The Washington Decree

by Jussi Adler-Olsen

  CHAPTER 18

  The world fell apart the day John and Danny were found to be HIV-positive. Not that John was afraid to die—the Bugatti family had always taken a quite humorous attitude towards this particular human frailty. No, it was because an ominous, black cloud had suddenly overshadowed the happy relationship that had been flowering between the two of them.

  The world didn’t fall apart because it would soon expire, but because it had finally begun to exist. They had been lovers for many years, even though they lived in different cities, with John working in New York and Danny in Washington. Then John had changed his base of operations and moved down to Danny, into his dream house in the right end of Georgetown, between the church and the Pet Gallery. Those were days of innocence, where people’s greatest fear was a worldwide computer meltdown as a result of the new millennium. Life was sweet, and the scent of oil paint filled the house as Danny’s canvases became increasingly paradisiacal. Then came the sickness.

  They both knew why. The temptations of Greenwich Village had always been hard to ignore, and John believed in living life to the fullest.

  Now the world had changed completely. John’s treatments were still effective enough that he wasn’t actually feeling ill, but Danny hadn’t been so lucky.

  In the beginning, John had fallen for his glossy hair and the spark in his eye, but now the spark had gone out, and even though Danny did his best, he could no longer hide the inevitable. His brushes dried out; the scent disappeared.

  * * *

  —

  John could hear the television running in high gear as he let himself into the house. His heart almost stopped every time he came home to a scene like this, and he had to force himself to place one foot in front of the other to make it to the living room and see if his beloved was still breathing.

  He found Danny with his legs up on the coffee table and an empty Martini bottle in his lap. It took a lot of Martini to deaden the awareness of death, but Danny had always had style. He wasn’t the type to dislodge his brain with a fifth of whisky, as John would tend to do.

  John watched his chest rise and fall with persistent life. “Thank you, my love, for not leaving me,” he whispered.

  He turned down the TV, leaving the credits of an old Marx Brothers movie to roll silently across the screen. It had been a dramatic day. United, for once, in their opposition to the government, religious organizations from across the sectarian spectrum had held a huge demonstration, their colorful religious garb filling the streets. The police had kept a low profile—they apparently hadn’t reached the point of teargassing rabbis, imams, and priests. Most of the electricity in town had been shut down, and the evening air was still ringing with damnations and hymns of protest in God’s name.

  There were repercussions just as great in other sectors of society. Powerful organizations that traditionally had conflicting interests—like trade unions and big business—were finding common ground. It seemed like anything was possible. Words like general strike, insurrection, and seizure of power were being whispered in the wings, but the state had big, attentive ears and people were disappearing from their homes in the middle of the night.

  Two of John’s colleagues hadn’t shown up for work that day. He was sure that one of them had gone underground, but that didn’t seem to be the case with the other. Miss B, as they called her, had made repeated trips to Somalia and Afghanistan when conditions were at their worst, so it took more to shake her up than the summary execution of militiamen in broad daylight or the sight of uniformed bodies floating down the Potomac. More likely the problem was that her profession had made her too hard-boiled to sense how dangerous the situation could become, to see that she, like the rest of the media, had to conduct herself with extreme caution when dealing with the concept of “the truth.” Maybe somewhere else in the world she would have kept quiet; in certain situations she’d learned it was wise to do so. But the other day she’d flipped out at the NBC offices and punched a delegated censor in the face when he demanded that her commentary in a news spot be deleted. She’d been reporting on the military’s hunting down of illegal immigrants and how they were being dumped in no-man’s-land on the other side of the Mexican border. They had no documents, no identity, and the Mexican authorities didn’t want them, either. It was an important and relevant news story, and John was sure that he, too, would have fought for his right to tell how terribly wrong and inhumane this new government policy was. How thousands of banished souls were freezing at night in the open without food, pinned down by American and Mexican soldiers on both sides of the border.

  No one had seen Miss B since lunchtime. Some were saying she’d “simply had enough.” John feared the worst.

  He put his hands to his head and massaged his temples, trying to soothe his mental anguish. Just before he’d left work, a source in the White House had leaked them the news of an assassination attempt on the president, but they were told not to publicize it before they were given permission. That meant one could soon expect countermeasures that were even more extreme, just like what followed previous violent episodes involving the president and his administration.

  He poured himself a second solid glass of whisky and looked over wistfully at Danny. His head had fallen on his chest and his spread-out legs were in danger of toppling a variety of pill bottles off the edge of the coffee table. He’d be so sorry if someone saw him like this, John thought. He collected the bottles and took them out to the kitchen, then sat down in the dining alcove in the corner of the living room, pulled open a wide drawer under the tabletop, and removed a sheet of paper. He’d divided it into two columns, one for the dramatic episodes that had occurred in the vicinity of the president, and one for what measures the president had subsequently put into effect. The second column gave a clear picture of a country that, from an innocuous announcement of reforms in the social and judicial sector, had steadily developed into a truly ugly police state. John had been on the scene a long time and had witnessed many serious conflicts around the world, so he knew the signs of a democracy’s impending collapse when he saw them. The Constitution was no longer really in effect, all opposition was systematically crushed, and the military was loyal to the regime. All borders were to be closed and the country would isolate itself from the rest of the world, as if this hadn’t already happened. And finally, there was the classic lie promoted by every dictatorship: the promise of how much better everything would be afterwards.

