State of Siege - Tom Clancy [83]
Hood folded his phone and put it away. Mike placed a hand on Hood's shoulder.
Suddenly, they heard Chatterjee's voice clearly.
"Lieutenant Mailman, what happened?" the secretary-general asked. "Someone shot Colonel Mott before the rest of the team went in," he said breathlessly. "He may be dead." "No," Chatterjee said while he was still speaking. "God, no."
"They killed ore of my people and then we got one of the terrorists before withdrawing," the lieutenant went on. "We also pulled a girl out. She'd been shot. There was no way we could get in without taking a lot of casualties."
Hood felt his knees weaken.
"I'll find out who it is," Rodgers said. "Don't call Sharon. You may worry her for nothing."
"Thanks," Hood said.
Rodgers went to the office phone and called Bob Herbert. In order to keep track of known terrorists and underworld figures-many of whom were regularly hurt in explosions, car accidents, or gunfights-Op-Center had a program that was connected with all the big-city hospitals and interfaced with the Social Security Administration. Whenever a social security number was entered on a hospital computer, it was checked against Op-Center's database to make sure that the person wasn't someone the FBI or police were looking for. In this case, Herbert would have Matt Stoll check on everyone who was admitted to a UN'-AREA New York hospital in the last half hour.
The conversation continued in the Secretariat. "You did the right thing pulling out," Chatterjee said. "There's something else," the lieutenant said. "Two of the delegates were armed and firing."
"Which two?" Chatterjee said.
"I don't know," the lieutenant replied. "One of the team members who got a good look said it was an Asian man and woman." "It could be Japan, South Korea, or Cambodia," Chatterjee said. "Both of the delegates were killed by the terrorists." "Who were the delegates shooting at?" Chatterjee asked. "Believe it or not, they were firing at Colonel Mott," he replied. "At the colonel?" she said. "They must have mistaken him for-was "The terrorist he replaced," the lieutenant said. A radio beeped as the lieutenant was speaking. Chatterjee answered it. "This is Secretary-General Chatterjee."
"That was stupid and reckless," said the voice on the other end. The man's voice was scratchy and faint and spoken with an accent, but Hood was able to make out most of what was being said. Concentrating on that was a welcome distraction from thinking about the wounded girl.
"I'm sorry for what happened," Chatterjee said. "We tried to reason with your partner-was
"Don't try and make this our fault!" the caller snapped. "No, it was all mine-was
"You knew the rules, and you ignored them," he said. "Now we have new instructions for you." "First tell me," Chatterjee said. "What is the condition of our officer?"
"He's dead."
"Are you sure?" Chatterjee implored.
There was a shot. "Now I am," the caller replied. "Do you have any other questions?" he asked. "No," Chatterjee said. "You can come and get him when we're gone," said the terrorist. "How soon that happens is up to you." There was a short, painful silence. "Go ahead," Chatterjee said. "I'm listening."
"We want the helicopter with six million American dollars," he said. "We want cash, not transfers. You have our man; he may tell you our names. I don't want our accounts frozen. Let us know when the helicopter is here. We will resume the killing in eight minutes and again every half hour. Only this time we won't be killing delegates. We'll continue on the young ladies."
Hood realized he had never known hate until that instant. "Oh please, no!" Chatterjee cried.
"You made this happen," the caller said.
"Listen to me," Chatterjee said. "We'll get what you want but there must be no more killing. There has been too much already." "You have eight minutes."
"No! Give us a few hours!" Chatterjee implored. "We'll