The Theta Prophecy (15 page)

Year: 1961

“How are you settling in?” Martin asked.

The Fed Chairman rarely left his office unless he was summoned to testify before Congress, and was especially uncomfortable walking through a Washington, D.C. park in the December cold.

“I’m getting along okay. My wife is still smarting, though, from the things some of those bastards have mentioned they’ll bring up during my confirmation hearings.”

Martin offered a polite chuckle as if he had never heard Congress disparaged before. The fact was that everyone he spoke with on walks such as this said the same thing, and yet nothing ever changed.

As they walked past rows of cherry trees, their branches bare until spring arrived, only a pair of joggers oblivious to the cold, and a young couple too in love to realize they were shivering, passed by them. None of these people recognized Martin or the man he was walking beside.

“There’s a special circle in Dante’s hell for the whole lot,” Martin said. “Half of them are on the take and too intoxicated with their own ideology to realize they’re the very definition of corruption, and the other half are on the take and wholeheartedly embrace their corruption. It’s a shame they’re a necessary evil.”

“How do you mean?”

“The two sides play against each other, giving everyone a team to root for and another team to blame all their troubles on. Meanwhile, nothing changes, but all the attention is on them, leaving men like you and I to do as we please.”

But John McCone, the new Director of Central Intelligence, wasn’t ready to acknowledge they were a circus worth seeing: “That asshole from New York has the gall to lecture me about a drunk driving ticket I got in college. That was almost forty years ago. He killed a woman with his car! Last year! Hypocritical asshole. But of course I can’t say that.” Then, after spitting in the snow, he added, “Prick.”

McCone’s white hair made him look like he was old enough to be his predecessor’s father. But whereas Dulles, especially toward the end, had suffered from a lack of vitality, McCone sounded and acted like he was still young enough to throw fists with anyone who scuffed his shoes.

“Forget about our good friend from New York and the rest of them. You’ll be confirmed soon enough. You run one of the most powerful agencies in the entire world.”

“I have to admit, I was surprised when the president nominated me. Someone up there,” McCone said, looking up at the clouds, “must be watching out for my career.”

The Fed Chairman couldn’t help but close his eyes and smile for a moment. There were congressmen who went their entire lives without realizing they were only elected because they served a purpose that rich men needed of them—all it took was exorbitant amounts of money in newspaper advertisements, street posters, and highway billboards and their man was sure to win. These were the men who felt lucky to have a position of power and would do anything it took to keep it. There were political appointees who were in a similar situation. Many of them never realized that while they were appointed by the president and confirmed by Congress, they were no different from the hired goons sitting in the Capitol Building.

After all, someone was responsible for handing the president a list of candidates so he could select one of them. And while the candidates often seemed like a nice mix of beliefs and backgrounds, they all had one thing in common: they were only offered up as potential candidates because someone else had already vetted them, not for competence or for a shared ideology, but for loyalty to the people who wielded real influence. Four candidates for the Secretary of the Treasury and each one with ties to the country’s largest banks. Three candidates for the Secretary of Defense and all three on the board of directors at a large military contractor. Yet this was never pointed out.

The people who followed the news always wondered why nothing ever changed in Washington even though a new president was elected every four or eight years, often from the opposite party, bringing with him a list of new appointees. It wasn’t because the people who were elected didn’t have their own thoughts on how things should be run. They did. It was because the men who surrounded the president, offering advice and policy support, would tell him that doing anything other than the status quo would have dire consequences and then offer a list of reasons why. Each president learned his role quickly enough.

A room full of men, all with ties to the three largest banks, would tell the president why financial institutions shouldn’t be held to the same standards as other companies, and it would become reality. A room full of men, all with stock in the four largest military contractors, would say why it was critical to covertly overthrow this or that government while also secretly providing weapons to its neighbor, and that too would become reality. These were the things McCone would come to understand in time.

Every once in a while, though, as was happening now, a president came into power who really believed he was working for the good of the people. Wars were an absolute last resort. Everyone should play by the same rules, rich and poor alike. The American Dream was made possible because Americans were the greatest people. It was enough to make Martin roll his eyes and wonder how the population could have been so stupid to vote the New Englander into office in the first place.

And to make matters worse, the man who the president relied on almost exclusively, the Attorney General, was his own brother, which made JFK even less susceptible to a room full of men telling him this invasion was necessary for national security or that law should be passed for the betterment of the economy.

In a way, it only made things easier for the people like Martin. Instead of assisting with another coup or assassinating another country’s president, Martin and Dulles worked without the president’s knowledge to make sure that events played out, like the Bay of Pigs, which made the entire administration look like an incompetent band of fools.

It was so bad in fact that the newspapers were reporting that the mess in Cuba was the reason Dulles had been asked to step down. Of course, it hadn’t been that at all. Kennedy had politely asked his former Director of Central Intelligence to retire because he not only refused to tell the president all the names and locations of the people who were suppressing any information about time travel, he was refusing to scale back the program. It was all insane.

McCone, the new Director of Central Intelligence, didn’t even know he was going to be a part of Martin’s squad yet. But he would.

“Do you know why Dulles is no longer the director?” he said.

“Of course. The Bay of Pigs fiasco.”

