Eye for an Eye (47 page)

“Hi, Dewey,” said Calibrisi.

Dewey stepped toward Calibrisi and wrapped his arms around him.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me,” said Calibrisi. “Thank the captain of your hockey team.”

87

THE PRINCETON CEMETERY
PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY
FOUR DAYS LATER

More than a thousand people were gathered at the cemetery on what was a beautiful autumn day. The cemetery’s entrance had been secured. Armed FBI and Secret Service agents stood just inside the gates, checking names against a master list. Past the gates, the road ran through row after row of headstones. Near the center of the cemetery was a large meadow. Two metal detectors stood on the lawn just outside the rope cordon.

The memorial service was supposed to begin at eleven, but one of the guests, a guest deemed important enough to wait for, was running late.

At 11:15, a black limousine, with flags flying at each of the four corners of the vehicle, pulled through the entrance gates. The vehicle rolled slowly through the cemetery to a reserved parking area. The limousine’s red flags, with gold stars arrayed in one corner, ruffled lightly in the wind.

Three armed Secret Service agents, carbines out, stood guard along the perimeter of the marked-off parking area.

Waiting there, dressed in a navy blue suit, was President J. P. Dellenbaugh. With him was his wife, Amy, who wore a black dress with thin white stripes.

The limousine stopped a few feet from Dellenbaugh. The back door opened, and Qishan Li, the premier of China, climbed out.

“Mr. Premier,” said Dellenbaugh, reaching out and shaking Li’s hand, “we’re happy you’re here.”

“Mr. President,” said Li, a somber but kind smile on his face, “as I told you, I wouldn’t have missed it.”

*   *   *

As they crossed the grass, Dellenbaugh glanced at Li.

When Li had called him three days earlier, Dellenbaugh didn’t know quite what to expect.

“Mr. President,” the soft-voiced Chinese leader had said after listing out a series of transgressions committed by the Chinese government against the United States. “I am calling for a very simple reason. I am calling to apologize for the murder of Jessica Tanzer by employees of the Chinese government; for the attempted murder of an American citizen, Mr. Dewey Andreas, as well as his parents and brother; and for the unauthorized, illegal use of the People’s Bank of China in an attempt to extort your country. I did not sanction any of these actions, and I am deeply embarrassed that it required so long for me to reach out to you. The Chinese government accepts full responsibility. While we both know actions do occur in the world of covert operations that sometimes lead to death, on both sides, I am personally, ethically, and morally opposed to the taking of innocent life as part of that effort. I am also opposed to the use of our financial resources in a way that can only be called extortion.”

Dellenbaugh, in his typical blue-collar manner, hadn’t beaten around the bush.

“What does ‘accepts responsibility’ mean, Mr. Premier?”

“Whatever you want it to mean.”

Dellenbaugh’s next call, to someone who was quickly becoming his closest advisor in government, began what was to be Dellenbaugh’s first real exposure to a world he only vaguely knew about.

“I need to talk to you, Hector.”

“Mr. President, I’m in the middle of a shitstorm. Dewey is two hours from landing in Beijing, and there’s a decent chance he’s dead once he steps off the plane. I have no assets on the ground there, and I’m down to begging the Taiwanese government to lend a hand, which they will only do if I promise them the first two dozen F-35s to roll off the line at Lockheed. I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t talk.”

“The person I just spoke to might be able to help.”

“Unless it was the Chinese premier, I highly doubt it.”

*   *   *

The president and Amy Dellenbaugh walked with Li to the seating area, which was quiet except for a lone violin player, who played a concerto by Bach.

They moved down the hushed aisle, past dignitaries, business leaders, ambassadors; past congressmen and senators, governors and cabinet members, members of the Supreme Court, foreign leaders, journalists—there as attendees, not to cover the story—and family members; all of them there to celebrate the life of Jessica Tanzer.

As they reached the front row, Dellenbaugh stepped to the couple seated in the first two seats.

“Don’t get up,” said Dellenbaugh. “Mr. and Mrs. Tanzer, I would like to introduce you to Premier Li of the People’s Republic of China.”

Li reached his hand out.

“I am deeply sorry for what happened,” said Li. “The death of your daughter was the fault of people within my own government. Even though I abhor what these criminals did to Jessica, I cannot change what happened. What I can do is accept responsibility for it and apologize to you sincerely from the deepest springs of humility and sadness that, today and always, shall flow from my heart.”

