The Sum of All Fears.pdf - Delta Force

'No preview, not even one professional to another?'
'Especially not one professional to another.' Jack drank his beer right out of
the bottle. The menu, he saw, was in Hebrew. 'Guess I'll have to let you order .
. . That damned fool!' I've been left holding the bag before, but never one this
big.
'Alden.' It was not a question. 'He's my age. Good God, he should know that
experienced women are both more reliable and more knowledgeable.' Even in
affairs of the heart, his terminology was professional.
'He might even pay more attention to his wife.'
Ben Jakob grinned. 'I keep forgetting how Catholic you are.'
'That's not it, Avi. What lunatic wants more than one woman in his life?' Ryan
asked deadpan.
'He's gone. That's the evaluation of our embassy.' But what does that mean?
'Maybe so. Nobody asked me for an opinion. I really respect the guy. He gives
the President good advice. He listens to us, and when he disagrees with the
Agency, he generally has a good reason for doing so. He caught me short on
something six months back. The man is brilliant. But playing around like that .
. . well, I guess we all have our faults. What a damn-fool reason to lose a job
like that. Can't keep his pants zipped.' And what timing, Jack raged at himself.
'Such people cannot be in government service. They are too easy to compromise.'
'The Russians are getting away from honey traps . . . and the girl was Jewish,
wasn't she? One of yours, Avi?'
'Doctor Ryan! Would I do such a thing?' If a bear could laugh, it would have
sounded like Avi Ben Jakob's outburst.
'Can't be your operation. There was evidently no attempt at blackmail.' Jack
nearly crossed the line with that one. The general's eyes narrowed.
'It was not our operation. You think us mad? Dr Elliot will replace Alden.'
Ryan looked up from his beer. He hadn't thought about that. Oh, shit . . .
'Both your friend and ours,' Avi pointed out.
'How many government ministers have you disagreed with in the last twenty years,
Avi?'
'None, of course.'
Ryan snorted and finished off the bottle. 'What was that you said earlier, the
part about one professional to another, remember?'
'We both do the same thing. Sometimes, when we are very lucky, they listen to
us.'
'And some of the times they listen to us, we're the ones who're wrong . . .'
General Ben Jakob didn't alter his steady, relaxed gaze into Ryan's face when he
heard that. It was yet another sign of Ryan's growing maturity. He genuinely
liked Ryan as a man and as a professional, but personal likes and dislikes had
little place in the intelligence trade. Something fundamental was happening.
Scott Adler had been to Moscow. Both he and Ryan had visited Cardinal D'Antonio
in the Vatican. As originally planned, Ryan was supposed to backstop Adler here
with the Israeli Foreign Ministry, but Alden's astounding faux pas had changed
that.
Even for an intelligence professional, Avi Ben Jakob was a singularly
well-informed man. Ryan waffled on the question of whether or not Israel was