The Final Warning

Chapter 1None of Tessa Bailey’s friends had been able to understand what she had seen in Adam Sukova. Here was this attractive, popular 21-year-old – quite a beauty in fact, with her blonde hair, pale green eyes, and a winning smile – who had the choice of countless admirers. Yet she only had eyes for Adam. Her standard reply to friends was I guess we’re just a good fit – and indeed they were, even if she was two inches taller than him. But there was more to it than that. They found each other endlessly interesting and entertaining. She loved Adam’s sense of humour. And she admired his honesty. From their first date he always said and did what he believed in and followed it on to wherever it took him, though Tessa never dreamed that that would be the White House. Over time, theirs became a very successful partnership. As Adam grew into his developing role in front-line politics, so his wife matured with him. Nowadays she was often likened to Barbara Bush – handsome yet still feminine, her hair an elegant silver now, her eyes as strong and kind as ever. Her husband had worn a little less well, the strain of his work drawing lines in his face; crushed velvet was how she liked to describe it. Smooth and crinkled. But it was his eyes that captured her and later on the nation too – clear blue, sharp yet kind, deep set beneath strong eyebrows. Of course, his election to the White House had not been the walkover they had predicted. Sukova had neither the charm and communication skills of a Clinton or Obama, nor the gung-ho of George W. Bush or Donald Trump. But to some extent, this lack of such qualities had helped to carry him through. He was an honourable man, prone to candour and seemingly free from cupboard skeletons. As a result, the public trusted him with votes that he was not able to gain through charisma or a gleaming track record. By the start of the nomination campaigns, the general public were deeply worried by America’s isolation on the world stage. More seriously for the candidates competing for high office, people had become increasingly angry over what they saw as the mismanagement of domestic affairs. The tidal wave called Donald Trump had, in the end, only deepened the public’s scepticism about those in high office, and their suspicion of their policies and promises. So Sukova’s persuasive stance against the previous administrations, and its handling of the worsening social crises in the country, had served him well. Yet, in its early stages, it was a bitter campaign that failed to catch fire with the electorate, and it had been a struggle from the start to capture the public imagination. To his friends and colleagues, he was easy to appreciate: open and straight, with unwavering convictions, topped off with a personality that tickled the funny bone and warmed you to him. In public though, he was unable to shine through as the character he was known to be to the people closest to him. There were experts skilled at managing this in his public appearances, but his natural stoop was harder to conceal, and with his rather beaky profile he had the air of a schoolteacher rather than a man suited to high office. With this in mind, he made sure to have his right-hand man Jeff Stone with him a lot so that the public got used to seeing them together. Jeff was a natural-born communicator and whenever possible he would handle media commitments and television appearances on the candidate’s behalf. For the same reason, he had gradually involved Tessa in his campaign. Reluctantly, she had agreed on the condition that her role was restricted to accompanying him on a few of his endless trips round the country. So it took him by surprise when she suggested that she might appear on a couple of chat shows. He argued that it would expose her to situations that were outside her control. But she disagreed. She was at her most comfortable and competent in social situations, and the polls were showing that people gave her husband low scores when it came to his personality, the human side of the man. As it happened, her appearance on The Late Show was one of the turning points of the campaign. Colbert quizzed her on the subject of her passion for music. She’d been briefed that it would be asked, but she’d not been warned that they were going to press her into playing the piano live on national TV. With her wits about her she spotted how for her husband this might be the goose that laid the golden egg. So she grudgingly allowed herself to be led to the backing band’s baby grand, where she proceeded to play, shyly and beautifully, part of Chopin’s E-flat Nocturne. Colbert and his audience were spellbound. It was a magical moment, and the next day’s Washington Post headline read First-Lady-to-Be Mesmerizes Chat Show Audience. Much to the nation's surprise, Nocturne No.2 in E-Flat Major entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Something had shifted. That one cameo had shone a human light on the couple, and the public began to look afresh at Adam Sukova. Intuitive by nature, Sukova’s campaign had been marked by a series of initiatives