*   *   *

Three rows back, Katie sat next to Tacoma. He was dressed in a gray Brooks Brothers suit, and was wearing a blue tie. It was the first time she’d ever seen the former UVA middie and Navy SEAL ever wear one. He pulled at his collar, which was too tight. Katie was dressed in a simple black sleeveless dress, her tan arms clutching a small bag of tissues, her blond hair parted neatly in the middle.

They were, like everyone else in the large crowd, silent, reverent, listening to the soft strains from the violin.

Down the row from Katie and Tacoma sat Calibrisi. His eyes were red and sad. Next to him was an older couple who’d traveled from Castine for the funeral of the woman who would have been their daughter-in-law. John Andreas looked distinguished, dressed in a new gray suit. Margaret was in a simple, pretty green dress. Beside her sat Reagan Andreas, then, to her right, her mother, Hobey’s wife, Barrett. Three seats sat empty at the end of the row.

At half past eleven, the minister gave an almost imperceptible nod to the woman playing the violin. He stepped slowly to the dais.

“Welcome to Princeton, and to a celebration of the remarkable life of a unique and special American, a daughter of Princeton, and someone I had the pleasure, some thirty-eight years ago, of baptizing. Today we cry, we mourn, and we rejoice the life of Jessica Cavendish Tanzer.”

*   *   *

Hobey and Sam stood just inside the gates to the cemetery. Despite the fact that the memorial service had begun, they remained at the gates, waiting for Dewey.

“Maybe it was just too hard,” said Hobey. “I don’t blame him.”

“He’s coming,” said Sam.

A few minutes later, Sam saw him first, walking down the road toward the gates. Dewey’s head was shaved. As he approached the gates, he pulled out his wallet to show ID.

“Please put it away,” said the agent. “I’m sorry for your loss, sir.”

Dewey walked through the gates. He looked at Hobey, who stepped to Dewey and hugged him. Then Dewey looked at Sam, who could only stare up at Dewey. Dewey’s eyes were bloodshot, red with tears. He eyed his nephew’s mop of curly blond hair and grinned through his grief.

“What, they don’t have barbers in Castine anymore?” said Dewey. He stepped toward Sam and hugged him.

“I know,” said Sam. “It’s a little long.”

“I heard what you did, Sammy,” Dewey whispered into Sam’s ear. “Pretty fuckin’ ballsy, if you ask me.”

“Thanks, Uncle Dewey.”

They walked down the cemetery road together, Sam in the middle. They passed a long line of limousines, SUVs, and government vehicles.

Dewey was dressed in a navy blue suit, a blue button-down shirt, a gray-and-white houndstooth tie. It was a tie that Jessica had given him; a tie she had picked out for him to wear to their wedding.

“You go ahead,” said Dewey, looking at his brother, then at Sam.

“You okay?” asked his brother.

“No,” said Dewey. “But seeing you two guys sure helps.”

Dewey went left, off the road, into the field of gravestones. He walked down a long line of headstones toward the funeral. He walked until he was just a few feet from a woman who was seated in the chair at the end of the last row. She glanced at Dewey; he didn’t recognize her. She looked at him for several moments, then turned back to the front.

Jessica’s sister, Percy, had asked Dewey to speak, but he said no.

Dewey shut his eyes, listening to Calibrisi’s normally loud, authoritative voice, softened by emotion, as he talked about Jessica.

There were times, minutes, moments that etched themselves into your memory, Dewey thought, like letters carved into an old maple tree. They were carved there, and there they would remain. Sometimes, those memories could be obscure and trivial. For whatever reason, at that moment, he thought of the color of a girl’s socks, a girl whose name he couldn’t even remember, on the first day of elementary school back in Castine, so many years ago. And yet that memory was a permanent marker that would never disappear. Other memories were like letters written into sand, there for only brief, fleeting moments, then gone, washed away forever by the water and the wind.

As Dewey listened, with eyes shut, to Hector speak, as he felt the warm breeze across his face, as he smelled the fresh-cut grass beneath his feet, as he fought back tears, anger, and frustration, he finally understood that his entire life had amounted to nothing; Jessica was but a set of letters, a word, now gone. And that as much as he fought to carve his life into the thickest of maples, he was little more than a boat, helpless on the incoming tide, watching the water wash away his dreams; an eyewitness to the tragedy that was the life of a warrior.

