by Warren Adler
The leader, who had observed this event, picked up the telephone, which dangled by its cord over the desk.
“I bring you greetings from the Soviet Union,” the man said in accented English. He barked another order to his men. Slowly, they lowered their guns.
40
ROBERT HAD JUMPED from his chair screaming with joy. He embraced Mrs. Santorelli, hugged her, kissed her on her fat jowls.
“Thank God, thank God,” he cried. Tears of joy streamed down his cheeks.
“We celebrate with my special pasta, yes?”
“Anything, Mrs. Santorelli.”
Soon he would have them both in his arms. What did anything matter but that?
The Pencil stood to one side, impassively watching the monitor.
“Only a razor would have done it,” he said, following the commentators’ speculation of what had occurred. Apparently the authorities had crashed into the living quarters. Everyone had been taken away. As Robert’s excitement cooled he joined the Pencil to watch the various live interviews.
Rocco, the Talker, came into the apartment and stood beside them.
“It is a propaganda field day for the Russians, of course,” Ned Foreman, the President’s National Security Advisor, was saying. “But then they deserve it. They saved the President’s life. Perhaps we have here a new beginning on the road to world peace. Maybe, by a strange twist of fate, we have even broken the back of terrorism.”
“Bullshit,” Rocco sneered. “It is the Padre who made it possible.” It was the longest sentence Robert had ever heard him utter.
Suddenly a wave of sadness washed over him. What would happen to his father-in-law now and the loyal men who accompanied him? How could he ever thank him? And yet, despite his happiness, something nagged at him. Surely the murders of the Saudi prince and the daughter of the Syrian President could not be excused.
Despite the happy outcome, he could not shake off the conflict in his heart and mind. After all, the freedom of Maria and Joey was paid for with their blood. Nor could he excuse himself. Hadn’t he, in the end, stood on the sidelines and cheered them on? He looked at the Pencil.
“And the Arab boy?” Robert asked.
“He will go home to his mother. I have already made the arrangements,” the Pencil said impassively.
“I feel very bad about the other two, Angelo,” Robert said, compelled to express the thought.
“They will be going back to school.”
Robert’s heart lurched.
“They’re alive?”
“We do not kill children for any government,” Rocco said.
“Unfortunately, young people drive too fast,” the Pencil said. He did not crack a smile. “It was no trouble finding bodies.”
41
IN THE THIN LIGHT OF DAWN, she saw the birds, flying helter skelter in their wallpaper cage. She imagined she heard wings flapping and strange eerie birdsongs.
“I heard your eyes blink,” Paul whispered, reaching out to touch her hair.
“I have to change this wallpaper,” she said. “This place should be an oasis of serenity. It’s too noisy.”
She laughed and cuddled close, cradling herself against Paul’s shoulder. He felt good to be near and she reveled in the feel and smell of him. With remarkable efficiency, the staff had put things in order, scrubbed the place free of any traces of their ordeal.
The hullabaloo still lingered. The aftermath had been a media feast. He had addressed a joint session of Congress, told the story of his captivity, cited the evils of terrorism in any form. His bravery and courage were lauded. The Soviet Union, too, came in for plaudits. People were saying that their equally heroic gestures brought down the curtain on the cold war.
“So every cloud has a silver lining,” she said.
“Or an Achilles’ heel,” he replied.
“You’re mixing my metaphor.”
Her effort to be cute won her a kiss on her head. She entwined her fingers in his and squeezed. He was silent for a long time. The light deepened, picking out shapes with greater clarity.
“Suppose they had blown us up? Would it have made any difference?” Paul whispered. Was this the first hint of what she had been waiting for? An explanation? Insight? She had not yet unraveled it for herself.
“It would to us,” she said. “We’d both be dead.” She wanted to say more, to offer contrition and apologies. She had been willful, impatient, romantically self-righteous. But it had taken him so long to get to the integrity part.
“There are times when the shortest distance between two points is not a straight line,” he said. “The son of a bitch took us as far as we were willing to go.”
Maybe even further, she decided. An honored homily bit the dust. Ends, on occasion, did justify means.
He turned his body and pressed himself against her.
She whispered, “A First Lady isn’t even safe in her own bed anymore.”
42
“HOW MUCH FURTHER, MOMMY?” Joey asked, for the tenth time in the last half hour.
“A few miles more,” Robert replied gently.
“About ten more minutes, sweets,” Maria said.
She watched the rolling Pennsylvania countryside pass by. The brightness of the winter sun made her squint as its beams bounced off icy patches on the hard, fallow farmlands. The three of them sat up front, Joey between them, touching. These days they were always touching and embracing. She squeezed Joey’s shoulder and kissed his cheek, then reached over and ruffled Robert’s hair.
Six months ago he might have minded and fussily moved her hand away. Now he seemed to welcome the attention.
“Strange place for a birthday party,” Robert said.
“Time marches on, even in the penitentiary,” Maria replied. In front of Joey they used penitentiary instead of prison to describe his grandfather’s residence.
“In thirty years, he’ll be exactly one hundred,” Robert said. “The judge had a sense of humor.” He had sentenced the Padre and the others to from thirty to life. They had all pleaded guilty and been shipped off to Allenwood, which was only a couple of hours from Princeton where Robert had resumed his teaching.
“Away from his life in the Village, I just don’t know how he’ll take it,” Maria said. It worried her deeply.
“Let’s face it, Maria. Where he is will be better for a lot of people.”
“I suppose,” she mused.
It was a rare remark on his part.
Before sentencing, the Padre and his men had been held in a maximum-security cell on Riker’s Island, less than a mile from the island of Manhattan. Visits there were severely restricted, but the authorities had relented for that first day when she and Joey had arrived home by plane. She hadn’t seen him since, although she had talked to him on the phone.
They saw the sign, Allenwood Correctional Facility, and turned into a well-kept road. At least it was a minimum-security prison and the signs were clearly visible: manicured lawns, neat buildings, no fences, even a tennis court in the distance. The decision to send him there had surprised her. She had, considering who he was, expected worse. His lawyers had hinted about the influence of a person in a very high position of power. Neither of them had dared to question what that meant.
They parked the car in the parking lot, where they found Benjy waiting for them. He shook hands with Robert, kissed Maria’s cheek, and patted Joey’s head. She opened the trunk and took out a birthday cake.
“Is he all right?” she asked solemnly.
“You’ll see.”
“Thirty years is such a long time,” she whispered.
They followed Benjy into a clean airy building, through a whitewashed corridor, and into a large dining room, currently serving cafeteria style. Men sat around in groups eating lunch. Some lifted their eyes and looked at her briefly.
“I don’t see him,” she said after a cursory look around the large room.
“He’s in there,” Benjy said.
They followed
him through another doorway to a small, neat room. There were photographs on the wall depicting scenes from New York and Italy.
He did not see her immediately. Joey and Robert stood beside her. She had stopped moving and she held them back.
She needed to freeze the moment in her mind. There he sat at a round table covered with a crisp, checkered table-cloth. On his face was a two- or three-day sprout of beard. He wore a frayed white-on-white shirt with the collar unbuttoned. Beside him sat Vinnie, the Prune. Benjy took his seat beside him at the table. He did not look up. He was busy concentrating on pouring Chianti into their glasses.
At that moment she saw the Canary, his bovine bulk swathed in an apron as he moved across the room precariously carrying a large platter of antipasto. The men looked up and watched him. He moved with great care. When he reached the table with the platter intact, her father patted him on the arm.
“You did good, Carmine,” she heard her father say.
Across the table from the Padre sat little Angelo Petinno, the Pencil. There were scraps of paper in front of him and a pencil in his hand.
