Stamping Butterflies

CHAPTER 9 Washington, Wednesday 27 June [Now]

"You can help...?" Gene Newman sounded almost doubtful.

"We'll see," said Professor Mayer. "Let me send you Katie Petrov. You'll like her. Very bright. Try not to like her too much..." Only Professor Mayer would have dreamed of talking to the President like that or got away with it.

"Okay, Petra," he said, "we'll talk later." President Newman put down his phone and flicked shut a little black book in which he kept those numbers which mattered to him. Old friends, ex-lovers, big-budget contributors and his old tutor. The fact he dialled these calls for himself drove his staff wild. That was one of the reasons the President still did it.

Gene Newman had a problem. On the desk in front of him was a telegram from the new Pope congratulating him on the capture of Prisoner Zero and asking him to rescind the death penalty.

A telegram was how the Washington Post described it, although the reality was more a list of tightly argued points, some of which were pretty good, particularly the one about not making martyrs. Unfortunately that suggestion didn't seem to be playing well in Kansas.

The letter from the Prime Minister in London was more mealy mouthed but it said more or less the same. Now might be a good time to commute the sentence and avoid making more martyrs than were strictly necessary.

Gene Newman loved that last bit.

"Mr. President..."

Gene Newman's secretary walked the long way round to his desk. Even after two years in the job, Isabel Gorst didn't feel right stamping across the eagle that glowered at her from the centre of the Oval Office carpet.

"Isabel."

The President wore black out of respect for those killed in the Marrakech helicopter crash, for the guards in the prison van and for the CIA agent and Moroccan officer whose bodies had been found in a burned-out car. Black tie, black suit, Stars and Stripes enamel badge. He'd been wearing the same outfit for almost a month.

"What have you got there?"

The President asked his question without looking up from the Pope's telegram. All the same there was a warmth to his voice that had the elderly Hispanic woman smiling. She knew it was mostly a side effect of memory.

For much of his early twenties, Gene Newman had earned his living with that voice, still did if he was honest. It had taken him from a local soap to prime-time comedy drama inside of three years. And from there to Hollywood. And his trick, the best he'd ever pulled, was to retire at the height of his earning power.

There'd been no big announcement, just an easing off of public appearances and a reluctance on the part of his agent to forward scripts that weren't original, thoughtful and immaculately written. Since these were rarer than hens' teeth, Gene Newman made two films in his eighteen months in Hollywood, won an Oscar for each and then bowed out so gracefully it took even his agent a year to work out what had happened.

"Edvard asked me to give you this."

She put a thin report on the side of his desk rather than overbalance the unstable pile that was his in-tray.

"It's breeding," said President Newman. He meant his in-tray.

"Let me handle it."

The President looked at her.

They'd been through this before, many times. The President's habit of trying to read everything that passed through his office was regarded with tolerant amusement by his friends and as a sign of paranoia by his enemies.

His wife, who seemed to spend more time than ever in the gym and rarely bothered to read anything before signing it, viewed it as a simple quirk and expected no less from a man who'd thrown in a high-level Hollywood career for three years at Harvard, two years at Oxford and ten months at the Sorbonne.

A number of stories circulated about his reasons for leaving Paris, and in his defence the President would only point out that he was still married and to his first wife, which made him something of a statistical rarity.

"Is that what I think it is?"

Isabel Gorst nodded.

"You read it?"

She looked as shocked as she felt. "It's from the National Security Advisor," she said.

"Just asking."

"Is there anything else, Mr. President?"

"Coffee," he said. He had kitchen staff to do all this, of course, but the First Lady had taken them aside and corrupted the lot of them. Told them about his kidneys, caffeine and the night sweats. So now he got decaf with soya milk as well as only one whiskey a day, more ice than alcohol. Payback for being a little too free with the chemicals in his teens. A fact he'd happily deny on anything except a Bible.

"You know, I'm not sure--" Isabel Gorst began.

"Look," said the President, opening the file. "I'm about to find out exactly why some guy tried to shoot me. I deserve a coffee."

When the cup finally arrived, weak, more milk than coffee, Gene Newman was still coming to terms with the fact that, far from now having his reason, it seemed the entire might of his intelligence services was unable to give him a name, nationality or political persuasion for the man.

"Paula." Gene Newman caught his CIA chief as she was putting on her coat for a meeting on the Hill. "I've got a question."

Paula Zarte waited.

"Why do you think he wanted to kill me?"

