Dan Brown - Digital Fortess

“Anything at all?” Becker pressed. “The escort’s name?

There was a long silence.

Cloucharde rubbed his right temple. He was suddenly looking pale. “Well . . . ah . . . no. I don’t believe . . .” His voice was shaky.

Becker leaned toward him. “Are you all right?”

Cloucharde nodded lightly. “Yes, fine . . . just a little . . . the excitement maybe . . .” He trailed off.

“Think, Mr. Cloucharde.” Becker urged quietly. “It’s important.”

Cloucharde winced. “I don’t know . . . the woman . . . the man kept calling her . . .” He closed his eyes and groaned.

“What was her name?”

“I really don’t recall . . .” Cloucharde was fading fast.

“Think.” Becker prodded. “It’s important that the consular file be as complete as possible. I’ll need to support your story with statements from the other witnesses. Any information you can give me to help locate them . . .”

But Cloucharde was not listening. He was dabbing his forehead with the sheet. “I’m sorry . . . perhaps tomorrow . . .” He looked nauseated.

“Mr. Cloucharde, it’s important you remember this now.” Becker suddenly realized he was speaking too loudly. People on nearby cots were still sitting up watching what was going on. On the far side of the room a nurse appeared through the double doors and strode briskly toward them.

“Anything at all,” Becker pressed urgently.

“The German called the woman—”

Becker lightly shook Cloucharde, trying to bring him back.

Cloucharde’s eyes flickered momentarily. “Her name . . .”

Stay with me, old fella . . .

“Dew . . .” Cloucharde’s eyes closed again. The nurse was closing in. She looked furious.

“Dew?” Becker shook Cloucharde’s arm.

The old man groaned. “He called her . . .” Cloucharde was mumbling now, barely audible.

The nurse was less than ten feet away yelling at Becker in angry Spanish. Becker heard nothing. His eyes were fixed on the old man’s lips. He shook Cloucharde one last time as the nurse bore down on him.

The nurse grabbed David Becker’s shoulder. She pulled him to his feet just as Cloucharde’s lips parted. The single word leaving the old man’s mouth was not actually spoken. It was softly sighed‑like a distant sensual remembrance. “Dewdrop . . .”

The scolding grasp yanked Becker away.

Dewdrop? Becker wondered. What the hell kind of name is Dewdrop? He spun away from the nurse and turned one last time to Cloucharde. “Dewdrop? Are you sure?”

But Pierre Cloucharde was fast asleep.

Susan sat alone in the plush surroundings of Node 3. She nursed a lemon mist herb tea and awaited the return of her tracer.

As senior cryptographer, Susan enjoyed the terminal with the best view. It was on the back side of the ring of computers and faced the Crypto floor. From this spot, Susan could oversee all of Node 3. She could also see, on the other side of the one‑way glass, TRANSLTR standing dead‑center of the Crypto floor.

Susan checked the clock. She had been waiting almost an hour. American Remailers Anonymous was apparently taking their time forwarding North Dakota’s mail. She sighed heavily. Despite her efforts to forget her morning conversation with David, the words played over and over in her head. She knew she’d been hard on him. She prayed he was okay in Spain.

Her thoughts were jarred by the loud hiss of the glass doors. She looked up and groaned. Cryptographer Greg Hale stood in the opening.

Greg Hale was tall and muscular with thick blond hair and a deep cleft chin. He was loud, thick‑fleshed, and perpetually overdressed. His fellow cryptographers had nicknamed him “Halite"‑after the mineral. Hale had always assumed it referred to some rare gem‑paralleling his unrivaled intellect and rock‑hard physique. Had his ego permitted him to consult an encyclopedia, he would have discovered it was nothing more than the salty residue left behind when oceans dried up.

Like all NSA cryptographers, Hale made a solid salary. However, he had a hard time keeping that fact to himself. He drove a white Lotus with a moon roof and a deafening subwoofer system. He was a gadget junkie, and his car was his showpiece; he’d installed a global positioning computer system, voice‑activated door locks, a five‑point radar jammer, and a cellular fax/phone so he’d never be out of touch with his message services. His vanity plate read megabyte and was framed in violet neon.

Greg Hale had been rescued from a childhood of petty crime by the U.S. Marine Corps. It was there that he’d learned about computers. He was one of the best programmers the Marines had ever seen, well on his way to a distinguished military career. But two days before the completion of his third tour of duty, his future suddenly changed. Hale accidentally killed a fellow Marine in a drunken brawl. The Korean art of self‑defense, Tae kwon do, proved more deadly than defensive. He was promptly relieved of his duty.

After serving a brief prison term, Halite began looking for work in the private sector as a programmer. He was always up front about the incident in the marines, and he courted prospective employers by offering a month’s work without pay to prove his worth. He had no shortage of takers, and once they found out what he could do with a computer, they never wanted to let him go.

As his computer expertise grew, Hale began making Internet connections all over the world. He was one of the new breed of cyberfreaks with E‑mail friends in every nation, moving in and out of seedy electronic bulletin boards and European chat groups. He’d been fired by two different employers for using their business accounts to upload pornographic photos to some of his friends.

* * *

“What are you doing here?” Hale demanded, stopping in the doorway and staring at Susan. He’d obviously expected to have Node 3 to himself today.

Susan forced herself to stay cool. “It’s Saturday, Greg. I could ask you the same question.” But Susan knew what Hale was doing there. He was the consummate computer addict. Despite the Saturday rule, he often slipped into Crypto on weekends to use the NSA’s unrivalled computing power to run new programs he was working on.

“Just wanted to re‑tweak a few lines and check my E‑mail,” Hale said. He eyed her curiously. “What was it you said you’re doing here?”

“I didn’t,” Susan replied.

Hale arched a surprised eyebrow. “No reason to be coy. We have no secrets here in Node 3, remember? All for one and one for all.”

Susan sipped her lemon mist and ignored him. Hale shrugged and strode toward the Node 3 pantry. The pantry was always his first stop. As Hale crossed the room, he sighed heavily and made a point of ogling Susan’s legs stretched out beneath her terminal. Susan, without looking up, retracted her legs and kept working. Hale smirked.

Susan had gotten used to Hale hitting on her. His favorite line was something about interfacing to check the compatibility of their hardware. It turned Susan’s stomach. She was too proud to complain to Strathmore about Hale; it was far easier just to ignore him.

Hale approached the Node 3 pantry and pulled open the lattice doors like a bull. He slid a Tupperware container of tofu out of the fridge and popped a few pieces of the gelatinous white substance in his mouth. Then he leaned on the stove and smoothed his gray Bellvienne slacks and well‑starched shirt. “You gonna be here long?”

“All night,” Susan said flatly.

“Hmm . . .” Halite cooed with his mouth full. “A cozy Saturday in the Playpen, just the two of us.”

“Just the three of us,” Susan interjected. “Commander Strathmore’s upstairs. You might want to disappear before he sees you.”