Blink of an Eye

by William S. Cohen

  Oxley put down the folder, stood, and walked around the desk. Falcone stood, knowing that the President had begun his polite ritual for bidding Falcone goodbye. Their meeting was over, and Falcone realized that no matter what the President did next, he would do it on no one’s advice but his own.

  Oxley draped an arm across Falcone’s shoulder and said, “You go find the bastards who did this, Sean. And I’ll start doing what I have to do.”

  Oxley returned to his chair as Falcone moved toward a door.

  “Hold on, Sean,” Oxley ordered, still in that firm, cool voice. “You deserve to know how I am going to handle this.”

  Falcone turned and listened. Oxley picked up the folder and said, “Admiral Mason, as our man on the scene, announces the NEST estimate of casualties and the low radiation readings—bad news but good news, too. He also announces that, because of the lack of radiation hazard, some restrictions on the media will be lifted. Stephanie will take that on: a media pool at first, then a tour of Army and FEMA facilities. Maybe a chance to meet the family of that girl—the Georgia Tech girl.”

  Politics rarely surprised Falcone. Nor did a politician’s lightning-fast shifts of emotion. He searched for the words of his response, unable to blurt out his shock at Oxley’s calculated musings after reading about death and destruction—and after getting that congressional invitation to his doom.

  Falcone felt his own blunt style trumped by politics, by the realization that he was advising not only the President but also the Politician who dwelled within. He was unable to respond.

  “Well, Sean, what do you think?” Oxley repeated.

  “I think that Lanier’s report completely knocks down Stanfield’s claim that Iranians carried the bomb on board in their baggage.”

  “And so?”

  “We can work on refuting Stanfield. We can divert the turncoats in Congress.”

  “That’s my worry, Sean. As you would say, ‘I’m on it.’”

  “And the probability that it was one of ours? Shouldn’t we tell—”

  “Think about it, Sean,” Oxley said. “If I released the full report, the way you suggested, we would have pandemonium. Panic. Accusations. Our weapon? We did it? My God! Questions and no answers. And all on top of Stanfield’s rant. No, Sean. This report has got to be absolutely secret. No disclosure about the dropped bomb.”

  “But, Mr. President, surely someone … some cable commentator … will learn about the old bomb and draw conclusions that—”

  “Right, conclusions. But not scientific credibility. If someone does recall the old bomb, so what? It’s a coincidence. That’s all.”

  Falcone found his voice, and he wondered, as he often did in the Oval Office, whether his words were being recorded. “A cover-up, Mr. President? Are you suggesting a cover-up?”

  “No, Sean. Of course not. The White House—not me, but this grand old building—will simply have no comment.”

  “But, sir. When will you—the White House—reveal the report’s conclusion that it’s one of ours?”

  “We reveal that, Sean, when you find out who set it off.”

  “And if I find that it was set off by accident? That there was no enemy?”

  “I want an answer, Sean. That’s all. Just get me the answer.”

  “Yes, Mr. President,” Falcone said. He turned and walked toward the door, yearning as much for sleep as for getting the President the answer.

  52

  AFTER TWO hours of sleep on the cot that Mae had set up, Falcone made coffee, picked up clean clothes that Mae had hung in a little closet in the anteroom, and went into the bathroom for a quick shower and shave. He went back to pick up a cup of coffee and a container of yogurt, which he carried to his desk. He looked at his watch. Seven fifteen. Then he looked through the windows at the outside world. Another tranquil morning out there.

  Mae walked in, carrying a glass of water and a handful of vitamin capsules. “Just like the old days,” Mae said. “Remember that last filibuster?”

  Falcone certainly remembered that filibuster—when cots were set up all over the Senate—with which a single senator had paralyzed the entire institution. His stream of senseless talking blocked for a time the presidential nomination of a federal judge—and won the babbling senator a few political points. That filibuster had been just one of the incidents that had fueled Falcone’s decision not to run for reelection.

