Читать книгу The Last President - Michael Kurland - Страница 5

CHAPTER ONE

There is an odor unique to police stations. Compounded of sweat, soap, cheap toilet water, machine oil, dried vomitus, stale urine, and the smell of fear, under a thin mask of ammonia cleanser, it is most noticeable early in the morning. At four o’clock this Saturday morning in the Second District Police Station at 2301 L Street, Washington, D.C., it was particularly strong.

Christopher Young carefully adjusted the knot of his black knit tie before pushing through the station’s heavy wooden door. As junior officer of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Washington domestic operations station, he found himself with erratic regularity in one of the District police stations on Company business. The assignment required a delicate hand, since he had no official status with the police at all. If a couple of Company men were apprehended rifling the safe of some embassy undersecretary, he was to try to get them out. But if a couple of thieves thought it would be useful to tell the arresting officers that they were CIA agents, Kit would be unable to deny the allegation.

Kit walked up to the desk sergeant and laid down his open identification case. “I got a call,” he said, stifling a yawn and trying to sound more alert than he felt.

“Right,” the desk sergeant said with disinterest. “Five John Does, apprehended at the Watergate complex. They won’t say word one about anything. But we got a phone call said you people would be interested.” The sergeant reached under his desk and brought out a couple of bulging oversized manila envelopes. “Here’s what they had on them,” he said, undoing the flaps and letting the contents spill out onto the desk.

Kit stared down at the assortment of burglary tools and photographic and electronic gear. Some of it looked familiar. “They said they were Agency?” he asked.

“They’re deaf and dumb,” the sergeant said. “We got this phone call said you’d be coming down.”

“I wonder who called us?” Kit said. “I’d better talk to them.”

The sergeant called upstairs and a man in a cut-off sweat shirt and denims came trotting down to take Kit to the holding tank. “Hi,” the man said, sticking out a hand. “I’m Veber, one of the arresting officers.”

Kit grabbed the hand and shook it firmly. “Where’d you find them?”

“In the Watergate. Inside the DNC headquarters, as a matter of fact. Night watchman noticed something funny and called in.”

“The DNC?”

“Yeah. The Democratic National Committee. What the hell are you people doing in the Democratic Committee?”

“You got me,” Kit said. “We don’t know yet that they’re our people. What did they say when you arrested them?”

Veber shrugged. “Not much. One of them turned around, nice and calm and polite, and said, ‘Are you gentlemen with the Metropolitan Police?’ Didn’t seem very excited.”

“I can see why he wondered,” Kit said.

Veber looked puzzled for a second. “Oh, my hippie clothes? We’re on a special detail. At least we don’t have to put dresses on, like those cops in New York. Come on, they’re up here.”

The holding pen was up one flight of stairs. It held five unruffled, ordinary-looking men in business suits. One of them stood up as Kit approached with Veber. “Hello,” he said. “Are you Company?”

Kit looked him over. A short, stocky man with an air of control and competence, he could have been a successful lawyer or a congressional aide, or an FBI special agent or a Company man. Or, for that matter, a clever thief.

“More to the point,” Kit said, “who are you?”

“Let me see some ID first,” the stocky man said. “I hate repeating myself.”

Kit smiled. “Do I look like a cop to you?”

“Do I look like a burglar to you?” the man said without emotion. “Show me a card.”

“Give me a name,” Kit said.

“Chandler,” the man said, naming the Deputy Chief of Station for Washington, and Kit’s immediate superior.

Kit pulled out his ID card. “Here.”

The man gave it a cursory glance. “Talk to me,” he said. “Alone.”

Veber shook his head. “Don’t mind me.”

The stocky man fixed him with a stare. “You don’t walk down to the end of the corridor, I don’t talk.”

“Give me a minute with him,” Kit told Veber.

“I guess,” Veber said, unconvinced. He retreated to the end of the corridor and turned his back on them, staring out the window at the early morning drizzle.

Kit turned back to the stocky man. “Well?”

