Текст книги "Deep Six"

Автор книги: Clive Cussler

Соавторы: Clive Cussler
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“A fact which is heightened by his vague denial of the Eaglemurders,” added Brogan.

“Why did he conceive such a crazy nightmare?” Oates asked dazedly.

“It really doesn’t matter why he came up with it,” said Emmett. “The programs probably were not even his idea. What matters is how his behavior is guided. Who is motivating his thought patterns, and from where?”

“Can we find out?”

“Yes,” said Emmett. “That’s why we wanted to catch you before you cut bait.”

“What can I do?”

“Stay,” Brogan replied. “The President is not fit for office. With Margolin, Moran and Larimer still missing, you remain the next man in line.”

“The President must be held in check until we can finish our investigation,” said Emmett. “With you at the helm, we keep a measure of control in the event he must be removed from office.”

Oates straightened and took a deep breath. “Lord, this is beginning to sound like a conspiracy to assassinate the President.”

“In the end,” Brogan said grimly, “it may well come to that.”

52

Lugovoy turned from his notes and stared at his staff neurologist, who sat at the console monitoring the telemetric signals.

“Condition?”

“Subject has entered a relaxed state. Brain rhythms indicate normal sleep patterns.” The neurologist looked up and smiled. “He doesn’t know it, but he’s snoring.”

“I imagine his wife knows it.”

“My guess is she sleeps in another bedroom. They haven’t had sex since he returned.”

“Body functions?”

“All reading normal.”

Lugovoy yawned and read the time. “Twelve minutes after one A.M.”

“You should get some sleep, Doctor. The President’s internal clock wakes him between six and six-fifteen every morning.”

“This is not an easy project,” Lugovoy groused. “The President requires two hours’ less sleep than I do. I detest early risers.” He paused and scanned the polysomnography screen that monitored the President’s physiological parameters accompanying his sleep. “It appears he’s dreaming.”

“Be interesting to see what the President of the United States dreams about.”

“We’ll get a rough idea as soon as his brain cell activity goes from coordinated thought patterns to disjointed abstractions.”

“Are you into dream interpretations, Doctor?”

“I leave that to the Freudians,” Lugovoy replied. “I am one of the few who believe dreams are meaningless. It’s merely a situation where the brain, freed from the discipline of daytime thinking, goes on holiday. Like a city dog who lives in an apartment and is unleashed in the country, running in no particular direction, enjoying the new and different smells.”

“There are many who would disagree.”

“Dreams are not my specialty, so I cannot argue from a purely scientific base. However, I put it to you that if they dohave a message, why are most of the senses usually missing?”

“You’re referring to the absence of smell and taste?”

Lugovoy nodded. “Sounds are also seldom recorded. The same with touch and pain. Dreams are primarily visual sensations. So my own opinion, backed up by little personal research, is that a dream about a one-eyed goat who spits fire is simply that: a dream about a one-eyed goat who spits fire.”

“Dream theory is the cornerstone of all psychoanalytic behavior. With your esteemed reputation, you’d shatter quite a few established icons with your goat opinion. Think how many of our psychiatrist comrades would be out of a job if it became known that dreams are meaningless.”

“Uncontrolled dreams are quickly forgotten,” Lugovoy continued. “But the demands and instructions we transmit to the President’s brain cells while he is asleep will not be received as dreams. They are injected thoughts that can be recalled and acted upon by outside stimuli.”

“When should I begin programming his implant unit?”

“Transmit the instructions shortly before he wakes up, and repeat them when he sits down at his desk.” Lugovoy yawned again. “I’m going to bed. Ring my room if there is a sudden change.”

The neurologist nodded. “Rest well.”

Lugovoy stared briefly at the monitoring system before he left the room. “I wonder what his mind is envisioning?”

The neurologist waved casually at the data printer. “It should be there.”

“No matter,” said Lugovoy. “It can wait till morning.” Then he turned and walked to his room.

His curiosity needled, the neurologist picked up the top printout sheet containing the President’s interpreted brainwaves and glanced at the wording.

“Green hills of summer,”he muttered to himself as he read. “A city between two rivers with many Byzantine-style churches topped by hundreds of cupolas. One called St. Sophia. A river barge filled with sugar beets. The Catacombs of St. Anthony.If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was dreaming about the city of Kiev.”

