"You really do, ma'am. Right now," Smith said.
"Oh, my god," said the president's wife, covering herself with covers as she sat up with night-blinders on.
"Come quickly," said Smith. The president led her by the hand out of the bed. Smith nodded them toward the door to the hallway, and shut their bedroom door. It was 6 A.M. exactly.
Smith knew the door was very good because it stayed on its hinges as the blast went off behind it. The floor shook.
"My god," said the black Secret Service agent. He lowered the Uzi.
"That was close," said the president. His voice was almost cheerful.
Smith had never seen anyone barely escape death and still exhibit such charm. "Are you all right, sir?" he asked.
"You bet," the president said. "I just started the day a bit earlier."
"How can you be smiling, sir?" Smith asked.
"I'm just imagining how disturbed the press corps is going to be when they find out someone missed again."
"Eeeeek," screamed the president's wife. The agent stepped back as though punched by her scream. Smith looked dumbfounded. Only the president was calm.
"You," she screamed at the president. "You and your frigging good nature. Will you hate, damn you? They almost killed us."
"But they missed," said the president with a smile. He looked around for a jelly bean.
"Hate," she shrieked. "Hate someone. Hate anything. Dammit, will you hate?"
"If it will help you, sure, dear. I'll hate whoever you want me to hate."
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"Anyone, damn you," she screamed. Veins bulged in her neck as she turned to Smith. "I've had to live with this damned good nature for thirty years now. Vilification in the press. Daily attacks and now bombs, and that . . . that . , . that whatever-it-is won't hate."
The shift supervisor finally made it down, and there was a confusion of men and guns and walkie-talkies. With the president's consent, Smith took charge.
"Sir, there is no time as safe for you as the next few minutes. Please get dressed. I would like to meet with you and your one most trusted advisor."
"I trust them all," the president said.
"Wouldn't you know?" said his wife. "And you," she said, pointing to Smith. "Why is now so damned safe?"
"Because they've just missed. They think the president is dead, tie is safe until they find out he is still alive. Then it becomes dangerous again because they'll try again."
"Good," said the First Lady. "That's something I can deal with. At least there are some reasonably vicious people around. Good. I can hate them."
"You can't blame her," said the president. "It's lousy getting awakened in the middle of the night."
"Yes sir," said Smith.
The man the president chose to accompany him to the meeting with Smith was his secretary of the interior. A bald man who also had a good nature. Smith was grim.
"First, let me thank you for giving me authority here in the White House, but I am going to have to leave you."
"Why?" asked the secretary.
"Because if I stay here, the president is definitely going to die. Eventually, one of these attempts will work. This is not some nut somewhere with a fast shot in a crowd. This is a determined methodical attempt on the president's life."
"Another government?" asked the president.
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"I don't know yet. But until we put them away, you are not safe."
"How do you know it's even an organization?" asked the secretary of the interior. "How do we know we're not dealing with one nut?"
"Because they have a communications network. And because we found the person who planted the bomb. She was the chambermaid who made the bed."
"And she said there were others?"
"Most eloquently," Smith said drily. "Her throat was cut by a not too sharp instrument."
The good nature left the face of the president. The secretary of the interior shook his head.
"How can you be sure you can get them before they strike again?" asked the president.
"I can't."
"Then I'm still vulnerable. Other people could get hurt around here if this keeps up," the president said.
"1 have a plan to deal with that. Go abroad," Smith said.
"What will that do?" asked the secretary.
"That will get the host country's secret service in charge of the president's safety."
"You mean the president has to leave the country because it's not safe for him to stay here?" the secretary of the interior asked. It was not so much a question as a statement.
"Exactly," said Smith.
"Well, that is one piece of garbage," said the secretary.
"Yes," Smith agreed.
The secretary of the interior's forehead was perspiring. He pulled a handkerchief from his vest pocket, and a few seeds fell from the handkerchief.
"Where did you get those?" Smith snapped.
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"Are they back again?" asked the secretary, holding up a seed. It was pale yellow and the size of a gnat.
"It's a grass seed," he said. "They're trying to frighten me. Just some environmentalist nuts."
"Do these people always leave grass seeds around?" Smith asked.
"Yeah. It's their calling card. They believe in the universal goodness of everything. Except people. They are the fringe of fringes. They protest everything."
"When did you put that handkerchief in your pocket?" Smith asked.
"Could you two deal with this later?" the president asked. "We ought to move along with our plans if I'm to leave the country."
"This is why you have to leave the country," Smith said. He took the seeds from the secretary along with the handkerchief. "We found the chambermaid dead. In the ragged edges of her throat were sprinkled a few grass seeds. They may be crazy, Mr. Secretary, but they're not so harmless."
But the secretary of the interior was not listening. At the very moment he realized that the people who had attempted to kill the president had gotten as close to him as his handkerchief, the fear and tension overloaded his nervous system, and he removed himself from the horror of it by simply passing out.
Chapter Six
They called him the Dutchman.
He was an American. His real name had been Jeremiah Purcell, but now 'the Dutchman' suited him as well as any. Long ago, before the madness in him forced him to run endlessly away from the world, he had lived on a small Dutch Caribbean island. The natives there gave him the name. He had tried to isolate himself then, thinking that if he could hide well enough, his powers could be controlled.
But nothing could control what the Dutchman had inside him.
He awoke in the full blaze of afternoon light. He felt a sharp stab of fear, as he did every time he faced a new day.
Where am 1?
Squinting into the brilliant sunlight, he made out the conical shapes of the Anatolian lava mountains with their almost absurd-looking little cutout squares where the inhabitants of the area chose to live.
Cappadocia. Now he remembered. He had been in Asia
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Minor for three days. Although the name was not to be found on any modern map, the residents of this part of eastern Turkey south of Ankara still called their home by its Biblical name.
He was thirsty. He felt his lips with his fingers. They were dry and cracked. His face was tender. He was fair skinned, and burned easily. He didn't remember falling asleep. Sleep was so rare for him that he was grateful whenever it came, but he wished he hadn't slept where the sun could burn him so badly.
What have I done?
There was a woman . . . blisters ... a fire . . . Death, death everywhere . . .
Stop it, he told himself. He couldn't change the past.
Or the future. It will all be the same.
Nearby, a farmer led a goat cart filled with containers of milk toward the village. Jeremiah stumbled forward on wobbly legs. The first hours after waking were sometimes painfully sane. At night, when his energies were high, when his mind flew, free and out of control, he could forget. There was no terrible past for him then, no future filled with dread and loathing. But now, and for a few minutes every day, he remembered the freakish thing that he was with an awful clarity.