To Kill the President Read online

  She had sent it to an email account so private, she was the only person who knew of its existence, let alone its address. When setting it up, she followed the advice of Eleanor’s son, who’d just been hired into the White House IT department, during a particularly fraught back-channel negotiation she had conducted for the last president. As he had suggested, she made up a pseudonym for the address and installed what he called ‘three-factor authentication’, meaning she had placed three different security hurdles at the entrance to the inbox. She was also careful to access it only from a computer or IP address that was not her own. If she couldn’t make it to an internet café, then she was to get online using a VPN that would hide her IP address. Once on, she would use the super-encrypted browser favoured by security purists as well as assorted criminals, terrorists and consumers of forbidden pornography. To a truly determined hacker, it was probably not impregnable. But since no one knew the email account was hers or would have any idea of its importance, she felt it was as secure a hiding place as she could find.

  She logged in now and there it was in full, that sickening exchange between McNamara and the man who had shared her bed through most of this bitter winter: the references to the President’s daughter – her ‘opening’ and its ‘dripping’ wetness – and to Maggie’s own private parts and personal hygiene.

  Maggie felt the weight fall on her heart again but, almost physically, tried to push it out of the way. She needed to heed Stuart’s advice, not to look at the obvious but to look left and right, to check her peripheral vision.

  There was the overt talk of white supremacism. It was unconscionable, of course. It could terminate the careers of both Richard and McNamara. Reading it again now, she could see that the latter was not nearly as exposed as the former: the very worst things had been said by Richard. Besides, McNamara would simply insist that the entire exchange had been faked. Without video or audio, there was always that risk, especially with the team around this President. They thought nothing of cheerfully, brazenly, denying the obvious truth even when it was staring them in the face. It drove the press corps mad, but the lead came from the top. The President would happily say that black was white and night was day, if it suited him. And there was a chunk of the country that was so devoted, they would cheer him when he said it.

  So the trick was to look in the margins. She attempted that now, scrolling through the pages of messages, trying to ignore the locker-room references to ‘the princess’ and to herself, as well as the jaw-dropping racism. The Stuart approach demanded she find something else. ‘Think like a reporter’ was one of his favourite lines. ‘No good proving that what everyone already knows to be true is really, really true. Find something new.’

  The racism, even the hideous registry for Muslims, was in the first category. So what was in the second? At first she could see nothing, certainly nothing of substance. She wondered who the ‘Rosemary’ that McNamara referred to might be: it was not a name she recognized. Then again, that was true of most White House staff these days. She would have to read the document again, more slowly this time.

  Even now she could only see two lines that might pass Stuart’s peripheral vision test, both of which seemed prosaic and wholly unpromising. First, was that odd reference to Delhi.

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

  It was no more intelligible to her now than it had been in the middle of the night. What could it refer to? And who were ‘our friends’?

  The second was in a similar vein. The same word – ‘package’ – appeared in this equally opaque message from Richard:

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

  Clearly he wasn’t bothering the President’s most senior counsellor with the mundane business of the mailroom. ‘Package’ was obviously code for something else. Could it be drugs? Or – yes, surely this was it – bribes? Was that what Maggie had uncovered in the dead of night? Was part of Richard’s role at Commerce the dispatch of envelopes stuffed with cash to various parties around the world? Given the President’s global business interests, it was plausible. That would represent a serious abuse of power, given that Richard – and McNamara for that matter – were both employees of the federal government. They were paid by the US taxpayer, yet here they were, apparently doing the business – the corrupt business – of a private corporation. (Already Maggie could hear the talking heads on cable TV, swearing that none of this was a problem. Helping an important American business is exactly what the White House should be doing. I’m sure they’d do the same for any good American business. In fact, I bet they didn’t even realize this company was owned by the President. And as for those ‘enhanced cash payments’, that’s just the way of the world. Business is not for boy Scouts and if that shocks you, you need to grow up a little. All I can say is, how lucky is America to have someone at the helm who understands that. His predecessor didn’t lift a finger for American jobs … )

  Now she looked more closely at messages she’d skimmed past when she’d first seen them. There was a reference to a ‘complicated drop’ in Africa. Richard had written: Delivery location remote, inaccessible. Close to the land of the Bushmen! Large team of postmen and equipment required. Some ours, some picked up in Nam.

  Maggie read the sentence over at least three times, but her bafflement only increased. Her chief confusion was the location. This bribe was to be paid in Africa – again plausible given the reach of the President’s commercial activities (which, despite a few feeble legal ploys to conceal the fact, were active and ongoing). But why then did Richard speak of hiring local people in Vietnam, using the cringe-worthy, movie-style abbreviation? Who did he think he was? ‘Nam’ indeed …

  It was only when she got up to stretch her legs and splash some cold water on her face that it came to her. Nam.

  Of course. ‘Nam’ wasn’t Vietnam. It was Namibia.

  The word alone set off a small chime in Maggie’s head. The longer it rang, the louder it became. She reached for the keyboard and could sense her hands trembling as she typed in those first few letters.

