The Last President: A Novel of an Alternative America (25 page)

“Yes,” Chaymber said. “I’ll be ready.”

“If you could contact some of your colleagues on this, Senator, we’d be grateful. And, by the way, I’m calling from a pay phone. You might want to do the same.”

“Yes,” Chaymber said. “I see. Of course. I’ll do what I can.”

“Very good, Senator,” Adams said. “Thank you.”

“No, Aaron, thank you,” Chaymber said. He hung up the phone. Tomorrow he and a handful of his fellow senators would vote to accept a bill of impeachment against the President of the United States—and his own career would be over. The President would not be one to give up without a prolonged and vicious fight, and even as he went down kicking and screaming he would drag Chaymber down with him. The country was not ready for a senator who was a faggot.

At least he’d be able to pay the President back for the long months of wearing the mantle of a senator while doing the work of a toady. He put his robe on and hunted for his slippers. He was going to have to get dressed and go out hunting for a pay phone, but first it occurred to him that it would be good to go into the other bedroom. It had been a long time since he’d talked with his wife.

It was after two in the morning when George Warren reached the Mini-Stor Private Storage Company outside of Charlottesville, Virginia, and roused the night watchman to let him into his locker. The bulky package he took out wouldn’t fit in the trunk of his Chevy, but with a little maneuvering and an extra fiver for the watchman, the two of them managed to cram it into the back seat.

He stopped for coffee at an all-night diner before heading back to Washington. It had been a long day and promised to be a long night, and he wanted to be fully alert while handling his cargo. He would take the return drive slowly and carefully. It’s no time to have an accident when you’re traveling with a missile with an atomic warhead in the back seat of your car.

Ian Faulkes staggered into his New York hotel room at three in the morning to find his phone ringing. He stared at it suspiciously for a minute and then picked it up. “Evening,” he said, holding the handpiece like a microphone and shouting into it. “Evening, America. This is your British consh—cons—this is Ian Faulkes speaking to all of you out there, and I’m just the tiniest bit smashed at the moment.”

He heard a tinny sound coming from somewhere. After a while he realized that it was coming from the earpiece, which was upside down in his hand. He turned it around and put it to his ear. “Sorry about that,” he said. “You still there, whoever you are?”

“Ian, you bastard, this is Aaron Adams. You’re drunk!”

“I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to be,” Ian said. “I’ve had a most wonderful evening, Aaron. I’d still be with the lady if there wasn’t some question of her husband arriving before dawn casts its rosy lips o’er the billowing watchamacallit. What do you need, Aaron?”

“I need you, Ian. I need you now, and I need you sober.”

At that moment an operator came on the line and told Adams to “signal when through.”

“You’re calling from a pay phone, Aaron,” Ian said.

“Yes.”

“You in New York?”

“No, Washington.”

“And you need me now? In Washington?”

“Right again, Ian. And if you don’t want to miss the biggest news story of this or any other century, you’ll hustle your ass down here.”

“Why? What’s happening?”

“Your ass and a camera crew and a helicopter. We won’t let you play unless you bring a helicopter.”

Faulkes shook his head. “Aaron, what the fuck are you talking about? Hold on a minute!” He put the phone down and went into the bathroom. Sliding open the glass door to the shower, he turned on the cold water and stuck his head under the showerhead. In seconds the cold had permeated from the top of his head to the base of his spine, and he turned the water off.

“I think I’m sober enough to talk with you now,” he told Adams. “But you’re sure as hell going to pay my hospital bill if I catch pneumonia. Now what the devil is going on?”

Adams talked to him for about twenty minutes, at the end of which he was completely sober and extremely awake. “You can count on me, Aaron,” he said. “Isn’t this a hell of a thing? See you later, old man.”

The duty officer of the
U.S.S. Guam
knocked on the door to General Moor’s cabin and entered. “Excuse me, sir,” he said. Moor was instantly awake. A lifetime in the Marines had given him the ability, but he had never learned to like it. “What is it?” he asked, turning on the lamp over his head.

“A priority message, sir. It came in from Atlantic Command about half an hour ago, addressed to you. The communications officer thinks its some sort of action code, sir, but he can’t find it in the book. I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but we thought it might be important.”

