Dark Rivers of the Heart

craft took off, he opened his attache case and plugged the computer power and transmission cables into outlets in the back wall of the cabin. He divorced the cellular telephone from the workstation and put it on the seat across the aisle. He no longer needed it. Instead, he was using the chopper's communications system. A phone keypad appeared right on the display screen. After putting a call through to Mama in Virginia, he identified himself as "Pooh," provided a thumbprint, and accessed the A miniature version of the scene on the surveillance-center wall screen appeared on Roy's VDT. The Range Rover was moving at reckless speeds, which strongly indicated that the woman was behind the wheel. It was past Panaca, Nevada, bulleting toward the Utah border.
        "Something like this agency was bound to come along sooner or later," she said as they approached the Utah border. "By insisting on a perfect world, we've opened the door to fascism."
        "I'm not sure I follow that." He wasn't certain that he wanted to follow it, either. She spoke with unsettling conviction.
        "There've been so many laws written by so many idealists with competing visions of Utopia that nobody can get through a single day without inadvertently and unknowingly breaking a score of them."
        "Cops are asked to enforce tens of thousands of laws," Spencer agreed, more than they can keep track of."
        "So they tend to lose a true sense of their mission. They lose focus.
        You saw it happening when you were a cop, didn't you?"
        "Sure. There's been some controversy, several times, about LAPD intelligence operations that targeted legitimate citizens' groups."
        "Because those particular groups at that particular time were on the wrong' side of sensitive issues. Government has politicized every aspect of life, including law-enforcement agencies, and all of us are going to suffer for it, regardless of our political views."
        "Most cops are good guys."
        "I know that. But tell me something: These days, the cops who rise to the top in the system… are they usually the best, or are they more often the ones whore politically astute, the great schmoozers. Are they ass kissers who know how to handle a senator, a congressman, a mayor, a city councilman, and political activists of all stripes?"
        "Maybe it's always been that way."
        "No. We'll probably never again see men like Elliot Ness in charge of anything-but there used to be a lot like him. Cops used to respect the brass they served. Is it always that way now?"
        Spencer didn't even have to answer that one.
        Valerie said, "Now it's the politicized cops who set agendas, allocate resources. It's worst at the federal level. Fortunes are spent chasing violators of vaguely written laws against hate crimes, pornography, pollution, product mislabeling, sexual harassment. Don't get me wrong.
        I'd love to see the world rid of every bigot, pornographer, polluter, snake-oil peddler eve jerk who harasses a woman. But at the same time we're living with the highest rates of murder, rape, and robbery of any society in history."
        The more passionately Valerie spoke, the faster she drove.
        Spencer winced every time he looked away from her face to the road over which they hurtled. If she lost control, if they spun out and flew off the blacktop into those towering spruces, they wouldn't have to worry about hit squads coming in from Las Vegas.
        Behind them, however, Rocky was exuberant.
        She said, "The streets aren't safe. Some places, people aren't even safe in their own homes. Federal law-enforcement agencies have lost focus.
        When they lose focus, they make mistakes and need to be bailed out of scandals to save politicians' hides-cop politicians, as well as the appointed and elected kind."
        "Which is where this agency without a name comes in."
        "To sweep up the dirt, hide it under the rug-so no politicians have to put their fingerprints on the broom," she said bitterly.
        They crossed into Utah.
        They were still over the outskirts of North Las Vegas, only a few minutes into the flight, when the copilot came to the rear of the passenger compartment. He was carrying a security phone with a built-in scrambler, which he plugged in and handed to Roy.
        The phone had a headset, leaving Roy's hands free. The cabin was heavily insulated, and the saucer-size