by G L Rockey
“Looking for somebody.”
“You notice anybody following you?”
“Not that I know of. Mr. Stearn, I must”
“Call me Zack.” He looked her in the eye. “Senator, we are in deep doo-dah-day.”
“These are momentous times, indeed, but”
“Senator, do you have a drink in this wagon?”
“Ah, well, yes, I think, in there.” She indicated a small compartment. Zack slid it open and looked at the four bottles of liquor.
“No Glenlivet?”
She raised her hands. “Sorry.”
Zack snatched a bottle of Dewars and poured half a glass. “You may need one of these after you hear the recording I have.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I do.” He put the bottle back.
“Why so?”
He pulled a long drink from the glass. “Senator, do you realize our President is planning a military attack on several nations, even as we speak?”
“Mr. Stearn, perhaps you had better go easy on that scotch.”
“A coup d'état is taking place.”
“I think you may be over-reacting. This is a tragic situation we are witnessing, but”
“Senator, there is a plot to overthrow the government, believe me.”
“How do you know that?” she said.
“I know.” He took out a Camel. “Mind if I smoke?”
“I’d rather you didn’t, but go ahead.” She looked at him. “Mr. Stearn”
“What happened to Zack?” He lit his cigarette.
Beno said, “You know, this is really extraordinary, meeting like this.”
“Senator, that may be the understatement of the century. Listen to this recording, you’ll recognize the voices of Armstrong’s brain trust—Babs Lande, Leo Novak and General MacCallister.”
He opened his briefcase, removed the CD player and started the recording. As they listened, the faint sound of the limo’s soft rubber tires thumped in the background along some unknown road.
When the CD finished Zack looked for Beno’s face but she was staring out the opposite window. He caught a reflection of her sad expression in the darkened glass.
Lightning illuminated night. Water droplets began hitting the windows. Thunder followed, then silence. Only the tire sounds, flowing now over concrete. A hard rain began.
Zack finished his drink in one long belt then spoke. “Fun stuff, huh.”
“That was”
“Right. Armstrong’s Elite Inner Circle: Cerebrum, Cerebellum and Medulla Oblongata. Lande, Novak”
“And General MacCallister.” She touched her lips. “Mr. Stearn, where did you get that recording?”
“You wouldn’t believe it.”
“Try me.”
“Somehow, I don’t know how, this was recorded aboard Armstrong’s yacht three months ago.”
“This is an egregious allegation. How do you know this recording is authentic?”
“You tell me. Those voices are undeniablethe events of the past few dayseverything fits.”
She sat in silence for several minutes then said, “I would say we have much work to do before Benjamin’s address to the nation tomorrow morning.”
“Why don’t we just take this CD over to the White House and shove it up his Southern-fried ass?”
She paused, looked at him. “The President is at Camp David.”
“Wanna bet he’s back in DC, getting his hair tinted for tomorrow’s televised speech to the world?”
“Even if he is, if this is trueif we got into the White Housewe would never get out.”
“True. So, what’s your suggestion?”
“Leave that to me.” She looked at the time, “Twelve-thirty. Let’s just say I’m going to have a very full night and Monday morning.”
“Forgive me, Senator, but the reporter in me would like to know what ‘full’ means.”
“I have to knock on some Congressional doors. I think a few Senators are in town. I know the Chief Justice is. Then, I think, a public forumI know someone at a TV network.”
“I tried that TV business, laid an egg.”
“I know someone personally at a network.”
“But”
“Trust me.”
“Whatever you think, I hope you impeach that sorry Armstrong bastard,” he wiped his face with a palm, “I have to get back to Miami.”
“You don’t think you’re going back to Miami tonight, do you?”
“Yes” He stumped his cigarette out in the armrest ashtray.
“How?”
“I was going to”
“Why don’t you stay here tonight, just in case, you know? There’s a Doubletree Suites not far.” She took the bottle of Dewars and handed it to him. “Here, take this with you. You look like you need it.”
“Probably a good idea.”
She picked up the intercom, spoke to the driver then to Zack. “We’ll drop you off.”
Zack handed her the CD player. “Here, you’ll need this.”
Chapter Fifty Seven
Dr. Barbara Lande cleared her desk and locked up a little after twelve-forty five a.m. The rain heavy, lightning and thunder intense, she drove her red BMW coupe past the security gate of the White House. Feeling like she needed to unwind, she headed out Pennsylvania Avenue to her favorite bar at the Georgetown Four Seasons. She needed to get home, get a little sleep, get ready for tomorrow’s excitement; but a nightcap to settle down the many things on her mind seemed logical.
At the bar, thinking how smooth this morning’s Meet The Press had gone, the ease of implementing the entire plan, she sat alone and savored a vodka martini. In just a few hours, she would be at Armstrong’s side as he entered the White House Press Room to deliver his message to the world. From there she had visions of a glorious and unprecedented future. She had a second martini, smoked a cigar and planned the international expansion of her department.
Buoyed as she drove home in a steady rain along Potomac Parkway, she noticed a black Humvee approach from the rear. She thought it too close, tapped her brakes; the Humvee swerved, began to pass then slowed.
