Zimmerman's Algorithm Read online

  But the only thing behind Gideon at that point was a mass of panicked civilians.

  But someone had shot first, starting that firefight, and it wasn't Lionel. There had been another shooter on the platform. There was little sign that anyone was investigating that, and—at this point—Gideon doubted he would be welcomed if he brought it to the department's attention.

  Shit.

  He spent the rest of the evening getting himself acquainted with Lionel, the guy who was responsible for Rafe's death.

  Gideon only stopped his computer research to hobble downstairs and watch the television. He had been waiting for this moment for a long time. Three-thirty PM, the press conference announcing the Senate investigation into the Daedalus incident.

  By three he was sitting on his couch in the living room, his foot propped up on the table in front of him. On his lap was a copy of the opening statement that Mayor Harris' speech writer had drafted for him.

  On the screen, Senator Daniel Tenroyan, Republican from Maine, was talking to reporters. He looked like an

  English professor, standing in front of a podium as if giving a lecture to a bored classroom. ". . . the first hearings will be held on April second, and should last for two weeks. Because of some sensitive testimony we'll be hearing about the Daedalus computer, these hearings will be in closed session—"

  Gideon sat up, spilling Mayor Harris' statement from his lap. He wasn't the only one that Tenroyan had caught by surprise. The entire press corps had erupted in a flurry of overlapping questions. For a moment Tenroyan was stuck, unable to be heard over the reporters' questions, his stillness highlighted by camera flashes.

  The anchorman cut in, saying, "There you have it. There will be a House-Senate investigation of the shooting of two law enforcement officers by the Secret Service, but the hearings will be in closed session. That means that there'll be no press coverage of the hearings themselves. There's no word yet on whether there'll be any offers of immunity in exchange for testimony . . ."

  "I don't believe it," Gideon muttered. He looked down at the canned speech—an emotional plea for the financial salvation of the D.C. police department.

  The statement was pretty much irrelevant now. It was one thing when an opening statement was in public view on CNN, it was another when only a few Congressmen and Senators would hear it—the people responsible for perpetuating the problem in the first place.

  They had to know something was wrong here. There was something more than a simple fuckup that had gotten his brother killed. But the people who were supposedly investigating were turning away from it. First the DA and the grand jury avoiding the subject, and now Congress wanting to hide the whole process from prying eyes— bargaining with immunity at the same time.

  "Fucking politics," Gideon muttered.

  Gideon knew what it was. Some bastard stood to be embarrassed, someone powerful enough to put the brakes on the investigation. It infuriated Gideon.

  He reached over and picked up the phone. With the Administration bearing down on this, there was no one left on the force he could turn to. But there was at least one ex-cop he knew who might be able to help him.

  Gideon called the number for the man who had been his first partner as a detective. He muted the television as a deep voice answered, "Kendal Associates Consulting."

  "You still answer your own phone, Morris?"

  "That who I think it is?"

  "Yes, it is," Gideon said. "You up for meeting me for dinner?"

  "Five to one they never even return an indictment," Gideon said, stabbing a piece of lamb stir-fry with his fork. His aim was a little off; he was still wasn't completely used to eating with his left hand.

  Morris Kendal looked across the table at him and shook his head. "You're being pessimistic." Kendal was a large man, nearly three hundred pounds. He was bald, black, and built like a pro wrestler.

  They were sitting in a Mongolian barbecue restaurant a block east of the garish Chinatown Friendship Arch spanning H Street. They sat a few tables away from a circular dais where a quartet of chefs were grilling the patrons' meals.

  Kendal had been a ten-year veteran of the detective bureau when they paired Gideon with him. Kendal had spent two years as his partner, teaching him, keeping him from screwing up too badly. Gideon had had no idea how lucky he had been to have been assigned to Kendal, not until Kendal announced that he was retiring and going into business for himself.

