Sick Puppy (14 page)

“A cheetah would be fantastic, really fantastic,” Robert Clapley was saying.

“I’ll call you soon with the details.”

“Terrific. Now, what else?”

Stoat shook his head helplessly. “What else do you want?”

“Something for the Barbies. Something special.”

Stoat sagged in relief. “I’ve got just the thing.” Opening a cupboard and removing the opaque Tupperware container; popping the lid and showing Clapley what was inside.

“Is that what I think it is?” Clapley wasn’t pleased. “I hauled all kinds a shit in my day, but I never used the stuff. As a matter of policy, Palmer.”

“It’s not dope, Bob. It’s rhinoceros horn. Powdered rhinoceros horn.”

“Wow.” Clapley, leaning closer, using a pinkie finger to touch the fine grains. “I heard about this,” he said.

“The Barbies will love you for it. And love you and love you and love you.” Stoat winked.

“No shit?”

“Magical erections, amigo. I want a full report.”

Stoat inwardly congratulated himself for remembering about the rhino powder. Now he and Clapley were back to being buddies, almost. Clapley closed the Tupperware and tucked it like a football under one arm. Palmer Stoat felt a wave of liberation as he escorted him to the door.

“What exactly do I do with this stuff?” Clapley was saying. “Snort it or smoke it, or what?”

“Put some in your wine,” Stoat advised. “You drink wine? Sprinkle some in there.” That’s what the Chinese man in Panama City had instructed.

“But how much? How much should I use?” asked Clapley.

Palmer Stoat didn’t know the answer; he’d forgotten to question Mr. Yee about dosages. So Stoat told Clapley: “Normally I’d say a tablespoon, but for you, two. One for each Barbie.”

Clapley laughed. “Well, I
do
try not to play favorites.”

“Exactly!” Now Stoat was laughing, too.

“Good night, Palmer. Sorry if Mr. Gash gave you a fright, but it’s important to get these things out in the open.”

“Speaking of which”—Stoat, giving a worried backward glance over his shoulder—“I almost forgot, Bob. What about that damn rat?”

“Oh, you keep it,” said Clapley amiably. “It’s yours.”

Contrary to popular assumption, Lisa June Peterson was not sleeping with her boss. To be sure, she had been hired by Dick Artemus with that in mind. The three names, the long straw-blond hair, the impeccable Tri Delt credentials from Florida State—she was everything the new governor desired in a junior staff assistant. But his lubricious plans for Lisa June had been derailed by her unexpected and dazzling competency, which made her too valuable to be a mistress. Dick Artemus was not a brilliant man but he appreciated talent, especially talent that made him look good. Lisa June was meticulous, quick-thinking and intuitive, and she advanced quickly to the important position of executive assistant—gatekeeper to the governor’s office. Nobody got a personal audience with Dick Artemus unless Lisa June Peterson checked off on it. No phone call reached the governor’s desk without ringing first at Lisa June’s. And, consequently, it was largely because of her that Dick Artemus’s office appeared to run smoothly.

He would have been disappointed to know that Lisa June Peterson’s fierce and protective efficiency had nothing to do with loyalty. She was assiduous and responsible by nature. It was not the rare honor of working for a governor that had drawn her to the job but rather a keen and calculating curiosity. Lisa June wanted to learn how government really worked, wanted to know who held the true power, and how they’d gotten it. She was looking down the road—long after Dick Artemus had returned to his Toyota tent jamborees in Jacksonville—to a day when she herself could be a serious player, putting to good use all the tricks she’d learned, all the contacts she’d made while baby-sitting Governor Dick. . . .

“Where do you see yourself, hon?” he’d ask her now and then.

And she would answer: “Someday I’d like to be a lobbyist.”

Dick Artemus would crinkle his face as if he’d just stepped in dog shit, as if lobbying was the most loathsome job in the universe. Lisa June Peterson was always tempted to say something sarcastic about the lustrous ethical standards of your average car salesman. . . .

But she held her tongue, and took the calls. For someone who professed to despise lobbyists, the new governor counted plenty of them as friends. And they were (Lisa June was the first to admit) a mostly purulent lot. Neggy Keele, the NRA’s seedy point man in Tallahassee, sprung instantly to mind. So did Carl Bandsaw, the pinstriped hustler who represented sugarcane growers and phosphate miners. And then there was sweaty-faced Palmer Stoat, the boss hog of them all. No cause was too abhorrent for Stoat—he’d work for anybody and anything, if the price was right. In addition to the requisite lack of a conscience, Stoat had been blessed with a monumental ego; he was openly proud of what he did. He considered it prestigious, the fixing of deals.

