by Ted Bernard
The governor, nodded uncertainly as if he’d absorbed few of Demopolis’ points. Stroking his chin, he gazed across at Katavanakis, who could read him perfectly. The man hated to be cornered, as he clearly was now, werewolves closing in for the kill. The risk of engaging the GCSGC mob, the political downside of sending troops to quell a distant and apparently benign campus protest, the stink of Morse’s (and Katavanakis’) offshore assets, the campaign contributions bundled by Morse. All this.
Winthrop had been a successful state legislator. He had won two gubernatorial elections against paltry opposition. But he was a cautious administrator. With the exception of Carton, he seemed to be in a state of perpetual paranoia about state officials with whom he served (curiously all members of his own party), as well as leadership in the Senate and Assembly (also from his party), and potential rivals in the opposite party. His number one management rule was to keep the lid on. No scandal, no fuckups, no flaps or blunders for the press to feast upon. And therefore, his governorship had demonstrated little imagination and had offered few memorable initiatives, unless you counted extension of the rose garden at the statehouse. So here, wrapped up in one super-sized shitbag, was the sum of all his fears. He sat there stupefied.
As was his way, Katavanakis moved to cut the governor some slack. He filled the lacunae with fustian blather about the difficulty of walking the line between decisive leadership and foolhardy suicidal action. He knew his boss needed space to think and breathe. But this boggle was extraordinary, to say the least, and he doubted he had enough words to allay the fear he read in his boss’ face and the reticence of his body language. Possibly heading toward unthinkable ignominy himself, if not a prison term, Katavanakis could no longer temporize. He needed to leap into the unknown. He was not governor, never aspired to be governor, but he understood exactly what must be done and he calculated Winthrop would agree. In fact, he would have no choice.
13
Samantha sat up in her bed, blinking. Her flushed face bore bed creases. She was confused about the hour. I rushed across to her. We hugged. She blubbered sordid details of being incarcerated. She dried her eyes, blew her nose. I studied my once regal roommate, now diminished and fearful. I decided that Samantha needed to get back in the game.
“I need a little help, Sam. A kind of secret mission. Would you be up for it?”
“As long as there’s no chance of encountering the police or breaking the law.”
I explained the mission.
“Okay, I think. So, when would you need me?
“Umm, now.”
Samantha waited at the top of the stairs. I knocked on the office door. It opened. As he led me inside, I unlatched the door. When Samantha heard the inner door close, she crept into the outer office and squatted in the darkness of a far corner. For the next ten minutes, she heard nothing alarming, nothing but murmurs. I came through the inner office door, calling back, “Okay, sir, I’ll be back soon.” I closed the door, saw Samantha in the corner, gestured for her to tiptoe out. We bounded down the stairway.
“So why is this so secret?” Samantha asked.
“Either Tulkinghorn is playing the honest broker tonight or he’s up to something else. I intend to find out and I don’t want to spook him in the meantime. Either way, I will have collected critical information.”
Samantha shuddered as we rushed back to the sorority house. Halfway home, she asked, “What have we become, Hannah, all this risk taking? I mean, once we were just a couple of sorority chicks. What if that man is up to no good?”
“Trust me, Sam. I’m the mole and the object of the man’s fantasy life. I’ll have the answer to your question soon.”
Samantha flopped on her bed, her Amazonian strength tapped out. I quickly changed clothes. I pulled on tight-fitting jeans, changed into the uplift bra and an Easter egg purple blouse with a ruffled collar, top buttons open. I turned to bid good-bye. Samantha had fallen into deep sleep. I switched off the lights, slipped out, and rushed along Athenian Way. I would have just a few minutes for my part of the plan. Providing I could muster the courage.