  At the time, his mentor's decision had surprised him. Kendal had seemed every inch a cop and it was impossible to envision him as anything else. Now Kendal was making about six times as much as a private security consultant as he'd ever made as a detective. He drove a Mercedes and wore thousand-dollar suits. Now the only thing that surprised Gideon about Kendal's move was the fact that he hadn't made it a lot sooner.

  Somehow, Kendal's skepticism about what was happening with the investigation seemed too reminiscent of Rafe's skepticism about Lionel. "Look," Gideon said, "this kind of crap worries me. It's not like he didn't know what he wasn't asking." Gideon finally speared the strip of lamb.

  "So what does this have to do with you asking me to dinner?"

  "I need someone to get to the bottom of this thing."

  Kendal grinned. "There isn't anything here to get to the bottom of—"

  "I know you've got contacts in the CIA—"

  "—and even if there was, you couldn't afford me."

  "I'm asking this as a favor."

  Kendal laughed. "A favor? I'll say this, they didn't shoot off your balls."

  "Come on. This isn't just cop pride—they killed Rafe, Morris. I saw the top of his skull peel away, and his wife just about believes I shot him myself." Gideon shook his head. "I've spent hours with IA. If someone big's behind it, who you think will get tagged with the blame?"

  "You're being paranoid."

  "Am I?" Gideon shook his head. "The Attorney General of the United States might have to resign over this, and he’s probably taking the fall for somebody—"

  "Taking the fall?"

  "I told you what I saw. Silencers? Black ninja suits with 'Treasury' hidden until the last minute? I doubt those were Lloyd's boys."

  "So, what, you think you stumbled on some black op? Who by? The CIA?"

  Gideon shrugged. "I don't know. An agency with the clout to stonewall a grand jury and convince Congress to close the investigation to public scrutiny."

  The air was filled with the smell of roasting pork as the chefs emptied someone's bowl onto the grill.

  "Free suggestion," Kendal said.

  "Yes?"

  "Walk away."

  Gideon shook his head. "You think I could if I wanted to?"

  Kendal attacked his bowl of chicken, pineapple, and rice. He took a few bites, shaking his head all the while. "You know the odds of you just stumbling in on someone's clandestine operation? And if you're right, you know what you're getting into? You're my friend, don't get mixed up in this."

  Gideon leaned over and said, "I'm mixed up in it now. This is the nation's number one screwup and they need someone to hang the blame on."

  "You think you're being prepped for that duty?"

  "IA has been glued to me. This guy, Magness, eyes me like he's already scripting the trial."

  "You need to get into this?" Kendal took another slow bite of his chicken. "You have a story, and you have the triggermen, right?"

  "How long before they turn the screwup into the work of one reckless cop?"

  "Was it?"

  Gideon's throat clenched shut and his fork clattered to his plate. "How can you—"

  "You're too close to this. Can you tell me that it wasn't?"

  Gideon lowered his eyes and whispered. "He was my brother."

  He heard the scrape as Kendal pushed his chair away. Gideon looked up at the man, who towered over him like an impending avalanche. "You aren't going to help me."

  Kendal shook his head. "I've always been willing to back you up. You know that. I wi
ll look into this for you," he walked up and squeezed Gideon's shoulder. "But I just want you to know that there isn't

  necessarily a conspiracy here just because you happen to need one."

  1.09 Sat. Mar. 7

  P resident John Rayburn sat behind his desk in the Oval Office, his chair half-turned toward the window, away from the other men in the room. He was possibly the most physically imposing man to occupy that seat since L.B.J. He loomed over everyone, even when he was seated and only half paying attention.

  The two other men in the office with him were his National Security Adviser, Emmit D'Arcy, a short man with thick glasses that he kept adjusting on his nose; and the director of the CIA, Lawrence Fitzsimmons, a man with sandy brown hair and a dead gray beard.

  Outside the windows, dawn was drawing a dull gray light across the rose garden.

  "This is where we are right now," Fitzsimmons said. "There's no sign of any connection between Kareem Rashad Williams and Zimmerman, despite what the NSA's computers might have said. There's some chance that it might have been deliberate misinformation.

