The Candidate (28 page)

* * *

THE VILLAGE rapidly receded into the distance in the rear view mirror but still Mike looked up to check no vehicle was following them. It seemed insane, but he would not be surprised to see Rodolfo drive after them in some beaten up old truck with a mob of machete-wielding Mayans in the back. Beside him Lauren sat and stared straight ahead. She was on the edge of tears. Now that he had calmed down and was over his fear he began to worry about her.

“Are you okay, Lauren?” he repeated several times and she nodded each time in a way that fell far short of convincing.

Mike resisted the temptation to simply floor the accelerator and speed away as fast as possible. The road back to Guatemala City climbed out of the crater in a series of terrifying switchbacks. He needed to take it easy. Not panic. Not kill them both in some stupid car crash. He glanced again at Lauren as they finally climbed out of the crater and saw again a broad panorama of mountains ahead of them. She looked silently out of the window, keeping her thoughts to herself. He surprised himself by feeling responsible for her. She was the one who came out here, practically sabotaging his mission, but now he simply and guiltily thought: what had he dragged her into?

He had no answer. It was a hard confession to make. He felt he was on a roller coaster. At first the shooter was a violent, evil mystery. Then she seemed a traumatized victim. Now it was clear Rodolfo and the others feared and hated the very sight of a photograph of her. And still he did not even know her name. Or have a link back to Hodges. He felt lost, and a long way from South Carolina where the political battle was being fought. Caught in his own thoughts, he heard Lauren speak at last.

“What’s going on, Mike?” she asked. “Who the hell is that woman? Why did she want to kill Senator Hodges?”

Mike shrugged. Despite Dee’s instructions to keep Lauren in the dark, he found himself telling her the truth.

“I have no real idea,” he said.

* * *

THEY ARRIVED back in Guatemala City that night and headed straight to the bar of the Marriott. They sat in a dark corner with a pair of strong drinks and relaxed. Finally, returned to the familiar environment of a modern hotel bar, they were at ease. It was a whole world away from the village of Santa Teresa with its massacre and strange pre-Christian Gods. That was a glimpse into an alien world, one that unsuspectingly lurked just under the surface. Always there but hidden. Even though they saw that now, and knew it existed, the surroundings of the hotel bar allowed them to convince themselves they were again on safe ground.

For a while they talked about themselves and ignored the wider world. Mike talked passionately about the campaign and Hodges and his desire to make a difference. As the words poured out, they helped him ground himself in his purpose here. It reminded him why he joined Hodges’ cause and agreed to what Dee asked him to do.

“I believe in him,” he said. “I’ve spent my life trying to make a difference with people’s lives. I’ve had my triumphs but mostly it’s a struggle just to keep things from getting worse. But this? This is different. If Hodges wins and he follows through on even half of what he’s promised, it’ll change our nation.”

Lauren smiled. “You really believe that?” she asked. She seemed genuine and Mike was genuine back.

“I honestly do,” he said. “Nothing is as important to me as getting Hodges elected. He’ll make people’s lives better. I’ve never really believed that before.”

They sat closer together now and drew in to each other as they talked.

“But who is that woman?” Lauren asked. “It makes no sense she would want to kill Hodges.”

Mike shook his head.

“No idea. But she tried to kill me too,” he whispered and unbuttoned the high collar of his shirt to show the purpling bruise around his throat where she tried to throttle the life out of him.

Lauren blanched.

“She attacked me when I saw her in jail a few days ago,” he said.

“Jesus,” Lauren said and gingerly caressed the damaged skin of his neck with a brush of her hand. Mike closed his eyes and luxuriated in her touch. But then an alarm bell went off in his mind. Stop! Get a grip, he thought. He opened his eyes and edged away.

Lauren withdrew her hand. “So what next?” she said as if nothing were amiss.

“We do what Rodolfo said,” Mike replied. “We go and see that priest. I asked the concierge. San Gabriel is a church out in the slums. We find the church and we find him. It’s our only lead really.”

Lauren sensed any moment of flirtation had passed. She yawned theatrically and stretched her arms. “I’m beat,” she said.

They headed upstairs to rooms that were opposite each other on the sixth floor. Mike closed the door to his room and breathed out a sigh of relief. He needed to keep self-control. This was too important to mess up and Lauren represented a time bomb on this story. He did not want to complicate things any further simply because he was attracted to her. He walked over to the window of his room and flung back the curtains exposing the nightscape of the city stretching out below.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. It was Dee. Her Southern drawl, more pronounced than he remembered, carried down the line.

“What’s up, Mike?” she asked.

He told her about the experience in the village. To his surprise she was not outraged or shocked. There was just a measured response.

“I always thought that shooter was just a plain old nut job. Some scary psycho,” she said.

“You did not see these people’s reaction. It was more than…” Mike began but she shushed him.

“Keep digging. We need to know her identity and the link with the General and Hodges. Every time I look at Hodges I see a man I believe in. But then I remember the money paid down to this goddamn Carillo in Guatemala and it’s like an itch I can’t quite reach. It’s bothering the heck out of me, Mike. I need you to scratch it.”

“There’s a priest here who should know who she is. We’ll try and find him tomorrow.”

“Good. But how’s our little blogging friend? Are you keeping her close by? Not too close I hope.”

There was a hint of playful accusation in Dee’s voice. Mike ignored it.

“It’s all under control,” he said.

Dee laughed. “Remember, Mike, men always mess things up because of their peckers. Keep yours in your own pants.”

Mike spluttered in embarrassment but Dee just steam-rollered on. “There’s one other thing,” she said. “My friend on your home town sheriff’s department just updated me on Jaynie’s case. He sent me her arrest report and case file. It’s pretty bad.”

