Someone had definitely called him.

"--where you can work things your own way. I've also recommended to the President that we set up a scholarship at the University. Something for Mr. Donald in the political science department."

"Thanks," Hwan said. "Don't forget Cho's wife. She'll need help."

"Already done," said Yung-Hoon.

Hwan watched the Director carefully as he asked, "And how is Ms. Chong?"

Yung-Hoon looked as though his necktie was too tight. "She's gone. As you-- requested, we allowed her to drive off."

"She saved my life. I owed her that. You followed her, though?"

"Well yes," Yung-Hoon said. "We were interested to know where she'd go."

"And?"

"And," said the Director, "she ended up in Yangyang. At your uncle's house."

Hwan smiled. They'd never find her. Uncle Pak would sneak her out on his boat, which they wouldn't dare board, and he'd arrange somehow to get her into Japan.

"Don't you think she'll spy for the North again?" Yung-Hoon asked.

"No," Hwan said. "She never wanted to be doing this. I'm glad she'll be able to find what it is she really wanted."

Yung-Hoon patted his hand. "If you're sure, Hwan." The Director rose. "I've put one of your men outside, Park. If you need anything let him know or call me."

Hwan said he would, and Yung-Hoon left him-- not alone, but with his ghosts, the bittersweet memories of Soonji and Gregory Donald, of his poor driver Cho and the guarded but entrancing Ms. Chong. He wasn't sure his own uncle would tell him where he'd taken the woman, but he vowed he would find her somehow. As this day had underscored, there were friendships and allegiances that transcended political boundaries, and there wasn't always the time to explore them.

Time had to be made for those bonds to be strengthened. Because in the end, what he remembered about all of those people was what they had in their hearts, not in their dossiers.

CHAPTER EIGHTY-EIGHT

Wednesday, 9:00 P.M., Op-Center

The President arrived at Op-Center unannounced.

He came in his stretch, armor-plated limousine, with two Secret Service agents, his driver, and no one else-- no aides, no reporters.

"No reporters?" Ann had remarked when the sentry at the front gate of Andrews AFB announced his arrival to Paul Hood. "Then it's got to be a former President."

"You're too cynical," Hood said, sitting back behind his desk. He had just finished bringing the heads of all the departments up-to-date-- Bob Herbert, Martha Mackall, Darrell McCaskey, Matt Stoll, Lowell Coffey, Liz Gordon, Phil Katzen, and Ann-- and also thanking them not only for their industry but for their ingenuity and cooperation: he told them he'd never seen a team mesh more effectively, on all fronts, and he was proud of the job they'd done proud of them, individually.

He had been about to leave his office when the call came, and so he sat back down to wait.

Ann waited with him.

She couldn't stop smiling. Ann was not just happy because things had worked out for Op-Center; not just because the TV networks had all broken into the prime-time schedule with news of the destruction of the Nodong; not just because she and her counterpart at the Pentagon, Andrew Porter, had sold to the press that what Gregory Donald and General Michael Schneider did were the acts of humanists, not partisans. They had gotten out with that story fast enough, honest enough, and strong enough so that whatever the North Koreans said about Major Lee's plot would sound ungracious and vindictive.