The man paused for a minute to select his words. “I’m George Warren,” he said. “We are not, at least at this time, with the Company. Not directly.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Kit demanded. “Not directly? What the hell did you get me down here for? Who called the Company?”

“I want you to make a phone call for me,” Warren said. “That will explain everything.”

Kit took a step back away from the cell bars. “You’ve got to be kidding. Why the hell should I make a phone call for you?”

“Listen to me,” Warren said patiently. “Does the number three-nine-five, three thousand mean anything to you?”

“Three nine—”

”Keep your voice down!” Warren demanded. “Do you know that number?”

“No.”

“It’s the phone number of the Executive Office of the President in the White House. It’s a listed number, you can look it up.”

“So?”

“Call it. Ask for extension four-nine-four. They should be expecting your call by now.”

“It’s four-thirty in the morning,” Kit objected.

“Our government is awake twenty-four hours a day,” Warren said. “You’re here, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, okay. I’ll call, but this better be straight. What do I tell them?”

“They’ll tell you,” Warren said. “This is a national security matter, so don’t open up to the locals.” He indicated Veber with a jerk of his head.

Kit nodded his head slowly. “I’ll be back.” He walked down the corridor to join Veber.

“Have an exciting talk?” Veber asked, pulling his gaze away from the murk outside.

“It had its points,” Kit said. “Where’s your phone?”

Veber took him to an office down the hall and, reluctantly, left him. “Yell if you need anything. I’ll be just across the way.”

“You bet,” Kit said, closing the door behind him. He found a District of Columbia Section white pages in the metal cabinet in one corner of the office and turned to United States Government. There was an entry for Executive Office of the President with twelve listings. One of them read:

At Night, Saturdays, Sundays & Holidays

Call—395-3000

He picked up the phone and did just that. It was picked up on the second ring. “Three thousand,” a female voice answered.

“Extension four-nine-four, please,” he said.

“One second. It’s ringing.”

“Hello?” A gruff male voice.

“I’m calling from the Second District Police Station,” Kit said carefully. “There is a gentleman in one of the holding cells that suggested I call you.”

“I see,” the voice at the other end said. “On whose behalf are you making his call?”

“He calls himself Warren,” Kit said. “George Warren.”

“Yes,” the voice said. “What I meant was, do you represent the Metropolitan Police?”

“No.”

“Then—who do you represent?”

“To whom am I speaking?” Kit asked. He could see that there was going to be a continuing identification problem.

“I’m an official of the executive branch,” the voice said. “I represent the President.”

Kit made a quick decision. “I’m an officer of the Central Intelligence Agency, and I’m going to have to know to whom I’m speaking before we proceed.”

“Oh,” the voice said. “Thank God. We certainly don’t want the local police in on this. Now listen, you’re speaking to Charles Ober. You know who I am?”

“Yes, sir,” Kit said. Everybody in the United States had heard of Uriah “Billy” Vandermeer, the President’s Chief of Staff, and Charles Ober, the President’s Chief Domestic Affairs Adviser. The New Yorker called them the Teutonic Bobbsey Twins, and Time referred to them as the Prussian Household Guard. This was inaccurate if not unfair, since Vandermeer’s father was Dutch, and Ober was a native American for at least the last four generations. But the wisdom of Washington had it that nobody, not even cabinet officers, got to see the President without first clearing with Billy or Charlie.

“Okay,” Ober said. “Now, have these men been, what do they call it, booked? Under what names? Have any of them talked—that is, have they said anything at all?”

“They’ve all been booked, sir,” Kit said. “No names given. Right now they are five John Does. None of them have made any kind of statement to the police.”

“Okay. Now, what’s the scenario? What happens next?”

“Well,” Kit thought for a minute. “Later this morning, they’ll be taken to the Fifth Street Courthouse for a preliminary hearing for the purpose of setting bond. The judge probably won’t set bond on them unless he has valid names.”

“Okay,” Ober said. “Well, that’s the thing we want to turn off. How do you get them out of that?”

It was not a question Kit had expected to hear. “I can’t do that,” he said, the abrupt answer pushed out by the surprise of the question. “I mean, I can’t just tell the police to let them go.”