  48

  Washington, DC, Saturday, 10.55am

  She put ‘Namibia’ into the search engine. Wikipedia, Tourism Board, Lonely Planet. Then the news stories. Top of the list was a Reuters report posted nine hours earlier which, given what had been happening in Washington, had surely received no attention anywhere. That in turn linked to a report from three or four days earlier. She read the older one first:

  From our National Security Correspondent

  Windhoek, Namibia

  Four US citizens are being held in custody in this southern African city, following a shootout in the bush which left one American tourist wounded and a local ranger dead.

  Ron Cain, CEO of a leading broadcast technology firm based in Dallas, was shot in the shoulder during the firefight, as he stalked a black rhino under a permit scheme operated by the Namibian government. Cain, 44, bid $350,000 for the controversial license at a charity auction earlier this year.

  US consular authorities said Cain’s party had spotted the rhino moments earlier, and were about to open fire, when they came under attack from a group of armed men. Initial reports suggested the gunmen were local poachers, anxious to bag the rhino – and its lucrative horn – for themselves. The Namibian authorities, however, have now established that all four men were Americans. None has yet been named.

  Cain’s guides, including a professional hunter recently discharged from the South African military, returned fire. One of the local rangers was shot dead, but the hunting party succeeded in subduing their assailants, two of whom sustained serious injuries. One is said to be in ‘critical condition’.

  Mystery surrounds both the identity and motives of the US gunmen, though more details are expected at a court hearing later this week. Both poachers and anti-poaching units in southern Af
rica have been known to employ veterans of the US military as advisers and security consultants.

  The black rhino earmarked for death by Cain’s license is thought to have escaped unharmed.

  It didn’t look like much. Now Maggie read the latest story.

  Windhoek, Namibia – One of the four US citizens held in custody following a fatal jungle shootout died from his wounds in hospital earlier today. Both Namibian and US consular sources refused to name the man, saying that they first wished to notify the next of kin.

  The Americans were detained after a clash in Omaheke province, formerly known as northern Hereroland, a remote area in the north of the country, left an American tourist injured and a local ranger dead. The tourist was taking part in a licensed hunt for a rare black rhino, amid speculation that the gunmen belonged to a well-organized group of poachers. US officials in Windhoek have refused to confirm or deny that the gunmen were veterans of the US military.

  The injured American, named as Ron Cain, is now back in the US.

  Maggie’s mind began to turn over. She opened up another tab on the browser and, on no more than an instinct, typed in ‘Hereroland, Namibia’. Slim pickings at first and Google Maps drew a blank, but eventually she came across an image of a 1960s surveyors’ map, dividing up the country into regions. She could see Damaraland, Tswanaland and there, in the east, Hereroland. Now she peered closer and when she saw it, she felt a surge of adrenalin enter her veins as surely as if it had been injected. The neighbouring area, bordering Hereroland to the north, was marked on the map by a single word: Bushmanland.

  Now she looked back at Richard’s message to McNamara. Delivery location remote, inaccessible. Close to the land of the Bushmen! Large team of postmen and equipment required …

  The land of the Bushmen. Bushmanland. It could not be a coincidence.

  She reached for her phone, then thought better of it. They were bound to be monitoring her calls. Come to think of it, there was a good chance they were eavesdropping on the man she was about to call too.

  Maggie went into her bedroom, and headed straight to the tall, wooden cupboard she’d picked up at an antiques market soon after she first moved here. She didn’t open the doors, but gathered her strength to shift it a couple of inches away from the wall. Then she reached behind the cupboard and felt along the back. A few seconds of groping and there, she’d got it. Closing her eyes to aid her concentration, she grasped the object and gave it a strong tug. It was taped in place, but it came away without too much resistance.

  It was a burner, a back-up, unregistered phone she’d used to communicate with her opposite number at State during those peace talks (though in those days it was Russian intelligence, rather than her own government, who she feared might be listening in).

  She turned it on, opened Signal and sent a short, fully encrypted message to her contact.

  Hi Jake. It’s Maggie C at the White House. Can you call me when you get this? Use Signal.

  As she expected, he called back no more than twenty seconds later.

  ‘Maggie. How’ya doing?’

  It always amused her, that Washington-style of greeting. Enough warmth to count as human, maintaining the pretence that you might be friends rather than simply parties to a transaction. But not so warm that it might invite actual conversation and delay the business at hand. The tone, a brisk impatience kept sufficiently in check to stay on the right side of rude, said: Great, we know each other: what do you want?

  To be fair, you could hardly blame Jake Haynes for having little time for small talk. He was the New York Times’ lead writer on the intelligence community: it was doubtful he had slept in the last twenty-four hours.

  ‘I’m OK,’ Maggie said. ‘Something I wanted to ask you about.’

  ‘Jeez, Maggie, not you too.’

  ‘Not me too what?’

  ‘Spinning this jihadist thing. They’ve got everyone on it. Full court. But you know what I keep noticing? It’s only White House folks who are doing it. No offence. And if it’s Agency, it’s only political appointees who are picking up the phone. Professionals don’t want to know. Which, forgive me, doesn’t smell so good.’

  ‘It’s not about that.’

