Capitol Punishment (An Art Jefferson Thriller Book 3) Read online

  “Did you get any quantity readings for the base?”

  “Too much evaporation to tell,” Orwell answered, shaking his head. He scrolled further through the data. “Here’s our activator reagents.”

  The binary chemical weapon consisted of two parts, separated until mixed for use: the base and the activator. The base, which was a sort of generous chemical receptor, mixed with the more important activator. This activator gave the weapon its “personality.” Several variations of known agents were possible depending upon how much one “tweaked” the activator, which made identification of its precise ingredients necessary in order to determine its lethality.

  “Dimethyl sulfate, sulfur dioxide, ethyl—ethyl?”

  The reading caught Orwell’s eye as well.

  “This says ethyl mercaptan,” the sergeant said. “That should be methyl mercaptan.”

  “I know.” Orwell was already reading the rest of the data on-screen, his heart rate rising.

  “Sulfur dioxide,” the sergeant continued. “That’s right. Ethy—” He stopped, staring at the screen.

  “Ethylene glycol dinitrate,” Orwell said, finishing the sergeant’s words.

  “That’s got to be wrong! It has to be!” The sergeant took the printout and read the hard copy to confirm that what he saw on the screen was not some anomaly. It wasn’t. “It isn’t.”

  “Dammit.”

  “Did you get a quantity on this?” the sergeant asked.

  “Yes.”

  “How much?”

  Orwell didn’t answer with words. His expression said Enough.

  “Dear God.”

  “Finish that sentence, Sergeant, and ask for His help,” Orwell said. He stood and slid by his subordinate, heading for the door. “We’re going to need it.”

  TWO

  Before the Horse

  “The Federal Bureau of Investigation has just confirmed that the incident north of Los Angeles initially reported as only a hazardous chemical mishap was actually a potentially disastrous spill of a military-style chemical weapon known as VX,” the CNN anchor reported, reading from news copy just handed him. “VX is a nerve gas common to the stockpiles of the military forces of both the United States and the former Soviet Union. At a news conference just carried live on CNN, Special Agent in Charge Jerry Donovan of the Los Angeles FBI office reported that the nerve gas was manufactured illicitly by a still unidentified person and released during some sort of mishap. Donovan repeated assurances that there is no reason to believe any of the nerve gas has fallen into the wrong...”

  Bud DiContino muted the television as his phone buzzed.

  “DiContino.”

  “Bud, it’s Gordy.”

  “Hey, I just caught your man in L.A. on CNN,” Bud said. “He handled it well.”

  The exasperation came through the phone in the form of a sigh before Director Jones spoke. “I’m not so sure. I’m faxing you something right now.”

  Bud heard the low hum of the whisper-quiet machine and pulled the pages out as they came through, scanning them quickly.

  “We’ve got trouble,” Jones said, using those words that no one at this level of government wanted to hear.

  Bud scanned the last page just after the director’s warning. Fast reading was a necessity in government service, the need for such a skill increasing proportionally the higher one progressed. There wasn’t any higher than the West Wing of the White House, and few faster than the NSA. “When did this info come in?”

  “Still the speed-reading champion, I see,” Jones quipped. “Less than an hour ago.”

  “Did...what’s his name?”

  “Donovan,” Jones prompted. “No, he didn’t know this. But he also didn’t have any authorization to say what he did.”

  Bud tossed pages haphazardly onto his desk. “Dammit, Gordy! He goes on national TV and tells everybody things are under control, and then this!”

  “I know, Bud.”

  Bud picked up the last page and read the important section of the fax once more. “This is confirmed?”

  “By the Army commander on-scene. He rammed this through channels and into the Pentagon at light speed to get it here.”

  “Christ!” Bud exclaimed. “What’s Drew have out there—a four-star?”

  “A young buck captain,” Jones replied. Secretary of Defense Andrew Meyerson was also sufficiently impressed with the young officer’s tenacity, the FBI director knew from the call the secretary had made to pass the info along.

