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  Then there were men like Rossky, who didn't appear to have any worldview. They simply enjoyed power and control. Orlov had been alarmed by Assistant Security Director Glinka's surreptitious call to the apartment. Glinka knew how to play both sides of the fence, but Orlov believed him when he said that Rossky's activities over the past twenty-four hours had been unusually secretive. It started when Rossky insisted on handling, himself, the trivial investigation of an intrusion alert the day before. It was followed by unlogged and coded computer communications to an operative in the field, not telling anyone where he was going, and mysterious dealings with a local coroner.

  I've been ordered to work with Rossky, Orlov told himself, but I won't let him run rogue operations. Whether Rossky liked it or not, he would toe the line or he would be restricted to a desk job. As long as Rossky had Interior Minister Dogin's support, threatening him would be difficult. But Orlov had overcome difficulties before. He bore the scars to prove it, and was willing to bear more if need be. He had learned English so that he could travel as a goodwill ambassador when, in fact, he was busy acquiring and sneaking home books just so he could see what the rest of the world was thinking and reading.

  Orlov raised the collar of his off-white trench coat against the knifing wind and tucked his black rimmed glasses into his pocket. They always fogged when he came back outside from the over— or underheated bus, and he didn't have time to fuss with them. As if it weren't frustrating enough to need them at all, these eyes that had once been keen enough to pick out the Great Wall of China from nearly three hundred miles in space.

  Despite the problem with Rossky, Orlov's full-lipped mouth was relaxed, his high forehead unwrinkled beneath the brim of his gray fedora. His striking brown eyes, high cheekbones, and dark complexion were, like his adventurous spirit, a part of his Asiatic heritage— Manchu. His great grandfather had once told him that his family was part of the first wave of warriors that had poured through China and Russia in the seventeenth century. Orlov didn't know how the old man could place them so precisely. But it suited him to think that he was descended from a pioneering people, benevolent despite having been conquerors.

  Standing just under five-foot-seven, Orlov had the narrow shoulders and slender build that had made him an ideal, resilient cosmonaut. Though his record as a fighter pilot had been flawless, Orlov carried physical and mental mementoes from his years in space. He walked with a permanent limp, due to a left leg and hip badly broken when his parachute failed to deploy in what turned out to be his last mission. His right arm was severely scarred when he pulled a cosmonaut-in-training from the wreck of a MiG-27 Flogger-D. He had pegs inserted in his hip to enable him to walk, but declined to undergo plastic surgery on the arm. He liked the way his wife oooohed and ohhhhhed whenever she saw her poor singed bird.

  Orlov smiled as he thought of his precious Masha. Though today's breakfast had been cut short by Glinka's call, the afterglow of being with her still warmed him. More so because it would have to hold him until tomorrow, which was the earliest he'd be seeing her again. As always before he left on a mission, the two of them went through a ritual they'd begun nearly twenty years ago, before he rode his first flaming rocket into space: they held each other tightly and made sure they parted with no unspoken thoughts or anger, nothing they would regret if he failed to return. Masha had come to believe that the day they broke the tradition, he wouldn't come back.

  Those days with the Mir and Salyut space stations, he thought, smiling. Years of working with Kizim, Solovyev, Titov, Manarov, and the other cosmonauts who spent weeks and months in space. Enjoying the sterile beauty of the Vostok and Voskhod spacecraft, of the Kvant astronomy module that allowed them to explore the universe. Experiencing the sound and fury of the mighty Energia rockets sending payloads skyward. He missed it all. But eleven months before, the space program was broke and in near collapse, and the forty-nine-year-old officer had agreed to command this place, a hi-tech operations center that was being designed to spy on friends and foes abroad and at home. Ministry of Security Chief Cherkassov had told him he had the calm but detail-oriented nature that was perfect for running a high-pressure intelligence facility like this— though Orlov couldn't help but feel he was being demoted. He'd gone from touching the vault of heaven to being cast underground into hell, and he'd been spoiled by the many humanitarian scientists he had worked with at the Yuri Garaging Space Center outside Moscow. As the Manchu had understood, progress and power should be used to ennoble people, encourage them to make sacrifices, not control and herd them.