  He dutifully gulped down the vitamins and water, then picked up his cup of coffee and turned to the stack on his desk. Mae was still standing there, and he knew she was not through with him.

  “You need to look at this,” she said, placing a plain manila folder atop the stack on his desk

  “Not now, Mae. I’ve got a—”

  “Oh, yes. I know. Oh, my! Probably a meeting with President Oxley himself. Imagine that! But this”—she pointed to the manila folder—“is very important.”

  Mae Prentice had worked with him through his political career in Massachusetts and Washington, not only as what used to be called a secretary but also as his stalwart gatekeeper, the den mother of his office staff, and the Mary Poppins who soothed irate constituents or graciously aided confused constituents in need of help.

  She had drawn upon her talents when she accompanied him to DLA Piper. She treated enormously wealthy clients with the same attention and sympathy that she had shown to the lowliest constituent appealing to Senator Falcone. And when Falcone went to the West Wing, she went with him. A slim and fit seventy-year-old with defiantly red hair, she still had an infallible knowledge of Falcone’s needs even before he knew them. He nearly always accepted her suggestions about scheduling, and he always listened to her warnings.

  “Mae, please,” he said, moving the folder aside.

  “Remember the Flanagans in Boston? The big cop family?”

  “Mae, come on!” Falcone said, looking up. She glared down at him.

  “All right,” he said in a theatrically weary voice. “Yes, I remember the Flanagans. Two or three generations of cops. One of them was shot and—”

  “Killed. They caught the guy who did it, and you put the son of a bitch away for life. You were the cops’ favorite prosecutor.”

  “Mae. What are you getting at?”

  “That cop’s daughter became a cop. She’s a sergeant now, and she sent you this,” Mae said, picking up the folder and taking out a one-page e-mail and printouts of a series of photographs.

  “The e-mail was almost lost,” Mae said. “On its way to some West Wing e-mail limbo when Jack in communications—he’s such a nice boy—spotted Boston and knew I’d want to see it. He forwarded it to me. The attachments are JPEG digitized photos. I printed them out.”

  Mae was a genius at cutting through red tape and defying bureaucratic systems. But even if she was a bit too much of a gadfly, he had to give her heed. So, as Mae was talking, Falcone obediently glanced at the e-mail. Suddenly, he understood what he was looking at. He looked up from the page. His hand was shaking. “My God, Mae!” he said. “This is tremendous!”

  “Yes, I thought so,” Mae said and left the office.

  The sending address on the e-mail was private, not the Boston PD’s.

  Dear Senator Falcone:

  I am Kelly Flanagan. I hope you remember me. I am a sergeant in the Boston Police Department, but I am writing you as a private citizen.

  My uncle, Dr. (dentist) Pat Flanagan and his wife, Kathy, a teacher, were passengers on the cruise ship Regal. Because they are childless, I have been like a daughter to them. I guess that they are dead.

  When Uncle Pat got one of those smartphones, he started sending me photos via the Internet. He got a kick out of doing that. He took the attached photos of my aunt Kathy. From the date and time on them, I think that they were taken just before the ship went down.

  When you look at them, you will see a bright flash on the last one. I didn’t think much about that when I first got the photos. I just looked at Aunt Kathy and cried a lot. When I hear
d the President’s speech about a nuclear device, I thought about that flash. I was going to call the FBI or maybe a superior in the Boston PD. But I just heard Stanfield and he mentioned the Boston PD and the cruise ship, and I figured a lot of politics is popping up. But I thought this was really important and I wanted to send it to someone I knew I could trust.

  I don’t know if anything can come from these photos, but I know you will do what you think ought to be done.

  Sincerely,

  Kelly Flanagan

  The first four photo prints were essentially the same: a smiling Kathy Flanagan on what looked like a ship’s ladder. The fifth print was a flash of light. Nothing else. If it had not been the last in a series of these particular photos, it would have been discarded.

