Grass Roots (35 page)

“What happened?” a man shouted from the car.

“I don’t know,” Ferkerson shouted back, not turning his head.

“I saw him grab his chest and fall; he must have had a heart attack. Do you know CPR?”

The car door slammed, and the driver knelt beside the body. He felt for a pulse at the man’s neck, then struck him sharply twice in the chest.

“Yes,” he said, “I do.

Take my car, and call an ambulance.” He turned the man’s face to him and started to give mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

Ferkerson ran around the car, the engine of which was still running, leapt in, and drove away, fast. He emerged from the tree tunnel into bright sunlight, rounded a curve, and came to a convenience store; a phone booth stood outside it. He whipped into the deserted parking lot, found some change, and dialed 911.

“Emergency,” a voice said.

“Which service do you need?”

“Ambulance.” A click.

“Ambulance services.”

“A jogger is down, suspected heart attack, Northside Drive, just outside the Perimeter; need an ambulance at once. Got that?”

“Yes, but I need some more information.”

Ferkerson hung up the phone, looked around him, then loped off into the woods, back toward where he had left his car.

will woke slowly, disoriented at first, unaccustomed to his own bed in the cottage at the Delano farm. The morning was his; the phone was shut off, Tom and Kitty were in Atlanta. It was over. There was nothing more he could do.

He sat up and groaned. He was still tired; his whole body was sore; his right hand was swollen and tender from shaking hundreds of hands, and his arm ached right up to the shoulder. He felt old and arthritic.

Ten minutes under a hot shower restored something like normal movement, and by the time he had opened the morning papers he was nearly awake.

Louise Dean, brunette, a carefully preserved forty-five, smiled bravely at him from the front page of the Atlanta Constitution. She stood, the Fulton County Courthouse rising behind her, a forest of microphones rising before her, cheerfully applying the finishing touches to the destruction of her husband’s political career. Will had seen it on TV, sandwiched between two of the twenty-five campaign appearances he had made the previous day. She had stood there, telling the entire state of Georgia and most of the rest of the country, of her husband’s infidelity over the years, of his weakness for the bottle, and of his personal and political incompetence. For one brief moment of panic Will had thought she was going to endorse her husband’s opponent. He had prayed that she would end her news conference without uttering his name and she had, finally flouncing off into the courthouse, smug with satisfaction over her morning’s work.

Bright and early Monday morning, a tabloid newspaper had appeared at every supermarket in the state and country, featuring well-taken photographs of MacK Dean and Shirley Scott in the throes, with little black bars covering strategic places.

On Monday’s noon news, the president of Channel 6 had announced, having ascertained from a recalcitrant Shirley Scott that her affair with MacK Dean had extended back in time at least as far as his television debate with Will Lee, that Ms. Scott had involuntarily left the employ of the station, indeed had left town, taking advantage of accumulated vacation time.

MacK Dean himself was holed up in a suite at the Peach-tree Plaza Hotel, and the operators were not putting through any calls. Nobody had seen him since Saturday night except the room-service waiters, who were talking freely to television cameras in their spare time. Old MacK, they all agreed, was drunk as a skunk.

And now Dean’s opponent sat alone in the cottage by the lake, a half-eaten bowl of cereal congealing before him, leafing listlessly through the papers, the primary victory all but his, and nothing between him and a seat in the United States Senate but a lackluster Republican opponent with a slight slammer and not much money. To Will, on this hot September morning, it did not seem possible.

Later in the morning, he shaved and dressed for what would be his only public appearance that day, until the election had been decided.

Glancing frequently at his watch. Will drove into town, pulling up, as previously arranged by Kitty Conroy with nearly every television station in the state, at precisely ten minutes past twelve, in order to make the noon news, live. As he got out of the car, six—he counted them—television cameras and their attached correspondents rushed at him. He had been expecting only one, the pool camera; it seemed a terrible waste of men and equipment, he thought, just to cover the candidate entering the polling place to vote.

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” he said, beaming at them.

“Or is it afternoon? I slept late.” The reporters, to his surprise, looked momentarily taken aback.

