Liberty

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

A stunned nation watched and listened to the address that Thursday evening by the president of the United States. One of the people who heard it on the radio was Dr. Hamid Salami Mabruk, who was now back in the country. He had finished his classes for the day at the university and listened in his pickup on the way to Washington.

As he had predicted to his colleagues when this mission was being planned, the authorities had indeed been watching the cells of militants in Florida. One of the two weapons allocated to the cells had been seized by the FBI. Mabruk suspected the second warhead soon would be.

The success or failure of the entire operation now rested on his shoulders. He had thought that development also probable.

He had his work cut out for him tonight, and he knew it. The bomb had been delivered to the Washington Convention Center in the heart of the city. He had selected the Convention Center after weeks of searching and watching, for several reasons. The site was in the heart of the downtown between the White House and the Capitol, near the FBI’s Hoover Building, the Treasury … When the warhead detonated, the explosion would cut out the heart of the American government. Even the buildings not flattened by the fireball, like the Pentagon, would be mere shells. Secondly, the Convention Center was relatively deserted at night.

He had sent an encrypted e-mail to his contact in the Sword of Islam informing him of his choice, so that the container could be shipped there.

Tonight was Thursday, and tomorrow and through the weekend a trade show was being set up. The cover was perfect. He had credentials — he was William Haddad, an electrical equipment manufacturer from Philadelphia, he was an exhibitor, and he was here tonight to set up his exhibit early. He had already met the security staff, sprinkled twenty-dollar bills around. They were expecting him.

He drove slowly by the Convention Center looking for police cruisers and unmarked cars. Seeing none, he turned around and came back, then parked across the street from the loading dock, which sat behind a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. The container was there, backed in against the dock on a truck chassis. The tractor that had delivered it was long gone. Two other containers were parked beside it.

Mabruk used his binoculars to scan the streets and roofs.

He saw no one. He assumed that if the authorities had discovered the weapon in transit, they would have confiscated it. Still, they could be watching the container to see if someone was going to come for it. Or they could be waiting inside.

It was a risk, one he could not avoid. He didn’t have the evening to waste watching. He intended to arm the weapon and put it on a timer. He would be long gone, on his way to arm the second weapon in New York, when this one detonated.

He wasn’t going to be in New York either, when that one exploded. Unlike the jihad soldiers, Dr. Hamid Salami Mabruk had no intention of heading for Paradise anytime soon. He intended to do a lot more damage to the infidels in the years ahead. God willing, he would live to see the Muslim world united under God’s banner.

Had he heard the American president’s private remarks to Jake Grafton and Sal Molina, Mabruk would have agreed with his assessment of the aftermath of a successful nuclear attack on America. Mabruk, too, thought that these explosions would ignite World War III. Bin Ladin and Dr. Zawahiri were absolutely correct: Nothing less than a world conflagration would force the vast bulk of the Muslim people worldwide to abandon their apathy, to choose sides. The explosions would prove that the infidels were vulnerable, and the wrath of the non-Muslim world would force them to defend themselves.

The possibility that the Muslims might lose the great war to come did not cross his mind. Allah was with them. If the true believers united in jihad, the forces of the devil would be defeated in the final war between good and evil. That he knew in the depths of his soul. Even the Christian Bible said so.

He locked the pickup and walked to the exhibitors’ entrance of the convention center. The security guard, a black woman wearing a radio in a holster on her belt, looked at his credentials and searched a document on a clipboard for his name. “You have an early setup approved,” she said. “Got you right here.”

“I have some equipment in my truck,” he said. “How can I get it in?”

“I’ll open the gate by the loading dock to let you in. Can you get your stuff in from there?”

“Yes. I would appreciate that.”

“Ten minutes. Let me get someone to stand here for me.” She began talking on her radio. Mabruk walked back to his pickup and drove it to the gate. He turned off the engine and sat waiting. A few people were on the street, but only a few. He heard a far-off siren that wailed for a time and didn’t seem to be getting closer. Several jets could be heard, probably flying down the river into Reagan National Airport.

Hamid Mabruk sat calmly, listening and waiting. The tension was extreme, but the payoff was close. As he sat there he prayed.

The guard appeared eleven long minutes later. She unlocked the padlock, swung the gate open, and he drove through. She locked the gate behind him.

