The Minotaur

21

Jake Grafton was amazed when he saw Amy at the passenger terminal at Andrews Air Force Base. In the three weeks he had been gone the child had visibly grown. “Hi, Jake,” she warbled, and ran to throw her arms around him. “Miss me?” he asked.

“Not as much as Callie did,” was the sophisticated reply. As he and Callie waited for the luggage to be off-loaded from the airplane, Callie visited with the other officers who had ridden the DC-9 from Toaopah. Jake made a fuss over Amy and teased her a little, causing her cheeks to redden. But she stayed right there beside him, saying hello to everyone and smiling broadly when spoken to.

“So how’d it go?” Callie asked him as they walked to the car- Jake shrugged. Everything was classified. “Okay, I guess. And you?’

“I stopped going to Dr. Arnold. Last Friday was my last ap- pointment.”

Jake set his luggage on the pavement and gave her a tight squeeze as Amy skipped on ahead, her black hair bobbing with every bound. Callie looked happier than Jake had seen her in a long, long time.

The next morning, a Tuesday, he spent closeted with Admiral Dunedin going over the test results. They watched videotapes and looked at numbers, and began writing down tentative conclusions.

“So how did Moravia do?” the admiral asked at one point

“Fine. Good stick, keeps her wits about her, knows more aero- nautical engineering than I even knew existed.”

“So you want to keep her for the TRX bird?”

“No reason not to.”

The admiral told him about the conversation Senator Duquesne had had with George Ludlow. ‘The secretary didn’t tell me to fire her, or keep her, or anything else,” Dunedin concluded. “He just relayed the conversation.”

“Let me see if I understand this. Admiral. Duquesne’s commit- tee deleted the appropriation for reactors for the new carrier from this year’s budget. Is he implying that if we get another test pilot he’ll put it back in?”

“No. I think the message is that unless the navy buys the Con- solidated plane, he’s not going to be — he’ll be less enthusiastic about navy budget requests.”

“Sir, I don’t think Consolidated’s plane can be modified enough to meet the mission requirements for a new attack plane. And you have to factor Athena into the equation. With Athena we won’t need to buy all that expensive stealth stuff on every airplane.”

“Fly the TRX plane. Then we’ll see.”

“Do you want me to get another test pilot?”

“I just wanted you to understand what’s going on. The tempera- ture is rising. Ludlow and all the politicos in SECDEFs office are playing politics right along with everyone else in this town. The admirals and generals are parading over to the hill for hearings. It’s that merry time of year.”

“I think we have to keep Moravia. After she’s flown both planes she can make point-by-point comparisons that can’t be questioned for extraneous reasons. Consolidated will beat us to death with Rita’s corpse if we use another test pilot to fly the TRX plane, and then recommend it instead of theirs. They’ll claim they got shafted by an incompetent, inexperienced pilot. You and I will look like blundering idiots, or worse.”

“I agree,” the admiral said.

One morning several days later Dreyfus stuck his head in Luis Camacho’s office door. “X mailed the Russians an- other letter.”

Dreyfus handed Camacho a copy and sank into a chair while his boss perused it. Addressed to the Soviet ambassador, the letter was a commentary on Gorbachev’s recent visit to Cuba. The last para- graph contained some advice on how the Soviets should handle Castro.

“On generic copy paper, as usual. Just like all the others.”

“Has the original been through the lab yet?”

“Nope. I just took it down.”

“Go get it. I want to see it”

“What for? That’s an accurate copy.”

“Please. Now.”

With a shake of his head, Dreyfus complied.

Camacho opened his desk drawer and pulled out a pair of rubber gloves, which he worked onto his hands without the benefit of baby powder. Then he extracted a jar from the lower left drawer. He opened it and used a letter opener to smear a little of the blue jelly on his desk. Oops, too much. He used a piece of paper from a legal pad to blot the mess, then stared at the stain on the back of the paper. After firmly closing the jar, he stowed it back in his desk.

When Dreyfus returned with the letter, Camacho was at the window idly watching the pedestrians on E Street. He gingerly opened the plastic bag and extracted the letter while Dreyfus watched openmouthed. He laid the fully opened letter on the desk and pressed. Then he turned it over and examined the blue smear on the back. Satisfactory. Not too much, yet enough for the lab to get a sample. He refolded the letter and replaced it m the see- through plastic bag.

‘Take it back to the lab.”

“Did I see that?”

”No. You are as ignorant as you look.”

“You’re the boss.”

“Indeed. And while you’re at it, see if this word is encoded in the text” Camacho seized a piece of scratch paper and carefully printed a word. “Kilderkin.” He passed the paper to Dreyfus.

