To Kill the President Read online

  She imagined how it would play out, not in theory but in practice. She had read enough to know how the killing of JFK had traumatized America when the country had seemed so full of hope, turning the sixties into a decade scarred by horrible political violence, and more assassinations. But surely it was worse now? Even in the years she had lived here, America had become more starkly polarized. People were vicious to each other on social media, spraying abuse at anyone who held a different opinion. Could you imagine what the President’s supporters would be like if their hero was murdered? Their fury would be total. He’d be a martyr, and they’d turn on anyone they deemed to be an enemy. Maggie doubted that rage would be confined to foul tweets and vile Facebook posts. She could imagine the atmosphere of hate spilling out onto the streets. Things could get ugly, very fast. Unbidden, a picture of Liz and her young boys formed in her head, the children running away from a stone-throwing mob. And suddenly she was visited by the familiar feeling of nausea. This whole mess: if only she hadn’t …

  She pushed that thought away, made herself concentrate instead on how she had figured out the puzzle, allowing herself a moment of professional satisfaction at her own ingeniousness.

  She wondered what it would be like to tell McNamara, striding into his office to let him know she had exceeded his expectations, that she had cracked the mystery. She only had to picture it for a moment to feel the revulsion. Why give that man anything? Whatever nugget of intel he had, he would only exploit it for his own twisted purposes. Surely she had learned that lesson: if you had information, you didn’t let it out of your grasp till you had thought through all the implications, starting with how it would be used. She thought of McNamara and his circle of devotees – ‘Mac’s boys’, the papers called them, or ‘the servants of the Big Mac’, according to a Twitter meme doing the rounds – and couldn’t bear the idea that, even for a moment, she might be deemed part of it.

  But then she looked at her notepad once more, contemplating the conclusion she had come to, and she felt her pulse quickening. A small, secret voice inside whispered, Thank God someone is doing something to stop this horror show. Liz had been right when she said I cannot believe you work for that evil man. Well, now there were two good men who were going to stop him.

  Reason intervened, tugging at the leash to pull her back. How ‘good’ could these men be if they were prepared to kill an innocent man, a doctor who loved his family and had devoted his life to healing the sick? How good could they be to consider killing – murdering – anyone? Maybe they were just a different shade of evil. She had seen that before too.

  It was nearly five am. Maggie went to the bathroom to splash cold water on her face. She needed to calm herself, to cool down.

  On her way back temptation beckoned her. It was there on the nightstand, on Richard’s side of the bed. His phone.

  Look, she said to herself. If he wasn’t texting that woman, perhaps it’s better for him if I know that. Why should he, an attentive, faithful lover, have to be under this cloud of suspicion? She couldn’t just ask him outright. Once you asked a question like that, you could never unask it. It was out there, a shadow over the relationship thereafter. A destruction of trust.

  How much better to do this now, quietly and discreetly.

  Noiselessly she picked up his phone, pressed the home button and the screen lit up. Slide to Unlock. She slid and then it offered her a choice:

  Touch ID or Enter Passcode

  There he was, sound asleep. His fingers, long and slim, the same fingers which had stroked her, entered her, just hours ago, were resting on top of the sheet, available. She slid the phone close to his right hand and, with the gentlest guidance, placed the pad of his index finger on the home button. The screen brightened and she slid the phone away and along the sheet. As she climbed back into bed, he took in a larger breath, but did not stir.

  Maggie went straight to his text messages. The first name, at the top, was her own, inviting him over. Below that, a colleague telling him that the documents he’d needed would be ready on Monday. Below that, a text from his brother about seeing the Orioles. Nothing from the presidential daughter.

  Now she glanced at the email. Nothing there of any significance. That was hardly surprising. Given the last few years, no one did anything that mattered on email. She checked WhatsApp: nothing. And Signal: nothing.

  But the next icon along said simply Notes. The first couple seemed innocuous enough but then she opened the third.

  She felt her brow crinkle. Her heart began to plunge. This file consisted of a string of Signal messages copied and pasted into a single document, dozens of them, going back months, all written in a tone of easy familiarity, even intimacy. Except they were not between Richard and the President’s daughter.

