Monday, August 23, 1977

 

Peter hung up the payphone in a McLean gas station and left for the meeting site in Great Falls Park. He had dropped Bernadette off inside the park at 8:30 AM. I have done all I could. I’ll soon know if it was enough.

He drove west on Route 193 until he came to the park entrance. He made the right turn and parked out of sight of the actual meeting site. Using his small handheld radio, he checked in with Bernadette. She was all set. It was overcast. Rain was promised. No one had come into the park. She had not seen nor heard any movement in the brush- and tree-covered slopes.

At exactly 12:30 PM a black Chevy pulled into the park and parked where he had told Frank. There was a driver in the car. It was probably Frank. He had only caught glimpses of him when he was casing his house and neighborhood. It was beginning to drizzle. A middle-aged man, slightly stout, wearing glasses, and carrying a rolled umbrella in his right hand walked rapidly with the left shoulder leading as if he was favoring an old injury. Five feet from Peter he stopped, looked around, and said, “Is it okay if I put the umbrella up?”

Peter smiled and said, “No. I’m glad you asked for you would be dead now.”

The man smiled back and said, “I guess getting wet is a better option.”

Peter said, “You have my attention. What do you want with me?”

“No small talk first?”

“We already did that with the umbrella talk.”

This time the man laughed. “Maybe you can help me.”

“I’m listening.”

“First, let me tell you what I think I know about you. I don’t expect you to confirm or deny. Just listen. You were a KGB officer who somehow got into this country and ran from the KGB, taking their money with you. In the escape you killed five of them, in Pittsburgh and Latrobe, and your wife killed three more before she and your daughter were killed by AK-47 fire. A remarkable achievement for both of you.

“When you got the chance you contacted one of my officers and gave him KGB equipment and information about a network of KGB illegals, spies, and saboteurs from your own network. I don’t know where you are living now and I don’t care.

“You have proved to me that we have nothing to fear from you and that you are willing to help. Taking down the sniper illegal agent in Georgetown is all the proof I need of your skills. You can plan and act. Not a usual combination of skills. I need you to help me protect this nation. I suspect that is consistent with your own objectives. Why else would you have come to us when you were already free of the KGB? You also don’t seem to want anything from us. Is that right?”

“Your connection of the dots is accurate. No. I do not want anything from you. I’ll help the cause of freedom but not at the cost of the rest of my family or a long life here in America. America, by the way, is the home of my ancestors. My grandfather got left behind in Siberia, and we have been hoping to get back to America for generations. The KGB has never connected these dots. Now they cannot. I assume what we say here stays here.”

“It stays here. This conversation could hurt me rather badly. I don’t want you ever to talk to anyone but Frank or me. Frank reports directly to me. No notes or records. I will not ever expose you to Congress. Some would say I don’t have to because there is no money involved. That judgment could change with shifting political agendas.”

“What exactly do you want me to do?”

“The short answer is I want you to kill enemies of this nation that I cannot have arrested and tried because of the rules of evidence necessary when foreign spies and saboteurs are given constitutional protection meant only for U.S. citizens. If I apprehend them, it will alert others, because I cannot keep the information away from the media.”

“I don’t see myself as a government assassin.”

“I don’t see you like that, either. You will always have the freedom to refuse assignments after being briefed.”

“Can you give me an example?”

“Yes. There are three USSR agents in your network who are still free. Some of their missions, if successful, could cause many deaths and damage America’s command and control system. Other than your information, I’ve no basis for arresting or even watching them. I would have trouble getting a warrant, though I probably could. And if I could get enough court-acceptable information to prove they are not U.S. citizens, I might, might be able to have some jurisdiction to make an arrest. Then would come the lawyers, the ACLU, and other progressive liberal groups to their rescue. In the end, unless they confessed in front of proper witnesses with legal counsel, they would most probably walk.

“I’m asking you to find them and talk to them about entering some kind of a protection program or voluntary deportation.”

“You’re asking me to commit suicide. I’m willing to find them and maybe talk to some of them about entering a program that would let them stay here and not be punished, but no deportation. The first thing they would say back in Moscow is that I talked to them representing the U.S. Government. The hunt for me would pick up steam. More resources would be committed. Maybe I made a mistake somewhere. One of them picked up a clue and the search, which I believe has wound down, would get new life.

“I’ll find them for you and talk to the one who has the mission of poisoning the water supply of a large city. If he refuses to go into a protection program, he will have to be killed. I cannot take on increased risk for a man who intends to kill thousands of Americans.”

“Okay, find them for us, and we’ll take it from there.”

“Good, I accept.”

“There is always one more thing. We have located a possible terrorist training camp. The information came from a long-term illegal agent who came into America through Canada years ago.

“I want you to check out this camp and report back to me what you have found. Are people actually being trained to commit terrorist acts in America, or is it just training so-called survivalists, minutemen, and ardent re-enactors?”

“And, and…?”

“What? Oh, you mean why should you take this risk?”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

“It just so happens that I thought of that. May I reach in my coat pocket?”

“Yes, but very slowly.”

“Is your shooter that good?”

“Better than you can believe and dedicated. The shooter may have a problem in heavy rain, so I would have to do the job myself. Right now you should be feeling the crosshairs of the shooter’s scope just above your left ear.”

“I believe you. Here is a letter I drafted. Note it is signed by the Director of Central Intelligence. No file copy. This is the only one. The blank file copy has a torn in half ten-dollar bill stapled to the blank but numbered page. The original I’m giving to you contains the other half of the ten-dollar bill. The bill is your bona fides in case you have to use this letter. The other pages contain what we know of the survival camp.”

Peter scanned the letter. It identified him as a loyal American citizen who has taken on dangerous missions assigned to him by the CIA. The bearer should be granted all possible immunity for actions he had to take in performing his mission. He has saved the lives of hundreds of American citizens.

Peter folded the papers and put them in his rain jacket. “This may help. What are you going to tell Batcher about this meeting?”

“As little as possible. Look at him as being my messenger. Now I’m going to go back to my car. Please give my best to your shooter on the slope behind me. I didn’t see anything. Just back tracking the line of fire, which you so carefully kept open. Lines work both ways. Thank you. No handshake. I don’t want to push my luck.”