Balance of Power

by Richard North Patterson

  It was a kind remark, Kerry thought. But he could feel Lara's unhappiness. Facing her, Kerry asked, "Do we try to kill it?"

  "Of course."

  He turned to Kit, eyebrows raised in inquiry. "When the Chronicle calls me," she told him, "I'll make as strenuous a plea as possible. But if it doesn't work, we'll have to move quickly. I'd suggest a positive message about protecting women and children, giving troubled families a second chance—maybe through an interview with Joan. That's much better for us than a President exerting influence."

  Silent, Lara shook her head in wonderment. "And if that doesn't work," Kerry answered, "we'll decide what's next."

  * * *

  When the others had left, Lara said, "I blame myself. I should have never put this off on you—it's not fair to Joan, or you."

  "I made the call," Kerry answered. "You didn't ask me to." Pausing, he felt his frustration boil over. "We can sit here beating ourselves up, or try to figure out what to say to your family and, if necessary, to the media. And how to make the next few days as happy as we can."

  Lara inhaled. "For a long time, I've known how little privacy a President can claim. But you and I assumed that risk with full knowledge of the rules. Joan didn't. Instead, we helped drag this to her door."

  "It was my mistake, not yours." Kerry went to where she sat, taking both of her hands in his. "If you don't mind, I'd like to tell Joan myself."

  "To protect me?" Lara inquired coolly.

  "To explain," Kerry answered. "And to apologize. She put her trust in me, after all."

  Lara looked up at him, and then her gaze softened. "I'll tell my mother and Mary," she said.

  • • •

  They ate in the family dining room, by candlelight, with Marie and her doll sitting next to Kerry. Lara and Kerry maintained a plausible vivacity; based on his recent remedial reading, Kerry told Marie that this once had been a bedroom in which another child, Alice Roosevelt Longworth, had her appendix removed.

  Marie took his hand. "Did it hurt?" she inquired.

  "Maybe the doctor," Kerry answered. "Alice had a wicked tongue. She was known for saying, 'If you don't have anything nice to say about anyone, please sit next to me.' "

  "Today," Lara added with a teasing smile, "we call people like that reporters."

  With her child's ear for the literal, Marie gave her aunt a puzzled glance. "Lara used to be a reporter," her grandmother explained. "But she covered wars, not gossip."

  "I remember your letters from Kosovo," Mary told Lara, "telling us not to worry. And all of us worrying like crazy, with Mom praying for you every day."

  Lara smiled. "And here we all are," she said. "With me about to get married."

  "Oh," Inez told her, "I prayed for that, too."

  Amidst laughter, Kerry raised his glass to her. When dessert was done, and the others about to leave, Kerry asked Joan to visit with him awhile.

  * * *

  Even in candlelight, she seemed to pale. Her eyes filled with tears, as if at a sudden blow. Her voice choked with fear and humiliation. "He'll be furious. John couldn't stand the thought of people knowing. It was like he was more ashamed of being exposed than he was of beating me up."

  Without much hope, Kerry ventured, "There's a chance that they won't print it."

  Joan shook her head. More quietly, she said, "I can never talk about this. Not in public."

  Nor, Kerry thought, had his mother. "If it comes to that, I can. Or Lara. But not before you tell us what you'd be comfortable with."

  "Nothing." Disbelief lingered in her voice. "I have to trust you about what's best to do. But it all seems terrible to me."

  "It is terrible," Kerry answered. "For Lara, too."

  Joan's smile was faint. "That's hard for me to imagine. I can't remember her ever seeming scared, or overwhelmed, or even vulnerable."

  Kerry nodded his understanding. "People as accomplished as Lara, and as driven, don't excite a lot of sympathy. They sure don't ask for any." He paused, gazing at Joan intently. "But she'll never feel right about her life if your life isn't good, or if your relationship isn't good. I can't tell you what hopes she had for this time with you, and how shattered she feels now."

  Joan seemed to absorb this. When she smiled again, her gratitude was tinged with melancholy, perhaps the thought that, just as she had failed to fully see her sister, she had imagined seeing love in the eyes of the wrong man. Softly, she asked, "Does Lara know how lucky she is?"

  "Every day I remind her," Kerry answered with a smile, and then his expression became serious. "I'm lucky to have all of you in my life. The Costellos are all the family I have, at least until Lara and I have children. I'm hoping for a daughter like Marie." Pausing, he added, "And, like Lara, I never want anything to happen to either one of you."

  Shyly, Joan kissed him on the cheek. "We'll be fine," she promised.

  * * *

  Mary waited until Inez was tucking in Marie to take her oldest sister aside, speaking quietly. "You've always been the one to decide things," she told Lara. "But this isn't good."

  They lingered in the hallway outside the Lincoln Bedroom. "What isn't good?"

  "Anyone talking about John in public. He'll blame Joanie."

  "We don't control this anymore. Especially the media."

  Mary's brow knit. "But you control who talks to them. If you do it, he'll think that Joan betrayed him."

