One Knight Only Page 5

  “Thank you, Mr. President,” said Cordoba.

  There was a sharp knock at the door and Arthur’s personal aide, Mrs. Jenkins, a brisk, no-nonsense woman of indeterminate years, stuck her head in and said, “Mr. President, the First Lady is here.”

  “Tell the faithless trollop she is never to darken my door again,” Arthur instructed.

  “Yes, sir, I’ll send her right in,” Mrs. Jenkins replied without missing a beat.

  “How marvelous to command that level of respect,” Arthur said to Cordoba.

  Cordoba shrugged. “We serve at the pleasure of the President.”

  Mrs. Penn entered briskly, her eyes lighting up in that way she had whenever she saw the President again after a lengthy absence. However, they had developed a very reserved, formal means of embracing since he had been elected, and they employed it now as she crossed the room to him, placed her hands on either arm, and lifted her face to his lips as he sedately brushed her right cheek with a kiss. “Faithless trollop?” she asked.

  “I meant that with the greatest respect. How did your trip go?”

  “As well as can be expected, considering it was busywork.”

  Cordoba and Arthur exchanged glances, with Ron silently dreading the direction the conversation was about to go. “Perhaps I’d better . . .”

  “No, stay, Ron,” Gwen said firmly, turning to Arthur, her arms folded. She had a stern look on her face . . . not annoyed so much as she was determined to discuss something that she obviously suspected wasn’t going to go over especially well. “It was busywork, Arthur. You know it, I know it.”

  “I know no such thing,” Arthur replied sharply, “and frankly, I resent the implication. That you believe I think so little of you.”

  She dropped into one of the chairs facing the desk. Cordoba could still remember the first time that Gwen had entered the Oval Office. She had squealed in disbelief, sat in every piece of furniture, and wondered who might have sat there before her. She had literally been bubbling over with joy. Now she just looked tired. Arthur had been President for two years. What the hell were they going to be like in another two? Or if he ran for reelection?

  “It’s not that you think little of me, Arthur,” she sighed.

  “Then perhaps you think little of your work. The people adore you, Gwen . . .”

  “Yes, I know,” said Gwen, crossing her legs and resting her hands on her knees. “And I go to different cities, and I talk to the soccer moms about their problems, and the B’nai B’rith, and the Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and on and on, but don’t you see? I feel segregated. As if the only thing you think I’m suited for is ‘women’s work.’ ”

  “Gwen, my dear, perhaps we should discuss this later . . .”

  “Don’t you trust me, Arthur?”

  Well, there it was, the worst question a woman could ask a man. Cordoba shifted uncomfortably in his spot, wishing for all the world that he was anywhere else.

  Slowly Arthur walked over to her, knelt, and took one of her hands between his two. “Gwen,” he said firmly, “of course I trust you. The things you’ve been involved with until now have been vital. If we’re going to be pragmatic about it, the simple fact is that the women’s vote carried the day when I ran, and it’s important to keep a very, very active presence with that group. And you are better suited to that task than am I.”

  “So you get to do what benefits the country and the world,” Gwen said, eyes flashing challengingly, “and I get to do what benefits you. Is that how it is?”

  His head slumped as if he was presenting it onto a block for a headsman to dispatch. “May I ask, just out of morbid curiosity, what brought this on? Does this have anything to do with the delay in your returning, and your visit to the castle?”

  “In a sense,” she said with a small shrug. “When I was there, it just reminded me of a time when absolutely anything seemed possible. That’s how it was when I was there with you, Arthur. You freed me from a restricted life, one of abuse and denial, and opened up an existence filled with potential. Now I want to live up to that potential, and I feel as if I’m not being allowed.”

  “All right, Gwen,” Arthur said, sounding very reasonable. “What is it that you would wish to do?”

  “Well . . . trying to reorganize and streamline health care might be a start . . .”

  Ron made no attempt to hide his very loud moan. “Ohhh, trust me, Mrs. Penn, you definitely do not want to get involved with that.”

