The Road to Omaha: A Novel

by Robert Ludlum

  “Well, they seem to be going from group to group encouraging … oh, oh, they’re carrying—”

  “Paper cups! And plastic bottles—it’s what Roman told us. They’re passing out yaw-yaw juice!”

  “Slight correction,” said Sam. “They’re selling it.”

  “I’ll murder that Calfnose!”

  “Second suggestion, Jennifer,” said Aaron, chuckling. “Instead, put him on your finance committee.”

  EPILOGUE

  The New York DAILY NEWS

  WOPS TAKE SAC

  Washington, D.C., Friday—In a stunning decision, the Supreme Court has upheld the legitimacy of a suit brought by the Wopotami tribe of Nebraska against the government of the United States. The Court, in a unanimous decision, held that a territory of several hundred square miles in and around Omaha is the rightful property of the Wopotamis, according to a treaty affirmed by the Forty-ninth Congress in 1878. This land includes the headquarters of the Strategic Air Command. The Senate and the House of Representatives have been called back into emergency session, and attorneys from several thousand law firms have expressed interest in the forthcoming negotiations.

  IL PROGRESSO ITALIANO

  Questo giornale muove obiezone all’insensibilita’ del Daily News facendo uno di un’espressione denigratoria nella tastata di ieri. Noi non siamo dei “pellarossa salvaggi”!

  (This newspaper takes great exception to the insensitivity of the Daily News by the use of a derogatory ethnic slur in its headline of yesterday. We are not redskinned savages!)

  HOLLYWOOD VARIETY

  Beverly Hills, Wednesday—Messrs. Robbins and Martin, top execs at the William Morris Agency, have announced that a major deal has been concluded between their clients, known at this juncture only as six terrif actors who’ve been toiling for the government as an antiterrorist unit for the past five years, and Consolidated-Colossal Studios, Emmanuel Greenberg, producer, for a $100,000,000 pic starring their clients who’ll be ’picting themselves. At the press conference held at Merv’s Place, that great legit character actor, Henry Irving Sutton, made an appearance, stating that he was so moved by the property he was coming out of retirement to play a major role. Apparently Greenberg was also mucho moved—he intermittently wept, too choked up to speak. Many at the press outing said it was because he was so proud, but others maintained it was due to the negotiations. Greenberg’s former wife, Lady Cavendish, was also present. She kept smiling.

  THE NEW YORK TIMES

  CIA DIRECTOR FOUND ALIVE

  RESCUED FROM AN ISLAND IN THE DRY

  TORTUGAS

  Miami, Thursday—A fishing yacht, the Contessa, owned by the international industrialist Smythington-Fontini, spotted smoke from a fire on the beach of an uninhabited out island in the Dry Tortugas. As the Contessa drew in to shore, the crew and passengers heard loud cries for help both in English and Spanish and saw three men racing into the water, giving thanks for having been found. One of the three was Vincent F. A. Mangecavallo, director of the Central Intelligence Agency, until this morning presumed lost at sea last week. The presumption was based on the debris of the yacht Gotcha Baby, on which Mr. Mangecavallo was a passenger and which was wrecked in a tropical storm. The debris included several personal effects of the director.

  The story of survival is one of extraordinary heroism on the part of Mr. Mangecavallo. According to the two Argentinean crew, who’ve been flown back to their families in Rio de Janeiro, the director literally dragged them through shark-infested waters by their holding on to his legs as Mr. Mangecavallo swam to the uninhabited island. Upon hearing the news, the President said, “I knew my old navy buddy would pull through!” As previously noted, the Navy Department had no comment other than to say,

  “That’s nice.”

  In Brooklyn, New York, one Rocco Sabatini, upon reading the account of the rescue, said to his wife over the breakfast table. “Hey, what the hell’s going on here? Bam-Bam can’t swim.”

  THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

  RASH OF BANKRUPTCIES

  SHOCKS FINANCIAL AMERICA

  New York, Friday—Lawyers are scurrying throughout the corridors of corporate America today, rushing in and out of executive suites and board meetings, trying to put scores of conglomerate Humpty Dumpties back together again. The conventional wisdom is that it’s impossible, as massive overextensions of debt incurred in the recent frenzy of buyouts, and block stock purchases have left many of the nation’s industrial giants, both corporate and individual, jointly and severally, with empty pockets, red faces, and, in a number of cases, a sudden desire to leave the country.

