Grass Roots (13 page)

Will laughed.

“I’m sorry, I’m not making myself clear.

I want you to sign on with me, help me run my campaign Jack smiled broadly.

“I’d really like that. Will.” He frowned.

“But I’m not sure I can handle it.”

“I’ve got some money. I can pay you what you’ remaking here, right through the campaign. If we make it, then I want you to run my office.”

Jack stood up and grabbed Will’s hand. He seemed to be having a hard time speaking.

“It’s going to mean a lot of time away from Millie and the kids, you know.”

“She’ll go along, you know she will. She’s nuts about you.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Listen, I’m going to ask Kitty Conroy to join us, too. The two of you are all I can afford at the moment.”

“I’ll call Millie now, and see what she has to say,” Jack said.

“Thanks, and as soon as Kitty comes in, ask her to see me, will you?”

“Sure.” Jack turned to go.

“One more thing. Jack. What do you think of Hank Taylor?”

“I don’t have much direct knowledge of him,” Jack replied. He grinned.

“We’ve never had much need of a political consultant around here.”

“I knew him slightly when he was a deputy press secretary to Jimmy Carter.”

“He’s done mostly New York and California campaigns hasn’t he?”

“Yeah, but television is a New York and California business. Anyway, he’s a Southerner. He won’t have forgotten what it’s like.”

“If you say so.” Jack turned to go.

“I’ll send Kitty to you when she comes in.”

kitty Conroy jumped at the chance.

“I’ll do a good job for you. Will,” she enthused. Kitty was in her late twenties, red-haired, smart, and pretty. She was from Savannah’s large Irish community, where her father was a city councilman.

“You always have. That’s why I’m asking you. I know you’ve chafed a bit at working as a deputy, when you were perfectly well qualified to be press secretary yourself.

Well, now you’re my press secretary, as of next Monday.

Type out a resignation for the files, and ask Jack to do the same, will you? Spend the rest of the week cleaning up around here and doing what you can to see that it runs smoothly when you’re gone.”

“Sure, Will.”

“And plan to come down to Delano this weekend. Bring what you’ll need for a long stay.”

will arrived at the Watergate and took the elevator to Hank Taylor’s floor. He was asked to wait by the pretty receptionist. Will sat down and took in the cool decor, the expensive furniture, the art. From the other side of the wall behind him, he heard a stirring march strike up.

“Heald, Heald, he’s our man, if he can’t do it, nobody can!” a male chorus sang. Will winced; it was awful. Thatwould be Michael Heald, who was running for Congress in New York City’s Silk Stocking District, Will remembered.

He had begun to think that maybe he should look elsewhere for a campaign consultant when a door opened and another pretty girl asked Will to follow her. They went down a long corridor toward the corner office, and Will caught glimpses of people designing ads and editing film. The music was farther away now, and Will tried to put it out of his mind.

Hank Taylor came from behind a large glass table to greet him. Short, wiry, athletic-looking, black-rimmed glasses, silk shirt, red suspenders.

“Will, how are you, boy?” He had not lost his accent.

“Good, Hank.”

“How’s the Senator?”

“Doing better. He’s having therapy every day now, and improving.”

Taylor waved him to a chair.

“Not fast enough for November, though, huh, boy?”

Will shook his head.

“I’m afraid he’s out of it. Hank.

That’s between you and me for the moment, though.” “And you’re going to go for his seat?” Taylor asked, leaning back in his chair and grinning.

“That’s the way the Senator wants it,” Will said uncomfortably.

“I hadn’t planned to run until Barnett comes up.”

“Sure, sure.” Taylor grinned.

Will flushed.

“Let’s be clear about this. Hank. I wouldn’t be running if the Senator hadn’t asked me to.”

“Sorry, Will,” Taylor said, holding up a placating hand.

“You’re going to need a lot of help, then.” “That’s why I’m here,” Will said.

“You’re the only guy I know in this business, you’re a Southerner, and your reputation is good.”

Taylor stood up and started to pace.

“Okay, boy, let me tell you what you’ll get for your money around here.

We’ll do your television, radio, and design all printed materials.

We think it’s important to have an overall look that runs right through everything.”

“Sounds good,” Will replied.

