During the silence, Apple Blossom looked around the room, saw the trappings of the office, the history, the nervous Secret Service guards, aides on the phone getting further updates.
Their minds flashed over a lifetime of decisions, over decades of fear and avarice merged into a single, undefinable but overpoweringly lusty emotion. They thought of the stark reality of what this moment would bring with it.
Of the universe that had been implied by the old man’s words.
They looked into the eyes of that desperate old man and of the blank German adviser who had replaced the first lady as the president’s only intimate; both begging in their own way to fulfill his and their destinies.
“Mr. President,” DeWitt said with sober sincerity after a brief, whispered conversation with Michael, “for the sake of the nation, I accept.”
It was a small theater, steeply tiered, with three-quarters of the seventy-five seats surrounding the tiny stage. The stage itself had two comfortable chairs, a lectern with a microphone, and a floor-to-ceiling mosaic of a small man—holding a bamboo spade—slowly chipping away at a massive mountain.
And above it, in large red letters trimmed in gold, the motto of the Long-Range Study Organization.
Time is our ultimate ally.
The room was packed, filled with men and women in faded gray or dark blue shapeless uniforms. Each with pad, pen, and laser pointer. All carefully arranged and undisturbed as they waited for the event to begin. There was no talking among themselves, no restless rustlings, just calm patience and anticipation.
On the stage a man in a suit—older than the rest, somehow different—sat in one of the chairs. He looked them all in the eye, making mental notes as to the comportment of each for correction or compliment later.
To his right was Xi. Hands folded in his lap, the slightest of smiles; he looked every inch the humble farmer waiting to be congratulated for a bumper crop of rice.
Nothing anywhere in the hall or on the stage indicated
that the group was over one hundred feet belowground, surrounded by a company of elite guards and state-of-the-art anti-eavesdropping gear.
As the hands on the antique Chin dynasty clock struck twenty minutes past the hour, the man in the suit stood, as if propelled by the minute hand. He walked to the microphone, bowed his head toward the audience, then toward Xi.
They all stood, bowing deeply toward him. Then, settling back in their seats, they uncapped their pens, opened their pads, and waited.
“Friends,” the man began in his strained, emphysemic voice, “these are dangerous times. Our enemies would seek to destroy us at every turn. Our allies become corrupt and useless, the unaligned continue to be seduced by the falsehoods and promiscuity of the West.”
“But we remain stalwart in our defense of our people’s honor and pride.”
He paused, looking over at Xi, then back at the assemblage.
“I am well pleased at our progress on this score. General Xi.”
Even as the suited man began applauding the approaching general, the rest of the group leaped to their feet and wrapped an enormous ovation around the tiny man. Shouts of “Xi!” and “First chair! rained down on the man, who took it stoically.”
Xi shook the suited man’s hand, then paused while he sat down. The applause instantly ceased.
“Friends, I am unworthy.”
Again applause led by the suited man.
“Friends,” Xi finally continued, “this is a progress report on Project Apple Blossom, as of 0515 this date.”
He opened a file—which he knew by heart—and began reading.
“Since the assassination of Vice President Kroll, the American FBI and CIA have concluded through the Buckley Commission’s investigation, as intended, that the
Dan
Jì
is responsible for the crime. This belief has been bolstered by the discovery of appropriately incriminating evidence at the sites of the factory fire and the tourist massacre. Taiwan has officially and unofficially denied all complicity, have offered complete cooperation to the American investigators in the case.”
“After initial proclamations of the PRC’s probable hand in this, they have even retreated on that score. Now even the Taiwanese traitors are beginning to believe that the operation was carried out either by renegade members of the Green Tiger, or by the Green Tiger itself without government sanction.” He paused. “We are encouraging that belief both in Taiwan and the United States.”
“Three American Naval Task Forces have taken up positions in the South and East China Seas and the Philippine Sea. They are flying freedom of navigation exercises in the Taiwan Straits and have moved B-1 and Stealth aircraft to their base in the northeast on Okinawa. While no strike appears likely in the short term, the pressure continues to build among American popular opinion for a retaliatory mission of some kind.”
