Stranglehold

by Ed Gorman

  Manning’s eyes showed tension, Doris Kelly’s misery, and Byrnes’s a hint of amusement. He was like the little kid you knew in second grade who wanted to see what would happen when you rode your bike off the roof of the garage.

  “We can try to get her back on the show,” Kristin said. “But first of all I wonder if it’s a good place for us. You have a hostile host and pretty much of a Limbaugh audience. I don’t think we’re going to make a hell of a lot of converts there.”

  “He’s got the best afternoon numbers of anybody in the state. Or don’t you people read radio ratings?” She turned her angry voice on Ben. “I expected you to prepare her better. But as usual you let me down.”

  I knew he wasn’t going to put up with it anymore. I shut up and let him talk. The way he was hunched over, you could see he was thinking of throwing a punch. Not at her but maybe at the wall. And the way his breath was seething forth from his nostrils made me think of an animal waiting to charge. But he knew the game, and he’d been slapped around by the best and the worst of them, as had most of us, so he managed to sound almost civil when he spoke. “Natalie, the night before the interview I took Susan out to dinner. And for one solid hour that’s all we talked about. The show. And how she should handle herself. And what she should say when one of his fascists called in and accused her of being a communist or a whore from her old days. I even had a list of likely topics for her. And we went over them one by one. Capital punishment and legalized marijuana were right up there with taxes and war. I gave her my suggestions on how she should talk about them. Just kind of shave them a little bit so that he wouldn’t jump on her. But she said, and I quote, ‘Fuck him. These are two things I really believe in and I’m not going to kiss his ass.’ I went with her to the studio and on the drive over we went down the list again. I suggested one more time that maybe we could go easy on these two particular subjects, but she went through the ‘Fuck him’ routine again. Now, if you want to take it up with your stepdaughter, that’s fine with me. But I’d appreciate it if you’d quit telling me that I’m not doing my job.”

  Most people would have apologized, said, “Hey, I didn’t know any of this and I’m sorry I jumped on your back.” But this was Natalie Cooper.

  “You’re paid to handle her.”

  “Not manhandle her, I’m not.”

  Byrnes said gently, “Come on, Natalie. They’re serving panfried trout at the club this afternoon.” He smiled at Ben.

  Natalie stood up. I made the mistake of thinking it was over. But Natalie frequently had a surprise ready. She took two steps toward Doris Kelly, hovered over the small woman where she sat, and said, “I’m not quite sure what you’re doing here, Doris.”

  There was no way Doris was going to defend herself, so Manning, getting awkwardly to his feet said, “I invited her, Natalie. We handle a lot of things at the foundation for your campaign. I thought she might like to visit the headquarters here and see how things are done.”

  “I’m more interested in her seeing how things are done at the foundation, David. She’s not exactly the best secretary you’ve ever had.”

  A noise that might have been a sob caught in Doris’s throat. She looked as if she’d just been stabbed—and in a way, she had.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake, Doris,” Natalie said. “I didn’t mean for you to get all upset. I’ve already talked to you about being a little more outgoing. You’re not only David’s secretary, you’re also the receptionist. Your secretarial work is satisfactory, but you need to work on greeting people. You’re so damned shy. Now, don’t make a big production out of this. You’ll just look like a fool.”

  Then she was gone.

  CHAPTER 6

  Susan Cooper stood in the doorway as if she wasn’t sure she should come in. “Hello, everybody. Sorry I missed the morning meeting.”

  The only person who spoke to her was Ben. “You look like you’re scared to come in. C’mon, for God’s sake.”

  As she entered, her gaze swept the office and the eight people working at their desks. “I’m sure you’re pissed off at me, so let me apologize for being late. But the important thing is, I’m ready now for anything we need to do.”

  As lovely and stylish as she was—and despite the fact that she was the client—she didn’t have the authority Natalie did.

  She tossed smiles like flowers until her eyes settled on me. The gray gaze narrowed and the smile pursed. She wasn’t happy to see me because my presence told her that Ben had sent for me because he was having problems with her.

  “Hi there, Dev.”

  “Morning, Susan.”

  “I’m sort of surprised you’re here. I mean, I thought you were working on the Michigan campaign.” Her look strayed to Ben as she spoke. There was a tone of accusation in her voice now.

  “Michigan’s going fine. I like to drop in on our campaigns and see how things are going. You know, firsthand, one-hundred-thousand-mile checkup.”

  “Well,” she said as she walked across to the coffeepot, her long legs perfect in shape and tone. Her ankles could break your heart. “I read the internals every day.” She poured herself a cup, then turned around and faced me. “It’s tightening up a little, but we expected that.” Then, “By the way, Peter—you know, my stepbrother—he’s very unhappy that you’re not using any of the speeches he’s writing.”

  “He’s a terrible writer, Susan, you know that.”

  “Oh, I forgot. You two had a little disagreement about that.”