  "We've coordinated efforts with the DISA to follow up every breach and near-breach of computer security in about twelve hundred secure intelligence and defense systems looking for any attacks that might have been engineered by Zimmerman. We have every regional office monitoring Internet activity overseas—"

  Rayburn turned the pages on a file in front of him. Eventually he said in a slow Texas drawl, "Hellfire."

  "It's only a matter of time before Zimmerman makes a slip—" Fitzsimmons started to say.

  Rayburn shook his head. "Goddamn—I'm starting to think that the damage from the search is going to be worse than anything Zimmerman could engineer. This is the second shoot-out across the evening news. Things like this have sunk more popular administrations than this one."

  "We are dealing with a severe threat to the National Security—"

  "Don't patronize me, Larry. I was Army Intelligence when we self-destructed in Vietnam. I know exactly what kind of threat Zimmerman poses. I also know what kind of threat your own Agency poses."

  Rayburn stood up. "You still can't even tell me who Zimmerman defected to."

  "As soon as we can trace some computer activity . . ."

  "That's what you were saying a week ago." Rayburn shook his head. "Larry, you aren't getting anywhere. The Daedalus theft was as close as you've managed to get, and all that's gotten us is two corpses, a wounded D.C. cop, and a half-dozen Central Americans who only know about some 'Deep Throat' in a Howard Johnson's parking lot. Meanwhile, I'm feeding my Attorney General to the dogs to cover this operation, and Zimmerman's trail is as cold as the chips in that damn computer."

  Fitzsimmons seemed to wince slightly.

  "It is unfortunate," D'Arcy said.

  "Unfortunate?" Rayburn replied. "You have a gift for understatement, Emmit." He turned to Fitzsimmons and said, "At the moment, Emmit is the only thing standing between Congress and your balls-up operation."

  Fitzsimmons looked across at D'Arcy.

  "I'm giving D'Arcy overall control of the effort to recover Zimmerman."

  "But," Fitzsimmons protested, "this was the Agency's—"

  Rayburn stared at Fitzsimmons. "If you want to split hairs, this is counterespionage and should be the FBI's bailiwick. Especially since it looks like Zimmerman hasn't left the country."

  Rayburn turned to the National Security Advisor. The man was small, but unlike Fitzsimmons, he didn't seem to shrink from under Rayburn's gaze.

  D'Arcy took a handkerchief, removed his glasses, and began cleaning them. "We can't let rivalries or past mistakes cloud the issue." D'Arcy replaced his glasses, and his eyes enlarged behind the lenses.

  "Zimmerman's a serious threat. We cannot dwell on this one 'cluster-fuck.' We're dealing with a time bomb here. We have to recover her before she irreparably damages the security of every computer system in this country. From what I know of the CIA's investigation, we only have one tenuous assumption—that Zimmerman is still in the country."

  D'Arcy shook his head. "And whatever damage has been done, Zimmerman's retrieval needs to be covert. More covert than the Daedalus incident. If it became publicly known that she's.out there, it would be nearly as damaging to our security as her defection."

  Rayburn walked back to his desk and picked up the file he'd been leafing through. "Back at square one."

  D'Arcy shook his head. "No, we've lost ground. The Daedalus might have lured her in, but this 'accident' will have made her more wary. She's unquestionably a genius, and while she may be naive about covert operations, she won't make the same mistake twice."

  Rayburn closed the file. "I hope I can say the same about the CIA." The President glared at the two men. "No more cowboy shit on CNN, understand? You have to take this woman, but goddamn you can be subtle about it. Get out of here."

  D'Arcy and pitzsimmons left together, and as they walked down the hall out of earshot of the Oval Office, Fitzsimmons asked, "Emmit?"

  "Larry?"

  "Think I should start looking for a job in the private sector?"

  Morris Kendal sat in a booth in the rear of a diner. The diner was on the fringes of Arlington, toward Largely. The booth was a little too small for him, the table pressed against his three-hundred-pound gut. He whiled away the time wondering if there could be anything to Gideon's paranoia. Even though he was here on Gideon's behalf, he still felt that his friend was engaging in an elaborate self-justification because his brother was the one who got killed in the shoot-out.

