The Zebra Network

Chapter 21

The limousine of Howard Van Skike, director of central intelligence, was admitted without ceremony at the west gate past the executive offices onto the grounds of the White House. His car drew up beneath the overhang and a uniformed guard came down and opened the door for him. He got out and sniffed the air; tall, imperious in his immaculately tailored suit and top coat. He was a presence on the American political scene, and even more of a presence in the intelligence community.

This noon hour he was preoccupied, even angry. He strode up the steps and into the west wing, taking the elevator to the President’s second-floor office, a thin alligator briefcase under his left arm.

Up to this moment he had remained relatively aloof from the business of David McAllister. He had known the man’s father, and in fact had modeled much of his intelligence career after the grandfather, Stewart Alvin, who by the time Van Skike had known him was already one of the holy cows of Whitehall who’d been to Moscow in the early days and who knew the Soviet mentality inside and out.

“Speak softly and carry a big stick,” the elder McAllister maintained was the only decent quote ever to have come out of the Americas. But good Lord he had known the business inside and out. They were still writing books about him.

McAllister’s father had been a power in the OSS and the early days of the CIA as well, and the son, by all accounts had been the natural extension, continuing the long family tradition that had stretched back to the First World War. Now, as hard as it was to believe, the tradition had fallen apart somehow, giving Van Skike pause to consider in the deepest recesses of his mind just what sort of a star he had hitched his wagon to. Van Skike entered the President’s study, the door closing softly behind him, and crossed the room to the massive desk. John Sanderson, director of the FBI, had been speaking with the President. They both looked up.

“You’ve heard?” the President asked, his voice as always, no matter the circumstances, soft. Some years ago he had been DCI, so he well understood what Van Skike was faced with at this moment.

“Yes, Mr. President, I have, though I’ve not yet seen any of the details.”

“Well look at these,” Sanderson said, stepping away from the President’s desk, and indicating a half a dozen photographs spread out there.

Van Skike laid his briefcase on a chair and bent over the black and white photos.

“Two of my people were killed in the driveway,” Sanderson said. “They used twenty-two-caliber silenced automatics. Highly accurate. One at point-blank range, the other at ten to fifteen feet; whoever was doing the shooting knew what they were doing.”

The first photographs showed the FBI agents lying in the driveway, blood staining the snow.

“They got Paul Innes’s wife on the stairs, Reisberg at the study door, Paul at the telephone… he was talking to our desk-duty operator… Quarmby at the end of the table in the breakfast room… and Highnote outside in the backyard.” The other photographs showed a woman in a print dress sprawled on a stairway, Reisberg’s body crumpled in a doorway, and Innes half sitting up against a glass buffet.

“Quarmby is in critical condition,” Sanderson was saying. “And Bob Highnote is in serious condition, but he’ll probably make it. The bullet hit half an inch from his spinal column.”

“The others?” Van Skike asked, looking up. “Dead,” Sanderson replied. He pulled out his pipe and tobacco, and turned away. “He was your boy, Van.”

Van Skike looked to the President. “Was it McAllister?” he asked. “Has that been established?”

The President nodded. “The Albright woman was with him. His car was spotted leaving Paul Innes’s place. From what I understand, the tire prints match.”

Sanderson turned back. “We interviewed McAllister’s neighbors. He and the Albright woman were spotted at the house. Around seven they definitely saw his Peugeot leaving his garage. They saw him and a small dark-haired woman leaving together.”

“Why?” Van Skike asked. “Bob Highnote was his friend. And how could he have known that Paul had called such a meeting?”

Sanderson and the President exchanged glances, which secretly infuriated Van Skike.

“There’s more,” Sanderson said. “McAllister and Albright were at the house. We’re definite about that. But someone else was there too.

Someone came to visit them early this morning.”

“Who?”

“We don’t know yet,” Sanderson said. “A man, well dressed. Came on foot, let himself in as if he belonged there.”

“Yes, and what does this prove?”

“I think you’d better listen to this, Van,” the President said. Sanderson came back to the desk and switched on a tape recorder.

…is offering McAllister amnesty, and I think it’s up to us in this room to figure out how to get to him as soon as possible with the message and without anymore casualties.”

“That’s Paul Innes’s voice,” Sanderson said. “He recorded the meeting.”

“Because he knows something?” another man asked. Van Skike recognized the voice as Highnote’s. “Because he evidently learned something in Moscow that has the Russians concerned… and possibly someone else… so concerned that they are willing to risk exposure in order to make sure he doesn’t talk?”

“Yes.”

“Which is?”

“We believe that there is more than a fair possibility that a Soviet penetration agent is working within the CIA at fairly high levels…

Sanderson switched off the tape recorder. “You will be provided with a copy of this tape, of course.”

“It sounds as if they thought McAllister was innocent. That the KGB was after him,” Van Skike said.

Sanderson advanced the recording.

“Then why did they release him in the first place?” Highnote asked. “An error, we suspect,” Paul Innes said. Sanderson switched off the tape recorder. “Not an error,” he said. “McAllister is trying to protect whomever he is working for, whoever showed up at his house this morning with the orders to kill Innes and the others.”

Again Sanderson advanced the tape recording.

“…a matter of procedure now, but you must understand the importance,” Innes said.

A moment later two soft noises came from the speaker, almost as if someone had closed a book, softly, and then closed it again. The hair prickled at the nape of Van Skike’s neck. He recognized the sounds as silenced pistol shots. The murders had been taped. He was listening to them now.

There was a sudden cacophony of noises. Innes was shouting something, wildly; more silenced shots were fired; there were crashing sounds, the sounds of breaking glass and then a man whispering as if from a very great distance, said: “Get him.” Sanderson shut off the tape recorder. “McAllister and Albright,” he said. “Are you certain, John?” Van Skike asked again. “Absolutely certain?”

“Yes,” the President interjected. “I’m convinced. David McAllister and Stephanie Albright have stepped over the edge. No matter what happens or does not happen, they must be stopped. Immediately. At all costs.”

“Am I understanding you correctly, Mr. President?…” Van Skike started.

“No screwing around now,” Sanderson said. “I’ve given my people explicit orders. McAllister and Albright are to be shot on sight. They can never be allowed to go to trial.”

Van Skike looked aghast at the President who looked away. He understood the logic of it, the necessity. But God in heaven, weren’t we a nation of laws; presumed innocent until proven guilty? “Gentlemen,” the President said, “they must be stopped.”