Jack Ryan 1 - Without Remorse by Tom Clancy Read Free Book Online Page B

were the only reminder of what it had once been. The furniture and rugs showed the influence of Patricia, but the current state of semiarray was evidence that only a man lived here now. Everything was neatly arranged, but not as a woman would do things. The Rosens also noted that it was the man of the house who led them to the 'galley' and got things out of the old-fashioned refrigerator box while Pam wandered around a little wide-eyed.
    'Nice and cool,' Sarah observed. 'Damp in the winter, I bet.' -
    'Not as bad as you think.' Kelly pointed to the radiators around the perimeter of the room. 'Steam heat. This place was built to government specifications. Everything works and everything cost too much.'
    'How do you get a place like this?' Sam asked.
    'A friend helped me get the lease. Surplus government property.'
    'He must be some friend,' Sarah said, admiring the built-in refrigerator.
    'Yes, he is.'
    Vice Admiral Winslow Holland Maxwell, USN, had his office on the E-Ring of the Pentagon. It was an outside office, allowing him a fine view of Washington - and the demonstrators, he noted angrily to himself. Baby Killers! one placard read. There was even a North Vietnamese flag. The chanting, this Saturday morning, was distorted by the thick window glass. He could hear the cadence but not the words, and the former fighter pilot couldn't decide which was more enraging.
    'That isn't good for you, Dutch.'
    'Don't I know it!' Maxwell grumbled.
    'The freedom to do that is one of the things we defend,' Rear Admiral Casimir Podulski pointed out, not quite making that leap of faith despite his words. It was just a little too much. His son had died over Haiphong in an A-4 strike-fighter. The event had made the papers because of the young aviator's parentage, and fully eleven anonymous telephone calls had come in the following week, some just laughing, some asking his tormented wife where the blotter was supposed to be shipped. 'All those nice, peaceful, sensitive young people.'
    'So why are you in such a great mood, Cas?'
    'This one goes in the wall safe, Dutch.' Podulski handed over a heavy folder. Its edges were bordered in red-and-white striped tape, and it bore the coded designator boxwood green.
    'They're going to let us play with it?' That was a surprise.
    'It took me till oh-three-thirty, but yes. Just a few of us, though. We have authorization for a complete feasibility study.' Admiral Podulski settled into a deep leather chair and lit up a cigarette. His face was thinner since the death of his son, but the crystal-blue eyes burned as bright as ever.
    'They're going to let us go ahead and do the planning?' Maxwell and Podulski had worked towards that end for several months, never in any real expectation that they'd be allowed to pursue it.
    'Who'd ever suspect us?' the Polish-born Admiral asked with an ironic look. 'They want us to keep it off the books.'
    'Jim Greer, too?' Dutch asked.
    'Best intel guy I know, unless you're hiding one somewhere.'
    '?? just started at CIA, I heard last week,' Maxwell warned.
    'Good. We need a good spy, and his suit's still blue, last time I checked.'
    'We're going to make enemies doing this, lots of 'em.'
    Podulski gestured at the window and the noise. He hadn't changed all that much since 1944 and USS Essex. 'With all those a hundred feet away from us, what'll a few more matter?'
    'How long have you had the boat?' Kelly asked about halfway through his second beer. Lunch was rudimentary, cold cuts and bread supplemented by bottled beer.
    'We bought it last October, but we've only been running it two months,' the doctor admitted. 'But I took the Power Squadron courses, finished top in my class.' He was the sort who finished number one in nearly everything, Kelly figured.
    'You're a pretty good line-handler,' he observed, mainly to make the man feel better.
    'Surgeons are pretty good with knots, too.'
    'You a doc, too, ma'am?' Kelly asked Sarah.
    'Pharmacologist. I also teach at Hopkins.'
    'How