He stood beside a pathway on a hill overlooking a wide river, gazing at the ship traffic and holding an artist’s brush. On the tree-covered slope below him he could see a large stone pedestal beneath a figure draped in robes and holding a tall cross as though it were a staff. An easel with a canvas stood slightly off to his right. The painting was nearly finished. The landscape before his eyes was perfectly mirrored in the exacting brush strokes, down to the stippled leaves in the trees. The only difference, if one looked close enough, was the stone monument.

Instead of a long flowing beard of some forgotten saint, the head was an exact likeness of Soviet President Georgi Antonov.

Suddenly the scene changed. Now he found himself being dragged out of a small cottage by four men. The cottage walls were carved with Gothic designs and it was painted a garish blue. The faces of his abductors were indistinct, yet he could smell their unwashed sweat. They were pulling him toward a car. He experienced no fear but rather blind rage and lashed out with his feet. His assailants began beating him, but the pain felt distant as though the agony belonged to someone else.

In the doorway of the cottage he could see the figure of a young woman. Her blond hair was raised in a knot atop her head and she wore a full blouse and a peasant skirt. Her arms were upraised and she seemed to be pleading, but he could not make out the words.

Then he was thrown on the rear floor of the car and the door slammed shut.

53

The purser looked at the two tourists weaving up the boarding ramp in frank amusement. They were an outlandish pair. The female was dressed in a loose-fitting, ankle-length sundress, and to the Russian purser’s creative eye, she could have passed for a rain-bowed sack of Ukrainian potatoes. He couldn’t quite make out her face because it was partially obscured by a wide-brimmed straw hat, tied around the chin by a silk scarf, but he imagined if it was revealed it would break his watch crystal.

The man who appeared to be her husband was drunk. He reeled onto the deck smelling of cheap bourbon, and laughed constantly. Dressed in a loud flowered shirt and white duck pants, he leered at his ugly wife and whispered gibberish in her ear. He noticed the purser and raised his arm in a comical salute.

“Hi-ho, Captain,” he said with a slack grin.

“I am not the captain. My name is Peter Kolodno. I am the purser. How can I help you?”

“I’m Charlie Gruber and this is my wife, Zelda. We bought tickets here in San Salvador.”

He handed a packet to the purser, who studied them carefully for a few moments.

“Welcome aboard the Leonid Andreyev,”said the purser officially. “I regret that we do not have our usual hospitality festivities to greet new passengers, but you’ve joined us rather late in the cruise.”

“We were sailing on a windjammer when the dumb helmsman ran us onto a reef,” the man called Gruber babbled. “My little woman and I near drowned. Couldn’t see going back home to Sioux Falls early. So we’re finishing our vacation on your boat. Besides, my wife turns on to Greeks.”

“This is a Russian ship,” the purser explained patiently.

“No kidding?”

“Yes, sir, the Leonid Andreyev’shome port is Sevastopol.”

“You don’t say. Where is that?”

“The Black Sea,” the purser said, maintaining an air of politeness.

“Sounds polluted.”

The purser was at a loss as to how America ever became a superpower with citizens such as these. He checked his passenger list and then nodded. “Your cabin is number thirty-four, on the Gorki deck. I’ll have a steward show you the way.”

“You’re all right, pal,” Gruber said, shaking his hand.

As the steward led the Grubers to their cabin, the purser looked down at his palm. Charlie Gruber had tipped him a twenty-five-cent piece.

As soon as the steward deposited their luggage and closed the door, Giordino threw off his wig and rubbed the lip gloss from his mouth. “God, Zelda Gruber! How am I ever going to live this one down?”

“I still say you should have taped a couple of grapefruit to your chest,” Pitt said, laughing.

“I prefer the flat look. That way I don’t stand out.”

“Probably a good thing. There’s not enough room in here for the four of us.”

Giordino waved his arms around the small confines of the windowless cabin. “Talk about a discount excursion. I’ve been in bigger phone booths. Feel the vibration? We must be next to the engine.”

“I requested the cheap accommodations so we could be on a lower deck,” Pitt explained. “We’re less visible down here, and closer to the working areas of the ship.”

“You think Loren might be locked up somewhere below?”

“If she saw something or someone she wasn’t supposed to, the Russians wouldn’t keep her where she might contact other passengers.”

“On the other hand, this could be a false alarm.”

“We’ll soon know,” Pitt said.

“How shall we work it?” Giordino asked.

“I’ll wander the crew’s quarters. You check the passenger list in the purser’s office for Loren’s cabin. Then see if she’s in it.”

