"I should have given you my name," Kocian said. "Paul Sieno, right?"

"Yes, sir."

"I thought I recognized your voice when you told me I had the wrong number," Kocian said. "Is Carlos handy?"

"Actually, sir, he's not."

"Where is he? Can you give me a better number?"

"I don't have one, sir."

"That's unusual, isn't it?"

"Charley's fly-fishing with his girlfriend in Patagonia, Herr Kocian."

"What did you say?"

"Charley went fishing with his girlfriend, Herr Kocian. In Patagonia. He left word not to bother him unless the sun went out."

"What if I told you this is very important, Paul? And what girlfriend would that be?"

"I can get word to him, Herr Kocian. Maybe tonight, and certainly by morning."

"And the girlfriend?"

There was a long pause, then Paul said, "Herr Kocian, if you don't know about Sweaty, I'm sorry, but you're not going to hear it from me."

"Are you telling me he's drunk and off in the woods with some floozy? Some floozy named Sweaty? That's what you said her name is, right? Sweaty?"

"Well, I can tell you he's probably not drunk, because Sweaty doesn't like him to drink too much. And that I can get word to him to call you, probably tonight, and certainly by morning. Your AFC's working, right?"

"As a matter of fact, Paul, my miraculous AFC communications device is not working at all. The reason I called on the telephone is because n.o.body we tried to call on it to find Carlos answered."

"Sir, we're not on twenty-four/seven anymore. Just once in the morning-oh-four-twenty-hundred Zulu time-and again in the afternoon at sixteen-twenty Zulu. I'm surprised no one told you."

"By Zulu, you mean Greenwich?"

"Yes, sir."

"Your AFC is working?"

"Yes, sir. I can have it up in a minute."

"There's a doc.u.ment I want Carlos to see. I want to send it in the highest encryption possible."

"Yes, sir, give me a minute to turn on my AFC."

"You can get it to him?"

"In the morning, maybe even tonight."

"I want you and Mrs. Sieno to have a look at it, to see if you can make more sense from it than I can. And tell Carlos what you think."

"Yes, sir."

"It's not addressed to Carlos, Paul. It's addressed to someone else. I don't want that party to see it until after Carlos does."

"This sounds important, Herr Kocian."

"I don't know. It may well be. Is Herr Delchamps available?"

"He's here, but he went out for dinner."

"Show this doc.u.ment to him, too, please, with the same caveat that I don't want the addressee to see it until Carlos has."

"Got it," Sieno said. And then, "There goes the AFC, Mr. Kocian. It shows you as online. I'm ready to receive. Send the message."

"It came through fine, Herr Kocian," Paul Sieno said over the encrypted AFC not quite two minutes later. "What the h.e.l.l is it all about?"

"I don't know, Paul."

"Where did you get it?"

"A Russian who said he was Colonel Solomatin was waiting for me in the lobby of the Gellert when I came in about an hour ago."

"I will be d.a.m.ned! I'll have this in Charley's hands just as quick as I can."

"Thank you, Paul."

"Herr Kocian, I'm sorry I hung up on you before."

"No apology necessary. My best regards to Mrs. Sieno."

"Will do," Sieno said, then gave the AFC the order: "Break it down."

The green LED indicating the AFC was connected to another AFC device at Encryption Level One went out.

[TWO].

Club America Miami International Airport, Concourse F Miami, Florida 2205 4 February 2007

Roscoe J. Danton of The Washington Times-Post The Washington Times-Post was not in a very good mood. Eagle-eyed officials of the Transportation Security Administration had detected a Colibri butane cigar lighter and a nearly new bottle of Boss cologne in his carry-on luggage and triumphantly seized both. was not in a very good mood. Eagle-eyed officials of the Transportation Security Administration had detected a Colibri butane cigar lighter and a nearly new bottle of Boss cologne in his carry-on luggage and triumphantly seized both.

The discovery had then triggered a detailed examination of the rest of the contents of his carry-on luggage. This had uncovered a Bic butane cigarette lighter in his laptop case and three boxes of wooden matches from the Old Ebbitt Grill in his briefcase/overnight bag. Two small boxes of matches, he was told he should have known, was the limit.

With the proof before them that they had in their hands if not an Al Qaeda terrorist cleverly disguised as a thirty-eight-year-old Presbyterian from Chevy Chase, Maryland, then at the very least what they categorized as an "uncooperative traveler," the TSA officers had then thoroughly examined his person to make sure that he wasn't trying to conceal anything else-a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, for example-in his ear ca.n.a.l or another body orifice.

With no RPG or other potential weapon found, he was finally freed.

Danton-convinced that his near crimes and misdemeanors had probably caused him to miss Aerolineas Argentinas Flight 1007, nonstop service to Buenos Aires-had then run all the way down Concourse F to Gate 17 hoping to be proven wrong. There he learned that "technical difficulties" of an unspecified nature were going to delay the departure of Flight 1007 for at least two hours.

As he walked the long way back down the concourse to the Club America, he recalled that C. Harry Whelan had called Miami International Airport "America's Token Third World Airport."

Say what you want about Harry-and there's a lot, all bad, to be said about Harry-but the sonofab.i.t.c.h does have a way with words.

Which is probably why he's always on Wolf News.

I wonder what they pay him for that?

Roscoe found a seat from which he could have a good view of one of the television sets hanging from the ceiling. Then he made three trips to the bar, ultimately returning to his seat with two gla.s.ses of Scotch whisky, a gla.s.s of water, a gla.s.s of ice cubes, a bowl of mixed nuts, and a bowl of potato chips. Then he settled in for the long wait.

