We Are Holding the President Hostage (13 page)

"Mr. President," the Padre said. "This is a
simple request."

"And if I refuse?"

"You cannot. Not under the circumstances," the
Padre said calmly.

"I'm telling you, I don't have the authority. You
don't understand—"

"Mr. President..." The Padre shook his head. Then
he nodded to Benjy who was attached to Amy.

"This is not a personal thing, believe me, Mr.
President."

The President looked at Amy, who had gotten the message.

"I'm not afraid of them," she said. "Let's
call their bluff." She stood up abruptly. The cord that attached her to
the young man tightened and he stood up in tandem. For a moment she faced them,
fearless and defiant. She started to take a step backward. Benjy closed the
distance between them and held her in a viselike grip. She struggled briefly.

"Amy," the President shouted. "For crying
out loud."

The younger man held her, then deftly twisted one arm
behind her. She grimaced in pain but did not cry out.

"This is not necessary," the Padre said quietly,
his features showing no emotion or concern.

"Tell him to get his hands off of her," the
President commanded.

He watched as Amy tried desperately to repress any
expression of pain.

"Please," the President said. Benjy loosened his
grip.

"Bastards," Amy hissed.

"Please, Amy." She looked at the President for a
moment. Then she shook her head in disgust. Tears welled in her eyes. But the
man did not release her. He guided her back to her chair and he stood behind
her, his forearm locked around her neck.

"Leave her alone," the President commanded.

She could not speak. But she shook her head in defiance.

"After the call, Mr. President."

Reluctantly, the President reached for the phone.

"What could be more simple? We are inviting him here
for a talk."

"They will not grant it. I promise you...."

He glanced at the clock on the buffet.

"You tell him we will expect him in a half hour,
precisely. Eleven-thirty." The President punched in a button.

"Yes, Mr. President." It was an operator's voice,
hollowed and amplified by the speaker-phone. The Padre rose and stood beside
the President.

He felt a warm hand on his own. The touch of the man's
flesh was surprisingly warm. He had expected it to be cold and clammy.
"Only the request. Nothing more," he whispered.

"It won't do any good." The President shrugged.
The Padre offered no comment and lifted his hand from the President's.

"Jack Harkins, please." He heard his voice. It
did not sound like his own. Then there were other sounds.

"This is Vic Proctor, Mr. President."

The President looked toward the Padre. So they were routing
all calls to the crisis-management team.

"The Secretary of State," the President said. The
Padre nodded and motioned with his hand, a signal to continue.

"I would like you to have Jack Harkins here in
precisely one half hour."

"Yes, Mr. President." There was a brief pause.
Then a whooshing sound. He knew that they had patched in another line.

Damn them, the President thought. Why must they still call
him Mr. President? Why hadn't they figured out a way to fire him?

Suddenly the Padre touched the connecting button. The line
went dead. At the same time, he noted that the younger man released his grip on
Amy and returned to his seat.

"He won't come," the President said. "You
just don't understand how these things work."

"We shall see," the Padre said.

MARTIN CHALMERS, Vice President of the United States, sat
in the front cabin of Air Force Two. He wore a light headset and microphone
attached to an open line that led to a conference room in the Executive Office Building, a gingerbread building next door to the White House.

He was alone in the front cabin by choice. He did not
completely trust his traveling staff. Some were a conduit to the President's
men. Unfortunately, this knowledge induced a paranoia that was
counterproductive. He needed a clear head, an alertness to subtlety and nuance.

The stakes, he assured himself, were larger than mere
personal ambition. Yet the dilemma was unavoidable. He was, indeed, next in
line. The President was a hostage and he, the Vice President, had been, to the
President's men, an outsider. Now they would consider him a usurper. The
thought made him exceedingly uncomfortable.

No Vice President in history had ever been caught in such a
situation. Others, he knew, would characterize it as a catastrophe. Surely, in
national terms, it was a crisis of the first magnitude. As soon as he arrived
in Washington he would take charge—fully, completely, speedily. They would have
to accept him now. Indeed, it was their patriotic duty.

Earlier they had patched him in to the conference room
devoted to the crisis management of this situation. He was waiting for Vic Proctor,
the Secretary of State, to report to him on the results of any conversation
with the President.

