by John Altman
And they had nothing.
She picked up her latte. It had gone cold.
There was a reason Dalia was alone here this morning. A reason she alone still pursued this fool’s errand. She was stubborn. Like Jana Dahan. They were two sides of the same coin. They were the same.
Jana had not given up.
Dalia was not giving up, either.
She went to ransack the office Rolodexes for Nebraska Avenue’s number. Sunday or not, she would request the day’s leads.
Part Five
Chapter Fifteen
Capitol Hill, Washington, DC
The flag in front of the dome snapped hard in a cold winter wind.
But inside Statuary Hall, the temperature was climbing—well into the nineties, Michael Fletcher thought, but maybe that was only his imagination. He was sweating freely, and he was not the only one. One hundred thirty-three people stood jammed between the bronze and marble statues, gazing into lenses, jockeying with microphones and makeup and cameras, blathering, trumpeting, trying fiercely to seem important, knowledgeable, and authoritative, their voices bouncing stridently off the domed cast-steel ceiling, all beneath hot lights that blazed like bone-bleaching desert sunshine.
Michael’s fight-or-flight reflex strained at the bit, champing, lurching, lunging. But no one could see that, he told himself. He was through the worst of it, he told himself. Through the security, the guards, the metal detectors, the dogs. Oh, the dogs. The dogs had been his biggest fear, Purina Moist and Meaty Burger with Cheddar Cheese Flavor notwithstanding. Some acid test—how fucking unscientific could you get, who the fuck do you think you’re kidding, acid test, it had been a crazy chance he had taken, fucking Moist and Meaty Burgers, holy hot humping fuck me, but he had done it anyway and now here he was, he was through, he was past, the dogs were behind him, and soon now, soon, soon soon soon, soonsoonsoon …
Pouring sweat notwithstanding, he felt calm. Moist and Meaty Burgers notwithstanding, racing thoughts notwithstanding, let his mind race, crazy, mad, wild thoughts skittering like dog’s claws on a polished hardwood floor, nobody could see his thoughts, nobody could tell what he was thinking, nobody knew, they could just see him sweating like everyone else, the lights, nobody could hear the voice, the voices, plural; nobody knew, he could think whatever he wanted, like MMMMMMMMMMMM! Beefy, moist, meaty, tender, yummy! Quick, no mess, and nobody would be the wiser and soon, soon, soon, soon, very soon, very soon, very soonsoonsoonsoonsoon it would all be over.
The voice had no comment.
But other voices around him could not stop commenting:
“… inside this central legislative building more than two centuries old. Months of tireless preparation by press gallery staff, sergeants at arms, and Capitol Police come to a head here tonight as they stage what is beyond a doubt the most …”
“… hundreds upon hundreds of guests, dignitaries, and members of the press. Roads have been closed in preparation for the arrival of the contingent from the White House. Which should very soon, I’m being told, get started down Pennsylvania Avenue. Of course, we’ll have live on-the-spot coverage …”
“… five hundred and thirty-five members of Congress on the House floor, along with the justices of the Supreme Court, and the Cabinet of the United States. The president will take a place on the rostrum, flanked by the Speaker of the House and the vice president, officially here tonight in his capacity as a legislative officer, president of the Senate …”
Matt Gutierrez, moving past on his way to work B-roll, tossed Michael a wink and a thumbs-up.
Michael smiled and gave back a double.
Martin Luther King Jr. Ave. SE, Washington, DC
On twelve monitors, ARGUS footage played: Capitol Hill during the preceding hour, with a live feed in the top left corner.
McConnell scowled at the wall of screens as if he had a chance of actually finding something significant in the seething mass of activity. At the far end of the conference table, Innes was drawing up a list of Hyundai owners he planned to follow up on in the morning. Across from him, another agent was making red check marks beside selected names on a printout. Horowitz huddled in a corner, taking a phone call from his family.
