as to ask why this female spook gets preferred treatment?'
'Sure,' replied Evan, his gaze settled on the chief of staff.
'That woman saved my life and you're not going to ruin hers by letting her own people know you've got her under your well-advertised White House shotgun. You've done enough of that around here.'
'All right, all right! But let's get one thing clear. If she's the sieve, you turn her over to me.'
'That'll depend,' said Kendrick, sitting back.
'On what, for Christ's sake?'
'On the how and the why.'
'More riddles, Congressman?'
'Not for me,' answered Evan, suddenly rising from the chair. 'Get me out of here, Dennison. Also, since I can't go home, either to my house in Virginia or even out to Colorado, without being swamped, can someone in this booby hatch rent me a lodge or a cabin in the country under another name? I'll pay for a month or whatever's necessary. I just want a few days to figure things out before I go back to the office.'
'It's been taken care of,' said the chief of staff abruptly. 'Actually, it was Jennings's idea—to put you on ice over the weekend in one of those sterile houses in Maryland.'
'What the hell is a sterile house? Please use language I can understand.'
'Let's put it this way. You're the guest of the President of the United States in a place no one can find that is reserved for people we don't want found. It dovetailed with my considered opinion that Langford Jennings should make the first public statements about you. You've been seen here, and as sure as rabbits have little rabbits the word'll get out.'
'You're the scenario writer. What do we say—what do you say, since I'm in isolation?'
'That's easy. Your safety. It's the President's primary concern after conferring with our counter-terrorist experts. Don't worry, our writers will come up with something that'll make the women cry into their handkerchiefs and the men want to go out and march in a parade. And since Jennings has the last word in these things, it'll probably include some whacked-up image of a powerful knight of the Round Table looking after a brave younger brother who carried out a joint, dangerous mission. Shit!'
'And if there's any truth to the reprisal theory,' added Kendrick, 'it'll make me a target.'
That'd be nice,' agreed Dennison, nodding again.
'Call me when you've made arrangements for the Rashad woman.'
Evan sat in a long leather chair in the study of the impressive sterile house on Maryland's Eastern Shore in the township of Cynwid Hollow. Outside, within the walls of the floodlit grounds, guards moved in and out of the lights as they patrolled every foot of the acreage, their rifles at the ready, their eyes alert.
Kendrick snapped off the third replay he had watched on television of President Langford Jennings's suddenly called press conference regarding one Congressman Evan Kendrick of Colorado. It was more outrageous than Dennison had projected, filled with gut-wrenching pauses accompanied by a constant series of well-rehearsed grins that so obviously conveyed the pride and the agony beneath the surface of the smile. The President once again said everything in general terms and nothing specific—except in one area: Until all proper security measures are in place I have asked Congressman Kendrick, a man we are all so proud of, to remain in protective seclusion. And with this request, I hereby give dire warning. Should cowardly terrorists anywhere make any attempt on the life of my good friend, my close colleague, someone I look upon no less than I would a younger brother, the full might of the United States will be employed by ground, sea and air against determined enclaves of those responsible. Determined? Oh, my God!
A telephone rang. Evan looked around trying to find out where it was. It was across the room on a desk; he swung his legs down and walked to the startlingly intrusive instrument.
'Yes?'
'She's flying over on military transport with a senior attache from the embassy in Cairo. She's listed as a secretarial aide, the name's unimportant. The ETA is seven o'clock in the morning our time. She'll be in Maryland by ten at the latest.'