He moved ahead several sections in the file before continuing.
“Vice President Kroll will be buried this afternoon—Washington time—in his home state of Wyoming. The president and full cabinet will be in attendance under maximum possible security. Upon his return to Washington, he will address the nation from the Oval Office and announce he is placing into nomination the name of Jefferson DeWitt—his attorney general—to become the next vice president, and Senator Rodney Buckley to replace DeWitt. The nominations will be approved within the month.”
This time there was no prompting for the applause. Shouts, cheers, genuine love were thrown down at him.
For nearly five minutes he luxuriated in it, then raised his hands for silence.
“This is the people’s victory,” not one man’s. It is a victory that was won due to the hard work of a great many. I
stand here for them, to accept your thanks and answer your questions. He turned to the suited man next to him. “Mr. Chairman?”
“Has any connection been made between our man and the operation? he asked carefully from a list prepared by his staff after Xi’s private briefing earlier.”
“Canvas has reported that the shooters and their facilitators escaped unwitnessed or marked in any way.” Xi seemed completely at ease. “The associate support drawn for this operation performed well and was never suspected. Their supervisors have been eliminated in two automobile crashes and a commercial airliner explosion. Those few voices that cry ‘conspiracy,’ cry
‘Taiwanese
conspiracy, nothing more.’”
The chairman nodded as he read the next question. “What are the prospects for Apple Blossom implementing some form of policy control and on what timetable?”
Xi pretended to deeply ponder that question, although he and the chairman had fastidiously crafted the answer hours before.
“It
is
a forked element of the plan,” he said slowly, as if the words were drawn from deep thought. “We
can
do nothing but rely on momentum and judicious tappings. This, in and of itself, will almost certainly deliver the Democratic nomination for the presidency to Apple Blossom in ten months. With proper funding, he cannot lose the general election and would rise to the presidency within fourteen months.”
“However, I am still cautious of the situation. There are the traitor Pei’s allegations; Congresswoman Alvarez is still a figure of concern; there is the very real possibility of exposure—in some form—prior to November of next year.”
He clasped his hands in front of him, the picture of deep concentration.
“The other fork available to us—in light of this information—is to continue to expedite the situation. President Brackens is an old man in ill health. The pressures on him are enormous. It would be a simple matter to eliminate
him, thereby giving greater policy control to Apple Blossom in the inevitable political confusion that would follow.” He looked contemplative. “From any number of positions or tangents, the elimination of the president
must
, of itself, give us more, perhaps total, control.”
“Another assassination?” the much older and sicker chairman said in shock, not from the prepared cards. His tone was both disapproving and fearful.
Xi shook his head in the finest tradition of grand Chinese theater. “A natural death, Mr. Chairman. A stroke or heart attack at a fortuitous moment.”
The room seemed to relax.
The chairman didn’t.
“You mentioned the congresswoman as a continuing threat,” the chairman said stiffly as he struggled to read his staff’s enlarged typing. “Is there anything new on that score?”
Xi nodded firmly. “There is, Mr. Chairman.”
Technically, at least, it was a beach. Really far more rocks than sand, it was an uncomfortable, if breathtaking, tableau to walk on, around, through. With sheer cliffs on one side, the pounding Mediterranean on the other, and the eons-old shining smooth rocks looking back at you in quiet mocking at your turmoil.
Valerie carried her shoes as she picked her way around the obstacles, concentrating as hard as she could on picking a path around the stones. It was the way she’d found—the only way—to escape thinking in general. Thinking, and crying.
She felt cursed, betrayed, abandoned by God and the devil to roast in a purgatory of her own making. With the ghosts of her children calmly, sadly, looking out at her from every shadow.
So she walked on the rocky beach, and didn’t think, for longer each day.
The tide was going out at the end of another of the interminably beautiful days of this place. Another day of warm breezes, sweet scents, and no news.
