Remo and Chiun were long gone, but the clouds were still hanging in the air when the city SWAT teams stormed the auditorium and cuffed every single person on stage, alive or dead, including the deceased governor.
Nobody on the SWAT teams had really liked that governor.
6
Dr. Harold W. Smith stared at the computer monitor under the surface of his desk. It was a brand-new flat screen, recommended by his assistant, Mark Howard. Mark helped him remove the old, heavy unit. The new screen that was bolted in its place looked like a toy to Smith. It was only an inch thick and weighed just a few pounds. Still, Smith never allowed himself to become outdated in his computer technology. The success of CURE depended in part on state-of-the-art technology.
Sure enough, the nineteen-inch flat panel provided a brilliant image with high resolution. When they had turned it on that morning for the first time, Smith had gazed into it and experienced a strange lack of tension in his eyes. He realized that he had been squinting into his old monitor for so long it had become an unnoticed habit.
"This enables digital video feeds," Mark explained as his fingers rattled on Smith's keyboard and brought up four windows, each showing a digital television channel, now a part of the standard media feed being channeled into the CURE computer systems.
"And this allows you to adjust the screen resolution at a touch," Mark added, maneuvering the mouse to an on-screen button and clicking it once. The screen images magnified. They looked huge, but the width of the display meant Smith was seeing as much information now as he had seen on his old, smaller monitor.
"I use this all the time when my eyes get tired," Mark explained, vacating the seat so Smith could test out the new display.
Smith appreciated the comment, but he knew why Mark was showing him this feature first of all. His eyes were tiring more easily as he got older. Smith was not a young man.
"So?" Mark asked. "How do you like it?"
"Like what?" Smith asked without tearing his eyes away. "Oh. Yes, fine, but we've got trouble, Mark."
Mark looked over Dr. Smith's shoulder. One of the news network's digital satellite feeds was displayed in the top right window. The network was interrupting its regular program for a breaking news story. Dr. Smith brought the volume up so they could hear the anchor inform them of "Reports of gunfire in Chicago at the auditorium where Governor Bryant..."
"I'm on it," Mark Howard announced, leaving for his own office. After working together for a short time, Howard and Dr. Smith had developed an efficient two-pronged approach that allowed them to scour the global networks and their own information sources for valuable intelligence at the first sign of a crisis.
This crisis was still evolving. Between the two of them they learned just one meaningful bit of data, soon verified by the media: the controversial governor was dead.
Minutes later all the networks were showing video footage of the gunshot in almost constant rotation and sometimes in slow motion, and the brain bits were clearly visible flying into the rows of seated convicts.
The two phones rang at almost exactly the same instant. Harold W. Smith grabbed them both and said into the red one, "Hold please, Mr. President."
Before the leader of the free world could respond with "Hell, no," Smith had lowered the red receiver to the desk and spoke into the blue one. "Remo, what went wrong there?"
"Well," Remo said, "first they elected this really bad man to be their governor, then a few years later somebody shot him."
"Remo, I have the President on the other line and I would appreciate a straight answer," Smith said icily.
"What could be straighter, Smitty?" Remo demanded. "You want the important facts, you just got them."
"Did you question them?" Smith demanded.
"They're all dead."
"You killed them? All of them?" Smith's voice rose slightly.
"Whoa, there, Smitty, I didn't kill them all."
"Did Chiun?"
"I most certainly did not!" squeaked a distant voice through the phone. "I spared several of the worthless cretins so that we might interrogate them fully, just as you requested, Emperor," Chiun insisted, getting closer to the phone.
"Give that back!" Smith heard Remo say.
"It was Remo who allowed the unslain men to boom themselves," Chiun accused loudly into the receiver.
"Give me that."
"Ingrate!"
Smith's hand gripped the receiver so hard it turned from gray to white. "Would you both stop bickering like children and give me a report, please."