  It wasn’t that John couldn’t see the positive features of Jansen’s agenda. Crime was down as criminals were forced to the surface, the streets were safer, and the suburbs were opened up. They’d begun tearing down condemned buildings in large cities like Detroit, Los Angeles, and Chicago. There were convoys of dump trucks and flatbeds with containers laden with all kinds of big-city debris, and work had been created for everyone. The streets in his own little oasis of Georgetown looked as if they’d been vacuum-cleaned; legions of the unemployed were busy picking up every scrap of litter along roadsides and highways all the way to the Great Falls. Yet on the horizon behind this ultra-tidy landscape one could occasionally spot columns of smoke rising from skirmishes between soldiers and their own landsmen. It was a grotesque sight to behold. Beneath the neat and orderly facade a society was disintegrating.

  He sat in the gathering twilight and stared at the sheet of paper, seeing how cause and effect merged into one. Would Jansen have ever gotten the majority of Cabinet members to back his Secure Future program without the support of Attorney General Lovell, and would Lovell have ever supported it if his daughter and poor old mother hadn’t been raped? John doubted it. And would the president have gotten away with suspending the parliamentary process without the attempt on the life of the attorney general and the assassination of the chief justice of the Supreme Court? Couldn’t the increasing threats against public institutions, the bombing of courthouses and the Democratic headquarters, as well as the murd
ering of public servants and congressmen, have been a convenient excuse for declaring a national state of emergency?

  The more he looked at the sheet of paper, the more he saw a totally different correlation between the two lists. The law of cause and effect had been reversed; a desired effect had created its own cause. The anxiety induced by “The Killer on the Roof” and the murder of some schoolchildren outside Washington had fanned the flames of the eternal national debate about weapon possession and had set the scene for new interpretations of the Second Amendment. Every day minor as well as major incidents were having big repercussions, and they all pointed in the same direction.

  President Jansen was steadily approaching his goal of gaining total control over society. John drained his glass in one gulp and reloaded. Why try and stay sober? What difference did it make? There was nothing he could do, anyway. If he began voicing his suspicions—that Jansen and his cohorts had instigated violence, bomb threats, killings, and even the sexual assault of an old lady—he was finished. Tell the world! he screamed to himself—silently—as though he could, even if he tried.

  It wouldn’t be at NBC, that was for sure.

  He sat for a moment, studying Danny. Had it been like the old, healthy days, he could have taken his lover by the hand, fled to Paris’s Left Bank, and spoken his mind as freely and vehemently as he wanted. He could have gotten a job anywhere—the Times, the BBC, ZDF, or Le Monde—and Danny would have loved it all. Then they could attend exhibitions in Berlin, the opera in Vienna, or walk together under the colonnades in Bologna. But now it was too late, hundreds of fever attacks and thousands of pills too late. Danny couldn’t go anywhere, and John couldn’t leave him. He loved this man, who would soon be with him no longer. Why did life have to be like this?

  One more glass of whisky, and he began sobbing. He leaned forward and gently took Danny’s hand. It was warm, like his own cheeks.

  Then, through the thickening alcohol mist, he noticed the news flickering to life on the TV screen. As he slowly turned to focus, he found himself staring straight at President Jansen’s face. It had been given a thorough makeup job and filled the whole screen. The president was looking good, as he always did in public.

  Bugatti let go of Danny’s hand and turned up the sound.

  There was no doubt the performance had been prerecorded some time earlier. How else could Jansen sit there, summing up the situation so calmly? Especially when there’d been an attempt on his life only hours before.

  John shook his head in an attempt to dispel his inebriation and tried to listen to what was being said. It was a very “personal” speech, directed to a nation of individuals about their “hopes and dreams,” as Jansen called it.

  Empty words from a forked tongue, thought John.

  “There is more that unites us Americans than separates us,” said Jansen, his eyes glowing. “There’s a great amount of confusion at the moment, but we’ll soon find our footing again and proceed towards our common goal. Our troops are being called home from abroad as I speak, to assure the rule of law and the safety of all our citizens. All body bags will be destroyed because there will no longer be any need for them.” He held a pregnant pause. “Our soldiers are coming home to help us restore order so that everyone can have the new chance they deserve. In the future, there will be funds to assure basic services and the functioning of society. There will be universal health care, and our courtrooms and prisons will be emptied as we cure the symptoms of criminality. And there will be meaningful jobs for everybody.”

  John shook his head. This called for yet another whisky.

  The camera angle changed so that one could see that the president was sitting in the Cabinet Room, and that he wasn’t alone. John had to squint to focus. He’d be damned if they weren’t there, all of them: Billy Johnson, Vice President Sunderland, Secretary of Defense Henderson, Lovell, and the rest. Even the national security advisor and the director of the CIA.

