Primary Storm

by Brendan DuBois

  A dark blue pickup truck came around the corner, heading in my direction. I ran toward it, holding my arms up, yelling, pleading, and ---

  The truck sped up and passed me by, the older driver grimly staring ahead, pretending I didn't exist.

  Of course.

  Who in hell would stop for a crazed man with no coat, standing in the middle of the road, wearing handcuffs?

  The sound of the gunshot spun me around, broke my stillness. Carla was running down the driveway, followed by Harmon, and I looked again at the roadway.

  Nothing. Just an empty road, both sides with high snowbanks. Can't go back. Go down or up the road, and be exposed like a fumbling ant on a kitchen counter.

  Can't wait for another disinterested driver to intercede. Only one place to go.

  Forward.

  So I ran across the two-lane road, hands still cuffed before me, and I scrambled up the snowbank and down the other side, feet digging into the crusty stuff, my legs and back now wet through from the snow. I now had cover, for a minute or two, and I was panting and shuddering, for it was still cold, still windy, and before me were snow-covered rocks and boulders, and the waves of the Atlantic Ocean, coming in, like they always do, nasty and gray-looking.

  Plans. I had very grand plans. To stay alive and maybe move south, move among the rocks and boulders, keep some cover between me and my pursuers, and if I was very, very lucky, I could make some good progress, until ...

  Until what? Saved? Rescued? No one knew I was here, and sure, maybe tomorrow or the next day, Felix would receive the Lafayette House Videotape that I had mailed him, but I didn't have tomorrow or the next day.

  All I had was right now, and right now was pretty damn grim. I went down the first set of rocks, looked at the place where there was a level snowbank, not much else, and I thought that must be where Audrey Whittaker's illegal-and to a certain Massachusetts family, dangerous-beach was hidden. Right now, it didn't look dangerous. Just looked empty. Audrey. One of these days, maybe I'd offer an apology to her for having thought she had something to do with this mess.

  I moved across the slippery rocks and boulders to the south, scrambling as best as I could, hands cuffed before me, lungs burning with heavy breathing, my back suddenly feeling itchy and exposed, not letting the thoughts of betrayal overcome me. There would be plenty of time for that later. Right now I had to move, had to hide, had to ---

  Another gunshot. I ducked, glanced behind me, saw a figure up on the snowbank, saw that it was Carla, and I slipped and fell, striking my right knee on an exposed piece of rock, making me snap my jaw in pain. I got up, my bare and handcuffed hands redraw from being dunked into the snow, and I kept on moving, weaving, thinking that if only I could get more rocks and boulders between me and my pursuer, and if that campaign convoy from Senator Hale finally got up here, even Carla might not want to be running around with a weapon in the midst of all the Secret Service and news media and-

  Good thoughts, great thoughts, right up to when I got up on a piece of New Hampshire granite, slippery cold with ice, and fell into the ocean.

  The cold felt like a telephone pole being swung against my chest, and I raised my head, coughing and sputtering, completely drenched, salt water in my mouth and nose, and my feet flailed about until I got traction and stood up, and I tried to slog my way back to shore, and I made one step and two ---

  The waves rolled in, banged me against a couple of rocks, and then dragged me out. The shock to my system made everything look gray, like some sort of veil had been pulled over my eyes. I moved my feet again, this time feeling nothing under me, and the weight of my wet clothes was starting to drag me down. The part of my mind that was still thinking rationally knew that in January in the Atlantic Ocean, I had just a handful of minutes left before hypothermia closed its cold fist around my heart and killed me. That's it. No appeal, no good nature, nothing. Just the cold facts.

  I coughed and gasped and raised my head again. I hated being in the ocean even on the hottest days of the year, and in January ... there was no coastline before me with open, inviting, sandy beaches and on-duty lifeguards looking for swimmers in trouble, swimmers like me. No, except for that strip of land converted by Audrey Whittaker, this was rocks and boulders and fissures and-

  A wave was coming in. I moved with it, hoping the momentum would carry me far enough, and it did. Maybe I was wave riding or something, letting the wave carry me, and if it carried me far enough, I could get traction and ---

  The wave petered out. I coughed and choked from the salt water. My legs moved again, scrambling, and there was nothing to stand on, and the waves dragged me back, even farther away from safety. I was shivering wildly now, teeth chattering, and I rolled over, tried to get on my back, maybe floating on my back would give me a better chance of getting to shore and ...

