Balance of Power: A Novel (45 page)

A
DMIRAL
R
AY
B
ILLINGS SAT ON THE ADMIRAL
’
S
bridge and watched the flight operations on the deck beneath him. Two F/A-18Cs sat on the bow catapults ready to take off as the arresting-gear crew prepared the flight deck for the last daylight recovery of the long flight schedule. Airplanes circled the carrier in sections at their designated altitudes. Billings watched the fighters enviously and thought of the hundreds of times he had flown that circle. The air was clear in spite of the high humidity. Visibility was excellent and the sea sparkled with a silver blueness.

Billings’s communications officer handed him a clipboard stacked with messages. Commander Beth Louwsma stood next to the admiral and read the messages over his shoulder. “Nice to be back up on the message circulation list,” she said absently.

“Yeah,” the admiral said, “except now we have to read them.”

“Yes, sir, the burdens of leadership.”

“Had a chance to interrogate the prisoners yet?”

“We aren’t really interrogating them, sir,” she said facetiously. “We’re interviewing them, checking for spies and the like.”

“Of course.”

“One of our cryptologists speaks Indonesian, Thai, and Malay.”

“Excellent. Get anything?”

Her eyes narrowed slightly, the subtle indication she was moving to a higher level of mental activity. “It’s very interesting. They seem to want to perpetuate this idea that they are Islamic fundamentalists, yet they aren’t Islamic at all. At least not in any serious way. We found all kinds of drugs and alcohol on these guys and not a Koran in the bunch.”

The admiral’s eyes sparkled. “What else?”

“Seems they had big ideas. We’ve gotten one of the lower-level guys to sing. All the leaders are mum, but this one guy—we promised him immunity”—she looked at him questioningly but didn’t see any response—“was ready to talk. They had set up this island which they hoped to build into a fortress. They were going to put in surface-to-air missiles and surface-to-surface missiles from about any country you can name. Their idea was to take their speedboats out into the strait of Malacca and threaten the ships that went by. If the ships agreed to pay extortion money, they’d let them go; if they didn’t, they’d either take the ship or sink it with one of their missiles.”

“I get that, but what I don’t get is why they started off by attacking a U.S. ship. Did they really think we wouldn’t do anything about it?”

“That’s
exactly
what they thought,” Beth said. “If they did the terrorist bit, the U.S. would be forced to withdraw from the Java Sea. We wouldn’t come back here very often because Indonesia wouldn’t want the U.S. Navy stirring up their Islamic fundamentalists. It was actually a pretty good plan.”

“I believe that is called a miscalculation.”

“I don’t know,” Beth said, “seems they knew our President better than we did.”

The admiral glanced up at her.

She went on. “If Congress hadn’t passed the Letter of Reprisal, they would have pulled it off completely. I don’t think Indonesia would have been able to touch them.”

“Sure they could have. They have a large enough air force to take these guys out.”

“They’d have to find them first. We never would have found these guys if our submarine hadn’t followed them.”

“That’s true enough.”

“Admiral,” Reynolds said from the other side of the bridge, “Admiral Blazer is on the radio; he wants to talk to you directly.”

The admiral walked to the radio receiver. He looked at his aide. “Is it secure?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Admiral Billings here.”

“Ray!”
said a deep booming voice, which everyone on the bridge could hear over the loudspeaker.

“Blazer, you lunatic, what’s going on?”
Billings asked, smiling.

“You read your message board this afternoon?”

“I’m working through it now. They cut me off for several days, so I’m playing catch-up.”

“I don’t think you knew I was sent down here to ‘intercept’ you.”

“And what did that mean?”

“Nobody ever told me. But unfortunately, when we got here, all the fun was over. Hell, I’d probably have been tempted to join you. Did you get the recent message from the White House?”

“Negative. What does it say?”

“It says that you and the entire battle group are to report immediately to Pearl Harbor.”

“Roger that. Hurt me. Send me to Paradise. You call me just to tell me that?”

“No. The interesting part is that I have been told to escort you.”

Admiral Billings’s neck reddened.
“Escort? For what?”

“Don’t know. Just said to escort you back to Pearl.”
Blazer’s tone was enigmatic. Billings saw that all those
on the bridge had heard Blazer.
“Well,”
he said,
“how about that?”

“So,”
Blazer continued more enthusiastically.
“Consider yourself under escort.”

“Escort aye,”
Billings said, trying to sound chipper.
“What do you want me to do?”

“Think you could helicopter over here for dinner tonight? Maybe we could play some ace deuce.”

“Not a problem.”

“1800 okay?”

“Perfect.”

“Okay. See you tonight.”
Blazer signed off.

Billings put the receiver back and returned to his chair. He stared ahead of the ship as it plowed through the beautiful blue ocean, northeast toward Hawaii. He looked at Beth, who avoided his gaze. “Sounds like a setup. I don’t think they’re telling us everything.”

Reynolds spoke first after the awkward silence, “Hard to say, sir. Maybe they’re going to put you in for a medal,” he said without conviction.

“We’ll see.”

“I mean,” Reynolds continued, trying to comfort him, “they should…” His voice trailed off.

Beth spoke. “Admiral, you did the right thing.”

Billings looked at her with warmth. “Whatever comes of this, it was worth it, Beth.”

“Yes, Admiral, it was.”

“Oyez, oyez, oyez. All persons having business before the honorable, the Supreme Court of the United States are admonished to draw near and give their attention for the Court is now sitting. God save the United States and this honorable Court. You may be seated.” Silence filled the room. You could hear the wheels of the chairs on the wooden floor and the squeak of the leather as the justices sat down. The Supreme Court clerks sat to the right near a large marble pillar. Bobby was in front. He looked at
Dillon and Molly, who both smiled a friendly greeting. Bobby turned away.

