Consolation? Had Angel actually said “consolation”?
“C-c-con . . .”
“Oh, God,” Angel said, “please tell me this hasn’t left you with a speech impediment.”
“Nnn . . .”
“Oh, great.”
“No!” Bird said, bursting through the verbal dam. “I do not have a speech impediment!”
“That’s a relief. For a moment there I imagined myself twiddling my thumbs waiting for you to get through ‘P-p-please p-p-pass the p-p-potatoes.’ ”
“Your empathy is truly overwhelming.”
“Empathy?” Angel said. “Would you like to hear about my week?”
“By all means. Did it include hooves coming through the windshield at sixty miles an hour? And being walked out on by your spouse?”
“Honey, I’ll trade you what I’ve been through for all four hooves and the antlers. Fucking reporters. Honestly. They’re all just swine in the end. That bastard made it sound like it was going to be a puff piece. Puff? Ha! Puff the Magic Dragon. This has been the week from hell.”
“Gee, that’s terrible. And it’s been so peaceful out here. Well, there was the excitement of Myndi punching me in the stomach and then leaving. Otherwise, not much to report. My brother, bless his heart, has the Fifty-sixth Virginia Volunteers standing by in case the PLA shows up. Oh, and the Fifty-sixth has artillery. A six-pounder! Of course, the guy in charge of the cannon is whacked on OxyContin. But as we all know, you go to war with the army you have, not the army you want. Yes, sir, we are ready for anything here at Fort Randolph.”
“Randolph,” Angel said, suddenly all cuddly. “Momma misses Randolph. Can Momma come out and play? I’ll bring Barry. He loves the country.”
For the third time in this conversation, Bird felt as though he’d been slapped across the face with a dead haddock.
“You want to come here? With Barry?”
“Well, it’s not like Muffy’s going to mind, is she?”
A fourth smack of haddock! This was no mere insouciance. No. This was surely something more . . . clinical. Something that ended in “-opathy,” or “-cism.” He must go online later and research. Yes.
“Darling,” she said, a term of endearment that Bird was not actually in the mood for at the moment, “I really could use some R&R. It’s been a circus here. I’m beat. I can’t even go to the ladies’ room without doing an interview. Oh, my God, I forgot to tell you—60 Minutes is doing a segment on us. They really, really want you to participate.”
“You’re giving . . . interviews?”
“Darling. You’re supposed to be the big PR genius. Yes, I’m giving interviews. When the sun is shining, make hay! I’ve been spinning like a top. My head is about to come off. I’m taking the position that of course we gave the story to the Indian paper. But that they called us first. I’m saying we had solid evidence but couldn’t reveal it because we had to protect our sources. I know that’s slicing the bullshit a bit thinly, but at this point who cares? The center of gravity has moved on. Now everyone’s furious at Beijing, not just because of Saffron Man but also the Taiwanese shrimp boat. By the way, Saffron Man must be getting a bit . . . ripe by now. It’s been ten days. Everyone’s waiting for the final autopsy report, not that that matters much anymore. Oh, my God, did you hear? It came out this morning—the White House offered to plant him at Arlington National Cemetery! And—get this—the Tibetans nixed it on the grounds that it was too military! Do you love it? Have you really not been following any of this? You do have television in Virginia, don’t you? Oh, my God, did I mention? I’ve had three offers for my own show!”
Bird thought, Maybe some form of Asperger’s?
“There’s so much I want to discuss with you. I’ve still got TV trucks parked outside the ICC. It’s actually getting annoying.”
“You used to love TV trucks.”
“I’m loving them less now. Have you got media there?”
“Yes. But that’s the nice part of living in the country and having a long driveway. The Fifty-sixth are manning the gate, pointing flintlock rifles at them.”
“Muskets,” Bewks said. “Enfields.”
“Sorry, Angel. Muskets, not rifles. That must be making for interesting photo ops. Maybe it will bring about a paradigm shift in celebrity paparazzi protection. You rent yourself a Civil War regiment and bivouac them at the end of the driveway. Might have to pay extra for the six-pounder.”
