To read this serial novel from the beginning, go here.
Land Lines
He couldn't sleep. Rove had let him and Marsha go "without prejudice," but something was not quite right. Cardinal sat up late thinking, but he couldn't figure out what was wrong. He reached for his cell phone, then stopped himself. With the new FISA laws, using a cell was about as safe as skywriting.
Instead he picked up his old fashioned land-line and dialed. His was a rotary phone, the model that hung in his grandma's house the day Ma Bell died. He recently installed it because an insider had told him the NSA computers had a bug that sometimes caused them to miss the old pulse dialing. The call went through, and a voice mumbled on the other end.
"Hello, Marsha?"
"Cardinal."
"I hope I'm not interrupting anything. You don't have someone with you tonight, do you?"
"You mean, am I sleeping with someone? No, Cardinal. In case you forgot, I was in Istanbul for the last 6 weeks trying to get you out of a Turkish prison. I've been in the U.S. for 12 hours and no, I haven't had time to hook up."
"Good. Anyway, I want to ask you something. Something bothers me about the way things went down today. I can't figure out what it is, though."
"You mean because Rove let us off so easily."
"That's it."
"Let's talk about it tomorrow. Remember, I am still your attorney, so our private conversations are protected. We can meet in my office. They won't bug us."
"You assume the Feds have ethics. Let's talk at a public place instead. I'll come to your office and we'll walk."
The next day, Cardinal picked Marsha up at her office and they headed over to the public library. "G-men don't read," he said. "At least not in this administration."
They sat at a desk in the card catalog room. No one under seventy in sight. "All right, here's the deal," Marsha said. "I think the government is using you as a pawn, a distraction."
"A distraction? From what?"
"I haven't figured that one out yet. They send you out on a dangerous mission, and you create all kinds of havoc. You did it twice, once with the hijacked plane, and then in Syria and Turkey. The noise you create allows them to do other things, without the public noticing. You take up all the public bandwidth, you might say."
"Marsha, the hijacking was an accident. We just happened to come across the ELFs --"
"You think so? I think the ELFs were a plant, to get you to do, well, you know, what you always do. Ever heard of the ELFs before, or since?"
"Well, no."
"Precisely. They were government. That's why we got out of the hijacking scot free. It is also how we got out of Turkey. The Feds let us create a distraction, and then when the distraction was no longer needed, they got us out."
"So you think Rove suckered us."
"I do. The question is, what was the distraction for? I've been checking the papers, looking for suspicious happenings while we were creating our diversions. During both times we got into trouble, two things happened. First, there was a major flood. Second, a blockbuster pharmaceutical was withdrawn from the market. Now, I can't see how the government could control a natural disaster, so I am thinking there is a connection with the drug withdrawals."
"Like what?"
"I haven't figured that out yet. Maybe terrorists are trying to poison people. Maybe the government has a shady deal going with the big pharmaceutical companies."
"Well, I guess we have some detective work to do."
"Yes. There is a major pharmaceutical convention going on in Las Vegas this week. I think we need to get over there and do a little investigating."
"I'm up for that. The place will be swarming with pharmaceutical reps. I hear those chicks are hot."