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  Blackburn gave her a quizzical glance, not quite sure what she meant. Only a moment later did it dawn on him that she was assuming his office was in America. A natural enough mistake, considering that he was obviously American, and that he'd payed for the puppet with American money.

  "Actually, my pal Ganesha here won't be leaving the peninsula in the foreseeable future," he said. "Guess I should properly introduce myself. My name's Max Blackburn. I work security for a company called UpLink International, and right now I'm based at our regional headquarters in—"

  "Johor, isn't it?" She suddenly burst out laughing as they shook hands, putting him at a loss as to what he could have said that was so funny. She recovered briefly, but then saw that the bemused expression he'd been wearing on and off over the last several minutes was very much back in evidence, and broke up again.

  Still, he noticed she hadn't let go of his hand. Which was something on the plus side, anyway.

  "I'm sorry, you must think I'm awfully rude," she said, getting control of herself at last. "I'm Kirsten Chu, and it happens that I work for Monolith Technologies, Singapore. The Corporate Communications Division. I'm here on holiday, visiting my sister and nieces."

  Understanding spread across Blackburn's features.

  "Ah-ha," he said. "So that explains why you're in conniptions."

  "It does indeed," she said. "Our employers are very much archrivals, aren't they? For the past six months I've done nothing but huddle with our lobbyists and publicists about the encryption flap, brainstorming ways to counter Roger Gordian's opposition."

  Though Blackburn would not realize it until several months later, that was the moment he had decided to use Kirsten. The exact moment. It had been a calculating, unemotional decision, entirely separate from the genuine attraction he felt toward her. And all the time they had spent together since, all the nights their bodies had been locked in passion, using her had been very much a part of it.

  "Well, judging by how badly things are going for us, you're doing a helluva job." He'd flashed an engaging smile, letting a hint of flirtatiousness slip into his voice. Calibrating both for maximum effect. "But does being on opposite sides of a professional dispute mean we can't make friendly overtures?"

  "Overtures," she repeated.

  "Right. A personal truce."

  Their eyes met.

  "I suppose," she said, "it could be possible."

  "Then let's seal it over dinner tonight."

  "Well…"

  "Please," he said, not giving her time to answer. "I guarantee a mutually agreeable resolution."

  She looked at him a moment longer. Smiled.

  "Yes," she said. "I'd love to have dinner with you."

  And that was that. The beginning of an affair that had turned out to be enormously satisfying for him. Great sex, great inside information.

  What more could a man desire?

  Now Blackburn sat in the silence of his office, his face troubled, looking out his window at the sprawl of low, prefabricated buildings that constituted the Johor ground station, hating to think of the danger he'd put her in, refusing to let himself think about it, instead turning his mind back to the part that was real for both of them, imagining her body moving against him, joined to him, their cries of pleasure mingling in the darkness of her bedroom, going on and on into the night.

  Yes, that part of it was real.

  Real.

  He reached for his phone, dialed her office number, waited for her secretary to connect them.

  "Max?" she said, picking up a moment later. "Did you get my messages?"

  "Yeah," he said. "Sorry I couldn't get back to you till now. They're adding components to the alarm system, and I had to oversee the whole thing. Took me most of the morning to get the glitches smoothed out."

  Her voice became hushed. "Guess I got a little anxious. Something's turned up, and I think it could be important. Perhaps the very thing you've been looking for."

  "You'd better not say any more right now."

  "Agreed. Even if I wasn't at the office, it would be much too sensitive to discuss over the phone."

  "Got you. We'll talk about it in person, then."

  "Will you be coming this weekend?"

  "Yes," he said.

  "Such enthusiasm," she said.

  He told himself to put away the guilt.

  "Just tired," he said. "Barring any unforseen developments, I'll be taking a lorry over the causeway tomorrow morning."

  "Bringing along your overnight bag?"

  "It's been packed since yesterday," he said.

  "Not too full, I hope. Clothes won't be necessary for the weekend agenda I've planned."

