To Kill the President

by Sam Bourne

  Kassian, still standing, offered his hand, which the Chinese diplomat took firmly. Kassian knew the man was just a year older than he was: fifty-one. He wore a plain blue suit, an off-white shirt and oversized, 1970s-style glasses. No retro chic was intended. They were just old.

  Their host gestured for them both to sit down in the living area – two couches, armchair, coffee table – at the centre of the suite. In an accent that suggested an expensive education in England, she spoke first.

  ‘Gentlemen, as you know, we were asked to make a space available for you to talk in a way that would remain completely unrecorded and confidential. It was Mr Kassian’s suggestion that you meet here, rather than in Washington, where he suspected discretion would be harder to achieve, especially perhaps for him.’ She smiled. ‘He was also aware, with all due respect to the Republic’s ambassador in Washington, that you, Mr Lei, are widely reputed to be even closer and, dare I say, more influential with your government in Beijing.’

  She paused and continued. ‘I should stress that Sweden has no selfish interest of our own in whatever issue has brought you both here. But you will both be aware of Sweden’s great and historic interest in advancing the cause of peace in the world. If there is anything that can be done to avoid war, then my country will give whatever we can.

  ‘I repeat that what is said in this room will remain confidential. No word of it shall be spoken by us. We will deny this meeting ever took place. No one knows any of us are here. This room is booked in the name of an anonymous Swedish businessman. As it happens, there are quite a few of those.’ That did as was intended, and brought smiles from both men. ‘Mr Kassian, it was you who suggested we meet. Why don’t you begin?’

  ‘Thank you, ambassador. And thank you, sir, for coming to meet me here today and at such short notice. You know, I hope, that I would not have asked our mutual friend,’ he nodded towards the Swede, ‘to bring us together unless I regarded it as of the gravest importance.’

  Zheng Lei looked at him impassively.

  Kassian glanced down at his own hands, wondering if they might start trembling again. ‘I don’t know how much, if anything, you know of what happened last night in the White House.’ No response from the man opposite. ‘But I’m going to be extremely frank. I can see no other way.’

  He cleared his throat. He had thought about what he would say – on the plane, in the car – but that had not prepared him for the sensation of actually saying it.

  ‘In the early hours of this morning, my country came within ten seconds – less than ten seconds, in fact – of launching an all-out nuclear assault on the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and,’ he heard a dryness enter his throat, ‘the People’s Republic of China.’

  The Swedish ambassador gasped at that. An involuntary, and entirely genuine, sound. Her hand now covered her mouth. Kassian went on.

  ‘The President had given the order. The War Room at the Pentagon was in the process of encrypting and communicating that order to nuclear commanders around the world, including firing crews based on land, in our underground launch facilities, as well as those on submarines and onboard our bombers in the sky. Only an ingenious and brave intervention from one of our military officers, at the very last moment, caused the order to be aborted.’

  The Chinese ambassador kept his gaze on the coffee table positioned between them. Kassian decided to read that as a reaction of sorts: perhaps this man was fearful of looking him in the eye, lest he give himself away. Kassian spoke again.

  ‘What prompted the attack was the statement issued by the DPRK late last night our time. It appeared to taunt the President. If I may quote.’ Kassian reached into his breast pocket, and unfolded a single piece of paper. ‘“The Workers’ Party knows it confronts in Washington a paper tiger, a coward and a small man. We will demonstrate our strength – for we know our enemy’s weakness.’”

  Still Zheng said nothing. Kassian went on.

  ‘Ordinarily, under previous administrations perhaps, such statements might be dismissed as rhetoric.’ He thought he saw the tiniest hint of a nod from the ambassador. It encouraged him.

  ‘But these are not ordinary times. For one thing, the DPRK has repeatedly signalled its intention to build a nuclear weapon capable of reaching the west coast of the United States. Capable of hitting Los Angeles. Our intelligence suggests that the DPRK is either at, or close to, that stage.