“Shit!” Ober said. “Look, supposing they were your boys: CIA, Agency, like that. What would you do then?”

“Well,” Kit said, “even that’s kind of hairy. I can’t do anything officially. If the Metropolitan Police want to book anyone at all, for any crime, for whatever reason they have, there’s nothing I can do about it. Nothing at all.”

“What do you do then?” Ober asked. “What the fuck do we pay you for?” There was a tension in his voice that hadn’t been there before; the question was almost a petulant whine.

“I work on a sort of unofficial understanding,” Kit told him. “Officially I can’t admit that any people who are picked up are our people.” Kit switched the phone mouthpiece to his other hand. “I suggest to the duty sergeant that the guys in his holding tank are really upright citizens and it would be a shame to charge them. He informally checks with the captain, who agrees that there wouldn’t be enough evidence to obtain a conviction, so there’s really no point in keeping them, and the charges are informally dropped.

“But what I’m really telling them, and what they’re trusting my word on, is that there’s some national security consideration in the case.”

“I understand that,” Ober said. He was back in control again and his voice was smooth. “What did you say your name was?”

“My name is Young,” Kit said, refraining from adding that he hadn’t said.

“Well, Mr. Young, you’ve put your finger on it exactly. National security is the issue. The men in that cell are members—I trust in your complete discretion—of a special White House national security unit which undertakes special, highly sensitive problems.”

“Like bugging the Democratic National Committee?”

“Exactly!” Ober said, sounding pleased that Kit had brought it up. “Who would you have do that? The FBI? Your people? No—you must stay above anything that could in any way be construed as political. But when we received word that the DNC was, unknowingly, being influenced by money and agents of the People’s Republic of Cuba, that had to be checked. Now, I can assure you that it would be in the best interest of your country if the investigation of the break-in were to end here. This is not an attempt to get these men off—any of them would gladly serve prison time in the interest of his country—but we cannot allow the ongoing investigation to be compromised.”

Kit slowly shook his head. “There’s nothing I can do. Look, Mr. Ober, I’m sure that what you’re telling me is true, but I have no authority to take action on behalf of these men. You get hold of my superior and have him call me and authorize this action, and I’ll use my best influence and see what I can do.”

“Your superior! How the hell—Wait a minute! Will you hold?” Without waiting for Kit’s assurance, Ober put the phone on hold, leaving Kit listening to that curious hollow sound of miles of phone wire connected only to itself.

Kit leaned back in the chair with the phone cradled against his shoulder and put his feet up on the desk. For a few minutes he stared at the ceiling, trying to make some sense of the great Rorschach of cracked and blotched green paint. Then, realizing that this was slowly putting him to sleep, he turned to read the notices on the bulletin board.

“Hello?”

Kit sat up, almost dropping the phone. He grabbed for it with both hands and restored it to his ear. This was someone new. “Hello.”

“You recognize my voice?”

It wasn’t Ober, and it wasn’t Chandler. “No,” Kit said.

“This is the President speaking,” the voice said.

“Yes, sir.” Kit took his feet down from the desk. “I wasn’t expecting—”

“You recognize my voice?” A flat, emotionless question.

“Yes, sir.” Kit did, now.

“I am your Commander-in-Chief,” the President said.

“Yes, sir.” Not technically accurate, since the CIA wasn’t part of the military, but the President was certainly Kit’s ultimate boss.

“I give you my personal assurance, as President, that what Charles Ober has told you in regard to these five men is accurate, and that it is a matter of national security to get them the hell out of that jail. You got that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Yeah. And as President, as your Commander-in-Chief, I give you a direct order to see that those five men are released. And for God’s sake, don’t let any of those media bastards hear anything about this. Right?”

“Right. Yes, sir.”

“Now, you’ve got the ball—run with it! Your President’s depending on you.” There was a click and the phone went dead.