He parked next to the container. “I’ll unlock this personnel door and you can use that,” she said as she took a wad of keys from her belt.

“I really appreciate this,” Hamid Mabruk said warmly.

“Glad to help, honey. If there’s anything else you need, just ask.” She walked back through the cavernous loading area, her footsteps strangely silent, until she disappeared around a turn.

He was alone.

The overhead door was not locked. He pushed the switch beside the door and it rose slowly, whining a little. He stepped out on the dock and opened the door to the container. This one was packed with boxes full of electrical equipment. Hamid Mabruk allowed himself a tight smile — the container looked exactly as it had when he had sealed it aboard Olympic Voyager.

He now had a choice to make. Two cables were hidden behind the lower box on the right-hand side, as he stood looking in. Merely moving the box would give him access. If he carried the car batteries in, wired them to these cables using a timer, the whole thing would explode when the timer ran down. Rigging the setup shouldn’t take much more than half an hour.

He could set the timer to detonate the weapon in three hours, giving him ample time to get out of the city.

Or he could unload the weapon with a forklift — there were three of them sitting near the door. He could hide it inside the Convention Center behind a pile of boxes, set it to detonate tomorrow, when downtown Washington was full of people. The explosion then would have the largest dramatic impact, might even make it onto television networks around the world. That wouldn’t happen if it detonated during the night. Moving the weapon would also protect it if the container were searched tonight or tomorrow morning.

He walked back through the huge storage bay looking for possible places to put the bomb. It’s a risk, of course, he admitted to himself. The truth of it is I feel lucky.

Jake Grafton found Tommy Carmellini and Anna Modin sitting on the couch with Callie watching television when he returned home that evening.

“I thought you were going to keep her out of sight until the FBI had that new identity ready to go,” Jake said to Carmellini after the greetings, when they went to the kitchen to fix a pot of coffee.

“Well, yeah, but when we heard the news today, I figured I ought to get back here and see if there is anything I can do. Feel pretty useless strolling up and down the beach. And I’ve gained five pounds.”

“I can see you’re porking up. Glad you came back. Callie tell you Toad was in a crash last night in Boston?” Carmellini nodded. Jake continued, “We’re down to one Corrigan unit, and it’s here in Washington. I just have time for a cup of coffee. They’re swinging by in a half hour to pick me up.”

“Mind if I tag along? I haven’t seen this thing in action yet.”

“Anyone outside pay any attention to you when you came into the building?”

“No. Everyone in North America is someplace watching television, even the terrorists.”

“Anna should be okay here,” Jake said, as the first of the coffee dripped through. “You two getting along okay?”

“Oh, sure,” said Tommy Carmellini.

“She hasn’t been put off by your disgusting personal habits?”

“She hasn’t complained.”

“Wonderful. The news here is that Zip Vance has a new girlfriend. He’s stepping out with one of the secretaries.”

“How’s Zelda taking it?”

“Don’t think she’s noticed yet. She’s been pretty busy.”

“He needed to get on with his life.”

“Don’t we all.” Jake pulled the pot from the coffeemaker and stuck a cup in its place. When it was full he substituted another cup for it and handed the first one to Carmellini. “There’s milk in the fridge.”

“Right.”

“So are you and Anna going to get married, or is she going to Europe or Russia when this is over?”

Tommy sipped the coffee experimentally before he answered. “Going somewhere,” he said, meeting Jake’s eyes.

“Umm.”

Jake took cups of coffee to the women, then sat with them to drink his. Callie asked how things went that afternoon at the White House, and Jake didn’t want to talk about it. The third time he glanced at his watch, she smiled and told him he had better get ready to go. She went with him to the bedroom, where he changed from his uniform into jeans, a sweatshirt, and tennis shoes.

“Anna’s going to stay here tonight,” he said, “while Tommy comes with me. Should be okay. Keep the doors locked, and if anything sounds or looks suspicious, call nine-one-one, then call me on my cell.” He took an old revolver from his sock drawer, loaded it, and stuck it in his hip pocket.

In the living room Carmellini took off his windbreaker and stripped off the shoulder holster. “Put this thing in your bag and keep it handy.” He explained how to work the pistol. “Just ear the hammer back, point it, and pull the trigger. It’ll go bang.”

She held the pistol tightly against her chest with both hands. “These have been the best two weeks of my life,” she said.