Despite his paranoia, despite his suspicions and
uncertainties, Martin Chalmers, in fact, had never felt more whole, more alive,
less frightened. He savored the thrill that trickled up and down his spine. His
main worry, of course, was his own worthiness. Would he have the resources, the
talent to be, well, presidential? Such a condition was wholly apart from
performing as Vice President, which was essentially a waiting game.

He also worried that he would be equal to maintaining the
image and tone of a man meeting his destiny. Think of Lyndon Johnson, he urged
himself, remembering those days nearly thirty years ago when the whole world
became a camera eye focusing on the Kennedy assassination. Old Lyndon had
pulled it off with dignity.

Martin Chalmers searched his heart for the levers of
magnanimity, even forgiveness. The President's men had put him down, ignored
him, insulted him with their indifference and silence. Above all else, he hated
being patronized. Nor did he have any illusions. Attitudes like that filtered
down from the top. Suddenly he heard a momentary burst of crackling static,
then a whooshing sound.

"Martin." It was Vic Proctor's voice coming through
again. Chalmers had put the Secretary of State in charge until he got home.
Whatever his faults, Vic had probity. Never mind that he would be one of the
first to go in a Chalmers administration. Most of them would in any event. No
vindictiveness there, he assured himself. A leader needs people around him with
whom he could be comfortable.

"Yes, Vic."

He wanted his voice to sound purposeful, commanding. He had
ordered that the conversations between him and the crisis team be recorded. The
world must have evidence of his leadership.

Paul had picked him as his running mate for his region, the
Southwest sun belt, his antecedents—his father had been the beloved senator
from Texas, Tad Chalmers—and his innocuousness. All his life he had been a
figurehead, a one-term governor of Texas, the chairman of the board of Chalmers
Industries, a professional board member of a dozen corporations. When you need
a good rubber stamp, get old Marty. He was, above all, a professional
ingratiator. It was a role he despised. Coming up at last was the moment he had
waited for all his life.

"The President has asked to see Jack Harkins. No
reason given."

"You spoke directly to him?"

"Directly. No other conversation."

"Did you mention the..."

"The procedure?" Proctor asked. They had chosen
the word for the euphemism.

"Yes."

He would have to be cautious. Procedure meant the
legalities of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, specifically the necessity for the
President to put in writing his admission that he was unable to govern. It was
explicit in the amendment. Section three. For the Vice President the
Twenty-fifth Amendment was holy writ. The words were engraved in his mind. The
amendment read:

"Whenever the President transmits to the President pro
tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his
written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his
office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary,
such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting
President."

"He said nothing about that," Proctor said.
"But then he has a gun to his head." Proctor paused. "A figure
of speech. But it means the same thing."

"Perhaps we had better put the procedure for Section
Four on standby," the Vice President said calmly. He felt the pounding of
his accelerating heartbeat. It was, after all, explicit:
in writing
. He
supposed the President could scribble the words on a piece of toilet paper and
get it out through Harkins. It was possible to do it if he was clever, and it
would save them all the back-biting and trouble. Section Four could be a real
problem. The Cabinet would have to decide. He had that down too.

"Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either
the principal officers of the executive departments, or of such other body as
Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the
Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written
declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his
office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of
the office as Acting President."

It got more complicated after that. One step at a time, he
told himself, although a black thought lapped at the edges of his mind, despite
his conscious refusal to acknowledge it. Blow him up. Jesus, Marty, he told
himself, you blood-thirsty bastard.

"Shall we give them Harkins?" Chalmers asked.

Proctor hesitated at his end of the line. For a moment the
Vice President confronted the statical void.

"I ... I didn't think we had a choice," Proctor
said. "It was a request from the President."

"The man's a hostage, Vic." It took a great
effort of will to keep his voice down.

"But he's still the President."

His paranoia flared.

"What about Harkins' life?" Chalmers asked. Of
all the President's gang, he detested Harkins the most.

"We gave him the option of not going," Proctor
said.

"Since when is that bastard calling the shots,"
Chalmers blurted, immediately regretting the outburst. Proctor's hesitation was
diplomatic. Both knew that the heart of the problem was the recognition of the
President's authority. Proctor, of all people, would stick to the most orthodox
legalities.