  They were between Richard and Crawford McNamara.

  Comrade! Put on Fox now. She’s hitting it out of the park.

  No clue what that referred to, but the brevity, the lack of formalities, suggested frequent if not constant contact. This was how friends talked to each other.

  Here was Richard’s reply:

  Totally agree. She nailed it. She looks hot as fuck too

  Maggie felt herself pale. All drowsiness had gone. She was sitting upright. She scrolled through the messages, most of them written in the same register of locker-room, towel-snapping guy talk.

  Another one from McNamara.

  Good job in the Oval today. The big man likes you. And as for the princess, she’s dripping wet for you, comrade …

  Maggie glanced down at Richard, still sleeping. The princess. It could only be one person. And the way McNamara referred to her, like he was some kind of voyeur, jerking himself off at the thought of the two young lovers getting it on. He was pimping the President’s daughter.

  The next message had her confused. This time from Richard to McNamara.

  Mid-Atlantic package has been dispatched. Presume we have delivery address for the next one. Let me know and I’ll prepare.

  More in that vein and then one that made Maggie go cold. From Richard again:

  Is there anything more hilarious than these libtards wetting the bed over the Muslim registry? I fucking love it. I almost want to do the whole yellow star thing - yellow crescents, anyone? - just to see them pee their pants. Didn’t you say the boss was up for it?

  McNamara’s reply: Moment not right just yet. Need to get the ban fully in place. Shutdown on all foreign ragheads, from everywhere (Europe especially). Then once we have register for “American” ragheads, we’re good to go. Yellow: too blatant? Or worth it for the lulz?

  Richard: Lulz, man, lulz! If your balls are big and hairy enough - and I know they are - then what are you frightened of? Some pushback from (((you know who)))?

  McNamara: You’re showing your youth and inexperience. First rule of DC: you never, ever cross the (((mighty, globalist powers that be)))

  Maggie closed her eyes as a wave of disgust, physical and visceral, crashed over her. The coldness she had felt before now spread throughout her body: it was as if she was shuddering, inside and out. The triple brackets were just too much. For a while, it had been like a secret handshake in the alt-right universe, putting three sets of brackets around the name of anyone they suspected of being a Jew. When social media got wind of it, plenty of Jews – and others – had done it to themselves. The way the King of Denmark wore the yellow star during the Nazi occupation: an ‘I am Spartacus’ gesture of solidarity. Maggie had assumed that that had killed the whole thing off. But here they were, using it casually to signal their shared suspicion of Jews. She looked at Richard’s reply.

  Richard: Yoda, I have been naive. Please guide me in the ways of the Jooooooz.

  McNamara: Money like they.

  Richard: Money of lots have they.

  Maggie’s revulsion was complete. The man lying next to her, the man she had allowed inside her, was a racist bigot – smart, sophisticated and well-dressed, but a hardcore neo-Nazi. She felt an urge to
retch.

  Yet there was an equal urge of masochistic cruelty that made her keep scrolling through these messages, a terrible compulsion to expose herself to it all until she had hit rock bottom. But there were just so many. It seemed Richard and McNamara were in the habit of communicating with each other twelve or fifteen times a day. There was another one about the daughter.

  Was in the Residence today. Not even sure the husband is that interested. He works hard! So there might be an opening – if you get my meaning ;)

  Richard’s reply: I want to make my way into that opening

  McNamara: Get in line. Hey maybe I can get Rosemary on it, see what the deal with those two is

  Another one she could not decipher. From McNamara:

  Our friends will need instructions on the next package. Shipment in Delhi, dispatch details as discussed.

  What could that even mean? Something to do with Richard’s work in Commerce perhaps. She gave it barely a second’s thought, for at that moment Richard stirred, his hand instinctively reaching for her bare leg, resting on her skin. A reflex of desire pulsed through her, fleeting but enough to make her disgusted with herself and the unthinking, animal ways of the body. She inched herself away from his touch.

  The sun was beginning to rise. She lay there, rigid and tense, conscious she should put the phone back soon, before he woke. But she needed to read it all.

