The Echo of the Whip

by Joseph Flynn

  “I’m beginning to think you’re happy delegating these things.”

  “You bet. How about you?”

  “I’ll be glad when we move on to new things.”

  “So you don’t want to hear about the guy who challenged me to a fight last night?”

  Patti took McGill’s chin in hand and used it as a swivel to examine his face.

  She found no bruises, lacerations or stitches.

  “Well, the good guy obviously won, so go ahead and tell me the story.”

  White House Chief of Staff’s Office

  On that Sunday, Galia Mindel was in her office. There was no other place for her to be when the president was one day away from being tried by the Senate. McGill rapped on the door and entered when given permission.

  “Sorry to intrude, Galia, but I have a bit of news.”

  She gestured him to a chair. “Sit.”

  McGill did and told her of his brief clash with Eugene Beck.

  “That sounds risky,” Galia said.

  “Life can be like that, but it turns out he’s not a bad guy. Never tried to kill me, and he kept his word. Told me where Mira Kersten’s missing embryo is.”

  “Don’t keep me in suspense, please. I have one or two things to do before tomorrow.”

  “Sure. That embryo is presently in utero. More specifically, it is being carried internally by a Ms. Mary Lee Emberton, Eugene Beck’s special lady friend.”

  Galia said, “What, the guy couldn’t do the job himself?”

  “Unfortunately for him, no. Beck caught the mumps as a kid and the illness left him sterile. When Edmond Whelan brought the job of stealing the embryos to Beck, he saw the list of who the fathers involved were. Turned out one of them was a favorite movie star. He talked it over with his honey. She was at the right point in her cycle and liked the idea, too.”

  “She’s a recipient of stolen property,” Galia said.

  McGill nodded. “Maybe, but recovery would be problematic at this point, and while a frozen embryo might be considered property, a growing fetus likely wouldn’t. There might be an element of kidnapping here, but I’ll leave that with King Solomon. I’m done with this case. I just wanted to let you know what happened. If I get any calls from Mira, I’m going to forward them to you since you were the one who brought me in on this.”

  Galia sighed. “All right, I’ll handle it.”

  McGill added, “Mira lied to me. She said she didn’t know who had stolen Whelan’s treatise, but she pointed her ex-husband right at Rangel. Technically, she might not have known Rangel was behind the theft but she certainly could have pointed out to me, too, that Rangel was a likely suspect. Why didn’t she? I don’t even want to ask, but I have to think there was some political or personal calculation involved.”

  McGill saw Galia’s face fall. He’d added concern to a heavily burdened woman. Telling Galia her one-time protégé was likely up to no good. He didn’t feel good about it.

  “Anything I can do for you, Galia? Short of talking to Mira again.”

  She shook her head. “I’ll find out what’s going on.”

  “Tomorrow’s going to go okay, isn’t it?” McGill asked.

  “With the Senate? Yes. I’ve got all the Democratic votes we need and then some. Tomorrow will be political theater, nothing more.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  She shrugged. “I just have the feeling something bad is going to happen.” After a pause, she added, “Like we’re coming to the end of something.”

  McGill shrugged. “If that’s so, we’ll go down fighting.”

  Chapter 12

  Monday, March 30, 2015, McGill Investigations, Inc. — Georgetown

  LAPD Detectives Zapata and MacDuff took a taxi to McGill’s office straight from National Airport after flying all night. Despite spending six plus hours in coach seats much too small to accommodate their bulk in comfort, the two cops were in an agreeable if not convivial mood. They even deigned to shake McGill’s hand.

  “So this is it, huh?” Zapata asked, looking around McGill’s inner office. “I was expecting something, I don’t know, more impressive.”

  MacDuff added, “The neighborhood’s real nice but, yeah, I thought it’d be more plush, too.”

  McGill told them, “Adjust your expectations. This is your future after you retire from the job. Unless, of course, you work security in a discount store.”

  The two West Coast dicks looked at each other and Zapata asked, “You saying you’re offering us a job?”

