Michael Walsh - Early Warning

Which is where the Black Widow came in.

The Black Widow was the in-house nickname of the NSA’s Cray supercomputer at Fort Meade. Forget privacy-no matter what the sideshow arguments in Congress were about the FISA laws or civil liberties, the Black Widow continued to go remorselessly about her job, which was to listen in on, and read, all telephonic and written electronic communication, in any language, anywhere in the world. It was the old Clinton-era “Echelon” project writ large, able to perform trillions of calculations per second as it sifted and sorted in its never-ending quest for key words, code words, patterns. The ACLU had screamed, but presidents from both parties had surreptitiously embraced it. The Black Widow was here to stay if only she could be heeded and translated in time.

Wiretapping had come a long way. In the popular imagination-and in the minds of the media, which, to judge from the op-ed pages of the New York Times, now viewed everything through the lenses of bad movies and show tunes-“eavesdropping” still conjured up images of fake telephone repairmen in jump suits, shimmying up phone poles or cracking open service boxes in the sub-sub-basement and applying alligator clips to the switching machinery.

None of that mattered anymore. It was all for show. the Black Widow not only heard all and read all, she could sense all: the technology had advanced to such an extent that the Widow and other Cray supercomputers like her-including the Cray XT4, known as the Jaguar, and the MPP (massively parallel processor) housed at the University of Tennessee-could read the keystrokes of a given computer through the electrical current serving the machine. And all linkable. If the Singularity wasn’t here yet, it would be soon.

“Major Atwater is here, sir,” said Ms. Overbay’s disembodied voice. Seelye punched a button on his desk that unlocked his office door-security was everything here-and in came the major as the door closed behind him.

Kent Atwater was from Thief River Falls, Minnesota, a place more celebrated for its evocative name than for any particular attraction, other than its mind-numbing winter weather. He had graduated from the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs with high marks in math and cryptography, and had distinguished himself with the 91st Missile Wing at Minot in North Dakota, first with the Gravehaulers of the 741st squadron, then with the Security Forces Group. In that capacity, he had caught the eye of NSA brass, been transferred to Fort Meade, and bumped up the chain in Seelye’s direction. Blond, strongly built, in his early 30s, he was a practically a caricature of what the world used to think of as a typical American but was now the vanishing remnant of a bygone ethnic archetype. Seelye liked and admired Atwater, although his demeanor never showed it, but the young Air Force officer had promise, which is why Seelye was grooming him as a possible deputy.

“Sir?” said Atwater, saluting.

“At ease, Major,” said Seelye, gathering up the sheaf of papers and handing them to Atwater. “Please take a look at these and give me your first reaction. Don’t think, just react. And please sit down.”

Atwater was already through the papers by the time his rear hit the seat. He said, “Anybody who knows anything about the history of cryptography knows what these are. Someone with a literary bent.”

“Indeed,” replied Seelye.

“I mean, The Gold Bug, Dorothy L. Sayers, the Beale Treasure. The only thing missing is the Voynich Manuscript. What is this, sir, a treatment for the next National Treasure movie?”

“You tell me, Major.”

Atwater thought for a moment. “Well,” he began, “obviously it can’t be as simple as it looks.”

“Does it really look that simple? And what if it is? Sometimes the best codes are the simplest.” Seelye suddenly flashed on those ridiculous “Dancing Men” from the Sherlock Holmes story, the substitution cipher that he had overlooked, but that had unlocked Devlin’s past, and thus given his most potent agent complete power over him, the nominal boss.

Which brought today’s events full circle. President Tyler had just ordered Devlin into action, and Seelye had no choice but to obey. And yet, under his agreement with Tyler, Devlin could terminate Seelye at any time, for any reason. That was something that was going to have to change.

“…me to do, sir?” Atwater was saying. Seelye looked up-

“Sorry, Major, say again?”

“I said, what do you want me to do, sir?” inquired Atwater.

“I want you to track down the sender-that shouldn’t be too hard-and I want you to tell me what all these references to bygone codes-”

“Some of which have never been cracked,” interjected Atwater. The man was evincing just the slightest signs of borderline insubordination, which was another thing that would have to be addressed. As if he’d read Seelye’s mind, Atwater immediately apologized. “If you’ll pardon the interruption, sir.”

Seelye ignored the mea culpa. “Just give me your best assessment on this, Major. It goes without saying that, since this directly affects the operations of DIRNSA, your report is eyes-only.”

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir.”

“That’s all.”

Atwater shot to his feet. “Yes, sir,” he said, saluted once more, performed a crisp about-face, and pushed the door open the instant he heard Seelye unlock it.

“Fail me not,” said Seelye as the Major left. Or maybe he said it to himself. It wasn’t clear, even to him.

In the air

Emanuel Skorzeny was so absorbed in the numbers dancing in front of him on a computer screen that he almost forgot his manners. “Would you like a drink, my dear?” he inquired, reaching out to pat her on her knee. “A gin martini, ice-cold, just the way you like them? All you have to do is ask, and Mlle. Derrida here will be more than happy to fetch one for you. Isn’t that right, Mlle. Derrida?”

Whether she was happy or not didn’t really matter. Emanuelle Derrida swallowed both her tongue and her pride as she awaited a request-no, an order-from the woman who had boarded the plane in Macao and who was now on her way with them toward their next destination. Where that was, exactly, Skorzeny had not told her, but it didn’t really matter: wherever he went, she went, no questions asked or answered.

Amanda Harrington stiffened at his touch. That he was insane, there could be no doubt. After what he had done to her in London and in France, and now here, as if nothing untoward had occurred. And there was nothing she could do about it. She hated the evil bastard, and dreaded whatever it was he now wanted from her. Maybe a martini would help. She nodded assent, and Ms. Derrida went to fetch it, leaving them alone.

Skorzeny gazed at her with those relentless eyes, so used to command, to fulfillment. Then he spoke:

“It seems that we underestimated the opposition,” he began, without preamble, as if the past nine months were but a single day. That was Emanuel Skorzeny’s secret of success, an indefatigable focus, a refusal to accept defeat. “And of course the loss of…”-here it came-“the loss of Mr. Milverton was regrettable. But here again perhaps I overestimated his powers.”

Amanda had never fully learned the whole story of her lover’s last moments in London, and she had no way of knowing how much Skorzeny knew of her relationship with the man called Milverton. That he knew, of course, was indisputable-she was barely living proof of his jealousy and malice. “How did he die?” she managed to ask.

“But here is Mlle. Derrida with your libation,” he said. The assistant set the drink down in front of her and awaited further instruction. “That will be all, Mlle. Derrida,” he said dismissing her. The woman shot Amanda a look as she left.