There was silence, as cold as the deep freeze of a miserable winter. Finally Remo came on the line saying, "Now you've done it."
"Did you learn anything, Remo?" Smith asked.
"N-0 spells no, how many times do I—"
Smith put the blue phone down and spoke into the red one. "I'm sorry, Mr. President, I was just getting a report from Chicago."
"Dammit, Smith, what went wrong?"
"I do not know yet, sir."
"All they had to do was protect one man. I thought your guys were supposed to have wonderful, strange abilities, but they can't protect one public official?"
"Mr. President," Smith said deliberately, "if my men had been instructed to protect the life of the governor instead of watch from the sidelines, then the governor would be alive right now. As I told you this morning, this event was foolhardy and by its very nature impossible to secure."
"I tried to talk him out of it," the President said. "That fool wouldn't hear of it."
"We also discussed increasing the security level at the auditorium," Smith reminded him.
"Bryant wouldn't go for that, either," the President said. "My boys said it would have taken days to set up and you know his term was ending Monday. That old bastard wouldn't let anything get in the way of his farewell extravaganza." The President sighed. "Guess he went out with a bang like he wanted."
"Yes, sir," Smith said. "I'll update you when I learn more." He disconnected the line.
"Remo, you still there?" Smith asked into the blue phone, but he heard only the distant sounds of a public place somewhere in Chicago. An intercom in the background said something about a cheeseburger with ketchup and extra-extra pickles.
Smith hung up and stared at the crystal-clear, ultraslow-motion video replay of the governor's exploding head.
7
Dr. Donald Lamble watched the replacement governor mumble his way through a press conference, his head hanging sorrowfully.
"He is talking to his shoes, not the reporters," Lamble observed.
"A shameful performance," agreed Dr. Lamble's campaign manager as she used a drapery steamer on his lapel. One corner wanted to curl. "Nobody is going to believe he's sorry about it," she added. "Best thing that could have happened to him."
"Yes. Exactly," Lamble said. The lieutenant governor had profited greatly from the screw-ups of his predecessor, including landing in the governor's seat when the scandal-plagued Bryant announced he would resign months before his term was scheduled to end. Bryant's death meant the lieutenant governor's chances of being indicted as party to the corruption scandal were greatly reduced, plus it gave his own administration credibility he would have otherwise lacked—and that added legitimacy to his campaign to be elected to a full term.
"The idiot thinks he has to look mournful," Lamble observed. "What he really should do is come out swinging. Tell the state they are better off without that man Bryant. Ouch!"
His campaign manager mercilessly triggered hot steam into the stubborn lapel, scalding his chest in the process. Lamble stood as straight as an arrow and grimaced through the pain. She wouldn't have stopped if he asked her to, and he wouldn't have asked her to. After all, he had to look sharp. He had to be perfect. Nobody could be cleaner cut than Dr. Donald Lamble. If he had to endure a minor burn to get his lapels to fall into place, then he would endure it.
His campaign manager, third cousin and occasional lover, nodded in satisfaction and ste
pped back, appraising Lamble critically. "Looking good."
"You're the best, Madge."
She flicked his nose sharply with one finger. "Contractions are for junkyard rabble!"
Lamble flinched. "Sorry. You are the best, Madge."
"Thank you. I know. Now go show them how it is done."
Dr. Donald Lamble was the picture of confidence when he stepped out into the crowded little room in his campaign headquarters. His campaign staff and volunteers applauded politely, but there was no mistaking the excitement in their eyes. They were Lamble's people.
They believed in him and his message. That faith was his fuel.
He greeted them with smiles, his backbone ramrod straight. He didn't need to be a humble man. He was a man with a message he knew was right, and there was no need to be humble about taking the ethical high road.
Only a few reporters were on hand, and Lamble knew that others had been turned away at the door. That was one of the techniques from the White Hand Book. It seemed like bad public relations until you thought it through.