  But Masha agreed with Cherkassov. She told her husband it was better for someone with his temperament to run the Operations Center instead of someone like Rossky, and she was right about that. Neither the Colonel nor his new best friend, Interior Minister Dogin, seemed to know where the interests of Russia ended and their personal ambitions began.

  As Orlov walked briskly along the broad boulevard, the bag lunch and bag dinner his wife had prepared tucked under his arm, he gazed across the river at the Frunze Naval College that housed the dozen soldiers of the Center's special operations force Molot, Hammer.

  Masha had been right about Rossky as well. After he told her who his second-in-cornmand was to be— the man who had been involved with their son, Nikita, in the incident in Moscow— Masha told him not to allow Dogin to force Rossky on him. She knew they would clash, while he thought that working on a common project, in such close quarters, would force them to trust and maybe respect one another.

  Now reckoning seemed inevitable. What made his wife so smart and him so naive?

  His eyes moved along the structures on the opposite side of the Neva as the slanting sunlight put yellow faces on the stately Academy of Sciences and Museum of Anthropology directly across from him, and threw long, brown shadows behind them. He took a long moment to drink in their beauty before entering the museum and the complex below. Though he was no longer able to see the earth from space, there was still much to savor down here. It bothered him that Rossky and the Minister never stopped to look at the river, the buildings, and especially the art. To them, beauty was merely something to hide under.

  Upon entering the museum, Orlov walked toward the Jordan Staircase and the entrance to the secret new arm of the Kremlin, a facility at once practical and idiosyncratic.

  The practical side was the Hermitage site itself. It had been chosen over potential locations in Moscow and Volgograd because operatives could he moved in and out inconspicuously with tour groups; because agents could travel easily from here to Scandinavia and Europe; because the Neva would hide and disperse most of the radio waves coming from equipment at the Center; because the working TV studio they'd built gave them access to satellite communications; and most important, because no one would attack the Hermitage.

  The idiosyncrasy came from Minister Dogin's devotion to history. The Minister collected old maps, and in his collection were the blueprints of Stalin's wartime headquarters under the Kremlin— rooms that were not only bombproof but led to a private subway tunnel that would have been used to shuttle Stalin from Moscow in the event of an attack. The Minister revered Stalin, and when he, now— President Zhanin, and the head of the Ministry of Security first planned this communications and spy facility for Boris Yeltsin, Dogin insisted on using the layout that worked for Stalin. The design actually worked out well, Orlov felt. As in a submarine, the tight, somewhat claustrophobic quarters helped to keep workers focused on the tasks at hand.

  Orlov acknowledged the guard as he passed. The General used the keypad to enter; once inside, he showed the receptionist his ID, despite the fact that she was Masha's cousin and knew him well. Then he made his way through the reception area and down the stairs to the TV studio. At the far end, he punched the day's four-digit code on a keypad and the door popped open. When Orlov shut it behind him, the dark stairwell's single overhead bulb snapped on automatically. He walked down the stairs where another keypad gained him access to the Center. Enter
ing the dimly lit central corridor, he turned to the right and strode toward the office of Colonel Rossky.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Sunday, 9:40 P.M., Washington, D.C.

  Rodgers was ushered quickly through the outer and inner gates, and was met at the White House by Assistant National Security Director Grumet. The fifty-year-old woman stood nearly six feet tall, had long, straight blond hair, and wore very little makeup. Rodgers had a great deal of respect for the Vietnam veteran, who had lost her left arm in a helicopter crash during the war.

  "You're waiting for me," said Rodgers. "Am I late?"

