by Tom Clancy
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“Maybe they can make some sense out of it. Andrea?”
“Yes, Mr. President?”
“Tell the driver it’s time to get moving.” He looked around. “Where’s Arnie?”
“I’M CALLING YOU on a cellular,” Plumber said.
“Fine,” van Damm replied. “I’m on one, too, as a matter of fact.” The instruments on the aircraft were also secure, with STU-4 capability. He didn’t say that. He just needed a retort. John Plumber was no longer on his Christmas card list. Unfortunately, his direct line was still on Plumber’s Rolodex. What a shame he couldn’t change it. And he’d have to tell his secretary not to put this guy through anymore, at least not when he was traveling.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
“Good, John. Then I don’t have to say what I think.”
“Catch the broadcast tonight. I’ll be on at the end.”
“Why?”
“See for yourself, Arnie. So long.”
The chief of staff thumbed the kill switch on the phone and wondered what Plumber meant. He’d once trusted the man. Hell, he’d once trusted the man’s colleague. He could have told the President about the call, but decided not to. He’d just delivered a pretty good speech, distractions and all, doing well in spite of himself, because the poor son of a bitch really did believe in more than he knew. It wouldn’t be smart to drop something else on him. They’d tape the speech on the flight into California, and if it were fit to view, then he’d show it to POTUS.
“I DIDN’T KNOW there was a flu bug around,” he said, putting his shirt back on. It took time. The auto executive was sore all over.
“There always is. Just it doesn’t always make the news,” the physician replied, looking over the vital signs his nurse had just written down. “And you got it.”
“So?”
“So, take it easy. Don’t go to the office. No sense infecting your whole company. Ride it out. You should be fine by the end of the week.”
THE SNIE TEAM met at Langley. A ton of new information had come across from the Persian Gulf region, and they were sorting through it in a conference room on the sixth floor. Chavez’s photo of Mahmoud Haji Daryaei had been blown up by the in-house photo lab and was now hanging on the wall. Maybe somebody would throw darts at it, Ding thought.
“Track toads,” the former infantryman snorted, watching the Predator video.
“Kinda big to take on with a rifle, Sundance,” Clark observed. “Those things always scared the hell out of me.”
“LAWS rocket’ll do ’em fine, Mr. C.”
“What’s the range on a LAWS, Domingo?”
“Four, five hundred meters.”
“Those guns shoot two or three kilometers,” John pointed out. “Think about it.”
“I’m not up on the hardware,” Bert Vasco said. He waved at the screen. “What’s this mean?”
The answer came from one of CIA’s military analysts. “It means the UIR military is in much better shape than we’d expected.”
An Army major brought over from the Defense Intelligence Agency didn’t dispute that. “I’m fairly impressed. It was a pretty vanilla exercise, nothing really complicated on the maneuver side, but they kept themselves organized for all of it. Nobody got lost—”
“You suppose they’re using GPS now?” the CIA analyst asked.
“Anybody who subscribes to Yachting magazine can buy the things. The price is down to four hundred bucks, last time I looked,” the officer told his civilian counterpart. “It means they can navigate their mobile forces a lot better. More than that, it means their artillery will become a whole lot more effective. If you know where your guns are, where your forward observer is, and where the target is in relation to him, then your first round is going to be pretty much on the money.”
“Fourfold increase in performance?”
“Easy,” the major replied. “That elderly gent on the wall has a big stick to wave at his neighbors. I imagine he’ll let them know about it, too.”
“Bert?” Clark asked.
Vasco squirmed in his seat. “I’m starting to worry. This is going faster than I expected. If Daryaei didn’t have other things to worry about, I’d be more worried.”
“Like?” Chavez asked.
“Like he has a country to consolidate, and he has to know that if he starts rattling sabers, we’ll react.” The FSO paused. “Sure as hell, he wants to let his neighbors know who the big boy on the block is. How close is he to being able to do something?”
“Militarily?” the civilian analyst asked. He gestured to the guy from DIA.
“If we were not in the picture, now. But we are in the picture.”
“I ASK NOW that you will join me in a moment of silence,” Ryan told the audience in Topeka. It was eleven here. That made it noon back home. Next stop Colorado Springs, then Sacramento, then, blessedly, home.
“YOU HAVE TO ask yourself what kind of man we have here,” Kealty said in front of cameras of his own. “Five men and women dead, and he doesn’t see the need for a law to control these guns. It’s just beyond my comprehension how anyone can be as coldly heartless as that. Well, if he doesn’t care about those brave agents, I do. How many Americans will have to die before he sees the need for this? Will he have to actually lose a family member? I’m sorry, I just can’t believe that remark,” the politician went on for the minicam.
“WE CAN ALL remember when people ran for reelection to Congress, and one of the things they told us was, ‘Vote for me, because for every dollar that taxes take from this district, a dollar-twenty comes back.’ Do you remember those claims?” the President asked.
