A Thousand Years of Darkness: a Thriller (27 page)

He glanced over to see if Nail was following him. Nail sat with his hands clasped across his knees and his head down, listening.

“Massa going to take care all us chil’ren ’cause we too stupid to do it ourself. Massa going to tell us how much money we can make, what we can eat, where we allow to live, where we work... We so stupid government put warning labels on lawn mowers: ‘Don’t stick your hand in the blades.’ You can’t escape. On your mattress—
on your mattress!—
it say; ‘It’s a violation of federal law to remove this label.’”

Nothing got Big C hotter than talking about government intrusion.

“We was once independent-minded folks who take care of ourself and our own people. We expect nothing from government except to be left alone. Now, we demand government give us Social Security, unemployment insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, student loans, food stamps, welfare, a college education... On and on. What Sharon and Rush Limbaugh and Zenergy News doing is trying to educate people. But it never going to work until we build back a independent culture that allow for the Constitution. That is not going to happen. It’s done too late for talk. They nothing left except action for the few of us left who still values freedom.”

Nail realized from his experience as a cop that people had a general propensity for obeying authority. Blind obedience certainly followed “if the government feeds you.” It was all too big, too overwhelming for him to believe he could have any impact on turning the country back from the direction it was headed. Especially since his own life from here on meant surviving on the run, living underground like a chased rat.

Out off the Creek Turnpike in Tulsa he had seen a billboard that he suspected expressed the future of mankind.

There Is No God

Rational Atheism is the Answer

Was that truly what man had to look forward to? Belief in
nothing?

PART III

“If we understand the mechanism of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing it.”

Edward Barnays,
Propaganda

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chicago

“
Rich
people will be there. The best kind,” Majority Leader Joe Wiedersham said, followed by that bark that served as laughter. “They’ll cheerfully cough up their dough for the cause.”

“For hope ’n change,” Trout muttered and hurriedly smiled to mask his growing cynicism.

Wiedersham hailed the black limo waiting for them in the roundabout of the Hyatt-Regency. Justin Cobb, 34, Wiedersham’s new chief of staff and Trout’s replacement, was already waiting in the car. Cobb had been a campaign gofer during Anastos’ run for the presidency. He was younger and thinner than Trout and wore an Al Capone hat that lent him a cold, sinister look. The look didn’t change when he doffed his hat in deference to Wiedersham. Trout doubted the guy ever woke up in a cold sweat at night over
anything
Wiedersham might ask him to do.

The political event to which they were bound was being held at the McCormick Place Convention Center, on the outdoor terrace overlooking Lake Michigan by moonlight. Part fund-raiser, part testimonial to the late leftwing Professor Howard Rhine, it was being attended by the glitterati of Hollywood, the media, and other sympathetic Marxist-leaning reformers. George Zuniga was coming. President Anastos opted out, since Zenergy News was certain to be lurking in the shadows in ambush. Soon, Wiedersham predicted, they wouldn’t have to worry about Zenergy News, Rush Limbaugh, Sharon Lowenthal....They wouldn’t have to worry about elections.

Out of curiosity, since Trout had never heard of Howard Rhine, he had conducted a web search beforehand. Although government was constantly scrubbing the web for detrimental or offensive references to government, Trout found enough to learn that Rhine had been a member of the Communist Party USA and a professor at the University of Chicago with Anastos buddies Bill Ackart and Bernadine Samson-Ackart, the 1970s activists-bombers. He was a lifetime member of The Institute for Open Societies, a pro-Marxist think tank founded by George Zuniga, and he had authored the revisionist textbook,
A People’s History of the United States
, that was being force fed to college students in at least thirty states so far. The American Progress Center, also founded by Zuniga, conceded that Rhine’s text “basically offered nothing in terms of ways to think about solutions to the problems of the world—but most of the best people have read it and that’s a pretty impressive achievement.”

Trout scoffed at the reference to “best people.”
He
had never read it.

