Murder at Union Station

TWELVE

Public life is a situation of power and energy. He trespasses against his duty who sleeps upon his watch, as well as he who goes over to the enemy.”

Chet Fletcher, political adviser to President Adam Parmele, liked to quote Edmund Burke’s take on power, loyalty, duty, and their uses. He was fond of such sayings and seemed always to have a dozen of them ready to be dropped into conversation.

Fletcher watched the news on a small, cable-connected TV set while eating breakfast in the kitchen of his Rosslyn, Virginia, home. He’d gotten up at five, his usual hour, and went through what seemed a daily morning routine. “You really should exercise,” he told his puffy, blotchy face in the bathroom mirror. A room off the master bedroom held a representative assortment of exercise equipment, which his wife, Gail, used with some regularity. But while Fletcher thought a great deal about exercising, he never seemed to get around to it, as evidenced by his soft girth and weary legs when climbing stairs.

Silently, he rationalized once more on not living an active physical life. He was, after all, an intellectual, with a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Chicago. He’d played some tennis as an undergraduate but wasn’t very good at it, and managed to avoid campus softball and volleyball games by proving those few times he did participate that he was even worse at those sports. No one fought to have him on their team.

But Adam Parmele had wanted him on his team when he decided to run for president of the United States. Fletcher had generated a name for himself in political circles through publication of a book that offered a new and radical blueprint for political success in the twenty-first century. Parmele, whose curriculum vitae included elected stints in the House of Representatives and the Senate, a brief ambassadorship, and a three-year tenure as director of the Central Intelligence Agency, brought Fletcher on board for his run at the presidency, and Fletcher soon found himself virtually running the campaign.

His commitment to the Democrat Parmele wasn’t based upon a political philosophy on Fletcher’s part, who prided himself on not claiming allegiance to any political party or dogma. His fascination was with power and the use of it, no matter the cause. When Parmele emerged victorious and put together his cabinet and team of advisers, Fletcher was invited to join and didn’t hesitate to accept. The change in lifestyle for this pudgy Ph.D. was heady and took some getting used to-the easy access to the White House and the Oval Office, the respect afforded him by less influential members of the president’s staff, and the mentions in the press. Perhaps most important was the pleasure Gail took in moving to Washington and basking in her husband’s newfound importance. She almost immediately joined with other wives of important men and threw herself into the city’s social and charitable activities.

All in all, it had been a good move on Fletcher’s part to join the Parmele inner circle. At the age of fifty-one, he’d achieved an enviable position of power, and no one questioned any longer his dubious physical shape with the exception of his wife, who consistently failed to entice him into even a walk around the block, and his boss, the president of the United States, Adam Parmele, who seemed to worship physical activity.

By six, an aide had delivered an array of intelligence reports and newspapers to the house, and Fletcher took a fresh cup of coffee and the papers to a bedroom that served as his home office. Two phones sat on the desk. One was a regular home line. The other was a secure line to his office in the West Wing of the White House.

“Good morning,” Gail Fletcher said from the doorway. “Sleep well?”

“Yes, I did,” he said.

She was a short, slender woman with an easily managed brunette hairdo and a known fondness for simple yet expensive clothing. Her most visible public credential, aside from being the wife of the president’s political adviser, was as head of a nonprofit organization whose purpose was to foster political involvement by women in third-world countries, a position that found her frequently away from home. She was as social as her husband was reclusive; they were seldom seen together at the theater or concerts, although they did host occasional small dinner parties at home, where Fletcher donned an apron and chef’s hat and produced perfectly cooked meals on the grill.

“What’s going on in the world this morning?” she asked, carrying a steaming cup of black coffee into the office and sitting on a small forest-green convertible sofa. She wore a short pink robe over flowered short pajamas and tucked her bare feet beneath her.

Fletcher smiled at the sight of her. That she’d said yes to his proposal twenty years ago never failed to amaze him. This beautiful, trim, and vivacious woman had agreed to be the wife of a dull, introspective college professor. Had she known back then he was destined for something decidedly more visible than teaching the subtleties of politics to college students, and decided to go along for the ride? She claimed she hadn’t, said she was pleased to be the wife of a distinguished college professor. But he had to provide himself with some reason for her agreeing to be Mrs. Fletcher. Their only child, a daughter, was away at college in Vermont.

“Nothing especially important,” he said, picking up one of the unread papers. “One irresolvable crisis after another. General dire predictions of the nation’s future and one question about whether we have a future. What’s on your agenda?”

