Paul Christopher: The Templar conspiracy

"I'm not even supposed to talk to you, let alone divulge state secrets. You haven't had clearance for years."

"How's Loretta?" Holliday asked, smiling. Loretta was Philpot's wife. A jealous wife. Like a lot of women Holliday knew, she didn't much care for her husband's old friends, especially those who knew him when.

"What does she have to do with this?"

"It's like John Lennon said-everyone's got something to hide."

"This is about that thing in Panama, isn't it?" Philpot asked darkly.

"I'm just saying…"

"You're blackmailing me?"

"Reminding you what friends are for," answered Holliday blandly.

There was a long silence punctuated by Philpot dragging on his shake. "We put traces on them all. The only one we couldn't finger was Tritt," he said finally.

"You're positive?"

"The others all alibied out. Travkin is in Mariinsky Hospital in St. Petersburg with lung cancer and has been for the last three months; Edward Fox, the Brit, is doing something nasty in the Sudan at the moment; and Bertrand, the Frenchman, is in Fresnes Prison."

"What's the last sighting of Tritt?"

"Geneva passport control. There's no record of him having left Switzerland but that doesn't mean much." He finished off the first cheeseburger, wiped his mouth and his tie with a napkin, and started on the second burger. His body language told Holiday the man was suffering from a bad case of nerves.

"You worried about something, Potsy?"

"I don't like being used," said the heavyset man. He shook his head. "This is worse than it looks, Doc. Stay out of it."

"That's it?"

"Talking to you is what worries me. You've gotta understand, Doc-I work for the organization that invented the word 'paranoia.'" He looked around the parking lot furtively. "Other places, they give random drug tests. At NCTC they put you under random surveillance and give you pee tests. It's a brutal environment to work in."

Something suddenly occurred to Holliday and he asked the relevant question. "Where was Tritt flying into Geneva from?"

"Rome," said Philpot. "November sixth. We're assuming he was doing research for the shot."

"Before Rome?"

"Glasgow International, Scotland."

"Before that?"

"Orlando on Virgin Atlantic."

"Before that?"

"Nassau, Bahamas. He has a little place there, a house on Lyford Cay. All under his own name."

"You don't find that a strange itinerary?"

"We get everything except Glasgow," said Philpot. "What the hell does a man like Tritt find to do in a place like that for three days?"

"Checks in with his employer," replied Holliday.

"You actually know who hired him to make the hit? Want to share? I've been doing all the talking so far."

"How about Katherine Pierce Sinclair?" Holliday said. "She owns a country estate called Edinburgh House within driving distance of Glasgow and a place in the Bahamas, as well."

"So does Sean Connery. So what?" Philpot asked. "I would have thought you'd have had enough of Sinclair since your run-in over the summer." Philpot shook his head. "You should have seen them dancing around, trying to clean up that mess. We called in the Israeli ambassador, who's from Queens, by the way, and tough as nails, but he just stonewalled us." Philpot took a last bite from the second burger and sucked on the straw in his milkshake.

"I'm going to need a few files," said Holliday as Philpot drained the last of the bright pink concoction. There was so much exhaust from passing cars and trucks that Holliday was getting a headache. "Quickly."

"Don't push it, Doc. I am absolutely, positively not giving you official files and that's final."

"Tritt, Kate Sinclair and whatever you've got on the senator."

"You're crazy. They could lock me away forever in one of those secret jails they've got in Colorado. You're talking treason."

"You owe me, Potsy."

Philpot picked up his garbage, lumbered over to the refuse bin and dumped the paper and plastic into it. He turned and walked back to the picnic table.

"You ever been to Rock Creek Park?"

"Sure."

"You know where Ross Drive is?"

"I can find it."

"Half a mile in off the Ridge Road there's a dry culvert and a bridge. Three steel pipes and concrete abutments. On the west abutment some kid has sprayed his tag with black paint. If it's safe there'll be a bright red strip sprayed under the tag. What you need will be rolled up in the middle pipe closest to the spray-painted abutment."

"You're a peach, Potsy."

"You know where you can put your peach, Holliday. Consider my debt repaid." He turned on his heel and went back into the McDonald's. A minute or so later he reappeared, biting savagely into an apple turnover.

"One more thing," said Potsy, his mouth full.

"Shoot."

"Bad choice of words," said the pudgy intelligence officer.

"Sorry."

"Our people found the kill site in Rome."

"Before the Italian cops?"

"Uh-huh," said Potsy. "It wasn't all that hard."

"And?"

"We found something," said Potsy. He finished off the turnover and brushed the crumbs from his hands.

"Don't be coy."

"It was a solid gold coin from the time of the Crusades. A dinar, I think it's called. It had Saladin's name on it in Arabic."

"And?"

"NSA has been hearing from all sorts of Al-Qaeda cell phone and e-mail chatter about a group calling itself Jihad al-Salibiyya. They've secretly been taking responsibility for whacking the man in the big hat."

"And you've been keeping it quiet?"

"We don't want to start up another shit storm like bin Laden and his pals. At least until we know more about them." He looked at Holliday carefully. "The name ring a bell?"

"No," lied Holliday. "Not even a faint one."

"Well, that's it, then," said Potsy. "Rock Creek Park."

"I'll be there."

Potsy got back into his car and drove off.

Half an hour later, Holliday was back at the house on Prospect Street, the faint chemical scent of the hamburgers clinging to him like a fog. Brennan and Peggy were in the kitchen, drinking more coffee and reading the Washington Post.

The picture above the fold on the front page was probably the last photograph of the living Pope taken by Dario Bondi, the official Vatican photographer and Peggy's friend. Brennan and Peggy both put down their sections of the newspaper as Holliday appeared in the kitchen doorway.

"So, how did that go?" Peggy asked. "Pick up any juicy rumors?"

"It was a setup," answered Holliday. "We're being played like a violin."

"Why do you say that?" Brennan asked.

"A group calling itself Jihad al-Salibiyya is taking responsibility for the Pope's assassination."

"Fundamentalists?"

"Yeah, but not the Muslim kind. Al-Salibiyya was the name for the Templar Knights who defected to the infidel side. The sworn enemies of the true Templars. It literally means 'Enemies of the Cross.'"

"Crusaders," said Peggy.

"Kate Sinclair," said Brennan.

"Philpot's a lot of things but he's no actor," said Holliday tensely, passing on yet another cup of coffee and sitting down at the kitchen table. "He just tried too damned hard. He was looking around like one of the villains in a Pink Panther movie. What he didn't try very hard to do was to keep back information. I barely put any pressure on him. He confirmed William Tritt as the most likely suspect and had his most recent travel itinerary memorized. Five will get you ten he was wearing a wire or we were being watched from the parking lot." Holliday sighed and shook his head. "The whole thing was far too easy. I asked him for some background files and he even had a dead drop organized and ready to go."

"Sounds like the lads are trying to distance themselves from this Tritt fellow," commented Brennan.