The Night Crew (26 page)

While she packed Willborn’s dinner in a Styrofoam container, I scrawled out a quick note on a napkin to him, handed it to the waitress, then ate my dinner.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

I was up at 5:00, after a troubled sleep, showered, shaved, dressed, and alert enough by 5:30 to notice that I was the only one stirring. I had not expected Katherine to awaken so early, but Imelda was a different story; her new civilian status was taking the edge off. I had sneaked in the night before, removing my shoes at the doorway, and tiptoed upstairs to my bedroom to avoid a late-night confrontation with Katherine, or another crusty lecture from Imelda. I have earned ribbons for fearlessness on the battlefield, but women are a different story.

I nearly walked past the doorway to Katherine’s bedroom, which was open, before I peeked in and saw that she was sound asleep. I did not want to awaken her, but I did want to see her, so I slipped quietly inside and stood and watched her, feeling somewhere between a guilty voyeur and a lovesick teenager.

She was on her side, arms akimbo, her long dark hair splayed out, framing her beautiful face, which was directed toward me. I noted that she did not snore: two points. Also, she slept on the left side of the bed, as did I: minus two. Her choice of sleep attire was a ratty old T-shirt and I did not even peek beneath the covers to discover if there was a commando under that outfit—minus two points for me.

But in repose, as she was, she looked serene, untroubled, and chaste, in fact, angelic, proving, once again, that those with an unsullied conscience are granted the gift of real rest.

I recalled the night we had shared a meal with Nelson Arnold, and the way he and Katherine had looked at each other. Clearly Nelson was totally infatuated with her, though I did not detect a reciprocal level of ardor emanating from Katherine. Still, despite the very large differences between them in age, wealth, social status, and background, they did appear to be entirely comfortable in each other’s presence. There were none of the difficulties or tensions that seemed to ignite every time Katherine and I laid eyes on one another.

Essentially, Katherine is a more cerebral person than she is a passionate one, at least in how she behaves and comports herself professionally. I have always suspected, however, that, in her case, it is more a product of self-control than libido. On the courtroom floor, she can be hot-blooded and fiery, and it would interesting, not to mention, fun, to find out which is the true Katherine.

But people are endlessly complex and there are no laws of nature to sort out romantic relations. Unlike magnets, opposites do not necessarily attract; sometimes they merely bash one another to death. But neither is absolute harmony necessarily a formula for smooth relations; very often, it only leads to emotional stagnancy and boredom.

I wanted to shake her awake and ask what she saw in Mr. Moneybags. But having now met him, he was everything most women dream of—handsome, filthy rich, smart, filthy rich, principled, filthy rich, and with a very pleasant personality. I wanted to demand that she pick up the phone and tell him that in a contest between an army officer who barely had a pot to piss in, who could offer her nothing but constant moves, frequent separations, lousy pay, and the ever-present chance of becoming a young widow, he, with a pot large enough for the whole world to piss in, could take a flying leap.

I looked down at her face and tried to imagine Katherine as an army wife. Indeed, the army is hard on the soldier, but it is murder for the wives or, these days, their husbands. Those mates who survive a full career tend to be strong-willed, resourceful, independent, and hardy. Katherine had all those qualities in abundance, yet I could not picture her wearing white gloves to the officer wives’ tea party, kowtowing to bossy generals’ wives, or enduring the petty politics and ritual ass-kissing that are as much a part of army life as parades and military funerals. Then again, the modern army is different than it was for my mother’s generation. The white gloves are gone, and while most of the generals’ wives I have met are humble and wonderful, a few are insufferable, and they do test you. But the army has long since adapted to the pushier mores of a new generation of ambitious, independent women like Katherine, who do not stand behind their man, but rather beside him. Still, Katherine being Katherine, I suspected she would push this newfound tolerance to its limits.

If Katherine were a more practical woman, there would be no contest—she would already be fitting Nelson’s yacht with new curtains and filling out the wardrobe closets with the newest French fashions. But the words Katherine and practical do not belong in the same sentence.

I blew her an air-kiss and wandered back downstairs, where I gathered some files, then down to Main Street where I found a restaurant that served breakfast, and awaited the CIA’s call.