Giordino grinned impishly. “What shall I wear?”

“Go as yourself. Zelda we’ll keep in reserve.”

A minute after eight P.M. the Leonid Andreyeveased away from the dock. The engines beat softly as the bow came around. The sandy arms of San Salvador’s harbor slid past as the ship entered the sea and sailed into a fiery sunset.

The lights flashed on and sparkled across the water like fireworks as the ship came alive with laughter and the music of two different orchestras. Passengers changed from shorts and slacks to suits and gowns, and lingered in the main dining room or perched in one of the several cocktail lounges.

Al Giordino, dressed in a formal tux, strutted along the corridor outside the penthouse suites as though he owned them. Stopping at a door, he looked around. A steward was approaching behind him with a tray.

Giordino stepped across to an opposite door marked MASSAGE ROOM and knocked.

“The masseuse goes off duty at six o’clock, sir,” said the steward.

Giordino smiled. “I thought I’d make an appointment for tomorrow.”

“I’ll be glad to take care of that for you, sir. What time would be convenient?”

“How about noon?”

“I’ll see to it,” said the steward, his arm beginning to sag under the weight of the tray. “Your name and cabin?”

“O’Callaghan, cabin twenty-two, the Tolstoy deck,” Giordino said. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

Then he turned and walked back to the passenger lift. He pushed the “down” button so it would ring and then glanced along the corridor. The steward balanced the tray and knocked lightly on a door two suites beyond Loren’s. Giordino couldn’t see who responded, but he heard a woman’s voice invite the steward inside.

Without wasting a second, Giordino rushed to Loren’s suite, crudely forced in the door with a well-aimed kick near the lock and entered. The rooms were dark and he switched on the lights. Everything was pin neat and luxurious with no hint of an occupant.

He didn’t find Loren’s clothes in the closet. He didn’t find any luggage or evidence that she had ever been there. He combed every square foot carefully and slowly, room by room. He peered under the furniture and behind the drapes. He ran his hands over the carpets and under chair cushions. He even checked the bathtub and shower for pubic hairs.

Nothing.

But not quite nothing. A woman’s presence lingers in a room after she leaves it. Giordino sniffed the air. A very slight whiff of perfume caught his nostrils. He couldn’t have distinguished Chanel No. 5 from bath cologne, but this aroma had the delicate fragrance of a flower. He tried to identify it, yet it hung just beyond his reach.

He rubbed soap on the wooden splinter that broke off when he kicked in the door and pressed it into place. A poor glue job, he thought, but enough to hold for a few openings in case the suite was checked again by the crew before the ship docked back in Miami.

Then he snapped the lock, turned off the light and left.

Pitt suffered hunger pangs as he dropped down a tunnel ladder toward the engine room. He hadn’t eaten since Washington, and the growls from his stomach seemed to echo inside the narrow steel access tube. He wished he was seated in the dining room putting away the delicacies from the gourmet menu. Suddenly he brushed away all thought of food as he detected voices rising from the compartment below.

He crouched against the ladder and gazed past his feet. A man’s shoulder showed no more than four feet below him. Then the top of a head with stringy, unkempt blond hair moved into view. The crewman said a few words in Russian to someone else. There was a muffled reply followed by the sound of footsteps on a metal grating. After three minutes, the head moved away and Pitt heard the thin clap of a locker door closing. Then footsteps again and silence.

Pitt swung around the ladder, inserted his feet and calves through a rung and hung upside down, his eyes peering under the lip of the tunnel.

He found himself with an inverted view of the engine room crew’s locker room. It was temporarily vacant. Quickly he climbed down and went through the lockers until he found a pair of grease-stained coveralls that were a reasonable fit. He also took a cap that was two sizes too large and pulled it over his forehead. Now he was ready to wander the working areas.

His next problem was that he only knew about twenty words of Russian, and most of them had to do with ordering dinner in a restaurant.

Nearly a half-hour passed before Pitt meandered into the main crew’s quarters in the bow section of the ship. Occasionally he passed a cook from one of the kitchens, a porter pushing a cart loaded with liquor for the cocktail bars, or a cabin maid coming off duty. None gave him a second look except an officer who threw a distasteful glance at his grimy attire.

By a fortunate accident, he stumbled on the crew’s laundry room. A round-face girl looked up at him across a counter and asked him something in Russian.

He shrugged and replied, “Nyet.”

