Gone Tomorrow

ashamed of. It was all about what the army used to call dash and daring. So his reaction was wrong.”
    “Still vague.”
    “He knew the sniper’s name. Grigori Hoth. From his dog tags. I figured he had the tags as souvenirs. He said, no, those tags were locked up with the after-action reports and everything else. It was like a slip of the tongue. And everything else? What did that mean?”
    Lee said nothing.
    I said, “We talked about the fate of the sniper and the spotter. Sansom said he had no silenced weapons. Which was like another slip of the tongue. Delta would never set up for clandestine nighttime incursions without silenced weapons. They’re particular about stuff like that. Which suggests to me that the whole VAL episode was an accidental byproduct of something else entirely. I thought the rifle was the story. But this thing is like an iceberg. Most of it is still hidden.”
    Lee said nothing.
    I said, “Then we talked about the geopolitics. He saw a danger, for sure. He’s worried about Russia, or the Russian Federation, or whatever it is they call themselves now. He thinks they’re unstable. He said things could blow up big, if the Korengal part of the story gets out. You hear that? The Korengal part of the story? It was like a third slip of the tongue. It was effectively a direct admission that there’s more. Direct from the horse’s mouth.”
    Lee didn’t answer. Jacob Mark asked, “What kind of more?”
    “I don’t know. But whatever it is, it’s information-intensive. Right from the start Lila Hoth was looking for a USB memory. And the feds assume there’s one out there somewhere. They said their task is to recover the real memory stick. Real, because they took a look at the one I bought and assumed it was a decoy. They said, it’s empty and it’s too small anyway. Hear that? Too small? Which means there are some big files in play. Lots of information.”
    “But Susan didn’t have anything with her.”
    “True. But everybody assumes she did.”
    “What kind of information?”
    “I have no idea. Except that Springfield talked to me here in New York. Sansom’s security guy, at the Sheraton. In a quiet corridor. He was very uptight. He was warning me off. He chose a specific metaphor. He said, you can’t afford to turn over the wrong rock.”
    “So?”
    “What happens when you turn over a rock?”
    “Things crawl out.”
    “Exactly. Present tense. Things crawl out. This is not about things just lying there, that died twenty-five years ago. This is about things that are squirming and wriggling right now. This is about things that are alive today.”
    I saw Theresa Lee thinking it through. She glanced at the phone on the night table. Her eyes narrowed. I guessed she was rehearsing the morning call to Sansom. She said, “He’s kind of careless, isn’t he? He made three slips of the tongue.”
    I said, “He was a Delta officer the best part of seventeen years.”
    “And?”
    “You don’t last seventeen days if you’re careless.”
    “So?”
    “He seems very engaged to me. He’s aware of everything to do with his campaign. How he looks, what he says, how he travels. Every last little implication.”
    “So?”
    “So I don’t think he’s careless.”
    “He made three slips of the tongue.”
    “Did he? I’m not so sure. I wonder if he was setting a trap instead. He read my record. I was a good MP, and pretty close to his generation. I think maybe he was looking for help, any old place he could get it.”
    “You think he was recruiting you?”
    “Maybe,” I said. “I think maybe he was dropping a couple of breadcrumbs, and waiting to see if I would follow them.”
    “Because?”
    “Because he wants the lid back on, and he’s not sure who can do it for him.”
    “He doesn’t trust the DoD guys?”
    “Would you?”
    “That’s not my world. Would you trust them?”
    “About as far as I can spit.”
    “Doesn’t he trust Springfield?”
    “With his life. But Springfield is just one guy. And Sansom has a big problem. So maybe he figures if some other guy is in, he might as well stay in. The more the merrier.”
    “So he’s bound to help us.”
    “Not bound,” I said. “His jurisdiction is strictly limited. But he might be inclined. Which is why I want you to call him.”
    “Why don’t you call him?”
    “Because I’m not going to be here at start of business tomorrow.”
    “You’re not?”
    “I’ll meet you at ten, in Madison Square Park. A