Presidential Deal (31 page)

Chapter 52

Lawrence Chappelear stood in steely composure at the podium, waiting for the interminable sound and video checks to be completed by the bevy of technicians swarming about with their cables and cameras. He glanced around the crowded room, ignoring the shouted questions from the media personnel, all of whom were being kept at bay by a phalanx of Secret Service men. If they only knew what he had just witnessed, he thought, then just as quickly forced the thoughts away. One crisis at a time, he told himself.

Somewhere down one of the hallways behind him was Frank Sheldon, about to step before these baying hounds, lay himself open before all this attendant apparatus like a Japanese warlord disemboweling himself in shame. No grief so deep that it could be hidden from the public need to know, Chappelear reminded himself. No refuge. No place to hide.

And soon, no need to hide. No matter how monumental the tragedy, how awful its aftermath, all of it would pass, the events, the people become history, and, ultimately, footnotes to history, lost in all the outrage and tragedy to come.

All this would pass, and he along with it. Best now to begin the process of acceptance, to allow himself to be swept up as well, one more bit of flotsam carried along toward darkness and forgetting, and everything he’d done along with it.

Go out with grace
, he told himself. He’d find some sinecure, some university post, some lobbyist’s niche, nothing he hadn’t anticipated, and though the need to come to terms with this future had presented itself sooner by some four years or so than he might have wished and despite everything he’d done to protect his own position, and, finally, Frank Sheldon’s too, look what it had resulted in.

He should console himself with the fact that the damage had been contained to the extent that it had. He’d made a mistake, a miscalculation, but with Salazar gone, that unfortunate business out on the Bay behind him, no one would be the wiser. The general knew nothing of Chappelear’s original involvement with Salazar; Williams was simply carrying out battlefield orders in an arena where covert operations were the norm, and he would have his battlefield promotion as a result.

Yes, Chappelear thought, he’d lost the battle, but he would survive. They would all survive. “
Being not the ones dead
…” he thought. Yes. Alive was always better.

Ignore the vast abyss that loomed just the other side of his scrambling thoughts. Don’t look down, for there was madness beckoning with an enormous finger.

He blinked, and found himself staring dumbly at a microphone, one of what seemed a hundred affixed to a podium that seemed too frail to support their bulk. He reached up in reflex and tapped at the mike, tapped again, heard no sound disrupt the clamor in the airless room. Nothing but static from the sound booth lead clipped to his ear, and probably no one listening even if he were to shout into the invisible mike at his lapel.

He tapped again and bent to the microphone and spoke some mindless words, some ladies and gentlemen homily of testing, two, three, four, and still nothing. Endless waiting, up there in plain view as technology’s stepchild, the President back there waiting, wanting to end his own agony too, and all these jackals eager for the flesh.

Stop it, Larry
, he thought.
Get this over with one step at a time. Maybe a possibility for a life even yet
.

He had opened his mouth again, ready to demand that the technicians get their act together, flip their switches, open their gates, when he heard a murmur from the crowd, something new there. Shouts then. Arms raised, and pointing toward the giant monitors set up to flank the stage.

He turned toward them and felt his mouth open in surprise at the image that filled the screens. He heard a voice from the lead at his ear: “What the hell is that? Where’s it coming from?”

“We don’t know.” He heard a technician’s voice in his ear. “It’s a pirate feed, someone’s overridden the outgoing line…” Then silence, nothing more from control central.

Zigzags of distortion scrolled down the big monitor screens and there was a momentary blackout, but then, like something from his worst dreams, the image was back, and he felt the yawning blackness opening up beneath his feet.

The image onscreen now was that of Angel Salazar, swollen and battered, but Salazar nonetheless, his mouth opening and closing, mouthing soundless words as a burly man in a badly chosen sportcoat held him by the hair and directed Salazar’s bleary gaze toward the camera’s eye.

There was a sudden blast of noise then, and Chappelear felt himself clapping his hands to his ears along with the others in the room, but then the noise modulated just as quickly and he realized that what he was hearing were undeniably the words of Angel Salazar. What Lawrence Chappelear heard was the explanation of their plan, “…the First Lady a so much simpler target, our intention all along,” and the proclamation of their doom.

