Oath of Office

Jean-Claude heard a commotion and turned to see Mbida walking out of the chancery. That made more sense. His children were playing football across the street while he plotted with the Americans.

“I think your brother did not have all the information about the general’s whereabouts,” Jean-Claude said, still smarting from the early smack to the side of his head.

Lucien cursed. “It does not matter. He will come out. They have his children.”

Sporadic gunfire popped and cracked at the football pitch. Women screamed, men shouted, as more orders boomed from the loudspeaker.

An instant later, three young women tore around the corner, running toward the embassy gate. Arms flailing, knees pumping, they ran as if chased by a wild beast. And indeed they were. A squad of about a dozen men ran after them. One of the men moved to shoot, but another swatted the rifle away. Jean-Claude was not a Fusilier, but he was smart enough to know that firing at someone running toward the American embassy would be the same as firing at the American embassy — bringing the wrath of the U.S. Marines posted there.

General Mbida had run from the chancery steps to the gate and waved the girls forward, beckoning them to hurry inside with him. All three of them were young, perhaps fourteen or fifteen, and all wore T-shirts and shorts, tight to their bodies. Boko Haram used children as suicide bombers along the Nigerian border. Even with the general standing right here, the Marines would never have let these girls near the gate if they’d had on clothing that could have hidden a bomb. The one in the lead was bleeding from a wound to her shoulder. As she ran closer, Jean-Claude could see her T-shirt was ripped. This was Mbida’s eldest daughter.

One of the Marines dropped to a knee and aimed his rifle at the pursuing Fusiliers, while the other waved the girls through the gate.

Lucien pounded his fist on the ground, cursing again. “Americans must always play the hero.”

One of the two armored MRAP vehicles rounded the corner now, and came to a stop facing the embassy. A man in a colonel’s uniform stood in the top hatch and spoke into a megaphone.

“General Mbida is a criminal and a traitor wanted for crimes against his people. Send him out at once.”

The Americans did not respond, so the colonel repeated himself. The Marines at the front post had moved behind a colonnade now. Their rifles were still at the ready, though not aimed at anything.

The colonel surveyed the embassy with a pair of binoculars for a moment, and turned to someone inside his armored vehicle before putting his hands over his ears.

An instant later the M2 .50-caliber machine gun mounted on top of the Cougar fired three short bursts at the embassy roof, destroying the antenna arrays.

The colonel spoke into the megaphone again. “You are harboring a known criminal. Send him out at once and we will stand down.”

Jean-Claude heard women’s voices next, yelling in angry English and something else, maybe Korean. A man barked orders, doors slammed. The colonel ducked into his MRAP for a moment, before stepping back up with the megaphone. “I say again — you must send out the traitor General Mbida without delay.” He paused for effect, gloating as if he now held the winning hand. “And please pass along a message to Deputy Chief of Mission Porter. His wife is being well taken care of. For now.”

12

The White House steward brought in a breakfast of steel-cut oats and fresh blueberries while Ryan showered and dressed. The cyan-blue tie was a little too bright — and too constricting — for his taste, so Ryan decided to leave it on the bed until the last minute. Cathy assured him the tie matched well with his charcoal-gray suit of worsted wool. A good fountain pen and a nice pair of cuff links were about as far as his style sense went.

Ryan kept a copy of The Wall Street Journal folded in his lap while he ate. Reading and eating were natural partners, feeding the mind and body — except at Cathy Ryan’s table. But she’d stepped away to take a call from the hospital, so Jack had decided to cheat and wash down his morning meal with a little economic news. His late father, a detective with the Baltimore PD, had imbued in him a fierce work ethic, while his mother had given him an extra measure of guilt for doing anything that felt remotely like he was wasting time.

He tossed the newspaper aside when he heard Cathy coming back in from the bedroom. She raised a suspicious brow, enough to let him know that he might be President of the United States, but she was the undisputed commander in chief at the breakfast table.

The Secret Service special agent posted in the Center Hall of the Residence could tell POTUS was on his way out before he opened the door.