“Everything is proceeding on schedule.”
“And you expect to finish in three more days?”
Lugovoy nodded.
“I’m moving your deadline up.”
Lugovoy acted as though he hadn’t heard correctly. Then the truth broke through to him. “Oh, God, no!” he gasped. “I need every minute. As it is, my staff and I are cramming into ten days what should take thirty. You’re eliminating all our safeguards. We must have more time for the President’s brain to stabilize.”
“That is President Antonov’s concern, not mine or my grandmother’s. We fulfilled our part of the bargain. By allowing a KGB man in here, you jeopardized the entire project.”
“I swear I had nothing to do with Suvorov’s breakout.”
“Your story,” Bougainville said coldly. “I choose to believe his presence was planned, likely on President Antonov’s orders. Certainly by now Suvorov has informed his superiors and every Soviet agent in the States is converging on us. We will have to move the facility.”
That was the final shattering blow. Lugovoy looked as if he was about to gag. “Impossible!” he howled like an injured dog. “Absolutely no way can we move the President and all this equipment to another site and still meet your ridiculous deadline.”
Bougainville glared at Lugovoy through narrow slits of eyes. When he spoke again, his voice was rock calm. “Not to worry, Doctor. No upheaval is necessary.”
42
When Pitt walked into his NUMA office, he found Hiram Yaeger asleep on the couch. With his sloppy clothes, long knotted hair and beard, the computer expert looked like a derelict wino. Pitt reached down and gently shook him by the shoulder. An eyelid slowly raised, then Yaeger stirred, grunted and pushed himself to a sitting position.
“Hard night?” Pitt inquired.
Yaeger scratched his head with both hands and yawned. “You have any Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger Tea?”
“Only yesterday’s warmed-over coffee.”
Yaeger clicked his lips sourly. “The caffeine will kill you.”
“Caffeine, pollution, booze, women — what’s the difference?”
“By the way, I got it.”
“Got what?”
“I nailed it, your cagey shipping company.”
“Jesus!” Pitt said, coming alive. “Where?”
“Right in our own backyard,” Yaeger said with a great grin. “New York.”
“How did you do it?”
“Your hunch about Korean involvement was the key, but not the answer. I attacked it from that angle, probing all the shipping and export lines that were based in Korea or sailed under their registry. There were over fifty of them, but none led to the trail of banks we checked earlier. With nowhere else to go, I let the computer fly on its own. My ego is shattered. It proved a better sleuth than I am. The kicker was in the name. Not Korean, but French.”
“French.”
“Based in the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan, their fleet of legitimate ships flies the flag of the Somali Republic. How does that grab you?”
“Go on.”
“A first-rate company, no rust-bucket operation, rated lily-white by
“What’s their name?”
“Bougainville Maritime,” answered Yaeger. “Ever heard of it?”
“Min Koryo Bougainville — the ‘Steel Lotus’?” said Pitt, impressed. “Who hasn’t? She’s right up there with the celebrity British and Greek shipping tycoons.”
“She is your Korean connection.”
“Your data are conclusive? No chance of error?”
“Solid stuff,” Yaeger replied adamantly. “Take my word for it. Everything triple-checks. Once I tuned in on Bougainville as the source, it became a simple chore of working backwards. It all came together; bank accounts, letters of credit — you wouldn’t believe how the banks turn their backs on these frauds. The old broad reminds me of one of those East Indian statues with twenty arms, sitting there with a holy look on her face while the hands are making obscene gestures.”
“You did it,” Pitt said enthusiastically. “You actually pinned Sosan Trading, the
“Like a stake through the heart.”
“How far back did you go?”
“I can give you the old girl’s biography almost to when she spit out the tit. A tough old bird. Started from scratch and a lot of guts after World War Two. Slowly added old tramp ships to her fleet, crewed by Koreans who were glad to work for a bowl of rice and pennies a day. With practically no overhead, she cut-rate her freight costs and built a thriving business. About twenty-five years ago, when her grandson joined the company, things really took off. A slippery customer, that one. Keeps in the background. Except for school records, his data file is almost blank. Min Koryo Bougainville built the foundation for maritime crime that spanned thirty nations. When her grandson — Lee Tong is his name — came along, he honed and smoothed the piracy and fraud part of the organization to a fine art. I had the whole mess printed out. There’s a hard copy on your desk.”
Pitt turned and for the first time noticed a five-inch-thick sheaf of computer printout paper on his desk. He sat down and briefly scanned the notched pages. The incredible reach of the Bougainvilles was mind-boggling. The only criminal activity they appeared to shy away from was prostitution.
After several minutes he looked up and nodded. “A super job, Hiram,” he said sincerely. “Thank you.”
Yeager nodded toward the printouts. “I wouldn’t let that out of my sight if I were you.”
“Any chance of us getting caught?”
“A foregone conclusion. Our illegal taps have been recorded on the bank’s computer log and printed out on a daily form. If a smart supervisor scans the list, he’ll wonder why an American oceanographic agency is snooping in his biggest depositor’s records. His next step would be to rig the computer’s communications line with a tracing device.”
“The bank would most certainly notify old Min Koryo,” said Pitt thoughtfully. Then he looked up. “Once they identify NUMA as the tap, can Bougainville’s own computer network probe ours to see what we’ve gleaned from their data banks?”
“Our network is as vulnerable as any other. They won’t learn much, though. Not since I removed the magnetic storage disks.”
“When do you think they’ll smoke us out?”
“I’d be surprised if they haven’t pegged us already.”
“Can you stay one jump ahead of them?”
Yaeger gave Pitt an inquiring stare. “What sneaky plan are you about to uncork?”
“Go back to your keyboard and screw them up but good. Re-enter the network and alter the data, foul up the Bougainville day-to-day operations, erase legitimate bank records, insert absurd instructions into their programs. Let them feel the heat from somebody else’ for a change.”