Kit spent a minute staring into space. He had no option except to believe Ober’s—and the President’s—word that national security was involved. If only it weren’t the Democratic National Committee. If word of this did get out, and it was discovered that CIA had claimed the burglars as their own, it would be embarrassing for the Company. And Kit’s superiors would see that all the embarrassment came down onto his own shoulders.

Clearly, if Kit was going to do this at all, he’d better do it right. He’d have to speak to everyone involved: the arresting officers, the duty sergeant, and anyone else who had dealt with the five John Does, and impress on them the value of having a short memory.

Veber came into the office. “You look thoughtful,” he said.

Kit nodded. “I just spoke to my boss.”

* * * *

THE OVAL OFFICE, June 18, 1972 ( 5:24-6:17 p.m.)

MEETING: The President, Vandermeer, and Ober.

AUTHORIZED TRANSCRIPTION FROM THE EXECUTIVE ARCHIVES

Following a discussion of election campaign strategy, Billy Vandermeer raises the matter of the flap at the Watergate complex.

V. It is late but I hope, sir, we can turn briefly to that little problem area that came up yesterday. The matter that Charlie had to wake you up for.

P. Yeah. Must have been four in the morning. But I have no complaints. You handled it fine, Charlie.

O. Thank you, sir.

V. Ed St. Yves, too. He has a good head on his shoulders. He got it all buttoned up and under control right away. This could have been damn serious.

P. We put it on the line, didn’t we? I mean, with me on the phone. We let it all hang out. A great defensive play. Blam, right on the receiver with no yardage gained. But we sold it, didn’t we?

O. Yes. The five were released with nobody taking a second look. And that CIA liaison guy came through for us. The kid could have kicked this whole thing right up to his bosses at Langley. Instead, he accepted your direct authority as Commander-in-Chief.

P. Right. Good guy.

V. But you know damn well that he’s going to cover his ass. He’s probably typing his report out right now—in triplicate.

O. Billy, we always knew that it’s only a matter of time before the Director gets wise to the SIU.1 Hell, he’s already got it roughed out.

V. Sure, but a botched bag job like yesterday is just the ammo he needs to move to eliminate SIU. We don’t want to give the Director a handle. And we might want a dependable pipeline into the Agency. So I suggest we use what we’re given.

P. Okay. What’s the game plan?

V. We transfer Christopher Young to the White House Staff—immediately. He’s proved his loyalty to the presidency. We reward him now. Make him White House Liaison to the Intelligence Community: CIA, Defense Intelligence, like that. That way he’s rewarded and CIA’s signaled off. Besides, Young is the perfect tripwire if—or maybe I should say when—CIA takes to snooping around the White House.

P. Great! Don’t you agree, Charlie?

O. That might play.

* * * *

The clock by Kit’s bed said four-fifteen when he woke up. For a second he had that curious sense of disorientation that attacks people with erratic sleep schedules: he didn’t know whether it was four-fifteen in the morning or afternoon. Lifting his blinds, he stared out at the gray Washington sky. Afternoon. That made it Sunday. That meant he hadn’t slept through his date with Miriam. He had a full fifteen minutes to pick her up at her apartment in Georgetown. Cursing the selective deafness that enabled him to sleep through every alarm in every clock ever made, he rolled out of bed and staggered into the shower.

He was only half an hour late. Miriam was on the steps of her red brick building waiting for him, trying not to look annoyed, the wind playing games with her long brown hair.

“The traffic—” he said.

“Bullshit!” she replied, not looking at him.

“Okay, I overslept. It just feels so damn silly saying ‘I overslept’ at five in the evening.” He pulled her toward him to kiss her. After a moment’s stubborn resistance, she yielded and returned the kiss with sudden warmth.

“I am very fond of you, you know. If you’d grow your hair longer, I’d run my fingers through it. And if you’d get a normal job and work normal hours, you’d be able to keep your social engagements.”

“I like my job,” he told her. “Excitement, danger, romance, far-off places, angry women.… Are we going to Aaron’s?”

“Right,” she said. “My car or yours, as the actress said to the bishop?”

