The Overseer (57 page)

He hung up and turned off the lamp. Again, he sat in silence, all too aware of the tightness in his shoulders. He knew he would have to wake her, as he always did. And she would take him, caress his back, rub her strong, thick hands along his thighs, drive him to climax and then let him drift off in her arms. For thirty years, he had wanted no other, had found salvation in no other. She had always understood. She would
understand
again.

 

Laurence Sedgewick sat in the limousine, eyes riveted to the screen in front of him. A Mozart horn concerto filled the space, strangely incongruous with the images he watched. Bodies lay strapped to stretchers, others as yet untended sprawled across the grass and mud, eyes open, deathly still against the constant movement around the house. Police were everywhere, cordoning off windows, doors, a collection of guns they had assembled between two patrol cars. Cameras also dotted the landscape, network teams busy with questions, early-morning reports dispatched to stations around the country. A cameraman transmitting to a private car drew no special attention.

Senator George Maxwell Schenten was dead, shot to death in his upstate home, signs of an extensive battle in evidence. Already, the newspeople were raising questions about foreign involvement—a reaction to the
senator’s
policy on a united Europe? An extremist fed up with Schenten’s open criticism of Islamic fundamentalism? Or was it somehow connected to the events that had been occurring across the country? The police declined to speculate.

The phone rang.

“Yes.” Sedgewick continued to watch the screen.

“They’ve begun to match fingerprints. They should have Jaspers and Trent within five minutes.”

“And the records?”

“Updated to indicate connections to the killings in Germany and Italy. We’re also ready to leak her history in Jordan.”

“Good. A slow drip, I hope.”

“An unnamed official, excerpts from a confidential file. Acceptable?”

“Difficult to acquire.”

“But not impossible. The reference should be enough.”

“Agreed. Naturally, you’ll let the boys from Washington put the pieces together themselves. We wouldn’t want any of them to think that they’ve been handed their suspects.”

“Of course. Do we pursue?”

“Only if asked,” answered Sedgewick. “We’ll be in touch.”

 

Anton Votapek tramped across the open field, the few clumps of brown grass underfoot the last vestiges of a once-lush soccer pitch. The rest was a mass of petrified mud, shaped by the spiked soles of eager cleats, hardened to rigid mounds of soil by chilled Montana nights. Beyond the goalpost stood a
single
building. Votapek mounted its steps and opened the door. The fire across the room beckoned, as did a pair of leather chairs planted comfortably by the blaze. He sat and picked up the receiver on the small side table.

“Hello.”

“Anton.” The voice was tired but alert. He did not like to be kept
waiting
. “You said it was urgent when you called before.”

“Yes,” answered Votapek. “I was hoping not to wake you, but I didn’t think it could wait.”

“I am sure you are right. Especially given recent events.”

Votapek waited, then spoke. “Alison’s missing.” His eyes remained fixed on the blaze.

“I see.”

“It’s impossible to say when. Sometime in the last two days.”

There was a pause. “Laurence told you this?”

“Yes.”

“And he is concerned?”

“Yes.”

“Why was this permitted to happen?”

“We can only assume—”

“The Trent woman,” interrupted the old man, his voice no less steady.

“Yes.”

“I find it hard to understand why she is proving to be so difficult. She was on the train with Pritchard—that is what we were told by that boy from the NSC. And you mean to say no one recognized her, that no one realized there could be only one reason for Arthur to be on that train?”

“It wasn’t their priority—”

“‘Their
priority
’? What could be more pressing than a woman who is utterly determined to undermine everything we have been working for? I have made it quite clear. Alone, she poses no threat, but with Alison … who is to say what might be believed? We have no place for such distractions.”

“I agree. Alison is of the utmost importance—”

“We have been through this, Anton. Personal sentiment only gets in the way. Your feelings for the girl, however strong they may be—”

“Then why do you continue to protect Jaspers?” A log shifted, flames darting through the tumbled recess.

For a moment, the old man remained silent; when he spoke, the words were simple, direct. “That has nothing to do with sentiment.”

“You really believe that?”

“You think you understand, Anton? You understand
nothing
.” He had little patience for Votapek’s goading. “Was Jaspers at Schenten’s home?”

“Yes.”

“And the conversation is on tape?”

“Yes. They knew about the schedule even before Schenten brought it up.”

“And they were eager to find it.”

“Very.” Votapek began to fiddle with a stray piece of thread dangling from the chair’s arm. Trying his best to sound casual, he added, “Schenten also told him that he had been …
selected
. That the overseer—I assume he meant you—had chosen him. We didn’t understand what that meant.”

“Did the senator mention my name?”

Votapek waited before answering. “Our men arrived before he could say anything.” He dropped the thread. “His explanation would have been—”

“Of no consequence.”

