“The Secretary of State,” he said, pointing to the front row, “announced to the public that I was mentally alert, but because my physical state was weak, that my physician had temporarily confined me to bed. The truth is that I am not—nor was I—feeble nor so confined. You can see before you that I am fit, and you will be your own judges that I suffer no mental impairment. But there are people who were hoping otherwise… who had planned otherwise. And it was vital in the nation’s interests that these people, these traitors, felt the possibility that they had… ah… that I had died.”
As he twisted around for a long glare at Isabel, the House rumbled. He turned back to the microphone, “Why did Secretary Robinson lie to you? Because I asked him to. A President does not deceive his people lightly, so why did I ask my friend and Cabinet colleague to do so for me? Several times in our more than two centuries of unbroken democracy, traitors or madmen have attempted to, and on four occasions have in fact assassinated our presidents. And this time… this week… such people—not madmen, but traitors surely—got close… perilously close… with a treasonous plan to assassinate both your President and your Vice-President. It was a plan to completely overthrow our elected administration, and our Constitution, and it nearly worked.” As the murmuring rose, Foster said, “One of those traitors… is here among us… in this Chamber.”
The House exploded in uproar and people leapt to their feet. The President looked back at Isabel, but signalled to her not to gavel. Instead, he raised his hand and waited until silence fell. The Chamber seemed to press in on itself.
As if to answer the obvious question—who?—the three security men who’d earlier marched onto the rostrum clamped themselves into a tight U-shape behind Isabel. The four who were on the side near Davey pressed forward, ready.
Until this minute, Isabel Diaz was a national treasure, yet now eyes all over the country were clouding with disbelief, many with tears. Isabel had been a shining light, an icon of hope. One Senator had even started humming to himself the Paul Simons’ lyric, “Who’ll be my role model now that my role model is gone?”
Isabel stared back at the Hall showing nothing but stony calm. She reached her good arm out toward Davey and Ed, and two of the police officers ushered them forward and escorted them up to stand beside her in support.
Spencer’s blood seemed to drain from his head, a cold sweat had burst through his skin and his hands were gripping the back of the seat in front of him as though he was dangling from a crumbling ledge thirty floors above the ground. He bit his lip until he tasted blood. How could he have so badly misread her?
“Please sit,” said Foster, but few obeyed him. “Initially,” he continued regardless, “medical opinion was that Vice-President Taylor died of natural causes. That was wrong: his death was a cold-blooded, carefully plotted assassination. A plot to eliminate Vice-President Taylor first so that when my own death followed—yes, consecutive assassinations—America would have no vice-president to replace me and the presidential succession would automatically fall to the House Speaker, Ms Diaz here.”
One congressman at the back shouted “Treason!” setting off a chain reaction. The President immediately raised his hand again, and when the clamour stopped, he went on, “To Julia, Mitchell Taylor’s widow, and Oliver, James and Tyrone, his three children who, by regretful necessity, are hearing this for the first time… let me say this to you: be strong in your knowledge that Mitch, my great friend and a fine man… your dad and your husband… died serving his country… All of us owe Mitchell Taylor, and the four of you he has left behind, a debt this country will never forget.” He bowed his head.
The Chamber flurried with whispers. Fingers accused Isabel from all directions.
The memory of a conversation flooded back to Spencer: when he’d pointed the finger at Ed, for manipulating her. “What makes you think I’m not using him?” she’d said. The comment had unsettled him at the time, but now… Spencer’s legs turned to jelly and couldn’t support him. He slumped back onto his chair and tears spilled down his cheeks, hidden from the cameras by the forest of legislators towering around him.
Isabel had been his trusted friend. No, it was more… the truth he could never admit before was that he had loved her. How could he have been so misguided… not to see the charade?
And suddenly what he had done hit him… his own unwitting role in this treachery with his fool idea to persuade Foster to get her appointed as Speaker… He, Spencer Prentice, had caused, or at least created the circumstances that killed Taylor and… worse.
Spencer wasn’t the only one searching for answers. To the cameras doing likewise, George was an early target, but all he offered them was a grey head burying itself into an old man’s trembling hands. Isabel had told him about Ed’s affair, but this…? He couldn’t believe it. But the evidence unfolding seemed to give him no choice.