We Are Holding the President Hostage

by Warren Adler

  Behind him, he heard panicked voices and the clatter of shoes. He paid little attention. The circle listed further sideways. Then, suddenly, the Padre felt resistance. They had been inhibited from falling by the banister. They rested now. He could feel and hear them taking deep breaths.

  “Now forward,” the Padre said. His voice had weakened. But the Secret Service men who had preceded them had melted away, as well as the others who followed. They moved upward haltingly, step by step, finding a foothold, then rising in unison until they reached the upper landing.

  They were in the long central hall. Quickly he took in the brightly lit crystal chandeliers, the polished double partners’ desk, the beautiful picture of the lady and her two children on the far wall, the plants and figures of animals on shelves, the gold carpet.

  Secret Service agents were posted everywhere, Uzis at the ready. A line of men was stretched across the corridor, beginning at a point where a door opened to what the Padre knew as the yellow Oval Room.

  Although the men were in different positions, no longer in a tight circle around them, the basic situation had not changed. It was still a stalemate. The Padre’s circle had stopped moving just beyond the partners’ desk at the entrance to what the Padre realized was the west sitting room.

  “Now what?” Fellows asked.

  “You will please order your men from the west side of the house,” the Padre said.

  He had studied the plans for hours, picking the best possible place for them to be with the President and First Lady. He had chosen the west quarter of the house for a variety of reasons. The plans showed that by closing off the sliding doors that separated the west sitting hall from the central hall and the corridor that connected the President’s study with the master bedroom, they could effectively seal off this section from the rest of the house. Also, in that area was a small kitchen and service pantry, the family dining room, the First Lady’s dressing room, and a bathroom. After all, they had to eat, had to perform ablutions, had to sleep.

  “Won’t we need guns?” Benjy asked the Padre, loud enough to be heard across the hall.

  “No guns,” Fellows said.

  “We have no need for them,” the Padre said.

  He looked at Fellows, now nervous and pasty-faced. The Padre was certain that the exact circumstances of his actions had never been seriously considered by the Secret Service as feasible. “Now please remove your men to the east side of the central hall.”

  He was being deliberately specific, illustrating his expertise and sense of authority. That, too, was important. They must believe in his authority.

  “Let the boundary between us be the partners’ desk.”

  Fellows hesitated. This was his turf. He seemed humiliated by the request.

  “For chrissakes, follow his instructions, Ike,” the President said.

  “We’re setting up a command post out here,” Fellows said. He was tentative and hesitant.

  “I have no objection,” the Padre said. “But I strongly advise that you do not pass the present line. In the interests of our mutual safety and the safety of your men.”

  “Thank you.” Fellows sneered.

  “Now there are certain ground rules that must be established,” the Padre said.

  “Jesus,” Fellows hissed.

  “Under no circumstances must you interfere with us. No sneak attacks. No heroics. We will, from time to time, give you instructions. For example, we will need meals, perhaps other necessities.” He was deliberately vague. “You must follow these instructions to the letter.”

  “And if, for some reason, the instructions are not followed?” Fellows asked.

  “That would be a mistake,” the Padre said. “You must understand. We do not intend to kill the President. Or ourselves. Don’t make us do it. Let us proceed under that idea.”

  “What is it you want?” Fellows asked.

  “I will explain everything. I promise you.”

  “May I ask who you are?” Fellows asked.

  “All in due time,” the Padre said.

  “All right then. How about a name? Surely we’re entitled to a name.”

  “You know the best way we can establish a relationship?” the Padre asked. Fellows seemed momentarily at a loss for words.

  “By not asking any questions,” the Padre said.

  It was, the Padre knew, rubbing their noses in it. The great Secret Service had been circumvented on their own turf. It was an organizational humiliation. He hoped it would not prod them to take chances. By now they would be taking all available countermeasures, bringing all their technological expertise to bear. He was very sure they would be scouring the East Room and the pantry for prints.

  The Padre and his men had worn white gloves. But the Padre knew that, sooner of later, their identity would be discovered. Better later than sooner. There had been no need to worry about a credibility problem. Their choice of weapon had been more than adequate. But Fellows was still not conforming, still hesitating on the order to withdraw his men.

  “Mr. Fellows,” the Padre said in an effort to cement a reasonable working relationship. “All your questions will be answered. I promise you.”

  The Padre counted twenty men, all with Uzis drawn. They took positions behind what had become the imaginary line, and the Padre started to move the circle backward. They reached the west sitting room. At the doorway, the Padre paused and moved the group first to one side, then to the other. They maneuvered the group inside the west sitting room and closed the sliding wooden doors. Still, he would not let them unlock their arms.

  “One more simple job,” the Padre said, moving the group to the presidential bedroom. He paused for a moment, surveying the connecting corridor between the bedroom and the President’s study. He heard movement in the closet, behind the President’s clothes.

  “Mr. Fellows is not a man of his word,” the Padre said. “You people there in the closet, I would suggest you tell him that.”