  She smiled indulgently. “You’re probably right, Ron.”

  “Thank you, Mrs.—”

  Gwen then snapped open the purse she’d kept carefully balanced on her lap, and extracted a sheet of paper from it. “As it so happens, however, I’ve been making a list.”

  Ron Cordoba and the President of the United States exchanged looks. This was suddenly shaping up to be a very, very long night.

  ARTHUR FELT THE need to talk to Merlin.

  It was late at night, Gwen having already gone to bed after an extremely lengthy discussion in the Oval Office. Cordoba had gone back to scrape Bob Kellerman off the wall and take him out for a drink, or possibly many drinks. Arthur had continued to study the treaty, assuring Gwen that he would be along shortly. He had very much meant it when he had said it, but time had passed and he was still not the least bit drowsy.

  The late-night staff, the Secret Service . . . they were used to Arthur’s occasional meandering. No one commented upon it, though. He was, after all, the President, and certainly wandering about in the middle of the night was hardly a violation of his oath of office.

  He made his way to the Rose Garden. There was a small greenhouse set off to the side, carefully maintained. Roses continued to bloom here even though they were out of season. Arthur laughed softly to himself at the thought; it was like stepping into the Garden of Eden, a place of quiet reflection and paradise on earth . . . as if such a place still existed.

  He dwelt on that for a long, pleasant moment. The notion of Eden on earth was a cheerful, quaint myth. On the other hand, to most people . . . so was he. Oh, certainly he had publicly stated that he was King Arthur of Camelot. Circumstances had arisen during the mayoral race that left him no choice. But the public had seized upon that in a fit of amused fancy. They thought it a marvelous joke that they were all in on. For a time, all of New York indulged itself, turning itself into one big renaissance fair. It was ridiculous to Arthur, but he had gone along with it because it had served his purposes so perfectly, and because Merlin had told him to.

  Merlin . . .

  There he stood, in the far corner of the Rose Garden. Arthur drew close to him, moving noiselessly across the small, meticulously watered lawn. He was, of course, just as Arthur had remembered him, as he would be for all time. There was that typical Merlin expression of barely masked annoyance, coupled with whimsical detachment, as if his last words had been: “Do you seriously think this will hold me?” Several strands of his hair were hanging in front of his face, and he was frozen in mid-spell cast, his hands poised for all eternity to inflict some sort of mystical damage that would never be delivered.

  Merlin the Magician, Merlin the Demonspawn, Merlin son of none . . . a statue of polished granite, half hidden in shadows, half bathed in moonlight. Somehow that seemed symbolic.

  Arthur placed one hand upon the smooth stone; it was as cold to the touch as ever, just as dead as it always was. Arthur had long since given up hope that he would feel some sort of distant warmth, some sign that this was something other than a lifeless sculpture. For the first months he had convinced himself that this condition was only temporary. That, somehow, Merlin would fight through it and come back: that he was asleep, that he was in some kind of stasis . . . something. But slowly Arthur had come to the conclusion that such was not the case. That Merlin was, in fact, lost to him, and this statue—this statue that had once been a living, breathing being—was all that remained of him. Not for the first time, he cursed under his breath the name of the indivi
dual who had done this horrific thing.

  Should it ever come to pass, Arthur, you will take no vengeance on my behalf, Merlin had warned him. I knew what I was getting into, and I’m far too old to start fobbing the blame off on others. He wondered if Merlin had known what was going to be coming. Perhaps if Merlin had indeed had the slightest inkling of his fate, he would have done more to stave it off, or maybe come up with a way . . .

  “And sometimes,” Arthur sighed, “you just run out of ways, don’t you, Merlin.” He allowed one hand to remain upon the statue’s shoulder, a gesture of familiarity in which he likely would never have indulged during Merlin’s life. “When a thousand challenges face you, and you have to pull the thousand and first trick out of your hat . . . sometimes you find the hat empty.”