“Meetings at the foundation. Several crises to compound. Lunch with Craig and Jill. Sure you can’t break away, even for an hour?”

He shook his head and gave forth what passed for a smile. “The president has me captive all day, Gail, and probably into the night, too. Won’t be home for dinner.”

He seldom was home for dinner, so no comment from her was necessary.

She pulled one of the newspapers he’d already read from the desk, and returned to the couch. They read in silence. Then she said, “How bizarre.”

He looked up. “What is?”

“This murder at Union Station.”

He returned to the paper he was reading.

“An old Italian man named Louis Russo comes here by train. He was from Israel. A black man-they say he was well dressed-comes up behind this old Italian man and shoots him in the head.”

“Oh?”

“Why would he do that?”

“Who?”

“This well-dressed man. Why would he-”

“They’ll figure it out, I’m sure,” he said, standing, stretching, and yawning. “That’s what the police are for. I have to get moving. I’m already running late.”

He came to the couch, bent, and kissed her lightly on the hair. “Give my love to Craig and Jill, and my apologies I won’t be able to see them while they’re visiting. Another time.”

“I will,” she said.

Minutes later he was in the backseat of the government car dispatched for him each morning. Not long after that, he passed through security at the White House, spent a few minutes in his office gathering notes, and went to the Oval Office, where President Parmele and other members of his staff had gathered.

There were three items on the agenda.

The first two had to do with bills initiated by the White House that were stalled in the Republican House. Walter Brown, Parmele’s chief congressional liaison, listed those moderate Republican representatives whose arms he felt might be twisted harder in favor of supporting the bills, and Parmele suggested the twisting begin immediately, singling out three House members who he said would play ball, adding that they probably wouldn’t want certain information about them made public. Knowing who was vulnerable in Congress and understanding the right buttons to push were integral parts of Parmele’s political arsenal. He was a master at it, as good as Lyndon Johnson had ever been, but decidedly more subtle.

He sat back, clasped his hands behind his head, and launched into a dissertation about how important the passage of those bills would be for his reelection bid.

As he talked, Fletcher observed the man he’d helped put in this position of awesome power. No question about it, this president was a skilled, self-confident politician with an ego necessarily large enough to even consider running for president of the United States. Parmele’s monologue this morning on the importance of education was familiar to Fletcher. It was part of a speech he’d helped draft a month ago with some of Parmele’s speechwriters. This was typical of the president, taking what someone else had conceived and making it his own, as though it had come to him on the spur of the moment. Rather than resent this, Fletcher welcomed it. It was the sign of a man prepared to seize power and language and to wield them effectively. No shame. No guilt. Just his eye on the prize, in this case a second term.

The third reason for the meeting that morning revolved around Fletcher and his staff. He’d been busy choreographing Parmele’s political travel agenda, including fund-raising appearances around the country. Others at the meeting not involved with that issue left the Oval Office, leaving the president and Fletcher alone.

“Well, Chet, give me the bad news,” Parmele said.

“Not as bad as we feared, Mr. President,” Fletcher said, laying the latest overnight poll numbers on the desk.

Parmele scrutinized them and slid the paper on which they were written back to Fletcher. “Encouraging,” said the president.

“Yes, it is, Mr. President. Did Walter brief you on Senator Widmer’s hearings?”

Parmele forced a laugh. “Sure he did. Widmer seems determined to go forward with them. You know, Chet, I like Widmer, always have, but I really question his mental health these days. Maybe it’s his age. Christ, I hope I don’t end up that way.”

“I doubt that you will, sir. I’d like to dismiss the senator as just an aging old fool who’s on his last legs, political and personal. But we both know he’s more dangerous than that, particularly to-”

“Particularly to me,” Parmele said, finishing Fletcher’s thought.

“Yes.”

They spent the next half hour going over the president’s plans for the next two weeks, and Fletcher gave a capsule evaluation of what each campaign stop would entail, and his analysis of the issues thought to be of particular importance to citizens in those areas of the country. When he’d finished, he gathered up his papers.

“Anything else, Mr. President?” he asked.

“No,” Parmele said. “But I want you to know how much I appreciate the way you’ve been handling things, Chet.”

“Of course, sir.”

“You ought to take a few days off, relax a bit. Get some air and exercise. I get the feeling you’ve almost been living here.”

“No, I’m fine, Mr. President. I get plenty of exercise saying no to you.”

“Well, say hello to that lovely Gail.”

“I certainly will, sir. My best to the first lady.”