He pulled her to him in a fierce hug. “Yeah.”

“So is this the way our lives are going to be?”

“I’m not the one on a mission from God, woman. I’m not going anywhere. You want to stay, just say so. You want to get married, we’ll find us a judge.”

She buried her face in his shoulder.

They were standing like that when the Graftons came out of the bedroom.

“Kiss her and let’s get outta here,” Jake said as he walked by. Carmellini obeyed the order.

Hoss Baker was a retired navy chief petty officer. He had grown up dirt poor on a worn-out tenant farm in Mississippi and joined the navy to get the hell out. Once out, he never went back. His last tour of duty had been in Washington, so he remained there after he retired. The city had a vibrant black community; he found a job at the Convention Center, and he and his wife fit right in.

Things happened in Washington. Conventions came one after another, the Wizards played at the MCI Center right down the street, there was music, art, political theater … all in all, it was a good town. Beats the living hell out of Mississippi, he thought, and chuckled.

Baker surveyed his little office. He felt pensive tonight, vaguely troubled. No doubt the news on television about the recovered nuclear weapon and the president’s address this evening were part of it. He had watched the address before he came to work. God knows America had its troubles — every black man knew it was a damned long way from perfect — but the fact that there were people out there who wished to destroy all of it, the good as well as the bad, seemed somehow obscene.

Tonight his small, well-lit room seemed a safe sanctuary. The desk was oak, given to him by his son, who was a lawyer here in town. He liked the solidity of it, the smooth, grainy feel of the wood, the inherent strength.

On the wall were photos of him with some of the celebrities and politicians whom he had met while working here, as well as a photo of an admiral pinning a Navy Commendation Medal on his shirt. He had been younger then, and skinnier.

He stood, adjusted his trousers and his pistol belt. Then Hoss Baker did something he rarely did — he removed his pistol from the holster and popped the magazine from the handle. He jacked the shell from the chamber and put the pistol on the desk. After thumbing all the cartridges from the magazine onto the desk, he carefully reloaded the magazine. He snapped it back into the pistol, jacked a new shell into the chamber and engaged the safety. Then he lowered the pistol into the holster and carefully put the strap over it, ensured the Velcro catch was engaged.

Hoss Baker left the office and walked the hallway rattling doorknobs, then descended the stairs to the main concourse. Two custodians were polishing the floor there. He strolled through the convention hall, where he found three small crews constructing exhibits for the next convention, one crew taking one down. A man was working on a refrigeration unit in a snack-bar kitchen. One electrician was replacing a faulty circuit breaker in a power distribution room. Hoss knew the electrician, who had served four years in the air force, so he paused to visit for a few minutes.

Mabel Jones was the security officer on the exhibitor’s door. Hoss had hired her two years ago. She had ridden the bus north from Georgia as a young woman, looking for a better life. She had two sons, one in the army and one in prison for dealing drugs. Her man, whom she never married, had died of diabetes some years back.

“Who’s in here tonight, Mabel?”

“Got the list,” she said. “Pretty quiet, all things considered.”

Baker scanned the clipboard. “Who’s this Haddad guy? I didn’t see him.”

“Back around the loading dock. Let him in an hour ago. Joe stood by for me.” Joe was the outside guard.

“I’ll go back that way. Everything okay?”

“Sure. What’re you doin’ here tonight? Thought this was your day off.”

“Watched all that crap on television, couldn’t stay home. Had to do something.”

He heard the forklift before he saw it, a beeping as it backed up. The ones used inside the building were electric and made little noise except when backing. The sound was coming from a concession supply storage room. Hoss Baker walked that way.

The storage room door was open and the forklift was putting something in there. What the hell? That place was supposed to be locked. And who was driving the forklift?

He approached the forklift as the driver turned his head to back out. He stood watching with his arms crossed. The driver stopped the thing, got off, walked toward Hoss. A man from the Middle East, in his forties, perhaps.

“What the hell you doin’?” Hoss Baker asked, not aggressively.

“Hope you don’t mind,” the man said, gesturing toward the storage room. “The door was open and I needed someplace to put my supplies until I can set up my booth.”