  It was reported that at Kennedy International Airport one such company president was heard to shout hysterically, “Anywhere but Cairo! I will not clean urinals!” The significance of the remark is unclear.

  STARS AND STRIPES

  THE NEWSPAPER OF THE U.S. ARMY

  DEFECTORS FROM CUBA COMMISSIONED

  Fort Benning, Saturday—In a first for the army, two highly regarded former officers in Castro’s military machine, experts in sabotage, espionage, covert operation, intelligence, and counterintelligence, have been commissioned with the ranks of first lieutenant at this base, announced General Ethelred Brokemichael, chief of Information and Public Affairs.

  Desi Romero and his cousin, Desi Gonzalez, who defected from “the intolerable situation in our homeland,” will head up a Special Forces unit being formed at Benning after linguistic indoctrination and orthodontal treatment.

  The army welcomes such brave and experienced men who risked their lives to seek freedom and honor. In the words of General Brokemichael, “A great motion picture could be made of their exploits,

  we should look into that.”

  Summer was fading, lethargy receding, each a prelude to the energized games of autumn. The north winds grew chillier in the mornings, reminding the residents of Nebraska that soon they would become colder, then very cold, finally numbing the skin; another prelude, this, to the winter snows. However, such thoughts were far from the minds of the Wopotami nation, for as the negotiations with the United States Government continued, Washington saw fit to send two hundred and twelve state-of-the-art trailer homes to the reservation, replacing the wigwams and the ramshackle structures previously used for communal gatherings and shelter for many against the winter snows. Of course, what Washington did not know was that several hundred perfectly adequate cabins had been bulldozed only weeks previously and that the tepees, or wigwams, were previously an unfamiliar sight on the reservation except for a few around the tourists’ gate. MacKenzie Hawkins was not one to overlook either the subtleties or the inconsistencies of observable terrain; no trained military man would. It was all part of the strategy, and no battle was ever won without a plan.

  “I still can’t believe it,” said Jennifer, walking hand in hand with Sam down a dirt road on the reservation, the field to their right dotted with huge, extravagant trailers, each with a satellite television dish attached to the roof. “It’s all coming out the way Mac thought it would.”

  “The negotiations are going well then?”

  “Incredibly. If we frown simply because something’s not clear, they fuss and backtrack and make a better offer. Several times I’ve had to interrupt the government people and explain that the financial aspects were perfectly satisfactory, I just wanted a legal point clarified. One lawyer from the GAO shouted, ‘You don’t like it, don’t worry, it’s out!”

  “That’s a nice position to be in.”

  “I was merely excusing myself to go to the ladies’ room.”

  “Strike my comment.… But why are you being so gentle?”

  “Come on, Sam, what they’ve offered is so outrageously beyond our wildest dreams it would be criminal to argue.”

  “Then why even negotiate? What are you after?”

  “To begin with, a legally binding guaranteed timetable for our immediate needs, such as good housing, fine schools, paved roads, a real, honest-to-God
village with seed money for stores and shops so decent livings can be made right here legitimately. Then maybe a few goodies like a couple of community pools and clearing Eagle Eye Mountain for ski lifts and a restaurant—but, of course, the latter could be considered part of our commerce. It was Charlie’s idea; he loves to ski.”

  “How’s he doing?”

  “Darling, I diapered that kid and now I sometimes feel almost incestuous.”

  “Huh?”

  “He’s so much like you! He’s quick and smart and, yes, funny—”

  “I’m a very serious officer of the court,” Devereaux broke in, grinning.

  “You’re a lunatic and so is he, both your lunacies mitigated by quick perceptions, irritating memories, and reducing complexities to fundamental simplicities.”

  “I don’t even know what that means.”

  “Neither does he, but you both do it. Did you know that he came up with an insane, insignificant blemish on our history of jurisprudence called non nomen amicus curiae when Hawkins filed his brief? Who would ever know what it is, much less remember it?”

