by Wil Mara
Sheila was pleased they finally moved her mother to a private room. She’d had roommates in the last three, all in worse shape. Each one was an elderly woman, and they were all deceased now. The first had been clearheaded for a few weeks, the other two in various states of delirium. Sheila was haunted by one in particular, who stared maniacally at the ceiling and produced an endless stream of glossolalia. It wasn’t her deteriorated mental state that affected Sheila so deeply but rather the fact that no one came to see her. There were no balloons, no flowers, no cards. A forgotten soul in a world of billions. Someone from the local church had left a prayer card—but then her mom received one too. So did every other patient, most likely. Then one day Sheila came in and found the bed empty, made up with fresh sheets. One of the nurses said the woman had died the night before. With no one there to hold her hand, no doubt, Sheila thought with a touch of anger.
She stroked her mother’s white hair, kissed her on the cheek, then sat in one of the ridiculously uncomfortable guest chairs and opened a cooking magazine she’d spotted in the lobby. No sooner had she found a recipe for sesame apricot chicken than her cell phone vibrated. Removing it from the holster, she found the following text message on the screen:
Sheila,
The guys are here with the new arc trainer and they’re setting it up. Is there anything else I need to do?
Vicki
Sheila rose from the chair and walked into the hallway before dialing. The call was answered on the second ring.
“That was quick,” Vicki said.
“I’m here at the hospital and it’s pretty quiet right now.”
“Oh, I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
“No, that’s fine. I asked you to let me know when they got there.”
“Do I need to tell them anything?”
“Are they actually working? Sometimes Eric’s guys need the whip cracked over their heads.”
“No, they’re doing it.” Vicki laughed. “I think they’re afraid of you.”
“That can be useful sometimes.”
“I don’t know. . . . You’re the best boss I’ve ever had; that’s for sure.”
“Vying for a raise again?”
“No, really. I—”
“I’m just kidding. How are things going otherwise?”
“Okay.”
“Busy?”
“No more than usual, but no less, either.”
“Any new recruits?”
“Yes!” she said. “I signed up four new people this morning. Four.”
“That’s excellent, Vick. Terrific work.”
“And I re-upped two others.”
“Re-upping is just as good. As long as they come to my gyms, I don’t care how or why.”
“We’re the best.”
“Better believe it.”
“Oh, and that guy stopped in again, too. . . .”
“What guy?”
“That Doug guy.”
Sheila rolled her eyes. “Did you tell him I was out of town?”
“Yeah. I don’t know if he believed me, but he said he’d be back.”
“Lucky me.”
“He’s creepy.”
Sheila agreed, but she was also at a point in her life where she wasn’t interested in a relationship with any man.
“Okay, let me get back to Mama.”
“How’s she doing?”
“Not that great. It’s just a matter of time.”
“How are you holding up?”
Sheila wasn’t sure how to reply to this. She’d been through every emotion on the spectrum since the cancer had quietly entered their lives three years ago. Truth be told, she felt like a towel wrung of all moisture. It was torture to watch her mother suffer like this and to know the end of her life was mere days or even hours away. But there was still that hope, like a little flame that never burns out, for a miracle. Of course it was ridiculous now, but that wouldn’t stop her from tending it.
“I’m doing okay,” she said, more to keep the silence from winding out than anything else. “As well as can be expected under the circumstances.” A tear rolled down her cheek, and she wiped it away before anyone else in the hallway noticed.
“I wish there was something I could do.”
“I know. I appreciate it.”
“Is there anything you need? Anything I can send you?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Really? Honestly?”
“Honestly. Hey, she was the greatest mom I could’ve asked for. She and my dad were always there for me, gave me everything I needed, and let me find my own way when the time came. I couldn’t have asked for much more. And they really loved each other, so she had a good life too.”
“You were all very lucky.”
“We certainly were. But let me go, okay? I want to stay by her side.”
“Sure. And don’t worry about anything here. I’ve got it all under control.”
“Thanks, Vick.”
Sheila ended the call and put the phone away. As she crept back into the room, she thought about how lucky she’d been to find Vicki, too. She had more than two dozen employees, and Victoria Miller was the best of them. No formal education beyond high school, yet she had more natural business sense than any of the arrogant MBA geniuses Sheila had interviewed. Vicki was hardworking, tough, and—best of all—trustworthy beyond all doubt. That was something they didn’t stress much in postgrad courses, Sheila noticed.
She was just about to return to the magazine when her mother groaned and rolled her head back and forth. The oxygen mask didn’t follow—the tube got caught under her arm. This caused the edge of the mask to press her nose down crookedly. Sheila hastened to fix it, and Margaret’s eyes opened. They were red-rimmed and watery, like those of a child who’d been crying.
“Sweetheart,” she said, her voice muted behind the clear plastic.
Sheila was stunned by the lucidity of her tone. They were medicating her heavily to chase off the pain. She slept most of the time, talked nonsense the rest. She usually confused the past with the present, referring to long-dead friends and family as if they were standing in the hallway. Every now and then she produced a coherent thought, but they were growing scarce.