  Now an unusually long one from Richard.

  Remember that lecture at the Utah conference? By the French guy, the one who worked with the Front National? We need to find a way to adapt that message for a US audience. Bottom line: no reason why every ethnic group in America gets to celebrate its heritage except the white race. White folks, white men especially, should be allowed their pride. ‘We are children of the sun!’ Loved that line. Want me to draft some paragraphs for POTUS?

  Maggie’s hands trembled as she thumbed her way down the screen, scanning the messages as fast as she could. She was now back to February, when she and Richard had only been involved a few weeks.

  From McNamara: So how’s it going with Firebush?

  Richard: I keep telling you: she may be Irish, but she’s not a redhead. Not on top and not down there.

  McNamara: A guy can dream, can’t he? Love the idea of a fish dish with a side of ginger.

  Richard: You are disgusting.

  McNamara: Vag in red sauce

  Richard: Stop

  McNamara: But seriously, anything you’ve picked up yet? Apart from Fenian crabs.

  Richard: Actually, she’s very clean in that department. Nothing yet. But she’s in touch with all the old crowd. Think she might even be in contact with the former P.

  McNamara: Really?

  Richard: It’s a maybe at this stage. But one thing I can tell you. She fucking hates our man. Fucking *hates* him. I have to console her sometimes, reassure her that “we’re doing the right thing.” Boo hoo.

  McNamara: Hilarious.

  Richard: I know.

  McNamara: Listen, you’re not banging her for fun you know. Intel, my boy. Intel.

  Richard: I know.

  McNamara: And she has no idea?

  Richard: About what?

  McNamara: That she’s, you know, sleeping with the enemy.

  Richard: Not a clue.

  24

  Washington, DC, Thursday, 7.15am

  Garcia had made several decisions about ‘Jorge Hernandez’. The first was that he would hew as closely as possible to the real Jorge Hernandez. He was a Latino man who had served in the military. He kept himself to himself. He was passionate about the state of his country.

  The second decision was that, when ‘Jorge Hernandez’ had to enter the real world, he would be very much like Julian Garcia. That was not too difficult. They were roughly the same age and of similar height and, until the wasting illness that had hollowed his friend out, similar build. Basic racism would take care of the rest: if – when – people saw a photo of Hernandez, few would swear it was not the man of that name they had briefly glimpsed a day or two earlier. Thick-set Hispanic man, late forties: they all looked the same, didn’t they?

  For now the real Hernandez was in a reclining chair in his living room, watching his former comrade get to work. Garcia was focused on the walls. The next canvas in his series.

  He opened the bag and took out his collection of papers. He had fewer original, hard copies than he would have liked and rather too many printouts. But he had taken care. The newspaper clippings, some going back nearly two years, which he had neatly excised with a scalpel from the stacks kept in the library – not the one at Anacostia, but the much grander Martin Luther King building in northwest DC – were varying shades of yellow. He had worked out a sliding scale. Articles that were a year old, he had left out in yesterday’s afternoon sun for an hour. Six months old, half an hour. And so on. Such was the intensity of a Washington sun in May, even a few minutes left a fragment of newsprint looking suitably aged.

  He began gumming a selection on the wall, interspersing them with a few of the printouts from web pages. Some of the online articles were spread over seven or eight sheets of A4 paper, including the roll of comments. No reasonable person would pin up the whole thing – so Garcia decided that Hernandez would pin up the whole thing.

  He had brought a couple of Sharpies, so that he could circle certain headlines in red or black. He also had string and pins, so he could tie one report to another. But now that it came to it, that struck him as a Hollywood cliché. Hernandez was not laying out a PowerPoint presentation; he was not trying to persuade anyone else. He was simply emptying out the contents of his own, troubled mind. So Garcia underlined a few key words: deportation, internment, snatch squads, families.

  After an hour or so, he stepped back to inspect his handiwork. He had covered much more of the wall than he intended. It worked. Had he confined himself, as he had planned, to just the area above the table, it would have looked too ordered, too controlled – like one of those collages of calendars and school notices you see in a suburban kitchen. Papering over the entire wall was more extreme. It had the requisite intensity.

