Oath of Office

by Michael Palmer

  She once again flashed on Russ Evans’s sad, desperate face.

  “Actually,” she said while Martin worked at her neck with his lips, “there is something I need to discuss with you. But it can wait.”

  Martin moaned in her ear. “Hmmmm … sure … get it off your chest if it will help you relax. You seem a little tense.”

  Darlene gazed up at the ceiling as he continued to explore the soft curves of her chin, neck, and breasts. He was right about her feeling tense, even though he was, as usual, unwilling to take any responsibility.

  “Russ Evans came to the dedication today,” said quietly. “We didn’t see him there, but afterwards, he followed us to the Bar None and asked us to meet with him in private upstairs.”

  Martin stopped kissing her and remained motionless. The temperature between them dropped several degrees.

  “And did you?”

  “Did I what?”

  Martin sat up. The ice in his eyes was reflected in his voice. “Meet with him.”

  “I … didn’t see what harm could come of it. I mean, we have known each other since we were kids. Kim was with me, and … and Victor was right outside.”

  Martin swung onto the edge of the bed, but never took his suddenly hard eyes from her. “I can’t believe you met in public with that pervert,” he said. “Do you think I don’t have enough problems without my wife adding to them with the man who is already the biggest blight of my administration?”

  Reflexively, Darlene pulled the sheet up to cover her breasts. “That’s a cruel thing to say, Marty. We three were alone in the upstairs of the restaurant. No one except the agents even saw Kim and me go up there. Russ Evans was our friend. He believed in everything I stand for. Hearing him out seemed the least I could do.”

  “You had no business talking with that man. He’s a disgrace. An utter disgrace. He humiliated the both of us.”

  “He says someone set him up.”

  “People like him always say that after they’re caught.”

  “Martin, have you ever considered that what happened to Russ could have been a politically motivated frame-up?”

  At this, the president leapt off the bed and stormed across the room, breathing heavily. “What would make you even imply such a thing?”

  “Well, when he asked to see me, I thought he was going to try to position himself for a presidential pardon. Use me to get to you.”

  “Go on.”

  “But he didn’t do anything of the sort. All he cared about was some legislation he’s been working on. He wanted me to tell you that the laws are important ones and that people, and especially children, shouldn’t suffer because of him. He asked me—no, more like begged me—to convince you to read over his bills and support his programs. That was it. That was the only thing that mattered to him.”

  Martin’s face turned crimson. “You’re kidding me, right? Darlene, you really are a gullible hick. Please, tell me this is a joke.”

  “Martin, I—”

  “You what? You what, Darlene? You had drinks with a pervert, and then you chat it up with him about a program that hasn’t even been formally presented to me!” His anger had charged the air like lightning, fueling itself before a strike.

  “Martin, please, you’re sounding unreasonable.”

  “You have no business talking to Russ Evans!” he shouted, pounding the top of their bureau and sending a velvet-lined box of costume jewelry spilling across the floor. The mouth that had moments before been kissing her was now contorted into a snarl.

  Darlene kept her eyes locked on him, watching with concern as he stalked back to her. Her chest tightened, and for a brief moment she felt trapped between her husband and the headboard of the bed. Then the president sat down on the edge of the mattress, just as gently as he’d done earlier. He put his hand on her knee. She could feel her leg shaking.

  “Sweetheart,” he said, “I am so sorry for going off at you like that. Just the mention of that man’s name is enough to make me go crazy. With all the pressures I have, right before my reelection bid is to start in earnest, I’ve got to live with the fact that I nominated a child predator to join the highest ranks of my administration.”

  “But maybe, just maybe he’s innocent.”

  “We both know that isn’t true,” Martin said, “but I also know how important kids are to you, so I’m going to make a deal. I’ll read whatever Evans’s remaining people submit. Then we’ll see.”

  “Thank you. That’s all I’m asking.”

  “But you have to make a promise to me.”

  “Anything. Anything at all.”

  “You are never, and I mean never, to speak to Russ Evans or mention him in my presence again. Promise me that, Darlene.”