“Let me see it,” General Moor said, swinging his legs over the side of the bunk. He took the flimsy and stared at it.

FROM NAVATCOM WASHINGTON

TO GENERAL CLEMENT MOOR USMC USS GUAM

TEXT:

JUBILEE REPEAT JUBILEE 16 JANUARY

Moor reached for his shirt. “This ship is now on full alert,” he said. “Tell the captain.”

It was six o’clock in the morning, barely an hour before sunrise, and the first hint of color was creeping into the cloudless eastern sky. To the west the sky was still black and star-studded, with Leo just preparing to drop below the horizon. Tommy Green, his eleven-year-old body well padded against the predawn chill, hurried down the street of identical two-story houses that made up this part of Fort Bragg’s officers’ row. Already the lights were on behind a good many of the bedroom and kitchen windows.

Tommy paused for a second to make sure he had the right house and then went up and rang the doorbell.

The blonde woman who answered the door was in a housedress with her hair up in curlers. She looked surprised to see him. “Why, good morning, Tommy. What are you doing here at this hour?”

“I have a message for Captain Beddow, ma’am. Is he up?”

“Yes. He’s in the kitchen,” she said, now thoroughly puzzled. “Come on through.” She closed the door and took Tommy through the living room and into the kitchen. “You have a visitor, Frank,” she called.

“Well,” Captain Beddow said, as his young visitor came to something approximating a position of attention in front of him. “Hello, Tommy. What can I do for you? Does your father need something?”

“My father sends his respects, sir,” Tommy Green said. “He asked me to tell you that this is Jubilee morning, sir.”

“Oh!” Beddow said. “I see. Well, thank you very much, Tommy. Tell Colonel Green that I understand.”

“Right, sir,” Tommy said. “Thank you, sir.” And with that he turned and raced out toward the front door.

“What was all that about?” Mrs. Beddow asked her husband as he poured himself a second cup of coffee. “Why didn’t the colonel just call if he had a message for you?”

“That was a classified message, Betty, my love,” Beddow told her, smiling broadly. “Not to be transmitted by unsecure channels.” He climbed up on a kitchen chair and began fishing for his .45 in the overhead cabinet where they kept it to be sure it was out of reach of their five-year-old.

“Oh, no,” Betty Beddow groaned. “Not another one of your war games! You’ll be gone for two weeks.”

Beddow stepped down off the chair and buckled the holstered .45 around his waist. “Probably not that long,” he said. “But I might be away for a few days. Why don’t you take the boy and go over to your mother’s until this is over. I’ll give you a call.” He took the automatic from his holster, pulled the clip, then worked the slide a few times. “I love you, Betty. Remember that.”

Betty Beddow looked at her husband intently for a long moment, and then reached out almost shyly to touch his shoulder. “I’ll pack a bag,” she said.

At 0630 General Moor was on the flight deck of the
U.S.S. Guam
with the ship’s captain, Commander Halberstrom. All around them men in fatigue jackets and men in dungaree jackets were busy fueling up and checking out the big Chinook helicopters of the Forty-First Marine Helo Squadron, Reinforced, that filled the
Guam
’s flight deck. The air was full of the sounds of engines and pumps, and the smells of oil and AVGAS mixed with the smell of the sea.

“We’ll be ready to start feeding your men in less than ten minutes,” Halberstrom said. “Should have the last shift out by seven-thirty. By which time we’ll be just off Assateague Island, right where you wanted.”

“Very good, Captain,” General Moor said. “If you’d be good enough to call all NCOs and officers of the battalion to the briefing room, I’d appreciate it. And have your armory crew break open the magazine and begin bringing the ammo up to the distribution area on deck. We should be out of your hair by oh-eight-hundred.”

“I’ll see to it, sir,” Halberstrom said. He stuck his hand out. “Good luck,” he said.

General Moor took the hand. “Right,” he said. Behind him one of the Chinooks roared into life, as the mechanic continued his preflight checkout on the big copter.

Major Connor Fitzpatrick strode out to the front of the assembled three companies that made up the 404th MP Battalion. “Good morning, men,” he yelled.