  ‘However there is a more – how should I put this? – pressing way in which these are not ordinary times. The leader of my country is not a politician. And he is not a military man. He hears statements like these’ – he held up the sheet of paper – ‘the way a young man might hear them in a bar.’ He hadn’t planned to say this; he wondered if he had made a mistake. ‘He hears them as a provocation. He believes he is being dared to prove the North Koreans wrong.’

  At that, Zheng sat up, readying himself to speak. Kassian did not know if that meant he had succeeded or failed.

  ‘Mr Kassian, are you a student of history?’ His English was impeccable.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Your résumé says you studied the liberal arts at Princeton. But it doesn’t tell me if you studied history.’

  ‘Some.’

  ‘I see. Well, I am a student of history. My specialism is the history of this country, in fact. Especially the last century. I took great interest in the Presidency of Richard Nixon. I wrote my master’s thesis on Mr Nixon’s relations with Asia.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Do you know why I bring this up now?’

  ‘I sense you’re about to tell me.’

  ‘Because Mr Nixon was very careful to have his closest aides – Dr Kissinger especially – travel the world warning everyone that their boss was a madman.’ At this he smiled. “Crazy! Unhinged!” Nixon was not offended. He encouraged it. He wanted America’s enemies to be frightened. “America has all these bombs – and Nixon is crazy enough to use them!”’

  ‘And you think that’s what I am doing now?’

  ‘History does not repeat itself, Mr Kassian. But it does sometimes rhyme.’

  The American found himself looking to the Swedish ambassador, by way of an appeal. She nodded, but only to encourage him to reply. She was not about to take sides.

  ‘Mr Lei. I have taken quite a risk by coming here this morning. My President does not know I am here. I would be fired if he knew. I can assure you I am not doing his bidding.’

  ‘Then why are you here?’

  ‘I’m here because I am scared.’ The words surprised Kassian as much as the other two, perhaps more. ‘I don’t think you understand what I’m telling you. Your neighbour was within seven or eight seconds of being wiped off the map this morning and your country within seconds of being hit by a nuclear bombardment. Every last one of North Korea’s people would have been killed, along with millions of your own countrymen. Children. Families. Perhaps even your own family.’ Kassian thought he saw a shadow pass across Zheng’s face. ‘This is not a tactic. This is not a game. This is deadly fucking serious.’

  ‘Mr Kassian—’

  ‘No. Listen to me. I’m warning you because I think – no, I know – that this could end in catastrophe. For the entire planet. He’s ready to do it. He did do it. He gave the order.’

  ‘So why didn’t it happen?’

  ‘We found a way to stop him.’

  ‘How?’

  Mr Kassian stole a sheepish look in the Swede’s direction. Without meaning to, he heard his voice dip. ‘We told him the DPRK had apologized for the statement.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘It was the only way.’

  ‘So now you need my country to use its leverage over the Democratic People’s Republic to persuade them to make good on the lie you told to stop your “crazy” President blowing up the world?’

  ‘That’s about the size of it, yes. And the North Koreans need to do it soon. They also need somehow to backdate it, so it appears they issued the statement
at around 3.45am Eastern Standard Time.’

  Kassian hesitated before making that last request. Partly because he feared it might be asking too much, but also because he had wondered if it was even necessary. These days, you could probably get away with falsifying a timestamp: in this era when everyone was ready to shout ‘fake news’ about anything, who would know or care? Not the President, who paid no attention to detail and who barely read the papers put in front of him.

  But Kassian knew that wouldn’t hold. Crawford McNamara, for one, immersed himself in the minutiae and was assiduous in his reading of documents. As a master purveyor of fake news, he rarely allowed himself to be a consumer of it.

  ‘That won’t be easy, Mr Kassian. The North Korean people are a very proud nation. They take pride in their defiance of the American tyrant. They will not fall to their knees.’

  ‘No one is asking them to fall to their knees, Mr Zheng. Just a form of words that gets us through to—’

  ‘You seem to forget something, Mr Kassian.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘That North Korea and the United States now have something in common. Both these nations are led by very unpredictable men – with very thin skins.’

