The proposed Thresher standard is therefore vulnerable. If this standard is adopted, the author believes that, given the high quality of Soviet mathematical research, codes developed from this standard could be broken within a relatively short period of time.

The author strongly recommends that Thresher Encryption Standard EVP-4 not be adopted in its current form.

That was it. Proof that his father had been framed. And then murdered. Gideon Crew already knew all about the man who had done it: Lieutenant General (ret.) Chamblee S. Tucker, currently CEO of Tucker and Associates, one of the high-profile defense industry lobbying firms on K Street. They represented many of the country’s largest defense contractors, and Tucker had leveraged himself to the hilt in order to finance the firm. He was raking in huge bucks, but they managed to go right back out the door thanks to his extravagant lifestyle.

By itself, this document meant little. Gideon knew that anything could be counterfeited — or be claimed to have been counterfeited. The document wasn’t an endpoint; it was a starting point for the little surprise he had planned for Chamblee S. Tucker.

Using the remote computer he had previously hijacked at the General Services Administration, Gideon stripped the document of its classification watermarks and sent it to a dozen large computer databases worldwide. Having thus secured the document from destruction, he sent an e-mail directly from his own computer to chamblee.tucker@tuckerandassociates.com with the document as an attachment. The covering e-mail read:

General Tucker:

I know what you did. I know why you did it. I know how you did it.

On Monday, I’m sending the attached file to various correspondents at the Post, Times, AP, and network news channels — with an explanation.

Have a nice weekend.

Gideon Crew

7

Chamblee S. Tucker sat behind an enormous desk in the oak-paneled study of his house in McLean, Virginia, thoughtfully hefting a four-pound Murano glass paperweight in one hand. At seventy years old, he was fit for his age and proud of it.

He shifted the paperweight to the other hand, pressed it a few times.

A knock came at the door.

“Come in.” He set the paperweight down with exquisite care.

Charles Dajkovic entered the study. He was in civilian clothes, but his bearing and physique shouted military: whitewall haircut, massive neck, ramrod posture, steely blue eyes. A grizzled, close-clipped mustache was his only concession to civilian life.

“Good morning, General,” he said.

“Good morning, Charlie. Sit down. Have a cup of coffee.”

“Thank you.” The man eased his frame into the proffered chair. Tucker indicated a silver salver on a nearby side table with coffeepot, sugar, cream, and cups. Dajkovic helped himself.

“Let’s see now…” The general paused. “You’ve been with Tucker and Associates for, what, ten years?”

“That’s about right, sir.”

“But you and I, we go way back.”

“Yes, sir.”

“We have a history. Operation Urgent Fury. That’s why I hired you: because the trust built on the battlefield is the finest trust that exists in this crazy world. Men who haven’t fought together in battle don’t even know the full meaning of the words trust and loyalty.”

“That’s very true, sir.”

“And that is why I asked you to come to my home. Because I can trust you.” The general paused. “Let me tell you a story. It has a moral but you’ll have to figure it out on your own. I can’t be too specific — you’ll see why.”

A nod.

“Ever hear of John Walker Lindh?”

“The ‘American Taliban’?”

“Right. And Adam Gadahn?”

“Isn’t he the guy who joined al-Qaeda and makes videos for Bin Laden?”

“Right you are. I’ve come into possession of some highly classified information regarding a third American convert — only this one is far more dangerous.” Tucker paused again. “This fellow’s father worked for INSCOM when I was there. Turned out the man was a traitor, passing information to the Soviets. You may remember the aftermath: he took a hostage over at the old HQ. Our snipers took him down. His kid witnessed it.”

“I recall that incident.”

“What you don’t know, because it’s also classified, is that he was responsible for exposing twenty-six operatives. They were swept up in one night and tortured to death in Soviet gulags.”

Dajkovic said nothing. He set down the now empty coffee cup.

“That’s just background. You can imagine what it was like to grow up in that kind of environment…Anyway, just like Lindh and Gadahn, this fellow converted. Only he didn’t do anything stupid like go off to a training camp in Afghanistan. He went on to MIT and now he works at Los Alamos. Name’s Gideon Crew. C-R-E-W.”

“How’d he get security clearance?”

“Powerful friends in high places. He’s made no mistakes. He’s good, he’s totally convincing, he’s sincere. And he’s al-Qaeda’s pipeline to getting the Bomb.”

Dajkovic shifted in his seat. “Why don’t they arrest him? Or at least cancel his security clearance?”

Tucker leaned forward. “Charlie, are you really that naive?”

