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home to campaign. The President had cut short a
    campaign trip to deal with the downing of Flight 002. Susanna wondered
    what brought Elliott to town now.
    That explained why she was sitting outside his Kalorama mansion in the
    rain. The front door of the mansion opened and two figures appeared, a
    tall man holding an umbrella, and a shorter silver-haired man, Mitchell
    Elliott. The taller man helped Elliott into the back of the car, then
    walked around and climbed in the other side. The headlights came on,
    illuminating the street. The car pulled swiftly away from the curb,
    heading toward Massachusetts Avenue. Susanna Dayton started the engine
    of her small Toyota and followed, keeping to a safe distance. The large
    black car moved quickly eastward on Massachusetts along Embassy Row. At
    Dupont Circle it melted into traffic in the outer lane and turned south
    on Connecticut Avenue. It was early yet, but Connecticut Avenue was
    nearly deserted. Susanna noticed that a strange quiet had descended over
    the city in the forty-eight hours since the jetliner had been shot down.
    The sidewalks were empty, just a few drunks spilling from a tavern south
    of the circle and a knot of office workers rushing through the rain into
    the Farragut North Metro station. She followed the car across K Street
    as Connecticut turned to 17th Street. She crossed Pennsylvania Avenue
    and swept past the ornate, brightly lit facade of the Old Executive
    Office Building. Susanna thought she knew where Elliott was dining
    tonight. The car made a series of left turns and two minutes later
    stopped at the South Gate of the White House grounds. A uniformed Secret
    Service agent stepped forward, peered into the back of the sedan, and
    ordered the driver to proceed. Susanna Dayton kept driving. She needed a
    place to wait. Sitting in a parked car for any length of time around the
    White House was not a good idea these days. The Secret Service had
    tightened security after a series of attacks on the mansion. She might
    be approached and questioned. A report might be taken. She parked on
    17th Street. There was a small cafe across the street from the Old EOB
    that stayed open late. She grabbed her bag, bulging with newspapers,
    magazines, and her laptop, and got out. She hurried across the street
    through the rain and ducked into the cafe The place was empty. She
    ordered a tuna sandwich and a cup of coffee and made a place for herself
    at a window table while she waited.
    She pulled the laptop from her bag, adjusted the screen, and turned on
    the power. Then she inserted a disk into the floppy drive and opened a
    file. When it came onto the screen, the file appeared as a meaningless
    series of letters and characters. Susanna was cautious by nature--many
    of her colleagues preferred the word "paranoid"--and she used encryption
    software to protect all her sensitive files. She typed a seven-letter
    code name, and the file came to life. The sandwich and coffee arrived.
    She scrolled down through the file: names, dates, places, amounts.
    Everything she knew about the elusive Mitchell Elliott and his links to
    President Beckwith. She added the events of this evening to the file.
    Then she shut down the computer and settled in for a long wait.
    CHAPTER 5.
    London.
    THE FAX ARRIVED in the Times newsroom shortly after midnight. It
    remained on the machine untouched for nearly twenty minutes, until a
    young assistant bothered to retrieve it. The assistant read it quickly
    once and took it to the night editor, Niles Ferguson. A thirty-year
    veteran, Ferguson had seen many faxes like it before--from the IRA, the
    PLO, Islamic Jihad, and the crazies who simply claim responsibility
    anytime someone dies violently. This one didn't look like the work of a
    lunatic.
    Ferguson had a special telephone number for situations like these. He
    punched it and waited. A woman's voice answered, pleasant, faintly
    erotic. "This is Niles Ferguson, The Times. I just received a