Phil thought that was weird. The individual lines weren't color-coded. But the supervisor assured him that they could start anywhere.

They were done everything and were burying the line by 10:30 a.m. The supervisor waited until the line was covered by six feet of dirt and sand before turning to go.

The New Rochelle Department of Public Works truck had just arrived. In back was a steaming pile of blacktop.

"Excuse me, sir," Phil Rand asked as the DPW truck backed up to the hole.

The supervisor was climbing into his station wagon. Phil noted that it was the same model as his wife's. The '69 they had bought new two years ago. The supervisor hesitated. For the first time, Phil noted his name tag. It identified the man as Harold Jones.

"Yes?" Supervisor Jones asked impatiently.

"What's this all about, sir?" Phil asked.

The supervisor didn't miss a beat. "Telephone company business," he said crisply.

As the city dump truck poured tar onto the road, the supervisor drove away. He left Phil Rand and his crew standing, oblivious, at ground zero of one of the most damning secrets in the history of the American republic.

THAT THE PHONE LINE was merely one of the most damning secrets in U.S. history was an unquestionable fact to the man who had spent the morning posing as an AT or. At this point in his life, he had been privy to enough secrets to know how to categorize them as either big or small.

He had been entrusted with national secrets for almost as long as he could remember. However, now it was different. Before there were always others who were in on the secrets. Higher-ups, as well as peers. Always a circle of knowledge, growing wider or smaller on a need-to-know basis.

That circle had now grown smaller, tighter than anyone could have ever imagined. And the circle closed around the driver's thin neck like a hangman's noose.