The Patriots Club (36 page)

64

The tip of the knife came to rest a millimeter above Bolden’s bare chest. It was a K-Bar, with white athletic tape wrapped around the handle. One side of the blade was serrated, the other sharpened like nothing Bolden had ever seen. Hands bound behind his back, feet tied to the legs of the chair, it was impossible to move.

“Why are you doing this?” he asked. “You know I didn’t send any papers. You were watching me the entire time.”

Wolf sniffed the air, giving the question his full consideration. “Easy, really: to settle the score. Make sure you go to the Lord with a sign that you crossed the Wolf’s path. It’s important to mark the bad guys.”

“Kill ’em all. Let God sort ’em out. Is that it?”

“Oh, I’m not going to kill you. Not yet.” He stuffed a cotton handkerchief into Bolden’s mouth and pulled a piece of tape across his lips. “Some of the guys liked to beat up the Muj. Knock ’em around until their brains were mushy, then start asking ’em questions. Others liked to work on fingers or toes. Crush their knuckles, whatever. Not me. I like the skin. Most people know what to expect when you snap their fingers or stuff bamboo under their fingernails. No one knows what it’s like to have your skin peeled off your body, strip by strip. That’s their fuckin’ nightmare, man. It’s medieval. I think it’s the fear as much as the pain that makes them talk.”

The point of the knife pressed into Bolden’s chest, an inch to the right of his nipple. A bead of blood bubbled around it. The knife cut deeper, Wolf drawing the blade in a straight line toward Bolden’s belly. When he reached his waist, he cut horizontally an inch, then twisted the blade and brought it back up.

Until now, the pain had been extreme, but bearable. Bolden stared into Wolf’s eyes and darkness stared back. The abyss.

“To those about to rock,” said Wolf. “We salute you.”

Spearing the strip of outlined flesh, Wolf yanked the blade up.

Bolden screamed.

Jacklin spotted Hugh Fitzgerald deep in conversation with Frances Tavistock.

“I see you two have met,” he said, pulling up a chair and joining them at their table.

The former British prime minister was an elegant older woman, with coiffed graying hair, a stern countenance, and a patrician manner that would have done Queen Victoria proud. “Senator Fitzgerald’s been telling me about his time up at Oxford. Did you know we were both at Balliol? What a marvelous coincidence.”

“Yes, I had to admit to Frances that she wasn’t all bad, considering she’s a Tory.”

“Oh, Hugh,” she said, slapping his leg. “Tony’s practically come out of the closet himself.”

“Does that mean you’re coming to our side of the table?” Jacklin asked.

“I do think we’ve made some progress educating the senator about the true nature of the world,” said Tavistock. “Bad, bad, bad. Isn’t that so? It really is ‘us against them.’ One can never possess enough of an advantage.”

“Simple common sense,” said Jacklin. “But it’s the soldier I’m worried about. Our boys don’t deserve to die just because one society has an inferiority complex toward America. I’m sorry, but that’s just the way I feel about it.”

“All right, you two,” said Hugh Fitzgerald. “That’s enough. You win. J. J., you’ll have my recommendation for the appropriations bill tomorrow. Frances has convinced me that six billion dollars isn’t too much to pay to ensure that our boys are as safe as they can be.”

“Hear, hear,” said Frances Tavistock, grasping Fitzgerald’s hand and giving it a squeeze. “Doesn’t it feel good to do what’s right?”

“Offer still stands if you’re retiring,” said Jacklin. “We’ve an office with your name on it.”

“Oh, do sign up with Jefferson, Hugh. It would be lovely. I’ve got to have someone to join me for roast beef and Yorkshire pudding on my visits.”

But Fitzgerald would only go so far in one night. “I’ll think about it, J. J. Give me some time.”

Jacklin stood. “Take all the time you need.”

The orchestra struck up “Witchcraft.” Fitzgerald extended a hand toward Mrs. Tavistock. “Care to dance?”

“Once we had a real tough Muj,” said Wolf. “He was as mean as a rabid dog. Six foot seven. Towered over me. These crazy blue eyes. We are talking wild. He was a warlord, had about two hundred savages under his control. And make no mistake, they were savages. I respect all religions, Islam, Buddha, what have you . . . but these guys . . . they came from another world, man. I mean, they weren’t even human. I found this guy easy enough. We brought him back to the base at Bagram to do a debrief. To tell you the truth, I was scared of him. I thought this sonuvabitch was going to outlast me. He was walking around on a busted knee. How much does that hurt?” Wolf shook his head in amazement. “Know how long it took before he spilled the beans? Ten minutes. Didn’t even get to finish the star I was cutting into him, my little reminder of his time with Uncle Sam. Now you, you’re still going strong. Tough little turd, aren’t you?”

Wolf pulled the gag out of Bolder’s mouth, then poked the tip of the blade into his chest. “One more time, Tommy. Did you make any copies of Mr. Jacklin’s files?”

