by James Phelan
“And then, finally, she asked me if I kept my promise.”
8
THE WHITE HOUSE
The Saudi ambassador, himself a prince of the House of Saud, sat back in the armchair to the side of the President. McCorkell was to the President’s other side, opposite the ambassador.
The clock in McCorkell’s eye-line over the ambassador’s left shoulder had just clicked over to 11.06. Greetings had taken less than a minute, business had been gotten down to, and the meeting could almost be considered as over. Not bad for six minutes in the Oval Office. Pity things had not gone their way. Yet. There was still a chance.
Fullop was there, as well as the Secretary of State, Adam Baker. The four Americans waited for their guest to answer the question.
“No, thank you,” the prince said. His body language and tone told them his heels were dug in hard.
Fullop raised his eyebrows. Adam Baker played his usual stoic role as Secretary of State when acting shotgun to the President’s lead. McCorkell squinted ever so slightly into harder focus at the Saudi.
This prince had only been in the post for six months. He was on a par with his predecessor, which wasn’t saying that much. The benchmark had been set with the guy before that. He had been in his post for almost thirty years, his career spanning alongside Secretaries of State Kissinger all the way through to Rice. He had been the only ambassador from any country who had a genuine personal friendship—going off to smoke cigars and drink un-Islamic beverages—with successive US presidents. Now, he was back in Riyadh as the head of the Saudi National Security Council. He was Bill McCorkell’s counterpart over there, and remained a trusted friend—they’d had a day of meetings just last July at Camp David. This current ambassador, McCorkell knew, didn’t like that his revered predecessor was still seen to carry far more weight than the office that he had left. A classic case of big shoes to fill. McCorkell could go over this prince’s head but it wasn’t that easy. The Saudi politics and family issues that surrounded ambassadorial postings was a mind-fuck of an ego minefield.
“Mr Ambassador, our FBI investigators are the best in the world,” McCorkell said. “If anyone can find the perpetrators of the attacks on your oil infrastructure, they can.”
The prince’s face was passive. He was silent, then turned to the President.
“These were not foreign terrorist attacks,” the ambassador said. “And we are not expecting any more attacks. It was an isolated incident by a local criminal element and we are rounding up suspects as we speak.”
“And their actions are hurting us as much as you,” the President said. “We would like our law enforcement specialists to help you. This was an attack on the global economy, with nothing to gain for the perpetrators involved other than seeing your royal family, and us as your friends, hurt.”
“Don’t underestimate our own investigators,” the prince said. “They will find those responsible for the planning of the attack. We will have justice.”
“Forgive us if we are not holding our breath for your police investigators,” the President said.
“It was Saudi workers who died in the attack,” the prince said. “This is an internal matter.”
“Six Pakistanis were also killed,” Fullop added.
“We’ll see their families receive justice too,” the prince said. His face remained impassive, despite McCorkell knowing the man had the propensity to show his feelings with little heed of the poker face that came with international diplomacy.
There was silence as the room considered the gravity of that statement. McCorkell knew the matter-of-fact tone of the prince’s comments meant that those responsible, when caught, wouldn’t see the inside of a courthouse. Just the swift justice of American-supplied munitions.
“Mr Ambassador, you know why we want to help,” McCorkell said. “You’ve been in this room many times. You know you are among friends here.”
“Of course,” the prince said. “And I know why you want to help. It’s oil. It’s always oil.”
A look was shared between McCorkell and the President. Baker spoke up for the first time.
“With all respect, this is about more than oil,” the Secretary of State said. “It’s our entire economy that suffers.”
“I am sorry for your economy,” the prince said.
“This attack directly affects us as the biggest consumer of your oil,” McCorkell said. “Whatever we can do to bring that supply back on to the market, we will do. We’ve had the Qatari attack, and now Nigeria overnight—the markets are getting killed.”
“I don’t want oil prices to rise any more than you do,” the prince said. He smiled. “When it becomes more expensive than alternative fuel sources, we all lose.”
McCorkell nodded almost imperceptibly to the President. The signal to ask the real question, the reason why the prince had been called in.
“But you’re not releasing any of your reserve capacity?” the President said. “You’re almost three million barrels per day down—and you have reserve refining capacity that you can bring on to the market to fill that shortfall.”
“Which would leave us totally exposed in the advent of another catastrophe,” the prince said, shaking his head. “I say again, I do not want oil prices to soar too high. But for our own national security reasons we cannot do anything about that right now.”
“And yet you know these prices are making it easier for our alternative fuel industries to take a bigger market share,” Fullop said. “All of a sudden a million acres of ethanol crops doesn’t look too expensive to harvest. More individual consumers and company fleets switch to hybrids. Or, worse still, Canada and Venezuela with their oil sands become the new Saudi Arabias of the world.”
“With respect, your alternative fuel industry seems to be growing quite fast as it is,” the prince said. “Mr President, we are on track to repair the pumping site and resume production to the previous capacity within three weeks.”
