“Hello.”
“Roger?”
“Yes, speaking.”
“God, you sound terrible. I didn’t recognize your voice.”
“The flu has really knocked me out.”
“Sorry to bug you, but we just received a strike.”
“California?”
“No, the epicenter is somewhere around the Wyoming-Montana border.”
There was a brief silence. “Odd, that area is hardly classed as an active quake zone.”
“This one is artificial.”
“Explosion?”
“A big one. From what I can tell on the intensity scale, this one reads like it’s nuclear.”
“God,” Stevenson muttered weakly, “are you sure?”
“Who can be sure about these things,” said Morse.
“The Pentagon never held tests in that part of the country.”
“They haven’t alerted us to any underground testing either.”
“Not like them to conduct testing without alerting us.”
“What do you think? Should we check it out with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission?”
Stevenson may have been laid low with the flu, but his mind was perfectly healthy. “Leapfrog the system and go to the top. Call Hank Sauer, our mutual friend at the National Security Agency, and find out what in hell is going on.”
“And if Sauer won’t tell?” asked Morse.
“Who cares? The main thing is we’ve dumped the mystery in his lap, and now we can go on watching for the next big one due in California.”
Sauer didn’t tell what he didn’t know. But he recognized a national emergency when he heard one. He asked Morse for additional data and immediately passed on the information to the Director of Central Intelligence.
The President was aboard Air Force One flying to a political fund-raising dinner in San Francisco when he received the call from Jordan.
“What’s the situation?”
“We have reports of a nuclear explosion in Wyoming,” answered Jordan.
“Damn!” the President cursed under his breath. “Ours or theirs?”
“Certainly not ours. It has to be one of the bomb cars.”
“Any word of casualties?”
“Negligible. The blast took place in a lightly populated part of the state, mostly ranch land.”
The President was fearful of posing the next question. “Are there indications of additional explosions?”
“No, sir. At the moment, the Wyoming blast is the only one.”
“I thought the Kaiten Project was on hold for forty-eight hours.”
“It is,” Jordan said firmly. “There hasn’t been enough time for them to reprogram the codes.”
“How do you see it, Ray?”
“I’ve talked to Percy Nash. He thinks the bomb was detonated on site with a high-powered rifle.”
“By a robot?”
“No, a human.”
“So the kamikaze phenomenon is not dead.”
“It would seem so.”
“Why this suicidal tactic now?” asked the President.
“Probably a warning. They’re reasonably certain that we have Suma, and they’re hedging their bets by trying to fake us out of a nuclear strike while they desperately struggle to reprogram the detonation codes for the entire system.”
“They’re doing a darn good job of it.”
“We’re sitting in the driver’s seat, Mr. President. We now have every excuse in the world to retaliate with a nuclear strike.”
“All too true, but what solid proof do you have that the Kaiten Project isn’t operational? The Japs might have pulled off a minor miracle and replaced the codes. Suppose they’re not bluffing?”
“We have no hard evidence,” Jordan admitted.
“If we launch a warhead missile on Soseki Island and the Dragon Center controllers detect its approach, their final act will be to signal the bomb cars to be detonated before the robots can drive them to isolated destinations around the country.”
“A horrible thought, Mr. President. Made even more so by the known locations of the bomb cars. Most of them are hidden in and around metropolitan cities.”
“Those cars must be found and their bombs neutralized as quickly and quietly as possible. We can’t afford to have this horror leak to the public, not now.”
“The FBI has sent an army of agents out in the field to make a sweep.”
“Do they know how to dismantle the bombs?”
“Each team has a nuclear physicist to handle that job.”
Jordan could not see the worry lines on the President’s face.
“This will be our last chance, Ray. Your new plan is the last roll of the dice.”
“I’m fully aware of that, Mr. President. By this time tomorrow morning we’ll know if we’re an enslaved nation.”
At almost the same moment, Special Agent Bill Frick of the FBI and his team were converging on the vault that held the bomb cars in the underground parking area of the Pacific Paradise hotel in Las Vegas.
There were no guards and the steel doors were unlocked. A bad omen, thought Frick. His apprehension increased when his electronics men found the security systems turned off.
Cautiously he led his team through doors into what looked to be an outer supply room. On the far side was a large metal door that was rolled into the ceiling. It yawned wide and high enough to pass a highway semitrailer.
They entered a huge vaultlike space and found it completely empty, not even a scrap of trash or a cobweb was evident. It had been scrubbed clean.
“Maybe we’re in the wrong area,” said one of Frick’s agents hopefully.
Frick stared around the concrete walls, focused on the ventilator Weatherhill had wormed through, then looked down at the barely discernible tire marks on the epoxy-coated floor. Finally he shook his head. “This is the place, all right. It matches the description from Central Intelligence.”
A short nuclear physicist with a full beard pushed his way past Frick and stared at the emptiness. “How am I supposed to disarm the bombs if they’re not here?” he said angrily, as if the disappearance of the cars was Frick’s fault.
Without answering, Frick walked swiftly through the underground parking area to a command truck. He entered, poured himself a cup of coffee, and then opened a frequency on the radio.
“Black Horse, this is Red Horse,” he said in a tired voice.
“Go ahead, Red Horse,” answered the Director of the FBI’s field operations.
“We’ve struck out. The rustlers got here first.”
“Join the club, Red Horse. Most of the herd has come up dry too. Only Blue Horse in New Jersey and Gray Horse in Minnesota found steers in the corral.”
“Shall we continue the operation?”
“Affirmative. You’ve got twelve hours. Repeat, twelve hours to track your herd to a new location. Additional data is being faxed to you, and all police, sheriff, and highway patrol units have been alerted to stop any trucks and semitrailers matching descriptions provided by Central Intelligence.”