  Again, she conjured up an image of Evans sitting across the table from her—a soul adrift and without hope of rescue. Despite her lingering doubts and the horrible accusations against the man, her heart ached for him. But loyalty to her husband was by far the stronger pull.

  “Of course,” she said. “I promise. Come closer, now. Let’s start over again.”

  Darlene turned off the bedside lamp, but Martin quickly switched it back on.

  “I’ve got work to do,” he said, pulling on a T-shirt and a pair of sweats. “You get some sleep. I’ll be in later and see you in the morning.”

  “I … I’m glad I told you,” she said, more than a little bewildered.

  “Me, too,” he replied, grinning without warmth, “because I already heard about the meeting from one of the other agents.”

  CHAPTER 12

  Stick and Move was a thousand-square-foot gymnasium located amidst a stretch of warehouses within walking distance of Lou’s two-bedroom apartment. Inside were three boxing rings, each the standard twenty-feet-by-twenty. Heavy bags hung from one side of the gym like trophy sharks on a dock, and a row of pear-shaped speed bags were wall-mounted to the other. There were several stationary bikes, a quality set of free weights, wall-length mirrors, plenty of room for jumping rope, and several sets of medicine balls.

  And best of all from Lou’s point of view, it smelled like a serious gym.

  A day had passed since the horror of Kings Ridge. Lou’s knee had calmed down from a four out of ten on the stiffness scale to maybe a two. The gym was active and noisy when he arrived to train. Cap Duncan, sparring helmet in place, was already in the ring, pounding his gloves together and dancing—a glistening, graceful block of granite on legs. He noted Lou’s arrival with hungry eyes, and motioned him through the ropes. Cap was Bahamian black, shaved bald, and fit—ripped was the gym rats’ word.

  A good guess would have placed him in his twenties, but Lou had organized a surprise fiftieth birthday party for him two years ago. Cap, who along with a bank or two, owned the place, was short for Cap’n Crunch, a moniker he earned during a brief but highly touted professional boxing career, largely because of the distinctive sound that noses made when he hit them.

  Crunch.

  “Hey, there, Doc, with all that you talked about at the meeting last night, I thought you might not make it in.”

  “I need this more today than ever, Cap.”

  Lou threw his ragged sweatshirt aside and worked the kinks from his neck. He was two or three inches taller than his sparring partner, in addition to being a decade younger, and his well-developed shoulders formed a decent V with his waist. But it would be difficult for anyone who compared the two men to believe that he was the harder puncher—and they would be right.

  The two of them had connected the day that Lou arrived from six months of treatment at a rehab center in Atlanta and moved into an attic room in the halfway house where Cap was a counselor. When the financing came through allowing the purchase of the Stick and Move, Lou went to work there and the fighter became his trainer and his AA sponsor. There was no one on the mean streets or in the recovery community that Cap didn’t know, and few on either side who didn’t respect him.

  With his hands already hot and sweat
y inside his gloves, and his wrists stiff from athletic tape, Lou moved to the center of the ring, still working the tightness from his shoulders and neck, and wondering if he should say something about the bandage on his forehead beneath the front of his helmet.

  “So, how’s your day been?” he asked, finagling with his mouth guard to sound intelligible.

  Cap’s first punch, which seemed to have arrived out of nowhere, caught Lou on the side of his headgear.

  “If you’re in the ring—”

  “I know, I know,” Lou said, finishing one of Cap’s favorite aphorisms, “be ready to get hit.”

  “So, what do you think this is? Ballet class?”

  Cap’s words were thick from speaking over and around his mouth protector, but Lou knew his translation of them was close enough. He circled, assessing his options, but not yet ready to commit to any punches. Then he made his second mistake, glancing down, momentarily mesmerized by the older man’s footwork. This time, he saw Cap’s jab coming from the right, but was no better at defending it. The blow connected against his temple with a solid thump.

  “Remember how I said I’d drive you to the meeting on Friday?” Lou said, already beginning to breathe heavily. “Well, another cheap shot like that and you’ll be going by cab.”

