Theyd first met in London, at St. Thomass Hospital to be precise, some years earlier when Murray had been legal attach to the American Embassy, and Ryan had been a shooting victim. Still tall and spare, his hair a little thinner but not yet gray, Murray was an affable, free-spirited man whom one would never pick for a cop, much less one of the best around. A gifted investigator, hed hunted down every sort of criminal there was, and though he now chafed at his absence from hands-on police work, he was handling his administrative job as skillfully as all his others.

Whats this sting I heard about? Jack asked.

TARPON? The Cartel murdered a guy who was laundering money for them on a very big scaleand doing some major-league skimming, too. He left records behind. We found them. Its been a busy couple of weeks running all the leads down.

I heard six-hundred-plus-million bucks.

Itll go higher. The Swiss cracked open a new account this afternoon.

Ouch. Ryan popped open a couple of beers. Thats a real sting, isnt it?

I think theyll notice this one, Murray agreed. Whats this I hear about your new job?

You probably heard right. Its just that you dont want to get a promotion this way.

Yeah. Ive never met Admiral Greer, but the Director thinks a lot of him.

Two of a kind. Old-fashioned honorable gentlemen, Jack observed. Endangered species.

Hello, Mr. Murray, Sally Ryan said from the door.

Mister Murray?

Uncle Dan! Sally raced up and delivered a ferocious hug. Aunt Liz says that you and Daddy better get out there, she said with a giggle.

Why do we let them push us warriors around, Jack?

Cause theyre tougher than we are? Ryan wondered.

Dan laughed. Yeah, that explains it. I Then his beeper went off. Murray pulled the small plastic box from his belt. In a moment the LCD panel showed the number he was supposed to call. You know, Id like to waste the bastard who invented these things.

Hes already dead, Jack replied deadpan. He came into a hospital emergency room with chest pains, and after the doc figured out who he was, they were a little slow getting around to treating him. The doc explained later that he had had an important phone call come in, and . . . oh, well. . . . Ryans demeanor changed. You need a secure line? I have one in the library.

Color me important, Murray observed. No. Can I use this one?

Sure, the bottom buttons a D.C. line.

Murray punched in the number without referring to his beeper. It was Shaws office. Murray here. You rang, Alice? Okay . . . Hi, Bill, what gives?

It was as though the room took a sudden chill. Ryan felt it before he understood the change in Murrays face.

No chance thatoh, yeah, I know Pete. Murray checked his watch. Be there in forty minutes. He hung up.

What happened?

Somebody killed the Director, Dan answered simply.

Whatwhere?

Bogot. He was down for a quiet meeting, along with the head of DEA. Flew down this afternoon. They kept it real quiet.

No chance that Murray shook his head. The attach down theres Pete Morales. Good agent, I worked OC with him once. He said they were all killed instantly. Emil, Harry Jefferson, the ambassador, all the security guys. He stopped and read the look on Jacks face. Yeah, somebody had some pretty good intel on this.

Ryan nodded. This is where I came in. . . .

I dont think theres a street agent in the Bureau who doesnt love that man. Murray set his beer down on the counter.

Sorry, pal.

What was it you said? Endangered species? Murray shook his head and went to collect his wife. Ryan hadnt even closed the door behind them when his secure phone started ringing.

The Hideaway, located only a few miles from the Luray Caverns, was a modern building despite its deliberate lack of some modern amenities. While there was no in-room cable television, no pay-for-view satellite service, no complimentary paper outside the door every morning, there was air conditioning, running water, and the room-service menu was six pages long, supplemented by ten full pages of wine listings. The hotel catered to newlyweds who needed few distractions and to others trying to save their marriages from distractions. Service was on the European model. The guest wasnt expected to do anything but eat, drink, and rumple the linen, though there were saddle horses, tennis courts, and a swimming pool for those few whose suite didnt include a bathtub large enough for the purpose. Moira watched her lover tip the bellman ten dollarsfar more than he ever tipped anyonebefore she thought to ask the most obvious question.

How did you register?

Mr. and Mrs. Juan Daz. Another embarrassed look. Forgive me, but I didnt know what else to say. I didnt think he lied haltingly. And I didnt wantwhat could I say without embarrassing myself? he finally asked with a frustrated gesture.