  Slowly he circled the statue, as he had so many times before. He always made sure it was kept meticulously clean. He knew that some on his staff thought his devotion to this particular piece of artwork to be somewhat . . . peculiar. But on the rare occasions that someone happened to voice curiosity as to what drew the President to this immobile young boy, Arthur would simply invite them to stare into the polished, unmoving features for a few minutes. They would do so, willing to accommodate him since he was, after all, the President. When they came away, however, some of them looked thoughtful, others shaken, and they would go back to Arthur and say, “I understand now, thank you, sir.” The truth was, of course, that they could never completely understand. They simply thought they did.

  “But isn’t that the way of things, Merlin?” he asked. His breath floated away from him in small puffs of mist. “Didn’t you always tell me that people could never distinguish between the concept of being entitled to their opinion, versus being entitled to their informed opinion? No one understands that, do they? They believe that, because they think something, it has validity just because it’s their own thought. They feel that their rights are being threatened if someone points out that to hold a worthless opinion is like holding a fistful of sand: It means nothing whether you’ve got it in your hand or not.

  “And ‘rights’ . . . everyone is so obsessed about those, Merlin. These people,”—he inclined his head as if he could take in the entirety of America with the gesture—“these people make such noises about their rights . . . but so few of them have actually fought for those rights. Their being born American simply entitles them, or at least makes them feel they’re entitled. ‘That they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.’ ” He rolled his eyes. “It’s a nice turn of phrase, but I almost wish that Jefferson hadn’t put it into the Declaration. People always treasure much more those things that they have to earn than those things that they feel are theirs by divine right. Don’t you think so, Merlin?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  Arthur jumped back three feet, gasping, hand to his heart, not believing what he had just heard, and then he perceived light, musical laughter behind him. With a grimace and look of utter chagrin, he turned and knew what he was going to see even before he saw it: Gwen standing there, trying to stifle her laughter, putting her hands to her mouth to stem the noise. But her shoulders and chest were bouncing up and down from the suppressed laughter.

  “Very funny, very funny,” said Arthur with the air of someone who didn’t think it was the least bit funny at all, even though he had to admit to himself that it was a rather worthy little prank.

  She lowered her hands, her mouth still in a thin and amused smile as she said, “I’m sorry.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “All right, I’m not. But I guess I should have resisted.”

  “Yes, you should have. And it’s a cruel lady you are, to have such a jest at Merlin’s expense, especially when he cannot defend himself.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said again, and this time sounded as if she meant it. Holding his hand, her own robe drawn tightly around herself, she walked purposefully back to the statue, and looked it up and down. Then she looked back to her husband, who stood there with a somber expression. “You still blame yourself, don’t you?”

  “Well, of course,” said Arthur matter-of-factly. “Who else could there possibly be to blame, if not myself? Truman was quite right: The buck stops here.”

  “But, Arthur, Merlin was a big boy . . . well . . . relatively speaking,” she amended, glancing at the statue. “He knew the risks. He knew what could happen. And I really don’t think that he would have wanted you to continue to mourn his fate.”

  Arthur considered that. “You know . . . I’m not so certain that he wouldn’t have wanted that. Indeed, he might have actually enjoyed it, knowing I was tormented so. He could be a vindictive little cretin when he was so inclined. It’s truly difficult to know which way he would have gone on it.”

  “But, Arthur, you knew him better than any man living.”

  “And yet,” he admitted, “in many ways, it’s as if I never knew him at all.”

  “So what you’re saying,” Gwen reasoned, “is that either he wouldn’t have wanted you to blame yourself . . . in which case you’d be acting contrary to his wishes. Or he would have wanted you to blame yourself, thus certifying that he was in fact a selfish little shit. Does that pretty much cover the range of possibilities?”

  “Yes,” said Arthur thoughtfully. “Yes, I suppose it does.”

  “So you’ve more or less got a no-win scenario on your hands.”

