By Order of the President

by Kilian, Michael;

  “He reacted much like you did, Mr. Ambassador. It seemed to confirm his own suspicions, or findings. He was very interested in detail.”

  “Did he keep your material?”

  “Yes. You’ve been looking at a set of copies. I’ve another set as well. Hidden.”

  The ambassador stroked his chin, which was beginning to darken with the need for a shave. “Yes. Very prudent. Now, Mr. Dresden. Did he mention anything with a time element in it? Something that must happen or might happen within the next few weeks—within the month of January?”

  “No, sir. There was some talk among others in the room about the Twenty-fifth Amendment, but he hushed that up.”

  “The transfer of presidential powers amendment. Yes. We’ve been studying that. But he made no specific reference to any forthcoming event within the next thirty days or so?”

  “No.”

  “Did he ask you any more technical questions?”

  “Yes. He wanted to know if it was possible to reproduce the president’s voice without using a mimic—if one could lift words and phrases from the president’s past recorded remarks and speeches and dub them onto videotape footage of him speaking. I told him it could certainly be done but that to do it properly was a very elaborate procedure.”

  “Did he ask how long it might take?”

  “Yes. I said a television network would have the resources to put together something airable within a few days, but that it would take longer for anyone else, even a fair-sized production company.”

  “A matter of weeks.”

  “A few weeks. Maybe two.”

  “Hmmmm.” The ambassador rose and poured brandy for everyone, though not for himself. “I should explain to you our most immediate concerns, Mr. Dresden. They’re of some significance. The first, of course, is NATO. The first is always NATO.”

  He seated himself again, looking into the fire. “There really isn’t any danger of war, I shouldn’t think. There can’t be that, because the instant you have shooting on the Rhine you have theater nuclear conflict, and then there is no Europe, no NATO, no Warsaw Pact. But there’s always nervousness, nevertheless. And the discovery that the United States has no president is not going to help.

  “Our more immediate concern is Central America and the Caribbean. As you know, we have military forces in Belize and are extremely concerned about the stability of the region, particularly vis à vis Guatemala. His Majesty’s Government has been a strong supporter of the Contadora process and, until a few weeks ago, thought we’d brought your administration around on that question. Now we’re told—by every intelligence source we have in the region, mind—including your good friends in Costa Rica and Panama—to expect an outbreak of all-out war there by the end of January.

  “By ‘war,’ Charles,” said Thompson, pushing his glasses back up the bridge of his long, elfin nose, “the ambassador isn’t referring to this tit-for-tat cross border stuff you chaps have been engaging in the last several years. We’re talking about total engagement, with fighting from the Gulf of Panama all the way to bloody Chiapas—U.S. forces certainly engaged and likely Soviet personnel involved as well.”

  “Our third concern is the most essential,” the ambassador continued. “You are our closest ally, after all, and we’re jolly well interested in who is, or will be, president. If, as you seem to have established, Hampton is dead, Atherton’s succession would have been quite satisfactory. He’s a reasonable sort of chap, well educated, has quite the global view, and has certainly got on well with our people. But from what you tell us of your misadventures out at the beach, directly after your audience with the good Mr. Atherton, well, we’d have to consider the vice president’s role in this under a cloud at the moment, wouldn’t you say, Graham?”

  “A deuced murky black cloud.”

  “Hardly His Majesty’s favorite candidate in the next election, at any rate. That leaves us with the septuagenarian speaker of the House, a New York Irishman whose idea of Anglo-American relations is Brits out of Northern Ireland, and after him, presuming next week’s ceremonial vote seating the new Congress remains pro forma, we have this warhawk philanderer from the South—what’s his name, Graham? Maitland Dubarry?”

  “In the local lingo, ‘Meathead’ Dubarry. Bright but besotted.”

  The man named Llewellyn continued taking rapid notes, though he had likely heard the ambassador run through all this before. Dresden had contributed little to the conversation.

