Washington Masquerade (15 page)

“Sex?”

“That, too.”

“Like a reduction in couplings?”

Izzy laughed.

“Say down to zero,” he said, “now that would tell us a great deal.”

“Like there was nothing left to keep the home fires burning?”

“Or yearning.”

“Always a possibility in this town,” Fiona sighed. “No matter how many are outed for these sexual discretions, they cannot stay away from it, top to bottom. What did Clinton say in his book when dealing with the Lewinsky episode: Because it was there. They all know it could be a career breaker but still go at it like rabbits in heat. Years ago, the media would never touch that stuff.”

She thought suddenly of her own needs in that department. To a woman, the signs of a man's diminishing interest were obvious. Desire, she had learned, was directly proportional to hydraulics, and vice versa. She smiled inwardly at the idea. Time and longevity had their own special effect, and a long marriage could be characterized as same old, same old.

“Hey, Fi, this was a columnist, a media celebrity. Who would give a damn about his sex life?”

“His wife for starters,” Fiona said. An idea had popped into her mind. She let it hang there.

At that point, Charlotte Desmond arrived, looking very unhappy. She joined their table, refusing any coffee, and fell heavily into her chair like a sack of potatoes.

“I've told you everything I know,” she said. “I would not have come, but my bosses said to be cooperative, so here I am.”

“Thanks, Charlotte,” Fiona said, forcing herself to be ingratiating. The woman's face expressed arrogance and extreme displeasure. She looked as if she had been abruptly awakened from a deep sleep. “We're just trying to clear up loose ends.”

“There are no loose ends,” Charlotte snapped back, her voice edgy with annoyance.

“When Mr. Burns was absent from the office, did he keep you informed of where he was going?” Fiona asked, plunging ahead, forgoing small talk.

Before she replied, Charlotte sighed with exasperation.

“That again,” she sighed again with impatience. “Not all the time, it wasn't necessary—when he needed me, he would call me at the paper. And he had his cell phone.” She hesitated for a moment. “Didn't we deal with that earlier?”

“So he was reachable at all times if you needed him?”

“Not all. Sometimes he shut off his cell or there was no signal.”

“Like in the subway?” Fiona pressed.

“I guess.”

“Did he take the subway often?”

“How would I know?”

“Did he call in often,” Fiona asked, “when he left the office?”

She hesitated, smirking and shaking her head again, looking at Fiona as a mother might look at a recalcitrant child.

“Most of the time,” Charlotte shrugged, but Fiona, despite her attitude, could read beneath the façade. She was showing signs of confusion.

“Most?”

“I was his assistant, not his mother.”

She was getting surly now, which indicated to Fiona that she was fast approaching a sensitive area.

“Would ‘most of the time' characterize the weeks, even days, leading up to your being transferred?”

Charlotte frowned, expelling a whispery obscenity.

“In other words,” Fiona followed up swiftly, giving her little time for reflection. “Were you having difficulty communicating during the last few months as his assistant? As if he didn't want you to know what he was up to?”

Charlotte cut a glance at Izzy, as if she was looking for any ally.

“When he was needed for some reason, I could track him down.”

“Could you?” Fiona asked. “Always?”

She was showing increasing signs of angry discomfort.

“Where is this going?”

“All I'm asking, Charlotte, is were you always in touch? Did you know where he went when he was not in the office? Did you notice a change in the few weeks before you were transferred? Was he more secretive than usual?”

“I can't really remember,” she said, stonewalling now.

Fiona piled on more pressure.

“You knew where he was some of the time, right? Playing squash with Mr. Perkins, carpooling his daughter to school, especially to her soccer practice and games. You knew that, of course?”

“Damn it, I told you I did.”

“But you said sometimes his daughter would call and ask where he was. Isn't that what you said?”

“Sometimes. So what?”

Fiona cut a glance at Izzy who nodded, acknowledging that she was honing in on an idea to which both subscribed.

“So did you know where he was when he was not carpooling his daughter?” Fiona pressed.

“I was only his assistant. I mean, I didn't know where he was every minute. For crying out loud, neither did Mrs. Burns.”

“How did you know that?” Izzy intervened, as if he was obeying some mysterious cue that passed to him from Fiona.

She let him take the question tiller.

“I… she must have called on occasion. I can't give you chapter and verse.”

“When he didn't show up for his parenting chores?”

“That wasn't on my résumé. It was Mr. Burns' personal business.”

