Atropos (27 page)

Ainley had taken to carrying a gun himself, a .25 caliber automatic. A little popgun, really, all but worthless for anything other than fighting off a face-to-face attack, but at least it was
something.
He was no hero, but he wasn’t a fool, either. He’d taken lessons. If he needed to use the gun, he could. And would, if it meant protecting his own life or that of a Van Horn.

Ainley nodded to one of the security men, who nodded back and told him the Senator and his son had been in their rooms for the last hour and a half or so. Ainley decided to be grateful for small favors. He knocked on the door.

Mark Van Horn said, “Ainley! Come on in.”

Ainley looked at him and rolled his eyes. Mark was wrapped in a towel.

Mark grinned. “Caught me again. Dad’s in the shower now. Wait a minute while I get dressed.”

It wasn’t much more than a minute. Mark came back wearing blue jeans and a rugby shirt open at the neck. He looked much younger than his years; he really was a handsome young man.

“I’m glad,” Ainley said with some asperity, “that you weren’t both showering, or I might not have gotten in at all.”

Mark grinned. “We have been kind of busy,” he said.

“There was a time when I was trusted to know the Van Horns’ business,” Ainley said.

Mark was suddenly serious. He came to Ainley, clapped a hand to the older man’s shoulder, and left it there. Ainley could feel the weight of it. He could almost imagine he felt its warmth through suit and vest and shirt and underwear. He did not speak.

Mark looked deeply into Alley’s eyes. “Ainley, please, don’t worry about this. I know what’s bothering you, and I don’t blame you. It’s just that some things are going on—”

“Going on?”

“Well, being discussed. Things that will change the organization of the family. Things that concern me.”

The hand was still on his shoulder. Ainley tried to ignore it. “Things that concern me?”

“If they concern me, Ainley, they concern you. I’d no more think of taking on a responsibility without you to shepherd me through it than I would try to shave with a lawn mower.”

Ainley usually had complete control over his emotions, but that was slipping. Right now, he would have been hard-pressed to name
what
he was feeling.

“It’s very gratifying to hear that,” he said. “But I’d still like to know why I haven’t been a party to any of these ‘discussions’ of ‘things.’”

“Ainley, I swear, I’ll explain later. It’s no reflection on you, I promise. You’ve got to trust me; stand by me.” Mark put his other hand on Amiens other shoulder and squeezed. “I
need
you, Ainley,” he said.

Ainley felt as if he should make some response, but for the first time in his life, he was at a loss for words.

Just then, the Senator walked in, wearing a royal-blue robe. Mark’s hands fell from Ainley like dead birds. Ainley himself jumped back, as though he’d been caught doing something shameful.

The Senator, as usual, was oblivious. “Ainley,” Hank Van Horn said heartily. “Where the devil have you been keeping yourself?”

Ainley decided to let it pass.

Mark said, “Ainley was just coming to tell you the details of the press conference, Dad.”

“Oh. Good work, Ainley.”

Just then, Mark winked at him. Ainley found it hard to suppress a grin. “Thank you, Senator,” he said. “The conference is set for 9:00
P.M.
in the Grand Ballroom on the eleventh floor of this hotel. There will be a brief statement by you, I assume giving your endorsement ...”

The Senator ignored the hint. Ainley went on. “... followed by questions from the press. There will be a buffet and reception afterward, which should put the press in a good mood after the questions.”

“It doesn’t always work,” the Senator said.

Ainley ignored him. “Ordinarily, I would arrange for the endorsee to arrive sometime during the proceedings for photo opportunities—”

“That’s a good idea, Ainley. You should do that.”

“You have not told me, Senator,” Ainley said in a tight voice, “whom you are endorsing.”

The Senator was shocked. “I
haven’t?”

Ainley’s voice was very quiet. “No, Senator.”

At which point, the Senator called himself a fool (a pronouncement on the Senator’s part equally remarkable for its rarity and its accuracy) and told Ainley whom he was endorsing. This was followed by an apology so offhanded Ainley suspected it was actually sincere.

“Will you get in touch with his people and ask them to be there?” Mark said.

“I’ll handle it,” Ainley said. He stood up, shook hands all around, and left feeling much better than he had when he arrived.