Well, I need a shower. Since we are husband and wife, you may join me. It looks big enough for two. She walked from the room, dropping her silk blouse on the bed as she went.

Five minutes later, Cortez decided that the shower was easily big enough for four. But as things turned out, that was just as well.

The President had flown to Camp David for the weekend, and had barely showered himself when his junior military aidea Marine lieutenant had the dutybrought him the cordless phone.

Yeswhat is it?

The lieutenants first reaction on seeing the Presidents expression was to wonder where his pistol was.

I want the Attorney General, Admiral Cutter, Judge Moore, and Bob Ritter flown here immediately. Tell the press secretary to call me in fifteen minutes to work on the statement. Ill be staying here for the time being. What about bringing them back home? Okaywe have a couple of hours to think about that. For now, the usual protocol. Thats right. No, nothing from State. Ill handle it from here, then the secretary can have his say. Thank you. The President pushed the kill button on the phone and handed it back to the Marine.

Sir, is there anything that the guard detail needs No. The President explained briefly what had happened. Carry on, Lieutenant.

Aye aye, sir. The Marine left.

The President put on his bathrobe and walked over to the mirror to comb his hair. He had to use the terrycloth of his sleeve to wipe the condensation off the glass. Had he noticed, he would have wondered why the look in his eyes didnt shatter it.

Okay, the President of the United States told the mirror. So you bastards want to play. . . .

The flight from Andrews to Camp David was made in one of the new VH-60 Blackhawk helicopters that the 89th Military Airlift Wing had just acquired. Plushly appointed to carry VIPs from place to place, it was still too noisy for anything approximating a normal conversation. Each of the four passengers stared out the windows on the sliding doors, watching the western Maryland hills slide beneath the aircraft, each alone with his grief and his anger. The trip took twenty minutes. The pilot had been told to hurry.

On touching down, the four men were loaded into a car for the short drive to the Presidents cabin on the grounds. They found him hanging up the phone. It had taken half an hour to locate his press secretary, further exacerbating the Presidents already stormy mood.

Admiral Cutter started to say something about how sorry everyone was, but the Presidents expression cut him short.

The President sat down on a couch opposite the fireplace. In front of him was what most people ordinarily took to be a coffee table, but now, with the top removed, it was a set of computer screens and quiet thermal printers that tapped into the major news wire services and other government information channels. Four television sets were in the next room, tuned into CNN and the major networks. The four visitors stared down at him, watching the anger come off the President like steam from a boiling pot.

We will not let this one slip past with us standing by and deploring the event, the President said quietly as he looked up. They killed my friend. They killed my ambassador. They have directly challenged the sovereign power of the United States of America. They want to play with the big boys, the President went on in a voice that was grotesquely calm. Well, theyre going to have to play by the big boys rules. Peter, he said to the AG, there is now an informal Presidential Finding that the drug Cartel has initiated an undeclared war against the government of the United States. They have chosen to act like a hostile nation-state. We will treat them as we would treat a hostile nation-state. As President, I am resolved to carry the fight to the enemy as we would carry it to any other originator of state-sponsored terrorism.

The AG didnt like that, but nodded agreement anyway. The President turned to Moore and Ritter.

The gloves come off. I just made the usual wimpy-ass statement for my press secretary to deliver, but the fucking gloves come off. Come up with a plan. I want these bastards hurt. No more of this sending a message crap. I want them to get the message whether the phone rings or not. Mr. Ritter, you have your hunting license, and theres no bag limit. Is that sufficiently clear?

Yes, sir, the DDO answered. Actually, it wasnt. The President hadnt said kill once, as the tape recorders that were surely somewhere in this room would show. But there were some things that you didnt do, and one of them was that you did not force the President to speak clearly when clarity was something he wished to avoid.

Find yourselves a cabin and come up with a plan. Peter, I want you to stay here with me for a while. The next message: the Attorney General, once having acceded to the Presidents desire to Do Something, didnt need to know exactly what was going to be done. Admiral Cutter, who was more familiar with Camp David than the other two, led the way to one of the guest cabins. Since he was in front, Moore and Ritter could not see the smile on his face.

