Stranglehold (23 page)

“I have a perfect employment record. You never know when you might need your employer to give you a recommendation.”

She was starting to irritate me. It was easy to see her now as the snitch in grade school who reported everything to the teacher.

“The police wouldn't do anything, anyway. There'd be no reason to. Not at this point. Did you try his home?”

“Yes. I talked to the maid. She said that David came home late and went to bed. She said he had an early breakfast and left for the office. That was around seven o'clock. Nobody's seen or talked to him since.” She touched a slender finger to the Kleenex box; there seemed to be solace in the act because she sighed. “I'm just so worried about him.”

I took out my card and placed it on her desk. “There's my cell phone. No matter what time it is, if you learn anything, call me. Meanwhile, I'll do some checking of my own.”

“You'll really help me with this?”

“Of course. I just want to keep it quiet while I'm doing it.”

“I'm sorry, Mr. Conrad. This has—this has just really frightened me.”

She'd always called me Mr. Conrad, even when the group of us had had dinner in Chicago. She was just being proper, I supposed, the way her favorite book instructed her to—
The Secretary's Guide to Anal-Retentive Behavior
. There was no point now in trying to get her to call me Dev.

“Remember, call me the minute you hear anything.”

“I will. Of course I will.”

I reached over and placed my hand on hers. “This'll have a happy ending, Doris. He'll turn up and he'll be fine. You'll see.”

Then I was walking to the stairs. I wondered how long it'd be before she hauled her rosary out again.

On the way to campaign headquarters I punched between three radio call-in shows. Each was dealing with the subject of Congresswoman Cooper's son and the fact that he was being held for questioning
by police. Somewhere amid the din of disapproval there was a gentler, more reasoned voice, female, making the point that a fair number of women had put illegitimate children up for adoption and that the fact that they were together again would be good for both of them. And that maybe we—the public we—should wait to see what kind of evidence the police had before judging Bobby guilty. She wasn't on long. Who wanted to hear this kind of conciliatory crap when finding a tree for lynching was so much more fun?

At four-thirty in the afternoon the front of headquarters was empty except for volunteer staffers. Between rain, fog, and headlines the usual crew of young helpers had found other things to do after school. In the staff office in back, only Ben and Kristin remained. Kristin was laboring through a telephone conversation with a reporter who was obviously checking out various rumors. Duffy was probably floating a few of them—just as we would—but this kind of situation produces fictions through some kind of organic process that borders on magic.
Then Susan wasn't a lesbian after all? Had Susan produced other illegitimate children we didn't know about and were any of them of the colored persuasion perhaps? Was there any possibility that Susan had been impregnated by an alien and that Bobby was a Venusian spy?

I got myself a cup of coffee and sat down at a Mac to check my e-mail. I needed to get caught up on the two other races my company was handling. The news made me feel better than it should have. I was probably just thankful that there weren't any scandals associated with either one. We were holding small leads in both, but right now that felt like smashing victories.

“I'm meeting somebody for an early dinner,” Kristin said, slipping into her tan Burberry and grabbing her umbrella. “If either of you need me, I'll keep my cell on.”

“What could go wrong?” Ben said. “Not on this campaign.”

Kristin laughed. “Oh, God, don't even joke about it. I just keep
thinking the worst is over and then something else happens. It's been like that since they found Monica Davies in her hotel room.”

“Dev here has assured me that if we can just keep Susan's police record as a hooker away from the press, everything'll be fine.”

“And don't forget when she was teaching grade school and selling crack to her students,” I said. I was glad to be making fun of it all. At this point there wasn't much else to do with it. “But I'm pretty sure that won't come out, either.”

“You two are terrible,” Kristin said. “You should have more respect for teachers who sell crack to their third-grade students.”

And with that she was gone into the cold, wet, black afternoon.

Ben took three calls from the press with no more than a few minutes between each one. He was patient and professional until the very end of the third one, when his sighs filled the room. “No, I told you Bobby hadn't been officially charged with murder. Right now all they're doing is questioning him.” Pause. “I know there's a story on one of the radio stations that he's been charged, but it isn't true and that's why we don't have a statement about him being charged.” Pause. “I'll tell you what, Nina. Call the police station. They'll confirm what I've said.” Pause. “You're welcome.”

After he hung up, he turned in his chair and said to me, “Kristin's off to meet the new one.”

“I figured.”

“It won't work out any better than the other ones, but right now she won't admit that to herself.”

“But as soon as he mentions settling down and raising a family—”

“Kristin's a political junkie just like us. She should settle down and have kids, but she probably won't.”

“Look at her role models—you and I were shit parents. No offense.”

“She'd be a hell of a lot better at it than we were.”

“That wouldn't be too hard.”

I always wondered if that wasn't one of the reasons Ben and I were such good friends. We'd only gotten to know our children after they were grown. There was a lot of remorse and shame in our conversations.

But now it was back to work. We both knew what we were up against, and that the odds of succeeding were getting longer by the hour. I'd spent half a delusional day convincing myself that after a fess-up press conference the story would go away. But we'd had to play defense at the press conference. And we hadn't expected the news about Bobby being sought by the police.

Another reporter called. Ben went back at it. He threw fastballs, sliders, curves. Ben at his best, which was very, very good.

And while he was talking I wrote e-mails to the managers of our other two campaigns. One of them wrote back immediately, saying that the Susan story was starting to get traction up where he was working. Not what I wanted to hear.

I was thinking about dinner and a few drinks when the cell phone in my pants pocket bleated. I didn't recognize the number of the caller. “Hello.”

“Mr. Conrad?” The voice was unmistakable. Sister from the beauty shop.

“Yes.”

She identified herself and then said, speaking quietly, almost a whisper, “We'll be closing up here pretty soon. I had a talk with Heather and I'm real worried about her. She says she's gonna leave town tonight.”

