Term Limits

chapter Two

"I'll put my boys on the street and see what I can do. I'll let you know as soon as I find anything out." Both men hung up. Congressman O'Rourke was sitting at his desk, reading over some documents and dictating notes, when the door to his office burst open. A slender, well-dressed man, who looked vaguely familiar, pushed his way past Susan and approached Michael's desk. In an irritated voice Susan said, "I'm sorry, sir, but I told this man that you weren't taking visitors this morning."

The man stepped forward. "I apologize for the intrusion, Congressman O'Rourke, but I'm one of Chairman Koslowski's aides. He has a proposal he would like you to consider, and he needs an answer immediately."

Michael leaned back in his chair and realized where he'd seen the dark-haired man before. Michael's gaze turned from the aide to his secretary. "Thank you, Susan, I'll see the gentleman." Susan retreated from the office and closed the door. The chairman's aide stepped forward and extended his hand across the desk. O'Rourke remained seated and took the man's hand.

"Congressman O'Rourke, my name is Anthony Vanelli." O'Rourke placed his Dictaphone on the desk behind several stacks of files and said, "Please take a seat, Mr. Vanelli." O'Rourke had heard several stories about the aide and doubted this would be a friendly visit. Vanelli sat down in one of the chairs in front of O'Rourke's desk and crossed his legs.

"Congressman O'Rourke, I've been sent here to find out if you're still going to vote against the President's budget, and if you are, what we can do to change your mind."

"Mr. Vanelli, I assume you know I spoke to the President this morning."

"I am fully aware of that, Congressman O'Rourke, but time is running short and we need to know who is standing with us and who is standing against us." O'Rourke leaned forward and placed his elbows on the desk.

"Well, Mr. Vanelli, I have made my position very clear from the start.

I will vote no for the budget unless the President cuts all funding for the Rural Electrification Administration."

"All right, Congressman, let's cut to the chase. We live in the real world, and in the real world, the Rural Electrification Administration is going to continue to exist. It's just the way things operate around here. You have to try to get over the little things and concentrate on the big picture. You can't damn the whole budget just because you don't like one little part of it."

"Mr. Vanelli, I would hardly consider a half billion dollars little.

The thing you people don't understand is that I consider most of the President's budget to be a waste. I am merely focusing on the Rural Electrification Administration because it's an easy target. You must agree with the simple logic that when an institution is founded to solve a problem, once that problem is solved, the institution should be closed. All of rural America has been electrified for over twenty years, but we continue to bleed the tax payers for about five hundred million dollars a year, just so Congressman and Senators can send pork back to their constituents. It's a crime that the President is predicting a one-hundred-billion-dollar budget deficit and garbage like this isn't being cut." O'Rourke looked down to make sure the Dictaphone was still running. Vanelli stood from his chair and walked toward the other end of the office. "They told me you were a flake," he said over his shoulder.

O'Rourke smiled to himself as he looked at Vanelli's back and said, "Excuse me. What did you just say?" Vanelli turned around and strutted back to the desk. "Enough of the bullshit, Mike. I'm not here to talk political theory with you, nor to discuss what is ethically correct.

That's for people like you and your loser friends to waste time on."

"Mr. Vanelli, I don't remember giving you permission to call me by my first name."

"Listen, Mike, Mikey, or dickhead, I'll call you whatever I want. All you are is a naive little freshman Congressman who thinks he has all the solutions. We're about the same age, but we're worlds apart.

I'm a realist and you're an idealist. Do you know where idealists get in this town? Nowhere! They go absolutely nowhere! They sent me down here to give you one last chance. You either get on board with the President's budget or your career is over. The choice is simple. You help us out and Chairman Koslowski will make sure some extra money finds its way into your district. If you don't, you'll be out of a job next year." O'Rourke looked up at the man standing over his desk and rose to meet the challenge. The six-foot-three, 210-pound O'Rourke smiled slightly and asked, "Mr. Vanelli, what exactly do you mean, my career will be over?" Vanelli took a step backward and replied, "You either play ball with us or we'll ruin your career. Chairman Koslowski will make sure he cuts off every penny from getting to your district.