Sheila leaned down and smiled. “Yes, Mama?”
Margaret lifted the arm with the gauzy wristband and, with surprising strength, took her hand. “I’m sorry,” she said. This came out shaky and labored, but the eyes were suddenly bright again. The abruptness of the change was unsettling.
“For what?” There was still a faint trace of the Texas accent in Sheila’s voice, in spite of not having lived here for almost twenty years.
Margaret’s eyes closed again, and she sank back onto the pillow. This simple exchange had drained her, it seemed. Sheila thought she might fall back to sleep.
Then her mother took a deep breath and swallowed to clear her throat. Her eyes reopened. “For the burden. The burden of it.”
Puzzled, Sheila studied her for a long moment. “What are you talking about?”
“This burden that I’m leaving you. I’m sorry, Sheila. I’m so sorry.”
“Mama? What burden? What do you mean?”
“Just get rid of it. Get rid of it.”
“What? Mama, I don’t underst—”
“I’m sorry. . . .”
The eyes closed slowly this time. Her breathing became deep and heavy.
Margaret Baker had just two more rational moments—one the next day in which she said that she loved her daughter more than anything in the world, and a second on her final day, when she asked Sheila what she thought God might have in store for her. When Sheila said she didn’t know but was sure it would be wonderful, her mother managed a weak nod before slipping into unconsciousness. Her suffering came to an end less than two hours later.
2
“THEIR OBJECTIVE was to blow up four synagogues in upstate New York. All on the Shabbat, all at the same time.”
As assistant deputy director of
the CIA, J. Frederick Rydell wouldn’t normally deliver this briefing. But the agency’s number two, the only man superior to Rydell aside from Director Vallick himself, was still overseas. Rydell was thin and smallish, with silvering hair that still bore random streaks of its former shoe-polish black. He was dressed in a dark suit with a tightly knotted tie and was leaning slightly forward with a manila folder in his lap.
“These were large congregations,” Rydell went on, “mostly wealthy and well-to-do. The planners wanted a high body count. Plenty of children would’ve been involved too.”
“And it was only six men running the operation?” Director Vallick asked from his side of the desk. The CIA boss’s personal feelings on most issues were usually a matter of speculation; it was impossible to tell exactly what was happening behind those gray eyes. But his focus was already the stuff of legend, and it was a mistake to think he wasn’t paying attention. He missed nothing.
“Yes,” Rydell replied. “Six men, five of Middle Eastern descent, and one illegal from Coahuila.”
The individual seated next to Rydell, the national security adviser, shuddered. “Savages,” he said. He was sickly thin and wore large glasses that augmented his already-academic bearing.
“Where, specifically, did the Middle Easterners come from?” asked the only other person in the room, a woman in her early forties. This was the president’s chief of staff and former campaign manager. She was attractive in spite of her reserved, bookish stylings. “The president will want to know.”
“Three were Saudis, one was from Syria, and the fifth was from Pakistan.”
“And our friends in Germany helped us with the intel, I understand?” This was Vallick again.
“Yes, they did. Above and beyond the call of duty, in my opinion.”
The plot would likely never have been uncovered if not for some patient monitoring of a suspected terrorist safe house by the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, Germany’s domestic intelligence group in Cologne. Two months earlier, they caught three of the conspirators on tape discussing the target locations. Prior to this, the CIA hadn’t even been aware of the cell’s presence in Europe or America.
“I will make sure that’s mentioned in the next press briefing,” the chief of staff announced, “but I will also let them know that your people made the arrests. The agency will get full credit.”
“We appreciate that,” Vallick said. “Is there anything else?”
Rydell said, “No, that’s it.”
Everyone rose. The director came around, waited for the others to leave, then put his hand out. “Thank you, Freddie. Excellent work.”
“My pleasure.”
“Seventy-four and still blowing steam out the stack. Incredible.”
Rydell smiled. He had known the director since the mideighties, when Vallick was still a field agent building files on Unabomber types.
“Not as much steam as I used to,” Rydell pointed out. “And none at all come this time next year.”
“When’s your last day?”
“In four months, give or take a week.”
The director smiled warmly and crossed his arms. “And you’re still heading for the Keys?”
“Yes.”
“White shoes, leisure suits, shuffleboard, that kind of thing?”
“I’m thinking more along the lines of fishing, reading, and finally learning how to cook.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad. Are you feeling the workload growing smaller? Less weight on your shoulders?”
Rydell laughed. “Not one bit. I keep promising myself to scale back. But that never seems to happen.”
With a dismissive wave, his boss said, “You love it. You’ll always love it.”
“Probably.”
“Within weeks you’ll be wishing you’d never left.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that.” They cackled like crows at this bit of comedy.
The director walked back to his chair but stopped before sitting down.
“You know, it could just as easily have been you behind this desk. About a half-dozen times over the years.”