  “No, I’ll leave that pleasure to someone else.”

  MacDuff said, “Lieutenant Proctor told us you said something about opening a shop in L.A.”

  “I might. I’m waiting to see if the guy who’d run the office gets final clearance from his rumored fiancée.

  MacDuff and Zapata found that bulletin worthy of a snort.

  Until McGill added, “He’s a deputy director of the FBI. He might be marrying the vice president of the United States.”

  They thought McGill was kidding them until he said he wasn’t.

  To dispel the idea that he wasn’t just any PI, he’d arranged to have Eugene Beck delivered by federal marshals from Virginia. McGill and his visitors made the transfer of custody on the sidewalk in front of his building.

  “Try not to lose him in the airport,” McGill told the LAPD detectives. “Eugene, play it straight; you know what your testimony back here will be worth to you.”

  “What’s that mean?” Zapata asked.

  He and MacDuff were looking at the prisoner’s battered face. It looked like a giant bruise with eyes, and the guy’s jaw was wired shut. “What’d you do?” MacDuff asked. “Run him over with a truck?”

  McGill shook his head. “He challenged me to a fight.”

  Zapata said, “If we tuned up somebody that bad, we’d lose our jobs.”

  “To answer your earlier question, Detective, Mr. Beck will be testifying in a number of federal proceedings right here in Washington. He’s a key witness. His testimony and other considerations will be taken into account when it comes time to decide his fate.”

  MacDuff said, “So we don’t get to keep him, is that it? This is all just play-acting here.”

  “Lieutenant Proctor and I thought it was worth observing the niceties; you two get credit for the arrest and Eugene knows he’s probably going to do a year or so in a California lockup. As to keeping Mr. Beck on a more extended basis, don’t count on it. If Eugene comes through with what he’s promised and otherwise behaves himself, I might give him a job in my L.A. office.”

  Beck grinned, insofar as he could.

  Zapata and MacDuff looked exasperated. There was just no pleasing some people.

  United States Senate — Washington, DC

  President Andrew Johnson’s trial in the Senate lasted more than two months. President Bill Clinton’s trial lasted five weeks. The trial of President Patricia Grant was done in less than a day. The only witness called to testify was Joan Renshaw. Washed, coiffed and dressed presentably, Ms. Renshaw appeared to be in relatively sound health and her responses to questions were on-point and lucid, if not always entirely rational.

  They were damning to Congress as an institution as well, according to most media accounts.

  Q. Ms. Renshaw do you know why you were first arrested and held in custody?

  A. I do.

  Q. What was the reason?

  A. I was accused of plotting to kill President Patricia Grant.

  Q. Without speaking to your innocence or guilt in that matter, do you have any personal feelings about the president?

  The hoped for answer by the prosecution was no.

  A. I hate her.

  Q. Why is that?

  A. She took the man I loved, Andrew Hudson Grant, away from me.

  Q. Were you and Mr. Grant engaged to be married?

  A. No.

  Q. Was there a less formal but still specific understanding between the two of you?

/>   A.I just knew. He was going to marry me, until she came along.

  Q. So, to be clear, that’s the reason you bear ill feelings toward the president?

  A. Yes.

  Q. Has Patricia Grant ever done anything else to harm you personally or professionally.

  A. No.

  Q. Turning to your transfer into a jail cell in which the late Erna Godfrey was housed, were you placed in that cell with Mrs. Godfrey by the president’s directive with the foreknowledge that you would kill Mrs. Godfrey and then receive a presidential pardon for that crime and any other crimes you may have committed?

  A. (Witness paused before responding and smiled) Maybe. I’ve told two different stories so far. In one I was working for the president and in the other I wasn’t. But as a matter of fact Erna Godfrey was the only person I hated more than Patti Grant. She killed Andy Grant. I had a plan to win him back, but she put an end to that when she killed Andy. I had a plan and that bitch ruined it.