  "Not at all, sir," Grumet said, saluting the General. "The rest of us happen to be old married people who were sitting home watching TV when the blast happened. We had a little head start. I swear, just when you think the world can't get any sicker—"

  "Oh, I read history," Rodgers said. "I never think that. "

  As Rodgers entered the doorway, he took off the jacket of his uniform and handed it to the armed Marine standing outside. Otherwise, the brass buttons would have set off the metal detector hidden in the jamb. The detector didn't ping. After running a portable detector over the jacket, the Marine returned it to Rodgers and saluted.

  "What's been happening?" Rodgers asked Grumet as they walked down the short corridor to the Oval Office.

  "We responded by the book," she said. "We closed down immigration and rounded up the usual suspects. The FBI put various bureaus and agencies on alert, dropped divers into the wreckage. Director Rachlin complained that the CIA spends too much money on political sensitivity training and not enough on keeping track of sociopaths, mad scientists, and ideological foes."

  "That's Larry," said Rodgers. "More outspoken than Mr. Kidd. What the hell do these people want, Tobey?"

  "Until we know more, we're treating it as a standard terrorist attack. It's possible that this was simply a criminal act, and that there will be a ransom demand. It's also possible that the bombing was the work of a psychotic individual or a domestic group."

  "Like the bombing in Oklahoma City."

  "Exactly. A group acting out their own deep anger and alienation from society."

  "But you don't think so?"

  "No, Mike, we don't. We think this was the work of a foreign terrorist group."

  "Terrorists."

  "Exactly. If so, they could simply want publicity for their cause. Generally, though, terrorist acts are used instrumentally— that is, they are part of a plan to achieve larger ends."

  "The question is, what is the goal of these people?"

  "We'll know soon enough," Tobey said. "Five minutes ago, the FBI got a call in New York saying that the President would be contacted by the terrorist. The caller provided the FBI with information about the size of the blast, its location, the kind of explosives used. It checked out exactly."

  "Is he going to take the call?" Rodgers asked.

  "Technically, no," Tobey said, "but he'll be in the room. We think that will satisfy— shoot!" she said as her pager buzzed. "They want us in there right now."

  The two ran down the corridor. They were waved ahead by an assistant in the antechamber of the Oval Office, and were buzzed through the inner door.

  President Mike Lawrence was standing behind his desk. He was drawn to his full six-foot-four inch height, his hands on his hips, his shirtsleeves neatly rolled back a turn. Facing him was Secretary of State Av Lincoln. Lincoln was a former major league pitcher with a round face and thinning widow's peak.

  Four other officials were also present: FBI Director Griffen Egenes, CIA director Larry Rachlin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Melvin Parker, and National Security Chief Steve Burkow.

  All of the men looked grim as they listened to a voice coming from the President's speakerphone.

  " save you the trouble of tracing this call," the thinly accented Russian voice was saying. "My name is Eival Ekdol. I am at 1016 Forest Road in Valley Stream on Long Island. It is a Grozny safe house, and you can have it, and me. I will also stand trial and denounce the officials who brought me down. It will be a good show."

  Grozny, thought Rodgers as he took a seat beside the dashing young National Security Chief. Oh, Christ.

  Ascetic FBI Director Egenes wrote on a yellow pad, "Let me get people over there, " and held it up.

  The President nodded and Egenes left the room.

  "Once you have me," Ekdol concluded, "there will be no further acts of terrorism."

  "Why blow up the tunnel and then surrender yourself?" Burkow asked. "What do you want in return?"

  "Nothing. What I mean is, we want the United States to do nothing."

  "Where, when, and why?" Burkow asked.

  "In Eastern Europe," said Ekdol. "A situation will soon develop militarily and we want neither the U.S. nor its allies to become involved."

  Chairman Parker picked up a phone near him. He turned his body so his voice couldn't be heard.

  Burkow said, "We can't promise that. The United States has interests in Poland, Hungary—"

  "You have interests in the United States as well, Mr. Burkow."

  Burkow appeared to be taken by surprise. Rodgers just sat still, listening carefully.

  "Are you threatening other American interests?" Burkow asked.