“I hope not, sir.”

“What do you think’s going on in this country? Just like we were infiltrated by the Reds during the Cold War, now we’re being infiltrated by jihadists. American jihadists.”

“I understand.”

“Now, with the kind of high-level protection this fellow has, he’s untouchable. There’s nothing concrete, of course. This information fell into my lap by accident, and I’m not one to shy away from defending my country. Imagine what al-Qaeda would do with a nuke.”

“It’s unthinkable.”

“Charlie, I know you. You were the top Special Forces guy in my command. You’ve got skills no one else has. The question is: how much do you love your country?”

The man seemed to swell in his chair. “You don’t ever need to ask me that question, sir.”

“I know that. That’s why you’re the only one I’d dare share this information with. All I can say is, sometimes a man has to take his patriotic duty into his own hands.”

Dajkovic remained silent. A faint flush had suffused his weathered face.

“Last time I checked, the fellow was in DC. Staying at the Luna Motel out in Dodge Park. We believe he’s going to make contact with a fellow jihadist. He may be getting ready to pass documents.”

Dajkovic said nothing.

“I don’t know how long he’s going to be there, or where he’s going next. He’s got a computer with him, of course, which is as dangerous as he is. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“I understand completely. And I thank you for giving me this opportunity.”

“Charlie, thank you. From the bottom of my heart.” He grasped Dajkovic’s hand and then, in a spontaneous display of emotion, pulled him in and gave him a crushing hug.

As the fellow left, Tucker thought he noted tears in his eyes.

8

Skyline Drive swept around the curve of Stormtower Ridge, and the Manahoac Lodge and Resort came into view, a collection of condominiums and A-frames surrounding a hotel and golf course at the base of Stormtower Mountain. The Blue Ridge Mountains, layer after layer, stretched off behind into the hazy distance.

Dajkovic eased his foot off the pedal as the car approached the entrance to the resort, and he came to a stop at the gate.

“Just checking in,” he said, and was waved through.

Crew had left this forwarding address at the Luna Motel, written it down “in case someone needed to find him,” according to the clerk. He was staying at this resort now — isolated, long drive to get to, no doubt with security cameras up the wazoo. So either, as Tucker had said, Crew was getting ready to meet a fellow operative…or this was a trap. The latter seemed more likely. But a trap for whom? To what purpose?

Dajkovic swung into the entry drive and parked in front, giving the valet a five-dollar bill. “I’ll be back in five minutes.”

“Oh yes,” said the lady at the front desk in response to his query. “Gideon Crew checked in this morning.” She clicked away at a keyboard. “Left word for you he was climbing Stormtower Mountain—”

“For me?”

“Well,” she said, “the message he left says a man would be coming to meet with him, and we were to tell him where he’d gone.”

“I see.”

“It says here he’s climbing Stormtower by the Sawmill Trail, expects to be back by six.”

“How long is the climb?”

“About two hours each way.” She looked at him with a smile, her eyes running up and down his physique. “For you, probably less.”

Dajkovic checked the time. Two o’clock. “He must have just left.”

“Yes. The message was left at the front desk…just twenty minutes ago.”

“Do you have a map of the mountain?”

“Of course.”

She produced a map — an excellent topographic one, with the trails clearly marked. Dajkovic took it back to his car and climbed in. The Sawmill trailhead was down the road, and the map showed it to be a winding path going up the ridge of the mountain, apparently following an old fire road.

It was entirely possible Crew had left the directions so his contact could find him. Yet it seemed unlikely. No one involved in espionage would be so ham-handed as to leave such a trail. Yes, it seemed more likely that this was a trap. Not a trap for him, specifically, but for anyone who might be pursuing Crew. And if so, then Crew would be on the mountain — waiting along the Sawmill Trail to ambush anyone coming up behind him.

He examined the map. A much quicker, more direct way to the summit led straight up the main ski lift cut, on the back side of the mountain.

Driving through the resort and past the golf course, Dajkovic came to the parking lot for the ski area. He got out and opened the trunk, removing a gun case. Back inside the car, he unlocked the case and removed an M1911 Colt and a shoulder holster, donned the holster, tucked the loaded weapon into it, and pulled on a windbreaker. A fixed-blade knife went into his belt and a smaller one into his boot, and a Beretta .22 was slipped in his trouser pocket. Into a small backpack he threw some extra ammunition, binoculars, and two bottles of water.

Once again he examined the map. If Crew was planning an ambush, there were a couple of obvious places for it where the Sawmill Trail passed through an area of exposed knobs.

