11
“See how she paints herself for him!” said Archimedes Hammett with a puritanical grimace. In his hand he held an enlarged photograph of Zarah Christopher, applying lipstick as she sat in the backseat of the taxicab. Sturdi had snapped this picture, among several others, with her pedometer camera. She was an excellent photographer—in fact she was good with every sort of technology, despite her deep-seated hatred of it as a symbol of imperialism—and the print was clear but grainy. Zarah was staring into a hand mirror with the self-absorbed rictus of a woman touching up her makeup.
“Did she see you?” Hammett demanded anxiously.
“Certainly not—at least not what I was really doing,” said Sturdi. “That look in her eyes is a trick of the light, a reflection from her compact.”
Hammett’s suspicions were not allayed by this explanation. “You’d better be sure about that,” he said. “This is a bad person; it’s in her blood.”
“Archimedes, if she had spotted me I’d know it.”
Hammett paid no attention. He was absorbed in examining the shots of Mallory and Zarah as they greeted each other. They appeared in the eight-by-ten-inch glossies as mere silhouettes behind the shimmering screen of the plate-glass wall. “Yes, yes,” he said happily. “There’s definitely something going on between those two. But look at this guy in the foreground. He’s identifying you. Sturdi, you got too close.”
At this, Sturdi’s face pinkened. “There’s no such thing as getting too close if you get the job done,” she said. “I think I’ve proved that.”
“Oh, yeah?” Still staring at the photographs, Hammett grunted. “Somebody must have taught Lady Zed the same rule, from the look of this rendezvous with the Führer,” he said. “You’re sure she came to this assignation straight from the White House? She talked to no one else en route?”
“She talked to no one but the driver. They were awfully friendly.”
“They were? What did they say to each other?”
“I don’t know. They spoke Arabic.”
“Then we’ll never know.”
Sturdi smiled triumphantly. “Oh, no?” she said. “What if I was close enough to get it on a chip?”
She held up her tiny recorder, an advanced solid-state device that captured sound on a microchip instead of tape, making it possible to play it back into a computer’s memory at speeds many thousands of times faster than human speech. Or at its natural speed, as you chose.
“Okay,” Hammett said. “Play it back. At least we’ll get the flavor.”
Sturdi held up her recorder and switched it on. Slim, who had been preparing dinner, came into the room carrying a tray. On the tape Zarah’s voice said, “Shahda: l ilha ili Llh”
Hammett said, “What does that mean, I wonder?”
Slim said, “It means ‘There is no God but God.’ ”
Hammett said, “How do you know?”
Slim put down the tray. “I learned a little Arabic from a friend after college.”
Hammett said, “Oh, where exactly was that?”
As though she had not heard the question, Slim continued, “This woman really speaks the language, but with a Maghrebi accent. Play it again.” Sturdi did so. Slim said, “Listen to her pronounce the open long a before the L in ‘Llh.’ The name of God is the only word in all of Arabic in which the I is hard-palate like that. Not one foreigner in a million can say it correctly.”
“Very impressive,” Hammett said. “Why didn’t you ever tell me you speak Arabic?”
Slim smiled a surreptitious female smile. “A girl has to have some secrets,” she said.
“A girl?” parroted Sturdi, enforcing terminological discipline.
“I was still a girl then.”
“Well, we’re all grown-ups now,” Hammett said. “You could have saved me, not to mention the Cause, a fortune in translators’ fees. I do have a few Arabic-speaking clients, you know.”
“I’m not that good,” Slim said. “All I really know is bed Arabic.”
Sturdi flushed; she did not like to be reminded that Slim had had other lovers before her—even men, before she gave up heterosexual sex after the outbreak of the AIDS epidemic so she could go on handling Hammett’s food.
“So what does the fact that this woman can pronounce her Is in Arabic tell us about her?” Hammett asked.
Slim said, “It tells us that she may really be dangerous.” She listened intently to the recorded exchange between Zarah and the taxi driver. “They’re talking commonplaces in this recording, but professionals always do, in case a hostile agent overhears them. Who knows what these clichés in Arabic might mean? She already knows things she ought not to know. And look at the way she’s shuttling between Lockwood and Mallory.”
Hammett said, “This is a real baddy. Keep on her.”
“You mean, like close?”
Sturdi’s tone was teasing. She was asking for positive reinforcement, and Hammett gave it to her. “As close as you think necessary and wise, but remember what you’re up against,” he said with concern in his voice. “Sturdevant, this is wonderful work. Only you could have done it. But remember, this female is no sorority sister; she comes from the Dark Side for generations and generations. The Christophers are worse, much worse, than Mallory and his torpedoes, so don’t make me worry. Be careful.”
“Don’t worry,” Sturdi replied. “I always have been.”
“Then scoot,” Hammett said indulgently. “I have miles to go before I sleep.”
