by Joseph Flynn
Sweetie said, “I’d make a comment about obedience and discipline, but that would only play into someone’s fantasy life.”
McGill felt sure she didn’t mean him.
“Will you put the protected witness on the phone, please, Sweetie?”
“For you,” he heard her tell Putnam. He came on the line and asked, “You find anything, Mr. McGill?”
“Pursuing my theory.” He told Putnam about the list of names Galia had given him and asked whether Putnam agreed with the emphasis Galia placed on the three underlined names. He also wanted to know if anybody on the list stood out from Putnam’s POV.
After a beat to think things over, Putnam said, “I have to agree with all the names she gave you, and the ones she stressed. Those guys really have no use for the influence community.”
McGill laughed. “With a gift for euphemism like that, you could go into advertising.”
“Or politics,” Putnam said.
“That, too. Will I have any trouble tracking these guys down, if they’re in town?”
“None, whatsoever. I have their office numbers on the Hill and their home addresses in my phone.”
There was a meaningful pause on both ends of the call.
McGill broke it. “You have that information because it’s at least potentially useful to you, right?”
“Right.” Putnam understood McGill’s point. “So if I know where they work and live, they might have taken the trouble to find out the same things about me. About us: Erik Torkelson, Bobby Waller, Mark Benjamin and me.”
“It’s at least a possibility.”
“I’m beginning to think more highly of your theory,” Putnam said.
“Bat it around with Sweetie. Maybe you’ll come up with something I’ve overlooked. Of the three emphasized possibilities, does any one of them stand out.”
“Not that I can think of,” Putnam said.
“Okay, then I’ll check them out the way Galia put them down, alphabetically.”
Welborn Yates’ Office
Welborn was surprised to find Kira sitting behind his desk. He thought she’d be off with her mother somewhere. Having last-minute alterations done on her wedding dress, in case she had lost another half-pound. He liked her just the way she was when they met, but she had felt compelled to lose weight for the wedding. It was starting to worry him. He might have to stuff her with wedding cake.
“All’s well on the nuptial front?” he asked, taking one of his guest chairs.
“Now that you’re here, yes. You don’t plan to run off again, do you?”
“I’ll try not to.”
“If you leave me standing alone in front of Father Nguyen, I’ll hunt you down.”
“I’ll leave a trail of breadcrumbs.” He leaned over his desk and kissed her. “I’ll be there. I’m afraid you’re stuck with me now, soon-to-be Mrs. Yates.”
“Who said I’m taking your name?”
“What you call yourself in public is your business. The way I’ll think of you is a settled matter.”
“And the children, what will we call them?”
“Huey, Dewey and Louie.”
Kira laughed. “You are so lucky I can’t stay mad at you.”
He’d bet she could if he tried to cut short their honeymoon. Rather than put that idea to a direct test, he told her what had happened in Baltimore. With the Porsche and Linley Boland. Also with Eli Worthington.
For once, Kira, bless her, didn’t think of herself or someone trying to make off with her wedding gift to her betrothed. She focused on what mattered most. The apprehension and subsequent disappearance of Linley Boland.
Maybe she wouldn’t begrudge him time away, after their honeymoon.
After all, she did just now reveal a vengeful nature.
“You had him, the bastard who hurt you and killed your friends?”
“I did, and now he’s gone. But Elspeth Kendry tells me both the Secret Service and the FBI have started to look for him. I suggested the Air Force OSI be added to the mix.”
Kira understood what that meant. “You want in.”
“I do,” Welborn said, “but as you’ve just reminded me I have another obligation to tend to first.” Off Kira’s smile, he added, “And we have to get a start on adding a class of cadets to the family.”
That surprised Kira. “You want children right away?”
“I want them when the time is right. We’ll both know when. But that doesn’t mean we can’t practice the procurement process.”
Kira turned a charming shade of red as her eyes went to the doorway to see if the president or some other grandee was eavesdropping.