We've got people right now who are digging through your past. If we find anything dirty, we'll spread it all over town, and if we don't, we'll make something up. We own enough people in the press. We could ruin you in a week. We're done playing nice guy." Vanelli shook his finger in O'Rourke's face. "I'm going to wait in your lobby for exactly five minutes. I want you to sit in here and think about having your career ruined over one stupid vote, and when you're done, I want an answer."

Vanelli turned for the door. O'Rourke reached forward and grabbed the Dictaphone with his left hand. He took his thumb and pressed the rewind button. The tiny machine started to squeak as the tape spun in reverse.

Vanelli heard the familiar sound and turned to look. Michael held up the' tiny machine and pressed play. Vanelli's voice emanated from the small box. "We've got people right now who are digging through your past. If we find anything dirty, we'll spread it all over town, and if we don't, we'll make something up. We own enough people in the press.

We could ruin you in a week." Vanelli stormed across the room and lunged for the Dictaphone. "Who the hell do you think you are?"

O'Rourke's right hand shot up and grabbed Vanelli's outstretched hand.

O'Rourke had practiced the judo move thousands of times while he was in the Marines.

In one quick motion he twisted Vanelli's hand until the bottom of the wrist faced the ceiling, then forced the hand back toward the elbow.

Vanelli collapsed to his knees in pain. O'Rourke continued to exert enough force to keep him on the floor. Vanelli looked up with a pained face and screeched, "Let go of my f*cking wrist, and give me that goddamn tape." O'Rourke increased the pressure and Vanelli let out a squeal. "Listen to me, Vanelli. Just because you're from Chicago and you have an Italian name doesn't mean you're tough. You're an aide to a Congressman, not a hit man for the Mafia." Vanelli picked up his right hand and reached for his bent wrist. Before he was halfway there, O'Rourke slammed the wrist back another inch and Vanelli's free hand shot back to the floor as he let out a scream. "Listen to me, you little punk! I don't know who you think you are coming in here and threatening me, but if you or your scumbag boss ever bother me again, you'll have the FBI, 60 Minutes, and every other major news organization in the country crawling up your ass. Do you understand?"

Vanelli was slow to respond, so O'Rourke increased the pressure and repeated the question.

"Do you understand?" Vanelli shook his head yes and started to whimper.

O'Rourke set the tape recorder on his desk, dropped to one knee, and grabbed Vanelli by the chin. He stared into his eyes and in a firm, precise voice said, "If you ever screw with me again, I'll do a hell of a lot more than twist your wrist."

Garret came bursting into the Oval Office. He'd been running back and forth between his office and the President's all morning, sneaking puffs of cigarettes and screaming into his phone. He strutted across the room to where the President and Dickson were sitting. "I've got great news; Moore is on board." The President punched his fist into the air, and all three men let out a yell. "Jim, I think we should postpone the press conference until one P.M."

"Stu, you know I hate postponing those things. It's just going to make us look like we're unorganized." Garret grabbed a fresh piece of paper and leaned over the table. He wrote the number 209 in the upper left-hand corner and 216 in the upper right. "We were at two hundred and nine votes versus two hundred sixteen this morning. Since then we've picked up Moore, Reiling, and one of those hicks. They were all undecided, and we got Dreyer and Hampton to defect. That's minus two for them and plus five for us. That puts us at two hundred fourteen apiece."

Garret stood up and screamed, "God, I love this tension. We're going to win this damn thing." The President and Dickson smiled. "I see where you're headed with this, Stu," said the President. "You would like to turn this thing into a little victory announcement."

"Exactly. If we can wait until one, I think Jack and Tom can pick up enough votes to give us a little breathing room. Tom's office has already leaked that Moore settled. The rest of the gamblers will be making their deals as soon as possible." The President looked up at Garret with a smile and conceded.