  Clothes rustled and three men hopped out from behind the clothes and dashed out toward the President’s study. He closed the door. With a sigh of relief, the Padre began the process of unlocking all their arms. They were stiff, and each of them flayed the air to get the circulation going.

  The Padre pointed to two chairs and signaled the President and the First Lady to be seated. Benjy, as he had been instructed, closed the draperies and tore out the pulley ropes. He threw one to Vinnie, who let out a ten-foot lead and tied one end around his waist and the other around the President’s. It was a tight, complicated knot, one that could not be undone without effort. Benjy repeated the process with himself and the First Lady.

  The Padre instructed Carmine to clear away the objects from the desk and place it against the door to the corridor. That task completed, the group again moved into the west sitting room. Creating a room out of this end of the large upper hall, with its huge rosette window, seemed like an afterthought. A brilliant floodlight provided a striking back-light to the window’s latticework, making it look like a giant spiderweb. Such a pretty window, the Padre thought as he pulled the heavy gold draperies, shutting out the glare. Then he instructed Carmine to move the couches and place them side by side in front of the sliding doors.

  “Good you came, Carmine,” he said, patting the Canary’s back. The big man turned and showed him a broad, partially toothless smile. A compliment from the boss was all he ever needed.

  The Padre stepped into the dining room, inspected it, then moved to the upstairs pantry beside it. Although it had facilities for cooking, the pantry was sparsely equipped and looked as if the main meals were prepared in the kitchen two floors below. Then he inspected the entire suite as the others followed him with their eyes. He kneeled on the floor and looked under the furniture, then upended all the chairs.

  “Maybe the chandeliers,” the President said.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’ve always suspected them.”

  He instructed Carmine to stand on tables an
d check the chandeliers for any signs of listening bugs. They waited until he went through all the rooms. Carmine returned from the dining room, his last stop, shaking his head.

  “Good to know,” the President said.

  “Why not check behind the pictures,” the First Lady said. “Saw it in a movie once.”

  The Padre nodded, and Carmine proceeded to look behind the pictures. He found one bug behind a painting of a beach scene hung on the south wall of the west hall, holding it up for all to see.

  “Speak of the obvious,” the President said. “But then they didn’t have much time.”

  “Unless they were there all along,” the Padre said.

  “Nothing would surprise me,” the President said, casting a quick glance at the First Lady.

  Carmine found five more bugs, all wireless and remote and magnetized to metal picture hangers. They had covered each room. The Padre found an antique nutcracker on one of the tables and handed it to Carmine, who crushed each microphone one at a time.

  “Do you play bridge?” the First Lady asked, looking at Benjy, to whom she was attached.

  Benjy chuckled.

  “A real joker,” he said.

  The Padre turned toward the Canary.

  “Carmine, I want you to stay right there.” He pointed to the entrance to the presidential bedroom, which opened off the west hall. “There are only two places where they could rush us. So watch and listen.”

  The Padre moved into the dining room and signaled the others to follow. He placed them around the polished rectangular table, and pulled another chair to join them.

  “You could have at least let me finish my main course,” the President said.

  “Wasn’t bad at all,” the First Lady said. She sighed. “All that planning for nothing.” She looked at the Padre. “You sure loused up the evening.”

  “Okay,” the President said. “Now that we have our appointment, what are you selling?”

  All this small talk and wisecracks, the Padre thought, was a defense mechanism.

  “I am the father of Maria and the grandfather of Joseph Michaels,” the Padre said.

  “Who?”

  The President turned to the First Lady, whose expression registered no recognition of the names.

  “The woman and child who were taken hostage,” the Padre prodded.

  “Oh my God,” the President said. “How stupid of me.”

  “Not stupid. It is simply not in the forefront of your mind.”

  “True. But it obviously is in yours.” The President seemed to stop in mid-thought. “I understand. I want you to know that.”

  “We have two children—” the First Lady began.

  “I am not here for understanding,” the Padre said.

  In the long silence that followed, the President and the First Lady exchanged glances. For the first time since they were seized, the Padre detected in their expressions a sense of tangible fear.

  “I am as helpless as you are,” the President said, his throat scratchy. He coughed into his fist, clearing it. “I’ve tried everything.”

  “Not quite everything,” the Padre interjected.

  16

  IF YOU SHOW THEM FEAR, the President thought, they will capitalize on it. Fortunately, he had been too stunned to react normally. He was sure it was the same for Amy, Not one of the scenarios ever posed by the Secret Service had mentioned this possibility. He always figured some little piece of the puzzle had been kept from him, as if he could not be trusted. That was the most difficult part of being President, coping with gaps in the flow of information. Too many middlemen deciding what he should be allowed to know. Now he was damned angry. But he kept that fury hidden as well. If he ever got out of this madness, heads would roll.

  He had expected that his captors would make a play to leave the White House. It surprised him that they hadn’t. Here in the living quarters, surrounded by armed agents, what did these men expect to accomplish? Sooner or later they would have to surrender. Or die. They had left themselves no middle ground.