  Peter Cooper was a failed politician. He’d run for Congress in this district but lost. He was terrible on the stump and worse on TV—nervous, irritable. He resented the fact that Natalie browbeat Susan into running for the same seat years later. She’d won and he hated her for it. His job was running her constituent services office and he was damned good at it. Every once in a while he’d write speeches and send them to Ben. He got pissed that Ben bounced them all, so he started bombarding me with them. We’d had sharp words.

  “I’ll talk to him about it,” Kristin said. “It’s my turn.”

  Susan frowned at me. “You didn’t look as if you agreed when I said things were tightening up but that we were doing all right.”

  “He’s coming on strong, Susan,” I said, “very strong.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Her words were sharp enough to get everybody’s attention. Now they were all watching us, her leaning against the coffee bar, me sitting on the desk chair I’d just turned around to face her. This was better than TV. The boss and the client getting into it.

  I walked over next to her so that I didn’t have to raise my voice. As I refilled my cup I said, “It means just what I said, that he’s coming on strong. Which means we have to come on strong.”

  We were having two conversations, the one everyone could hear and the unspoken one, the latter being about her not staying focused, not fighting hard enough.

  “His side has a lot more registered voters than ours does, Susan. And we have to remember that.”

  She turned that chic face on the staffers and said, “I appreciate all you’re doing for me. I’ve had some personal things I’ve had to attend to. But they’re being handled now, and I promise you I’m going to start kicking ass again.”

  A few of them laughed. She was a hard worker and a no-bullshit boss. She didn’t play any games and she was generous with her people. We knew this because we always talk with the client’s staffers to get some kind of fix on who we’ll be working with. Some clients resent this. Susan was happy we were doing it.

  “And to prove it I’m going to humiliate Steve Duffy in the next debate. I was too nice the last time. This time I’m going to slap that frat-boy smirk off his face.”

  I was smiling with the rest of them. Ben high-fived me. Susan had good instincts. She knew why I was here, and she was going to shut me down fast so that I’d hop on that plane and head back to Chicago. “Could I see the internals, Ben?”

  Then it was back to work. I finishe
d up my e-mailing while Susan and Ben went over our own tracking polls. These polls weren’t as simple as how many points we were up and down. They detailed how we were doing with various groups broken down by income, education, ethnicity, religion, and address. I’d looked them over a half hour ago. I was still unhappy with the blue-collar vote. Though we were nine points ahead of Duffy right now, in economic times like these we should have been hitting fourteen, fifteen points ahead. But Duffy’s days as a sportscaster—and not a loudmouth, either; a good, solid pro who knew what he was talking about—gave him an edge with males across the board.

  After going over the internals, Susan and Ben talked about the scheduled radio interview she’d be doing this afternoon. This interview would be different from the one she had done with Gil Hawkins. He hated her politics and had done everything he could to make her look bad. Don Stern was a real reporter. His questions this afternoon would be tough but fair.

  Like most politicians, running for reelection meant stealing days from her duties in Washington. Generally she’d fly home for weekends and the weekends were packed with speeches, events, interviews. For example, when she finished with the radio interview, she’d be attending a women’s business conference. She was the keynote speaker at this conference, which started on a Friday afternoon. It was a regional gathering of successful businesswomen. Duffy would be speaking tomorrow. There would be a lot of press. We needed to make a good showing.

  “A friend of mine is in the hospital here, Ben. I want to run over there and spend an hour with her if I can. The interview isn’t till one, so I’ll have plenty of time to just meet you at the radio station.”

  “I was hoping we’d have lunch together and go over a few more things, Susan.”

  “There’ll be plenty of time for that tonight.” A studied laugh. “Don’t worry, Ben. I’m not going to wander off again.”

  “Think I’ll head down the hall,” I said. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  When I left, Susan was still trying to reassure Ben that he could trust her again. They were so busy talking that they didn’t notice that I’d grabbed my topcoat on my supposed trip to the men’s room. I went out the back door, slid under the wheel, and backed a quarter of the way down the alley. There was a narrow spot in front of a loading dock where I could hide. Susan didn’t know what my rental looked like, and as far as she was concerned, I’d just made a trip to the john, nothing more suspicious.

  She didn’t emerge for another fifteen minutes. She’d probably spent the time showing off the shiny, fine, trustworthy Susan to the staffers. She hesitated before opening the door of her new green Volvo. She took a deep breath. Her blond hair gleamed in the sunlight. Then she eased herself into the car and left the parking lot. I gave her a half-block head start. I’d done a fair share of tailing in my army intelligence days. I hoped I hadn’t lost the touch.

  At the time I had no idea where she’d be leading me. My first shock was seeing the shabbiness of the motel. The second was seeing her rush from the room as if she’d witnessed something terrible. The third was going into the room myself and finding the bloody towel in the bathroom.

  The new, improved, trustworthy Susan wasn’t any of these things at all.

  CHAPTER 7

  On the way back from following Susan, I called Ben on my cell and asked him if he’d seen anybody from the Larson-Davies oppo research group in town here.

  “Oh, yeah. Monica and Greg Larson himself. The Chronicle is doing profiles of state political people who went on to become national. Since Monica and Larson are working for Duffy, the Chronicle had them come here for photos, you know, his hometown and all. Why, you thinking of asking her out again?”