When I entered his office, he looked up blankly from his computer, an unreadable expression on his puffy face. Inexperienced as a seductress, I jumped right in, not with caution but recklessly. I lowered the lights, shed my coat, did what I imagined Lyndsy Fonseca, the sexiest of Hollywood actresses, or Adrianne, poor Adrianne, might do in this situation. I strutted across the office, moving slinkily around his desk and up behind him. I placed my hands on either side of his pumpkin head and began a slow finger and palm massage that moved to his neck and shoulders, upper arms, and downward over his manboobs. Disgusting! He swiveled his chair to open access to his mid-section. I ceased my caresses at the belt line and began, with my stiff little body, a series of artless movements: a preposterous strip tease, my hands whirling above and around my head. What? Like some sort of oriental snake? A Turkish belly dancer? (Shit. I should have gone to YouTube for strip tease lessons.) Out of nowhere, that skinny-assed, judgmental conscience of mine materialized. She looked down from the top of Tulkinghorn’s empty bookshelves, a mocking expression on her face. I willed that past-tense girl away. Away!
I got back to business: unbuttoned my blouse, cavalierly throwing it aside, caressed my flat stomach and boney hips, kicked off my stilettos and slowly dropped my jeans, twirling round to show him my swaying tush in Ashley’s black string bikini. I turned back to expose a wee bit of breast. Aghast, I then saw Dr. Tulkinghorn, his face red as an overripe Macintosh, unzipping, and with his right hand, emancipating his tiny schnitzel. There it stood, triflingly, at attention. Gagging at the sight, yet painfully aware there was no going back, I looked to the bookcase for guidance. My conscience, nowhere to be seen, had been willed away. Oh Yeah.
I plunked myself on Tulkinghorn’s fat knee, brushed his hand away from the little creature, replacing it with my own, plenty adequate for the task at hand, though gross in the extreme. Strangely enough, I knew how to do this (something buried deep in my DNA?): rhythmically stroking him right to the edge of the cliff, so to speak, judging by the little moans the schnitzel summoned from adolescent chords in the old man’s larynx. Just short of the edge, I demonically ceased all action. But I did not release the you-know-what. He moaned for more, his thirteen-year-old voice cracking pathetically. What a stitch! I raised my right hand to his neck and began caressing his occipital ridge and pulling at his ear lobe. Still holding the schnitzel, hard as a deep-frozen breakfast sausage but orders of magnitude hotter, I pressed my cheek to his whiskered puss. And in my best Greta Garbo impersonation (I had studied the 1931 film), I whispered, “Dr. T., Dr. T. … Vaat is happening tonight? I mean really happening.”
He said, “Finish what you’ve begun, then I’ll tell you.”
I steadfastly refused. “Tell me now, darlink. Now!” He mumbled a chopped liver response, almost incoherently, that ended, “Don’t worry. I’ll protect you.” I responded, “Yes, I vant a strong mahn to proo-teckt me.” And my hand jerked back into action, stepping up the pace to lead him, in a matter of seconds, right over the edge to omega, thus yielding one gawdawful gob of goo all over himself, his keyboard and blotter, my hands. Amazing production from that little thing, I concluded, as though I possessed a metric for comparison.
There. I’d done it!
At the rattle of the outer door, I leapt away from him hysterically. With lightning quickness, as if I’d done this dozens of times, I collected my shoes, blouse, and jeans and retreated to the back of the office to seek cover. There was no cover. He stayed put, dazed somehow, fussing with his zipper and belt.
Julianna, Zach, and José burst on the scene, flipped on the lights, and skidded to a halt. It took no more than ten seconds, fifteen most, for them to reconstruct what had just happened. Rumpled but clothed, I stepped out of the shadows, a sly smile creeping across my face. Still back in the Garbo era, I breathed a throaty greeting, “Julianna, Zach, José! How velly lufflie to see you.”
>
Nobody quite knew how to respond.
I stalled. “Tell me, are you the leadership delegation our steering committee has selected to negotiate with Dr. Flintwinch? Are you the ones?”
Julianna replied, “Yes. Yes, we are the ones, Hannah.”
“Vell then, allow me to ask you to introduce yourselves to Dr. Tulkinghorn. He has kindly agreed to serve as our advocate, or at least our broker, in discussions with Dr. Flintwinch to resolve our differences and save Blackwood Forest. Isn’t that so Dr. T.?”
