'What's that?' McCaskey asked.
'How not to engage HUMINT operatives in the future,' Hood replied.
McCaskey smiled and left. Hood went back to his warm office. He took an old fan from the closet, set it on the floor beside his chair, angled it up, and turned it on. It felt good. If he shut his eyes, he could imagine he was on the beach in Carlsbad, California, where he used to go with young Harleigh and Alexander. They would stroll along the miles-long concrete seawall, occasionally going down to the beach to sit, drink, or watch for dolphins.
Where did those breezy, innocent days go? How did he end up alone? How did he land in the windowless basement of an old military building, leading a team of military officials, diplomats, and intelligence officers, trying to put out fires around the world?
You wanted to get out of politics but still do something important, he reminded himself.
Well, Paul Hood got that. He also got the pressures and demands that came with that challenge.
Yet there is also deep, deep satisfaction, he had to admit. And this moment was one of them.
But now it was time to get back to work. Before Hood left for the night, he wanted to send Emmy Feroche an E-mail to thank her for her help and tell her not to worry about Stiele, for now. Then, after a long night's sleep, there was a conversation he had to try to have. A chat with the man who probably knew much more about this situation than he had let on: Shigeo Fujima. Hood suspected that, at best, the conversation would go something like the talk with Edgar Kline. On topic without being particularly illuminating.
Only this time, it would be Paul Hood generating those carefully measured pauses.
SIXTY-SIX
Tokyo, Japan Monday, 3:18 P.M.
MISSION OF HONOR
417
The red telephone beeped in Shigeo Fujima's office at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The head of the Intelligence and Analysis Bureau had no intention of answering it. Not unless the call came in on his private black line. Fujima was waiting to hear some very specific information. Without that information, other conversations were not relevant. Nor were they of any interest at the moment. Fujima's deputies could handle those.
The young, clean-cut intelligence officer was smoking an unfiltered cigarette. He sat with the phone headset resting on his head as he looked at a map of Botswana on his computer. The map was marked with symbols signifying copper, coal, nickel, and diamond mines. China produced a great deal of coal. But those other assets would have been useful to them. The map was also marked with red flags. Those were targets he had hit. One at the airport in Maun. The other, a psy-ops strike, at Dhamballa's camp in the Okavango Swamp. His people had used a laptop to re-create Seronga's voice, using taped radio communiques. Communiques that also enabled them to pick up the password. Then they had broadcast their own message to Dhamballa, that Seronga had been the one who killed the American bishop.
That had put doubt in Dhamballa's mind about the loyalty of Leon Seronga. If the Botswanans had not brought Dhamballa down, Fujima had to make certain that the cult itself was unstable. The Vodunists could not have been allowed to succeed with what they were planning.
Now, just two things remained:
First was to make sure that both the Europeans failed. That was an easier task.
Then there were the Chinese. That would take more time, but it must be done. Beijing and Taipei were an even greater threat.
The outside line kept beeping. Fujima used one cigarette to light another. He looked at his watch. It was about eight A.M. in Botswana. The operatives should have reached the target by now. They tracked him from the swamp, first by boat and then by air. They should have found him.
And then the call came. Fujima continued to smoke as he punched the button to answer. He inhaled quickly, then blew out smoke to relax.
'Mach two,' Fujima said, using the code word that was changed daily. 'Go ahead.'
'I would recognize that exhaling of cigarette smoke even if you did not use the code word,' the caller remarked. 'So might an enemy, if he were using my secure phone.'
'Point taken,' Fujima said. That was the trouble with so many field agents. They had to be invisible and silent most of the time. When they got a chance to speak their mind, they did. Agent Kaiju was no exception.
'We found him,' Kaiju went on.
'Where?' Fujima asked. As the intelligence director spoke, he accessed a drop-down menu of the cities in Botswana.
'City one, sector seven,' the caller reported.
'I'm there,' Fujima replied. The Belgian was in Gaborone near the athletic stadium. He dragged silently on his cigarette. Then he exhaled from the side of his mouth.
'He is in a hotel,' Kaiju informed him. 'The sign is in English. I cannot read it.'
'The Sun and Casino,' Fujima told him, consulting the map. 'That's the only one in the area.'
'Very good,' the caller said. 'What do we do?'
Fujima thought for a moment. 'Debrief and neutralize,' he replied.
Kaiju repeated the instructions. Fujima acknowledged them.
He hung up and promised to call back when he and his partner had more information.
