She started to undo her purple shirt. ‘Because I want you to do the same to me,’ she said. ‘Is that all right?’
‘Oh, boy,’ he said.
CHAPTER 9
President Green discussed the bad news with her Secretary of State, Chester Jackson. He looked like a college professor, with his herringbone suit and knitted tie, but when he sat on the couch beside Pauline she noticed something white on his left wrist. ‘What’s that watch, Chess?’ she asked him. He normally wore a slim Longines with a brown alligator strap.
He pulled up his sleeve to reveal an all-white Swatch Day-Date with a plastic strap. ‘A present from my granddaughter,’ he explained.
‘Which makes it so much more valuable than anything you could buy in a jewellery store.’
‘Exactly.’
She laughed. ‘I like a man who has the right priorities.’
Chess was a shrewd practical statesman with a conservative bias towards letting sleeping dogs lie. Before going into politics he had been a senior partner in a Washington law firm specializing in international law. Pauline liked his dry, concise briefings, with not a word wasted.
He said: ‘We may lose the vote at the UN today. You’ve already had the numbers in the report from Josh.’ The American ambassador to the United Nations was Joshua Woodward. ‘Our support has shrivelled up. Most of the neutral countries who originally promised to back us have now said they’ll abstain or even vote against. I’m sorry.’
‘Damn,’ said Pauline. It had been looking dubious over the weekend and she was dismayed to have her fears confirmed.
Chess went on: ‘The Chinese have won a lot of people over by threatening to cancel investments.’
Vice-President Milton Lapierre was sitting opposite Pauline, fiddling with a purple scarf he had been wearing when he walked in. He spoke indignantly. ‘We should do the same – use our overseas aid programme as a lever. People we help should help us!’ In his southern accent, help came out as hay ulp. ‘And if they don’t, they can go to hell.’ Hail.
Chess shook his head patiently. ‘Much of our aid is tied to purchases from American manufacturers, so if we pull the aid we get in trouble with our businessmen.’
Pauline said: ‘This resolution wasn’t such a bright idea.’
Chess said: ‘We all thought it was a good plan at the time.’
‘Rather than lose the vote, I’d like to pull the resolution.’
‘Suspend it. We can say it’s a postponement to discuss amendments. You can suspend for as long as you like.’
‘Okay, Chess, but it breaks my heart when a kid from a salt-of-the-earth American family like the Ackermans has just been killed by a terrorist with a Chinese rifle. I’m not giving up on this. I want to make sure China knows there’s a cost to what they do. They won’t get away with it scot-free.’
‘You could protest to the Chinese ambassador.’
‘I most certainly will.’
‘The ambassador will say that the Chinese sell guns to the Sudanese armed forces, and it’s not really China’s fault if the Sudanese sell them to ISGS.’
‘While the Chinese and Sudanese governments turn a blind eye.’
Chess nodded. ‘Imagine what they’d say about us if Afghan army officers sold American rifles to the anti-Beijing rebels across the border in Xinjiang province.’
‘The Chinese government would accuse us of trying to bring them down.’
‘Madam President, if you want to punish China, why not tighten up the sanctions against North Korea?’
‘That would cost the Chinese money, but not very much.’
‘No, but it would show the world that China ignores UN sanctions, and that would embarrass them. And if they protest, that will only prove our point.’
‘Very sly, Chess. I like it.’
‘And we wouldn’t need a UN vote, because the UN has already imposed trade restrictions on North Korea. All we need to do is enforce existing rules.’
‘For example . . .?’
‘Import–export documents are published on the Internet, and if we scrutinize them closely we can tell which are false.’
‘How?’
‘I’ll give you an example. North Korea makes piano accordions, good quality and cheap. In the past, they exported them all over the world, now they can’t. But you’ll find that last year some province in China imported four hundred and thirty-three of them, and in the same year China exported to Italy exactly four hundred and thirty-three piano accordions marked: Made in China.’
Pauline laughed.
Chess said: ‘It’s not rocket science; we just have to do the detective work.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Lots. Monitor ship-to-ship transfers at sea – something we can do now by satellite. Make it difficult for North Korea to access its offshore hard-currency reserves. Make trouble for nations suspected of sanctions-busting.’
‘Heck, let’s do it,’ said Pauline.
‘Thank you, Madam President.’
Lizzie opened the door and said: ‘Mr Chakraborty would like a word.’
Pauline said: ‘Come in, Sandip.’
Sandip Chakraborty, the Communications Director, was a bright young Bengali American wearing a suit with sneakers, a current fashion among hip Washington staffers. He said: ‘James Moore is making a major speech tonight in Greenville, South Carolina, and I’ve heard he’s going to talk about the UN resolution. I thought you might want to know.’
Pauline said: ‘Put on CNN, please.’
Sandip switched on the TV set and Moore appeared.
He was sixty, ten years older than Pauline. He had craggy features and a greying blond crewcut. His suit jacket was Western style, with V-shaped stitching on the shoulder yokes and pocket flaps.
Milt said disparagingly: ‘Just because you come from the south doesn’t mean you have to dress like a shit-kicker.’
Chess said: ‘He made his money from oil, not cattle.’
‘I bet he has a horse called Trigger.’
‘But look,’ said Pauline, ‘see how they love him.’
Moore was glad-handing shoppers in a sunlit street. They crowded around him, taking selfies with their phones. ‘This way, Jimmy! Look at me! Smile, smile!’ The women in particular were thrilled to be with him.
He never stopped speaking, saying: ‘How are you? Good to see you. Hi. Thank you for your support – I sure appreciate it.’
A young woman thrust a microphone in his face and said: ‘Are you going to condemn China for selling arms to terrorists when you speak tonight?’
‘I’m sure fixing to discuss arms sales, ma’am.’
‘But what will you say?’
Moore gave her a roguish grin. ‘Well, ma’am, if I told you that now, no one would need to come out and hear me speak later, would they?’
Pauline said: ‘Turn it off.’
The screen went dark.
Chess said: ‘The man’s a walking joke!’
Milt said: ‘But he’s got a great act.’
Lizzie looked in and said: ‘Mr Green is here, Madam President.’
Pauline stood up, and the others did the same. She said: ‘I’m not finished with this. Let’s have a meeting tomorrow morning in the conference room. Come with ideas for letting the Chinese know we haven’t given up.’
They all left, and Gerry came in. He was dressed for business in a navy suit and a striped tie. He rarely entered the Oval Office. Pauline said: ‘Is something wrong?’
‘Yeah,’ he said, sitting opposite her. Milt had left his purple scarf behind on the seat, and Gerry picked it up and draped it over the arm of the couch. ‘The principal of Pippa’s school came to my office this afternoon.’
Gerry’s retirement from the law was not total. His old firm gave him a small but luxurious office on the partners’ floor, theoretically for him to use for foundation work. But he often gave advice, informally and unpaid, and it was a boost for the firm to have the president’s husband on tap. Pauline was not quite comfortable with this arrangement, but she had decided not to fight him over it.
She said: ‘Ms Judd? You didn’t tell me you were seeing her.’
‘I didn’t know. She made an appointment using her married name of Mrs Jenks.’
It still seemed odd to Pauline, but that was not the important issue. ‘Is Pippa in trouble again?’
‘Apparently she smokes marijuana.’