By Order of the President

by Kilian, Michael;

  In that discreet surrounding they had talked over their next course of action, finding little opportunity for any. Camp David had given them no instructions whatsoever. Camp David had been informed of Atherton’s call of NSC and cabinet meetings, and had not responded, unless the rude silence could itself be considered a pointed response. It had been decided to proceed in similar fashion. They would go to their offices and attend to the daily routine of their governmental responsibilities, but nothing beyond that.

  With one exception. The news media were behaving almost hysterically about the lack of information and presidential presence, and shortly much of the public would be doing the same. Atherton would take it upon himself to calm the nation, or at least make clear that there had been no coup, that the White House was in safe hands, and that the government was functioning normally. He would stay off “Today,” “Good Morning America,” and “CBS Morning News”—for the time being—but he would grant enough interviews to satisfy all three networks’ evening news programs and the major wire services. If Bushy Ambrose objected, well enough. Let him come forward, and bring President Hampton with him.

  With a whoop of sirens, the motorcade again turned, crossing the oncoming lanes onto a road that led north past the Lincoln Memorial. Atherton turned to look at the huge columns and the darkness behind them, his mind filling with the image of the great, staring statue within. Atherton was no worshiper of Lincoln, but he felt in awe of the man’s extraordinary place in history. It was awe compounded by a sense of his own inadequacy, and despair that the reference to him in the history books would be a footnote in the account of a failed and mediocre administration in the service of a vain and ineffectual man. Hampton styled himself the great compromiser. Atherton saw him as weak and equivocating, a dodger of opportunity, an evader of the historical main chance. Lincoln was the greatest war president America had ever had. Hampton kept his dirty little war in a closet. When John Wilkes Booth’s bullet crashed into Lincoln’s skull, it destroyed a monumental intellect. What had the bullet that struck Hampton destroyed, if anything?

  The thought of bullets brought the remembered sound of them—snaps and poppings as heard on the television news, shattering explosions in Atherton’s mental ear. He shivered, putting his head down and folding his arms tight against his chest. He would concentrate on the approaching cabinet meeting. The Hampton men would doubtless stay away. His own remnant force would be going through the motions largely for the benefit of the public.

  The only meeting of consequence that day was likely to be the one ordered by Colonel Ambrose at Camp David, to be attended by Walt Kreski and Steve Copley of the FBI. Both Copley and Kreski had promised to give Atherton a full briefing after they returned—if they returned.

  At yet another turning, the White House swept distantly into view across the Ellipse, looking not at all the place of dread and menace it had the previous night. Quite the contrary. As long as Hampton, Ambrose & Co. remained in hiding in their Maryland mountain fortress, the White House would be Atherton’s domain.

  He began to rehearse answers to questions he could expect from the television interviewers. They would most certainly not be the right questions, but then, he hadn’t the right answers.

  Summoning his courage, for he feared humiliation as much as anything that had threatened him in his life, Charley Dresden spun his old MG into the Channel Three parking lot with a nonchalance that required a great deal of acting. His old parking place four spaces from the main door was, of course, occupied, as all of them on the paved portion proved to be. He was compelled to park in a gravel side lot, next to a rusting van that had the name of an obscure country and western band on the side. There were a number of cars he recognized, but none he recalled belonging to Jim Ireland. Stepping out of the roadster, he snatched up his briefcase as he might a weapon before going into battle.

  The receptionist was new, which helped, as he was going to play this very straight. He asked for Bert Novak, a salesman he occasionally drank with in Antoine’s when Jim Ireland wasn’t around. The wholesome, sweet-faced brunette motioned him to a chair, where he remained ignored for nearly twenty minutes. At last Novak appeared in the doorway, but the man hung back, holding onto the door, looking impatient.

  “I’m kinda busy, Charley,” he said. “What’s up?”

  “I got the amusement park account,” Dresden said, rising. “I want to buy some air time.”