“We do understand that, Charlotte,” Izzy said. “But you did say you knew his whereabouts most of the time like any efficient assistant.”

“Except for personal business.” She looked at him belligerently, which seemed to prod him.

“Personal business, of course. Did you know he kept his so-called disguises in one of his desk drawers? The one he kept locked. Were you ever curious as to what he had stashed there?”

“No. Besides, I also had a desk drawer that I locked with personal things in it.”

“You were never curious about what he put there?”

“Why should I have been? It was his personal stuff.”

“So you knew nothing about his false moustaches?”

“Nothing.”

“Did you see any physical signs? Ever? Say some glue residue on his upper lip?”

Something seemed to light up in her eyes, perhaps a recalled memory. Then she shook her head, but a moment too late.

“You did see something of the sort, didn't you, Charlotte?” Izzy said.

“It could have been a cold. You know when the nostrils get irritated from blowing too frequently.”

“Come on, Charlotte,” Fiona interjected, “drop the pretense. You were pissed off when he canned you. Why the charade? We are trying to get to the bottom of why he… you know what I mean? Why are you protecting him?”

“From what? He's done nothing wrong except to get himself killed.” Charlotte offered an expression of disgust. “You people,” she said with a sneer.

Fiona and Izzy exchanged glances. He was throwing the ball back to Fiona.

“Charlotte….” Fiona paused, staring into the woman's eyes, the pupils of which seemed to be expanding like small balloons, “did you suspect that Mr. Burns was having an affair?”

A shot in the dark, she knew, but Fiona was detecting something in Charlotte's defensiveness that seemed beyond mere loyalty, something deeply emotional, perhaps jealousy. It could not be ruled out.

“Absolutely not,” she answered, raising her voice in indignation. “What are you trying to do?” She stood up. “I will not answer such dirty-minded questions.”

Customers at other tables suddenly looked up.

“Please sit down, Charlotte,” Fiona ordered. “Or would you rather that we asked these questions back in headquarters?”

Charlotte's face flushed with anger and frustration. Breathing heavily, she sat down, looking fiercely at the curious customers, who turned their heads away in obvious embarrassment.

“You people are awful, awful,” she said between clenched teeth.

“So you completely rule that out,” Fiona said, “about Mr. Burns having an affair?”

“A pack of lies. He was an ardent family man, totally committed to his wife and children. He would never, ever. No way, not him.” She was adamant, borderline hysterical.

“You don't think it's possible?”

Something in the woman's passionate protestation was working inside her, burrowing into her bone marrow.

“I told you, not him.”

“How can you be so sure?” Fiona directed the question as a challenge.

“I was his assistant, damn it! I knew him. Maybe better….” She stopped abruptly in midsentence.

“You weren't curious why he suddenly stopped showing up on those carpool days in which he was scheduled to take his daughter and her schoolmates to their soccer practice and games? When that happened, were you the one who called to get someone else to take his place?”

“Of course, I did,” she replied dismissively. “I was his backup. That was my job.”

“Whom did you call?”

“My God,” she snickered. “I had a list of other parents. I went down the list. Sometimes they called him when someone couldn't make it.”

“He didn't tell you why he could not make it?”

“No, he did not.”

“Why not?”

“Because it was none of my business!”

“So what excuse did you use when you called the other parents?”

“Business mostly. They knew what he did. He was a celebrity parent.”

“But you didn't know exactly what kind of business? It could have been personal, right?”

“I guess so.”

“You weren't curious?”

Again she stood up.

“Just what is going on here? You are trying to smear him. Who put you up to this? I know, you're part of the conspiracy to ruin his good name. I know what you're up to. You're on their side, with them. Damn you! Adam Burns was a good man, a good man.”

“And you cared a lot about him?”

“Yes, I did.”

“You suspected him of having an affair?”

“He would never, never.”

“But it crossed your mind?”

“Maybe,” she seemed suddenly horrified at what she had said. “No, not him. He… he wasn't interested.”

“How would you know that, Charlotte?” Fiona said, upgrading the implication to an accusation.

“Because I knew. I knew.”

She had become militant. More here than meets the eye, Fiona thought, looking about her at the startled customers.

“Sit down,” Fiona ordered.

“Fuck you both!” Charlotte cried, storming out of the place.

Fiona and Izzy watched her leave then looked at each other.

“Obvious,” Izzy said.

“She had a crush on him. I'll bet on it. Unrequited love,” Fiona sighed, “is powerful stuff.” Been there, done that, she wanted to say, but held back, remembering the emotion but not the cast of characters.