“Can I come and bring Barry? He’s a little freaked out by what Momma’s going through.”
“Nice as that might be,” Bird said, “I don’t think so just now. We pride ourselves on our hospitality out here in Rappahannock County but I’d just as soon Myndi—wherever she is—not turn on her TV and see you pulling up at the gate. With Barry.”
“Bird,” Angel said, “Muffy has left the building. Okay? She has moved in with Mr. Flying Stables. Deal with it.”
“It’s Myndi. With a y. You might want to practice saying it. For when you’re deposed by her divorce attorneys.”
“Darling.” Angel laughed. “I’ve been through so many of those I could do it in my sleep.”
“Well, that makes me feel all the more special. But the answer is no. You may not come here.”
Silence.
“Fine. If it makes you happy to be out there with a bunch of morons dressed up as Civil War soldiers, wallowing in self-pity, go for it. Far be it from me to intrude on your bliss.”
“Angel,” Bird said, “the Fifty-sixth Volunteers are not quote/unquote morons. They are my brother’s friends and boon companions. And they may be the only thing standing between me and the Chinese dragon.”
“Who’s she calling ‘morons’?” Bewks spoke up. “Did she just call us morons?”
“She didn’t mean you personally. You weren’t calling my brother a moron, were you?”
“Not specifically. It was more of a generic statement.”
“She says she wasn’t talking about you. It was a generic statement.”
“Yeah? Well, you tell Ms. Templeton she can kiss my generic—”
Angel said, “I’m gathering this isn’t a good time.”
“A good time? No, I wouldn’t call it that.”
“I’ll let you deal with Jeb Stuart. But will you give Randolph a message from me?”
Bird sighed. “In the event I run into Randolph, yes, I’ll give him a message.”
“Will you tell him Momma misses him?”
“I’ll tell him.” Bird handed the phone back to Bewks. “Well, that was enjoyable.”
“Who the hell is Randolph?” Bewks said. “Is he a pleasanter individual than her?”
“She.”
Bird and Bewks had shared many a confidence over the years, but right now Bird was not in the mood to explain about Angel’s bizarre boudoir nomenclature.
“He’s some . . . oh, God knows who Randolph is. Bewks, we are dealing with a complex human psyche here. And I’m not a hundred percent sure about ‘human.’ Her name is Angel, but I’m beginning to think she may have been sent here by the Dark Lord himself, in the vanguard of the apocalypse.”
Bewks considered this weighty statement. “Well, big brother, it’s your neck and your pecker.”
“Fix us another couple of these things, would you, Bewks?”
LATER, AFTER DINNER and another tender bedtime moment upstairs with Mother shrieking at them about the colony of ferrets that had supposedly taken up residence in her bed, the brothers returned to the front porch. The night was moonless, full of stars.
Bird had soothed Bewks’s wounded pride over Angel’s “morons” remark by sharing with him the strange business of Randolph. Bewks found the revelation amusing but also troubling. His analysis was that Randolph must be some prior lover of extraordinary sexual ability who might turn out to be “even more of a nutjob than her.”
“She.”
“What if he shows up, armed and jealous?”
“Well, I doubt he’d get past th
e Fifty-sixth.”
“The Fifty-sixth Virginia Morons?”
The brothers laughed. They watched the sky and soon were at the old game they’d played as boys, lying side by side in meadows at night, seeing who could spot the most passing satellites.
“Got another,” Bewks said. “That makes three for me and none for you.” He chuckled. “And you working for a company that makes them.”
The idea came to Bird, in all its elegant simplicity.
“Bewks. For a moron, you’re a genius.”
“Don’t know about that,” Bewks said, “but I bow to no man in the field of satellite spotting. Whup—got another one. Four for me. None for you. I believe you may be losing your touch, big brother.”
CHAPTER 39
A THING OF RARE BEAUTY
My, my, my,” Chick Devlin said into the phone with an air of apprehension, “if it isn’t Mr. Radioactive. I was beginning to wonder when you’d check in.”
“I’ve been at a disclosed location.”
