David Morrell - The Covenant Of The Flame

'You have to eat.'

'Forget it. Food's the last thing I'm interested in. I probably couldn't keep it down.'

'But you're useless to me if you're exhausted. My informants tell me you don't eat meat. Would fish be acceptable?"

Tess felt intimidated by Father Baldwin's intimate knowledge of her habits. At the same time, she felt indignant. But the priest's forceful tone had its effect.

'If you're that determined,' Tess said, 'go ahead, although I don't know why my permission matters. You'll do it anyhow. Sure. Yeah, fish will be fine.'

'And Lieutenant, what about you?'

'A week ago, I'd have ordered steak and fries,' Craig said. 'But now, after having met Tess… Whatever she recommends to eat is good enough for me.'

'I'll also need your clothing sizes,' Father Baldwin said. 'What you're wearing is torn and reeks of smoke. Since you'll soon be out in public, to avoid attracting attention, you'll have to put on fresh clothes.'

'For the second time today,' Tess murmured and discovered she was trembling.

Eric Chatham stood at the bottom of the steps that led to the Lincoln Memorial, its massive statue and white marble columns glowing eerily in the darkness. This section of the circular street around the memorial was closed to traffic, but to his right, headlights of vehicles approached along Daniel French Drive to stop at a parking lot, visitors getting out to stroll around and enter the memorial. Chatham studied those cars and visitors, waiting for a man to walk toward him and mention that he'd come from Tess Drake.

The night was warm. All the same, Chatham 's stomach felt crammed with jagged chunks of ice. He brooded, unable to subdue his misgivings. It wasn't just that he'd agreed, against all his instincts, to meet in this unorthodox, potentially dangerous way. It was also that this was the second such unorthodox meeting he'd had today, the first during noon hour at Arlington National Cemetery with Kenneth Madden, the CIA's Deputy Director of Covert Operations. The meetings were related, and Chatham was more convinced that something disastrous was about to happen. He thought of Melinda Drake's murder and corrected himself. No, not about to happen. Now. His years of experience as the Bureau's director told him that whatever was wrong had already begun and might even be out of control.

Tess was frightened, that much was certain. When she'd called him two hours ago, he'd been alarmed by her trembling voice, her desperate tone. Before he had a chance to explain why he needed to talk to her, she'd interrupted, claiming that she knew who'd killed her mother, that she had important information about the murder, but that she couldn't reveal it over the phone. She had to tell him about – to let him see - the evidence in person.

Then come to my office. No,' Chatham had said, 'it's more private at my home.'

'But I can't trust either place!'

'Forgive me, Tess, but don't you think you're taking precautions to an extreme?'

' After everything I've been through ? Eric, you have no idea. In my position, you'd be…!'

'Okay. Calm down. If you believe you're in that much danger, I'll arrange for special agents to guard my house.'

'No! The meeting has to be on my conditions! If you were truly a friend of my father, you'll do your best to help me stay alive!'

Chatham had hesitated. 'Yes. For your father. Anything.'

'Some friends of mine will pick you up and bring you to where I feel safe.'

'Agreed.'

'You'll come alone,' Tess had said.

'I don't like that, but again, all right.' Chatham 's forehead had suddenly throbbed.

'It has to be that way, so my friends can make sure you're not followed. The people who want to kill me might be watching you.'

'Again, you're being extreme.'

'No, Eric, practical! If I'm not careful, they'll use you to find me. It doesn't matter who you are. The heretics have proven how determined they are to stop me.'

'Heretics?' The word had frozen Chatham 's spine. 'What are you talking about?'

'You mean you pretend… You're claiming you really don't know?

'If I did , would I…?'

'Be there. I'm begging you! Please!' Tess had named the specifics of the rendezvous. 'I'll be waiting for my friends to bring you to where I'm hiding.'

Now, in the darkness, Chatham glanced nervously at the luminous dial on his watch. Eleven-ten. Amid tourists at the base of the dramatically lit columns and statue of the Lincoln Memorial, he felt chilled in his short-sleeved cotton sweater, despite the night's warmth. After all, the rendezvous was supposed to have occurred ten minutes ago, and although the man who'd been sent to take him to Tess was probably scouting the area to make sure that Chatham had come alone and hadn't been followed by Tess's enemies, the FBI director couldn't help feeling exposed among the numerous passing tourists, any one of whom might be a threat.

Keep control, he told himself. You'll soon be as paranoid as Tess sounded.

Soon be? I already am! I wish I hadn't -

A man stopped beside him and took a photograph of the memorial. He had an average build, nondescript face, and neutral clothes. 'It probably won't turn out.' The man shook his head. 'I brought the wrong speed of film.'

'You never know. You might get lucky,' Chatham said, tensing, completing the identification code.

'Tess Drake,' the man said, taking another picture up the stairs toward Lincoln 's statue beyond the spotlit looming pillars. 'You came alone?'

'As I promised.'

'Not to doubt your word, but I checked to make sure.'

Chatham shrugged. 'I assumed.'

'In that case, are you ready to take a ride?'

'Anything to find out what's going on. Let's do it.' Chatham.urned impatiently to the right toward the murky, tree-enclosed Parkmg lot at the end of Daniel French Drive.

'No, we go this way.' The neutral-faced man with the camera jerked his head in the opposite direction. 'On your left.'

Chatham scowled. ' Left ? But…' Turning his nervous eyes in that direction, he saw a waist-high metal barricade that prevented cars from driving completely around the memorial.

Beyond the barricade, numerous headlights flashed by. Chatham heard the din of speeding cars swarming loudly across Arlington Memorial Bridge to veer farther left, away from the Lincoln Memorial onto Twenty-third Street.

'Yeah, I know,' the man with the camera said. There's no parking lot over there. Not to worry. Everything's been taken care of.' He reached inside a leather camera case strapped to his waist and removed a cellular telephone.

Quickly tapping numbers, he listened, then spoke as quickly. 'All clear. We're ready. Two minutes? Good. That's about how long it'll take us.'

The man placed the telephone back in his camera case. 'Would you care for a stroll, Mr Chatham?' Not waiting for an answer, the man touched Chatham 's arm and guided him toward the left, toward the metal barricade.

They skirted it, passing trees whose lush boughs obscured the stars and whose thick trunks flanked an unused, weed-grown section of road.

'If you're wondering,' the man said, I'm not alone. My companions are watching in case anyone's foolish enough to try to come after us.'

Nervous, Chatham managed to say, 'The Bureau's training team at Quantico might benefit by taking lessons from you.'

The man with the camera – which wasn't a camera at all but somehow a weapon, perhaps a hidden gun, Chatham suspected -merely gestured with his free hand. 'We'd never agree to do it, but a compliment is always appreciated.'

'What I'd appreciate is to know what on earth is - '

'Soon, Mr Chatham. Soon.'

They approached the lights and the noise of the off-bridge traffic on the busy thoroughfare. Beyond the trees, on the gravel shoulder, the average- looking man paused, blocking Chatham's way, and in the glare of passing headlights, Chatham realized that the man's ordinary-seeming build was actually sinewy and lithe. Feeling the exhaust-laden wind from the rushing traffic, Chatham concluded that this man was probably more in condition than even the best of his bodyguards.