  On my back, my handcuffed hands on my chest, the hands lobster-red raw, wondering if I could swim somehow, even with my fastened hands, or maybe kick my way to shore, if I was very, very lucky. But I was so cold and my wet clothes were dragging me down and my teeth were chattering and my legs and arms were numb, and I began to imagine things. Imagining I was warm, imagining I was in the desert, that's right, back in the Nevada desert so many years earlier, when I was younger and dumber and full of vim and vigor and energy, fighting the good fight from the Department of Defense, and-

  Oh yes. The desert. When my intelligence section was accidentally exposed to something horrible and illegal, and the helicopters came, the helicopters came, and everyone died, everyone save for one poor fool, one poor fool named Lewis ...

  Now I was certain I was hallucinating, For I was quite warm, warm indeed, and the ocean felt as warm as it did in south Florida, and the sound of the helicopter was quite loud, chattering and overwhelming everything, and I closed my eyes and floated and things felt light indeed before there was nothing else there. Nothing at all.

  The voice said, "Are you all right? Can you wake up?"

  I shifted my weight and winced from the pain in my right knee and ---

  The pain in my knee.

  I opened my eyes and wiped them with my warm and dry hands and ---

  I sat up. I was in a bed and I looked around and it wasn't a hospital, but it was a hotel room. That was my very first big surprise. My second very big surprise was sitting next to me, in a hotel chair.

  Secret Service Agent Glen Reynolds.

  "I'm awake now," I said, my voice just barely above a whisper.

  "And I don't know how all right I am. I hurt like hell ... but I'm alive. I suppose I have the Secret Service to thank for that."

  "You do."

  "Very well. Thank you. Thank you very much."

  I sat up in the bed, put a pillow behind my back, winced again from the pain in my leg, and said, "The senator?"

  "He's fine. Just gave a hell of a campaign speech a while ago." "His wife?"

  "Standing right next to him like a good wife and the possible first lady she might become. All nice and normal."

  I looked again at the room. A funny world. It seemed like we were in the Lafayette House. How bloody ironic.

  "And Harmon Jewett? And his woman companion?"

  Reynolds shrugged. "In custody, talking to us. And they'll probably be in custody for the foreseeable future."

  "I see."

  I moved again in the bed and the pain wasn't as sharp this time. Goody. I was making progress. I looked at Agent Reynolds and remembered the last time we met, and what he had told me about staying away from the senator's wife and bookstores. I said, "You've been following me, right?"

  "Of course. Off and on, here and there. We would have been remiss if we hadn't. For a few days you were the chief suspect in the attempted assassination of a leading presidential candidate. You were subsequently cleared of that attack, but just because you were cleared for that doesn't mean you were cleared for doing anything stupid in the future."

  "Thanks. I think."

  "You're welcome,
Mr. Cole. You see, you have an odd and dark background, which we couldn't get into, no matter how much we dug," Agent Reynolds said pointedly, as if it had always been my fault. "So yes, we kept an eye on you. Right up to the point when you went for a swim earlier today after your visit to Mrs. Whittaker's home. Lucky for you, we had an airborne asset in the area, and we were able to reel you in after you took that swim. Any longer ... they would have reeled in a corpse."

  "How in hell did you bring me here?"

  He shrugged. "Through a service elevator. So things would be nice and quiet without all that nasty publicity."

  I rubbed my wrists and saw that one was bandaged, the one I had cut on the glass shard back in the basement. I looked at him and his calm appearance, and I said, "You guys are up to something, aren't you."

  "Define 'something.'"

  "So far, you haven't threatened me with arrest. Or anything else. We're having an adult, intelligent conversation. No mention of Harmon and the senator's wife conspiring either to have him killed or to lose the election. All the while using me as their handy-dandy nut with a grudge."