  "Yes, I am," said Ekdol. "In fact, at a quarter past ten, a major suspension bridge in another American city will be blown up. Unless, of course, we've reached an agreement by that time."

  All in the room looked at their watches.

  "As you no doubt realize," said Ekdol, "you have just under four minutes."

  The President said, "Mr. Ekdol, this is President Lawrence. We need more time."

  "Take all the time you want, Mr. President," said Ekdol. "But you'll pay for it with lives. You can't reach me in time, even if you dispatched personnel when I gave you the address. And though you'll have me, you won't stop Grozny."

  The President slashed his hand from side to side and Burkow muted the phone.

  "Hit me," Lawrence said. "Fast."

  "We don't deal with terrorists," Burkow said. "Period."

  "Sure we do," said Lincoln. "Just not in public. We have no choice but to deal with this man."

  "What about the next Tojo wannabe with a bomb?" Burkow asked. "What if Saddam does it next? Or some neo-Nazi right here in the States?"

  "We don't let it happen again," said CIA Director Rachlin. "We learn from this. We prepare. Right now, we don't want another New York. Defuse the bomb, nail the peckers later,"

  "But it could be a bluff," said Burkow. "He may he a nutcase who blew his wad under the East River."

  "Mr. President," said Rodgers, "let the bastard have this one. I know a little something about these Grozny fanatics. They don't bluff, and you see how hard they strike. Give them the win and we'll catch them with an end run."

  "You have an idea?"

  "I do," he said.

  "At least that's something," the President said.

  "Right now, a spitball in a slingshot would be something," Burkow said. "But is it the right something?"

  Lawrence rubbed his face with his open hands while Burkow scowled at Rodgers. The National Security Chief was not big on capitulation, and he obviously had thought he'd an ally in Rodgers. Ordinarily, he would have. But this was much bigger than what was happening here, and they needed time and clearer heads to deal with it.

  "Sorry, Steve," said the President. "I agree with you in principle. God, how I do. But I've got to give this monster what he wants. Put him back on the line."

  With a jab of his finger, Burkow unmuted the telephone.

  "Are you there?" the President asked.

  "I am."

  "If we accept your terms, there will be no blast?"

  "Only if you do so at once," said Ekdol. "You have less than a minute."

  "Then we agree," said the President. "Damn you, we agree."

  "Very well," said Ekdol.

  The phone was silent for a moment.
/>   "Where are the explosives?" Burkow asked.

  "They are in the back of just another truck crossing just another bridge," said Ekdol. "I just phoned the driver not to deliver them. Now, as I promised, you can come and get me. I'll say nothing of our agreement. But go back on your word, Mr. President, and you will be unable to stop my people in other cities and towns. Do you understand?"

  "I understand," said the President.

  And then the line went dead.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Monday, 6:45 A.M., St. Petersburg

  Orlov touched the button on the speaker outside Rossky's door.

  "Yes?" said the Colonel in a strident voice.

  "Colonel, it's General Orlov."

  The door buzzed and Orlov entered. Rossky sat behind a small desk to the left. There were a computer, telephone, coffee mug, fax machine, and flag on its gunmetal surface. To the right was the cluttered desk of his assistant and secretary, Corporal Valentina Belyev. Both of them stood and saluted when the General entered, Belyev smartly, Rossky more slowly.

  Orlov returned the salute and asked Valentina to excuse them. When the door clicked shut Orlov regarded the Colonel.

  "Has anything happened in the last day that I should know about?" Orlov asked.

  Rossky sat slowly. "A great deal has happened. As to whether you should know— General, our nation's satellites, field agents, cryptography, and radio surveillance all become our responsibility later today. You have a lot to attend to."

  "I'm a general," Orlov said. "My subordinates do all the work. What I'm asking, Colonel, is whether you've been doing more work than you should."

  "Specifically what, sir?"

  "What business had you with the coroner?" Orlov asked.

  "We had a body to dispose of," Rossky said. "A British agent. Brave fellow— we'd been watching him for days. He took his life when our operative closed in."