As he stared at the map, he became convinced this was where the ambush would take place.

9

Dajkovic started up the ski lift cut, moving fast. It was half a mile to the top, and unrelievedly steep, but he was in peak physical condition and could make it in ten minutes; then, cresting the mountain, he would head down the Sawmill Trail, bushwhack to the summit of a secondary peak he’d identified on the map, an ideal place from which to surveil the area of exposed knobs, locate the ambusher — and then ambush him.

Five minutes later, halfway up the slope, a maintenance hut for the ski lift, shuttered for the summer, came into view. Dajkovic churned up the slope, detouring around it. As he moved past the hut he heard a tremendous boom! and suddenly felt a violent blow to his upper back — which, with his upward momentum, pitched him forward onto the slope and knocked the wind from him.

As he struggled for his .45, fighting the pain in his back and gasping for breath, he felt a boot press down on his neck and the warm snout of a weapon touch his head.

“Hands spread-eagled, please.”

He stopped, his mind racing, trying to think through the pain. Slowly he spread his hands.

“I knocked you down with a load of rubber,” came the voice, “but the rest are double-ought buck.”

The barrel remained on the back of his head while the person — he had no doubt it was Crew — searched him, removing the .45 and the .22 and the knife in his belt. He did not find the knife in Dajkovic’s boot.

“Roll over, keeping your hands in sight.”

With a wince, Dajkovic rolled over onto the dirt of the trail. He found himself facing a tall, lanky man in his mid-thirties, with straight black hair, a long nose, and intense, brilliant blue eyes. He was gripping a Remington 12-gauge with a practiced hand.

“Fine afternoon for a walk, isn’t it, Sergeant? Name’s Gideon Crew.”

Dajkovic stared.

“That’s right. I know a fair amount about you, Dajkovic. What sort of story did Tucker tell you to get you out here, looking for me?”

Dajkovic said nothing, his mind still working furiously. He was mortified the man had gotten the drop on him. But all was not lost — he still had the knife. And though Crew was a good fifteen years younger than he was, the fellow looked thin, weak — not a good physical specimen.

Crew gave him a smile. “Actually, I can probably guess what the good general told you.”

Dajkovic didn’t answer.

“It must have been quite a story, to turn you into a hired assassin like this. You’re not normally the kind of person to shoot someone in the back. He probably told you I was a traitor. In league with al-Qaeda, maybe — that would be the treason du jour, I guess. No doubt I’m abusing my position at Los Alamos, betraying my country. That would push all your buttons.”

Dajkovic stared at him. How the hell did he know that?

“He probably told you about my traitor father, what he did getting those agents killed.” He laughed mirthlessly. “Maybe he said traitorousness was a family tradition.”

Dajkovic’s mind was clearing. He had fucked up, but all he had to do was get his hands — one hand — on that knife in his boot and Crew was a dead man, even if he did manage to get off a shotgun blast.

“May I sit up?” Dajkovic asked.

“Slow and easy.”

Dajkovic sat up. The pain was mostly gone. Broken ribs were like that. Stopped hurting for a while and then the pain came back, twice as bad. He flushed at the thought of this weenie knocking him down with a load of rubber.

“I’ve got a question for you,” Crew said. “How do you know old man Tucker told you the truth?”

Dajkovic didn’t answer. He noticed for the first time that Crew’s right hand was missing the last joint of the ring finger.

“I was pretty sure Tucker would send an underling after me, because he’s not the kind to put himself on the front lines. I knew it would be someone he trusted, who’d served under him. I looked over his employees and figured you’d be the one. You led a marine SOF team in the Grenada invasion, securing the American medical school in advance of the main landing. Did a good job, too — not one student was hurt.”

Dajkovic remained poker-faced, waiting his opportunity.

“So: is your mind made up about me? Or are you willing to open your ears to a few facts that might not quite jibe with what General Tucker told you?”

He didn’t respond. He wasn’t going to give the scumbag an inch of satisfaction.

“Since I’m the one with the loaded shotgun, I guess you’re going to have to listen anyway. You like fairy tales, Sergeant? Here’s one for you, only nobody lives happily ever after. Once upon a time, back in August of 1988, there was a twelve-year-old boy…”

Dajkovic listened to the story. He knew it was bullshit, but he paid attention because a good soldier knew the value of information — even false information.

It only took five minutes. It was a pretty good story, well told. These types of people were always amazing liars.

