George Chesbro - Two Songs This Archangel Sings

"Fuck you, thank you, and good night." I said, and turned around. I started to walk away, but was stopped when Garth gripped my shoulder and turned me around again.

"Go ahead, Mongo," Garth murmured. "This man's just doing his job, and he happens to be right. You go ahead and see what Shannon has to say. I'm feeling very spooky, and I really don't care to meet with the son-of-a-bitch anyway."

"Okay, brother. You all right?"

"I'm all right. Go take care of business, and don't give him shit."

I squeezed Garth's hand, then walked ahead, across a short open expanse, to the lip of the recess in which, like a monster shard in a great, rectangular bomb crater, the Viet Nam War Memorial stood. Again, I found myself profoundly moved by the stark simplicity and awesome power of the sculpture. As had been intended, the black stone slab cut not only through space, but also through all the pretensions and desperate, muddled rationales all sides offered to try to explain the most complex and ultimately futile war the United States of America had ever fought.

I slowly descended a ramp into the magnificent hole in the ground, walked up to the granite, and touched my fingertips to the sharp lines of the stonecutter's art in the center of the wall of names. Keeping my left hand on the wall, I moved to my right until I finally came to the last of the names. The rest of the wall was naked black stone awaiting more bad news about bones unearthed from unmarked graves halfway around the world.

There were some names that should be added, I thought-the victims, including two children, who had died in the fire that had destroyed my apartment building; Loan Ka and his family, and Kathy; Gary Worde, and the six fighting men of America's armed forces sent to die in shame on a madman's murderous errand.

I was most impressed by the monument-and angry that Kevin Shannon should use the mystery of the site in an embarrassingly obvious effort to manipulate my feelings. I resented the banality and predictability of his action and found it depressing.

I heard footsteps behind me, and I turned as Kevin Shannon, casually dressed in charcoal slacks, black loafers, black turtleneck, and a heavy white cardigan sweater, came down the ramp and walked toward me at a brisk pace. He was shorter in person than he appeared on television or in photographs. His thick, gray-streaked black hair was cut sharply in the swept-back style that was his trademark. His craggy, fifty-seven-year-old face could not be described as handsome, but his features were nonetheless striking, with a square jaw, pronounced cheekbones, and bright, black eyes. He looked like a man who could control himself as well as situations, and it was this bearing-along with his political views-that had first attracted me to him. I had believed in Shannon, believed he was somehow different from the mangled politicians who usually survive the internecine warfare that is our political system to gain election to high office. Now I felt like a fool.

His grip, when he shook my hand, was firm. "Good evening, Dr. Frederickson," Kevin Shannon said in his pleasing baritone.

"Good evening, sir." Courtesy costs nothing.

Shannon motioned for me to sit down on the stone bench behind us. I did, and he sat beside me. He crossed his legs, reached into a pocket of his cardigan, and to my surprise, brought out a small silver flask emblazoned with the presidential seal. He unscrewed the silver cap, drew a shot glass out of the same pocket, set them both down on the bench between us.

"Your rather extensive dossier indicates you like Scotch, Frederickson. I thought you might like to share a drink with me. The flask is for you."

I hoped that the offer of a presidential souvenir at the beginning of our discussion was an attempt at humor, but I had the most disquieting feeling that it wasn't. Like Burton Andrews, probably like most people who crave for and exercise power, Kevin Shannon seemed to have had his soul, as well as a good deal of common sense, displaced by a preoccupation with symbols. It was at once fascinating and unnerving, and I wondered how much of this presidential stroking I was going to have to put up with before we got down to business.

"No, thank you," I said.

Shannon shrugged, set down the flask next to the shot glass and cap. "What do you want, Frederickson?" he asked, leaning toward me and resting his forearms across his knees.

"I thought Burton Andrews might have told you."

"You tell me."

"Justice."

"We might disagree over what constitutes justice."

"Let the courts decide. That's what they're there for."

Shannon leaned back, drew a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He offered me one, which I declined. He lit one, inhaled deeply, exhaled slowly. "What, in your opinion, would constitute justice in this matter?"

"At the very least, Orville Madison should be sent to prison for the rest of his life."

"What about Veil Kendry?"

"He should be left alone."

"Ah. That might or might not be just, but it would certainly be a circumvention of the law. No?"

"No. Not if he received a presidential pardon in advance-something on the order of what Gerald Ford provided for Richard Nixon would seem appropriate. There were extenuating circumstances for everything he's done. He's killed, yes-but only in self-defense, or in defense of others."

"He's killed for revenge."

"That, too-which is why a presidential pardon is needed. But we know, and I'm sure Veil knows, that things aren't going to work out that way. I can't speak for Veil, but I'm certain that when he sees Orville Madison being dealt with appropriately, he'll come in peacefully and surrender himself to the authorities."

"Oh, good," Shannon said, lighting a second cigarette from the butt of his first. "That's just what I need. With a little luck, Madison's trial will be over in a year or so, and then Kendry's trial can begin. Are you serious? My entire term would be dominated by headlines about Archangel and a defrocked, murderous secretary of state. Do you think I intend to allow myself to be mortally crippled by events before my tenure in office has barely begun?"

"I'm sure I don't know what you intend, sir."

"Do you think I wanted to become president so that my administration could be blown out of the water before it had even set sail?" Shannon continued like a man whose carefully prepared speech had been interrupted. "Do you think I will jeopardize this adminstration's place in history because of one man's mistake?"

"Mistake? You're talking about a man who's killed-"

"I know what I'm talking about, Frederickson. I'm talking about an entire administration imperiled because of a long-standing personal grudge between two men. I won't have it. What you propose is patently ridiculous. Frankly, I'm surprised at your naivete."

"I wouldn't presume to try and guess why you wanted to become president," I replied curtly, trying to suppress my anger. "And if you'll pardon my continuing naivete, I don't understand what you mean when you say that you won't have it. You're responsible for Orville Madison-not for his actions, because you couldn't have known he was a lunatic, but for making certain he's sufficiently punished for those actions."

"Mr. Madison has been totally neutralized, Frederickson."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"It means he's lost all vestiges of power already. If you knew Orville Madison as well as I do-"

"How well do you know him?"

"Well, enough. As a matter of fact, our relationship goes back a good many years; I'm sure you'll be interested to know that it goes back to the war in Southeast Asia. I was a congressman then, without a great deal of seniority, but I was rewarded for certain good political deeds by being named to a very prestigious, select, secret Senate-House committee that monitored intelligence activities in Southeast Asia. That's how I met Madison, and he deeply impressed me. I knew he was ruthless, but certain kinds of jobs require ruthlessness; his was one of them. I respected him for his ability to get things done, and for his ability consistently to win skirmishes against other men who were every bit as ruthless as he was. I was one of the people who first heard about-and approved-the Archangel plan. I was also instrumental in cutting through about a thousand miles of red tape in order to get Colonel Po secretly into this country after the collapse of Saigon. I didn't know about the affair with the Hmong village, or about Madison's bit of business with Kendry. I never even knew why the plan had been abandoned. I'd like you to believe that."