Op-Center

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Bob Herbert stewed as he rolled his wheelchair into his office. His mouth was locked in a frown, his teeth clenched, his thin eyebrows pinched in the center. He was angry in part because Stoll had been tactless enough to say what he did, but also because, in his heart, Herbert knew that he was right. They were no different, the glitch in software Matt wrote and the breakdown in security he'd helped to organize— they were all part of the same SNAFU scheme of things. You couldn't avoid it, however hard you tried.

Liz Gordon was right too. Rodgers had once quoted Benjamin Franklin, the gist of which was that we must all hang together or we'll all hang separately. Op-Center had to run that way, and it was difficult. Unlike the military or NASA or any organization where the people were of a vaguely similar background or orientation, Op-Center was a potpourri of talent, education, experience— and idiosyncrasies. It was wrong and, worse, counterproductive to expect Stoll to act like anyone but Matthew Stoll.

You're going to give yourself a stroke- Herbert slid behind his desk and locked the wheels. Without lifting up the receiver, he punched in the name of the U.S. military base in Seoul. The main number and direct lines came up on a rectangular screen below the keypad. Herbert scrolled through them with the* button, stopped at General Norbom's office, lifted the receiver, and punched # to enter it. He tried to think of what he could say to Gregory Donald, since he had lost his own wife Yvonne, a fellow CIA agent, in the Beirut blast. But words were not his forte. Only intelligence… and bitterness.

Herbert wished he could relax, just a little, but it wasn't possible. It had been nearly a decade and a half since the blast. The sense of all he'd lost haunted him, every day, though he had gotten used to the wheelchair and to being a single father to a sixteen-year-old girl. What didn't diminish with time, what was as wrenchingly vivid today as it was in 1983, was the sheer chance of it all. If Yvonne hadn't popped in to tell him a joke she'd heard on a Tonight Show tape, she would be alive today. If he hadn't gotten her that Neil Diamond tape, and Diamond hadn't been on that night, and she had never asked her sister to record it- It was enough to make his heart sink and his head spin each time he thought about it. Liz Gordon had told him it was best not to, of course, but that didn't help. He kept going back to that moment when he stood in the music store, asking for anything by the singer who did the song about the heart-light

General Norbom's orderly answered the phone and informed Herbert that Donald had accompanied his wife's body to the Embassy to see to her return to the U.S. Herbert brought up Libby Hall's number and entered it.

God, how she loved that dopey song. As many times as he'd tried to interest his wife in Hank Williams and Roger Miller and Johnny Horton, she kept going back to Neil Diamond and Barry Manilow and Engelbert.

Hall's secretary answered and put Herbert through to Donald.

"Bob," he said, "it's good to hear from you."

Donald's voice sounded stronger than he'd expected. "How are you, Greg?"

"Like Job."

"I've been there, friend. I know what you're going through."

"Thanks. Do you know anything more about what happened? They're working hard at KCIA but coming up short."

"We've, uh, got a bit of a situation here ourselves, Greg. Seems our computers have been violated. We can't be sure of the data we're getting, including the pictures from our satellites."

"It sounds like someone did their homework for today."

"They did indeed. Now we know what your situation is, and with God himself holdin' the Bible I swear I'll understand if you say no. But the chief wants to know if you'd consider going to the DMZ and eyeballing the situation up there firsthand. The President's put him in charge of the Korea Task Force, and he needs reliable people on the scene."

There was a brief silence, after which Donald replied, "Bob, if you'll arrange the necessary clearances through General Schneider, I'll be available to go north in about two hours. Will that be acceptable?"

"I'm sure it will," said Herbert, "and I'll see to the clearances and a chopper. Good luck, Greg, and God bless."

"And God bless you," said Donald.