“I give my personal attention to every single thing that comes our of this office, boy. This firm’s biggest asset is my feel for things, and as a client, you’ll get the full benefit of that.”

“Glad to hear it.”

“My guys will get your positions right on all the issues.”

“Well, Hank, I’ve got a lot of ideas of my own,” Will said.

“I’ve been writing Senator Carr’s position papers for years.”

“Sure, sure, boy, but we want to home in on one or two out-front issues, you know? For instance, education.

We’ve been getting a lot of playback on the idea of a bill offering parents government vouchers that they can spend at any private school.

Hot response, sexy stuff.”

“I’m a Democrat, Hank. I believe in public education.”

“Sure, sure, boy, I’m just throwing around ideas off the top of my head. We’ll be in sync with your convictions, don’t worry.” Taylor walked back behind his desk and sat down.

“Now, let’s get down to brass tacks,” he said.

“You got any money?”

“I’ve got enough to get us set up. Of course, fundraising is going to be very important to us.”

“Yeah, I know. We don’t handle that end, though. We’re primarily a media outfit.”

“I understand that. Now, what’s this going to cost me?”

“Our fee is seventy-five grand, thirty-seven five now and the rest the day after you win the primary. That covers all our creative fees.

We’ll bill you for production costs and add our standard 17.85 percent commission. Our media service will place all the advertising, and we split the 15 percent commission from the stations with them. Got it?” “Seems clear,” Will said, swallowing.

“Good. When can you let me have your check?”

“Well, we haven’t even got a bank account yet. Will next week be all right?”

“Sure, sure. Can I expect your check on Monday, then?”

“All right, I’ll have it in the mail by Friday.”

“Use Federal Express,” Taylor said, rising from his chair.

“More reliable.” He took Will’s arm and steered him toward the door.

“I want to send one of my guys down to see you next week, soak up some atmosphere, get your slant on the campaign, okay?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll send Tommy Black down there. He’s one of my best. You’ll like him.” Taylor walked Will to the door and down the hall to the reception room. There he stopped and took Will’s hand.

“Will, boy, I don’t want you to worry about a thing. You’ve got the best outfit in the business on your side. You’re going to be the next senator from Georgia.”

Will shook Taylor’s hand and left. As he walked toward the elevators, he could still hear the music hammering away through the walls.

“Heald, Heald, he’s our man! If Heald can’t do it, nobody can!” He shuddered.

Driving back toward the Capitol, though. Will felt somehow better prepared, more in the race. Now he had some professionals on his side.

Now, too, he was seventy-five thousand dollars in debt. detective Sergeant Charles Pittman sat at his desk at downtown Atlanta police headquarters on Decatur Street. His partner, Mickey Keane, sat facing him across the desk.

“This is everything we’ve got?” Pittman asked.

“This is it. Chuck,” Keane replied, ticking information off a list.

“We got some slugs and shell casings—Mac Tens and a Beretta handgun; we got some red mud from the shoes of these guys…”

“Red mud. Swell. The whole state of Georgia is made out of red mud.”

“Yeah,” Keane said.

“We got a tire track that’s used on a dozen General Motors vans and pickups, and some Chryslers, too. That’s it.” “We got Manny Pearl,” Pittman said.

“He’s worth a lot. He’ll make of’ Sarge, if he get a chance.”

“Sarge” was their name for the leader of the assassins.

“And we got this,” he said, opening a drawer and tossing a thick stack of computer printouts onto the desk.

“An answer to my Pentagon inquiry. Just information, no pictures.

There’s five hundred and eighteen of them, and the guy I talked to balked at printing five hundred and eighteen photographs.

The reason there’s so many is, we’ve got half a dozen major army bases in the state, thank old Senator Ben Carr for that, and a lot of guys who serve in the state like it and retire here. Thank God we’re not Florida; we’d have ten thousand to go through.”

“What were your parameters for the search?” Keane asked.

“Army, retired less than ten years, buck sergeant or better, Georgia resident.”

Keane picked up the stack of sheets, tore off half, and tossed the remainder to Pittman.

“How you want to do this?”

“Pearl says he’s tall and skinny. Pity they don’t keep track of ear size in the army. Let’s look for what—six feet and under a hundred and sixty?”

“Pearl’s short. Five-ten might look tall to him.”