“Should I stop talking dirty to you?” Welborn asked.
“No, but you could lower your voice a little.”
He asked softly, “Whispering makes it naughtier?”
“Yes, it does.”
Welborn mimicked making a note of that point.
“As long as you’re here,” he told Kira, “might you tell me how I can find out the identity of a former or current member of the legislative branch who is or was called ‘The Conscience of the Congress’?”
Kira said, “That would be Representative Zachary Garner, Democrat of Virginia.”
Welborn beamed at his fiancée. “And how do you know that?”
“He’s a friend of Uncle Mather. He gave me my first pony ride at his horse farm when I was a little girl.”
“Oh.” Be damn inconvenient if he turned out to be the K Street killer.
“Is something the matter?”
Welborn dodged answering directly and asked a question of his own.
“I need to talk with him. Do you know where I might find him?”
“Not today, I don’t.”
“But thereafter?”
Kira told him, “He’ll be one of our wedding guests.”
Q Street NW, Washington, D.C.
As far as was known, Mohammed never came to the mountain, but Sir Edbert Bickford, passing through the U.S. capital, came to his nephew Hugh’s townhouse. The media mogul’s assumption was that a private residence was a better bet not to be bugged than the commercial property of his local news operation — if only because Hugh and the impudent young woman working with him would make sure of it.
Ms. Booker opened the front door for Sir Edbert before he could ring the bell, but he was sure that if the weather had required him to dress warmly she wouldn’t have lifted a finger to take his hat or coat. He didn’t know whether to fire her or seduce her.
The dilemma tickled him. Doing the former would be foolish; attempting the latter would be futile. This one wouldn’t sell herself for cash or the crown jewels. Come to that, she really wasn’t his type. Possibly might be, though, if she had the embellishments she’d mentioned the last time they’d met.
“Where’s my nephew?” Sir Edbert demanded, staying in character.
“I have him polishing the silver.”
The knight of The Most Noble Order of the Garter goggled at Ellie Booker, until he realized she was having him on and then, impudence be damned, he couldn’t keep himself from laughing.
“The revolution has come, has it?”
“Not yet,” Ellie said, “but the peasants are massing.”
She led him to the kitchen where Hugh sat at the table drinking beer and outlining the recent actions taken by Patricia Darden Grant. By looking at the past, Hugh was trying to divine the future. Get a jump on the damn woman for once.
“G’day, Uncle,” Hugh said.
“I own this hovel, don’t I?” Sir Edbert asked.
“Formerly,” Hugh told him. “You sold it to me for a song one day after the housekeeper failed to dust it to your liking.”
The nobleman snorted.
“Care for something to drink, Sir Edbert?” Ellie asked, opening the fridge to show him what was available. A bottle of Epic Armageddon caught his eye. He’d never tasted the stuff but he loved the name.
“That one,” he said, pointing.
Ellie uncapped the bottle for him and set it on the table, neither inquiring if he’d care to have his beer in a glass nor providing a coaster. She grabbed a bottle of Schweppes tonic water for herself and sat next to Hugh. Solidarity. The toiling class was indeed mobilizing.
Sir Edbert seated himself and said, “So, the two of you, all of your efforts have come to naught. Under other circumstances, I’d have to wonder if you spent all your time and a good deal of my money shagging.”
Hugh grinned. “You’ve found us out, Uncle. I decided to give that opposites-attract idea my best effort, and Ms. Booker was gracious enough to accommodate me.”
Ellie faced her employer wearing a Mona Lisa smile.
They had Sir Edbert believing for a moment.
Until Hugh added, “I’m sorry to say that though Ellie is lovely in every regard, for me there’s nothing quite as appealing as a hairy arse.”
That sentiment caused the gentleman from London to spew his first sip of Epic Armageddon, which he’d been enjoying but would never touch again. Hugh and Ellie roared with laughter.