A greater clamor arose then, and the doors to the room had flown open, a crowd of agents were flooding in, reporters stumbling in the wake of this tide, all of it lit in the glow of camera lights and flashes. Shouts and cries of amazement, for there, at the center of the throng of security men,
she
was:

The First Lady, Linda Barnes Sheldon, still soaking from the waters of the bay, her expression haggard, one hand thrown up against the glare of the lights, the other tight at the arm of a man just as soaked and even more battered-looking. In their wake, a weasel of a man with dripping bandages obscuring his face.

The words of Angel Salazar blared over it all: confession, explanation, and, where Lawrence Chappelear was concerned, annihilation.

Babel. Absolute chaos. Cameramen jockeyed for position. Reporters screamed questions, shouted into cellular phones. One or two might have been taking notes.

Hard to believe that anyone had his or her eyes on the podium on the stage where Lawrence Chappelear was standing, along with one amazed security officer. Though in the days to come, nearly everyone present would swear they saw it happen:

As the furor on the other side of the hall builds, this grim-faced man, who has spent an adult lifetime as advisor to his president, spins toward the distracted officer, snatches the man’s weapon from his grasp.

Speculation still rages as to what target Chappelear might have had in mind. Was it John Deal? The First Lady? Or, as most argue, did he intend to turn the weapon upon himself?

All that will ever be known for certain is what happens next:

Chappelear pulls the weapon toward him; the astonished guard pulls back at last; there is a single shot expended…and Lawrence Chappelear falls in a spray of blood and bone at the podium, sending chaos into overdrive.

Chapter 53

Miami Beach: One Month Later

“Could’ve been me up there in Washington, you know that, don’t you?” This from Ray Brisa, who’s just opened a fresh beer from the ancient Coca-Cola cooler near the entrance to Doc Jameroski’s emporium, is waving it at the tiny television set on the wooden counter.

“My aching ass,” Driscoll says, readjusting himself in one of the webbed lawn chairs the doc has pulled down from a dusty shelf, some extra seating for their little gathering.

“Careful with such language,” the doc says with a stern look at Driscoll. The doc points at Isabel Deal, age seven, who sits on a stool where once upon a time there was a soda fountain, with levered spouts that actually worked. She is bent intently over a coloring book, its pages yellowed with age: a moose, a flying squirrel in an aviator’s skullcap, a little man with a raincoat and a pencil mustache saying something to a tall, dark companion named Natasha. Brown for the moose, gray for the squirrel, black for the evildoers, all of the work held neatly, perhaps even obsessively, within the lines.

Driscoll nods at the doc, contrite. He knows that it is true, that Isabel misses nothing. Intent as she may be upon her work, she glances up each time the CNN announcer mentions the ceremonies, which are to be carried by the network live and in their entirety this afternoon from the White House. And happy as he is to have Isabel here, something in Driscoll aches for her. He wants to push himself up from the flimsy chair that threatens to explode at any moment with his weight, lumber over to the counter and fold her up in his arms, squeeze her and assure her that her father loves her, that more than anything, he would love to have her with him on this day…

…but then the door behind the counter that leads to the storeroom opens, and Janice comes out from a trip to the rest room back there and gives him her rueful smile, and Driscoll simply nods and smiles a kind of a smile in return and bends for another beer of his own. He guesses he can’t blame Janice for refusing to let Isabel attend, given all that’s happened, the entire country still in fearful aftershock, but still it seems a shame.

The door to Jameroski’s is shuttered and locked, the oblong of the
CLOSED
sign a mute silhouette behind the old-fashioned shade, and the junkies and the winos seem to know enough to stay their normal knob-rattling and foyer mutterings for this day. There, beer and several kinds of soft drinks are lined up vertically in the old-fashioned cooler, and Jameroski has rigged the mechanism so you can just open the rubbergasketed door, reach in, choose one of the cylinders, and yank on the chilly neck of whatever you want and—forget the quarter—out it comes, with a clank and a thunk that sends another bottle down to replace whatever was there.

Something nice about that, Driscoll thinks. A suggestion of bounty, of a world that every so often gives, just for the hell of it.

The doc has ordered in food as well, great mounds of it, rich deli salads and carvings that reek of garlic and spice and threaten to send his cholesterol count soaring just from the smell alone. A celebration, Driscoll thinks, and shakes his head when he thinks about it. Amazing that he is here to celebrate, that any of them are.