  "I'm worried, too." Unsettled by Mary's new assertiveness, Lara touched her arm.

  Mary stared at her, unmollified. "Don't put me off, Lara, or treat me like a child. You're not my mother."

  "I know," Lara answered with renewed sadness. "Sometimes it must have seemed like I thought I was." Glancing at Marie's bedroom, she finished softly. "I can't tell you what will happen. But whatever we have to do, we'll protect them both."

  Silent, Mary seemed suspended between resignation and frustration. Then, without saying good night, she turned and went to her room.

  EIGHTEEN

  The next morning, under the cover of showing Lara's family Camp David, Kerry again met George Callister in secrecy.

  As Lara led the others on a tour, the President and Callister took a separate trail. Even in the Catoctins, the air was hot, dense, mosquitoridden, causing Kerry to fear for the weather on his wedding day.

  "Your immediate problem," Kerry began, "is lawsuits. Including thirteen already brought by cities against the industry, seeking to recover the cost to the public health system of treating gunshot deaths and injuries."

  Hands shoved in the pockets of his jeans, Callister scowled. "Those deaths and injuries are caused by shooters we've never heard of. These suits are bullshit—political grandstanding combined with blackmail, meant to extort a settlement by imposing millions in legal fees."

  As they entered a bright patch of light, Kerry put on the sunglasses hanging from the neck of his polo shirt. "So," he ventured, "if the federal government sued the industry for the costs of security in public housing, that would also be bullshit?"

  Callister stood still, turning to the President with a look of controlled anger. "You'd do that?"

  "In a heartbeat," Kerry said evenly. "And if some demented ex-felon slaughters a roomful of schoolchildren with one of your semiautomatic handguns, and the grieving parents bring a wrongful death action, would that be bullshit, too?"

  "Yes," Callister snapped. "And for the same reason. Personal responsibility."

  "But it's still costly, you'll agree. Plus you can't be sure that a jury won't choose the mother of a murdered six-year-old over a company which markets weapons whose only legitimate purpose is to slaughter human beings. And if anyone thinks the Republicans can pass a bill to immunize you from lawsuits, forget it. If I can't get thirty-four senators to uphold my veto, I shouldn't have this job." Facing Callister, Kerry placed his hands on his hips. "It seems that you're caught between the SSA and a pack of cynical pols and greedy trial lawyers. Settle, and the SSA will bankrupt you with a boycott; litigate,
and you'll be bled to death by legal fees, or whacked with a jury verdict bigger than your whole net worth."

  Callister emitted a harsh laugh. "If you're trying to scare me, Mr. President, tell me something new. Other than that you'll sue me, too."

  "It's this. I'm also your only way out."

  Callister folded his arms. "You may be the President, but you don't control thirteen city governments. Let alone megalomaniacs like Bob Lenihan."

  "Every one of those cities," Kerry countered, "has a Democratic mayor. They need me. So do the trial lawyers. They're both already on board."

  Callister's expression betrayed complete surprise. "You're putting together a package deal?"

  "Yes. For the company brave enough to take it. The one thing they don't know is the company I'm meeting with."

  Turning, Callister began walking again, gazing at the trail of light and shadow cast by overhanging trees. "I don't know what you're proposing. But the SSA would put us on the cover of The Defender magazine, with me as Neville Chamberlain." Pausing, he glanced sideways at Kerry. "They'd make Lexington an object lesson. Dealers would stop selling our guns, customers would stop buying them. They'd destroy my company and end my career."

  "You're headed there already," Kerry retorted. "Lexington's owned by a British corporation. They can't be happy owning a wasting asset. When they decide to sell you, who'll want to pump more money into a company which promises endless legal fees, the worst PR this side of nicotine, and an excellent shot at insolvency?"

  Taking out a handkerchief, Callister dabbed the sweat off his forehead, refolding the cloth with great deliberation before returning it to his pocket. "What do you have in mind?" he asked.

  "Let's find some shade," Kerry answered. "It's too damned hot out here."

  * * *

  They sat in the relative cool of the patio. The steward brought ham sandwiches, iced beer mugs, and two cool green bottles of Heineken.

  "The first thing I want," Kerry said, "is to keep your guns from potential murderers.

  "We talked about this in Washington. Federal law requires gun dealers to run background checks on buyers, so they're not selling to felons, wife-beaters, and others with a known propensity toward violence. But forty percent of guns sold are sold privately, without checks.

  "Part of the problem is gun shows, where even an escapee from Bellevue can buy a Lexington semiautomatic." Pausing, Kerry sipped his beer and put it down again. "To start, I want Lexington to require gun shows to enforce background checks before it allows its dealers to sell any Lexington guns at the show. The same thing I proposed to Bresler's group."

  "That's when we were a group." Callister took a larger swallow of his beer, gazing fixedly at Kerry. "To the SSA, your proposal infringes the right of private parties to sell guns without the government knowing who they are. If a buyer later kills someone, then he should be prosecuted to the full extent of existing law—including the death penalty."