“Didn’t have time,” whispered Bolden. “You were there.” His mouth was dry, his lips crusted with spittle. He couldn’t look at himself. It would be worse if he saw what Wolf had done to him. His breath came in short bursts, the slightest expansion of his ribs plunging a serrated spear into the farthest recesses of his belly. Fire. He was on fire.

“Liar,” said Wolf. “I know you did. Just tell me where you sent them.”

“No time. You saw. No time.”

“Wrong answer,” said Wolf.

Beneath the flickering light, the knife flashed.

When he was finished, Wolf threw Bolden into the room with Jenny. “Looks like he was telling the truth. Take care of your man. He’s a tough one.”

Jenny stared at Bolden’s chest, at the orthodox crucifix carved into his flesh, and stifled a scream. “My God, what have you done to him?”

“Marked him for the Lord.”

Bolden staggered and fell into her arms.

65

The old ship’s clock struck midnight. Around the table, all heads bowed in prayer.

“. . . and so we thank you, Lord. Amen,” intoned Gordon Ramser, President of the United States. He looked up. “We all have a busy day tomorrow. Let’s keep this meeting as brief as possible. I’m sorry to report that my discussion with Senator McCoy did not produce the desired results. She even threatened to talk to Charlie at the
Post
.”

“Would’ve taken that bet at ten to one,” said James Jacklin.

Charles Connolly shook his head.

“A shame,” said Ramser. “She would have been a solid addition.”

“No shame at all.” Jacklin despised this maudlin hypocrisy. Either you stood with them or against them. All the moralizing in the world didn’t change what the men in this room had to do, or what those actions branded them. “We’d be looking at eight years of playing it safe,” he went on. “Kissing our allies’ asses and saying mea culpas for having the guts to do what was right, instead of what was expedient. Mrs. McCoy’s first trip would be to France, and she’d follow that up with a ride up the Rhine with her lips firmly planted on the German chancellor’s ass, all in the name of reestablishing our reputation as a team player. Alliances breed indecision. There’s not one thing to be gained from playing kissy-face with old Europe. Hell, they want nothing better than to see us fall on our ass, anyway. McCoy’s standoffishness is the best thing we could have asked for, besides getting our own man put into the White House. Any plans we had for Iran and Syria would have been scotched then and there. The whole Middle East would sink back into that pit of fundamentalist quicksand. Everything we’ve done would have gone for naught. I don’t even want to think what she’d do to defense spending.”

“Defense spending?” asked John Von Arx, director of the FBI. “Is that what this is all about? We’re talking about taking the life of the next President of the United States. Jesus Christ, J. J., sometimes I think you confuse what’s good for the country with what’s good for your company.”

“What do you mean by that?” snorted Jacklin.

“It means I don’t like you asking me to call out my boys to solve your own problems. I’m talking about Tom Bolden and what transpired this morning in Manhattan.”

“Bolden was a threat that needed to be neutralized.”

“I heard it was an error.”

“Who told you that?”

“I do run the FBI. I have a few sources.” Von Arx addressed the other members seated at the table. “Some of my guys looked at that tape of Sol Weiss being shot. They say it was faked. Top-quality work, but their computers spotted it in a jiff. It would never hold up in court.”

“It was a judgment call,” said Jacklin. “He was a threat to Crown. We needed to get him off the street.”

“Where is he now?” asked Von Arx.

“He’s been contained. You don’t have to worry about it any longer.”

Gordon Ramser clasped his hands on the table and directed a long, hard gaze at Jacklin. “The rumors about Jefferson are getting out of hand,” he said. “Your ‘revolving door’ is becoming a popular topic for the press corps. All this talk about ‘access capitalism’ has to stop. Are we clear on that, J. J.?”

“That’s right, boys,” said Jacklin. “I only bribe ’em when you tell me to.”

“The feeling is that you’re gorging yourself at the public trough,” said Chief Justice Logsdon.

“Bullroar!” exclaimed Jacklin.

“A word to the wise, J. J.,” cautioned Ramser. “Don’t confuse the Committee’s policies and your company’s.”

Jacklin shook his head in disgust and disbelief. “Don’t talk to me about keeping public and private separate. Old Pierpont Morgan helped get us into the Great War and his company practically underwrote the whole thing. The history of this country is nothing but the government helping out the private sector, and vice versa. One hand washing the other. Hamilton knew it when he started the club with Nat Pendleton. Economics must dictate the country’s policies.”

“You like to mention Hamilton so much,” said Charles Connolly, the journalist and author, also known as Rufus King. “He made it a point never to take a profit from policies he had a say in. He repeatedly turned down territories in Ohio and the Missouri Valley that would have made him immensely rich.”

“He also got us started down this rocky road by getting rid of that scoundrel who was threatening the Jay Treaty. Don’t go moralizing to me about Hamilton. He was no saint. The man was a skirt chaser of the first degree. ‘The man had an overabundance of secretions no number of whores could satisfy.’ I believe I got that quote from your book, Charlie.” Jacklin pushed his chair back and stood up. “I’ve read those minutes, too. Go tell it to John Rockefeller and Standard Oil and Commodore Vanderbilt and his railroads. They all sat in my chair before me. Go tell it to Averell Harriman and his cronies. They all got rich from decisions that were made right here. The business of America is business. A wiser man than me already said it.”

