That self-doubt, however, slowly began to disappear. At first Jan had started looking for some clue that would explain why a man like Big Al Malin would turn his back on his sworn duty and so endanger his command without the full support of his nation. But instead of finding answers and understanding, Jan just found more questions. Though everything taken in isolation seemed to make sense, when Jan put it together, it didn't come together into a nice neat bundle. With her intimate knowledge of what she often referred to in a half-joking manner as the military mentality as well as personally knowing several of the prime players in Washington and Germany, the story line handed out by the White House and the Department of Defense fell way short. Convinced that she was onto something, but that the raw news stories being dumped out onto her computer screen didn't contain the answer, Jan decided it was time to work her sources. While she left a story about German reaction from the Reuters news agency on the screen, Jan reached over, grabbed her phone, and dialed Ed Lewis's office number from memory.
When Jan was told by a staffer that Lewis was at an important meeting and wouldn't be available until noon, she asked to speak to Lewis's secretary, Terri Allen, rather than Lewis's assistant. Terri, who often knew more about what was going on in Lewis's office than Lewis himself, was the friendly type that got along well with just about everyone. If Jan was going to find out where Lewis was so that she could contact him before she finished preparing her program notes for the day, Terri, and not Lewis's male assistant, would be the person to talk to. After her call was routed to Terri's desk, Jan started the conversation in her usual casual manner. "Hi, Terri, this is Jan. I hate to bother you at a time like this, but I really need to talk to Ed as soon as possible. Is it possible for you to tell me how I can get ahold of him or transfer my call to where he is?"
Terri, with a hint of a Tennessee back-country accent, sighed. "Oh, gee, Jan, I'm sorry, dear. I'd love to, but Ed has been at the White House since six this morning, in the War Room, I think. He can call us but we can't seem to call him. The best I can do is to leave a message with the White House switchboard and hope that the Cro-Magnon security people there will get it to the right person sometime this century."
Ordinarily Terri's humorous comments about the White House staff would bring a smile to Jan's face. Today, however, it caused her to pause and think. If Lewis had been in the War Room that early and was still there, that meant that he would have been present for the early-morning update briefing, which, Jan knew, was a ritual for the military while operations were under way. This small shred of information served only to heighten Jan's feeling that there was more to what was going on than was being told. In an effort to get as much information as she could from Terri, Jan decided to subtly probe further. "I can't imagine Ed, who's probably madder than hell with the President, sitting that long with her. I mean, he's been blaming her for this whole mess."
There was an "oh, don't worry" manner in Terri's voice when she responded. "Well, to tell you the truth, Jan, we're all a little taken aback here by the way he's taking all of this. As a matter of fact, last night he went home early, and with a smile on his face."
"Well, I guess he has the right to gloat. Ed did, after all, predict that the President's plan was dumb and would lead to no good."
Terri hastened to correct Jan. "Oh, he's not gloating, Jan. I've seen Ed gloat. No, this is different. It's…" Terri paused. When she did continue, Jan noted that her voice betrayed a little concern. "You know, Jan, it's almost as if he was satisfied with the way things are going. You don't suppose he's up to something, do you?"
Though Jan suspected just that, she put Terri off and covered her tracks. She had gotten about all she could from Terri. "Ed working with the administration and smiling? No, too much to expect. Well, I've got another call coming in, Terri. Got to go."
"Do you want Ed to call you when he comes up for air?"
Jan, not wanting Ed to get wind that she was snooping about, for Lewis would know what Jan was up to, told Terri, no, that it wasn't necessary and then hung up. Glancing over to two battery-operated clocks on the corner of her desk, one set to Eastern Standard Time and the other Central European Time; she saw that it was midafternoon in Germany and time for the American broadcast of the World News Network early-morning news show. Turning in her chair, she took the remote control unit that controlled the TV monitor that always seemed to be on in her office and cleared the mute button, allowing her to hear the top news stories of the hour. While she still mulled the question of what Ed Lewis was up to, Jan watched her morning-show counterpart run through the news of the morning. Nothing that he said made Jan feel any better or clarified the murky and disjointed drama that Jan saw unfolding in Central Europe.
Even the Germans themselves, sitting right in the middle of the crisis, seemed to be confused about what was going on and what to do. While the Chancellor's office in Berlin was pronouncing that a virtual state of war existed between Germany and the United States because of the "invasion," a majority in the Bundestag, or German Parliament, were demanding that the Chancellor curb his reaction to what they referred to as the "current American operations" in Germany. This divergence in views, the World News commentator pointed out, was not confined to Berlin. Based on stories from the German media as well as other crews in Germany covering the story, he reported that the population was divided on how best to react. Though reservists had been recalled to active duty, the commentator noted that early indications based on CIA reports showed that the response to these recalls had been very light. A Berlin newspaper pointed out that the confusion and conflict between the Chancellor's office and the Bundestag was to blame for this. That, the commentator pointed out, was substantiated by incidents throughout what one Munich newspaper editor was referring to as the "liberated" zone of Germany.
One incident, filmed in Nuremberg that morning by a WNN news crew following American forces, was telling. As Jan watched, the news correspondent explained how life in the city continued to go on despite the presence of American forces flowing out of the Czech Republic and staging for General Malin's announced march to the sea. At one train station, where he was filming the manner in which the citizens of Nuremberg were carrying on, a group of four German reservists in uniform and responding to the recall came onto the train platform to wait for their train. Almost immediately, and without any apparent prompting, several German civilians began taunting the German reservists. Unsure as to what to do, the reservists began to back away from the angry civilians. Their line of retreat, however, was blocked by other civilians who joined in condemning the confused reservists. Surrounded and in danger of being mobbed, the reservists had no choice but to stand their ground.
Just when it seemed that the verbal abuse would turn physical, two American military police, one male and one female, fully armed and in complete battle gear, came running down the train platform and began to work their way through the crowd. Parting reluctantly, the angry crowd allowed the Americans through. Once they reached the German reservists, the American MPs escorted the embarrassed reservists off the platform and to safety. As the television camera watched, the little parade of two American MPs protecting their erstwhile enemy marched out of the station followed by determined civilians who shouted angry words and shook their fists at the German reservists who represented to them the Berlin government's unjustified harsh and provocative actions. One civilian, speaking to the correspondent after the crowd had dispersed on their morning commute to work, summarized the view of his fellow protesters. "We have no argument with the Americans. They were wrong to bring the bombs to Germany. That was not proper. But that does not justify what that fool in Berlin, Herr Chancellor Ruff, is doing. It's crazy, just crazy, to turn our country into a battlefield just to teach the Americans a lesson.