The position was not a reward.
The watch was.
And he had abused it. He had tricked her with her own declaration of eternal friendship.
Verus amicus rara avis. It had proved to be truer than she thought.
She went over to the door and opened it carefully. There was a folded pile of clothes just outside as promised. As quickly as her aching body would allow, she bent down, snatched up the pile and closed the door again. Then she locked it.
The underwear was completely new. The labels were still attached. She noted this kind gesture, before putting the bra and panties on. The jeans also looked new and were a perfect fit. When she put on the pale pink cashmere V-necked sweater, she felt the fibres scratching at the cuts on her wrists.
She stood looking at herself in the mirror. The ventilation fan had dispensed with most of the steam and the bathroom was already a few degrees cooler than when she’d got out of the shower five minutes ago. From force of habit, she considered for a moment putting on some make-up. There was an open lacquered Japanese box by the sink, full of cosmetics. But she decided against it. Her lips were still swollen and the cut on her lower lip would look ridiculous if she was to put lipstick on.
Many years ago, during Bill Clinton’s first term in office, Hillary Rodham Clinton had invited Helen Bentley to lunch. It was the first time that they had met in more personal circumstances, and Helen remembered that she had been extremely nervous. It was only a few weeks since she had taken her seat in the Senate, and she had had more than enough on her plate, learning about all the customs and etiquette that a young and insignificant senator had to know in order to survive more than a few hours on Capitol Hill. Lunch with the First Lady was a dream. Hillary had been just as personable, attentive and interested as her supporters said she was. The arrogant, cool and calculating person that her enemies made her out to be was not in evidence. She did, of course, want something, just as everyone in Washington always wanted something. But on the whole, Helen Bentley got the impression that Hillary Rodham Clinton wished her well. She wanted her to feel comfortable and confident in her new environment. And if, in addition, Senator Bentley would be willing to read through a document about a health reform that would benefit middle America, she would make the First Lady very happy indeed.
Helen Bentley remembered it well.
They got up after the meal. Hillary Clinton looked discreetly at her watch, gave Helen a formal peck on the cheek and shook her hand.
‘One more thing,’ she said, still holding her hand. ‘You can’t trust anyone in this world. Except one person, your husband. As long as he is your husband, he’s the only person who will always want the best for you. The only one you can trust. Never forget that.’
Helen had never forgotten it.
On the 19th of August 1998, Bill Clinton admitted that he had betrayed not only the entire world, but also his wife. A couple of weeks later, Helen bumped into Hillary Clinton in a corridor in the West Wing, following a meeting at the White House. The First Lady had just come back from Martha’s Vineyard, where the presidential family had sought refuge from the storm. She had stopped and taken Helen by the hand, just as she had during their first meeting, many years before.
‘I’m sorry, Hillary. I’m truly sorry for you and Chelsea.’
Mrs Clinton said nothing. Her eyes were red. Her mouth trembled. She managed to smile, nodded and let go of Helen’s hand before moving on, proud, straight-backed, meeting the eye of anyone who dared to look.
Helen Lardahl Bentley had never forgotten the advice of the President’s wife, but she had not followed it. Helen couldn’t live without trusting someone. Nor could she have set course for the country’s top position without a handful of loyal staff, whom she trusted implicitly. An exclusive group of good friends who wished her well.
Warren Scifford had been one of them.
That was what she had always believed. But he was lying. He had betrayed her, and the lie was bigger than him.
Because he couldn’t know what he claimed in the letter the Trojans knew. No one knew. Not even Christopher. It was her secret, her burden, and she had carried it alone for more than twenty years.
It was totally incomprehensible, and it was only the panic, the paralysing, overwhelming fear that engulfed her when Jeffrey Hunter showed her the letter that had prevented her from seeing that.
Warren was lying. Something was very wrong.
No one could know.
Her teeth felt like they were covered in fur and she had a bad taste in her mouth. She looked timidly around the bathroom. There, she saw it by the mirror. Hanne Wilhelmsen had put out a glass for her, with a new toothbrush and a half-used tube of toothpaste in it. She struggled with the obstinate packaging and cut herself on the plastic before managing to extract the toothbrush.
President Bentley bared her teeth at the mirror.
‘You bastard!’ she whispered. ‘May you burn in hell, Warren Scifford! That’s the only place for people like you!’
II
Warren Scifford felt awful.
In the half-dark he fumbled around for his mobile phone, which was playing a mechanical version of something that was supposed to sound like a cockerel. The noise would not stop. He sat up in bed, confused. He had forgotten to close the blackout curtains again before going to bed, and the grey light behind the thin curtains gave him no idea of what time it was.
The cockerel got louder and Warren swore passionately as he searched around on the bedside table. Finally he caught sight of the mobile phone. The display said it was 05:07. It must have fallen on the floor in the course of his three hours of restless sleep. He couldn’t imagine how he had managed to set the alarm so wrong. He had meant to set it for five past seven.
He missed a few times before he finally managed to turn the alarm off. He sank back into the bed. He closed his eyes, but knew immediately that there was no point. His thoughts were crashing and colliding and creating chaos, so it would be impossible to sleep. He stood up, resigned, padded into the shower and stood under the water for the next fifteen minutes. If he wasn’t rested, he could at least scrub himself into some sort of waking state.
He dried himself and pulled on his boxer shorts and a T-shirt.
It didn’t take him long to rig up the portable office. He left the ceiling lamp switched off and closed the blackout curtains. The table lamps gave sufficient light to work. When everything was set up, he filled the kettle and stood leaning against the bookshelf, waiting for it to boil. For a moment he considered coffee. But the powder looked old and tasteless, so he took a tea bag and dropped it into the cup instead, then filled it with boiling water.
No new emails.
He tried to work his way back. It was around two in the morning when he went to bed. That would be around eight in the evening in Washington DC. So now it would eleven o’clock back home. Everyone was working flat out. No one had sent him anything for more than four hours.
He tried to reassure himself that it was because they thought he was asleep.
It didn’t work. The fact that he was being frozen out was becoming increasingly apparent. The more time that passed without the President being found, the more Warren Scifford’s role was diminishing. Even though he was still the contact person for the local police, it was obvious that operations at the embassy on Drammensveien had increased in scope and content without him being fully informed. The operative investigators the FBI had sent to Norway some hours after he had arrived were the kings of the castle. They stayed at the embassy. They were linked to communications technology that made his little office, with his selection of mobile phones and encrypted PC, look like a pathetic delivery to a technical museum.
They didn’t give a damn about the Norwegian police.