Sturdi asked him no questions; she had too much discipline for that. Actually, she was glad enough to be sent away early. She had to drive home to the farm in Connecticut that night to prepare Hammett’s food for the following week and then bring it back to Washington in the Volvo. She would be traveling alone; Slim was staying in Washington for the weekend, doing a job for Hammett. Gathering up the photographs of Zarah, Sturdi was just as glad; the flat images recalled the flesh-and-blood woman, and she did not want to fantasize while in bed with Slim, the person to whom she had made a commitment. But Slim’s remark about learning Arabic in bed with a man still stung. Sturdi knew all too well that she herself was only human, and she was not sure she could control the sexual truant that had been let loose in her mind today.
12
After Sturdi left, Hammett telephoned Ross Macalaster. As was his habit, he did not identify himself or even say hello. His first words were “How well do you know the Speaker of the House?”
Macalaster’s voice was thick with sleep. “I know him. Why?”
Hammett said, “For years I’ve heard really bizarre stuff about Attenborough—that he’s a racist and a drunk, that he’s a compulsive ass-grabber. Now I hear he’s in deep with the religious right. Is there any truth to any of that?”
“All true. He’s even memorized the Bible.” Macalaster paused; Hammett could hear him drinking water; he must keep a glass beside the bed in case he awoke dehydrated by alcohol. In a more normal voice Macalaster replied, “Why do you ask?”
“Because I’d like to meet him.”
“Would that be proper, Mr. Chief Justice, given the impending impeachment trial and your role in it?”
Hammett permitted a tiny silence to gather before replying, to let Macalaster know that he had noted this indiscreet use of his title over the telephone and disapproved of it. Then he said, “At a social occasion, what would be improper about it? I thought maybe you could have us over to your place together.”
“Like before, as an agent of history? I’m not really in that business, you know.”
“I never would have guessed from the stuff you’ve been writing in the newspapers lately. But that was a wonderful party. That was the night I met that lovely Valkyrie.”
“Who?”
“That Christopher woman. Can’t get her out of my mind. Only this time I’d like to bring my own date.”
Macalaster guffawed. “A date? You?”
Hammett ignored this. “I mean our mutual friend Slim, if she
’s forgiven for the séance. Is she?”
“If she doesn’t entrap my kid into another one.”
“That won’t happen. She can drive me over and bring my food. I was hungry last time.”
“All right, but just her. Two vestal virgins are one too many.”
Hammett put a note of pleasure into his reply. “Then you’ll do it. When?”
“That depends on Attenborough; he may turn down the invitation. But I’ll let you know. Is that all you wanted?”
“That’s it for now. But I may have something for you by the time we meet.”
“Oh? What?”
“Something to your advantage. I may be locked up in this marble sarcophagus now, but sometimes I get a message from the outside world.”
“What kind of message?”
Curiosity again. Hammett smiled. “By the way,” he said, “did you ever identify the mysterious stranger you ran into in the men’s room on Inauguration Day?”
“No. Is that what you have for me—a clue?”
Hammett chuckled. “Just asking. I never go into public toilets.”
Macalaster was silent. “Good night,” he said at last.
“Oh, by the way,” Hammett said.
“Archimedes, good night. It’s three in the morning.”
Hammett said, “Then go back to sleep. And Ross?” Macalaster grunted. Hammett said, “If you want to invite the Valkyrie, go ahead. Don’t mind me.”
“I’ll call Attenborough in the morning,” Macalaster said in a tone of finality, “and the girl of your dreams.”
13
In the den of his house in Alexandria, R. Tucker Attenborough, Jr., decided to have a drink of vodka while waiting for Sam Clark to arrive with Lockwood’s lawyers. He thought he knew what the lawyers wanted, and he wasn’t at all sure that it lay in his power—or in Clark’s either—to give it to them. The Congress of the United States wasn’t what it used to be when Attenborough, Clark, and Lockwood were young and the two great political parties wanted to do the same things in slightly different ways and always found a way to make things happen. Now everybody behaved like a bunch of damn Frenchmen, each and every one of them wanting to have his own way and to hell with the Constitution, the country, the party, and most of all the idea of civilized behavior.
Attenborough finished his drink, went into the downstairs bathroom, where he kept his vodka in a plastic spring water bottle submerged in the toilet tank, and carefully washed the glass in soap and water to remove the odor of spirits. The face he saw in the mirror looked strange to him and somehow not his own, but alcohol often had that effect. He winked sardonically at the little fellow in the mirror, whom he recognized as the little fellow inside himself; the reflection winked right back. “You look a little green, my friend,” Attenborough said. His image shrugged as if to say, You’re right, but what the hell. As a matter of fact, his skin did look slightly green. He leaned closer. The actual color was more of a yellow; his eyeballs were yellow too, but that had been so for a long time; he chalked it up to malaria, contracted many years before on a fact-finding mission to the Philippines.
When Attenborough emerged into the living room, the doorbell was ringing. When he opened the door, his heart sank. There, side by side with Olmedo, stood Norman Carlisle Blackstone. The son of a bitch was wearing a derby hat. Attenborough was not sure that he could get through a briefing by this fellow, and made reckless by eight ounces of hundred-proof vodka drunk at room temperature, he might have said so—or at least commented on the derby—if at that exact moment Sam Clark had not appeared on the doorstep. So instead of hurting Blackstone’s feelings with a wisecrack, as he had on other occasions, he said, “Howdy, folks. Come right in and grab a chair.” His tone was hearty, but Blackstone, no fool, smiled uncomfortably. He knew well enough that he annoyed the Speaker as much as he bored the President.