“Mr. Lee,” said a young woman, thrusting her microphone into his face.

Will was ready for a question about MacK Dean’s predicament, on which he did not plan to comment.

“Do you have any comment on the death of your Republican opponent?”

Will thought he had misunderstood.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Sir, perhaps you haven’t heard that Jim Winslow suffered a heart attack and died while jogging early this morning.”

Will stood speechless before the cameras.

“Will,” a young man said, elbowing the woman out of the way, “you obviously haven’t heard. To bring you up to date, just after six this morning a jogger was discovered, unconscious, on a North Atlanta street by another jogger and a motorist. An ambulance was called, and he was DOA at Grady Hospital. There was no identification on the body. Mr. Winslow’s wife went out looking for him at seven o’clock and reported him missing at seven-thirty, but there was some foul-up at the morgue, and his body wasn’t identified until just over an hour ago.”

“Well, I’m shocked,” Will said truthfully.

“I didn’t know Jim Winslow well, but from all I knew of him he was a fine man. I was looking forward to facing him in the general election, if, of course, I win today. I can only extend my sympathy to his family and friends. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d better get inside and vote.” He made his way through the maze of equipment and up the steps of the Community Building, pausing to shake a hand or two along the way. Inside, he greeted a few locals who were there to vote, voted himself, and left the building.

The cameras were on him again immediately.

“Mr. Lee, how do you feel about all the events of the past few days?”

“Well, frankly, I’m a little dazed. Sunday and yesterday were, of course, very crowded days for me—I think we made something like a couple of dozen stops yesterday in the Atlanta area—and that sort of schedule doesn’t afford much time for reflection. Of course, I’m very shocked to hear about Mr. Winslow’s death. I just hope that folks won’t forget that there’s a very important election today, and that everybody will get out and vote. Thank you very much.” He made his way back to the car and pointed it toward the airport at Warm Springs.

will arrived at mid-afternoon at the Omni Hotel in Atlanta, where a suite had been reserved for Election Day.

His parents were already there, manning phone lines to headquarters, where Tom Black was in touch with precinct captains all over the state.

“The turnout is low,” Tom said on the phone.

“We might have expected that, I guess, but I thought it would be better, even with the news about MacK. Scattered exit polling gives us better than sixty-five percent so far, and it could get better when our people start to vote after work.

Any way you slice it. Will, it looks like a milk run.”

“Yeah,” Will replied, “I wish I could enjoy it more.

To tell you the truth, I’d rather have had MacK on his feet at the end and taken my chances with the vote.”

“The last polling we did, which was on Friday, had you three points ahead, with an error margin of four points, and that was a gain on early in the week. If it’s any consolation, I think you would have won, anyway.”

“Well, thanks for that, Tom.”

“Word is, the Republican State Executive Committee is meeting this afternoon, but I expect it’ll be later in the week before we know who the candidate is going to be.

Winslow’s death must have thrown them for a bad loop, but I can’t imagine they’d choose that clown Calhoun.”

“But he was their second choice last time.”

“Yeah, he was their last choice, too. They couldn’t be that crazy.”

“Okay, I’ll talk to you later. I’m going to try to take a nap; I’m still pretty bushed.”

*

will surprised himself by sleeping until he was awakened by his mother at dinnertime. They ate well from room service, and his mood improved.

It began to sink in that he was going to be the Democratic nominee.

At eight-fifteen, Tom called.

“I’ve had all three television stations on the phone. They’d planned full election coverage from nine o’clock, but now, with the returns so one-sided, they’re badgering us for an early statement.”

“Suits me,” Will said, “but I think we ought to hear from MacK first.”

“You come on over here now, and I’ll get hold of his campaign manager.”

will arrived at campaign headquarters to find a party in full swing.

Nobody was even chalking up precinct returns anymore. He made his way through the crowd of campaign workers and supporters to the front of the room.

Tom thrust a yellow sheet of paper at him.

“Call this a telegram. MacK himself dictated it to me five minutes ago. He sounded awful.”

Will read the concession statement.