  Over her right shoulder hung the crescent moon. He had a flash of memory about seeing that crescent himself. Realizing he was looking at the face of one of the dead, he was gripped by an intense feeling of horror and loss. He felt tears welling up.

  He steeled himself to look closely. At the upper right corner of the image he saw what he thought was the bow of the Regal and faint lights beyond. He spread all five prints on his desk and saw that Pat Flanagan had moved slightly after taking each photo, changing the perspective so that the images of the bow and the lights also changed.

  In an instant he was wide awake, for now there was little doubt that a nuclear bomb went off at sea and not aboard the Regal. And those lights in the background. Something about them …

  He picked up the phone, “Mae. Find out how to get in touch with Kelly Flanagan.”

  “I have her home number, cell phone, and the Boston PD’s nonemergency number.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Falcone said.

  “Let’s try the cell phone first,” Mae said. A moment later he was talking to Kelly Flanagan. He thanked her abundantly and told her to keep the information to herself until she heard from him again.

  Falcone picked up the red phone and said, “Mr. President, I think I have an answer.”

  “You sound like you got some sleep, Sean. I wanted to call you about something, but I wanted to give you a chance for a nap. Come on in.”

  Falcone hurried down the hall and was admitted to the Oval Office by a Secret Service agent he did not recognize. To expand the Presidential Detail, agents had been brought in from several cities, where they had been working on counterfeit cases.

  “Mr. President, we have a breakthrough” Falcone said exuberantly. Oxley pointed to a chair. But Falcone could not sit down without blurting out the story of Kelly Flanagan’s photos and their significance

  “That’s very interesting, Sean. Now please sit down.”

  Interesting had about the same effect on Falcone’s enthusiasm as the point of a pin would have on a balloon.

  “I’ve decided,” Oxley said, “to accept the invitation and address the joint session tonight. I want your response to what I see as my options.”

  “But, sir. Given this new information, can’t you postpone the address?”

  “I can’t afford a postponement, Sean. I’m running out of time.”

  “Yes, sir,” Falcone said. He knew when Oxley was beyond persuasion.

  Oxley picked up a yellow pad with a mass of curved-over pages. He flipped back to the first page and then began, “The way I see it, I have four options. One, I can take no action until we know exactly who is responsible for the destruction of Savannah. Or I can do one of the following.”

  He turned to another page of the pad, then put the pad aside and continued, “Two, I can impose a naval blockade on Iran until it destroys all of its nuclear facilities and allows open and free elections with international monitors to ensure all demands are met.

  “Three, I can launch a surgical strike, using conventional weapons, against their leadership, the IRGC and those facilities that contribute to their war-making capability.

  “Four, I can unleash a nuclear attack against all known and suspect nuclear sites, decapitate the Iranian leadership, and demand a formal surrender.

  “There may be some variations on each of these options but, Sean, as far as I’m concerned, those are the stark choices.”

  “Mr. President, it would irresponsible—from a sheer evidentiary basis—to attack Iran without knowing more,” Falcone said. “The information I just brought you is an example of the kind of leads we’ll be getting. My strongest instinct—and I’ll bet yours, too—is to be careful about blaming Iran. If the United States goes to war on the basis of Stanfield’s accusation, it will be even worse than when America went to war against Iraq over the allegation that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction! The international community would—”

  “Would what, Sean? Call us lawbreakers and rush to the International Criminal Court? We have been attacked with a nuclear weapon. War has been declared against us. Thousands of Americans are dead. And more will be dying from this for years to come.” He paused and added, “And there’s the Elkton.”

  “But, sir, there’s no evidence that Iran was responsible for that attack either. If anything, the evidence points to an Al Qaeda cell still operating in Iraq. We didn’t go after Iran then, and the political consequences of attacking Iran now—”

  “It’s my job to ponder political consequences, Sean, not yours.”

