The Chosen One

by Sam Bourne

  She had tranquillized her doubts, allowed herself to believe that this time it would be different. Her own experience told her that politics was bound to end in failure. She had seen it when she worked for the United Nations, where even the most elementary, obvious truths – ‘These people are dying and need help!’ – could get tangled up in turf wars, rivalries, bureaucratic indecision, vanity and, that most decisive of categories, ‘interests’. So often she had felt – she stopped saying the words, knowing that to utter them out loud made you a hippy, a naïf who could be ignored – that something must be done. And so often it had not been.

  For years she had come to believe that the last truly worthwhile work she had done was back when she started out, as an aid worker in Sudan. Handing out sacks of grain from the back of the truck: that had value. The minute she had stepped back from the frontline, lured by the promise of helping more than one person at a time, she had been less use. The titles were grander – first she had been involved in policy, then strategy, finally, at the UN and the State Department, she had been at the highest levels of diplomacy – but she remained stubbornly unimpressed. Help was what she was interested in, and she’d begun to lose faith that she, or anyone in these grand jobs, could ever deliver it.

  Then Stephen Baker had appeared. Reluctantly and despite herself, she had allowed the hide she had grown over her once-tender idealism to be pierced. He had done it to her, breaking through layer after layer of scepticism, until he had found the person underneath – the person she had not been since she was twenty-five.

  Now, though, the ship was listing. She had got it wrong. Again. Politics would always rise up and strangle hope, like a weed choking a flower. She had been stupid to think it would be any different this time.

  But another, sharper pain gnawed at her stomach. Maybe she had not only been wrong to forget that politics always intruded, always stood between good people and doing good. Maybe she had been wrong to assume that she was working for good people. For a good man.

  After all, Goldstein had not denied the accusation. If this does not turn out to be bullshit was the best he could offer. Did that mean Baker had taken money from the Iranians? If he had, that made him an idiot – and worse.

  By now, she was out of the shower and standing in a towel, staring at her wardrobe, wondering what you were meant to wear for a full-blown political crisis. A special prosecutor, Jesus.

  The cellphone rang again, displaying ‘restricted’. Maggie grabbed it. ‘Stu, you didn’t need to call back.’

  ‘Excuse me?’ A woman’s voice. ‘Is this Maggie Costello?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can you hold for Magnus Longley?’

  Maggie felt her guts clench.

  ‘Miss Costello?’ The voice was dry enough to sand a table. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you so early but I thought it best to let you know of my decision immediately. I’m afraid Dr Adams is…adamant.’ Longley sounded pleased with his pun. ‘He insists that you be removed from your post. And I see no alternative but to bow to his wishes.’

  Maggie felt as if someone had plunged a needle into her neck, mainlining fury directly into her bloodstream.

  ‘Does the President know about this?’

  ‘Perhaps you haven’t seen the news, but the President has rather a lot on his plate at the moment.’

  ‘I know that, but just yesterday he asked me-’

  ‘You should come in early this morning and clear your desk. Your White House computer log-in will expire at twelve noon. And you will need to surrender your pass.’

  ‘Don’t I get at least to-’

  ‘I fear my 6.45 meeting is due to start. Goodbye, Miss Costello. And thank you for your service.’

  She stood there a full five seconds, the rage inchoate and rising. How could they do this to her? After all she had sacrificed? And just when she had so much to give? Not twenty-four hours ago, she had been asked by the President of the United States himself to draw up a plan to save lives – perhaps thousands or tens of thousands of lives – in Darfur. Besides, she was needed on this latest Iran problem. Stuart had said so.

  And now that was all going to come to nothing because of, what? Calling a bloody pompous old git an asshole – when that was exactly what he was.

  She turned around, raised her arm and was about to hurl the phone at the bedroom wall – bracing herself for the satisfaction of seeing it shatter – when it began to ring. That stopped her. Her arm raised aloft, she suddenly felt ridiculous. She looked at the display: Restricted.

