The Big Lie

by James Grippando

  Jack saw it as a waste of time trying to convince the attorney general to drop her civil lawsuit to remove Charlotte from the Electoral College as “unfit” to serve. The criminal charge, Jack hoped, was a different matter. Ultimately, the decision to prosecute Charlotte for homicide or to dismiss the charge based on stand your ground was in the hands of the Leon County State Attorney. Jack began his pitch with the criminal defense lawyer’s mantra:

  “Beyond a reasonable doubt,” said Jack, invoking the highest standard of proof in American jurisprudence. “General Barrow is lucky she doesn’t have to meet that standard in the fitness hearing. If she did, Judge Martin would have thrown the case out already.”

  “I take your point,” said Kutter. “But this case is much simpler than you think. My position is that stand your ground just doesn’t apply here.”

  “It’s textbook,” said Jack. “Mr. Meyer threatened to use the ‘fire’ in his pocket, and Charlotte Holmes thought he was going for his gun. If there’s a criminal trial, I’ll put her on the stand to say exactly that. The law doesn’t require her to turn and run. She stood her ground, unless you accept General Barrow’s myopic argument that the only thing that matters is the final seconds before the shot.”

  “To me, the key is what happened before Mr. Meyer even arrived.”

  Jack assumed he was talking about the flash drive. “The only charge against my client is second-degree homicide. The flash drive has nothing to do with the shooting.”

  “The bribery and the homicide go hand in hand.”

  “Whoa,” said Jack. “Let’s back up. First, there was no bribery. My client didn’t go to the meeting to accept a bribe. She had no idea what was on the flash drive, and when Dr. Perez offered her the flash drive she refused to accept it.”

  “I have reason to believe that Dr. Perez will cooperate and testify that he met with Ms. Holmes to buy her vote.”

  Jack couldn’t tell if the prosecutor was bluffing or not. “I can’t stop Dr. Perez from lying to save his skin. But his lie about a bribe doesn’t change the fact that Charlotte Holmes had a legal right to stand her ground against Mr. Meyer and his threats.”

  “Are you asking me to drop the homicide charge before I’ve even heard from Dr. Perez?”

  “Yes—because there’s no story Dr. Perez can craft about bribery that will turn my client into a murderer.”

  “You’re ignoring the most important language in the statute,” said Kutter. He reached for the book of Florida statutes on the credenza behind his desk and flipped to the stand-your-ground provision. “A person using deadly force ‘does not have a duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground if he or she is not engaged in a criminal activity.’ Plain as day,” he said, closing the book. “You have no right to stand your ground while you are engaged in a criminal activity.”

  Jack was aware of the exception. “The legislature put that language in the statute to prevent drug dealers from shooting their customers.”

  “That’s not the way I read it. If Charlotte Holmes was in the process of accepting a bribe, she was engaged in a criminal activity at the time of the shooting. Stand your ground does not apply.”

  “You’re going out of your way to reach an unjust result.”

  “Please, Jack. Don’t accuse me of playing politics. I’ve done my best to stay out of this shit storm.”

  “My point is that my client didn’t go to this meeting intending to hurt anyone. She was stalked and harassed for weeks. The police were no help. The gun she carried was purely for protection, and a situation arose where she needed to protect herself.”

  “That’s why the charge is homicide in the second degree. I’m being more than fair.” He set the statute book back on the credenza. “Look, I’ll be honest with you: I don’t like stand your ground. In a civilized society, a person’s first instinct should be to de-escalate a situation, not pull out a gun and start shooting. That’s how we end up with cases like this, where a guy who doesn’t have a gun says something stupid—‘I got fire in my pocket’—and he ends up dead.”

  “Do you really believe Mr. Meyer was unarmed?”

  “No gun was found.”

  “I checked with the Department of Agriculture,” said Jack. “Meyer had a concealed-carry license.”

  “So? Not everyone carries all the time.”

