by Steve Berry
He shook his head. “They’re not our problem.”
She agreed.
“I really screwed up,” Terry Morse said, his voice shaking.
And she could not argue with that conclusion.
Cotton seemed to grab his breath. “Listen good,” he said to Morse, the voice hard. “You’ve only got one more chance to make this right. If not, then you’re both going to need a real good lawyer to stay out of prison.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Danny drove across Blount County, navigating roads he’d known since childhood. The windshield wipers ticked a slow, symmetrical beat, keeping the view ahead clear. So much had changed, some of the county nearly unrecognizable, a lot like his own life. He’d risen to what many regarded as the highest office on earth, and now his career was over. Yet he was barely eligible for Social Security and mentally he felt like a man of fifty. There was so much more he could do. But how? Nobody gave a damn about an ex-president. Courtesy demanded that he never criticize either his successors or Congress. Something about preserving the integrity of the office. So if history was any judge all he would do was write his memoirs, build a library, adopt some charitable cause, then charge a god-awful fee to people who wanted him to come and impart upon them his accumulated wisdom. In short, a slow, painful fade to oblivion.
And what wisdom would he charge those people to hear? He was just an east Tennessee boy who’d had a knack for politics. Campaigning ran in his blood. No one had ever defeated him at the polls. His two runs for president had been landslide wins in both the popular and the electoral vote. He’d miss campaigning. He loved connecting with voters. He’d always been a straight shooter, staring the public square in the eye and saying what he meant. Sure, that had gotten him into trouble over the years, but it had also forged him a reputation. He’d been called a lot of things. Stubborn. Arrogant. Overbearing. Even a bastard once by a fool congressman. But never had he been labeled a hypocrite or a liar. His friends loved him and his enemies feared him, which was precisely how he liked things.
Only two failures haunted him.
That night in the fire with Mary, and his inability to make Pauline happy.
And both were irretrievable.
The time was approaching 9:00 P.M. The woods around him towered as a thick mass of impenetrable shadow. He’d encountered no one on the highway, which was not unusual for rural Blount County at night. He eased up and stopped at the intersection with the route to the Sherwood place. A pair of headlights to his right signaled an approaching car, which sped through the junction, headed in the direction he was about to take.
The vehicle caught his attention.
A black Lincoln sedan.
Cars were his thing. He loved them. Always had. While in the White House he’d maintained subscriptions to Hot Rod, Car and Driver, Road & Track, and several other auto magazines. They’d been his escape from the job. And if in the coming years he could swing a few special invites to some antique-car shows—now, that would not be so bad.
He turned and drove toward his destination.
The notebook lay on the passenger seat. Explaining to Diane why he’d stolen it was not going to be easy, but he’d cautioned Taisley that her secret may have to be revealed. A part of him wanted to tell Diane the truth just to wipe all the smugness from her face. She’d seemed to have enjoyed digging into him about his own divorce. But that would mean truly hurting her, and no matter how he might feel about her personally, that was not his style.
It seemed really odd tooling around by himself, on a dark highway. The only place he’d been alone for the past eight years was his bedroom at the White House. That had been his sanctuary, breached only by his chief of staff. Pauline had adhered to tradition and kept her own room down the hall. Presidents and First Ladies rarely slept together, their schedules so different and rest so needed that separate accommodations had proved a necessity. There’d been exceptions, but life in the White House was not conducive to sound marital relations. The Former Presidents Act gave him a pension, an office allowance, health care, and bodyguards for life. He’d kept the pension—splitting it with Pauline, God knows she’d earned it—and the health care, then declined the rest. If somebody wanted to kill him, bring it on. But he doubted that anyone really gave a damn about ex-president Danny Daniels. It would be like going to the trouble of shooting a piece of roadkill.
He approached the driveway for the Sherwood residence. Through the trees he noticed that lights still burned inside. Floodlights washed the front and sides, burning through the steady mist. Surely the wake was not still happening? One car was parked in front along the circular drive, a Lincoln sedan like the one he’d just seen. He eased his own car into a long driveway across the highway and doused the headlights, buying himself a few moments to think about what to do.
He hadn’t expected Diane to still have visitors.
So this would have to wait.
He reached for the gearshift, intent on backing out and heading home. He’d deal with this tomorrow. But another set of headlights caused him to pause. They came from his left and he watched in the rearview mirror as a second sedan turned into the Sherwood driveway. Rain transformed the back windshield into a watery kaleidoscope of blurred images. So he lowered the driver’s-side window and stuck his head out, able to see through the trees as the car rounded to the front and stopped. The rear door opened and a man stepped out, the silhouette distinctive—the face clear in the front-porch lights.
Lucius Vance.
What was the Speaker of the House of Representatives doing here at this hour?
Two other men emerged from the car.
Secret Service.
The Speaker of the House, like the president and vice president, had long been afforded protection. They’d been at Vance’s side earlier at the funeral. One of the agents entered the house with Vance, the other stayed outside with the car.