Ryan was just getting to his office, having driven himself in, a habit which he had just unlearned. The senior intelligence watch officer was waiting for him in the corridor as Jack got off the elevator. The briefing took a whole four minutes, after which Ryan found himself sitting in the office with nothing at all to do. It was strange. He was now privy to everything the U.S. government knew about the assassination of its peoplenot much more than what hed heard on the car radio coming in, actually, though he now had names to put on the unnamed sources. Sometimes that was important, but not this time. The DCI and DDO, he learned at once, were up at Camp David with the President.

Why not me? Jack asked himself in surprise.

It should have occurred to him immediately, of course, but he was not yet used to being a senior executive. With nothing to do, his mind went along that tangent for several minutes. The conclusion was an obvious one. He didnt need to know what was being talked aboutbut that had to mean that something was already happening, didnt it . . . ?If so, what? And for how long?

By noon the next day, an Air Force C-141B Starlifter transport had landed at El Dorado International. Security was like nothing anyone had seen since the funeral of Anwar Sadat. Armed helicopters circled overhead. Armored vehicles sat with their gun tubes trained outward. A full battalion of paratroops ringed the airport, which was shut down for three hours. That didnt count the honor guard, of course, all of whom felt as though they had no honor at all, that it had been stripped away from their army and their nation by . . . them.

Esteban Cardinal Valdz prayed over the coffins, accompanied by the chief rabbi of Bogots small Jewish community. The Vice President attended on behalf of the American government, and one by one the Colombian Army handed the caskets over to enlisted pallbearers from all of the American uniformed services. The usual, predictable speeches were made, the most eloquent being a brief address by Colombias Attorney General, who shed unashamed tears for his friend and college classmate. The Vice President boarded his aircraft and left, followed by the big Lockheed transport.

The Presidents statement, already delivered, spoke of reaffirming the rule of law to which Emil Jacobs had dedicated his life. But that statement seemed as thin as the air at El Dorado International even to those who didnt know better.

In the town of Eight Mile, Alabama, a suburb of Mobile, a police sergeant named Ernie Braden was cutting his front lawn with a riding mower. A burglary investigator, he knew all the tricks of the people whose crimes he handled, including how to bypass complex alarm systems, even the sophisticated models used by wealthy investment bankers. That skill, plus the information he picked up from office chatterthe narcs bullpen was right next to the burglary sectionenabled him to offer his services to people who had money with which to pay for the orthodonture and education of his children. It wasnt so much that Braden was a corrupt cop as that hed simply been on the job for over twenty years and no longer gave much of a damn. If people wanted to use drugs, then the hell with them. If druggies wanted to kill one another off, then so much the better for the rest of society. And if some arrogant prick of a banker turned out to be a crook among crooks, then that also was too bad; all Braden had been asked to do was shake the mans house to make sure that hed left no records behind. It was a shame about the mans wife and kids, of course, but that was called playing with fire.

Braden rationalized the damage done to society simply by continuing to investigate his burglaries, and even catching a real hood from time to time, though that was rare enough. Burglary was a pretty safe crime to commit. It never got the attention it deserved. Neither did the people whose job it was to track them downprobably the most unrewarded segment of the law-enforcement profession. Hed been taking the lieutenants exam for nine years, and never quite made it. Braden needed or at least wanted the money that the promotion would bring, only to see the promotions go to the hotshots in Narcotics and Homicide while he slaved away . . . and why not take the goddamned money? More than anything else, Ernie Braden was tired of it all. Tired of the long hours. Tired of the crime victims who took their frustration out on him when he was just trying to do his job. Tired of being unappreciated within his own community of police officers. Tired of being sent out to local schools for the pro forma anticrime lectures that nobody ever listened to. He was even tired of coaching little-league baseball, though that had once been the single joy of his life. Tired of just about everything. But he couldnt afford to retire, either. Not yet, anyway.

The noise from the Sears riding mower crackled through the hot, humid air of the quiet street on which he and his family lived. He wiped a handkerchief across his sweaty brow and contemplated the cold beer hed have as soon as he was finished. It could have been worse. Until three years ago hed pushed a goddamned Lawn-Boy across the grass. At least now he could sit down as he did his weekly chore, cutting the goddamned grass. His wife had a real thing about the lawn and garden. As if it mattered, Braden grumbled.