  “He had a license to carry. He made a racial slur, baiting Dr. Perez to come at him. He said, ‘I got fire in my pocket.’ Charlotte Holmes saw him reaching for his gun. But no gun was found at the crime scene. It doesn’t add up to me.”

  “Are you suggesting that someone in law enforcement made that gun disappear?”

  “In the middle of a partisan lawsuit to get my client disqualified from serving as an elector, a gun gone missing strikes me as politically expedient.”

  “If you came here to threaten me with allegations of police misconduct, you made a very bad miscalculation.”

  “If you’re vouching for every MacLeod supporter in that crowd of hysteria outside Clyde’s immediately after the shooting, the miscalculation may be yours.”

  “We’ll see,” he said, checking his watch. “My Jameson and water beckons.”

  Kutter rose, and Jack walked with him to the door. Jack started out, but the state attorney stopped him.

  “Jack, let’s not get hung up on did Mr. Meyer have a gun or didn’t he. I’ve listened to the audio recording. If your client was not there to receive a bribe, she was not engaged in criminal activity. If there was no criminal activity, she had a right to stand her ground, whether I like it or not. The homicide charge goes away.”

  “That’s good to know.”

  “I had no legal or ethical obligation to throw you that bone.”

  “Understood.”

  “But, like I said: I do like your old man. Say hello to him for me.”

  Jack smiled more on the inside than out. “Thanks. I will.”

  The lighting of the national Christmas tree on the Ellipse south of the White House was that evening. President MacLeod and the First Lady graced the dais, seated behind the podium for the musical portion of the program. As the St. Thomas Episcopal Parish Children’s Chorus sang “Christmas Time Is Here,” the jazz hit written for A Charlie Brown Christmas in 1965, the president fired off another tweet:

  “Senator Stahl sends boyfriend to buy a Florida Elector. TREASON!”

  The fake news would skewer him for working social media in the middle of a holiday tradition, but he didn’t care. The media never treated him fairly. If a Democrat invoked an inflammatory anti-Semitic stereotype, it was merely “a trope.” If MacLeod said “Merry Christmas” instead of “happy holidays,” it was a dog whistle for white-supremacist hate speech. So dishonest.

  He tucked his smartphone into the pocket of his overcoat and, when the music stopped, stepped up to the podium.

  Although the First Amendment required the separation of church and state, the national Christmas tree and the nearby national menorah had survived constitutional challenges as “secular symbols” for purposes of the Establishment Clause. It was a chilly night, and apart from the sea of glowing smartphones in record mode, the principal sign of life in a crowd shrouded in darkness was the sporadic steaming of breath into puffs of conversation. Attendance at the ceremony was by national lottery, and each year twenty thousand lucky winners had a folding chair waiting on the lawn. Not every winner came, no matter who was president. MacLeod’s first-term average was about eight thousand no-shows, which his press secretary declared was the fewest empty chairs at any tree lighting since Calvin Coolidge began the tradition in 1923. No explanation was given as to how that historical fact was ascertained, and some questioned its veracity, given that official White House photographs show no chairs, let alone empty chairs, at the 1923 ceremony.

  “I want to thank all of the talented people who contributed to this year’s America Celebrates display,” MacLeod said, referring to the smaller trees surrounding the thirty-foot
blue spruce that was the national Christmas tree. “Christmas trees from our states, territories, and the District of Columbia are decorated to symbolize the history, heritage, and culture of our great land. Each Christmas tree includes one-of-a-kind ornaments made by creative Americans, mostly children.”

  MacLeod paused. He’d promised the First Lady that he would stick to the script, but he couldn’t ignore the ongoing effort to steal his Electoral College victory. He suddenly found himself way off track, going state by state to praise the artistry of each ornament—but only the states that he’d won in the general election.

  “Alabama. What a beautiful ornament from the art class at Hewitt-Trussville Middle School outside of Birmingham. I won Alabama by over six hundred thousand votes. Arkansas. Don’t miss the Razorback ornament. Sixty percent of Arkansans voted for me.” And on he went, skipping over the blue states, spiraling into campaign-rally mode—Georgia, Idaho, Indiana; state, ornament, and margin of victory.