"Stu, do what you have to do to move it from twelve to one o'clock, but try to be gentle with Ms. Moncur." Garret nodded, then headed off to get the job done. He would be about as gentle with Ann Moncur as a five-year-old boy is with his three-year-old baby brother. He was in one of his zones. Victory was just around the corner, and he would do anything to win. He had no time for frail egos and overly sensitive, politically correct appointees. He was on the front line and they were nothing more than support people. It was always amazing to him that the people who complained the most were usually the ones who were trying to justify their jobs. The people in the trenches never complained. They just continued to produce results. Koslowski was like that. He didn't care if it looked pretty or not, he just made sure the job got done.

Their new ally, Arthur Higgins, was a producer. No bullshit, no complaining, only results. He made a mental note to thank Mike Nance, the national security adviser, for setting that one up. God, did he do a nice job on Frank Moore. That could be the one that put them over the top. THE PRESIDENT AND HIS ENTOURAGE WERE STANDING IN THE ANTEROOM located behind the White House Press Room. They could hear Ann Moncur explaining to the White House press corps that the President had a busy afternoon and would not be able to answer a lot of questions. Stevens was a little nervous. It had been almost four months since his last press conference. The honeymoon between him and the press had ended in the middle of his second year of office. During the first year and a half he could do no wrong. The press had backed him during the election, and he had in turn given them unprecedented access. The honeymoon soured when certain members of the press corps remembered that their job was to report the facts and keep the public informed.

Several potential scandals were uncovered, but before they became full-blown stories, Stu Garret stepped in and put out the fires.

Documents were shredded, people were paid to keep quiet or lie, and everything was emphatically denied and denounced as a ploy by the opposition to smear the President. When the scandals finally died, Garret laid out a new strategy for the President when it came to dealing with the press: act hurt, betrayed, and keep your distance.

The President gladly complied with his chief of staff's plan, and the new strategy had partially worked. Some in the press were in awe of the President and yearned for the relationship they had had with him during his first year in office, but the hardened reporters saw right through the scam. Too many documents had miraculously disappeared, and too many sources had changed their story overnight. The old guard of the press corps had been around too long to be taken in by the feigned isolation of the President. They were cynical, and to them, professional politicians did nothing that wasn't calculated. If the President was isolating himself from the press, it wasn't because his feelings were hurt. It was because he had something to hide. Garret had pulled the President away from the rest of the group and was reminding him which reporters he should steer clear of during the question-and-answer period. "Now, Jim, don't forget, no more than four questions, and whatever you do, don't recognize Ray Holtz from the Post and Shirley Thomas from the Times." The President nodded in agreement.

Garret grabbed him by the shoulder and started to lead him toward the stage. "I'll be right there if anyone backs you into a corner, and remember, only four questions and then you have to go meet the new premier of Ukraine. If they whine about how short it is, just smile and tell them you're sorry, but you've got a full calendar and you're already running behind." The President smiled at Garret. "Stu, relax, I've done this before." Garret smiled back. "I know, that's what makes me nervous." Ann Moncur was still addressing the gallery when she noticed the reporters look to her right. She glanced over and saw the President standing in the tiny doorway. "Good afternoon, Mr. President.

Are you ready to take over?" The President bounded up the two small steps and walked toward the podium, extending his right hand. "Thank you, Ann." The two shook hands, and Moncur went to join Stu Garret and Mark Dickson, who were standing against the wall. While the President organized his notes, the photographers were busy snapping shots. After a brief moment, he cleared his throat and looked up from the podium.

With a slight smile he greeted the press corps, "Good afternoon." The press responded in kind, and the President's slight smile turned into a big one. Like most politicians, Stevens knew how to work the crowd, and his most successful tool of all was his larger-than-life smile.