T
HE SENATOR SAT DOWN
and beamed at his son. He had a feeling of happiness he supposed was parental pride. Hank had to admit to himself that that was a feeling he never expected to experience—he hadn’t had that much to do with raising Mark, after all. Still, whatever he’d done, it must have been the right thing. Hank chuckled.

Mark was sitting on the sofa, his legs stretched way out in front of him. He’d been staring at his toenails in apparent fascination, as though they were tiny television screens. Now he lifted his head and looked at his father. “What are you laughing at, Dad?”

“Oh, just a thought I had. This family has had everything but the White House and a motto; I expect you’ll take care of the White House.”

Now Mark smiled. “One way or another, Dad,” he said, “I promise I’ll take care of the White House.”

“Well, I just came up with the motto—
Whatever we do, it must be right.”

“I like that,” Mark told him. “Nice double meaning and everything.”

The Senator frowned. He thought hard for a few seconds, then he got it and grinned. “My God, we might actually be able to use it.”

“Well, let’s save it for a while, okay, Dad?”

“Whatever you say, son.” Hank Van Horn had probably said those words a hundred times over the years, but they were empty things, a way to get the kid off his back. “Whatever you say, son,” had really meant “Go bother the housekeeper about it, or your mother, or Ainley, or the driver, or whomever. Don’t bother me.”

This time, for the first time, he meant the words literally. Hank had thought
he
was smart and tough. Van Horns were
raised
to be smart and tough. But Mark had them all beat—the dead war hero, the dead astronaut, all of them all the way back to the patriarch. What Mark had done was simply—staggering.

And he had done it all for his father.

Hank had found out about what Mark had been up to shortly after the Russians had returned him. They’d gone back to the Van Horn town house for the first of these little father-son chats.

And Mark had told him.
Twelve
of them. His son had killed twelve of the bastards without a second thought. Just to get him out from under, which, as Mark had pointed out, the kidnapping and Helen’s murder by the Russians proved it was essential to do.

“They said they’d look out for you, didn’t they?” Mark had demanded. “This proves they won’t care.”

At first, Hank had refused to believe it. But when Mark told him the whole story, beginning with his having cracked the wall safe the Senator had been so careful to have installed, and ending with the death of the last possible wiretapping bastard in Minneapolis, the Senator could do nothing but sit there shaking his head in awe.

He had begun to see why Ainley had always been so gaga over Mark. Hank would ask his son questions, and Mark would deflect him with, “Don’t worry, Dad, it’s all part of a plan I have,” and the Senator wouldn’t even mind. For now, Mark said, all they had to do was to follow whatever instructions Gus Pickett passed along from General Dudakov. The General himself had stayed back in Washington. Apparently he wasn’t feeling too well, and anyway, it might look a little fishy for a Russian general to follow the band to a key primary.

Since all Hank had been doing was following instructions in any case, Mark’s plan was easy to keep to. They had run into a bit of trouble when they’d run into that Albright character, on the way out of the meeting where Gus Pickett had finally told Hank who the hell he was supposed to endorse.

The black man bothered Hank. “I think we ought to finish him, you know,” he said to his son.

“Of course, Dad,” Mark said. “But we’ve got to find out who he’s working for, and what he might have told them.”

“You told me Ed and Jeff don’t think he knows anything.” Ed and Jeff were muscle that worked for Gus Pickett. Mark hadn’t been too impressed with them. He said they got their ideas of how to be smart and tough from reading private-eye novels.

“I’ll find out for sure tonight. After your speech, and the interview with Regina Hudson.”

“Oh, son, I want you with me during the reception.” Hank tried to keep the disappointment out of his voice; he didn’t entirely succeed.

Mark shook his head. “As much as I’d like to, Dad, no. This is your night, yours and the candidate’s.”

“If it’s my night, then I should be able to have my son with me if I want to.”

Mark shook his head again. “No, Dad, the press would see it as my political ‘coming-out’ party, and I’m not ready for that, yet. Plus, we don’t want to upset the General. He’s planned for years and years for you to make just this statement at just this time in such a way that it will make the greatest possible impact. If anything happens to dilute the attention your endorsement is supposed to get, he may be angry. And we’re not ready to defy him, yet.”