  Jansen spread out his arms like he was going to give all those present a big hug. “Here, in this historical parlor, sit the people this nation needs. Gifted, brave people, each one with a plan for you—for all of us—to make our dreams reality.” He turned back towards the first camera and put on an even more earnest expression. “Unpopular measures will be needed to reach our goal—we know that. We must close our borders to immigration; we must get rid of all weapons. We have to raise our moral standards, and we have to learn how to make do with less.”

  John shook his head again. Stalin couldn’t have said it better. Wesley had done his work much too well. He took another gulp of alcohol and felt like he had to throw up.

  “America has been dependent on other countries’ raw materials for all too long. Some of my predecessors have gone so far as initiating wars to secure us these resources, and often with catastrophic consequences. But I’m telling you today that we can become self-sufficient. The possibilities abound. Oil deposits have been found in Alaska, huge deposits that will ensure our energy supply for decades to come. And in the meantime we must learn to use less energy and alternative sources of energy. We Americans can do everything—we know that—and we’ll show the way for the world again, as we have before.”

  John was halfway out of his seat and almost fell on his face. His body had suddenly become heavy and ungovernable. One leg shot out instinctively to keep his balance, almost kicking over the coffee table. Then came the dizziness, and he fell across the low table, breaking his whisky glass and landing on the carpet on top of the bottle and a pile of old interior decorator magazines.

  This woke Danny up in a combination of confusion and fright.

  John waved his hand at the television. “Turn that shit off,” he raved, “before I put this bottle through the screen.”

  Danny had been here before—they both had. John knew this all too well. And even though Danny was so weak he could hardly bend over, he did the same thing every time. No sarcastic comments or disapproving looks. Just a cool washcloth to pat on his lover’s forehead, a glass of water to drink, and a small sigh as he set about cleaning up the mess. Danny always made things all right again, soothingly and nonjudgmentally.

  John took Danny’s free hand and put it to his lips. “I love you, you old bastard. You’re the only light in my life.”

  “Try and concentrate a minute, John.” Danny looked distraught behind his smile. “Someone’s been looking for you,” he said. “That horrid TV host Tom Jumper, together with Miss B. They were here a couple of hours ago, wanting to talk to you. Miss B looked like she was totally out of it.” He squeezed John’s hand. “What have you got to do with Tom Jumper? The whole country’s looking for him. You’re not in any trouble, are you, John?”

  John sat on the floor, trying to swallow, but his mouth was already like a desert again. He looked about to see if there was a bottle within reach, just a little nip to clear the head. He groped around under a couple of chairs but found nothing other than the fallout from dried-up snacks that had escaped Danny’s vacuum cleaner.

  So Miss B was on the loose. That, in itself, was good news, but not the fact that she was in the company of Tom Jumper. They made quite an unlikely couple.

  “I don’t know what they wanted,” he said, getting up with difficulty. He looked out the window, where the sky had clouded over and raindrops had begun spattering the back porch.

  * * *

  —

  They came back at night. Suddenly, somehow, they were standing in the backyard in an apocalyptic rain, knocking on the porch door. Danny begged John to stay in bed, whispering about the Pandora’s box he’d open by letting them in, but John didn’t listen. If he’d been standing there in their wet shoes, desperate for help, he’d expect to be let in, sure as hell. There were unwritten laws, especially in his business.

  The two refugees stood there, shivering and wet to the bone, looking around as though they expected to be caught in a police
searchlight any second. Danny tightened the belt of his robe, beckoned them indoors, and went straight to work as always, helping them out of their wet clothes. There were no protests. “I’ll just pop these in the dryer. You can use these in the meantime,” he said, laying out two kimonos over the back of a chair.

  Miss B was strikingly thinner than John would have expected. She was gracious and vulnerable, and at present she was also a time bomb under the system. John had the greatest respect for her. Next to her stood Tom Jumper in all his pale-skinned, naked glory, staring at him with his TV-trademark brazenness. He had no illusions as to what John thought of him; it was something he was used to. Who could ever love a person who had made a huge fortune by exhibiting and exploiting society’s losers for the entertainment of a TV audience? The answer, of course, was the rest of society’s losers. But John lacked this curious form of mental and moral degeneracy. To him, Jumper was no less than a disgrace to his profession, with or without an arrest order on his head.

  “You’ve got to help us, John.” Miss B wrapped the kimono tight around her gaunt body and took his arm.

  “Do your pursuers know you’re in Georgetown?” he wanted to know.

  “Do you think we’d be standing here if they did?” Tom Jumper was putting on his kimono slowly—typically provocative—but John didn’t notice. He’d never been able to stand men who smelled like Jumper, a mixture of sweet sweat and expensive eau de cologne. “No, they don’t know where we are. We’re not so dumb as to use the net on a cell phone or wireless connections or credit cards. They’ve got a whole army of security goons these days whose only job is tracing shit like that.” He patted his briefcase. “We pay cash.”

  That briefcase is brim full, thought John. He’d heard what this character made per show. “What are you two doing together?” he finally asked. “Do you know each other?”