He concentrated on the job at hand, making sure that the spinning blades had at least two sweeps over every square inch of the green crap that, this early in the season, grew almost as fast as you cut it. He didnt notice the Plymouth minivan coming down the street. Nor did he know that the people who paid him his supplementary income were most unhappy with a recent clandestine effort hed made on their behalf.

Braden had several eccentricities, as do many men and most police officers. In his case, he never went anywhere unarmed. Not even to cut the grass. Under the back of his greasy shirt was a Smith & Wesson Chiefs Special, a five-shot stainless steel revolver that was as close as hed ever get to something with chief written on it. When he finally noticed the minivan pull up behind his Chevy Citation, he took little note of it, except that there were two men in it, and they seemed to be looking at him.

His cops instinct didnt entirely fail him, however. They were looking real hard at him. That made him look back, mainly in curiosity. Whod be interested in him on a Saturday afternoon? When the passenger-side door opened and he saw the gun, that question faded away.

When Braden rolled off the mower, his foot came off the brake pedal, which had the opposite effect as in a car. The mower stopped in two feet, its blades still churning away on the bluegrass-and-fescue mix of the policemans front yard. Braden came off just at the ejection port of the mower assembly, and felt tiny bits of grit and sand peppering his knees, but that, too, was not a matter of importance at the moment. His revolver was already out when the man from the van fired his first round.

He was using an Ingram Mac-10, probably a 9-millimeter, and the man didnt know how to use it well. His first round was roughly on target, but the next eight merely decorated the sky as the notoriously unstable weapon jerked out of control, not even hitting the mower. Sergeant Braden fired two rounds back, but the range was over ten yards, and the Chiefs Special had only a two-inch barrel, which gave it an effective combat range measured in feet, not yards. With the instant and unexpected stress added to his poorly selected weapon, he managed to hit the van behind his target with only one round.

But machine-gun fire is a highly distinctive soundnot the least mistakable for firecrackers or any other normal noiseand the neighborhood immediately realized that something very unusual was happening. At a house across the street a fifteen-year-old boy was cleaning his rifle. It was an old Marlin .22 lever-action that had once belonged to his grandfather, and its proud owner had learned to play third base from Sergeant Braden, whom he thought to be a really neat guy. The young man in question, Erik Sanderson, set down his cleaning gear and walked to the window just in time to see his former coach shooting from behind his mower at somebody. In the clarity that comes in such moments, Erik Sanderson realized that people were trying to kill his coach, a police officer, that he had a rifle and cartridges ten feet away, and that it Would Be All Right for him to use the rifle to come to the aid of the policeman. The fact that hed spent the morning plinking away at tin cans merely meant that he was ready. Erik Sandersons main ambition in life was to become a U.S. Marine, and he seized the chance to get an early feel for what it was all about.

While the sound of gunfire continued to crackle around the wooded street, he grabbed the rifle and a handful of the small copper-colored rimfire cartridges and ran out to the front porch. First he twisted the spring-loaded rod that pushed rounds down the magazine tube which hung under the barrel. He pulled it out too far, dropping it, but the young man had the good sense to ignore that for the moment. He fed the .22 rounds into the loading slot one at a time, surprised that his hands were already sweaty. When he had fourteen rounds in, he bent down to get the rod, and two rounds fell out the front of the tube. He took the time to reload them, reinserted the rod, twisting it shut, then slammed his hand down and up on the lever, loading the gun and cocking the exposed hammer.

He was surprised to see that he didnt have a shot, and ran down the sidewalk to the street, taking a position across the hood of his fathers pickup truck. From this point he could see two men, each firing a submachine gun from the hip. He looked just in time to see Sergeant Braden fire off his last round, which missed as badly as the first four had. The police officer turned to run for the safety of his house, but tripped over his own feet and had trouble getting up. Both gunmen advanced on Braden, loading new magazines into their weapons. Erik Sandersons hands were trembling as he shouldered his rifle. It had old-fashioned iron sights, and he had to stop and remind himself how to line them up as hed been taught in Boy Scouts, with the front-sight post centered in the notch of the rear-sight leaf, the top of the post even with the top of the leaf as he maneuvered it on a target.

