Patrick O'Reilly, Detective First Grade, District of Columbia Police Department. You've got to find him for me!'
Suddenly, startlingly, a male voice was on the line. 'O'Reilly?' the man said. 'Like in O'Reilly, the secretary of a certain Congressman?'
'The same, sir. You don't answer your goddamned phone—excuse my language.'
'This is a trunk line to my apartment, Mr. O'Reilly… You may switch systems, Operator.'
'Thank you, sir.' There was a snap over the phone.
'Yes, Mr. O'Reilly? We're alone now.'
'I'm not. I'm in the company of six corpses thirty yards from my car.'
'What?'
'Get out here, Mr. Payton. Kendrick's house. And if you don't want headlines, call off any relieving unit that's heading here.'
'Secure,' said the stunned director of Special Projects. 'The relief comes on at midnight; it's covered by the men inside.'
'They're dead, too. They're all dead.'
Mitchell Payton crouched beside the dead body of the guard nearest the gate, wincing under the beam of O'Reilly's light. 'Good God, he was so young. They're all so young!' 'Were, sir,' said the detective flatly. 'There's no one alive, outside or inside. I've turned off most of the lights, but I'll escort you through, of course.'
'I must… of course.'
'But I won't unless you tell me where Congressman Kendrick is—if he is, or whether he was supposed to be here, which would mean he probably isn't. I can and obviously should call the Fairfax police. Am I clear, sir?'
'Gaelically clear, Lieutenant. For the time being this must remain an Agency problem—a catastrophe, if you like. Am I clear?'
'Answer my question or rest assured I'll do my sworn duty and call Fairfax headquarters. Where is Congressman Kendrick? His car's not here and I want to know whether I should be relieved by that fact or not.'
'If you can find any relief in this situation you're a very strange man—’
'I mourn these people, these strangers to me, as I've mourned hundreds like 'em in my time, but I know Evan Kendrick! Now if you have the information, I want it this very moment, or I go to my vehicle and radio my report to the police in Fairfax.'
'For God's sake, don't you threaten me, Lieutenant. If you want to know where Kendrick is, ask your wife!'
'My wife?
'The congressman's secretary, in case it's slipped your mind.'
'You fancy rumbugger!' exploded Paddy. 'Why the hell do you think I'm out here? To pay a two-toilet social call on my old society chum, the millionaire from Colorado? I'm here, Chauncy-boyo, because Annie hasn't heard from Evan in two days, and since nine o'clock this morning both his phone here and in Mesa Verde don't ring! Now, that's what you might call a coincidence, isn't it!'
'Both his telephones—' Payton snapped his head around, peering above.
'Don't bother,' said O'Reilly, following the director's gaze. 'One line's been cut and expertly spliced into another; the thick cable to the roof's intact.'
'Good Christ!'
'In my opinion, you need His immediate help… Kendrick! Where the hell is he?'
'The Bahamas. Nassau, in the Bahamas.'
'Why did you think my wife, his secretary, knew that? And you'd better have a good goddamned reason for thinking so, Dan Fancy, because if this is some kind of spook shit to involve Annie Mulcahy in one of your fuck-ups, I'll have more blue jackets swarming around here than you've ever seen!'
'I thought so because he told me, Lieutenant O'Reilly,' said