They finished their coffee and drove back to headquarters.

“Did you notice, Fi? No mention of the big enchilada, the conspiracy theory that is rattling everybody's cage, especially at the
Post
. She didn't mention it.”

She was becoming more and more impressed with Izzy and his way of looking at things, thinking outside of the box. She had been so busy concocting questions on this new theory that she had ignored the prevailing one.

“At the first interrogation, she was touting the groupthink,” Fiona said, recalling.

“Not on the second go,” Izzy said. “Makes me think that she has had another idea about his disappearing act. Just a theory, listen up: He suddenly changed his behavior, dropped off her radar screen. His kid calls, his wife calls. Where's Adam? She has a King Kong–size crush on him. Maybe she shows him her cards, looking, hoping for reciprocity. No dice. But she's thinking that in her mind at least, he's so damned desirable that she suspects someone else has got his attention.”

“Maybe she follows him around,” Fiona embellished. “She thinks other women are after him. Isn't that the mindset of a woman with a crush? It arouses jealousy, perhaps one step further.”

“Stalking?”

Fiona contemplated the idea. It was entirely possible.

“She discovers that he is seeing someone else. She is inflamed with jealousy. She follows him, pushes him.” Fiona shook her head rejecting her own idea. “No way.”

“Remember that oldie? You always hurt the one you love,” Izzy said.

“Easy to check,” Fiona said.

It was easy. They did check. The Style section had an eleven o'clock staff meeting that morning, and Charlotte took notes.

In just a few days, it was all over the Internet, television, and newspapers in every language, a multiplying virus, seeping into the collective universal brain. It was melding into a single theory, ubiquitous now, all-encompassing. Adam Burns had been whacked by the target of his barbs. Some marveled at the cleanliness of the hit—no witnesses, a tiny push, and splat!

Chief Hodges was beside himself, being pushed pillar to post at every level and harassed by the all-engulfing media monsters, his superiors, and an avenging army waiting in the wings. They weren't exactly at square one; they knew that something had happened months ago that made Adam Burns pull a disappearing act. The Chief very diligently and secretly shared information with the two Homeland boys working internally, finding nothing but dead ends.

Congress was calling for an investigation. To his credit, the Chief remained Horatius at the Bridge, urging more time, stalling, insisting that so far they could find no evidence of foul play, none. It wouldn't be long, Fiona knew, until the giant federal wave would pass over them, casting them aside and losing them in the rough surf. The “hit” scenario was too juicy a story for the politicians and media to pass up.

When the subject came up between Larry and Fiona, they danced cautiously around each other. Larry defended his paper for harping on various theories, one of which hinged on some inside government-connected, assassination-staged hit, although they continued to toy with the theory that the culprits might have been some rogue secret group.

Naturally, the White House and the various allies of the President were offering pious rebuttals and proudly championing the concept of a free press and the rights of journalists to express opinions, however caustic, contrary, and reckless. Thus, the
Post
was having it both ways, and Larry boasted that their circulation numbers were up.

Fiona kept the
A
-for-Adultery theory close to the vest, since even that had so far borne no fruit. Again, they interviewed Mrs. Burns, Jack Perkins, and Charlotte Desmond, who were becoming less and less cooperative. Even Charlotte, probably advised by counsel to the
Post
, was close-mouthed and defensive, adamantly denying that her boss was involved in such a tawdry episode. Nor could they press the point, for fear of being accused of harassment in the new politically correct environment.

Then it was Larry who threw the bombshell that exploded in Fiona's den, her one hand curled around the stem of a very dry martini. His revelation caused her to spill most of it on her skirt.

“It's true,” Larry said. “It's exclusive for tomorrow.” He looked at his watch. “You've got a two-hour heads-up. The presses roll in a couple of hours, and then shit hits the fan.”

She had made him a martini as well, but his hand was steady as he sipped. He did not spill a drop. He lifted his glass as in a toast.

“They, our great leaders, are itching to accuse our deceased hero of being involved in an assassination attempt on the President. We've been mulling that one for days. Now we have the real skinny, a hot inside source. Even I am excluded, Fi. But they assure me that that little rumor has finally been confirmed by a live legitimate source, signed and sealed, and now we can go with the story. They were debating whether to use the man's name in the breaking story or hold it for future use.”

Fearing that her hand was too shaky to hold the glass, she swallowed the remains of her martini in one gulp.

“Who?” Fiona managed to ask.

