Balance of Power

    Tensing, both Nolan and Fancher eyed the witness. Sarah glanced at one lawyer, then the other, and calmly asked, 'What did Dane say to you at the meeting?'

    'Same objection,' Fancher cut in, turning to Nolan and the witness. 'The question seeks to probe confidential discussion of political and legislative strategy protected by the First Amendment. The SSA requests that Mr. Callister not answer.'

'So directed,' Nolan told his client.

    Sarah kept watching Callister. 'Would you classify your meeting with Mr. Dane as a 'confidential discussion of political and legislative strategy'?'

    Callister folded his hands, gazing silently at the table. At length he looked up at Sarah with a new aura of equanimity. 'Not in the main.'

    Sarah smiled faintly. 'Then when you answer my questions, please leave out the 'confidential discussions of political and legislative strategy.' '

    'Objection,' Nolan snapped with rising annoyance. 'It's impossible to segregate what may be a general discussion from the legislative and political discussions which are intertwined with it. I direct the witness not to answer any questions about his private discussions with Mr. Dane.'

    Sarah turned to the witness. 'Do you think you can separate 'legislative and political discussions' from whatever else you and Dane talked about?'

    'I believe I can, yes.'

    Nolan grasped Callister's wrist. 'As counsel for Lexington Arms,' he said in a peremptory tone, 'I am directing you not to answer Ms. Dash's questions, or to attempt to distinguish what is confidential from what is not.'

    Callister stared at Nolan's hand. 'You've given me your advice, John. I get to decide whether or not to take it.'

    Removing his hand, Nolan turned to Sarah. 'I request a break to consult with my client.'

    Sarah forced herself to remain low key. 'Mr. Callister?'

    'You can take a break,' Callister told Nolan. 'I'm fine.'

    In a tone of alarm, Fancher interjected, 'I protest the continuation of the deposition without time to discuss with Mr. Callister the implications of your questions for the First Amendment rights of Lexington and the SSA.'

    Shrugging, Callister turned to Sarah. 'Go ahead, Ms. Dash.'

    Ignoring Fancher, Sarah asked, 'During that meeting, Mr. Callister, what did Mr. Dane say to you?'

    'Several things,' Callister answered in a calm, incisive voice. 'That anyone who dealt with President Kilcannon was selling out the Second Amendment. That if Lexington made this deal he would use the SSA's newsletter, the Internet, and grassroots organizations to urge every American gun owner to boycott all our products and every gun dealer to bar us from their stores. That the SSA magazine would refuse to run our advertisements, and that other gun publications would follow suit.

    'With respect to private lawsuits like this one,' Callister went on, 'our defense is financed by the Heritage Fund, which is principally funded, and therefore controlled, by the SSA itself. Dane warned me they wouldn't fund the defense for any company who cut a deal with Kilcannon.' Turning to Fancher, Callister said evenly, 'At the end of his summary, Mr. Fancher, your client promised me that settling with the President would lead to the destruction of Lexington Arms. I didn't take that to be a 'First Amendment discussion of political and legislative strategy.' '

    Sarah felt as stunned as John Nolan and Fancher. Callister's tone suggested a man who was finally and inexorably fed up; that his last response delivered the SSA to the edge of an antitrust violation seemed to concern him not at all. 'In connection with his threats against Lexington,' Sarah managed to inquire, 'did Mr. Dane mention your fellow manufacturers?'

    Callister turned back to her. 'He asked if I remembered Martin Bresler. Then he wondered aloud if I didn't think the others would be happy to carve up the market share of someone who'd just sold them out.' Briefly, Callister's voice betrayed his bitterness. 'But just to be sure I didn't strike a deal, someone leaked the negotiations to the Washington Post.

    'All of a sudden, there were demonstrators in front of our company, and I was getting death threats on the Internet.' Pausing, Callister finished quietly, 'The day before the President's wedding, the board ordered me to pull the plug.'

    Sitting back, Sarah surveyed the scene in front of her: Callister, now dissociated from the lawyers, Fancher scribbling notes with the fury of a slasher, Nolan, straining to cope with a loss of control which, in his experience, surely was unprecedented. 'George,' Nolan said in a strained voice, 'your testimony has implications far beyond the concerns of the SSA. You have obligations to your company.'

    Callister turned to him with a look of mild disdain. 'Yes,' he said simply, 'I do.'

    'After the Costello murders,' Sarah cut in, 'did you take any further action?'

    'George,' Nolan repeated, 'I'm imploring you to take a break.'

    Callister turned from him. 'I went to the board,' he told Sarah, 'and said enough was enough. The shooter had used a P-2, and the eleventh Eagle's Claw bullet in a forty-round magazine had killed that little girl I'd met at Camp David. It was past time for reaching an arrangement with the President, if that was even possible with all that had happened.' Callister's tone grew soft. 'I knew Kilcannon would do everything in his power to destroy Lexington Arms unless we gave him what he needed, and that was what I told them.'

    His quiet statement, with its implicit reference to the lawsuit, reminded Sarah of her first call from Lara Kilcannon. It seemed a long time ago. And for most of that time, she had assumed that George Callister was as callous as Charles Dane. Softly, she said, 'Why couldn't Lexington reach agreement with the President, Mr. Callister?'

    'Lord knows I tried. In fact I told the board I'd resign unless they authorized me to discontinue the P-2 and Eagle's Claw.' Callister gazed at the table, as though drawn into memory. 'I guaranteed them there'd be more lawsuits coming—if not from the First Lady or her sister, then from the other families, and that the victims had too much public sympathy for us to risk a trial. But before the board could hold a vote, Dane called to ask for a second meeting . . .'

    'Mr. Callister,' Nolan said formally, 'I'm forced to admonish you to consider the legal implications of your actions here today. By ignoring my instructions, you're acting in conflict with the interests of your company.'

    Callister shrugged. 'Someone is. Maybe you should hear the rest before you decide it's me.'

    Tense, Sarah sensed that what was to follow would dwarf all that had come before. 'At the second meeting,' she asked swiftly, 'what did Dane have to say?'

    'That the SSA's objective was to get rid of Kerry Kilcannon. Rather than make a pact with the devil, I should just get out of the way and let them work with the Republicans on a tort reform bill which would get us off the hook.'

    Sarah heard Lenihan laugh softly. 'That conversation,' Fancher protested, 'is the epitome of political and legislative strategy . . .'

    'Did you respond to Dane's suggestion?' Sarah broke in.

    'Yes. I said that Congress had never passed a gun immunity bill and sure as hell couldn't now. And that Kilcannon would veto it if they did.'

    'How did Dane react?'

    Briefly Callister glanced at Fancher. 'He said that the SSA would commit whatever resources were needed to pass tort reform in both houses of Congress. Then he told me something that I couldn't understand: that Kilcannon could be handled if he got in the way.'

    The last words of his answer hit Sarah hard. At once, she was intensely aware of the video cam focused on George Callister. 'Did Mr. Dane tell you what he meant by that?'