he was part of a coun-terintelligence division, so they tried pumping him pretty hard. Got frustrated when it went nowhere. He was lucky he survived. Damn lucky."
"Not lucky he got captured," the National Security Advisor said.
"Well, that's where things get complicated, of course. Janson believed that he'd been set up. That the VC had been given information about him and he'd been deliberately led into an ambush."
"Set up? By whom?" Ainsley's voice was sharp.
"His commanding officer."
"Whose own opinion of his darling protege seemed to have cooled a little." She flipped to the final sheet headed officer fitness report remarks and read out loud:
Although Lt. Janson's own standards of professionalism remain impressive, difficulties have begun to emerge in his concept of leadership: in both training exercises and duty, he has failed to demand from his subordinates a similar level of competence, while overlooking obvious shortcomings. He appears to be more concerned with the welfare of his subordinates than with their ability to help execute mission objectives. His loyalty to his men overrides his commitment to broader military goals, as specified and set out by his commanding officers.
"There's more going on there than meets the eye," said Collins. "The chill was inevitable."
"Why?"
"Because, it seems, he'd threatened to report him to the high command. Crimes of war."
"Forgive me, I should know this. But what was going on here? The warrior wunderkind had a psychotic break?"
"No. Janson's suspicions were correct. And once he'd returned stateside, and got out of medical, he made a stink about it - within channels, of course. He wanted to see his commanding officer court-martialed."
"And was he?"
The undersecretary turned and stared: "You mean you really don't know?"
"Let's cut the drumroll," the round-faced woman replied. "You got something to say, say it."
"You don't know who Janson's commanding officer was?"
She shook her head, her eyes intent, penetrating.
"A man named Alan Demarest," the undersecretary replied. "Or maybe I should say Lieutenant Commander Demarest."
" 'I see,' said the blind man." Her largely suppressed Southern accent broke through, as it did at times of great stress. "The source of the Nile."
"When next we see our man Janson, it's graduate studies at Cambridge University on a government fellowship. Winds up back on board, in Consular Operations." The undersecretary's voice became summary and brisk.
"Under you," Charlotte Ainsley said.
"Yes. In a manner of speaking." Coliins's tone said more than his words, but everyone understood his import: that Janson was not the most subordinate of subordinates.
"Rewind a sec," Ainsley said. "His time as a POW in Vietnam had to have been incredibly traumatic. Maybe he never really recovered from it."
"Physically, he got to be stronger than ever ... "
"I'm not talking about physical prowess or mental acuity. But psychologically, that sort of experience leaves scars. Fault lines, cracks, weaknesses - like in a ceramic bowl. The flaw you don't see until something else happens, a second trauma. And then you split, or break, or snap. A good man becomes a bad one."
The undersecretary raised a skeptical eyebrow.
"And I'll accept that this is all on the level of conjecture," she continued smoothly. "But can we afford to make a mistake? Granted, there's a great deal we don't know. But I'm with Doug on this one. Comes down to this: Is he working for us or against us? Well, here's one thing we do know. He's not working for us."
"True," said Collins. "And yet - "
"There's always time for 'and yets,' " Ainsley said. "Just not now."
"This guy is a variable we can't control," said Albright. "In an already complex and confusing probability matrix. Outcome optimization means we've got to erase that variable."
"A 'variable' who happens to have given three decades of his life to his country," Collins shot back. "A funny thing about our business - the loftier the language, the lower the deed."
"Come off it, Derek. Nobody's hands are dirtier than yours. Except your boy Janson. One of your goddamn killing machines." The DIA man glared at the undersecretary. "Needs a taste of his own medicine. My English plain enough?"
The undersecretary adjusted his black plastic glasses and returned the analyst's unfriendly look. Still, it was clear enough which way the wind was blowing.
"He'll be hard to take out," the CIA operations man stressed, still smarting from the Athens debacle. "Nobody's better at hand-to-hand. Janson could inflict serious casualties."
"Everybody in the intelligence community has received rumors and reports about Anura, albeit unsubstantiated," said Collins. "That means your frontline agents as well as mine." He glanced at the CIA operations man