There was an awkward beat for the Americans. Another look between the President and McCorkell. That was twice the time frame that the State Department had previously been assured of. The Saudi oil workers drilled for this type of catastrophe all the time. These oil guys did things one way: fast. In the Saudi oil machine, nothing took three weeks.
“Three weeks?” McCorkell asked. “Is the damage worse than we’ve been informed?”
“Mr McCorkell, thirty-six of my countrymen died in this terrorist attack,” the prince said. “We are moving forward as fast as the attack site will allow.”
“And you know we in the Executive branch are getting a battering on this from our congress and senate?” the President said. “They can halt us on military supplies.”
“I am sorry for your internal affairs, Mr President, really I am,” the Ambassador said. “If your politicians want to get career mileage out of this terrorist attack on my country, so be it. My hopes and prayers are that you do not have any other issues that arise to compound these pressures.”
“What do you think their idea of ‘justice’ is? Eye for an eye, limb for limb?” Fullop said.
Baker had shown the prince out, and the three men in the Oval Office were more uncomfortable than they’d been fifteen minutes before.
“That and more,” McCorkell said. “Saudi police and military are busting some asses over this. The royal family want to use it to bolster their image as being tough on crime and criticism, a way of proving legitimacy to the way they rule.”
“Bill, you know that governing bodies, including us, use catastrophes for their own agenda all the time,” Fullop said. “From disaster economics to regime shift, significant events like a terrorist attack are ripe fodder for change. It’s the way of the world, and the Saudis are no exception.”
“You think the Kingdom is gonna change in a hurry?”
“Mr President, their royal family might want this to be seen as their nine-eleven, to show the world that they have teeth,”
Fullop said. “What do you suggest we do, Bill? Hold up some military hardware until they budge on letting us lend a helping hand?”
“Too long-term—they can hold out on receiving more tanks and aircraft for far longer than the three weeks we’ve just been promised,” McCorkell said. “We need something more immediate. I want to go to the press on this.”
“What’s the angle?” the President asked.
“Saudis don’t like bad press, particularly if we paint the picture that the royal family are refusing the help of the best investigators in the world. That they’re sticking to their old-fashioned ways of getting things done.”
“Do I need to remind you we have a presidential election around the corner?” Fullop said, his cheeks flushed. “We make this a bigger story than it already is and it shows that we don’t have influence with these guys. Our opponents will make this spin that our administration is weak in the Middle East.”
“Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and now Nigeria, we’ve got ourselves a trifecta of bad news,” McCorkell said. “The Press Secretary is getting hammered in the press room right now, every question from reporters who want to know what we’re doing to alleviate the price pressures at the gas pump. And the entire press corp know that the prince’s motorcade just pulled out of the White House gates.”
“So we tell them our help’s been turned down?” the President asked.
“It’s then an opportunity to make it our story. To own it,” McCorkell said. “The Kingdom wants stability in their relationships here—we’re their biggest customer, and they’re a decent-sized consumer. They don’t like bad press any more than we do. This will make our case go before all the finance guys, all the industry guys that have influence over there. We can bypass the prince and have dozens of big American companies applying all sorts of fiscal pressure over in the Kingdom.”
“How far do we go?” the President asked.
“I think this is a bad idea,” Fullop said. He stood and paced by the window.
“We issue travel warnings to Saudi Arabia,” McCorkell said. “There’s a legitimate threat there, so let’s say it’s of the highest terror threat level. No one in, all non-essential Americans out. Let it leak that not only is there another threat but that the Saudis are dragging their feet in the investigation. The Press Secretary will get the question as to why we haven’t sent the FBI in…”
“Our response is that we have a team locked and loaded on the tarmac waiting for the Kingdom’s green light.”
McCorkell nodded at the President’s reasoning.
“We’ve been hitting a brick wall with that prince since he got here,” McCorkell said. “I’ve been in the room with him and his uncle before; his family have been waiting for an excuse to replace him as ambassador. This means that they save admitting to the mistake of putting him in the job in the first place.”
“He still has the confidence of a big portion of their family,” Fullop said.
“Yeah, the portion that wants to see us hurt,” McCorkell replied. “The moderate Saudi players will go around him and let our investigators in. Nothing surer.”
“And, more importantly, get the oil pumping again,” the President said. “Bill, get it out with the press, make it happen.”
9
NEW YORK CITY
Fox waited outside the Lincoln Center, hands in his pockets. He wore a black one-button Paul Smith suit, white linen shirt, black silk tie. Metropolitan Opera attire. His collar button was undone, his tie knot loose a couple of fingers at the neck. Under the fall of his trousers’ hem his black RM Williams boots passed as dress shoes, their high-gloss military shine reflecting the lights of traffic.
He checked his Skagen watch. Al was late. Bastard had probably forgotten about it, too busy sitting at home watching sport on his birthday.
The bells chimed with the final call for patrons to enter and be seated.
