Worst Case Scenario (15 page)

Chapter Twenty-one

Michaelson's proposal to Pilkington had three parts. Michaelson and Gallagher began the first one late that afternoon.

They returned to Sharon Bedford's apartment, arriving just before five p.m. Gallagher turned the alarm off and they went inside. They stayed inside for forty-five minutes, more than long enough to install a SafeHome LokBox in the cabinet above her refrigerator. They left the lockbox open and the cabinet door ajar.

Michaelson returned to Gallagher's Cadillac. After he was sure that Michaelson had had time to get back to the car, Gallagher turned the apartment alarm back on, exited the apartment, closed the door, and locked it. He waited one more minute. Then, without turning the alarm off, he unlocked the door, pushed it open, and walked away.

Forty-five seconds later a siren began screaming from the apartment. Gallagher by this time had reached the sidewalk. He continued along it without haste for another ten seconds, slipped into the front seat of his car beside Michaelson, and drove off.

Four minutes and five seconds later a Montgomery County Police Department patrol car pulled up outside the town-house complex. Two and a half hours or so after that, Patrolman Steph Richardson submitted a written report detailing his discovery of a concealed but open and empty safe in Bedford's apartment, and his failure to find any other indication of mischief on the part of whoever had triggered the alarm.

Although the following morning was a Saturday, a copy of Richardson's report, summarized and annotated by Pilkington, landed on Quentin's desk at eleven a.m.

The second phase was a bit more complicated. Evidence of it didn't surface until ten days later.

That evidence took the form of three paragraphs in a
Washington Post
article on the future of American intelligence agencies in the post–Cold War world. Starting at the top of the article's second column, the first of the three paragraphs noted that a proposal to establish a “permanent task force” on coordination of intelligence-gathering activities had suddenly advanced from something everyone had had at the back of his credenza for five years to something that was about to happen in a big hurry.

The next paragraph opined that, particularly in light of the Aldrich Ames/Soviet mole fiasco, this embryonic task force had all the earmarks of an outfit intended to gather all intelligence responsibility under a single new directorate, leaving the CIA with Operations and Hardware Maintenance.

The final paragraph, amid references to “senior officials” and other allusions to deep background chats, mentioned four candidates for the task force chairmanship: two who were clearly impossible, one who would have accepted a caustic enema before taking an appointment from the incumbent president, and Richard Michaelson.

“‘Permanent task force.' There's a nice Washington touch,” the deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency said when he saw the story. The CIA has heard the permanent task force rumor roughly once every eighteen months for forty years and no longer pays much attention to it.

Lacking this institutional memory, Jeffrey Quentin reacted with less equanimity. He called several senior officials and demanded acidly whether they planned on telling the president whom he'd be inviting into his administration before they made it official. The responses varied from veiled condescension to borderline derision—unsubtle reminders that the people Quentin was talking to were the permanent government, whereas Quentin himself was as good as out of town.

Except for Scott Pilkington's response. Pilkington, who at least paid lip service to the respect that Quentin's position should in theory have commanded, analyzed the development with his customary lucidity when Quentin phoned him. Deconstructing the
Post
story and putting it together with the police report, Pilkington accompanied Quentin effortlessly to the conclusion that Michaelson must have come up with a hard copy of the coup d'état order and was now capitalizing on it.

“So you're saying for sure he has the goods,” Quentin said.

“That's the way it looks from here,” Pilkington said with long-practiced, big-picture expansiveness.

“And he's showing them to everyone in town except us.”

“That's definitely the implication.”

“We can't keep leaving the initiative to him, goddammit,” Quentin snapped. “We have to get proactive on this. We've gotta smoke him out.”

“Perhaps,” Pilkington said judiciously. “Or perhaps we should use him to smoke someone else out.”

“Marciniak?”

“He's the only other player I know who seems to have one of the damn things.”

“I
know
that,” Quentin said sardonically. “I told
you
that, and I told you how he got it. But he's been guarding it like the crown jewels for years. What can we do with Michaelson to change Marciniak's mind?”

“Marciniak's been guarding his duplicate original of the order because he wants to use it one more time, at exactly the right moment, to get the one thing he really wants.”

“Agreed. So what?”

“Marciniak's crown jewel loses one hundred percent of its value overnight if Michaelson decides to make his public,” Pilkington explained. “By turning it over to you, for example.”

