by Allan Topol
When he walked through the doorway of the room, he saw them seated on one bench. His wife, Lucinda, in the center, Naomi and Ruth, ages twelve and seven, on one side of her, and Rachel and Clyde Junior, ages eight and seven, on the other. Gillis threw his shoulders back and raised his head. He forced a smile onto his face.
Once they saw him approaching, the two older girls waved. Little Rachel, the smallest and shiest, clutched her mother's hand tightly and pressed her body close to Lucinda. Clyde Junior slipped off the bench and ran over to take his daddy's hand. When Gillis sat down across from Lucinda, Clyde Junior remained at his side.
"How are you doing?" she asked.
"Okay so far," Gillis said. "I told the prosecutor what happened. I think he believed me that it was all a mistake."
The two girls moved over next to their father. Ruth squeezed his hand.
"It wasn't a mistake at all," Lucinda said. "It's just some more injustice that white folks push on us."
"I know it's not fair, but..."
Lucinda had a look of rage in her eyes. "It's more than just unfair. I'm working to get you a lawyer. Not just any lawyer, but a good lawyer. Only they want so much money, and I can barely make his next treatment."
Gillis put his arm around his son. "How's he feeling?"
"I'm okay, Daddy," Clyde Junior blurted out. "Mama says I'm the man of the house now, so I should act like it."
Naomi began to laugh. Lucinda shot her a look. "That's enough."
"God will take care of me," Gillis said with deep conviction. "C'mon, let's all pray."
Lucinda didn't object to praying with her husband, but she still wanted a good lawyer to help do the Lord's work.
As they leaned in toward the center of the table, he began to recite, "The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer...."
* * *
On the plane, Ann went to the back with Philip and Beverly Brewster in the presidential compartment. Slater sat down next to Jennifer, who thought he looked debonair dressed in shirtsleeves, blue striped and monogrammed on the pocket, navy blue suspenders, gold cuff links with the presidential .seal, and a red silk Hermes tie with gray sheep. She liked how stylish he looked—unlike some men, such as Ben.
As they taxied out toward the runway, a marine officer asked them, "Would you like something to drink?"
"Black coffee for me," Jennifer replied.
"The same," Slater said. Then he turned to Jennifer. "Did you know Robert well?"
"Not really. My friendship has been with Ann. She's a classy lady."
"He and Philip were such close friends. Go figure."
This remark made her pause, but then she said, "I've often wondered about that myself. They seem so different."
Slater shrugged. "Sometimes you develop friendships as children. I guess they stick with you."
She nodded. "That's about as good an explanation as any."
Air Force One roared down the runway. When they leveled off, the marine served the two cups of coffee.
"It's been a long time since I've been with a famous actress," Slater said.
She smoothed down the side of her hair. "What do you mean?"
"I saw you in Picnic on Broadway. You played Madge, right?"
She was pleased. "I got lucky landing that part."
"That was a helluva story. I remember reading it in the Times. With Trent McCall groping that actress. What was her name?"
"Denise Waller."
"Yeah. See? You made me forget her. And as for your being lucky landing the part, life's full of chance events. It's always that way. So why'd you give up the acting biz and go to law school?"
She paused to sip some coffee. "You really want to know? I had a lock on a starring role in a good feature film. My agent sent me out to the director's house in Malibu one Sunday for lunch, to get acquainted. Just the two of us."
"So what happened?"
She looked irate. Just thinking about it rankled her. "The old Hollywood casting couch. We finished lunch. We were sunning on the deck, and he dropped his pants. Real subtle."
He shook his head and snarled, matching her anger. "That's disgusting. So what'd you do?"
"I told him to stuff it into a piece of liver."
He burst out laughing. "Portnoy's Complaint."
"Yeah. Well, anyhow, the next day, my agent called to say I blew it. I'd lost the part. He was plenty pissed at me. He was even more pissed when I told him what happened. 'Why didn't you just fuck the guy?' my agent said. 'What's the big deal? You're no virgin, for chrissake.' "
"So you went to see a lawyer," Slater said.