“Yours,” Kit said. He gave Miriam a last hug and they started, hand in hand, for her parking space. “And you drive. It’s not fit work for a man. I almost killed myself twice getting over here.”

“Sleep-driving is a special skill,” Miriam agreed, unlocking the passenger-side door of her Volkswagen and starting around. Kit watched Miriam as she climbed in beside him, and once again he wondered at the providence that had brought her into his life. They had met at one of Aaron B. Adams’ small dinner parties three years before. Professor Adams had seated his newest assistant professor, Ms. Miriam Kassel, campus liberal, next to Christopher Young, Jr., CIA, apolitical conservative, and then sat back to watch. They disagreed on just about everything political, and somehow they were unable to talk about anything but politics. Kit’s worst moment had come when, in exasperation, he had admitted that actually he just didn’t care much one way or the other about politics. Miriam had exploded and told him that not caring was a worse moral crime than being wrong.

But somehow Kit and Miriam had found, without discussing it, that there was something pulling them together that made all the arguments about politics worthwhile, that made the times when they didn’t argue sweeter and fuller and more beautiful than either of them had known before.

“That strange buzzing in your ears,” Miriam said sweetly, “won’t stop unless you buckle your seat belt. Not that I’m trying to influence your actions.”

“Oh. Sorry.” Kit buckled the belt. “You know, actually, I have a very good job. It keeps me here near you. I could have been assigned to Saigon or Phnom Penh or one of those other resort areas where the natives spend their spare time taking potshots at American civilians.”

“They only acquired the habit because American soldiers spend so much time shooting at them,” Miriam said.

“Oops,” Kit said. “I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have mentioned it. I just wish you wouldn’t take your gripes against the policies of this administration out on me. I’m merely a minor bureaucrat. My job is to report facts, not to decide what’s done with them. I just work for the government.”

“The CIA,” Miriam said.

“Intelligence-gathering is not a more intrinsically evil profession than college teaching.”

“If the CIA’s only activity were intelligence gathering, I wouldn’t say a word. But both you and I know that isn’t so. You must know it far better than I.”

“Please get that pedantic tone out of your voice,” Kit said. “I’m sorry I can’t discuss the inner policy-making of the Agency with you, but I’m far too junior for anyone to ever discuss it with me. Technically I’m not even supposed to admit to you that I’m CIA.”

“Come on,” Miriam said. “When Aaron first introduced us he told me you were CIA. It must be a very open secret.”

“Professor Adams is part of what we call the old-boy network. He was in OSS with a lot of people very high up in the Agency now, including my present boss. But since he’s retired from the, ah, government service, he’s assumed the right to discuss many things that we GS types aren’t supposed to talk about—including my work.”

“What’s your point?” Miriam asked.

“My only point is that, since I’m not allowed to discuss my work, it isn’t fair for you to take potshots at it—or me.”

“Bang,” Miriam said. “A potshot’s better than a bullet any day.”

“Listen, I agree with you,” Kit said. “I think the war is a mess and it’s being handled all wrong.”

“Yes, but you also think they ought to go over there and beat the shit out of those nasty North Vietnamese,” Miriam said. “Bomb ’em back to the stone age.”

“Damn right,” Kit said as a way of ending the discussion. And it did. Miriam sulked the rest of the way over to Professor Adams’ Chevy Chase estate.

* * * *

Professor Aaron B. Adams did not maintain his three-story stone house with swimming pool and guest cottage, along with its two acres of very subdividable land, on the salary of a tenured professor in Georgetown University’s Department of Government and Political Science. Not even when that was added to his retirement pay from the various secret branches of the government he had served in. Had it not been for an obscure Adams ancestor somewhere—after the two who had been impecunious but honorable Presidents—who had gone into business in Boston importing Japanese habutae silk and had later expanded into mother-of-pearl buttons, Professor Adams could not even have afforded the guest cottage.

Of course, as Professor Adams himself liked to say, his fondness for money was such that, had he not inherited it, he probably would have occupied himself with making it. In which case the United States would have lost a brilliant intelligence officer and Aaron B. Adams would have led a much duller life.

