The Rivalry (11 page)

“Oh, Steve, one more thing,” Dowling said. “I need you to turn off your cell phone.”

Stevie had forgotten. He took it out of his pocket. “How come you need the cell phones off?” he asked.

“To make sure the intruders don’t have a contact in this room,” Dowling said.

Stevie looked down to turn off his phone. When he looked back up, Dowling was gone.

T
he next hour was both tense and intense.

Not long after Dowling had left, another agent appeared, introducing himself as the head of the Secret Service’s Philadelphia field office. He assured everyone that the area was “locked down temporarily” only as a precaution and that everything would be back to normal shortly. A few minutes later he returned to say that the lockdown would continue for a few more minutes, but people were welcome to go through the buffet line.

“Can we go to the bathroom?” someone shouted.

“Not just yet,” the agent said. “Soon. I promise.”

But it wasn’t soon. Stevie was seated at a table with Jerardi, Dei Lynam from Comcast SportsNet, and Derek Klein, one of the Army team captains, all of them wondering what could be going on.

Stevie had told the table what Dowling had said. “Michael was never coming today,” Lynam said. “I don’t think Shifty was either. I’d like to know if someone from the station put their names on the list.…”

“Or if someone who knew they wouldn’t be here did,” Jerardi put in.

“Problem is, we can’t call anyone right now to find out,” Lynam said.

Stevie could tell the room was getting restless. He needed to go to the bathroom too. Normally he would have welcomed an hour with Derek Klein, but he was too distracted to really focus on any kind of interview. But he did get some background. Klein was a Michigan kid, a coach’s son who had come to Army as a quarterback but had been converted to safety after his sophomore year.

“Trent Steelman was better than I was at quarterback,” he said. “And I wanted to play. So I went to the coaches before spring practice two years ago and asked if I could move. At first they said no, they needed me as a backup QB because I had experience. I told them I didn’t want to graduate without having made a serious contribution. This was the only way I thought I’d get a chance to do it.”

One thing Stevie had noticed in his brief exposure to the Army and Navy athletes was that they almost never used the phrase “you know.” And they looked you right in the eye when they spoke to you. When he had met Niumatalolo with his captains downstairs, they both repeated his name when they shook his hand: “Steve, nice to meet
you.” Stevie had grown accustomed to athletes who didn’t even bother to take their headphones off when being introduced.

Klein was about to tell a story about an old teammate who was now serving in Iraq when Stevie saw Pete Dowling walk back into the room.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’re all clear,” he said. “I apologize for the inconvenience. We thought we had an intruder, but it turned out to be a miscommunication. I’m told Mr. Needle will start the program in a few minutes.”

Stevie knew, because he’d seen his name in the paper and his face on TV, that Larry Needle was the head of the Philadelphia Sports Congress, a group that tried to bring events like Army-Navy to Philadelphia. Needle had now moved to the microphone at the front of the room. “Folks, I’m really sorry about all this; I know we all are. Unfortunately, because of the mix-up, the mayor had to head back to his office. Governor Rendell, I’m told, is on his way up right now and—”

“I’m here right now, Larry,” a voice said from the back of the room.

Stevie looked around and saw Ed Rendell—with lots of security in tow—walking through the tables to the podium. Stevie knew that Rendell was not a politician who pretended to like sports because it played well with the voters. In fact, he was such an ardent Eagles fan that during his days as mayor, he appeared weekly on an Eagles postgame show on Comcast.

Rendell strode to the microphone and Needle moved away to give him room.

“I apologize for all the hoo-ha these last few minutes,” Rendell said. “We were hoping to surprise everyone by having Vice President Biden join us today. But with the mix-up, the Secret Service turned the VP around. Better safe than sorry. He sends his regrets; he really did want to be here.

“And Mayor Nutter also sends his apologies for not being able to stay. He had a meeting at city hall he had to get back to. I think he would have said the same thing I’m going to say if he had been able to stay: ‘Philadelphia
is
the home of the Army-Navy game.’ We don’t mind loaning it out for a year every now and then, but I think everyone agrees this is where the game belongs. We love having everyone from both schools in town, and I think Larry and his guys have done a great job in making all of you feel welcome.

“So, I hope you have a great game this year down in, what is it—Landover, Maryland? That’s another thing I’m proud of—Philadelphia’s stadiums and arenas are
in
Philadelphia, not in the suburbs. But I hope you have a great game. I plan to be there with the president and the vice president, so I look forward to seeing all of you there and then back
here
, where you belong, a year from now.”

There was enthusiastic applause as he finished.

“Governor,” Needle said, stepping back to the microphone, “do you mind taking a few questions from the media while you’re here?”

“Glad to,” Rendell said.

There were a couple of questions about Philadelphia’s commitment to keeping the game in future years. Then Jerardi stood up.

“Hey, Dick, long time, no see,” Rendell said.

“Thanks, Governor, we miss you on the postgame show,” Jerardi said. “Since the incident is now over, can you give us some idea about what happened earlier?”

Rendell appeared to be ready for the question. He nodded at Jerardi.

“Sure, Dick,” he said. “Two people got into the stadium who shouldn’t have. The Secret Service was understandably alarmed. But it turned out to be just a couple of kids from Penn on a fraternity initiation assignment.”

“Fraternity initiation?”

Rendell nodded. “Apparently they were supposed to get their picture taken with me—you know, the old Penn grad who is now governor. They had no idea there’d be extra security because of the vice president or that the vice president was even coming.

“They were actually pretty clever. They called Comcast, claiming to be from Larry’s office, and asked who was coming to the lunch. Then they called Larry’s office, claiming to be from Comcast, and added two names to the list of attendees.