Dalia watched McConnell watching the screens. Here again he encountered the limits of his technology, his air superiority, his crushing advantage in manpower. In this cauldron of humanity, one woman did not register. And yet, one woman, in the right place at the right time, was all it would take. Anyone who had ever played chess knew the lesson. It didn’t matter that your opponent kept all her other pieces, if one pawn sneaked through to capture the king. Capture the king, and the game was over.
In the live feed—speaking of the king—the presidential motorcade was leaving the White House. First came a phalanx of motorcycles with flashing lights and sidecars. Then limos with sirens. Then limos without sirens, glossy black and chitinous, like sluggish metal beetles. Then the Beast itself. Then more limos. A helicopter dipped briefly through the drone’s sight line, and Dalia turned away.
In the corner, Horowitz said, “You’ve got to listen to your mother, honey … No, I don’t … Yes. I know. But that doesn’t … All right, I hear you. But sometimes we don’t get exactly what we want in life. It’s your bedtime and you’ve got to do what your mother tells you.”
Dalia looked back to the live ARGUS feed: 8:09 p.m. In fifty-one minutes, if all went according to schedule, the president would step up onto the rostrum.
“She won’t show,” McConnell announced suddenly. Still watching the screens, the sirens, the police, the helicopters, the cordons, the dogs, the motorcade.
Dalia didn’t answer.
Horowitz was still murmuring on the phone. His tone, affectionate but disciplined, gave Dalia a sudden urge to talk to her grandkids. But her daughter had made it abundantly clear that a once-monthly conversation was quite sufficient, thank you very much. And, of course, Zvi was beyond Dalia’s reach.
8:10. The presidential motorcade turned at a crawl onto Pennsylvania Avenue.
Ellicott Street NW,
Washington, DC
Jana wore the straight black wig from the beauty supply store.
She sat on the couch in the living room, holding the phone. She had used spirit gum to change the thrust of her brow, rouge to accentuate the slope of her jawline. She had photographed herself and laminated a new driver’s license. Her next ticket would be bought in the name of Kari Anderson, from White Plains, New York. It would bring her to Montana, or maybe Wyoming. Big sky, wide open spaces. She wanted to see the horizon in every direction.
On TV, talking heads were nattering away, describing again and again the scene on Capitol Hill. Two thousand people had squeezed into the House Chamber “anywhere they can fit them,” said a pretty woman with perfect golden hair, “standing in back, along the walls …” The air buzzed with excited expectation. It reminded Jana of a New Year’s Eve cocktail party. From time to time, she glimpsed Michael Fletcher, captured by an upstairs gallery shot, moving fluidly down the narrow central aisle. Kit balanced on his thick shoulder, somehow avoiding the tangle of people moving alongside him. Often, he was less than a meter away from the arriving dignitaries he filmed. Once, when a hiccup with a cable held up the procession momentarily, he was only centimeters from the chief justice of the United States. Jana felt the power in her hand, coursing up her arm, electric. Her thumb stroked the call button absently. The button held a deadly attraction. But patience. Shvoye. The main course would arrive soon enough.
The network cut regularly to footage coming directly from Michael’s camera: the so-called pool feed, shared with dozens of credentialed outlets. Each network had its own team in the upper galleries, but downstairs, on the floor, all images originated from the pool feed. Michael Fletcher was the chosen one. Her finger trailed over the phone, lingering.
She felt calm. Her eyel
id was still.
Her small suitcase waited by the front door, near the cat’s travel cage, sitting there for Michael’s benefit before he left the house. Glancing at it now, Jana made a moue of distaste. She would not be taking the cat.
8:17 p.m.
“The Senate gathers in the Senate Chamber,” the perfectly assembled blonde was saying cheerily, “and convenes an official session with the gavel, which we should see any minute now. Sometimes, they’ll take care of a little outstanding business, though more often not. Then they’ll come in a procession to the House Chamber. Down the hallway, through the rotunda, through Statuary Hall …”
Capitol Hill, Washington, DC
Soon.