Bundles of washed uniforms lay neatly stacked on a long table. It occurred to him that the laundry-room girl had asked him which bundle was his. He studied them for a few moments and finally pointed to one containing three neatly folded white coveralls like the dirty pair he wore. By changing into clean ones he could have the run of the entire ship, pretending to be a crewman from the engine room on a maintenance assignment.

The girl laid the bundle on the counter and asked him another question.

His mind raced to dredge up something from his limited Russian vocabulary. Finally he mumbled, “Yest’li u vas sosiski.”

The girl gave him an odd look indeed but handed him the bundle, making him sign for it, which he did in an illegible scrawl. Pitt was relieved to see that her eyes reflected curiosity rather than suspicion.

It was only after he found an empty cabin and switched coveralls that it dawned on him that he’d asked the laundry girl for frankfurters.

After pausing at a bulletin board to remove a diagram showing the compartments on the decks of the Leonid Andreyev,he calmly spent the next five hours browsing around the lower hull of the ship. Detecting no clue to Loren’s presence, he returned to his cabin and found Giordino had thoughtfully ordered him a meal.

“Anything?” Giordino asked, pouring two glasses from a bottle of Russian champagne.

“Not a trace,” said Pitt wearily. “We celebrating?”

“Allow me a little class in this dungeon.”

“You search her suite?”

Giordino nodded. “What kind of perfume does Loren wear?”

Pitt stared at the bubbles rising from the glass for a moment. “A French name; I can’t recall it. Why do you ask?”

“Have an aroma like a flower?”

“Lilac… no, honeysuckle. Yes, honeysuckle.”

“Her suite was wiped clean. The Russians made it look like she’d never been there, but I could still smell her scent.”

Pitt drained the champagne glass and poured another without speaking.

“We have to face the possibility they killed her,” Giordino said matter-of-factly.

“Then why hide her clothes and luggage? They can’t claim she fell overboard with all her belongings.”

“The crew could have stored them below and are waiting for an opportune moment, like rough weather, to announce the tragic news. Sorry, Dirk,” Giordino added, no apology in his voice. “We’ve got to look at every angle, good or bad.”

“Loren is alive and on board this ship somewhere,” Pitt said steadfastly. “And maybe Moran and Larimer too.”

“You’re taking a lot for granted.”

“Loren is a smart girl. She didn’t ask Sally Lindemann to locate Speaker of the House Moran unless she had a damn good reason. Sally claims Moran and Senator Larimer have both mysteriously dropped from sight. Now Loren is missing too. What impression do you get?”

“You make a good sales pitch, but what’s behind it?”

Pitt shrugged negatively. “I flatly don’t know. Only a crazy idea this might somehow mix with Bougainville Maritime and the loss of the Eagle.”

Giordino was silent, thinking it over. “Yes,” he said slowly, “a crazy idea, but one that makes a lot of circumstantial sense. Where do you want me to start?”

“Put on your Zelda getup and walk past every cabin on the ship. If Loren or the others are held prisoner inside, there will be a security guard posted outside the door.”

“And that’s the giveaway,” said Giordino. “Where will you be?”

Pitt laid out the diagram of the ship on his bunk. “Some of the crew are quartered in the stern. I’ll scrounge there.” He folded up the diagram and shoved it in the pocket of the coveralls. “We’d best get started. There isn’t much time.”

“At least we have until the day after tomorrow, when the Leonid Andreyevdocks in Jamaica.”

“No such luxury,” said Pitt. “Study a nautical chart of the Caribbean and you’ll see that about this time tomorrow afternoon we’ll be cruising within sight of the Cuban coast.”

Giordino nodded in understanding. “A golden opportunity to transfer Loren and others off the ship where they can’t be touched.”

“The nasty part is they may not stay on Cuban soil any longer than it takes to put them on a plane for Moscow.”

Giordino considered that for a moment and then went over to his suitcase, removed the mangy wig and slipped it over his curly head. Then he peered in a mirror and made a hideous face.

“Well, Zelda,” he said sourly, “let’s go walk the decks and see who we can pick up.”

54

The President went on national television that same evening to reveal his meeting and accord with President Antonov of the Soviet Union. In his twenty-three-minute address, he briefly outlined his programs to aid the Communist countries. He also stated his intention to abolish the barriers and restrictions on purchases of American high technology by the Russians. Never once was Congress mentioned. He spoke of the Eastern bloc trade agreements as though they were already budgeted and set in motion. He closed by promising that his next task would be to throw his energies behind a war to reduce the national crime rate.