  “I do. Jackson versus Buckley, 1827, one stole pigs from the other—”

  “Oh, shut up!” Jenny released his hand, then immediately grabbed it back.

  “What’s Charlie going to do when this is over?”

  “I’m making him the attorney-of-record for the tribe. He can run the ski resort in winter at the same time.”

  “Isn’t that terribly limiting?”

  “Perhaps, but I don’t think so. Someone has to be here to make damn sure Washington lives up to every article of the reconstruction agreement. When you’re involved with building on this scale, you’d better have a lawyer at your beck and call. Ever put an addition on your house that was completed on time? And I should add that I’ve placed heavy penalty clauses on every aspect of the construction.”

  “Charlie will have his hands full. What else did you get from Dizzy City, as Mac calls it? I mean beside your “immediate needs’?”

  “Very simple. An uninvadable, irrevocable trust based on irreversible guarantees by the Treasury Department that the tribe will receive a basic two million dollars a year, adjusted for inflation, for the next twenty years.”

  “That’s chickenshit, Jenny!” cried Sam.

  “No, it’s not, darling. If we can’t make it by then, we don’t deserve to. We don’t want a free ride, we simply want the opportunity to get in the mainstream. And knowing my Wopotamis, we’ll take you palefaces for just about every nickel you’ve got. If I also know my tribe, and surely I do, in twenty years your President will probably have a surname like ‘Sundown’ or ‘Moonbeam,’ take my word for it. We didn’t refine the yaw-yaw juice for nothing.”

  “And now what?” asked Devereaux.

  “And now what what?”

  “What about us?”

  “Did you have to bring that up?”

  “Isn’t it about time?”

  “Of course it is, but I’m afraid.”

  “I’ll protect you.”

  “From whom? You?”

  “If need be. Actually, it’s very simple, and as you’ve pointed out, Charlie and I can reduce complex matters into simple issues anyone can understand.”

  “What the hell are you talking about, Sam?”

  “Reducing a complicated situation into a very simple problem.”

  “What, may I ask, is that?”

  “I refuse to live the rest of my life without you, and somehow I get the idea that you might feel the same way.”

  “Say there’s a grain of truth in what you say, just a grain, even a large kernel, how is it possible? I’m in San Francisco and you’re in Boston. That’s not a good arrangement.”

  “With your credentials, Aaron would hire you in a minute at a terrific salary.”

  “With your record, Springtree, Basl and Karpas of San Francisco would make you a partner before me.”

  “I could never leave Aaron, you know that, but you’ve already left one firm in Omaha. So you see it’s been reduced to a simple either/or, based on the assumption that we’d both take the gas pipe if we couldn’t be together.”

  “I didn’t go that far.”

  “I did. Can’t you?”

  “I refuse to answer on the grounds that it may incriminate me.”

  “Still, I have a solution.”

  “What is it?”

  “Mac gave me a medallion of his old division from World War Two, the one that broke through the Bulge, and I always keep it on me for good luck.” Devereaux reached into his pocket and withdrew an outsized, lightweight, ersatz coin with the face of MacKenzie Hawkins etched in the center. “I’ll flip it up and let it land on the road. I’ll take heads, you take tails. If it’s tails, you’ll go back to San Francisco and we’ll both suffer the tortures of the damned. If it’s heads, you’ll come to Boston with me.”

  “Agreed.” The medallion spun end-over-end in the air and fell on the dirt road. Jennifer bent down. “Good heavens, it’s heads.” She started to pick up the coin when Sam’s hand clamped over hers.

  “No, Jenny, you mustn’t lean over like that!”

  “Like what?”

  “It’s very bad for your sacroiliac!” Devereaux pulled her up while clutching the medallion in his right hand.

  “Sam, what are you saying?”

  “The husband’s first job is to protect his wife.”

  “From what?”

  “Bad sacroiliacs.” Devereaux manipulated the medallion in his fingers and scaled it into the pasture on their left. “I don’t need any lucky pieces anymore,” he said, embracing Jenny. “I have you, and that’s all the luck I ever wanted or needed.”

  “Or maybe you didn’t want me to see the other side of the coin,” whispered Redwing into his ear while softly biting it. “The Hawk gave me one of those in Hooksett. His face is on both sides. If you had said tails, I would have killed you.”

