Balance of Power

answer.'

    The smile lingered. 'What about my previous answer did you fail to understand?'

    Lenihan emitted a short, sardonic laugh. Hearing this, Nolan froze, but did not look toward Lenihan. Sitting beside the President, Avram Gold—clearly under instructions not to intervene—raised his eyebrows at Nolan as if to ask what he'd expected. Unable to resist, he inquired, 'Would you like the reporter to read the answer back?'

    Scowling, Nolan checked his watch, as though to indicate that any attenuation of the deposition was Kilcannon's own doing. Then, wisely, he gave up on the question altogether.

    'In giving the interview, Mr. President, didn't you consider that you might inflame Mr. Bowden to violence?'

    'To the ultimate violence? I couldn't know. I was certain he'd not only be inflamed, but humiliated. But no more than he would have been by a story in a hometown paper with a circulation of a million, which then would have been picked up by every national and local media outlet in America . . .'

    'Given that, did you take additional measures to protect Joan and Marie?'

    'They were with us at the time, under the protection of the Secret Service. What I did do was make sure that the private security firm which we'd hired to watch Joan's home also met them at the airport.' The President paused, and his voice became soft with regret. 'What I failed to consider was that your client's advertisement would induce Bowden to travel to a gun show in Las Vegas, where a convicted spousal abuser could acquire a Lexington P-2 and Eagle's Claw bullets. And that those at risk included Lara's mother.'

    This stopped Nolan. For a moment, he seemed undecided as to his course. Then, from a folder to his right, he slid a copy of a document with the jagged scrawl Sarah knew at once to be John Bowden's.

    As she watched, appalled, Nolan asked the reporter to mark the paper as 'Kilcannon Exhibit One,' and then slid it in front of the President. 'Can you identify this document?'

    Gazing at Bowden's words on paper, Kilcannon seemed to pale. 'It's a letter from John Bowden. The contents speak for themselves.'

    'In that John Bowden blames you for the murder he intends to commit?'

    'Yes.'

    'Given this, would you still have exposed him before an audience of roughly forty million people?'

    The President drew a breath, still gazing at the fateful words. 'There isn't any aspect of what I did,' he answered softly, 'that I don't question every day. And will, every day for the rest of my life. But I truly believe I did everything I could to protect Lara's family—including disarm John Bowden.' Pausing, the President looked up at last. 'But there was no way, Mr. Nolan, to completely protect them from your client.'

    Briefly, Nolan seemed taken aback. Then, with a rising undertone of anger, he asked, 'Isn't it true, Mr. President, that you're attempting to blame Lexington Arms for your own decision to provoke a man who you knew was prone to violence?'

    The words 'Mr. President,' Sarah noted, were spoken with a slighting emphasis which suggested that Kerry Kilcannon did not deserve the office. 'No,' Kilcannon answered in a cold but even tone. 'I'm blaming Lexington for its own decision to market uniquely lethal weapons to criminals and wife-beaters. I blame Lexington for its failure—even after this tragedy took three members of Lara's family and three members of other families—to lift a finger to keep still more deaths from happening. Or do anything at all, it seems, except to hire you to deflect their blame onto what remains of a family still grieving for our losses.

    'That's why you've brought me here—despite the fact, which you occasionally seem to recognize, that I am the President and, as such, somewhat busy. Perhaps even busier than the President of Lexington Arms. Nonetheless, I'm answering your questions. So where, I have to wonder, is Mr. Callister?

    'I haven't heard from him. He hasn't been seen. In fact, Professor Gold tells me that you're refusing to produce him for a deposition. What are you afraid of, Mr. Nolan? That the experience will be insuffi ciently congenial for him? Please assure him for me that he'll be treated with respect.'

    Watching, Sarah felt a deep surge of satisfaction, both because the President had, at last, retaliated and because he had so pointedly contrasted his own availability with Callister's. Were she John Nolan, Sarah thought, she would burn the videotape before anyone could see it.

    This seemed to have occurred to him. Staring at the President, Nolan shed the last veneer of courtesy. 'Isn't it true,' he asked in a hectoring tone, 'that Mr. Callister refused your demands to change Lexington's marketing practices?'

    'No, it isn't true,' Kilcannon answered calmly. 'But he did decline my request in that regard. Both before and after the murders.'

    'And it's also true, is it not, that you blame the SSA for Congress's failure to enact the kind of gun laws you think should exist?'

    'In some measure, yes. I also blame myself for failing to get them enacted. I'm trying to rectify that.'

    'In fact,' Nolan pressed, 'isn't this lawsuit part of an effort to do that?'

    'Whose effort? I'm not a party. And if anything tarnishes your client, it will be the facts you seem to be trying to suppress . . .'

    'Isn't,' Nolan snapped, 'Mary Costello conducting this lawsuit at your direction?'

    'Mary,' Kilcannon answered, 'has never talked with me about this lawsuit.'

    Nolan scowled in disbelief. 'Have you discussed it with Ms. Dash?'

    Briefly, the President glanced in Sarah's direction. 'I admire Ms. Dash's work. But I've never spoken to her before this morning.'

    'But you do know Mr. Lenihan. And have for some time.'

    'True.'

    'In fact, he's your leading supporter.'

    'I try to encourage a little competition for that title. But he's certainly been supportive.'

    'And have you discussed this lawsuit with Mr. Lenihan?'

    'Once. Shortly after the murders, he asked me if Mary might require representation. I replied that, if she did, I couldn't think of anyone better. Nothing more was said. Sometime thereafter, I learned that Mary had engaged Mr. Lenihan as cocounsel.'

    'Do you know how Mary Costello came to engage Ms. Dash?'

    The President shrugged. 'I think Lara may have suggested it. What did Mary say?'

    Frustrated, Nolan renewed his attack. 'Did you discuss Ms. Dash's engagement with the First Lady?'

    The President sat straighter, looking straight at Nolan. 'Lara's my wife, Mr. Nolan. Three of her family members were slaughtered. You can fairly surmise that, from time to time, the subject comes up—even, on occasion, Mary's lawsuit. In fact, we may even discuss this deposition over dinner. But that's not for you to know.'

    'Are you refusing to answer?'

    At this, Avram Gold began to speak. Gently, the President placed a hand on his wrist. 'Lara and I may be public figures,' he told Nolan. 'But we have the same privilege of privacy between us as any other couple . . .'

    'Are you,' Nolan cut in, 'directing this lawsuit through Mrs. Kilcannon?'

    ' 'Directing'? No. That's the job of the lawyers, I would have thought.'

    'Then you can clear all this up, Mr. President, by telling me whether you're using your wife as a conduit for your instructions to Mary Costello and her attorneys . . .'

    'There's about to be some 'directing' done,' Avram Gold interjected. 'By me. By asking your last question you're trying to get the President to waive the marital privilege, now and in the future. I'm directing the President