“Anything else?” Dreyfus asked hopefully.

“Like what?”

“Oh, I dunno. I’ve got the feeling that neat and wonderful wheels are turning like crazy, though I haven’t the foggiest idea why. Or where the wheels will take us.”

“Wbat do you want? A Tuesday-morning miracle?”

“It doesn’t have to be a miracle. A tiny little sleight of hand would be welcome. Or a very brief explanation.”

Camacho shot his cuffs. “See. Nothing up my sleeves. No hat, so no rabbit”

Dreyfus stood and ambled toward the door. “Kilderkin, huh? You know, I get the impression that—“

“Never trust your impressions. Wait for evidence.”

“So what do we do with the original letter when the lab’s through with it?” The agent fluttered the plastic bag gently.

“The usual. Stick it back in the envelope and let the post office deliver it. I’m sure the ambassador will convey the writer’s advice to the members of the Politburo at his earliest opportunity. This may be the great watershed in U-S.-Soviet re—” He stopped be- cause Dreyfus was already out the door and had closed it behind liiqi-

At ten o’clock Dreyfus was back. He waited patiently until Ca- macho was off the phone, then said, “Okay, how’d you know?”

The Minotaur

“Know what?”

‘That that antique word from merry ol’ England would crack it?”

“Kilderkin?”

“Yeah.”

“Elementary, my dear Watson. A kilderkin is a barrel or cask. It contains something, as that letter did.”

“Shit”

Camacho extended his hand. Dreyfus passed him a small piece of white paper containing the three words from the message and waited white he examined it. The second word was “kilderkin.”

“That’s all,” Camacho said, looking up as he folded the small page and stuck it into his shirt pocket. “Thanks.”

“Always a pleasure, Holmes.”

When he was again alone, Camacho dialed a telephone number from memory and identified himself to the woman who answered. In a moment the person he wanted was on the line and he said, “Let’s have lunch.”

“Can’t today. Pretty busy.”

“Appointments?”

“Yep.”

“Cancel them.”

“Where and when?”

“On the mall, in front of the Air and Space Museum. Twelve or so.”

The line went dead in Camacho’s ear. He cradled the instru- ment. He leaned back in his chair and looked out his little window at the buildings on the other side of E Street. He pursed his lips and breathing deeply in and out, gently massaged his head with one hand.

An hour later he was out on the sidewalk in his shirt sleeves, striding along. He had left his pistol locked in his desk drawer, his jacket and tie over the back of his chair. He was violating FBI policy but so be it. The summer heat was palpable, a living, breath- ing monster no doubt goaded by the sheer numbers of humans who were defying it this midday. Where did all these people come from? The streets were packed with cars, taxis,’snorting buses and trucks, the sidewalks covered with swarming humanity.

Overhead the summer haze made the sky appear a gauzy, indis- tinct white, but it failed to soften the sun’s fierce glare. Camacho’s shirt wilted swiftly and glued itself to the small of his back. He could fed the perspiration soaking into his socks. Little beads of sweat congealed around the hairs on the back of his hands, and he automatically wiped the palms on his trousers as he walked.

Every shady circle under the mall trees was home to office work- ers and tourists who could no longer stay on their feet. Children sprawled and played on the hard-packed dirt. The grass that had grown under the trees so profusely this spring had succumbed weeks ago under the impact of infinite feet. An endless stream of joggers and serious runners pounded up and down the gravel paths of the mall, little dust spurts rising from the thud of each foot The combined effect was a thin brown curtain of dust that rose into the air and tilted away toward the monolithic art museums that lined the northern side of the open expanse.

The street in front of the Air and Space Museum was bumper to bumper with tour buses. As he came closer, Luis Camacho threaded his way through the hordes of teenagers and middle-aged pink people in shorts and cutesy T-shirts.

The great American sightseeing excursion was in full swing. Herds of Japanese tourists clad in the requisite button-down short- sleeved shirts clustered near some of the buses and busily snapped their cameras at each other, the huge windowless museums to the north, the distant Washington Monument and the dome of the Capitol rising in the east like a corpulent moon. In spite of the oppressive heat, the mood was cheerful, gay.

Camacho found a spot in the shade near a tree and sat down gratefully. Cigarette butts and candy-bar wrappers littered the ground. He didn’t care. To his left a souvenir stand was doing a land-office business in film, soft drinks and ice-cream bars. Squall- ing youngsters and frisky youths queued like soldiers in the sun as they waited for their turn to surrender their money to the happy merchant.

