“Yes, Zhang, they do. They apply an astounding degree of importance to this incident.”
“Those two policemen ought to be shot for what they did, but we cannot allow the Americans to dictate that sort of thing to us.” The embarrassment of the incident was one thing—and embarrassing the state was often a capital offense in the People’s Republic—but China had to make such a decision on its own, not at the order of an outsider.
“They call it barbaric,” Shen added.
“Barbaric? They say that to us?”
“You know that Americans have tender sensibilities. We often forget that. And their religious leaders have some influence in their country.
Our ambassador in Washington has cabled some warnings to us about this. It would be better if we had some time to let things settle down, and truly it would be better to punish those two policemen just to assuage American sensibilities, but I agree we cannot allow them to dictate domestic policy to us.”
“And this Gant man says his ji is bigger than ours, does he?”
“So Xue tells me. Our file on him says that he’s a stock TRADER, that he’s worked closely with Minister Winston for many years. He’s a Jew, like lots of them are—”
“Their Foreign Minister is also a Jew, isn’t he?”
“Minister Adler? Yes, he is,” Shen confirmed after a moment’s thought.
“So, this Gant really does tell us their position, then?”
“Probably,” Foreign Minister Shen said.
Zhang leaned forward in his chair. “Then you will make them clear on ours. The next time you see this Gant, tell him chou ni ma de bi.” Which was rather a strong imprecation, best said to someone in China if you had a gun already in your hand.
“I understand,” Shen replied, knowing that he’d never say anything like that except to a particularly humble underling in his own office.
Zhang left. He had to talk this one over with his friend Fang Gan.
C H A P T E R – 34
Hits
Over the last week Ryan had come to expect bad news upon waking up, and as a result so had his family. He knew that he was taking it too seriously when his children started asking him about it over breakfast.
“What’s happening with China, Dad?” Sally asked, giving Ryan one more thing to lament. Sally didn’t say “daddy” anymore, and that was a title far more precious to Jack than “Mr. President.” You expected it from your sons, but not from your daughter. He’d discussed it with Cathy, but she’d told him that he just had to roll with the punch.
“We don’t know, Sally.”
“But you’re supposed to know everything!” And besides, her friends asked her about it at school.
“Sally, the President doesn’t know everything. At least I don’t,” he explained, looking up from the morning Early Bird. “And if you never noticed, the TVs in my office are tuned to CNN and the other news networks because they frequently tell me more than CIA does.”
“Really?” Sally observed. She watched too many movies. In Hollywood, CIA was a dangerous, lawbreaking, antidemocratic, fascist, and thoroughly evil government agency that nonetheless knew everything about everybody, and had really killed President Kennedy for its own purposes, whatever they were (Hollywood never quite got around to that). But it didn’t matter, because whoever the star was always managed to thwart the nasty old CIA before the credits, or the last commercial, depending on the format.
“Really, honey. CIA has some good people in it, but basically it’s just one more government agency.”
“What about the FBI and Secret Service?” she asked.
“They’re cops. Cops are different. My dad was a cop, remember?”
“Oh, yeah,” and then she went back to the “Style” section of The Washington Post, which had both the comics and the stories that interested her, mainly ones having to do with the sort of music that her father put quotation marks around.
Then there was a discreet knock at the door, and Andrea came in. At this time of day, she also acted as his private secretary, in this case delivering a dispatch from the State Department. Ryan took it, looked at it, and managed not to pound on the table, because his children were present.
“Thanks, Andrea,” he told her.
“Yes, Mr. President.” And Special Agent Price-O’Day went back out to the corridor.