Close to six hundred men yelled back something incoherent, but probably obscene.

“I thank you all for responding so promptly to the alert,” Fitzpatrick bellowed, “and apologize for making you give up your Sunday.

“I think you’ll all appreciate this more when I tell you this is not a drill. We’re about to hop into our vehicles and drive off to downtown Washington. In fifteen minutes sharp, at oh-seven-hundred, our little caravan will start.

“Remember, this is very serious. Strange gentlemen in various uniforms may come up to you and request you to cease what you’re doing. Some of them may be driving tanks. You will not listen to them. This will anger them, but as long as you do your jobs as we’ve practiced, they can’t get at you, so don’t worry about it.

“This could be your moment of glory, boys. I’m counting on you. Don’t fuck up.” He saluted his men, and then turned and strode back into his office.

His adjutant turned to the men. “All officers into the squad room,” he called. “NCOs take over your companies!”

At a few minutes past eight on Sunday morning, Grier Laporte parked his panel truck on Seventeenth Street off Constitution Avenue, right across the Ellipse from the White House. Aaron Adams, sitting in the back of the truck, flipped on the illegal linear amplifier that would boost the signal on their CB rig from the legal five watts to a highly illegal kilowatt.

A traffic cop pulled alongside them in his car, and was about to tell them to move on when he noticed the neat lettering on the door panel of the white truck: Atomic Energy Commission—Nuclear Emissions Test Truck, and caught a glimpse of Grier and Aaron in their white smocks surrounded by apparatus. He looked over at the broken dome of the Capitol across the Mall, still off limits after all these months, and nodded at the two. “Going to be long?” he asked.

“I hope not,” Grier told him.

“This is Jubilee,” Adams said into his microphone. “This is a go, repeat, go! This is Jubilee to Omaha—go, Omaha. Jubilee to Green Leader—go, Green Leader. All units are go.”

“Jubilee, this is Eire,” came a distant voice over the loudspeaker. “We’re going, even as we speak.”

Grier half turned to the inside of the truck. “Air?” he asked.

“Eire,” Adams told him. “That would be Major Fitzpatrick. I didn’t expect any of them to answer me, but it’s good to know someone’s listening.”

“Everyone’s listening,” Grier grumbled. “Hell, I’ll bet even money that the President’s listening. This isn’t exactly a secure channel.”

“Of course he is, Grier,” Adams said. “That’s part of the game.”

The President reached his office at eight o’clock to find Vandermeer waiting for him. “Morning, Billy,” he greeted his Chief of Staff. “You haven’t been up all night, have you?”

“Good morning, Mr. President,” Vandermeer said. “I arrived here about ten minutes ago. I’ve been down in the Special Situations Room for the past hour, sir. Everything’s ready for Bull Run, and we’re proceeding as planned. The roundup of traitors will begin in about fifteen minutes.”

“Is the media stuff—the coverage—ready?”

“I have all three networks standing by,” Vandermeer said. “They’re curious as to what’s going on, but they know better by now than to ask questions before we’re ready to tell them anything.”

“That’s right,” the President said. “That’s good.”

“When do you want them notified?” Vandermeer asked. “We should give them some time to set up. They have to have some warning to get their cameras positioned.”

“Wait till the thing’s under way,” the President decided. “We don’t want it to fall flat at the last minute. Think how stupid we’d look if we show Cronkite how well prepared we are for a coup, and then there’s no coup.”

“Right,” Vandermeer said. “Although there’s little chance of them backing out now. They’re committed and we’re committed. Colonel Hanes should be on his way in with his tanks by now. There’d better be someone here for him to shoot at, or we’re not going to look too good.”

The red phone rang, and Vandermeer picked it up. “Vandermeer,” he said. “What’s that? I see. Okay, thanks. Keep it up. Increase the coverage, if you can. We’ll be right down.”

“What was that?” the President asked.

“The Comint people in the Special Situations Room have just picked up what they call the go parole for Jubilee. That’s the official go-ahead. They’re using CB stuff and their signal is very loud. Probably from somewhere around here. Our boys are trying to get a triangulation on it now.”

“That’s good,” the President said. “Isn’t it?”

