Free Call to Treason by Tom Clancy, Steve Pieczenik, Jeff Rovin Page B

a stupid question, Mike, but how are you with this?"
        McCaskey asked.
        "I'm a soldier," he said. "I go where I'm told."
        That was what McCaskey had expected Rodgers to say.
        The general let you know what he was thinking. But with rare exception, he did not let you know what he was feeling.
        "Will you stay with the army?" McCaskey asked.
        "I don't know," Rodgers said.
        "Jesus!" Herbert said. He was no longer brooding. "I can't believe we're hanging here, calmly discussing the screwing of a friend and coworker."
        "We're not," McCaskey said. "We're talking about his plans."
        "Darrell, the man has no plans; he was just fired," Herbert said. "As for you, you're a company boy, you've always been a company boy, and you'll always be a company boy." Herbert pushed on the hard-rubber wheels of his chair and turned. "You may be next. You need to grow a pair, my friend," the intelligence chief added as he maneuvered around McCaskey.
        "Really?" The former FBI agent dropped a strong hand on Herbert's shoulder. He gripped it hard and stopped the intelligence chief from leaving. "Yeah, I'm a team player. Always have been, always will be.
        Battles are won by artillery working in tandem, not by loose cannons."
        "What is that, a quote from the FBI manual?"
        "No," McCaskey replied evenly. If they both got angry, this would get ugly. "That's a personal observation from twenty years of stakeouts, undercover stings, field work, and saving the asses of rogue warriors who thought they could handle entire operations by themselves."
        Herbert thought for a moment. "Okay. I deserved that. Now, take your hand off my shoulder before I go rogue warrior on it."
        There was a disturbing absence of levity in Herbert's voice. He knew he had been the target of McCaskey's remark and did not like it.
        McCaskey let go and stepped to one side. Herbert wheeled away.
        McCaskey would try to talk to him when he got back. Herbert's temper had a way of subsiding as quickly as it flared.
        Other Op-Center personnel had maintained a discreet distance from the three men. They moved through the corridors in silence, their eyes down or facing straight ahead. But this was an intelligence-gathering organization with sharp political hearing. The employees did not miss much.
        "Sorry about that, Darrell," Rodgers said. "Bob's angry."
        "He's Bob," McCaskey replied.
        "True."
        "Look, you've got things to do, and I've got to be somewhere," McCaskey said. "Let me know when you're free for a beer."
        "The end of the week should work."
        "Sounds good," McCaskey said and shook Rodgers's hand. It seemed a remarkably anticlimactic gesture after all these years and all they had shared. But this was not the time or place for good-byes.
        McCaskey hurried down the corridor to the elevator. He got in his car and switched on the new FIAT device, the Federal Intelligence Activity Transponder. It was a chip built into his watch and activated by pulling the stem and twisting it clockwise. The signal was monitored by all mobile metropolitan and state police units. It was basically a license to speed or leave the scene of an accident. It told the authorities that the car was on time-sensitive government business and could not be stopped. The FIATs were introduced two years before so that unmarked Homeland Security officials would not be stopped or detained. Though McCaskey was not on a high-priority mission, Scotland Yard was an important ally. He wanted to get them what they needed as quickly as possible.
        Wilson's body had been taken to the Georgetown University Medical Center on Reservoir Road. That was where the medical officer was conducting autopsies while the coroner's office was being modernized.
        McCaskey went downstairs to look at the body with Dr. Minnie Hennepin.
        The