Without remorse - Tom Clancy [216]
'So what brings you in, Bob?' MacKenzie asked from behind his desk. Hicks flipped open his note pad and began his struggle to take down every word.
'Roger, a rather unique opportunity has presented itself over in Vietnam.' Eyes opened wider and ears perked up.
'What might that be?'
'We've identified a special prison camp southwest of Haiphong,' Ritter began, quickly outlining what they knew and what they suspected.
MacKenzie listened intently. Pompous though he might have been, the recently arrived investment banker was also a former aviator himself. He'd flown B-24s in the Second World War, including the dramatic but failed mission to Ploesti. A patriot with flaws, Ritter told himself. He would try to make use of the former while ignoring the latter.
'Let me see your imagery,' be said after a few minutes, using the proper buzzword instead of the more pedestrian 'pictures.'
Ritter took the photo folder from his briefcase and set it on the desk. MacKenzie opened it and took a magnifying glass from a drawer. 'We know who this guy is?'
'There's a better photo in the back,' Ritter answered helpfully.
MacKenzie compared the official family photo with the one from the camp, then with the enhanced blowup.
'Very close. Not definitive but close. Who is he?'
'Colonel Robin Zacharias. Air Force. He spent quite some time at Offutt Air Force Base, SAC War Plans. He knows everything, Roger.'
MacKenzie looked up and whistled, which, he thought, was what he was supposed to do in such circumstances. 'And this guy's no Vietnamese ...'
'He's a colonel in the Soviet Air Force, name unknown, but it isn't hard to figure what he's there for. Here's the real punchline.' Ritter handed over a copy of. the wire-service report on Zacharias's death.
'Damn.'
'Yeah, all of a sudden it gets real clear, doesn't it?'
'This sort of thing could wreck the peace talks,' MacKenzie thought aloud.
Walter Hicks couldn't say anything. It wasn't his place to speak in such circumstances. He was like a necessary appliance - an animated tape machine - and the only real reason he was in the room at all was so his boss would have a record of the conversation. Wreck the peace talks he scribbled down, taking the time to underline it, and though nobody else noticed, his fingers went white around the pencil.
'Roger, the men we believe to be in this camp know an awful lot, enough to seriously compromise our national security. I mean seriously,' Ritter said calmly. 'Zacharias knows our nuclear war plans, he helped write SIOP. This is very serious business.' Merely in speaking sy-op, merely by invoking the unholy name of the 'Single Integrated Operations Plan,' Ritter had knowingly raised the stakes of the conversation. The CIA field officer amazed himself at the skillful delivery of the lie. The White House pukes might not grasp the idea of getting people out because they were people. But they had their hot issues, and nuclear war-plans were the unholy of unholies in this and many other temples of government power.
'You have my attention. Bob.'
'Mr Hicks, right?' Ritter asked, turning his head.
'Yes, sir.'
'Could you please excuse us?'
The junior assistant looked to his boss, his neutral face imploring MacKenzie to let him stay in the room, but that was not to be.
'Wally, I think we'll carry on for the moment in executive session,' the special assistant to the President said, easing the impact of the dismissal with a friendly smile - and a wave towards the door.
'Yes, sir.' Hicks stood and walked out the door, closing it quietly.
Fuck, he raged to himself, sitting back down at his desk. How could he advise his boss he didn't hear what came next? Robert Ritter, Hicks thought. The guy who'd nearly destroyed sensitive negotiations at a particularly sensitive moment