  “So from our point of view,” the ambassador resumed, “your Constitution isn’t working very well at all. If this appalling killing goes on, the succession goes from bad to worse …”

  “To unthinkable,” said Thompson.

  “… unless someone intervenes with a military coup, which may well be what those chaps up at Camp David have in mind.”

  “But the opposite is just as possible,” Thompson said. Dresden wondered how closely he ranked to the ambassador in his unspoken government role. “The Camp David chaps may be trying to prevent a military action.”

  “Quite so,” added the ambassador. “A dust-up in the Caribbean could be used by the vice president and his people to force the imposition of the Twenty-fifth Amendment. Certainly if there was no president about to come forward and deal with it.”

  “‘Whenever the vice president and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the president pro tempore of the Senate and the speaker of the House,’” Thompson read, from a small copy of the U.S. Constitution taken from his pocket, “‘their written declaration that the president is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the vice president shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as acting president.’”

  “I’m not exactly a constitutional scholar,” Dresden said. “And neither is Maddy. You should be discussing all this with someone else.”

  This was not exactly true. He had been thinking many of these same things himself, in the long hours of his enforced detainment, though he had not articulated them so clearly.

  “And so we have,” said Thompson.

  “Discreetly,” said the ambassador. “We just want you to understand the exact nature of our concern, and what we might be up against if we choose to act in this situation. And by ‘we’ I include other members of the alliance.”

  “That’s not to be repeated, Charles,” said Thompson.

  “The only other person I get to talk to is Dr. FitzGerald,” Dresden said, somewhat sarcastically.

  “Yes, of course. But you see why we’re so interested in these reports—and they’ve been numerous and from many quarters—that it’s all to happen in January,” the ambassador said. “Unless they’ve just arbitrarily picked some date, there are only three events of consequence in the month. The first is the opening of the Congress and the election of new officers.”

  “And that doesn’t involve the presidency at all,” Thompson said, “Except that the vice president administers the oath of office to the new senators. Usually in the Old Senate Chambers that they’ve preserved on the Capitol’s ground floor.”

  “Which have always struck me as an ideal setting for an assassination, as a matter of fact,” said the ambassador. “Or some such melodramatic occurrence. But that is to digress. The second consequential event is the formal submission of the president’s budget, but that’s not done in person, and we’re given to understand that this year’s will be largely the same as last year’s, with only a minor change or two.”

  “We’re told there won’t even be a fight over farm price supports.”

  Dresden was tiring of this British loquacity. He thought of asking for another brandy, if only to provide a break in the conversation, if not an end to it.

  “So there’s just one event left,” said the ambassador. “The State of the Union message. No president fails to appear for that. Franklin Roosevelt made his last one in person, and he was virtually o
n his deathbed.”

  “Woodrow Wilson was the last American president not to make an appearance for that speech,” Thompson said, “having been totally incapacitated by a stroke. That incident was in part the inspiration for the Twenty-fifth Amendment.”

  “So you see how our interest rather focuses on this event,” said the ambassador.

  Dresden drained his glass and sat silently, staring at it pointedly. This time it was Thompson who went to refill it.

  “How may I help you gentlemen?” Charley said, after a sip.

  “As this proceeds, I’m sure in a great many ways,” the ambassador said. “But right now, I’d like you to search your memory very carefully. Was there anything the vice president or any of his people said concerning the State of the Union, in any context?”

  “Not that I can remember. Just that background talk about the Twenty-fifth Amendment.”

  “Do you suppose someone might have said something about it to Mrs. Calendiari?”

  “Possibly, but she was with me throughout the entire visit, as far as I can remember.”

  “Her husband doubtless talked to the vice president, though, out of your earshot.”

  “Yes. I’m sure he did when he arranged our appointment. Perhaps on a number of occasions.”

  “And he might have discussed some of what was said with Mrs. Calendiari?” Thompson looked at his watch.

