"My point exactly," Newbury said. "A useful tool, and if he'd pulled it off, we might be singing a different tune. But my point is that from time to time we've realized that we should not be iron-bound to the canon of first sons if the candidate is defective or untrustworthy. We seem to be forgetting that until Kane's personality disorders got the best of him, he was our golden boy-the next mayor of New York City, and a strong candidate for a run at the White House."
"Well, at least he was brought up in our ways," one of the bankers said. "Your nephew is fiftysomething and a lifelong 'public servant' known for his fundamentalist views on the Constitution. And then there's his friendship with Karp. I don't see how it can work."
Dean shrugged. "Granted, it may be a difficult sell," he said. "Unless he can be convinced that it's for the good of his country."
"Brainwashing?" the congressman scoffed.
"A version, perhaps," Dean replied. "But gentlemen, I'm not suggesting that he be initiated straight into the council. We can bring him along slowly and see what sort of candidate he makes. Perhaps blood will tell. If not, there is a spot next to his father in the Newbury plot."
"And what will you do for an heir if this experiment fails?" the senator asked.
"The daughter of one of my sisters has a ten-year-old son who seems bright enough. The family might prevail upon his parents to let him live under my wing, where he can be provided with all of life's best advantages." And maybe persuade them to allow me to adopt the boy so that the Newbury name is not lost, he thought.
"A wiser choice, I think," the television commentator said.
"Perhaps if I had the time to raise another boy," Dean replied. "But I want the wheels set in motion for our great triumph before I die."
With that said, Dean moved to put the debate over his heir aside for the time being. They had a more pressing matter to attend to: Senator Tom McCullum. Bad enough that he was questioning the legitimacy of the Patriot Act; the council had supported the act as a small step forward toward a government they'd control. But now he was also calling for a full-out congressional probe into the attack at St. Patrick's Cathedral, the involvement of the Russians, and allegations-all true-that the "act of terrorism" had been arranged to turn world opinion against Chechen nationalists. McCullum had gone so far as to hint that he believed that certain factions in both governments were using Islamic extremists for their own ends. And that was really hitting close to home.
McCullum was one of the most persuasive speakers on the Hill. He had a way of uniting both liberal and conservative factions, especially as a champion of the Constitution. After much debate, and going back and forth-after all, assassinating a U.S. senator was not to be taken lightly-the council had decided that it could not risk the potential that a congressional hearing might lead Senator McCullum to them.
The council's plan had been set in motion by Newbury's conversation in Manx with Jamys Kellagh. The Sons of Man would march with the Sons of Ireland to silence the critic for the good of all.
Kellagh was next on the evening agenda. Dean pressed a button beneath the table and spoke so that the receptionist could hear. "Miss Rauch, would you let Mr. Kellagh know that we are ready to see him."
A minute later, Jamys Kellagh entered the room. It was not his real name, but he had not used that since he was a teenager and it had been determined what career path he would take. He was the son of a male family member but not a first son, and groomed to be a second-level operative like his father.
Kellagh remained standing while the others questioned him about his mission in the East Village that December.
"Do we know for certain that the book perished with the bookkeeper?" the old general asked.
"I was there when the girl climbed out of the window," he said. "She did not have the book, and the place was gutted."
"Good," the general said. "But are we confident that what she was told does not compromise the bigger mission?"
Kellagh shook his head. He hated reporting failures to this group, both because he believed in the cause and because it could be dangerous. Too many things had already gone wrong. It started with the mess at St. Patrick's because of Kane. But it continued when the man he'd sent to murder the reporter in her apartment had tumbled off the roof. The man's name wasn't Don Porterhouse, a piece-of-shit rapist who'd been killed and his identity switched with Kellagh's man, one of his best assassins and a former colleague at the agency, years earlier. Then the bitch had survived another attempt to kill her at the cafe in Brooklyn, though that he could blame on Nadya Malovo.
"I don't think there's a problem," he said in answer to the general's question about Lucy Karp. "She heard a story about some odd group from history about which there's never been anything more up to date than the book. They were able to translate a message in the old tongue between Mr. Newbury and myself, but they had no clue what it means. I think we are safe to go forward as planned."
"What about Butch Karp?" a banker asked.
"He's supposed to be taking it easy, doctor's orders, and is occupying himself with a civil case in Idaho of all places," Kellagh replied. "Right now, he's still here in New York, but he doesn't go to the office and about the only other activity he seems to have is breakfast with a bunch of retired old duffers who sit around arguing about the Constitution. To be honest, I wonder if the latest attempt on his life didn't take some of the fire out of him."
"And your counterpart with our Russian friends?" one of the retired judges asked.
"She is taking care of the reporter and the gangster herself," Kellagh said. He looked at his watch. "In fact, I would say they are no longer an issue."
"I wonder if we should concentrate more on removing these impediments, Karp and his associates," the other lawyer said.
Kellagh shook his head. "I wouldn't recommend that," he replied. "For one thing, these missions have put them on a heightened alert, and we cannot account for all of their friends. The Indian and the Vietnamese gangster have disappeared, and of course, tracking David Grale is impossible. My advice is to wait while we concentrate on accomplishing the main mission. We can deal with these issues later."
When Kellagh left the room, the retired general turned to Newbury. "There seem to be a lot of excuses for failure these days from Mr. Kellagh."
"He's your nephew, what would you have us do? Up until now he has performed well."
"Yes, but any more failures and we may have to rethink his position," the general said. "Too much hinges on him and we can't afford weak links that fail us. Keep that in mind with your own nephew, Mr. Newbury."
"I will do that," Newbury agreed icily. "Now, if there's nothing else that anyone needs to discuss, I call an end to this Tynwald… Myr shegin dy ve, bee eh!"
"Myr shegin dy ve, bee eh!" the others replied.
18
That same night, Marlene and Butch were cuddling on the couch when she told him about Santacristina and his theory that there might be a connection between his daughter's disappearance and Mikey O'Toole's case. She'd just returned from Idaho following Huttington's deposition and some initial inquiries at the Sawtooth police department regarding Maria's disappearance, and it was weighing on her mind.
Karp was skeptical. "I'm sorry about what he's going through," he said. "It doesn't sound good. But I don't see the connection except that Huttington is involved in both at least at some level. You know as well as I do that parents of missing children will grasp at any possibility. Every time the cops catch some serial killer-no matter what part of the country he may have terrorized or when-these families converge on the off chance that the killer might know what happened to their son or daughter. But thousands of these cases go unsolved, and their bodies are never found, and-while Santacristina might not want to hear this-sometimes people do run away."