5

Andrew Hartford Clarke was a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.

Now in the second term of the Clarke administration, Marcus found the line from Winston Churchill describing how difficult it was to understand, much less predict, the actions of the Kremlin apropos in trying to forecast the moves of his commander in chief.

The self-made, blunt-talking, hard-charging former CEO had spent two decades on Wall Street making stunning sums of money before shocking the political establishment by ditching it all and running for governor of New Jersey. Defying literally every political pundit and prognosticator, Clarke not only won—however narrowly—but served two full terms in Trenton, slashing taxes and spending, balancing the budget, and radically reducing the state’s heretofore mushrooming crime rate, before setting his sights on the big prize. No one thought Clarke could reach the White House, yet he won the presidency in an electoral landslide. To be sure, he entered the office with no foreign policy or national security experience. Nor had he ever served in the military. That had worried Marcus. Yet to his credit, Clarke had successfully navigated one international crisis after another far more adroitly than Marcus had feared he might.

Clarke’s greatest strength, however, was also his most serious weakness. Rather than being guided by a set of fixed ideological principles, the man prided himself on being unpredictable. True, this had kept America’s enemies off guard, continually unsure of what they could get away with and what might set Clarke off. But for America’s allies, Clarke’s lack of predictability was both nerve-racking and infuriating. The Israelis had come to believe he genuinely had their backs. So did the moderates in the Arab world. But the leaders of NATO? Not so much. And the leaders of South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and other Pacific powers felt ever less secure, even as they faced an increasingly belligerent Beijing.

When Clarke first took office, Marcus was still in the Secret Service, a decorated member of the presidential protection detail for his role in thwarting a terrorist attack on the White House years earlier. But Clarke and Marcus had never been close. They had even had some serious blowups over the years, though the more results Marcus delivered in the field, the more Clarke had warmed to him. Whether any of that was going to help him today, Marcus had no idea.

In the end, the most important voice influencing Clarke was going to be Richard Stephens, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Now sixty-six, Stephens was widely considered the dean of the intelligence community. Known by friends and foes alike as “the Bulldog,” the brandy-swilling chain-smoker was barely five feet, five inches tall, over two hundred pounds, balding, and in possession of an explosive temper. A three-term senior senator from Arizona, he had long served as chairman of the Senate’s Select Committee on Intelligence before being tapped by Clarke as CIA director on day one of Clarke’s first term. The reason was clear enough. The two men were longtime golfing buddies and the closest of political allies. Behind closed doors they loved their Cuban cigars and off-color stories to boot.

For reasons Marcus could only guess at, Stephens hated him with a vengeance. He had tried relentlessly to block Marcus from working for the Agency in the first place, and when Clarke had overruled him, Stephens had worked hard to drive Marcus out.

Complicating matters was that Marcus was not the most effective public speaker. His career had been conducted in the shadows, not the spotlight.

Taking a sip of water and wondering why the painkillers were not doing their job, he drew a deep breath, gripped the remote a little tighter, and began the PowerPoint presentation he had hastily assembled en route from Gitmo.

A grainy black-and-white photo came up on the large flat-panel screens on the walls around him. As it did, Marcus realized he had left his notes at his seat at the conference table. Unwilling to look like the moron he now felt like by going back and retrieving them, he chose to press on, giving his presentation from memory.

“Mr. President, this is the most wanted man in the world,” Marcus began. “To his family, he’s known by his given name, Walid Abdel-Shafi. To his disciples, he’s known as ‘Father.’ To the jihadi community, he’s known as ‘the Libyan.’ To you, he’s best known as Abu Nakba, the ‘Father of the Disaster.’”

Marcus played a short video of Abu Nakba, now in his eighties, walking through a park, surrounded by little children cheering him and giving him kisses and freshly cut flowers. The man’s long, flowing hair was entirely gray, as was his unkempt beard. He was stooped, walking with a wooden cane, and wore leather sandals and a white tunic covered by the classic Libyan robe known as the jard.

“Let’s be clear,” Marcus said as the video ran. “As the founder of the terrorist network we’ve come to know as Kairos, this man has been responsible for the murder of more Americans than anyone since Osama bin Laden. That’s why, Mr. President, you ordered the most extensive, expensive, and exhaustive manhunt in American history, second only to the hunt for bin Laden. It’s been my honor to be part of this manhunt, and I’m here today to tell you that we now know where Abu Nakba is hiding and to assure you that we have the opportunity to eliminate this major threat to U.S. and global security, but only if we move fast.”