Back Channel

by Stephen L Carter

  Esman frowned. “These were all staff?”

  “Yes.”

  “No visitors?”

  “Not officially,” said Youngblood.

  Esman rounded on him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “There’s one girl who snuck in with a false ID.”

  “Why didn’t you say so? Where is she?”

  “Last I heard, she was locked up in the basement.”

  IV

  At ten minutes past eleven, Bundy slipped out of the Cabinet Room into the foyer. Janet was waiting.

  “Any word?”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Bundy. Nate Esman went off with the chief usher half an hour ago, and I haven’t seen him since.”

  The national security adviser looked around. The foyer was unusually crowded. Most of those waiting were military aides. A direct line had been set up to the Signals Office, so that the President’s attack order might be transmitted precisely at noon.

  In the Cabinet Room, a couple of members of the ExComm were continuing to fight a holding action, but support for any option except bombing and invasion was crumbling. Even Bobby Kennedy was finally running with the hounds—and not just as devil’s advocate.

  Bundy slipped back into his chair. It was time to put aside childish hopes and begin planning for the war.

  “We have to discuss evacuation,” he said.

  Several heads turned. “Of what? Essential personnel?”

  “Of our cities,” said Bundy.

  V

  Infected by Esman’s energy, Youngblood led him in a charge down the winding staircase. They burst into the room, only to find it empty.

  “I guess the FBI already came for her,” said the agent.

  VI

  Jack Ziegler and Viktor Vaganian were sitting in a car three blocks north of the White House, along Sixteenth Street.

  “You should have arranged to take her yourself,” said Viktor.

  “Too complicated once she’s inside the gates.”

  “But surely your President can order her release!”

  “The idea is to get her out of the building before that happens. Sure, eventually they’ll find out that Margo Jensen has been arrested. But look at the clock. Almost eleven. The planes will be in the air soon. The FBI only needs to hold her until noon. Then the attack begins.”

  Viktor watched the thin stream of pedestrians. He had never known Washington to be so empty.

  “Has it occurred to you, my friend, that, in our efforts to prevent our governments from appearing weak, we are bringing down horror upon all of these innocent people?”

  “Are you turning sentimental on me, Viktor Borisovich?”

  “To be a true socialist is also to be a realist. It is you capitalists who cannot live with the consequences of your actions and therefore constantly deny them or blame them on others. I refuse to hide my eyes from that which I have caused.”

  “You’re not going to cause anything, because there isn’t going to be a war.” Ziegler checked his watch again. “We’re going into Cuba, and your man isn’t going to do a thing about it.”

  “You are wrong, my friend.”

  “You can stop all that ‘my friend’ stuff, too. I’m not your friend. This is a business collaboration. We’ve always been enemies. We’ll always be enemies.”

  Nyekulturny, Viktor reminded himself. Not the man’s fault.

  “I must return to my embassy now,” he said.

  This got Ziegler’s attention. “Why?” he asked, suspiciously.

  “I have an appointment with the traitor you call Aleksandr Fomin. He has betrayed the Motherland and must be placed under arrest.”

  “He was acting under Khrushchev’s orders.”

  “Once the bombing begins, the Comrade General Secretary will either deny that order or no longer be giving any.”

  VII

  The FBI agents led her politely to a dark sedan parked at the crest of the driveway on the Pennsylvania Avenue side. One of them joined her in the back seat while the other slid in beside the driver. Up to this point, they had been deaf to both her entreaties and her arguments. The car headed down the drive, and Margo, turning her head, watched disbelieving as the White House into which she had so easily gained entry receded—

  The driver slammed on the brakes.

  A pudgy young man was standing in the road. A dark-haired Secret Service agent looked on curiously from the grass.

  One of the FBI men stepped out.

  “What’s going on?” she heard through the open door.

  “I’m afraid you can’t take Miss Jensen,” said the pudgy man.

  “And who are you exactly?”