EPILOGUE

BIRCH HILL
M
C
LEAN, VIRGINIA

Dewey parked his pickup truck in front of a large, rambling, white-brick, three-story 1885 colonial, the home of Hector and Vivian Calibrisi.

Dewey’s hair had grown out a bit, perhaps a quarter inch, and he’d let his beard and mustache grow out. He looked like a spot-on twin for the young man who, more than a decade before, had been the first-ever Ranger to make it through Gauntlet; big, tough, and plain-out mean. That wasn’t his intent when he got up, but it’s the way it was.

He knocked on the front door, and a young woman with long brown hair, dressed in plaid pajama bottoms and a Northwestern sweatshirt, appeared, then opened the door. She had a cup of coffee in her hand. She looked like a young Sophia Loren. She scanned Dewey from head to toe.

“You must be Dewey.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m Daisy.”

“Hi.”

“Come in.”

Dewey followed her inside. He smelled wood burning in a fireplace somewhere off inside the big house.

“Your dad talks about you a lot.”

“He does, huh?” she said. “My background is supposed to be kept classified.”

“Seriously?” Dewey asked, believing her.

She glanced around.

“I’m a secret agent,” she whispered. “Russian. Deep cover. My real name is Svetlana.”

Daisy looked up at Dewey and smiled; he couldn’t help smiling back.

“I know,” said Dewey, whispering back. “That’s why I’m here. Moscow sent me. They have a job they want you to do.”

Daisy giggled.

“Really?” she asked conspiratorially. “What is it?”

“It has to do with the truck out front,” said Dewey, glancing around suspiciously.

“The truck?” she asked, leaning closer to Dewey. He could smell her shampoo. She put her hand on his forearm and stood up on her tiptoes to be closer to his ear, then whispered, “Do they want me to blow it up?”

“No,” he whispered back. “They want you to clean it, then wax it.”

Daisy started laughing, and soon Dewey joined her.

“What’s so funny?” asked Vivian Calibrisi, who heard the commotion and walked out from the kitchen.

“Dewey,” said Daisy, smiling at him, then turning and walking toward the stairs. “This is going to be a fun Thanksgiving!”

“Come on in, Dewey,” Vivian said, walking to him.

Dewey hugged Vivian, then followed her into the kitchen.

“It’s great to see you.”

“You too. Thanks a lot for having me. I hope I’m not intruding or anything.”

“Are you kidding? We’re going to have a blast. Hector said he wants you to carve the turkey. He said he thinks you’ll do a good job.”

Dewey smiled. He looked around the big kitchen. A racing green AGA stove was covered in various shiny pots and dishes. A fire roared in the fireplace. In the middle of the kitchen, a long harvest table had flowers on it. A beautiful chandelier dangled overhead.

“Where is the old geezer?” Dewey asked.

“He’s in back. Just look for the forest fire.”

Dewey walked across the back lawn, toward a pond that sat in the middle of a field, beyond which were trees. Next to the trees, a chimney of smoke swirled into the late-autumn air. He came to the source of the smoke: a brick fire pit at the edge of the forest. Standing there was Calibrisi. His back was turned, oblivious to the outside world. He was singing a song to himself, “Feed the World,” in a jarringly off-key tone. He had on boots, a flannel shirt, and jeans and was stirring a large pool of brown liquid which was in a steel pan simmering on the fire.

“First of all,” said Dewey, “you are the worst goddam singer I have ever heard.”

Calibrisi turned, stopped singing, and smiled.

“Second, what the fuck are you doing?”

“You guys never made maple syrup?” asked Calibrisi. “I thought you were raised in Maine.”

“We just bought it from the idiots who spent all day making it,” said Dewey.

Calibrisi laughed, then reached down with a spoon and took a small amount of the piping hot liquid, blew on it then slurped it up.

“Getting there,” he said. “You wanna try?”

“Tempting, but no thanks.”

Calibrisi put the large wooden spoon down and gave Dewey a hug.

“How you doing?” asked Calibrisi.

“Good,” said Dewey. “Good to see you. Your daughter is hilarious.”

“We’re all glad you’re here,” said Calibrisi.

“I am too,” said Dewey, reaching for the wooden spoon. “Let me stir a while. You rest that pretty head of yours.”