  She hit the green button. A woman’s voice again, different this time. ‘Please hold for the President.’

  A second later, it was him. A voice known to millions, though in a tone heard only rarely and by those closest to him: ‘Maggie, I need to see you. Right away.’

  7

  Washington, DC, Tuesday March 21, 07.33

  Baker had insisted they meet in the Residence: him, her and Stuart. Maggie called Goldstein immediately and explained that she’d just been fired. ‘I’ve got to surrender my pass by twelve noon, for Christ’s sake!’

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘That means we’ve got a few hours.’

  ‘Is that meant to be funny?’

  ‘No. And Maggie? Come to my office first. I need to give you a heads-up before we go in.’

  She was there twenty minutes later. Stuart was tearing his way through a memo, his eyes red and agitated. He looked awful.

  She spoke from the doorway. ‘Is that the file on the Iranian?’

  He didn’t look up but kept his eyes fixed on the document on his desk. ‘Known in this country as Jim Hodges, resident in the state of Texas.’

  ‘He’s a US citizen! So then we’re off the hook. The whole point is-’

  ‘But he’s also Hossein Najafi, citizen of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Who just happens to be a veteran of the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, better known as the Revolutionary Guard.’

  ‘But he gave the donation as Jim Hodges. How was anyone to know that he was really-’

  ‘Because we’re meant to check these things!’ Now Goldstein was looking up, his voice raised, his eyes bugging out with rage. ‘We’re the fucking White House. He’s the fucking President of the United States. He sends people into wars. To die. He’s meant to know who he meets, for Christ’s-’

  ‘He met him?’

  ‘Yes! Some fundraiser. During the transition.’

  ‘So there’ll be a photograph.’

  Stuart’s reply came in a quieter voice. ‘Yes.’

  ‘And people will ask why we didn’t have the basic intel to know we were letting an Iranian spy get close to the President-Elect.’

  ‘Yes.’ Stuart spread his hands across the table and let his head fall onto them. ‘And why-’

  ‘-on earth the Iranians would want to give money to Stephen Baker.’

  ‘You could make the ad now.’ He picked his head up and did a mock voiceover. ‘“The Ayatollahs like Stephen Baker so much they gave him cash. In secret. Is Baker working for you – or them?”’

  ‘It’s a nightmare,’ Maggie agreed.

  ‘But that’s not why he wants to see you. Us. Not completely, anyway.’

  ‘Why, then?’

  Stuart hauled himself upright and told Maggie about the message sent to Katie Baker via Facebook. He reached for a piece of paper to read the final paragraph: And if that doesn’t smash his pretty little head into a thousand pieces, I promise you this – the one after that will. Make no mistake: I mean to destroy him.

  ‘Jesus.’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Stuart checked his watch. ‘He wants us over there right now.’

  Inside the Residence, the difference in mood from the previous morning was palpable. Kimberley Baker had taken the children to school early – the White House breakfast event she was chairing on cervical cancer awareness would just have to start without her – so that they could be out of that atmosphere. She spent the journey repeating what she had said last night,
over and over: reassuring Katie that Daddy was going to be fine, that the police would find and punish whoever sent that horrible message and she would make sure there would be no more of them.

  The President was in the kitchen again, but this time he was pacing. Maggie had seen Stephen Baker receive all kinds of bad news during the campaign and, on all but a handful of occasions, he had remained calm, almost preternaturally so. He would keep his voice down, when others would raise theirs; he would be forgiving when any other candidate would be demanding instant revenge; he would stay seated when the rest would be leaping to their feet. But now he was pacing.

  ‘Thank you both for coming.’ He nodded towards two chairs but remained standing. ‘Maggie, I take it you now have the full picture?’

  ‘Yes, Mr President.’

  ‘And you know why you’re here?’

  ‘Not entirely, sir.’

  ‘The crank who wrote that message to my daughter. He warned there would be another big story “tomorrow morning”. And there was. Which means he’s no crank.’