Alex and Lucius Vance had never been friends. One was of the House, the other the Senate. And though the two bodies were, in theory, equals, everyone knew that wasn’t the case. One senator possessed as much raw political power as the Speaker himself. No Speaker liked to acknowledge that, but it was true. So no senators gave a rat’s ass what the Speaker of the House thought of them. And he certainly knew of no connection between Vance and Diane.
So what was Vance doing here?
Years ago, when he first sat on the Maryville city council, a constituent complained about how some employees with the city road department were not working a full day. Instead, they’d take their truck out into the woods, where they’d smoke and drink beer for at least a couple of hours. That post had been his first experience in public office and he’d wanted to make a good impression, so one day he hid himself in the woods and waited. Sure enough, as advertised, those employees came, smoked their cigarettes, and drank their beer. He’d brought a camera and snapped a few choice shots. What really shocked him was that their supervisor was there with them, a man he’d managed to get hired as a favor to another supporter. It would have been easy to have them all fired, but instead he just stepped out, popped open one of their beers, and had a chat about what wasn’t going to happen anymore. After that, they were the best workers the city ever had, and forever grateful to Councilman Danny Daniels.
Try to make a point and a friend.
That was his motto.
He doubted Lucius Vance would ever be a friend, but he could make a point. So he left the notebook in the car and stepped out into the rain. He crossed the street and avoided the two entrances for the rounded drive. The house sat about twenty yards off the highway, among trees and underbrush. Alex used to complain how much trouble it was to keep the green stuff out of the brown.
Ten yards beyond the Sherwood mailbox he left the roadway. If he recalled, the trail should be no more than a few yards in. He knew this path. It led up a ridge toward the rear of the property, where the Little River cut a swath across the county. Somewhere up there his old friend had
fallen to his death. Alex used to call the woods his office, a place away from the scrutiny of the public and press, where he could smoke his pipe and do his best thinking. Presidents had a spot like that, too. Camp David.
As a kid and teenager Danny had spent many a night in the Smoky Mountains. His father had been a devoted hunter, his mother born and raised in Appalachia. He liked the sodden, gloomy world of a dark forest, the air pungent with the waft of damp earth. He’d learned a long time ago not to be afraid—instead to be aware. That advice had also served him faithfully in politics.
He found the trail, his coat wet from the underbrush, and curbed his pace to a slow walk. Pine needles underfoot cushioned each step as he slowly worked up the incline toward the rear of the Sherwood house. It wasn’t all that difficult to make out the twisting, turning track in the surrounding gloom. Thankfully, his night vision had survived the years of public service.
A gentle breeze soughed among the trees, the river could be heard in the distance. A dog barked and the mountains caught the sound and threw it back with an echo. Crickets pulsated, but more under than over the other sounds. In the White House he’d loved the night’s solitude, his early-morning phone calls to sleepy aides legendary. He spotted the house’s interior lights through the trees and hoped the wall of glass in the great room had been left unsheathed. That would not be unusual, considering there was nothing but woods for miles.
He came to a point where he thought his view would be unobstructed and plunged into a mass of ferns. There he edged forward, careful with his steps, aware of his vulnerability. He was mindful, too, of the security detail, who might decide to check out the rear of the property. Luckily the foliage, though wet, seemed moderate. It was an easy matter to make it to the trunk of a thick pine, where he could clearly see the rear deck. This was nuts, but he couldn’t help himself. As with those workers all those years ago, something drove him forward. A need to solve a problem. But he was not a city councilman. He was a former president of the United States.
And for the first time in a month he actually felt alive.
Rain fell in more of a mist than a drizzle, the spring foliage overhead keeping most of it off him. His hopes were raised when he saw that the rear glass doors and windows were unobstructed by drapes or shutters. He could see straight into the great room and counted three people.
Diane.
Vance.
And one other man. Middle-aged, dark-haired, mustache, dressed in a suit but no tie. The face was not familiar. He could hear nothing, but he watched as they each took a seat, drinks in hand. Every political alarm inside his head screamed Trouble. Not a single reasonable explanation for this gathering occurred to him. Still, he told himself to be calm. All his life he’d thought like a person surrounded by enemies. Justifiable paranoia, he called it. But that fear had kept him sharp. And there was no denying that a clear sense of menace hung in this wet air.
Along with a jumble of unanswered questions.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Stephanie stared down the tunnel in both directions, her head whipping back and forth, the gun following her gaze. Someone rounded the bend from the natural history side and headed her way.
Rick Stamm.
She relaxed.
“We lost you on the radio,” he whispered, approaching close. “Oh, no,” he said, seeing Thomas’ body. “It can’t be.”
She saw the panic in his eyes.
“This is awful,” he said.
“You have to forget it for right now. He’s dead. We have to deal with the shooter.”
He nodded, took a moment, gathered himself, then they stepped over the body. He led her down the tunnel at a brisk pace until they found an unlocked iron grate at the far end. He opened the portal and they walked through into a lit space. The block walls here were all whitewashed, the ceiling lined with pipes, ducts, and wires, the floor a polished tile.
“We’re below the Castle,” he whispered. “In the basement. My office is right over here.”
