But she needed more. Mohandas told her he wasn't going to 'betray my principles,' not for just that. Which had made her think of the old line: 'We've already determined what you are. Now we're just haggling about the price.'
How about if she could somehow deliver to Mohandas control of the huge tract of prime real estate that was the Hunter's Point Naval Reservation? Sitting as it did right on the bay, with some of the best views in the city, in the heart of an African-American cultural enclave, the place was a diamond in the rough, simply waiting for the right vision, the leader who could make its facets shine.
Loretta was in fact a member of the Parks Reclamation Commission and sat on the Committee on Decommissioned Military Installations in the Senate. She knew that the site was a multi-million dollar headache for the federal government. Estimates on the cleanup of the toxics alone – if it could be done at all, and opinions varied widely on that – ran to over $30 million. After that gargantuan task had been accomplished, and it was then designated as a national park (as the Presidio had been), the renovations and improvements necessary before it actually could be opened to the public would cost an additional fifty-five to one hundred fifty million dollars. Finally, add to that the cost of administering the park – twelve thousand dollars a day – and the Hunter's Point Naval Reservation had to be seen, in even the kindest light, as a negative. But Mohandas needed to know none of this.
There were other considerations. First, she was certain she could in fact deliver. She'd been working for months now on some version of what was developing as her final plan. Because it was such a white elephant, Loretta knew that the federal government would like nothing better than to simply give the HPNR away, wash its hands of it, goodbye. Naturally, bureaucracies being what they were, this couldn't just happen in the normal course of events.
But that was the very point of the past few days – the normal flow of events had been radically altered. Symbols were needed, drastic action, red tape cut through to get the message across – we're all in this together, on the state and national level, good faith needed to be demonstrated, not talked about.
And so, early that morning Loretta had pitched the final draft of her proposal to a couple of her senatorial colleagues, as well as to the president's chief of staff, and it had been immediately embraced as brilliant and even visionary by each of them – the idea of an executive order that would release the HPNR to a trustee who would pledge to develop the site as a camp for underprivileged children. It would be a fine opportunity for the president to demonstrate his sensitivity to the plight of inner-city youth – give them a place to go, to play, to learn. (It would also get rid of a massive two-hundred-million-dollar administrative nightmare.) Of course, sources close to the president would leak that Senator Wager had come up with this brilliant idea.
And who better to be the trustee than Philip Mohandas – a man with a vision who had shown even in this crisis a willingness to compromise for consensus? Mohandas had an undoubted commitment to the people he'd be serving, an organization already in place to administer the project. The moderate Senator Wager would vouch for his good intentions.
Finally, she had told Philip, he could expect federal funding (not even including what he could expect in matching or co-payment funds from the state government in Sacramento and the city of San Francisco) in the neighborhood of twelve million per year. A million a month. No taxes. Essentially – cash.
And, like cash, it was nearly impossible to keep perfect tabs on it. No one really even expected it. So Philip Mohandas had gone to Conrad Aiken and sold Alan Reston to the city of San Francisco as its new District Attorney.
Chris Locke's death, Alan Reston, Philip Mohandas, the HPNR – all potential negatives, and wasn't it marvelous to see how they all seemed to be working out?
'Let me drive. You look exhausted.'
Glitsky hesitated briefly, then shrugged and handed his keys over to Loretta. 'I won't argue.'
'And I'm paying for dinner, too.'
'I don't—'
'No discussion. Senators do not brook argument with lesser mortals, which includes everyone except the President, who doesn't brook much argument himself.'
Glitsky enjoyed her, no doubt about it. He was crossing in front of the Plymouth, going to the passenger side, smiling. 'What about the Vice-President?'
She gave him a disdainful look. 'He's just a senator who doesn't get to vote very often. Definitely a lesser mortal.'
'Governor?' he asked.
Opening the driver's door, she shot back, 'What state?' Inside, leaning to the side, she flipped up the lock on Glitsky's door.
He slid in. 'California.'
Loretta thought a minute, reached under the seat and tried to slide it forward. It didn't move. She wasn't big enough. 'Help me here, on three.' She counted, and together they got the seat far enough so she could touch the floor pedals. 'California, I'd say "brook." '
'Brook? What does brook mean?'
'Lieutenant, what are we talking about here? – the brooking of argument, are we not? And I'd say the governor of California would brook no argument from lesser mortals.'
He grinned at her, the scar tight through his lips. 'Okay, then, how about the governor of Delaware?'
'No brook.'
'Louisiana?'
'No brook.'
'Hmm. So police lieutenants – '
Turning the key – the car started right up – she patted his leg, slipping into the familiar patois she used with her daughter and almost no one else. 'Honey, they is only a hundred U.S. senators in the whole world. You got any idea how many police lieutenants they is?'
Glitsky actually laughed out loud, something he did with about the regularity of a lunar eclipse. 'So definitely they are lesser mortals? Police lieutenants?'
That disdainful look again, a Whoopi Goldberg glint in her eyes. 'Now you tell me, sugar. I don't make this stuff up. The numbers don't lie.'
'So I am definitely a no brook.'
