Free The American Ambassador by Ward Just Page A

it.”
    â€œHate hospitals,” Carruthers said.
    North looked at him and smiled, not unkindly. “No shit, Sherlock.”
    â€œI hear you’re going to Bonn. Congratulations. Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted? The Jerries. Not me. When I get my reward it’ll be the sunny south, a nice consulate, Oporto or Marseilles. Though as I understand it you’ll be interim, until the new man arrives. President wants a
friend
in Bonn, you understand. A good, close friend he can shmooze with. The friend can tell him all about the pinko assholes in the Foreign Service. Then they can trade anecdotes about the Jerries then and now. An anecdotal history of the Holocaust. I wish you luck in Bonn, Bill.” Carruthers sighed, and cleared his throat. “I’m here at the suggestion of the under secretary, and I’ll be reporting to him. We’re all on the same side here. This meeting so far’s I’m concerned is informal, no written record.” He bent down to squint at the top sheet of the pile of papers in his lap and gave a little exhausted laugh. “We’re just getting a ton of paper from the committee. Senator Winston is working overtime, one piece of paper after another, and he’s not giving up. No, sir. He has a good, young staff, zealous and confident. And he has Dunphy. And they’ve turned up some information, it’s such a nuisance. What I’m saying is that some of the paper is
our
paper, that they’re dealing back to us, and asking questions. The Department of State is a god damned sieve. They have a lot of stuff, is what I’m saying. Hired one investigator from the UPI. Couldn’t make a name there, I guess he figured to make a name on the Hill, ha-ha. He’s quite a gumshoe, this lad.” Carruthers paused, his thumb on his tongue. “He’s a god damned good man with a document, I can tell you that. He has a law degree, too. And a litigious turn of mind. Christ. Another lawyer, comfortable with documents. Know how to get them, knows how to
read
them. And that’s the big thing, isn’t it? Knowing how to read them.” Carruthers sighed. “Damnedest thing, they used to go from the committee to the UPI or the
Post
or the
Times.
Now it’s the other way around because it looks like Senator Winston and that son of a bitch Dunphy have reinvented the wheel. They’ve discovered that they’ve got subpoena power, and that’s just set the gumshoe atingle. The UPI and the
Post
and the
Times
don’t have that. Sometimes they act like they do, but they don’t. Goodness, but they’re zealous.” Carruthers laughed pleasantly as though he had made a joke.
    North lit a cigarette, his third of the day, flexing the fingers of his left hand. This was going to take a minute, Carruthers being cute, composing his overture. He looked out the windows at the gray shape of the building two, three blocks away. It was an old government building, one of the anonymous departments or agencies, an annex of Commerce or Labor or the FCC or ICC. When North first came to Washington they were important, their secretaries or directors men with influence. Twenty-five years later it was hard to remember the names of the current Cabinet, and no one did except the army of lawyers and lobbyists hired to manipulate them. Today a department or agency didn’t count unless it was involved with national security. Everyone wanted a piece of national security because that was where the money was.
    â€œSo,” Carruthers was saying, “the main thing is that Warren Winston wants to make a name for himself this session at least as big as he did last session, when he won the hearts and minds of all America. He has all those friends in the news business. And now with Dunphy and that young staff and the gumshoe he’s got a whiff of something. Maybe more than a whiff, because he knows more than I’d expect him to know.