Jack saw his wife looking at him. The kids couldn’t read all his facial expressions, but his wife could. To Cathy, Ryan couldn’t lie worth a damn, which was also why she didn’t worry about his fidelity. Jack had the dissimulation ability of a two-year-old, despite all the help and training he got from Arnie. Jack caught the look and nodded. Yeah, it was China again. Ten minutes later, breakfast was fully consumed and the TV was turned off, and the Ryan family headed downstairs to work, to school, or to the day-care center at Johns Hopkins, depending on age, with the requisite contingent of Secret Service bodyguards. Jack kissed them all in their turn, except for little Jack—shortstop to the Secret Service—because John Patrick Ryan, Jr., didn’t go in for that sissy stuff. There was something to be said for having daughters, Ryan thought, as he headed for the Oval Office. Ben Goodley was there, waiting with the President’s Daily Brief.
“You have the one from SecState?” CARDSHARP asked.
“Yeah, Andrea delivered it.” Ryan fell into his swivel chair and lifted the phone, punching the proper speed-dial button.
“Good morning, Jack,” SecState said in greeting, despite a short night’s sleep gotten on the convertible sofa in his own office. Fortunately, his private bathroom also had a shower.
“Approved. Bring them all back,” SWORDSMAN told EAGLE.
“Who handles the announcement?” Secretary Adler asked.
“You do it. We’ll try to low-key it,” the president said, with forlorn hope in his voice.
“Right,” Adler thought. “Anything else?”
“That’s it for now.”
“Okay, see ya, Scott.” Ryan replaced the phone. “What about China?” he asked Goodley. “Are they doing anything unusual?”
“No. Their military is active, but it’s routine training activity only. Their most active sectors are up in their northeast and opposite Taiwan. Lesser activity in their southwest, north of India.”
“With all the good luck the Russians are having with oil and gold, are the Chinese looking north with envy?”
“It’s not bad speculation, but we have no positive indications of that from any of our sources.” Everybody envied rich neighbors, after all. That’s what had encouraged Saddam Hussein to invade Kuwait, despite having lots of oil under his own sand.
“Any of our sources” includes SORGE, the President reminded himself. He pondered that for a second. “Tell Ed I want a SNIE on Russia and China.”
“Quick?” Goodley asked. A Special National Intelligence Estimate could take months to prepare.
“Three or four weeks. And I want to be able to hang my hat on it.”
“I’ll tell the DCI,” Goodley promised.
“Anything else?” Ryan asked.
“That’s it for now, sir.”
Jack nodded and checked his calendar. He had a fairly routine day, but the next one would largely be spent on Air Force One flying hither and yon across America, and he was overnighting in—he flipped the page on the printout—Seattle, before flying home to Washington and another full day. It was just as easy for him to use the VC-25A as a red-eye … oh, yeah, he had a breakfast speech in Seattle to the local Jaycees. He’d be talking about school reform. That generated a grunt. There just weren’t enough nuns to go around. The School Sisters of Notre Dame had taught him at St. Matthew’s Elementary School in northeast Baltimore back forty-plus years earlier—and taught him well, because the penalty for not learning or for misbehaving did not bear contemplation for a seven-year-old. But the truth of the matter was that he’d been a good, and fairly obedient—dull, Jack admitted to himself with a wry smile—child who’d gotten good marks because he’d had a good mom and a good dad, which was a lot more than too many contemporary American kids could say—and how the hell was he supposed to fix that? Jack asked himself. How could he bring back the ethos of his parents’ generation, the importance of religion, and a world in which engaged people went to the altar as virgins? Now they were talking about telling kids that homosexual and lesbian sex was okay. What would Sister Frances Mary have said about that? Jack wondered. A pity she wasn’t around to crack some senators and representatives over the knuckles with her ruler. It had worked on him and his classmates at St. Matthew’s. . .
The desk speaker buzzed. “Senator Smithers just arrived at the West Entrance.” Ryan stood and went to his right, the door that came in from the secretaries’ anteroom. For some reason, people preferred that one to the door off the corridor opposite the Roosevelt Room. Maybe it was more businesslike. But mainly they liked to see the President standing when the door opened, his hand extended and a smile on his face, as though he really was glad to see them. Sure, Wilbur.