  Now Garcia walked alongside it, his eyes a TV news camera panning at slow speed. What would it see?

  A screaming front page from the New York Post: ‘No Papers, No Home’. A photograph of the President, his face apparently contorted with hate, his lips appearing to spit out the f-word from behind a lectern. Next to it, a mock-up picture of the President appearing to dance with three hooded Klansmen. It was a fake, assembled by some artist. But Garcia had decided that his Hernandez, such was the fevered state of his mind, believed it was real.

  The newspaper stories would be a blur of accounts of both forced round-ups of illegals by the new US Deportation Force and protests against them: the human chain that formed in Miami, the burning tyres during the riot/pogrom in Phoenix; the ‘This Is Our Home’ march on Washington. The detail was less important than the overall impression.

  But Garcia was not done. He pulled out the item which would be the emotional centrepiece of the story he was telling, one he and Hernandez had worked on together. The core facts were borrowed from Julian Garcia’s life, but rendered in such a way that they would be compatible with Hernandez’s, should anyone check (which they would). And so now, with what he hoped was the right degree of solemnity, he pinned up a portrait photograph of Alicia Hernandez, Jorge’s dead mother. He placed it in the middle of the display.

  He stepped back one more time, surveyed it all and decided it was good. He looked over at Jorge, who nodded. It worked.

  There was one last task. He pulled out a map of Washington, DC, and pinned it on a patch of wall he’d already covered. Using the red Sharpie, he circled the area just north of the National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, where tomorrow there would be a formal, televised ceremony – and where the guest of honour would, of course, be the President of the United States.

  25

  Dupont Circle, Washington, DC,
Thursday, 7.16am

  ‘Morning, darling.’ Richard’s voice was bright, rested.

  ‘Morning.’

  ‘Sleep well?’

  Maggie braced herself for her first lie of the day. She knew there would be many, many more. ‘Yes, actually. I slept well. What about you?’

  ‘Good.’ He leaned over for a kiss. She allowed him to come towards her, but she did not meet him halfway. He pulled away, with a perplexed expression.

  ‘Haven’t brushed my teeth yet,’ she offered by way of explanation.

  In truth, she had spent the last hours wide awake, lying next to him as rigid as a board, staring at the ceiling. Her body had been frozen, recoiling from the proximity to this man. Her mind had been racing, horrified by what she had discovered, disgusted by him, but most of all, and inevitably, appalled at herself for being such a fool. How had she not seen it? How had she allowed her judgement to be so clouded? How, how, how?

  She got out of bed first, another break from the usual pattern. She was not handling this well. ‘Are you running this morning?’ She could hear the strain in her voice, the pitch too high. And if she could hear it, so could he.

  ‘No,’ he said, stretching languorously, his abs becoming taut. Once again, she felt the instinctive stirring of desire and resented her body for allowing itself to be lured so easily, for being so ready to betray her. ‘I thought we could have a shower together – and then a slow breakfast. What do you think?’

  ‘Actually, I really need to get in early. Lot on.’ Her second ‘actually’. Such an obvious tell. She turned around and headed for the bathroom, where she could do less damage.

  She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. The red rims around her eyes were offset by grey shadows underneath. Her hair was lank. She entered the shower, hoping Richard wouldn’t follow her.

  But he did, opening the door, walking in and beginning to soap himself. His semi-erect penis brushed her thigh, as if by accident. On any other day she would not have been able to resist him: she’d have turned and started to kiss and touch him. This time, too, her skin and her nervous system automatically responded in the usual way. But in the same moment a deep loathing was churning, partly in her brain and largely in the pit of her stomach. The things Richard had said to that awful man. The repugnant racism: I almost want to do the whole yellow star thing. Referring to white people as ‘children of the sun’, quoting with approval that neo-Nazi maniac. And the misogyny that ran all the way through their nauseating little bromance: She looks hot as fuck too … I want to make my way into that opening. Line after line came back to her, as they had for the last couple of agonizing hours.