third sniper is a real problem,” he said.
“Could it be something other than a building?” Howard asked. “A plane, maybe?”
Andy shook his head. “Planes move too fast for a sniper, and they’re too unstable.”
Howard frowned. “A helicopter?”
“Too much vibration.”
Howard shrugged. “Let me give it some thought, Andy,” he said. “In the meantime, why don’t you try ignoring the long shot? — concentrate on the two closest. That would give the Secret Service boys something to work on. I mean, better safe than sorry. They can check out all the venues where two out of three match, couldn’t they?”
Andy nodded. “That’s a good idea.”
“There’s something else that’s been worrying me,” said Howard. “The two men and the woman, the ones on the ground close to the target.”
Andy frowned. “What’s wrong?” He ran his hand through his hair, brushing it away from his eyes.
“We’ve been assuming that they’re organising the hit, right?”
“Right,” agreed Andy.
“Well, what if they’re not? What if they’re actually part of the hit? What if they’re carrying guns?”
“And if the snipers fail, they’ll finish the job?” said Andy, his eyes sparkling.
Howard nodded. They had all been assuming that Carlos, Hennessy and Bailey were helping the snipers calibrate their sights. But it was perfectly possible that they could actually be part of the assassination. “I’m going to speak to Bob Sanger about it,” he said.
“So even if we find the snipers, the President might still be at risk?”
“That’s what I’m frightened of,” said Howard. He saw that Andy had a direct line on his desk and he noted down the number. He looked around the office and saw a dozen programmers, including Rick Palmer, hard at work, but no sign of Bonnie.
“Bonnie’s at home, I told her to get some sleep,” said Andy, as if reading his mind.
Howard squeezed his shoulder. “That’s where you should be,” he said.
“There’ll be plenty of time for sleep when all this is over,” said Andy, turning back to the screen.
Howard patted Andy on the back and returned to his office. His desk faced the one being used by Don Clutesi, who was lounging back in his chair, his phone lodged between his chin and his shoulder. He winked at Howard as he sat down. Howard picked up his own phone and called home. He’d been ringing all day but no-one had answered and he’d assumed that Lisa had been out playing golf. This time she answered and she appeared no less lukewarm than the last time they’d spoken.
“Do you have any idea yet when you’ll be coming back?” she asked.
“Hopefully we’ll make some progress tonight. I’ll call you tomorrow, I should have a better idea then. How are the children?”
“Asleep,” she said. Howard wondered if she’d played golf with her father that day. The seconds ticked off with neither of them speaking. Lisa broke the silence. “Cole, why do you have Trivial Pursuit cards in your suit pockets?” she asked.
“Excuse me?” said Howard, bewildered by the change of subject.
“I was taking out some of your suits for cleaning and I found them in an inside pocket.”
“Ah,” said Howard.
“So what gives?”
“I was practising,” he said.
“You mean you were cheating,” she said.
Howard groaned inwardly. “Honey, I wasn’t cheating. I was just going over a few cards before we had dinner with your father, that’s all.”
“Cole, to me that sounds like cheating. I think it’s despicable. Are you so insecure that you have to resort to cheating to beat my father at a board game?”
Howard sighed. Sometimes there was no arguing with her. “Maybe we could talk about this when I get back,” he said.
He could picture her shaking her head, a look of contempt on her face. “The subject is closed,” she said. “But I just want you to know I think you’ve behaved really badly. Beating my father shouldn’t mean that much to you.”
“Can I say goodnight to the kids?” Howard asked.
“I already told you, they’re asleep,” she replied. Howard had the impression that she wasn’t telling the truth and that she was depriving him of the children as a punishment.
“Well, tell them I called, will you? Please.”
“Sure,” she said curtly and Howard knew that the message wouldn’t be passed on. “Goodbye.”
Howard was left with the buzzing of a disconnected line in his ear. As he replaced the receiver, Don Clutesi did the same. “Any luck?” Clutesi asked.
Howard smiled thinly. “Very little,” he said. “You?”
“According to Frank, the credit card Hennessy was using was applied for in New York two years ago. The driving licence is a valid New York State one and was taken out eighteen months ago.”
“That suggests that this has been a long time in the planning,” said Howard.
Clutesi shook his head. “Not necessarily. The Irish are always setting up fake identities and paperwork so that they have a steady supply. They probably wouldn’t know that Hennessy was going to use it.”
“What about the photograph on the driving licence?”
“Probably just a close match. Blonde woman in her late forties; who’s going to look any closer than that? No-one looks at the photograph anyway. Passports are a different matter, but the IRA have plenty of contacts within INS; they can get a genuine one within a few days.”
“What about getting records of her credit card?” Howard asked. “That way we can find out where she’s been.”
Clutesi mopped his brow with the back of his sleeve. “Already in hand,” he said. He looked at his wristwatch and nodded over at a large-screen television which Helen had positioned at the far end of the office. “Not long before the show starts,” he said.
Mary Hennessy wiped her hands with a white towel, leaving crimson streaks on the material. She threw it onto the workbench and studied the man hanging from the overhead pipe. Two rivers of dried blood ran down his chest like stigmata — one from the hole where his right nipple used to be, the other from a strip of flesh some six inches long which hung down over his stomach like some demonic tongue, red and glistening under the fluorescent lights.
Joker was unconscious, breathing heavily through his nose like a sleeping dog. Thick, clotting saliva bubbled from his lips and greenish yellow slime oozed from his nostrils. He was a disgusting mess, but most of the damage was superficial, Hennessy knew. Painful, excruciatingly so, but a long way from death. Over the coming hours she would take the SAS man closer and closer to extinction, narrowing the gap with exquisite skill and enjoying every moment of the journey. It wasn’t pain that people died from when under torture, or shock, it was loss of blood. The human body contained about five litres, and Hennessy knew from experience that a man could lose almost half of that before the body failed. The skill was to prolong the torture, allowing the body to manufacture more blood to replace that which was lost, and to give wounds a chance to stop bleeding. By stopping and starting, the procedure could be prolonged almost indefinitely. It was almost like sex, she thought, gradually taking a man to orgasm, holding him to almost the point of coming, and then stopping, letting him subside until he was ready to start again. As she could build the pleasure until it was almost unbearable, so it was with pain. When he’d suffered enough she’d push him over the edge, into the eternal abyss, and she’d be standing in front of him, watching him as he took the final plunge.
He’d pretty much told her everything she needed to know. He was working alone, recruited by his former masters because they knew he had a personal grudge against her, and because he was in such a bad state health-wise no-one would ever believe that the SAS would use him. He had the perfect cover.
He’d seen the plane but had no idea what part it, or Patrick Farrell, played in their plan. He hadn’t known about Carlos or the snipers, and he knew nothing of what had happened in Arizona. She’d taken him to such levels of pain that she was certain he wasn’t lying or holding anything back. In agony there was only truth.
She picked up the pruning shears, the blades crusted with dried blood. Joker’s chin was jammed against his