Miriam parked behind the four other cars in the driveway, groped in the back seat for a large straw tote bag, and preceded Kit into the house. Neither residents nor guests were in evidence as they crossed through the huge living room and through the open French windows to the cabaña area next to the pool, which was one of the most imposing features of the Adams house.

Even compared to the house and grounds surrounding it, the pool was large. The previous owner of the house had been told by a mystic that his son was going to be an Olympic swimmer, so he built a full Olympic pool for him to practice in. This was in 1932 when labor was cheap and Sonny was five years old. Thirteen years later, after paying a lot of money to get his son cleared of charges of draft evasion, the father closed the house and moved back to Iowa.

For nine years, the house and the pool lay vacant. Then Adams bought it at auction and moved in, lock, stock, and unwritten memoirs. After two years of starting his memoirs, Adams decided he was too young for such nonsense and took a part-time teaching position at Georgetown. “You understand this is only temporary,” they told him. “Suits me,” he said.

In his spare time he taught a couple of courses for the newly formed CIA, at the behest of some of his old OSS buddies. He tried to give a sense of historical perspective to the business of espionage, and found himself fighting a growing trend to rely less upon men and more upon gadgets. Gradually his job at the university grew into a full-time position. Then he was offered a full professorship with tenure, and discovered that he had become an academic.

Adams was pushing himself out of the pool as they approached. A short, compact man, he looked in very good shape for his fifty-plus years. “Welcome,” he said, shielding his eyes against the sun to stare up at them. “What’s up? Have you got suits, or do you need loaners?”

Miriam held up the straw tote bag. “Still in here from the last time,” she said. “As a matter of fact, I forgot to take them out.”

“Probably mildewed,” Kit said, “and we’ll come down with some exotic form of crotch rot. But we’ll make do.”

Adams nodded thoughtfully. “Togetherness, even in vulgarity. This here modern generation shows promise, as Plato once said. Pick a cabaña and change. Gerald is inside somewhere decanting for the other guests”—he indicated an assortment of the usual academic and government types scattered about the pool area with a wave of his hand—“and if you’ll indicate a preference, I’ll have him deal you in.”

Gerald was a middle-aged war orphan whom Adams had picked up in one of his trips to occupied Europe during “the Big One,” World War II. It was believed that Gerald could not speak; it was certain that he did not. He could, however, understand in almost every language. He served Adams as a sort of majordomo and secretary.

“Coffee,” Kit said.

“If you could have him mix me a Bloody Mary,” Miriam said, “I’d appreciate it.”

“Whatever you appreciate,” Adams said, “I arrange.” He did his best to affect a lecherous leer.

“If you weren’t the head of my department, I’d tell you what you look like when you do that. And to hell with your togetherness!” And she turned around and strode toward a cabaña.

“An abrupt mood change,” Adams commented, pushing himself to his feet and heading toward the poolside intercom.

“Women,” Kit said, shaking his head sadly in an exaggerated gesture of compassion. “Unstable.”

“I understand they make the best mothers,” Adams said. “I myself have attempted to make an occasional mother, with varying degrees of success.”

“How’d you like to have a talk with me for a few minutes?” Kit asked. “After I change into my suit, so it doesn’t attract attention poolside.”

“We can wander off and look at my petunias,” Adams said. “By the way, when you encounter Miriam in the cabaña, see if you can find out what she thinks I look like when I do that,” he added, once more composing his face into a leer.

“Fair enough,” Kit said, and headed off to change and talk to Miriam.

“Groucho Marx,” he said when he returned in his navy-blue swim trunks.

“Exactly the effect I was trying for,” Adams said. “The two heroes of my youth were Groucho Marx and Bugs Bunny. I’ve given up trying to look like Bugs Bunny. Are you and Miriam having a fight?”

“Not about anything important,” Kit said. “Only about my job and politics.”

“That’s good,” Adams said. “I was afraid it was over food or sex or something important. I like you both, and I’d hate having to see you on alternate weeks. You’d never have stood a chance with Miriam in the first place if I hadn’t thought it destructive of departmental morale to make passes at assistant professors.”