“Laurence and Jonas think otherwise.”

Votapek heard the deep breath. “And what does that mean, Anton?”

“It means,” he said, a slight waver in his voice, “that they find Schenten’s remarks a little puzzling. We’ve all been under the impression that Jaspers stumbled onto all of this
accidentally
. If it’s otherwise …”

“Yes, Anton?” Impatience now turned to irritation. “What would
that
mean? What would Laurence and Jonas have to say about
that
?”

“I … I don’t know.” Silence.

“Of course you do not know, because you speak without thinking—Jonas the worst of you, his belief that he is somehow cleverer than the rest. Perhaps that is why it was clear from such an early age that he belonged in politics. But you, Anton, you were smarter than that. I always hoped it would pass, that you and Laurence would see his prattling for what it was.”

“He said we needed to eliminate the problem.”

“
Miss
Trent
is the problem, Anton.”

With as much courage as he could muster, Votapek answered, “That’s not what Jonas said.”

Again, he paused before answering. “I see. And what
did
he say?”

Votapek remained silent.

“What have you done, Anton?” The words were almost a whisper. “My God, what have the three of you
done
?”

 

Sarah sat across from Xander, her second refill nearly gone, the waitress too busy to take any notice of the empty cup. Instead, she was chatting with a driver, a young man whose interests clearly lay in more than just coffee and pancakes. He had even removed the meshed baseball cap from his head, smoothing back the greasy blond curls in an attempt to make himself more presentable; it was having the desired effect, the young woman’s lips peeling up to her gums in a frighteningly toothy smile. Sarah couldn’t help but stare, her gaze fixed on the large yellow teeth, her fatigue stripping her of the will to turn away. No thoughts. Only smile, teeth, gums. Even Xander slipped from her mind, his complete self-absorption in the book lost to her fixation. He flipped a page, the movement enough to draw her attention.

She watched him, elbows firm on the table, right hand clenched in a thick tuft of hair as his eyes flew through the words on the page. If he was tired, he was doing his best to fight it, his knee shaking with nervous intensity. All thoughts of Schenten had clearly been set aside. For the moment, the scholar was back at work. Sarah sipped at her coffee and continued to watch. It was good to have him so close again.

“They’ve got to have an army of people to do all of this,” said Xander, not bothering to look up from the page. “Rapid-fire disruptions, phases to be carried out by different groups of people—one to plant the explosives, another to position them, still others to set them off. Where Eisenreich took weeks to instigate his chaos, they’re taking days, sometimes hours. Plus, they’ve got things going on all across the country, timed out to the minute.”

“How long a period are we talking about?” asked Sarah.

“Eight days.
Eight
days of sequential terror. The irony is that very few things in here could be described as catastrophic. The first one on the list”—he flipped back a few pages—“reaches completion in two days.” He looked up. “At least we have some time before they start by bombing the Capitol.”

“And that doesn’t strike you as catastrophic?”

“Symbolically, yes. As a means to social upheaval, no. Look at Oklahoma three years ago. It was despicable, tragic—however else you want to describe it. And for two weeks, every militia in the country got ten minutes on
Nightline
. But that was it. We were all horrified, outraged, but then we happily forgot about it. By itself, that bomb didn’t create the kind of panic our friends want.” He flipped a few pages ahead.

“Which is?”

“Suppose something else had happened that day—a systemwide failure of the computer network at Southwestern Bell, or every tunnel and bridge leading into Manhattan out of commission, all in less than five hours? Then it would have been a little more frightening, a little more overwhelming.”

“And that’s what they’re planning to do?”

“Replace Oklahoma with the Capitol and you have numbers one, eight, and seventeen on their list. The first raises the question of national security, perhaps even foreign involvement; the others confirm those fears and heighten panic. It’s what they did in Washington and Chicago writ large. You put those little events together, making sure that their timing is
precise
, and you can create the sort of chaos that makes the big events seem much larger than they are. It’s right out of the manuscript.”

One on top of another, on top of another. Tieg’s words
. “How many?”

“Forty-eight. The grand finale is the assassination of the president.”

Sarah shook her head. “How original.”

“It’s not the killing that’s important to them.”

“That’s
reassuring.”

“It’s the way people will
see
it that will make the difference.”

“I don’t follow.”

“Think about it. When JFK was shot, people talked about conspiracy, but most of them regarded it as the act of a deranged gunman. Sorrow, betrayal, anger—those were the prevailing sentiments.”

“Not mass hysteria.”

“Exactly. When they kill Wainwright, his death won’t be an isolated
incident
, but the ultimate act in a sequence of battering blows against the republic, a sign that the country has become too weak or too corrupt to maintain order. Whether it’s seen as a conspiracy won’t matter. All people will feel is despair, a sense that everything has fallen apart.”