Line of Succession
- Автор: Гарфилд Брайан
- Год: 1972
- Язык: английский
- Год: Delacorte Press
- ISBN: 978-0440048473
- Жанр: Политические детективы
Электронная книга - «Line of Succession». Краткое содержание книги:
It all happened so fast: the terrorist bombings of Congress which killed nearly a hundred senators and congressmen; the incredible kidnapping of the President-Elect, Clifford Fairlie.
Tough, veteran agent David Lime was summoned to track down the kidnappers, who threatened to kill Fairlie if the captured terrorists were not set free. And behind the scenes, ruthless men battled for the glory of the highest office in the land.
The rescue efforts swung into high gear. It became a vast, global manhunt. The entire world watched in frozen horror.
But only two men had the power to shape the end of this chilling, savage drama — agent Lime and the terrorist leader for whom hate had become a holy mission.
He turned, a heavy deliberation in the movement, toward Howard Brewster. “Mr. President, when I accepted the nomination at Denver I accepted the responsibility that went with it.”
“You didn’t campaign for that nomination very hard.”
“No. I didn’t. I was a dark horse, admitted.”
“Have you ever campaigned for anything very hard, Dex?”
“I think I have.” He smiled slowly. “Campaigned pretty hard against you, didn’t we.”
Brewster didn’t bat an eye. “That was Fairlie’s campaign.”
“I think I had a hand in it. Am I flattering myself?”
“Not at all. You won him a lot of votes — you probably swung the election. But balancing that forty-foot pole takes a different kind of campaigning.” The President’s cigar had gone out. He found a new one in his pocket. “The hell with it. We’ll have to do the best we can in nine days, that’s all. At least you’ve been a long time on the Hill and you haven’t made too many enemies. FDR came in, he was a state governor, the only people he knew were people who hated him, he didn’t know the first thing about dealing with the club. It worked out — it always does.”
Ethridge had the distinct feeling the President was talking mainly to convince himself — and that he wasn’t succeeding. The pale eyes mirrored that. You’re not FDR, Dex. You’ll never have his drive in a million years.
Well, Ethridge thought, we’ll see about that. And as he reached his decision a surge of exultation lifted him.
The President was on the telephone. “Bill? Update me.” The big face nodding, the eyes brooding into space. He listened for several minutes with an actor’s variety of expressions chasing one another across his face. His replies were mostly monosyllabic; he ended by saying, “Keep me posted,” and rang off.
“Any news?”
“The Spanish police found the helicopter. Abandoned.”
“Where?”
“A farm in the Pyrenees.” Brewster had a deep suntan, the product of lamps, but in this light he looked very old. He had aged a great deal in two or three years. They always did, Ethridge observed, and the thought was tainted by an unwholesome personal regret; Ethridge knew his own vanity.
“They may be able to find some sort of fingerprints,” the President was saying, not with great conviction. “Some sort of clues.”
“There’s no word from Fairlie?”
“No. Nor from the people who took him.”
“It’s an awful thing.”
“It wouldn’t have happened,” Brewster intoned, “if I hadn’t let him talk me out of cracking down on the bastards.”
“I doubt you can say that. A crackdown wouldn’t have netted these — they’re in Europe.”
The pale eyes flickered. “Dex, I want to get tough with these bastards. I need your help.”
“You’re asking me the same thing you asked him a week ago.”
“The situation’s got worse. Out of hand.”
“We don’t even know who these are yet, Mr. President.”
“One of them’s an American. A black. We know that.”
“That hardly justifies a mass lynching.”
“I don’t want a lynching, Dex.”
“A net would only catch thousands of innocent fish.”
“It’ll show them we won’t back down.” A gesture with the hand that ordinarily held the cigar. “That’s important right now — a lot more important than people seem to think.”
Ethridge knew the President wanted a crackdown not for any strategic purpose but to give the appearance that the Administration was doing something firm and functional. Right now the public needed that reassurance. Ethridge conceded the President had a point; but it was an equally valid point that an overt display of official violence could trigger the dissidents into rebellious mob riots which would force Washington into punitive reaction. It could only be military. And once you unleashed your military establishment against segments of your own populace you were admitting the whole democratic structure was a failure. Ethridge was not willing to risk that when, through Fairlie, the country’s chances for reorganization and reform and ultimate stability were better than they had been in decades.
Pain stabbed his eyeball. He squinted. “Mr. President, I’m against taking any wholesale action right now. But I’m going to give this a lot of thought.”
Brewster backed away with grace. “Do that, Dex.” He looked at his watch. “Get a good night’s sleep then; we’ll start the briefings first thing in the morning. I imagine you’ll — are you all right, Dex?”
“Headache, that’s all.” The spasm receded; he stood up to go. A slight weakness in his right leg but when he put his weight on it he had no trouble walking. In the morning he’d call Dick Kermode.
The President walked him to the door. “Mind your health, Dex.” Partly in jest: “You know what happens if you bail out on us. Old Milt Luke’s next in the line of succession.”
It was a curiously bemusing thought. The old House Speaker hadn’t lost any marbles yet but he had reached the age where every point had to be illustrated by a long trudging ramble into reminiscence, an excursion into debilitating recall.
The President said, “I’m serious about that, Dex. Milt Luke’s your backup man until you’re inaugurated. Once you’re sworn in you can nominate your own Vice-President and have him confirmed by Congress — have you picked anyone yet?”
“You’re talking as if you don’t expect we’ll get Fairlie back.”
“I hope we will. But things don’t always come right in the end, Dex. We may not get him back in time, we may not get him back at all. You may have to swear in as President. Pick yourself a Vice-Prez — do it soon.”
Agent Pickett and the protective squad picked him up in the corridor and convoyed him to his car. He had one of the presidential limousines now; he slid down in the seat and rested the back of his head against the cushion, closed his eyes, felt the headache begin to wane.
Sam March, he thought. March would make a good Vice-President. Level-headed, a good Senator, the right kind of Republican...
Good God.
March was dead: killed in the bombing.
Ethridge sat up, winced, looked out the window. So many of them were dead. It was difficult to credit.
Silence inside the moving limousine. Thump of tires, the soft whoosh of the heat blowers. It was a cool steamy night, the windows fogging up, windshield wipers batting softly. The back of the driver’s head was flat and complacent; the Secret Service guards always taciturn, were silent now.
Big black limousine: like a hearse, he thought. How many of them he had followed this week. The endless funerals. He couldn’t get to them all. Most of them had been taken home to their native states but a few — those with war records who had indicated the preference — had been interred at Arlington. He had shuttled to and from them, reminded each time of the first state funeral he had witnessed. Raining, he remembered: hot and wet, and the cortege had marched from the Capitol all the way to Arlington on foot in the drenching rain. The caisson had rolled with stately grandeur and the Mall had been crowded with veterans and the honor guard behind Black Jack Pershing’s casket had included Eisenhower and Hap Arnold and all those others who were dead now.
The overlap of generations was stunning: Ethridge had been a young congressman heading for the Seventies, perhaps the Eighties; Pershing had fought Indians on the frontier...
The limousine drew up. The Secret Service had a van drawn up in the driveway — stakeout headquarters. Ethridge was ushered into his own house, an agent preceding him to check out the shadows. They were very tense now, these Secret Service men. They took their jobs seriously and there had been too many failures.