“Ms. Alston? Ma’am?”
Corrine looked up from her computer to see Jess Northrup, poking his head in the doorway.
“President was wondering if you could wander into his office in about five minutes,” said Northrup, who as an assistant to the chief of staff was the president’s schedule keeper. “Senator Tewilliger’s in there.”
“Thanks, Jess.” Corrine hit the Save button and stood up. “How’s the car?”
Northrup’s face, which had been so serious his cheeks looked as if they were marble, brightened immediately. “Paint job over the weekend,” he said. “Assuming matters of state don’t interfere.”
“You promised me a ride with the top down.”
“Soon as it’s done.”
Northrup’s car was a 1966 Mustang convertible he’d started rebuilding soon after Jonathon McCarthy won reelection as senator nearly four years before. McCarthy was now president, but Northrup’s car still lacked key items, among them an engine.
“Do you have a fresh yellow pad?” she asked her secretary, Teri Gatins, in the outer office.
“Wandering into the Oval Office?” said Gatins.
Corrine returned the assistant’s smirk. Having an aide “spontaneously” interrupt him was a favorite McCarthy tactic for cutting short visits from people like Gordon Tewilliger, who were too important and dangerous to blow off but too dense to take all but the most obvious hint that it was time to leave.
“You have that appointment with Director Parnelles at Langley on Special Demands this afternoon,” said Gatins as Corrine took the notebook. “Should I get you a sandwich?”
“I’m not really hungry. It’s only eleven.”
“I’ll get corned beef,” said the secretary, picking up the phone.
The president’s office was only a few feet down the hall, but in that distance Corrine transformed herself, consciously changing her stride and stare. Senator Gordon Tewilliger was not, technically speaking, an enemy, but he was far from a friend.
Very far. Though he was a member of McCarthy’s own party, there were strong rumors that he was thinking about launching a primary fight against him. The election was a good three years away, and Tewilliger had steadfastly denied that he was interested in the job, but even the news-people thought he was testing the water.
Corrine winked at Northrup, knocked once on the door, and pushed inside.
“Well, now, if I didn’t know any better, Gordon,” said McCarthy, eyes fixed on Tewilliger, “I might think one or two of those projects there smelled of pork.”
“Pork?”
“Pork might not be the proper word in this context.” McCarthy came by his South Carolina accent honestly—his forebears, as he liked to call them, had been in the state since before the revolution—but sometimes it was more honest than others. At the moment it was honest in the extreme.
“I expect that many of those programs are important programs in their own right,” added McCarthy. “One or two of those highway patrol elements, I believe, should be funded through Transportation. And in a case or two of high priority relating to homeland defense, those items might be added by our budget director, working in close relation with your staff, of course.”
Senator Tewilliger, who for a moment had felt as if he’d been punched in the stomach, now felt like a man pulled from the ocean. He knew it was partly, perhaps mostly, a game—he’d seen McCarthy operating in the Senate and was well aware how smooth he could be—but still, in that instant he felt grateful, even flattered, that the president was going to help him.
Then he felt something else: the absolute conviction that he, Gordon Tewilliger, deserved to be the next president of the United States. McCarthy couldn’t be trusted with power like this.
Corrine cleared her throat. “I didn’t realize you were in the middle of something.”
“Well, now, Miss Alston, I am always in the middle of something,” said McCarthy. “Isn’t that right, Senator?”
“Yes. Corrine, how are you?” Tewilliger nodded in Corrine’s direction.
“Senator Tewilliger and I were just discussing how important the security of Indiana is. He has been doing quite a bit of work to ensure that we do not forget the state in the upcoming homeland defense bill.”
“Just keeping the home fires burning,” said the senator.
It occurred to Corrine that, had McCarthy lost his bid for president, she could well be working for Tewilliger right now, as counsel to the Senate Armed Services Committee; he had inherited the chairmanship when McCarthy left.
Then again, she and Tewilliger had clashed in the past, and it was much more likely that he would have fired her. He liked his aides and staffers to be people he could push around.
Tewilliger got up to leave; McCarthy got up as well, extending his hand. “It occurs to me, Gordon, that you haven’t declared which way you will vote on the Korean nonproliferation treaty.”
“No, I haven’t,” said Tewilliger.
“Well, now, I hope you will explain your views to me on any possible objection you have.”
“I’m not sure I have any objections.”
McCarthy continued to grip the senator’s hand. “You’re worried about verification of the treaty?”
“We all have concerns.”
“That is a difficult section of the entire document, I must give you that.” McCarthy glanced toward Corrine. “Have you had a chance to finish your review, Miss Alston?”
“I have looked at it, yes, sir,” said Corrine. The president made it sound offhand, but in fact Corrine had reviewed several drafts of the treaty and spent countless hours with State Department lawyers refining some of the language.
