“Whatever the kitchen happens to have available. I will need a room for private discussion with Ms. Silvers while I eat, but what I eat is of no importance. As for sleeping, do you still have visitors’ quarters on base?”
“Yes, sir.” Captain Kennecott blinked watery blue eyes at Saul. “Here in the Officers’ Club. But, Mr. President, the rooms here in the Mix House are old and primitive and unused for many years. The BEQ’s, Bachelor Enlisted Quarters, are even worse. They have never been updated for an integrated service. There was no budget for it.”
“Do you have running water?”
“Yes, sir. The base has its own generators and storage tanks.”
“Then we are better off than most people in this country.” Saul looked around. He knew where Captain Kennecott was going: to an invitation to stay at his own house, which Saul did not want at all. “I’ll stay here in the Officers’ Club. Do you have a room right here where I can hold private meetings?”
“Yes, sir. And the kitchen is already open.” Kennecott led them through the building and up one floor, to a blue-walled room holding a long oak table and twenty chairs. “If this would do?” He ran a gnarled hand lovingly along the smooth, still-polished surface. “This was our conference room, Mr. President, back in the days when this base still had a major mission as a naval propellant test center.”
“This will do beautifully. Thank you, Captain.” Old sailors didn’t die. They went down with their bases.
“Thank you, sir. May I say what an honor it is to have you here? In one hundred and twenty-eight years since this facility was established, this is only the second visit from a sitting President.”
As Captain Kennecott left, Yasmin Silvers nodded to Saul. “You really made his day.”
“I hope so.”
“Would you consider making mine?” Her voice changed. “By telling me what is going on?”
No “sir,” no “Mr. President.” Saul heard bottled-up bewilderment and unhappiness coming out at him. And he didn’t know why.
“You mean, why did I decide to visit Indian Head?”
“I don’t mean that at all. I mean, why did you arrange for me to go down to the Q-5 Syncope Facility, and not tell me that something peculiar was going on there? I gather all sorts of things happened downriver tonight. If I hadn’t been stuck here because of the weather, I’d have landed in the middle of it.”
“You think I set you up? That I knew what was going on there, but I sent you without telling you?”
“Didn’t you? Yes, I do think that. I feel like an experimental animal.”
“Christ, Yasmin. What kind of sadist do you take me for?” It was a reaction not to her anger, but to her lack of trust. That hurt. “You have a good brain. Use it, and think. Did I arrange for your brother to stick a knife into that twisted bastard rapist Lopez? Did I arrange for your brother to be iced down in Q-5, just so I could send you there? For your information, I didn’t know that anything was happening downriver tonight. And I still have no idea what’s going on there.”
When Saul was angry he became cold and remote, not hot and loud. He had not raised his voice. That was just as well, because his final words came at the same time as the perfunctory knock on the door and the arrival of their food.
Did it really take nine people to serve bean soup followed by broiled fresh fish with potatoes and carrots? It did if you happened to be the President, and all the cooks on the base wanted to be able to tell their friends that they had served you dinner.
He and Yasmin waited in awkward silence as the plates and serving dishes were set out, along with glasses and a bottle of white wine that he had not asked for. She had an appalled and stricken stare on her face. She knew she had gone way over the mark for a presidential aide. And she had been wrong in her accusations. He knew it, too, but for the moment he could say nothing without making things worse.
The head of the group of waiters at last stepped back and cocked his head at Saul. “Mr. President?”
Saul nodded. “That’s wonderful. Thank you.”
You were polite to and praised strangers, but you told a staff member whom you really liked to use her brain and think.
“I’m sorry, Yasmin,” he said as soon as the servers had left the room. “Really sorry for what I said. It’s no excuse, but all the frustrations of the day came out at you.” He waved to the food. “Help yourself. Eat.”
“I can’t.” She swallowed. “Not yet. You—”
He waited, pouring and drinking wine that he did not want. ’
“You didn’t know?” she said at last.
“I didn’t know. I don’t know now.”
“Then why did you come here?”
Saul poured wine for both of them and served soup into Yasmin’s bowl. He coaxed her to eat.
If the staff wanted to see something, they ought to have stayed for this. President turns headwaiter and wet nurse.
When she took a first spoonful he said, “I came here for two reasons, one professional and one very personal. You may find the first hard to understand, but I have more trouble with the second. To begin with, from February 9 until this evening I had not been out of the White House for more than a few minutes at a time.”
“But that’s because everyone comes to see you, to save your time. And you were receiving plenty of reports. I know, because Auden Travis and I brought them to you.”
“You certainly did.” Saul gave up on the wine, too sweet for his taste. Yasmin was drinking it much too fast. “Which reminds me. I’m not trying to change the subject, but what happened between the two of you just before you left?”
“Oh.” Yasmin pushed out her bottom lip. “We had a bit of a fight.”
“I could guess that. About?”
“Well, it began when he learned of your authorization for me to travel to the syncope facility. I wouldn’t — couldn’t — tell him why I was going. I said it was no business of his. So he started making guesses. I didn’t respond, and he became upset because he thought you were sending me on some special secret mission. I told him that wasn’t true. He didn’t believe me. He accused me of having an unfair advantage dealing with you because I’m a woman. I told him it wasn’t my choice, Nature did that.”
“That’s all you said to him?”
“Well, no. I kind of told him—”
“Kind of? I’d rather hear it exactly.”
“Yes, but I wouldn’t rather say it.” When Saul remained silent, she went on, “All right. I told him that he’d fuck you himself if he had half a chance. I knew the cussing would annoy him as much as the thought — especially since it’s true. He got madder than ever.”
Saul shook his head in disbelief. “What did you expect? That after he heard that he would back down and apologize?”
“I wasn’t thinking. Especially after he told me that I now occupied the most senior position I would ever have in my whole life, because I’d used up all the black-Hispanic-woman cards.”
“And you of course, to avoid further argument, agreed.”
“No, sir.” Yasmin emptied half a glass of wine in one gulp and poured herself more. “I told him that I would go a damn sight farther than he ever would, and I didn’t see why I couldn’t be President someday.” Her nostrils flared, and emotion thickened the air between them like hot, strong syrup. “I’m going to be the first female President, I told him, the way Saul Steinmetz is the first Jewish President. And to get there I’m going to jiggle and wiggle my sexy black-Hispanic-woman’s ass any way I have to, with anybody I feel like. A damn sight more men will chase me, I said, than will ever go after you, Auden Travis. You should have seen his face when I told him that. He’d have murdered me on the spot if he could.” She looked up at Saul, who was sitting with head bowed. “I’m sorry, sir. I’m not suggesting that I really do — well, you know. I was just mad at him. But you did ask for it exactly.”