  “That takes balls,” Bud said. He thought again of the press briefing just completed. “I hope you’re going to bite a big chunk out of Donovan’s ass.”

  “I will. Don’t worry. He’s only been running the show out there for a while, but he knows better than to give everybody the safe signal on something like this before checking with me first. No excuse at all.”

  So a SAC was going to get the riot act read to him in a major way. As necessary as that was, it still wouldn’t undo the damage already done. “So what’s the plan now?”

  “Silence,” Jones said.

  “This may not be the best time to close our mouths, Gordy. Think of how the press will play it. FBI flubs first by telling the public all is A-OK, then they hide their mistake when it’s discovered. It doesn’t look good.”

  “I’m not concerned with appearances right now, Bud. That was the mistake Donovan made. He jumped the gun because he wanted this wrapped up. I’ve seen it before.” And Jones had suspected the new SAC in L.A. might live up to those low standards. But the senior senator from a state that possessed forty-three electoral votes liked the smoothness of Donovan, and certain things in the political arena had to be accepted with bared teeth disguised as a smile. “I don’t want this out because it might hamper what my people are going to have to do. L.A. is going to have to figure out more than just ‘who’ and ‘why’ now. We have to add ‘where’ to that list The press is going to find out at some point in any case. I just don’t want it to hamper an investigation. Hey, I’ll stand up to the plate afterwards and say that we fucked up royally. Until then, I don’t need reporters hounding me or my agents about a bad situation gone worse.”

  Jones did make his point with conviction. Bud was still uneasy about it, but he was not the number-two cop in the land. “You know what’s best, Gordy. So what is your read on this?”

  “I won’t know until I get something from L.A.”

  “When?”

  “Tonight I’m going to talk to Donovan after we’re done. I want his assistant to oversee this. Lou Hidalgo is his name. You know he lost a son in what happened? A fireman.”

  “Yeah, I read that in the Post. Is he going to be up to it?”

  “Lou is tough. But he will just be oversight. There are a couple agents already on the investigation working the Allen aspect of things. I’m sure Lou will use them as lead.”

  “I know from experience you have good people out there,” Bud said. “This Allen fellow had some pretty nasty affiliations, didn’t he?”

  “Aryan Brotherhood. But they operate pretty much behind bars, and he’s been out and on the run for quite a while. Like I said, I’ll know more later.”

  “Fair enough,” Bud said, knowing some things had to wait. But some things couldn’t. “Gordy, to be safe I’m going to have to let some people in on this.”

  “I understand. Just be particular.”

  “You know it,” Bud assured the director, then hung up. A sandwich was on his desk, calling his name, but Bud had some calling that needed to come first. The first number he dialed was that of the president’s chief of staff. After a brief conversation requesting a meeting he dialed the other. It was answered by the supervising agent of the Secret Service presidential detail.

  * * *

  Cat and Dog. The title of the book John Barrish held while sitting in the overstuffed chair might have led one to believe that the subject was rudimentary reading skills for children. But it was not.

  There is the cat,
an obvious hunter, difficult to domesticate and train, cunning, yet susceptible to the distraction of simple stimuli such as a string dangled before it. Then there is the dog, a thinker, able to follow commands to a much higher degree than the cat. It learns. It is loyal. It obeys commands of logic presented to it. It is discerning.

  The cat and the dog inhabit the planet together. They are each prolific breeders. Yet they have never mixed, never attempted to meld their distinct selves into one bastardized offspring. Why? Why?

  “Because they know better,” John said aloud, answering the question posed by the book’s author, Dr. Felix Trent, a social and racial theorist from the early part of the century whose writings and teachings had helped a very angry and a very confused young John Barrish find the proper way to channel his energetic convictions on the subject of race.

  Because they know better. The cat functions as a more primitive creature, successful in the environment it chooses. The dog functions at a higher level in its own environment. Logic tells the two not to mix. No biological reasoning need be added.

