Born to Run (39 page)

To be truthful, Bert completely understood Ed’s anger and confusion—what rational person wouldn’t?—but according to Isabel, there were things Ed didn’t know and
shouldn’t know. Neither Bert nor Attorney General Marcus Bentley knew them either and she certainly wasn’t telling either of them, so Robinson was forced to accept that pragmatism was
the only sensible course of action for now, no matter how awkward.

But the fact that Isabel was hiding the truth, whatever it was, from her husband as well impressed Robinson, certainly dismissing for him all those bitchy snipes during the campaign about Ed
being the one pulling
her
strings. The woman had
cojones
, that was for sure, and after everything she’d just been through, Robinson couldn’t help but be awed.

Inside the room, Isabel was still hooked up to monitors, but the drips were no longer connected, and the morphine had been replaced with more standard painkillers plus her own adrenaline and
single focus. If she was suffering any trauma or residual shock, she wasn’t letting anyone see it. She was plumped up in bed with pillows, her face stitched, plastered and bruised, her arm in
a sling and every time she winced, Bert Robinson felt a sympathetic twinge himself. He couldn’t see the bandages beneath the sheets, but Dr Cisco had explained in detail about the
hypothermia, the ripped skin and leg muscle. She’d been a lucky woman to survive, let alone to be as on top of everything as she most clearly was.

Chief Franklin was whispering something to her while Attorney General Bentley was at the window surveying the security circus outside.

“Ah, Bert, you’re back,” she said acknowledging the Secretary. “Marcus, let’s run through it again, okay?”

When the Attorney finished, Chief Franklin said, “Just to make it clear, if anything gets in the way of the President delivering his State of the Union Address, we will be 100-percent
ready to swear in Madam Speaker instantly.”

Plan B still rankled the two Cabinet members, and Robinson couldn’t wait for his own call with Foster, not just so he could hear it all directly, but so he could have the comfort of
hearing his friend’s own voice.

“If people out there,” Isabel looked at them each pointedly, “want to believe President Foster is dead, so be it. In any case, if I
am
going to be sworn in as President,
it’ll be when the two Houses of Congress are sitting together tomorrow night, not a moment sooner, not unless there’s an emergency.”

“Isn’t this an emergency?” Marcus whispered to Bert as they left her room.

A
FTER SECRETARY BERT Robinson’s mobile phone battery died, the hour he spent drumming his fingers in Tom Cisco’s office waiting for his
call from Bobby Foster bled into a second and then into a third. His mounting stress that as the senior-most Cabinet member, he still hadn’t made personal contact with the President almost
made him puke. And this after he’d been on the head table at Foster’s wedding and later godfather to one of his kids. Despite repeated calls to Chief Franklin, even to the First Lady,
he couldn’t access either.

But he persisted, both in the national interest and as a frantically worried friend, and eventually Franklin, who he viewed as a brick wall physically and who was certainly behaving like one,
called him from one of the secure lines on the plane they’d flown down on after returning to the operations room he had temporarily set up there.

Robinson was praying that Franklin’s call was to put the President through to him.

“I’ve checked with the President,” said Franklin. “Yes, personally. And he apologises, but he can’t speak to you till later today. Remember, he’ll call
you
. Bye.”

Secretary Robinson blinked. He didn’t know what to say, even though Franklin was no longer on the line to hear it if he did. He simply stared into the phone still in his hand contemplating
an explanation that, up to now, he had been reluctant to accept.

He slammed down the phone, and sprinted from Cisco’s office back toward Isabel’s room. The agent let him pass and he pushed her door open without knocking. Both she and the Attorney
General looked up with stunned expressions. “Sorry, I…,” said Robinson, recovering his own composure, “Marcus, I need you… Outside, please.”

Once the two Cabinet members were in the corridor, Bert held his hand up and said, “Not here.” He led the Attorney by the elbow back to Cisco’s office.

Marcus Bentley listened carefully. Neither man had met Ed Loane before today, nor was either hoping for a repeat performance with him but, even so, both were now convincing themselves that
Ed’s suspicions simply had to be correct.