  Kassian nodded. He knew it was bad diplomatic form to appear to be agreeing with criticism of one’s own leader, but he couldn’t help himself. Besides, it seemed to bear fruit. Zheng spoke again.

  ‘Nevertheless, I appreciate the approach you have made to me. I will see what can be done.’

  Kassian hoped he hid his relief. ‘I am grateful, Mr Zheng. But I’m afraid I need to ask even more of you.’

  The ambassador said nothing.

  ‘The reality is that so long as the DPRK is led by this man, his presence will provoke the President I serve. You might say that is unjust or disproportionate. Even that it is irrational. There are some who might well agree with you. But that is the fact of the matter. So long as North Korea is led by its current ruler, a great danger exists. The risk is mainly to the DPRK, of course, but China is mortally threatened too. He could have chosen to hit just North Korea last night. But his orders were to strike at China too. So long as that regime remains in place, your country is in grave danger. The whole world is in grave danger.’

  ‘You are asking the People’s Republic to topple the ruler of the DPRK? Seriously? This is the request you would have me discuss with my government?’

  Kassian signalled that this was indeed his request.

  Zheng smiled and said, ‘Now I know for sure that you are on this mission alone. Your State Department would never have let you come here saying such nonsense! This is craziness, Mr Kassian. Complete craziness.

  ‘Of course we would not do that. If we topple the regime in North Korea, the country would collapse in an hour and by nightfall it would be entirely ruled from Seoul. My government has not forgotten what happened to Germany in 1989. The Berlin Wall came down and, a day or two later, Germany was one country again, ruled by the west. A united Korea would be wonderful for America, but not so good for China. Like you say in the United States, “We have seen this movie before: we know how it ends!”’

  ‘So you won’t help, even though I have been honest with you and told you I believe there is a risk of all-out nuclear war on your territory and in your backyard?’

  Zheng shook his head. ‘I cannot give you what you want.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Remember, Beijing is not so different from Washington. Maybe it’s not so visible. There’s not so much publicity. But we have arguments too. Factions who compete for power. If my president were to do what you ask, there would be much opposition from some very powerful people. It would be a great risk for him. So I cannot give you what you ask.’

  ‘I’m very sorry to hear that.’

  ‘But I can give you something else.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Time.’

  ‘I don’t follow.’

  The Chinese diplomat took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes and put the spectacles back on. ‘You said I have some influence in the governing circle in my country and, with some modesty, perhaps you are right. So here’s what I can promise you. We will give you five days to resolve the problem you have with your President. For these five days, the People’s Republic of China will,’ he paused, looking for the right word, ‘restrain the hand of our friends in the north of Korea. But once these five days are passed, we can offer no guarantee. Then, if the young leader in Pyongyang is provoked once more, it will be his right to respond with great force.

  ‘You and I agree that that would be a disaster for all of us. But this is how it must be. I repeat: you have five days, Mr Kassian. I hope for all our sakes you use them wisely.’

  4

  Washington, DC, Monday, 7.02pm

  Maggie was home at seven pm. Unheard of, at least under the previous president. Back then, Maggie regarded eighteen-hour days as the norm. That felt a long time ago.

  Ideally, she wanted to flop into bed, pull the duvet over her head and not come out for a week. Pathetic, she knew, to have her priorities so out of whack. So right, she said to herself, when your main problem was that the free world was led by a bigoted sociopath – let alone one you worked for – that was somehow bearable. But seeing your boyfriend smile at another woman, suddenly that is too much? What kind of person are you, Maggie Costello?

  This was not a new question. She was used to interrogating herself this way and almost always in these circumstances. ‘Boyfriend trouble’, as Eleanor at work put it, making Maggie feel fifteen years old. ‘Heartache’ had been her mother’s preferred term.