“I know,” Kit said, “and I appreciate that.”

They walked over to what Adams referred to as the “more or less formal garden” on the east side of the house, and stood staring at the carefully sculptured rows of varicolored blooms.

“It’s about the job,” Kit said.

“I assumed,” Adams told him. “Who else can you talk to about the Company but an old lag like me?”

“A strange thing happened to me yesterday,” Kit said. “And it doesn’t exactly involve the Company.”

“Tell me about it,” Adams said, looking interested.

Kit described the trip to the police station in the early morning, the events leading up to the phone call, and the call itself.

“So you got them off,” Adams said.

“Yes. I don’t know whether I was right or wrong, but I couldn’t see that I had any choice.” He picked up a twig and broke it between his fingers. “What do you think?”

“There are several interesting possibilities that present themselves,” Adams said. He ticked them off on his fingers. “One: it may not have been the President, or even the White House, you spoke to.”

“What?” Kit looked startled. “I hadn’t thought of that! How—?”

”Easy,” Adams said. “According to prearranged plan, in case they get caught they tell the police to call you, and then they tell you to call the White House. Meanwhile, under the street by the police station, a henchman is splicing the phone wire and practicing his imitation of that famous presidential voice.”

“Son of a bitch!” Kit said.

“Two,” Adams said, “it was Ober and the President, and everything they told you was completely true.”

“I vote for two,” Kit said.

“Three,” Adams said, “it was Ober and the President, but the whole story was a complete fabrication. Which would imply that a group of common criminals have something so serious on the White House that they can make the President and his chief domestic adviser lie for them.

“Four: The President of the United States, for purely political motives, had his agents burglarizing and bugging the offices of the Democratic National Committee.

“Five: Ober was doing it without the President’s knowledge or consent, but was able to get him to agree to cover it up.”

“I don’t like any of those but two,” Kit said. “I’ve been mulling over variants of three, four, and five all day while I typed out my report.”

“Your response was completely correct in any of those scenarios except one,” Adams said. “And if the President tells you to do something that’s proper to do, then it’s your job to do it. I agree that option one isn’t very likely.”

“You think it’s proper of me to help get off his men if what they were doing was actually a burglary for political motives?”

“If you knew that for sure,” Adams said, “then no.”

“What you’re saying is that the President’s motives are none of my concern, is that right?”

“Not at all. What I’m saying is that it is not your privilege to guess at the President’s motives. It is, however, your job to make a full report of this to your superiors and let them evaluate the President’s motives and what to do about them.”

“I’m doing that. But I’d really like to figure this out, for my own sake. None of it really makes sense. Cubans infiltrating the Democrats?”

“I doubt that,” Adams said. “But I’m quite willing to believe that the President of the United States thinks there are Communist agents secretly supporting the party that’s trying to oust him—implacable enemy of communism that he is. The man doesn’t seem to trust anyone.”

“Don’t you think it could have been just a political move?”

Adams shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “But that’s the most stupid of the possibilities. Any professional intelligence officer would have assessed the gain against the possible damage and dropped the idea. If you get caught, you could blow the whole campaign, and if you don’t get caught, what can you learn? Where the next pep rally is going to be held? No, if I had to vote, I’d go with the President’s paranoia.”

“But you think I did right in going along with it?”

“I’m not going to give you right or wrong,” Adams said, “but you did what you had to do. You had no acceptable choice.”

Kit nodded. “But it’s nice to hear someone else say it.”

Adams looked up at the gathering clouds for a moment, “I’ll tell you something else.”

“What’s that?”

“Be prepared for a sudden job offer from the White House.”

“What kind?”

“I don’t know, but it will either be in the Executive Office Building or in Antarctica. And listen—either way, keep in touch.”

PRESIDENT REELECTED

LANDSLIDE 61% MAJORITY

carries every state but massachusetts:

fails to carry district of columbia

—Washington Post, November 8, 1972

1. Special Investigations Unit.