Джон Болл: The First Team

Hewlitt sat in his office for the rest of the day waiting for a summons, but he received no messages of any kind. That in itself was highly unusual; normally his phone was reasonably busy and a day during which he was not called in for consultation was rare. Not that his opinions or judgments were that highly respected at thirty-two, but his language capability was. The questions usually revolved around what might be the implications and nuances of specific material which he had translated. Now the silence was disturbing.

When the normal working hours were over Hewlitt considered carefully whether he should remain overtime, as he had so often done. Zalinsky had told him to wait, but his manner of speaking had not implied that he would necessarily be wanted the same day. The decision was partly made for him when he noted that everyone else was going home. He solved the problem by arranging to be one of the last to leave. Just before going out he put a slip of paper on his desk with his home telephone number on it. It was on file, of course, but by doing that he at least indicated that he would be available if Zalinsky chose to summon him back. Satisfied that he had taken the best path, he went out through the gate and over to Frank’s cab, which was waiting for him in its usual spot. He climbed in, but refrained from saying anything until the vehicle was well out into the stream of traffic. He was still holding his peace when Frank asked over his shoulder, “How did it go?” “I honestly don’t know,” Hewlitt answered. “That’s the real truth.”

“ Did you see this guy, you know the one…?”

“Yes, I saw him — briefly.”

Frank abruptly changed the subject. “That was a twenty you gave me this morning. Make a mistake?”

“No. I wasn’t sure what might happen next and I thought that you might need it — that’s all.”

“That’s what I thought.” Frank turned his full attention to his driving and maneuvered his way proficiently, and illegally, out of a traffic bind. “The cops, they ain’t writing any tickets today,” he volunteered. “If you knock a guy down you might get one, otherwise most anything goes.”

“How is it working out?” Hewlitt asked.

“All right, I guess. Just as soon as we get more by ourselves, I’d like to talk to you a little.”

That called for another decision; Hewlitt weighed the odds and then, somewhat against his better judgment, committed himself. “Frank, I think you’d better be careful. You know how all of this happened; we let our defenses down. We talked a little too much, trusted too many of the wrong people. And they bugged us more than we ever dreamed that they could. They listened in on everything. This cab, for instance, it could be bugged right now.”

“Not likely,” Frank said.

“Of course not, but that’s what we thought about a lot of other things and we were caught dead asleep.”

Frank nodded, the back of his thick neck creasing and uncreas-ing. “I know what you mean, they had bugs in every can in town. Funny how when a guy goes to the john he figures that somehow he’s got more privacy. But did I ever tell you ’bout Davy Jones? Not the guy in the ocean, another one.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Davy’s a good friend of mine and he’s a genius with electronics, that man is. He built himself a little box with a light on it and some batteries inside. He keeps it in his car. Anytime any cop shines a radar signal at him, that little red light goes on — just like that.”

As he stopped to untangle another traffic problem Hewlitt carefully refrained from telling him that radar detectors were not new, there would be no point in it. When they were again free of the congestion Frank went on.

“Yesterday I went to see Davy to find out if he had any more news. He’s got radio equipment that he built himself and he can talk all over the world. He’s got his little place next to the garage where I do my work. I had this hack in, tunin’ her up just in case we might be going down to the mountains like I suggested. After I talked to Davy he came out and while I had the car up on the rack he went over it. He knows I carry you every day and how you work in the White House. When he got through he said that the cab was O.K. — no bugs. It was locked in the garage last night and I been in it ever since.”

That was evidence of a sort, despite the fact that Hewlitt had never heard of Davy Jones before and wasn’t inclined to trust him too much. When it was added to the fact that Frank’s cab would have a very low-priority interest to the enemy it resulted in a reasonably safe conclusion that the vehicle had not been tapped. The big remaining caution now was Frank. Hewlitt had known the man

I or years, but that did not constitute a security clearance. Far from

II — and that too had been vividly brought home. The United States had not been defeated as much as it had been betrayed.

“What happened today?” Hewlitt asked. “Did you see anything or pick up any news?”

Frank nodded again. “All day long, the planes they been coming in. Big turboprops, freighters, even some supersonic stuff — all from the other side. At National, Dulles, Andrews, all over the place. They had it all planned out; I took an air controller home and he told me they had it so well organized he could have stayed in bed. Most regular air traffic was cut off except for a few flights. It was all their stuff, full of men, troops, a lot of equipment. We just let them come in, but I guess there ain’t much we can do about it now.”

That made Hewlitt flush, and it took him a few seconds to recover his composure. “Not right now, anyway. Anything else?”

“Lots of stuff on the radio. All about the same, telling us to keep on with our regular jobs for a while, not to do anything out of the ordinary, and to remember that if we get in the way, or try anything, we’ll be ‘dealt with.’ Maybe I can pick it up now if you want to hear it.” He leaned over to turn on the set.

“Not now,” Hewlitt said. “I’d rather talk to you. How threatening were they?”

“Mighty damn threatening, take it from me. There was nothing polite about it — get out of line and right now you get shot — that was about the size of it. Listen to that fifty times over and you begin to believe it. It’s been on TV too, I hear. I can see it, the people are runnin’ scared.”

“I can’t blame them too much.”

Frank lifted his shoulders as he had in the morning and let them fall. “I’m no hero, but I was in the Marines once.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Nothin’ to talk about. But I still hate to see us just lie down and play dead. You’d think that somebody’d do somethin’.”

“It’s pretty early in the game,” Hewlitt said carefully.

Frank pulled up to the curb in front of Hewlitt’s place. No one was visibly within earshot. “Sure, but that’s a good time to score some points if you can, ain’t it?” he asked. Then he changed his tone. “Never mind about the fare, you’ve got a lot in the bank yet.”

For a long time after he had let himself into his apartment Hewlitt sat in the gathering darkness. He had a little more data to go on now, but there was nothing even approaching a clear picture in his mind. He had tried to think before; now in surroundings which were more personally his own he tried again, with strengthened determination.

First he had the uncomfortable knowledge that he had been named at the briefing and had been told to hold himself in readiness. Since he was only one of the many on the White House staff, he accepted the conclusion that it was his language capability which had made him stand out. He remembered Frank’s statement that there had been a heavy influx of aircraft bearing troops and other personnel. He could talk to them, give them instructions if need be, read their communications. All this might make him useful as an errand boy. His nature rebelled against that kind of an assignment, but his good sense told him that it would be far better to survive in such a capacity than to accept a possibly severe alternative. He did not draw the alternative out of the shadows, he simply acknowledged to himself that it would be totally unacceptable and left it at that.