“Yes. Very good, sir. Everything’s going according to plan. I think we’d better get down to the Special Situations Room now. There may be some Jubilee people with access to the White House.”

“You mean someone who works here is plotting against me?” the President said. “Who? Who in the White House is disloyal?”

“It’s just a precaution, sir,” Vandermeer said soothingly. “We mustn’t take any chances until we’re sure Jubilee has bought it.”

“Right,” the President said. “Good thinking. Sock it to ’em. Let’s go to the basement.”

At 0800 Rear Admiral David Bunt entered the Fleet Communications Office at the Pentagon. “You’re holding a ready-coded message under the code name Widowmaker,” he told the duty officer. “See that it goes out to all ships as soon as you can get it on the net. That includes the VLF sub net.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” the officer said. “On what authority?”

“Here’s my authority,” Admiral Bunt said, taking a sealed letter from his breast pocket. “It’s signed by the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence.”

“Yes, sir.” The lieutenant glanced at the letter and then turned to the CPO at the desk behind him. “Pull Widowmaker and put it on global and subcom,” he said.

Within minutes the doubly encrypted message was going out to all ships’ captains. It was short and simple, and probably puzzling to most of those who read it. It was a precaution against insanity, against the fear that the Supreme Commander, in his last moments, might start pushing buttons.

TO ALL CAPTAINS

FROM CHIEF OF STAFF, NAVY

TEXT:

REMAIN ON STATION OR CONTINUE SCHEDULED MISSION DESPITE POSSIBLE MESSAGE TO THE CONTRARY FROM ANY SOURCE. ACCEPT NEW ORDERS ONLY DIRECTLY FROM CINCAT OR CINCPAC OR COSN. IGNORE HIGHER AUTHORITY UNTIL THIS MESSAGE IS SPECIFICALLY COUNTERMANDED BY COSN. END.

It was pushing eight-thirty when Charles Ober arrived at his office in the Executive Office Building. There might be an attempted coup going on, but after all somebody had to run the government. Let Billy Vandermeer and the President get all the glory, as usual. He was content to stay behind the scenes and see that everything ran in as orderly and correct a fashion as was ever possible to get out of a bureaucracy. That was what government was all about.

Three men were waiting in his office when he came in: George Masters of the FBI and two other gray-suited men who looked to Obers trained eye like field agents. “Good morning, Masters,” Ober said, smiling grimly. “What can I do for you?” It probably had something to do with the coup, Ober thought.

Masters pulled his badge case from his jacket pocket. “Good morning, Mr. Ober,” he said. “I’m George Masters of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and these are special agents Garber and Wilcox.”

“For Christ’s sake, Masters,” Ober said, annoyed, “what’s all this formal bull? I know who the hell you are. Now what’s this all about?”

“We have a warrant for your arrest, Mr. Ober, signed by Judge Bryan Bellows of the Ninth Court of Appeals,” Masters said. “Here it is, if you’d like to look it over. Will you please come with us.”

Ober crossed over to his desk and sat behind it, acting on some kind of primitive bureaucratic instinct, as though once behind his desk he were safe and couldn’t be dislodged or removed. “Is this a joke?” he demanded. “I’ll see you busted down to flatfoot, you stupid son of a bitch! Who the hell put you up to this? I’m going to launch an immediate investigation. You just stand there, while I call the Attorney General. We’ll get to the bottom of this right quick!”

“The Attorney General was named on the same indictment,” Masters said. “He’s been relieved of his job and placed under arrest, also.”

“I’m calling the President!” Ober snapped. “I’m calling Billy Vandermeer!”

“I have a warrant for Mr. Vandermeer, also,” Masters said. “I don’t expect to get to serve it—at least right now—but I have it. The indictment also names the President as an unindicted co-conspirator. There was some legal question as to whether he could be indicted, so we compromised.”

“You people are part of the coup!” Ober said, waving a finger in sudden realization.

“What coup is that, Mr. Ober?” Masters asked politely.

“You can’t do this!” Ober snapped. “It’s against the Constitution!”

“That’s very amusing, coming from you,” Masters said. “Come along, Mr. Ober.”