They turned their attention to him. With his handkerchief, he was maniacally blotting stains on his computer and obviously unaware he’d been asked a question. Zach put on a puzzled look and rubbed the top of his head. Julianna scrunched her forehead. José leaped into the lurch, for some reason affecting a plumy British accent. “Right. Dr. Tulkinghorn, I’m so pleased that you have offered your help. I’m José Cintron and I’m a theatre and dance major. I really love the thrill of performance, you know, the stage, the orchestra, opening night, those sorts of things. Oh, by the way, I’ll be in the forthcoming production of Hair! I do so hope you will be able to attend. Now, to my right, this is Julianna, um, Julianna …” To Julianna, he whispered, “I forgot or never knew your last name.”
“Ferguson, Julianna Ferguson.”
I sensed that José, at least, with his cheesy accent, understood my need to delay the progression. A quick study, that boy. With a twist of my wrist, I signaled him to continue.
“Oh yes, Doctor, and right here, to my left, sir, is Sir, er, I mean Mr. Zachary Grayson. It is Grayson, right? Or is it Garrison, or, no, Grayton?”
Zach blew up his eyes, raised his eyebrows into upward pointing arrows. He said, “Yes, Dr. Tulkinghorn, it’s Grayson. I am Zachary Grayson and I’m also a sophomore with a joint major in political science and environmental studies. Glad to meet you.”
Tulkinghorn snorted. “Introductions — good, good. Helpful. Yep.”
I could see our time was running out. He knew that I knew. And who knew what might happen next? One thing was clear. Tulkinghorn was fast reverting to post-orgiastic reality. With a suddenness that took everyone by surprise, he bolted toward the door, intent on executing his plan to imprison us.
I shrieked, “Stop him. He’s not our friend.”
Julianna screamed, “HELLLP!”
Tulkinghorn continued his splayfooted waddle toward Zach and the door. Like the Road Runner, Zach extended his right leg. Tulkinghorn tripped over it. Perfect! José and Julianna jumped on him as he floundered on the floor. A bulbous whale, he shunted them away like so many barnacles. He regained his feet. He aimed again for the door. At that moment, Nick and Jason stormed through, crashing him to the floor. Like tiger sharks, they enveloped the foundering whale, quickly disabling him, Jason at his feet, Nick atop his chest.
“Hannah, find something to tie up this bloke,” Jason ordered.
I returned with twine. They secured his hands behind his back, lashed together his ankles, and dragged him into the closet.
“You all will live to regret what you are doing to me,” he yelped.
“I doubt that. So much for your treachery”, Nick said. “I’m ashamed to be a student in CNRD with you as its head.”
“I’ll have your head!” he retorted.
Jason, the last out of the closet, looked back at Tulkinghorn, toppled against office supplies, brooms and mops. He yelled, “Larnaca Chair? Forget about it, mate.” He slammed the door.
14
In the Wild West atmosphere following the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the manic passage of the USA Patriot Act, a polecat of a sheriff came to Washington: the Department of Homeland Security Agency (DHS). Within a year, DHS became one of the federal government’s most bloated bureaucracies. Among its many responsibilities, DHS was handed six pre-existing programs meant to beef up local government preparedness for terrorism, crime, biological and health threats, and disasters. DHS began to make grants to state and local governments to enable the purchase of surveillance equipment, uniforms and protective gear, weapons, fixed-wing aircraft, watercraft, armored vehicles, and advanced training for law enforcement personnel and civilians to prepare for, prevent, respond to, and clean up after attacks and other emergencies and hazards such as chemical and biological agents, nuclear and radiation contamination, and high-yield explosives. By 2010, the DHS budget for these programs exceeded $1.7 billion annually.
In 2004, the City of Cleveland and the Ohio Attorney General’s office collaborated to write a proposal to the State Homeland Security and Citizens Corps programs of DHS. They proposed to create a rapid response unit to operate under the Office of the Governor to respond to emergencies along Ohio’s international border and in its international airports and be available to mitigate other risks in Ohio. The proposal was funded in 2005 at twenty-five million dollars annually. The Citizen Corps piece of the project was to be overseen by the City of Cleveland Police Department. It would recruit and train a volunteer cadre to join appointed officers from the state police, the governor’s security force, the Bureau of Criminal Investigation, and police forces and sheriff’s departments across Ohio.