that had simultaneously scared his staff and nudged him forward in the polls. It had been his decision alone to select as his vice-presidential running mate John P. Grover, an ex-war hero, veteran of overseas military successes, and ex-member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The two men had seldom met prior to the nomination convention, and when they came together they didn’t hit it off too well. In appearance they were opposites – Grover stood six foot two in his stockinged feet, a handsome dark-haired military figure – and in personality they were no less dissimilar. Sukova clever and studious; Grover not a brainbox, but dashingly appealing to the voters. In his army days, Grover used to say that there were two types of military men: those who worked on winning over people, and those who worked on defeating people. His approach was decidedly the second of these. The reason he was there was to make others obey him, he used to say. Some called it bullying; others called it leadership. Either way, he was not someone to be crossed, and under his command life in the army was not a lot of fun. To Sukova, his chosen running mate represented what he disliked most about successful men – pleased with himself, overtly ambitious, and a poor listener. He could not have imagined anyone less suitable to be his ‘mate’. On the other hand, he was well aware of his own shortcomings as a presidential candidate, and the ways in which Grover made up for them. Among these was an undisguised opposition to the Iraqi wars. He was implacably against his country pushing the rest of the world around and telling it how to behave. He did not believe in trying to impose American-style democracy on foreign nations, and he feared such wars would create a vacuum in which anti-Western resentment and revenge could fester. However, despite the public’s drift away from support for war itself, anxiety about national security and the threat from America’s enemies abroad was as strong as ever. On top of everything, the fallout from the outbreak of Coronavirus was still weighing heavy on the economy, and people were angry. People were scared. They needed a leader who understood national security as something that extended beyond just airports or the CIA, in a nation with a distinct, ever-growing distrust of the police and the justice system, in a world where a mere pathogen could bring such a nation to its knees. From the moment that Sukova emerged as a serious candidate for the White House, he began to come to terms with the calling that had somehow been thrust upon him – to lead America through potentially one of the most dangerous periods in its history, so it didn’t help that public opinion of central government had fallen to the lowest level since records began. Ironically, he could remember a conversation a few years earlier with Sir Alistair Scott-Boyd, then London’s ambassador to Washington and a good friend of the Sukovas, who had assured him over dinner at the Embassy that the American public’s view of politics and politicians would never sink to the disastrous level of his own country. ‘Back home, politics is like the worst kind of soap opera,’ he had confided indiscreetly. ‘There’s no style or ceremony to it anymore. Just vulgar upstarts sniping at one another while they feather their own nests and test out their own bigoted theories. I can’t blame us British for not respecting our governments.’ He looked mischievously under the table as though searching for hidden bugs. ‘After all,’ he whispered, ‘I don’t, so why should they!’ Sukova had been surprised. Like most of his peers, he had always held the Mother of Parliaments in high regard, even if he couldn’t stand hearing commentators addressing the Prime Minister as Robert. But he knew the ambassador to be an astute and intelligent statesman, so at the time he had taken heart from his friend’s optimism about the United States. ‘In America, Adam, politics is like theatre. I remember years ago watching Charles Laughton in Advise & Consent, and thinking this was how the world of politics should be. The Watergate hearings – they had a sort of gravitas too, even if they were dealing with the highest level of sleaze. How could the Clintons have survived and prospered if there wasn’t an underlying respect for the offices of state?’ ‘Even if the holders didn’t deserve it,’ Sukova added drily. ‘Another thing, Adam. Never let the people lose their faith in what makes America great. Democracy. Freedom. Trust. It’s too late in the UK. We’ve allowed ourselves to go shy about our beliefs, our values, the things that shape our way of life. And look at us. Look what’s happening. We’re limping around, stumbling closer and closer to the cliff edge. We’ve ended up weak and cynical. Now reality is tapping us on the shoulder, and we’re too afraid to turn around and face it.’ As the words echoed in his head, Sukova wondered now whether his friend’s advice was too late for America as well. ‘Never let the people lose faith in what makes America great. Heed the warning, Adam. Don’t let that happen to America. Don’t let it happen.’