"Really, honey. CIA has some good people in it, but basically it's just one more government agency."
"What about the FBI and Secret Service?" she asked.
"They're cops. Cops are different. My dad was a cop, remember?"
"Oh, yeah," and then she went back to the "Style" section of The Washington Post, which had both the comics and the stories that interested her, mainly ones having to do with the sort of music that her father put quotation marks around.
Then there was a discreet knock at the door, and Andrea came in. At this time of day, she also acted as his private secretary, in this case delivering a dispatch from the State Department. Ryan took it, looked at it, and managed not to pound on the table, because his children were present.
"Thanks, Andrea," he told her.
"Yes, Mr. President." And Special Agent Price-O'Day went back out to the corridor.
Jack saw his wife looking at him. The kids couldn't read all his facial expressions, but his wife could. To Cathy, Ryan couldn't lie worth a damn, which was also why she didn't worry about his fidelity. Jack had the dissimulation ability of a two-year-old, despite all the help and training he got from Arnie. Jack caught the look and nodded. Yeah, it was China again. Ten minutes later, breakfast was fully consumed and the TV was turned off, and the Ryan family headed downstairs to work, to school, or to the day-care center at Johns Hopkins, depending on age, with the requisite contingent of Secret Service bodyguards. Jack kissed them all in their turn, except for little Jack-SHORTSTOP to the Secret Service-because John Patrick Ryan, Jr., didn't go in for that sissy stuff. There was something to be said for having daughters, Ryan thought, as he headed for the Oval Office. Ben Goodley was there, waiting with the President's Daily Brief.
"You have the one from SecState?" CARDSHARP asked.
"Yeah, Andrea delivered it." Ryan fell into his swivel chair and lifted the phone, punching the proper speed-dial button.
"Good morning, Jack," SecState said in greeting, despite a short night's sleep gotten on the convertible sofa in his own office. Fortunately, his private bathroom also had a shower.
"Approved. Bring them all back," SWORDSMAN told EAGLE.
"Who handles the announcement?" Secretary Adler asked.
"You do it. We'll try to low-key it," the president said, with forlorn hope in his voice.
"Right," Adler thought. "Anything else?"
"That's it for now."
"Okay, see ya, Scott." Ryan replaced the phone. "What about China?" he asked Goodley. "Are they doing anything unusual?"
"No. Their military is active, but it's routine training activity only. Their most active sectors are up in their northeast and opposite Taiwan. Lesser activity in their southwest, north of India."
"With all the good luck the Russians are having with oil and gold, are the Chinese looking north with envy?"
"It's not bad speculation, but we have no positive indications of that from any of our sources." Everybody envied rich neighbors, after all. That's what had encouraged Saddam Hussein to invade Kuwait, despite having lots of oil under his own sand.
"Any of our sources" includes SORGE, the President reminded himself. He pondered that for a second. "Tell Ed I want a SNIE on Russia and China."
"Quick?" Goodley asked. A Special National Intelligence Estimate could take months to prepare.
"Three or four weeks. And I want to be able to hang my hat on it."
"I'll tell the DCI," Goodley promised.
"Anything else?" Ryan asked.
"That's it for now, sir."
Jack nodded and checked his calendar. He had a fairly routine day, but the next one would largely be spent on Air Force One flying hither and yon across America, and he was overnighting in-he flipped the page on the printout-Seattle, before flying home to Washington and another full day. It was just as easy for him to use the VC-25A as a red-eye… oh, yeah, he had a breakfast speech in Seattle to the local Jaycees. He'd be talking about school reform. That generated a grunt. There just weren't enough nuns to go around. The School Sisters of Notre Dame had taught him at St. Matthew's Elementary School in northeast Baltimore back forty-plus years earlier-and taught him well, because the penalty for not learning or for misbehaving did not bear contemplation for a seven-year-old. But the truth of the matter was that he'd been a good, and fairly obedient-dull, Jack admitted to himself with a wry smile-child who'd gotten good marks because he'd had a good mom and a good dad, which was a lot more than too many contemporary American kids could say-and how the hell was he supposed to fix that? Jack asked himself. How could he bring back the ethos of his parents' generation, the importance of religion, and a world in which engaged people went to the altar as virgins? Now they were talking about telling kids that homosexual and lesbian sex was okay. What would Sister Frances Mary have said about that? Jack wondered. A pity she wasn't around to crack some senators and representatives over the knuckles with her ruler. It had worked on him and his classmates at St. Matthew's…
The desk speaker buzzed. "Senator Smithers just arrived at the West Entrance." Ryan stood and went to his right, the door that came in from the secretaries' anteroom. For some reason, people preferred that one to the door off the corridor opposite the Roosevelt Room. Maybe it was more businesslike. But mainly they liked to see the President standing when the door opened, his hand extended and a smile on his face, as though he really was glad to see them. Sure, Wilbur.
Mary Smithers from Iowa, matronly, three kids and seven grandkids, he thought, more talk about the Farm Bill. What the hell was he supposed to know about farms? the President wondered. On those rare occasions that he purchased food, he did it at the supermarket-because that's where it all came from, wasn't it? One of the things on the briefing pages for his political appearances was always the local price for bread and milk in case some local reporter tested him. And chocolate milk came from brown cows.
Accordingly, Ambassador Hitch and Assistant Secretary Rutledge will be flying back to Washington for consultations," the spokesman told the audience.
"Does this signal a break in relations with China?" a reporter asked at once.
"Not at all. 'Consultations' means just that. We will discuss the recent developments with our representatives so that our relations with China can more speedily be brought back to what they ought to be," the spokesman replied smoothly.
The assembled reporters didn't know what to make of that and so three more questions of virtually identical content were immediately asked, and answers of virtually identical content repeated for them.
"He's good," Ryan said, watching the TV, which was pirating the CNN (and other) coverage off the satellites. It wasn't going out live, oddly enough, despite the importance of the news being generated.
"Not good enough," Arnie van Damm observed. "You're going to get hit with this, too."
"I figured. When?"
"The next time they catch you in front of a camera, Jack."
And he had as much chance of ducking a camera as the leadoff hitter at opening day at Yankee Stadium, the President knew. Cameras at the White House were as numerous as shotguns during duck season, and there was no bag limit here.
Christ, Oleg!" It took a lot to make Reilly gasp, but this one crossed the threshold. "Are you serious?"
"So it would appear, Mishka," Provalov answered.
"And why are you telling me?" the American asked. Information like this was a state secret equivalent to the inner thoughts of President Grushavoy.