She was surprised. The guy was smart, thinking on his feet. "How'd you guess?"
"I feel as if I know you. I can understand how your mind works."
She smiled, liking him more and more. "So you tell me what happened."
He finished his coffee, touched her arm ever so gently with his left hand—which didn't have a wedding band, she noticed—and then removed it. "The lawyer told you that you'd never get any legal relief because of the director's power."
"Precisely."
"So you decided to go to law school and then to the Justice Department to do something for other women caught in this situation. Cases involving battered women were one of your specialties."
She was stunned that he had guessed so much about her. "So what about you, Jim? Let me take a stab in the dark like you did. Poor kid from the wrong side of the tracks someplace like Pittsburgh. Scholarship to Yale, MBA at Wharton, and with your drive you blow them away on Wall Street."
He laughed easily. "Close, but no cigar. I'm the black sheep in an old ranching family from California, near Santa Barbara. My dad was ready to disinherit me when I refused to go home after Stanford and join him in the family business. I got a Rhodes, Harvard MBA, then Wall Street. He learned to love me again when he needed financing about ten years ago."
"So why'd you cash in your chips on the Street and come down to D.C.?"
He laughed. "You must be a good trial lawyer. You know how to bore into the key question quickly."
She smiled at the compliment.
"I wanted to serve my country," he said, echoing the standard line heard from high-level appointees in Washington. "Give back some of what I've gotten."
She laughed. "Are you trying to kid me or yourself?"
He looked hurt. "I was being sincere, and you don't believe me."
"Poor baby." Jennifer poked him playfully. "You came down because you figured that you're smarter and can do things a lot better than the dopes running around our town."
Now it was Slater's turn to be surprised. She was plenty sharp, this Jennifer Moore. "How'd you know that?"
She gave him a devilish smile. "I've been around Washington a while."
Their laughter was drowned out by the whine of landing gear being lowered. Jennifer couldn't believe that they were already descending toward Andrews Air Force Base. Jim Slater must have been good company. It was the quickest New York-to-Washington flight she ever remembered.
* * *
"My jaw hurts from saying the appropriate grieving-widow phrases." Ann lifted her chin, turning it to and fro. "As for Philip, he's an ass to be so torn up about Robert's death. He should be damn glad Robert didn't bring the whole administration crashing down on his head."
A light mist was beginning to fall as Jennifer pulled onto the beltway, turned on the radar detector, and gunned the engine. "I doubt if Jim Slater shares the President's grief," she said.
"Well, well." Ann winked at her. "I could see that you made a new friend on the plane."
"What do you think of him?"
"I don't know him that well, but he disliked Robert, so he can't be all bad."
The radar detector started to beep, and Jennifer cut her speed to sixty-four. "Is there a Mrs. Slater?"
"Alice, the equestrian queen," Ann said dryly. "I've met her a couple of times. Spends her life riding and worrying about her horses. They have a big horse
farm in Rancho Santa Fe near La Jolia and a place in Westchester. She refused to move to Washington. As far as I can tell, they've got a marriage in name only. Parallel play. He does what he wants. She does too. Which mostly involves horses."
Jennifer was pleased by what she had just heard. "Any children?"
"My understanding from cocktail-party gossip is that early on in their marriage they couldn't have any. They never tried very hard." Ann's expression darkened. "You seem awfully interested."
"Just curious."
Ann gave Jennifer a stern protective look. "Be careful, Jenny."
Jennifer understood exactly what was running through Ann's mind. "Yes, Mom," Jennifer said laughingly. "What am I missing?"
"As long as he's still married, you don't want to be the other woman. It's not a good part to play in Washington. Rarely brings happiness and joy, or even a long run."
Jennifer winced. "Aren't you getting ahead of me here?"
Ann said earnestly, "I know you. I also know that Jim's smart, sophisticated, and suave. Twenty years younger and unmarried, he might be worth a careful look."
