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The Assistant Director cleared his throat and spoke for the first time. “Some of us think that anyway.”
The Director continued unswervingly. “This morning, Andrews, you will write a report on Casefikis’s information and the circumstances of his murder, and you will hand it in to Grant Nanna. Do not include the subsequent murders of Stames and Calvert: no one must connect these two events. Report the threat on the President’s life but not the possibility that a senator is involved. Is that how you would play it, Matt?”
“Yes, sir,” said Rogers. “If we voice our suspicions to people who don’t need to know them, we will run the risk of provoking a security operation that will make the assassins run for cover; then we would simply have to pick up our marbles and start over—if we were lucky enough to get a second chance.”
“Right,” said the Director. “So this is how we’ll proceed, Andrews. There are one hundred senators. One of them provides our only link with the conspirators. It’s going to be your task to pinpoint that man. The Assistant Director will have a couple of junior men follow up the few other leads that we have. No need for them to know the details, Matt. To start with, check out the Golden Duck Restaurant.”
“And every hotel in Georgetown, to see which one put on a private luncheon party on 24 February,” said Rogers. “And the hospital. Maybe someone saw suspicious characters hanging around the parking lot or the corridors; the assassins must have seen our Ford there while Calvert and you, Andrews, were interviewing Casefikis. I think that’s about all we can do for the moment.”
“I agree,” said the Director. “Okay, thanks, Matt, I won’t take up any more of your time. Please let me have anything you turn up immediately.”
“Sure,” said the Assistant Director. He nodded at Mark and left the room.
Mark had sat silently, impressed by the clarity with which the Director had grasped the details of the case; his mind must be like a filing cabinet.
The Director pressed a button on his intercom.
“Coffee for two, please, Mrs. McGregor.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Now, Andrews, you come into the Bureau at seven o’clock every morning and report to me. Should any emergency arise, call me, using the code name Julius. I will use the same code name when calling you. When you hear the word ‘Julius,’ break off whatever you are doing. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Now, a most important point. If, in any circumstances, I die or disappear, you brief only the Attorney General, and Rogers will take care of the rest. If you die, young man, you can leave the decision to me.” He smiled for the first time—it was not Mark’s idea of a joke. “I see from the files that you’re entitled to two weeks’ leave. Well take it, starting at noon today. I don’t want you to exist officially for at least a week. Grant Nanna has already been briefed that you have been seconded to me,” continued the Director. “You may have to tolerate me night and day for six days, young man, and no one other than my late wife has had that problem before.”
“And you me, sir,” was Mark’s quick and unthinking reply.
He waited for his head to be bitten off; instead the Director smiled again.
Mrs. McGregor appeared with the coffee, served them, and left. The Director drank his coffee in one swallow and began to pace around the room as if it were a cage; Mark did not move, though his eyes never left Tyson. His massive frame and great shoulders heaved up and down, his large head with its bushy hair rocking from side to side. He was going through what the boys called the thought process.
“The first thing you’re to do, Andrews, is find out which senators were in Washington on 24 February. As it was near the weekend, most of those dummies would have been floating all over the country, making speeches or vacationing with their pampered children.”
What endeared the Director to everyone was not that he said it behind their backs but that he said it even more explicitly to their faces. Mark smiled and began to relax.
“When we have that list, we’ll try and figure out what they have in common. Separate the Republicans from the Democrats, and then put them under party headings as to interests, public and private. After that, we have to find out which ones have any connection with President Kane, past or present, friendly or unfriendly. Your report will cover all these details and be ready for our meeting tomorrow morning. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Now there’s something else I want you to understand, Andrews. As I am sure you know, for the past decade, the FBI has been in a very sensitive political position. Those watchdogs in Congress are just waiting for us to exceed our legitimate authority. If we in any way cast suspicion upon a member of Congress, without indisputable evidence of his guilt, they will hang, draw and quarter the Bureau. And rightly so, in my opinion. Police agencies in a democracy must prove that they can be trusted not to subvert the political process. Purer than Caesar’s wife. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“From today we have six days, from tomorrow five, and I want to catch this man and his friends red-handed. So neither of us will be on statutory overtime.”
“No, sir.”
The Director returned to his desk and summoned Mrs. McGregor.
“Mrs. McGregor, this is Special Agent Andrews, who’ll be working closely with me on an extremely sensitive investigation for the next six days. Whenever he wants to see me, let him come right in; if I’m with anybo
dy but Mr. Rogers, notify me immediately—no red tape, no waiting.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention this to anybody else.”
“Of course not, Mr. Tyson.”
The Director turned to Mark. “Now you go back to the WFO and start working. I’ll see you in this office at seven o’clock tomorrow morning.”
Mark stood up. He didn’t finish his coffee; perhaps by the sixth day he would feel free to say so. He shook hands with the Director and headed towards the door. Just as he reached it, the Director added: “Andrews, I hope you’ll be very careful. Keep looking over both shoulders at once.”
Mark shivered and moved quickly out of the room, down the corridor, keeping his back firmly to the wall when he reached the elevator, and walking along the sides of the passage on the ground floor, where he ran into a group of tourists who were studying pictures of the Ten Most Wanted Criminals in America. Next week, would one of them be a senator?
When he reached the street, he dodged the traffic until he arrived at the Washington Field Office, on the other side of Pennsylvania Avenue. It wouldn’t quite be like home this morning. Two men were missing, and they weren’t going to be able to replace them with a training manual. The flag on top of the FBI Building and the flag on top of the Old Post Office Building were at half-mast; two of their agents were dead.
Mark went straight into Grant Nanna’s office; he had aged ten years overnight. For him, two friends had died, one who worked under him and one who worked above him.
“Sit down, Mark.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“The Director has already spoken to me this morning. I didn’t ask any questions. I understand you’re taking a two-week leave as of noon today, and that you are writing me a memorandum on what happened at the hospital. I have to pass it on to higher authorities and that will be the end of it as far as the WFO is concerned, because Homicide will take over. They are also trying to tell me Nick and Barry died in a car accident.”