  Was the same true for him and Amy? Hell, he shrugged, summoning what he suspected was more bravado than courage, he had had a good run. If he had to choose a place to die, this one was as good as any. In fact, the best.

  Thankfully, the Secret Service had not forced the issue. Biding one’s time was always the best choice. If only he could resist showing his fear, hold it from their view, keep his mind clear, alert for opportunities.

  He had no doubt that the men were carrying liquid explosives. Indeed, he had felt the sacks in which it was contained beneath the leader’s clothing. Soft. Pliable. A kind of waterproof plastic container somehow fastened to their bodies. Able to explode on impact. He believed that implicitly as his mind searched for some countermeasure. Perhaps the slash of a razor blade, clean cut through clothes and plastic, might safely disarm them. He would think about that. Think hard.

  Contemplating the havoc that these men had wrought was daunting. The very idea of the presidency was about to undergo a metamorphosis. Who the hell was in charge at this moment? He had sent the Vice President on one of those endless combination funeral and goodwill tours. The idea was to keep him out of the country, out of the political mainstream. A string of world leaders had died in recent weeks and Martin Chalmers was fast becoming the perfect mourner. He wondered how long it would take him to get home. Twenty hours. Poetic justice.

  He had used Marty, used his regional clout and antecedents to get elected, but he never brought him into the fold. Now all the people on his own team, the people whose careers, ambitions, jobs, and futures depended on him, were in deep trouble. And if Marty’s plane blew up or he stepped on a rusty nail, who then? The Speaker of the House. That turkey. Leadership in depth, he thought. Sarcasm aside, these men who had taken him hostage weren’t as clever as they appeared. Didn’t they know about the damned Twenty-fifth Amendment for chrissakes?

  They were all seated around the dining-room table now. The heavy blue draperies had been drawn, a remarkably perfect fit. Not a rim of light from the powerful floodlights seeped out from where the edges joined. The crystal chandelier above them was lit. The table, an ironic counterpoint to this incongruous situation, was, as always, permanently set for four, with the usual centerpiece of fresh flowers, plates, crystal glasses, and silverware.

  “I want my daughter and my grandson. I want them freed. I want them home,” the man said. He spoke quickly, his tone commanding, yet surprisingly gentle.

  “You know,” the President said. “I really feel for you. But we have a problem. I represent two hundred and thirty-odd million souls. Any crackpot demands something, he takes an American. You tell me what I’m supposed to do.”

  “That, Mr. President, is why I am here,” the man answered calmly.

  “He’s done everything humanly possible,” Amy interjected. “You really are off the wall on this.”

  “Amy, please,” the President said.

  “It’s an exercise in futility and he should know it,” Amy persisted, directing her attention to the President. “It’s wrong. What they’re doing is just as inhuman as what is happening to his daughter and grandson.”

  She turned to the leader. “You’re not really going to blow yourselves up. This whole thing is silly. . . .” Her voice trailed off. The men watched her impassively. She waited, then shook her head and said, “Just a stupid woman, right?”

  They were tolerating her, waiting. In the distance, he heard the telephone’s ring. It seemed so inconsistently normal under the circumstances. The men exchanged glances.

  “It doesn’t ring in here. Only lights up,” the President said, pointing to a console device with a speaker-phone attachment on one corner of the buffet with a number of buttons, one of them flashing. “It can reach to the dining table. I’m supposed to be always in touch.”

  “Of course,” the leader said.

  The telephone continued to ring in the distance.

  “Let it,” the leader said.


  “Can you imagine what’s going on out there?” the President asked.

  He could barely imagine it himself. To contemplate the ramifications staggered him. The country was a rudderless juggernaut. He wondered whether provisions had ever been made for this eventuality.

  “Now, Mr. President,” the leader said calmly, “all I ask is for your cooperation. I know that this is very difficult for you.”

  “How kind of you to understand,” Amy snapped.

  “And for Mrs. President,” the leader continued without missing a beat, “we must try to ignore the circumstances and work together.”

  “May I ask you a question?” The President was genuinely confused by the man’s tone.

  The man contemplated the question for a moment, then nodded.

  “My wife and I are here under the most terrible conditions of duress. You claim to be wearing an explosive device that could blow us all to hell. You have the entire world holding its breath. We’re here, for chrissakes, in the goddamned White House, and you have the gall to ask my cooperation. Would you please tell me what the devil is going on here?”

  “I have only one thought in mind,” the man replied. “To get my daughter and grandson home safely. I am willing to die for that mission. I’m sorry that it has come to this. We have, it seems, a simple disagreement in method.”

  “He’s crazy,” the President said, turning to his wife, then exploring the faces of the other men seated around the table. But when his gaze lighted on the face of the man to whom he was attached by the cord, he shook his head. The man’s expression had become a mass of dark wrinkles.

  “Who are you?” the President asked, turning to the leader.

  “My name is Padronelli,” the man said.

  “Who?”

  “The Padre,” the younger man said.

  The President was genuinely confused.

  “You never heard of the Padre?”