“That got them through the door, and I guess no one looked closely enough at their IDs. That’s where the breakdown was. So they went into the concourse to wait for me to come in, hoping they could get a picture.”

“So what took so long to sort things out, then?” Jerardi asked, which was what Stevie had been thinking.

Rendell nodded again. “When the folks downstairs realized they hadn’t gotten on the elevators but were somewhere else in the stadium, they called up here, and the Secret Service shut the place down. By then there were police and Secret Service all over, and the kids panicked and hid. Took a while to find them.”

“Were they arrested?” Jerardi asked.

“No,” Rendell said. “Their stories checked. They weren’t carrying anything resembling a weapon—except their cell phone cameras. They were given a stern lecture and sent back to Penn.”

“Last question,” Jerardi said. “Did they get their picture?”

Rendell shook his head. “Secret Service wouldn’t let them anywhere near me. Not because they were dangerous, but because they caused everyone so much trouble. When I say they got a stern lecture, I mean they got a
stern
lecture.

“Dick, they’re telling me I’m out of time; we need to get the coaches and players up here. Let’s get back to the reason we’re all really here!”

With that, Rendell escaped, giving Needle the microphone so he could begin his introductions of the coaches and players.

Jerardi sat down and leaned over to Stevie. “You buy that story?” he asked.

Stevie looked at him. “You don’t?”

“Maybe,” Jerardi said. “But if I had a relationship with Agent Dowling like you seem to have, I’d find him and see what he has to say. Rendell had almost too many details. He sounded very well coached to me.”

“He’s a politician,” Stevie said.

“Good point,” Jerardi said. “They’re very coachable.”

As soon as the lunch was over, Stevie tried to find Dowling and Campbell. The police were no help, claiming they had no idea who Stevie was even talking about. Stevie finally found the guy who had introduced himself to the crowd as the head of the Philadelphia field office.

“Bud Keyser,” he said, shaking hands when Stevie introduced himself. “I know who you are; Pete told me that you were shadowing him on some Army-Navy stuff.”

“Do you know where he is right now?” Stevie asked.

“Yeah, I do,” Keyser said. “He’s on his way back to Washington. Once everything was clear, he took off.”

Stevie wondered what he should do next. He looked around and saw Niumatalolo finishing up a one-on-one with a local TV station and waving at Larry Needle.

He thanked Keyser and made his way in that direction.

“Interesting day,” he heard Niumatalolo say to Needle. “Sort of more than we bargained for.”

“No kidding,” Needle said. “Who’d have thought two kids from a fraternity could hold us all hostage for an hour?”

They shook hands and Niumatalolo turned and saw Stevie.

“Hey, Steve,” he said. “You got a little more of a story than coaches and players talking about how much they’re looking forward to the game, didn’t you?”

Stevie nodded. “That’s for sure. Did you happen to see Mr. Dowling once everything was all clear?”

“The Secret Service agent? Yeah. Coach Ellerson and I spoke to him earlier. He explained that they had turned the vice president around just to be safe.”

“How’d he seem? Concerned or annoyed?”

Niumatalolo shot him a look, then smiled. “Always reporting, huh? He was calm and professional. Off the record, though, I thought he seemed kind of ticked off. He said something about having enough to worry about without panicking people over a fraternity prank.”

“Thanks, Coach, I appreciate it.”

“No problem—I hope we’ll be seeing you and Susan Carol on the Yard after Thanksgiving.”

“We’ll be there.”

Niumatalolo went off to round up his players. Stevie could see why Susan Carol had liked him so much—he was very friendly and talkative, probably much to Dowling’s chagrin. Then Stevie was struck by a scary thought. Dowling might have
wanted
Niumatalolo to pass on the fraternity prank story, along with Rendell. Maybe Dowling was ticked off because the story
wasn’t
that simple.

*   *   *

Kelleher must have said “Are you kidding me?” a dozen times as Stevie filled him in over the phone on his way home. “Nothing ever happens at that lunch!”

“So maybe it
was
just a fraternity prank,” said Stevie.

“I know Pete Dowling and Bob Campbell pretty well. They’re careful, but they don’t panic. They must have been really nervous about something to turn Biden around.

“And Jerardi’s right—Rendell was most likely briefed beforehand so he could be the face of the story. Secret Service doesn’t like to put itself out front on anything unless there’s no choice.”

“So should I call Dowling? Should you?” Stevie asked.

“Right now, neither of us should call,” Kelleher said. “If something is going on, he’ll be too spooked to talk. I’d let it simmer a few days, and maybe when you see Dowling again in person, you can get an explanation that makes more sense.”

“So what now?” Stevie said.

“Go home and write,” Kelleher said. “And then ask more questions tomorrow. I think it was Woodward who first said to me, ‘Never think a story is over.’ At some point every day you have to sit down and write, but you never stop trying to gather more information.

“So write what you know now. And then keep digging.”

A
fter a long talk with Stevie about his adventures at the Army-Navy lunch, Susan Carol decided she should start compiling her notes for the story they were supposed to write on the Secret Service’s pregame security measures. The story had taken a turn for the weird, and she figured it’d help to have everything in order when they started to write.

But a quick check of her emails sent the thought of the security story right out of her head. The subject line was:
Letter to the Editor—Any comments?

When she opened up the email, she found a note from the woman in charge of the letters page at the
Post
:
Thought you should see the attached. The plan is to run it on Thursday. If you have any comments, please let me know by early Wednesday
.

Susan Carol opened the attachment and let out a little gasp as she began to read: