Balance of Power

    Kit had arrived the night before, after Lara had retreated upstairs. It was the first time they had spoken since the shootings: Kerry sensed that Kit, as others, had been waiting for clues about how and when to approach him. He had waved her to the chair across from him, accepted her condolences. A few awkward moments passed before Kit addressed what could no longer be avoided. "This is your tragedy," she said with unwonted hesitance. "But it's also the country's. My sense is that people need you to help them mourn, and to help them know how to feel."

    Fruitlessly, Kerry wished for a respite from obligations. "Compared to Lara," he answered, "it's not my tragedy at all."

    Kit lapsed into contemplative silence. "Does Lara plan to speak?" she asked. "It might be enough for people to see her . . ."

    "See her?"

    "I know how you'll feel about this, but I think you should consider letting television do its work." To ward off a quick response, Kit had reached out to touch Kerry's wrist. "A funeral where you speak could be the best memorial. It would allow the nation to participate, and reflect on how the victims died, like in Columbine or Oklahoma City . . ."

Now, Lara put down her fork. "Kit wants to televise the service?" she

repeated with an air of muted incredulity. "What a tribute to my family that would be. Perhaps we can read Bowden's letter, explaining how television pushed him to the edge."

    Kerry could say nothing: to Lara, these deaths were so enmeshed with his decisions, the cost of being President, that he could not give voice to his own guilt, nor penetrate her sense of complicity. "I don't want to mourn them as symbols," Lara said more evenly, "but as three people I loved, who will always be a part of me. Even if I felt otherwise, I could never push Mary to bastardize the funeral. She's the one who saw them die, and she's all the family I have."

    I'm your family, as well, Kerry thought. But all he ventured was, "If you want, Kit can help Connie Coulter with the media. Like it or not, they're out there."

    Lara looked around her at the garden. "I'll ask Mary if she minds a press pool," she said with a faint sardonic undertone. "Perhaps in the rear of the church, as they did at our wedding."

    I didn't kill them, Kerry wanted to say. We didn't kill them. But he could not even persuade himself. "We're the President and First Lady," he said in measured tones. "We'll be that at the funeral, like it or not. We're also two people who've been married for five days, three of them so hellish that neither of us knows what to do. Once we leave here we'll need to begin to find our way." Reaching across the table, he took her lifeless hand. "You can start with the fact that I love you."

    Silent, she gazed at their intertwined hands. "Then let me have my family back," she answered softly. "At least for the funeral."

* * *

    An hour later, after Lara left to be with Mary, Kerry and Clayton watched CNN: in the unspoken protocol of Kerry's mourning, Clayton Slade was the only person—except as absolutely required—whom the President wished to see. The broadcast showed a collage of national mourning—cards and bouquets left at the base of the iron bars surrounding the White House; a deluge of letters to the President and Lara; impromptu memorial gatherings in scores of American cities, and several in Asia and Western Europe; interviews with women who wept for three victims they had never known; a commentator weighing the impact of these deaths against that of Princess Diana. Then Wolf Blitzer began reading a statement from George Callister:

    "All of us," Blitzer began, "are shocked and saddened that the murderer of seven innocent people used a gun and ammunition manufactured by Lexington Arms. On behalf of all the employees of Lexington, I've conveyed to the President

and First Lady our profound sympathy and sorrow . . ."

    "He called," Clayton told the President, "while you were with Lara."

    Kerry did not turn. "Callister? What did he say?"

    "How sorry he was. I didn't want to interrupt you."

    Kerry let a brief, harsh laugh escape through tightened lips. He did not respond in words.