“You’re fired,” Sir Edbert said, “both of you.”
“Father will be so pleased to learn of your decision,” Hugh said.
Ellie looked at Hugh. “We can take all our research to Fox.”
Sir Edbert’s wattles reddened and shook. “You will do nothing of the sort,” he told Ellie. Turning to Hugh, he added, “And bugger your father.”
“Uncle,” Hugh replied with a smile, “you’ve come over to my side.”
The knight of the realm grabbed Ellie’s bottle of water and downed half of it. He glowered at the two younger people. “Have you had all your fun for the moment?”
Hugh looked at Ellie. “Have we?”
“Are we still looking for work?”
They turned to Sir Edbert.
“No, you are not,” he said.
They didn’t press for a rehiring bonus.
“What have you learned?” Sir Edbert asked. “About James J. McGill.”
That was, after all, the original assignment.
“There’s no hint of either illegal activity or marital infidelity,” Hugh said.
Ellie added, “As far as I can tell there have been only three women in his life, including the president. Each knows about the other two and they all seem to get along.”
“Bloody Disney ought to make a movie,” Sir Edbert grumbled. “I thought there was something unseemly about this first girlfriend of his.”
Hugh said, “Clare Tracy admitted to me that McGill got her pregnant.”
“Were they married?”
“No.”
“Well, that’s a start.”
Ellie told Sir Edbert, “There’s no record of a live birth with Clare Tracy and James J. McGill as the parents.”
“An abortion. That’s even better.”
“Clare Tracy is still a practicing Catholic,” Ellie said. “She receives the church’s sacraments. Without being able to learn the details, I discovered that she was hospitalized for three days during her senior year at DePaul University.”
“That’s when she had the abortion,” Sir Edbert said.
Ellie shook her head. “It was a Catholic hospital, St. Joseph’s. They don’t do abortions. The strong inference is Ms. Tracy suffered a miscarriage and has since relied on her faith to comfort her.”
“Where was McGill during all this? Why didn’t he comfort her? That would be something we could —”
Hugh shook his head. “If anyone ended things, it was her. If you talked to her you would know that.”
Ellie added, “McGill remains close to his ex-wife, Carolyn, even though she initiated the divorce proceedings against him. He’s not a quitter.”
Sir Edbert clenched his teeth; then his eyes brightened.
“What was the cause of McGill’s divorce?”
Ellie said, “The former Mrs. McGill couldn’t stop worrying that her husband, then a policeman in Chicago might die a violent death. The city had a rash of such killings in the years preceding the divorce. Her fear was not irrational and the anxiety was eating her up.”
Sir Edbert snorted in disgust. A man couldn’t be expected to leave his career because he’d married a weak ninny. Even he couldn’t make anything of that, wouldn’t bother to try.
It was bloody amazing that McGill would continue to have anything to do with the woman. “So we are at a loss,” he said.
Hugh shook his head.
He said, “Patricia Grant is doing her level best to turn the order of things in the United States inside out and upside down. Revolutionaries would stand back in amazement watching her.”
“What she proposes to do, nephew, is put the likes of us at the back of a very long queue when all the favors are being handed out. Our power, our wealth, our very way of life will be diminished. The woman is a traitor to her class.”
Ellie smiled. “They said the same of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.”
“And that blighter would still be in office if he’d kept his health,” Sir Edbert grumped.
Hugh said, “There are differences, Uncle. Patricia Grant is limited to one more term at the most, and we now have a twenty-four hour news cycle. Let’s watch her every single minute of every hour. She’s bound to make a mistake and —”
“When she does, we’ll pounce!” Sir Edbert said.
Ellie added, “And if it starts to look like she’s not prone to pratfalls, we can toss a banana peel or two into her path.”
Sir Edbert liked that idea.
He was happy Ellie Booker hadn’t left him for Fox.
McGill Investigations, Inc.
