Feldman rubbed his eyes and stared at the ceiling. "Let's say they have a copy of the brief, and that they know she wrote it, and now she's vanished. They can't verify it right now, but they're not afraid to mention the brief without naming Mattiece. Let's say they know Callahan was her professor, among other things, and that he brought the brief here and gave it to his good friend Verheek. And now they're dead and she's on the run. That's a pretty damned good story, wouldn't you say, Gray?"
"It's a big story," Krauthammer said.
"It's peanuts compared to what's coming," Gray said. "I don't want to run it because it's the tip of the iceberg, and it'll attract every paper in the country. We don't need a thousand reporters bumping into each other."
"I say we run it," Krauthammer said. "If not, the Times will beat our ass with it."
"We can't run the story," Gray said.
"Why not?" asked Krauthammer.
"Because I'm not going to write it, and if it's written by someone else here, then we lose the girl. It's that simple. She's debating right now about whether to jump on a plane and leave the country, and one mistake by us and she's gone."
"But she's already spilled her guts," Keen said.
"I gave her my word, okay. I will not write the story until it's pieced together and Mattiece can be named. It's very simple."
"You're using her, aren't you?" Keen asked.
"She's a source. But she's not in the city."
"If the Times has the brief, then they know about Mattiece," Feldman said. "And if they know about Mattiece, you can bet they'ie digging like hell to verify it. What if they beat us?"
Krauthammer grunted in disgust. "We're going to sit on our asses and lose the biggest story I've seen in twenty years. I say we run what we've got. It's just the surface, but it's a helluva story right now."
"No," Gray said.I won't write it until I have all of it."
"And how long might that take?" Feldman asked.
"A week, maybe."
"We don't have a week," Krauthammer said.
Gray was desperate. "I can find out how much the Times knows. Give me forty-eight hours."
"They're running something tomorrow or Sunday," Feldman said again.
"Let 'em run it. I'll bet money it'll be the same story with probably the same mug shots. You guys are assuming a hell of a lot. You're assuming they've got a copy of the brief, but its author doesn't have a copy of it. We don't have a copy of it. Let's wait, and read their little story, then go from there."
The editors studied each other. Krauthammer was frustrated. Keen was anxious. But the boss was Feldman, and he said, "Okay. If they run something in the morning, we'll meet here at noon and look at it."
"Fine," Gray said quickly and reached for the door.
"You'd better move fast, Grantham," Feldman said. "We can't sit on this much longer."
Grantham was gone.
* * *
THE LIMOUSINE moved patiently in the Beltway rush hour. It was dark, and Matthew Barr read with the aid of a reading light in the ceiling. Coal sipped Perrier and watched the traffic. He had the brief memorized, and could have simply explained it to Barr, but he wanted to watch his reaction.
Barr had no reaction until he got to the photograph, then slowly shook his head. He laid it on the seat, and thought about it for a moment. "Very nasty," he said.
Coal grunted.
"How true is it?" Barr asked.
"I'd love to know."
"When did you first see it?"
"Tuesday of last week. It came over from the FBI in one of their daily reports."
"What'd the President say?"
"He was not that happy with it, but there was no cause for alarm. It's just another wild shot in the dark, we thought. He talked to Voyles about it, and Voyles agreed to leave it alone for a while. Now I'm not so sure."
"Did the President ask Voyles to back off?" Barr asked the question slowly.
"Yes."
"That's awfully close to obstruction of justice, assuming of course the brief turns out to be true."
"And what if it's true?"
"Then the President has problems. I've got one conviction for obstruction, so I've been there. It's like mail fraud. It's broad and wide and fairly easy to prove. Were you in on it?"
"What do you think?"
"Then I think you've got problems too."