It came at 8:00 a.m., and it was Margaret, still speaking in her asphyxiating monotone. I was in neither a chatty nor a convivial mood and abruptly named the place for our meeting, then rang off and spent the next hour reviewing the office log of Captain Howser, my deceased predecessor, before I got into the pukey yellow Prius and drove on post. A different MP was at the gate. I could swear I saw him laughing as I drove past.

I drove to, then parked in the lot directly to the rear of the small, picturesque Catholic Chapel, where, half a century before, Ma and Pa Drummond got a life sentence together, then I walked up a steep hill to the much larger and more visually impressive Cadet Chapel, where the Prods perform their pagan rituals. In the old days, chapel was mandatory for cadets, so every Sunday morning they were formed up like stiff-faced prisoners and marched to the morning service of their particular predilection. These days they are free to go or to sleep in, as they wish. But I have heard that attendance is not an issue. There are no atheists in the foxhole, the saying goes, and since most of these young men and women know they will graduate and march off to war, it probably doesn’t strike them as a waste of time to get an early jump on things.

I entered through the imposing wooden doors and walked down the broad center aisle, about midway to the altar. I had chosen this somewhat unconventional venue for our meet because it was public, but not entirely. It was a cavernous cathedral, gothic both in design and scale, capable of seating well over a thousand, and thus, three people could conduct a perfectly discreet discussion in plain sight, as long as the conversation didn’t become overheated—and no gunfire was involved.

Also, I hoped this comingled monument to religious and patriotic ardor would stimulate my guests to be on their best behavior. I could not imagine even the CIA would whack a US Army officer with the aroma of the pulpit filling their nostrils. On the other hand, if I was overestimating their moral sensitivities, at least it would be a short trip to my funeral. Last but not least, such a pious setting seemed ordained to be a place where only truth was spoken.

I was seated at 9:55 and, at 10:00 a.m., I heard the large wooden doors open.

I stared straight ahead, with my back turned to my punctual guests. I could hear their steps as they moved quickly toward me, a pair of high heels making quick clacking sounds like a malfunctioning machine gun, the other pair, much heavier and louder, like the clump of approaching artillery shells.

They eventually progressed to the middle pew where I was seated with my .45 pistol pointedly positioned in my lap.

A mellifluous male voice to my rear informed me, “You won’t need that gun, Colonel.”

I looked up and directly into the snub-nosed, saturnine face of Thomas Bernhardt, National Security Advisor to the president. He offered me a friendly wave and requested, “Please put that away. It makes me nervous.”

The woman beside him put out her hand. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you face-to-face, Colonel Drummond. I’m Margaret Martin.”

So much for my illusion about an ambience conducive to integrity—it was anything but a pleasure to meet each other face-to-face. I stood and stuffed the .45 into my waistband, then shook her hand. “Have a seat,” I offered.

While Mr. Bernhardt and Ms. Martin took a moment to squeeze into my pew, get seated, and arrange themselves, I used the opportunity to study my guests.

Thomas Bernhardt, as I knew from press coverage, was a corporate lawyer by training and by profession, who had advised the president about foreign affairs during the campaign and was rewarded with his elevation to his current position of West Wing Mandarin. This meant he either had something on the president, or he had the president’s ear, respect, and confidence.

His reputation was as a behind-the-scenes, fingerprintless fixer, a guileful troubleshooter, who, unlike many of his predecessors, eschewed the Sunday morning press circuit and kept himself off the front pages. I didn’t know if this was a commendable personal trait or a slick survival mechanism to allow his boss to hog all the press clippings. I had the thought, however, that this explained his presence here—to wit: make the Sean quagmire disappear without raising any waves.

I shifted my attention to Margaret Martin, who appeared to be about my age. She was dressed in a cool blue blazer, a shimmery white blouse, and a tight red skirt that went down to her knees—the standard attire of a life-long bureaucrat, which conveyed that she was feminine by gender without evoking any untidy male sexual fantasies. The red-white-and-blue color coordination seemed to be designed for me.

