Zero Option

22

Brig. Gen. Lee Carrothers rejoined his wife, Sue, out on their patio, where she was having coffee and reading the Washington Post. It was a glorious spring day along the Potomac, with the cherry blossoms and dogwoods competing with one another to set the woods ablaze in pink and white. Only the constant muted thunder of jets from National Airport marred the otherwise-pristine air along the river. He was decked out in shorts and a sweatshirt, having just mown their backyard.

“So what did Himself want?” she asked. “You don’t have to go in, do you?”

He sat down in a deck chair next to hers and took her hand. “You know that flap I’ve been dealing with all week? What I called the ‘Anniston problem’?”

“Yes?”

“Let me run something by you.” He then proceeded to tell her the story of the missing cylinder, ending with what the team had reported to the Security Working Group and what the group had concluded in its report to General Waddell. She was silent for a minute when he was finished.

“So,” she said finally, “they’re going to assume that thing was destroyed when the containers went into the— what’d you call it? The demil process?”

“Right.”

“And what if it didn’t? What if somebody heisted it?”

He nodded silently, looking out over the freshly mowed grass. They could hear the susurrations of Saturday morning traffic out on the G.W.

Parkway behind their backyard fence. His dear wife, Sue, was absolute hell on getting right to the heart of the matter, which was why he often consulted her, security or no security. Besides, she could keep her mouth shut.

“I asked that very question, early on, when we decided to send in a monitoring team to the DRMO at Fort Gillem, disguised as an exercise.

Got a ‘Who farted in church?’ reaction. Himself sort of made it clear that the right answer was going to be found there, at Fort Gillem, one way or the other. Either they’d find the containers, and the cylinder in one of them, or the containers would have been demiled, and we’d have to assume the missing cylinder was destroyed right along with them.”

“In other words, there were no other thinkable alternatives.”

“Right. Losing a cylinder of this stuff was simply ‘not possible.”

Himself was calling to reiterate that sentiment this morning.”

“Why? Did you object to the group’s findings?”

“Just to Fuller, that biological weapons guy from Die trick. I think maybe he had a word with Waddell. That maybe I needed my loyalty calibrated.”;

She put the paper down. “Biological weapons guy? I thought we were talking CW here.”

“Oh, we are. As if that’s not bad enough. Ambrose Fuller’s an old pal of Waddell and keeps him apprised of what’s going on out at USAMRIID. He used to work the BW program before 1968. He’s a veterinarian. They used [vets back then, and now, for all I know, to work the infectious disease vaccine programs there.”

“So why was Fuller pulled into this problem?” Carrothers had been thinking about that. Good question. “Because Waddell wanted him to chair the Security Working Group.”

“Lee?”

I “Yeah, right. Why a biological guy? Shit.”

I “What exactly was the good Herr General conveying this morning?” she asked. “That maybe your future as, crown prince of the Chemical Corps was dependent on manifestations of right attitudes? Like he wants to see Chairman Hillary’s little red book prominently displayed in your breast pocket?”

(Carrothers laughed out loud. Sue knew how things worked. “Nothing quite so subtle,” he said. “This is Myer Waddell we’re talking about. He said to go along with the report, and to keep any doubts I might have until such Jl time as I was head of the Chemical Corps, at which time ‘ j I would be free to open fire on either one or both of my I feet as I saw fit.”

“Uh-huh. And meanwhile?”

“Meanwhile? Well, hell, they might be right. The Working Group, that is.

It is logical that the missing cylinder was left in a container. It’s also logical that all the (containers went unopened into the demil process. Who the hell would go opening up a CW container?”

“Lee.”

“Lee’s not here. Lee’s away on TOY somewhere.”

“Lee!”: [“Hush, Sue.

I’m going to have to think about this one.”

Carson had come into his office, even though it was a Saturday morning.

The DRMO, of course, was empty, and his pickup was the only truck out in the lot. He had told his wife that he needed to catch up on some paperwork, but the real reason was that he needed time to think. His latest conversation with Tangent had been nip and tuck.

In retrospect, he had probably done things backward. First he had told Tangent that the Army had come and gone — satisfied, he was pretty sure, that the cylinder had been destroyed in the demil machine. Then he had told him that the DCIS guy, Stafford, had tumbled somehow to why the Army was there, evidently because of something Dillard had told him.