  “Wanton bitch,” whispered Sam, nibbling her lips like a chimpanzee finding peanuts. “Is there a secluded field we might wander into?”

  “Not now, Rover, Mac’s expecting us.”

  “He’s out of my life; this is the end!”

  “I sincerely hope so, my darling, but being a realist, I wonder for how long?”

  They rounded the corner of the dirt road where the huge multicolored, multilayered tepee of imitation animal skins flapped down from the apex to the widespread stakes in the ground. Smoke emerged from the opening above.

  “He’s there,” said Devereaux. “Let’s make the good-byes quick and simple, like in nice-to-know-you-stay-the-hell-away-from-our-lives!”

  “That’s a bit harsh, Sam. Look what he’s done for my people.”

  “It’s all a game for him, Jenny, don’t you understand that?”

  “Then it’s a good game he plays, darling, can’t you see that?”

  “I don’t know, he always confuses me—”

  “Never mind,” said Redwing. “He’s coming out. Good Lord, look at him!”

  Sam stared in disbelief. General MacKenzie Lochinvar Hawkins, a.k.a. Thunder Head, chief of the Wopotamis, bore absolutely no resemblance whatsoever to either alleged person. There was not an inkling of the military, much less the majesty of the American Indian; in fact, there was no dignity properly attributed to either image. Instead, regality had been replaced by gaucherie, the flamboyance of the shallow man, which somehow was more solid, more convincing. Partially covering his bristling, close-cropped gray hair was a yellow beret, and below his strong nose a thin, blackened mustache, and below that a purple ascot that was in flaming contrast to his pink silk shirt, which was color-coordinated with his tight-fitting bright red trousers, the cuffs lopping over a pair of white Gucci loafers. Naturally, the suitcase he was carrying was a Louis Vuitton.

  “Mac, who the hell are you supposed to be?” yelled Devereaux.

  “Oh, there you two are,” said the Hawk, without answering the question. “I thought I’d have to leave w
ithout seeing you. I’m in a dreadful hurry.”

  “ ‘A dreadful hurry’?” said Jennifer.

  “Mac, who are you?”

  “Mackintosh Quartermain,” replied the Hawk sheepishly, “veteran of the Scots Grenadiers. It was Gin-Gin’s idea.”

  “What?”

  “Off to Hollywood,” mumbled Hawkins. “I’m a co-producer and technical adviser on Greenberg’s flick.”

  “ ‘Flick’ …?”

  “Just to keep an eye on Manny’s financial imagination … and maybe a few other things, if they crop up. Hollywood’s in a mess, you know. It needs some clear-thinking innovators.… Look, it was terrif seeing you two sweethearts, but I’m really in a hurry. I’m meeting my new adjutant—assistant—Colonel Roman Zabritski, late of the Soviet military cinema, at the airport. Our plane goes on to the Coast.”

  “Roman Z?” asked a stunned Redwing.

  “What happened to Cyrus?” said Sam.

  “He’s somewhere in the south of France, checking on one of Frazier’s châteaus. It was vandalized.”

  “I thought he wanted to go back to the laboratory.”

  “Oh, well, what with his prison record and everything … well, Cookson’s buying a chemical plant.… Look, it was great you dolls came out to see me, but I’ve really got to dash-bash. Give us a kiss, sweetheart, and if you ever want a screen test, you know where to jingle me.” The astonished Redwing accepted the Hawk’s embrace. “And you, Lieutenant,” continued MacKenzie, throwing his arms around Devereaux, “you’re still the best legal skull on the planet, except maybe for Commander Pinkus and the little lady here.”

  “Mac!” cried Sam. “Don’t you see? You’re starting all over again! There’ll be nothing left of Los Angeles!”

  “No, not true, son, not true at all. We’ll bring back the glory days.” The Hawk picked up his Louis Vuitton suitcase, stifling the emergence of tears. “Ciao, babes,” he said, quickly turning away and hurrying up the dirt road, a man with a mission.

  “Why do I have the idea that sometime, somewhere in Boston, the telephone will ring and at the other end will be Mackintosh Quartermain?” said Devereaux, his arm around Jennifer as they watched the figure of the Hawk grow smaller in the distance.