“Come on, Al…” Fox said, and got out his iPhone to dial …
“Hey there, sailor,” Jane Clay said. Little black dress. Hair up. More make-up on than when he’d last seen her—smoky eye-shadow, heavy black mascara, red lips. A faint smell of spring perfume—Kenzo?
“Hey Jane,” Fox said. He turned his attention back to scroll through his iPhone. When he looked up again, Jane was right in his face. He was about to offer a handshake but she leaned in and kissed him on the cheek.
“Al’s not coming, is he?”
“He gave me a call, something about watching the Windies play the Aussies? Anyway—I’m your date,” Jane said. “Unless you prefer men?”
The final bell sounded.
Fox, still with his iPhone in his hand, raised his eyebrows. Smiled, and pocketed the phone.
“Come on,” he said, and crooked his arm for her to link her hand through.
They walked through the door, saying a couple of brief hellos to society. Fox was popular there, recognised by other reporters and some socialites who might have seen him interviewed or in a discussion on television. He was uncomfortable with it, and led the way to their seats. Centre stage, eight rows back. Several more people recognised him along the way.
“Well, aren’t you Mr Popular,” Jane said, beaming. More at home with the attention than he was.
They settled in to their seats. The conductor turned to the audience, bowed to applause. Jane leaned close to Fox.
“You didn’t call me,” she said.
“I didn’t know we were at that stage,” Fox replied, smiling.
“I want to write your story,” she said. “I have an agent, in Hollywood, at UTA, reps my stuff for film rights. She wants to sell your life rights, make it into a movie.”
Fox looked at her: Really?
“What, to have Jake Gyllenhaal and Reese Witherspoon dramatise my life? I’ll give you your article,” Fox said quietly. The curtain came up, revealing the opening scene. He whispered into Jane’s ear, “But I’m not ready to tell you my life story, if that’s what you’re after.”
She nodded, her attention towards the opera. Fox’s gaze hung on her for a moment. There wasn’t any coltishness about her. She certainly didn’t look like the sort of girl who had just got off the bus from Wisconsin. She’d lived life, and radiated a sense of—what? She turned to him, motioned with her expression that he should be watching the scene. Her smile held the answer Fox was searching for, and he himself smiled, and settled in to hear the opera.
Fox sat opposite Jane in Barcibo Enoteca, a small Italian wine-bar and restaurant near the Lincoln Center on Broadway and 69th. The interior was all blasted brick and timber shelves lined with wine. The dim hanging lighting and small glass cups with tea candles created a late-night atmosphere easily lost in. Their portion of the long white marble table was lined with wine glasses as they tasted their way through the Italian reds on offer.
“Why opera?” Jane asked over the rim of a glass of Tuscan Brunello di Montalcino. The aged red left sticky fingers of wine down the inside of the glass.
“Excuse me?”
“What’s your interest in opera?”
“You have something against opera?”
“No—it’s not the most popular of arts is all. Particularly in your demographic.”
“Well, for me … it’s hard to articulate,” Fox said. “I guess it ultimately comes down to a love of words.”
“Words? Not the music, the performance?”
“Well, yeah, opera has all the drama and storytelling to go with it, but it’s the transition of words to music that really gets to me,” Fox said. “The rhythm, pitch, timbre, volume, all the properties of music that have the ability to move us in ways beyond literal meanings. A great opera singer can deliver all this imbued with their life’s journey. And there’s something magical about the delivery of a great opera aria that just…”
“Moves us.”
“Touches the very core of us,” Fox said. He took the final sip from his glass and poured another for them both,
finishing the bottle. The wine swirled around as it filled the empty space.
“You’re going to Africa soon for your OPEC security pieces?”
“Day after tomorrow,” Fox said. “There was a bombing in Nigeria, so I’m starting things off there.”
They were silent for a moment. It was the first time in the past hour and a half that neither of them had not spontaneously filled with words.
“This a favourite place of yours?”
“First time,” Fox said. Small talk could be revealing and he remained wary that this could well be material for her profile piece. “You got a favourite bar in town?”
Jane took her time to answer and had a sip of wine, licking a drop from her bottom lip.
“Not really in Manhattan,” she replied. “I grew up in New Jersey.”
“I would have picked your accent as Texan, somewhere in the panhandle?”
“Yeah, I was born in Amarillo, we moved over here for most of my childhood, then I went back there for my undergrad.”
“Cool—sorry, I just have a thing for that accent,” Fox said, smiling. “Can pick it out across a crowded bar packed above fire code. But okay, New Jersey…”
“New Jersey, right. I remember sometimes going with my dad to a place called McGovern’s Tavern. Went in there again recently, it’s still much the same. The same murals of Irish scenes still look down on the same large, open room, and the walls are hung with the same old photos. There are still a couple of his old cop buddies, drinking at the same place, while the next generation comes in and goes through the same motions.”
Fox knew the type of place. Knew those kind of men that were the same the world over. Replicating some kind of ritualistic nostalgia their fathers had done.
