Mission of Honor (5 page)

“Pass,” said a voice as one of the flashlights snapped off.

Seronga had uttered their password, the name of their guardian deity. One of the guards left to inform Dhamballa that the team had returned.

The men walked ashore. Seronga quickly removed his boots, watching as the soldier carrying Father Bradbury set him on the shore. The priest fell back, wheezing through the mask, unable to move. The militiaman stood over the prisoner, while another soldier bound his hands. When they were finished, Seronga walked over. He grabbed Father Bradbury under an arm and hoisted him to his feet. The priest’s robes were thick with sweat.

“Let’s go,” Seronga said.

“I know your voice,” the priest gasped.

Seronga tugged on the priest’s slender arm.

“You are the leader,” the priest continued.

“I said let’s go,” Seronga replied.

Father Bradbury stumbled forward, and Seronga had to hold him up. When the clergyman regained his footing, the men started walking slowly through the warm, soft soil. Seronga directed the priest toward the main hut.

“I still do not understand,” Father Bradbury went on. “Why are you doing this?”

Seronga did not answer.

“The mask,” Father Bradbury implored. His voice was breathy and weak. “At least won’t you remove it?”

“When I have been instructed to do so,” Seronga replied.

“Instructed by whom?” the priest persisted. “I thought you were the leader.”

“Of these men,” Seronga said. He should never have answered the man. Additional information gave him new avenues to poke and prod.

“Then who are we going to see?” Father Bradbury asked.

Seronga was too tired to tell the priest to stop talking. They were almost at the hut. Though the Batawana native was leg weary, seeing the hut gave him strength. It was more than just the soft, welcoming glow through the wood slats. He was renewed by the knowledge of who was inside.

“Forget about me,” the priest said. “Have you no fear of God’s judgment? At least let me save your soul.”

His soul. What did this man know? Only what he had been taught. Seronga had seen life and death. He had seen Vodun power. He had no doubt about what he was doing.

“Look to your own soul and your own life,” Seronga advised.

“I have done that tonight,” Father Bradbury replied. “I am saved.”

“Good,” Seronga told him as they reached the hut. “Now you will have a chance to save the lives of others.”

Washington, D.C. Tuesday, 10:18 A.M.

For most of his career, Mike Rodgers had gotten up with the sun. There were soldiers to drill, battles to fight, crises to settle. Lately, however, Rodgers’s world had been quiet. There were reports to file about the mission to Kashmir, dossiers to review for possible new Strikers, and endless sessions with Liz Gordon. There was no reason to be in early.

Also, it was difficult to sleep. That made it damned difficult to get up as early as he once had. Fortunately, the decor and the caffeine at DiMaggio’s Joe brought him up to something resembling full speed.

Rodgers parked and walked toward the building. The rain had stopped. He carried his rolled-up newspaper, whacking it in his open hand. The blows smarted. The general was reminded of basic training, when he was taught how to roll newspaper tightly to form a knife. Another time, the DI showed them how to use a crumpled piece of newspaper or napkin to disable someone. If hand-to-hand combat were inevitable, all a soldier had to do was toss the scrap to one side. An opponent would always be distracted. During that moment-and a moment was all it took-the soldier could punch, stab, or shoot an adversary.

Rodgers entered the small, brightly lit reception area. A young female guard stood in a bulletproof glass booth just inside the door. She saluted smartly as Rodgers entered.

“Good morning, General,” the sentry said.

“Good morning,” Rodgers replied. He stopped. “Valentine,” he said.

“Go right in, sir,” the guard replied. She pressed a button that opened the elevator door.

Valentine was Rodgers’s personal password for the day. It was left on his secure GovNet E-mail pager the night before. Even if the guard had recognized Rodgers, he would not have been allowed to enter if his password did not match what was on her computer.

Rodgers rode the elevator to the basement. As he stepped out, he bumped into Bob Herbert.

“Robert!” Rodgers said.

“Morning, Mike,” Herbert said quietly.

“I was just coming to see you,” Rodgers said.

“To return some of the DVDs you borrowed?” Herbert asked.

“No. I haven’t been in the mood for Frank Capra,” Rodgers said. He handed Herbert the Washington Post. “Did you see the article about the kidnapping in Botswana?”

“Yes. They caught that item upstairs,” Herbert told him, refolding the newspaper.

