“Thanks so much for taking time to see us, Jack,” I said as I clipped the badge onto the lapel of my jacket.
“My pleasure,” he said.
Jack led us quickly through a maze of velvet ropes that in happier times had been used to control the tourists who flocked to the Pentagon like visitors to Disney World. There were plenty of military personnel and men in suits hanging around that morning, but I hadn’t noticed anybody in sweats with cameras slung around their necks. Maybe February was a slow month. Either that or tour buses were taking those visitors to other Washington landmarks where security, especially for foreign visitors, was not nearly so tight.
As we followed Jack past the visitors’ center and the nearly deserted gift shop toward the escalators, I was thinking about 9/11, feeling slightly queasy and desperately sad that just a short walk from where we were standing, terrorists had flown an airplane into the building and 184 people had died.
And then I saw it, completely covering the wall to my right, stretching so high that I had to throw my head back to see the top: a spectacular 9/11 quilt. From across the lobby it had looked like the American flag, but when we got closer, I could see that the flag was composed of thousands of four-by-four-inch squares, one for each individual who had perished in the nearly simultaneous terrorist attacks on New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, D.C., that terrifying September day. Men and women, young and old, their faces smiled out at us. Christine Hanson of Groton, Massachusetts, who would never see her third birthday. Robert Grant Norton of Lubec, Maine, eighty-five, the oldest victim. White, black, Hispanic, Asian, Muslim, Jew-a cross section of America, land of the free, where their promising lives had been snuffed out in an instant. And for what? It broke my heart.
“Amazing, isn’t it? Three thousand thirty-one squares altogether,” Jack commented as he directed us to the turnstiles and showed us how to scan the bar codes printed on our badges. “The quilt was put together by quilters from more than forty states, honchoed by the Memorial Quilts group out in California. They toured it for a while, but I think it’s home for good now.” He clasped his hands behind his back and rocked back on his heels. “Frankly, I hope it stays forever. Not that anyone working here needs any reminding.”
As we rode the escalator to the next level, I glanced up. A military guard dressed in camouflage gear stood on the landing, cradling a machine gun. In the corridor behind him was a shopping mall; I watched Pentagon workers scurrying from a dry cleaner to a card store, from a chocolate shop to one of several fast food stalls. “Expecting trouble at Burger King?” I asked with an uneasy eye on the cop in cammies with the gun.
“Regrettable, but necessary, I’m afraid. This is the main entrance,” Jack explained. “If someone should barge in and jump the turnstiles…” His voice trailed off.
He didn’t need to finish the sentence; I could see clearly what would happen. From his vantage point on the landing, that single guard controlled the entire lobby. Anyone attempting to charge up the escalator would be shot, easy as plugging a rat in a drainpipe.
“There’s a river entrance, too.” Jack waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the Potomac River just to the north. “But it’s for the bigwigs.”
Walking briskly, Jack led us up a gradual rampway into the Pentagon proper, past a more luxurious food court-KFC, Manchu Wok, Pizza Hut, Subway-with a common seating area furnished, to my surprise, with wooden tables and chairs and upholstered furniture that wouldn’t look out of place in my own dining room.
Just past the ATM and the Navy Federal Credit Union, Jack paused before a glass case that housed a wooden model of the Pentagon. “You probably remember the structure of the building from the newspaper accounts of the crash,” he said, “but this scale model shows it graphically. There are five levels to the complex.” He tapped the glass with his finger, pointing out each feature of the building as he explained it to us. “Five levels, five sides and five rings. The A-ring is the inside ring, as you can see. The E-ring is the most desirable because it has windows that look out rather than looking in at other windows.”
We had given the guy at Security Jack’s room number when we registered, so it was still fresh in my mind. “So if your office is in room 3E844,” I said, “that would be the third floor of the far outside ring, roughly in the middle of the eighth corridor.”
Jack smiled. “Exactly. There are seventeen and a half miles of corridor in this building,” he commented as he led us down one of them. “And they say it takes only seven minutes to get from any one point to another.” He punched the button to call the elevator. “Tell that to me when I’m juggling coffee and a doughnut.”
We rode up to the third floor, disembarking in a hallway that reminded me of a fine old hotel. Elegant dark wood paneling covered the walls beneath a chair rail, above which hung oil paintings of former Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the colors of the artwork vibrant in contrast to the creamy walls. On both sides of the hallway, dark paneled doors-some open, some closed-led to offices whose occupants, all high-level political appointees, were indicated by brass plaques bearing titles such as Secretary of Defense, Under Secretary of Defense for This and Under Secretary of Defense for That. Framed photographs of the incumbents and flags hung about everywhere.
As we strolled along the corridor, the large-scale oils gradually gave way to smaller works. Jack paused in front of one of them, an unassuming but competent landscape. “And this delightful little watercolor was painted by Dwight David Eisenhower,” he told us.
Ah, yes, I thought, as I studied the pleasant fall scene and wondered if it was in Pennsylvania, where Ike had retired with Mamie. Eisenhower, like his friend, Winston Churchill, had enjoyed painting watercolors in his spare time.
We all need a hobby, I thought. Mine was knitting. Would they let me have knitting needles in jail? If not, I might never get back to that cable-knit sweater I’d started for Paul last Christmas.
Still worrying about the unfinished sweater, I hurried to catch up with the guys, who were standing in front of a massive wooden door, waiting for me. “This is where I hang out,” Jack was saying to Paul when I approached.
The minute we entered the office, two well-trained secretaries leapt to their feet. Secretaries in the traditional sense-small s-they came out from behind their desks, greeted us warmly, took our coats and asked if we’d like coffee, which we politely declined.
Jack’s office adjoined the Secretary’s, capital S. It was smaller than I would have expected for a Navy captain, certainly small by Naval Academy standards, but large enough to accommodate his desk, a round conference table piled high with file folders, and several upholstered chairs, which we promptly settled into.
What is it they say? Location, location, location. Jack’s office had it in spades. Prime real estate on the E-ring, with a window overlooking the Potomac.
“Paul told me over the phone what you’re interested in,” Jack was saying just as I was getting comfortable, “and I’m only too happy to oblige. You asked about Lieutenant Jennifer Goodall. She was stationed here for two years before being assigned to the Naval Academy. The last year she worked here, Goodall was Admiral Ted Hart’s assistant.”
“What would that entail?” I inquired.