He led her into a room cluttered with display cabinets, bookshelves, and a desk stacked with files and paper. The décor consisted of artifacts that clearly had come from the Smithsonian collections, the walls dotted with historic paintings and pictures, most of the Castle.
“Are there cameras in this building?” she asked in a low voice.
“Only a few on the ground floor, in the main hall, where the public goes. This is generally an admin building. There’s not much of value to worry with security.”
“So what’s this guy doing here?”
“I truly don’t know.”
She could see he was upset over Martin Thomas. But she was as much to blame as him. “Maybe we should alert security as to what’s happening.”
“Not yet.”
That answer came too quick.
“Why not?”
“You can handle this, right? This is what you do.”
“It’s actually what my agents do.”
“I called you because I need your expertise. Let’s find the guy and see what he’s after.”
“Without security?”
He seemed to steel himself. “For the moment. Can you do it?”
“I can handle it.”
His attention was suddenly diverted and he darted toward one of the exterior walls where a metal panel hung ajar. He swung it open to reveal a spiral staircase that wound a path upward inside the confines of rough brick.
“I keep this door closed at all times,” he said. “He must have gone up through here. This guy definitely knows his way around.”
* * *
Grant climbed the spiral stairs. Nine towers were the Castle’s trademark. They were built primarily to hold staircases like this one, and later elevators, but eventually they came to house offices, laboratories, and storage. A few even served as sleeping quarters for 19th-century interns. One once held an aviary for falcons, and the tall north tower had served as an observation perch during the Civil War. The most famous residents were owls, who came uninvited, keeping the National Mall clear of swallows. When those squatters disappeared, two similar birds from the National Zoo were relocated. But eventually they flew away, too.
He knew all about the stairway he was climbing, put here so scientists could get from their labs above down to the wet collections storage area below. The door he’d entered through in the curator’s office was sealed shut back in the 1970s, reopened in the early 1990s. He was there the day his father cracked the seal.
He stopped his corkscrew ascent and eased open a wooden door on the Castle’s second floor, in what would have long ago been the original picture gallery. The great fire of 1865 had started right here. Now it was a dimly lit space, part of the administrative areas that dominated the second floor, off limits to the general public. As best he could recall, this floor was a maze of nooks and crannies, all from decades of haphazard remodeling. Though the outside remained inviolate, the Castle’s inside was nothing like the original.
He hustled through the former picture gallery and came to a long, narrow corridor. Paintings and sculptures graced the walls. Carpet lined the floor. Display cases stood full of objects. Offices lined either side. Originally the second floor had accommodated an enormous two-tiered lecture hall, an apparatus museum, and a picture gallery. The Smithsonian’s first secretary, Joseph Henry, had his office up here, too. But all that changed after the fire, when the lecture hall was eliminated and the floor converted to other uses.
He made his way down the corridor, past the dark offices.
Into the rotunda.
* * *
Stephanie exited the spiral staircase into a second-floor gallery. Rick had explained that the hidden staircase once offered employees a quick way up and down, away from visitors. Now it was used mainly by him to gain access to the upper reaches.
She stopped and gestured that they should move quietly. She gripped her Beretta, ready for what might come their way, allowing Rick to lead, not knowing where she was going.
He approached an open doorway that led out and peeked around the edge, jerking his head back quickly.
“He’s in the rotunda, just outside the Regents’ Room,” he whispered in her ear. “There’s nothing there of any historical value. Zero to steal. I prepared those exhibits myself.”
But apparently he was wrong.
* * *
Grant marveled at the rotunda, recalling how he’d once explored this area as a child. Twenty-five years ago the octagonal-shaped, windowless space had also been secretarial, filled then, as now, with desks, sofas, and chairs, serving as an anteroom for the adjacent office of the secretary and the prestigious Regents’ Room. Back then, though, there’d been few display cases. Especially not the oversized one, sheathed in gold leaf, that now dominated one wall. An antique lamp on a wooden table burned as a night-light. He approached the gold case and read the placard at the top.
S. Dillon Ripley, 8th Smithsonian Secretary, was once eloquently lauded for “his almost magical sense for the perfect symbolic gesture.” The importance of symbolism and ceremony was never lost on him. For Ripley’s induction as Secretary, in 1964, outgoing Secretary Leonard Carmichael originated the custom of presenting a ceremonial key to the new Secretary, a symbolic tradition at many universities. Ripley further commissioned the creation of two more symbolic ceremonial devices commonly found in institutions of higher learning. The Mace and the Badge of Office. These three special objects, imbued with symbolism, are uniquely associated with the Smithsonian.
He stared at the mace, the badge, and, most important, the ceremonial key, gently tapping on the sheet of glass that protected the case front. Maybe five feet wide and at least that much, or more, tall. Thick, too.
But breakable.
He stepped back, aimed his gun.
And pulled the trigger.
* * *
Stephanie snuck her own look at what lay down the corridor. Their target had disappeared from view, somewhere in a spacious room at the end that Rick had called the rotunda. Then the man reappeared with his gun leveled at something.