"I gather that he and Robert weren't exactly the best of buddies."
"That has to be one of the great understatements of all time. Robert said that Jim was unprincipled. Totally amoral."
Jennifer burst out laughing. "You mean as opposed to Robert?"
Ann laughed too, but said, "Actually, this may sound funny, and believe me, I'm not getting soft on my late husband, but while he was a disgusting human being personally, in matters of state he had some principles. That's what got him into trouble with the Chinese government. He believed we had made commitments to Taiwan, and we had an obligation to honor them. Not to toss them aside for pragmatic Machiavellian reasons. He was convinced that nothing had changed since Tiananmen Square. He detested the ruling regime in Beijing." Ann reflected for a moment. "Of course, there was the personal jealousy factor. Jim resented Robert's close friendship with Philip, and Robert saw Jim as an evil influence corrupting Philip's decency. Call it sibling rivalry. So they battled over every decision."
"Sounds like a great way to run a government."
"Oh, it was. And don't forget Marshall Cunningham. He despised both of them. Thought he was the most astute politically among the three of them. The one who was best able to make judgments on foreign policy issues because of his military-defense-contractor background."
She paused and shook her head. "I used to call them the Venomous Triumvirate. That's probably unfair to Marshall, who's really not so bad." She stopped to think about what she had just said. "No, I take that back. He is just as bad. He's totally results-oriented. When he sets off on a course, he won't quit until he succeeds, regardless of the cost. He loves exercising all the power he has. He uses people to get what he wants. Jim's the same way. You know how I hate crap like that."
"In that way he's like half the people in this town."
"I know, but I don't have to like it."
Jennifer pulled off the beltway. They started driving south on Connecticut Avenue, heading toward Ann's house.
"Did you get a chance to talk to your PI friend, this Mark Bonner?" Ann asked, knowing that the answer would be yes because Jennifer always did what she promised.
Jennifer looked a little sheepish. She should have told Ann first thing this morning, but she decided to leave it alone until after the funeral. Then there was the whole Slater business on the plane. "I called him at home in New York late last night."
"What does he think I should do about the video in my house?"
"Mark's got a great plan."
Ann looked at Jennifer with confidence, knowing that her friend had found a solution to her problem. "You want to let me in on it?"
Jennifer returned Ann's look. "You bet. Mark's theory is that if your intruder friend can't get into your house because of the security people the President sent, he'll go after you personally until he gets what he wants."
"That's a pretty frightening thought. So what should I do?"
Jennifer spoke softly, sounding mysterious. "Make yourself the bait."
* * *
The State Department occupies a sprawling, dull gray, eight-story, nondescript building in a part of Washington known as Foggy Bottom, which acquired its name in the days when Washington was still a small southern town built on a swamp. Fulton and Traynor barged in unannounced to the secretary's suite on the top floor. With Hazel and Doreen, Winthrop's two longtime secretaries, in New York for the funeral, there was no one to provide resistance. Certainly not the temp manning the phones, who moved out of the way as soon as Traynor flashed his FBI badge. The game plan Fulton had developed was simple. They were each carrying empty briefcases. Traynor would look through the file cabinets in the outer office, while Fulton went alone into Winthrop's inner sanctum. What Traynor thought they were searching for was any information that could lead them to George Nesbitt. Fulton, though, had a second objective in mind. As soon as he locked the door to Winthrop's office, Fulton began a careful search through every desk drawer and cabinet for any evidence c' Winthrop's extracurricular sexual activities or anything else that could damage the administration.
Fulton found diaries for each of the last three years, since Winthrop came to Washington, with curious evening entries that had to be some code for Winthrop's sexual assignations. He stuffed all of the diaries into his briefcase, along with Winthrop's little black book of telephone numbers and addresses, again written in some type of code, because all the names were men's names. Fulton guessed that Jack must mean Jacqueline; Alex, Alexandra; and so forth.