The Chief Justice wasted no time. He looked over his reading glasses at the attorneys. “Call the calendar,” he said to the clerk.

David Compton, the clerk to whom Pendleton could now assign a face, read loudly, in his court voice, “Number one on the special calendar, Edward Manchester, as a citizen of the United States and as President and Chief Executive Officer of the United States versus John Stanbridge as an individual, and as Speaker of the House of Representatives of the United States of America, et al. Please state your appearances.”

“Good morning, Your Honors. Jackson Gray on behalf of the United States…”

“I’m afraid you are going to have to be more precise,” David Ross said with a very serious face.

Gray looked at him. “Yes, sir. Jackson Gray on behalf of the Justice Department, representing the President and the Executive Branch.”

Pendleton paused until he had the attention of all the justices. “David Pendleton on behalf of Mr. Stanbridge and the Congress, Your Honors.”

“Thank you,” Ross said. “Please be seated.” Ross looked at the papers in front of him and then at Gray. “I believe this is your application, Mr. Gray.”

“Yes, sir, thank you. May it please the Court,” he said, then, nodding to Pendleton, “Counsel.” He paused and took a deep breath. “We have reached a time where the Supreme Court must act, or risk the government falling.” The gallery gasped audibly, but it was unclear to Dillon—who hadn’t gasped—whether the gasps were due to the gravity of the situation or the audacity of Gray’s statement. Gray continued, “Congress directed a Navy battle group that is wreaking havoc on citizens of foreign countries—and those of our country, I might add—without the authority of the President or the Executive Branch. All because the House of Representatives and the Senate
adopted a Letter of Reprisal in a way that has never been done in history, and has used it as its own tool,
defrauding
the citizens of the United States. They have put forth disingenuous arguments based on history—”

Ross interrupted Gray. “Mr. Gray, am I correct in noticing, and I do hereby take judicial notice, that the attack you are attempting to preclude by this stay, to which you refer to in your application papers, has already occurred?”

Gray pulled back visibly, as if he had been hit in the chest. “There has been one attack, yes, sir.”

Ross continued, “From the way I read your papers, that is the attack you were trying to prevent by this emergency application. Is that correct or not?”

“It is correct, Your Honor,” Gray said as if talking to someone who wasn’t completely clued in, “that we were trying to stop that attack, but we also want to stop any
subsequent
attacks. We want to prevent this battle group from rampaging through the South Pacific at the whim of Congress.”

Dillon watched the back of the Speaker’s neck, which had turned noticeably red.

Ross’s face took on a sour, displeased expression. “On what do you base your fear that the battle group is intending to do anything other than what it has already done? There is no evidence before this court that anything else is likely to happen.”

“On its past behavior, Your Honor. It has directly disobeyed orders of the President of the United States, and we have no indication yet that it doesn’t intend to keep doing just that.”

“Well, that may be, but the question is whether you think any such disobedience or lack of control will be based on this Letter of Reprisal on which you have based your application. Will you be bringing actions against all battle groups, or only those to whom a Letter of Reprisal has been issued?”

Dillon grinned involuntarily. He had always thought of Ross as President Manchester’s pawn, appointed to the
position of Chief Justice of the United States from the Supreme Court of Connecticut, where he had served for ten years and where Manchester had met him. His appointment had caught the Court watchers off guard. He was unknown. Considered a moderate Democrat, he had graduated from Boston College Law School after college at Amherst. But no one knew what he stood for. His opinions were unremarkable in Connecticut. Most thought he would be Manchester’s man on the Court. Apparently not, Dillon thought, as he watched Ross’s face and Gray’s back.

Gray answered, “The Letter is a factor, and we want that factor to be removed as a reason or grounds or justification for
any
action.”

Ross said, “Before you go on, Mr. Gray, I would like to hear from Mr. Pendleton on this point. Mr. Pendleton.”

Pendleton stood up. “Your Honors, whether the President can control the Navy under normal circumstances is a question that one might ponder on any given day. Why does the military obey the President?” He paused for effect. “Because of the direct constitutional authority of the President. This application is about whether the Letter of Reprisal should be stopped immediately by this Court.” He shook his head gravely. “That was impossible even when this misguided action was filed in the District Court—Congress had already passed it. The only entity that could be enjoined was the Navy, and the Navy was not before the Court. But more important, as the Court properly points out, this action is moot. The only action that the President was attempting to forestall has already occurred. For the Court to issue an order now would be a meaningless gesture. It does not benefit the reputation of this Court to issue orders on matters that have already occurred. This Court was not appointed to issue futile orders.” Pendleton let his voice travel off. “Thank you.”

Gray, still standing, began again, “Mr. Pendleton continues to divert the Court’s attention from the real issue—”

The Chief Justice raised his hand. “Mr. Gray, we were
willing to hear this issue at this early hour because it seemed to us an issue of critical importance. However, it is now out of our hands. The actions you were attempting to forestall have occurred. The application for stay is denied. The application is moot. The matter is remanded to the District Court for consideration on the merits.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Pendleton, standing to go, a subtle way to encourage the Court not to change its mind.

Gray stood dumbfounded. He tried to hold his tongue. He was seething inside, angry at a system that waited too long to hear something and then refused relief, claiming it was too late. He forced himself to nod at the justices as they rose from their chairs. Then he couldn’t contain himself, “But
you’re
the ones who decided not to hear this until today. This was in your hands Friday night. This
Court
has
made
it futile!”