"Be my guest. You'd probably do better working through his special-projects director, though. He's the guy who's heading up the search."
"What's his name?"
"Dirk Pitt."
"The fellow who raised the Titanic a few months back?"
"The same." Ravenfoot held up his wristwatch and noted the time. "I have to run along. If you get a lead on those shells, I'd appreciate a call. Jim Sandecker is an old friend. I still owe him a favor or two."
"Count on it."
Jarvis sat for several minutes after Ravenfoot left, poking his fork idly at the pie. Then he rose and walked back to his office,
lost 68
in thought.
Barbara Gore knew the instant her boss stepped through the door that his intuition was working overtime. She had seen that haunted look of deep concentration too many times not to recognize it. Without waiting to be asked, she picked up her pad and pencil and followed Jarvis into his private office. Then she sat down, crossed her magnificent legs, and waited patiently.
He stayed on his feet and stared at the wall. Then he turned slowly and his eyes came back in focus. "Call Gossard and set up a meeting with his Africa Section staff, and tell him I'd like another look at the Operation Wild Rose folder."
"You've changed your mind? There may be something to it after all?" He didn't answer immediately. "Maybe, just maybe."
"Anything else?"
"Yes, ask the ID department to send up whatever they have on Admiral James Sandecker and a Dirk Pitt." "Aren't they with NUMA?" Jarvis nodded.
Barbara gave him a questioning look. "Surely you don't think there is a connection."
"Too early to tell," said Jarvis thoughtfully. "You might say that I'm picking up loose threads to see if they run to the same spool."
48
Frederick Daggat and Felicia Collins were waiting in the limousine when Loren came through the portico of the Capitol. They watched as she gracefully skipped down the steps, her cinnamon curls trailing in a light breeze. She wore a persimmon pantsuit with double-buttoned blazer and vest. A long gray silk scarf curled around her neck. Her briefcase was covered with the same material as the suit.
Daggat's chauffeur opened the door for her. She slipped beside Felicia as Daggat gallantly took one of the jump seats. "You look lovely, Loren," Daggat said familiarly-too familiarly. "It was obvious the minds of my male colleagues were elsewhere when you stood up on the House floor in that outfit."
"Being a woman has its advantages during debate," she said coolly. "You look stylish, Felicia."
A strange look flashed over Felicia's face. The last thing she expected from Loren was a compliment. She smoothed the skirt of her creamy white jersey dress and avoided Loren's eyes.
"It's good of you to see us," she said quietly.
"Did I have a choice?" Loren's face was a mask of resentment. "I'm afraid to ask what you demand of me this time."
Daggat raised the window behind the chauffeur. "The vote comes up tomorrow on whether or not to grant aid to the African Army of Revolution."
"So you two poked your heads above the slime to see if I was still in the fold," Loren said bitterly.
"You refuse to understand," said Felicia. "There is nothing personal in this. Frederick and I do not stand to gain financially. Our only reward is the advancement of our race."
Loren stared at her. "So you sink to blackmail to further your great moral cause."
"If it means saving countless thousands of lives, yes." Daggat spoke as though he were lecturing a child. "Each day the war continues brings a hundred deaths. The blacks will eventually win in South Africa. A foregone conclusion. It is the manner in which they win that is important. Hiram Lusana is not a murderous psychopath like Idi Amin was. He has assured me that when he becomes Prime Minister, the only major change he seeks is equal rights for South Africa's black people. All democratic principles the present government was founded upon will remain in effect."
"How can you be fool enough to accept the word of a criminal?" asked Loren.
"Hiram Lusana grew up in one of the worst slums in the nation," Daggat continued patiently. "His father deserted his mother and nine children when he was eight. I don't expect you to understand what it's like to pimp for your own sisters in order to put food on the table, Congresswoman Smith. I don't expect you even to imagine living in a fifth-floor tenement with newspapers stuffed in the cracks to keep out blowing snow, with overflowing toilets because there is no water, with an army of rats waiting to scavenge when the sun goes down. If crime is your only means to exist, then you embrace it with open arms. Yes, Lusana was a criminal. But when his opportunity came to rise above the filth, he snatched it and turned his energies toward fighting the very circumstances that cursed him."