The Book of Spies

3

Washington, D.C.
April, Two years later
CARRYING A thermos of hot coffee and two mugs, Tucker Andersen crossed into Stanton Park, just five blocks from his office on Capitol Hill. The midnight shadows were long and black, and the air was cool. There were no children in the playground, no pedestrians on the sidewalks. Inhaling the scent of freshly cut grass, he listened as traffic rumbled past on C Street. All was as it should be.
Finally he spotted his old friend Jonathan Ryder, almost invisible where he sat on a bench facing the granite statue of Revolutionary War hero Nathanael Greene. Tonight a call had come in from Tucker's wife that Jonathan was trying to reach him.
Tucker closed in. A slender man of five foot ten, he had the long muscles of the runner he still was. His eyes were large and intelligent behind tortoiseshell glasses, his mustache light brown, his gray beard trimmed close to the jaw. Mostly bald, he had a fringe of gray-brown hair dangling over his shirt collar. He was fifty-three years old, and although his official credentials announced CIA, he was both more and less.
"Hello, Jonathan." Tucker sat and crossed his legs. "Nice to see you again. What's it been--ten years?" He studied him. Jonathan looked small now, and he was not a small man. And tense. Very tense.
"At least ten years. I appreciate your meeting me on such short notice." Jonathan gave a brief smile, showing a row of perfect white teeth in his lined face. Lean and fit, he had a high forehead topped by a brush of graying blond hair. He was wearing black sweatpants and a black sweatshirt with a Yale University logo on the sleeve instead of his usual Savile Row business suit.
Tucker handed him a mug and poured coffee for both of them.
"Sounded important, but then you could always make sunrise seem as if it were heralding angels."
"It is important." Jonathan sniffed the coffee. "Smells good." His hands shook as he drank.
Tucker felt a moment of worry. "How's the family?"
"Jeannine's great. Busy with all her charities, as usual. Judd's left military intelligence and isn't going to reenlist. Three tours in Iraq and a tour in Pakistan were finally enough for him." He hesitated. "I've been thinking a lot about the past lately."
Tucker set the thermos on the seat beside him. They had been close friends during their undergraduate days at Yale. "I remember when we were in school and you started that investment club. You made me a grand in two years. That was a hell of a lot of money in those days."
Jonathan nodded. Then he grinned. "I thought you were just a smart-ass--all looks, no brains, no commitment. Then you saved my skin that night in Alexanderplatz in East Berlin. Remember? It took a lot of muscle--and smarts."
After college, both had joined the CIA, in operations, but Jonathan had left after three years to earn an MBA at Wharton. With an undergraduate degree in chemistry, he had worked for a series of pharmaceutical companies, then gone on to found his own. Today he was president and board chair of Bucknell Technologies. Monied and powerful, he was a regular on Washington's social circuit and at the president's yearly Prayer Breakfast.
"Glad I did the good deed," Tucker said. "Look where you ended up--a baron of Big Pharma, while I'm still tilling the mean streets and urine-scented dark alleys."
Jonathan nodded. "To each his own. Still, if you'd wanted it, you could've headed Langley. Your problem is you make a lousy bureaucrat. Have you heard of the video game called Bureaucracy? If you move, you lose."
Tucker chuckled. "Okay, old friend. Time to tell me what this is all about."
Jonathan looked at his coffee, then set it on the seat beside him. "A situation's come up. It scares the hell out of me. It's more your bailiwick than mine."
"You've got a lot contacts. Why me?" Tucker drank.
"Because this has to be handled carefully. You're a master at that. Because we're friends, and I'm going to go down. I don't want to die in the process." He stared at Tucker, then looked away. "I've stumbled onto something . . . an account for about twenty million dollars in an international bank. I'm not sure exactly what it's all about, but I'm damn sure it has to do with Islamic terrorism." Jonathan fell silent.
"Go on," Tucker snapped. "Which bank? Why do you think the twenty million is connected to jihadism?"
"It's complicated." He craned around, checking the park.
Tucker looked, too. The wide expanse remained empty.
"You've come this far." Tucker controlled an urge to shake the information out of him. "You know you want to tell me."
"I didn't have anything to do with it. I'm not exactly an angel myself. . . . But I don't understand how anyone could--" Jonathan shuddered. "What do you know about the Library of Gold?"
"Never heard of it."
"It's key. I've been there. It's where I found out about this--"
Tucker watched Jonathan intently as he spoke. He was leaning forward slightly, gazing off into the middle distance.
There was no sound. No warning. A red dot suddenly appeared on Jonathan's forehead and the back of his head exploded with a loud crack. Blood and tissue and bone blasted into the air.
Tucker's training kicked in immediately. Before Jonathan's lifeless body had time to keel over, Tucker hit the sidewalk and rolled under the bench. Two more sniper shots dug into the concrete, spitting shards. His heart pounded. His friend's blood dripped next to him. Tucker swallowed and swore. He had come unarmed.
Using his mobile, he dialed 911 and reported the wet job. Then he peeled off his blazer, rolled it thick, and lifted it to attract attention. It was a light tan color, a contrast against the shadows. When no more rounds were fired, he snaked out from under the bench. Hurrying off through the park, he headed toward Massachusetts Avenue, where he thought the bullets had originated. As he moved he considered what Jonathan had said: Islamic terrorism . . . $20 million in an international bank . . . the Library of Gold. . . . What in hell was the Library of Gold?
As he crossed the street, Tucker scanned the area. A young couple was drinking from Starbucks coffee cups, the man carrying a briefcase. Another man was pushing a grocery cart. A middle-aged woman in a running suit and wearing a small backpack jogged past and circled back. Any of them could be the shooter, the rifle quickly broken down and concealed in the briefcase, the shopping cart, the backpack. Or the shooter could be someone else, still tracking him.
When he reached Sixth Street, Tucker ran into the swiftly moving traffic. Over the noise of honking horns, he heard the distinctive sound of a bullet whistling overhead. Crouching between the lanes of rushing cars, he spun around and stared back. A man was standing on the sidewalk at the corner, holding a pistol in both hands.
As the man fired again, Tucker put on a burst of speed, running with the cars. More horns honked. Curses filled the air. A taxi was entering traffic after dropping off its fare. Tucker pounded the fender to slow it, yanked open the back door, and fell inside.
The driver's head whipped around. "What in hell?"
"Drive."
As the taxi took off, Tucker peered out the rear window. Behind him, the killer ran into the congestion, looking everywhere, his gun still searching for its target. A van entered traffic, and Tucker lost sight of him. When the van turned the corner, opening up the view again, he spotted the man three blocks back. A car slewed around him, horn blaring. Another car skidded. The man pivoted, and a racing sedan slammed into him. He vanished under the wheels of the car.
"Let me off here," Tucker ordered. He shoved money at the driver and jumped out.
Running back, he studied the stream of cars. They should have stopped. At least they should be swerving around the downed shooter.
As two police cars arrived at the park, sirens screaming, Tucker walked up and down the tree-lined block. Both sides. Traffic roared past. There was no sign of a body.