'I know.'
'It's a package deal. Voters size up the first lady candidates as much as the presidential candidates. You've got to get her back.'
'I know… I just don't know how.'
It was just before noon, and Bode and Jim Bob were strapped into their seats aboard the governor's jet for the final approach to John Ed Johnson's private airstrip. Ranger Hank was again up front with the pilots. Mandy had stayed behind to play camp counselor at the Mansion. Jim Bob fiddled with that fucking phone again.
'Your Twitter followers exploded after the morning shows. Over half a million now.'
Bode responded with a grunt.
'Now, listen, Bode, whatever you do, don't talk politics with this reporter.'
'Why not? It's an opportunity to share my political views with the American people.'
'It's an opportunity to screw up on national TV. We've got to find out how the shooting went down with the Independent voters first.'
'Why?'
'Because they're the swing votes. In a national election, the Independents decide who wins. So no politics until I get the poll results in.'
'You're the boss, Professor.'
'We'll meet the production crew at John Ed's lodge. They flew into El Paso from New York last night and were driving out this morning.'
'Why didn't they fly into Austin and out with us?'
'And have all of America see you flying in a private jet on 60 Minutes when twenty million people are out of work?'
The Professor didn't have a Ph. D. in politics for nothing.
Back in the Governor's Mansion, Mandy Morgan walked into Jolene Curtis' office and shut the door behind her. Jo looked up. Mandy aimed a manicured finger at her.
'You stay away from Bode. He's mine.'
Jo smiled. She was very pretty. Which meant there was one too many pretty young women in the Governor's Mansion.
'He's married,' Jo said.
'Not for long.'
'And you figure you can keep him from straying again?'
'I can keep him… and I can get you fired. Which won't look good on your resume. Which means you get to go back to pole dancing.'
Mandy opened the door then turned back.
'I want you gone by the time we get back from the media tour.'
Mandy left Jolene with a look of shock on her very pretty face.
Lindsay Bonner ducked her face against the dust blown by the dry wind and her nose from the foul smell of the river. The stench was savage when the wind blew from the south, and the wind always blew from the south. For an hour now, she had walked the narrow dirt roads accompanied by Pancho. She was the Anglo nurse, not the glamorous governor's wife. She wore a loose blue peasant dress under a white lab coat, the pink Crocs, a yellow scarf, and the wide-brimmed hat.
' Hola,' she said to each woman and child she encountered. They washed and cooked and played outside their residences. Life in the colonias was lived out of doors. 'I am the doctor's new nurse,' she said in Spanish. 'Are you ill? Are your children sick?'
'No, no,' was the standard response.
She introduced herself and said she would make rounds each day and would be available at the clinic as well. She urged them to come to the clinic if they or their children fell ill or developed sores or suffered injuries. She knew it would take time for them to trust her. But she wasn't going anywhere.
' Senor gobernador, it is very good to see you back again.'
John Ed Johnson had wired $25 million to the 'Bode Bonner Reelection Campaign' that morning as he had promised then had flown up to the Panhandle to buy more water rights, so Pedro greeted them at the lodge.
'Been pretty exciting around here the last few days.'
' Si. Mucho conmocion. The cameras, they are here.'
Pedro grabbed their gear and led them inside. Jim Bob leaned into Bode.
'Okay, here's the deal. I negotiated an exclusive interview in exchange for another interview when your book comes out.'
'What book?'
'Your memoir.'
'What memoir?'
'The one I'm negotiating with publishers for right now. Every presidential candidate writes a book these days-Obama, Palin, Paul, Gingrich, Cain, even Bachmann… it's a campaign tool. Course, you've got to donate the money to charity.'
'I don't want to.'
'Give the money to charity?'
'Write a book.'
'You don't have to. I'm going to write it. I'm thinking about calling it, 'Take this Government and Shove It.' '
'That has a nice ring to it.'
'By the time I'm through with your memoirs, you'll be a regular Teddy Roosevelt.'
'He was crippled.'
'That'd be Franklin.'
'Oh.'
Jim Bob Burnet sighed. The boy got hit in the head on the football field one too many times for his own good. But, it wasn't as if political success required a genius intellect. In fact, smarts often proved an impediment to a political career, Obama being Exhibit A that you can be too damn smart to be a good president. You don't want to over-think the job. Which was not a worry with Bode Bonner.
' Buenos dias,' Lindsay Bonner said to the children gathered around a chicken as if considering how to pluck it and cook it for lunch. The children and the chicken instinctively withdrew from the Anglo nurse. She reached into the satchel and found the hard candies. She squatted and opened her hand to reveal the colorful candies. The children eyed them then debated with each other. She unwrapped a candy, put it in her mouth, and made a yummy sound, as if trying to get little Becca to eat pureed squash. At least the sweet dispelled the taste of dirt. She held the candies out to the children. One little girl in a ratty red dress stepped forward bravely and snatched a piece. She put the candy in her mouth and smiled broadly.
' Dulce.'
Sweet.
The others now stepped forward and took the candy. They did not withdraw. They gathered around her and petted Pancho. They smelled worse than the dog; they either bathed in the river or didn't bathe. Their hair appeared not to have been brushed in months; their faces were dirty and their feet bare. Open sores spotted their arms and legs. She reached into her satchel and pulled out a pair of latex gloves. She put them on then found the antibiotic cream and the 'Dora the Explorer' Band-Aids.
'This will help your sores,' she said in Spanish.
She squirted the antibiotic on a Band-Aid and applied it over one child's sore. The girl examined Dora and smiled.
' Es chula. '
'Yes, she is cute.'
Lindsay soon had applied a half dozen Band-Aids to each child. Their mothers had come to see what the Anglo nurse was doing to their children. They had been suspicious at first, but now they were smiling. Several of the women were pregnant, so Lindsay discussed their prenatal care and recorded their names and expected due dates in her journal. Inez kept a notebook with medical histories of every patient. She now sat at an old picnic table with