  Falcone, stung by the presidential jab, did not reply.

  “Assuming I take one of the options, Sean, I suppose you would prefer the blockade?”

  “It sounds benign enough, compared to a strike,” Falcone responded. “But it is fraught with danger. What if the Russian or Chinese vessels fail to stop and be searched? Do we fire warning shots across their bows? What if they ignore the warning? Do we sink their ships or just disable them? Would they respond in kind with their warships?”

  “For God’s sake, Sean, I don’t need a Harvard dissertation. I know the perils of a blockade.”

  Falcone suddenly felt tired again. “Well, sir,” he said, “you’ve been told that a conventional attack will not knock out their nuclear sites. So what is left is option four, the nuclear option.”

  “Yes, Sean. That seems to be what is left. But, I promise you, I am not committed,” Oxley said, rising to signal that the colloquy had ended.

  “Thank you, Mr. President,” Falcone said. As he walked out he heard Oxley pick up the phone and tell his personal secretary, “Margie, call the Speaker of the House and tell him I accept his invitation and will attend the joint session.”

  *

  THE photos were still spread on Falcone’s desk when he returned to his office. He opened the folder and reread the e-mail from Kelly Flanagan:… you will do what you think ought to be done.

  53

  A JOINT session of Congress always sends an electrifying jolt through Capitol Hill. All 535 members gather in the House of Representatives chamber and sit in a large semicircle in large brown leather chairs. The best known joint session is the annual occasion for the president’s State of the Union address, usually, both a somber and celebratory event. Members respond to the president’s declarations with cheers or, sometimes, wih a few jeers. Journalists hang precipitously over the balcony to watch the proceedings below, trying to catch every reaction to the president’s words, looking for affirmation or dissent in the expressions on their faces.

  Ordinarily, members of the president’s cabinet, the Supreme Court justices, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and members of the Diplomatic Corps join the lawmakers. It is one of the few moments during the year when the three branches of a divided government sit as one to hear the president of the United States speak to America in a kind of national fireside chat.

  But tonight would be different.

  This joint session was being convened at the behest of a presidential candidate, not the President. The leaders of the House and Senate had abandoned all allegiance to their political affiliations and agreed to the extraordinary request. The purpose was to hear President Oxley tell them what action he intended to take in th
e wake of the attack on America. They wanted action, and if he was not prepared to give them action, Congress was prepared to take it.

  During the previous three years there had been many hearings in both houses about the threat that Iran posed to the Middle East and to America’s interests there. But there had been no debate or even any serious consideration about going to war against Iran. For Congress, there had not been any classified briefings on what waging war would involve. And yet many members were prepared to declare war for the first time since Japan attacked America at Pearl Harbor in 1941.

  This would also be an historic event. Among members and their staffs, among journalists and pundits, their only questions were: Will the President appear? And will the President agree to be bound by what Congress decides?

  *

  “MARGIE, cut the phone calls,” Oxley ordered. “I’ve talked to all the leaders I need to for today.”

  “But, Mr. President, the Chinese and Russian presidents have called three times.”

  “They can wait. I need to be alone.”

  Being alone is different than being lonely. But Oxley felt as if he were the only man still alive in the nightmare world that had become his to wander.

  He had read in detail how harrowing the Cuban Missile Crisis has been for President Kennedy, how close the United States had come to nuclear war with the Soviets. To outsiders, it was a simple morality tale: Handsome young prince stares down ugly bear and sends him packing back to Siberia.

  Only it was not that simple. A misplayed word or step and the dogs of war could have been unleashed. Few could have calculated the outcome. But it would have been bad. Horrible.

  Had Kennedy blinked or painted Nikita Khrushchev into a corner, one that didn’t allow him a face-saving exit, much of the world could still be a heap of radioactive waste.

  Now, radioactive waste had saturated Savannah and its people. And Oxley had to do something about it. But what? What was the right thing to do?