When he was done, Crew pulled an envelope out of his pocket and tossed it at Dajkovic’s feet. “There’s the memo my father wrote Tucker. The reason why he was murdered.”

Dajkovic didn’t bother to pick it up. For a moment, the two just remained where they were, staring at each other.

“Well,” said Crew at last, shaking his head. “I guess I was naive to think I could convince an old soldier like you that his beloved commanding officer is a liar, coward, and murderer.” He thought for a moment. “I want you to bring Tucker a message. From me.”

Dajkovic remained grim-jawed.

“Tell him I’m going to destroy him like he destroyed my father. It’s going to be nice and slow. The memo I’ve released to the press will trigger an investigation. No doubt a news organization will put in a FOIA request to confirm the document is genuine. As the truth comes out, bit by bit, Tucker’s integrity will be impeached. In his line of work, even though everyone is corrupt, the appearance of integrity is pure gold. He’ll see his business dry up. Poor Tucker: did you know he’s leveraged up the wazoo? The mortgage on his McLean McMansion is swimming with the fishes. He owes a shitload on that tacky Pocono golf-club condo, the apartment in New York, and the yacht on the Jersey Shore.” Crew shook his head sadly. “Know what he calls that yacht? Urgent Fury. Funny, isn’t it? Tucker’s one weak-ass moment of glory. The Poconos, McLean, the Jersey Shore…the general can’t be accused of good taste, can he? Of course, the Upper East Side girlfriend was a step in the right direction, but she’s a hungry little bird, her beak open day and night. He hasn’t saved his money like a good boy should. But bankruptcy will only be the beginning, because the investigation will eventually show everything I just told you: that he framed my father and was himself responsible for the death of those twenty-six agents. He’s going to end up in prison.”

Dajkovic found Crew staring at him. Again, he said nothing. He could see Crew was getting frustrated at his lack of reaction.

“Let me ask you another question,” Crew said finally.

Dajkovic waited. His chance was coming — he felt it in his bones.

“Did you actually see Tucker under fire? What do you know of the guy as a soldier? I’ll bet Tucker didn’t set foot on land until the beachhead was totally secure.”

Dajkovic couldn’t help but remember how disappointed he’d been that Tucker seemed to be the very last soldier onto Grenada. But he was a general, one of the top commanders, and that was army protocol.

“Fuck it,” said Crew, taking a step backward. “It was a mistake to expect you might actually be capable of thinking. You got the message: go deliver it.”

“May I get up?”

“By all means, get your sorry ass up and out of here.”

The moment had arrived. Dajkovic placed his hands on the ground and began to rise to his feet; as his hands passed his boots he slipped out the knife and in one smooth motion threw it, aiming at Crew’s heart.

10

Gideon Crew saw the quick movement, the flash of steel; he threw himself sideways but it was too late. The knife slammed into his shoulder, burying itself almost to the hilt. As he fell back, trying to bring the shotgun up, Dajkovic leapt for him, ramming him backward with immense power and wrenching the shotgun from his hands. He heard a crack as his own head caromed off a stone.

For a moment, all went black. Then the world came back to him. Gideon was sprawled on the ground, staring into the barrel of his own shotgun. He could feel the knife in his shoulder, searing hot, the blood seeping out. He reached to pull it out.

“No.” Dajkovic stepped back. “Keep your hands away from your body. And say your prayers.”

“Don’t do this,” Gideon said.

Dajkovic racked a shell into the chamber.

He fought to think straight, to clear the fogginess from his head. “What do you know about me besides what Tucker said? Christ, can’t you think for yourself?”

Dajkovic raised the gun and looked him in the eye. Gideon felt desperation take hold: if he died, his father would never be vindicated, and Tucker would never get his comeuppance.

“You’re not a killer,” he said.

“For you, I’m going to make an exception.” Dajkovic’s finger tightened on the trigger.

“If you kill me, at least do me this one favor: take that envelope. Look into the story I told you. Follow the evidence. And then do what you think is right.”

Dajkovic paused.

“Find someone who was there in 1988. You’ll see. My father was shot down in cold blood — with his hands up. And that memo — it’s real. You’ll discover that, too, eventually. Because if you take my life you’ll also have to take on the responsibility of finding the truth.”

He found Dajkovic peering at him with a strange intensity. He wasn’t pulling the trigger — yet.

“Does it sound likely to you? Not that a guy with a top-secret security clearance at Los Alamos would be passing secrets to al-Qaeda — that’s possible. No — that General Tucker would know about it? And ask you to take care of it? Does that really make sense?”

“You have powerful friends.”