  “Gentlemen,” Dresden said. “Maddy is not feeling at all well. She went to bed early, long before midnight. She’s certainly more than a little depressed. I would strongly suggest that a chat tonight is not in order.” He was beginning to talk like a Britisher himself. Worse, like a diplomat.

  The ambassador sat back in his chair, allowing his massive body to relax into a disorderly slump, his bristly brow sliding over his eyes like a coverlet. His repose was that of a man acting as though he had completed a great job of work.

  “Graham,” he said, without looking at Thompson. “I fear you’ve neglected our guests during my absence. This place is mournful enough to rattle about in at the best of times. Perhaps your dear Pamela could find the time to drop round and cheer up Mrs. Calendiari a little.”

  “They’re old chums, Sir Guy, I’m sure they can find something to do.”

  “We’re having the German ambassador and his wife over for dinner Friday,” the ambassador said, directly to Dresden. “I hope you’ll both be up to joining us. He’s quite an agreeable chap. Spent quite a bit of time in the States; last time as military attaché. You’re of German ancestory yourself, aren’t you?”

  “Prussian,” Dresden said, as the ambassador rose and the others followed suit on cue. “My grandfather was in the German Air Service in the first war. As I fear some of your people had occasion to regret.”

  “Old war, long ago,” said the ambassador, with a pat on Dresden’s back. He paused as they reached the door. “I just want to reiterate, Mr. Dresden, how grateful we are for your help, for this material, for all that you’ve done. We consider you our friend and hope the feeling’s mutual. I’d also like to emphasize that, at the moment, I fear we’re your only friends. It’s really quite dangerous out there for you, for both of you.”

  “So I’ve seen.”

  “By the by, were you able to watch the television tonight? No? Well, there’s been quite a spot of news. The FBI has arrestd Peter Ashley Brookes for complicity in the president’s shooting.”

  “The one who bankrolls all those right-wing causes?”

  “That’s the chap. Charged him with accessory to murder and conspiracy to cross state lines to assault a federal officer—by that, meaning the president.”

  “Did they arrest anyone else?”

  “Not yet. But they’ve identified the ringleader of this right-wing terrorist group La Puño. He’s an American, a mercenary chap called Colonel Barren, Colonel Mason Barren, a protégé of Brookes’s. His name’s been in our files a bit, hasn’t it, Graham? Helped stir up a bit of trouble in Rhodesia during the transition to Mugabe’s Zimbabwe. I gather they’re searching to the ends of the earth for him.”

  24

  Atherton was in the library of the Vice President’s House. As usual, he had told the servants he had reading to do, but they knew that now to be a euphemism for drinking. He sat before the fire, staring with melancholy eyes into the flames, a whiskey in hand, his government papers untouched on a table beside him. He had come back to this house on Christmas night with his daughter, and now spent much of his time here. That he heard his wife’s voice calling to him no longer disturbed him. According to the servants, he sometimes talked back to her.

  “Daddy?” His daughter stood in the doorway.

  “What?”

  “Mr. Shawcross is here, with Mr. Howard and Mr. Copley. Do you want to see them?”

  “No.”

  “Shall I send them away?”

  “No.” He coughed. His health had fallen with his broken spirit. “Give me a few minutes. Then send them in.”

  When she did they entered and stood in a row before him. He waved them to chairs, chiefly to get them out of the way of the fire.

  “Well it’s done,” Shawcross said. “Meathead Dubarry is now officially president pro tem of the Senate. He even got votes from across the aisle. Some people like to rub it in.”

  “Was he there? At the Capitol?”

  “Yes,” said Howard. “But he left immediately after. By helicopter. There was talk about your not being there, especially for the swearing in of the new senators.”

  “Let them talk.”

  “We told them you were ill.”

  Atherton coughed again, and took a draught of whiskey as medicine. “Precisely.”

  “We think we know where they’re keeping Meathead,” Copley said. “Should have looked there in the first place.”

  “Where? Back in Louisiana?”