  “Love, love, love the Hoosier ornaments from Oakwood Junior High in Indianapolis—uh, excuse me, that would be ‘Native-American-apolis’ for any Democrats out there.”

  The First Lady could take no more. “Malcolm,” she said through clenched teeth, “time to light the tree.”

  MacLeod had no appetite for another overdose of laxatives in his pudding or lemonade, another round with First Lady’s Revenge. He sped things up, racing through Tennessee, Texas, and Utah to get to the big finish, “Wyoming, a landslide sixty-seven percent of the vote!” It left him so out of breath that he had to truncate the traditional “backward from ten” countdown:

  “Three, two, one!”

  The First Lady pushed the button, and some 75,000 colored LED lights brightened the night sky. As the Navy Band played “Joy to World,” the president stepped back to admire gold and silver stars and ribbons, icicle lights, and a sparkling heirloom tree topper. Beautiful, but it was MacLeod’s personal opinion that the tree looked better on television. Being there made it obvious that the tree had nothing hanging from its limbs; the tree was actually tented, with decorations draped over the branches like a giant wigwam in order to prevent damage to a living tree that stood on the Ellipse year-round.

  A post-lighting speech was not part of the program, but when the Navy Band paused between songs, the president returned to the podium, and the band instinctively deferred.

  “One last sentiment,” he told the crowd. With his impromptu launch into a state-by-state victory tour, he’d forgotten to deliver his prepared remarks. “The lighting of the national Christmas tree marks the beginning of our beautiful Pageant of Peace, a tradition started by the great Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower. The Pageant of Peace was intended to echo the words of the angels during the Annunciation to the shepherds, as found in the Authorized King James Version of the New Testament. ‘Glory to God in the highest . . .’”

  MacLeod looked beyond the crowd, gazing toward the south portico of the White House, where, he was certain, Senator Stahl and his queer-as-a-three-dollar-bill Dr. McDreamy would never live.

  “‘And on earth peace, goodwill toward men.’”

  Real men, he said to himself, giving a presidential twist to the holiday blessing.

  “Merry Christmas to all.”

  The president and First Lady stepped down from the dais, waving to the crowd as they walked toward the exit.

  Chapter 50

  The call came Friday evening, while Jack was on his way to the airport to catch his flight to Miami. It was from his father.

  “You should come now, son. This will be goodbye.”

  Jack headed for the Gulf Coast, and in about an hour he reached the Swyteck home-turned-hospice in the resort town of Seaside. His father greeted him at the door with an embrace. There were few words, which was the Swyteck way, but the expression on his father’s face said it all. Agnes probably wouldn’t make it till morning. Harry disappeared into the bedroom and brought the homecare nurse into the hallway with him. Jack went inside, alone.

  Jack wasn’t sure he wanted to finish the conversation they’d started on his previous visit. A proper goodbye, however, was the right thing to do. Agnes seemed to rally as he approached the bed, and she even managed to sit up a bit in her weakened condition.

  “How’s your father doing?” she asked.

  Not the question Jack had expected, but the focus of her concern said something about those two. “I think he’ll be okay,” said Jack.

  A hint of a smile was in her eyes. “I know he will.”

  They sat in silence for a moment. Agnes turned her head, her gaze landing on the collection of framed photographs on the table beside her bed. It was a pictorial timeline, the story of Harry and Agnes in color and in fading black and white. One photo that Jack had never seen before was a portrait of the three of them: Harry, his new wife, and Jack as a preschooler.

  Agnes drew a deep breath, and her gaze drifted back to Jack. “You know, Jack,” she began softly. “People were talking about your father being governor before your father even thought about being governor. I remember his first campaign for State Senate. We walked for days on end, literally knocking on doors and asking for votes. He was so impressive. I was impressed.”

  “He was a skilled politician,” said Jack.

  “No, I meant as a man. I was so impressed with Harry Swyteck, the man.”

  “Were you dating at this time?”

