by Joseph Flynn
A dance lesson was under way, Caitie keeping up respectably, but the instructor was McGill’s new client, Harlo Geiger.
The White House, Vice President Wyman’s Office
The vice president was on the phone with his niece, Kira. He could have walked across the building from his office in the East Wing, but being a gentleman of the old school he observed a protocol stricter than what was actually required of him. He never intruded on the president’s side of the building without a specific invitation from Patricia Darden Grant.
Being a stickler on this point also gave him the privilege of declining a summons from Galia Mindel or any other functionary, keeping those minions mindful of the constitutional hierarchy. He, after all, was the man a heartbeat away from the presidency.
For a little while longer anyway.
Kira was getting a bit nervous about her wedding and the unexpectedly high number of acceptances to the last minute invitations. She was worried that the necessary preparations would not be met: seating for the ceremony, food, drink, flowers.
Maybe just a bit of uncertainty Captain Yates was the right man, her uncle wondered.
“Everything will be perfect,” Mather Wyman assured his niece. “Why, I’ve even found room for the handful of last-minute acceptances to the invitations I sent out.”
Kira groaned, “Oh, Uncle Mather, I’m so sorry. I completely forgot about your friends, and mother’s. Did her people accept, too?”
“Every last one of them. It’s going to be a full house.”
“Wait! Do you know about the password you need to get in?”
“O lucky man! Delightful and entirely appropriate.”
“Welborn told you?”
“He did … You are sure he’s the one, sweetheart?”
Since the time Kira’s father had passed away so tragically in a hotel fire, Mather Wyman had filled the paternal role for his niece. A widower without his own children, it was the role he came to cherish above all others. He’d have given up all his political ambitions in a heartbeat, if it would have served Kira’s best interests.
“Mattie,” Kira said, using the nickname that was her privilege alone, “my only concern about Welborn is that I’m not good enough for him — though I’m careful never to let him know that.”
“I doubt he’d believe you if you told him word for word.”
“I love you, Mattie.”
“I love you, too, Kira. I’m happy you’ve found someone to make you happy. Now, don’t worry about a thing. Your wedding is going to be perfect.”
After saying their goodbyes, the vice president’s phone rang almost immediately.
Kira calling back about something she’d forgotten or …
The president saying, “Mather, could you stop by the Oval Office?”
“Immediately, Madam President.”
Department of Justice Building, Washington, D.C.
Attorney General Michael Jaworsky sat motionless as he watched the DVD play on his office television. The video had been recorded that morning in the federal prison in Hazelton, West Virginia. Rather than transmit it to Washington electronically and risk an interception and a leak, one hard copy was made and it was brought directly to Washington by a special agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
As a further precaution, Erna Godfrey was removed from the Hazelton penitentiary and placed in a government safe house in rural Massachusetts.
The video began with Deputy Attorney General Linda Otani identifying herself and asking Erna Godfrey to do the same. After Erna complied with the request, the DAG recited Erna’s Miranda rights and asked if she was waiving them. Erna said she was.
The DAG said, “Very well, Ms. Godfrey, please feel free to say what you wish.”
Looking straight at the camera, her eyes were clear and her face was composed, but she’d been given no makeup, special grooming or civilian clothing. The deputy attorney general wanted Erna to come across as being exactly what she was, a federal prisoner in possession of all her faculties making an uncoerced statement.
“My name, as I just said, is Erna Godfrey and I’m one of the people responsible for killing Mister Andrew Hudson Grant. In fact, I’m the one most responsible. I pulled the trigger on the launcher that fired the rocket that killed him.
“I am grievously sorry for what I did. The problem with that is I’ll never get to express my regret, in this life, to the person I most want to hear it. That’s what happens when you kill someone. If there’s any remorse in your heart, you can never express it to them.
“I have seen that Mr. Grant is with the Lord, but I have no assurance that when I leave this life that I will ever stand at the Lord’s side. So maybe I’ll never get to tell the man I killed how sorry I am.
“I want to make it clear to everyone that I haven’t changed my feelings one bit about thinking that the taking of life that we call an abortion is an abomination. As much as my heart has broken about what I did, it breaks anew each time I think of other innocent lives being taken. On that matter, I will never change my beliefs.
“Even so, it doesn’t excuse what I did. Nothing can justify that. Most of the people who participated with me in the taking of Mr. Grant’s life are, like me, already in prison. But there is one who is not, my husband, Reverend Burke Godfrey.
“Just a few days ago, I talked with Burke and pleaded with him to make his peace with the Lord and with the temporal authorities. He walked out on me without saying a word. I wept for him after he left. I fear for his soul. I beg of him up to this very moment to set things right.
“What weighs on my heart even more is that I know of other men and women who have worked tirelessly to end the plague of abortions and who have gone too far in their zeal. A handful of them even share my sin. That’s why I asked to make this statement today. My hope is that I can persuade some of you, if not all, to confess, to God and to the authorities for what you’ve done.