The ensuing uproar in government circles swept all other news before it. Curtis Mayo and other network commentators broadcast scathing attacks on the President for overstepping the limits of his authority. Specters of an imperial Presidency were raised.

Congressional leaders who had remained in Washington during the recess launched a telephone campaign encouraging their fellow lawmakers who were vacationing or campaigning in their home states to return to the capital to meet in emergency session. House and Senate members, acting without the counsel of their majority leaders, Moran and Larimer, who could not be reached, solidly closed ranks against the President in a bipartisan flood.

Dan Fawcett burst into the Oval Office the next morning, anguish written on his face. “Good God, Mr. President, you can’t do this!”

The President looked up calmly. “You’re referring to my talk last night?”

“Yes, sir, I am,” Fawcett said emotionally. “You as good as went on record as saying you were proceeding with your aid programs without congressional approval.”

“Is that what it sounded like?”

“It did.”

“Good,” said the President, thumping his hand on the desk. “Because that’s exactly what I intend to do.”

Fawcett was astonished. “Not under the Constitution. Executive privilege does not extend that far—”

“God damn it, don’t try and tell me how to run the Presidency,” the President shouted, suddenly furious. “I’m through begging and compromising with those conceited hypocrites on the Hill. The only way I’m going to get anything done, by God, is to put on the gloves and start swinging.”

“You’re setting out on a dangerous course. They’ll band together to freeze out every issue you put before them.”

“No, they won’t!” the President shouted, rising to his feet and coming around the desk to face Fawcett. “Congress will not have a chance to upset my plans.”

Fawcett could only look at him in shock and horror. “You can’t stop them. They’re gathering now, flying in from every state to hold an emergency session to block you.”

“If they think that,” the President said in a morbid voice Fawcett scarcely recognized, “they’re in for a big surprise.”

* * *

The early-morning traffic was spreading thin when three military convoys flowed into the city from different directions. One Army Special Counterterrorist Detachment from Fort Belvoir moved north along Anacostia Freeway while another from Fort Meade came down the Baltimore and Washington Parkway to the south. At the same moment, a Critical Operation Force attached to the Marine Corps base at Quantico advanced over the Rochambeau Bridge from the west.

As the long lines of five-ton personnel carriers converged on the Federal Center, a flight of tilt-rotored assault transports settled onto the grass of the mall in front of the Capitol reflecting pool and disgorged their cargo of crack Marine field troops from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. The two-thousand-man task force was made up of United Emergency Response teams that were on twenty-four-hour alert.

As they deployed around the federal buildings, they quickly cleared everyone out of the Capitol chambers, the House and Senate offices. Then they took up their positions and sealed off all entrances.

At first the bewildered lawmakers and their aides thought it was a building evacuation due to a terrorist bomb threat. The only other explanation was an unannounced military exercise. When they learned the entire seat of American government was shut down by order of the President, they stood shocked and outraged, conferring in heated indignation in small groups on the grounds east of the Capitol building. Lyndon Johnson had once threatened to lock out Congress, but no one could believe it was actually happening.

Arguments and demands went unheard by the purposeful-looking men dressed in field camouflage and holding M-20 automatic rifles and riot guns. One senator, nationally recognized for his liberal stands, tried to break through the cordon and was dragged back to the street by two grim-faced Marines.

The troops did not surround or close the executive departments or independent agencies. For most of the federal offices it was business as usual. The streets were kept open and traffic directed in an efficient manner local citizens found downright enjoyable.

The press and television media poured onto the Capitol grounds. The grass was nearly buried under a blanket of cables and electronic equipment. Interviews before cameras became so hectic and crowded the senators and congressmen had to stand in line to voice their objections to the President’s unprecedented action.

Surprisingly, reaction from most Americans across the country was one of amusement rather than distaste. They sat in front of their television screens and viewed the event as if it were a circus. The consensus was that the President was throwing a temporary scare into Congress and would order the troops removed in a day or two.

At the State Department, Oates huddled with Emmett, Brogan and Mercier. The atmosphere was heavy with a sense of indecision and suspense.

“The President’s a damned fool if he thinks he’s more important than the constitutional government,” said Oates.

Emmett stared steadily at Mercier. “I can’t see why you didn’t suspect what was going on.”