Tangent had been worried about this sudden Army “exercise,” but he’d gone positively hermantile over Stafford’s accusations.

“He knows? He described the item?”

“Pretty close, he did. But look, he has no evidence. Lambry is gone, and I’ll guarantee you Lambry did not know where the cylinder is hidden.

Only what it looked like when he brought it to me.”

“I don’t know, Carson. We may have to dump this thing. What if Lambry’s in hiding somewhere, just waiting to testify? What if they have his ass?”

“Who? The Army? The DCIS? Is that likely? Stafford wouldn’t be running his mouth in my office if they had anything at all. They’d be all over this place waving warrants, and my ass would be in the slammer. They have nothing. Stafford was just trying to spook me, that’s all.”

Tangent thought that one over. “So where the hell is Lambry?”

“Who the hell knows? I think he got scared when Stafford showed up. He’s a hillbilly from Alabama somewhere. We’re not talking math major here, okay? Probably got scared and hightailed it back into the piney woods.

Left the gas on in his house in southeast Atlanta and burned the thing down.”;-:

“I didn’t know that.”

“Well, he did. Day after he failed to show up for work.” It had, of course, been more than one day, but Tangent didn’t need to know that.

“The arson cops came around, but they didn’t think it was arson. No bodies or anything. No insurance policy. He just cleared out.

Unfortunately, he must have leaked something to Dillard, and Dillard was seen talking to Stafford.”

“That’s what I’m worried about. Where’s Stafford now?” “Don’t know. But you said you had some influence up there. You found out his political situation. Why don’t we act on that? The Army’s come and gone; they’re not going to want to hear any noise about any missing CW cylinder. If you can neutralize Stafford quickly, after all that trouble he got in up there in Washington, then we’ll be home free.”

“And how are we supposed to do that?”

“I’m thinking of complaining up my chain of command that Stafford is making wild-ass accusations. I’ll start it with a side bar to the local DCIS office in Atlanta. Make it sound like Stafford’s lost it — you know, become some kind of nutcase. You say you can make things happen up there. You get DCIS headquarters to pull him back to D.C. Get Stafford out of the picture. The Army’s already out of the picture. Like I said, we’re home free. Better yet, we’ll be dealing with an object that isn’t missing.”

“That’s probably going to be harder than it sounds,” Tangent said. “My people have no direct leverage on the DCIS.”

“Well, get some, goddamn it,” Carson said. “Stafford’s the only thing between us and some serious money, right? You said he was on a shit list up there. Pull the string with the people he burned. Didn’t you say he took down a Bureau guy?”

“Yeah, that’s right. The Bureau. There is an angle we can work with the Bureau.”

“Well, all right, then. I guess you have to wait until Monday.”

“No, I don’t. But you let us worry about that. From what I’ve heard about this guy, all it’s going to take is a few words that he’s running wild again, and somebody’ll step on his neck.”

“But it’s Saturday: Nobody—”

“Every department in government law enforcement has a duty officer, Carson. Which is even better: When the duty officer calls, the bosses react first, and then pulse their staffs on Monday.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Nothing. Sit tight. Don’t call DLA. You’re right. This is the way to go. We’ll have this Stafford prick off the boards by Monday.”

“Okay, but then what? Should we sit on things for a week, let the dust settle?”

“I don’t think so. Stafford can be neutralized, but short of somebody shooting him, he can’t be silenced. No, if anything, I think we have to move up the transfer. Our clients are anxious, and we don’t want them to get wind of any shit brewing in DCIS circles. I want you to call me at six p.m. tomorrow, that’s Sunday.” He gave Carson another 800 number and hung up.

Carson thought about all that. So now it was hurry up and wait, while the Washington ballerinas did the monster mash on Stafford. Short of shooting him, Tangent had said. Well, if he gets between me and my money, I may have a go at that option.

He decided to go over to the demil building and make damned sure that no one had messed around with the roller casing. But first he would take a little stroll, make sure that bastard Stafford wasn’t skulking around the warehouses somewhere. He patted his windbreaker pocket as he left his office. His snub-nosed Colt felt reassuringly solid.