  Reynolds held his hands together in his lap. "That's sheer speculation and idle chitchat, Mr. Cole, and you know it. If Harmon and his friend do face the music, it will be on violating federal firearms and explosives statutes, and probably homicide, if we're lucky and we find the right evidence."

  "Homicide?"

  "Of course. Mr. Jewett's companion, Carla, claims that Mr. Jewett killed his cousin, one William Spenser Harrison, aka Spenser Harris, just a few days ago. Carla wants a deal before saying anything else about the circumstances or location of his death, and right now, it's in the lawyers' hands. Which is fine. We don't like people pretending to be Secret Service agents, and since it looks like this fake Secret Service agent met a demise that he so richly deserved, I'm quite content to let others take care of matters."

  "I see."

  Reynolds said, "You wouldn't happen to know where Mr. Harris is currently located, would you?"

  I said carefully, "I've not spoken to him since that day before the attempted assassination."

  "So you say."

  I changed the subject and said, "What about Barbara Hale?"

  "The senator's wife?" he said. "I imagine that she will be traveling apart from the senator during the rest of this campaign ... and I also imagine that her movements, conversations, phone calls, and e-mails will be strictly observed just to make sure that any future unpleasantness doesn't occur."

  "The senator ... he knows?"

  "Of course."

  "And ... "

  "What do you think?" Reynolds asked. "At this moment, do you think he's going to dump everything to try to have her arrested? Be real, Mr. Cole. He's within a few months of getting his party's nomination. If that means believing that his wife is slightly unbalanced, and that she and her troubles can be kept under wraps and control ... well, that's what's going to happen."

  The room seemed to vibrate just a bit, as if something were about to spin free and shatter, and I guess it was just a reaction to my deep-January swim. I shivered suddenly and pulled the thick blankets closer to me.

  "So it's a cover-up. Why's that?"

  Now Reynolds smiled. "Cover-up is such a loaded phrase. We prefer ... we prefer a reality check."

  "A what?"

  "Reality check. And the reality is ... well, I know a bit about your background, Mr. Cole, which is why we're having this kind of conversation. In your previous life you had a very high security clearance. That's why I think I can trust you with what you said earlier, about having an adult conversation."

  "Go on," I said.

  "For the past several years and campaign cycles, the Secret Service has become a modern-day Praetorian Guard. We've been putting our elected officials in a safe, quiet bubble, where never is there a disquieting word to be heard. We've been on our way to losing our professionalism, and becoming just another part of the political process. You know, the sane, non-corrupted, non-cynical political process that makes this country so great and admired."

  “I see,” I said.

  He shook his head. "We got a new administrator two years ago. And he put the word down. We were going back to our roots, as a protective force. We weren't going to be adjuncts of an administration or a campaign. We were going to serve and protect. That's it. Mr. Cole, you served some time in government. What's the worst thing that any government agency fears?"

  I thought about that for a moment, and was going to say budget cutbacks, when something else came to mind. "Public humiliation or embarrassment."

  He gently clapped his hands together. "Exactly. Embarrassment, which leads to headlines and news stories and the death of a thousand cuts from the news media and the Internet."

  I thought it over and said, "So ... the public release of information from the Secret Service that the wife of a leading presidential candidate is having an affair with a political operative in the campaign, and who may have a role in the shooting attempt on the senator himself ... that's not going to happen, is it?"

  "Not from us," he said. "You're a bright fellow. Imagine the uproar that would cause. The day before the New Hampshire primary, having a story like that make the front pages of all the newspapers and every minute of every cable show. We'd be accused of trying to influence the election. Of favoring one candidate over another. Of being the power behind the throne of whoever might become the next president." Reynolds shook his head. "Not going to happen, not this time."

  I said, "By keeping quiet, you can be accused of the same thing."

  "Maybe so. But we keep quiet about a lot of things. About which presidential candidate's spouse has a drinking problem. Which presidential candidate has a fondness for bisexual pornography. Or which child of which candidate has a problem of assaulting women. Not our job to make that stuff public. So here we are."

