Basset had been hit. The answer was immediately obvious. There was blood everywhere. The nitro-tipped bullet had ripped apart the back of Basset’s head, and the white shirts of the Capitol Police officers were covered with blood and a good portion of the Speaker’s brain.
Dorrell kneeled over the pile and brought his mike to his mouth.
“Bobcat’s been hit! I repeat, Bobcat has been hit!” Two of the Secret Service agents were now standing between the street and the pile of bodies on the ground, their Uzis drawn, and their eyes searching the buildings across the street. The assassin quickly disassembled the rifle and put everything back in the bag. Smoke was filling the room and he yanked his gas mask over his face. Grabbing the bag, he ran down the hallway toward the stairwell. Once in the stairwell, he pushed his way past the scared office workers who thought the building was on fire.
Dorrell looked down at what was left of Basset’s head and knew the Speaker was dead. Just then, the voice of the Secret Service agent on the roof of the CNN building came barking over Dorle’s earpiece. “I think the shot came from the building directly across the street!”
Dorrell jumped to his feet and started shouting orders. “Art, call for backup, let’s secure that building!” Turning to one of the cops, he yelled, “Take two of your men and head around the back! I don’t want anyone leaving the area! And be careful!” Grabbing the two agents who had their Uzis drawn, he ran across the street for the front of the building. They darted between the cars that had stopped to see what was happening. They made it to the other side of the street, and just as they reached the front of the building, an onslaught of frantic office workers met them coming the other way. They were blocked from getting inside. Three blocks away at Union Station, the blond-haired assassin was wearing loose jeans, a large sweatshirt, and a baseball hat. He walked over to a row of pay phones. Union Station, like most large train and subway stations, had hundreds of pay phones. It was an easy place for a person to come and go unnoticed. The man
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reached into his left pocket and pulled out a quarter. The dirty-blond hair that came out from under the cap and down to his shoulders was not natural.
Neither was his posture. Instead of standing erect and looking like an athletic, six-foot-tall man, he was slouching. To the casual observer he looked like a slightly overweight man who was no taller than five ten. He punched the seven digits into the phone and pulled a small recorder out of his pocket. A female voice answered on the other end, “Good afternoon, American Broadcasting Corporation. How may I direct your call?” The man pressed the play button on the recorder, and a computerized voice emanated from the small speaker. “Do not hang up.
This message is from the group that is responsible for the killings of Senator
Fitzgerald, Senator Downs, Congressman Koslowski, and Speaker Basset.” The twenty-three-year-old receptionist felt her heart jolt.
She panicked for a moment and then remembered that all calls coming into the main switchboard were recorded. After a short pause the recording continued. “Speaker Basset was killed because he and the rest of his colleagues have failed to take our demands seriously. We are not terrorists. We have killed no innocent civilians; in fact, we have gone to great lengths to avoid doing so. We are not, as the White House has led the media to believe, part of a conspiracy to topple the Stevens presidency. We are a group of
Americans who are fed up with the corruption and complete lack of professionalism that exists in Washington, D.C. “We gave you a chance to implement in a peaceful, democratic way the reforms you have been promising. You have failed to do so, so we have intervened. Do not test us again or we will be forced to impose more term limits.
We have the resources and the resolve to kill any Congressman, any Senator, and even the President.
“We will grant a cease-fire and give you the remainder of the week to bury
Koslowski, Downs, Fitzgerald, and Basset. After they have been laid to rest, we expect immediate action on the reforms we have proposed.”
IT WAS STILL LIGHT OUT AS HARRY DORRELL PASSED THROUGH THE
SECRET Service checkpoint and parked his car outside the staff entrance to the West
Wing of the White House. Getting out of the car, he asked himself for the hundredth time since the shooting how the assassin had gotten away.
The police had sealed off the entire block within minutes of the attack.
All of the people who had evacuated the smoke-filled building had been roped off and were being questioned for the third and fourth time by the FBI and the Secret Service. So far, every one of them had checked out as a legitimate office worker. The building had been searched with dogs and was empty. What a mess, he thought to himself. I’ve had twenty-three good years and now this.
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As he reached the entrance, Jack Lortch opened the door. “Harry, I’m sorry… I’m really sorry.” Lortch had replaced Dorrell as the special agent in charge of the
Presidential security detail. The two men had known each other for most of their professional careers. Dorrell nodded his head in acknowledgment, but kept his eyes averted. They walked to the main floor, Lortch leading and Dorrell following, neither saying a word. When they reached the door to the Roosevelt Room, Dorrell stopped and asked, “Jack, is the President in there?”
“No, he’s over on the residential side talking to Mrs. Basset.”
Dorrell looked down at the ground and shook his head. Lortch put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Harry, it wasn’t your fault.” Dorrell looked up. “Yeah, yeah, I know.”
When they entered the room, Stu Garret was pacing back and forth talking to Alex Tracy, the director of the Secret Service. Mike Nance was at the far end of the table, sitting by himself and observing the conversation between Garret and Tracy. Garret turned and stopped speaking as Lortch and Dorrell entered. The room fell silent and no one spoke for a moment. Director Tracy finally broke the silence.
“Gentlemen, please sit down.” Everyone sat with the exception of Garret.
Director Tracy looked at Dorrell. “Harry, are you all right?” Dorrell nodded his head yes, but said nothing. Tracy stared at him a while longer and went on, “Harry, have you met Stu Garret and Mike Nance before?”