  “Nathaniel Esman, chief deputy to the President’s special assistant for national security affairs.”

  The FBI man folded his arms. “Well, Mr. Esman, I don’t work for your boss, and I certainly don’t work for you. Now, get out of the way, or I’ll place you under arrest for obstruction.”

  Esman turned to the man on the lawn. “Agent Youngblood. Do not let this car leave the grounds. I’ll be right back.”

  SIXTY-ONE

  Payback

  I

  It was another room, much like the first, although this time there was a window giving on an air shaft. A guard removed the cuffs and left her alone. A moment later, McGeorge Bundy stepped inside.

  “Thank God,” he said, and the Catholic in him seemed to mean it. “We’ve been looking all over for you.”

  He ordered the agent to wait outside.

  Margo rubbed her wrists. “How did you even know I was here?” she asked, a bit stupidly.

  “I got a call from your friend Major Madison. He seems like a good man, Miss Jensen. Never mind. Now, please. Tell me the message from Fomin, so that I can convey it to the President.”

  “No.”

  Bundy was startled. “What did you say?”

  “I said, no. I’m sorry. The message is for the President’s ears only.”

  He took his time. “You know who I am, Miss Jensen. I recruited you. I briefed you. I have the President’s ear, at this moment, more than anyone else, with the possible exception of his brother. You can tell me.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “If you tell the President, I’m the first one he’ll consult in any case.”

  “That’s up to him, Mr. Bundy. But after last night, I’m afraid I don’t trust anybody.” She lifted her chin, every inch a Jensen. “I have to see the President myself.”

  Bundy shook his head. “I’m sorry, Miss Jensen. I don’t see how that’s going to be possible. We’re just about out of time. The President is in an emergency meeting. He can’t duck out to come down to visit you in the basement.”

  “Then take me upstairs.”

  “If you go upstairs, Miss Jensen, everyone will see you.”

  “So what? All that will do is confirm what they already believe. That I’m having an affair with the President.” She almost smiled. “The fact that I’m being escorted by the national security adviser will simply add a certain spice to the tale.”

  “I’ll seem to be a procurer. And what people will think of the President—”

  “Mr. Bundy, you and the President have asked me to risk my reputation for the good of the country. I’ve been arrested twice, I’ve been kidnapped, and I’ve been shot at. It seems to me entirely reasonable that you and the President should also pay a small reputational price. If my presence in the White House embarrasses you, I apologize. But remember. History will record me as just another presidential mistress. If you take me upstairs, maybe you’re right, and history will record you as a procurer. But I’m ready to convey Fomin’s message only to the President. The question, then, is whether you and he are prepared to pay the same price you’ve demanded of me.”

  Bundy pondered. He took off his glasses and polished them. Margo didn’t know what had gotten into her, speaking that way to a man of his eminence. And Bundy evidently wondered the same thing, or so she judged fro
m his moue of disapproval. She wondered whether she had pressed too far. But then, to her surprise and immense relief, Bundy almost smiled—not quite, but it was a near thing. He slipped his horn-rimmed glasses back on. “And he that rolleth a stone, it will return upon him. Well, well.” He stood. “You make a reasonable point, Miss Jensen. I can certainly see why Fomin trusts you.” He walked over to the door and knocked. A guard opened it at once. “Come with me, then.”

  II

  “It’s good to see you again, Margo. I hear you’ve had a time of it.”

  “Yes, Mr. President.” She had met the President on five occasions now, had allowed him certain liberties, but she was awed nevertheless to be in his presence in the fabled Oval Office. She wondered whether people were whispering already about why Kennedy had left his meeting.

  “Would you like a drink?”

  “No, thank you, sir.”

  “Mind if I have one?” He was already pouring. He poured a second, held the glass toward her. She shook her head. He smiled ruefully, set it down on the coffee table, and seated himself in the rocker. “So. I understand you have a message for me.”