What most of the people in the room didn't know was that the smile had been rehearsed. Few things in this administration happened by accident. Stu Garret made sure of that. The smile had its desired effect, and the majority of the people sitting in the gallery smiled back. The President placed his thin, well-manicured hands on the edges of the podium and cleared his throat again. "I have called this press conference to announce a victory for the American people. During the past week, this administration has battled partisan politics, disinformation, gridlock, and a thirty-two vote deficit to secure the successful passage of my budget in the House of Representatives. As of noon today, we have obtained two hundred twenty votes, enough for a narrow margin of victory. "I would be remiss if I did not take this opportunity to thank the esteemed Speaker of the House, Mr. Thomas Basset, for all of the hard work he has done to ensure passage of this budget. His hard work will help put us another step closer to getting this country back on the road to a speedy economic recovery." The President glanced down at his watch, then brought his gaze back to the reporters. "I'm sorry for being so brief, but I have an extremely busy calendar today, and I'm already running an hour behind. I have a couple of minutes to field a few brief questions." Hands immediately shot up, and a dozen or so reporters started to shout questions. The President turned to his right and looked for the familiar face of Jim Lester, the ABC White House correspondent.

Lester was sitting on the edge of his chair, right hand raised, obediently waiting to be called on. Stevens pointed in his direction and called his name. The rest of the reporters fell silent as Lester rose from his chair. "As of this morning, sir, it was reported that you had secured approximately two hundred ten votes. How did you pick up the remaining ten so quickly, and are any of those new votes coming from Congressman who were previously committed to voting against your budget?"

"Well . . . we picked up the ten so quickly because there are a lot of people up on the Hill who know, despite what the opposition has been saying, that this is a good budget. There are a lot of people in this country who need the relief this budget will provide, and there were several Congressman who, after taking a more serious look at the budget, realized it would be mean-spirited not to vote for it." The President turned his head away from Lester, and the hands shot up immediately. He rested his gaze and forefinger on another friendly face, Lisa Williamson, the White House correspondent for the Associated Press.

"Mr. President, are you worried that with such a narrow victory in the House, your budget will have a harder time getting through the Senate, where the opposition holds a much higher percentage of seats?" Stevens wasted no time responding. The question was anticipated and the answer prepared. "Not really. The American people want this budget, and our Senators know that. They will do what is right and they will pass the budget." Stevens started to turn to find another reporter before he finished answering the question. More hands shot up, and this time the President turned to find Mick Turner from CNN. "Mr. President, the successful passage of this budget through the House will be a political home run for your administration. How much do you think it will improve your position when negotiating with the Japanese during next month's trade talks?"

"Well, the Japanese have a history of walking away from these talks in a better position than when they entered them. This is somewhat ironic when one considers the fact that they have been running an ever-increasing trade surplus with us for the last fifteen years. The trade deficit that we run with them is hurting American labor. We are putting out high-quality products and the Japanese refuse to open their markets. This trade deficit is stifling our economy from reaching its full potential, and most importantly, it is costing us American jobs.

There is no doubt that the passage of my budget will be a signal to the Japanese that we are finally ready to reverse a trend that previous administrations let get so out of control. "I have time for one more question." While Stevens was talking, his head swiveled to take in the whole press gallery. He noticed a stunning brunette sitting in the section usually reserved for foreign press. He decided that since voters cared little about foreign affairs, he would be safe calling on her. He pointed toward the back of the room. "The young lady in the back rose."

The President was expecting to hear a foreign accent and was somewhat shocked when she stood and spoke perfect English. "Mr. President, Liz Scarlatti from the Washington Reader. Congressman Michael O'Rourke from Minnesota has said that even though he thinks your budget is, quote, 'stuffed with more pork than a Jimmy Dean sausage,' he would still be willing to vote for it if you shut down the Rural Electrification Administration, an agency that is estimated to cost the American taxpayer five hundred to seven hundred million dollars a year.

This agency was founded in 1935 for the sole purpose of bringing electricity to rural America .... My question is this: Mr. President, I know that the leaders of our country are very busy, but have you or anyone else in Washington noticed that all of rural America has had electricity for over twenty years? And now that you've been informed, what are you going to do to shut down this wasteful program?" Many of the reporters in the audience started to chuckle.