“Yeah, I caught a glimpse of it on the TV. Who are those people pointing bayonets at the media?”
“Too complicated to explain.”
“Well, guess it’s about time someone pointed bayonets at those bastards. You, uh, holding up?”
“I’ve got something for you. Something hot.”
“Oh, hold on, old buddy. You’re just a tad toxic right now. To be honest, when I saw it was you calling, I wasn’t a hundred percent sure I was going to pick up.”
“Really? And why would that be? Old buddy.”
“That article in the Post didn’t exactly bathe our company in reflected glory. There are folks in the building here think we ought to—”
“Cut me loose?”
“Well, put a bit of sunlight between us, anyway. Till things calm down.”
“Let’s review, shall we?” Bird said. “You tasked me with whipping up anti-China sentiment. Would you agree that the whole world is in a veritable lather of anti-Chineseness?”
“I’ll stipulate that, yeah.”
“And now you’re telling me the company needs to put a little ‘sunlight’ between it and old Bird?”
“Oh, come on now, Bird—”
“No, Chick,” Bird said, “we are well past the point of ‘Oh, come on now, Bird.’ We passed that mile marker light-years ago.”
“You did a hell of a job. And you will be compensated. Don’t you worry about that.”
“Were you thinking thirty pieces of silver?”
“No need to get insulting.”
“Sorry. Must be the meds.”
“If we gave out decorations, you’d be up for a Silver Star with V device. But be reasonable. As CEO of this company, I’m the custodian, the steward of Groepping’s good name.”
“Steward? Oh, I like that,” Bird said. “Okay, then, you being the steward, would you be the go-to person?”
“For what?”
“Well”—Bird chuckled—“if you think Groepping’s ‘good name’ needs a little buffing up now, just you wait until my memoirs are published.”
“Your memoirs?”
“Yes. Oh, it’s been quite a week, Chick. It started out with a bang. A real one. I had this collision with a deer a few days ago. You know how people who’ve been through traumatic experiences—hospital, prison, foxholes, what have you—sometimes, after they emerge from their dark night of the soul, they have these . . . epiphanies? Sometimes they take the form of getting religion. Sometimes losing religion. Affects different people in different ways. Anyway, my epiphany took the form of wanting to share with the world just what a skunk I’ve been. Now you might say, ‘But, Bird, old buddy, that newspaper article has already told the world what a rascal you are.’ But then I would say to you, ‘Oh no, Chick, it didn’t nearly explain what a scoundrel I am.’ However, the general public’s appetite has, to be sure, been whetted to hear more. This is America. The people demand to know more about their scoundrels. And being Americans, they’re willing to pay top dollar. How do I know this? Well, I’ll tell you. My phone has been ringing off the hook. Publishers. New York–type publishers, the real deal. Waving fistfuls of cash. Do I love this country? I do! And is it not ironic? Here I’ve been trying to sell these folks my novels for years—couldn’t even get them on the phone. Now they’re elbowing one another in the ribs trying to be the first to have lunch with me. Still there?”
“I’m here,” Chick said.
“Want to hear the working title? Bull in the China Shop. Do you like that? I love it. Did you get the bull reference? Taurus? Bull? Is that clever or what?”
Chick groaned.
“Here’s the subtitle: The True Inside Story Behind Project Taurus and My Sorry-Ass Role in It All. I know it’s long, but doesn’t it draw you in? Make you want to hear more? It is self-derogatory, but I’m going for a confessional tone. Like The Confessions of St. Augustine? Well, that might be putting it a bit grandiosely. But the revelations speak for themselves. Let me read you an excerpt. It’s from the scene—one of my favorites, but there are so many—where I’m standing in your office, the very one you’re sitting in right now, and you’re telling me to go foment you some China bashing in order to grease your weapons system through the Congress and Pentagon. Listen:
“Bird, we need to educate the American people as to the true nature of the threat we face. If we can do that, then those limp dicks and fainting hearts and imbeciles in the United States Congress—God love them—will follow.”
Bird chuckled. “Won’t those limp dicks and fainting hearts and imbeciles in the U.S. Congress—the ones you work with on a continuing basis—think that’s a dilly? Want to hear the part about the muons?”