"I must say, he has got a lot of courage stepping into
the eye of the storm," Proctor said with the barest hint of deflection.

"I think it's very stupid," Chalmers muttered. He
hoped the man would get his ass blown up.

"Maybe—" Chalmers paused to calm himself
"—we should have that cabinet meeting. Explore Section Four just in
case."

"I'll get them together."

"And I'd like to be kept informed."

"Of course," Proctor snapped. Chalmers heard the
man suck in his breath. "TOA still the same?"

"About seven hours to go," Chalmers said, looking
at his watch.

"They'll be here waiting," Proctor said.

Chalmers thought he had detected a slight note of
deference.

NED FOREMAN SAT at the conference table and blew his nose
into a Kleenex. A cold in July, he thought with disgust. In fact, everything
that was happening was ludicrous. Foreman, the National Security Advisor, had
spent the last couple of hours on a mission of reassurance. He had called the
foreign ministers of all the NATO allies, of France, of Japan, of India, and,
of course, of the Soviet Union.

To all the message was the same. The machinery of
government would operate smoothly in this crisis, as it had in previous
circumstances. Not to worry. Some crazies have got the President holed up, but
we'll figure out a way to get the situation resolved.

"What are their demands?" Dimitri Karkov, the Soviet
Foreign Minister, had asked in his remarkably unaccented English. He had seemed
genuinely shocked, expressing deep concern. He and the General Secretary liked
the President. Endangering the American President was not in their interests.

"We are not yet certain."

"That is very bad," the Russian said.

Foreman, although unseen, nodded in agreement. He was
tempted to ask what he knew had been asked many times before when American
hostages had been taken. Is this a KGB-inspired operation? If not, what is your
influence? Do you control these people through surrogates? Surely, if you
tried, you could get them out. Always the answer had been the same.
Nyet
.

"They are in no way connected to us," Karkov
assured him.

"We studied that possibility. It was quickly rejected,
Minister."

It had been a carefully measured response. He wanted the
Russian to be certain that the matter had been under deep consideration. Nor
had it been rejected out of hand.

"Of course you realize that we may have to put the
armed forces on worldwide alert," the Foreign Minister said. "But, I
assure you, it will be routine."

"It could be viewed as a provocation," Foreman
said cautiously.

"We have studied that possibility."

It occurred to Foreman that they were talking in the same
language but at cross-purposes. He remembered a line from a movie: "What
we have here is a failure of communication."

"You think this hostage incident was arranged by our
side to provoke yours?"

"A thought," the minister responded, "but
quickly rejected."

Foreman doubted that he spoke the truth. The Soviets were
always testing America's motives. Devious bastards. He would have to arrange
another clandestine meeting with Peter Vashevsky to confirm the Russian's real
intentions. Peter Vashevsky was the top KGB operative in the United States,
with a direct pipeline to the General Secretary. He and Vashevsky had no
communication problem. The Soviets were only comfortable operating on two
tracks. One public. One private.

"I hope your alert doesn't get our people
nervous," Foreman said.

"You must assure them. But certain things are
necessary."

"I understand, Minister."

"So who is running your country?" the Russian
asked. In his voice Foreman detected an unmistakable note of contempt.

"At the moment—" Foreman hesitated "—the Secretary
of State is nominally in charge."

"Nominally?"

"Actually, he is reporting to the Vice President, who
is on his way home from the Far East."

Always futile, he thought, to define the intricacies of the
democratic process to the Soviets. To begin to define the Twenty-fifth
Amendment to him would be unthinkable. Besides, no one was quite certain how it
applied in this case. He could sense the wheels going around in the Russian's
mind.

"Everything is under complete control here,"
Foreman added, but thought to himself, bullshit.

"Do you know anything about these people who have the
President?" the Russian said, his voice demanding.

"We'll have something soon."

"They have a great prize. They could demand the
impossible."

"We will keep you informed, Minister."

His conversation with the Russian reinforced his sense that
something was nagging at Karkov, something he could not distinguish through the
murk of these swift-moving events.

The White House staff had set up a crisis center in a
conference room on the basement level of the Executive Office Building. The
Vice President was theoretically in charge. However, he was so far outside the
circle of power that, as the saying goes, he did not even have the keys to the
men's room.

