Some of the younger office workers came forward. Having watched the whole chase, they wanted to help.
But then the terrorist slowed down and allowed himself to be caught.
One of the Americans grabbed the man’s arm while two more patted him down for explosives. Others gathered round, cutting off any chance of escape.
The terrorist just looked confused. He tried to talk back to the Americans in Italian, panicking but polite. ‘Dove si trova la bomba?’ he asked.
Once Myles caught up with them he was desperate to make sure the man couldn’t use any electronic devices to set off the bomb.
One of the Embassy men retrieved some keys attached to a small remote control transmitter from the Italian’s pocket. ‘What’s this?’
The Italian gesticulated in an attempt to explain, but was gabbling too fast for anyone to understand. The man reached for the transmitter in desperation.
Myles tried to grab it first. ‘Don’t let him press it!’
But it was too late. The terrorist put his thumb to the red button and pushed.
There was no explosion. Instead, the lights on an Alfa Romeo parked not far away blinked, matched by a faint sound from the horn.
One of the Americans asked him about the hanging box.
‘Si tratta di una lavatrice,’ answered the man.
It was a washing machine. The man had been dangling it into the building by rope because it was too big to be carried up the small Italian staircase.
Four
Myles lowered his head, paused, then simply sat down in the street. He tried to apologise to the man, but the blare of approaching police sirens meant nobody heard what he said.
The Embassy staff began drifting back to their offices, and within minutes police were swarming everywhere. They checked and confirmed that the hanging box was indeed a washing machine. It was soon swung inside the house. One of the police even helped fit it into place.
Helen put an arm on Myles’ back. Myles just sat there, thinking through what had happened. ‘I really thought it was a bomb…’
Helen knew it was best not to answer. She just nuzzled her head onto his shoulder in consolation.
A policeman approached and began speaking English with only a mild accent. ‘Are you the one who caused the disturbance?’
‘Sorry. I thought it was a bomb,’ replied Myles.
‘You understand you caused a serious panic. The old lady is being taken to hospital with chest pains — she could have died from a heart attack.’
Helen and Myles could both tell the Italian policeman was playing it up, but Myles answered calmly. ‘Sorry officer. I just tried to do the right thing.’
‘There are professionals to deal with bombs.’
Myles was about to answer back but Helen stopped him. This was a time for discretion. She put her hand on his arm and spoke for him. ‘Thank you officer. We’re sorry. We won’t cause another alarm,’ she promised.
Myles wasn’t sure she was right. If he came across another ‘bomb’ he would try to tackle it again. Maybe the same way. Alone, if he had to. He still distrusted the authorities — all authorities.
He had never trusted them, at least not since his mother had been diagnosed with bowel cancer. Myles had seen medical bureaucracy deny her the early surgical treatment she really needed. He saw her battle against authorities, both public and private, who cared only for their reputations. And he saw her fight the withering poisons of the chemotherapy they gave her. By the time she eventually died, in the week of his fourteenth birthday, Myles had no faith left in ‘the authorities’ at all. Everything since had just confirmed his view.
Even before his mother’s death, Myles had been different. As a child, he was uniquely brilliant at most academic subjects, but unable to read aloud or distinguish his left from his right. He hadn’t been able to tie his shoelaces until he was twelve, and he had no natural ability to empathise. His condition might have been labelled as dyslexia or even Asperger’s syndrome. But there was never a need for diagnosis — Myles was nice to everyone, just a little other-worldly. He had found juvenile pleasure in performing magic tricks for people and helping them solve puzzles. At school he would happily share his always perfect answers with his many friends, none of whom were close. He learned to empathise as an acquired skill and he was soon empathising more naturally than almost everybody else.
But he knew he would never fit in. He’d gone on to study history at Oxford — a university full of oddballs, but even there he felt like an outsider.
In the military they’d put him in intelligence. With his overpowered brain and lack of physical skills it should have been the perfect fit. But Captain Munro could never settle into being a normal officer. Some seniors said he had no discipline. Others said he had too much sense. In the doomed war of Iraq, his military career had ended in disgrace.
Myles had retreated into academia — where else could he go? — accepting a junior lectureship on military history back at Oxford University. There, the students loved him — partly because of his attitude, but mostly because his views were unorthodox. In his ever-popular lectures he would explain why most military historians were wrong. It annoyed the other military historians, and it gave Myles a certain reputation.
A reputation which meant nothing to him at all.
Five
Reputation mattered to Richard Roosevelt because he knew his reputation could never be truly earned. People thought they already knew about him, just from his name.
It wasn’t the two presidents which framed people’s impressions. Dick Roosevelt didn’t remind people of Theodore or Franklin Delano, the boldest Commanders-in-Chief of their generations. Richard Roosevelt had been eclipsed by a far more historic personality, and one who was still alive: his father, Sam.
Even though Senator Sam Roosevelt would probably never run for the White House again — twice was enough — everybody knew of his heroism in the Vietnam War. He had been even more courageous on the floor of the Senate, where he had driven the Roosevelt-Wilson Act into law. It meant US citizens could be tried for crimes committed abroad, ‘Because the laws of the land must reach beyond the sea,’ he famously explained. The senior Senator frequently appeared on early evening news shows, talking to the ‘common American’ in straight language — often very straight language, which left interviewers shocked. Sam Roosevelt was loved by the American people. And some of that affection tumbled down onto his only son, Richard. Now aged thirty-one, Dick tried his best to deserve what people thought of him.
‘This way, Mr Roosevelt, sir,’ ushered a staffer.
‘Call me “Dick”,’ he replied.
As Richard was led into the Treasury building opposite number 23 Wall Street, he leant over to his executive assistant. ‘Remind me of the brief. How many people do we have working here, again?’
‘Seventy-eight on duty at the moment, a total assignment just under two hundred, sir.’
Dick nodded, then straightened his back. He readied himself to meet more of the men and women employed by Roosevelt Guardians, the private security company established by his father, of which he was now the Chief Executive.
It was as he was entering the lobby that he first noticed someone in a Roosevelt Guardian uniform looking concerned. One of his security guards — alarmed?
Dick remembered words from his speech:
‘Your job is to allay fear, so Roosevelt Guardians, you should appear calm and assured at all times…’
Dick stopped to watch. His small entourage stopped with him, knowing great men often noticed important things others missed.