Murray hurried through White House security, having left his service pistol in his official car. His month had not been any better than the rest of the government's. He'd blown the Linders case with a rookie mistake. Brandy plus a cold medication, he said to himself yet again, wondering just what Ryan and the President would have to say to him about that. The criminal case had come apart, and his only satisfaction was that at least he had not brought a possibly innocent man to trial and further embarrassed the Bureau. Whether or not Ed Kealty was really guilty of anything was a side issue for the FBI detective. If you couldn't prove it to a jury, then the defendant was innocent, and that was that. And the man would soon be leaving government service for good. That was something, Murray told himself as a Secret Service agent conducted him not to Ryan's office, but to the one at the opposite corner of the West Wing.

"Hi, Dan," Jack said, standing when he came in.

"Mr. President," Murray said first. He didn't know the other man in the room.

"Hi, I'm Scott Adler."

"Hello, sir." Murray took his hand. Oh, that was the guy running the negotiations with the Japs, he realized.

Some work had already been accomplished. Ryan could not believe that Adler was the leak. The only others who knew were himself, the President, Brett Hanson, Ed and Mary Pat, and perhaps a few secretaries. And Christopher Cook.

"How close are we keeping tabs on Japanese diplomats?" Ryan asked.

"They don't move around without somebody keeping an eye on them,"

Murray assured them. "We're talking espionage?"

"Probably. Something very important leaked out."

"It has to be Cook," Adler said. "It just has to be."

"Okay, there are some things you need to know," the National Security Advisor said. "Less than three hours ago we slam-dunked their air defenses. We think we killed ten or eleven aircraft." He could have gone further, but did not. It was still possible that Adler was the leak, after all, and the next step of Operation ZORRO had to come as a surprise.

"That's going to make them nervous, and they still have nuclear weapons. A bad combination, Jack," the Deputy Secretary of State pointed out.

Nukes. Murray thought. Jesus.

"Any changes in their negotiating position?" the President asked.

Adler shook his head. "None, sir. They will offer us Guam back, but they want the rest of the Marianas for themselves. They're not backing off a dot from that, and nothing I've said has shaken them loose."

"Okay." Ryan turned. "Dan, we've been in contact with Mogataru Koga—"

"He's the ex-Prime Minister, right?" Dan asked, wanting to make sure he was up to speed on this. Jack nodded.