Josh looked at us both, ‘You got your camera?’
I played dumb. ‘What?’
‘Your camera?’
There was a big laugh. He said, ‘Go on, get up there!’
Sarah and I looked at each other and I thought, Fuck it, we’ve got to do it, it would be unusual not to. Josh took pictures of each of us at the lectern, and one of us together; we put our arms around each other for it and smiled. He threw the camera at me as we walked towards him. ‘Something to show your grandchildren!’ On cue, Sarah and I exchanged the expected coy smile.
We came out of the press conference area and back onto the pathway. Davy was looking at the satellite truck. Josh was still saying hello to everyone he knew and explaining to them why he was here. Davy had made up his mind. ‘Hey, you know what? I think we will go round the other side. It’s kinda busy in there.’ Shading our eyes from a sudden burst of brilliant sunshine, we started to walk up the small flight of stairs that would take us to the same level as the main entrance staircase.
Still no Al or Bill, but we were a bit early. What we were going to do when we pinged them, I hadn’t actually worked out yet. It all depended on the situation. I hoped we could get Josh to take action, alert him that something was wrong, or maybe I’d say that I’d seen people I could positively ID as terrorists. Whatever, it didn’t matter, as long as these people stopped them. All we had to do was find them first.
I asked, ‘Davy, when do the rest of the media arrive, mate? Do they go anywhere to get instructions and stuff like that?’
He pointed back to the press room. ‘The media get a briefing in there at noon. The TV presentation guys won’t pitch up until then. They just have their sound and lighting people rig up first.’
I looked excited. ‘Would it be possible to see the briefing? I’m a bit of a media junkie, I really like that sort of thing.’
Davy looked at me as if I was mad. How could something like that be interesting? ‘Sure, no problem.’
I looked over at Sarah as we walked. She knew what I was doing. All we had to do was keep this up until midday. If the players were going to show, they’d be at the media brief.
We’d reached the bottom of the stairs of the North Portico leading into the mansion. Davy pointed to the stage on the grass opposite, still receiving its finishing touches. He nodded towards Pennsylvania Avenue. ‘The cameras will be on that side of the stage, with the TV reports made from the media area we passed earlier.’ We both nodded and looked extremely interested, which wasn’t difficult. Josh wasn’t so enthralled. He asked Davy, ‘Where to now?’
‘You wanna see the alley?’
We continued to walk past the Executive Mansion towards the east wing. The drive we were walking on went from the white gatehouse the press used and swept in a semicircle to the far right of the lawn, where there was a similar security post. An ERT guy was walking towards it from a line of black Chevy pickups parked in line on the driveway. Their red and blue light racks, darkened windows and antennae made me remember that there were probably more guns within a 200-metre radius of where we were standing than Jim’s had sold in its lifetime. We would have to be careful not to get zapped ourselves when they took on the players.
We now had an uninterrupted view down into the lower area the other side of the staircase. I couldn’t help noticing the paint. It was more cream than white, and it was peeling. We moved a bit further along and went down some steps that took us below the level of the grass. At the bottom, Davy turned and walked backwards so he could face us as he explained, ‘This is the part the public don’t get to see.’ We bent down to get past some large steel ventilation pipes. He pointed at the Executive Mansion. ‘This is really the ground floor. Behind this wall are some of the state rooms, like the Diplomatic Reception Room, the China Room, that kinda thing.’ He indicated the area below us. ‘But this is more interesting… the basement, that’s where it’s at. In fact, there are two basements. Bowling, rest areas, paint shop and repairs. There’s even a bomb shelter down there.’ Looking to the right, I saw windows that opened onto rooms under the White House driveway and lawn.
We came to a white, glass-panelled double door. Actually, it was more grey than white, now. You could tell this was the admin area. Davy kept the door open for me and Sarah. Josh followed.
We were now under the main staircase. Across the way the satellite crew were working under the eagle eye of an ERT escort. Davy gave him a wave. ‘Hi, Jeff, good to see you, man.’