Jim McGill placed a call to the Capitol Hill office of Congressman Zachary Garner, Democrat of Virginia.
Before picking up his phone, he had done some secondary source research. He found out, among other things, that Garner had been the youngest of the twenty-one Democrats on the Judiciary Committee to vote to impeach Richard Nixon. Soon thereafter, he gained a seat on the House Committee on Ethics where for decades he gave genteel hell to members of both parties who chose to act unethically or illegally.
He never used harsh language or raised his voice when questioning a member who came before the committee, but he was relentless in batting aside equivocations. He forced attempts at obfuscation to yield to clarity. He denied the use of the passive voice. Things never just happened. He assigned personal responsibility and dared the unfortunate respondent to say otherwise.
Not many did, but more than a few fell prey to memory lapses.
One congressman from California, who was later found guilty of taking kickbacks from defense contractors and sent to prison, was overheard complaining to his defense lawyer, “Who the hell does that guy think he is, the conscience of the Congress?” To which his lawyer answered, “Apparently, he’s the closest thing this place has to one.”
Garner’s picture ran in the next day’s Washington Post.
The headline: Conscience of the Congress? Apparently.
The sobriquet stuck, though Garner never used it to refer to himself.
Political adversaries covered the accolade with sarcasm, but not to Garner’s face. He stood six-foot-five and had done a good deal of manual labor on his family farm, including shoeing his own horses. He’d cast a long shadow over anyone who attempted to confront him.
And apparently, McGill thought, Garner had mystical powers that let him steal into Kenny’s room without being seen and give his son the strength to rally at least momentarily. Long enough, McGill prayed, for the bone marrow transplant to work its magic.
Please, Lord, save my son, McGill prayed as the phone rang in Garner’s office.
The congressman had a suite in the Longworth building, just down the hall from Derek Geiger, if proximate office numbers meant anything.
McGill had felt a jolt when he’d seen Garner’s name on the list Galia had given him. Had a hard time keeping the surprise off his face. He’d felt more than a li
ttle anxiety that one of the politicians most likely to object to malefactors with gunfire had befriended his sick son.
Garner was a suspect any cop would like: A guy who had been called the Conscience of the Congress wouldn’t take kindly to lobbyists taking over the government, and a guy who was dying didn’t have anything to lose, except the nickname he’d never acknowledged, by taking down lobbyists in a permanent way.
McGill thought he’d better tell Sweetie about what he’d learned.
The phone in Garner’s office rang for a fifth time and McGill was about to hang up when someone finally answered.
“Representative Garner’s office, may I help you?”
“Is he in, please?”
“Are you a constituent, sir?”
“No, I’m not. But I would like to talk with him. It’s important.”
“May I have your name, please?”
“James J. McGill.”
There was a brief pause. “The James J. McGill?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“May I inquire —”
McGill was tempted to invoke Patti’s name, bull his way past any underling, but he’d never gone down that path and didn’t want to start even now.
He said, “I’d like Congressman Garner’s help with an investigation I’m working. I think he might be able to clear up a few things for me. I really can’t say more than that.”
There was another, longer moment of silence.
“The congressman has told us staffers he really likes your wife’s ideas for lobbying reform. He thinks quite highly of the president.”
“We have that in common, then.”
“Yes, sir. Let me just make a call and see if I can’t work something out.”
“I’d appreciate that. You know where Congressman Garner is now?”
“Yes, sir. He’s on his way to a wake.”
“A wake?” The man was dying and he went to a wake? McGill asked, “Whose?”
“His, sir. He planned it quite some time ago.”
Number One Observatory Circle
Before he went to be the guest of honor at his own wake, Representative Zachary Garner stopped at Vice President Wyman’s official residence. He’d thought he might catch up for a short time with his old friend, Mather, in his East Wing office at the White House, but calling ahead to make sure he wouldn’t interrupt anything important, he’d learned the vice president was at the Queen Anne mansion that came with his job.