“Okay, five-ten.”

“What if our man weighed two-twenty when he retired, then lost fifty pounds?”

Pittman laughed.

“Nobody loses weight in middle age.

I’ll bet our man has been skinny all his life.”

Both men began going through the sheets, painstakingly reading height and weight on the forms and setting aside the shorter, heavier men. At lunchtime, they ordered a pizza and continued working while they ate.

By the end of their shift, they had finished.

Pittman counted the forms.

“Eighty-one more-or-less tall, skinny retired sergeants,” he said.

“Why don’t we separate out the Atlanta addresses? I doubt if these guys drove up from south Georgia just to blow away a dirty bookstore.”

They went through the papers again.

“An even dozen,” Pittman counted.

“Now we can ask the Pentagon for pictures.”

He typed out a telex, left it with the operator, and called it a day.

it was just after lunch the following day when the photographs came back. Pittman and Keane shuffled through them.

“Funny how most tall, skinny guys seem to have big ears, ain’t it?” Keane said.

“Let’s go see Manny Pearl,” Pittman said.

man ny was sitting up in bed when Pittman and Keane entered the room.

“How you feeling, Mr. Pearl?” Pittman asked.

“The kid neurologist says my left side is impaired,” Manny says.

“They’re talking therapy now.”

“You’ll be jogging again in no time,” Pittman said.

“Hah!” Pearl snorted.

“I should get over getting shot in the head so I can wear myself down to nothing, running around?”

Pittman pulled a chair up to the bed and took the photographs from an envelope.

“Mr. Pearl, we’ve got some pictures to show you. Your army idea sounded good to us, so we’ve got twelve pictures here that the Pentagon sent us. Every one of these guys is tall, skinny, retired from the army as a sergeant, and lives in the Atlanta area. I want you to look at each one carefully and tell me if any one of them is the man who shot you. Take your time.”

Manny took his time. With his half-glasses perched on his prominent nose, he gazed solemnly at each photograph, running his eyes over the face and ears. When he had finished, he handed the photographs back to Pittman.

“Nope,” he said emphatically, “he’s not among them.”

“Why don’t you look at them again, Mr. Pearl,” Keane said.

“Let’s be absolutely certain about this.”

“All right,” Manny said. He repeated his performance, taking even more time.

“Sorry, you haven’t found him yet, gentlemen.” He handed back the photographs.

Pittman stood wearily.

“Okay, Mr. Pearl. Thanks for your time. We’ll keep looking.”

“Sergeant,” Manny said, “when you find him, I’ll know. Believe me.”

“I believe you, Mr. Pearl,” Pittman said.

“What next?” Keane said, when they were in the hallway.

“We’ll talk the Pentagon out of shots of the other sixty-nine in the tall skinny group. If that doesn’t work, we’ll start on the Marines.”

Pittman sighed.

“What the hell, it’s all we’ve got to go on.” will stood before Judge Boggs. His arguments for bail were pretty much as they had been in Larry Moody’s preliminary hearing: no previous record, roots in the community, gainfully employed, necessary to the conduct of his employer’s business. John Morgan sat in the front of the courtroom, ready to make bail. Charlene Joiner sat next to him.

Elton Hunter then had his say.

“Your Honor, the defendant has been indicted for a capital crime, that of first-degree murder. The circumstances justifying bail on such a charge would have to be extraordinary, and they are not extraordinary.

To release the defendant on bail at this time would constitute a danger to every woman in the county.

The prosecution requests that application for bail be denied.”

The Judge shuffled papers for a moment, scribbled something, then looked up.

“Bail is denied. The defendant is bound over to the sheriff until trial. Is there any objection to setting a trial date at this time?”

Will stood.

“Your Honor, the defense requests a meeting in chambers.”

The Judge looked at him blankly. “Why? I’m prepared to set a date now.”

“If Your Honor please, I would be grateful for a meeting in chambers.”

The Judge looked at Elton Hunter, who shrugged. Boggs sighed.

“All right. We’ll meet in chambers in ten minutes.

I got a call of nature to answer.”

Will took Larry to the rail to speak with Charlene and John Morgan.

“Folks, I’m afraid this is as expected. There was never much chance of bail, not on this charge.”