  “Yes, sir.” Margo had spent every calm moment rehearsing the words, so as to leave nothing out. “I am told that the General Secretary agrees to the entire arrangement, with one amendment. Whatever you decide to say publicly, you must agree privately to remove the Jupiters within a year. Khrushchev will trust your word on this.”

  Kennedy took a moment to ponder. “You know, I just might be able to sell that to the ExComm. It won’t make everybody happy, but …” He trailed off, and his eyes found her again. “What about the other matter? Making sure of who we’re dealing with?”

  “I am also told that, on the first night of the summit, the General Secretary sat beside the First Lady. The First Lady asked him not to bore her with statistics.”

  Kennedy was perplexed. “That’s it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “That’s the entire message?”

  “Yes, Mr. President.”

  “I asked you to call me Jack when we’re alone.” But the teasing was distracted, automatic. He put down his glass too hard. He seemed angry, and his next words told her why. “That might not be enough. Anybody could have overheard Khrushchev saying that. An aide. A translator. For all I know, it was in The Washington Post.” He smacked his fist into his open palm. “I’m sorry, Margo. I can’t go to Taylor and LeMay with ‘I know it’s Khrushchev because he flirted with my wife.’ They’ll laugh me out of the room.”

  “You don’t have to,” she said softly.

  “What was that?”

  “I said, you don’t have to, sir. You don’t have to justify your decision to them. You’re the President of the United States. It doesn’t matter if they believe you’re really dealing with the General Secretary. It only matters if you believe it.”

  The gray-green eyes widened, and it was as if he was seeing her for the first time not as a messenger or potential conquest but as a mind.

  An instant later, everything was motion. Kennedy was striding toward the door. His secretary had stepped in and was inviting Margo to follow her. She showed her into what was obviously somebody’s office, with files and papers and a half-covered typewriter.

  “You’re to wait here,” the secretary said. “Can I bring you anything?”

  Margo blinked. It had been days or more since what she had wanted had mattered. She needed a moment to readjust. Perhaps the nightmare was over after all.

  “I’d like to call my grandmother,” she said.

  “Of course. I’ll get you an outside line.”

  III

  “So we have failed,” said Viktor Vaganian. They were in the safe house, sitting in the kitchen while their fellow conspirators cleansed the place of evidence. The Russian was spreading thick butter on black bread. “I am relieved, in a way. I would not want my country to be humiliated in this fashion, but I also would not want a war.”

  Ziegler was pacing. “There wouldn’t have been a war. Maybe your guys would have tried a little something in Berlin, but that would have been it.” His fists were clenched. “We were so close. So close.”

  “It makes no difference.” He finished the bread, began carving another heavy slice. “I shall be summoned home. Perhaps they will shoot me. Perhaps Comrade Khrushchev will fall and I will be among the victors. There is no way to tell.” He was drinking beer rather than vodka, and wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “Perhaps you should come with me.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Your government will likely try you for treason.”

  Ziegler laughed. “Won’t happen. I have powerful friends, believe me. And the Kennedys, well, they’re pragmatists. They won’t want to take on—”

  The doorbell rang. One of the others went to answer, and returned a moment later with Jerry Ainsley.

  “What do you want?” asked Ziegler, nastily.

  “I’m here to arrest you,” he said. “I assume you won’t be resisting.”

  “You can’t arrest me. You’re unarmed, number one, and, number two, you’re Agency. You have no domestic jurisdiction.”

  “But I do,” said Agent Stilwell, stepping into the room. “Mr. Ziegler, you are under arrest. Captain Vaganian is to return to his embassy at once.”

  Ziegler went purple with fury. For a bad moment, Viktor thought he might actually draw a weapon—or, far worse, blurt out the truth, that he and Stilwell had made a deal. Whereas, as even the Russians knew, with Hoover there was never a deal, there was simply the director himself, skulking in the shadows, using to his advantage whatever information he gleaned.