“Powerful friends? Like who?”

Slowly, Dajkovic lowered the shotgun. His face was slick with sweat, and he was pale. He looked almost sick. Then — kneeling abruptly — he reached for the knife in Gideon’s shoulder.

Gideon turned away. He’d failed. Dajkovic would cut his throat and leave his body in the dirt.

Grasping the knife, Dajkovic pulled it from the wound.

Gideon cried out. It felt as if his flesh had just been seared by a hot iron.

But Dajkovic didn’t raise the knife to strike again. Instead, he removed his own shirt and used the knife to cut it into strips. Gideon, head swimming in mingled pain and surprise, watched as the man used the strips to bind his shoulder.

“Hold that down,” Dajkovic said.

Gideon pressed the strips against the wound.

“We’d better get you to a hospital.”

Gideon nodded, breathing hard, gripping the bandaged shoulder. He could feel the blood soaking through already. He tried to overcome the searing pain, worse now that the knife was gone.

Dajkovic helped Gideon to his feet. “Can you walk?”

“It’s all downhill from here,” Gideon gasped.

Dajkovic half carried, half dragged him down the steep slope. In fifteen minutes, they were back at Dajkovic’s car. He helped Gideon into the passenger seat, blood smearing over the leather.

“Is this a rental?” Gideon asked, looking at the car. “You’re going to lose your deposit.”

The old soldier shut the door, came around and got in the driver’s seat, started the car. His face was pale, set, grim.

“So you believe me?” Gideon asked.

“You might say that.”

“What changed your mind?”

“Easy,” Dajkovic said, backing out of the parking spot. He threw the car into gear. “When a man realizes he’s going to die, everything is stripped down to essentials. Purified. No more bullshit. I’ve seen it in battle. And I saw it in your eyes, when you believed I was going to kill you. I saw your hatred, your desperation — and your sincerity. I knew then you were telling the truth. Which means…” He hesitated, gunned the engine, the rubber squealing on the macadam, the car shooting forward.

“Which means,” he resumed, “Tucker lied to me. And that makes me angry.”

11

What the hell’s this?”

Tucker rose quickly as Dajkovic pushed Gideon into the study, hands cuffed. The general stepped around from behind his desk, pulling a .45 and training it on Gideon.

For the first time, Gideon came face-to-face with his nemesis. In person, Chamblee Tucker looked even more well fed and well watered than in the dozens of pictures he had studied over the years. His neck bulged slightly over a starched collar; his cheeks were so closely shaved that they shone; his hair was trimmed to crew-cut perfection. His skin bore a spiderweb of veins marking the face of a drinking man. His outfit was pure Washington: power tie, blue suit, four-hundred-dollar shoes. The soulless study was of a piece with the man — wood paneling, interior-​decorator antiques, Persian rugs, power wall plastered with photos and citations.

“Are you crazy?” Tucker said. “I didn’t tell you to bring him here. My God, Dajkovic, I thought you could handle this on your own!”

“I brought him here,” Dajkovic replied, “because he told me something completely different from what you said. And damned if it didn’t sound plausible.”

Tucker stared hard at Dajkovic. “You’d believe this scumbag over me?”

“General, I just want to know what’s going on. I’ve covered your back for years. I’ve done your work, clean and dirty, and I’ll continue to do it. But a funny thing happened on the side of that mountain — I began to believe this guy.”

“What the hell are you trying to tell me?”

“I’m beginning to have doubts, and the minute that happens, I’m no longer an effective soldier. You want me to get rid of this man? No problem. I’ll follow your orders. But I need to know what’s going on before I put a bullet into his head.”

Tucker stared at him for a long time, then broke eye contact and passed a hand over his bristly scalp. He stepped over to a well-polished cabinet, slid open a drawer, pulled out a glass and a bottle of Paddy, slammed them on the mahogany, and poured himself a few fingers. He swallowed it in one gulp. Then he glanced back at Dajkovic.

“Anyone see you come in?”

“No, sir.”

Tucker looked from Dajkovic to Gideon and back again. “What did he tell you, exactly?”

“That his father wasn’t a traitor. And that he isn’t a terrorist, or in league with them.”

Tucker carefully set down his glass. “All right. Truth is, I did tell you a bit of a story. His father didn’t pass secrets to the Soviets.”

“What did he do?”

“You got to remember, Dajkovic, we were in a war, a Cold War. In war, ugly things happen. You get collateral damage. We had a problem: an error was made. We rolled out a flawed code and some operatives died as a result. If that had come out, it would have taken down the entire cryptology section at a time when we desperately needed a new set of codes. His father had to be sacrificed for the greater good. You remember what it was like: them or us.”