  “Don’t remind me.”

  Several years earlier, in a zombie state following my divorce, I ended up in the arms, if not the bed, of Monica Davies. We missed the bed part because we were both so drunk we passed out on her hotel room couch. Just before we were to stagger into bed she brought out a joint the size of a finger and it made us both comatose within ten minutes. This had been in Vegas at a convention for political soldiers. Hard to say who was more disgusted—me for betraying my side or her for betraying hers. The few times we’d met since then we’d been resolutely cold.

  “Any particular reason you’re asking?”

  I could have told him about her business card being in the cheap suitcase I’d found in the motel room, but I decided against it for now. “Somebody said they thought they saw her in a restaurant here. I was just curious.”

  “Yeah, in fact I ran into Larson the other night at a bar where the local reporters drink. He was telling them all his war stories and they were eating it up. According to him, everybody on our side is a traitor, a terrorist, and a sexual deviant who would put de Sade to shame.”

  “Good old Greg.”

  “Hey, are you insinuating he’d lie?”

  “Of course not. Not our Greg.”

  The only hotel in town with four stars was where I happened to be staying, the Commodore. If they were in town it was likely they were staying there also. I could double up lunch with finding out if they were under the same roof.

  For lunch I had a BLT and a glass of ginger ale and then I went looking for them. Detective work should always be this easy. She was in room 608 and he was in room 624.

  I stepped off the elevator to find a bellhop leaning against the wall talking fast into a cell phone. He looked and sounded agitated. I’d spent a year reading Jim Thompson novels set in hotels that were actually concentration camps of sorts. This guy looked like he’d fit in there.

  He dropped his voice when he saw me emerge but not so low that I couldn’t hear him: “So I made a mistake. How many times do I have to say I’m sorry?” He clicked off, stuffed the phone in the pocket of his gray-trimmed blue uniform. He was in his thirties, chunky, balding. He had one of those put-upon faces that not even a smile would light up. “Help you with something?” he said.

  “Just looking for room 608.”

  “Right down here, sir.” He pointed to his left. The corridor was carpeted in dark brown to complement the tan walls and brown trim. The wide window at the end of the corridor gleamed with thin autumn sunlight. He walked down to the room and stood beside it like somebody in a print ad pointing out a product.

  I knocked. He started walking back toward the elevator. I knocked again. This time of day the sixth floor was quiet except for elevator doors opening and closing. I knew nobody was going to be answering here. I saw the bellhop starting to get on the car and I said: “Could I talk to you a minute?”

  He turned around and shrugged. “Sure.”

  “The woman in room 608. Do you know who I mean?”

  “The Davies woman.”

  “Have you seen her around today?”

  He bit the inside of his lip and looked past me. His mind was still on the phone. “Today? I don’t think so.”

  “I need to talk to her about something. I’ve had a hard time reaching her.”

  He was suspicious. “So you know her, you mean?”

  “We work for the same company. I was supposed to meet her for lunch. I just got in about three hours ago. But she didn’t show up.”

  “Oh.”

  “One of our men might have been around here, too. Did she have any visitors that you know of?”

  “You mean Mr. Larson? He’s staying right down the hall. He sees her two, three times a day.”

  “Anybody else ever see her?”

  He just stared at me and said, “Did I mention that Mr. Larson is a good tipper? You must know him. She told me that he’s her partner in some kind of political firm.”

  I reached for my wallet. I gave him a ten.

  “You kidding, man? You know the kind of shit this place would give me for even talking to you about stuff like this?”

  I gave him a second ten.

  He stuffed the bills into the same pocket the cell phone rode in and said, “One guy. Big redheaded guy. Expensive
suit. Gold watch. But there was something rough about him. You’ve seen guys like him. No matter how well they dress they still come across as rough.”

  “How many times have you seen him?”

  “At least three times in the past two days. Last time they had a real argument. Bad enough that somebody called down to the desk about it. I came up. He was in the doorway when I got here. He was still arguing, but when he saw me he left right away. Damned near knocked me down getting out of here. She was standing there looking really pissed at him. She slammed the door in my face.”

  “You ever hear her call him by name?”

  “Oh, yeah, she called him a name all right. A couple of them. ‘Piece of shit’ and ‘bastard.’ Once she even got him with ‘motherfucker.’ ”

  “So no ID on him at all?”

  “No.”

  I took out my card and gave it to him. I scribbled the number of my cell phone on it. “There’s another twenty in it for you if you call me when you see her next time. Call me right away.”

  “So you work with her, huh?” He smirked. “The hell you do.”

  “All right, thirty if you call me.”

  “I’m working through the dinner shift tonight. I need to buy my lady a nice gift. I had a little fun with one of the girls who work in the kitchen and she took it serious. Called the apartment for me where I live with my lady. I’ve been trying to tell her it didn’t mean anything—my lady, I mean. You know, a little nookie on the side? She’s making a big thing out of it.” He grinned. Not smiled, grinned. He was presenting himself as a man of the world and happy with his self-image. The nudge as ass-bandit.