  Goldstein now spoke. ‘Or at the very least he’s a crank who knows how to hack computers. He must have identified the White House IP address, and worked backwards from there, searching teenage websites for a match. Then hacked into this girl’s-’

  ‘Alexis,’ the President added.

  ‘Right. Into her account. Smart.’

  To her surprise, the President suddenly turned and fixed Maggie with his deep green gaze. Though this time, the steadiness was gone. He looked hunted. ‘You should have seen my daughter, Maggie. She looked terrified.’

  ‘It’s horrible.’

  ‘I always promised Kim that whatever happened we’d keep the kids out of it.’

  Stuart replied. ‘And you have, sir.’

  ‘Until now, Stu. Until now.’

  Both Maggie and Goldstein remained silent, while Baker resumed his pacing. Finally, she felt she had to speak.

  ‘Sorry, Mr President. I’m not sure I’m completely clear on what needs to be done here. On what you want us to do.’

  Baker looked to Stuart and nodded, giving Goldstein the cue to answer on his behalf.

  ‘This has to be handled extremely carefully, Maggie. We need to know who this man who contacted Katie is. If he really is the source of these stories and is determined to reveal more, we need to identify him. Fast.’

  ‘Can’t the Secret Service help? He made a direct threat against you.’

  Once again Baker said nothing, looking to Stuart.

  ‘The agent assigned to Katie is running a trace.’

  ‘Good,’ said Maggie. ‘So we’ll see what she finds out.’

  Now the President spoke. ‘I need someone I trust involved, Maggie.’

  ‘You can trust the Secret Service.’

  ‘They will investigate the threat to my life.’

  Stuart leaned forward. ‘But this is not just a physical threat, is it? This is political. Someone is out to destroy this presidency. Two leaks, carefully timed for maximum impact. And threatening another.’

  Maggie nodded. ‘I know.’

  ‘Which is why we need our own person on it. Someone who cares. Someone who has the resources to do, you know, unusual work.’

  ‘What do you mean, unusual?’

  ‘Come on, Maggie. We know what you did in Jerusalem. Put it this way, you weren’t just drafting position papers, were you?’

  ‘But I don’t even work for you any more!’ It had come out louder and angrier than she had planned. The intensity of her outburst surprised even her.

  ‘I’m sorry about that,’ the President said quietly.

  ‘Longley runs his own show, you know that, Maggie.’ Stuart paused, then brightened. ‘But it doesn’t mean you can’t help. If anything, it’s better. You have distance. Arm’s-length.’ ‘Deniability, you mean. You can disown me.’ She was staring hard at him.

  The President drew himself up to full height and let his eyes bore into her. ‘I need you, Maggie. There is so much we hoped to achieve. Together. To do that, I need to stay in this office. And that means finding this man, whoever he is.’

  She held his gaze for a long second or two in which she thought of the conversation they had had in this same place twenty-four hours earlier. She thought of the barely-started options paper for Darfur on her computer, of the helicopters that this president was ready to send and the lives they would save. She pictured a Darfuri village about to be torched to the ground and the militiamen on horseback poised to set it ablaze; she saw them reining in their animals and turning around, because they had heard the sound of choppers in the sky that told them they would be seen and caught. She thought of all that and the certainty that nobody other than Stephen Baker would lift a finger to help those villagers.

  ‘All right,’ she said, still looking directly into the deep green of his eyes. ‘We find him. Then what?’

  Stuart answered. ‘We see what he wants. We ask what-’

  The President wheeled round to address his closest advisor directly. ‘I hope you’re not suggesting I engage in dialogue with a blackmailer-’

  ‘Not you. Nowhere near you. A million miles from you.’

  ‘You mean you?’

  ‘Not even me. Or at least not a me that anyone could identify as me.’

  ‘No way.’

  ‘He said he has one more story that will-’

  ‘Well, I’m not going to authorize any such thing. And you know better than to ask.’

  Stuart gestured an apology, heaved himself up out of his chair, muttering a ‘one, two, three’ under his breath as he undertook the necessary exertion. Maggie followed his lead and headed for the door.

