The Prisoner - Carlos J. Cortes [136]
Bill Anderson was in charge of the scores of people fielding the telephones. Having commandeered a full floor of SINTA, a corporation providing telephone support for government services, the operators sifted, around the clock, through thousands of calls reporting sightings of suspicious-looking people or vehicles. So far, and however well-intentioned the calls, none amounted to anything beyond wishful thinking.
Enrique craned his neck and spotted Bill barreling down the corridor to crash-stop before his booth, the side panels rattling with the impact.
“… shift supervisor of the Washington, D.C., hibernation facility.” A short pause. “ID number 17395878 XCJ.”
Bill made a rolling motion with one hand, the other busy with a cellular pad. “Could you repeat, please?”
“No.”
“Pardon?”
“If you missed something, listen to the recording. Testimony is slated for day after tomorrow at ten-thirty A.M. at the ABC TV studios down Rhode Island Avenue Northeast. We’ll be there an hour before.”
The line went dead.
“Twenty-two seconds,” Enrique announced. Not enough.
“Prepaid SIM,” someone yelled.
“Radio mast at Meridian Hill Park,” another voice shouted. “Sander transmitter.”
“Switched off,” a third voice rattled.
Enrique exchanged glances with Bill. The caller knew the system. Had he kept his cell phone switched on, the direction finder could have zeroed in on it, given another minute or so.
Text started scrolling against his screen. The SIM had been bought three days before in a pack of five from a machine dispenser at Union Station.
Bill Anderson nodded. “Log the recording into the system; I’ll download it into my station.”
Enrique followed Bill’s retreating figure as it marched along the corridor to his glass-walled office, where he closed the door and reached for a secure phone.
chapter 47
20:30
After bridging its alarm circuit, George Wilson picked the lock and pushed open the heavy steel door. Hefting a long polymer guitar case, he stepped onto the rooftop and closed the door. A knee to the floor, he fished in his coat pocket for two slim neodymium wedges and rammed them between door and casing.
The sun had set minutes before, and its feeble residual light was drenched in red. Wilson peered around the Paige Building’s deserted roof—a vast esplanade capping a hundred-story skyscraper, with a huge water tank and a room housing the air-conditioning machinery. Carrying his case, he strolled to the southernmost edge of the building and the foot-high parapet that topped the roof. From his vantage point, Wilson spotted long chains of streetlights coming alive. Eight hundred feet below, the already heavy evening traffic snaked down New York Avenue toward John Hanson Highway and the suburbs. A mile ahead in a bend of the road stood Mason Tower, his target.
A four-foot-wide puddle, left by rain the day before and stretching almost the length of the roof, rippled in the breeze. The construction workers must have been sloppy, probably eager to head for a beer at ground level. It was a ridiculous puddle, no deeper than an inch, but he would have to lie in it, perhaps for hours on end. Wilson hawked a wad of phlegm and spat it to the side. Sloppy. In time, the puddle would cause dampness on the lower floors. Not that the workers cared, and that was the problem: no pride in workmanship—a trait Wilson possessed in spades.
With a final look around in the rapidly waning light, Wilson rested the case on the ground, squatted, and threw its catches open.
Based on the venerable CheyTac M100 rifle, the CT-16XBO had evolved into a wonder of precision engineering and electronics, delivering stunning accuracy at two thousand yards in the hands of a rookie. With thousands of hours clocked at ranges and a bunch of soft target interdiction