The Zero Hour

Sarah paused. “So that’s where this is leading. Yeah, I miss it a lot. But I have personal reasons to be where I am.”

“I’ve read your file; I know about your custody situation. I understand about the sacrifices you sometimes have to make for family.”

“Is this a job interview?”

“Sort of. You think we’re tough enough on terrorists?”

“‘We’ being the FBI or the United States?”

“The United States.”

“You can’t be serious. Of course not. We talk tough, but that’s about it. Remember how, during the Gulf War, the Pentagon wanted to target the terrorist training camps in the Iraqi countryside, strike them, but the White House said no? Didn’t want to piss off the Syrians, ’cause we needed them in the coalition against Saddam Hussein. That’s really tough, huh? And remember when the president of Pakistan, Zia, was killed along with the American ambassador in a plane crash and State wouldn’t allow any of our agents into Pakistan to investigate? Pretty damned tough, huh? We’ve got more than two dozen executive agencies and departments that monitor and respond to terrorism, and we couldn’t stop the Gang That Couldn’t Bomb Straight at the World Trade Center.”

“Why not?”

“Because we’re sloppy. The blind sheik behind the World Trade Center incident was on our watch list of suspected terrorists, but he twice got visas to enter the country because his name was spelled wrong on the application, right?”

“You think if we were tougher, things like Oklahoma City wouldn’t happen?”

She paused. “I don’t know. You can’t stop maniacs.”

Taylor leaned back in his chair, folded his arms. “All right. We noticed that you’ve been doing some deep background investigation into a New York banker named Warren Elkind. That seems a little outside your jurisdiction, unless there’s an OC connection I don’t know about.”

Sarah looked at him penetratingly. So that was it. “A prostitute who happened to be one of my key informants-helped me wrap up a couple of important cases-was killed. A call girl, actually, not a prostitute-in her line of work they make certain distinctions. Anyway, the Boston police have cleared the case, but I’m skeptical, to be honest. It appears that the call girl was hired to steal something-a CD-ROM disk, I believe-from this Elkind guy.”

“What’s the connection between Elkind and this prostitute?” Russell Ullman asked.

“A preexisting relationship. She did bondage-and-discipline sessions with him whenever he was in Boston. She was his ‘top,’ or dominatrix. His mistress. Someone who knew she worked for Elkind must have hired her.”

“What was on the CD-ROM?” asked Vigiani.

“I don’t know. Bank records, I’d guess. Obviously something pretty valuable.”

“But how do you know the call girl was hired to do this?” Vigiani persisted. “You haven’t talked to Elkind, have you?”

“No,” Sarah said. “Not yet. He wouldn’t take my call, actually. The reason I know is that I have it on tape.”

“Really?” Taylor said, hunching forward. “Phone cover on the prostitute?”

“Her answering-machine tape.” She explained how the tape was unerased.

“FBI Crime Labs,” Taylor said with a proud smile. “Best in the world.”

Sarah cleared her throat. “Actually, I had to go outside the Bureau. MIT. We don’t have the technology.”

“You have a transcript?” Taylor asked.

“Better than that,” Sarah said. “I have the tape right here. I had a hunch you’d want to hear it.”

After Sarah played the tape twice, on an old Panasonic that Ullman had rounded up from a nearby desk, Taylor said: “Now we’ve got a transcript we’d like you to take a look at.” He handed Sarah a transcript of the NSA intercept; the three were silent as she scanned it.

Sarah read with puzzlement. When she got to Warren Elkind’s name she looked up, then resumed reading. Once she finished, she asked, “Who’s speaking here?”

“We don’t know,” said Taylor.

“Where was the conversation picked up?”

“Switzerland.”

She exhaled slowly, looked around at the others. “The ‘target,’ as they put it, is either Warren Elkind or Manhattan Bank, or both. Elkind is not just one of the most powerful bankers in the world, but he’s also a major fund-raiser for Israel. A lot of Palestinians would probably love to see him roast in hell.”

Vigiani shrugged, as if to say, This is news to you?

Sarah continued, “And this Heinrich Fürst, however it’s spelled, who’s ‘accepted the sales assignment’-what have you turned up on him?”

“Nothing,” Taylor said.

“Big fat goose egg,” said Ullman. “Under every variant spelling, every homophone, anything remotely close. Nothing.”

“Fürst…” Sarah said aloud. “You know, I do have an idea.”

“Let’s hear it,” Taylor said dubiously. “We’ll take anything.”