  The consensus among her friends – and family – was that Maggie was a bad picker, that she chose men who were either absurdly unsuitable or transparently unavailable. There had certainly been several in that first category. She thought fleetingly of Edward, her first Washington boyfriend and a certifiable control freak. How funny: they had lived together, yet now she hardly thought of him.

  There were a few in the second category too: relationships doomed from the start. She thought back to her much younger self, working for an NGO in the Congo, part of a team charged with brokering a ceasefire. She had become involved with a leader of one of the armed factions, hopelessly compromising her status as a mediator. That mistake had cost her dear. The affair had been charged and intense, of course, but it was obvious now – and surely obvious then – that it could never have worked.

  But then she thought of Uri, the man she had met in Jerusalem, who had followed her here. Nothing unsuitable about him. He was gorgeous, clever, loving. And he had been available too. He had wanted to settle down, to have a family. It had been Maggie who had been unavailable, too restless to fix on one place or one person. It had been Maggie who had said no. Just bad timing with that one, she told herself.

  She had made it to the bed when the phone rang. Shit. She had told Richard to meet her back here for Chinese. What if that was him? She didn’t want to see him, but she was pleased he wanted to come. Or maybe not. She had no idea.

  She looked down at her phone. Not Richard. But her sister.

  ‘Hi, Liz.’

  There was a pause and then, ‘Oh, Maggie.’

  ‘What? What is it? Has something happened to the kids? Are they OK?’

  ‘Yes,’ her sister sniffed. ‘They’re fine. It’s not them.’

  Truth be told, Maggie was not yet used to having her sister phone like this. Not used to her being in the same timezone. But Liz’s husband had been offered a job in Atlanta two years ago and so they’d left Dublin. ‘Now that Ma’s gone,’ Liz had said, ‘it makes sense, don’t you think?’ Maggie had agreed of course, but she wasn’t convinced. Having the Atlantic Ocean between her and her closest relatives had worked pretty well until now: why mess with a winning formula?

  ‘So what is it? Is it you? Are you ill?’

  ‘No. Nothing like that. Do you remember I told you about that girl in my class?’

  ‘Which one?’ Maggie had
moved to the kitchen, where she was opening and closing cupboard doors, looking for a serviceable bottle of whisky. She didn’t want any of that hipster shite Richard claimed to like.

  ‘Mia.’

  ‘The one who was raped?’

  ‘Yes. Really lovely girl. Quiet, but smart. Thoughtful.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Well, she got pregnant.’

  ‘Christ.’

  ‘Yes. And she wanted an abortion. She thought about it. She had counselling. And she was, like, “There is no way I can have this baby.”’

  ‘Course.’

  ‘But guess what? Thanks to the Supreme fucking Court, there is no way within six hundred miles of here that she could get an abortion.’

  ‘Oh no.’ Maggie found a bottle of Laphroaig behind the tins of peeled tomatoes, several of them with pre 9/11 use-by dates. She poured herself a glass.

  ‘No exceptions, remember? Not even for rape or incest. Maybe for “life of the mother”. She’s been getting counselling, seeing doctors, trying to establish that her life is in danger.’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘No, I’m not.’

  ‘And she just can’t find two doctors who will agree to say it, to say her life is in danger.’

  ‘Why? How difficult can—’

  ‘I was pleading with the principal, saying we have to do something. I went to the police. No one would listen. And Mia’s saying, “I can feel this thing growing inside me. Because of him. I can’t bear it, Miss Costello. I can’t bear it.”’

  Maggie felt the dread rising. She knocked back the glass. And poured herself another. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I made a plan. I thought, I’m going to raise the money and put her on a plane to Canada. Or maybe Cuba or something. But I’ll get her out of here and we’ll do it. I was going to see her parents tonight, to arrange it.’

  ‘What happened?’

  At that, her younger sister let out the most awful howl. And then there was an explosion of snot and tears. Maggie knew. But she waited for her sister to say the words.

  ‘This morning. She wasn’t in school.’ More sobbing. ‘And I was worried. I had this feeling, you know?’