The Sum of All Fears.pdf - Delta Force

the back of his hand on the page. 'Brent is really delivering for us. And that
Ryan guy, too. He's a pretentious pain in the ass, but that idea of his – '
'Come on, Bob! It wasn't even original. Ryan just repeated some things other
people have been saying for years. It was new to Arnie, but Arnie's interests
stop at the White House fence. Giving credit to Ryan for this is like saying he
managed a nice sunset for you.'
'Maybe,' the President allowed. He thought there was more to the DDCI's
concept-proposal than that, but it wasn't worth upsetting Elizabeth about. 'Ryan
did do a nice job with the Saudis, remember?'
'He'd be a lot more effective if he'd just keep his mouth shut. Fine, he gave
the Saudis a good brief. That's not exactly a great moment in American foreign
policy, is it? Giving briefs is his job. Brent and Dennis are the guys who
really pulled it together, not Ryan.'
'I suppose not. You're right, I guess. Brent and Dennis are the ones who got the
final commitments to the conference . . . Brent says three more days, maybe
four.' The President handed the faxes over. It was time for him to rise and
prepare for a day's work, but before he did he ran a hand over a particular
curve in the sheet, just to let her know that . . .
'Stop that!' Liz giggled to make it sound playful. He did as told, of course. To
ease the blow, she leaned over for a kiss, which was delivered, bad breath and
all, just as requested.
***
'What gives?' a truck driver asked at the lumber terminal. Four enormous
trailers sat in a line, away from the stacks of felled trees being prepared for
shipment to Japan. 'They were here last time, too.'
'Going to Japan,' the dispatcher observed, going over the trucker's manifest.
'So what here ain't?'
'Something special. They're paying to have those logs kept that way, renting the
trailers and everything. I hear the logs are being made into beams for a church
or temple or something. Look close – they're chained together. Tied with a silk
rope, too, but chains to make sure they stay together. Something about the
tradition of the temple or something. Going to be a bitch of a rigging job to
load them on the ship that way.'
'Renting the trailers just to keep the logs in a special place? Chaining them
together. Jeez! They got more money'n brains, don't they?'
'What do we care?' the dispatcher asked, tired of answering the same question
every time a driver came through his office.
And they were sitting there. The idea, the dispatcher thought, was to let the
logs season some. But whoever had thought that one up hadn't been thinking very
clearly. This was the wettest summer on record in an area known for its
precipitation, and the logs, which had been heavy with moisture when their
parent tree had been felled, were merely soaking up more rain as it fell down
across the yard. The stubs of branches trimmed off in the field hadn't helped
much either. The rain just soaked into the exposed capillaries and proceeded
into the trunk. The logs were probably heavier now than when they had been cut.
Maybe they should throw a tarp over them, the dispatcher thought, but then
they'd just be trapping the moisture in, and besides, the orders were to let