The White House Roosevelt Room—June 21
Brewster McGreer paced around the oak conference table.
“‘She knows.’ She knows?” he said. “What the fuck does that fucking mean?”
He was trying to make sense of the only two words the assassin had said to the business wire service reporter sixty minutes ago. “Any fucking ideas?”
The senior staff was there. No one answered.
“And HAPPY? Is this a fucking joke?”
Addis sat at the table and stared at the Nobel Peace Prize medal in the glass case, sitting on the mantel at the far end of the room. Teddy Roosevelt had won the award for brokering an end to the Russo-Japanese War.
Addis was in shock. They all were. His mind drifted to his first tour of the West Wing during the transition. A Navy officer who worked in the mess was showing him about. In this room, he pointed out the medal display. You’ve heard about San Juan Hill? he asked Addis. Without waiting for an answer, the officer disclosed that he had studied that Spanish-American War battle. His speech quickened: It was, you probably don’t know, not actually a heroic contest, as depicted in Roosevelt legend, with T. R. valiantly leading the Rough Riders in the fight for the ridge overlooking Santiago. Addis began to feel trapped. The officer continued his well-rehearsed lecture. Roosevelt’s force, he explained, engaged in desperate maneuvers, reckless and bloody attacks, and took many needless casualties. When the Navy man started diagraming the battle on a piece of scrap paper, Addis requested they push on. The fellow was disappointed. He handed Addis the drawing, and Addis had placed it in his pocket.
Addis raised himself from his reverie. McGreer was proceeding with a
situation report, the word fuck punctuating almost every sentence. Yesterday—yesterday? —an intern had asked Addis if McGreer suffered from Tourette’s syndrome. For what else would account for the amount of fucks in his speech?
Addis concentrated on the chief of staff: the kinky red hair that resembled an industrial product, the bushy eyebrows. In his early fifties, McGreer walked with a bow-legged gait. He was tall, nearly Addis’s height. None of Hanover’s main advisers, Addis thought, were short.
McGreer raced through the list. The Vice President was flying back from Dallas—again it had to be Dallas—and a federal judge had been located to administer the oath of office. White House security had been tightened to the maximum; the nearby streets were closed. The military, at the Vice President’s command, had been placed on alert, to Defcon Four. The Cabinet was to meet in a few hours. The National Security Council was sending messages to Russia, China, and the allies: the President is dead, the succession is transpiring in an orderly fashion, the chain of command is intact, the U.S. government is in complete control of its nuclear arsenal. The First Lady and Jack were being brought back to the White House from the young boy’s physical therapy session.
“The Vice President’s speech?” Addis asked.
“At nine,” McGreer said.
Ken Byrd, the press secretary, nodded. It was his second week on the job. His predecessor had resigned after a tabloid television news show aired video footage of her smoking marijuana at a celebration in Berlin the night the Wall fell.
“I’ll tell the nets,” Byrd said.
“What exactly will the Vice President say?” Addis asked.
“The President—”
Margaret Mason Hanover, the widowed First Lady, had entered the room. Half of the staff at the table stood. The others looked uncomfortable. Her gray hair was in its customary bun. Her eyes were red, her face ashen.
“If I understand correctly,” she continued, “now he is the President.”
No one spoke for a moment.
Only a week ago—or was it less?—she had passed through this room while Addis was chairing a planning meeting for a White House conference featuring former Cabinet members who were supporting Hanover’s decision to sign a controversial trade accord with China. Several of these past officials had helped run the Vietnam War. “Great,” Margaret Mason Hanover had whispered to Hanover, “we can call this event, ‘War Criminals for Free Trade.’”
McGreer kept his eyes on her. “We do not know what he’s planning to say,” he said. “He insisted on writing his own draft. Something reassuring, he said.”
No fucks now, Addis thought.
At the doorway, Lem Jordan stood with his arms crossed. He was the unofficial bodyguard and man-Friday to the First Lady. As a state trooper in Louisiana, Jordan had been part of Governor Hanover’s security detail. He came with the Hanover’s to Washington. He was a constant presence, always within yards of her or Jack. Addis stared at Jordan, a short, barrelchested fellow with chipmunk cheeks. Addis always thought of him as a fire hydrant topped by a pie plate.
“Any explanations, Brew?” she asked.
“No, we have none,” McGreer answered.
“And ‘She knows’? It’s all over the news …”
“No, Maggie, we—”
That was odd, Addis thought. McGreer had known her for years, ever since NYU Law. He always addressed her as Margaret. Only the President called her Maggie.
She looked at Dunne.
“Not yet, Mrs. Hanover,” Dunne said. Maybe never, he thought.
“You know what people will say?”
Everyone in the room realized what she meant. That she was the one who knew, the she in she knows.
Is anyone going to ask her? Addis thought. The room was quiet.
“I have no idea. No idea. And HAPPY? Where do such crazy people come from? Where?”
It was as if she expected an answer. No one said anything.
“Well, you’ll excuse me. I have a son to tend to, and a husband to bury.”
She started to leave the room. At the door, she paused and without turning said, “Nick, please see me when you have a moment.”
Byrd waited a few seconds and then returned to the plans. The ceremony at the National Cathedral—who would preside? The Hanovers’ local pastor in New Orleans or a national religious figure? Hanover’s brother, the part-time evangelist, had already told CNN that he wanted to officiate.
“Let’s ignore the fuck,” McGreer said.
The route from the cathedral to Arlington. A riderless horse? Or would it be too reminiscent of the last time? A private burial for the immediate family or a larger affair for the public? What if the turnout was not overwhelming? someone asked. What about music? What pieces will be performed? And by whom? How do we handle the invitations? someone else asked. Which world leaders? Addis floated away from the details.
“We have to be true to him,” McGreer was saying. “The images of this day will fucking outlast everyone in this room. We must send him off with something better than the footage of his face being fucking …”
McGreer issued assignments. Addis was to meet the new President at Andrews Air Force Base and then assist—“gently,” McGreer said—in the preparation of the speech that Sam Mumfries would deliver that night.
Before adjourning the session, McGreer turned to Dunne.
“What are the prospects? Will you have anything for the speech?”
“Not unless we get lucky.”
McGreer started to curse.
“But,” Dunne continued, “we—the Bureau is trying to locate the reporter whose credentials he used. Maybe they’ll have something soon.”
“Can we have a closed chapter the day after next?” McGreer asked, referring to the day of the funeral.
“I don’t know,” Dunne said. “As of now, no name. No known address. No known history. No known associates.”
“Just a fucking unknown psycho,” McGreer said “Try, try very hard. That’s the fucking least we can do.”
Dunne knew what McGreer was saying. He knew everyone in the room was watching to see how he would react. “Yes, sir,” he said.
“Let’s go,” McGreer said to end the meeting. “We will have years to mourn. We have only hours to act.”
Addis left without talking to anyone else. He wanted to avoid questions about the First Lady’s request. He returned to his office, sat down at his desk, and shoved all the land deal papers into an accordion file. And he cried for the first time that day.