by a small blue ribbon at the nape of his neck.
"Hi," he said pleasantly,."I'm Joel Greenberg, the resident general here. How're you doin', Jackman?"
"Waiting for you, Genius Two."
"Hey, I'm Numero Uno, remember?"
"I just replaced you, I got here first," replied Rowe, still typing.
"You must be the exalted Colonel Witkowski," said Greenberg, extending his hand to the perplexed chief of security, whose glare did not convey much pleasure at the sight of the slender man in blue jeans and an open-collared bush jacket, to say nothing of the ponytail.
"It's an honor to meet you, sir, and I mean that."
"At least you're sober," said the colonel awkwardly.
"I wasn't last night. Wow, did I do a mean flamenco! .. And you have to be Mrs. de Vries. The rumors weren't wrong, ma'am.
You're a gorgeous, A-plus."
"I'm also an officer-attache of the embassy, Mr. Greenberg."
"I'll bet I outrank you, but who's counting.. .. I apologize, ma'am, I didn't mean to offend you. I'm just sort of the ebullient type. No offense, okay?"
"Okay," said Karin, laughing quietly.
"You've got to be our Mr. Cons-Op, right?" said Greenberg, shaking hands with Drew, then becoming suddenly serious.
"My heart goes out to you, sir. You lose a parent, it's kind of expected, you know what I mean? You lose a brother-yes, Jackman and I were told the scenario -well, it's something else. Especially the way it happened. I don't know what else to say."
I "You've said it very well; it's appreciated.. .. Who else down here knows what you just told, me?"
"Nobody, only Rowe and myself. We have two pairs of relief.
The last left when the Jackman arrived, but none have the codes to invade our super bird. If either of us has an accident or a cardiac arrest, a sub is flown down from NATO."
"I've never seen you around the embassy," said Witkowski.
"And I'm sure I'd recall having seen you."
"We're not permitted to fraternize, Colonel. We have a separate entrance and our own very small elevator."
"That seems rather excessive."
"Not when you consider what's in Mother Bird. The only people accepted for this job are computer PhDs, male and unattached.
That may be sexist, but it's the way things are."
"Are you armed?" asked Latham.
"Just curiosity."
"Two weapons. Both Smith and Wesson, nine mil limeters. One,in a chest holster and one strapped to the leg. Trained in usage, by the way."
"May we get to work," said Karin firmly.
"I believe your partner has inserted the information I need."
"It won't do us any good until I repeat it," said Greenberg, heading for his chair on the left of the giant equipment and sitting down, entering his code.
"Print it up for me, Jackman, okay?"
"Transfer in sequence," answered Rowe.
"It's in your ballpark.
Repeat and release on demand-print key."
"I'm with you." Joel Greenberg swiveled in his chair and addressed the three intruders.
"As I repeat his data, it'll come out on the printer below the center screen. That way you won't have to remember everything on the movie."
"The movie?"
Chapter Twenty-Two
"The screen, Colonel, the screen," said Jack Rowe.
As the computer printouts spewed forth, page by page, date by date, Karin ripped them off and studied them. Twenty minutes passed. When the printouts were finished, she went back over each, circling items in a red pencil. Finally, she said softly but emphatically, "I've found it. The two occasions when I went back to Transport. I remember exactly.. .. Can you now bring up the names of the D and R personnel on the left side of the center aisle?" She handed the printouts with the data circled in red to Greenberg.
"Sure," said the Ph.D. with a ponytail, in concert with his associate.
"Ready, Jack?"
"Go ahead, Numero Duo."
"Asshole."
The names appeared on the screen before the ten-second delay for the printer.
"You're not going to like this, Mrs. de Vries," said the computer Ph.D. named Rowe.
"Out of the six days you specified, you were. on three of them."
"That's crazy-insane!"
"I'll bring up your data, see if you recall it."
The screen printed out the information.
"Yes, that's mine!" cried Karin, her eyes on the line of green letters as they first appeared.
"But I wasn't there."
"Big Bird doesn't lie, ma'am," said Greenberg.
"It wouldn't know how."
"Try the others, their inputs," insisted Latham.
The bright green letters appeared again on the screen, each from different offices. And again, the very data Karin had recognized was on two others.
"What more can I say? I could not have been in three offices at once. Someone has penetrated your holy computers."
"That would require such a complex number of codes, including insertions and deletions, that it