Once Fulton had sanitized the office, he opened the door and met Traynor back in the outer office. "Any useful info?" Traynor asked.
"Not a thing," Fulton replied, lying without any qualms. He rationalized that what he had taken was irrelevant to the Winthrop murder. During the secretary's life, his whoring around had been one of Washington's best-kept secrets. With his death, it couldn't be permitted to rise up and bite Brewster and the administration on the ass.
* * *
Three blocks from Ann's house, she said to Jennifer, "Don't stop and look, but on the right, there's a maroon Camry parked. I'll bet it's my visitor from yesterday."
As they drove by, Jennifer glanced at the man behind the wheel, whose nose was heavily bandaged.
"Did you do that to him?" she asked.
"Damn right. I was furious. If he wasn't so strong, I'd have killed him."
Jennifer let out a long, low whistle. "He's obviously learned how to breathe through his mouth. I'm glad I'm on your side."
Ann looked fierce. "I'm ready for the second act, as you put it a few minutes ago."
"He's not Chinese."
"I didn't say he was. I said the Chinese government sent him."
"You may be right, but we've got to know for sure."
Ann stopped to talk to the two armed agents from the Secret Service in front of her house. Then she and Jennifer went inside. They stayed only five minutes—long enough for Ann to get the videotape from the safe upstairs and for Jennifer to call Mark in his car. "You in place?" she asked.
"A-okay," he answered in a curt military voice.
"The Camry's there too. Three blocks up on Ellicott."
"I know. I've got a bead on him."
"We're leaving in about five minutes."
"Gotcha."
Jennifer hung up the phone. Ann came into the room, nervously clutching the video in her hand. "You sure this is going to work?"
Jennifer looked confident. "Mark's good. He's never let me down yet."
"There's always a first time."
They climbed into Jennifer's car and drove back up Ellicott toward Connecticut Avenue. Through the rearview mirror, Jennifer watched the Camry turn around quickly and fall in behind them. She couldn't see behind the Camry. She was hoping that Mark's rental car was back there somewhere. Thinking about it, she realized that she shouldn't expect to see him, because he wouldn't
want the driver of the Camry to know he was there. At Connecticut Avenue she turned left, and then a few blocks later left again and into the parking lot for a strip mall that included City Video Center, with a sign that said, Tapes Rented. Tapes Sold. Tapes Duplicated.
The parking lot was only about a third full. Jennifer parked twenty yards from the entrance to the video store. She took the loaded .22 from her purse and slipped it into the pocket of her gray raincoat. She had last fired the gun at a practice range two months ago. She could use it if she had to. Then she looked at Ann. "Showtime. You ready?"
Ann emerged from the passenger side holding the video in her right hand, where it was visible. Jennifer kept her hands in her coat pockets. Side by side they walked toward the entrance of the video store. A light, cold drizzle was falling. When they were halfway there, Jennifer saw a white-bandaged face approaching to cut them off. Jennifer waited until he was ten feet away to pull out the gun. "What do you want with us?" she demanded.
He sneered. "Don't play games with me. I want the video."
"You can't have it," Ann said. "So fuck off."
He was seriously considering forgetting about his assignment, just for the pleasure of killing this bitch.
"You know I'll get it sooner or later. Once you leave it in the shop, it's as good as mine. The kids who work here won't risk a scratch for your video. If you take it home, I'll make your life miserable until I get it."
Ann was nervous, feeling uneasy about Jennifer's plan. This was taking so long. Each second increased the risk that this goon would blow up and try to get even with her.
Sensing Ann's anxiety, Jennifer glanced over the man's shoulder. Mark's car was in place. By now he had to be snapping away on his Nikon. She'd better move things along before they took an unexpected turn. She nodded to Ann.
"Let's take it back home," Ann said to Jennifer, following the script.
"Ah, screw it," Jennifer said forcefully, not giving away how she felt inside. Her hair was getting wet. A trickle of water was dripping down the side of her face. "It's not worth it. Give him the damn thing. You've got to get on with your life."