'In theory, absolutely right on. But you, personally, Abe Glitsky, there might be a loophole ...'
'Which part, the lesser or the mortal...?'
Her hand was on his thigh again. 'Good part of you ain't no lesser than nobody.'
They pulled out into Polk Street, into traffic, heading north – bantering, goofing one another.
Kids.
There were no tents in Washington Square. The riots had not yet infringed on the core of San Francisco, the compact and for the most part elegant wedge of pie bounded on the south and east by Market Street and on the west by Van Ness Avenue – thirty-five blocks north to south, seventeen east to west. The city within.
Glitsky was sitting with Loretta at a back corner table in La Pantera on the corner of Columbus at Washington Square. Up the street was the much more tony Fior d'Italia; across the park was Moose's, hangout, even in these days of crisis, of every bon vivant in the city. But La Pantera was a private place for anonymous citizens and that suited them both. This was a private dinner.
'The rumor that just won't die,' she said. She pushed some tubular pasta around on her plate, drank some of her 7-Up, sighed. Glitsky marveled at the shape and tone of her face – unlined, the skin smooth as fine chocolate. 'The Pacific Moon,' she said. 'Sometimes I wish I'd never heard of the place.'
'I'm just telling you what I heard, Loretta. It's not an issue for me personally. It was just one of my inspectors trying to protect me, that's all.'
But she didn't seem to hear that. 'Now it's three million dollars? Time I'm sixty it ought to have grown to ten.'
"Three million is the profit.'
'I know, I know.' She held up a hand. 'Please. Wait. I want to tell you.'
He nodded, waiting.
'After ... after the plane crash ... you know about the plane crash, right? Colombia? I thought you did, but... well, Dana and I were having some problems even before then. It was one of the reasons I decided to go to work, get into politics again, have something of my own in case D
ana and I split up, which at the time I thought was pretty likely.'
'You mind if I ask why?'
She took a long moment deciding. 'Dana was one of those men who was great to be around when things were going well, when he had money and things seemed to be under his control. He was all tied up in that.'
'Okay.'
'But his investments started to go sour. He took a couple of big hits in the stock market, tried to recoup some of that in real estate here in the city and guessed wrong. Notes were coming due and he couldn't pay them and I guess he started to panic. I mean, he was turning sixty by now. His confidence began to erode. I told him that it didn't matter, that we still had plenty. What was important to me was how he treated Elaine, if he loved me, personal things. But to him, if he wasn't a provider he wasn't anything – it was all tied up in that men's macho thing. And then he got so ... well, we gave up on ... the physical side, and that of course just continued the cycle.'
She sipped at her drink.
'But after Colombia ...?'
'After Colombia, after I got back ... I don't know. Maybe it shocked him awake. He wasn't that old. He wasn't going to lose both me and Elaine. He couldn't let that happen. So when I got out of the hospital we came back home and people started talking about me running for Congress, running for Theo Heckstrom's seat, and suddenly we were both looking forward again. His confidence came back, he took a few risks – one of them was the Pacific Moon.'
'And the place made three million dollars?'
She smiled at him. 'Abraham. Please. In the first place, it wasn't three million dollars, not even close. And whatever it was got divided up among the investors. In the second, what it did make was based on another risk Dana took – that's the way he always was. When he had the guts he could do anything. He talked the other investors into rolling the restaurant's profits into the down payment on some throwaway land south of Market here that Dana had heard was going to ... well, a good portion of it now is the Moscone Center.'
'My, my, my.' The Moscone Center was San Francisco's own multi-million-dollar convention showcase.
'Yes. And as it turned out they only had to make three or four payments before the city bought it back from them. It was a nice windfall, one time only, and then Dana got out of the restaurant business, rolled his share of the profit over to continue in development, which was his first love anyway. He just needed the Pacific Moon to use the other investors' money, to get some leverage so he could make a move on the land.'
Glitsky was sitting back, arms folded. He leaned forward. 'This isn't somewhere in the public record? Why would there still be rumors?'
A resigned edge crept into her voice. 'I think, Abe, first, because people don't understand what Dana did. And when people don't understand an answer, they often make one up. Next, I'm a public figure – there would never have been a rumor if I were some housewife, believe me. But now it might be to someone's advantage to find out something bad about me.' She leaned across the table, speaking quietly. 'Abraham, listen to me. Dana went to some pains to keep his books... private. The investors formed a holding company, which bought the property, then turned the profits back to the restaurant, which is why the restaurant showed so much profit that year. No names. But you can find them – people have found them – if they know where to look. Auditors, for instance.'
'But why didn't he use—?'
'Why no names? Why all the hiding?' She sat back. 'Because Dana believed knowledge is power, so don't tell anybody anything they don't need to know. Also, he thought, probably correctly, that there would be resentment by voters if it appeared that I made money off the city on a lucky guess, which was essentially what it was. We didn't do – Dana didn't do – anything wrong, but in this business, my business, politics, appearance is everything.' It clearly troubled her still. She reached a hand across to him. That's the story. Satisfied? Can we still be ... whatever we are? You being a policeman and all?'