For weeks, the papers had been speculating if Kennedy, who really was furious about what had happened in Cuba, had demanded that Dulles step down or if the director had done so voluntarily. Martin was one of the few who knew the real reason Dulles had left: he no longer had the stomach for what needed to be done. Dulles had wanted to serve Martin and their cause, but he also wanted to serve the president and his country. When the two objectives didn’t align and he was stuck in the middle, he saw no alternative but to get out.

Good riddance, as far as Martin was concerned. He needed people he could trust to do whatever was needed, no matter how repugnant the rest of the country might think their actions. Dulles simply wasn’t that man. But as long as he kept silent the rest of his life, didn’t start blabbing about what everyone would take to be a nonsensical conspiracy theory, he would be fine.

“You are quickly going to realize that there are two sets of tasks in your new job,” he told McCone.

“Of course,” the new director said, nodding. “The stuff the public can know about and the stuff we must keep secret.”

“Sort of,” Martin said. This was the part he liked most, seeing the look on each man’s face when they realized why they had been on the short list of candidates to be selected by the president. “More accurately, the stuff people can know about and the stuff they cannot.”

“Isn’t that what I said?”

“It is not.”

Cold air puffed from McCone’s mouth when he scoffed in annoyance. “Well, I don’t see how not.”

“The president is a person, albeit a very popular one, but a person nonetheless. Like I said, there is stuff people can know about and the stuff they cannot.”

The pair of men walked through a bend in the trail, arcing around a trio of cherry trees with plaques at their bases to commemorate the individual each tree was dedicated to.

“I think I understand what you’re saying,” McCone said.

“It’s for the best. The things we have to do, sometimes, are not things normal men can accept. It takes people of will and determination to do what other men cannot. Men such as yourself.”

“Thank you.”

The Fed Chairman smiled. McCone’s personality assessment had been flawless. A little flattery went a long way with some people.

“You will quickly discover for yourself that our president is a man of boundless ideals and romantic sentiments. This would make him a great poet. But as a president, he is a liability.”

“How do you mean?”

“He has these notions about how the world should be. They make for nice discussion in college classrooms, I’m sure, but they are not practical in the real world. Men like you and I are the ones who need to ensure the path for not only this country, but for the world.”

“Work against our president?”

“Not against him.
In spite of him
is more like it. He is already making a nuisance of himself, constantly badgering me for some information I possess. Each time I refuse he acts like a petulant child and threatens to reduce the Federal Reserve’s power.” Martin leaned his head back and laughed. “I keep telling him he’s more than welcome to have Congress call me to Washington to testify about it.”

“But what if he does?”

“He will quickly find out how limited his powers are. Let me ask you a question: why do you think our president has such a reputation for being a ladies’ man?”

“The rumors of Marilyn Monroe and—”

“No. I can assure you that our president is no more or less faithful to his wife than any other president before him, and probably all those after him as well. But everyone whispers about Kennedy sneaking off for rendezvous with various beauties. Why do you think that is?”

“Because of how famous his girlfriends are?”

“No. Not a bad guess. But no. It’s because Hoover has all of his men at the FBI giving little comments here and there about how much Kennedy needs to lie on his back. As far as I can tell, it’s actually supposed to be an insult to his nearly crippled back and how much pain he suffers through every day, needing to spend hours lying flat on his back in the Oval Office rather than sitting in a chair. But the press hears these things and they take it and run, assuming that it must mean he’s always on his back because of a famous beauty.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Because it’s what Hoover does. It’s his idea of payback or mind games or something else. Who knows? But it’s trivial. It’s not the sort of action men like you and I take part in. While Hoover is playing his rumor mill games at the president’s expense, you and I will be shaping the country.”

“And if the president stands in our way?”

“He will discover that he is not as invincible as he thinks he is, which—you would think—would be obvious considering how much pain medication he requires for his back. But I will give him one thing: he is stubborn. That much is for sure.” When Martin looked over and saw McCone frowning at these last comments, he added, “Just think of it as part of the job duties. There are operations that you will carry out in other countries. Some are our allies, some are not.”

“Yes.”

“And,” the Fed Chairman continued, looking around at how beautifully desolate the park was this time of year, “there are some operations you will carry out by request of the president and some that are not.”

“Agreed.”

“Democratically elected leaders will be killed.”

“Of course.”

“Countries will be thrown into turmoil.”

“I’m sure they will.”

What Martin liked most wasn’t that the new director replied without hesitation, it was that he refrained from asking any of the inconvenient questions that had kept his predecessor awake at night. Once someone started asking those questions, they weren’t cut out for the job.

“And sometimes,” Martin said. “If worst comes to worst, these operations will need to be carried out in our own country.”

“Whatever is for the greater good.”

The Fed Chairman thought about saying, “
That
is why you were on the short list of candidates,” but he kept silent. McCone, during his time with the Atomic Energy Commission, had quickly earned a reputation as someone who did whatever was asked of him.

Instead, Martin said, “I think you’ll do very well in your new position.”

“Thank you.”

Approaching the park’s exit, Martin patted the white-haired man on the shoulder and told him they would stay in touch. Maybe, when the time was right, he would tell McCone about what had been found at Oak Island and about how important it was to preserve a certain path for the country. For now, he knew McCone would do whatever was asked of him without even needing to know about future dangers.