She also was moderately attractive and would’ve been more so had she chosen to wear makeup. She had what I would characterize as a pleasant face, only contradicted by a pair of narrow blue eyes that sparkled with calculation and worry. Those eyes had puffy black circles underneath them, indicating that she hadn’t gotten much rest, and the half-hearted, forced smile was because she now was looking at the festering boil that caused her insomnia.

As the senior official present, Bernhardt decided to kick things off, observing, “I think it’s fair to say that you’ve stuck your fist into a hornet’s nest, Colonel.”

I wasn’t sure where he was going with this, but I had half a mind to remind him that they were the ones with their dicks in a wringer—and I had my hand on the handle. Given the professional sloppiness I had uncovered, they had to know one other truth; they were now less than a banana peel away from complete disaster. But instead of mentioning this unpleasantness, I merely nodded.

He continued, out of the blue, “How familiar are you with the history of the Second World War?”

“It occurred after the First, right?”

“Good guess.” He smiled and winked. “Have you ever heard the tale about Churchill and the town of Coventry?”

“Can you come to the point?” I replied, not really in the mood for a long-winded history sermon.

“Bear with me, Colonel . . . please. There is a point to this, and it’s relevant to what we’re here to discuss, I promise.”

Well, he did have a pleasant smile, and he said please, so it would be churlish of me to develop attention deficit issues. Also, he was about thirty paygrades higher than me. I can be easily influenced that way.

He cleared his throat. “The accuracy of this tale is questionable, but the British had broken the top secret German military codes, a program called Ultra, and two days before, they had intercepted a German transmission indicating that the city of Coventry was about to be bombed. The dilemma this presented Churchill had to be excruciating. If he took action based on this intelligence, say by ordering a hasty evacuation of Coventry, or amassing his air defenses around the city, he would’ve tipped off the Germans that we had broken their code, which would’ve altered the course of the war.” He paused for dramatic effort before he informed me, “He allowed the city to be bombed.”

“And did the survivors of Coventry erect a monument to his good judgment?”

“Probably not.”

“You said there’s a point to this story.”

“Yes, and you seem like a smart guy so I’m sure you didn’t miss it.” But he apparently had second thoughts about that assessment because he then explained, “In war, Sean, you often have to make difficult decisions . . . even distasteful choices. You have to weigh the larger picture against the small actions that, in comparison, and in hindsight, pale into insignificance.”

I looked at Thomas Bernhardt and replied, “And as an attorney, I’m sure you also recognize that’s the same greasy moral reasoning that led to the trial docket at Nuremburg.”

“Yes, and . . . well . . . I must confess I have some ambivalence myself about the choice we’re here to discuss. But I assure you, I will still sleep soundly at night.” He turned to Ms. Martin who definitely was not sleeping well. “Margaret, I think it’s time Sean learns what really happened at Al Basari.”

Margaret clearly was expecting this hand-off of the baton, so to speak. She cleared her throat, then quickly asked me, “How much have you learned about Amal Ashad’s role in the interrogation team?”

“A great deal, and the more I learn, the worse it gets.”

“Do you believe what you’ve learned?”

“You people always bring a lot of smoke and mirrors to the party. I thought we were here so you can clear up any confusion.”

She shifted gears and observed, “I hear you’ve done an interrogatory with Captain Willborn.”

“Correct.”

“And how did that go?”

“As it was supposed to go. He jerked me off with sandpaper.”

To Margaret’s credit she did not act shocked or take offense at my off-color metaphor. In fact, she smiled. “Phyllis said you have a way with words.” She then added, “I enjoy candor, however.”

Not so fast, Margaret
. “What was, or what is, Captain Willborn’s role in this?”

“Captain Willborn, as I think you already surmised, was a figurehead. As Phyllis told you, we went to great lengths to conceal the roles and involvement of our interpreters. He was nothing more than camouflage for Amal Ashad.”

“And I told Phyllis what I thought of that Potemkin stupidity. Would you care to hear me repeat it?”

“No . . . that won’t be necessary,” Margaret responded. “Understand that based on Amal’s experience and expertise, it would have been limiting and counterproductive to put a young, ill-prepared captain in charge.”