A bank of televisions fed by video cams showed every possible approach to the apartment; in addition, a small radar unit and two bugs gave the detectives and agents a full picture of what was happening inside.

Which was nothing.

Fisher surveyed the feeds for a few minutes, then picked up the latest intelligence summary on the case, which ran down intercepts the NSA had made with any possible connection. That, too, was a blank, with the only mention of a blackout coming in a conversation that clearly had to do with basketball coverage.

“You missed the morning quarterback session,” said Macklin, showing up with a bag of doughnuts around eleven. “Hunter was asking for you.”

“Use any four-letter words?”

“Many.” Macklin ripped open his bag and spread it over the table at the center of the room. “I’m thinking of pulling the plug on the surveillance. I have warrants so we can go search the place. What do you think?”

Fisher took two of the doughnuts from the table. “I think it’s time to find out how good a cup of coffee Mrs. DeGarmo makes.”

“DeGarmo? The landlady?”

“Yeah,” said Fisher. He checked his watch. “Maybe if we stay long enough, she’ll invite us for lunch. Plate of cold spaghetti would really hit the spot.”

“Who’s there?”

“Andy Fisher.”

“Who’s Andy Fisher?”

“FBI.”

“Who? The plumber?”

“Yeah. You have a leaky faucet?”

The doorknob turned and the heavy door creaked open. Fisher saw a pair of eyes peering at him about chest high.

“You’re a plumber?” she asked.

“FBI.” He showed her his Bureau “creds,” a small laminated ID card.

Mrs. DeGarmo squinted at it. In the right light, the picture looked a bit like that of a dead rat.

In bad light, it was the spitting image of one.

“Where’s your tools, if you’re a plumber?”

“I have to look at the leak first,” said Fisher.

“Okay,” said the woman, pulling the door open.

Lillian DeGarmo was ninety if a day. Her biceps sagged beneath her print housedress and her upper body pitched toward the floor. She tottered slightly as she walked but soon reached the kitchen, which lay just beyond the long entry hall.

“Sauce smells good,” said Fisher.

“The faucet’s in the bathroom, around the corner,” said the old lady, pointing to the doorway at the other end of the small kitchen.

“Actually, I’m here for something else,” said Fisher. “I’m an FBI agent. Say, is that coffee warm?”

“You want coffee?”

“Well, I have doughnuts,” said Fisher, pulling the doughnuts from his pocket.

“Oh, I can’t,” said Mrs. DeGarmo. “The doctor said they’re bad for my diabetes.”

“Doctors. Probably told you not to smoke, right?”

She pursed her lips for a moment.

“I hate doctors,” said Fisher, pulling out his cigarettes.

“Me too,” said Mrs. DeGarmo, grabbing the pack.

By the second cigarette Mrs. DeGarmo had told Fisher all she knew about her tenant. Faud Daraghmeh went to St. John’s University, where he was a prelaw student. He claimed to be Egyptian-he was actually from Yemen, according to the Immigration and Naturalization Service-and greatly admired the United States. Until a few days ago he had kept a very strict schedule, always in by nine o’clock and always in bed before the eleven o’clock news, which Mrs. DeGarmo watched religiously. He got up within a few minutes of eight o’clock every morning-during the Today show-and left by noon, before the afternoon soaps (she called them her “stories”) came on.

“You can hear him above the TV?” Fisher asked.

“Big feet,” said the old lady, waving her hand. “More coffee?”

“Sure,” said Fisher. “So a couple of days ago he just stopped coming home, huh?”

“Sometimes he goes away, but usually he tells me when he’ll be back. ‘Mrs. D,’ he says, ‘I go to see friend in Florida.’ ”

“ Florida?”

“I think he said that.”

“He said that this time?”

“No. Other times. This time, eh…ragazzi.”

Technically the word ragazzi meant “boys,” though coming from the old Italian lady the word implied much more.

“He’s a nice boy,” added Mrs. DeGarmo quickly. “He’s not in trouble, I hope.”

“Might be,” said Fisher.

“He’s very nice. He helped me out.”

“How?”

“Little jobs. He could fix things. You want lunch? I have sauce on the stove: Have a little spaghetti.”

“Spaghetti’s good,” said Fisher.

Mrs. DeGarmo made her way to a pantry at the end of the hallway in the back where she kept extra groceries. The groceries were on a small bookcase in the hall; the pantry itself was occupied strictly by grocery bags. If there was ever a shortage, she could supply the city for months.

“Look at that,” she said, pointing to the floor as she took the box of Ronzoni.

“What?”

“The rats are back,” she said.

“Rats?” asked Fisher. “Rodent rats?”

“They always come back. This time at least they stayed away for weeks.”

“Good exterminator’s hard to find,” said Fisher, helping himself to another cup of coffee as they returned to the kitchen.

“Faud knows how to chase them away,” said the landlady, checking on her large pot of water.

“Really?” said Fisher.

“Oh, yes. He was very good at that. He was a very good boy.”

“He put out traps?”

“No. Fumigate.”

“Fumigate?”

“Very stinky. We had to go outside the whole day. He sealed it off. Smelled like Clorox when he was done, but there were no rats.”

“Sealed what off?”

“Downstairs. Two times, he did it.”

“Two times?”

“He was a very good boy.”

“Mind if take a look?” asked Fisher.

“First you have something to eat. Then you fix the faucet,” said Mrs. DeGarmo. “Then you take a look.”

“Can’t argue with that,” said Fisher, twirling his spaghetti.

Howe was fifty miles from the coast when the radar warning receiver buzzed, picking up the two MiGs flying almost directly at him from the east at 25,000 feet. They were less than fifteen miles away, which would put them overhead in roughly sixty seconds. He pushed lower to the mountains, sliding down through 10,000 feet in hopes of avoiding their radar.

He thought he’d slid by when the RWR came up again; he’d strayed close to a ground radar. Howe held to his course anyway. There was another radar to the north closer to the coast, and maneuvering away from one would expose him to the other. The MiGs or at least their radars had disappeared.

Four minutes to the coast, then another five minutes before he’d be far enough away that nothing could stop him.

A flight of F/A-22s would be on station by now, off the coast to the south. If they scrambled north, they’d meet him over the coast, or just off it.

So, really, he only had to make it though four minutes. Two hundred and forty seconds.

Long seconds.

He got a blip: the MiGs.

Howe glanced down at the map he’d unfolded across his lap and leg. He could cut farther north and hope to avoid the MiGs by legging into Russian territory, but that would take him farther from the F/A-22s presumably scrambling to his aid. It also would stretch his fuel further and leave him vulnerable to the Russians, who surely would be interested in a plane that looked like one of theirs.

He looked up at the black night in front of his cockpit, calculating which way to push his luck. There was chatter on the frequencies used by the Korean air force.

“Ivan, be advised a second flight of MiGs scrambling from Orang to check unknown contact in your vicinity,” warned the mission coordinator in Sky. “We’re tracking them now. They’re going to be in your face in zero-two minutes. SAMs are coming up.”

“Ivan,” acknowledged Howe, his grip tightening on the sidestick.

“Another flight: You’re being targeted!”