With a forced smile, the President pulled out his best, good-old-boy drawl. "Well, Ms. Scarlatti, first of all, this budget is one of the leanest budgets that any President in the last twenty years has sent to the Hill." Eyes started to roll in the audience. The cynical members of the press were getting sick of hearing the tactless rhetoric of the President. It was cute for the first year, but they'd grown tired of it. "And second of all, I have been trying to shut down the REA ever since I took office, but the hard fact remains that if I killed the REA, my budget would never make it out of committee." Before the President could continue, the fiery brunette shouted again from the back row.

"Mr. President, don't you think it is a harsher fact of reality that your budget is forecasting a one-hundred-billion-dollar deficit and you are still funding Federal agencies that are obsolete? Not to mention the fact that you have done nothing to control the growth of Social Security and Medicare!"

Stu Garret could see that the President was in trouble, so he stepped forward and touched his elbow. The President turned and Garret pointed to his watch. Stevens turned back to the press and said, "People, I'm running very late. Let me finish the young lady's question and then I'm going to have to leave .... This administration is very concerned about finding and getting rid of government waste.

Vice President Dumont is heading up a task force right now that is vigorously searching for ways to cut government waste. This has been a major priority of my administration and will continue to be one. Thank you all very much for your time and have a good day." The President stepped back from the podium and waved good-bye. Reporters continued to shout questions as Stevens walked off the stage. Once backstage, Stu Garret grabbed him by the arm and pulled him close. "What in the hell were you doing calling on someone you didn't know?"

"She was sitting in the foreign-press section. I called on her because I thought she would ask me a question on foreign affairs. Relax, Stu, I handled it fine." Garret frowned deeply. "Foreign affairs, my ass.

You were thinking of another type of affair. You know which reporters to call on if you want a question on foreign affairs. That was stupid.

From now on, stick with the program!"

10:40 P.M Thursday

THE BLUE VAN WOUND ITS WAY THROUGH THE TINY WASHINGTON, D.C neighborhood of Friendship Heights. Dark green letters strewn across the side of the van read, "Johnson Brothers' Plumbing, 24 Hour Emergency Service Available."

Inside were two men, both in their late twenties, both extremely fit.

They were wearing dark blue coveralls and matching baseball hats. The van slowed down and turned into a narrow, poorly lit alley. Ten yards into the alley the van rolled to a stop and the driver pulled the gear lever up and into reverse. Pulling back out into the street, the van stopped again and then headed back in the direction from which it had just come. To anyone who may have been watching, it looked as if the plumber's van was harmlessly searching for a house in need of its services. Back in the alley, behind a row of garbage cans, the dark-haired former passenger of the van crouched silently and observed.

After several minutes, he stood and slowly started down the alley, going from shadow to shadow, quietly walking on the balls of his feet.

Six houses down, he stopped behind a garage on his right. It belonged to Mr. Harold J. Burmiester. He grabbed a plastic bag from inside his pocket, reached over the seven-foot fence, and dumped the bag's contents into the backyard. Huddling between the corner of the fence and the garage, he pressed the light on his digital watch.

It was 10:44 P.M. He would have to wait another fifteen minutes to make sure the bait was taken. Burmiester felt that high-tech security systems were a waste of money. His was the only house on the block that did not have one, and the only house on the block that had never been burglarized. This distinction was directly attributable to a rather large German shepherd named Fritz. The unwelcome observer waited quietly in the shadows, as he had done on dozens of previous nights, waiting and watching, recording times and taking notes- always reassured by the punctuality of the retired banker. At 10:55, the backyard floodlight was turned on, and a silhouette of the fence was cast across the alley onto the neighbor's garage. A moment later, the door opened and the tags on Fritz's collar could be heard jingling as he bounded down the steps and across the yard. Every night at exactly 10:55, Burmiester would let Fritz out to go to the bathroom, then let him back in five minutes later, just in time for his owner to watch the nightly news. The dog ran straight to the back fence, where his master had trained him to go to the bathroom. Fritz was urinating on the fence when he started to sniff frantically. Dropping his leg, he ran toward the corner where the meat had been deposited and immediately started to snap up the small pieces of beef. The motionless man listened intently as the dog feasted on the meat. After several minutes, the creaking noise of the back door opening broke the silence of the cool night air, and without being called, Fritz sprang away from the fence and ran into the house.