And there will be no mention of Raymond Brisa this afternoon, and none of Vernon Driscoll, who turned a few of Salazar’s interrogation techniques upon their inventor in that little phone company building where their impromptu studio had been set up. No mention of Osvaldo Regalado, whose considerable communications skills sent Salazar’s confession beaming out into the world, if only a few minutes later than they’d intended.

No mention of Dedric Bailey, whose death remains attributed to accident, nor of Captain Billy—Captain Michael Cudahy, that is, shot down by the defenders of his country as a result of “tragic error.” Of Tilton, or Gavin, or his cousin Cork. Of those nameless Bahamian kids who helped to hustle him and Ray Brisa off in the night, risking themselves for people they didn’t know, for reasons no one could begin to explain.

There will be no mention of Angel Salazar, who sits now in the bowels of a facility unknown and unannounced, delivered from the hold of the boat Deal brought back into something like justice.

Nor will there be mention of Lawrence Chappelear. The story of his demise, of his ill-fated deal with Angel Salazar, has been aired in every imaginable form, in every media outlet the world over. One man who sought power, another who disdained it absolutely. Joined in unthinkable acts. Incomprehensible treachery. The legacy of antiquated cold war attitudes toward Latin America, et cetera, ad infinitum. Though the rumors of Jorge Vas’s involvement never figured in the media circus, however. Salazar may have told them much, but he’d stayed mum on Vas.

Another escape for the seemingly invulnerable Jorge Vas, Driscoll thinks, another considerable irony. Though none of this confounds him. He finds no irony too great, no actions unthinkable, no betrayal beyond the bounds of comprehension. It is his strength and his curse. “The way my mind works,” he mumbles.

“What did you say?” asks Ray Brisa.

Driscoll blinks, looks up into Brisa’s disbelieving stare. “I don’t know what I said.” And it is true. He may as well have been dreaming.

“Funny,” Brisa says, shaking his still-bandaged head. “I could have sworn you said it.”

“Quiet!” Doc Jameroski commands them.

Isabel is sitting straight up on her stool now, her crayon work forgotten. “Daddy,” she cries, clapping her hands. Janice stands behind her, her hands on Isabel’s shoulders.

“Daddy!” Isabel repeats, pointing at the television screen, where a camera pans over a procession that steps lively from a door in the White House itself. Janice is nodding. There may be tears on her cheeks, but Driscoll can’t be sure. He is thinking about what’s unfolding on the screen before him, and all of a sudden, he’s not seeing so clearly himself.

***

“…this highest
of awards, for heroism beyond reward, and beyond measure,” the President concludes. “Though evil may persist, this greater spirit will prevail.”

He moves to drape the medal about Deal’s neck. There is an explosion of applause from those gathered in the Rose Garden, and, right on cue, the thunder of three Air Force fighters streaking in formation overhead. The President, all thought of his doomed campaign set aside for this day, embraces Deal, and despite his misgivings, Deal feels himself leaning to return the gesture.

Next it is the First Lady who steps forward to embrace him. Though he has spent a good part of the day anticipating this moment, Deal feels her in his arms for only the briefest instant. Memories crowd in upon him, so many that his head feels ready to burst.

“Not what the bad guys had in mind,” he manages.

She steps back. “They didn’t count on you,” she tells him. And then she is gone, back to her place at her husband’s side, and the band strikes up its stirring song.

Someone comes up to lead the President away. The President turns to Linda Barnes Sheldon, who is about to take her husband’s hand. She glances back at Deal—one instant, but that’s all there needs to be.

Deal watches her go, washed in the glare of photographers’ lights and the wave of sound from the military band, and he wonders at the emotions that swell within him.
So many
, he thinks.
So much to contend with all at once
.

There is one thing above all, of course, one thing he no longer can escape. Pride, Deal thinks. Nothing he’s asked for, nothing he’d ever flaunt. But pride, just the same.

He thinks of his daughter, hoping dearly that she has watched all this. Thinks of his estranged wife, Janice, and all her pain and fear. Thinks of the twisted course of politics, of all those women and children in the water who had given over their lives just for the chance to live in freedom. Thinks of the twists and turns his life has taken to bring him exactly to this place…

…and despite his knowledge that politics will grind on, and whatever the President’s name, the boats and the rafters will keep coming, and the Chappelears and the Salazars as well…despite all this, he feels such gratitude to be here. He straightens. Today he’ll be a hero. He bears himself away.