Clear and Present Danger

Moore was not so much angered as upset by the impropriety. He still had the flag in his lap, holding it as gently as a newborn baby without knowing why - until he realized that if there really was a God, as the Baptist preachers of his youth had assured him, and if James had really had a soul, he held its best legacy in his hands. It felt warm to the touch, and though he knew that it was merely his imagination or at most the residual heat absorbed from the morning sun, the energy radiating from the flag that James had served from his teens seemed to accuse him of treachery. They had just watched a funeral this morning, but two thousand miles away there were other people whom the Agency had sent to do a job and who would not receive even the empty reward of a grave amidst others of their kind.

"Bob, what the hell have we done?" Moore asked. "How did we ever get into this?"

"I don't know, Arthur. I just don't know."

"James really was lucky," the Director of Central Intelligence murmured. "At least he went out -"

"With a clear conscience?" Ritter looked out the window, unable to bring himself to face his boss. "Look, Arthur -" He stopped, not knowing what to say next. Ritter had been with the Agency since the fifties, had worked as a case officer, a supervisor, station chief, then head of section at Langley. He had lost case officers, had lost agents, but he'd never betrayed them. There was a first time for everything, he told himself. It had just come home to him in a very immediate way, however, that for every man there was also a first time for death, and that to meet that final accounting improperly was the ultimate cowardice, the ultimate failure of life. But what else could they do?

It was a short drive to Langley, and the car stopped before that question could be answered. They rode the elevator up. Moore walked to his office. Ritter walked to his. The secretaries hadn't returned yet. They were in a van. Ritter paced around his office until they arrived, then walked over to see Mrs. Cummings.

"Did Ryan call in or anything?"

"No, and I didn't see him at all. Do you know where he is?" Nancy asked.

"Sorry, I don't." Ritter walked back and on impulse called Ryan's home, where all he got was an answering machine. He checked his card file for Cathy's work number and got past the secretary to her.

"This is Bob Ritter. I need to know where Jack is."

"I don't know," Dr. Caroline Ryan replied guardedly. "He told me yesterday that he had to go out of town. He didn't say where."

A chill went across Ritter's face. "Cathy, I have to know. This is very important - I can't tell you how important. Please trust me. I have to know where he is."

"I don't know. You mean you don't, either?" There was alarm in her voice.

Ryan knows , Ritter realized.

"Look, Cathy, I'll track him down. Don't worry or anything, okay?" The effort to calm her down was wasted, but Ritter hung up as soon as he could. The DDO walked to Judge Moore's office. The flag was centered on the DCI's desk, still folded into its triangular section, called a cocked-hat. Judge Arthur Moore, Director of Central Intelligence, was sitting quietly, staring at it.

"Jack's gone. His wife says she doesn't know where. He knows, Arthur. He knows and he's off doing something."

"How could he have found out?"

"How the hell should I know?" Ritter thought for a moment, then waved at his boss. "Come on."

They walked into Ryan's office. Ritter opened the panel for Jack's wall safe and dialed in the proper combination, and nothing happened other than the fact that the warning light went on over the dial.

"Damn," Ritter said. "I thought that was it."

"James's combination?"

"Yeah. You know how he was, never did like the damned things, and he probably..." Ritter looked around. He got it on the third try, pulling out the writing panel from the desk, and there it was.

"I thought I did dial the right one." He turned and tried again. This time the light was accompanied by the goddamned beeper. Ritter turned back and checked the number again. There was some more writing on the sheet. Ritter pulled the panel farther out.

"Oh, my God."

Moore nodded and walked to the door. "Nancy, tell security that it's us trying to work the safe. Looks like Jack changed the combination without telling us like he was supposed to." The DCI closed the door and turned back.

"He knows, Arthur."

"Maybe. How do we check it out?"

A minute later they were in Ritter's office. He'd shredded all of his documents, but not his memory. You didn't forget the name of someone with the Medal of Honor. Then it was just a matter of flipping open his AUTOVON phone directory and calling the 1st Special Operations Wing at Eglin AFB.

"I need to talk to Colonel Paul Johns," Ritter told the sergeant who'd picked up the phone.

"Colonel Johns is off TDY somewhere, sir. I don't know where."

"Who does?"

"The wing operations officer might, sir. This is a nonsecure line, sir," the sergeant reminded him.