“Bird—”
“I tell you, Chick, I feel a complete fool. A gold-plated fool. All these years I’ve been staying up nights writing novels till my fingertips go numb. And now I find out that writing nonfiction is so much easier. You don’t have to invent anything, see. The words have been flowing like water. I’ll be e-mailing you chapters as I write them. So you can check your quotes.”
“All right, Birdman,” Chick said. “I’m sweating blood here. What’s it going to cost me?”
“Oh, Chick. I was so hoping you wouldn’t say something like that. How long have we known each other? Do you really think this is about blackmail? I find that sad. But then I found it sad that you began this conversation by intimating that you were going to toss your old buddy under the bus. How did we ever arrive at this sorry juncture?”
Silence.
“And now,” Bird said, “you can relax, old buddy. All that stuff I just told you right now about publishers and my memoir? It’s all bull. Not that publishers haven’t been calling. Oh, they have, believe me. But I have no plans to put pen to paper. As of now, at least. So shall we start over?”
“I’m flailing, Birdman. I’m pissing down both legs. What do you want from me? Put me out of my misery. Anything!”
“I would like my old job back.”
Silence.
“Bird.” Chick sighed. “How on God’s green earth is that going to look? My board of directors would have my ass for supper.”
“And a fine supper it’ll make, your ass being so cute from all those hours on the StairMaster. But I think you may be wrong there. Walk with me, Chick, walk with me out of the valley of darkness and into the sunshine. I confidently predict to you that the board will not only be delighted to have old Bird back but will instruct you to double my salary. There might even be a bonus in there for you, old buddy. As I mentioned at the beginning of our little chin wag, I have something for you. A thing of rare beauty. Of such blinding brilliance that I have to put on sunglasses just to think about it.”
“All right,” Chick said, “but let me turn on some background music. Chopin’s Funeral March, something along those lines.”
“Music? If it’s music you want, you got Handel’s Messiah there on your iPod? Put it on the ‘Hallelujah Chorus.’ And crank up the volume l
oud enough to wake the possums. Okay, old buddy, here’s the deal . . .”
CHAPTER 40
I’M GOING TO MAKE YOU A STAR
Rogers P. Fancock, director of national security, sat at his desk in the White House, mentally composing a letter of resignation.
Dear Mr. President, it is with the keenest reluctance that I . . .
No.
Dear Mr. President, when you asked me to take on the great responsibility of . . .
No. For God’s sake, Fancock, he’s an old friend.
Whatever the wording, the fact was that the good ship Fancock had finally gone up on the shoals of desolation. He was just too goddamned old for this.
Of course he couldn’t resign now, in the midst of the crisis. But when the situation resolved—if it ever resolved—he was going to walk in there and tell the president that the time had come to hand the baton to . . . anyone, really. At this point Rogers P. Fancock did not care.
As for the president, his mood these days ranged from dismal (on a good one) to foul (on a bad one). The sinking of the Taiwanese shrimp boat had caused such a furor that he had no choice but to approve the sale to Taiwan of seventy-five F-22 fighter planes and four Aegis-outfitted destroyers—four! This was especially painful, as he’d spent the previous two years making every effort not to sell more arms to Taiwan. Now what choice did he have? Even the leaders of his own party had started asking—out loud—if he was showing enough “spine” in dealing with the People’s Republic. At times he felt that the only one who really sympathized with his predicament was . . . the president of China, for God’s sake. They were spending so much time on the phone to each other, holding each other’s hand and moaning about the hard-liners—it was beginning to resemble a high-level support group or AA meeting.
Now, as a result of the Taiwan arms sale, Fa informed him that the Central Bank of China was making noises about sitting out the next auction of U.S. Treasury bills. The stock market was doing quadruple-front-flip triple gainers off the high board, gas prices were spiking at the pump, people were being laid off everywhere. But there was some good news, at least: Gold was at an all-time high! Yay! So if things got really bad, people could buy groceries with twenty-dollar gold pieces or coupons from their gold stock certificates.
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