“So where you headed to, Wes?” Stevie calls out.
“Wes, listen to me,” Lisbeth pleads. “Thanks to your low-life friend Dreidel, I found another puzzle. Are you listening?”
I turn back to the two men, who’re still standing in front of the closed garage and the matching Chevy Suburbans parked a few feet away. Stevie’s hand disappears into his pants pocket. It’s not until that moment that I realize that on the night I first saw Boyle, Stevie was driving the lead car in Malaysia. “Wes,” he says coldly. “I asked you a—”
“Just back to the office,” I blurt. Spinning clumsily to the gate, I stare at the double-plank wooden slats that keep people from looking in. I grip the phone to stop my hand from shaking. The sun’s about to set in the purple-orange sky. Behind me, there’s a metallic click. My heart leaps.
“See you soon,” Stevie calls out. There’s a loud rrrrrr as the wooden gate rolls to the right, sliding open just enough for me to squeeze through.
“I’m out,” I whisper to Lisbeth.
“Fine — then pay attention. Do you have the old puzzle on you?”
Staggering across the street to the car, I don’t answer. All I see is Manning’s grin and his yellow Chiclet teeth—
“Wes! Did you hear what I said!?” she shouts. “Take out the original one!”
Nodding even though she can’t see me, I reach into my pocket and hastily unfold the original crossword.
“See the handwritten initials down the center?” she asks. “M, A, R, J…”
“Manning, Albright, Rosenman, Jeffer… what about them?”
“He’s got the same list on the new puzzle. Same initials down the middle. Same order. Same everything.”
“Okay, so? Now there’re two lists of top senior staff,” I say, stopping just outside the car. I have to lean against the door to keep standing.
“No. Pay attention, Wes. Same everything. Including those scribbles down the side.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“On the left — before each set of initials: the four dots in a square, the little oval, the cross with a slash through it…”
I look at each one:
“The chicken scratch?”
“That’s the thing, Wes,” she says, deadly serious. “I don’t think it’s chicken scratch. Unless he’s got some majorly smart chickens.”
86
But those doodles,” I say as I study Manning’s scribbles on the side of the crossword.
“Are you listening?” Lisbeth shouts through the phone. “That’s what they wanted it to look like — random doodles and extra letters that make the hidden initials disappear. But if you look at this new crossword, the exact same scribbled images are in the exact same order. There’s nothing random about it, Wes! The four dots… the small oval — Manning was using them as some sort of message.”
“Why would—?”
“You said it yourself: Every politician needs allies — and every President needs to figure out who he can trust. Maybe this is how Manning ranked those closest to him. Y’know, like a report card.”
Nodding at the logic, I glance again at the list, mentally adding the real names.
“And no offense,” Lisbeth adds, “but your boy Dreidel? He’s a piece of shit. Real shit, Wes — as in beating-up-prostitutes-and-ramming-their-faces-into-mirrors kind of shit.”
As she relays Violet’s story, I can still picture the woman in the bathrobe peeking out from Dreidel’s hotel room. Still, to go from that to smashing faces… “You sure you can trust this Violet woman?” I ask.
“Look at the list,” Lisbeth says. “That is Manning’s handwriting, right?” When I don’t answer, she adds, “Wes, c’mon! Is that Manning’s handwriting or not?”
“It’s his,” I say as my breathing again quickens.
“Exactly. So if he’s the one filling in this report card, then the grade he gives himself — those four dots — you think in his own personal ranking, he’s giving himself an A or a big, steaming F?”
“An A?” I say tentatively, staring at the::.
“Absolutely an A. He’s the cipher. In fact, I’ll wager those four dots are a sparkling A+. Now look who else was lucky enough to get the exact same ranking.”
I look down at the list. It’s the first time I realize Manning and Dreidel are both ranked with four dots.
“Red rover, red rover, we call Dreidel right over,” Lisbeth says through the phone.
“Lisbeth, that doesn’t prove anything. So what if he trusted Dreidel more than any of the others?”
“Unless he trusted Dreidel to do what none of the others would.”
“Wait, so now Dreidel’s a legbreaker?”
“You were there, Wes. You’re telling me the President never had any personal issues that needed dealing with?”
“Of course, but those usually went to—” I cut myself off.
“What? Those were the problems that went to Boyle?”
“Yeah, they… they were supposed to. But what if that’s the point? What if they used to go to Boyle…”
“… and suddenly they stopped?”
“And suddenly they started going to Dreidel,” I say with a nod. “No one would even know the President made the switch unless…”
“… unless they happened to find their ranking on the list,” Lisbeth agrees, her voice now racing. “So when Boyle found this, when he saw that Dreidel and Manning were ranked together…”
“… he could see the real ranking of the totem pole.”
An hour ago, I would’ve told Lisbeth she’s crazy — that there’s no way the President and Dreidel were scheming together. But now… I replay the last ten minutes in my head. What the First Lady said… what Boyle accused the President of… and what Lisbeth’s already confirming… if even half of it’s true… I inhale a warm burst of muggy air, then grit my teeth to slow my breathing. But it won’t slow down. My chest rises and falls. My neck, my face — I’m soaked.
Up the block, on the corner of County Road, there’s a white car with its blinker on, waiting to turn toward me.
“Get the hell out of there,” Lisbeth says.
“I’m leaving right now.”
Ripping the door open, I hop into the car and frantically claw through my pocket for my keys. I came here to confess… to get help from the biggest and the best. But now — with the President as The Fourth, and Dreidel feeding us directly to the Lion… I ram the key at the ignition, but the way my hand’s shaking, the key bounces off the steering column. I try again. Dammit, why won’t it—? I take another stab, and the tip of the key scratches across the metal column, pinching my fingertip. The pain’s sharp, like being jabbed with a needle. But as my eyes swell with tears, I know it’s not from the pain. Or at least not this pain.
A sob rises like a bubble in my throat. I again clench my teeth, but it won’t go down. No, don’t do this… not now, I beg as I press my forehead as hard as I can against the steering wheel. But as I picture the President — all these years — I didn’t just learn his shoe size and pillow preference. I know what he thinks: who annoys him, who he trusts, who he hates, even who he thinks is still using him. I know his goals, and what he’s afraid of, and what he dreams about, and what he hopes… what I hoped… The bubble in my throat bursts and my body begins to shake with silent, heaving sobs. After eight years… every single day… Oh, God — how could I not know this man?
“Wes, you there?” Lisbeth asks through the phone.