Rhine’s New York
Times
obituary described him as “an activist, a socialist, a pacifist, an anti-racist who never strayed from his conviction that humanity was capable of making this a better world.”

Trout doubted Wiedersham knew squat about the man they were honoring and probably cared less. What was important was the fundraising and making an appearance among people who counted. Hold your nose and go for it. For the good of the nation. For the good of the world. For your own good. Better to be a shepherd than a sheep.

Wiedersham and Cobb began their intrigue before the limousine had gone a block from the Hyatt-Regency. Wiedersham settled in the rear seat with Trout while Cobb faced them in the other seat. Although a soundproof glass between them and the driver permitted normal private conversation, Cobb leaned toward the Majority Leader like Reggie did when he thought Marilyn was going to pet him. If he’d had a tail, it would have been wagging like crazy. The guy’s ass kissing was pathetic.

Wiedersham crossed one leg over the other. He glanced at his watch. His shoes were Italian Gravitas, his watch a Rolex Oyster. On his lap lay an open copy of
Wall Street Journal
bearing the headline
Jerry Baer’s Warriors Turn to Sharon Lowenthal
. Wiedersham and Cobb seemed to be in agreement that the cunt had to be derailed before her train picked up speed.

Judging from her first rabble-rousing show, she might easily surpass Baer in influence and popularity among America’s Homers. Although Trout didn’t know it for a fact, he suspected Wiedersham was behind lifting the warrant for her arrest in order to clear the way for her return to New York where she would be more accessible.

“Boss, how does this sound?” Cobb asked, snicking on the overhead lamp in order to read a statement. “‘I hereby offer to negotiate a one-hundred-thousand-dollar payday to the person or persons who will come forward with a sex tape or phone record or anything else that succeeds in discrediting Sharon Lowenthal and removing her from the public eye—?’”

Wiedersham frowned and flicked his fingers. The pleased-with-himself look disappeared from Cobb’s face.

“Boss, they won’t be able to trace it to us—”

“Where do you propose releasing it?”

“Radio Air America?”

“Too obvious. Let me think about it.”

Trout turned his head away and looked out the window as the limo picked up speed on South Lake Shore Drive. Headlights were already coming on.

“Don’t look so stressed, Dennis,” Wiedersham admonished, barking more quick laughter. “There won’t be any coconut cream pies tonight.”

Cobb sniggered. Trout glared at him. Wiedersham’s foot crossed over the opposite knee and began to jiggle.

“What about the Tulsa cop that shot Kimbrell?” Wiedersham asked Cobb. “Is he fucking the Lowenthal bitch when he’s not shooting people? We might explore that possibility.”

“Apparently, his daughter was killed when—”

“I know all that. Kimbrell was a fool for not taking care of business when he had the opportunity. From what I gather, this Nail is a loose cannon. Mr. Zuniga doesn’t like loose cannons. They make people nervous.”

Wiedersham’s foot jiggled harder.

“He got his revenge,” Cobb said reassuringly. “That’s probably the last we’ll hear from him until he’s in jail.”

“I’m not so sure,” Wiedersham pondered. “Anything on the black cop with him?”

“Homeland Security promises they’ll soon catch both of them.”

Wiedersham sneered. “Vladimir Gonzalez couldn’t catch his ass with both hands.”

We are charming bastards, aren’t we?
Trout thought. The Saul Alinsky method of persuasion in action. You ridiculed the worthy, attacked the courageous, bribed the weak—
like me
—and intimidated the cowardly and ignorant, until no one remained to question your power and you were secure and ready to implement real change. In the name of the people, of course.

The limo slowed and pulled into the Convention Center, terminating further conversation. Other limos and chauffeur-driven cars ahead were releasing their beautiful people. An attractive blonde in a low-cut gown smiled and wiggled her fingers at Wiedersham when he got out on the sidewalk with Cobb and Trout. Trout recognized her as the upcoming new starlet in
Forever Sundown
. He wondered who was buttering her toast.

Someone popped up in front of him with a video feed.

“Get that thing out of my face,” he snarled, “or I’ll shove it up your ass and call you a popsicle.”