  "Toothbrush and deodorant?"

  "Now they're absolute requirements." She laughed. "I have to run, Max. Love you."

  Blackburn's eyes moved from the window to the spot where he'd hung the puppet on the wall.

  Atman and Brahman, he thought. Illusion and truth.

  "I love you, too," he heard himself say.

  Wondering if the words sounded as empty and mechanical over the phone as they did to his own ears.

  Chapter Four

  SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA

  SEPTEMBER 17, 2000

  "Congratulations, Alex. I'll bet every political columnist in the country's writhing in the light of your greater glory."

  Alex Nordstrum smiled a little uncomfortably as he walked into the conference room, hoping Gordian's comments, coupled with his late arrival, wouldn't give rise to certain impressions about him. That they might be accurate impressions was beside the point. Why be blatant? Conceit was a quality Nordstrum preferred to bear with discretion; he had an old Harvard classmate who'd been wearing his Phi Beta Kappa fraternity key on a gold fob for the past twenty years, and it was never a pretty sight.

  "So you've heard about my upcoming submarine ride," he said, taking his place at the table. And how was that for understatement? Or had he struck a false note right there? Maybe it was a mistake trying to appear blase about being handpicked for the small group of reporters who would accompany the President and several other world leaders — all of whom were intent on milking a treaty-signing event for every bit of public attention it was worth — on a "ride" aboard a Seawolf nuclear sub.

  Yes, maybe he ought to let the others in the room be freely awed.

  "May I ask who gave you the news?" he said, knowing Gordian could have gotten it from any number of political and business contacts, including at least a couple of the individuals present at the meeting. Although the list of invited reporters had been released only hours earlier, this was a plugged-in bunch if there'd ever been one.

  "My source insisted on anonymity," Gordian said. "Anyway, Alex, you'd better pour yourself some coffee. We've got a lot to talk about this morning, and you just might feel like you're already underwater before we're finished."

  A workable segue to more relevant matters of discussion, Alex thought.

  He looked around the room, nodding his acknowledgment to the parties who'd arrived ahead of him. Most of the faces he saw were very familiar, belonging to Gordian's core group of friends and advisors. There were two UpLink employees at the table besides Nordstrum himself, who, as Foreign Affairs Consultant, was technically a freelancer: Vice President of Special Projects Megan Breen, seated to Gordian's immediate right, and Risk Assessment Manager Vince Scull at his left. Directly across from Nordstrum was Dan Parker, the congressman from California's Fourteenth District and Gordian's closest confidant since the days when they'd flown bombing sorties with the 355th Tactical Fighter Wing in Vietnam. In a chair alongside Parker sat another government official, Robert Lang, chief of the FBI's Washington, D. C., bureau.

  The man poring over a document at the far end of the table was Richard Sobel, founder and CEO of Secure Solutions, a young Massachusetts-based encryption tech outfit. He both rounded out the small group and, by mere virtue of his presence, symbolized all the reasons it had come together this morning. Nordstr
um couldn't have said whether it was more significant that a competitor in the field of cryptographic technology was here to offer Gordian his support and alliance, or that Sobel was the only one of fifty leaders in the software business to accept Gord's invitation.

  "Okay, let's get rolling," Gordian said now, the intense gravity of his manner hardly lifted by a cordial smile. 4 'First, I want to thank all of you for coming. Second, I want to be clear about how much I appreciate why you've come. It obviously would have been easy to remain silent and invisible. Our unified stance on the encryption issue has already caused most of us considerable problems, and it's a fair bet they're going to increase exponentially in the next couple of days." He paused and glanced over at Megan Breen. "The credit for putting together the statement I'll be reading at our press conference goes entirely to Ms. Breen. Assuming everyone received a copy by fax and has gotten a chance to review it, I believe you'll agree she's done a magnificent job of boiling our concerns down to media-friendly sound bites."

  "Absolutely," Sobel said, looking up at her from the sheet of paper he'd been scanning. "Megan, if I thought I had any chance of poaching you from Roger, I'd make an offer right now and be off, never mind the order of the day."