“He shut me out completely,” said Mercier, his expression sheepish. “He never offered the slightest clue of what was on his mind.”

“Surely Jesse Simmons and General Metcalf weren’t a party to it,” Oates wondered aloud.

Brogan shook his head. “My Pentagon sources say Jesse Simmons flatly refused.”

“Why didn’t he warn us?” asked Emmett.

“After Simmons told the President in no uncertain terms that he was off base, the roof fell in. A military security guard detail escorted him home, where he was placed under house arrest.”

“Jesus,” muttered Oates in exasperation. “It gets worse by the minute.”

“What about General Metcalf?” asked Mercier.

“I’m sure he voiced his objections,” Brogan answered. “But Clayton Metcalf is a spit-and-polish soldier who’s duty-bound to carry out the orders of his commander in chief. He and the President are old, close friends. Metcalf undoubtedly feels his loyalty is to the man who appointed him to be Chief of Staff, and not Congress.”

Oates’s fingers swept an imaginary dust speck off the desktop. “The President disappears for ten days and after his return falls off the deep end.”

“Huckleberry Finn,” Brogan said slowly.

“Judging from the President’s behavioral patterns over the past twenty-four hours,” Mercier said thoughtfully, “the evidence looks pretty conclusive.”

“Has Dr. Lugovoy surfaced yet?” Oates asked.

Emmett shook his head. “He’s still missing.”

“We’ve obtained reports from our people inside Russia on the doctor,” Brogan elucidated. “His specialty for the last fifteen years has been mind transfer. Soviet intelligence ministries have provided enormous funding for the research. Hundreds of Jews and other dissidents who vanished inside KGB-operated mental institutions were his guinea pigs. And he claims to have made a breakthrough in thought interpretation and control.”

“Do we have such a project in progress?” Oates inquired.

Brogan nodded. “Ours is code-named ‘Fathom,’ which is working along the same lines.”

Oates held his head in his hands for a moment, then turned to Emmett. “You still haven’t a lead on Vince Margolin, Larimer and Moran?”

Emmett looked embarrassed. “I regret to say their whereabouts are still unknown.”

“Do you think Lugovoy has performed the mind-transfer experiment on them too?”

“I don’t believe so,” Emmett answered. “If I were in the Russians’ shoes, I’d keep them in reserve in the event the President doesn’t respond to instructions as programmed.”

“His mind could slip out of their grasp and react unpredictably,” Brogan added. “Fooling around with the brain is not an exact science. There’s no way of telling what he’ll do next.”

“Congress isn’t waiting to find out,” said Mercier. “They’re out hustling for a place to convene so they can start impeachment proceedings.”

“The President knows that, and he isn’t stupid,” Oates responded. “Every time the House and Senate members gather for a session, he’ll send in troops to break it up. With the armed forces behind him, it’s a no-win situation.”

“Considering the President is literally being told what to do by an unfriendly foreign power, Metcalf and the other Joint Chiefs can’t continue giving him their support,” said Mercier.

“Metcalf refuses to act until we produce absolute proof of mind control,” Emmett added. “But I suspect he’s only waiting for a ripe excuse to throw his lot in with Congress.”

Brogan looked concerned. “Let’s hope he doesn’t make his move too late.”

“So the situation boils down to the four of us devising a way to neutralize the President,” Oates mused.

“Have you driven past the White House today?” Mercier asked.

Oates shook his head. “No. Why?”

“Looks like an armed camp. The military is crawling over every inch of the grounds. Word has it the President can’t be reached by anybody. I doubt even you, Mr. Secretary, could walk past the front door.”

Brogan thought a moment. “Dan Fawcett is still on the inside.”

“I talked to him over the phone,” Mercier said. “He presented his opposition to the President’s actions a bit too strongly. I gather he’s now persona non grata in the Oval Office.”

“We need someone who has the President’s trust.”

“Oscar Lucas,” Emmett said.

“Good thinking,” Oates snapped, looking up. “As head of the Secret Service, he’s got the run of the place.”

“Someone will have to brief Dan and Oscar face-to-face,” Emmett advised.

“I’ll handle it,” Brogan volunteered.

“You have a plan?” asked Oates.

“Not off the top of my head, but my people will come up with something.”

“Better be good,” said Emmett seriously, “if we’re to avoid the worst fear of our Founding Fathers.”

“And what was that?” asked Oates.

“The unthinkable,” replied Emmett. “A dictator in the White House.”