She smiled. "You're the President of the United States of America."

"Yep." President Newman nodded. "I've been told that already, but it's not an acceptable answer. Think about it," he said. "Is that an answer?"

"It works for me."

"Let them wait," Gene Newman said. "Let's take a stroll."

They walked in silence, Paula waiting as the President watched a bird swoop beyond the Rose Garden. "You know," he said, "Ally wants a cat."

"You don't like cats?"

"Of course I like cats. And dogs and horses, cows, pigs, mules, turkeys, especially turkeys. I even love coyotes. But that's not--" He stopped suddenly. "Did I leave anything out?"

"Eagles, sir."

Gene Newman frowned. "Let's take that one for granted."

"So what's the problem with cats?"

"They kill birds and they make me sneeze."

"Didn't you have a cat in--?"

"Two," he said. "Siamese and Persian. One lilac, one blue. They belonged to the director's mistress. You remember the nose job I was meant to have got done just after I left the show?"

"It's been mentioned."

"That wasn't rhinoplasty, that was how I looked when not suffering from histamine overload."

"Is there something I can help you with, Mr. President?"

"Yeah," Gene Newman said, "there is. There's something Ed's not telling me. I need you to find out what."

"I love this garden..."

The CIA operative standing next to a twisted crab apple nodded. He was wearing tortoiseshell glasses and a very good Italian suit, probably better than the one the President was wearing.

"This whole area used to be greenhouses. Did you know that?"

"No, sir."

"Well, it was, before that monstrosity was built." Nodding over his shoulder Gene Newman indicated the lighted windows of the West Wing and the still-open door to his office. "You know what was here before the greenhouses?"

"No, sir."

"Jefferson's pavilion. The one he had built in 1807."

The agent looked blank and Gene Newman sighed.

"You knew Charlie Bilberg?"

He saw the answer in the set of the young man's jaw.

"And you were present when Prisoner Zero was retaken?"

"Yes, Mr. President." Michael Wharton looked like he wanted to add something but restrained himself and Gene Newman smiled.

"I know," he said. "You led the capture, only you didn't because it's not our country, so officially you were there as an observer. An unnecessary question but we have to begin this conversation somewhere. And that was it."

They were standing, shoulder to shoulder, at the far end of the Rose Garden, the President's bodyguards safely out of earshot but firmly within view. Gene Newman was resisting the First Lady's latest suggestion, that he have himself microchipped for safety like some dog, and he'd threatened her with a state visit to Belgium if she dared mention the idea again.

A bit of Gene Newman wanted to ask the boy if he knew who first planted roses on this site and when, but it was unfair to expect everyone to have his own interest in the minutiae of White House history.

"What was Charlie Bilberg like?"

Agent Wharton hesitated.

"This is off the record," said the President. "In about two hours' time, when you've got sufficiently bored being shown Mrs. Roosevelt's china collection by an intern, my Chief of Staff is going to bring you into the Oval Office for thirty seconds so we can go through the rigmarole of being introduced all over again. That will be the first time you've ever met me. Is this clear?"

A quick nod.

"Good. Now tell me about Agent Bilberg."

"He would have made a good officer, sir."

"But he wasn't there yet. Is that what you're saying?"

"He spoke Chleuh."

"What?"

"It's the language of the Atlas, one of them anyway. Charles spoke a little and intelligence suggested Prisoner Zero spoke it also."

"That was why he was sent?"

Agent Wharton almost shrugged, but caught himself in time. "Someone obviously thought--"

"Someone?" the President said sharply.

"Yes, sir."

"But you don't know who?"

"No, sir. I don't have that information."

Gene Newman sighed. "No problem. I'm sorry about Agent Bilberg."

"Yes, sir, so am I."

"He was a friend?"

"No, sir. We barely knew each other."

"Well," said the President, "that was quick." He was still in the garden, thinking about Thomas Jefferson, slave owner, drafter of the Declaration of Independence and third President of the new United States of America.

Paula Zarte's smile was a full-on dazzler and revealed perfect teeth, the kind Gene Newman would never have dared possess, even when he was in Hollywood and certainly not now he was in his late forties. Mind you, for all he knew they were real and untouched by cosmetic dentistry.

"I did what you asked."

"Good," said the President. "That's what you're there for."

Paula paused, decided his comment wasn't serious and risked a mocking smile.

She was beautiful, Gene Newman thought in passing. A full ten years younger than he was with the body of someone ten years younger than that. Full breasts, slight hips and curved buttocks, her skin almost purple in a certain light. The President couldn't help himself, he noticed the same things, every time.