She knew the negotiations between the Chinese and the Corsicans had begun, but had heard nothing beyond that. Assumed they were going badly, that her children had already been made to pay for the headstrongness of their insane mother; that the Chinese were delaying to cover that fact.
But the head of the Council had urged patience. And since she was a wanted fugitive in her own country, in this one illegally, as powerless as a human being could be to stop the events she saw unspooling on the evening news nightly, she just grit her teeth and walked the beaches.
Her own limbo in paradise.
When not on the beach, Valerie had been keeping mostly to herself. Despite the debt she owed him, she couldn’t bring herself to talk to Xenos anymore. He’d refused to involve himself any further—as he’d told her in the midst of the chaos—and she’d been led to believe that this was the primary reason the Corsicans chose to negotiate rather than fight.
She understood him, in her mind—he’d been drawn into this thing unwillingly and accidentally—but these days she was ruled by her heart, not her mind.
And her heart couldn’t forgive him.
Avidol had been nice, solicitous, talking to her every day—the weather, her health, small talk meaning nothing—and she understood that he was legitimately concerned for her. But he was an old man from a different time, and she was unwilling to educate him about the kind of man his son was, and the men his son knew that he refused to confront.
The Corsicans were… polite. They saw her, she believed, as an inconvenience. A tool necessary to propel the negotiations for the compensation for Paolo’s murder. A club to hold over the Chinese’s head. But beyond that, she was simply and purely the instrument that had caused Paolo’s death in the first place.
A thing that kept her from looking Franco in the eyes, in the soul, the few times she encountered him.
So she walked.
She looked up from the thin strip of sand, in order to better pick her way around a boulder, suddenly surprised to see someone else on this deserted stretch of ocean’s edge.
Franco, staring out at the water, unmoving, silhouetted by the setting sun.
Embarrassed, she quickly looked for a way off the beach, realizing that her only options were to go back the way she had come or to continue on, past the man. She turned around to go.
“Alvarez!”
Valerie winced when she heard her name called out, freezing with indecision as to whether or not to answer or hurry off the beach.
“Alvarez!”
The voice was closer now, coming toward her. Reluctantly she forced up a nonfrown and turned to face the brother of the boy she’d betrayed.
“Franco.”
He came up to her, his face an angry blank. “It is dangerous for you to walk alone.”
She shrugged. “I need alone.”
He seemed to study her closely. “Me also.” He turned away from her, again looking out at the water, beyond the water.
“Are the, uh, negotiations going well?” She felt she had to ask.
He raised his eyebrows in an expression of both doubt and
I don’t really give a damn.
“Everything with the
Cinesi
is time. They analyze, dissect, repeat, and probe. Then they ask for clarifications.”
“But at least they’re talking, right?” Her voice was strained as she longed to be gone, to not be so physically close to the man she’d so soul-wounded.
The man she had so much in common with.
Franco never looked away from the blue water that reflected the reds and oranges of the sunset as if it were on fire.
“We all die.”
“What?”
He took a deep breath, exhaled it even more deeply, then pointed out at the water.
“Moriamo tutti.
It is an old Corsican belief.”
Valerie felt sick to her stomach. “I, uh, I promised Dr. Jacmil that I would …”
“What it means,” Franco said, ignoring the clearly distraught woman, “is that death is inevitable. We will all, at length, return to the sea that gave us life. It’s comforting somehow. Don’t you think?”
A chill raced through Valerie. An unclean hand clenching her soul to the brink of extinction. Slowly, almost against her will, she moved closer to the Corsican strongman.
“You’ve heard something. A statement,” not a question. “My children…”
Franco shook his head. “No.” I’ve heard nothing. He laughed bitterly. “But then it doesn’t matter, does it?”
Valerie had looked down, saying a private prayer of thanks, but she snapped her head up at that. “What! What did you say?”
Franco just looked at her blankly.
“You bastard,” she whispered. “You unfeeling sonofabitch!” Her anger found its voice and exploded over the man. “It amuses you to play head games with me? To tell me that it doesn’t matter if my babies are dead! That it’s inevitable?”