Davy steered us towards the door that was nearest the other entrance, into which all the cables seemed to lead. Once through it, I was hit straight away by the smell: the heavy odour of school dinners and cleaning products that I’d known as a child and which, as I got older, I came to associate with army cookhouses or stairways of low-rent accommodation. We were in a hall about four metres wide, with polished floor tiles. The walls were stone, with a plaster skim and many years’ worth of cream gloss paint. Grooves and concave shapes had been gouged into the plaster by carelessly pushed food trolleys, an empty one of which was parked up in the corridor.
Following the cables, we passed a lift and staircase on our left, then went through another door. It was like walking into a different world. We emerged into the opulent splendour of marble walls and glass chandeliers, hanging from high cross-vaulted ceilings. The smell had disappeared. Blocking the view to our left were two tall brown screens, positioned like a roadblock. Davy and Josh muttered greetings to the ERT and two Secret Service agents who were in the area. One of them had a blue tie with golfers in various poses, the other had a yellow one covered in little biplanes.
Davy said, ‘This is the ground floor hallway. We can’t see down it today as the president will be here later on. He won’t want to see all this stuff trailing around.’ He was pointing to the cabling.
Sarah wanted to know more. ‘Why, what’s happening in here? I thought everything was going on outside?’
Two television technicians walked past from left to right, escorted by their ERT minder. Josh was still talking quietly to the two Secret Service guys.
Davy whispered, ‘At about eleven, Arafat, Netanyahu and the president will be in the Diplomatic Reception Room for coffee.’ He nodded his head towards the TV crew, who were now walking back towards us. ‘These guys are rigging up a remote for CNN that’s going to put out live coverage. The leaders stay there for twenty to thirty minutes, then move out for an early lunch.’
Sarah was trying to work out where the Diplomatic Reception Room was, pointing past the screens. ‘That’s the oval-shaped room down there on the right, isn’t it?’
Davy nodded. ‘Yeah, after lunch they then move to the Blue Room. That’s the same shape and directly above on the first floor. Then, at one o’clock, they walk out onto the lawn and get blasted by the heavenly choir.’ He screwed up his face again at the thought of 200 kids out of tune.
Josh came over and joined us. ‘Hey, guys, I think we’d better move on.’ We got the hint. The Secret Service guys didn’t want us around so near coffee time.
We started down the corridor to the right, following the cables. Davy sparked up, pointing at a large white double door at the end of the corridor. ‘That leads to the west wing, where the briefing area is.’ The cable went through a door on the left of the corridor. We turned right and entered one of the admin areas. The smell came back to me. To the left was another lift. ‘That’s the service elevator for the State Dining Room.’ Davy was clearly enjoying his role as tour guide. ‘It’s directly above us on the first floor.’ To the right of the lift was a spiral staircase.
We stopped by the elevator. Davy had a huge grin on his face. ‘I gotta show you folks the burn marks you Brits made last time you made an unannounced visit!’
A trolley headed towards us, pushed by an efficient-looking, mid-fifties black guy in black trousers, waistcoat, tie and a very crisply laundered white shirt. It was laden with coffee pots, cups and saucers, biscuits and all sorts. The guy said, ‘Excuse me, gentlemen,’ then saw Sarah and added, ‘and lady,’ in a very courteous manner as he cruised past, the cups rattling on the metal trolley. Basically, of course, he was just telling us to get the fuck out of the way. He was a man with a mission.
We climbed down the spiral staircase as Davy continued his running commentary. ‘We have two other elevators, one hundred and thirty-two rooms and thirty-three bathrooms.’
Josh chipped in. ‘And seven staircases.’
I tried to raise a smile of acknowledgement. At any other time this would be interesting, but not now.
At the bottom we stopped by a pair of fire doors with thick wooden panels inset with two rectangular strips of wired, fire-resistant glass, and covered with dirty handmarks where they got continuously pushed. Above them sat a large slab of stone supporting the archway. Black scorch marks were clearly visible.