  ‘I’ve spoken to people in Tanzania, Kenya, Lebanon, Libya and they’re not feeling it, Maggie. Basic message seems to be, presidential assassination is kind of beyond them. Too hard—’

  ‘Jake?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘It’s not about that. Something else.’

  ‘Something else? There is nothing else. Not this week.’

  ‘Just hear me out. What do you know about that Namibia thing?’

  ‘Namibia? This is a joke, right? Maggie, I don’t know if you noticed but somebody tried to kill the President of the United States last night. That’s kind of a big story. Do you want me to transfer you to Foreign?’

  Maggie made an instant decision. She’d have to take a risk. ‘Jake, listen. I could have something very big for you. It relates to the President.’

  ‘Bigger than an assassination attempt?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘When it’s ready, I’ll give you what I have. Remember Jerusalem?’ Thanks to Maggie, then part of the mediation team shuttling between Israelis and Palestinians, Jake had been the first journalist to know of a development that had changed everything.

  ‘That’s the story that made my career. How could I forget?’

  ‘All right then. So you know: I keep my word.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘So. Namibia. Four US citizens were held in custody there. Except now it’s three. One died this morning.’

  She could hear some keystrokes at the other end. Either he was ignoring her and going back to the assassination story – or he was already on the case.

  ‘Hold on, I did hear something on this.’ She could tell he was reading something off his screen as he was talking. ‘Yesterday. Before the shooting.’

  ‘What did you hear?’

  ‘It’s one source, Maggie. It’s not—’

  ‘Jake, we have a deal, remember? We’ll share what we have. You’ll end up the winner, I promise.’

  ‘Careful, you’re beginning to sound like the President.’ He did the voice, the way everyone did these days. ‘Big winner. BIG!’

  ‘Jake?’

  ‘All right, all right. We didn’t have enough to run with this. Our correspondent in Johannesburg was following it up – I got a note from him – and we were ready to throw some bodies at it, and then, you-know-who gets you-know-what. So we—’

  ‘Abandoned it?’

  ‘For now. Give us a break, Maggie: only so much bandwidth. Anyway, what are you talking to me for? You must have CIA guys you can talk to. You know, that big building in Virginia. It’s area code seven-o-three—’

  ‘There’s been quite a lot of change in that agency recently, in case you haven’t noticed.’

  ‘Victims of the purge? Tell me about it. It’s like year zero over there. Burnt, like, half my contacts book. More in fact.’

  ‘Anyway,’ said Maggie. ‘What did your Jo’burg guy say?’

  ‘Woman actually,’ he replied, not too busy to be smug.

  ‘What did she say?’

  ‘Like I say, not confirmed—’

  ‘But?’

  ‘But she had it from the Station Chief there that the four Americans were veterans of the US military—’

  ‘We know that already.’

  ‘Jesus, Maggie, if you’d let me get to the end of a sentence! They were veterans of the military.’ He paused for effect. ‘Who are currently employed by Langley.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Seriously. Agency operatives. Undercover. Christ knows what they were doing there. We wondered if it was maybe some rendition thing. You know, picking up some African jihadist, take him to a black site. It’s an oldie but goldie.’

  ‘And was it?’

  ‘I told you. Thanks to the littl
e incident at the Marines War Memorial, we dropped it.’

  ‘But they were nowhere near any jihadists. They shot some random tourist out looking for rhino. Why would the CIA care about that?’

  ‘Maggie, last time I checked you were the highly placed, senior White House official and I was the underpaid reporter with his ear by the air-conditioning vent. You’re meant to be the one who knows stuff, and I’m meant to be the one asking the questions. The federal government’s pretty big, you know. If Langley’s a brick wall, what about State?’

  ‘Relations are a little strained right now,’ she said, choosing not to reveal that she had no idea who she could trust any more, not after Richard. ‘But you’re right. About questions, I mean. Go on. Ask a question. Anything you like.’

  ‘All right. Here goes.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Rosemary.’

  Maggie waited. Eventually she said, ‘Rosemary who?’

  ‘Exactly. “Rosemary, who?” That’s my question. Everyone keeps mentioning this name to me. Rosemary this, Rosemary that. But I’ve checked the White House staff directory and there’s only one Rosemary and she’s, like, some old lady in the protocol office. Doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘And who keeps mentioning her?’

  ‘I’m obviously going to tell you that, aren’t I?’

  ‘No, I mean what kind of people? What level?’

  ‘Senior. So is Rosemary a new appointment? Is she going to be the new liaison with the agencies? That would make sense, given what’s just—’

  ‘Jake, I’m going to get back to you on this.’

  ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Maggie. You can’t do that. Not after what I gave you! Come on, Maggie, there’s—’

  ‘Because I want to give you the real deal. Believe me, it will be worth it. Just a little patience.’

  Maggie hung up and made a mental note to herself, which she filed away. She then went back to the news stories she had called up. Jake had initially suspected that what had happened in the Namibian jungle was a case of extraordinary rendition, though one that had been botched. That would outrage a few liberal bloggers, and would bring some loud tutting from the Times editorial page, but would barely make a ripple anywhere else. If that’s all this was, Maggie could forget it.