  “It certainly wouldn’t be my first, and very probably won’t be my last.”

  They said nothing for a long moment, instead just basking in the quiet. Even though Arthur knew that elsewhere in the world, much was going on, here—just for that brief period—he felt as if everything was utterly still. That the entirety of the planet earth had joined him in this moment of silence.

  “Arthur,” Gwen said finally, and even though her voice was barely above a whisper it made him jump slightly just the same. “Arthur . . . you have a busy day tomorrow. You’re delivering the State of the Union. And I’m freezing.” And he saw that, indeed, she was lightly bouncing up and down in place in order to keep her circulation going. “Can we please . . . ?”

  “Of course,” he said solicitously, and putting an arm around her, he guided her back into the White House. Behind him, falling silently, gentle snowflakes drifted in on the night air, frosting the ground and covering Merlin the magician with a blanket of white.

  CHAPTRE THE THIRD

  THE PERUVIAN AIR hung heavily around him, and had he not been standing in the middle of a hospital ward, the broad-shouldered black man would have been inclined to pull out his machete and try to hack his way through it. He knew it was a ridiculous notion. One couldn’t carve a path through something that wasn’t there. Still, it would have made a nice symbolic gesture.

  Some years earlier, he had been found in an alleyway by a young boy who claimed to be—and actually turned out to be—a centuries-old magician named Merlin. For all his eldritch talents, Merlin would likely never have recognized the black man now. He was wearing a green tank top, sweated through, which revealed sizable arms and broad shoulders. Since he’d taken to shaving his head, removing all hint of the graying hair he’d once had, his indeterminate age became even more difficult to fathom. To the casual viewer, he might have been twenty, he might have been sixty. It would have been impossible to say . . . except that anyone guessing in the vicinity of a thousand would have been far closer to the mark.

  His bald head glistened with perspiration. He was wearing army utility slacks, the pants pockets bulging with various necessities ranging from small bottles of fresh water to bug lotion. The machete he kept in a holster slung over his back. A Colt was hanging from a holster on his right hip. He would have preferred a dependable broad sword, unable to shake the feeling—even after all these centuries—that taking down a foe while standing a good twenty, thirty feet away just wasn’t fair somehow. If you’re going to take a man’s life, be close enough to do him the courtesy of seeing the light depart f
rom his eyes. Still, he was realistic enough to admit that he was very likely old-fashioned in that regard.

  In general deportment, he looked like a mercenary who had just wandered in from the jungles, which suited him fine. He wasn’t about to cause trouble with anyone, but he wasn’t inclined to paint himself as an easy target, either.

  The hospital itself was a very primitive affair. Understaffed and overwhelmed, it served the needs of a populace that had been through an absolutely abysmal year. Several acts of God, including an earthquake, a flood, and—worst of all—a particularly virulent plague, had prompted some to wonder just what the hell the people of this country had ever done to deserve this kind of treatment. A fake memo from the United States Attorney General’s office, which had made the rounds on all the computer nets, had suggested a class action suit be filed against the Almighty since all these “acts” attributed to him amounted to either extreme neglect or intense malevolence on his part. Either way, it seemed actionable.

  Obviously the United States had not embarked upon legal remedies, but President Penn had been front and center in spearheading a global relief effort. The black man who was now walking through the hospital had the nominal and vague title of presidential aide, which suited him just fine. He had the freedom to come and go as he pleased, and be wherever his king—that was to say, his president—needed him to be.

  At that moment, where he happened to be was Camana. Camana, situated on the South Panamerican Highway, 830 kilometers from Lima, was on the South American coast in a fairly agricultural valley. It was a popular coastal getaway, and was renowned for the “camarones,” or shrimp, that the rivers in that region produced. At the moment, however, Camana—population approximately 35,000—was hardly a getaway for anything, unless one was anxious to get away to a scene of devastation. Even though it had not been the epicenter of the quake, the damage had nevertheless been catastrophic.