been completed the year before, and beyond, the rolling wooded hills of the old Bureau of Public Roads property. The DCI, Roland Murphy, who had retired from the Army as a major general to take the assistant directorship, was hunched over the long conference table looking at a series of maps and photographs. He was a very large man, with a bull neck, beefy arms, and thick eyebrows over deep-set eyes. He’d taken over as DCI two years ago after the death of Donald Powers. With him at the table were Lawrence Danielle, the new deputy director of central intelligence, and Howard Ryan, the Agency’s general counsel. In contrast to Murphy, Danielle was a small man with a permanently pinched expression on his face, and a voice that was so soft listeners often had to strain to hear him. He’d worked his way up through the ranks over the past twenty years, and had even served as an interim DCI a number of years ago before Powers had been hired for the job, and again for a short period before the president had talked the general into taking over the helm. Ryan was relatively new to the Agency. Like Carrara he had come over from the National Security Agency.
He was an extremely precise man, whose father ran one of New York’s top law firms. “This sort of excitement is better for the blood than corporate law” he was fond of saying. And he was sharp. They all looked up when Trotter and Carrara entered the room and approached the long table. “You look like hell” Murphy rumbled brusquely. “No sleep on the flight over, General” Trotter said. “I just got in, as a matter of fact”
“Coffee”
“Yes, sir. Ryan went over to the sideboard to pour him a cup from the silver service. Trotter’s eyes strayed to the maps and photographs. “Has Phil briefed you on the latest”
“No, sir” Trotter said, looking up. “Just that there have been some new developments overnight”
Actually Carrara had told him that this was a council of war. “That’s the understatement of the year” Murphy said, shaking his leonine head.
“I’ve got to see the president at nine-thirty, which gives us just a little over an hour to figure oui what the hell we’re going to do” Ryan came back with the coffee and handed it to Trotter. “Thanks” Trotter said. “What’s happened”
“First things first. What about this free lance of yours, McGarvey? Is he all right”
“Disappointed. He’s on his way back to Paris by now, I suspect. We had no reason to hold him”
“Kurshin just disappeared into thin air” Danielle asked, his voice soft. Trotter nodded glumly. “By the time we got everything sorted out, he was long gone. No trace whatsoever except for the latex mask he had worn. We found it along with Brad Allworth’s uniform in the transporter”
“We have a confirmation that the body the French police found along the railroad tracks outside of Paris was Allworth” Ryan said. “He was shot in the forehead at close range. Ninemillimeter slug. Almost certainly a Graz Buyra. The SDECE has been very cooperative”
“Well, I’ll tell you one thing. McGarvey saved our asses” Murphy said.
“In a very big way”
“Sir” Trotter asked. “The technicians pulled that Pershing apart overnight. Its guidance system was reprogrammed just as you expected.
But the target profile was not for any city. No one could make any sense of it until they pulled the flight coordinates out of the inertial guidance system”
“Where” Trotter asked. Murphy glanced down at a message flimsy on the table.
“Latitude thirty-one degrees, five minutes north, and longitude thirty-five degrees, twenty-four minutes east. Too far north and east for it to be Tripoli” He turned the map around so that Trotter could see it, and he stabbed a blunt finger at a spot along the southern edge of the Dead Sea. “En Gedihe said. “More specifically the Israeli nuclear research facility eight miles from the town” Trotter didn’t understand, and it was evident on his face. “What is it” Danielle prompted. Everyone was lookin at him. Trotter felt as if he were on stage, his audience waiting for his next line. “From where I sit that doesn’t make much sense” he said. “Go on” Murphy ordered. “Israel has two such installations in addition to their facilities for enrichment and reprocessing of nuclear fuels, as well as at least one heavy water plant.’$ “Get to the point” Trotter glanced at the map. “We’re fairly certain that this was the big operation we were expecting from Baranov.
Kurshin is his handpicked man. Frankly I don’t think he’d bother with a simple research reactor”
“Why” Danielle asked. “For one thing, he placed Kurshin in a high-risk situation. He wouldn’t have done that for such meager pickings. In the second place, by reprogramming that missile he’s tipped his hand that tie’s got a damned good pipeline either into the manufacturer of the guidance system “Goodyear” Ryan interjected. “Yes. Either that or into the Pentagon itself” Danielle and Murphy exchanged glances. “The Pentagon” the DCI said. “Do we know who it is” Trotter asked. “Not yet, but the list is narrowing”
“But don’t you see, General, that’s my point. Whatever the KGB has got going in the Pentagon, and of course we’ve long suspected something like this, Baranov wouldn’t tip his hand merely to destroy one of Israel’s two research reactors.
Murphy sighed deeply and shook his head. “No, he wouldn’t”
“There’s more” Trotter asked. “You bet” Murphy replied. “Four days ago an NSA satellite picked up what was believed to be an alarm situation at the En Gedi facility. It was turned over to the Non-Proliferation Treaty Inspection Service. They sent two of their people over to have a look; one of them coincidentally was Lorraine Abbott who has done a little work for us in the past. The other was a Brit” Trotter said nothing.
“Scott Hayes, the Brit, reported that he was satisfied that the Israelis were telling the truth. Apparently a leak in one of the steam valves.
Nonradioactive”
“Dr. Abbott didn’t believe them”
“No. As a matter of fact she’s still over there snooping around. She’s convinced they’re lying. She has a feeling that whatever happened was a hell of a lot more important than a simple steam leak” Why”
“She’s being watched by the Mossad, and the Israelis have all but ordered her out of the country The clincher came out at the facility, though. She and Hayes were@ shown around by a man who identified himself as a Crises Management Team leader. Lev Potok. He’s Mossad. “What are they hiding”
Trotter asked. “Something important enough for Baranov to go after it”
Murphy said. “We think that Israel has a stockpile of battleready nuclear weapons” Ryan said. “We’ve suspected that for some time now.
But there’s been no proof..” Trotter stopped. “En Gedi” Murphy nodded. “That’s our best guess “
“Then the Russians know about it. Baranov would have to be sure about his information to take such a risk”
“And he won’t stop” Murphy said. “No.
“You and McGarvey are our resident Baranov experts” Murphy was saying.
Trotter was thinking ahead of the DCI. Baranov would certainly not stop with one failure. He would keep at it until he succeeded. With Israel’s nuclear capability destroyed there would be no stopping an all-out-Soviet-backed- attack. This time the Arabs would probably succeed, and the entire region would join the Soviet bloc-oil and all.
“The ball is in your court” Murphy said. “Why not tell the Israelis what we know” So that they could prepare themselves” the DCI asked.
Trotter nodded. Murphy shook his head. “No good. We’re in a very delicate balance over there, you know that, John. Almost anything could tip the scales one way or the other, and there’d be an all-out shooting war. It’s a gentleman’s agreement between us. Call it a politically necessary fiction. If we acknowledge to Israel that we know they have battleready nuclear weapons, they will be forced into doing something.
They would have to for their own sake. Just as we would be forced into demanding they dismantle those weapons”
“Which they would not do”
Trotter said. “No” the DCI agreed. “As I said, the ball is in your court. “I don’t know if McGarvey will agree to it”
“Convince him” Murphy said. “But his primary mission is going to have to be confirming that the Israelis actually do have nukes, and that they’re stored at En Gedi”
“We’re going to spy on our allies”
“It’s a tough world”