“What do you make of it?” Rodgers asked.

“Too early to say,” Herbert answered truthfully.

“The uniforms don’t sound like the men were Botswana army regulars,” Rodgers went on.

“No,” Herbert agreed. “We haven’t had any reports of paramilitary activity in Botswana, but it could be a new group. Some idiot warlord who’s going to turn Botswana into the next Somalia. Or the soldiers could be expatriates from Angola, Namibia, any of the countries in the region.”

“Then why take a priest?” Rodgers asked. He was uncharacteristically anxious, tapping a foot and toying with a button on his uniform.

“Maybe they needed a chaplain,” Herbert said. “Or maybe the priest heard someone’s confession, and they want to know what was said. Why are you all over this, Mike?”

“There’s something about the size of the group and the timing of the attack that bothers me,” Rodgers said. “Why send so many soldiers to kidnap a single, unarmed man? And in daylight, no less. A small squad could have picked him up in the middle of the night.”

“That’s true,” Herbert agreed. “But you still haven’t told me why this is important. Do you know anyone over there? Do you recognize something about the abduction scenario?”

“No,” Rodgers admitted. “There’s just something about it-” He did not finish the thought.

Herbert’s eyes were on the general. Rodgers was restless. His eyes were searching, not steady as they usually were. There was an unhappy turn to his mouth. He looked like a man who had put something down and couldn’t remember where.

Herbert flipped over the newspaper and glanced at it. “You know, now you’ve got me thinking,” the intelligence chief said. “If this is a paramilitary unit that’s been dormant somewhere, maybe they chose this target as a way of announcing themselves without having to face a firefight. If it’s a new group, maybe they wanted to give their people some field experience. Or maybe they just miscalculated how long it would take to get to the church. Didn’t that happen to George Washington during the Revolution?”

“Yes,” Rodgers said. “It took him longer to cross the Delaware River than he had expected. Fortunately, the Brits were all asleep.”

“That was it,” Herbert said. “So there could be trouble percolating somewhere in southern Africa,” Herbert said. He slid the newspaper into the leather pocket on the side of his wheelchair. “I’ll make calls to our embassies, see if this smells dangerous to anyone. Find out if there’s any additional intel. Meanwhile, Paul was asking if you were in yet.”

Rodgers’s expression perked. “Did he hear from the CIOC?” the general asked.

“I don’t know,” Herbert said.

“He would have told you if he had,” Rodgers said.

“Not necessarily,” Herbert said. “He’s supposed to brief his number-two man first.”

“That’s according to the Good Book,” Rodgers said. The Good Book was what they called the National Grists Management Center Operations Book of Codes, Conduct, and Procedure. The CCP was as thick as the Bible and almost as idealized. It explained how life should be lived in a perfect world.

“Maybe Pope Paul’s found religion after all these years,” Herbert said.

“There’s one way to find out,” Rodgers said.

“Go get ‘em,” Herbert said.

“I will.” The general stepped around the wheelchair. “And thanks for checking out that priest for me.”

“My pleasure,” Herbert replied.

Rodgers threw him a casual salute and started down the hall. It was strange to hear Hood’s old nickname after all these years. Press liaison Ann Farris had given it to Hood because of his strict selflessness. Ironically, the name didn’t really apply. Early in his tenure, Hood had discontinued adherence to the CCP. He tossed the rule book when he realized that it was the antithesis to intelligence work. All an adversary needed to do was get a copy of the CCP from the government printing office to know exactly what OpCenter was going to do in a given situation. That included enemies outside the country as well as rivals inside the U.S. intelligence community itself. When Hood retired the CCP, his nickname went with it.

Hood’s door was closed when Rodgers arrived. The director’s assistant, Bugs Benet, was sitting in a cubicle directly across from the door. Bugs told Rodgers that Hood was on a personal call.

“I don’t expect it to be a long conversation,” Benet said.

“Thanks,” Rodgers said. The door was soundproof. Rodgers stood beside it and waited.

Hood was probably talking to his wife, Sharon. The two had recently reached an agreement on terms for their divorce. From what little Hood had confided to Rodgers, their primary goal now was the rehabilitation of their daughter, Harleigh. The young girl was one of the hostages taken by terrorists at the United Nations. After nearly a half year of intensive therapy, Harleigh was at last beginning to recover from the trauma she had suffered. For weeks after the crisis, she had done little more than cry or stare.