“By God, I think you've got something,” Quentin said, his voice softening to a near whisper and quickening with excitement. “If we let Marciniak know that Michaelson has the same bombshell he does, find a way to really rub his nose in it, then make him think Michaelson's in the process of auctioning it off, he's gonna have to take the damn thing out of whatever hole he's put it in and make the best deal he can with it. Right now. And I'll have every goddamn ace at the table.”

“There's an outside-the-Beltway foreign policy conference in about three months at Hilton Head,” Pilkington began almost dreamily. “I was thinking—”

“Screw your conference,” Quentin yelped. “Screw your three months. I haven't got any three goddamn months. Get Marciniak a copy of that police report before lunch, and make sure he understands what it means.”

“Consider it done,” Pilkington said, just the hint of an edge to his voice. “I mentioned the Hilton Head conference because it seems to me that someone in line to chair a permanent task force ought to have a key organizational role at a conference like that. He should pop down there on the government's nickel in the next week or so, talk to the on-scene people, make some security assessments, walk over the grounds, kick the tires, that kind of thing.”

“So?”

“He'll need some input from your end, of course.”

“You bet your ass,” Quentin said, beginning to understand.

“On the other hand, we can't have the White House openly involved. You'd want to have some innocuous agency reserve the rooms and clear the bills.”

“What agency did you have in mind?”

“Jerry Marciniak's,” Pilkington said. “That way, he'll know that Michaelson and you were both going to be down at Hilton Head, with every chance in the world to get chummy and make deals. Marciniak's a smart chap. You did mention rubbing his nose in it, didn't you?”

A tense, electric silence throbbed over the line for five seconds while Quentin calmed himself and tumbled in stages to the elegant, delicately nuanced beauty of the idea. Then he spoke.

“Do it,” he snapped.

Pilkington hung up, beating Quentin's click by a quarter-second or so. The third phase of Michaelson's proposal was under way.

Chapter Twenty-two

“I'm not certain the second reservation is in my name,” Michaelson told the desk clerk at the Hilton Head Radisson four days later. “It may be under the National Health Research Agency.”

“Yes, here it is,” the smiling young woman said. “That room has already been registered. Two-oh-four, right next to yours.”

She turned to the bank of pigeonholes behind her and took a cardboard folder from the 204 slot.

“Your name is on that folder, too, so I guess I'll just give it to you,” she said.

“That will be fine,” Michaelson said, accepting the second cardboard folder and palming it underneath the one he'd already been given for his own room.

He glanced inside. His folder held two rectangular plastic key-cards, as he'd requested. The folder for 204 held one key. Strolling across the lobby, he tossed the folder for 204 to Jeffrey Quentin.

“We might as well start by looking at the rooms,” he said. “They're only on the second floor. Let's just take the stairs.”

“Fine,” Quentin sighed, heaving himself out of an overstuffed chair.

“Do you have any searing insights to share with me so far in your capacity as an expert consultant?” Michaelson asked as they walked together toward the stairway.

“Sure,” Quentin muttered. “Get receipts for everything and don't pimp for anyone lower on the food chain than subcommittee chair.”

They found Rooms 202 and 204 at the right end of the second-floor hallway. Michaelson opened 202, which looked like a double room, almost suite-sized. They stepped inside and glanced around.

“They tell me they can move the bed and the dresser out, put some more tables and chairs in, and we can use this for the conference nerve center,” Michaelson said.

“Makes sense. I don't envy whoever ends up with the room next door when the conference actually happens, but I guess that's not your problem.”

“Actually, I'll probably take it myself to preserve the illusion that I'm at the heart of the action,” Michaelson said with a hint of self-mockery. “You can give me a report on it after tonight. That should be at least as productive a way for us to spend the public's dollars as sipping gin and tonics and looking at pretty girls in string bikinis will be—and that's close to the next thing on the agenda for this little boondoggle.”

“Look at it this way,” Quentin said. “We'll be spending the money more wisely than the taxpayers would if we let them keep it.”

Walking over to the adjoining door between the suite and Quentin's room, Michaelson slid the metal sleeve on the chest-level tongue-and-groove lock back and forth across its tracks. Then he ambled to the windows and checked their locks in the same desultory way.

“Security inspection is complete,” he said offhandedly. “I can't think of any good reason to put off my examination of the patio bar and the poolside view any longer. My meeting with the arrangements manager isn't for another two hours yet. Care to join me in, say, forty-five minutes?”

“Knock on my door,” Quentin said, and stepped toward his own room.