  Q. Which of your answers is the true one, Ms. Renshaw?

  A. Depends on who you are. The people who impeached Patti Grant and are trying her here today have their own reasons for hating her as much as I do. That’s why we’re all here. For them, for me, for us, there’s only one answer: She’s guilty. For everybody else … well, fuck them.

  As there were no other witnesses called, the Senate recessed for an extended lunch and caucuses among those who would cast their votes. That result followed strict party lines: the GOP and True South delivered 50 guilty votes (the four senators absent due to their incarceration on pending charges were not permitted to vote); the Democrats and the sole Cool Blue senator provided 45 not guilty votes. (Senator Randall Pennyman, Democrat, GA, subject of a federal arrest warrant, was still unaccounted for.) As a two-thirds vote was required to convict, President Patricia Grant was vindicated. In terms of the law, anyway. As a matter of public opinion, the debate was just beginning.

  The Oval Office — Washington, DC

  The four people sitting that evening in the Oval Office chose not to open a bottle of champagne to celebrate. They looked ahead to the final year of Patricia Grant’s presidency, trying to work out how to make some small measure of progress for the people who sent them to Washington. Galia said, “Madam President, a flash poll says your henchman is the most popular public male figure in the country.”

  “You’re making that up,” McGill said as he sat next to his wife.

  Galia shook her head. “It’s true. In a question asking women in the United States who they would want sitting next to them at a critical moment in their lives, you were number one.”

  Patricia Grant took McGill’s arm and said, “I’m not lending him out.”

  “Stop it, both of you,” McGill said. “If I remembered how, I might blush.”

  The fourth person in the room, Vice President Jean Morrissey, changed the subject. “I don’t know if it will mean anything politically in the short term, but I’m getting married.”

  The First Couple beamed and Galia joined them in saying congratulations.

  “Byron DeWitt, I assume,” the president said.

  “Yes, ma’am. He proposed this morning, said we ought to remember this day for something happy.”

  “Isn’t it customary for the fellow asking for a lifetime contract to offer a ring in compensation?” eagle-eyed McGill asked.

  Jean said, “He did that, but he underestimated my ring size. Couldn’t get it over my hockey knuckles.”

  Everyone laughed and Galia said, “Being married will help your run for the White House.”

  “Byron mentioned that, too. I had thought of it, but I said yes because I wanted to be with him in any case.”

  “I hope I won’t be too big a drag on you, Jean,” Patti Grant said.

  “Madam President, I’d like you to campaign for me every chance you get. I’m sure I’ll have different ideas on some issues, but I’ll never run away from you. You were the first woman to hold the office and I can’t imagine anyone doing better, especially considering the opposition you’ve faced.”

  “Thank you, Jean. Hearing that from you means a great deal to me.”

  “There is one thing I have to tell you, though, that I will be doing differently.”

  The vice president looked at each of the others in turn. She saw that the president and McGill didn’t know what was coming. Galia, though … damn, if she didn’t have the inside dope.

  “I won’t be running as a Democrat,” Jean said. “I’ll be running for the nomination of Cool Blue. If I win that, I’ll run on their ticket. Darren Drucker and Putnam Shady are putting the wheels in motion to get the nominating process up and running.”

  “As someone who’s changed parties myself, I can’t object,” the president said. “Nor do I see having any problem campaigning for you, Jean.”

  “Count me in, too,” McGill said. “I hear I might do well attracting the women’s vote.”

  The vice president said, “Thank you. I’m sure you will, sir,”

  “You made this decision at least a little while ago, didn’t you?” Galia asked. “You held off telling anyone until the trial in the Senate was over. So you wouldn’t alienate any Democrats.”

  “I didn’t want to make your job or anyone else’s harder,” Jean said.

  Before the chief of staff could respond, her cell phone trilled.

  “You didn’t think to turn your phone off, Galia?” the president asked.

  “I’m sorry, Ma’am, I … I’m still a bit on edge. May I take the call?”

  “Go ahead. It’s probably just a telemarketer.”

  It wasn’t, not from the look that crossed Galia’s face.