Rodgers understood what Harleigh was feeling. The general was luckier than the young woman. The difference between an adult and an adolescent was a lifetime of anger. “Impotent rage” was what Liz Gordon had called it. When a kid took an emotional beating, he tended to feel victimized. He shut down the way Harleigh had done. When an adult took a hit, it often tapped into buried resentment. He let it out. That aggressiveness did not heal the trauma, but it did provide fuel to keep the individual going.

“He’s off now, General,” Bugs said.

The general nodded. He did not have to knock. There was a small security camera in the upper left corner. Hood already knew Rodgers was there.

“Good morning, Mike,” Hood said.

“Morning.”

“Sit down,” Hood said. He did not say anything else.

The general lowered himself into one of the room’s two armchairs. He knew then that Hood was troubled. Whenever Paul Hood had bad news, he did not engage in top-of-the morning chat. The only thing Mike Rodgers did not know was whether this was personal or professional. And if it was professional, which one of them it was about.

Hood did not waste time getting to the point.

“Mike, I received an Emailed letter of resolution from Senator Fox early this morning,” Hood told him. He regarded the general. “The CIOC has voted unanimously not to allow the NCMC to rebuild its military capacity.”

Rodgers felt as if someone had driven a baseball bat into his gut. “That’s knee-jerk bullshit.”

“Whatever it is, the decision is final,” Hood said.

“We can’t restaff Striker?” Rodgers said, still in disbelief.

Hood looked down. “No.”

“But they can’t order that,” Rodgers protested.

“They have-“

“No!” Rodgers said. “Striker is mandated by charter. Fox would need an act of Congress to change it. Even if we sent Striker on an unauthorized mission, the CCP very clearly states that disciplinary actions are to be directed against the commanders in the field and at HQ, and not against the unit individually or in total. I’ll send her the chapter and verse.”

“They took pains to point out that this is not a disciplinary action,” Hood told him.

“Like hell it isn’t!” Rodgers snapped. Senator Fox had poked a hole in his rage. He was fighting to control it. “Fox and the CIOC doesn’t want one, because if they investigate us under DA charges, the hearing has to be public. The press would put her against a wall and pull the trigger. We stopped a goddamn war. They know it. She has no reason other than pressure from other agencies to shut us down. Hell, even Mala Chatterjee had good things to say about us.”

Mala Chatterjee was the Indian-born secretary-general of the United Nations. Before the Striker action in Kashmir, she had been fiercely critical of Paul Hood’s handling of the United Nations situation.

“Mike, we stepped on the toes of the military and made things rough for the embassy in New Delhi,” Hood said.

“Aw, I’m bleeding for them,” Rodgers said. “Would they have preferred dealing with a nuclear attack?”

“Mike, what was going on between Pakistan and India was not our official business,” Hood said. “We went in to reconnoiter, not intervene. Yes, you have humanitarian rights on your side. They have political ramifications on their side. That’s why the CIOC is hitting us so hard.”

“No, they’re just hitting us low,” Rodgers shot back. “They don’t have the balls to hit hard. They’re like my friggin’ Uncle Johnny who didn’t have a car but liked to take drives. He called realtors and asked them to show him houses. The CIOC doesn’t have a car, or money, but they’re working us.”

“Yes, the CIOC is working us,” Hood said. “And yes, they’re doing it very quietly and very effectively.”

“I hope you told them to stuff their little letter,” Rodgers said.

“I did not,” Hood replied.

“What?” Rodgers said. That felt like the small end of the baseball bat.

“I informed Senator Fox that the NCMC would comply with the resolution,” Hood said.

“But they’re cowards, Paul!” Rodgers yelled. “You kowtowed to a bunch of sheep.”

Hood said nothing. Rodgers took a long breath. He had to reel it in. He was not going to get anywhere beating up on Paul Hood.

“Fine,” Hood agreed at last. “They’re cowards. They’re sheep. But you’ve got to give them credit for one thing.”

“What’s that?” Rodgers asked.

“They did something that we did not,” Hood replied. “They did this thing legally.” Hood opened a file on the computer and swung the monitor toward Rodgers. “Have a look.”