Murder in the White House Read online

  The President frowned, began to shake his head.

  “Oh, I don’t mean a literal insanity plea,” Ron hurried on, reading the President’s thoughts. “More that Blaine had involved her, manipulated her, got her into such an emotional state that she did what she did without understanding, when she did it, that it was wrong. There are plenty of precedents for that…”

  Catherine looked to her husband, then the Attorney General. “Well,” he said, “we’d have to establish that the emotional impact of what he did or threatened—or what Lynne honestly thought he did or threatened—was so strong that she was deprived of her normal perception of right and wrong. It wouldn’t be easy, but it’s certainly not unreasonable… A sympathetic jury would be a help and—”

  “She’d have one,” Ron put in quickly. “How could they be otherwise—?”

  “If,” Catherine said, “they had all the facts. All of them.”

  Lynne was shaking her head now, a bit more composed. “No, that’s what Lan was going to do, tell everything, ruin everything; don’t you see? …oh, Daddy, it would be terrible for you, ruin your chances for reelection…”

  “I’ll survive, honey. I’ve had it, we don’t need it any more—”

  “Forgive me, Mr. President.” The Attorney General seemed almost angry. “I don’t see that at all.”

  “Neither do I, sir,” Ron put in.

  “Well, my own handpicked Secretary of State and longtime friend turned out to be a liar and a cheat and a thief working against the interests of this country—”

  “And,” Gimbel said morosely, “your Chief of Staff has killed a woman—”

  “But none of that is his fault or responsibility,” Ron said, and spoke now directly to the President. “Sir, you had no idea what Fritz was doing. When the investigation began to point to him, you immediately confronted him… As for Blaine, you picked him for the right reasons and he performed well in many areas. When you began to suspect him of what he was doing, you immediately asked for his resignation. Except for tearing up a suicide note twenty years ago, what have you done wrong?”

  Catherine tightened her arm around her daughter and looked directly at the President. “It does seem a poor time, Bob, to talk about quitting. It’s never been your way…”

  He took a deep breath, tried to break a smile. He kissed his daughter and his wife. “All right, we’ll do what we have to do… we’ll go this one together, just like we always have with all the others… all of it, all the way. We’ve been a family a long time. It’s never been easy. But we’ve made it this far…” He stopped for a moment, as though gathering up his resources from the furthest depths of himself. “I say we go on. No matter what….”

  ***

  Ron, wrung out, went back to his office. He was still carrying the pistol he had taken from his filing cabinet earlier in the evening and wanted to put the thing back before he left the White House.

  He unlocked his office door. It was not dark inside. The lamp burned on his desk.

  On his couch, stretched out asleep, was Jill Keller. He nudged her, and she woke up.

  “It’s all over,” he said. And he told her everything.

  “Oh, my God, Ron… Lynne…?”

  “The President thought he had to resign but I think he’s been persuaded otherwise… You know, they’re quite a family, the Websters. I mean all of them…” He looked at her, undid his tie. “Well, I guess it’s over, at least our part in it…”

  She got up from the couch, took his arm. “Then, sir, I suggest you take the girl home and let her buy you a drink. Some things end, some others begin… You get my drift, counselor?”

  “I do,” he said, and he did.

  Other Books by Margaret Truman

  Murder at the FBI

  Murder on Capitol Hill

  Murder in the Smithsonian

  Murder on Embassy Row