The movement was swift. In a moment, Lande was upside down in Rock Creek, her BMW filling with water. She pounded on the windshield; she saw the stopped Humvee’s headlights shining on the roadside. Two people, in silhouette, watching as she sucked a last small air bubble.
Chapter Fifty Eight
1:30 a.m. EST
Monday, September 1
Labor Day
The thunderstorm pummeling the DC area, Zack had checked into the Doubletree using his favorite alias, Joe ‘Jocko’ Lewis. He paid cash, found his second-floor suite, went in, surveyed the suite, sat on the sofa, retrieved the bottle of Dewars from his briefcase, said, “Thank you God for good companions in the night,” took a swig, drained himself of the events of the past few hours, then left the room and went down the hall to get a bucket of ice. Returned, he stripped naked, poured a stiff Dewars on the rocks, drank and out of somewhere, thoughts of Mary_what she was doing, where she was, twenty guys in line_he glanced at the time—1:35 a.m., smelled himself, finished his drink, went to the bathroom and took a fifteen-minute very hot shower.Drying off, he talked to Jocko. “I don’t believe any of this. How many times have you heard that in the past two days? Plenty. Still don’t believe it. But here we are, Jocko, the wee hours of Monday, September 1, 2020, Labor Day, and I have a feeling this night is going to be like listening to a long confession on a hot summer afternoon, sans air conditioning, as some joker tries to escape the Christian version of the never-ending story.”
Then it was there again, that anxiety thing with the dank smell, peeking in the window.
“Go find somebody else to play with,” he said and pulled the drapes. He looked at the video phone. Thought again of calling Mary. He reached to turn on the phone then stopped. “Can’t do that, Jocko, you have to get past that. I think the current phrase is ‘ge
t a grip.’”
He topped off his drink, went to the bedroom, sat on the bed, opened the night stand drawer and took out a red soft cover book version of the hard cover edition in his office. He read the title, Great Religions of the World—Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, and Islam.
“If you lump the Christian two together, five. Count all the splinter groups, another twenty or so. Put in the nuts, kooks and cults, you got—what?—five thousand? Amazing what human beings can do with a simple concept.”
He realized he was saying what he was always saying. He put the book down and took a drink.
“Now I lay me down to sleep.” He looked up. “Why so much confusion?” He drank. “When in doubt, write.”
He went back to the living room, took his wrinkled yellow pad and a pencil from his briefcase, sat on the sofa, flipped several pages and read the draft of something, he wasn’t sure what, once an editorial, now perhaps a book, he had been working on for, it seemed forever. He began to read a recently revised draft:
An Deus sit? (Does God Exist?)
It’s all fairly simple. Except for greed, ego and organized religion. Amazing what the human mind can do with a simple concept. Then there is reality and how did humans get here. And then there is the insanity of how people carved the world up into small pieces.
He dropped down several lines.
In the beginning, so the story goes, there was darkness upon the face of the deep. From there the tale gets complicated. One supposition suggests a
He skimmed the rest of the creation part: Big Bangevolved many mysterious things ordered course around the suntime moved forwardthen came upon Planet Earth living forms one, Homo sapiens, multiplied, subdued the earth and everything in it
He said as he read, “Then came capitalism. Then came journalism. Then came television news, then came”
He paused, thought then flipped a page and read a draft of something he had begun while waiting on Senator Beno under a tree in that park:
The events of the past week would seem to bugle that Planet Earth and her society are in deep doo-dah-day. We live in an age of instant communication when the thoughts of a few become words and the words of a few become meaning and the meaning of a few becomes truth handed down as myth and the myths spawn deeds put down between people and the deeds end one reality and begin another toward the history of man, (storia di uomo). Problem is, who controls the few who may or may not be well-intentioned? And the problem there is the definition of “well-intentioned.” What it comes down to is the basic question: An Deus sit? If so, then there is hope, good, and we should go forward. If He doesn’t exist, well, Tweedledee, Tweedledum logic, if it is, it is; if it isn’t, it ain’t. Done deal. There are no flying saucers. There is nobody out therewe’re it, get what and all you can and who will say the eulogy at that funeral
Jocko said, “Somebody said that.”
“Me. Think about it. If there is anything remotely intelligent out there, half as advanced as we are, would not they be sending out signals, too? If there are those as bright or brighter, would not they have found us by nowand where is HE in all the razzmatazz HE supposedly started?”
He put the yellow pad down and sucked his ice cubes. Maybe tomorrow they will find us. In the meantime the earth is Eden and there are three kinds of people—Negroid, Mongoloid and Caucasianwhat’s the big deal?
Pretty much drunk, the uncanniness on hold, he picked up the TV clicker. “Wonder what the boob tube is saying now.”
He rested back on the sofa, and as images of burning cars, talking head, and police lobbing tear gas filled the screen, dead tired from the day’s event, his eyes closing closing closing, he dreamed.
a knock on the door. Afraid to answer, he went and peered through the peephole. Mary. He opened the door and she stood barefoot, dressed in a sheer black see-through lace nighty, she held a basket of grapes.
