Triggers

“Where do you think they got the technology?” Muilenburg replied evenly. He held up a hand. “Not that we gave it to them, of course. The initial research was another one of those cold-fusion notions, coupled with some interesting new physics out of Brookhaven. No one quite realized the destructive potential at first; when we did, it was classified beyond top secret, but enough hints and clues had already gotten out.”

“So the Chinese have this, too? And the Russians?”

“Not big bombs, like we’ve got, sir—at least, as far as we know. Which is why we have to do it now—an immediate counterpunch.”

Seth shook his head. “It’s not a proportionate response, Peter.”

“Was nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki a proportionate response to Pearl Harbor?” asked Muilenburg. “Two whole cities, full of civilians, for one Navy base? At Pearl Harbor, twenty-four hundred people died, of whom just fifty-seven were civilians; the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed a hundred times as many—almost a quarter of a million people, almost all of them civilians. Was that proportionate? No—but it ended the war. It stopped it cold. When we had the clear upper hand in 1945 against the Japanese, we used it—and we never had to fear the Japanese again.”

“But the terrorists aren’t just in Pakistan,” Seth said.

“True. But most of the al-Sajada leaders are there. And Pakistan shielded bin Laden for years; their ISI knew he was there. Yes, there are terrorists in Afghanistan and Iraq and elsewhere, but the message will be clear: if there’s another attack on American soil, we’ll take out another nation that harbors terrorists.”

“No,” said Seth. “I mean the terrorists are here. In the United States, and London, and elsewhere. They’re already here; that’s how these attacks can happen.”

“Foot soldiers. The leaders are back there.”

“In the Islamic world?” Seth said. “This isn’t a war against Islam.”

“No, it’s not,” Muilenburg said. “There are 1.6 billion Muslims in the world, and fifty countries in which Muslims are the majority of the population. Pakistan is just a tiny part of Islam.”

“This is horrific,” Seth said. “Abominable.”

“What’s been done to us is horrific,” replied Muilenburg. “And it will go on and on unless we force them to stop, unless we show them that we will not tolerate it. We’re the last remaining superpower. It’s time we used our superpowers and put an end to this.”

Darryl listened intently as Bessie recounted the meeting between Secretary of Defense Muilenburg and the president. “And Jerrison bought into this?” he said when she was done.

Bessie nodded. “And it’s going ahead on Monday. Tomorrow.”

Darryl looked around the luxurious cottage—but a gilded cage is still a cage. “I guess there’s nothing we can do about it, is there?”

“Well,” said Bessie, “there’s not much.” She searched the president’s memories to see if he had received her letter yet; it didn’t seem so. “But,” she added, looking out the window at the snow-covered forested ground, “at least I’ve given it my best shot.”

Chapter 46

Seth Jerrison was still lying on the bed in the presidential residence at Camp David. The First Lady—Jasmine Jerrison, tall, sophisticated, refined—was sitting nearby, working on her laptop computer, which was perched on a little desk. With the exception of Agent Susan Dawson, Seth had dismissed the Secret Service from providing his protection here; he was now relying on Navy and Marine officers who had been screened by Peter Muilenburg’s staff.

There was a knock at the door. Jasmine got up and opened it. One of the Marine guards saluted her crisply. “Ma’am, an envelope for the president.”

Seth couldn’t see her face from here, but he imagined she was narrowing her green eyes. “Who’s it from?”

“Ma’am, Mrs. Stilwell insisted that it be delivered to your husband.”

“I’ll take it.”

“I promised Mrs. Stilwell that it would go to the president.”

“I’ll give it to him. Thank you.” She took the envelope. The young man saluted and left, and Jasmine brought the envelope over to Seth. He nodded, and she got the ornate letter opener off the desk and slit the flap, put on her reading glasses, and pulled out the single sheet.

“It’s gibberish,” she said.

“What?”

She held it so he could see. He was already wearing his Ben Franklin glasses, and he tipped his head so that he could look through the lenses at the paper. It was a piece of Camp David stationery with a long message written on it in a shaky hand. The letter began:

5-2-6

IJFXK XVXJY DIJLZ…

“What’s it mean?” Jasmine asked.

The First Lady was privy to all his secrets—personal and professional—although he’d never had cause to explain the 13 Code to her before. He did so now. It took only a few seconds for her to write up a decryption table for the key 5-2-6, but converting the message was tedious—just as, Seth imagined, it had been tedious for Bessie to write it out.