  I was feeling warmer, though my right knee was throbbing like the proverbial son of a bitch. "So here we are," I said. "Is this the point in time when you tell me to keep my mouth shut, or else?"

  Reynolds smiled and said, "No. It isn't the time. Not sure if that moment will ever come, no matter how many bad movies you've seen or bad books you've read. But it is the time when I tell you it's your choice to do what you will about what happened to you. And that you should think carefully about the choice you make."

  "How's that?"

  He said, "In a manner of minutes, I'm going to leave this room, Mr. Cole. A doctor is going to come in to give you a final check-over. The room is yours for the night, if you'd like. And after I leave, you can do whatever you want. Stay here. Depart. Call up CNN and tell them everything you know ... However ... "

  "Yes?"

  "What you need to think about is this," Reynolds said. "You have it in your power to destroy or damage the candidacy of Senator Jackson Hale. You. And it's up to you to decide if it's worth it ... for some sense of justice or getting back at a woman who apparently used you and betrayed you. For what it's worth, a fair number of people want Hale in the White House. Do you want to keep that away from them?"

  "I don't know," I said. "But if I do talk, it'll make things hell for you, won't it."

  "We've been through hell before. Like November 1963. We'd survive. Question for you ... I know you like your privacy. Would you survive?"

  I looked at that professional face, the face of a man sworn to throw his body in front of an assassin's bullet for a man or woman who might not even be worth it. Some sort of man, some sort of dedication.

  I burrowed back into my blankets.

  "Sure, I'd survive," I said. "But there's more to everything than survival."

  Reynolds stood up. "Ain't that the truth." He reached inside his coat pocket, took out a business card and passed it over. "Here you go. My card. Business and cell phone and home phone numbers ... call me if I can do you a favor, or something."

  I looked at the card and said, "How about now?"

  He shrugged. "Sure. Go ahead."<
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  "My ... my friend Annie. She's involved with the Hale campaign. I want to make sure that ... well, if Barbara Hale can't get at her husband, I want to make sure that nothing bad happens to Annie."

  A quick nod. "Sure. I'll make sure it happens. Anything else?"

  "Not at the moment."

  He started for the door. "If that's the case, Mr. Cole, well, it's been a bit of an adventure getting to know you. Look forward to the adventure ending tonight."

  "Back to Boston?"

  "I wish. Off to South Carolina, for the next stop on this crazy trip we call choosing a president."

  Damn. I turned and looked at a small digital clock on the nightstand and the coldness returned and I said, "That time right? Is it really that late?"

  "Sure is," he said, now at the door, "and I've got to get going." So he left and I looked at the clock again. It was just past 9 P.M. I was supposed to have met Annie Wynn, in Room 110, more than four hours earlier.

  I picked up the phone at my side --- and, by the way, confirmed that I was at the Lafayette House ---- and called her cell phone. Went directly into voice mail. I left a long and heartfelt message, and then I called home to check messages on my answering machine. Eight messages, all reminding me to vote tomorrow.

  None from Annie.

  I called her cell phone again.

  And went straight to voice mail again.

  Damn.

  There was a knock on the door and I called out, "Coming!" thinking that maybe some magic had been worked, that Annie was here to see me, but no, no such luck on this cursed day. I went to the door and opened it and a sour-looking man in an ill-fitting brown suit said, "Mr. Cole? Frank Higgins, on contract with the Secret Service. I'm here to see that you're breathing and all that."

  He looked me up and down. "And I can tell that you're at least doing that."

  I went back inside the room. "Nice diagnosis, so far."

  "Yeah, well, the night's still young."

  About a half hour later, I was hobbling my way through the lobby of the Lafayette House, my right knee in a brace, leaning on a metal cane, the metal cold and uncomfortable in my stiff fingers. The lobby was crowded with all sorts of campaign people, press types and the usual hangers-on, some passing out press kits or leaflets, grabbing almost everyone and anyone trying to get his or her message out before the big day tomorrow.