That the President, their friend, might truly be dead was shocking, a tragedy of vast proportions, personally and politically, but a conspiracy to conceal it would be even more alarming. What
absolutely petrified them was the chill of not knowing who was exercising the President’s authority… or why.

“As senior-most Secretary, if anyone should know what’s going on, it’s me, right?” Robinson asked Marcus.

The two colleagues tried several more avenues but they all led back to Franklin, a route as unhelpful as it was disturbing. The two men suddenly gaped at each other as though lightning had just
struck them. Without a further word, they charged out of the office. They passed Ed as they ran through the corridor, but were going so fast they didn’t see the smile of smug satisfaction
crawl onto his face.

When they got to Isabel’s room, Marcus was puffing. He was tall, but unlike Robinson, he was not a slight man. His career outside politics was as a trial attorney and though he’d
made millions out of the tobacco companies for his clients, as well as himself, he’d never kicked the habit. “Ma’am. Bert and I… well, look… we don’t buy
what’s happening.”

Bert was nodding.

Marcus continued, “We can’t get access to the President and…”

“He’s fine,” Isabel said.

“He’s fine?” Bert almost exploded. “
I
don’t know he’s fine…
Marcus
doesn’t know he’s fine…
No one
knows
he’s fine except you and that damn Franklin. There’s nothing
fine
about that in our book.”

Marcus rested a hand on Bert’s shoulder and looked at Isabel, “Your husband was right, wasn’t he? Bobby
is
dead.”

Isabel gingerly pushed herself back into her pillows, her flinch worrying the pair even more. Marcus moved to help her, but she frowned. “I’m fine.”

“Now
you’re
fine too?” spluttered Bert, his voice almost a screech. “Hey, Marcus! Everyone in this whole fucking world is fine. The Vice-President is dead, but
that’s fine. The President’s suffered a life-threatening asthma attack, something he’s never had before, ever, and that’s fine, too. We can’t even speak to the
President, but he’s fine, just trust me. The Speaker is in hospital, bandaged to the hilt and can hardly sit up in bed without wincing in pain, but she’s fine too. It’s all
fucking fine. Well, Madam Speaker, it’s not… fine.”

“Bert’s right,” said Marcus, playing good cop to Bert’s crazy cop. “In a situation where we can’t even speak to the President to confirm he’s
alive… well, my advice to the Cabinet will be that we’ve got no choice but to assume he’s unable to act in the Office, at a
minimum
, in which case it is our constitutional
duty to invoke the succession…”

“And have me declared as Acting President until his inability is removed?”

“Yes. And if, Madam Speaker, you decline the role, as you might… you know, out of respect for the… ah… political situation… the next in line is Senate President
pro tempore.” The current Senate President was Eric Mallord, a Democrat.

“And after him, it goes to me,” added Bert needlessly.

“Gentlemen,” said Isabel, “please believe me. President Foster is certainly not dead nor is he unable to fulfil his duties as you and my hus… others are too willing to
speculate.”

“We believe you, of course, ma’am,” said the Attorney. “But until we know that as a hard fact, and not hearsay, we have no choice other than to invoke the succession.
Then, once we can be sure his disability has been removed, he’ll be reinstated. But meanwhile, this country cannot be rudderless. We simply can’t permit it.”

“Actually, I’m afraid you must,” she said, pushing herself further back into her pillows, this time without letting them see her pain. “You give me no
choice…”

M
ANIFOLD’S AIRSTRIP COULDN’T take the highly modified Boeing-747 yesterday, so the presidential plane had instead landed thirty miles
away by road, at the South Burlington Air National Guard airfield. And that was where it was now waiting to fly its passengers to Washington DC for the State of the Union Address that evening.

Back in the hospital carpark, Isabel and a small contingent of her entourage strapped themselves into the Sea King helicopter. As it lifted its precious cargo into the air for the short airtrip
to South Burlington, the rest of the party of officials and security personnel were separately being ferried there in a fairly hotchpotch cortege of two bulletproof limos flown in earlier on one of
the C-5 Galaxy heavy transport aircraft, several borrowed pickup trucks, some rented SUVs, and nine of Manifold’s taxis.