“Did she say why?” I tried not to sound excited—you know, like a doctor when he sees a thirty-pound tumor; nothing here to get agitated about at all, Mr. Gleason—so I stayed calm. But obviously Heather was afraid now and I wondered why.

“She—” Now her words were barely audible. “Could you just come over here? I need to go. She's coming back here to the office now.” She clicked off.

Ben was answering another call as I hung up. I heard him say, “Yes, Natalie. He's right here.”

Ben waggled the receiver in my direction and rolled his eyes. Sotto voce he said, “She's pissed off!”

I punched in the blinking line and picked up the receiver. “Hi, Natalie.”

“This is to inform you that as of this moment our reelection campaign is officially being run by Crane and Wilbur from Washington, D.C. In return for your help with any transition problems they might have, I'll personally see to it that all your reasonable fees and charges are paid promptly.”

I was pretty sure she'd written this down and was reading it.

“They're flying six people out here tomorrow morning. I'll be announcing the changeover tonight. I've called two newspapers and three TV stations. I plan to be professional. All I'll say is that we had certain intractable disagreements about procedures. I won't get into personalities.”

“I appreciate that, Natalie.”

Ben stood over me now. He sensed the nature of the call.

“Wyatt said to tell you that he sends his best and that he wishes all of you good luck.”

“That's very nice of him. And good luck to you and the campaign, Natalie.”

“Good-bye, Dev.”

“Bye, Natalie.”

“She fucking dumped us?”

“Yep,” I said, hanging up.

“This late in the campaign?”

“Crane and Wilbur.”

“No shit? Well, at least she made a good choice. They're on a roll.”

“They're sending an invasion force tomorrow. Six people. They'll
want to see everything. According to Natalie, if we help them with the transition, she'll pay all the ‘reasonable' bills we submit.”

“I love that ‘reasonable.' Pure Natalie.”

I pushed back from the desk and went to get my coat. Natalie's call hadn't done its damage yet. It probably wouldn't do its worst until the middle of the night when I'd wake up and face the fallout from being fired. I doubted Natalie would keep her word. She'd managed to stick a shiv in us at least once during these interviews. She'd also try to cheap-jack us on the bills, denying this one and that one as legitimate expenses. If she said anything especially nasty, we'd have to respond. The public wouldn't care about our battle, but insiders would. Like Susan at her press conference, we'd be on the defensive. We'd have to explain ourselves, and even those who'd been in our position from time to time would pretend otherwise and shake their heads and say poor old Dev must be losing it. It was vanity mostly, I knew. But the image of certain enemies smirking over martinis at the mention of your name was not comforting.

“Where are you going?” Ben said. He sounded plaintive. He didn't want to be alone at this moment, and I didn't blame him. But just because we'd been fired didn't mean I wanted Bobby to sit in jail any longer than he had to.

“I'm sorry, Ben. Sometime tonight steaks and drinks are on me.”

“A lot of drinks.”

“A lot, a lot.”

“Dumped by a fricking starlet,” he said. “With one of the greatest asses in history.”

I laughed. “So you had fantasies about her, too?”

“You, too? God, how can we hate somebody this much and still want to go to bed with her?”

“A question for the ages, my friend. For the ages.”

Rain and darkness hid the grim little strip mall. The only light came from Hair Fare and that was in the back of the shop. I peeked through the window. The front of the place was in shadows. The barber chairs were empty. The light came from the tiny office. I knocked and got no response, so I started pounding.

Sister appeared soon after. She waved and shook her head. With the unlocking of the door came the apology: “I'm so sorry. I didn't hear you. The rain drowns everything out.”

“Is Heather still here?”

“Yeah. Sitting in the office. Hurry up. I didn't tell her I asked you to come over. She'll try and get out the back door if she figures it out.”

We hurried through the darkness ripe with the scents of hair spray, hair dye, and all the other chemicals used in the various processes.

Sister was right about the bolting. Heather was facing front when I reached the threshold of the office, but when she turned and saw me, she jumped up and said, “No way! Goddamn you, why did you tell him to
come here?” Then she lunged at me, palms flat so she could push me away. She was a forceful woman but not forceful enough. I spun her around and dragged her back to her chair and pushed her down in it. Then I slammed the door shut behind us.

“I'm not going to say a single goddamn word to either of you,” Heather said, folding her arms across her chest. “We can just sit here all night.”

Sister sat behind her desk now. “I did this for your benefit, whether you believe that or not, Heather. You're terrified of something and all you can think of is running away? To where? You don't have any money. I'll bet if I checked your account you'd be overdrawn as usual. And where the hell would you go anyway?”

“To Aunt Sally's.” Heather had broken her vow of silence, but now wasn't a good time to point it out.

“Aunt Sally's.” Sister found this hilarious. “Between her cooking and his farting, you'd go crazy after one night.” Sister looked at me and said, “Aunt Sally gave people food poisoning at three different family reunions over the years. And Uncle Len's always had these gas problems. And it's not just that he farts loud—he smells. We used to have to sit on his lap when we were little, and you just had to hold your breath.”

I stood to the left of the desk so that I could see both their faces. Heather couldn't help herself. She smiled at the memory. Sister smiled, too. Her eyes gleamed with tears. “Honey, you got to tell Mr. Conrad here about what you saw. I know you saw something, and I know that you think if you tell anybody, the cops will think you were in on the whole thing.”

Heather, blond, blowsy, beaten, now said quietly, “I was in on the whole thing, Sis. I mean, I helped him with things.”

“What sort of ‘things'?”

Heather's ruined eyes met mine. “I made a couple calls to Cooper's mother. That rich bitch. I disguised my voice though.”

“Anything else?” I said.