When he looked up at the television, he saw C. Harry Whelan in conversation with Andy McClarren, the anything-but-amiable star of Wolf News's most popular program, The Straight Scoop The Straight Scoop.

The screen was split. On the right, McClarren and Whelan were shown sitting at a desk looking at a television monitor. On the left was what they were watching: at least two dozen police cars and ambulances, almost all with their emergency lights flashing, looking as if they were trying to get past some sort of gate.

A curved sign mounted over the gate read WELCOME TO FORT DETRICK.

Their pa.s.sage was blocked by three U.S. Army HMMWVs, each mounting a .50 caliber machine gun. HMMWV stood for "high-mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicle." With the acronym a little hard to p.r.o.nounce, the trucks were therefore commonly referred to as "Humvees."

"That was the scene earlier today at Fort Detrick, Harry," Andy McClarren said. "Can you give us the straight scoop on what the h.e.l.l was going on?"

You're not supposed to say naughty words on television, Roscoe thought as he sipped his Scotch, Roscoe thought as he sipped his Scotch, but I guess if you're Andy McClarren, host of the most-watched television news show, you can get away with a "h.e.l.l" every once in a while but I guess if you're Andy McClarren, host of the most-watched television news show, you can get away with a "h.e.l.l" every once in a while.

"A lot of arf-arf," Whelan said.

"What the h.e.l.l does that mean?"

Careful, Andy. That's two "h.e.l.l's," probably the most you can get away with. Three "h.e.l.l's," like three small boxes of wooden matches, will see the federal government landing on you in righteous indignation.

"That's the sound-you've heard it-dogs make when chasing their tails."

"You said that earlier today, didn't you?"

"Yes, I did. To describe various senior bureaucrats rushing around, chasing their tails."

"And so did President Clendennen. Or his spokesman, What's-his-name."

"John David Parker," Whelan offered, "more or less fondly known as 'Porky.'"

"Okay. So, Porky said the press was playing arf-arf, too. Which meant they were chasing their tails, right?"

"And so they were. Andy, do you really want to know what I think went on over there?"

"I want the straight scoop," McClarren said. "That's what we call the show."

"Okay. Take notes. There will be a quiz," Whelan said. "You know, Andy, right, that the United States has vowed never to use biological weapons against our enemies?"

"Uh-huh."

"This was largely because Senator Homer Johns, the junior senator from New Hampshire, thinks that while it is perfectly all right to shoot our enemies, or drop a bomb on them, it is unspeakably evil to use poison gas or some kind of biological weapon on them."

"You think poison gas is okay, Harry?"

"I think poison gas and biological weapons are terrible," Whelan said. "But let's talk about poison gas. In World War One, the Germans used poison gas on us, and we used it on them. It was terrible. In World War Two, the Germans didn't use poison gas, and neither did we. You ever wonder why?"

"You're going to tell me, right?"

"Because between the two wars, the Army developed some really effective poison gas. When we got in the war, and American troops were sent to Europe, so were maybe a half-dozen ships loaded with the new poison gas. We got word to the Germans that we wouldn't use our poison gas first, but if they did, we were prepared to gas every last one of them. They got the message. Poison gas was never used."

"Interesting."

"Then science came up with biological weapons. Our Army, in my judgment wisely, began to experiment with biological weapons. This happened at an obscure little Army base called Fort Detrick. The idea was that if our enemies-we're talking about Russia here-knew we really had first-cla.s.s biological weapons, they would be reluctant to use their biological weapons on us."

"Like the atom bomb?"

Harry Whelan nodded. "Like atomic bombs, Andy. We weren't nuked by the Russians because they knew that if they did, then Moscow would go up in a mushroom cloud. They called that 'mutual a.s.sured destruction.' The same theory was then applied to biological and chemical weapons.

"Then we had a President running for reelection. Senator Johns and his pals thought painting him as a dangerous warmonger would see their guy in the White House. When the inc.u.mbent President saw in the polls that this was working, he quickly announced that he was unilaterally taking the United States out of the chemical-biological warfare mutual destruction game. He announced we wouldn't use them, period, and ordered the destruction of all such weapons sitting around in ordnance warehouses.

"This saw him reelected. But Johns wouldn't let him forget his campaign promise. So the Army's biological warfare laboratories at Fort Detrick were closed and the fort became the home of the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command. What could be more opposite to biological warfare than medical research?

"Even Senator Johns was satisfied that the forces of virtue had triumphed, and we would never use evil biological warfare against our enemies.

"But Army medical research should, it seemed logical to a.s.sume, concern itself with what would happen to our soldiers-even our civilian population-should our enemies use biological warfare against us.

"With that in mind, the medical corps began to study the biological weapons in the Russian inventory. If they knew what the Russians were going to use against us, we could come up with antidotes, et cetera.

"How would we know what biological weapons the Russians had? Enter the CIA."

"Really?"

Harry Whelan nodded again. "They bribed the appropriate Russian scientists, and soon samples of the Russian biological inventory began to arrive at Fort Detrick for evaluation by the medical corps.

"Since it was the CIA's duty to evaluate the efficacy of enemy weapons, and since the best place to determine that was Fort Detrick, and since the medical corps was a little short of funds, the CIA thought it only fair that they pay for the investigation.

"This had the additional benefit-since CIA expenditures are cla.s.sified-of keeping Senator Johns and his pals from learning what was going on. Getting the picture, Andy?"

"That's a h.e.l.l of an accusation, Harry."