Even with Secretary Robinson giving the orders, the symbolism of Isabel flying in the President’s personal helicopter and then on one of the two presidential planes, as well as her being
escorted by C-5s and protected by AWACS, F-15s and F-16s—while President Foster remained incommunicado for the second day running—was torturing an incredulous media and an increasingly
jittery public.

Before boarding the chopper, Robinson and Bentley had fronted the media swarm outside the hospital. They repeated the lines they’d started parroting the prior afternoon: that because
President Foster was physically weak after the debilitating asthma attack, even though he was fully competent and definitely in charge, the White House Physician had confined him to bed rest ahead
of his State of the Union Address, due that evening. And yes, they had spoken to him personally.

That two such respected men, who were also known to be his personal friends, were standing side-by-side saying this so unflinchingly placated many people watching, but there were enough
rumblings around the country to keep the nation on edge… that the President was dead… he was seriously incapacitated… there’d been a coup.

The hardcore conspiracy theorists were having a field day.

T
HE JOINT SESSION of the two Houses of Congress was scheduled for 8:30 PM, with the State of the Union Address being broadcast at nine. This time
every network, not just C-Span and the news channels, was scrabbling to take the feed live. Tonight, virtually every eye in the nation would be glued to a TV screen.

In the corridor, just before she entered the Hall of the House of Representatives, Isabel sighed, “And now for the public hanging.” Marcus Bentley hoped he knew what she meant, but
after what was to follow they were words he would scarcely ever forget.

Ed went to take her wrist, her undamaged left one, to wish her luck but, so noticeably that even Secretary Robinson flinched, she shook him off. So far, she’d barely said anything to Ed,
and certainly nothing about his affair or, for that matter, the President.

Ed’s fingers had felt like sandpaper against her skin, and as his hand dropped away, she noticed flesh-coloured pads covering a couple of his fingertips.

“What’re those?” she whispered, trying not to move her lips, aware that Davey wouldn’t be the only one able to read them this time; there were no press or cameras
permitted in the corridor, but it was abuzz with staffers, the Secret Service and the Capitol’s own police.

“A couple of warts,” Ed shrugged, leaning into her ear. “Got ’em burnt off.”

Isabel didn’t recall him having any warts recently, but didn’t think about them further after a nod from the Sergeant at Arms signalled her to follow him in, leaving Ed and Davey
with the two Cabinet Secretaries.

Bert pointed out the correct door for Ed and Davey to wait at, and he and Marcus turned, heading for the anteroom where the Cabinet was assembling.

CARRYING the traditional mace, the Sergeant at Arms walked slowly down the aisle to the rostrum. As Isabel limped behind him, the Hall kept an embarrassed silence, no one
confident enough of the circumstances to lead any applause. Her cane was its own mace of sorts, reminding some of the now almost folkloric day she hobbled into George and Annette Hicks’
diner. When her eyes located George up in the public gallery, the old guy, genetically contemptuous of convention, leapt to his feet and started to clap. His outburst seemed to trigger an electric
shock through everyone’s seats at the same moment and they all stood to follow him, though their applause was hesitant, unsure.

Isabel cracked a wrinkled smile, as genial as she was able given her stitches, and pushed on down the aisle until she stood unsteadily to the side of the podium.

The applause thickened, and with small, precise steps, Isabel cut a slow pivot to face the chamber simultaneously scanning over the faces while the hundreds of Representatives, those cramming
the press and public galleries, and the millions more in the TV audience, all scanned her and stared back in shock.

She knew she wasn’t the pretty sight they’d got comfortable with during the campaign but she’d scrubbed up well enough: a gifted makeup artist had plastered over her facial
bruises, though her stitches were there for all to see, and she was stuck with her right arm bent in its sling and her left having to lean on a gnarled oak cane. There was nothing she could do
about any of that, but to her, even making it to stand here tonight was an extraordinary feat.

As the ovation clattered on, she turned and, with her back to the chamber and the cameras, she slowly climbed step-by-painful-step to the top tier of the rostrum where eventually she slumped
into the Speaker’s red leather chair.