  For the African and the Aryan the question is the same, as it is for all other races defined by their bloodline and simpler cultures. The African is a hunter, a gatherer, a master of an uncivilized environment whereby its natural physical strengths and lack of inhibiting moral codes allow it to thrive. The Aryan is of a higher order, an organizer, a builder, an exploiter of tools and technology. There can be no dispute to this, nor can there be a dispute that any mixing of these races, whether by habitation in proximity to one another or by, in a more serious and tragic sense, relations that produce mixed offspring, will end in disaster. The animals know better. So should we.

  It was just the foreword to one of Trent’s many books, but it was powerful, John thought. So simple. Separation. Was it so hard a concept to understand? It was not for him. The Africans—why people persisted in antagonizing them by calling them niggers and the like was beyond him—could have Africa. The Aryans of pure blood could have America, the country built by white people, and parts of Europe, though he believed that so much mixing had occurred there that that continent was best abandoned, surrendered to the Gypsies and their cohorts. America would be for the white man.

  John closed the book with a satisfying slap that coincided with the opening of the front door. His eldest boy was back. Finally! he thought, hoping some questions would now be answered. “What happened?”

  “I don’t know, Pop,” Toby Barrish said, shrugging apologetically.

  “The TV said there was an accident,” Barrish said, the force in his words exceeded by the menace in his posture. His feet shuffled on the living room carpet like a bull’s before the charge.

  “Calm down, Pop,” Toby said. “I checked the stuff. It’s safe.”

  “But what the hell happened out there?!” Barrish demanded, his small neck bulging and his teeth gritted as short breaths whistled through them.

  “I don’t know. Freddy was supposed to take care of things after I picked up the stuff. When I left him he was going to go back in and do it.”

  Barrish rubbed a hand over his head and turned away from his son. Through the doorway to the kitchen he saw his wife looking at him, her face covered with that same, weak expression of what she thought was concern. He rejected that, from her or from anyone. John Barrish did not need sympathy. He did not need pity. Both offerings were from and for the meek, and he could be characterized as nothing if not the total opposite of that.

  “Pop, there’s no way they can trace any of what happened to us,” Toby assured him. “I was careful with Freddy. Real careful.”

  Barrish faced his son again. “I knew you would be. This just shouldn’t have happened.”

  “I know.”

  It had to be Freddy the federal pig was talking about on TV when he mentioned a dead fugitive. Freddy was that, to be certain. But then the pig from the Internal Robbery Service had it coming, John believed. It hadn’t been done cleanly, but some resistance actions were bound to be messy. Freddy simply came from a group that subscribed to the belief that the dirtier the action was, the better.

  “I’m glad he’s out of the picture,” Barrish said. “You did good keeping him at arm’s length, Toby.”

  “I knew he didn’t fit into our group, Pop, but he served a purpose. Means to an end,” Toby added as an afterthought.

  “That’s right,” Barrish agreed. “When is the meeting?”

  “Monday,” Toby answered. “Stan and I are going to meet them at the zoo.”

  Barrish’s eyes looked down in thought briefly. “Keep an eye on Stanley. He’s still young.”

  “He just needs a little toughening, that’s all,” Toby said. “This’ll help.”

  Barrish nodded acceptance of his eldest’s belief. “And you watch the Africans. You hear me?” He tapped his temple with a single finger. “They may be feeble up here, but they have centuries of genes on their side in the muscle department.”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  “Make sure Stanley understands that, too,” Barrish admonished his son.

  “I will.”

  The heat of the moment was subsiding now. Barrish let several breaths loose to unwind further. “I want to see it.”

  The words took Toby by surprise. “That’s not a good idea, Pop. You should be as far away from the stuff as possible.”

  “I want to see it,” he repeated, his wish obviously not up for further discussion. “Tonight.”

  “Okay, Pop. Tonight.”