The chief justice was sitting on the aisle, one foot thoughtlessly sticking out. Michael almost tripped over it as he backed up before the diplomatic corps.
From the balcony came a ruffle: the First Family joining the vice president’s spouse. For a few moments, all attention was focused up, beyond the rows of cameras mounted on balcony railings, beyond the lights, beyond the ranks of laptops balanced on journalists’ laps. Michael took advantage of the distraction to push the chief justice’s foot out of the aisle with his own. The man looked up, shocked at the effrontery of this peon with a camera. Michael smiled back down and winked. Then he headed back up the aisle to await the next arrival.
His smile was spreading: a fulsome grin, weird and suspicious. But he could not wipe it away. He could not stop grinning. And now his face was twitching, tugging. Fuck’s sake, said the voice, you might as well write it across your forehead: “I AM A SUICIDE BOMBER!” GET IT TOGETHER, YOU MAGGOT!
He got it together.
An arctic wind seemed to blow through the chamber. Something wild on that wind. Something dead and rotting; and something resurrected, something returned; something ancient and hungry. No one else seemed to notice it. They chattered, awaiting the arrival of the guest of honor. Giddy as schoolgirls. They did not know about the ancient wind blowing through the chamber. They did not know about the wolf in their midst. They were sheep. They were pigs, Orwell’s pigs. Some animals are more equal than others. They were sheep, pigs, fat cats, plummy in their tailored suits, passing legislation that doomed more Jews to more suffering and more death, throwing their piggy weight here and there as it suited them, now behind Arafat, the backstabbing cockteaser talking out of both sides of his mouth, and now behind BDS, Boycott Divest Sanction, just to get a few votes at election time, punish the victims, what the fuck kind of sense did that make, and fuck the right of Jews to defend themselves, sheep-pigs-cats raising silver spoons laden with caviar to their piggy mouths, talking more and more about a one-state solution, everybody knew what a one-state solution really meant: the end of the Jewish nation, the end of the dream, the end of Israel, the end of Jews, holding Jews to a crazy double standard, racist anti-Semitic pigs, piggy piggish pigs who deserved what they would soon get, who deserved the slaughterhouse, the blood running in rivers, let their blood spill for a change, see how long it took them to respond, to overrespond, to overreact in the tried and true American way, to send in soldiers and tanks and BFGs—big fucking guns—and drones and flying robot killing machines and bombers, angels of death, the Lord, Blessed be He, King of the Universe, with a strong hand and outstretched arm, and with great terribleness, and with signs and wonders, avenging themselves upon their enemies, delivering ten plagues, more than ten, Americans did everything oversized, it would be eleven, fifteen, fuck it, twenty plagues, big-box American plagues, not just locusts but more motherfucking locusts than the world had ever seen, the best locusts, the greatest top-of-the-line locusts, locusts turned up to eleven, culminating with the slaying of the firstborn sons, and not just the firstborn, with America, but first, last, and middle—all the sons dead, more tiny hands lying dismembered in more smoking ruins than the world had seen since Hitler …
He had wiped the smile from his face. Now his features felt dull, slack. Unresponsive. Someone was entering, moving down the aisle, shaking hands, and Michael was backing up before him, heavy kit balanced on his shoulders, flat faced, body moving of its own accord, practiced movements long since drilled into his limbic system.
Soon.
A cold sheath had enveloped him. But just beneath the surface was something hot, something burning, something like lust.
Martin Luther King Jr. Ave. SE, Washington, DC
8:23 p.m.
On the monitor, the Speaker of the House was calling a joint session to order. Closed captions scrolled across the bottom of the screen:
The gentleman from Wisconsin, the gentlewoman from Arkansas …
A fine target, Dalia thought. Look at that target. Every dignitary in the nation, foolishly assembled at the same place, beneath the same roof. Ceremony, pomp. Hubris. Jews would know better. But America thought itself invincible.
