Killing the President
Wasn’t that the greatest sadness of all? To kill the President was to strike at the heart of meaning, family, country, home, safety, security, comfort. Because I almost certainly would fail, and certainly would be captured. Not that killing the President was nihilistic: he was a bad President. If my life were abandoned as sadness, why not kill the President on my way out? I had nothing to lose.
I made plans.
On a drafting table I unrolled a large sheet of graph paper and drew an X in its center. X to represent the President. There was no way for me to get close to the President, so I would need a long range weapon. The more precise the weapon, the greater the chance of failure. The President was a small man. I would need a nuclear bomb. This meant innocent people would die. On the other hand, it meant more guilty people would die—for example the Vice President. I drew a small x near the first X.
I decided to telephone the President to tell him about my plan to destroy him and some of his advisors with a large-scale explosive, probably thermonuclear, possibly fuel-air. (Well, certainly there was no point in trying to impress the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces with my poor knowledge of explosives). I wondered whether he would resent the suggestion that innocent people might die. I wanted him to be outraged, and demand that I use more precise weaponry. His phone number was listed in the book beside his name. Over the phone he told me he was interested. He suggested I drop by the top of the pyramid after dinner to discuss my plan in person.
When the President opened his door, he seemed pleased to see me. His handshake was firm but cold. The President, I noted, was the same age as me, although his hair was graying faster. The first lady greeted me and excused herself; the President and I sat in armchairs by a fireplace. He offered me brandy and a cigar, I accepted the brandy. We appraised one another. The President was sharp-eyed, but, wearing a cardigan sweater and BUNNY slippers, seemed at ease.
“So why do you want to kill me?” the President finally asked.
I explained that life was sour. I did not think this was due entirely to my attitude, but that, in fact, the world, at least the human world, was, on the whole, bad. He frowned at this but seemed to consider it, nodding somewhat. I went on to explain that the thought of suicide gave me the strength to commit murder, and that he was my chosen victim. I ended by saying that his policies had brought death to thousands and untold suffering to thousands more, perhaps millions. I ended with what I felt to be a flourish, explaining that I did not think the democratic process was sufficient to remove him from office, even if his policies were unpopular, because of his administration’s manipulation of the media, the polls, and the electoral process. At this last he smiled lightly, as though not really listening. Perhaps I was not as original as I thought. When I finished speaking, he stared into the fire, and picked up a telephone on a table to his side and spoke a few words.
Very soon after that, a large man with a beard and a nice suit entered the room. The President introduced me to the man as his assassin. To me, the President introduced the man as my torturer. The President returned to staring into the fire, apparently finished with my visit. My torturer said, “Come with me, sir.” The President flung his brandy snifter into the fireplace where it shattered and the liquor spat a tongue of flame into the room. This startled me. But the President did not seem to be angry, so I surmised that dashing his beverage into the fire was his habit.
In a small concrete building about ten feet cubed, the torturer gestured to a metal chair facing a mirror above a shelf of implements. The walls were stained stone without windows. In the corner was a pink teddy bear; in the floor was a drain. The torturer said that if I tried to resist or attempt to escape, he would have to restrain me. I told him I understood. The metal chair was already quite uncomfortable.
“Now then,” the torturer said, “tell me all relevant information.” I repeated to him more or less what I had told the President. After he did not react, I asked whether it was what he had in mind by relevant. He turned a dial. A blinding wave of voltage burned through me. I think I jumped, and, in the sudden warmth, smelled a bit of smoke which I took to be myself. For a moment it had been as though I had never had a Dora. Heaven must be electric.
“Who are your accomplices?” the torturer asked.
I replied that I had none, my trembling voice not quite my own.
“Where is the nuclear device?” he asked.
My voice replied that I did not have it yet. Was this how things would go? That the torturer’s implements would mold my mind like plastic until I told him what he wanted, moving further from the truth of things.
“Where are the nuclear materials with which you intend to construct the device?” he asked, selecting an implement and holding it to the light.
I replied that I was not that far along in my planning. He seemed distant, examining the device, testing its sharpness with his thumb. I wasn’t sure whether he was satisfied with my explanation, or whether he was even listening. The tool was triangular with three blades, one of them serrated. The handle was coated with rubber with a silver ring for the thumb to provide leverage and stability. He apologized, said he wasn’t listening, and asked me to repeat what I had just said, so I explained that the idea of killing the President had only come to me that day. I did not, I admitted, know how nuclear things worked. “Hm,” he said, “pity.” I sensed that he was intent. I wondered where all this was leading.
“She was beautiful. If you will remove my teeth, let me tell you about her smile, wide and angular with a gap. If you will blind me, let me tell you about her eyes: they were blue like yours, each creased at the corner, bird eggs hidden in a nest woven of flesh. If you will cripple me, let me tell you about her feet: she would never let me touch her soles because her father used to tickle her there.”
“I know her smile,” he said, “I removed her mouth. I still keep it in a jar.”
I read that when the Soviet Union collapsed they had a large amount of unsecured uranium, and so I traveled to Asia. In the shadow cast by a minaret I instructed my bearded translator to ask anybody. As the sun set, its light climbed unbelievably vast mountains, turning their peaks pink. We were offered gold, heroin, hashish, but no depleted uranium or fissile materials. Truth was, my translator expressed, I was in no small danger being a Westerner in Turkmenistan looking for radioactive material.
A stranger with turban and eyepatch, wearing a red suit, spoke excitedly to my translator. We followed him on horseback into the desert. Since my torture, walking was difficult on me. At evening’s last light, the man pulled a pistol and pointed it at me. He said something my translator said was an instruction to remove my clothing. And then my teeth and nails until I was entirely smooth.
Though the cosmos was a black velvet jewelry box of unsurpassable beauty, I looked down only on the clouds. All I wanted to be was beneath the sky. I had been a fetus encased in a bag of skin. I had pushed my face against this membrane but all I could see was pink. I had known she would be out there, and for a time she would be a comforting layer between me and life. Until she died and life moved in to carve me. If I could kill the President any way I wanted, I would be dropped out of a helicopter head first, landing on top of him, killing both of us, shattering his skull, on television, such that the last thing he said would be a lie, a stupid lie.
The torturer smiled and told me my blood tasted sweeter than money, wiping red specks from his face with a handkerchief.
2005