Hoss walked toward the open door, the man following. “You aren’t supposed to be driving that thing,” he said, gesturing toward the forklift. “Liability. And that room is supposed to be locked up. Thing’s full of soda pop and candy bars. People steal—”

The words died in his throat when he saw the warhead resting on its pallet. Small, round, festooned with wires leading from the detonator contacts — after watching the FBI videotape from Atlanta this afternoon on television, Hoss Baker instantly recognized it for what it was.

He started to turn, drawing his pistol, when a bullet from a silenced .22 hit him in the head. He fell to the concrete floor, twitching, breathing raggedly.

Hamid Salami Mabruk stepped over to Hoss Baker and shot him again in the head. That shot killed him. He jabbed the pistol into his waistband and grabbed Hoss by the feet. He dragged him over behind a pallet stacked with cartons of soft drinks. Hoss was a big man; Mabruk was breathing heavily when he got him there.

A bad break. So much for a daylight explosion. He would have to get the batteries rigged and the timer wired up, then give himself perhaps an hour to get out of town.

Oh, bad break!

Mabruk jumped onto the forklift and drove it over to the exterior door. There was a stack of empty pallets there — he placed one on the forks. He would put all the batteries into the storeroom in a single trip, which would save some time.

He had cut the padlock on the storeroom door. Fortunately he had another in his pickup. Even if security personnel came looking for the dead man, they probably wouldn’t try to open the lock until they had searched the entire building. They would be dead before they finished that chore.

The bags of birdshot in the container — there was nothing he could do about that. He would padlock the container door, too. The weapon would explode before anyone got around to cutting off the padlock, Inshallah!

The technician working the Corrigan unit in the back of the van had rings dangling from his ears and tattoos peeking out the neck of his shirt. Jake Grafton tried not to stare. He hadn’t gotten used to the new ways youth had found to declare their independence from convention.

Tommy Carmellini chattered as the van rolled through the streets of downtown Washington and Jake and the technician watched the needles on the meters. After they had circled the Capitol, they drove up Constitution Avenue. “She doesn’t work for the SVR — I’m positive about that. Really a great person. You know, I’ve looked all my life for a woman to share life with, and when I finally meet her, she’s got another commitment. Isn’t that the way life works?”

“How are you dealing with that?” Jake asked over his shoulder, without taking his eyes off the gauges. The technician was concentrating, too, ignoring Carmellini’s recitation of his romantic woes.

“It’s a bummer. At least she isn’t married to some other Joe. Or Ivan. But it’s frustrating as hell, you know? I never really thought love would bite me. Sure, I’ve jumped into the sack with my share of broads, but that’s all they were, broads. Oh yeah, a few nice girls, too, but when the nice ones figured out I was a thief they didn’t want any part of my act. Sure as hell weren’t going to take me home to introduce me to Mom and Pop. Anna doesn’t care. It’s me she loves ….”

He fell silent, thinking about her, about how she hugged him before he left the Graftons’ apartment. Maybe she would change her mind about leaving. He weighed that possibility.

“Do you want to drive over to the Pentagon, check around there?” the driver asked.

“No. Go over to Pennsylvania Avenue, work your way north and east, then west. We’ll go all the way around the White House.”

The driver acknowledged.

“The D.A. in Baltimore decided not to prosecute,” Jake said to Carmellini, to fill the silence.

Carmellini grunted. He didn’t want to discuss that subject, which was ancient history. He had more important matters on his mind.

“Uh-oh,” the technician said. “We got something hot around here.”

Jake was fixated on the gauges.

“Getting hotter …. Real hot. Jesus Christ!”

Jake got off the stool and took two steps forward so that he could look out the window. The van was rolling along in front of the Convention Center.

“Fading now,” the technician said. His name was LeRoy. “We’re going away from it.”

“Around the building,” Jake said to the driver. “Circle the Convention Center.” The driver took the next left.

Jake went back to the gauges. After two trips around the building, LeRoy wiped the perspiration from his face with his shirttail. “It’s in there, swear to God.”

Jake hunkered down beside the driver as he circled the building one more time. He saw the containers by the loading dock, the gate in the fence that was ajar.

“Stop here,” he said. He went back through the van and got out. He examined the padlock on the gate. Someone had cut it with bolt cutters. The lock lay on the ground. He opened the gate enough to get through, walked over, and inspected the containers. Well, it could be, he decided.

He climbed up on the dock. All three containers were padlocked. He went back to the van and spoke to the driver. “I’ll open the gate. You back in. Have LeRoy wand the containers for radiation.”

This operation took three or four minutes. “This one on the end has had something radioactive in it, but it’s not hot. Whatever is setting this thing off is inside the building.”

“Tommy, you and the driver help LeRoy rig up the sensor cables. I’ll walk around to the vendors’ door — its open, I think — and get someone to unlock these doors. We’ll run the sensor cables right through these doors.”

“Okay.”

As he walked around the building, Jake Grafton used his cell phone to call Zelda, who was at the office. She answered on the third ring. “Grafton here. I’m downtown at the Convention Center, at the loading dock. We got a real hot reading on the Corrigan unit. Get onto the police traffic camera system. See if you can find some footage of a vehicle that might have been here in the last little while. It may still be around.”

“Want me to call the police or FBI?” Zelda asked.

“Not yet. I’m on my cell. See what you can come up with while we check things out here. Then call me.”

The guard eyed him coldly when he got inside. “May I help you?”

“Name’s Grafton.” Jake displayed his CIA ID. “We’re checking this area for radioactivity and got a hit on the meter. I want in through your loading dock.”

“I’ll have to call my supervisor,” she said. “He’s here tonight. I saw him just a little while ago.”

“Do that.”

She used her handheld radio. “Hoss, this is Mabel. Where are you?”

No answer. She tried again.

“We have a man setting up an exhibit back there,” she said to Jake. “My supervisor went to check on him a while ago.” Mabel Jones looked at her watch. “It’s been over a half hour,” she added pensively.

Now she was worried. “Radioactivity, you say?”

“That’s right. Let’s go see if we can find your supervisor. What’s his name?”

“Hoss Baker. I’ll go look. You stay right here.”

She walked away. Jake let her get ten feet in front of him, then he followed. She didn’t seem to notice. She walked quickly.

When they reached the area of the loading dock, she stopped, looked around. If she was surprised Jake was behind her, she didn’t show it. “I don’t see him,” she said. “Or Haddad, the exhibitor. Hoss came to check on him.”

“Did you know that someone cut the lock off the gate outside, in the loading area?”

“No,” she said, frowning. “Joe is our outside security man, and he hasn’t said anything about it.”

“Maybe it just happened. Was anyone out there?”

“Haddad, the exhibitor, parked out there, but I locked the gate behind him.”

“He’s gone now. Why don’t you look for your boss? Tell me if you find him. Open this door for me before you go.” He gestured at the overhead door nearest the place where he had left the van.

Mabel Jones was plainly worried. The man beside her had a commanding presence, as if he expected her to do as he asked. Yet she was still undecided, unsure of what to do as he punched numbers into his cell phone.

“Me again, Zelda. Call the FBI and the police bomb squad. The Convention Center. Tell them not to waste time. Get Gil Pascal at home and have him go to the office to help you.”

That call made up Mabel’s mind. She strode to the overhead door control panel and pushed the button to raise it. Then she went looking for Hoss Baker.

Once they got the cable sensors inside, the search didn’t take long. In five minutes Jake was looking at the padlock on the door to the concession storeroom.

Tommy Carmellini bent down, retrieved something from the floor, and held it out for Jake’s inspection. “Twenty-two casing.”

Jake examined the small brass shell. He sniffed it. He could still smell powder residue.

“I want a bolt cutter,” Jake said. “There should be one in the van. Hurry.”

Mabel Jones came back with two policemen as Jake was cutting the lock off the storeroom door. Carmellini showed the policemen the shell as Mabel announced, “I can’t find Mr. Baker, the security officer.”

Jake opened the door, used a flashlight to examine the storeroom. When he saw the warhead he said to LeRoy, “There it is, by God.”

He found the light switch beside the door and flipped it on. Batteries on a pallet, a timer, the warhead covered with wires … He was inspecting it when he heard Mabel exclaim, “Oh, my God, they killed Hoss!”

One of the policemen stood beside Jake, looking at the warhead. “It’s just like the one they found in Atlanta, isn’t it?”

“Yep,” Jake said, looking at the timer. Seventeen minutes left. Even as he watched, the seconds were ticking away. “Get on your radio. We need the bomb squad right fucking now.”