“Those were different times,” said Gordon Ramser. “Far less transparent. We can’t afford to attract any undue scrutiny.”

Jacklin rested a hand on the back of his chair. “What are you all driving at?”

“Just watch what you’re doing,” said Ramser forcefully. “We can’t risk your actions discrediting our motives. The good of the nation comes first. Remember that.”

“I’ll be sure to tell it to Hugh Fitzgerald. He’s decided to give us his vote. The appropriations bill will pass. Our pre-pos should be restocked within six months. We can continue with our plans to bring some light to that godforsaken desert.”

“Congratulations,” said Ramser. A few of the others joined in, but Jacklin thought their voices were hollow, insincere. He noted the veiled stares, the averted faces. They’d been talking behind his back again. He knew the reasons why. He was too direct. Too brash for them. He was the only one who had the gumption to tell it like it is. Not one of these two-faced bastards dared look him in the eye. They’d been shoveling bullshit for so long, they’d grown to like the smell.

Jacklin cleared his throat. “I believe we were talking about Senator McCoy. It’s got to be done up close. I have something our British subsidiary developed for MI Six . . .”

“Excuse me, J. J., but I don’t believe we’ve taken a final vote on the matter,” said Chief Justice Logsdon.

“A vote? We decided last night. Gordon gave it a last shot and she turned him down. Our hands are tied. The President has always been a member. If she can’t take the hint, then she’s making her own bed. God knows, we’re better off without her.”

“No!” said Charles Connolly, and the word echoed around the room.

“No what?” asked Jacklin.

“We can’t do it. She’s the President. The people elected her. It isn’t right.”

Jacklin rose from his chair and walked the length of the table. “Since when do we care what the people say? This committee was created to temper the people’s will. To stop them from running this country into the ground.”

“It was not created to kill the President,” Connolly retorted.

“Sounds like you’re afraid you’ll lose your special pass at the White House. Did McCoy already promise to pull back the curtains and give you an insider’s view of how she saves us from the ‘new Vietnam’? Is that it, Charlie? No grist for the new book?”

“Don’t you see?” Connolly continued. “Any authority we claim comes from the President’s presence. Without him . . . or her . . . we’re not patriots, we’re renegades.” He shot a corrosive look at Jacklin. “Just a bunch of businessmen looking to enrich ourselves at the country’s expense.”

“That’s nonsense!” said Jacklin.

“Is it? The people expect the President to do what’s necessary. They realize that there are times when he can’t consult them, maybe even when he shouldn’t. It’s their implicit trust in him that gives us our legitimacy. Hamilton would never have started the club without Washington.”

“Screw him,” said Jacklin. “He’s been dead two hundred years.”

“But his ideas are still alive,” shouted Connolly right back.

“The club’s grown bigger than one person,” said Jacklin. “I don’t care if it’s the President or not. We have responsibilities to the nation. We have a history. You ask me, the country practically belongs to us. We bribed that Frog Talleyrand to make the Louisiana Purchase happen. We convinced old Du Pont to help underwrite the loan that paid for it. Whose idea was it to blackmail the czar so he’d sell us Alaska for three cents an acre? We’ve helped facilitate every major acquisition of territory in this country’s history. You say we need the President. I say we are the President. This is the White House, right here!”

“Shut up, J. J.,” said Chief Justice Logsdon. “You’ve gone too far.”

“No such place,” said Jacklin, dismissing the comment with a nasty wave.

“And you others?” asked Ramser. “Have you changed your mind?”

For a few moments, no one in the room spoke. Only the ticking of John Paul Jones’s ship’s clock filled the room. Jacklin paced back and forth, like a beleaguered ship’s captain. “Come on, Von Arx,” he said, putting a hand on the FBI director’s shoulder. “You know what’s right.”

Von Arx nodded reluctantly. “I’m sorry, J. J., but I have to agree with Charlie,” he said. “It’s tampering. We’ve got to give McCoy a chance to come to us. Her time in office will make a convert out of her.”

“Me, too,” said Logsdon. “Give the woman time.”

“And you?” Jacklin said, facing President Gordon Ramser.

“It doesn’t matter what I say. That’s three votes against. A unanimous vote is required for measures of this kind.”

“Screw the bylaws. What do you think we should do?”

Ramser rose from his chair and walked over to Jacklin. “J. J.,” he said. “I think we may have gotten ahead of ourselves on this one. There’s no hurry now that Fitzgerald’s given us his vote. The military needs at least six months before they can make any move. The joint chiefs are busy revising their battle plan. Let’s all take a breath and calm down. Like the chief justice says. ‘Give the woman time.’ ” He laughed richly to paper over the discord. “She has no idea what she’s in for.”

Jacklin forced a smile to his face, joining the others in laughter. But inside, his gut clenched and his nerves hummed with near unbearable tension. Gordon Ramser was right. She had no idea.