“Please, if not for yourselves then for the children, come forward. We are never going to win this battle as long as we countenance the violence we ourselves do. Our only hope is to lead by loving example, extending our hands to those who don’t understand the horrible things they are doing, and by praying that they see the light.
“That is what I will try to do, as I hope to start a ministry within the prison system. If I succeed at all, I hope the Lord will show me mercy and someday I’ll be able to apologize directly to the man I killed.”
Erna turned to her right and said, “That’s all.”
The video ended. The attorney general sat back in his chair, thinking about the legal, not the moral, meaning of what he’d just watched. Erna Godfrey had just followed in the footsteps of Joe Valachi.
Valachi had been the first insider to acknowledge the existence of the Mafia.
Insider Erna Godfrey seemed to be saying there existed an organized element in the anti-abortion movement that believed the taking of life was justified to achieve its goals.
Moreover, she implied she knew who these people were.
But she hadn’t revealed any names.
The attorney general placed a call to the White House.
Hay-Adams Hotel
Speaker Derek Geiger sat alone at the desk in the master bedroom of the RNC suite, where he’d taken shelter after being evicted by his wife. He’d been trying to tend to political duties, but memories of his personal life kept intruding on his thoughts. Not the end of his marriage but an emotional trauma from boyhood.
He’d lost his dog, Beau, to a gator. Probably would have lost his own life, too, if his father hadn’t killed the predator with three shots from his .45. The boyhood trauma seemed to occupy his thoughts and dreams any time he experienced emotional turmoil. If he had made his mark in any other profession, he might have sought therapy, but having your head shrunk when you were in politics was a non-starter.
Measured against the loss of his dog, the political setbacks Geiger had suffered in his career were nothing. Even hi
s first two divorces weren’t particularly troubling. Getting free of Harlo would be more aggravating, but that, too, would pass.
What was far more of a heartache was losing Brad Attles. He’d been a true friend. Like Beau. And just like the gator had taken Beau, some predatory bastard had killed Brad.
He knew there would be people who’d criticize him for comparing the death of man to the death of a dog, but those shitheels didn’t understand, and fuck them anyway.
“Mr. Speaker, we’re ready now,” Reynard Dix said.
Geiger looked up and saw the chairman of the Republican National Committee.
“All the candidates are here?”
“Yes, sir. The ones that could get here fast. The others are flying in.”
“Well, let’s go give them their marching orders.”
Geiger couldn’t handpick his choice as the GOP’s candidate for president, but with the damn Patti Grant having left the party, he was at the top of the food chain. No, wait just a minute. As far as he knew, the vice president hadn’t quit the party.
Maybe Geiger could —
No, Mather Wyman was Patti Grant’s man. Wasn’t he?
The speaker decided to give that question some thought. If he could prevail on Wyman to spy on the president for him — for the good of the GOP — that might give the eventual Republican candidate a big advantage.
Meanwhile, he would remind the would-be occupants of the Oval Office, waiting in the next room, the points of party dogma to which each of them must hew, and how they would conduct themselves with the legislative — his — branch of government, should one of them actually be elected.
If anyone gave him any trouble, he’d put an end to it as surely as his father had put an end to that goddamn gator.
WorldWide News, Washington Bureau
The chattering class was having a feeding frenzy with the news about Patti Grant leaving the Republican Party. Not only was the subject wall to wall on the basic cable news stations, the broadcast networks had pre-empted their soap opera programming to cover the new reality show melodrama. Undoubtedly, Jon Stewart and his staff were already working up comedy riffs for that night’s Daily Show.
Stewart notwithstanding, the other great thinkers were starting to repeat themselves. Nobody had had the time to think the matter through and the superficial observations were getting as annoying as the video loops most stations used to illustrate the story. In the face of that reality, and needing to find something fresh to grab big numbers for WorldWide News, Hugh Collier changed his mind.
It was time to tell the world about the K Street Killer and the attack on Putnam Shady’s residence. He and Ellie still didn’t know if there was any connection to the president leaving her former party, but they could always raise the question.
That would start a mad dash of news outlets trying to find out if it was true. Should that be the case, someone else might find the proof, but credit for bringing the news to light would have to be shared with WWN. If there was no proof to be found, Hugh and Ellie would have the time to shift the story in another direction, raise another question.
But in the here and now, they would get the big ratings numbers.
Jack Negron and Kerri Landers, the Ken and Barbie who would read the breaking news story, were in their anchor chairs looking like the next step in human evolution. Perfect hair, flawless skin and smiles so bright they could drive at night without headlights.
Hugh and Ellie sat next to each other in the control booth waiting for the network to come out of its top of the hour commercials and go live with the introduction of the K Street Killer. The director gave the on-air talent their initial heads-up. Stop fidgeting in their seats and patting their hair. The last commercial had just started its thirty-second run when —
The phone rang.