  Fear, anger and compassion all fought for and found places on the chief of staff’s face. “Yes, of course. I’ll have an attorney for him on hand within the hour. Tell him not to say a word to the police or anyone else.”

  Galia had everyone’s attention as she clicked off.

  “That was Mary Louise Roosevelt,” Galia told them. “She’s the wife of one of my … people. The ones who help me stay on top of things.”

  “One of your spies,” McGill said. “And he’s in trouble with the police?”

  “Elias Roosevelt works for Thomas Winston Rangel. Rangel has accused him of stealing a stamp collection worth more than a million dollars. Don’t ask if Elias did it. He didn’t. I’d trust the man with my grandchildren.”

  Jean said, “Is there any way Rangel could have guessed Mr. Roosevelt was working for you?”

  Galia said, “I really don’t see how.”

  “Maybe it just dawned on him he was worthy of being snooped on,” McGill said.

  Before that point could be debated, the president said, “I assume the lawyer you’ll be sending out shortly is first rate.”

  “Yes, of course,” Galia said.

  McGill told her, “That might be the giveaway Rangel hopes to see. Mr. Roosevelt likely can’t afford top-end representation on what Rangel pays him.”

  Galia’s face sagged and then hardened. “I don’t care. I’m not abandoning him. He’s one of my people.”

  “None of us think you should leave him hanging,” the president said. “We’ll work this out. Mr. Roosevelt will get the representation he needs.”

  Galia said, “There’s more.”

  “What?” McGill asked.

  “I decided long ago that if something like this ever happened I’d shut down my whole … group of people. If I do that, Madam President, you might have to go through your final year in office blind, so to speak. We’ll likely have no advance word on what the other side might be planning.”

  “Maybe that’s what T.W. Rangel himself has in mind,” Jean said. “He might need to get knocked on his ass.”

  McGill smiled inwardly. He thought a Morrissey administration might be something you’d buy a ticket to see. He said, “Rangel should be worrying about the accusation Edmond Whelan has made against him, claiming that Rangel stole his treatis
e, but as far as I know it hasn’t turned up yet. Not in Rangel’s possession anyway. So —”

  Galia picked up the thread. “If Whelan hears from the big money men on the conservative side that the only way he’ll get the best lawyers in town to defend him is to drop the accusation against Rangel, that’s just what he’ll do. T.W. Rangel will feel like a geriatric Superman and come after —”

  “You, Galia,” the president said. “The other side has taken their best shot at me and failed.”

  “And they’re probably still digging for dirt on me,” the vice president said.

  McGill held up a hand. “Let’s get back to all that in a moment. Seems to me Rangel is fishing. If Mr. Roosevelt isn’t a stamp thief, Rangel is using that allegation in the hope Roosevelt will have something he can use to buy his way out of trouble. ‘Hey, boss, how about I tell you how I’ve been working for Galia Mindel all these years?”

  “He’d never do that,” Galia said.

  “Okay,” McGill said. “That’s point number one. Number two is, even we can’t foresee any attacks that might be coming this way, can we hit back hard?”

  Galia nodded. “I’ve got the goods on just about everyone in town.”

  The thought encouraged Galia so much that she laughed.

  She told the others, “There’s a clause in most publishing contracts. It says the publisher can sell the rights to a book it has purchased to a third party. The publisher who was going to bring out Edmond Whelan’s book, Permanent Power, got cold feet at the last moment. Someone started a rumor that Whelan had doctored the manuscript to make himself look more prescient and efficient than he really was.”

  The president said, “We won’t ask who started those rumors.”

  Galia only grinned. “Another publisher, with a different political point of view, picked up the property for a song. Imagine how Whelan and the opposition leadership in the house are going to look if Permanent Power comes out just as Whelan goes on trial for conspiring to kill Mr. McGill.”

  Possibly without even noticing what she was doing Galia began to rub her hands together in glee. McGill liked Galia’s idea, but he had a cautionary point to make.