Based in Columbus, the Ohio Rapid Response Force (ORRF) had become an elite and well-equipped option in the Governor’s emergency response tool kit. In its eight years, ORRF had been deployed to Cleveland Hopkins International Airport for several terrorism threats of little consequence, had contributed to quelling street riots in Cincinnati, had staunched a suspected dirty nuclear device at the Ohio eastern border (which turned out to be a propane tank in the truck of a Youngstown plumber of Lebanese heritage), and had collaborated occasionally with the Coast Guard along the Lake Erie shores. Through three administrations, ORRF had been used selectively and had been carefully shielded from the public eye to prevent penetration by the enemy. Little did anyone know that from the very onset, the citizen corps component of ORRF had been infiltrated. It was comprised almost entirely of members of the Greek Cypriot Society of Greater Cleveland.
15
Helen Flintwinch awaited Katavanakis’ call. It was 8 PM and it had been a day from hell. Now, her apprehension had reached its limit. How, she wondered, did Mitch Redlaw put up with this snot-nosed sycophant? You simply cannot get to the governor without passing through him. Under the pressure of her own ultimatum, it roiled her gut to be pacing the floor for a call from such a bootlicker. In the executive council meeting that afternoon, Flintwinch had taken hits from that wench Agatha Larkins and her two conspirators — the ones who dissented in the vote to dismiss Redlaw, and who, in the past two days, had gathered two others to their cause. They argued for negotiation. They wanted nothing to do with a call up of the National Guard, nor a sweep of the occupation. Her cast-iron obstinacy inviolate, Flintwinch yielded no ground and called for a vote. The five were hushed, at least for now. This mini-insurrection injected further drama into the worst predicament of her life. She popped three more antacid tablets.
A knock. Beth Samuels, still Media Relations Director, stepped into Flintwinch’s office. “What’s happening Helen?”
“Just waiting for Katavanakis to confirm that the Governor will send the Guard. I’m secretly hoping, even praying that those students out there get a grip and peacefully evacuate before dawn.”
“Uh huh.”
The phone rang. “Katavanakis, at last,” Flintwinch said.
“Should I leave?”
Flintwinch shook her head.
With a minimum of pleasantries, the call got straight to business. Flintwinch’s stone face at first revealed nothing, then uncoiled into disbelief.
Flintwinch interrupted Katavanakis. “What in the hell is ‘orf’ ?” she asked.
He apparently explained.
“Helicopters!” she shouted. “Jesus. This is Ohio not Afghanistan! These are rebellious college students not terrorists.”
“Wait!” she screamed in response to his curt answer. “I told t
he students they have until dawn.”
Katavanakis said something in response and the call ended without good-byes.
“What was that about?” Beth asked.
“A terrible turn of events. When I told him the students are expecting a dawn deadline, he said, ‘ They’re in for a big surprise.’ ”
Beth mumbled, “How can they do that, Helen? This is going sideways with potentially tragic outcomes. What? Storm troopers dropping out of the sky? Who?”
“Some kind of rapid response force. I’m beginning to fear the worst. Beth, tell me: How would a media relations director possibly put a positive spin on what is about to happen? Christ, we’re on the road to ruin. Gilligan: the new Kent State! Me, its president. Could things be worse?”
“Give me a few minutes,” Beth said as she hurried out of the room.
Flintwinch stood there, alone and terrified. Her windows rattled in tempo with her jangled nerves. Stiggins Hall had long been on the university’s renovation list. The toll of deferred maintenance was most obvious on windy days. In spite of the rattles of fifty-year-old windows, the sounds of this black night reverberated and would, she feared, haunt her ever after: the chime of a church bell, a freight train heading toward Zanesville, the beat of rap music from the quad village, the incessant howl of the wind. Light beams from Centennial Quad lamp posts cast shadows across the tent city, the bane of her few days as acting president. Standing there, her reason lost in the shadows, a muddle of raw anger, regret, and indecision, she recalled Mitch Redlaw’s words: If we live to tell the story, we shall long regret what we have wrought.