A hustling bellhop, spotless in summer whites, appeared a couple of minutes later with the bags for both rooms. Michaelson tipped him two dollars, as prescribed by executive-branch travel guidelines, and began to unpack. He hadn't quite finished when he heard the rap on his door.

“Dr. Marciniak,” he said as he opened the door. “What a surprise. Please come in.”

Jerry Marciniak stepped briskly into the room, tossing a New York Mets baseball cap on the bed. He strode to the window bank on the far side of the room, then turned to face Michaelson.

“Thank you for reserving and then registering the rooms, by the way,” Michaelson said. “Surely you didn't have to fly down yourself to take care of that chore, though, did you?”

“I take every perk I can get,” Marciniak said. “I know jobs that'd pay me three times what the government does. I'm not complaining, but this kind of thing is part of the deal. When the eagle flies, I go along for the ride.”

“Well, I hope you enjoy your stay as much as I intend to enjoy mine,” Michaelson said. “Anything in particular I can do for you?”

“Sorry to be abrupt, but I don't really have time for foreplay on this one. Have you given it to him yet?”

“‘It' being the order? He wouldn't be here if I had, and I'm no more likely than you are to tuck it into a travel bag and haul it to a hotel room.”

“Good,” Marciniak said, pacing around the expansive room. “Then there's still time for us to help each other instead of screwing each other.”

“The ball's in your court,” Michaelson said with a chilly, make-it-good smile.

“We need to level with each other,” Marciniak said. “If we let him play one of us off against the other, he'll win and both of us will lose.”

“That's a view I've held for some time, actually,” Michaelson said.

“What has Quentin offered you for your duplicate original of the order?”

“The moon, the stars, and the sky,” Michaelson said. “What has he offered you for yours?”

“Assuming I actually have one,” Marciniak said.

“You have one,” Michaelson said genially. “Only a handful of people had them, one of them got a favor only you could provide, and a short time later you achieved a dramatic promotion.”

“That might have been charm and good looks,” Marciniak said, grinning.

“If your abundant talent were enough, you would've become a senior policy-maker long ago. I thought we were playing straight with each other, by the way.”

“Fair enough,” Marciniak said. “I have one, Quentin's offered me a blank check, and so far I haven't delivered. But apparently he thinks that you will.”

“Why do you say that?” Michaelson asked. “Because of my chairmanship of a Gilbert-and-Sullivan task force that some reporter thinks is going to replace half the CIA?”

“Yes,” Marciniak said. “Because of that. Plus, with apologies to Rodgers and Hammerstein, because of things I've heard from fellas who were talking like they know.”

“The fact is he's far from sure that I will come across with the order,” Michaelson said. “This little task force flutter is his idea of an appetizer. To taste the main course, he's made it clear that I have to put a hard-copy duplicate original of the critical order in his hands.”

“I'd say you're tempted.”

“Sorely,” Michaelson admitted. “As you must be. I frankly would have expected you to succumb to your temptation long ago, before I was even in the picture. Your self-restraint to date borders on inspirational.”

“Self-restraint has nothing to do with it,” Marciniak said. He stopped pacing and, affecting a nonchalant pose, leaned against the locked door joining the two rooms, slipping his hands into his pockets. “I've told him what I want, but I've also told him I'm not sure his boss will ever be in a position to deliver it. The position I want doesn't exist yet, and I'm not sure Quentin's going to be a player when it does.”

“You want to be health policy czar, when and if the federal government takes over the financing of medical care in this country—is that a pretty fair guess?” Michaelson asked.

“Except there's no ‘if' about it. You've got half the fat cats in the country paying eight thousand, ten thousand a year for health insurance for themselves already, and going up by three percent a quarter. Plus what they pay for their employees. It can't go on. I don't care which party has a majority in Congress or who wins the presidential elections. I don't care if conservatives or liberals or the Christian right or the radical left end up calling the shots. Ideological purity stops when the checkbooks come out. It's simple arithmetic. What we have now simply cannot continue. It's going to change. The change may be packaged and labeled as something else, but the federal government's going to be functionally running health care in this country before any of us gets too much older.”

“And when that happens,” Michaelson prompted, “you want to be running the show.”

“You bet I do,” Marciniak said. “Deputy Director for Health Policy. I told Quentin it had to be a quasi-tenured office, like the Director of the FBI. Seven-year term, Senate confirmation, dismissal only for cause, budget subject to independent congressional authorization.”

“At least you didn't demand cabinet-level status.”