  But Ziegler controlled himself. His anger softened into a smirk. He used two fingers to remove his weapon, and put out his hands for the cuffs.

  The house was full of agents now. Viktor gathered his associates and headed for the door. Half the neighborhood lined the street. The Russians were walking along the sidewalk, under the wary escort of a pair of FBI agents, when Vaganian felt a sudden terrible pain in both legs.

  He cried out and collapsed.

  One of the agents knelt beside him. The other was chasing a woman into the crowd.

  Viktor lay on the pavement, sweating in sharp red pain. They would never catch her, of course, and he would never know whether the attack had been staged. He did know that both of his kneecaps had been crushed, and that in all likelihood he would never walk again. He even found a grim admiration for the swiftness and skill with which Agatha Milner had taken out both knees with one roundhouse kick.

  SIXTY-TWO

  Additional Terms

  I

  In later years, the events of the next couple of hours remained hazy in Margo’s memory. She sat in the office, eating the sandwich the secretary had brought her from the mess and washing it down with milk. Possibly she dozed a bit. She had a sense of frenetic activity just beyond the range of her perceptions, as if people were running here and there, but offstage. At one point, two men she didn’t know peered through the doorway, one wearing Air Force blue festooned with ribbons, the other in glasses and an expensive suit.

  “Is that her?” said the military man.

  “That’s her.”

  “A coed?”

  “That’s right, General. Nineteen years old.”

  “Brave kid. She should get some kind of medal.”

  “Maybe so.”

  “Not that I trust the Commies further than I can throw them,” said the general, the two of them chatting as if she weren’t even in the room. She might even have dreamed them, because, when she looked again, the pair was gone and the secretary was back. Margo’s lunch dishes had magically disappeared.

  “Are you up for some company, honey?”

  She sat up straighter. “Of course. Thanks.”

  McGeorge Bundy stepped into the room, shutting the door behind him. “Your nation owes you a great debt, Miss Jensen,” he began. “Even though the world will never know of your contributio
n—”

  “It’s over?”

  “Not quite. There’s still a chance that they might renege. But, for the moment, war seems to have been averted.” Behind the glasses, his eyes were exhausted. “Unfortunately, we shall have to call upon your assistance one final time.”

  “You mean, I have to see Fomin again.”

  “That’s exactly what I mean, Miss Jensen. I apologize. But there are some final details to be worked out, and, at the moment, I believe you are the only one he will trust. Remember, they shot at him last night, too.”

  A beat.

  “Who’s ‘they’?” she asked. “You must know by now.”

  “I can’t tell you everything. Some of their people are being deported. Some of our people are under arrest.”

  “And Ainsley?”

  “What about him?”

  “Is he under arrest?”

  “Jericho Ainsley? Goodness, no. Why would we arrest him? He saved your life last night, Miss Jensen. And he also tipped off the Bureau to where the conspirators had their safe house.”

  “If he knew about the safe house, it’s because he was one of them! He tried to kill me last night!”

  She was on her feet now, and every bit as tall as the diminutive Bundy. But he responded to her anger only with amusement.

  “No, Miss Jensen. He didn’t. Evidently, you ran away before he could explain that he was pointing his gun not at you but at the man standing behind you. Look. You can talk to him yourself.”

  “He’s here in the building?”

  “We thought it unlikely that you would trust anyone else to take you to the rendezvous with Colonel Fomin.”

  II

  They met on the park bench across from the National Gallery of Art. The late-afternoon sun was low and listless. There was no wind, but the chill was rising all the same.

  “You have done well,” said Fomin. “Will they be arranging a suitable reward for you?”

  “I just want to go back to what I was doing before.”

  “Your life will never be the same. You understand this. I refer not only to the memories that will plague you—some wonderful, some horrible, all of them impossible to escape—no, I refer to you. The changes in you. You are not the person that you were a month ago, or even a week ago. You belong to them now.”