COVERT WRITERS TAKEDOWN by Joe Bergeron (best beach reads txt) 📕

a man like Randall Benson.”
He took the compliment, something he’d been
doing for a long time in many positions.
“Mister Vice President, what did you find at
Bellcamp’s home?”
“Only confirmation of what he’d already given
us. My agents returned after a difficult boat crossing
with his computer and data bases. Everything Mister
Bellcamp told us is true. It was almost worth the two
million dollars he took from us for his information.”
“He’s still an intolerable loose end, Mister Vice
President.”
273
“I understand. We are continuing our search
for him.”
“Very well, I’ll keep you informed on the Yankee
Echo stories and their effect.”
“Yes, please do, Mister Secretary. Good night,
my friend.”
In narcissistic self indulgence, he not only
knew his plan was working, but he also felt Courtney
was frightened.
Stories would come out next Friday.
The President would eventually have to
capitulate.
Negation: Law Five and Thirty-Two
Saturday, May 27, 6:04 a.m.
In Newtonian Mechanics, all physical events
are reduced to the motion of material points in space
caused by their natural attraction, i.e., by the force of
gravity.
To put what would be the effect of gravity on a
mass point into a precise equation, it was necessary for
Newton to create concepts and mathematical
techniques that had never existed before.
Thus, we were given Differential Calculus.
Equations of motion developed by Newton are
the basis of classical mechanics
Because they were considered to be fixed laws
according to which material points move, they were
believed to be related to all the changes in the physical
world.
The entire world was originally set in motion
by the highest spiritual authority, and it has continued
to run ever since governed by Physical Laws.
If we apply a mechanistic thought process to
the universe, and to all its natural orders, we come to
understand that every cause gives rise to a definite
effect.
274
This is Law One. Therefore, and in addition,
the future of any of the natural orders could, in
principle, be predicted with absolute certainty if its
state of existence at any given point in time were
known in all details.
Courtney’s Game Theory called for an escape,
and he’d use some of the concepts in Newtonian
Mechanics to make this happen.
He felt the CIA was watching him. He didn’t
think Orefice would call off his spooks
In fact, agents trained in surveillance were
only yards away from the walls of the suite, twenty-four
hours a day.
He’d been up since 4:30 a.m., having showered,
shaved, and packed.
There’d be no way he could bring a suitcase,
and wait for it at the Miami airport turnstile. His red,
nylon gym bag, sporting the Boston College Crest,
tightly housed a few changes of underwear and socks,
three sports shirts, a change of shoes, a light nylon
jacket, a pair of jeans, and his toiletries.
Everything and anything else he needed, he’d
buy in Florida.
In between the pants and the jacket, he packed
his Yankee Echo code book and about twenty pages of
notes he’d written since his arrival in the Capitol.
Working a simplified version of Newtonian
Mechanics and the Theory of Opposites, he’d be able to
predict the events that would take place when he left
his suite if he knew what physically existed from
outside it to the front entrance to the hotel.
His actions would cause reactions.
He knew speed wasn’t as necessary as
manipulation, that, for now, presence was more
important than analysis.
It was time.
He dialed room service.
275
A woman answered. It wasn’t Hendricks.
“May I help you?”
“Yes, would you please send a pot of coffee to
the McKenzie suite?”
“Certainly, we’ll have that up to you in about
five minutes.”
It actually took eight minutes for the attendant
and her cart to get there.
A look through the convex lens confirmed a
wish. The lower part of the cart was draped with a
linen cloth, a curtain to hide dirty dishes, utensils, and
other ware that guests shouldn’t have to observe. It’s
emptied every time the cart is returned, so, on every
returning trip to a room, there is a vacancy behind the
linen.
Opening the door, he exchanged a pleasantry
intended to establish a rapport.
“Hey, come on in, you guys are fast.”
“No problem, Sir.”
She transferred the brew from stainless steel to
wood.
Courtney, making eye contact moved to within
two feet of her.
“Would you do me a favor when you leave?”
The question had attached to it an urgency
that not only seemed difficult to refuse, but also seemed
to suggest a larger tip. That made the answer easy.
“I guess so, what is it?”
“Put this bag on the bottom of your cart. Take
it to any cabby out front, and send it to the Delta
counter at Dulles. Can you do that?”
He extended five twenty dollar bills.
“Give the cabby two of these, and you keep the
other three.”
She took the money and the bag. There was
plenty for the fare and cabby’s tip - and even more for
her.
276
“It’ll be done, Mister, and anything else you
need done, just call down and ask for Marcie.”
“OK, Marcie, thanks.”
She left, the linen obscuring her cargo from the
view of two people in the hallway outside the suite.
A maintenance man was repairing the
baseboard molding thirty feet to the north of the suite.
Another man, tall, wearing glasses, walked the hallway,
his dress blazer exhibiting a patch on its left breast
pocket identifying him as a member of the hotel
security staff.
A third man, unseen, was in the room kittycorner
to the bank of elevators. He sat on his bed
watching a television screen displaying nothing but the
other two men in the hallway, a miniature remote
control camera he’d mounted at the top of the wall
outside his room providing the picture.