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot you were just in a car accident,” Cap said. “Tell you what, I’ll go easy on you this session.”

  “By easy, you mean?”

  “You’ll only need to soak for an hour in the ice tub.” He grinned broadly around his green mouth guard.

  Lou blocked a left-right combination and returned one of his own, which barely connected. Cap could still fight him almost blindfolded. In order to do much of anything against the man, he was going to have to concentrate.

  Childless, but married “a few times here and there” when it suited his purpose, Cap had devoted his youth to boxing, spending every waking hour training in grungy gyms, slowly climbing the amateur ranks. He could dazzle opponents with his footwork, but it was his punching, as powerful with his left as he was with his right, that garnered the most attention. As a kid, he fooled around with alcohol and reefer, but then a trainer set him straight. He gave up smoking and drinking, and began to care for his body through diet, vitamins, and more training.

  Eventually, Cap got his big break, scoring a professional fight against a much-hyped contender for the IBA’s middleweight belt. The fight that should have made his career was ultimately what landed him in the same halfway house where Lou would one day reside.

  Alone in the dressing room, only minutes before the bout, Cap received a bouquet of flowers along with an envelope containing five one-hundred-dollar bills and a note instructing him to lose by a knockout in the seventh round. Cap knew it was a mob thing. In his circles, talk about fixing fights was as common as advice shared on punching technique. But instead of losing the fight, Cap beat his opponent to a pulp and won a technical knockout in round two.

  He never got to box professionally again.

  Before his next scheduled bout, the state boxing federation pulled him from the card, citing a positive test for performance-enhancing drugs banned under their governance. Forced out of the sport he loved, he soon began taking narcotics to help ease his emotional pain and humiliation. The back alleys of D.C. became his home, a brown bag his constant companion. People whom he suspected had set him up offered him work as an enforcer, but he never took the jobs. Finally, when he had suffered enough, two more people came—people from AA.

  “You’re slow tonight, Welcome,” Cap said after he threw a series of blazing-fast jabs, purposely pulled to keep from doing any real damage. “You sure you’re all right to box?”

  Lou got in a quick, effective body blow and danced away, preening. “I’m fine,” he said. “I need this to clear my head.”

  Lou bobbed and weaved while circling his friend. He feigned a couple jabs that Cap shrugged off. Sweat was engulfing both men now. Cap’s shaved pate was glistening beneath the incandescent overheads. No matter what was ever troubling Lou, sparring like this was the treatment.

  “Did you gash your head?” Cap asked, jabbing at but not hitting Lou’s forehead, indicating the bandage was visible from underneath his headgear.

  “That accident was the craziest thing,” Lou said.

  “Yeah, how so?”

  Lou bobbed again, and this time got in one good shot to Cap’s jaw. Then he danced back and dropped his red mouthpiece into the palm of his glove so he could be heard more clearly.

  “Carolyn Meacham, the dead doc’s widow, was convinced the busted taillight on the car in front of us was going to cause an accident, so she ends up causing one herself, trying to catch up and warn the driver.”

  Cap waited until Lou had reinserted his guard, then almost immediately hit him with two quick punches—one to either side of his face. Lou thought he heard a crunch from the vicinity of his nose, and his eyes teared. He wiped at the area with the back of one glove and checked for blood. None.

  “Keep your hands up, Doc! Hands up! Now, go on.”

  Lou increased his movement around the ring. Sweat was pouring off him now, stinging his eyes. He loved the feeling.

  “After the crash, she couldn’t explain why she’d gotten so reckless,” he said. “Lucky for her, she knew the chief of police. He let her off with just a warning, if you can believe it.”

  “I can’t believe you can’t keep your hands up,” Cap answered, stepping away and removing his mouth guard. “Take a moment without the guard. I think trying to talk is wearing you out.”

  Lou obliged, and took a few deep breaths to catch up. “Just for a minute or two,” he said. “I promise to keep my hands up. Did you get everything I said about Carolyn Meacham?”

