The Threat

The Old Executive had been built sixty years before anyone thought of exercising at work. A grimy washroom on the ground floor, 18-M had the fiberglass shower stalls you found in cheap hotels, blue-tile walls, and a busted ceiling he could see asbestos-crusted pipes through. And five vertical gray steel lockers. He pushed through the morning crowd and got the last one. He didn’t know the guys undressing, clanging locker doors, but judging by their haircuts, they were military like him.

Which they must have figured too, because one said, “Mike Jazak. Army.” Looking at Dan. “You West Wing?”

“NSC. Dan Lenson.”

They shook hands. Jazak said he was one of the military aides. “You a runner? Up for a couple miles? Not too fast?”

“I guess so,” Dan said, not catching anything in the glances the others exchanged.

“We suit up every morning and wait around for Mustang. If he comes, we go.”

“Mustang?”

“POTUS. President of the United States.” He asked one of the others, who Dan now saw had an earphone, “Okay if this guy comes along? We’re supposed to have four on the track.” The Secret Service guy ran an eye across Dan and nodded.

* * *

He followed them to the South Lawn and a glare of sun more suited to July than September. Did a few push-ups, sucking in his breath as pain lanced up his arms. “You all right?” the Secret Service agent asked. Dan said he just needed to warm up.

He was still stretching when the president came out in gray cutoff sweatpants and a baggy T screened with what seemed to be a cherub. It might have been an old rock concert T. Out of a suit De Bari looked less impressive than he had in the corridor. More like somebody who got into the ice cream more often than he should. He tousled Jazak’s hair and poked the other runners in the ribs, joking about how much dust they were going to eat today.

The aides and agents eased into motion like a destroyer screen escorting a carrier out of port. Shoulder holsters printed under the protective detail’s track suits. Across the lawn Dan caught sight of a guy watching them, in full uniform, a black briefcase at his feet.

It wasn’t much of a track. Maybe a fifth of a mile, a resilient-surfaced loop. They started fast but the pace dropped off quickly. Dan lagged back, letting the agents stay close to their charge. They shambled along together in a close scrum meant, he supposed, to protect the president if someone took a potshot from the fence line. As they rounded a turn he saw tourists pointing. Taking pictures, though at this distance they wouldn’t get much.

“Whew … take a breather,” someone muttered. They slowed to a walk. The chief executive’s layer cut sagged over his forehead. He rubbed his side, blowing out ruefully. An intern or press relations woman was walking along the colonnade. De Bari eyed her yearningly.

He muttered, “You know, I had a good ole boy working for me in the governor’s office. He always had the best-looking women around. I asked him one day how he managed to do that. Know what he told me? ‘I tell ’em to walk over and face the wall. If their tits hit it before their nose, I hire ’em.’”

The agents laughed dutifully. Dan didn’t, and caught the president’s glance.

They jogged another slow lap, then walked again. The air was sultry. Everyone was sweating now despite what Dan found to be an undemanding pace.

A hand with two fingers missing came through the press and grabbed his arm. “Hey there. Who’s this?”

He’d thought De Bari might remember him from their encounter that first day. But face-to-face with flushed cheeks and blue eyes, Dan realized he didn’t. Well, as many people as he met … He introduced himself and said where he worked.

“Counterdrug,” the president said, looking toward the colonnade again. No one there Dan could see. “Need to make some waves there. What do you think? Are we doing all we can?”

“Mr. President, I’m not sure we are. Especially in Asia.”

“That’s what I thought. Damn it! Look, anything I need to see, anything to shake things up, put it in a paper and send it up. Tell Mrs. C I said so.”

He sounded so concerned and eager that Dan felt eager too. Even if this was just a job to bureaucrats like Meilhamer, the president cared. “Yes sir, I sure will.”

They came abreast of the Mansion, and though Dan had thought Jazak had said two miles, and they hadn’t gone that far yet, the president broke off and headed across the lawn. The detail stayed with De Bari, as if welded by invisible bars. The aides didn’t. They kept walking till the president was hidden by the shrubbery, then broke into a run again. Someone said something Dan didn’t catch, and they laughed.

Suddenly he felt energetic, optimistic. There were those who said Bad Bob wasn’t particularly bright. But close up the guy seemed very intelligent. Dan put on a burst of speed, catching up with the aides, then cut off the track and kept going, walking now, sweating, not meeting anyone’s eyes, through the West Wing.

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