Six Seconds

34

Washington, D.C.

Twenty minutes later Graham sat alone in a corner of The Stargazers Club, a sleepy bar two blocks from his hotel.

Morrow had given him directions to it for their clan destine meeting.

He got there just ahead of the rain and wondered if the shower would delay her. While waiting, he checked his hotel for any messages. He had one from Tarver’s father confirming the time he would meet Graham the next morning.

Good.

A moment later, Morrow arrived in a navy trench coat with her collapsed umbrella dripping. She placed her shoulder bag on the bench seat and caught her breath as she pushed aside her hair and dabbed her damp face with a tissue.

They ordered coffee.

Morrow waited for the server to leave then said, “This is crazy. I don’t do this sort of thing.”

“I understand. It’s all right.”

“This has gnawed at me since it happened. It got worse after I’d talked to you.”

“I sensed you had more on your mind. This is about Ray’s last story, about some kind of weapon?”

“Yes, there’s more, but you have to swear that what I’m going to tell you doesn’t come from me. You have to give me your word no one knows it came from me.”

“We protect our sources just like you guys do.”

“I’ve never told anyone this. No one at the news bureau, not even my husband.”

“May I take notes?”

Morrow hesitated then nodded.

“Ray wasn’t like the other reporters who are spoonfed their stories by people with a political agenda. He dug and he had many sources.”

She stopped when their coffee came and resumed when the server left.

“This may mean absolutely nothing, but Ray told me he had a source who was a former CIA counterintelli gence officer who became a contractor and trusted Ray because they’d cooked up a deal to do a book together on the guy’s life story.

“This guy worked at arm’s length for the CIA, FBI, DIA. Everybody. He was plugged in to foreign intelli gence networks and contractors from Britain, Germany, France, Israel, India, Africa, everywhere.

“He used the name of Cliff Grady. Ray said it wasn’t his real name. Anyway, Grady was supposedly a spe cialist at extracting information from captured hostile operatives. One night he called Ray to tell him that he’d just returned from Africa.”

“What was he doing there?”

“He’d been dispatched to Nigeria to help interview a terror suspect who, it was believed, had information on a large-scale attack being planned on a major target. Ray said the suspect was from Ethiopia and was being held in a secret prison on the outskirts of Abuja, the Nigerian capital. Grady wanted to tell Ray about it right away, before he reported to his clients so as ‘to protect the integrity of the true information,’ as Ray put it.”

“Which is?”

“I don’t think we’ll ever know. Grady told Ray that the suspect was very determined not to reveal any in formation and that local security, in trying to impress him, went too far. They tortured him and he died in custody.

“Ray had no other details. Grady told him the thinking was that the target was London, Washington, Berlin or Rome.”

“Which means they really don’t know?”

“I guess.”

“So how did Ray come by this information specifi cally?”

“Ray got it from Cliff after meeting him late in a bar near Langley.”

“Where the CIA has its headquarters.”

“That’s right.”

“Then what?”

“Ray said Cliff never made his report to any U.S. in telligence agency.”

“How did Ray know that?”

“Because Cliff was killed that night driving from the bar.”

“What?”

226 Rick Mofina

“I know, this is how a lot of Ray’s stories go. He comes up with something earth-shattering that’s im possible to confirm. I checked every way I could for any report of a fatal car wreck, even called police. There is absolutely no record of a fatal crash in the area in the time that Ray insists it happened.”

“So it’s like it never happened?”

“That’s right.”

“And Cliff Grady never existed?”

“You’ve got it.”

Graham peered into his coffee, unsure of what to make of this.

“It sounds like some kind of spy novel,” he said. “I know.”

“Hold on. Does the name Blue Rose Creek figure into this or mean anything?”

“No.” Morrow reached for her bag. “But you can search Ray’s files.”

“You have his files on this?”

“I made you copies of all the stuff he passed to me.

He was working on a Pentagon source trying to obtain the names of every civilian driver involved in the secret convoy attacked in Iraq so he could interview them.

That’s where I was helping him by running expensive data searches.”

Morrow passed a tattered legal-size file folder to

Graham.

“Corporal Graham. I know this is all crazy. Ray was an eccentric. A lot of the stories he chased were over the top and I know he’d stretched the truth before they forced him out. Tragically, that’s all true.

“For that reason, I didn’t take this to anyone in our newsroom, or, for that matter, anyone inside the Beltway. They’d laugh it off because it was Ray. And I didn’t want people knowing that I’d been helping him with bureau resources. Because of my personal situa tion, I just can’t afford to get caught up in Ray’s world, you know?”

“I understand.”

“I know it’s all nuts and it may not mean much. But Ray was my friend and I figured I owed his memory something, that I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t pass it to somebody. I believe Ray would want that. I hope you understand.”

“I do.”

“Thank you. And good luck.”

After Morrow left, Graham ordered another coffee and flipped through Ray Tarver’s file.

He stopped when he saw one handwritten note.

Blue Rose Creek-possibly in California-keep checking.