Circle of Bones, стр. 63
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
McLean, Virginia
March 28, 2008
4:05 a.m.
There were two of them. Diggory stood behind the desk and listened to the footfalls outside the door. The one at the end of the hall by the restrooms hollered, “Clear!” Dig heard the other man jiggle the office doorknob.
“Door’s locked,” he told his partner. “Do we know where the keys are?”
“Pick it or kick it.”
“They’re not going to like it if we break the place up.”
“So, pick it. It’s a friggin’ office door, Johnson.”
Dig looked around the office. There was no closet, nothing to hide behind. Just a tall file cabinet in the corner behind the desk.
He wished he had a weapon. Too late now.
Then he saw the recessed panel in the ceiling above the desk. An attic access panel.
One of the men outside shouted to the others a floor below. “We’re coming. Just a minute.” Then lowering his voice, he said, “Hurry up. They want us downstairs.”
Dig slipped off his shoes, climbed onto the desk, and stood on the papers scattered across the desktop. With the low ceiling, he had to bend his head to one side. The panel was stuck with paint.
“I’ve got ears, you know. This pick’s stuck in my wallet. It’s like it’s embedded in the leather.”
“News flash. Time to go on a diet.”
“I wish we had another man, tonight. I don’t like coming out here like this.”
Dig hoped that between the heating system and the men’s voices, any noise would be covered as he gave the panel a sharp push. One small flake of paint fluttered onto the desk when the plywood panel broke free. No time to clean it up. He placed the panel aside, shoved his shoes inside, then pulled himself up through the opening. There was barely room for him to sit up on the rafters. He pulled his legs up just as he heard the men’s voices below.
“You go on down. I got this.”
Dig lowered the panel back into place.
The lock clicked and he felt the atmosphere in the room below change when the door opened. Warm air blew up through the cracks around the attic panel. Footsteps circled the room and stopped beneath him. He thought of the paint chip and wondered if he had left footprints on the paper with his sweaty socks. Then, just as quickly, he heard footsteps again and the door slammed.
“All clear up here,” he heard the man yell.
Dig exhaled and the floor in the hallway creaked as the agent walked toward the stairs. That man should be fired, he thought. Certainly not up to his standards. He would have noticed the tiny fleck of paint. But he knew there weren’t many operatives of his caliber, no matter what branch of service.
He set the panel aside, dropped down onto the desk — didn’t bother closing it up. He might need it again.
From down below, he heard their voices and the scraping sounds as the men pulled out chairs. They were greeting one another, and the odor of cigar smoke wafted up the stairs. While they were still making lots of noise, Dig climbed down off the desk. Leaving his shoes off, he took slow and cautious steps across to the door.
Dig gripped the doorknob, rotated it one half inch, then another, and another. He felt the latch give way, but it made no noise. Squatting down, he eased the door open and put his right eye to the crack.
His vantage point provided him with an excellent view down the staircase. Someone had covered the round table with a black cloth and at the center, a candle burned in a crystal skull. Of the twelve chairs, all but one were occupied. He identified Beelzebub to the right of the empty chair, and there was Magog and Hellbender. Several of the others, he recognized as well, although he did not know their Bonesman names. A cloud of smoke hung near the ceiling, and each man had a cut-crystal highball glass on the table filled with ice and amber-colored liquid.
“Let’s get started,” Beelzebub shouted over the din of voices. “Agents, you may leave us now.” Dig heard the back door open and then close. The room quieted.
Beelzebub produced a short staff and pounded the heel of it on the table. “Hear ye, hear ye, by the power conferred upon me in the absence of our leader Yorick, I do hereby call to order this convocation of the Patriarchs of the Order of Skull and Crossed Bones. If there be any man present who objects to my assumption of command, let him speak now.” Dig noted that Beelzebub waited three seconds before continuing.
A man Dig did not recognize said, “I think the first order of business should be filling that chair.” He pointed to the empty seat.
“You know we can’t do that,” Beelzebub said.
Magog asked, “Well, what’s the story with Yorick’s health now? Is there any chance of improvement?”
Beelzebub shook his head. “It’s not good. He’s in a wheelchair now. Some days when I visit, he doesn’t even know who I am. But his doctors say he could live another ten years.”
A man Dig recognized from a network television news desk said, “Lord, if that happens to me, I hope someone will take me out and shoot me.” He drained his glass.
“Surely we can’t leave the head chair empty for another ten years?” Magog said. “Can’t we change the charter?”
Side conversations broke out all around the table.
Beelzebub raised the staff to quiet them. “Listen, I know Yorick’s health is a problem, but remember, the man sacrificed a great deal for this organization.” At that the others stopped speaking. “And our forbearers knew what they were doing when they decided that those who sit around this table will do so for life.” He looked around at the other men. “The only way to quit our august body, gentlemen, is through death. You know that. And that will come to Yorick in due time. At that time, we will choose his successor. Until then, we continue as we are, holding his place as chair should he recover sufficiently to resume. Agreed?”
The group responded with a low rumble of inarticulate voices. Most of the men round the table looked at their drinks or their watches, or the ceiling.
They want him dead, Dig thought, and I’ll be happy to oblige them.
“So on to the real reason I called this meeting. I received word within the last couple of hours, that Caliban’s body has washed up on a beach in the northeastern corner of Guadaloupe.” The murmuring rose in volume. “It’s not clear what he was doing out there, outside Pointe-a-Pitre, nor have they established a cause or time of death. However, Caliban’s associate Thor could not rule out that that this might be Thatcher’s work.”
Magog chimed in. “This has gone on far too long, been far too costly. I say we eliminate Thatcher and forget about the submarine.”
“I wish it were that easy,” Beelzebub said. “Thatcher has been in contact with too many others. We can’t kill them all, can we?”
“I don’t see why not,” Hellbender said.
Diggory watched the faces around the table. Hellbender was a cartoonist with a distinct pro-life view, but no one else seemed to see the humor in his comment.
“Be serious,” their leader said. “What if we miss one? To make it worse, there are all these damn rumors of gold. I swear the Brits started those rumors after the war to goad the public into searching for the boat. They want to know what happened to their men.”
“Maybe that’s all Thatcher knows. Those rumors.”
“Doubtful. We know the father knew more. But, have any of you contemplated the consequences if this sub were to be found? What if proof of Operation Magic were to go public?” The man’s voice had been rising and he took a long swallow of his drink, then looked from one end of the table to the other.
“It’s not like we could fall much farther in the polls,” Hellbender said. “But we’ll manage. After two miracles, we’ll pull out a third.” A few of the men at the tabled chuckled.
Beelzebub stood up. “Think of all the Americans who died that day. My god, men, think about it. Think about the fucking reporters who couldn’t wait to start digging for other similar cases related to Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf. And let’s not even discuss more recent events. Do any of you want to be publicly connected to an organization responsible for that?”