  Megan smiled at the compliment. A tall, slender woman of thirty-six, with huge sapphire eyes and shoulder-length auburn hair currently worn in a French braid, she looked crisp and able in a violet blouse and a gray designer blazer-and-slacks combination. Being that he was a heterosexual male with what he regarded as a good eye for attractive women, Nordstrum had long ago observed that she was a knockout. Being that she was a professional colleague, Nordstrum recognized it wasn't politically correct to give that observation any air time, and had wisely kept it to himself… although he reasonably suspected that many of her other male business associates, a couple of whom were in the room at that very moment, shared his atavistic view. Or hadn't there been a jag of envy in Scull's voice when he'd conveyed the rumors about Meg and Max Blackburn heating up the Russian winter last year?

  "While Roger may have put it a bit too flatteringly, I did want to make our comments brief and straightforward," Megan was saying. "Still, I hope none of you will hesitate to let me know if there's anything that should be added, removed, or clarified. We have forty-eight hours before President Ballard signs the Morrison-Fiore Bill, which gives me ample opportunity to fine-tune any part of the statement that needs it. I think, though, that our message really is a simple one."

  "Looks that way from where I sit, too," Vince Scull growled. His fringe of hair in a careless uproar around a shiny expanse of scalp, a frown creasing his bulldog face, Vince appeared to be on the verge of an angry eruption. This was nothing unusual to people who had been exposed to him for any length of time, since his total range of emotions ordinarily seemed as narrow as it was volatile, with splintery annoyance being the lowest gradient on the scale, blistering fury the highest, and radical fluctuations between these extremes occurring once every hour or so. "We put the crypto out overseas without restrictions, and presto, every bad guy with a computer link can buy himself electronic communications that law enforcement can't crack. If Ballard's got the high-wattage brain they say he does, he ought to be able to understand that without any problem. I mean, it's pretty damn obvious, isn't it, Bob?"

  The FBI man shrugged. 4 'In all fairness, there are gray areas. A valid argument says the bad guys have already gotten their hands on the technology through Internet dissemination, not to mention American companies who've circumvented the law by selling crypto abroad through their international subsidiaries. Follow that line of reasoning, and you have to ask whether it pays to restrict our software manufacturers from competing on the foreign market."

  "Can't put the genie back in the bottle, so put him to work instead. That's the same crap I've been hearing for years from people who want to legalize dope. And let me tell you, it doesn't make any sense. Back when I was wearing a cop's badge, I saw—"

  "Listen, you asked me something, I answered," Lang interrupted. "If I needed to be persuaded, I wouldn't be here today, putting my career and reputation on the line. As Dan can attest, I've argued vehemently against deregulation before a dozen congressional committees."

  "I agree," Gordian said. "There's no need to rehash the whole policy debate at this table. Our purpose should be to make sure we haven't overlooked any means of stopping Morrison-Fiore, or effectively presenting our case — and our solidarity — to the public, the government, and the rest of the industry."

  Nordstrum had been thinking precisely the same thing, and was relieved Gordian had gotten the static out of the air before sparks started flying.

  "Regarding your last few points, I'd say reading our little declaration to the National Press Club on the day of the signing is perfect strategy," he offered. "It will stir up controversy, grab media attention, take a story that would otherwise appear on page nine of the dailies and put it right on page one, above the fold." Nordstrum paused thoughtfully, adjusting his wire glasses on the bridge of his nose. "As to throwing some last-minute hurdle in front of the bill… short of locking the President out of his office the day after tomorrow, or conspiring to break his writing hand, I honestly don't see how it would be possible."

  "Any ideas, Dan?" Gordian asked.

  "I opt for breaking his hand," Parker said, but Gordian could only manage a feeble approximation of a smile in response.

