Chapter 67

Chapter 67—Allison tells Bob off

12:39 p.m., Friday, December 30

Allison’s face was on fire. “I stuck with you through all those affairs, all those blow jobs, and a whole damn truck load of your filthy cheating deeds. Do we need to talk about the drugs? Then there were the murders of your so-called friends? I had nothing to do with them—not with any of that. But I stuck it out with you. Now, damn you, you’re going come down off your high horse, and help save our careers. …”
Allison paused, as Bob contemplated. She then continued. “I completely realize the mess I’ve created. I know I’m in over my head. But we’ve been there before. Many times before. And we always got out. Are you suggesting we give up, this time? What makes it so damn different; except for the fact that it was me screwing up, and not you?”
Bob knew she was right. He knew before he picked her up that they were going to work this out—that they would come up with a game plan, pick up the pieces, and move on. He was not about to give up on her, or, more importantly, on his own career.
“This is what we’re left with,” Bob continued, visibly settled down. “Someone has tapes of four of the five meetings. The reason he doesn’t have the one meeting is because good old Jerry’s bionic ear wasn’t there to record it. Is that right?”
“That’s what we have surmised. Seems to be totally logical, and James is convinced that’s the way it was.”
“Okay, now we know that the tapes exist, and that they have been transcribed. And that some reporter, or some possibly non-reporter, has the transcriptions. And he is intimating that he will publish them. Is that correct?”
“He did actually threaten to publish them,” Allison replied. “But it was kind of strange. It seemed as though he was more interested in our being aware that he had them, than in meeting a deadline.”
“Blackmail?”  Bob again suggested.
“Hard to say, but it didn’t feel like blackmail. It was very strange.” Allison paused again, and then continued, “the one thing that stood out was that the caller was missing the transcription for meeting three. That’s what turned us on to Jerry, and his implant.”
“How sure are you about his being the source?”
“Totally,” Allison said. “James determined that it had to be Jerry’s implant. Jerry missed one meeting, and the nature of the transcript changed dramatically. James determined that my recording was the source used by the transcriber for that meeting. Besides, before every meeting, James would wand the members of the group, and every time Jerry’s implant would trigger the device. Jerry was the principal source.”
“The implant triggered the wand, and you still let him into the meeting? Why did you do that?”
“James assumed that it was just the nature of the device to activate the wand. I suppose because it had a microphone. But there was no evidence of a transmitter. James thought it was acceptable—the fact that there was no evidence of a transmitter.”
“Hell, that sounds pretty stupid to me. If a transmitter was turned off, it would not be detected. All that was required would be to record the audio, and then have the transmitter activate later. … I thought James was more careful than that.”
“Well, we screwed up,” Allison admitted. “It was as much my fault as James’.”
“Tel me again, who does James think is responsible?” Bob asked.
 “James suspects Mossad.”
“Sounds like James, he blames them for everything. … You can buy most of that stuff over the Internet now. Could have been anyone. Could have been the Russians.”
“James is pretty sure that the transcriber was Israeli. He concluded that from some spelling mistakes in the transcript,” Allison said. Allison could see that Bob had settled down a bit, so after a few seconds she asked him, “so, how did you come up with my thumb drive?”
“Rumor had it that you had summarized all the meetings, and stored the audio on thumb drives hidden in your second apartment. … I had some of my people retrieve ‘em.”
“Rumor! Screw your rumor! You’ve been spying on me. Damn you, don’t you ever quit?”
“You should be damn happy I secured the originals of those recordings for you. That is exactly the sort of thing that brings presidencies down. I thought you were a student of history, Al, don’t you remember Nixon?”
Allison again grew silent. She knew Bob was pontificating. She knew that the thumb drives could have brought her down, were she to have become President.
“Don’t worry, Al, the rest of the thumb drives—I’ve destroyed them. And I mean destroyed them, with my own two hands.”
There were distinct tones of pride and anger in Bob’s words. He liked taking matters into his own hands, at every opportunity.
“There are no other copies out there? Aside from the one I have in my hand?” Allison asked.
“Not unless you made some others, but I don’t think you did. Right?” Bob asked, in a quasi-rhetorical manner. “… Of course, the reporter would have made a copy—or copies. But if James is right, and if it is Mossad, it won’t be a major problem. Besides, copies are not the same as originals.”
Allison did not respond because of his condescending tone.
Again the two of them rode along together without saying a word. It was an uneasy silence. The best that Allison could hope to come out of this meeting was for the two of them to form a united front. So very many times before they had attacked problems in just this way—a lot of friction, a lot of sarcasm and name calling, but in the end, unity. Something akin to unity was what Allison was seeking now.
But, in this case, while she felt unity was getting closer, she sensed it had not yet materialized. Finally, Bob broke the silence.
“Al, do you know how embarrassing it is for me that the whole world thinks you are screwing around with one of my closest friends?”