All three worked for Deputy Director David
Eisenberg.
Courtney pulled open the center drawer of the
desk retrieving the black encoding device. Slipping it
into the left pocket of his jacket, he pulled his wallet
from left rear pocket of his jeans. In it were ten one
hundred dollar bills, five twenties, and two fives. In
addition, he had ten credit cards including American
Express, both Gold and Corporate, Citibank Master
Card and Visa, and five miscellaneous gas cards, all
with max limits.
Law Seventeen
It was time to move - slowly - create an
opposite - be momentarily static - they would move
quickly believing he would also.
He opened the door, appearing in the hallway
to the surprise of both agents in eyesight, in addition to
the agent unseen.
It was 6:45 a.m. He was fully clothed. Where
was he going? To breakfast, out for a walk or jog? It
wouldn’t matter, they’d pick him up in the lobby.
277
At the bank of elevators, he summoned both
cars to his floor, the car on the left arriving first.
Stepping inside, he pressed the buttons for
every floor below his, then backed out of the car.
He had some temporary luck he didn’t know
about.
The wall-mounted camera didn’t pick up that
side of the corridor.
When the second car arrived, he entered and
repeated the button pushing procedure. This time he
stayed in the car.
Getting off on the floor below the suite, he
headed West down the hallway.
In the lobby, two empty elevator cars that had
stopped at every floor below his revealed themselves to
a man dressed in jogging attire, as well as to another in
slacks and a sports shirt.
The jogger quickly pulled a two-way radio from
the pouch in his sweat shirt. He was walking fast
toward the main entrance.
The man in slacks pulled a same-brand radio
from his pants pocket.
Their similar remarks, although one not an
echo of the other, contained equal content and gravity.
“He’s not on the elevator.”
“No one got off.”
Courtney had found an open banquet room.
The facility was being dressed out for a noon
wedding reception.
A tent sign outside the entrance would reveal
its location to attendees who would come later.
Six men and three women moved briskly but in
organized fashion preparing the room for the event.
Approaching two males finalizing the location
of a table, he addressed the eldest.
“Hi, I’m with the groom - mind if I look
around.”
278
“Be my guest.”
It was almost seven. He needed fifteen
minutes to be immobilized.
He knew they were following him, and he knew
they’d move fast, would follow the rules, and be
conventional.
More conversations were taking place via twoway
radios.
“We lost him.”
“I don’t know where he went.”
“Get outside.”
“I’ll take the restaurant.”
Thirteen minutes later, after reviewing the
entire wedding reception hall, Courtney sought out,
found, and approached the elder again.
He produced a twenty dollar bill.
“I need a favor, I’ll be escorting a guest who
doesn’t want to be seen in the lobby, can you show me a
back way in and out of here?”
It really wasn’t all that unusual a request for
this City
He took the twenty.
“Follow me.”
A rear elevator door opened to a short hallway
leading to a parking lot furthest from the main
entrance. No one was in sight.
Beyond the lot, a strip plaza with no customers
at this early hour would become a pick up point.
He needed one more favor, and produced
another twenty to get it.
“Go out front and send a cab to that pizza joint
over there to pick me up.”
The elder nodded his head.
“OK.”
Eight minutes later, Courtney, now in the rear
seat of a yellow Chevy, gave the driver his destination.
His permit card did not identify him as Timothy
Metcalff.
279
“ Dulles - Delta terminal.”
The cabby got his fare, a one hundred dollar
tip, and a request to forget what he looked like should
anyone ask him to describe his early morning
passenger.
“You never saw me before, OK?”
“You don’t look nothing like yourself in my
memory, buddy.”
At the Delta counter, his bag waited on the
bottom of a shelf behind two ticket agents. It was seven
fifty-nine.
“That’s my bag, my name’s Michael Courtney -
can I still get on the eight o’clock flight to Miami?”
The fact that the plane was almost empty made
his request easy to fill.
“We’ll hold the plane for you, Mister Courtney.”
She was kidding, but also serious.
Nine minutes later he inclined a window seat
over the port wing while voices continued to crackle
from CIA radios both within and outside of the
Marriott.
“We have four more people on the way, stay at
the entrance.”
“Check the restaurants around the lobby
again.”
One more radio transmission
“You’d better call Hendricks.”
Saturday, May 27, 8:15 a.m.
Delta flight 412 from Washington to Miami was
approaching eleven thousand feet when she got the call
at her apartment.
“Hello?”
“Liz - it’s Marty - we lost him.”
“What the hell happened? How could you lose
him? Where is he?”
280
“He played a game with the elevators. We
underestimated him. We have six people here now. He
may still be at the hotel.”
“Damn - do Scott and David know?”
“Not yet… I’d rather you call one of them.”
“Sure - let me take the heat. Alright, listen, get
into his suite and go over the whole thing. See if he left
anything. Have someone talk to all the cabbies coming
back from anywhere - is someone at JGM?”
“Yeah - I was there, but we have someone else
watching it now.”
“OK, Marty, find me when you have something
- I’ll do your dirty laundry for you.”
She called him at home.
The Director wasn’t as disturbed as she
thought he should be.
He listened to the whole story