  It was a lie. His contract with the advertiser was merely to produce the commercial, not to buy time for it on television stations. What Dresden was doing was extremely unethical and probably illegal.

  Novak stared at him a moment, frowning and blinking. “Doesn’t he want to wait until after the rainy season?”

  “He thinks he can attract some business during the Christmas holidays.”

  “Santa’s coming on a roller coaster?”

  “It’s only money, Novak.” Ed Stanley, the station’s sales manager, kept a sign on the back of the sales office door: REMEMBER … IT’S ONLY MONEY. It was intended for the benefit of station executives squeamish about running commercials for aluminum siding sales outfits and furniture stores that catered mostly to poor Mexicans.

  “How many spots?” Novak asked.

  “Two.”

  Novak frowned again.

  “Two a night,” Charley said. “For two weeks.” The amusement park man had actually mentioned such a possible schedule.

  As Novak wrote up the contract in his small cubicle of an office, Dresden kept as calm as possible. He was fraudulently committing himself to an obligation of several thousand dollars.

  “Charley, I’ll need some money up front. I’m afraid you’re still on the bad list.”

  “You mean before the spots run.”

  “Before they get on the schedule.”

  “I’ll drop a check by tomorrow.” Dresden signed the contract, then sat back. “As a certified client, I’d like to ask a favor. I’ve got some footage of his thrill rides I have to preview, and my recorder’s on the bum.”

  “Charley. You can’t mess with our equipment unless we produce the spots. You know the rules.”

  “I’m not asking to do any editing now. I just want to look at some tape.”

  Novak sighed. “The client is always right. Even you, I guess.”

  “Don’t tell Ireland that. He would differ.”

  Dresden actually did have some amusement park footage—an old commercial the park operator had used years before and had given to Charley as an example of what he didn’t want. It was very bad. Charley ran it through three times, pretending to study it. The consumption of time was making him nervous. This particular editing and previewing room was just off the main corridor and a fairly public place. Novak had kept the door open because of the heat generated by the equipment.

  “I’ve another favor to ask,” Dresden said. “I need a tape of the shooting of the president.”

  “For a commercial?”

  “For history. I tried to record from the networks, but my machine screwed it up. It won’t cost you anything. I just want to record from your stuff. I brought along an empty cassette.” He took it from his briefcase and held it up.

  “Charley. I’m really busy.”

  “Look, Bert. I just did you a favor. My client wanted to put the whole schedule on Channel Eleven in San Jose.”

  “All right. I’ll go over to the newsroom. Wait here. Don’t go wandering into the control room and get yourself in trouble.”

  “I won’t budge.” He didn’t. He sat motionless, as though that would keep people in the corridor from noticing him.

  “They need this right back,” Novak said, returning. “So hurry. It’s good quality. It was taken right off the network feed.”

  The taped gunfire had only just commenced when Dresden sensed the hulking figure in the doorway behind him. He had no need to turn to confirm that it was Ireland. He knew his luck.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing, Bert?�
� Ireland thundered.

  “Charley’s a client.”

  Ireland swore. “Like hell he is. The son of a bitch is just trying to use our equipment, to try to win a goddamn bet with me!”

  Before Ireland could speak further, Dresden leaped up, hit the “stop” and “eject” buttons, snapped out both tape cassettes, and slapped them down on the console. “Say no more. I’m leaving.”

  “Now!”

  Dresden retrieved two of the tapes and dropped them into his briefcase, handing the third to Novak. He waited for Ireland to step aside—if he brushed against the man, he feared there’d be violence—and hurried down the hall, pausing on the way out only to smile at the receptionist and say, “Thank you, sunshine.”

  He smiled again as he roared the MG out into the street. The tape he had handed Novak was of the old amusement park commercial. The network assassination tape was safe in his briefcase.

  “You’re a crazy man, Charles Dresden,” he said to himself, to the world. “But you’re smart. And you’re right. You’re right, and the whole world is wrong.”