He was horrified to be too late. Both men blew his little-league coach to shreds with extended bursts at point-blank range. Something snapped inside Eriks head at that moment. He sighted on the head of the nearer gunman and jerked off his round.

Like most young and inexperienced shooters, he immediately looked up to see what had happened. Nothing. Hed missedwith a rifle at a range of only thirty yards, hed missed. Amazed, he sighted again and squeezed the trigger, but nothing happened. The hammer was down. Hed forgotten to cock the rifle. Swearing something his mother would have slapped him to hear, he reloaded the Marlin .22 and took exquisitely careful aim, squeezing off his next shot.

The murderers hadnt heard his first shot, and with their ears still ringing from their own shots, they didnt hear the second, but one mans head jerked to the side with the wasps-sting impact of the round. The man knew what had happened, turned to his left, and fired off a long burst despite the crushing pain that seized his head in an instant. The other one saw Erik and fired as well.

But the young man was now jacking rounds into the breech of his rifle as fast as he could fire them. He watched in rage as he kept missing, unconsciously flinching as bullets came his way, trying to kill both men before they could get back into their car. He had the satisfaction of seeing them duck behind cover, and wasted his last three rounds trying to shoot through the car body to get them. But a .22 cant accomplish that, and the minivan pulled away.

Erik watched it pull away, wishing hed loaded more rounds into his rifle, wishing that he could try a shot through the back window before the car turned right and disappeared.

The young man didnt have the courage to go over and see what had happened to Sergeant Braden. He just stayed there, leaning across the truck, cursing himself for letting them get away. He didnt know, and would never believe, that he had, in fact, done better than many trained police officers could have done.

In the minivan, one of the gunmen took more note of the bullet in his chest than the one in his head. But it was the head shot that would kill him. As the man bent down, a lacerated artery let go completely and showered the inside of the car with blood, much to the surprise of the dying man, who had but a few seconds to realize what had happ Another Air Force flight, as luck had it, also a C-141B, took Mr. Clark out of Panama, heading for Andrews, where rapid preparations were being made for the arrival ceremony. Before the funeral flight arrived, Clark was in Langley talking to his boss, Bob Ritter. For the first time in a generation, the Operations Directorate had been granted a presidential hunting license. John Clark, carried on the personnel rolls as a case-officer instructor, was the CIA chief hunter. He hadnt been asked to exercise that particular talent in a very long time, but he still knew how.

Ritter and Clark didnt watch the TV coverage of the arrival. All that was part of history now, and while both men had an interest in history, it was mainly in the sort that is never written down.

Were going to take another look at the idea you handed me at St. Kitts, the Deputy Director (Operations) said.

Whats the objective? Clark asked carefully. It wasnt hard to guess why this was happening, or the originator of the directive. That was the reason for his caution.

The short version is revenge, Ritter answered.

Retribution is a more acceptable word, Clark pointed out. Lacking in formal education though he was, he did read a good deal.

The targets represent a clear and present danger to the security of the United States.

The President said that?

His words, Ritter affirmed.

Fine. That makes it all legal. Not any less dangerous, but legal.

Can you do it?

Clark smiled in a distant, smoky way. I run my side of the op my way. Otherwise, forget it. I dont want to die from oversight. No interference from this end. You give me the target list and the assets I need. I do the rest, my way, my schedule.

Agreed, Ritter nodded.

Clark was more than surprised by that. Then I can do it. What about the kids we have running around in the jungle?

Were pulling them out tonight.

To be reinserted where? Clark asked.

Ritter told him.

Thats really dangerous, the case officer observed, though he was not surprised by the answer. It had probably been planned all along. But, if it had . . .

We know that.

I dont like it, Clark said after a moments thought. It complicates things.

We dont pay you to like it.

Clark had to agree to that. He was honest enough with himself, though, to admit that part of it he did like. A job such as this, after all, had gotten him into the protective embrace of the Central Intelligence Agency in the first place, so many years before. But that job had been on a free-agent basis. This one was legal, but arguably. Once that would not have mattered to Mr. Clark, but with a wife and kids, it did now.

Do I get to see the family for a couple of days?

Sure. Itll take awhile to get things in place. Ill have all the information you need messengered down to The Farm.