Tom Clancy - Executive Orders

IT WAS BECOMING an all-nighter all over the world. In Tel Aviv, where it was now after four in the morning, Avi ben Jakob had called in his top terrorism experts. Together they went over the photos transmitted from Washington and were comparing them with their own surveillance photographs that had been taken over the years in Lebanon and elsewhere. The problem was that many of their photos showed young men with beards— the simplest method of disguise known to man—and the photos were not of high quality. By the same token, the American-transmitted images were not exactly graduation pictures, either.

"Anything useful?" the director of Mossad asked.

Eyes turned to one of the Mossad's experts, a fortyish woman named Sarah Peled. Behind her back, they called her the witch. She had some special gift for ID'ing people from photographs, and was right just over half the time in cases where other trained intelligence officers threw up their hands in frustration.

"This one." She slid two photos across the table. "This is a definite match."

Ben Jakob looked at the two side by side—and saw nothing to confirm her opinion. He'd asked her many times what keyed her in on such things. Sarah always said it was the eyes, and so Avi took another look, comparing the eyes of one with the eyes of the other photo. All he saw were eyes. He turned the Israeli photo over. The printed data on the back said that he was a suspected Hezbollah member, name unknown, age about twenty in their photo, which was dated six years earlier.

"Any others, Sarah?" he asked.

"No, none at all."

"How confident are you on this one?" one of the counterintelligence people asked, looking at the photos himself now and, like Avi, seeing nothing.

"One hundred percent, Benny. I said 'definite, didn't I?" Sarah was often testy, especially with unbelieving men at four in the morning.

"How far do we go on this?" another staff member asked.

"Ryan is a friend of our country, and President of the United States. We go as far as we can. I want inquiries to go out. All contacts, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran, everywhere."

"SWINE," BONDARENKO RAN a hand through his hair. His tie was long since gone. His watch told him it was Saturday, but he didn't know what that day was anymore.

"Yes," Golovko agreed. "A black operation—a 'wet' one, you used to call it?" the general asked.

"Wet and incompetent," the RVS chairman said crossly. "But Ivan Emmetovich was lucky, Comrade General. This time."

"Perhaps," Gennady Iosefovich allowed.

"You disagree?"

"The terrorists underestimated their opponents. You will recall that I recently spent time with the American army. Their training is like nothing else in the world, and the training of their presidential guard must be equally as expert. Why is it that people so often underestimate the Americans?" he wondered.

That was a good question, Sergey Nikolay'ch recognized, nodding for the chief of operations to go on. "America often suffers from a lack of political direction. That is not the same as incompetence. You know what they are like? A vicious dog held on a short leash— and because he cannot break the leash, people delude themselves that they need not fear him, but within the arc of that leash he is invincible, and a leash, Comrade Chairman, is a temporary thing. You know this Ryan fellow."

"I know him well," Golovko agreed.

"And? The stories in their press, are they true?"

"All of them."

"I tell you what I think, Sergey Nikolay'ch. If you regard him as a formidable adversary, and he has that vicious dog on the leash, I would not go far out of my way to offend him. An attack on a child? His child?" The general shook his head.

That was it, Golovko realized. They were both tired, but here was a moment of clarity. He'd spent too much time reading over the political reports from Washington, from his own embassy, and directly from the American media. They all said that Ivan Emmetovich… was that the key? From the beginning he'd called Ryan that, thinking to honor the man with the Russian version of his name and the Russian patronymic. And an honor it was in Golovko's context…

"You are thinking what I am thinking, da?" the general asked, seeing the man's face and gesturing for him to speak.

"Someone has made a calculation…"

"And it is not an accurate one. I think we need to find out who has done so. I think a systematic attack on American interests, an attempt to weaken America, Comrade Chairman, is really an attack against our interests. Why is China doing what she is doing, eh? Why did they force America to change her naval dispositions? And now this? American forces are being stretched, and at the same time a strike at the very heart of the American leader. This is no coincidence. Now we can stand aside and do nothing more than observe, or—"

"There is nothing we can do, and with the revelations in the American press—"

"Comrade Chairman," Bondarenko interrupted. "For seventy years, our country has confused political theory with objective fact, and that was almost our undoing as a nation. There are objective conditions here," he went on, using a phrase beloved of the Soviet military—a reaction, perhaps, to their three generations of political oversight. "I see the patterns of a clever operation, a coordinated operation, but one which has a fatal flaw, and that flaw is a misestimation of the American President. Do you disagree?"

Golovko gave that a few seconds of thought, noting also that Bondarenko might just be seeing something real—but did the Americans? It was so much harder to see something from the inside than the outside. A coordinated operation? Back to Ryan, he told himself.

"No. I made that mistake myself. Ryan appears much less than what he is. The signs are all there, but people don't see them."

"When I was in America, that General Diggs told me the story of the time terrorists attacked Ryan's house. He took up arms and defeated them, courageously and decisively. From what you say, it appears he is also highly effective as an intelligence officer. His only flaw, if one may call it that, is that he is not politically adept, and politicians invariably take that for weakness. Perhaps it is," Bondarenko allowed. "But if this is a hostile operation against America, then his political weaknesses are far less important than his other gifts."

"And?"

"Help the man," the general urged. "Better that we should be on the winning side, and if we do not help, then we might be on the other. Nobody will attack America directly. We are not so fortunate, Comrade Chairman." He was almost right.

RYAN AWOKE AT DAWN, wondering why. The quiet. Almost like his home on the Bay. He strained to listen for traffic or other sounds, but there were none. Moving out of the bed was difficult. Cathy had decided to have Katie in with them, and there she was in her pink sleeper, looking angelic as toddlers did, still babies at that age whatever others might say. He had to smile,

then made his way to the bathroom. Casual clothes had been set out in the dressing room, and he put them on, with a pair of sneaks and a sweater, to head outside. The air was brisk, with traces of frost on the boxwoods, and the sky clear. Not bad. Robby was right. This wasn't a bad place to come to. It put a distance between himself and other things, and he needed that right now. "Morning, sir." It was Captain Overton.

"Not bad duty, is it?"

The young officer nodded. "We do the security. The Navy does the petunias. It's a fair division of labor, Mr. President. Even the Secret Service guys can sleep in here, sir."

Ryan looked around and saw why. There were two armed Marines immediately around the cabin, and three more within fifty yards. And those were just the ones he could see. "Get you anything, Mr. President?"