Divide and conquer - Tom Clancy [35]
"The president's running a few minutes late," Mrs. Leigh said. "But that's all right. You can tell me how you are."
"Coping," Hood said.
"And you?"
"Fine," she replied flatly.
"My strength is the strength of ten because my heart is pure."
"I've heard that somewhere," Hood said as he continued toward the secretary's desk.
"It's Lord Tennyson," she replied.
"How is your daughter?"
"She's strong, too," Hood said.
"And she has an awful lot of people pulling for her."
"I don't doubt that," Mrs. Leigh said, still smiling.
"Let me know if there's anything I can do."
"I absolutely will," Hood said. He looked into her gray eyes.
"There is something you can do for me, though."
"And that is?"
"Off the record?"
"Of course," she assured him.
"Mrs. Leigh, has the president seemed all right to you?" Hood asked.
The woman's smile wavered. She looked down.
"Is that what this meeting is about?"
"No," Hood said.
"What makes you ask a question like that?"
"People close to him are worried," Hood said.
"And you're the one who's been asked to bell the cat?" she asked.
"Nothing that calculated," Hood said as his cell phone beeped. He reached into his jacket pocket and answered the phone.
"This is Paul."
"Paul, it's Mike."
"Mike, what's up?" If Rodgers was calling him here, now, it had to be important.
"The target was seen leaving the Iranian mission to the UN about three minutes ago."
"Any idea where he was the rest of the time?" Hood asked.
"Negative," said Rodgers.
"We're working on that. But apparently, the car didn't show up at the embassies of any of our top allies."
"Thanks," Hood said.
"Let me know if you find out anything else." Hood hung up. He put the phone back in his pocket. That was strange. The president had announced an intelligence initiative involving the United Nations, and one of the first missions the national security adviser visits belongs to Iran. As a sponsor of the kind of terrorism the United Nations opposed, that did not make sense. The door to the Oval Office opened.
"Mrs. Leigh, would you do me a favor?" Hood said.
"Yes."
"Would you get me Jack Fenwick's itinerary in New York?"
"Fenwick? Why?"
"He's one of the reasons I asked you the question I did," Hood replied.
Mrs. Leigh looked at Hood.
"All right. Do you want it while you're with the president?"
"As soon as possible," Hood said.
"And when you get the file number, let me know what else is in the file.
I don't need specific documents, just dates when they were filed."
"All right," she said.
"And Paul-what you asked before?
I have noticed a change." He smiled at her.
"Thanks. If there's a problem, we're going to try and fix it quickly and quietly, whatever it is." She nodded and sat at her computer as the vice president emerged from the Oval Office. Charles Gotten was a tall, stout man with a thin face and thinning gray hair. He greeted Paul Hood with a warm handshake and a smile but didn't stop to talk. Mrs. Leigh punched the phone intercom. The president answered. She told him that Paul Hood was here, and the president asked her to send him in. Hood went around the desk and walked into the Oval Office.
Baku, Azerbaijan Tuesday, 12:07 a.m.
David Battat lay on the flimsy cot and stared at the dark ceiling of the damp basement storehouse. Pat Thomas slept on his back in a cot on the other side of the small room, breathing softly, regularly. But Battat couldn't sleep. His neck still ached, and he was angry at himself for having gotten cold-cocked, but that wasn't what was keeping him awake.
Before going to sleep, Battat had reviewed the original data the CIA had received about the Harpooner. He could not put it out of his mind. All signs, including a reliable eyewitness, pointed to it having been the terrorist that was being met by the Rachel. And if that were so, if the Harpooner had passed through Baku on his way to somewhere else,