Red Rabbit - Tom Clancy [169]
"Okay." Moore leaned forward. "Let's get our thinking organized. First, how important is this information?"
James Greer took it. "He says KGB's going to kill somebody who doesn't deserve it. That kinda suggests the Pope, doesn't it?"
"More importantly, he says our communications systems might be compromised," Bostock pointed out. "That's the hottest thing I see in this signal, James."
"Okay, in either case, we want this guy on our side of the wire, correct?"
"Judge, you can bet your bench on that," the Deputy DDO shot back. "As quickly as we can make it happen."
"Can we use our own assets to accomplish it?" Moore asked next.
"It won't be easy. Budapest has been burned down."
"Does that change the importance of getting his cute little cottontail out of Redland?" the DCI asked.
"Nope." Bostock shook his head.
"Okay, if we can't do it ourselves, do we call in a marker?"
"The Brits, you mean?" Greer asked.
"We've used them before. We have good relations with them, and Basil does like to generate debts with us," Moore reminded them. "Mike, can you live with that?" he asked Bostock.
A decisive nod. "Yes, sir. But it might be nice to have one of our people around to keep an eye on things. Basil can't object to that."
"Okay, we need to decide which of our assets we can send. Next," Moore went on, "how fast?"
"How does tonight grab you, Arthur?" Greer observed to general amusement. "The way I read this, Foley's willing to run the operation out of his own office, and he's pretty hot to trot, too. Foley's a good boy. I think we let him run with it. Budapest is probably a good exit point for our Rabbit."
"Concur," Mike Bostock agreed. "It's a place a KGB officer can get to, like on vacation, and just disappear."
"They'll know he's gone pretty fast," Moore thought out loud.
"They knew when Arkady Shevchenko skipped, too. So what? He still gave us good information, didn't he?" Bostock pointed out. He'd helped oversee that operation, which had really been ramrodded by the FBI in New York City.
"Okay. What do we send back to Foley?" Moore asked.
"One word: 'Approved.' " Bostock always backed his field officers.
Moore looked around the room. "Objections? Anybody?" Heads just shook.
"Okay, Tommy. Back to Langley. Send that to Foley."
"Yes, sir." The NIO stood and walked out. One nice thing about Judge Moore. When you needed a decision, you might not like what you got, but you always got it.
CHAPTER 19
CLEAR SIGNAL
THE TIME DIFFERENCE was the biggest handicap in working his station, Foley knew. If he waited around the embassy for a reply, he might have to wait for hours, and there was no percentage in that. So, right after the signal went out, he'd collected his family and gone home, with Eddie conspicuously eating another hot dog on the way out to the car, and a facsimile copy of the New York Daily News in his hand. It was the best sports page of the New York papers, he'd long thought, if a little lurid in its headlines. Mike Lupica knew his baseball better than the rest of the wannabe ballplayers, and Ed Foley had always respected his analysis. He might have made a good spook if he'd chosen a useful line of work. So now he could see why the Yankees had fallen on their asses this season. It looked as though the goddamned Orioles were going to take the pennant, and that, to his New York sensibilities, was a crime worse than how the Rangers looked this year.
"So, Eddie, you looking forward to skating?" he asked his son, belted in the back seat.
"Yeah!" the little guy answered at once. Eddie Junior was his son, all right, and maybe here he'd really learn how to play ice hockey the right way.
Waiting in his father's closet was the best pair of junior hockey skates that money could buy, and another pair for when his feet got bigger. Mary Pat had already checked out the local junior leagues, and those, her husband thought, were about the best this side of Canada, and maybe better.
On the whole, it was a shame he couldn't have an STU in his house, but the Rabbit had told him that they might