Patriot Games

Robby nodded at that one. Pilots trust their instinct, too. Now, his were telling him something.

'So,' Jack leaned back. 'What should I do?'

'The best defense against terrorists—what the security schools teach business executives, for example—is to avoid patterns. Take a slightly different route to work every day. Alter your time of departure somewhat. When you drive in, keep an eye on the mirror. If you see the same vehicle three or more days in a row, take the tag number and call me. I'll be glad to have it run through the computer—no big deal. It's probably nothing to be worried about, just be a little bit more alert. With luck, in a few days or weeks we'll be able to call you and tell you to forget the whole thing. What I am almost certainly doing is alarming you unnecessarily, but you know the rule about how it's better to be safe than sorry, right?'

'And if you get any information the other way?' Jack asked.

'I'll be on the phone to you five minutes later. The Bureau doesn't like the idea of having terrorists operate here. We work damned hard to keep it from happening, and we've been very effective so far.'

'How much of that is luck?' Robby asked.

'Not as much as you think,' Shaw replied. 'Well, Doctor Ryan, I'm really sorry to have worried you about what is probably nothing at all. Here's my card. If there is anything we can do for you, don't hesitate to call me.'

'Thank you, Mr. Shaw.' Jack took the card and watched the man leave. He was silent for a few seconds. Then he flipped open his phone list and dialed 011-44-1-499-9000. It took a few seconds for the overseas call to get through.

'American Embassy,' the switchboard operator answered after the first ring.

'Legal Attaché, please.'

'Thank you. Wait, please.' Jack waited. The operator was back in fifteen seconds. 'No answer. Mr. Murray has gone home for the day—no, excuse me, he's out of town for the remainder of the week. Can I take a message?'

Jack frowned for a moment. 'No, thank you. I'll call back next week.'

Robby watched his friend hang up. Jack drummed his fingers on the phone and again remembered what Scan Miller's face had looked like. He's three thousand miles away, Jack, Ryan told himself. 'Maybe,' he breathed aloud.

'Huh?'

'I never told you about the one I… captured, I guess.'

'The one they sprung? The one we saw on TV?'

'Rob, you ever seen—how do I say it? You ever see somebody that you're just automatically afraid of?'

'I think I know what you mean,' Robby said to avoid the question. Jackson didn't know how to answer that. As a pilot, he'd known fear often enough, but always there was training and experience to deal with it. There was no man in the world he'd ever been afraid of.

'At the trial, I looked at him, and I just knew that—'

'He's a terrorist, and he kills people. That would bother me, too.' Jackson stood up and looked out the window. 'Jesus, and they call 'em professionals! I'm a professional. I have a code of conduct, I train, I practice, I adhere to standards and rules.'

'They're real good at what they do,' Jack said quietly. 'That's what makes them dangerous. And this ULA outfit is unpredictable. That's what Dan Murray told me.' Jackson turned away from the window.

'Let's go see somebody.'

'Who?'

'Just come along, boy.' Jackson's voice had the ring of command when he wanted it to. He set his white officer's cap on his head just so.

They took the stairs down and walked east, past the chapel and Bancroft Hall's massive, prison-like bulk. Ryan liked the Academy campus except for that. He supposed it was necessary for all the mids to experience the corporate identity of military life, but Jack would not have cared to live that way as a college student. The odd mid snapped a salute at Robby, who returned each with panache as he proceeded in total silence with Jack trying to keep up. Ryan could almost hear the thoughts whirring through the aviator's head. It took five minutes to reach the new LeJeune Annex across from the Halsey field house.

The large glass and marble edifice contrasted with Bancroft's stolid gray stone. The United States Naval Academy was a government complex, and hence exempt from the normal standards of architectural good taste. They entered the ground floor past a gaggle of midshipmen in jogging suits, and Robby led him down a staircase into the basement. Jack had never been here before. They ended up in a dimly lit corridor whose block walls led to a dead end. Ryan imagined he heard the crack of small-bore pistol fire, and it was confirmed when Jackson opened a heavy steel door to the Academy's new pistol range. They saw a lone figure standing in the center lane, a.22 automatic steady in his extended right hand.

Sergeant Major Noah Breckenridge was the image of the Marine noncommissioned officer. Six-three, the only fat on his two-hundred-pound frame was in the hot dogs he'd had for lunch in the adjacent Dalgren Hall. He was wearing a short-sleeved khaki shirt. Ryan had seen but never met him, though Breckenridge's reputation was well known. In twenty-eight years as a Marine, he had been everywhere a Marine can go, done everything a Marine can do. His 'salad bar' of decorations covered five even rows, topmost among them the Navy Cross, which he'd won while a sniper in Vietnam, part of 1st Force Recon. Beneath the ribbons were his marksmanship medals—'shooting iron' — the least of which was a «Master» rating. Breckenridge was known for his weapons proficiency. Every year he went to the national championships at Camp Perry, Ohio, and in two of the past five years he had won the President's Cup for his mastery of the.45 Colt automatic. His shoes were so shiny that one could determine only with difficulty that the underlying leather was actually black. His brass shone like stainless steel, and his hair was cut so close that if any gray were in there, the casual observer could never have seen it. He had begun his career as an ordinary rifleman, been an Embassy Marine and a Sea Marine. He had taught marksmanship at the sniper school, been a drill instructor at Parris Island and an officer instructor at Quantico.

When the Marine detail at the Academy had been augmented, Breckenridge had been the divisional Sergeant Major at Camp LeJeune, and it was said that when he left Annapolis, he would complete his thirty-year tour of duty as Sergeant Major of the Corps, with an office adjoining that of the Commandant. His presence at Annapolis was no accident. As he walked about the campus, Breckenridge was himself an eloquent and unspoken challenge to whichever midshipman might still be undecided on his career goals: Don't even think about being a Marine officer unless you are fit to command a man like this. It was the sort of challenge that few mids could walk away from. The Marine force that backed up the civilian guards was technically under the command of a captain. In fact, as was so often the case with the Corps, the Captain had the good sense to let Breckenridge run things. The traditions of the Corps were not passed on by officers, but rather by the professional NCOs who were the conservators of it all.

As Ryan and Jackson watched, the Sergeant Major took a fresh pistol from a cardboard box and slipped a clip into it. He fired two rounds, then checked his target through a spotting scope. Frowning, he pulled a tiny screwdriver from his shirt pocket and made an adjustment to the sights. Two more rounds, check, another adjustment. Two more shots. The pistol was now perfectly sighted, and went back into the manufacturer's box.

'How's it going, Gunny?' Robby asked.

'Good afternoon, Commander,' Breckenridge said agreeably. His southern Mississippi accent spilled across the naked concrete floor. 'And how are you today, sir?'

'No complaints. I got somebody I want you to meet. This here's Jack Ryan.'

They shook hands. Unlike Skip Tyler, Breckenridge was a man who understood and disciplined his strength.

'Howdy. You're the guy was in the papers.' Breckenridge examined Ryan like a fresh boot.

'That's right.'

'Pleased to meet you, sir. I know the guy who ran you through Quantico.'

Ryan laughed. 'And how is Son of Kong?'

'Willie's retired now. He runs a sporting goods store down in Roanoke. He remembers you. Says you were pretty sharp for a college boy, and I imagine you remember mosta what he taught you.' Breckenridge gazed down at Jack with a look of benign satisfaction, as though Ryan's action in London was renewed proof that everything the Marine Corps said and did, everything to which he had dedicated his life, really meant something. He would not