“What they didn’t say was—well, it was actually a lot of things. Number one, who ever said that you depend on the government for money? We don’t vote for Santa Claus, do we? It’s the other way around. The government can’t exist unless you give it money.
“Number two, are they telling you, ‘Vote for me, ’cause I really stick it to those rotten people in North Dakota’? Aren’t they Americans, too?
“Number three, the real reason this happens is that the government deficit means every district gets more in federal payments than it lost in federal taxes—excuse me, I mean direct federal taxes. The ones you can see.
“So they were bragging to you that they were spending more money than they had. If your next-door neighbor told you he was kiting checks drafted on your personal bank, you think maybe you might call the police about it?
“We all know that the government does take more than it gives back. They’ve just learned to hide it. The federal budget deficit means that every time you borrow money, it costs more than it should—why? Because the government borrows so much money that it drives up interest rates.
“And so, ladies and gentlemen, every house payment, every car payment, every credit-card bill is also a tax. And maybe they give you a tax break on interest payments. Isn’t that nice?” POTUS asked. “Your government gives you a tax break on money you ought not to have to pay in the first place, and then it tells you that you get back more than you pay out.” Ryan paused.
“Does anybody out there really believe that? Does anybody really believe it when people say that the United States can’t afford—not to spend more money than it has? Are these the words of Adam Smith or Lucy Ricardo? I have a degree in economics, and I Love Lucy wasn’t on the course.
“Ladies and gentlemen. I am not a politician, and I am not here to speak on behalf of any of your local candidates for the vacant seats in the People’s House. I am here to ask you to think. You, too, have a duty. The government belongs to you. You don’t belong to it. When you go out to vote tomorrow, please take the time to think about what the candidates say and what they stand for. Ask yourself, ‘Does this make sense?’ and then make the best choice you can—and if you don’t like any of them, go to the polls anyway, go into the voting booth, and then go home without giving your vote to anyone, but at least show up
. You owe that to your country.”
THE HEATING AND air-conditioning van pulled up the driveway, and a pair of men got out and walked up to the porch. One of them knocked.
“Yes?” the lady of the house asked in puzzlement.
“FBI, Mrs. Sminton.” He showed his credentials. “Could we come in, please?”
“Why?” the sixty-two-year-old widow asked.
“We’d like you to help us with something, if you might.” It had taken longer than expected. The guns used in the SANDBOX case had been traced to a manufacturer, from the manufacturer to a wholesaler, from the wholesaler to a dealer, and from the dealer to a name, and from a name to an address. With the address, the Bureau and Secret Service had gone to a United States District Court judge for a search-and-seizure warrant.
“Please come in.”
“Thank you. Mrs. Sminton, do you know the gentleman who lives next door?”
“Mr. Azir, you mean?”
“That’s right.”
“Not very well. Sometimes I wave.”
“Do you know if he’s home now?”
“His car’s not there,” she replied, after looking. The agents already knew that. He owned a blue Oldsmobile wagon with Maryland tags. Every cop in two hundred miles was looking for it.
“Do you know when the last time was you saw him?”
“Friday, I guess. There were some other cars there, and a truck.”
“Okay.” The agent reached in his coveralls pocket and pulled out a radio. “Move in, move in. Bird is probably—say again, probably—out of the coop.”
Before the widow’s astonished eyes, a helicopter appeared directly over the house three hundred yards away. Zip lines dropped from both sides, and armed agents slid down them. At the same time, four vehicles converged from both directions on the country road, all of them driving off the road, onto the wide lawn straight toward the dwelling. Ordinarily, things would have gone slower, with some period of discreet surveillance, but the word was out on this one. Front and back doors were kicked in—and thirty seconds later, a siren went off. Mr. Azir, it seemed, had a burglar alarm. Then the radio crackled.
“Clear, building is clear. This is Betz. Search complete, building is clear. Bring in the lab troops.” With that, two vans appeared. These proceeded up the driveway, and one of the first things the passengers did was to take samples of the gravel there, plus grass, to match with scrapings from the rented cars left at Giant Steps.
“Mrs. Sminton, could we sit down, please? There are a couple questions we’d like to ask you about Mr. Azir.”
“SO?” MURRAY ASKED, arriving in the FBI Command Center.
“No joy,” the agent at the console said.
“Damn.” It wasn’t said with passion. He’d never really expected it. But he expected some important information anyway. The Lab had collected all manner of physical evidence. Gravel samples could match the driveway. Grass and dirt found on the inside of fenders and bumpers could link the vehicles to the Azir house. Carpet fibers—maroon wool—on the shoes of the dead terrorists could put them inside the house. Even now, a team of ten agents was beginning the process of discovering exactly who “Mordecai Azir” was. Smart money was that he was about as Jewish as Adolf Eichmann. Nobody was covering that wager.
“Commander Center, this is Betz.” Billy Betz was assistant special agent in charge of the Baltimore Field Division, and a former HRT shooter, hence his dramatic descent from the helicopter, leading his men ... and a woman.
“Billy, this is Dan Murray. What do you have?”