Derelicts shuffled slowly through the human forest. They were blithely ignored as they mined the trash bins for pop cans. A cou- ple of alkies snoozed further away from the street in the shade cast by the treetops, out where the grass still survived: their day had apparently ended some hours ago when the critical intoxication level had been reached and surpassed.

He had been there no more than five minutes when he spotted the man he had come to meet feeling his way through the crowd, looking about him. Camacho stood and walked toward him.

“Morning, Admiral.”

“Let’s get the hell out of this crowd,” Tyler Henry growled.

“Next time pick a quieter spot.” Henry was clad in beige slacks and a yellow pullover with a little fox on the right breast. His eyes were hidden behind the naval aviator’s de rigueur sunglasses.

“Aye aye, sir.”

The two men walked east, toward the duck pond at the base of Capitol Hill. When they were out of earshot of the tourists and drunks. Henry said, “Okay. I haven’t got much time today. What d’ya want?”

“We intercepted another letter from X this morning. Thought you’d be interested. Here’s the coded message it con- tained.” The FBI agent passed him the little square of words with the three words penciled on it.

Admiral Henry stopped dead and stared at the words on the paper. “Kilderkin. Holy rock! The damned Minotaur is giving away Athena!”

“Yes.”

“Awww, goddamn! Awww…”

Camacho gingerly removed the paper from the admiral’s fingers, refolded it and put it in his pocket.

“And I suppose you assholes with badges just stuffed the fucking letter back in the envelope and gave it to the postman?” When he saw Camacho’s silent nod, Henry scuffed angrily at the dirt. He indulged himself in some heavy cussing.

“Do you know what Athena is? Do you silly half-wit peepers have any idea what the hell Athena is all about?”

“Will, you said—“

“I know what I told you! I’m asking if any of your superiors have even the slightest glimmer how valuable Athena is.”

“I don’t know.”

The admiral gestured hugely in exasperation. “Just what in the name of God is going on, Luis?”

They had reached the edge of the duck pond. Camacho stood with folded arms and gazed across the placid surface, past the statue of U.S. Grant on horseback, at the imposing edifice of the Capitol building. “I can only guess,” he said softly.

“But do they have any idea what Athena is — just what the hell they are giving away?”

“I don’t know what they know.”

“This isn’t fiber optics, or ring laser gyros, or any of that other magic shit they’ve been letting cart out of the vault Athena is the Hope Diamond, the mother lode, the most precious, priceless treasure in the vault. Do those stupid, ignorant incompe- tent half-wit political pimps have even the faintest glimmer what it is Just laid his filthy hands OB?

“I don’t know!”

“Athena will make radar obsolete. Inevitably it will become cheaper and well be able to miniaturize if get it so small and cheap we can use it to hide tanks and jeeps, not just ships and airplanes. We can hide satellites with it. In ten years or so we can probably hide submarines with it. Athena will revolutionize strat- egy, tactics, weaponry. And we’ve got it! The Russians don’ti Yetl If we can keep them from getting it for just a couple years — just a couple years — I tell you, Luis, Athena will give America such a huge technological edge that war will become a political and mili- tary impossibility. War will be impossible!”

“I believe you.”

“Then why? Tell me that! Why?”

Camacho shrugged.

“What could be so goddamn valuable that they would bet the ranch, the nation, the future of mankind?”

“I don’t know for sure, and I couldn’t tell you if I did.”

The admiral exploded. Thirty-some years in the navy had really taught him how to swear. Camacho didn’t think he had ever heard such a virtuoso performance,

Finally Henry stopped spluttering. Bitterness had replaced his exasperation. “I think there’s some treason going on over in your shop, Camacho. That’s all it could be.”

“Better go easy with that word.”

“Treason.” Henry spit it out “Don’t like it, huh? By God, if Congress gets hold of this, that may be the kindest word those slimy spook bastards ever hear. People will go to prison over this. You wait and see.”

Camacho lost his temper. “I showed you that piece of paper so you could take some reasonable steps to protect Athena, you swab- bie,” he snarled. “Like change the code or empty the file. Not so you could shoot your mouth off about things you know nothing about, things that will ruin you and me. Now I’ve heard all the crap from you that I’m gonna listen to. I’ve heard enough. One more crack out of line and I’ll come get you with a national secu- rity warrant and you can sit in a padded cell at St. Elizabeth’s until I think it’s safe to let you out. That may be when you’re a corpse. Is that what you want?”

“No,” said Tyler Henry contritely, aware that he had gone too far.

“Just one word. Admiral, just one little slip by you, and I’ll come after you with that goddamn warrant. You’d better believe I will. You and John Hinckley can spend your declining years together.”

Camacho wheeled and walked away, leaving Henry standing there staring at his retreating back.