Indeed, America has a grand record of knocking over other nations, even if our history of installing lasting new regimes is a bit checkered. Plus, I suppose it's hard these days to find a great power willing to kick a little butt for a righteous cause. The Europeans have been there, done that; they have lost their appetite, if not their flair, for foreign empires, intrigues, and escapades that often turn out badly. As for the Russians and Chinese, they lack charitable impulses. They liberate like the mob lends money; the vig sucks. But Americans are a generous if slightly naive people, with a distinct messianic bent and the animating conviction that what works for us must work equally well for others. We are the New World, they are the Old; new is always better. Right?

But as I said, Washington attracts a lot of these zealots yearning to borrow Uncle Sam's checkbook and a few legions to rearrange the decor at home. Some are the real deal and their tales of oppression and woe, and their sad optimism, are deeply affecting, even heartbreaking; others are charlatans, schemers, phonies, and scoundrels. Unfortunately they are hard to tell apart, and when you guess wrong, you have a long supply of corpses with a short list of excuses. A happy few, like Shah Pahlavi or Aristide, get their wish; but possibly these are not the best examples.

It's interesting. Having Irish heritage, I find all this a little ironic. Rather than enlist others to fight their battles, my ancestors had the literally unsettling habit of migrating in vast, freckled flocks to fight other people's causes.

There is, in fact, an almost embarrassingly long tradition of this in the Drummond strain. In 1862, Great-great-grandpa Alfonso fled Ireland, he claimed to escape the potato famine; and a pregnant lady and an aggravated father with a shotgun might have added a little impetus. While still scratching his ass on the dock in New York harbor, he promptly accepted one hundred greenbacks from a prosperous New Yorker to take his place in the Civil War draft. He spent three years as an infantryman in a war he understood nothing about, killing people he felt no animus toward, at the behest of somebody who deserved to be there, and decided America truly was the Promised Land.

Great-grandpa Seamon served nearly a year in the trenches as an infantryman in the War to End All Wars-subsequently renamed the First World War, after that turned confusing. He insisted to his grave that he shipped out without the slightest idea the Germans, whom he had no particular feelings toward, were killing the English, whom he truly detested, and the French, whom he regarded as uppity bastards who would benefit from a Hun boot on their throat. At least Seamon read the newspaper, cover to cover, every morning the rest of his life.

Grandpa Erasmus waded ashore at Normandy, got lost in the Huertgen Forest, and spent the final months of his war cooling his heels in Stalag Eighteen. Afterward, he swore those were the most relaxing and luxurious years of his life. But maybe you had to know Grandma Mary.

My own father became a lifer, and made a full-blown career of fighting wars in hilly and jungled places with obscure and unpronounceable names. He battled the commies in Korea and completed nearly two full tours in Vietnam-the former referred to as the Forgotten War, and the latter as the War Everybody Wishes They Could Forget.

But as I look back on this extended family chronicle, it strikes me that the Drummonds make good infantrymen-at least we survive-though, as they warn about mutual funds, past successes never guarantee future returns.

Also the wars that five generations of Drummonds have fought have become increasingly less popular, less fashionable, and more morally confused. I myself was an infantryman before I became a lawyer and saw action in Panama, the first Gulf War, Bosnia, and Mogadishu-messy war, good war, utterly confused war, total fuckup.

As I grow older, I find myself less tolerant of people with well-expressed causes they want Sean Drummond to fight for.

Anyway, Phyllis must have been reading my thoughts, because she suggested, "So you're familiar with Mr. Charabi?"

I allowed that question to linger in the air, then said, "What was… or what is, the Agency's relationship with Charabi?"

"None. He approached us many years ago. We did some back-grounding and didn't like what we saw."

"I know the official line. Try the truth."

"I'm telling you the truth. We took a pass." She emphasized, "Charabi was, and is, the Pentagon's creature. Start to finish."

"And how did the dead guy on the bed end up as Charabi's… as his what?"

"Technically, his controller. But it's more complicated than that… Before he moved to the Pentagon, Cliff Daniels was a career officer at the Defense Intelligence Agency. About a decade ago he befriended Mahmoud Charabi, or possibly vice versa." She concluded, "That's it. As far as I can go on an unsecure line."

I thought about this a moment. From the news reports, I had read that Charabi spent about twenty years peddling his plans and scams for a free Iraq. I'll bet he thought his train had come in when this President decided that Saddam needed the boot, if only somebody could help him justify why.

I wasn't sure why or how Charabi became that go-to guy; but he did, and apparently the dead guy on the bed played a big hand in it. Also, as I recalled from the news reports, Charabi was supposed to be the Pentagon's man to run Iraq after the invasion, though obviously that hadn't worked out exactly as planned, since nobody seemed to be in charge in Iraq now, at least no Iraqis, and possibly not even the U.S. military.

Then, somehow, Daniels himself ended up as a target of intelligence interest, with an invitation to explain his activities in front of a congressional panel. Interesting.

Anyway, Phyllis repeated herself, saying, "I really can't go any deeper on the phone." She added, "I've told you more than you should know, as it is. Unless you're part of the investigation."

"I didn't know there was an investigation."

"With Daniels dead, it's now imperative to learn why. An investigation is how we usually handle these things."

"Maybe it was suicide. Sure looks like suicide."

"Maybe it was. But knowing what you now know, the alternative gains a little added weight… don't you think?" She gave me a moment to think about it, then said, "Now you persuade the Arlington police that it was suicide. And bring back that briefcase."

"Are you ordering me to lie to the police? I want to be clear on this."

"Did I say that?"

"In so many words… yes."

I couldn't see her smile, but I could picture it. She said, "You're a lawyer, Drummond. Handle it."

"Am I part of this investigation?"

"Do you want to be?"

"No."

"Then now you are. Is that settled?"

"Not yet. Who am I working for?"

"You report to me."

"And who do you report to?"

She ignored my question and said, "The Agency inspector general and the FBI already have an ongoing investigation, of which Daniels was a subject. But we'll handle them as parallel efforts. Ours will be kept separate, quiet, distinct."

Interesting. "And will one hand know what the other hand is doing?"

"I receive ongoing updates on what they're doing."

"That's not what I asked."

"Figure it out."

I figured it out. Phyllis would hold all the cards. I asked, "What am I investigating?"

"Whether Daniels was murdered or not. We'll see where it leads from there."

"And Major Tran?"

"Yes… I'm glad you brought her up. Do you feel you can trust her?"

"As much as I trust you."

Now I was sure she was smiling. She asked, "More relevantly, does Major Tran trust you?"

"Absolutely. As we speak, she's on the other side of a glass slider, trying to read my lips."