  “Most of it. Obviously she was distressed about what her husband had done. It could have been that. Any clue what set him off?”

  “No idea,” Lou said. “He really was a talented doctor and an interesting guy. His AA recovery seemed right on track, and he hadn’t had any issues with his temper since he got in trouble four years ago.”

  Cap continued shifting from foot to foot like a runner at a red light, staying loose. “I heard on the news,” Cap said, “that one victim, before she died, had said something about ‘no witnesses.’ They were speculating that’s what Meacham was saying during his rampage. ‘No witnesses.’ I suppose it had something to do with that lady he was yelling at.”

  “What lady?”

  “On the news. I saw them interviewing her. Apparently she left the office right before your pal went ballistic—so to speak. She said that Meacham had screamed at her about her weight and that she ran off in tears. She got home, turned on the TV, and saw the shooting on the news.”

  “First I’m hearing of that,” Lou said. “I probably should have been watching more TV.”

  “Nobody should ever be watching more TV, bro. Unless it’s the Friday-night fights. So, what was this ‘no witnesses’ thing all about?”

  Lou toweled off and, feeling himself beginning to stiffen, started his own side-to-side shuffle. He needed more sparring time, but Cap was one of the wisest people he knew. If the man was interested enough to ask, his question was worth answering.

  “According to the police,” Lou went on, “the only victim who lived long enough to say anything quoted Meacham as saying, ‘No witnesses.’”

  “That’s strange.”

  “I agree, but why?”

  “Because if I understand what went down correctly, the potentially strongest witness, the woman I saw interviewed, had left the office before the shooting.”

  Puzzled, Lou looked across at his sparring partner. “What are you getting at?” he asked.

  “The kids from the street—the ones I train—they’d call that redonkulous.”

  “Redonkulous?”

  “Yeah, it’s a portmanteau.”

  “Portmanteau? I always thought you spent too much time reading.”

  “I have a vo
cabulary notebook. I hardly ever get to use what I write down in it, but here’s my chance. Portmanteau means a new word formed by joining two others and combining their meanings. Redonkulous is a blending of the words ridiculous and donkey. It implies something bizarre, or impossible to the extreme.”

  “Why donkey?”

  “Poker donkey,” Cap said matter-of-factly.

  “What’s that?”

  Cap shook his head in dismay. “Doc, you need to hang on the streets more often. Get back in touch with the people. Poker donkey is just what it sounds like—a really bad poker player.”

  “Okay, I got it. So why is what I said redonkulous?”

  “Say it’s true, and Meacham was shouting ‘no witnesses’ while he’s gunning folks down.”

  “Okay.”

  “Why would he be worried about witnesses? What did he think these people had witnessed?”

  Lou’s chest began to tighten as an anxious feeling took hold. “He’d be worried they had witnessed him yelling at a patient. John was already on probation with the medical board about his drinking and his temper, which is why he was under PWO supervision. An outburst like that might have cost him his license for good.”

  “No witnesses,” Cap said. “But this lady he yelled at, she’d already left the building before he started shooting. Obviously, she was a witness, and someone he couldn’t get at now.”

  “You think John realized his mistake after the shootings?”

  “Otherwise, he probably would have gone after the lady and plugged her instead of himself.”

  “It’s possible,” Lou said. “It’s sort of like Meacham’s widow realizing after the fact how she caused an accident because she was trying to prevent one. If that’s the case, then Carolyn wasn’t just traumatized by her husband’s death. She was acting just as crazy as he was.”

  Cap reinserted his mouth guard, put up his gloved hands, and resumed his fancy footwork. “Not just crazy,” he said. “Redonkulously crazy.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Babs Peterbee, the sixty-three-year-old matronly receptionist, greeted Lou’s arrival with a look befitting a funeral. Lou was accustomed to seeing the effervescent woman lodged behind her desk in the cramped Physician Wellness Office. But throughout all the tragic clients, disciplinary hearings, and budget crises, he had never seen her looking so deeply concerned.