“Harry Truman used to say,” he began, “‘if you want a friend in Washington, buy a dog.’ I think I’ve experienced the precise feelings that inspired his wit. I’m almost sure that I have.”
The President was an unusually engaging speaker. I already knew as much from his address at his convention and other televised talks—his version of FDR’s fireside chats. He was clearly able to bring his oratory talents to a much smaller room and audience, even a tough, cynical crowd like the one before him. “What a royal pain in the butt this job can be. Whoever coined the phrase ‘If drafted, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve’ had the right idea. Believe me on that one.”
The President smiled. He had an ability to make anything he said sound personal. I wondered if he planned it. How much of this was a first-rate acting job?
The President’s intense blue eyes circled the room, stopping for a moment on each face. He seemed to be judging us, but more important, communicating with us individually. “I’ve been thinking a great deal about this current, unfortunate situation. Sally and I have talked about it upstairs, late into the night, several nights in a row. I’ve been thinking about Jack and Jill too much, in fact. For the past few days, this miserable three-ring circus has been the focus, and a major distraction to the executive branch of our government. It’s already disrupted cabinet meetings and played havoc with everyone’s schedule. This situation simply can’t be allowed to continue. It’s bad for the country, for our people, for everybody’s mental health, including my own and Sally’s. It makes us look weak and unstable to the rest of the world. A threat by a couple of kooks can’t be permitted to disrupt the government of the United States. We can’t allow that to happen.
“As a consequence, I’ve made a tough decision, which ultimately has to be mine to make. I’m sharing it with you this morning, because the decision will affect all of you as well as Sally and me.”
President Byrnes let his eyes quickly roam around the room again. I didn’t know where this was going yet, but the process was fascinating to me. The President led us a step, then he checked to make sure we were still with him. He was clearly issuing an order, but he made it seem as if he were still seeking some consensus in the room.
“We simply have to return to business-as-usual at the White House. We have to do that. The United States can’t be held hostage to real or imagined dangers or threats. That’s the decision I’m making, and it goes into effect at the end of today. We have to move on, to move ahead with our programs.”
As the President told us his decision, there was uneasy movement in the room. Ann Roper groaned out loud. Don Hamerman dropped his head down low, close to his knees. I kept my eyes pinned on the President.
“I fully understand that this makes your jobs more difficult, to say the very least. How in hell can you protect me if I won’t cooperate, won’t follow your recommendations? Well, I can’t cooperate anymore. Not if it means sending a message to the world that a couple of psychopaths can completely alter our government. Which is exactly what is happening. It’s happened, folks.
“Starting tomorrow, I’m back on my regular schedule. There will be no further debate on that subject. Sorry, Don.” He looked at his chief of staff as he officially rejected his advice.
“I’ve also decided to make my scheduled visit to New York City on Tuesday. Sorry again, Don, Jay. I wish the best to all of us on our appointed tasks. You do your jobs, please. I’ll try to do mine. We will have absolutely no regrets, no matter what happens from this point on. Is that understood?”
“Understood, sir.” Everyone in the room nodded yes. Every eye was intensely focused on the President, mine included. President Byrnes had been both impassioned and impressive.
Absolutely no regrets, I repeated the phrase inside my head. I was sure I’d remember it for the rest of my life, no matter what happened, no matter what Jack and Jill had planned from here on.
Thomas Byrnes had just put his life on the line, really on the line.
The President had just put his life in our hands.
“By the way, Don,” President Byrnes said to Hamerman as the meeting was starting to break up. “Have somebody run out and get me a goddamn dog. I think I need a friend.”
We all laughed, even if we didn’t quite feel up to it.
CHAPTER
74
THAT NIGHT it snowed about an inch in Washington. The temperature dropped way down into the teens. The Truth School killer woke up feeling scared. Feeling very alone. Feeling trapped. Feeling quite sad, actually.
No happy, happy. No joy, joy.
He was in a cold, greasy sweat that grossed him out completely. In a dream that he remembered now, he had been murdering people, then burying them under a fieldstone fireplace at his grandparents’ country home in Leesburg. He’d been having that same dream for years, ever since he could remember, ever since he was a kid.
But was it a dream, or had I committed the grisly murders? he wondered as he opened his eyes. He tried to focus on the surroundings. Where the hell am I?
Then he remembered what he was, where he had come to sleep for the night. What a mindblower! What a cool idea he’d had.
The song, his song, blared inside his head:
I’m a loser, baby.
So why don’t you kill me?
This hiding place was cool as shit. Or maybe he was just being too stupid and careless. Cool as shit? Or dumb and dumber? You be the judge.
He was in his own house, up on the third floor.
He wrapped his mind around the idea that he was “safe and sound” for now. Man, he loved the power of that thought.
He was in total control. He was mission control. He could be as big and important as Jack and Jill. Hell, he could be bigger and better than those trippy assholes. He knew that he could. He could stomp Jack and Jill’s asses.
He felt around on the floor for his trusty backpack. Where the hell is his stuff?… Okay. There it is. Everything is cool. He fumbled inside—located his flashlight. He flicked the ON switch.
“Let there be light,” he whispered. Wah-lah!”
