The Teeth of the Tiger - Tom Clancy [187]
"I have some of the CDs," Dominic answered, with a smile. As it turned out, the State Opera House was a magnificent example of imperial architecture, built and executed as though for God Himself to attend a performance, and bedecked in scarlet and gold. Whatever its faults might have been, the House of Hapsburg had shown impressive taste. Dominic thought briefly about checking out the cathedrals in town, but decided it wasn't fitting, given the reason they were here. In all, they walked around for two hours, then headed back to the hotel and up to Jack's room.
"No joy from the home office," Jack told them.
"No problem. We saw the guy. He's an old friend from Munich," Brian reported. They walked into the bathroom and opened the faucets, which would put out enough white noise to annoy any microphones in the room. "He's a pal of Mr. Atef. He was there when we popped him in Munich."
"How can you be sure?"
"A hundred percent sure, we can't be-but what are the odds that he just happened to be in both cities, and the right hotel, man?" Brian asked reasonably.
"Hundred percent certainty is better," Jack objected.
"I agree, but when you're on the right side of thousand-to-one odds, you put the money down and toss the dice," Dominic responded. "By Bureau rules, he's at least a known associate, somebody we'd take aside to interview. So, he probably isn't out collecting for the Red Cross, y'know?" The agent paused. "Okay, it's not perfect, but it's the best we got, and I think it's worth going with."
It was gut-check time for Jack. Did he have the authority to give a go-no-go on this? Granger hadn't said so. He was intel backup for the twins. But what, exactly, did that mean? Great. He had a job without a job description, and no assigned authority. This did not make much sense. He remembered his father saying once that headquarters people weren't supposed to second-guess the troops out in the field, because the troops had eyes, and were supposed to be trained to think on their own. But in this case his training was probably at least as good as theirs. But he hadn't seen the face of the supposed subject and they had. If he said no, they could just as easily tell him where to stick his opinion, and, since he had no power to enforce it, they'd win the day and he'd just stand around with his dick in his hand, wondering who was right on the call. The spook business was suddenly very unpredictable, and he was stuck in the middle of a swamp without a helicopter to lift his ass out.
"Okay, guys, it's your call." This seemed a lot like taking the coward's way out to Jack, and even more so when he said, "I'd still feel better if we were a hundred percent sure."
"So would I. But like I said, man, a thousand to one constitutes betting odds. Aldo?"
Brian thought it over and nodded. "It works for me. He looked very concerned over his pal in Munich. If he's a good guy, he has funny friends. So, let's do him."
"Okay," Jack breathed, bowing to the inevitable. "When?"
"As soon as convenient," Brian responded. He and his brother would discuss tactics later, but Jack didn't need to know about that.
He was lucky, Fa'ad decided at 10:14 that night. He got an instant message from Elsa K 69, who evidently remembered him kindly.
WHAT SHALL WE DO TONIGHT? he asked "her."
I'VE BEEN THINKING. IMAGINE WE ARE IN ONE OF THE K-LAGERS. I AM A JEWESS, and YOU ARE THE KOMMANDANT I DO NOT WISH TO DIE WITH THE REST, and I OFFER YOU PLEASURE IN RETURN FOR MY LIFE "she" proposed.
It could scarcely have been a more pleasant fantasy for him. GO AHEAD and BEGIN, he typed.
And so it went for a while, until: PLEASE, PLEASE, I AM NOT AN AUSTRIAN. I AM AN AMERICAN MUSIC STUDENT TRAPPED BY THE WAR
Better and better. OH, YES? I HAVE HEARD MUCH ABOUT AMERICAN JEWS and THEIR WHORISH WAYS
And so it went for nearly an hour. At the end, he sent her to the gas anyway. After all, what were Jews good for, really?
Predictably Ryan couldn't sleep. His body hadn't yet acclimated to the shift of six time zones, despite the decent amount