12:05 A.M Friday

Daniel Fitzgerald's limousine lumbered north along Massachusetts Avenue. It was just after midnight, and the Senator was sitting in the backseat, drinking a glass of Scotch and reading the Post. He'd just left his third party of the evening and was on his way home.

Fitzgerald was the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and one of the most powerful men in Washington. He had a full head of gray hair and a red, bulbous nose that was a direct result of his heavy drinking.

The Senator had two vices--women and alcohol. He had already been married three times and was currently separated from his third wife.

He'd been through approximately a half dozen treatment programs, none of which had worked. Several years earlier, he'd decided to stop fighting his addiction. He loved the booze, and that was that.

During all of the personal turmoil's of ruined marriages, bouts with depression, and six children that he didn't know, the Senator had always clung to one thing-his job. It was all that was left in his life.

Fitzgerald had been in Washington for over forty years. After graduating from Yale Law School, he had gone to work for a prestigious law firm in Boston, and then, at the age of twenty-eight, he was elected to the United States House of Representatives. After serving as a Congressman for three terms, one of the two Senate seats in his home state became available. At the urging and financial backing of his father, Fitzgerald launched the most expensive campaign New Hampshire had ever seen. The political machine his father had built ensured a victory, and Fitzgerald was elected to the United States Senate. For the last thirty-four years, he'd survived scandal after scandal and hung on to that seat like a screaming child clutching his favorite toy. Fitzgerald had been a politician his entire adult life, and he knew nothing else. He'd grown numb to the day-to-day dealings of the nation's capital. The forty-plus years of lying, deceit, deal cutting, career trashing, and partisan politics had become so ingrained in Fitzgerald that he not only thought his behavior was acceptable, he truly believed it was the only way to do business. Dan Fitzgerald had been pulled into the vacuum of Washington politics, and like so many before him, he'd checked his conscience and morals at the door. For Fitzgerald, such things as integrity, hard work, taking charge of one's own life, individual freedom, and the Constitution of the United States had little meaning. To him, being a leader of the country was not about doing the right thing. It was about holding on to power.

Holding on no matter what it took. Fitzgerald was addicted to power no differently than a crack addict is addicted to the rock. He always needed more, and he could never get enough. Fitzgerald lived only for the present and the future. He had never bothered to look back on his life until now. He was experiencing something that many of his predecessors had gone through late in their careers. He'd sold his soul and integrity to get to the top, and now that he was there, he was starting to realize it was a lonely place. With old age staring him straight in the face, he was, for the first time, forced to look back on his life with a critical eye. He had always known he was a failure as both a father and a husband. Everything he had, he'd put into his career. Leaning his head against the window, he took a long pull off the fresh drink and closed his eyes. Senator Daniel Fitzgerald had never been interested in the truth, but now in his waning years, he could no longer escape it. He had never liked being alone. He had always needed others around to feel secure, and it had only gotten worse over the years. He had worked his whole life to get where he was, and now that he was there, he had no one to share it with. But, even worse was that deep down inside something was telling him he had wasted his life fighting for the wrong things. He finished off the glass of Dewar's and poured another. The limousine turned off Massachusetts Avenue and wound through the narrow residential streets of Kalorama Heights. One block before its destination, the limousine passed a plain, white van. Inside were two men who had been waiting-waiting and preparing for this night for over a year. The limo stopped in front of Fitzgerald's $1.2-million brownstone, and the driver jumped out to open the door for his boss. By the time he got around to the rear of the car, Fitzgerald was out of the backseat and stumbling toward the house. Fitzgerald fancied himself too important a man to shut car doors, so as usual, he left it for the driver to take care of. The driver shut the door and wished his employer a good night.

Fitzgerald ignored the pleasantry and continued up the steps to his front door. The driver walked back around to the other side of the limo and watched Fitzgerald punch in his security code and unlock the door.

