Is it theoretically possible to set things up in such a way as to fool our people?' O'Day asked rhetorically. 'Yes, sir, maybe it is, but to do that would take months of preparation, and they didn't have months. It really comes down to one thing: the decision to call the joint session happened while that aircraft was over mid-Pacific.'
Much as she wanted to, Price couldn't counter that argument. She'd run her own quick investigation on Patrick O'Day. Emil Jacobs had reinstituted the post of roving inspector years before, and collected people who preferred investigation to management. O'Day was an agent for whom running a field division had little appeal. He was part of a small team of experienced investigators who worked out of the Director's office, an unofficial inspectorate which went into the field to keep an eye on things, mainly sensitive cases. He was a good cop who hated desk work, and Price had to concede that he knew how to run an investigation, better yet was someone outside the chain of command who wouldn't ham things up in order to get a promotion. The inspector had driven to the House in a four-by-four pickup—he wore cowboy boots! she noticed—and probably wanted publicity about as much as he wanted the pox. So Assistant Director Tony Caruso, titularly in charge of the investigation, would report to the Department of Justice, but Patrick O'Day would short-circuit the chain to report directly to Murray—who would, in turn, farm O'Day to the President so as to garner personal favor. She'd figured Murray for a sharp operator. Bill Shaw, after all, had used him as personal trouble-shooter. And Murray's loyalty would be to the institution of the FBI. A man could have a worse agenda, she admitted to herself. For O'Day it was simpler still. He investigated crimes for a living, and while he appeared to jump too quickly to conclusions, this transplanted cowboy was doing it all by the book. You had to watch the good ol' boys. They were so good at hiding their smarts. But he would never have made the Detail, she consoled herself.
'ENJOY YOUR VACATION?' Mary Pat Foley was either in very early or in very late, Clark saw. It came to him again that of all the senior people in government, President Ryan was probably getting the most sleep, little though that might be. It was a hell of a way to run a railroad. People simply didn't perform well when denied rest for an extended period of time, something he'd learned the hard way in the field, but put a guy into high office, and he immediately forgot that—such pedestrian items as human factors faded into the mist. And then a month later, they wondered how they'd screwed up so bad. But that was usually after they got some poor line-animal killed in the field.
'MP, when the hell is the last time you slept?' Not many people could talk to her that way, but John had been her training officer, once upon a time.
A wan smile. 'John, you're not Jewish, and you're not my mother.'
Clark looked around. 'Where's Ed?'
'On his way back from the Gulf. Conference with the Saudis,' she explained. Though Mrs. Foley technically ranked Mr. Foley, Saudi culture wasn't quite ready to deal with a female King Spook—Queen Spook, John corrected himself with a smile—and Ed was probably better on the conferences anyway.
'Anything I need to know about?'
She shook her head. 'Routine. So, Domingo, did you drop the question?'
'You are playing rough this morning,' Clark observed before his partner could speak.
Chavez just grinned. The country might be in turmoil, but some things were more important. 'Could be worse, Mr. C. I'm not a lawyer, am I?'
'There goes the neighborhood,' John grumbled. Then it was time for business. 'How's Jack doing?'
'I'm scheduled to see him after lunch, but it wouldn't surprise me if they canceled out. The poor bastard must be buried alive.'
'What I saw about how he got roped into this, is what the papers said true?'
'Yes, it is. So, we have a Kelly Girl for President,' the Deputy Director (Operations) posed as a multifaceted inside joke. 'We're going to do a comprehensive threat assessment. I want you two in on it.'
'Why us?' Chavez asked.
'Because I'm tired of having all that done by the Intelligence Directorate. I tell you one thing that's going to happen: we have a President now who understands what we do here. We're going to beef up Operations to the point where I can pick up a phone, ask a question, and get an answer I can understand.'
'PLAN BLUE?' Clark asked, and received a welcome nod. «Blue» had been his last function before leaving the CIA's training facility, known as 'the Farm,' down near the Navy's nuclear-weapons locker at Yorktown, Virginia. Instead of hiring a bunch of Ivy League intellectuals—at least they didn't smoke pipes anymore—he had proposed that the Agency recruit cops, police officers right off the street. Cops, he reasoned, knew about using informants, didn't have to be taught street smarts, and knew about surviving in dangerous areas. All of that would save training dollars, and probably produce better field officers. The proposal had been File-13'd by two successive DDOs, but Mary Pat had known about it from the beginning, and approved the concept. 'Can you sell it?'
'John, you're going to help me sell it. Look how well Domingo here has turned out.'
'You mean I'm not affirmative action?' Chavez asked.
'No, Ding, that's only with his daughter,' Mrs. Foley suggested. 'Ryan will go for it. He isn't very keen on the Director. Anyway, for now I want you two to do your debrief on SANDALWOOD.'
'What about our cover?' Clark asked. He didn't have to explain what he meant. Mary Pat had never got her hands dirty in the field—she was espionage, not the paramilitary side of the Operations Directorate—but she understood just fine.
'John, you were acting under presidential orders. That's written down and in the book. Nobody's going to second-guess anything you did, especially with saving Koga. You both have an Intelligence Star coming for that. President Durling wanted to see you and present the medals himself up at Camp David. I suppose Jack will, too.'
Whoa, Chavez thought behind unblinking eyes, but nice as that thought was, he'd been thinking about something else on the three-hour drive up from Yorktown.
'When's the threat-assessment start?'
'Tomorrow for our side of it. Why?' MP asked.
'Ma'am, I think we're going to be busy.'
'I hope you're wrong,' she replied, after nodding.
'I HAVE TWO procedures scheduled for today,' Cathy said, surveying the breakfast buffet. Since they didn't know what the Ryans liked to have in the morning, the staff had prepared some—actually quite a lot—of everything. Sally and Little Jack thought that was just great— even better, schools were closed. Katie, a recent graduate to real foods, gnawed at a piece of bacon in her hand while contemplating some buttered toast. For children, the immediate has the greatest importance. Sally, now fifteen (going on thirty, her father sometimes lamented), took the longest view of the three, but at the moment that was limited to how her social life would be affected. For all of them, Daddy was still Daddy, whatever job he might hold at the moment. They'd learn different, Jack knew, but one thing at a time.
'We haven't figured that out,' her husband replied, selecting scrambled eggs and bacon for his plate. He'd need his energy today.
'Jack, the deal was that I could still do my work, remember?'
'Mrs. Ryan?' It was Andrea Price, still hovering around like a guardian angel, albeit with an automatic pistol. 'We're still figuring out the security issues and—'
'My patients need me. Jack, Bernie Katz and Hal Marsh can backstop me on a lot of things, but one of my patients today needs me. I have teaching rounds to prep for, too.' She checked her watch. 'In four hours.' Which was true, Ryan didn't have to ask. Professor Caroline Ryan, M.D., F.A.C.S., was top-gun for driving a laser around a retina. People came from all over the world to watch her work.
'But schools are—' Price stopped, reminding herself that she knew better.
'Not medical schools. We can't send patients home. I'm sorry. I know how complicated things are for everybody, but I have people who depend on me, too, and I have to be there for them.' Cathy looked at the adult faces in the kitchen for a decision that would go her way. The kitchen staff—all sailors—moved in and out like mobile statues, pretending not to hear anything. The Secret Service people adopted a different blank expression, one with more discomfort in it.
The First Lady was supposed to be an unpaid adjunct to her husband. That was a rule which needed changing at some point. Sooner or later, after all, there would be a female President, and that would really upset the applecart, a fact well known but studiously ignored to this point in American history. The usual political wife was a woman who appeared at her husband's side with an adoring smile and a few carefully picked words, who