“TV wants to go on at eight-fifty, so they can resume the network schedule at nine. I told them okay.”

“Good,” Will said. He passed the next few minutes accepting congratulations, then, on signal from a television man, he climbed onto a desk.

“Thank you for being here,” he called out, quieting them.

“First of all, I know you all join me in extending to the family of Jim Winslow our sincere sympathy.” He paused for a beat.

“Now, I want to read something to you.” He held up the yellow sheet of paper.

“I have a telegram here; it says: “I want to extend my congratulations to you, your mother and father, and all your campaign workers this evening. You have fought a fine and clean campaign and have won the right to represent all Democrats in the general election. Come November, you will have my full and un stinting support.”

It’s signed “Governor MacK Dean.”

“Will paused for a moment of pandemonium from the campaign workers, and as he did, he saw Kitty Conroy come out of her office and take Tom Black aside. Tom turned toward Will and drew a finger across his throat.

“Cut,” he mimed.

“I want to thank you all here for working so hard during this campaign,” Will continued, wondering what was up, “and all the people across the state who have worked hard and contributed their hard-earned dollars to this victory.”

He looked at Tom, who was giving him the “cut” sign again.

“And finally, I just want to say that about this time on that Tuesday in November, I’m going to throw you a much bigger party than this!”

Will hopped down from the desk, embraced his mother and father, and, shaking hands and kissing cheeks, made his way through the television cameras and celebrants toward his office. Tom and Kitty were waiting for him there.

Tom closed the door.

“Kitty just got a call from a friend of hers,” he said.

“The Republican State Executive Committee has already agreed on their nominee for the Senate.”

Will was surprised.

“They’re not even waiting until Jim Winslow’s body is cold?”

“Nope,” Tom said.

“They don’t plan to announce it until after the funeral, but their nominee is the Reverend Don Beverly Calhoun.”

“Oh, shit,” Will said.

“There’s more,” Kitty said.

“They’ve already scheduled his first campaign appearance. He’s conducting Jim Winslow’s funeral.”

BOOK THREE.

When Will arrived at St. Philip’s Cathedral for the funeral of Jim Winslow, he could see why Tom and Kitty had persuaded him to come. As Will and his father got out of the car, it was immediately apparent that half the politicians in the state were there. Billy introduced him to a dozen people before they had left the parking lot, and in the vestibule of the cathedral, business was being done. Inside, the church contained a dozen members of the Winslow family, four television crews, and what appeared to be a joint session of the Georgia State Senate and House of Representatives. Seated next to the widow and her two daughters was Governor MacK Dean, looking frail.

Billy Lee broke away from a knot of legislators in the vestibule in time to accompany his son to a pew.

“The word is,” he whispered to Will, “that Doctor Don is not going to conduct the service after all.”

“No? What happened?”

“Apparently, the Bishop took the chairman of the Republican party aside and explained to him, in no uncertain terms, that a self-ordained minister in the so-called Pentecostal Baptist Church, with a dubious doctorate from a redneck Bible college, is not entitled to conduct a High Episcopal religious service.”

Will tried not to laugh.

“No kidding?”

“However,” Billy continued, “the party principals, over the initial objections of the widow, have prevailed upon the Bishop to allow Calhoun to do the eulogy.”

“Too bad.”

“If he promises not to come to the graveside.”

The service was glorious. There was pomp, pageantry, and incense; the Atlanta Boy Choir sang their hearts out;

the Bishop contributed his personal reminiscences of Jim Winslow’s character, then introduced the Reverend Don Beverly Calhoun, representing the Republican party of Georgia, he added, dryly.

Will had never seen Calhoun in person, only on various talk shows, and he was interested to see that Doctor Don, unlike some public figures, was actually taller than he seemed on television. He was dressed in a very correct, severely cut black suit, a black necktie, and a gleaming-white shirt. Even the cuff links were muted. This was the man. Will remembered, who had been described by one columnist as having “the brains of a Pat Robertson, the preaching skills of a Jimmy Swaggart, the charm of a Jim Bakker, and the ruthlessness of a Jerry Palwell.”