Yuri put his blinkers on to make it look as if he was waiting for a fare and climbed from his car. No one had gone in or out of the Corinthian Rug Company for the half hour he'd been watching. He ran across the street. With his hands around his face he leaned against the glass office door and looked inside. The place was empty. There were no lights on. He tried the door. It was locked.
Yuri walked a few steps to the west and went into a neighboring shop.
He'd seen a number of people going in and out while he'd been sitting in his cab. It was a store for stamp collectors. Inside it was as quiet as a tomb after some bells attached to the door had ceased their tinkling.
The proprietor appeared from an inner area with tiny reading glasses teetering on the end of a bulbous nose. On his bald head was a yarmulke that Yuri thought must have been stuck on with glue.
'I got a call to pick up a Mr. Papparis at the Corinthian Rug Company, ' Yuri explained. 'That's my cab outside. Unfortunately the rug office is closed. Do you know Mr. Papparis? '
'Of course.'
'Have you seen him? ' Yuri asked. 'Or heard anything about him? '
'I haven't seen him all day. But that's not surprising. Our paths rarely cross.'
'Thanks, ' Yuri said.
'My pleasure.' Yuri went to the store on the east side of the Corinthian Rug office.
He got the same response. He then got back into his cab and thought about what he should do next. He considered trying to call the neighborhood hospitals, but he gave up on the idea when he remembered he didn't know where Mr. Papparis lived. He pondered getting a phone book to see if he could find Mr.
Papparis's number but quickly decided that calling his home would be foolhardy. Yuri had been extraordinarily careful so far and had no desire to take any unnecessary chances. For what he had in mind to do to New York, he didn't want there to be any warning.
Yuri drove off. When he came to the corner of Walker and Broadway it occurred to him that he was only a little more than six blocks away from Curt and Steve's fire station on Duane Street. Although Yuri had never visited his partners' workplace, he decided to drop by. He wouldn't yet be able to confirm that the anthrax was potent, a question Yuri thought was academic, but he could at least inform them that the trial was underway. That was exciting enough, because it meant that Operation Wolverine was truly imminent. All the planning and preliminaries were over. Now it was only a question of producing adequate amounts of the agents and dispersing them.
MONDAY, OCTOBER 18
11:30 A. M. 'Do you think we should be doing this? ' Steve Henderson asked. 'I can't imagine we're going to learn enough to justify the risk.' Curt grabbed his friend's sleeve and pulled him to a stop. They were standing in front of the Jacob Javits Federal Building at 26 Federal Plaza. Crowds of people were coming and going. It was a busy place.
It housed nearly six thousand government employees and was visited daily by a thousand civilians.
Curt and Steve were dressed in their freshly pressed blue class B firefighter uniforms. Their black shoes glistened in the bright October sunlight. Curt's shirt was a lighter blue than Steve's, and Curt had a tiny gold bullhorn on his collar. Curt had made lieutenant four years previously.
'With an operation of this magnitude, reconnaissance is an absolute must, ' Curt hissed. He glanced furtively at the scurrying crowd to make sure no one was paying them any heed. 'What the hell did they teach you in the army? We're talking about basics here! ' Curt and Steve had been childhood friends.
Both had grown up in the strongly blue-collar area of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. Both had been quiet, polite, and neat loners who'd gravitated toward each other over the years ia_.
as kindred spirits, particularly during high school. They had been indifferent students although they'd scored high on aptitude tests, Curt higher than Steve. Neither had played any sports despite Curt's older brother's being one of Bensonhurst's legendary football stars.
They had mostly 'hung out, ' as they explained in their own words.
Both had ended up in the armed forces, Curt after an abortive six-month try at college and Steve after working for his plumber father for a year.
'The army taught me just as much as the Marines taught you, ' Steve shot back. 'Don't give me any of your Marine Corps bullshit.'
'Well, we're not going to carry the stuff in there on D-Day without having reconnoitered the place, '
Curt said. 'It's got to go into the HVAC induction. We got to make sure we can get access.' Steve nervously glanced up at the huge building. 'But we got the plans, ' he said.
'We know it's on the third floor.'
'Jesus Christ! ' Curt exclaimed.
He threw up his hands, including the one holding his clipboard. 'No wonder you washed out of the Green Berets. Are you going to chicken out on me? ' In contrast to their desultory academic careers, both men had excelled in their respective branches of the service. Curt had gone to Camp Pendleton in California, while Steve had gone to Fort Bragg in North Carolina. Both had risen quickly to the ranks of non-commissioned officers. The regimentation and sense of purpose excited them, and they became model gung-ho, spit-and-polish soldiers.
Of particular interest to each was any kind of ordnance, especially assault rifles and handguns.
Both became decorated marksmen.
The two buddies corresponded infrequently over the years. Being in different branches of the service and stationed on different coasts was a barrier to their friendship. The only times they got together were on the rare occasions when their leaves happened to coincide, and they met up in Bensonhurst. Then it was like old times, and they traded 'war stories.' Both had participated in the Gulf War.
Although neither Curt nor Steve had said as much, they both assumed the military would be their careers. But it was not to be, ultimately both were disappointed by their respective branches.
Curt's experience was the more troubling. He'd risen to a position of leadership in the training of recruits for an elite Marine reconnaissance team. During a particularly grueling night maneuver and on specific orders from Curt to keep up, a recruit died. A subsequent inquiry implicated Curt as being responsible for a portion of the blame.
Nothing was said about the fact that the man shouldn't have been in the program. He was a 'mama's boy' who'd been accepted only because his father was a Washington bigwig.
Although Curt wasn't punished per se, the incident tarnished his record and precluded further advancement. He was devastated and ultimately furious over the episode. He felt the government had let him down after he had given his all for his country. When the time for his next reenlistment came up, Curt took an early out.
Steve's experience had been different. After a lengthy and frustrating application process, he'd finally been accepted into Green Beret training, only to have to drop out during the initial twenty-one-day assessment course. It was not his fault, he'd come down with the flu.
When he learned he had to start the whole application process again despite everything he'd done for the army, he followed Curt's example, and with a sense of disgust and betrayal left the military.
After a series of odd jobs, mostly involving private security, Curt had been the first to join the New York City Fire Department. He liked it from the start, with its military-like hierarchy, uniforms, inspiring mission, pride, and interesting equipment. Without any sort of ordnance, it wasn't the Marine Corps, but it was close enough. Also on the positive side was the fact that he could live in Bensonhurst.
Soon Curt was encouraging Steve to follow suit and take the civil service test. With some wrangling after Steve had gotten himself hired, they managed to get themselves assigned to the same firehouse and ultimately to the same engine company. Their story had come full circle.
They were back living in Bensonhurst and were once again best friends.
'I'm not going to chicken out, ' Steve said morosely. 'I just think we're asking for trouble. The building's not scheduled for a fire inspection. What if they call the firehouse? '
'Who's to know they're not scheduled? ' Curt said. 'And what difference does it make if someone calls? The captain's on vacation. Besides, we're out doing legitimate inspections, and I happened to have found out there'd been a violation on the fed building's last inspection. If a question arises, we're just checking to make sure the violation has been corrected.'
'What kind of violation was it? '
'They'd installed a small grill in the ground floor sandwich kiosk, ' Curt said. 'Probably some food service manager just thought of it as an afterthought. I doubt they even pulled a permit. It got put in without a dry