When the door opened and the Senator stumbled into the foyer, the driver got into the limo and drove away. Fitzgerald set his keys down on a table to the left of the door and reached for the light switch.

He flipped it up, but nothing happened. He tried it several more times, and the result was the same. Swearing to himself, he looked around the dark house. The front door was bordered on both sides by panes of glass six inches wide that ran from the top of the door to the floor. Through the two narrow windows, the streetlight provided a faint glow to the front hallway. From where Fitzgerald stood, he could barely make out the white tile floor of the kitchen, just thirty feet away, straight down the hallway. As he started for the kitchen, he passed the dark entryway to the living room on his right and the stairs that led to the upper floors on his left. His heavy, expensive wing tips echoed throughout the house as they struck the hardwood floor with each step. The dim light shining through the windows cast a long shadow of him that stretched down the hallway toward the kitchen. With each step his round body blocked more and more of the light coming from the street. By the time he reached the kitchen, he was surrounded by darkness. He turned to his left and searched for the light switch.

Before Fitzgerald could find it, a pair of gloved hands came out of the darkness and grabbed him from behind.

The blond-haired intruder yanked the older man off his feet and slammed him face first into the tiled floor. Dropping down on his target, the powerful man thrust his knee into the center of Fitzgerald's upper back and grabbed the Senator's head with both hands. In one quick burst of strength the assassin brought all of his weight down on the back of Fitzgerald's head and yanked up on his chin. The noise that the Senator's neck made as it snapped shot through the quiet house like a brittle tree limb broken over a knee. The crack was followed by silence, and then an eerie gurgling noise that emanated from Fitzgerald's throat.

The dying Senator's eyes opened wider and wider until they looked as if they were about to pop out. About thirty seconds later the gurgling noise subsided, and Fitzgerald's body lay lifeless on the cold, tile floor. The assassin rose to his feet and exhaled a deep breath. He looked down at the dead body on the floor with a sense of great satisfaction. The killer standing over Fitzgerald had just avenged the deaths of eight of his closest friends-eight men who had died a senseless death in a desolate desert, thousands of miles away, all because men like Fitzgerald didn't know how to keep their mouths shut.

The killing of Fitzgerald was personal, but the next two would be business. The thin arm of a microphone hung in front of the assassin's square jaw. He spoke with a precise voice, "Number one is in the bag, over." After a brief second, a confirmation came crackling through his earpiece, and he went back to work. Grabbing the body by the ankles, he dragged it down into the basement and deposited it in a large storage closet. The assassin took one last tour through the house, collecting the electronic listening devices he had placed there the previous week.

Before leaving, he zipped the collar on his coat up around his chin and pulled his baseball hat down tight over his short, blond hair. He stood at the back door momentarily, looking out the window into the small yard. The wind was picking up, and the trees were swaying back and forth. Once again he spoke softly into the mike, "I'm on my way, over."

He locked the door and closed it behind him. Casually he walked across the yard, through the gate, and into the alley. When he reached the end of the alley, the white van stopped just long enough for him to climb in, then sped off down the street.

3:45 Friday

The blue Johnson Brothers' Plumbing van was again driving through the streets of Friendship Heights. It pulled into the same alley it had stopped in five hours earlier. While the van was still moving, the passenger jumped down onto the pavement and walked beside it, crouching and holding on to the door. The dome light on the inside of the van had been removed. As the van stopped, the broad-shouldered, dark-haired man quietly closed the door and darted into the shadows.

He waited while the van drove away.