A little plastique, a little sarin, and a great swath of death would be carved through that room. And the dogs of war would slip indeed. The wrath of America would be a frightful thing to behold. And Israel, even if she seemed in the short term to benefit, would in the long run lose. She would lose everything. For she would have sacrificed her ideals, her very reason for being. She would no longer be fighting for anything, but only against: dumb fighting reflex, like a mad dog.
The overkill security did not set Dalia at ease. American security was like American military policy, trying to smother every threat with manpower and equipment and technology, always and forever lacking the personal touch. Their TSA did not interview airline passengers, as did the Border Police for El Al. They only scanned mechanically, with metal detectors and X-rays, maybe sometimes with dogs. And so they missed things. Not just things—they missed everything that mattered.
She watched the coverage. All this technology, all this security overkill, and yet no focus on the people. It took only one, slipping through the gauntlet.
Horowitz was off the phone at last. He followed her eyes, seeming, as he often did, to read her thoughts.
On-screen, the closed captions, sprinkled with errors, scrolled on:
… ritual of getting seats on the isle, where they can shake hands with the President on camera. People line up early, staking out spaces, or send staff or interns to hold seats. Then you’ll see some cards chairs, some blocs held out—“Supreme Court”—and of course the aisle seed goes to chief Justice—and here, of course, we see the Joined Chiefs right up front …
Another interesting status thing to look for is the official escort when the President moves down the aisle. It includes majority and minority leaders and wimps and some other strategic choices; a way of showing favor …
They cut to an overhead view, and Dalia could see the aisle down which the official escort would move. Cameraman backing up in front of arriving dignitaries. Close enough to reach out and touch them. Right smack-dab in the center of everything. What kind of security clearance had this man received? What kind of interviews had been conducted?
She recognized him. She had encountered him, briefly, when interviewing Christina Thompson. Pool feed, the woman had said. House floor. And Dalia had picked up something coming from the man—some almost subliminal scorn.
Yankee White, category two. That was his security clearance. But what did that mean, really? Just words.
She took a step nearer the monitor. The man looked fit. Had to be, to lug that camera for so long. Brown hair. Something shuffled in her mind. Thoughts trying to organize themselves into neat compartments. Brown hair, athletic build.
Horowitz came over, sensing something.
Again he read her mind. In the next instant, he had a phone to his ear. Murmuring, holding up one finger.
She watched the screen, suddenly nervous. Butterflies in her stomach.
The man in question moved as gracefully as a ballerina, threading his way backward in long, choreographed strides. But was so
mething about him … off? Fixed, rusted into place, not swiveling loose? She frowned. Less than a feeling, less than an intuition. It was nothing at all, and as soon as she had felt it, it was gone.
Horowitz covered the mouthpiece of his phone with one hand. “Michael Fletcher. EOD vet. Five-year-old son.” And suddenly it was back, so powerful that for an instant Dalia was transported out of herself; staring into space, as her mental compartments filled, one after another.
Still nothing, really. Not nearly enough to call a halt to the State of the Union as forty million people watched. But if this was the man who had rented the house in Snickers Gap, the man who had tested sarin and explosives …
Horowitz was still on the phone. Finding a pen on the conference table, scribbling down an address. Hanging up, checking his watch. “Thirty minutes by road,” he said. “We might just make it ahead of POTUS.”
And find what? Dalia wondered. Jana herself?
Nobody was paying them any attention. She hesitated for a last instant, then nodded and reached for her coat.
Ellicott Street NW,
Washington, DC
When the phone rang, Jana jumped.
For a crazy moment, she thought it was the phone in her hand. Then she realized it was Michael’s phone, on its charger in the kitchen. She stood, keeping one eye on the television, and went to look at the display: Stacy.
Another ring; the call went to voice mail. Jana walked back into the living room and took her place again on the couch. Her skin felt cold, her mouth hot and dry. Her thumb massaged the call button, gently and repetitively. The cat jumped up next to her and nosed against her elbow. She ignored it.