“Only Jack Brady and Don Grant are in the loop on that one, Fi. Thank the Lord! It is a burning ember, and I don't want to handle it. But the story is a go for the bulldog. I love it! Playing hardball with the sons of bitches. Always happens that way, one courageous son-of-a-bitch who couldn't abide the bullshit cops a plea. We are the watchdogs, Fi. Celebrate us, kiddo, we keep America free. And mix another martini.”

It was not easy for her to remain calm.

“An inside source? Sounds bizarre.”

“That's what makes it so delicious.”

“And you people actually believe it?”

“Believe? We report what's out there. It has nothing to do with beliefs.”

For some reason, she remembered her conversation with Dolly and her reference to “cooking the books.” Her thoughts turned dark—not Philip, no way.

“And you don't know who blew the whistle?” Fiona pressed, knowing she was moving into forbidden territory.

“Outta the loop.” Larry said. She searched his face, but it told her nothing beyond his denial. “Wish I could.”

“Did this source implicate others?” Fiona asked.

“Apparently,” Larry said, adding, “Sorry, Fi, can't say. Wait until that bomb goes off—boom, boom.” He giggled, showing signs of the alcohol working. “Goes to show you. We played the Burns story on the nose. Proves that even the good guys play hardball. This proves it.”

“So it's now a pox on both their houses,” Fiona said.

“On the people, not the concept.”

“Meaning the
Post
's continual love affair with the progressive tilt.”

“That's the vision, baby, and we're the watchdogs.”

“Woof, woof.”

“Very funny.”

Remembering what Dolly had told her, his self-satisfaction was making her nervous. Then suddenly her cell rang. The caller ID identified Dolly. She took the call.

“Need you, Fi. Please.”

“What's going on?” Fiona said breathlessly.

“I don't know, Fi,” Dolly said, her voice betraying her hysteria. “I just don't know.”

“Where is Phil?”

“I don't know, Fi. I'm scared. I have this note.”

“Oh, shit.”

“He asks forgiveness.”

“Oh my God, Dolly. I'll be right over.”

A cold sweat crawled down her back. She ran to the bathroom and threw cold water on her face. Asking forgiveness was a signature phrase for a potential suicide, a kind of signal.

“Cop emergency, Larry,” she said.

He was mixing another pitcher of martinis.

“No time for a tiny one, baby?” Larry asked, oblivious to her concern. At that moment, he seemed utterly irrelevant. As she went out the door, she heard him say. “I'll wait up.”

She didn't answer and sped to Dolly's house in Spring Valley, just a ten-minute drive. She put her blinker on the roof and made it in five.

Dolly fell into her arms, near collapse.

“I've called everywhere!” Dolly could barely get the words out. “I just don't know. I don't know!” She repeated the words over and over again. “I'm at my wits' end!” She was breathing deeply, trying to catch her breath, and the tears were flowing down her cheeks. “He came home early, went right into his study. He looked awful, but I didn't question him and went about my business making dinner. Suddenly, he appeared, looking pale, his face tear-stained. ‘What is going on?' I asked. I knew, of course, and I was scared. He looked so strange. He embraced me, kissed me deeply, thanked me for everything, and then walked out of the house. I went after him, but the car shot out of the garage, and he was gone. It's been a couple of hours. I don't know what to do! Fi, I'm scared. I don't know if I can handle this by myself!”

“Don't think the worst, Dolly,” Fiona said in an effort to be reassuring, but it did sound ominous. “He's probably in a bar somewhere, getting smashed.”

Hardly, she thought. Phil was not much of a drinker, and was sparing in his wine drinking.

“Hell,” she said, looking at her watch. “I'm sure the phone will ring any minute with Phil on the other end.”

“A woman knows her husband, Fi. He was hurting, really hurting. It was getting worse… you know what I mean? I never told him I spoke to you. He would die if he ever knew I spoke to you about it.” Her expression indicated that she had regretted offering Fiona the revelation. “Please, Fiona. Don't ever tell, ever.”

Fiona nodded, deeply troubled by Dolly's report on Phil's strange behavior.

“He's never acted like this, Fi, never.”

“Have you called around?”

“I called everyone I could think of. I was circumspect, of course. I did not want to compound his troubles or show them that I was concerned other than I needed to get in touch with him.”

“He's just working it out in his own mind, Dolly.”

“‘Thanks for everything,' he said. I'm not stupid, Fi. He kissed me like he was saying good-bye.”

“You're reading too much into this, Dolly,” Fiona lied. “Let me check.”