Reporters were just nosy troublemakers who liked nothing more than getting what they couldn't have. The practice of letting in just a few journalists for important press conferences made Lamble's events all that much more newsworthy. The local media had begun getting competitive about who could and who should get in to his media events.
The other purpose was more subtle. No reporter, however jaded, however politically disenfranchised, could remain unenthusiastic when he was surrounded by a crowd of supporters. Today the handpicked media were all those who had begun to lean in Lamble's direction. He needed sympathetic ears -for what he was about to say. But the White Hand Book said this was the time for it. Lamble believed in the White Hand Book— he had faith in it. You had to have faith in the book to have faith in the party, because without faith there was only failure.
Lamble smiled, the picture of self-assurance, tolerating not even a glimmer of doubt to flutter through his head as he thanked his campaign staff and the reporters and launched into his comments on the assassination of governor Bryant.
"The violence visited upon the governor of our neighbor state today was a horror," he said. "But what we have witnessed today is a perfect example of how bad government is ruining this great nation. Ironically, Governor Bryant was a victim of the very violence that his corrupt administration allowed to flourish unchecked."
There was a murmur among the people. The reporters who had shown signs of being Lamble converts were now showing suspicion and surprise. Saying bad things about the recently deceased was a big political no-no.
No need to worry. The idea was on the table. Time to convince the people, including the reporters, to see the message in the same light as Lamble.
"Governor Bryant was a man who furthered his career through the corruption of his elected office. There are more than sixty corruption counts in the charges brought against his former staff, and yet Governor Bryant claimed he knew nothing of it."
Lamble knew what every person in the room was thinking—Bryant was never charged with any crime...
"My Washington sources tell me, in fact, that an indictment against Governor Bryant was delivered two days ago and ordered sealed by the courts—a legal stipulation that becomes null when the defendant dies. Therefore I can reveal now that this man was charged by the government of the United States with twenty- seven counts of corruption, racketeering, and misuse of public funds. These charges extend beyond the campaign scandal of his secretary of state term and include accepting bribes in exchange for state contracts, for state jobs, and for the commutation of harsh prison sentences against convicted murders."
There was a buzz in the room. There had been speculation of such things throughout the brief stint of Bryant's term as governor, and now there was confirmation. If Lamble said it, then it had to be true. If it was true, then Bryant was indeed a bad, bad man.
"Governor Bryant brought corruption into the highest office in his state. He made his own self-interests more important than the welfare of his people. He put murderers on the streets to make himself rich. He put his friends into jobs for which they were not qualified, then took kickbacks. These are not rumors or speculation, but the very words of federal prosecutors as written in charges against the governor."
The reporters were practically drooling and the campaign workers' eyes were shimmering with excitement.
"Governor Bryant allowed corruption to fester in his state, creating an environment for violence to thrive, and that violence killed him," Dr. Lamble intoned. "Is it any surprise?"
"No," answered some in the crowd.
"And this violence was visited upon him in the minutes before he could commit the most egregious and self-aggrandizing act of his administration—putting even more violent criminals on the streets," Lamble said. "I call it just deserts."
The applause was more than polite. They were actually buying it. "The message is this," Lamble said. "Those who live by corruption will die by corruption."
"Excuse me, Dr. Lamble," interjected one of the reporters.
Lamble made a show of stopping with his mouth open, smiling, clearly not taking offense at the interruption. His people would take offense for him. "Yes, Mr. Rode?"
"Are you saying you condone this violence?"
"Not at all."
"Are you saying that vigilantism is an unacceptable method of removing politicians from office if they are perceived as being corrupt?"
"No, Mr. Rode. When a Mafia boss is gunned down by a rival crime Family, that is poetic justice. When a gangbanger has one of his own cheap guns blow up in his face, that is poetic justice. And when Governor Bryant is assassinated along with a bunch of convicted murderers and rapists, it is poetic justice."
