'A normal life?'

'Some coffee and sandwiches.'

'Sure. A picnic.'

15.

The colonel frowned and set down the phone. In the safe-site apartment five blocks north of The Washington Post, Alan - who'd been watching the colonel while listening on an extension - set down his phone as well.

The only sound was the faint drone of a car that went by outside.

'Do you want my advice?' Alan asked.

'No.' The colonel's narrow face looked haggard from strain and fatigue.

'Well, I'll give it to you anyhow.' Alan's portly cheeks were emphasized by whisker shadow. 'Buchanan's waving you off. He's asking for a truce. Agree to it. You've got nothing to win and everything to lose.'

'That's your opinion, is it?' the colonel asked dryly. 'I'm not used to taking advice from civilians, especially when they don't understand the serious nature of Buchanan's offense. A soldier can't be allowed to just walk away from his unit, certainly not Buchanan. He knows too much. I told you before, his behavior makes him a security risk. We're talking about chaos.'

'And gun battles in the street aren't chaos? This has nothing to do with principle or security. It's about pride. I was afraid of what would happen when the military became involved in civilian intelligence operations. You don't like taking advice from civilians? Well, maybe you ought to read the Constitution. Because taking advice is exactly what you're supposed to do. Without the Agency's oversight on this, you'd be autonomous. You'd love that, wouldn't you? Your own private army to do with as you want. Your own private wars.'

'Get out of here,' the colonel said. 'You're always grumbling about never seeing your wife and kids. Go home.'

'And give you control? No damned way. I'm staying with you until this issue is resolved,' Alan said.

'Then you're in for a long, hard ride.'

'It doesn't need to be. All you have to do is leave Buchanan alone.'

'I can't! Not as long as he's with that reporter.'

'But Buchanan says that his business with the reporter has nothing to do with you.'

'And you believe that?'

'He's not a fool. I was talking about gains and losses. He has nothing to gain if he turns against you, and everything to lose. But if you hunt him, he'll turn against you out of spite, and frankly, Colonel, he's the last person I'd want to be my enemy.'

ELEVEN.

1.

Buchanan woke to a throbbing headache aggravated by banging metal and a roaring engine. He roused himself and blinked through the windshield at where a sanitation crew was emptying cans and throwing bags of refuse into the back of a garbage truck. He glanced at his watch - 8 a.m. Holly was driving north on Madison Avenue in New York City.

'You should have wakened me.' Buchanan shielded his eyes from the hazy sunshine.

'So you could keep me company? No. You obviously needed the rest. Besides, I didn't mind the quiet. It gave me a chance to think.'

'About what?'

'I realized I can't go back. Not until we find a way to convince them this has nothing to do with them. I have to keep moving forward.'

'But there's only so far you can keep going until you drop. I'm not the only one who needed rest.'

'I took your advice,' Holly said.

'I don't remember giving.'

'Last night, I asked you how you'd managed to drive all the way from New Orleans to San Antonio, as tired as you must have been after having been wounded. You said you'd napped at rest stops along the way. So whenever I had to stop to go to the bathroom, I locked the car doors and closed my eyes. You're right. People make so much noise, slamming their car doors, it's hard to sleep more than a few minutes.'

'You certainly don't look like you've been up most of the night.'

'The miracle of cosmetics. Thanks to sinks and mirrors at rest stops. If we're going to pull this off, by the way, you need a shave.'

Buchanan rubbed his jaw, reached into his travel bag, pulled a safety razor from a pouch, and began to scrape it along his beard-stubbled cheeks.

'Ouch,' Holly said. 'Doesn't that hurt?'

'You get used to it. A lot of times on assignments, this was the only way to try to keep clean.'

He waited uneasily, hoping that she wouldn't take advantage of the reference and ask him questions about those assignments.

Instead she passed the test and merely concentrated on her driving.

'Have we got any coffee left?' he asked.

'We drank it all. But now that you mention it.'

She pulled over to a curb, parked with the motor running, ran into a coffee shop, and returned in a minute with two styrofoam cups of coffee and four Danish.

'You're a good provider.'

'And you'd better keep being a good teacher,' Holly said. 'The Sherry-Netherland's one block over on Fifth. It was mentioned in yesterday's article in the Post. How do you want to do this?'

'First, we find a parking garage that has space.'

'Easier said than done.'

'Then we look for somebody watching Frederick Maltin's apartment.'

'Why would someone be watching-?'

'To tie up an unfortunate loose end. I don't think he was expected to be as big a problem as he's become, going to reporters, drawing attention to Maria Tomez's disappearance. My guess is, whoever's responsible will want to take care of that.'