Moving away from Dolly, she called Izzy and asked him to put out an alert and to check with the hospitals. She gave him a quick physical description of Philip, explained his government role and her fear that he was a potential suicide victim. She asked for a quick response either way, hoping she was not overreacting.

She deliberately did not inform the Chief, wanting to be certain of the results of Izzy's inquiry. She reasoned that there was no point in stirring things up until she knew whether Dolly's hunch was fully explored. Soon, too, the Chief would see the
Post
story and a new wrinkle would have to be dealt with.

There was a conspicuous dilemma to be faced: the conflict posed by her relationship with Larry. Although it was known, she and the Chief had agreed to be circumspect about it. Unfortunately, the line between business and the personal could be a problem, especially when it was intersected by related events.

To make matters more complicated, it was becoming increasingly obvious to her, considering Dolly's insight into her husband's state of mind, that Phil was the source of the
Post
story.

She sat beside Dolly on the couch, embracing her as they stared into space and waited for a return call.

“I begged him to get out of it. Underneath, he was a fragile man. Oh God, I loved him.”

Fiona noted the past tense and hoped it would not be true, hoped he would come walking in the door, handsome, sensitive, vulnerable Phil Owens, her first flame.

“He was acting strangely. I told you that, Fi. They were asking him to do something against the grain. He said it wasn't exactly a lie, just a hint, to counter what everybody is saying. He did not name names or anything and said it could not have been an order from the President. No way. He said he would try to go further upstairs….”

They sat immobile on the couch for more than an hour. Fiona called Larry and told him not to wait up, that something real important was happening that could keep her involved all night. He sounded upset and slightly tipsy and said he would get back to his own apartment for the night.

An hour later the Chief called. “The redhead and his buddy have called a meeting.”

“The
Post
story?”

“I saw it,” the Chief said, noncommittal.

She quickly informed him of where she was and what was happening regarding Philip.

“Get your ass up here.” He hung up abruptly.

It was an order, tinged with a bit of anger. She should have notified him immediately upon getting it from Larry. Dolly's call had changed her priorities. She looked at her friend, sitting hunched up on the couch, a pale figure, laden with anxiety, looking up at her, fearing the worst.

“No,” she said, “just my boss. No news. My partner is on it.”

She wished she could offer something more optimistic, but she could not bring herself to fill her friend with false hopes anymore. Dolly nodded.

“Just keep yourself together, Dolly,” Fiona said. “I'll stay in touch, news or not, and be back just as soon as I can.”

“It runs in families, Fi,” Dolly said ominously. “His grandfather and an aunt… suicides.”

“Proves nothing,” Fiona said cautiously. “It's a theory, not a scientific fact, purely anecdotal.”

Although the evidence was overwhelming, she did not wish to deepen Dolly's anguish. She squeezed her friend's shoulder and turned away before Dolly could see her tears.

“One thing more, Fi,” Dolly said, as Fiona moved toward the door. Her voice stopped Fiona in her tracks. “Phil kept a revolver upstairs in a drawer next to our bed.”

Fiona stiffened.

“It's gone.”

***

Izzy and the two men from Homeland Security had arrived before she had. It struck her as a strange scene—four men and a woman in the far corner of the men's lavatory of police headquarters. A sign on the doorknob said Out of Order.

She could tell that the Chief was disturbed, not only by her tardiness but also her failure to tell him about what she had learned earlier from Larry. He did not like surprises.

Chief Hodges held up the front page of the
Post
, which he had pulled from his pocket. The headline read: Administration Hints Burns Killing Linked to Assassination Ploy. The gist of the story was exactly as recounted by Larry. To Fiona's cynical reasoning, the Administration was trying to mount a false campaign alleging that somehow Burns' columns had triggered a plot to assassinate the President and that Burns might have physically provided aid and comfort to the plotters.

The
Post
cited a high Administration authority who had access to the inside scoop and had revealed it to the
Post
for ethical and moral reasons. According to the story, the anonymous informer had signed affidavits to back up his claim and had implicated his superiors.

“No clue as to who blew the whistle?” Izzy asked.

The two men from Homeland Security exchanged glances.

“No secrets, remember,” Fiona said, with some trepidation.

“Philip Owen,” Wallinski said, turning to face Fiona.

She felt her stomach congeal and could sense the blood draining from her face.

Chief Hodges turned toward Fiona, as well. He and his wife had been guests at one of Dolly and Phil's soirees. Fiona nodded.