  I’m not going to authorize any such thing. Both Maggie and Stuart knew what that meant. They had been given their orders. Deniability, the lubricant of high-level politics. The message had been clear. Do whatever you have to do. Just make sure it has nothing to do with me.

  As they walked back to the West Wing, Maggie turned to Stuart. ‘We better start drawing up a list.’

  ‘A list of what?’

  ‘Of everybody who wants to drive Stephen Baker from office.’

  8

  Washington, DC, Tuesday March 21, 09.16

  In the office of the junior senator from the great state of South Carolina, they liked to pride themselves on the knowledge that a visitor had only to cross the threshold to feel as if he had stepped inside the Old South. The receptionist on duty was usually blonde, under thirty, wearing a floral print and always ready with a welcoming smile, a ‘Yes sir’ or a ‘Yes ma’am’. Nearly always a ‘Yes sir’. Outside that door, they could offer no guarantees. You entered the swamp that was Washington, DC at your own risk. But here, once you were a guest of Senator Rick Franklin, you were south of the Mason-Dixon line.

  The visitor, once he’d helped himself to the pitcher of iced water in the waiting area, would notice more than the Southern smiles. His eye would be caught first, perhaps, by the bronze plaque above the reception desk depicting the Ten Commandments, as if etched on two tablets of stone. Not for Senator Franklin the niceties of separating Church and State in a public building.

  Then, if he were especially vigilant, he would spot the TV monitor tuned not to CNN or MSNBC, as would be the case in most Democrats’ offices, nor even Fox News, as in most Republicans’, but to the Christian Broadcasting Network. Midterm elections might be nineteen months away, but there was fundraising to be done – and it paid to give the folks the right impression.

  That was the outer area. Once a visitor had pierced the perimeter, and entered the private office of the Senator himself, he would get a rather earthier glimpse of the realities of political life. In here, it was Fox or MSNBC, usually the latter. ‘Know thine enemy,’ Franklin would say.

  In the last twenty-four hours, however, it had hardly felt like an enemy. The network, usually pilloried in Franklin mailings as news for arugula-munching liberals, had been making the weather on the Baker preside
ncy; and for those on Franklin’s side of the aisle it had felt like sunshine. Some of his colleagues had simply sat back and enjoyed the show. First, St Stephen of Olympia revealed as some kind of wacko, in need of treatment. The joy of it was that story still had some distance to run. What kind of treatment exactly? Were electric shocks involved? Was he ever an inpatient? Was there a ‘facility’ that might be photographed, complete with exterior shots of a building reminiscent of the Cuckoo’s Nest, that could run on a loop on Fox?

  Senator Franklin could feel the saliva welling as he imagined the meat still to be picked off that particular bone.

  And this morning the Iranian Connection. Iron law of scandal: gotta have a good name. ‘The Iranian Connection’ did the job perfectly. Exotic and dramatic, like a movie, but with the added threat of somewhere dark and scary. Sure the details were obscure, the experts unintelligible bald guys captioned on TV as ‘forensic accountants’, but that only made it better. The liberal editorial boards could sweat through their tieless shirts explaining that there was ‘no case to answer’, but that wouldn’t wash with the folks. Oh no. They would see a blizzard of numbers and laws and rules – and they would conclude that, whatever the fine print might say, Mr Perfect President was no longer as pure as the driven snow.

  Which is why he had got on the phone to his Democratic colleague within minutes of the story breaking. Calling for an independent counsel was the no-risk move. If the investi gation found nothing, then Franklin could claim to have performed a public service, getting to the bottom of baseless rumours. If it found something, then bingo! And, in between, day after day of stories full of mind-numbing detail on campaign finance law and on the horror show that was the Iranian regime. The mere fact that these subjects were raised in the same breath as Stephen Baker would generate a quite perfect stench of scandal. Voters would be forced to conclude, as they had so many times before, ‘Ain’t no smoke without fire.’