  Bushy Ambrose had taken a two-room “suite” at the Rustic Motel in Thurmont, and had had the desk pulled away from the wall so he could sit behind it and deal with his visitors as though he were in his White House office. Both Walt Kreski and Steven Copley had arrived with aides, but Ambrose had insisted on meeting with them alone, himself joined only by Peter Schlessler. He went wherever Ambrose did now, or where Ambrose sent him. Some said Schlessler was actually more loyal to Ambrose than to the president, and it was probably true. Schlessler had served the colonel in Vietnam. After getting out of the army he had gone on the bum and gotten into more than occasional trouble. Ambrose had rescued him, giving him a job at the amusement park and eventually making him his top assistant. He had come along when Ambrose had joined Hampton’s staff in the Colorado governor’s office.

  Ambrose spent more than an hour looking through the reports Kreski and Copley had brought with them, asking periodic questions in the manner of an inquisitor. Kreski felt almost as though he were under arrest. Finally, Ambrose slapped the folders shut, folded his hands, and glared at them as might an army CO having to deal with two GIs returning AWOL.

  “There’s a lot of paper there but what there’s most of is bullshit,” he said.

  “Colonel?” Copley said. Ambrose did not like being called colonel.

  “You’ve got it all tied up, except you only seem to have one real fact. That the president was shot at by a now deceased wetback named Manuel Lopez Angel Huerta.”

  “We might learn more if we could retrieve the bullet or bullets that hit the president for ballistics,” Copley said.

  “There was one,” Ambrose said. “It passed through.”

  “They could be imbedded in the limousine.”

  “How can you tell them from all the other bullets? Anyway, the limo stays up here, for the time being.” Ambrose’s eyes fixed on Kreski. “Your Agent Schultz. I want him charged with everything in the books, including war crimes and violation of the Hatch Act, if need be.”

  “He has been,” Copley said.

  “He’s become a psycho case,” said Kreski, softly. “We have him in St. Elizabeth’s.”

  “Great. Where they put John Hinckley,” Ambrose said. “I want Schultz in jail, instanter. I want his supervisor suspended. The networks are screaming about Bonnie Greer.”

  “His supervisor was Al Berger,” said Kreski.

  “That reminds me,” Ambrose said, reaching for one of the file folders. “The only other fact in here is that you’ve established that Berger was struck by a bullet different from those fired by the wetback, one fired by a party unknown. All the Secret Service and police on the scene say they were firing away from Berger. Party unknown is another assassin?”

  “Apparently so.”

  “Why didn’t you come out and say so clearly? There’s no other evidence of this party unknown, no footprint, no shell casings?”

  “No shell casings,” Copley said.

  “There were a thousand footprints,” Kreski said. “People ran in every direction.”

  “And all these arrests,” Ambrose said. “These Hispanics in New York sound like drug dealers.”

  “As the report notes, weapons were recovered from the rooftop,” Copley said. He looked exasperated, and was sweating slightly.

  “And this revolutionary group in Chicago, La Puño. Admiral Elmore says no one in Central Intelligence has ever heard of it before. The Defense Intelligence Agency says La Puño has no connection with the Honduran Army of the People’s Liberation or any of the other guerrilla groups.”

  “If we had learned about it beforehand we would have stopped this from happening,” Kreski said.

  “These people in Chicago,” Ambrose continued, “aside from their being associated with La Puño, all you can really charge them with is being illegals.”

  “For now,” said Copley.

  “You’ve made no arrests in Washington? Three bombs were exploded. They blew up some parked cars in the Rayburn and a wastebasket at the OAS building.”

  “No arrests,” Copley said. “Yet.”

  “Have you made any arrests he hasn’t, Kreski? Do you have any new suspects?”

  Kreski shook his head. “We’re doing our best. My principal concern has been protecting the senior members of the government.”

