The First Commandment

The Troll had done the hardest work of all, narrowing in on who had set up the operation in Brazil. He’d even gone so far as to provide a list of banks and a date range as well as an approximate amount of money that McCauliff should be looking for.

It wasn’t easy by any stretch, but the NGA operative eventually found it. The payments had been broken up and wired through a series of intermediary banks in Malta, the Caymans, and the Isle of Man, but they all had one thing in common. Each payment could be traced back to a single account number at Wegelin amp; Company, the oldest private bank in Switzerland.

That was as far as McCauliff got. Wherever Wegelin amp; Company kept its records, they weren’t on any of their servers, at least not any that could be accessed from outside. McCauliff tried every trick he knew to no avail. Whoever these people were Harvath was hunting, they were extremely careful about covering their tracks. Extremely careful, but not perfect. It was nearly impossible to move large sums of money without leaving some sort of trail.

The only problem for Harvath at this point was that the trail dead-ended at Wegelin amp; Company, the archetype for Swiss banking discretion. If he wanted answers, he was going to have to go to Wegelin amp; Company directly.

Harvath thanked McCauliff for the information and logged off their call. Removing the ear bud from his ear, he turned to the Troll and shared with him the news that the funds had been traced back to a bank outside Zurich called Wegelin amp; Company.

The minute the name was out of his mouth, a pall fell across the Troll’s face and he held up his index finger.

His stubby fingers rattled across his laptop. When he found what he was looking for, he recited a string of numbers. They were a perfect match for the account McCauliff had just identified.

“How did you know that?” asked Harvath.

The Troll ran his hand through his short, dark hair and replied, “I’m the one who set up the account.”

“You?”

“Yes, me. But it gets worse. Plain and simple, Abu Nidal was nothing more than a terrorist. Despite his father’s success as a businessman, he didn’t know anything about banking or protecting his assets.”

“So you handled his money?” asked Harvath.

“No. Not for his organization. He had people for that. Nidal asked me to do something different. He wanted this to be off the books, as it were. He didn’t want it tied to the FRC. If anything ever happened to him, he wanted to make sure this layer of protection was in place.”

“Protection for whom?”

The Troll looked at Harvath and said, “His daughter, Adara. It was set up to be her private, personal account.”

Over four thousand miles away, an analyst at the National Security Agency had just tagged and compressed the audio file he was working on.

Picking up his phone, he dialed a cell phone number. It was the second time in twenty-four hours he’d called the anonymous man on the other end.

When the voice of his contact came on, the analyst said, “You wanted to know if Scot Harvath made any further attempts to speak with Kevin McCauliff, the analyst at the NGA?”

“Go ahead,” replied the voice.

“He just hung up with him less than three minutes ago.”

“Did you get a fix on Harvath’s location?”

“No,” said the NSA man, “but based on his conversation, I think I may know where he’s headed.”

Chapter 101

SOMEWHERE OVER THE ATLANTIC

As he raced back toward the States, Harvath was consumed by conflicting emotions. Shortly after speaking with Kevin McCauliff, he’d contacted Ron Parker to ask for a favor, only to be filled in on the failed plot at The Bucket of Blood.

Though the police hadn’t apprehended the suspect yet, based upon the description of the man they were looking for, he was a dead ringer for Philippe Roussard. The Bucket of Blood was a SEAL Team Two hangout, Harvath was a former SEAL, the SEALs were often referred to as frogmen, and the next-to-last plague had to do with frogs. It was enough to cement for Harvath that the Bucket had been Roussard’s target.

Thanks to two sharp Virginia PD officers, the killer had been prevented from carrying out his attack. Score one for the good guys, even if it was the first time they had managed to put anything up on the board.

Roussard had gotten sloppy, and Harvath wondered if maybe the killer was getting tired.

That said, Harvath was pretty tired himself. It had taken him a full day to set everything up, and even though he’d had a couple of down days in Brazil before that, he hadn’t gotten any significant rest. He’d slept with one eye open the entire time. The Troll was someone he’d never be able to fully trust, and having to sit and wait while he plied his seamy trade in search of Roussard’s Brazilian connection had almost driven him crazy.