Awhh, too bad, sports fans—he was definitely in the attic of his home. This wasn’t a dream. He was the Truth School killer, after all. He shined the bright light down on his wristwatch. It was a twelfth-birthday present. It was the kind of sophisticated watch that pilots wore. Wow, he was so damn impressed! Maybe he could study to be a jet pilot after this was all behind him. Learn to fly an F-16.
It was 4:00 A.M. on the jet pilot’s watch! Must be 4:00 A.M., then.
“The hour of the werewolf,” he whispered softly. It was time to come down out of the attic. It was time to continue to make his mark in the world. Something cool and amazing had to happen now.
Perfect murders.
Had to, had to, had to.
CHAPTER
75
HE LET the bulky foldaway stairs drop down very slowly to the second floor of the house. His house. If his foster parents happened to get up for a pee right now—BIG PROBLEMS FOR HIM.
BIG SURPRISE FOR THEM, THOUGH.
MAJOR SHITSTORM FOR EVERYBODY CONCERNED.
He was having a little trouble with his breathing. None of this was easy now. He needed to set the heavy, unwieldy stairs down quietly on the second floor, but there was a little thud right at the end.
“Damn you. Loser,” he whispered.
He still couldn’t exactly catch his breath. His body was covered with a thick coat of sweat, the kind horses break on a morning workout. He had seen that phenomenon on his grandparents’ farm. Never forgot it: sweat that almost turned into this frothy cream, right before your eyes.
“Pusillanimous,” he whispered, mocking his own cowardice. “Chickenshit bastard. Punk of the month. Loser, man.” His theme song again.
He tried to let some of the icy panic and nervousness pass. He took long, slow, deep breaths as he paused at the top of the folding stairs. This was so freaky. It was helter fucking skelter, in r
eal life, in real time.
He finally began to climb down the wobbly wooden stairway, on wobbly wooden legs that felt like stilts. He was being as careful and quiet as he could be.
He felt a little better as he got to the bottom. Terra firma.
He walked on his tiptoes down the upstairs hallway to the door of the master bedroom. He opened the door and was immediately struck with a blast of really cold air.
His foster father kept the window open, even in December, even when it fucking snowed. He would. The arctic cold probably kept his silver-blond crew cut short. Saved him on haircuts. What a super jerk-off the guy was.
“Do you screw her in the cold dark?” he whispered under his breath. That sounded about right, too.
He walked up real close to their king-size bed. Real close. He stood at their altar of love, their sacred throne.
How many times had he imagined a moment like this? This very moment.
How many other kids had imagined this same scene a thousand thousand times? But then done nothing about it. Losers! The world was full of them.
He was on the verge of one of his worst rages, a real bad one. The hair on the back of his neck was standing at attention. TEN-SHUN. It felt like it, anyway.
He could see red everywhere in the bedroom. Like this misting red. It was almost as if he were viewing the room through a nightscope.
He… was… just… about… to… go… off… wasn’t… he?
He could feel himself… exploding… into… a… billion… pieces.
Suddenly, he screamed at the top of his voice. “Wake up and smell the fucking Folger’s coffee!”
He was sobbing now, too. For what reason, he didn’t know. He couldn’t remember crying like this since he was a real little kid, real little.
His chest hurt as if he’d been punched hard. Or hit with an eighteen-inch ball bat. He realized that he was starting to wimp out. Mister Softee was coming back. He felt like Holden Caulfield. Repentant. Always triple-thinking every goddamn move both before and after he made it.
“POW,” he screamed at the top of his voice.
“POW,” he screamed the word again.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.
“POW.”
And with every bloodcurdling yell, he pulled the trigger of the Smith & Wesson. He put another 9mm bullet into the two sleeping figures. Twelve shots, if he was counting correctly, and he was counting everything very correctly. Twelve shots, like those Jose and Kitty Menendez got.
The Roosevelt military education finally came in handy, he couldn’t help thinking. His teachers had been right, after all. Colonel Wilson at the school would have been proud of the marksmanship—but most of all, the firm resolve, the very simple and clear plan, the extraordinary courage he had shown tonight.
His foster parents were annihilated, completely vanquished, almost disintegrated by all the firepower he’d brought to the task. He felt nothing—except maybe pride in what he had done, in his fine workmanship.
Nobody was here. Nobody did this, man.
He wrote it in their blood.
Then he ran outside to play in the snow. He got blood all over the yard, all over everything. He could, you know. He could do anything he wanted to now. There was no one to stop Nobody.
CHAPTER
76
ANOTHER MURDERED CHILD has been discovered.
A male. Less than an hour ago.
John Sampson got the news about seven o’clock in the evening. He couldn’t believe it. Could not, would not, accept what he had just been told. Friday the thirteenth. Was the date deliberate?
Another child murdered in Garfield Park. At least, the body was left there. He wanted Sumner Moore bad, and he wanted him now.
Sampson parked on Sixth Street and began the short walk into the desolate and dreary park. This is getting worse, he thought as he walked toward the red and yellow emergency lights flashing brightly up ahead.
“Detective Sampson. Let me through,” he said as he pushed his way inside a circle of police uniforms.