  Kendal understood. If he was in Gideon's place, he'd want to believe that there was some great conspiracy behind what happened.

  However, even if he thought that the thing was a generic Washington law-enforcement screwup, he was still treating his friend's fears seriously. That was why he was here in an anonymous diner with dirty windows and flyspecked lamp shades.

  Kendal was on his third cup of coffee when Christoffel walked in. He walked up to Kendal's booth and asked, "Is this seat taken?"

  Christoffel knew it wasn't, but he always asked anyway.

  "Go ahead," Kendal said. He had cultivated Christoffel for a few years now. Always with these informal chats. What Christoffel got out of it was the information Kendal gathered as a security consultant for a half-dozen embassies and foreign officials. What Kendal got out of it was the opportunity to pump Christoffel for information.

  Kendal nodded slightly to the seat next to Christoffel. "You're sitting next to Saudi Arabia."

  Christoffel slid down the seat, and though Kendal didn't see him do it, Kendal knew he palmed the CD that'd rested on the seat next to him. On the CD was a catalog of security measures of a Saudi diplomatic attache, including a list of the procedures used against electronic surveillance.

  "So how're things at the Agency?" Kendal asked.

  "Same old, same old."

  Kendal gave his disarming smile and commented, "Not what I hear." It was the usual banter, but Kendal noticed something wrong. Christoffel looked nervous. He never looked nervous. It was as if his offhand comment had struck a nerve. Maybe Gideon was on to something here.

  "Do you need anything?" Christoffel asked. "I'm late for an appointment."

  Then why aren't you looking at your watch ?

  "Yeah," Kendal asked. "I want to talk to you about a certain Secret Service operation." Kendal swore the guy actually paled when he said that. This was a guy who had once told him of covert operations to topple three different third-world governments in a single conversation without showing a twinge of discomfort.

  "I can't help you," Christoffel said, and stood up.

  "Wait a minute," Kendal said. "You've got to give me something."

  Christoffel looked at Kendal, and did something he'd never done before. He took the CD out of his pocket and laid it on the table in front of Kendal. "No, I don't, Morris."

  Kendal looked at the CD, then back up at Christoffel.

  Christoffel shook
his head. "As much as I know, which isn't much, I shouldn't know. Leave it alone."

  He walked out of the diner, leaving Kendal with his CD full of Saudi intelligence secrets.

  Morris Kendal met Chaviv Tischler in the Georgetown Mall. Tischler was a minor diplomat at the Israeli Embassy,. He was also Kendal's contact with the Mossad. Not that Tischler ever identified himself as anything other than a secretary.

  Kendal wasn't in the habit of dealing with governments other than the U.S. However, since he worked for so many Middle Eastern states, it was only natural that he'd develop some sort of relationship with the Israelis.

  If anything, his relationship with Tischler was even more informal than the one he had with Christoffel.

  Tischler was a white-haired old man with a humorous glint in his eyes that were otherwise as hard as steel. He was as tall as Kendal, but much less massive, so it still seemed as if Kendal loomed over him.

  Tischler was leaning on the railing, looking down a level at the people going from shop to shop on the ground floor. Kendal walked up to the railing and put a hand on it.

  "You wanted to see me?" Tischler asked.

  "I have some data you might find useful." Kendal's hand was on the Saudi disk in his pocket.

  Tischler nodded. There never was any question about Kendal's intelligence. If he brought it to Tischler's attention, Tischler knew he could use it. Tischler also knew that there was a quid pro quo involved.

  Tischler pushed away from the rail and waved him along. "Come, let's walk."

  Kendal followed the old Israeli diplomat as Tischler asked, "Now what is it you want?"

  "I'm looking into a certain Secret Service fiasco—"

  "Ah. That is a U.S. matter. I don't think you expect us to spy on our allies?"

  And tell me about it? No. "I was just hoping that you may have heard something .. ."