Mike felt struck in the stomach. Jaynie. He thought of her screams when the police burst in. They were animal-like: pure anguish and fear. On instinct alone she must have known that moment was the end of freedom.

“How bad is it?”

“She’s been mixed up in some pretty nasty stuff, Mike. She’s brewed meth for a crew of dealers for a year or so. The cops have her red-handed with a still in her trailer and enough meth to float the boats of half of New York’s cracker population. She’s staring at five years, minimum. Maybe a hell of a lot more.”

There was nothing left to say.

“Thanks for letting me know, Dee,” he said and he hung up the phone.

Five years inside? Jaynie would not survive that he thought. He remembered the last time he saw her, in the back of the cop car. She had reached out to him with her bound hands and he edged away from her. He felt a terrible rush of guilt and he pulled down the blinds on his window, blocking out the sparking lights of the city in a series of shadows that looked like the bars of a cage.

CHAPTER 19

DEE WATCHED BOB “Swampy” Murphy lift the tumbler of expensive scotch to his mouth and down it in a single gulp. He smacked his lips with loud theatrical effect and settled back in the comfy leather of his chair. They sat in a back room at Magnolia’s, one of the finest restaurants in Charleston, which took the common food of the South and gave it a haute cuisine twist. Dee hated the place. But Murphy insisted. After all he wasn’t the one paying the bill.

“So will he agree to it? Has this candidate of yours got what it takes to win down here?” Murphy asked.

He was almost a parody of the dark side of South Carolina politics. Obese and short with what seemed a permanent sheen of sweat on his forehead, Murphy ran a small political consultancy in the state. He had done so for decades. Just like his father before him and his grandfather before that. Down in the South even dirty politics were passed on in families like a real sweat-and-blood trade and no game-player was dirtier than Murphy. For a fee, he arranged rumors to sweep through an election. Fly-posters appeared over night in any neighborhood in the state. Untraceable stories popped up on the Internet or in gossip columns. Push-polls planted the most outlandish stories about an opponent. It was a dark, seedy underbelly of “The Swamp“ and Murphy was its master practitioner.

Dee poured him another glass from a whisky bottle the waiter left on the table along with a carafe of expensive red wine.

“I do believe he will, Bob,” she said. “But we have to convince him it is the right thing to do. Not just tactically. But morally.”

Murphy chuckled, his fat cheeks inflating and deflating. “Oh boy, Dee. Have you got yourself lumbered to a candidate with a serious case of morality? For a campaign that hopes to win anything, that can be a very debilitating condition.”

A warm glow of dislike rose up in Dee. She needed Murphy. She would sanction anything he would do if it de stroyed Stanton and won this fight. But she baulked at his casual joy in the dark arts of their craft. Dee still believed in a cause. She was a means to an end. Murphy lost any notion of an end long ago. He was all about the method. She sighed inwardly. She disliked Charleston, she thought. It was genteel and Southern and wealthy, but it masked its ugly side. The terrible race relations and the ghettos just a few miles from the mansions of Broad Street were all hidden under the surface. Like this restaurant, she thought. Dress up chitterlings with some fancy sauces and slap a high price tag on it and call it gourmet. But at the end of the day you still ate pig belly.

“He’s a good man, Bob,” she said quietly, gritting her teeth.

Murphy failed to notice anything amiss. “They’re the worst,” he said. “What do you need?”

“To undermine Stanton’s support in the black community. She’s from Virginia. She knows her way around this territory better than Hodges. She’s got a long record of support from black churches. We need to chip away at that. Splinter off some of her base. If we do that we can take her down.”

Murphy nodded. “Go on,” he said.

“Nothing too extreme, Bob,” Dee said. “I don’t want a repeat of the McCain fiasco when everyone thought his own adopted daughter was a black love child.”

Murphy gave an impish grin.

“Just kick up a bit of doubt,” Dee said. “If we can puncture Stanton’s black support, then all the air will go out of her campaign. It’s her weak underbelly,” Dee said.

Murphy smiled and revealed a mouth of stubby off-white teeth. Dee had a sudden mental image of some ugly, bottom-dwelling fish that lurked deep in the ocean far from sunlight.

“Creating doubt is my specialty,” Murphy said. “I can push-poll some stuff about her comments on cutting welfare and portray that in more racial terms. She’s been close to a few evangelical leaders in her time. I bet a few of them have some associations on the extreme right I can use. Colored folks don’t have too much time for the Jerry Falwells of this world.”

Dee smiled. Murphy was a son-of-a-bitch. But, for the right price, he was going to be
her
son-of-a-bitch. She began to speak again but just then the door to their semi-private dining room opened and Hodges and Christine walked in, arm in arm, accompanied by a blast of sound and laughter from the main dining room outside. It was like a light switched on in the room.

“Dee!” Hodges said, striding forward. “This place looks fantastic. Christine and I have been blown away by Charleston. It’s wonderful.”

Dee made her introductions. She described Murphy as a trusted political consultant and poured out the wine. She filled four glasses until they almost over-flowed as she listened to Hodges and Christine praise the delights of the city. Murphy played along and oozed his local charm and recommended a series of other restaurants they should try. Then he offered the use of his weekend beach house the next time they were in town.

“It beats hotels,” Murphy said. “It will save your campaign some money down the line too.”

Dee interjected. “Yeah, well, we have to win here first, Bob,” she said.

Now was her chance. She looked at Hodges. “Jack. Bob has offered to run some polls for us, maybe take the fight to Stanton a little. He thinks he can knock five points off her in the next week by going for the black vote.”

Hodges put down his glass of wine. “What sort of polls, Dee?” he asked. “You’ve been telling me Stanton’s pretty solid with African-Americans here.”

Murphy spoke up. “It is my belief that there are some serious doubts to be raised about Governor Stanton’s commitment to minority rights. It’s time someone started asking some tough questions of your opponent.”