‘We’ve kept them there just as a little reminder of the sort of thing that happens when you guys come to town. Not that you stayed that long; we’d had more than enough of you by then.’
There was more laughter. I saw Sarah check her watch.
Davy said, ‘You know, people think that it was called the White House after you Brits burned it down. Not so, it only got its name in 1901, under…’ He turned to Josh for the answer.
‘Roosevelt.’ Josh looked at us sheepishly. ‘Hey, if you work here you have to know these things.’
There wasn’t much we could say, and there was only so much burned stone we could look at. After a minute or so, Davy said, ‘OK, let’s go bowl a few.’
27
As we pushed our way through the fire doors, I could see maybe twenty-five or thirty metres of white painted corridor in front of me, each side of which were white wooden doors slightly inset into the walls. The whole area had a functional feel. It was lit by strip lighting, with secondary lighting boxes positioned at key points in case of power failure or fire. The same cookhouse-and-polish smell hung in the air. There was no activity down here at all. Our footsteps squeaked on the tiles and echoed along the corridor.
We came to a pile of cardboard boxes and bulging bin liners stacked against the wall. ‘It’s just like any other house,’ Davy said. ‘All the junk goes into the basement.’
We passed several of the white doors and came to a grey metal one with a slowly flashing red bulb above it. Davy pointed up. ‘Let’s see who’s in.’ He swiped his ID card through a security lock and said, ‘Welcome to Crisis Four.’
He opened the door and gestured us in. I followed Sarah into a darkened room which contained a bank of at least twenty CCTV screens, set into the wall in banks of three. Each carried a different picture, with a time code bar at the bottom ticking away the milliseconds. The coloured views were of large, richly decorated rooms, and hundreds of metres of corridors and colonnades. On a desktop that ran the whole length of the console, illuminated by small down-lighters, were banks of telephones, microphones and clipboards.
I went in and moved to one side so that Josh could follow. The temperature was cooler in here; I could hear the air-conditioning humming gently above me. Lined up in front of the bank of screens were four office chairs on castors. The sole occupant of the room was sitting on one of them, dressed in ERT black, his baseball cap illuminated by the screens as he mumbled into one of the phones.
I looked at Sarah. Her eyes were glued to the screens; I could see the light from them reflecting off her face.
The phone went down and Josh called out, ‘Yo, Top Cat! How goes it?’
TC spun round in his chair and raised both arms. ‘Heyyya, fella! I’m good. It’s been a while.’ He was white and looked in his mid-thirties, with a very smart, well-trimmed moustache.
They shook hands and Josh introduced us. ‘This is Nick, and this is Sarah, they’re from the UK. Friends of mine. This is TC.’ We both walked over to him, and he stood up to shake hands. His chin already had shadow and he looked as if he needed five or six shaves a day; either that, or he’d been on duty all night. He was maybe about five foot six, with short dark-brown hair under his black cap.
TC’s firm grip contrasted with his very soft Southern accent, but both oozed confidence. ‘What have you seen so far?’
‘Josh has been showing us what happened the last time the Brits were down here.’
Sarah had a question to ask Davy. ‘Do you think it would be possible to see the State Dining Room? It’s just that I’m a big fan of Jackie O and…’
Davy looked at TC, who shrugged apologetically. ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you folks that no-one can go upstairs today.’
Josh felt that he had to explain. ‘Access depends on what is going on. Just about any other day would have been fine. Hey, thousands of people visit most days; it’s one of Washington’s biggest attractions.’
Sarah and I both started waffling variations on the theme of, ‘It’s no problem, it’s great just being here. We’re really enjoying it.’
Davy sounded like he had a good idea. ‘I tell you what, from here you can see it all anyway.’ He pointed at the screens, and then proceeded to give us a quick rundown. ‘As I said, this room is Crisis Four. It’s one of the control centres from where any incident in the White House or grounds can be monitored and controlled. Which control centre is used depends on where the incident occurs.’