‘Tough.’
‘I need your cell phone number.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I may need to get hold of you.’
Her sigh would have made Hamlet envious. But she went over to the table with the printer and scratched out a number on a sheet of paper. She tore it in half and folded it over and then brought it back to me. ‘I know I’m going to regret this.’
I took her arm and led her out of the apartment. ‘Maybe you’ll change your mind about telling me everything you know.’
‘Haven’t you ever given your solemn word to somebody? That’s what Jimmy made me give him. My solemn word that I’d never tell anybody under any circumstances.’
We were walking toward the rear of the hall where there was presumably a back way out. We kept our voices low. The blare of different types of music covered us.
‘We’ll never find out who killed him unless we know everything.’
‘I’ll just have to think about it.’
When we reached the door I held it open for her. She led the descent. We didn’t talk as we worked our way to the ground floor.
The night, all brace and filled with the promise of noisy neon life, was waiting for us and all of a sudden I wanted to be with a woman and a few drinks and having some laughs. This one was not only way too young, she was like working a Rubik’s Cube.
‘I need to go get stoned and listen to some of the CDs he liked.’
‘Just keep thinking about helping me find out who killed him.’
‘Man, you never give up, do you?’
‘Not when it’s important.’
‘You and my dad would get along. He just harangues you until you give in. Only I don’t give in.’
I had no trouble believing that.
Then she was walking away.
‘I’ll talk to you soon,’ I called.
She gave me one of her typical replies over her shoulder. ‘Maybe and maybe not.’
The only cash I had was a twenty so the bellhop who brought me my very late dinner got lucky. As I ate I went through the thirty-seven e-mails I’d received since the last time I’d checked. I was getting updates on all four of our races. Good news on two, fair news on another. Right now I had to put Jeff Ward in an ‘Unknown’ column. The murder could sink us. Even if we proved that Jim Waters’ death had absolutely nothing to do with the campaign, we’d be smudged by it. Burkhart, like most of his fellow haters, made sanctimony one of his weapons. He’d wonder aloud if homicide wasn’t something a ladies’ man like Ward had brought on himself.
I caught the ten o’clock local news. On camera the scene at headquarters resembled one of those factory explosion shots. Real turmoil; mass tragedy. Since the reporters had little to go on as yet they took turns speculating on how this ‘bloody death that police are hinting is a murder’ would affect the Ward campaign. The footage they showed was of the dashing young congressman in his nightclub duds, of course. His trophy wife was the latest model.
When the news finished I switched to the radio. There were six local stations, only two with news staffs. They covered the story at much greater length than their TV counterparts but they made it even more suggestive and lurid. One even claimed that an officer who didn’t wish to be named said that ‘maybe a drug deal was involved.’ The easy blame would fall on Burkhart; he’d somehow mind-manipulated all these reporters to trash Ward.
But no, this was just the American press we have today. And the blame isn’t all theirs. We’ve been tabloidized as a culture. Left and right, both. We want news that sizzles and if it’s not news, who cares as long as it sizzles anyway.
I was just about to open a few of the new e-mails when the knock came. The Glock I carried lay on the bed where I’d parked it earlier. Opening a hotel room door this late at night can be dangerous. You never get a fetching, willing woman; you almost always get a rumpled surly male with bad news.
Well, nobody would ever accuse Jeff Ward of being rumpled, but standing there in his bomber jacket and looking like a print ad for some macho aftershave, he said: ‘I don’t appreciate being summoned, Conrad.’
Off to a good start.
I opened the door wide and he came in as if he was in a hurry. He walked straight to the refrigerator where he helped himself to a beer. ‘You know I didn’t want you here in the first place. And now you’re giving me orders?’
He had to take his anxiety about Waters’ murder out on someone. I’m sure he’d unloaded at least some of it on his minions earlier but I was to get whatever was left of it. That is, if I’d allow it.
‘That makes us even. I didn’t want to come here, either, because everybody told me what an asshole you are. I only did it because your father asked me to. He called in the old times with my own father. That didn’t leave me much choice.’
I thought maybe he’d see the humor or at least the irony in our positions but that had been expecting too much. ‘Don’t do me any favors, Conrad. You’re just one more consultant and the same people who told you I’m an asshole probably told you that I go through consultants two or three a campaign.’
I sat at the table and watched him pace. I’d never realized it before but he had the looks of one of those old B-movie stars in the Saturday afternoon serials. The sleek, dark hair, the jutting jaw, the patrician nose. Hell, he already had the bomber jacket for it.
‘This is all I fucking needed,’ he said. He was talking to himself. ‘Burkhart’s going to be all over this. We were just catching up with him, too. I can’t believe this.’
‘I take it the police interviewed you?’
‘What the hell’s that supposed to mean?’
This guy was in pure paranoid mode.
‘I meant what I asked. Did the police interview you?’
‘Of course they interviewed me. So what?’
‘So did they tell you anything about his death?’
‘Do the cops ever tell anybody anything?’
‘This is a waste of time. Get the hell out of here. I’ll be leaving in the morning.’
‘Yeah. And let me be the first to thank you for all the fucking help.’
‘One of us is about to get his face punched in and I’m betting it’s going to be you.’
‘Oh, great, now you’re threatening me. Dad can sure pick ’em.’
He was thirty-six going on fifteen.
‘Why don’t you sit down at the table here and shut up for a few minutes.’ I’m not sure if he was afraid of me. I think it had all caught up with him. The anger in the dark eyes gave way to weariness. A great sigh as he tossed himself into a chair.
‘You have a lot of faith in Nolan. You’re going to have to sit down and figure out how you’re going to handle a press conference.’
‘Are you crazy? A press conference? They’d eat me alive.’
I wanted to say be sure you don’t whine like this at your press conference but I’d probably ragged him enough already.
‘It’s too late to get ahead of the story. All you can do is try to stop the bleeding. Find the closest of Waters’ relatives you can. Fly them here first class if you need to. Have them standing next to you at the press conference. Limit your opening statement to your feelings about Jim. Tell a few stories about how close you were. Make them up if you have to. Make everything about Jim. Then offer a ten-thousand-dollar reward for any information leading to the arrest of his killer.’
‘Ten grand? Ten grand’s not shit these days.’
‘All right. Twenty-five grand.’
He shrugged.
‘Then let the relative speak. Tell him or her what to say beforehand. Hopefully this’ll be a woman and hopefully she’ll cry a little bit. If it’s a woman, put your arm around her when she starts to choke up. What we’re
