Ken Goddard - Double blind

The veteran congressman chuckled over what he considered his brilliant plan.

"I want him to see it," Sam Tisbury insisted flatly.

"Say what?" Smallsreed blinked his beady eyes.

"I want agent Lightstone to see it happen," the wealthy industrialist clarified. "I want him to know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that he's responsible for all those deaths."

"Oh hell, that's easy." Smallsreed dismissed the industrialist's primary concern with a wave. "All Rustman's people need to do is keep him separate from the main explosion. Then, at the proper moment, they can point out the realities of life to the young fellow, let him know that his pals probably wouldn't thank him for his dedication… and then maybe blow him up all by his lonesome, a little diversion to make sure our people get out of there okay." Smallsreed rubbed his meaty paws together as he fleshed out his plan. "Come to think of it, we ought to add a nice little wildfire, too, just to make sure we don't leave any of that trace evidence behind."

"Considering what he did to my daughter, that sounds like a very appropriate finale." Sam Tisbury nodded his head in apparent satisfaction. "One final thing though. I still want it videotaped."

"You want what videotaped?" So many different aspects of his glorious plan filled Smallsreed's mind, he couldn't imagine what Tisbury meant. "The fire?"

Sam Tisbury shook his head irritably.

"No, I want to see Lightstone's expression on tape when he finally comprehends the magnitude of his loss. Same conditions. I guarantee I'll destroy it once I see it."

"Far as I know, that's already part of the game plan. But I'll verify it when I talk with Rustman," the politician assured his old friend genially.

"Then I'm satisfied. Make it happen, and you'll never need to worry about campaign funds again," the wealthy industrialist promised.

Smallsreed turned toward the figure sitting in the shadows, the fearsome chairman of the ICER committee, who simply nodded his head.

"All right then." Regis J. Smallsreed opened his hands in a benevolent gesture. "You've got yourselves a deal."

"But how will you get word to Rustman's team about the changes if you can't find Whatley?" the shadow-man's voice echoed hollowly in the large room.

"Don't worry about that." The veteran congressman smiled broadly. "An old poker player like me's always got an extra ace or two up his sleeve. You just never know when you might need to fix a temporary run of bad luck."

A beep from the pager on Lt. Colonel John Rustman's belt interrupted him as he methodically cleaned one of his favorite over-and-under shotguns, using a fine-wired brass brush meticulously to loosen the seared gunpowder residues that had collected under the twin extractors.

Frowning, he set the small implement aside, extracted the pager from his belt with his free hand, briefly examined the digital message, and blinked in surprise.

Approximately forty-five minutes later, at precisely twelve noon Pacific standard time, the retired military officer stepped into a phone booth at a gas station located just across the Jasper-Jackson County border, punched in a long-distance number, waited, fed the requested number of quarters into the slot from the open roll in his jacket pocket, and waited again.

"Hello?"

"I got your message," Rustman replied in a neutral voice. "What's up?

"We have a change in plans," Regis J. Smallsreed announced casually.

Smallsreed surveyed the area surrounding the public phone booth located in the basement of the Longworth House Office Building one more time, making sure no one paid him any special attention. Then he outlined the new scheme that he, Sam Tisbury, and the chairman of ICER — the notoriously misnamed International Commission for Environmental Restoration — had agreed upon earlier.

After going through the new plan in some detail, Smallsreed paused for a moment, then asked, "What do you think?"

"No problem at our end," Rustman replied cautiously. "But what happened to our mutual friend?"

Translation: "Why isn't Simon Whatley making this contact, in person, the way we agreed, instead of you — which is a risky idea under the best of circumstances?"

"We don't know where he is."

"What?"

As a highly competent and experienced combat officer long accustomed to recognizing-and reacting to — potentially hazardous situations at a moment's notice, Lt. Colonel John Rustman immediately realized that Simon Whatley's disappearance posed a significant threat to his operation… and to his men.

"I have no reason to think it's serious… yet," Smallsreed cautioned the other man. "There were scheduling problems with his flight to DC this morning, and he might have missed one of the connections."

"But he hasn't called in."

It wasn't so much a question as an accusation.

"No, he hasn't," Smallsreed admitted.

Rustman slowly inhaled, then released a deep breath.

"We need to find him, immediately," he insisted after a moment's reflection on the impact Whatley's defection could have on the remaining years of his life. It had already occurred to him that Smallsreed probably didn't know about the summary execution of Lou Eliot; otherwise, he wouldn't be nearly so calm about his underling's disappearance.

"Yes, we do need to find him… and we will," the powerful congressman hastened to reassure Rustman while he continually scanned the public access area around the isolated phone booth. "But in the meantime, we need to put the new plan into motion right away."

Rustman hesitated.

"Are you sure that's wise right now?" he finally asked.

"Yes, I am… financially and otherwise."

Smallsreed's insistence certainly arose from his awareness of Sam Tisbury's promise of political funding, not to mention the deadly consequences that would befall him if he failed to meet his promises to Aldridge Hammond, the shadow-dwelling chairman of the ICER committee.

However, Lt. Colonel John Rustman considered quite different consequences — such as the financial impact of the loss of Smallsreed's operational payout on his future retirement plans. While significant, however, it paled beside the thought of spending the rest of his life on the run from federal or state prosecution for the murder of Lou Eliot.

Even though they approached it from two quite different standpoints, both men realized that, in the context of the financial issues and otherwise, Simon Whatley had become a very expendable resource.

Resolving the expendable part was easy.

But they had to find him first.

"How do you intend to handle it?" Rustman finally asked.

"What?"

"The search."

Meaning don't sic a private investigative agency — much less a federal government law-enforcement agency — on Whatley, because even if he didn't talk, someone was bound to make the connection.

"We'll handle it in-house," Smallsreed replied evenly.

"What does that mean?"

The congressman sighed heavily.

"It means" — an audible edge crept into his gravelly voice — "that if the members of my Washington Office staff would like to remain attached to the public tit, then they'd better find the son of a bitch before I do."

It took Rustman another three hours to arrange a face-to-face meeting with Wintersole.

They sat sheltered in a small grove of evergreen trees and undergrowth on a low hill overlooking the Chosen Brigade's hidden training compound. The Army Ranger first sergeant listened carefully as Rustman detailed the change in plans.

"We can handle our end just fine," he assured Rustman when the latter concluded his recitation. "Fact is, the new plan makes everything a lot easier all the way around. Only problem is, we're still waiting for those agent profiles."