  "Will the SSA also resurrect the victim?" Kerry inquired mildly. "It strikes me that my brother is still dead."

  For a moment, Callister was silent. "There's also my board of directors," he finally said. "They'll claim that agreeing to this would put us at a competitive disadvantage . . ."

  "By not selling to mass murderers? That's just the clientele you need." Kerry's tone became incredulous. "Why in hell should anyone without a record care about a background check? And why sell guns to anyone who does care?

  "You can't want Lexington handguns used in crimes—it's bad for business, and it leads to lawsuits. So unless you do want to market guns to criminals, a background check helps protect you."

  Callister considered this. "Speaking personally," he said at length, "I don't have a problem with that. Neither do some of my fellow CEOs . . ."

  "Good. Because I'll also want Lexington's help in lobbying Congress for background checks on every gun sold in America."

  "In other words," Callister said with a fleeting smile, "suicide. Is that all you're proposing?"

  Despite his skepticism, Kerry sensed, Callister was intrigued, waiting for the scope of Kerry's design to become clearer. "Not quite." Pausing, Kerry marshalled his resources of personality and persuasion. "No civilian needs a gun that fires forty rounds, or bullets designed to kill by shredding someone's insides. That's not about self-defense—unless you're a crack-cocaine dealer in Miami . . ."

  "Some people," Callister interjected, "including the SSA, think they need to defend themselves against their own government."

  "Paranoia," Kerry retorted, "is not a basis for public policy. Or a license for mass murder . . ."

  "Other people," Callister continued, "just enjoy owning highcapacity weapons. If I start saying some guns are 'bad,' I lose them . . ."

  "Is nothing 'bad'? Are cop-killer bullets just a fun toy for hobbyists?" Kerry's voice turned cold. "Federal law limits the capacity of new magazines to ten rounds. But the old magazines hold forty, and Lexington's guns are designed to ensure that they still fit.

  "That's not everyone else's fault, George. At some point, the weapons you sell become your moral choice. Make the wrong choices, and you deserve extinction."

  Calmly, Callister finished his beer, placing the foam-streaked mug to one side. "What's the right choice, Mr. President?"

  Kerry leaned forward. "Retrofit your guns—no magazines over ten rounds. At least make it a little harder for a mass murderer to slaughter twenty people. And stop selling bullets designed to eviscerate vital organs."

  "Aside from the small matter of an SSA boycott," Callister objected, "you're asking me to change my product line overnight."

  "High time. We lose over thirty thousand people each year to guns— a big chunk of those to suicides or accidents. Little kids shouldn't be able to kill themselves by accident; depressed teens shouldn't be able to commit suicide with a parent's gun; that woman you persuaded to buy a gun for self-defense shouldn't be murdered with her own weapon." Kerry paused for emphasis. "We need more than trigger locks. I want your commitment that in five years every Lexington gun will be programmed to respond only to the fingerprint of the owner. Anyone else, and the gun won't fire."

  Callister nodded curtly. "You're talking about so-called smart guns," he observed in a more approving tone. "That's where I'd like to go. But they'd have to run on batteries, or computer chips, and withstand repeated firing. Have you ever put a computer chip in an oven? How many times does the battery in your watch die? If it does, are you worried that you'll die? But if you need a gun to fire, you may die if it doesn't. And if you do die, what are the chances your widow sues us for a product defect?

  "These concerns are real, Mr. President. The SSA will tell you that your smart gun will never be safe, and that some bad guy with a good old-fashioned American weapon will blow you and your loved ones clean away. The technology just isn't there for us yet."

  "You'll get there a lot quicker," Kerry responded evenly, "with a twenty-million-dollar research grant from my administration."

  Callister raised his eyebrows. "That's part of the deal?"

  "There's more. You're worried about a boycott. By law, I can't make promises. But I'm confident you'd be seriously considered to get a much larger share of military weapons purchases, as well as by the FBI, the ATF, and the Secret Service. For what it's worth, all thirteen cities have committed to arm their cops with a greater percentage of guns from whoever signs off first."

  Callister emitted a long, silent breath. "You've been busy," he said slowly. "What else are you prepared to offer?"

  "A complete settlement of all thirteen lawsuits, for ten million dollars in fees for the plaintiffs' lawyers." Briefly Kerry smiled. "For everyone but your lawyers, it's a bargain. You'd spend more on them in a year."

  Callister's eyes held an answering amusement. "Any other incentives?"

  "Several. While Lexington is transitioning to smart guns, its agreement to limit capacity, ban cop-killer bullets, and plug the gun-show loophole will all minimiz
e future lawsuits. This administration won't sue you either. Between the thirteen settlements, and a whole new customer base, you'll become the envy of your peers." Kerry's tone became cool. "At some point, one or two of them will stop toeing the SSA line. And then we'll break those bastards for good and all. Before they take you with them."

  Callister sat back. "In your brave new world, Mr. President, more people will wind up owning more Lexington guns. Is that really what you want?"

  Kerry shrugged. "If they're not the wrong people, and their guns are safer, I can live with that."