Until this incident he had been barely tolerated, and the
prevailing opinion was that God did not give him his fair share of gray matter.
At least he had the good grace to be separated by distance. Once he arrived on
the scene, the situation could only go downhill. At the moment any shred of
hope was invested in the director of the CIA, Jack Harkins, a smart son of a
bitch.

Foreman studied the faces of the men around the table. At
the head of it sat Vic Proctor, the Secretary of State, an old nemesis of the
Vice President but too much of a pro to refuse the call to close ranks.
Already, in his mind, the conference room had become the bunker.

Others around the table were Steve Potter, the President's
press secretary, Lou Shore, counsel to the President, and Bob Nickels, the
Chief of Staff, the old-boy team, the death-till-us-part triplets he called
them, but never to their faces. Also present, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff, Admiral Bill Kendall, who sat quietly in a chair at a far end of the
table directing the so-called siege, which was not a siege at all, in fact, was
no more than a small cordon of men who had no practical function except to show
the world that, somehow, America was still in charge of itself.

The Secretary of Defense, Harley Fox, was also present, as
usual, scaring them to death about the Soviets taking advantage. He had
orchestrated a presentation by some general who was sure that his elite
military SWAT team could do the job with a fifty-fifty chance of getting the
President out unharmed. Good odds, considering, the Secretary of Defense had
offered.

"Considering what?" someone had asked.

Fox grunted. He hated to have his military options put
down. Then someone said, "Suppose it was you, Harley?"

He seemed to be considering a comeback until someone said,
"Anyone can walk through the detectors in the Pentagon carrying the same
material."

"Then we'll authorize a body frisk for everyone,"
Fox snapped.

"Body frisk thirty thousand people a day?" Vic
Proctor asked.

By then everyone in the room realized the futility of the
discussion and Steve Potter put it in perspective. "Fact is," the
President's press secretary said, "none of us are really safe. There are
holes in the system. That's a given. Besides, the body frisk is just not
American." Invoking what was or was not American had a soothing effect on
the tense gathering.

A bank of telephones had been swiftly installed. When they
spoke on the phones their voices were low, controlled. These were men who under
most circumstances knew the value of tone. Outwardly, they were cool, although,
Foreman knew, most were genuinely frightened. If the President were blown up,
the ball game was over for them as far as government was concerned. Chalmers
would bring in his own team.

A telephone button flashed suddenly. The men looked up from
their various conversations. Vic Proctor picked up the instrument.

"Good. Right now."

He nodded and tapped lightly on the table with his free
hand. Then he replaced the receiver and looked up.

"Halloran," he said. Halloran was the head of the
FBI.

The interrogation of the caterer was taking place a few
doors down from the conference room, a makeshift filing office pressed into
service for its proximity and lack of windows.

They did not have to wait long. Halloran arrived. He and
his wife had been guests at the state dinner. He was still wearing his tuxedo.
The ready-made black tie hung awry on one collar point. Halloran appeared as a
big, bluff, red-faced man whose face was the map of the Emerald Isle and whose
speech contained the sounds of Bean Town. He had given the FBI back the glamour
that had seeped out of the organization over the last decade. Once a big-city
cop, he developed into a hands-on manager who, like Hoover, often led the posse
and conducted the big investigations himself. He had done so in this case.

"I got good news and bad news," he began. His
eyes surveyed the faces around the table. He did not sit down, knowing that he
was about to impart something momentous. He waited to create the perfect sense
of drama.

"Mafiosa," he said, pausing for a long moment.
"The man who has the President is Salvatore Padronelli, better known as
the Padre, probably the most important don in this country. Second generation.
A racket network of powerful proportions. The other three are his top capos,
loyal to the death. One of them, the Canary, is a known murderer and hit man.
The other, the Prune, has a rap sheet as long as your arm. The young one is
Benjy Mustoni, known as the Kid, an ambitious enforcer. This caterer, poor
bastard, was, as they say, given a deal he couldn't refuse."

"What the hell do they want?"

"They want Maria and Joseph Michaels, the Padre's only
daughter and grandson."

"Who?" the Secretary of State asked.