Paula Zarte also had the nerves of a poker player and a brain so sharp he paid it the respect due to an edged weapon.

"Maybe we should go in," Gene Newman said, "before someone starts talking."

They sat in the West Sitting Hall, by a window which overlooked the Executive Office Building. Yellow curtains behind them, eaude-nil walls and a dado rail and door arch painted in a hue his wife's Italian designer insisted on calling duck-turd blue.

"Is something wrong, Mr. President?"

"A madman wants to kill me and no one can tell me why. The Republicans are targeting my son's girlfriend. My wife thinks I need a trip to the vet. The coffee around here tastes like dishwater. Apart from that everything's fine."

The black woman smiled. "I've just called in the transcript of the very first interrogation, the one when he was first asked why he tried to shoot you."

"And what was his answer?"

"He was listening to the rain."

"What?"

"That's what he said. ‘I was listening to the rain.’ We're not talking conspiracy here. We're talking lone nutter. That's what Ed doesn't want widely known. Conspiracy plays better."

"And what was he hearing?"

Paula looked puzzled, then understood. "Who knows?" she said. "Something else, I guess..."

"You want to be my excuse to order some coffee?"

"Sure," Paula said, amending it to, "that would be good."

The First Lady might not approve of caffeine but she approved of Paula Zarte even less. It was down to the business in Paris. And then the President appointed Ms. Zarte head of the CIA over the head of the obvious candidate. The First Lady wasn't the only one still deciding what she thought about that.

"What do you want?" Gene Newman asked, when the coffee had been brought and a woman from the kitchens had shut the door behind her.

"I'm sorry?"

"I want to win the next election," said the President. "That's short term. Long term I want to walk out of here in six years with some of my self-respect still intact. I want Ally and Bill to be happy. And if I make a small difference to the safety of this country and the world, then that would be good too.

"And if I can't go down in history as a good president then I'll settle for not being a bad one. That's what I want. Prisoner Zero risked his life to try to kill me, so that's what he wants. Now what do you want?"

"My version of what you just said," said Paula. "To be good at this job. Not to screw up. Not to end up with another divorce."

"You guys having trouble?"

"Only the usual," Paula said. "The hours are too long. We're never in the same city at the same time. We buy breast fillet, sugar snap peas and portobello mushrooms every Friday evening and throw the lot out a week later because even when we're both there neither of us has the time, energy or slightest inclination to cook."

"I'm sorry."

Paula sighed. "It gets worse," she said. "Mike's having an affair."

The President had known Paula for most of her life. That was one of the reasons why Paris had been such a mistake. He could still remember the girl she'd been, a spindly army brat off to college. Their families had known each other and the President knew she wasn't telling him. She was telling the late twenty-something he'd been back then. Old enough to give advice and not so old it was like talking to someone's father.

"God," Gene Newman said, "when did Mike tell you?"

"He didn't."

He looked at her then.

"Oh yeah," Paula said. "I'm completely compromised."

"You had him followed?"

Her nod was slight.

"By someone you trust?"

"Every day, with my life."

Which had to mean the Puerto Rican woman waiting anxiously in an area now reserved for the bodyguards of those visiting. One of the First Lady's more interesting ideas.

"Felicia?"

Another nod.

"Who is Mike seeing?"

"One of your staff."

The President sighed. "You probably shouldn't have told me that," he said. "You want me to end it?"

"How?"

"I'm sure we need an ambassador somewhere. You stay, Mike goes... You can write the closing script nearer the time. Meanwhile think about redeploying Felicia. Make it a promotion."

"And me?"

"You?" The President tipped his head to one side.

"Should I expect to be redeployed?"

"No." Gene Newman shook his head. "This job belongs to you for as long as you want it." He was working on the basis that Paula knew she'd got the job in spite of what happened in Paris and not because of it...

"Paula was here." The First Lady's comment was not a question.

"You're right," said the President. "So she was."

"And that's why you're sitting in the dark?"

"It's the overload of caffeine."

The First Lady looked around at the sitting room. "Did Paula have anything interesting to say?"

"The man who tried to shoot me had been listening to the rain."

"I can think of better reasons."

"Yes. I'm sure you can."

"Is Paula about to become one of them?"

"No," said Gene Newman, and there was a firmness to his voice which his wife hadn't heard in months. Being shot at seemed to agree with him.