“Sorry to be late,” Blackstone said. “My fault entirely.”
They were ten minutes behind schedule. To avoid being observed, the two lawyers had driven across the river in Blackstone’s small, uncomfortable car. He was a tyro driver and an inattentive one; he had spent his life up to now riding in taxicabs and the New York subway, in which the trick of survival was to absent the mind until it was time to get off at your destination. Half-lost for the entire journey through the unfamiliar city with its bewildering traffic circles and illogical diagonal avenues, he had taken several wrong turns before finally finding Attenborough’s house, a modest ranch house, located in a cul-de-sac among others exactly like it.
Attenborough waved off Blackstone’s apologies. “Every Yankee except U. S. Grant has always got lost as soon as they cross the bridges into Virginia,” he said. “How’s the President?”
Blackstone said, “Bearing up, Mr. Speaker. He’s asked us to fill you and the Majority Leader in on certain developments.”
“Shoot.” Attenborough did not offer them a drink; except for his vodka, replenished daily, he kept no liquor in the house, believing that the omission created the impression that he was abstemious, if not a teetotaler.
Blackstone began; as Attenborough had feared and expected, it was slow going. The briefing covered every last detail of Horace Hubbard’s statement to Olmedo, with one omission—the Ibn Awad affair. Olmedo, who had been intently studying the reactions of Clark and Attenborough to Blackstone’s words, had the impression that the two men were fearful that they would be told something they did not want to hear. When at last Blackstone stopped talking, they both relaxed in what Olmedo took to be relief.
Clark said, “What exactly does Horace Hubbard mean by ‘immunity’?”
Blackstone consulted his yellow tablet. “Total immunity from prosecution for any criminal offense that either Julian Hubbard or Rose MacKenzie may have committed as a result of any action connected in any way to any articles of impeachment that may be brought against President Lockwood.”
“Any article of impeachment?”
“Yes, sir. He made that quite clear.”
Attenborough said, “In other words, he and his brother and his mistress have destroyed Lockwood and his party and maybe the institution of the presidency; but they don’t want to be inconvenienced in any way as a consequence?”
Olmedo looked from one grim face to another. “That’s a fair assessment,” he said, “but the truth of the matter is that it’s an interesting offer. The way Hubbard looks at it, it should be irresistible. He’ll clear up the doubts surrounding the outcome of the presidential election, exonerate the President, and give your party a chance to redeem itself before the world. He will also let himself be disgraced in the most public possible way and go to jail for the rest of his life, if necessary. All he asks in return is immunity for the two people he says he led into temptation.”
“That’s what he’s asking,” Clark said. “Will he take less?”
“Where his brother and the woman are concerned,” Olmedo said, “I think not.”
“We’re supposed to just let the pair of them go?”
“Whatever you do, both will be ruined, their professional lives over.”
“Julian has money.”
Olmedo wagged his head. “No, sir, he does not.”
“You know that for a fact, Counselor?”
“We’ve looked into the matter. His father spent the last of the Hubbard fortune before he died a couple of years ago. He has what he earns, his house, and a few heirlooms, a valuable painting or two, that’s all. The MacKenzie woman has literally nothing; the government would have to pay for her defense. Sparing them prison, which is what Horace is asking, seems a reasonable price to pay for testimony that will help the President in such a unique and vital way.”
Clark pointed a forefinger. “Getting Lockwood off the hook is not the only question here, Counselor.”
“How right you are, Senator,” Olmedo said. “The President is innocent of any corruption of the electoral process. My objective—my only objective—is to establish that fact before the worl
d.”
“And you’re willing to buy testimony to accomplish this?”
Olmedo smiled coldly. “ ‘Buy testimony’? No. Bargain for it in the interests of the truth, with all that means to justice in this case and to the future of our country, yes. What does the punishment of two foolish people mean in comparison with that? Julian and Rose are not going to get away with anything, Senator; they may escape jail, but they cannot escape retribution. Horace Hubbard can testify to the facts. Without him, the truth may never be established, and if that happens, history will be corrupted.”
Clark stared for a while into the middle distance. Then he said, “That would certainly be a terrible outcome. But I’ve got news for you, and for Horace Hubbard. He should have presented his demands to the Lord God, because He’s the only one who has the power to grant his prayer.”
Olmedo glanced in Attenborough’s direction. The Speaker, sitting bolt upright, was sound asleep. This did not seem to surprise Clark in the least. “Then it’s unanimous,” he said. “I mean, you’d better get rid of the idea that either one of us, or anyone else in this day and age, can appeal to the general interest, to patriotism or common sense, and achieve a result that’s in the best interests of the country.”
Olmedo listened without expression. He was not surprised to hear these words spoken; even Lockwood seemed to hold the same sour opinion of the government. He wondered why these men wanted to occupy offices for which they seemed to feel such contempt.
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