Rawhide Down_ The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan - Del Quentin Wilber [37]
Unrue, having parked the limousine, walked over to the follow-up car and began chatting with its driver. None of the agents or police officers had seen any sign of trouble. A heckler had caused a bit of a ruckus, but he was a regular on the Reagan circuit who often appeared at public events to chant antinuclear slogans. Just in case a photograph might prove useful, the hotel security chief pulled out his Olympus camera and snapped a picture of the crowd, hoping to capture the heckler’s image for his files. Police officers and agents shooed a few spectators away from the president’s limousine and other cars in the motorcade, although they allowed the Hilton’s cafeteria manager to peek inside the armored Lincoln after listening to a persuasive plea on her behalf from a hotel security officer. Meanwhile, across T Street, agents and officers worked diligently to prevent any of the approximately two hundred onlookers from slipping across the closed street.
As departure time neared, Mary Ann Gordon, the motorcade’s advance agent, inspected the line of motorcycles, police cars, and government vehicles. Everything seemed in order, so she took her place in the lead cruiser. Unrue returned to the limousine, took his seat, and switched on the car’s engine. The follow-up driver started his engine and flipped on his flashing red lights. Agents and police officers began to return to their assigned posts. By now, the crowd of spectators and reporters hoping to catch a glimpse of the president had swelled to about twenty-five people.
It was 2:20 p.m.
CHAPTER 6
2:27 P.M.
Agent Jerry Parr stood backstage, watching President Ronald Reagan finish his address to the four thousand union members sitting politely in the International Ballroom. Standing behind the familiar blue podium with the presidential seal, Reagan was bathed in bright television lights as he read from his cards between practiced glances at the audience. He was wrapping up his speech in typically optimistic and patriotic fashion: “I know that we can’t make things right overnight. But we will make them right. Our destiny is not our fate. It is our choice. And I’m asking you as I ask all Americans, in these months of decision, please join me as we take this new path. You and your forebears built our nation. Now, please help us rebuild it, and together we’ll make America great again.”
The crowd rose to its feet, but the applause was more polite than enthusiastic. The speech had not been one of Reagan’s better efforts, but he hadn’t blundered and no one had heckled him or booed.
Parr moved to the edge of the stage and stood behind a swath of gold bunting as Reagan shook a few hands before walking past the head table and off the stage. The agent fell in step behind the president and trailed him down the curving hallway toward the holding room, where White House aides awaited Reagan’s return.
A platoon of Secret Service agents rushed ahead. They took the stairs up from the ground floor two at a time and then moved quickly out the VIP doors and into the gray, misty afternoon. One agent aimed for the rope line; another trotted along the hotel’s stone wall; a third angled for the limousine’s right front fender; a fourth swept around the far side of the limousine. A fifth, carrying an Uzi submachine gun in a briefcase, kept an eye on a group of spectators on a traffic island in the middle of the hotel’s driveway. A sixth, Tim McCarthy, strode to the limousine’s right rear door. It would be his job to open the door for the president.
Directly across T Street, Jerry Parr’s wife, Carolyn, looked out her fourth-floor window and saw that the president’s limousine was preparing to leave. The IRS lawyer knew her husband would be directing Reagan’s security detail