  THREE

  Relations

  Darren Griggs wondered how one man could hate so much. He had puzzled over the same question more than a year before, when the name of John Barrish sparked images of a pitiful man who was so fearful of those whose skin was of a darker hue than his that he would champion their removal from “white” America. Now, as the head of a family torn apart by the actions of that same man he had pitied, Darren Griggs knew that he could hate even more.

  Yet his hate was more profound. It came from a place inside that used to be filled with a contrasting emotion. Now there was a blazing inferno there. His rage was burning, aching for vengeance, consuming its host as it searched for a target of opportunity. It had tempted him to strike out at his own family, but he resisted, burying it deeper. His wife, already destroyed by the vicious murder of her little girl, was little more than a shell of the woman she had been. His son, who had doted on his little sister like any big brother would, was now more of an adversary in their family structure than a member. He thrived on conflict, savoring it, even in the smallest amounts. Arguments with his defenseless mother. Defiance of his father. And, even though Moises was of age, this devastated his father, who had always been the closest of friends with his son. Now the rift could hardly be wider.

  And what could Darren do? He himself was teetering on the brink, ready to succumb to destructive urges, which would destroy the last vestige of shaky stability in his family. And that knowledge had guided him to the logical answer to the question. There was something he could do. Something he had to do.

  Darren left his car a block and a half from La Brea and began walking east, his right hand curled around the rolled-up flyer. He had memorized the address, which would be just across La Brea and south a half a block or so. He knew so from having driven by a dozen times or more in the past week, hoping each time the courage to stop and go through with it would come to him. This time it had.

  As he walked he was the subject of much interest from the residents of the neighborhood. He was an outsider; that was of no doubt. Half of those whose eyes were cast upon him looked out from under the wide brims of coal-black hats, their faces framed by long, regal beards. Children with curls dangling in front of their ears stared the most at the black man walking down their street, not because he was black, but because he was not like the other black men their parents had chased out of the neighborhood. He was dressed nice, not fancy, like Mr. Katz at the shoe store. This black man was clean, and h
e wasn’t pushing a shopping cart piled with bags and cans and blankets. He wasn’t dirty, and he didn’t have lots of little plastic bags in his hand. He looked almost normal, except that he was black.

  Darren glanced left and right as he moved down the block. He saw some of the stares, and felt others. And he knew why he was suddenly the focus of attention. He also didn’t care. There were more important things to worry about, more pressing matters at hand. He had hate to deal with; this was just fear.

  The evening rush hour was almost over, and Darren had little trouble crossing La Brea. He trotted through a break in traffic and turned right, his feet moving him toward the building frontage he had memorized from numerous no-stop passes in his car. Just inside the lobby, through twin glass doors that let the bright lights spill out onto the darkening street, Darren saw the signboard. He rubbed a nervous thumb on the roll of paper in his hand and uncurled it. Race and Hate: A Program on Understanding. The words on the sign and the flyer in his hand were the same, and the fact that he had it at all was another product of his daughter’s murder. If his son hadn’t started getting into trouble with the law Darren would never have had to come down to an attorney’s office two weeks before, and if that office hadn’t been just a half-mile from where he now stood, and if there hadn’t been a flyer stuck on his car windshield when he came out...

  Coincidence or design, Darren didn’t care. It had happened, maybe for a purpose, maybe not, but he was here, standing outside the Hanna Schonman Jewish Community Center in the heart of the Fairfax District of Los Angeles holding on to a piece of paper that told of understanding, and to a thread of hope that it could all be true.

  Darren Griggs hated himself for hating others, and he wanted it to stop. For his sake, and for his family’s.

  With that determination he pushed the glass doors inward and followed the signs to the indicated room. The door was closed. He knew he was late, a product of his trepidation, but the cliché fit in this circumstance. Never just wasn’t an option. Darren took the knob in hand and opened the door, hoping, praying desperately that his mind and heart would follow.