  “Not yet. Your father was a widower, and I figured he’d ask when he was ready. But he never asked while he was campaigning. Then he won the election. I thought he’d ask then. But he didn’t. And then it came time for him to leave for Tallahassee for his first legislative session, and he still didn’t ask. So I just figured we would be great friends, and that would be that.”

  “How did you end up together?”

  “Well, I took it as a pretty positive sign when, instead of asking me out on a date, he asked me to look after you while he was in Tallahassee.”

  “Lucky you,” said Jack, kidding.

  “You were precious, and I was a good mother. Or practice mother, I guess you’d call it. I really was.”

  “I don’t doubt that,” said Jack, even though he had reason to.

  “When the session ended, he came back to Miami. We dated a little, but we knew we were already in love. We wrote to each other almost every day while he was away. Your father wrote such beautiful letters,” she said wistfully. “We didn’t wait long after he was back. We got married.”

  “Sounds kind of magical,” said Jack.

  “It was. It really was.” Her eyes brightened for a moment, and then clouded. “But the following spring, it was time for him to go back to Tallahassee. You were just starting kindergarten. We agreed that moving you in and out of schools for each legislative session wasn’t the best thing for you. Harry would be gone for weeks at a time. I stayed back in Miami with you.”

  Jack had his own memories of those long stints alone with Agnes, and they were not pleasant. But this was her story, not his, and so he just listened.

  “I was friends with the wives of other state representatives. I wasn’t so keen on being away from your father for so long, but they explained the rules to me. We were the proper ladies who were supposed to smile and support the opposition of southern Democrats to the Equal Rights Amendment. We were exactly what was meant by the old saying, ‘Behind every successful man, there’s a good woman.’ And all of us ‘good women’ understood that the home district was for the wife; Tallahassee was for the mistress.”

  Jack couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and he felt some resentment that she felt the need to tell him.

  “Are you saying that my father—”

  “No, no. Harry would never. It was my own insecurity.”

  Jack was relieved, but he again reminded himself that this was her story, and the point of it surely wasn’t to tell him something that he already knew—that his father would never cheat on his wife. “Was it Dad who made you so ins
ecure?”

  “No. It was your mother.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, come on, Jack. I’d seen the photos. I wasn’t nearly as pretty as your mother. And I was older than your father. He was the hotshot young politician. The thought of him being in Tallahassee with so many pretty and younger women was—well, it was more than I could handle. I’d already divorced one man who’d done that to me.”

  Jack had been unaware. “I’m sorry” was all he could say.

  “I’m the one who’s sorry, Jack. I coped with it by drinking. You paid the price.”

  The deepest wounds between Jack and his stepmother were inflicted when his father was away during the legislative session and Jack was home alone with Agnes. The wives of other state representatives may have been willing to put up with the “other woman” in Tallahassee, but Agnes had no room for the “other wife” in Miami, ridding their house of all memories of Jack’s mother. The crucifix from the casket that Harry hid in the toolbox. A photograph in Jack’s bedroom that mysteriously disappeared after a particularly loud argument between Harry and Agnes.

  “I told your father that I would leave him if he ever cheated on me.”

  “I’m sure he respected that.”

  “Just listen. The way I was thinking in those days deserved no respect.” She swallowed hard, then continued. “Having a baby with your father would have made it impossible for me to leave. Or at least that’s the way I saw it back then. What man would want a twice-divorced woman who had a child and who drank too much? Isn’t that a terrible way to think?”

  Jack didn’t answer.

  “My doctor said I would probably never get pregnant if I didn’t stop drinking so much. In my own alcoholic mind I twisted that around completely and told your father I drank because the doctor said I couldn’t get pregnant.”

  Jack wished she would stop punishing herself, but she was determined.

  “By the time your father and I worked through my problems—my drinking problem—I actually couldn’t get pregnant. They didn’t have the kind of fertility drugs they have now. I drank my way through my childbearing years, and your father stuck by me, because I lied and told him I drank because I couldn’t have children. Poetic justice, you might call it.”