  “Damn straight,” said Ambrose. “But you sure fucked up that mission in Gettysburg. That’s why we’re staying up here. If that embarrasses you, too bad. The president’s life comes first.” He shoved the reports across the desk in their direction. “I want to hear from both of you twice a day, and sooner if you should learn a new fact.”

  Schlessler stood up. It was the first time he had moved during the entire interview. Kreski started to rise, but Copley remained seated.

  “If you don’t mind, Colonel,” he said. “We’d appreciate a little assistance. It would certainly help if we could interview the president.”

  “Impossible. Certainly not now. I was with him all the time. There’s nothing he could add.”

  “If we could at least have the president’s clothing—as evidence.”

  “Not now.”

  “There’s something called obstruction of justice.”

  “There’s something called endangering the life of the president.”

  “By taking his clothes? His suit jacket and flak vest?”

  “Enough of this, Copley. You are an employee of the Justice Department. Kreski, you work for the Department of the Treasury. The attorney general and the treasury secretary serve at the pleasure of the president. Do you read me?”

  “At the moment, the attorney general and the treasury secretary have no way of knowing the president’s pleasure.”

  “Yes, they do! Through me and the White House staff! We don’t know what’s going on out there, damn it! All we have is a pile of hamburger that used to be a wetback and a bunch of innocent dead people. The president of the United States was almost one of them, and neither of your agencies knew the first goddamn thing about it. Your job isn’t to write another Warren Commission report. It’s to find out who tried to kill the president and whether they’re going to try to do it again and what we can do to stop it!”

  “Will you at least tell us the president’s condition?”

  Ambrose glanced at Schlessler. “The president’s condition is good.” He stood up and folded his hands behind his back. “He took a bad round, gentlemen. A through-and-through wound in the muscle where the neck joins the shoulder. But he’s coming along fine. Dr. Potter will be making a statement later.”

  “Why wait? The public ought to know,” said Copley. “The networks have been screaming about that too.”

  “We’ve kept the public informed. We issued a statement last night. We don’t need to grant Barbara Walters an interview.”

  “The public would like to see the president, if that’s possible.”

  “It’s not. Th
is is a serious goddamn security situation! This is damn near a military situation! You’re the country’s top cops, aren’t you? Now go out and do your goddamn jobs!”

  Copley, who had gone to Harvard Law as well as Princeton, never liked being called a cop, or even a policeman.

  “It’s time to go, sir,” Schlessler said.

  Copley at last arose.

  “Well, Bushy,” he said, as he should not have. “The American people at least ought to know who’s running the government while the president is, uh, recovering.”

  But instead of becoming angrier, Ambrose suddenly calmed.

  “The president will decide that shortly,” he said, and walked out. Schlessler waited until Kreski and Copley had left the room, then closed the door and followed his superior.

  As they returned to their cars, Copley said, “I think we’ve just seen who’s running the government.”

  “Maybe the networks will start screaming about that,” said Kreski.

  Tracy Bakersfield had no class to teach that day and was at her home by the sea. Dresden had not talked to her in three or four months, but as always she sounded delighted to receive his call, though she never made any to him. After he made his strange request, she paused, but then agreed. She had always indulged him in sisterly fashion.

  Her car was being repaired and her husband had the other one, so it was necessary for Dresden to drive out for her. There would be no work that day on the new commercial. He didn’t mind. He would meet the deadline somehow, in a flash of brilliance and an hour or so of concentrated effort, as had served him in such situations before. Were he to fail and miss the deadline, well, there were other clients, somewhere.

  He found her asleep, reclining in a lounge chair on the scrubby lawn behind her house. It sloped down to the brink of the cliff and overlooked a wide expanse of ocean. Hidden from view was the little village of Villa Beach that was crowded against the base of the cliff below. Only a glimpse of the town’s long wooden fishing pier, a concrete breakwater, and a lone palm tree was visible. But Tracy’s small house and lawn possessed as full a sweeping prospect of sea and embracing coastline as there was in California. At night the lights of Monterey could be seen far to the south.