"The woman and kid, the hostages who were picked up in
Egypt."

"You're joking," Steve Potter said.

"Notice my laughter," the FBI chief said.
"Joke's on me, too. He served me a drink. The Padre himself. I knew he
looked familiar, but I couldn't place him. Dammit. Not in that atmosphere. He's
slippery and efficient as hell, a master motivator. But stand in his
way..."

Halloran remained silent for a moment, then continued.
"In his group of people, they worship him. It is no accident that he is
called the Padre."

Halloran shook his head. "He's sixty-nine years old.
I'm sending his file over. Makes good reading. He's seen it all. Not a scratch
on him. Knows his business. Worse, he subscribes to a mythology that makes him
truly believe he is a man of honor. Gives him total justification for any act
of thievery or brutality. Yet, he's supposed to live modestly, although he's
richer than Croesus."

He looked at Potter. "Now you got something to feed
the animals."

"Depends on how stupid you want us to look," the
press secretary said gloomily. "Those Arabs who got her and the kid will
be laughing for a millennium. The fucking Mafia. Who would believe it?"

"At least we know they're not fanatics," Bob
Nickels, the Chief of Staff, said.

Inexplicably, Foreman noted, the tension seemed to ease.
Even in himself. Perhaps it was because the Mafia was perceived to be, under
all the hoopla, business people. Lou Shore, presidential counsel, seemed to put
it in perspective for all of them.

"They know the value of a deal," Shore said.
"Also, I doubt if they're suicidal. That's the key. We might just have to
wait them out."

"You been dealing with them, Lou?" Halloran asked
with unmistakable sarcasm. He did not wait for an answer. "The world's
best police brains have been trying to break them for years. No way. They know
what they want and that old bastard up there will die trying. If necessary, he
will blow himself to kingdom come. I shit you not."

"That doesn't mean he would stand in the way of
negotiations," Vic Proctor said.

"You can call it that if you want to," Halloran
said, meeting Proctor's gaze. "Just ask the caterer."

"Are you saying he won't negotiate?" Shore asked.

"All day long. But he won't settle for anything less
than the delivery of his daughter and grandson harm-free."

"But we've done everything we can," Foreman
interjected. "Jack Harkins will explain that to him."

"The Padre doesn't think so," Halloran said
stubbornly. "That's the whole point of this exercise."

"Got to get him out of the line of fire," Proctor
said wearily.

The National Security Advisor sensed his meaning. Force the
President out of office. Leave the Padre no one to negotiate with. Halloran
appeared uncertain as to how to bow out. He seemed disappointed that his advice
was not being solicited. But the Secretary of State was lost in his own
thoughts.

"Shall I go out and toss the fish to the seals?"
Potter asked.

The question brought Proctor back to alertness.

"We've got to ask Chalmers," he said with obvious
distaste.

"In that case..." Whatever came next was
swallowed, unheard.

"No way out on that," Proctor said, looking
toward Potter with obvious sympathy.

"Too juicy an opportunity for him to miss,"
Potter sighed.

"You might want to knock out a statement,"
Proctor said.

"For him?"

"He's the man." Proctor looked about him,
searching the faces. "Unless someone's got a better idea."

"We've got nearly seven hours before the Vice
President touches down. You'd think all you superbrains would find an
answer," Lou Shore interjected, his expression growing more harried by the
minute.

He had less to lose than the others, Foreman thought. The
President's childhood friend, he would be perceived by Chalmers as a fanatic
loyalist and marked as one of the first to go.

"All right," Proctor said, glaring at Shore.
"What's your pleasure?"

Shore lowered his eyes and cracked his knuckles. "Try
gas or something. Hell, that's what some of you get paid for."

"Whistling Dixie," Halloran said.

"You're the head of the fucking FBI," Shore said,
raising his voice. "What the hell have you got to offer?"

Illogic was taking hold now. Shore, striking out blindly,
had begun to reflect everyone's frustration. And panic. Halloran flushed red.
He shifted his weight from foot to foot.

"You people haven't been listening," he muttered.
All eyes in the room had once again turned to him. "There are no
alternatives," he said, lowering his voice. "Bottom line. Get the
woman and the boy out. End of story."