“Only a moron would care about cabinet-level
status
,” Marciniak said, whipping out his right hand and jabbing the air with his index finger. “I want cabinet-level
power
. Let the Secretary of Health and Human Services walk point. That's fine with me—as long as she signs the checks and stays out of my shop.”

Marciniak's eyes shone as this torrent of words flowed. Michaelson met the passionate verbal onslaught with a jovial and almost condescending smile.

“You've obviously thought this through thoroughly,” he said mildly. “I'm sure your course is a wise one.”

“Except it all goes south if you get greedy,” Marciniak said.

“I don't think I'm the one who sounds greedy,” Michaelson protested. “I haven't asked for a fully autonomous, quasi-tenured appointment yet.”

“That's not what I mean,” Marciniak said, spitting the words out in a short, impatient burst. “We each have something very valuable. Agreed?”

“Obviously.”

“Now, there's two ways we can each use our little asset. There are people still in powerful positions who want that order kept secret. Certainly through the next election and, depending on who ends up on each ticket, probably well beyond that. We can take what they'll give us in exchange for keeping it secret. On the other hand, there are people like Quentin who want that order made public, and we can take what they'll give us for letting them publicize it.”

“It's hard to argue with any of that,” Michaelson said, a bit dismissively.

“The thing is, you can
threaten
to disclose the order an indefinite number of times. It's as worthwhile the tenth time as the first.”

“You apparently speak from experience, to which I defer,” Michaelson said.

“But you can only
actually
disclose it once,” Marciniak said insistently. “As soon as it shows up above the fold on the front page of the
Washington Post
, no one cares about any threats to reveal it again. You've shot your wad. From that day forward, the asset's worth zero. Mine
and
yours.”

“Fair enough. Your point, I take it, is that you and I can make a gentlemen's agreement, and as long as we trust each other and respect that agreement, we can by our forbearance preserve the value of the documentary proof that we share.”

“Exactly.”

“Of course,” Michaelson said, “the value of our document diminishes over time. As late as 1992 this would certainly have been a huge story. Today, as you pointed out, it would still stir very great interest. But every year the number of powerful people who could be compromised or inconvenienced if this came out goes down. Combine that with the fact that either you or I might prove untrustworthy, and the risk of sitting on the order increases exponentially over time. If I were Quentin, I'd suggest to you—and to me—that the best thing to do now is to get the maximum immediate value that we can for the thing with a onetime disclosure.”

“By giving it to him, you mean?”

“Yes.”

“You sound like he's already made that pitch to you.”

“He hasn't,” Michaelson said. “At least in those words. But he will. And he'll also make it to you.”

“Suppose I cross my heart and promise to say no?” Marciniak asked with a biting smile.

“That would satisfy me just as much as an equivalent performance by me would satisfy you,” Michaelson said. “No, I think we'll need something a bit more concrete. Safe-deposit box requiring two keys, something like that. But this will all be academic unless we both resist temptation this weekend. Quentin is here, and as you've already pointed out, he's going to spend his time playing each of us off against the other. If neither of us sells out, we'll have something to talk about on Monday. If both of us do, then we'll both lose.”

“How about if one does and the other doesn't?”

“Then one of us will be a victim and the other a fool,” Michaelson said. “We have no choice but to trust each other until we're both back in Washington. No bargain with Quentin can be relied on without ironclad guarantees in place. There's no way he can give those to either of us this weekend.”

Marciniak moved away from the adjoining door and gave Michaelson an intrigued and appraising gaze as he walked over to the hallway door.

“Quentin and I will be sipping gin and tonics by the patio bar in the very near future,” Michaelson said. “If it would make you feel more secure, you'd be welcome to join us.”

“That's all right,” Marciniak said. “I can't keep tabs on you for the entire weekend, any more than you can keep an eye on me. I'm going to freshen up, hit CNN for half an hour, and return phone calls. I'm in six-fifteen if something comes up.”

“Until later, then,” Michaelson said.

He finished unpacking, reknotted his bow tie, washed his hands, and stepped into the corridor to knock on Quentin's door. Quentin joined him immediately, and they walked downstairs together in search of alcoholic refreshment and female visual relief.

With Michaelson's professorial reserve and Quentin's nervous, hustler's energy, they stood out among the vacationing lawyers, executives, award-winning salespeople, and small-business owners populating the patio bar. Someone with binoculars in Room 615, for example, could have spotted them without difficulty.

The hotel operator confirmed later that, in response to calls from a house phone rather than a room phone, she rang 202 and 204 twenty times each a few minutes after Michaelson and Quentin reached the patio bar.