The cop made the transmission, talked to the dispatcher. While he was talking Jake turned to look at the body. The second policeman was searching for a pulse. “Is he dead?”

“Yeah.”

“Nothing we can do for him. Leave the body. You and your partner take Mabel and go to the exhibitors’ door. The FBI and bomb squad are on their way. If you can get them on the radio, have them come into the loading dock area. If they come to the exhibitors’ entrance, bring them here the instant they arrive. Go!”

They went. Tommy Carmellini and the technician bent over the timer, which was ticking away.

“Not much time, boss.”

“LeRoy, what’s going to happen if I cut the leads from the timer to that box”—he pointed—“with the bolt cutter?”

LeRoy looked. “That must be some kind of capacitor, I think. If you cut that wire, the damn thing should be disabled.”

“What if the capacitor already has a charge stored?”

“The fucking thing might go.”

“Cutting the wire between the capacitor and the junction to the detonator leads?”

“Maybe we ought to operate there.”

“Fourteen minutes, boss,” Tommy Carmellini said.

Jake picked up the bolt cutter, examined the wires.

His hands were slippery. “Help me with this, Tommy.” Jake placed the jaws of the bolt cutter around the wire, Carmellini provided the muscle. He had plenty of it. The jaws sliced the wire as if it were a garden hose. “Next one.” When both the wires were severed, Jake had Carmellini cut the wires from the timer while he watched, then had him sever the battery wires.

All three men moved the pallet that held the batteries away from the weapon, just in case.

The Corrigan technician used his shirttail on his face again. He muttered an oath.

Jake heard sirens. As he listened the sirens swelled in volume.

And he heard his cell phone ring. He took it from his pocket and opened it.

“Yes.”

“This is Zelda. We have a shot of the vehicle that was parked by the Convention Center loading dock, a pickup truck with a cab over the bed. I have the license number.”

“We found a bomb here. See if you can find where the truck went. And have someone run the plate. I want a name and address. The man who armed the bomb probably drove the truck.”

Jake and LeRoy were sitting on the loading dock with their legs dangling over the edge when the bomb squad truck rolled through the gate. Both men were smoking cigarettes. Although Jake hadn’t smoked in twenty years, he had gratefully accepted LeRoy’s offer of a cancer stick.

“In there,” Jake said to the bomb squad sergeant, and jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

Carmellini came out of the building and took a seat on the dock beside Jake. “This thing would have popped if we had gone over to the other side of the river to drive around the Pentagon.”

“Yeah.”

“Are there any more in Washington?”

That was the question. Jake sat thinking about it. He had precisely one Corrigan unit and it was here. Two of the four warheads had been seized.

He hauled out his cell phone and dialed Zelda again. “Well?”

“The pickup headed north. We saw it make the turn from New York Avenue onto the Baltimore-Washington Parkway headed north.”

“Okay.”

“The bad news for him is that there has been a wreck on the Beltway on-ramp from the parkway. Traffic is at a standstill.”

“Welcome to the city.”

“Pennsylvania plates on the pickup. It’s registered to a Hamid S. Mabruk.” She gave him the address in a suburb outside of Philadelphia.

“Call Harry Estep. Have the FBI get over to his house and seal it. Harry can get busy on a warrant. Murder One. This guy killed a guard here at the Convention Center. He’s armed and dangerous. Give them everything you have.”

He broke the connection and sat thinking. Either Mabruk had armed more than one weapon in Washington, or he was on his way to arm others now. Or both.

The safe way to play it was that both possibilities were true. Once Jake had made that decision, the best course of action became plain. He would leave Carmellini and LeRoy to search Washington for more weapons, and he would have Mabruk followed, not arrested, to see if he would go to another bomb.

Jake called Zelda back. Gil Pascal answered the telephone. “I was on my way in anyway. Couldn’t sleep.”

“I want Mabruk found and followed,” Jake told him. “Tell Harry. Give him my cell number. And I’ll need a chopper. Get on it, please.”

He turned to Carmellini and LeRoy. “Carmellini’s in charge. I want the city swept from end to end. LeRoy, you know about the hot spot on Hains Point. Call Gil Pascal immediately if you find anything. Call me at dawn if you don’t.”

“Aye aye, sir,” Tommy said. He wasn’t in the military, but that seemed to be the right answer.

“Go,” Jake Grafton said. “Now.”