  Parker studied his face, and for perhaps the fourth time that morning observed that he was not looking well at all. His cheeks were ashen, and there were deep lines under his eyes that gave him the appearance of someone who hadn't had a decent night's sleep in weeks. Gordian wasn't the sort of man who was quick to share his problems, but he generally got around to it with Parker long before they swamped him. He had opened up to him about his difficulties readjusting to freedom after five years in a Hanoi POW camp, confided in him when his marriage hit a rocky patch a while back.

  Lately, though, he'd been sealed tight, leaving Parker to play guessing games with himself about what was wrong. His instincts told him it was something personal… but a hunch was a hunch, and with Gord keeping quiet, and the shit flying in every direction because of the crypto debate, he hadn't had a chance to pursue it very far.

  Parker suddenly became aware of the silence around him, realized Gordian was still waiting for his answer.

  "From a political standpoint, I think we ought to be looking ahead to the next session of Congress," he said, shoving his concerns about Gord to the back of his mind. "Take a hard line now to gain a public-relations edge, advocate a return to the previous Administration's policy of setting firm limits on the level of encryption software that's authorized for foreign sale…"

  "And perhaps ease toward some compromise as things pick up again in the Hill," Gordian said, completing Dan's thought. "I like it."

  "So do I," Lang said. "As it reads, I believe Morrison-Fiore will be calamitous to our national security. But certain changes could be incorporated that would mitigate its damage."

  "Such as…?"

  "Off the top of my head, a clear-cut provision banning export of plug-in encryption cards, and critical components for multiplex encoding units, like the type used by our armed forces — the same type you and Mr. Sobel are refusing to market abroad."

  "Another thing would be a tough set of international laws and standards managing the operation of key recovery centers," Parker said. "These places are essentially private banks where governments deposit the digital key-codes to their data-scrambling software. Right now, police and intelligence agencies can subpoena the banks to turn over the codes… although the civil libertarians are challenging that power in various courts."

  He looked at Lang. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that there are no effective international treaties which would compel a key recovery center in one country to turn its keys over to another, even if the nation requesting them can prove they're needed to counter a threat to its se
curity."

  Lang nodded. "You're dead-on. A terrorist with sophisticated electronic equipment could theoretically cripple our economy, even disable our military computers, while the ambassadors are wrestling over what legitimately can and can't be done under existing cooperation agreements."

  For a moment Gordian sat staring out the office's floor-to-ceiling window at the San Jose skyline, and the vague humps of the mountains off to the southeast. Then he shifted his attention back to Dan.

  "What about the Foreign Trade Commission?" he said. "Setting our sights on the future, I'm wondering if anybody there eventually could be nudged toward at least some of our positions."

  "Never happen," Parker said. "Olivera, the head of the organization, is a militant free-trader. More important, he's a Ballard appointee who's been brown-nosing the President since they were poli-sci majors at the University of Wisconsin. Not for all the Chapstick in the world would he tear his lips away from the President's backside. Nor would he allow his underlings to stray."

  "Somebody in Congress, then. Preferably the NSC."

  Parker shook his head. "I know of several men on the panel who are privately sympathetic, and one who actually views Morrison-Fiore as a poison seed in our national defense system. But all come from states where the software industry has tremendous clout, and where people are afraid of losing jobs because of an inability to enter foreign markets." He smiled ruefully. "Do you have any idea what my opposition to the bill has cost me in votes? Being the representative from Silicon Valley? I'd probably have alienated fewer constituents if I got bagged for armed robbery… with an Uzi and the stolen goods in hand."

  Gordian looked outside again, past the broad stretch of Rosita Avenue, to where the Diablos went marching up to Mount Hamilton, its distant flank barely visible through a thin veil of smog. Closer by, one could still see a few of the aging food-processing plants and plastic factories that had once formed the industrial base of the city… but they were really nothing more than relics. Technological research and development had been San Jose's lifeblood for over twenty years; its economic survival was dependent on the hardware and software outfits that gave a huge chunk of the population their employment. Dan Parker was deliberately understating the price he would have to pay for standing by his principles… and by his friend. In doing so, he had quite possibly committed political suicide.