One of the uniforms was holding a gray-and-white yapping mutt on a leash. It was a weird touch at a weird scene. Sampson addressed the patrolman. “What’s with the dog? Whose dog?”
“Dog uncovered the victim’s body. Owner let it loose for a run after she got home from work. Somebody covered up the dead kid with tree branches. Not much else. Like he wanted somebody to find it.”
Sampson nodded at what he’d heard so far. Then he moved on, stepped closer to the body. The victim was clearly older than either Vernon Wheatley or Shanelle Green. Sumner Moore had graduated from murdering very small children. The creepy little ghoul was on a full rampage now.
A police photographer was taking pictures of the body, the camera’s harsh flashes dramatic against the blanket of snow covering the park.
The boy’s mouth and nose were wrapped with silver duct tape. Sampson took a deep breath before he stooped down low next to the medical examiner, a woman he knew named Esther Lee.
“How long you think he’s been dead?” Sampson asked the M.E. “Hard to say. Maybe thirty-six hours. Decomposition is slowed a lot in this cold weather. I’ll know more after the autopsy. The boy took a brutal beating. Lead pipe, wrench, something nasty and heavy like that. He tried to fight the killer off. You can see defensive bruises on both hands, on his arms. I feel so bad for this boy.”
“I know, Esther. Me, too.”
What John Sampson could see of the boy’s neck was discolored and badly bloated. Tiny black bugs crawled along the hairline. A thin line of maggots spilled from a split in the scalp above the right ear.
Sampson sucked it up, grimaced, and forced himself to move around to the other side of the boy’s body. Nobody knew it, not even Alex, but this was the part of homicide that he just couldn’t handle. DOAs. Bodies in decomposition.
“You won’t like it,” Esther Lee told him before he looked. “I’m warning you.”
“I know I won’t,” he muttered. He blew warmth on his hands, but it didn’t help much.
He could see the boy’s face now. He could see it—but he couldn’t believe it. And he certainly didn’t like it. Esther Lee was right about that.
“Jesus Christ,” he said out loud. “Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Make this terrible thing stop.”
Sampson stood up straight. He was six nine again, only it wasn’t tall enough, wasn’t big enough. He couldn’t believe what he had just seen—the boy’s face.
This killing was too much even for him, and he had seen so much in D.C. during the past few years.
The murdered boy was Sumner Moore.
PART V
NO RULES. NO REGRETS.
CHAPTER
77
NOTHING EVER BEGINS at the time we believe it does. Still, this is what I think of as the beginning.
Jannie and I sat in the kitchen and we talked the talk, our own special talk. The words didn’t matter much, just the sentiments.
“You know, this is an anniversary for us,” I said to her. “Special anniversary.” I touched her cheek. So soft. Soft as a butterfly’s belly.
“Oh, really?” Jannie said and gave me her most skeptical Nana Mama look. “And what anniversary might that be?”
“Well, I’ll tell you. This just happens to be the five-hundredth time that I’ve read you The Stinky Cheese Man.”
“Okay, fine,” she said and smiled in spite of herself, “so read the story already! I love the way you read it.” I read the story again.
After we were done with our Stinky Cheese, I spent some time with Damon, and then with Nana. Then I went upstairs to pack.
When I came back down, I talked out on the porch with Rakeem Powell. Rakeem was waiting to be relieved. Sampson was coming over for the night. Man Mountain was late as usual, and we hadn’t heard from him
yet, which was a little unusual, but I knew he would be there.
“You okay?” I asked Rakeem.
“I’m fine, Alex. Sampson will get here eventually. You take care of yourself.”
I went out to my car. I stepped inside and put in a tape that felt right for the moment at hand—for my mood, anyway. It was the finale to Saint-Saën’s second piano concerto. I had always dreamed of being able to play the piece on the porch piano. Dream on, dream on.
I listened to the blazing music as I drove out to Andrews airfield, where Air Force One was being prepared.
President Byrnes was going to New York City, and I was going with him.
No regrets.
CHAPTER
78
THERE HAVE BEEN many conflicting accounts, but this is what happened and how it happened. I know, because I was there.
On Monday evening, nine days before Christmas, we landed in a grayish-blue fog and light rain at La Guardia Airport on Long Island. No specific information about President Byrnes’s travel plans had been announced to the press, but the President was keeping his commitment to speak in New York the following morning. Thomas Byrnes was known for keeping his commitments, keeping his word.
It had been decided to go from La Guardia into Manhattan by car, rather than by helicopter. The President wasn’t hiding anymore. Had Jack and Jill counted on just that kind of courage, or arrogance, from him? I wondered. Would Jack and Jill follow the President to New York? I was almost sure that they would. It fit everything we knew about them so far.
“Ride with us, Alex,” Don Hamerman said as we hurried across the tarmac, a cold December rain blowing hard in our faces. Hamerman, Jay Grayer, and I had gotten off Air Force One together. During the plane ride we sat together, planning how to protect President Byrnes from an assassination attempt in New York. Our talk was so intense that I missed out on the specialness of the ride.
“We’re traveling in the car directly behind the President. We can continue our little chat on the way into Manhattan,” Hamerman said to me.