'I didn't need all that, but it's good to hear.'
Their hands met in the middle of the table. 'I don't need you to be doubting me.'
'I don't. I won't.' He raised her hand to his lips, held it against them.
It was tempting, though Loretta knew she could never do it, to lay it all out for Abe and the world to see. She'd been listening to the moans and accusations of the self-righteous for most of her adult life, and just once she'd like to go on record so the vast unwashed could really understand what you had to do to get somewhere if you'd started where she had.
She had always wanted to do some honest good, to help raise up the people she represented, to make a difference and be an active part of making her country a better place. She wasn't a cynic – she truly wanted these things. And in her career she thought she had gone a long way toward achieving some progress.
It had not been just for ego or self-aggrandizement – at least not for those alone. She never wanted Elaine to suffer the slights she'd had to endure as a child and even more as a young woman. And by God, she hadn't. Power and position did get you protection from the worst of the world. And through Elaine, by extension, her protectiveness embraced others – she'd started out her career by representing the disadvantaged, the downtrodden, back where there was a plurality of votes in that stance.
That had changed now, and she'd had to change along with it if she wanted to stay in power to do any good. She didn't believe she was abandoning her principles, she had just had to adapt to hold onto them. She couldn't help anybody, could she, if she didn't get elected first? Perhaps a politician's age-old rationalization, but it was also true. So maybe the message got watered down some, but it didn't get compromised away, not completely.
What would the righteous have done, she wondered, in her place? It was one thing to take the high moral ground and say, 'Oh I would have turned the found money over to the authorities,' another altogether to sit for four days in the stinking jungle thinking you were going to die and know you had in your possession over half a million dollars in cash that no one could ever trace.
She had never felt any qualms about the fact that she alone survived the crash. No survivor guilt. It was hardly her fault. Yes, the money might originally have come from drugs, who knew? It might have belonged to somebody else, it might have gone untaxed in the United States as income, but certainly the greater good was all it had enabled her to accomplish for her people first as a congresswoman and then a senator. The ends did justify the means – and anybody who didn't think so wasn't living a reality-based existence.
There was another more personal reason why keeping the money had never bothered her. For her it represented random fate evening out the playing field. She had been a victim of poverty – even though her good parents had always proudly if blindly denied it. They had been wrong – where they ended up verified that. She had felt the pain of it every day, in every situation. She deserved some random good luck after the bad that had been the accident of her birth into a powerless family.
Well, finally it had come to her and she had taken it – without apologies, without explanations or guilt. The only ones who wouldn't take it were losers who were afraid to reach beyond where everyone else expected them to stop. That wasn't her. She'd made it and she'd done a hell of a lot of good in the process.
God had sent her that money. All the powers on earth would never persuade her otherwise, or could have forced her to give back even a penny of it.
Not back then, not now, not ever.
49
'I'm sorry, you must have the wrong number.'
'Wes ...?'
The phone went dead in Kevin's hand.
'What was that?' Melanie asked. She was combing her hair at Ann's bedroom vanity – eighty-one, eighty-two ... She hadn't gotten around to putting her clothes back on.
'That was Wes being cryptic. I'll call him again.' He started to punch the numbers.
'No, wait a minute. What did he say?'
'Melanie, he always does stuff like this. Says I've got the w
rong number, then hangs up.' He started pushing buttons again. She was up from her seat, threw herself over him on the bed, grabbing for the telephone. Landing across his ribs.
'Ahh!'
'Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Kevin, I didn't mean . . .'
He, also naked, was on his side, half-rolled into a fetal position, moaning. She took the phone from him and placed it in its receiver. 'Are you all right?'
He shook his head, trying to catch his breath, struggling with it. 'You want to call him so bad, okay, you call.'
'I don't want to call him. Tell me what he said.'
Rolling over, flat onto his back, Kevin gingerly pushed at his ribs. 'He said, this is a direct quote, get ready. He said, "Sorry, wrong number." '
'Somebody was there. He was followed home. We were right to get out of there. It's true. You know it's true.'
He poked gingerly at his ribs as she sat beside him on the bed. After a minute she lifted the receiver. 'What's his number?'
Closing his eyes, he leaned back again and mumbled it to her. She pushed the buttons. 'This is your mother, Wes. Say, "Oh, hi Mom." Now, if the police are there, say "I don't know. I might be busy that night." '
She nodded. 'We'll call you later. Do you think they'll be gone within an hour?'
A small pause. 'All right, now say "Okay, sorry. 'Bye, Mom." '
She hung up and put a hand on Kevin's belly, shaking her head.
He covered her hand with his. 'Now what?'
Dressed now, hair as neatly combed as Melanie could get it – she thought it might make a difference – Kevin sat rigidly in an easy chair in the living room surrounded by plants, the blinds drawn at the window behind him. They had all the lights turned on, some dragged in from the bedroom, all the lamp shades stripped from them. Ersatz klieg.
Melanie had moved Ann's tripod and video camera around – it was loaded with tape and ready to go – and pointed it at Kevin. She pushed the button, the red light came on, and Kevin tried to smile at the camera, though it came out forced.
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