“And what do you think?” said McCarthy.
“At first blush, the language appears solid. The difficulty is making sure North Korea complies with it.”
“Now that is the first time I think in the history of the Union, perhaps in the history of mankind, that a lawyer has admitted there is something of importance beyond the letter and face of the law,” said McCarthy. He turned back to Senator Tewilliger. “I have some concerns about verification, but ultimately our question should be: Is the treaty better than nothing?”
“I’ve always taken a hard line with North Korea,” said Tewilliger. “We have to be tough with them. We need assurances.”
“What sort of assurance would be sufficient, Senator?” asked Corrine. “We have their six warheads under constant surveillance. Their launch vehicles have been dismantled. The International Atomic Energy Agency will inspect all military and nuclear facilities on the peninsula and Japan. Beyond that, we have the satellites and—”
“That’s another thing that bothers me,” said Tewilliger. “South Korea is being treated like a pariah here.”
“Well, now, Gordon, I have to say the South Koreans are the least part of the problem,” said McCarthy. “They have less to hide than the preacher’s wife.”
“I didn’t say they were a problem, just that they have to be treated fairly.”
“True, true,” said the president. “Perhaps you could give the verification matter additional thought. Maybe someone from State could go over and brief your committee.”
“Yes. Of course.” Tewilliger decided it was time to leave. “I better let you get back to work.”
“Always a pleasure talking to you, Gordon,” said McCarthy, walking with him to the door.
“South Korea’s being treated unfairly?” said Corrine after the senator was gone. “Where did that come from?”
The president pulled his chair out and sat down. He had known Corrine literally all of her life; her father was one of his best friends, and he had visited the family at the hospital the day after she was born. She’d worked for him since high school, first as a volunteer, then as a lawyer.
“Well, dear. What the senator just told us is very interesting,” explained McCarthy. His thick Southern drawl not only made “dear” sound like “deah”; it removed any hint of condescension. “I would wager a good part of the back forty that some of Senator Tewilliger’s Korean-American constituents are feeling that North Korea is getting all of the attention.”
“The South Koreans pushed for the deal.”
“South Korea did, yes. We are not talking about South Korea. We’re talking about the senator’s constituents. Very different.”
McCarthy leaned back in his seat. Against his wishes, the disarmament treaty had become an important centerpiece of his foreign-policy strategy, an important test not only of his plans to limit the growth of nuclear weapons—Iran was his next target—but of his influence with Congress. Lose the vote, and Congress would feel emboldened to block any number of initiatives.
“And how precisely are we doing on verification?” he asked Corrine.
“The mission is proceeding. The IAEA just changed its inspection plans, pushing things up. The First Team should get there in—”
McCarthy put up his hand. He didn’t want to know the specifics, just that Corrine had it under control.
“You know, Parnelles is not in favor of the treaty,” said Corrine, referring to CIA Director Thomas Parnelles.
“As I recall he said he is not opposed to the treaty,” said McCarthy.
“Same thing, if you read between the lines.”
“Not precisely. Mr. Parnelles is very careful with his words, very, very careful. There are no lines to read between.”
McCarthy folded his arms. He admired Parnelles a great deal, but having a strong man in charge of the CIA presented certain problems. Appointing Corrine as his “liaison” to Special Demands and its so-called First Team of CIA paramilitary officers and Special Forces soldiers was one of several steps he’d taken to keep some control over the agency without pulling the reins too tight.
“Like many of the people who work for him at the CIA,” continued the president, “Tom Parnelles does not trust the North Koreans to tell him whether the sun is shining on a cloudless day.”
“Do you?”
“Of course not.” McCarthy laughed. “That’s why your people are there.”
Corrine wasn’t particularly comfortable calling the First Team “her people,” but she let the remark pass.
“Anything else, Jon?”
“No. Thank you, dear. I believe I should release you back to your regular chores.”
“I’ll have that briefing paper on the requests from the Senate ready for you first thing in the morning, so you can read it on your way up to Pennsylvania.”
“Very good.” McCarthy was heading off on a nine-day, twelve-state swing across the country in the morning. “By the way, Miss Alston, I spoke to your daddy last evening. He asked me to send his regards.”
“Oh?”
“He was concerned that you are not getting enough time off. He saw a picture of you on the television the other day and said you looked rather ragged.”
“I hope you took full blame for that.”
“I did, I did. And I gave orders to the press secretary to keep you off camera from now on.”
“I’m in favor of that.”
“Call him a little more, would you, dear?” said McCarthy as she got up to leave.
“I call him once a week.”
“That’s not very much to a father. Trust me.”
“Yes, Mr. President.”