As smooth as silk, Lamble thought, as the applause filled the room. People were whistling. People were shouting. Their faces shone with their adoration. Even the rude reporter was nodding as he jotted down his messages and checked his audio recorder. It was a bold message and Lamble had delivered it perfectly.
Man, did he know how to push the good people's buttons or what?
8
Orville Flicker watched the news feed from the Midwest, where candidate Dr. Donald Lamble was pretending not to be overjoyed by the hoots and cheers.
The network cut back to the anchor. "Strong words from Senate candidate Donald Lamble. Not the sort of aggressive stance I would have expected from an independent running at least four points behind the two major-party candidates vying for the same seat. Sam?"
"That's right, Sam," said the hastily arranged expert, a commentator from the nightly news show who was added to the normally second-rate afternoon line-up just to give it a shot of credibility. The camera pulled back to take in the elderly man who had been a network news fixture for decades.
Two Sams, Flicker chuckled. Some producer was probably being fired that very minute.
"It is just the kind of remark the public will take as coldhearted," Commentator Sam opined.
"Although his constituency seems to agree with him," the anchor said.
The old commentator gave the younger man a patronizing, gin-soaked smile. "Important to note that those are not his constituency, Sam, but his campaign staff. I think we'll see quite a different reaction from the voters Dr. Lamble hopes to represent."
"Perhaps, Sam," said the younger anchor doubtfully.
"Count on it, Sam," snapped the commentator.
"I wouldn't count on it at all, Sam, you old sot," Flicker told the television.
"What's that, Mr. Flicker?" Noah Kohd thumbed off a mobile phone and looked at the television, just one of three that folded down from the roof of the limousine. The other two were silently showing broadcasts from other networks.
"I know that old drunkard better than my own Dad," Flicker complained, waving his remote at the screen. "He dropped out of high school, for Christ's sake. He never would have made it to the networks if he hadn't been in the trenches in
Korea, and he only made it there because he was too sauced to know any better. Then he spends the next fifty years on the air acting like he knows what he's talking about. He's a moron. You should have heard some of the questions he used to come up with for the President."
"Yes, sir," Kohd said as his phone tweeted and he placed it to his ear. Kohd listed to the phone with one ear and to his boss with the other, although he knew perfectly well that Flicker was about to tell him about the time the commentator fell asleep during a White House news conference.
"One time he fell dead asleep during a White House news conference and started snoring. I wanted to have the old booze hound blacklisted after that." Flicker bit the inside of his cheek out of habit. "Of course that didn't happen," he concluded for his own benefit.
Orville Flicker sat up straighter. Got to look good. No slouching. He knew he was not a terribly appealing man physically, and only persistent attention to posture and behavior could overcome his physical failings. Small of stature, gaunt without looking fit, he was in his mid- forties and already his murky brown hair was showing signs of gray. His skin was pasty and his lips thin.
What he needed was an image consultant. Not one of those Hollywood sleaze merchants, but a real man who knew what a real man should look like. Someone who could train him to smile like he meant it. Someone who could make Flicker look like he had stature. Presidential stature.
Kohd nodded into his phone. "Okay," he said, and thumbed it off. "Check BCN, sir."
Flicker expertly muted one screen and brought up the sound on another just in time for the BCN Instant Opinion Poll.
"Well, it looks like the people have spoken!" cheered the anchor. Frank Appee was the new afternoon man at the BCN news desk. "Senate candidate Donald Lamble has got a few folks jumping-up-and-down mad in his home state, no doubt about it."
Flicker froze, eyes locked on the screen.
"But the angry types are in the minority! Just look at how the chips are falling in America's heartland, folks! Our results show eighty-one percent agreeing with Doc Lamble. You heard me. That's eight out of ten think Lamble's on-target when he says that Governor Bryant was a crook and he died like a crook. Ten percent are undecided and another nine percent think it's Lamble who ought to be shot for saying bad things about the recently deceased."
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