“It’s yours with my blessing. To whom or what will it be delivered, an embedded terrorist cell?”
“Yes and no. Politics, as we all know, makes for strange bedfellows. These guys were working with some folks from one of those the Liberty Tree groups, maybe even a little right of them; we’re not sure. The latter are ignorant of who the former might be and think they will have documents that will increase the current level of societal distrust and eventually lead to what they have been calling the final chapter of the American Revolution, wherein the righteous ‘Right’ will reestablish a country and a code that never existed in the first place. Thus, they both have the same thing in common, but with radically different ideas of what constitutes righteousness.”
“This is all very baroque, Charlie. If it weren’t so dangerous, it would make a very funny operetta. Rudolph Friml could have a field day with this.”
“Franz Lehar would be your man, I think.”
“Or Peter Ustinov. A darker version of Romanoff and Juliet.”
“Possibly, but I don’t think so. Anyway, it is the great irony of our times that groups or individuals who hate or fear each other passionately will frequently espouse identical goals, in this case, violence in order to take down the government of the United States. Domestic terrorists and the imported variety are sisters under the skin. The whole business is peculiarly paradoxical.”
“I would say it’s more along the lines of oxymoronic.”
“I’m not sure of the oxy part, but it is certainly moronic. Timothy McVeigh, it would seem, lives on wearing a keffiyeh.”
“Right. One last question, Charlie, and then I’m off. How did you manage to keep the FBI away? This is their turf. I can’t believe they rolled over for you.”
“A trade-off, Ike. We explained to them our need to haul in our double, and they agreed to let us have the day if we gave them Plan B. So, at long last the era of interagency cooperation has arrived. They will take it from here. It’s just as well. They have better contacts in that murky area of Americana than we do. They will deliver the phony icon and its bogus documents to the local terrorist cell who, in turn, will slip it to a group composed of our homegrown variety. You can imagine what they will do with it. I expect you will see the documents reported in hysterical detail on cable news in a day or two. And then, of course, the forgeries will be exposed, and all hell will break loose in what we laughingly refer to as the responsible media.”
Ike snorted. His coffee was cold, and he was tired. He stood and slipped on his jacket. “We live in interesting times, as the Chinese might say. Time to say goodnight, Charlie. I am tired. Ruth waits with a candle burning in the window, I hope, and on the morrow there is her mother to contend with, extended family to sort out, bad guys to put away, and Essie Sutherlin’s impending calving. I need peace and quiet and sleep.”
Ike gave Charlie a desultory wave and walked out into the night, fatigued but alert and entertaining quirky and, some might add unworthy, thoughts of plum sauce, sheriff’s badges, and Smoky the Bear hats.
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