Ellie stared death rays at it.
The call was answered nonetheless, and the message relayed.
The producer said, “The president just entered the White House press room. No advance notice.”
“That bitch!” Ellie said.
Hugh gave her an avuncular pat on the leg.
“Go with the president,” Hugh told the producer. “Maybe she’s announcing her resignation.”
Everyone in the booth gave Hugh a look. Did he know something?
“Now, now, children,” he said. “Just a joke. Patti Grant is one of the few people too rich for even Uncle Edbert to buy off.”
White House Press Room
The president asked all the members of the White House press corps to take their seats. Once that was accomplished, she said, “I’ll take your questions shortly, but first I want to announce a new jobs initiative my administration will be putting into effect starting, appropriately, just after Labor Day, a little more than two weeks from now.
“I’m sure most of you are familiar with the expression most favored nation. In terms of international trade, most favored trading partners are given specific advantages such as lower tariffs and larger import quotas. Borrowing from that idea, my administration will begin classifying certain companies currently doing business with the federal government as most favored enterprises.
“Let me assure everyone right now that this special designation will not be applied to any business on the basis of the political contributions it makes to anyone in government. In order to become a most favored enterprise, a business must show a continuing record of providing well-paying jobs to United States citizens and legal resident aliens.
“American workers, through their tax payments, allow the federal government to stay in business. So it’s only fair the government does business with the companies that want to employ those citizens and other legal residents of this country in well-paying positions. Companies that are outsourcing jobs and offshoring operations should be and will be the last to receive government contracts. If things go the way I hope, they will receive few if any contracts at all.
“The implementation of this policy won’t exclude foreign companies. If, for example, a foreign manufacturer were to open a factory in the United States and employ American workers at good wages, it most certainly could be considered a most favored enterprise.
“You might be wondering how I can do all this on my own. It’s very simple, really. I will veto any spending bill sent to me that disfavors American workers. It’s possible the Congress, as is its right, might override my veto. But should they do that, they would have to explain to the American people why they did so; I’m sure that would be a very difficult sales job.”
The newsies were bouncing in their seats like kernels of corn about to pop.
The president held up a hand.
“We’ll get to all your questions in just a minute, but I want to add that I will have several more announcements to make in the coming days. Some of them, as with the most favored enterprises policy, I will be able to implement by using the powers of my office. Others will require legislation passed by Congress. It’s no certainty that the House and the Senate will see things the way I do, but at the very least I will introduce ideas to be included in the public discussion.”
Patti was also laying down planks for her reelection run.
And markers to see whether the Democrats would want her.
Or if she’d start from scratch, spend a lot of Andy’s money and start her own party.
Washington, D.C., Route 185
Rockelle remembered how it was that she, Meeker and Beemer happened to be on their way to visit Widow Torkelson. Welborn Yates had read that some overprivileged young men liked to bolster their masculinity by purchasing handguns and becoming proficient in their use. Then a lot of these white-collar heroes got their firearms stolen right out of their homes.
Yes, Welborn had made the observation, after his initial reading of the Metro crime files, that the victims of the K Street killings had been shot with different high-end weapons, and then had made the intuitive leap that maybe some pissed-off sonofabitch had killed the lobbyists with their
own guns.
Turned out, that looked like a real possibility.
Maybe even a probability.
That being the case, and Rockelle being someone who had done her homework ever since kindergarten, she wondered if there was anything else in the literature that would be worth knowing. Something Welborn had forgotten to let her in on or hadn’t thought to be worth mentioning.
So with soft jazz coming out of Meeker’s MP3 dock, and her two subordinates under orders not to disturb her, Rockelle used her department-issued PDA to search police databases for articles whose keywords included “residential burglaries, handguns stolen.”
She got better than two thousand returns.
Everybody and his dog, Rover, was a writer these days.
And the drive to Chevy Chase was only six miles.
She’d have to narrow the parameters if she hoped to come with anything useful to ask Joan Torkelson. It was important to keep things as simple as possible. You were dealing with someone in the throes of grief, keeping things dry and factual was the best way to get accurate information.
Stumble around asking vague questions, you were likely to add aggravation to agony, cause emotional upset, bring the interview to a swift close without learning anything of value.
Rockelle narrowed the focus of her search: “residential burglaries, handguns stolen, most common perpetrators.”
Whodunnit, after all, was the sixty-four thousand dollar question.
The first response to the query gave her what she was looking for, in general terms.
Family members and invited guests.
They out-stole handguns from homes by a three-to-one margin over professional thieves. Made sense, if you thought about it. A burglar would certainly take a gun if he found one, but he’d usually have no advance knowledge of whether a weapon was kept on the premises or where it might be found. An insider would know the gun was there and maybe where it was kept, too.