“Would you believe it? A half—empty crate of seven-six-two ball ammo, and the lot numbers match, Director. Living room has a dark red wool rug. This is our place. Some clothes missing from the master-bedroom closet. I’d say nobody’s been here for a couple of days. Location is secure. No booby traps. The lab troops are starting their routine.” And all eighty minutes from the time the Baltimore SAC had walked into the Garmatz Federal Courthouse. Not fast enough, but fast.
The forensics experts were a mix of Bureau, Service, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, a troubled agency whose technical staff was nonetheless excellent. They’d all be shaking the house for hours. Everyone wore gloves. Every surface would be dusted for fingerprints to match with those of the dead terrorists.
“SOME WEEKS AGO you saw me take an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. That’s the second time I did that. The first time was as a brand-new Marine second lieutenant, when I graduated from Boston College. Right after that, I read the Constitution, to make sure I knew what it was that I was supposed to be defending.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we often hear politicians saying how they want government to empower you, so that you can do things.
“That’s not the way it is,” Ryan told them forcefully. “Thomas Jefferson wrote that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. That’s you. The Constitution is something you should all read. The Constitution of the United States was not written to tell you what to do. The Constitution establishes the relationship among the three branches of government. It tells the government what it may do, and it also tells the government what it may not do. The government may not restrict your speech. The government may not tell you how to pray. The government may not do a lot of things. Government is a lot better at taking things away than it is at giving, but most of all, the government does not empower you. You empower the government. Ours is a government of the people. You are not people who belong to the government.
“Tomorrow you will not be electing masters, you will be choosing employees, servants of your will, guardians of your rights. We do not tell you what to do. You tell us what to do.
“It is not my job to take your money and give it back. It is my job to take what money I must have to protect and serve you—and to do that job as efficiently as possible. Government service may be an important duty, and a great responsibility, but it is not supposed to be a blessing for those who serve. It is your government servants who are supposed to sacrifice for you, not you who sacrifice for them.
“Last Friday, three good men and two good women lost their lives in the service of our country. They were there to protect my daughter, Katie. But there were other children there, too, and in protecting one child, you protect all children. People like that do not ask for much more than your respect. They deserve that. They deserve it because they do things that we cannot easily do for ourselves. That’s why we hire them. They sign on because they know that service is important, because they care about us, because they are us. You and I know that not all government employees are like that. That’s not their fault. That’s your fault. If you do not demand the best, you will not get the best. If you do not give the right measure of power to the right kind of people, then the wrong people will take more power than they need and they will use it the way they want, not the way you want.
“Ladies and gentlemen, that’s why your duty tomorrow to elect the right people to serve you is so important. Many of you operate your own businesses and you hire people to work for you. Most of you own your own homes, and sometimes you hire plumbers, electricians, carpenters to do work for you. You try to hire the right people for the work because you pay for that work, and you want it done right. When your child is sick, you try to pick the best physician—and you pay attention to what that doctor does and how well he or she does it. Why? Because there is nothing more important to you than the life of your child.
“America is also your child. America is a country forever young. America needs the right people to look after her. It is your job to pick the right people, regardless of party, or race, or gender, or anything other than talent and integrity. I can’t and I won’t tell you which candidate merits your vote. God gave you a free will. The Constitution is there to protect your right to exercise that will. If you fail to exercise your will intelligently, then you have betrayed yourselves, and neither I nor anyone else can fix that
for you.
“Thank you for coming to see me on my first visit to Colorado Springs. Tomorrow is your day. Please use it to hire the right people.”
“IN A SERIES OF speeches clearly designed to reach conservative voters, President Ryan is stumping the country on the eve of the House elections, but even as federal officials investigate the vicious terrorist attack on his own daughter, the President flatly rejected the idea of improved gun-control laws. We have this report from NBC correspondent Hank Roberts, traveling with the presidential party today.” Tom Donner continued looking into the camera until the red light went off.
“I thought he said some pretty good things today,” Plumber observed while the tape ran.
“Invoking I Love Lucy must have come from Callie Weston on a serious PMS day,” Donner observed, flipping through his copy. “Funny, she used to do great speeches for Bob Fowler.”
“Did you read the speech?”
“John, come on, we don’t have to read what he says. We know what he’s going to say.”
“Ten seconds,” the director called over their earpieces.
“Nice copy for later, by the way, John.” The face broke into the smile at “three.”
“A huge federal task force is now investigating Friday’s attack on the President’s daughter. We have this report from Karen Stabler in Washington.”
“I thought you’d like it, Tom,” Plumber replied, when the light went dark again. So much the better, he thought. His conscience was clear now.
THE VC-25 LIFTED off on time, and headed north to avoid some adverse weather over northern New Mexico. Arnie van Damm was topside in the communications area. There were enough important-looking boxes to run half the world here, or so it seemed, and hidden in the skin of the aircraft was a satellite dish whose expensive aiming system could track almost anything. At the chief of staff’s direction, it was now getting the NBC feed off a Hughes bird.