Hank scratched his head. “You’re right. Of course, you’re right. Should have seen it myself.”

That’s okay, Dad,” Mark said.

“There’s still one thing I don’t understand, though.”

“Yes?” Was that a trace of impatience in his son’s voice? No, couldn’t be. No man had ever had more convincing proof that his son loved him.

“I still don’t understand
how
taking care of those twelve ...
people
is going to help. There’s still a tape, and you-know-who still has it. What’s to stop him from playing it once we do defy him?”

“I told you, Dad, it’s all part of the plan. Nobody who hears that tape will believe it, I promise.”

“Well, okay, but—”

“Dad, if I work this right, the General won’t dare even
play
the tape.”

And his son smiled so warmly that the Senator could do nothing but believe him.

T
HE WORK HAD LEAKED
, as the word always does. An aide brought the news to the candidate at his suite. The aide was controlling his face. The candidate was, too. He put a slight smile on his face, and asked the aide to leave him alone with the news for a while. He’d speak to the whole staff when the news was absolutely official.

The candidate (in lighter moods he liked to think of himself as “The Siberian Candidate,” or “The Muscovian Candidate”) went into his private bedroom and locked the door behind him. He felt more excited than he had since he was a boy, and had first started on this road. He had to cork his mouth with both hands to prevent unseemly squeals of joy from leaping out.

He could see the headlines now—
VAN HORN ENDORSES BABINGTON
. The press interviews. The photos—the endorser with his arm around the endorsee. Van Horn perhaps kissing Mrs. Babington. Speculation that the Governor might name Senator Van Horn to the second spot on the ticket, or to a senior Cabinet post when, as seemed likely, he was elected in November.

Well, the candidate thought, this is what I’ve been promised all along. A greased chute straight to the White House. And when I get there, oh, my friends, history is going to be made. Not the kind of history anybody knows about while it’s happening, of course. But future generations, the children of one just and happy socialist world, would know him as the man who devoted his life in secret labor to conquer the People’s greatest enemy—and that he did it
without war.

Tonight was the major step. Tonight, Henry Van Horn’s destiny redeemed his crimes. You might say that poor Josephine Girolamo had died in fire so the man in this hotel room, in a city in the middle of a wheat field, could neutralize the only real obstacle to the glowing future he saw for the world. The candidate decided that one day, if it proved to be safe, he would cause some important building to be named after the girl as a memorial. There were already too many things named after the Van Horns.

There was a knock at the door.

“Yes?” the candidate said.

“Phone call for you, Congressman. It’s Governor Babington.”

The candidate grinned. He wanted to laugh out loud.

“Congressman Abweg?” the aide asked.

“Yes, Gary,” Congressman Stephen Abweg said. “I’m here. I’ll take the call out there.”

Abweg shrugged into his jacket, straightened his shoulders, and left the room.

“I suspect it’s about Senator Van Horn’s speech tonight, Congressman,” Gary said.

“Undoubtedly,” Abweg told him.

Congressman Abweg was very conscious of his posture and the look on his face as he walked to the phone. The press would be all over his staff once the story broke for sure; for all he knew, some of these people had already been talking. The Congressman had to make sure the reporters heard he took it all with confidence and dignity. That was important.

He picked up the phone and talked to Babington. The Governor hinted at a Vice-Presidential slot for Abweg if he withdrew from the race after tonight’s endorsement. Not in so many words, of course, and couched in terms of the “good of the Party.”

Abweg declined confidently, and with dignity. He said he would carry on with his campaign until the convention, and let the assembled multitude decide. He would have had to say that in any case, of course, and Babington must have known it.

Abweg decided that Babington had called merely to gloat.

Abweg walked back to his room with more confident dignity. He was thinking
let the poor bastard enjoy it. It’s only going to last a day or so before it all comes crashing down on him.

I
F MURPHY EVER WANTED
concrete proof that I’m not a real journalist, Trotter thought, all he’d have to do is look at me now. Trotter smiled. All around him people were talking loud into telephones, or staring into orange-on-black computer terminals, taking in information and feeding it back to Kirkester.