First Lady Targets Childhood Obesity

(Washington)—
First Lady Cynthia Anastos unveiled more of the President’s Fitness, Sports and Nutrition Program at a D.C. middle school today in the administration’s ongoing crusade against childhood obesity. She said the President will sign an executive order requiring school teachers to monitor the weight of all children and issue a “body mass index” on report cards. The idea is to “encourage parents of overweight children to seek help for their kids—and themselves.” Parents who fail to heed body mass index reports are subject to child abuse action from the Department of Human Services and may face criminal or civil charges...

“This will make the American people healthier and happier,” President Anastos said. “If they won’t do it for themselves, then we’ll make sure they do it...”

Chapter Forty-Eight

New York

What appeared to be an elderly man with a limp shuffled past Rockefeller Center. A hole in the right shoe of his old sneakers exposed a bare big toe. His hair was gray but thick. Likewise the mustache. He wore horn-rimmed glasses mended with a paper clip through one of the arm hinges. Ratty jeans and a too-big flannel shirt with an oil stain on the back, as though from crawling in and out from underneath a car, completed James Nail’s disguise. He carried a Missouri driver’s license and a Social Security card in the name of Jonathan Harker. Even Big C would probably not have recognized him.

The worst part of living with the homeless guise was sleeping outdoors and in Dipsy Dumpsters in alleys. Last night he crashed in Central Park, pushing himself in underneath bushes near The Pond where police weren’t apt to find him. He had lost weight too, picking up only one meal a day at a mission or Salvation Army soup kitchen. On the positive side, the human wreckage that wandered the streets of New York was all but invisible to most people. The homeless had almost doubled in recent months, what with the collapsing economy, providing Nail even greater concealment.

This was the best way he knew to keep a protective eye on Sharon without the police or Homies slapping a collar on him. TV sets in display windows sometimes ran photos of Big C and him. They were described as “domestic terrorists...armed and extremely dangerous.”
Enemies of the State.

Nail’s weary, limping gait brought him to Avenue of the Americas and the Zenergy News Building where Sharon’s studio was located. The constant din of traffic and the throbbing buzz of people trapped in the canyons of Manhattan’s skyscrapers jangled his nerve endings. New York reminded him of the frenzied, mindless energy of an ant colony that had been poisoned. People rushing about all jammed together in each other’s armpits and bad breath.

It did provide a certain anonymity, however.

Down the block from Zenergy a stand of suffocated maples within a wall pretended to give the city a splotch of greenery and perhaps remind inhabitants that there
might
be life elsewhere. It was still early light, the morning rush beginning, when Nail posted himself against the wall, sitting clumped up with his back against it, waiting for Sharon to arrive accompanied by her two private bodyguards. Nail had little faith in her security. Bodyguards hadn’t done Jerry Baer any good.

Normally, since Sharon lived only a few blocks away, she and her escort walked to and from work; Nail usually followed at a discreet distance. This morning, however, a car picked her up, either because she had other things to do on the way to work or because the sky threatened rain. Nail was watching from an alley across from Sharon’s
Hampton Arms
apartment when the car arrived. That, not Central Park, was where he spent most nights in order to be nearby in the event of danger. He was prepared to keep up his vigil, no matter how long, since he knew in his gut
they
would come after her again sooner or later.

She was late arriving at the studio this morning. It made him uneasy when she was out of his sight or varied her routine. Maybe she stopped in to visit Jerry Baer’s widow and kids on her way to work, as she sometimes did.

To kill time and give the impression that he was doing something, he removed a worn paperback from inside his shirt, tucked into the waistband of his loose-fitting jeans next to the .38-caliber S&W Featherweight Big C had given him before they split up. Ayn Rand’s classic
Atlas Shrugged
. Sharon said the novel ranked near the top of a
Subversive Literature
list secretly published by the government. Reading, he went over the same passage two or three times; he kept glancing up to let his eyes sweep the street and sidewalks for signs of Sharon or of trouble.