Rydell’s smile didn’t vanish, but it changed into one colored less by humor and more by soulful reflection. “Perhaps, Pete. I don’t know. . . . I’m just not a spotlight type of guy. Putting up with the media nonsense. Look at all the noise you have to deal with.”
“A royal pain to be sure.”
“I wanted to serve the agency without distractions like that.” Rydell brightened again. “Just serve, you know?”
“Sure, of course. And you’ve done that amazingly well.”
“A lot of people have served this government honorably.”
“But not too many for more than half a century.”
“No, I guess not.”
The director waited for his guest to say something else but didn’t appear surprised when he didn’t. Rydell, who was barely known to the rest of the world but was an icon within the intelligence community, had never been one to let his words runneth over.
“Okay, old friend,” the boss said finally, “get back to your glorious retirement plans, and let me get back to my first heart attack.”
“You mean you haven’t had one yet?”
“Out.”
Rydell arrived back at his office ten minutes later. His secretary, an efficient woman of fifty-four who’d been with him since the first President Bush, held up a pile of phone messages. She also gave him a beaming smile.
“Thank you so much for your thoughtfulness,” she said, nodding toward a crystal vase with a pink ribbon tied around its midsection and an explosion of spring flowers out the top.
Taking the messages, Rydell said, “Oh, of course, Theresa. I’m just sorry Greg can’t be here to share them with you.”
Her husband, a career infantry officer, had been killed by a sniper in the Gulf War during a routine patrol. The grim irony was he had less than two weeks before he was due back in the States. Today would have been their thirty-third anniversary. She had never taken her wedding ring off, and she kept her husband’s service photo in a large frame on her desk.
Turning to it now, she said, “He did like flowers. He certainly would’ve liked these. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. If you need me, I’ll be inside.”
He closed his office door gently, tossed the briefing file on a table, and got behind his computer. His in-box was overflowing, as usual. He scrolled through the list rapidly, giving the subject lines a cursory scan. Most messages were ignorable, destined for the recycle bin unread. Half had the red “Important” flag. Everyone thinks their problem is priority one, he thought. Even those messages of genuine concern, he had come to realize, wouldn’t prevent the world from rotating if disregarded. It made him think back to his early days in the agency, when he was fueled by the mortal conviction that every little thing mattered, that the world truly would stop spinning if every agency employee didn’t run at full throttle all the time. What devotion, he remembered. What fanatic, maniacal devotion.
His focus drifted away from the e-mails and further into the past. These sentimental journeys had become more frequent in recent months. He was well aware of the habit but never made any attempt to coax his concentration back. The simple fact was he was gradually unplugging himself from the job. It was perfectly normal, he had decided, to become nostalgic about the beginning when one was so close to the end. And there had been nothing wrong with his gung ho approach during those formative years. The agency needed boys like that. He’d caught the attention of the intelligence gods, and he’d wanted them to know that his dedication was absolute. Opportunities had arisen with gratifying regularity, and he had gone to great pains to cultivate the right image and reputation. He’d made as few enemies as possible, steered clear of controversy, and become known as a man of quiet, competent reliability. His rise had continued unabated until, in 1988, he was named assistant deputy director. Then, he decided, he would go no further. He had been offered the top jo
b on five separate occasions in the years that followed, and he had declined each time with appropriate grace and etiquette. His formal explanations always seemed sound, even noble—he did not crave the spotlight, did not want to deal with the media, did not cherish the thought of stepping onto the political battlefield that was home to all who were vested with such awesome power.
His true reasoning, however, was never revealed.
He did not want anyone watching him too closely.
As third in command, he knew he could still wield a fair share of power while remaining invisible. It was true that all of Washington’s elite would have his number in their digital Rolodexes, but few beyond the Beltway would even know his name. One average citizen in a hundred might be able to identify the director; one in a thousand knew the guy right behind him. The number three man, though, was basically a nobody. That kind of anonymity meant no Meet the Press appearances, no tabloid pictures of him walking to his car, no editorials cooking him alive to satisfy the public’s voyeuristic gluttony.
And it also meant he could get away with things. Rydell’s list of transgressions—ranging from thinly legal to outright criminal—was extensive. Some were carried out in the good name of the agency and the American government. Others, however, had been personal. Those were the ones he found most gratifying. By the midpoint of his career, the holy line of moral demarcation had been blurred out of existence, and he found this liberating.
A tiny smile appeared on his lips, and his thoughts shifted from the past to the future. There was the new house in the Keys, a little Cape by the channel with the Boston Whaler 255 Conquest moored outside. Three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a garage, and a patio with an inground barbecue. Reasonable, modest, humble. The kind of retirement home that would draw no attention, raise no eyebrows. He had already invited some of the agency boys down, held a housewarming party and a handful of poker games. He got to know a few of the neighbors, too. Again, cultivating a certain image, striking just the right note. He even went to pains to mention the down payment on the boat and grumble about the local taxes.
But it was all a ruse. Because Frederick Rydell was sitting on millions that no one knew about.