Dajkovic nodded. “Yes, sir. I remember.”

“So now this fellow here, Gideon, more than twenty years later, is threatening me. Blackmailing me. Trying to tear down everything we’ve built, to destroy not only my reputation but the reputation of an entire group of dedicated, patriotic Americans. That’s why he has to be eliminated. You understand?”

“I get it,” said Dajkovic, with a slow smile. “You don’t have to work around the facts to get me to do something for you. I’m with you one hundred percent, whatever you need.”

“Are we clear what needs to be done?”

“Absolutely.”

Gideon said nothing and waited.

Tucker glanced down at the bottle and glass. “Drink on it?”

“No, thanks.”

Tucker poured himself another, slugged it back. “Trust me that this is for the best. You’re earning my eternal gratitude. Take him out through the garage and make sure no one sees you.”

Dajkovic nodded and gave Gideon a little push. “Let’s go.”

Gideon turned and headed toward the door, Dajkovic following. They passed into the front hall and headed toward the kitchen, walked to the back where a door evidently led out into the garage.

Gideon placed one handcuffed hand on the knob, realized it was locked. At the same moment he saw a quick movement out of the corner of his eye and instantly realized what was happening. Throwing himself sideways, he pitched himself into Dajkovic’s shoulder just as Tucker’s gun went off, but the round still caught Dajkovic in the back, slamming him forward into the closed door, the gun knocked from his hand. He sank to the floor with a grunt.

As Gideon spun and dove, he caught a glimpse of Tucker in the kitchen doorway, isosceles stance, pistol in hand. The gun barked again, this time aimed at him, blasting a hole in the Mexican tiled floor mere inches from his face. Gideon leapt to his feet, making a feint toward the general as if to charge.

The third shot came just as he made a ninety-degree lunge, throwing himself atop Dajkovic and grasping the .45 that lay against the far wall. He swung it around just as a fourth shot whistled past his ear. He raised the .45 but Tucker ducked back through the doorway.

Wasting no time, Gideon seized Dajkovic’s shirt and pulled him to cover behind the washing machine, then took cover there himself. He thought furiously. What would Tucker do? He couldn’t let them live; couldn’t call the cops; couldn’t run.

This was a fight to the finish.

He peered out at the empty doorway where Tucker had been. It led into the dining room, large and dark. Tucker was waiting for them there.

He heard a cough; Dajkovic suddenly grunted and rose. Almost simultaneously, rapid shots sounded from the doorway; Gideon ducked and two more rounds punched through the washing machine, water suddenly spraying from a cut hose.

Gideon got off a shot but Tucker had already disappeared back into the dining room.

“Give me the sidearm,” Dajkovic gasped, but without waiting for a reply his massive fist closed over the .45 in Gideon’s hand and took it. He struggled to rise.

“Wait,” said Gideon. “I’ll run across the room to the kitchen table, there. He’ll move to the doorway to get off a shot at me. That’ll put him right behind the door frame. Fire through the wall.”

Dajkovic nodded. Gideon took a deep breath, then jumped from behind the washing machine and darted over behind the table, realizing too late how badly exposed he really was.

With an inarticulate roar Dajkovic staggered forward like a wounded bear. Blood suddenly came streaming from his mouth, his eyes wild, and he charged the doorway, firing through the wall to the right of the door. He pulled up short in the middle of the kitchen, swaying, still roaring, emptying the magazine into the wall.

For a moment, there was no movement from the darkened dining room. Then the heavy figure of Tucker, spurting blood from half a dozen gunshot wounds, tumbled across the threshold, landing on the floor like a carcass of meat. And only then did Dajkovic sag to his knees, coughing, and roll to one side.

Gideon scrambled to his feet and kicked Tucker’s handgun away from his inert form. Then he knelt over Dajkovic. Fumbling in the man’s pockets, he fished out the handcuff key and unlocked the cuffs. “Take it easy,” he said, examining the wound. The bullet had gone through his back, low, evidently piercing a lung but, he hoped, missing other vital organs.

Suddenly and unexpectedly, Dajkovic smiled, bloody lips stretching into a ghastly grimace. “You get it on tape?”

Gideon patted his pocket. “All of it.”

“Great,” Dajkovic gasped. He passed out with a smile on his face.

Gideon snapped off the digital recorder. He felt faint and the room began to spin as he heard sirens in the distance.