What are you doing here?
Hanging around.
Did you doze off?
Just taking a catnap.
How’s that ear?
Good.
May I come in?
Sure, sure. He returned to the sofa and sat.
She followed and sat beside him. Want some grapes? I’ll peel them for you.
I don’t think so.
Let’s go for a swim.
You have a suit?
No. She smiled, stepped to Veracity’s cabin door and dropped her nighty to the floor. Come on, chicken.
Chapter Fifty Nine
Awakened by blaring sound from the TV, Zack blinked and saw on the screen an upbeat TV morning program showing giddy Labor Day New York visitors holding cardboard signs from Davenport, Poughkeepsie, Amarillo.
Zack glanced at his wristwatch—7:01 A.M.
His head pounding, he recalled the Mary dream. Same version, how many times? It’s the booze, fat chance.
A close-up of Senator Beno on the TV put him in the present. He sat up, increased the volume and watched TV morning show host, Pam West: “Good morning. In what might be the story of the millennium, I’m here with Senator Nancy Beno. She has a startling revelation about the events of the past two days and an audio recording of shocking import.”
West paused, touched a tiny ear prompter, listened for a moment then said, “I’m told by the producer that we have a breaking story. Let’s go to the news desk and Dee Dee Paulsen.”
Close-up of anchor Dee Dee: “Pam, we have just received information the President’s media guru, Dr. Barbara Lande, is dead. She was found in her submerged car in Rock Creek by police a short time ago. The accident was discovered earlier by a passing motorist. Paramedics and DC police pulled Dr. Lande’s body from the wreckage. An eyewitness said, ‘Lande looked a little pruney.’ More details as we receive them. Now back to you.”
Zack shook his head and flipped to another news channel, same Lande breaking news. He surfed TV anchors discussing the Lande accident and the upcoming historic address to the world by President Armstrong.
He wiped his face with his palm and clicked back to the morning TV show with West and Beno:
Close-up of host West speaking, “So, Senator Beno, let’s first play your recording. Then we’ll discuss the ramifications.”
The recording of Lande, Novak and MacCallister played. The words of the E.I.C. were superimposed as subtitles in white over a blue background.
The recording ended and the video switched to a close-up of West. “Where on earth did you get this amazing recording?”
“A journalist.”
There was a knock at the hotel door.
Zack swallowed a sudden choke of anxiety, “Who’s there?”
“Room service,” a thin voice mumbled.
Zack peered through the peephole. Looked like a server—young, freckled female, white jacket, tray. He said again, “Who’s there?”
“Room service.”
“I didn’t order room service.”
“New Doubletree thing, complimentary.”
“What ya got?”
“Coffee, cinnamon roll.”
He opened the door.
The young female nodded and whipped past him, put the serving tray on the little kitchen table and smiled.
“Thank you.” Zack gave her fifty cents.
She looked at the change in her palm and said, “Rough night?”
“Week.”
“You can say that again, brother.” She left.
Zack noted a BREAKING NEWS graphic on the TV. He pressed the sound up.
West announced, “We interrupt our interview with Senator Beno to go to Herb Abelard at the White House”
Herb, standing in front of White House: “Yes, Pam, we have just been told that President Armstrong has been visited by a select Congressional delegation from his political party and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court . Sources say he was given two options, resign or be impeached. The President’s address to the world, scheduled for this
morning, has been canceled, Herb Abelard reporting, back to you.”
Shot of West and Beno, West: “So, Senator Beno, it would appear your Presidential stock just went up a few points.”
Zack poured a cup of the complimentary coffee, ate the cinnamon roll and sipped, “Not bad.”
Chapter Sixty
The following Saturday
11:15 a.m. EST
Drifting over the shallow waters northeast of Bimini, Zack, dressed in his best black T-shirt, khaki shorts, deck shoes and black baseball cap, eased Veracity to idle-speed-forward.
Mary, in white tennis shorts, white T-shirt, barefoot, leaned over his shoulder and looked at the water.
“Wow, the water’s so clear. Are those stones that Bimini Road thing name sake for that dump in Miami you used to like to go to.”
“Some predict the lost continent of Atlantis will be re-discovered at Bimini. Those underwater rock formations have been the subject of much study since discovered in the late 60’s.”
“Wasn’t that something to do with some clairvoyant?”
“Edgar Cayce.”
“Yeah, that’s him. Right up your alley, professor.”
“Much debate.”
“Yeah, like the one about Looney Toon cartoons found on cro-Magnon cave walls.”
Ignoring her, “The underwater stone formations and the vortex of energy have been bringing scholars and enthusiasts to the islands for years. Jacques Cousteau studied the site in the 1980’s.”
“Wow, the Calypso.”
“Way back when, the Discovery Channel did a TV show on all of it.”
“Well, that ices it.”
After cruising around the site for an hour, Zack headed for Brown’s Marina. There, he docked, tied up and negotiated use of a Jeep from the marina manager.
After taking a stop-look-slow drive for ten minutes, Zack said to Mary, “Here we are.”