  “Atlantic City. Close to Camp David. Close to here. Bushy Ambrose has another helicopter war going. We’ve tracked three chopper flights to the Jersey Shore. I don’t think they’re taking blackjack breaks.”

  “You find Dubarry. Find him fast. It’s almost time for the State of the Union.”

  “We’ll find him. But then what?”

  “We can’t have any more public trouble, Larry. We just can’t.”

  “You just find him. Find him fast. Then we’ll decide what to do next.”

  Bushy Ambrose stepped from his Camp David cabin accompanied by White House Communications Director Jerry Greene and two black beret sergeants from the Special Functions Force, armed with fully automatic M-16s with the safeties off. It was a cold day, a fully January day, and all were dressed for the weather, Ambrose even wearing a rabbit fur shapka he had bought in Moscow on a presidential trip. But, at Ambrose’s insistence, the meeting was held outside, standing.

  “I just want to be absolutely, positively sure we’re not overheard or recorded,” Ambrose said.

  Waiting for them, dressed in overcoats, hats, and gloves, were the rest of what remained of the Camp David team: Senator Rollins, the defense secretary, the National Security Adviser, David Callister, Surgeon General Potter, Jerry Greene, and Press Secretary Weigle, whom attrition had elevated to a more respected role in the group’s affairs. They were grumpy at what they uniformly viewed as an idiotic winter outdoors session, but were more attuned and responsive to Ambrose’s wishes than ever.

  “I know it’s colder than hell,” said Ambrose, rubbing his gloved hands together, “but this won’t take long, and most of you will be glad to hear what I have to say.” He turned to Jerry Greene. “First, I want to hear everything on C. D. and Schlessler.”

  Greene, still troubled by the loss of his friends, coughed before speaking. “The bodies were dropped in regulation body bags in a wooded section within the perimeter here by an unmarked Hughes Five Hundred helicopter, the same kind we’ve been routinely using for the Special Functions Force. They had one of Peter Brookes’s men with them. His body was dropped, too.”

&nb
sp; “The drop mashed up C. D.’s face,” said the defense secretary. “And Schlessler broke open like a watermelon. It was like that on the low paratroop drops at Normandy.”

  “It was goddamn murder,” Ambrose said. “They weren’t out to hurt those people. They were just going to put them on ice.”

  “They weren’t out to hurt them yet,” said Callister. “The conditional tense is applicable. That man Dresden is a violence-prone, gun-loving psychopath, genius that he may be.”

  “Well, C. D. and Pete and the other guy will be buried with full military honors—after this is over. In the meantime …” Ambrose looked hard at everyone there, “not the slightest intimation this happened. Expropriate some morgue or funeral parlor in West Virginia. Give the undertakers a lot of money up-front, and not another word.”

  The others were unsure to whom these orders were addressed. Ambrose sensed that, and turned to Defense Secretary Moran. “Have your Special Functions Force attend to it. No questions, and sure as hell no answers.”

  “No problem.”

  “All right,” said Ambrose. “The good news. We’re going to move. For all practical purposes, the Camp David operation is going to be shut down. Countdown is to the State of the Union address.”

  “Just a moment,” said Callister. “There’s a matter of justice here. At least one of honor. You can’t let those men just be dropped in the trees like so much garbage. Let’s be biblical about this. I wouldn’t mind seeing a dawn drop of the corpus delecti of Shawcross and Neil Howard.”

  “You don’t know Atherton had anything to do with this,” said Moran. “All we know is that Atherton wants to be president.”

  “There can’t be any more killings,” Rollins said. “One more casualty and there’ll be demands for full-blown congressional hearings, impeachments, martial law, who knows what. We won’t be able to wait until the State of the Union. We won’t be able to do anything.”

  “Well, we will do something,” said Ambrose. “Starting now. George,” he said to Moran, “I want you back at the Pentagon fulltime. I want you sitting in the National Military Command Center at least four times a day. Including late-night visits. I want a service secretary, not deputy, in there at all times.”