The two trucks turned left onto Pennsylvania Avenue and proceeded toward the Capitol. Ted was caught at a light and waited impatiently for it to change. Once it did, the massive acceleration at his disposal quickly caught him up. Now he moved into the right lane and closed the distance between his car and the two Suburbans. A block ahead, he saw a traffic light turn to red. There was nothing between his car and the light, so he could stop next to the trucks. His windows were blackened, like those of the Suburbans, so they could see him no better than he could see them. Ted stopped next to the Suburbans, carefully choosing his position between the two trucks. He had only until the light changed. He picked up the weapon and worked the action, chambering the first round; he checked the cross-street traffic, then he pressed the down switch on his window. From his position a little ahead of the second Suburban, he could see through the windshield into the car, could see both the driver and Efton. There was only one agent in the car. He fired the first round before his window was fully down, killing the driver, then he turned the weapon toward Efton and began emptying the magazine, first at the man, then at the front passenger seat as Efton ducked behind it.

The front passenger door of the first Suburban suddenly opened, and an agent came out, drawing his weapon. Ted floored the Mercedes, striking the agent and taking off the Suburban’s door, then he hung a sharp right, drove across two lanes of traffic, and headed down the street. He knew the driver of the first Suburban would have to check on the state of the second truck before pursuing, so he would have a good head start.

He whipped the car down an alleyway, drove a block, then turned left on Pennsylvania, headed back the way he had come. Now he slowed his progress, so as not to attract attention. The garage where he had parked the RV was in sight now, down the street a couple of blocks on his left. He pulled into a parking lot on his right, took a ticket from the machine, and found a spot. He took off the jumpsuit, the beard and the wig, put on a baseball cap and packed the weapon and the wig into a canvas bag; he got out of the car, locked it, and began walking down the street toward the garage where he had left the RV. Halfway there, he tossed the Mercedes’s keys into a trash can.

KINNEY HAD BEEN in his office for an hour when the first news came in; typically, it was from CNN.

“There has been a shooting incident in downtown Washington, D.C.,” the announcer said. “A black GMC Surburban with D.C. license plates was fired into several times from another car, and a second Suburban lost a door in the incident. We expect to have further details momentarily, but these vehicles are typical of those used by the government to transport VIPs around the city.” Kinney pressed the intercom. “Get me the chief of police.” A moment later he was buzzed; he picked up the phone. “Good morning, Chief,” he said.

“Not really,” the chief replied. “We’ve got three men down in a shooting on Pennsylvania Avenue.”

“Any ID?”

“I’m waiting for that, now. Hang on a minute.”

Kinney was placed on hold, and he waited impatiently, tapping a foot and drumming his fingers on his desk.

The chief came back on. “It’s bad, Bob,” he said. “Speaker Efton has been shot twice and is being transported to Walter Reed Hospital as we speak. One Secret Service agent is dead and another down.”

“Any suspects?”

“We’re looking for a silver Mercedes that left the scene at high speed,” the chief replied. “That’s all I’ve got at the moment. I’ll get back to you when I have more.”

Kinney had barely hung up the phone when his secretary buzzed him. “It’s the president,” she said.

Kinney didn’t want to talk to the man, but he had to.

53

KINNEY TOOK A FEW deep breaths while he waited for the president to come on the line.

“Bob?”

“Yes, Mr. President.”

“Tell me about your trip to Atlanta.”

“First, Mr. President, I have to tell you that I’ve just learned from the D.C. police chief that the speaker of the House has been shot on Pennsylvania Avenue, on his way to the Capitol.”

“Good God! Is he dead?”

“He’s on his way to Walter Reed, sir. A Secret Service agent is dead and another wounded.”

“Was it Fay?”

“I have no evidence to that effect yet, sir, but I have no doubt that it is.”

“Was Rawls of any help?”

“Yes, sir. He told us that Fay might be using a hangar at Manassas Regional Airport, south of Washington. I landed there on the way back, and we raided it at the earliest possible moment.”

“And…?”

“The hangar was empty, but my crime scene team found a wristwatch that had apparently been run over by a car or truck. It had stopped four minutes before my SWAT team arrived.”

“And it was Fay’s?”

“I believe so, sir, but he had cleared the hangar of any evidence that he might have been there.”

“What’s your next move?”

“Rawls also told us that he believed Fay had bought a cottage on an island in Maine, Islesboro.”

“I know the place. My wife has spent some time on the island.”

“We’ve checked with the local postmaster and located the house. I have a team on the way to the island as we speak, and I had planned to leave myself almost immediately, until I heard about the Efton shooting. I want to look into that before I leave. I’ve also alerted every state police department between Washington and Maine to be on the lookout for Fay. We believe he’s driving an RV.”

“All right, keep me posted. I have to call Walter Reed now, and find out how the speaker is doing.”

“I’ll be in touch, sir.” He hung up.

Kerry Smith had come into his office while he was talking. “Are we on for Maine?”

“Yes, but first I want to check out the scene on Pennsylvania Avenue.”

“I talked to the ER at Walter Reed. The speaker is hanging on, but he’s gravely wounded. He took two fifty-caliber, armor-piercing slugs.”

“Christ, that’s machine gun ammo.”

“Right. It’s hard to know how Fay could have used such a large weapon in such a confined space as a car.”

“Let’s get out of here,” Kinney said.

TED SAT IN THE garage, in his RV, watching the story unfold on CNN, switching now and then to MSNBC, to see if they had any further information.

“THIS JUST IN,” the CNN reporter said. “Police have found a silver Mercedes answering the description of the car driven by the shooter of Speaker of the House Eft Efton. The car has a damaged left fender bearing traces of black paint. The first Secret Service vehicle was a black GMC Suburban, and the Mercedes collided with it during its escape, striking a Secret Service agent and taking off the right front door. Crime scene investigators from the D.C. Police Department and the FBI are on their way to the scene now.”

The reporter was handed a sheet of paper. “State police units in states along the Eastern seaboard north and south of Washington have been alerted to be on the lookout for the suspect, Theodore Fay, who may be driving a recreational vehicle north on I- 95.”

The report made him glad he had decided to sit things out for a day before heading for Maine.

KINNEY STOOD beside the silver Mercedes and looked into it. All the doors, the hood, and the trunk were open, and it was crawling with technicians. “Anybody found a print yet?”

“There aren’t any prints,” a tech replied. “This baby is cleaner than when it left the factory.”

“This is no ordinary Mercedes, either,” another tech, who was looking into the engine bay, said. “Somebody has shoehorned a big, AMG V8 into it, and the suspension has been reworked, too. You can buy one of these off a lot these days. It’s called an E55, but this car was made before they came out with that model. This is a custom job. It must go like a scalded cat.”