Slung over his shoulder was a large black canvas bag. After several minutes passed, he started to make his way down the alley. When he reached Burmiester's fence, he pulled a can of WD-40 out of his bag and sprayed the hinges of the gate. He waited for the oil to take effect, then carefully lifted the latch on the gate and opened it. Slipping into the backyard, he dropped down behind a row of bushes and looked up at the windows of Burmiester's house and the neighbors', waiting to see a face peering out or a light being turned on, announcing that someone had seen him. For almost five minutes he sat behind the bush, waiting and watching. There was time to be careful and that was the way he liked it, the way he'd been trained. The man reached into the bag, this time retrieving a pair of wire cutters. Cautiously rising to his feet, he walked along the edge of the garage and then darted across the small open space to the back stoop, where he crouched down. Again, he used the can of WD-40, spraying the hinges of the screen door. While he waited for the oil to soak in, he grabbed the pair of wire cutters and cut the phone line running into the basement of the house. He put the wire cutters back in the bag and grabbed a glass cutter. Jumping up on the stoop he opened the screen door about two feet and slid in between it and the back door. The back door was wood with the top third split into four sections of glass. He placed the cup of the glass cutter in the middle of the bottom left pane and swung the cutting edge around the suction cup in a clockwise direction. After five revolutions, he took both hands and pressed in on the newly created circle. The freshly cut piece of glass popped free and stayed attached to the suction cup.

Sticking his arm through the hole, he unlocked the door, opened it, and stepped into the kitchen, carefully closing the door behind him. He stood completely still and looked out the window, staring at the neighbors' houses, looking for anything that might have changed while his ears focused on the inside of the house. He heard the dog breathing and turned to see him lying on a piece of carpet in front of the kitchen table, completely relaxed and limp. Pulling the microphone down from under the brim of his baseball cap, he spoke in a soft whisper, "I'm in, over." His partner was sitting in the blue van, six blocks away, around the corner from a small, twenty-four-hour convenience store. He was monitoring the local police scanner.

Calmly, he spoke into the microphone hanging in front of his mouth, "Roger that, everything is clear on my end, over."

The man in the kitchen of Burmiester's house pushed the microphone back up under the brim of his hat and slowly removed the black bag from over his shoulder. Gently placing it on the floor, he retrieved a gas mask and a green tank with a clear rubber hose attached to the end. With the tank and mask in hand, he walked down the uncarpeted hallway toward the front door and the staircase that led to the second floor. When he reached the foot of the staircase, he stopped and leaned forward, placing his hands on the fourth step. Again he paused, not moving, just listening. After he was sure that Burmiester had not been awakened, he started to crawl up the steps, keeping his hands and feet away from the center of the stairs, leaning forward, trying to keep his weight as equally distributed as possible, not wanting the old stairs to creak and wake the owner.

When he reached the second floor, he stayed on his knees and continued to crawl slowly toward the master bedroom, about twenty feet away. Once again, he waited patiently and listened. Gently, he stuck the rubber tube under the door, put his gas mask on, and opened the valve on the tank. Sitting down with his back against the wall, he started the timer on his watch. After fifteen minutes had elapsed, he turned off the valve and pulled the tube out from under the door. Slowly, he opened the door and peeked into the room. Burmiester was lying with his back to the door and showed no signs of movement. The intruder pushed the door the rest of the way open and walked over to the bed. Reaching down, he nudged Burmiester several times. The old man didn't move. He took the glove off his right hand, placed it on Burmiester's neck, and checked his pulse.

After checking it twice more, he concluded with relief that the old man was fine. The intruder did not know the man he was standing over, and he did not wish to see him die. Harold Burmiester was not the man he was after tonight.

He walked around the bed to the double window that looked out onto the street below and stared straight across at the house opposite Burmiester's. He lowered the mike and said, "I'm in position.

Everything looks good, over."

The response came crackling back through his earpiece immediately. "Roger, everything is quiet on this end, over." Five miles away on the other side of the Potomac River, the second team had moved into position. The nondescript white van was parked on a quiet side street. Inside, the blond-haired assassin was undergoing a change. He'd taken off his dark jeans, jacket, and boots and had replaced them with a gray pair of sweatpants, a blue sweatshirt, and a pair of Nike running shoes. He sat still while one of the other men carefully applied black makeup to his face, neck, and ears. The makeup was for camouflage, but not in the typical military sense. It was meant to be noticed and to deceive, not to conceal.

After the makeup job was completed, a tight, black Afro wig was placed over his blond hair, and a pair of brown contacts were inserted over his blue eyes. Next, he put his headset back on and pulled a University of Michigan baseball hat over his head.