Other lobbyists didn’t try to sleep with Lisa June Peterson because they assumed she was sleeping with the governor. Dick Artemus did nothing to discourage the rumor, nor did Lisa June herself. It made life easier, not having to fend off so many drooling scumbags. Palmer Stoat was the only one who didn’t seem to care. In fact, he often hinted to Lisa June that he and the governor had “shared” other women, as if inviting her to join some exclusive club. She declined firmly but without reproach. In two years Dick Artemus himself had made only one drunken pass at Lisa June Peterson, late one evening when she was alone at her desk. He had come at her from behind, reaching around and cupping both hands on her breasts. Lisa June hadn’t protested or squirmed or yelled—she had simply put down the telephone and said: “You’ve got sixty seconds, Governor.”

“To do what?” Dick Artemus had asked, his breath sour and boozy.

“Touch ’em,” Lisa June had said, “and you’d better make the most of it, because this is all you’ll ever get from me. No blow jobs, no hand jobs, no intercourse, nothing. This is it, Governor, your one minute of glory. Fondle away.”

He had recoiled as if he’d stuck his hands in a nest of yellow jackets, then shakily retreated to the executive toilet until Lisa June Peterson went home. To the governor’s vast relief, she never mentioned the incident again. Nor did she interfere with, or comment upon, his many liaisons with other staff members. Dick Artemus mistook Lisa June’s silence for discretion, when in truth it was plain disinterest. She was no more surprised or appalled by the governor’s oafish behavior than she was by that of legislators, cabinet members or (yes) lobbyists. Far from being dispirited by their aggregate sliminess, Lisa June Peterson found in it a cause for hope. She could run circles around these lecherous, easily distracted clowns, and in time she would.

Until then, she would continue to watch, listen and learn. Every morning she arrived at work at eight sharp, poised and cordial and always prepared—as she was on this day, one of the rare days when Dick Artemus had beaten her to the office. He was waiting at his desk when she brought him a cup of coffee. He asked her to close the door and sit down.

“I’ve got a little problem, Lisa June.”

He always used both names.

“Yes, sir?”

“I need to find a man that’s been missing awhile.”

Lisa June said, “I’ll call FDLE right away.”

That was the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the state equivalent of the FBI.

The governor shook his head. “Naw, there’s a better way to handle this. If I give you a name, can you get me some information?”

“Certainly.”

“Take as much time as you need. The whole day,” Dick Artemus said. “It’s real important, Lisa June.”

He told her the man’s name, and what he’d done. She looked surprised.

“I’ve never heard of him,” she said.

“It was before your time, hon.”

“But, still. . . .”

“Ancient history,” said the governor. “When were you born?”

“Nineteen seventy-five.”

Dick Artemus smiled. “Sweet Jesus, you weren’t even out of diapers when it happened.”

Lisa June Peterson spent the morning at the state archives, her lunch break on the telephone, and the afternoon in the morgue of the Tallahassee
Democrat
. That evening she returned to the governor’s office with two cardboard boxes of files and newspaper clippings.

“It’s all old stuff,” she reported. “Too old. He could be dead by now.”

“Oh, I seriously doubt it. Who could find out for us?” asked Dick Artemus. “Who would know where he might be?”

Lisa June passed the governor a sheet of paper. It was the copy of a letter from a Highway Patrolman to his troop commander, a seemingly routine request for transfer. In red ink Lisa June had circled the name at the bottom of the letter.

“
He
could probably find out,” she said, “and he’s still with the department.”

“Good,” said the governor. “Anything else I oughta know?”

“Yes, there is.” Lisa June Peterson handed him a copy of another letter. This one was signed by the man himself.

Dick Artemus read it and said: “Excellent. This is excellent. Thank you, Lisa June.”

“You’re welcome.”

She went home, showered, skipped dinner, got into bed and lay there all night with her eyes wide open. She couldn’t stop thinking about the missing man, wondering why Dick Artemus wanted to find him after so many years.

Car salesman turned governor.

How it fried Dick Artemus to hear himself described that way, the snotty implication being that all car salesmen were cagey and duplicitous, unworthy of holding public office. At first Dick Artemus had fought back, pridefully pointing out that his dealerships sold only Toyotas, the most popular and reliable automobile on the face of the planet. A quality vehicle, he’d said. Top-rated by all the important consumer magazines!

But the governor’s media advisers told him he sounded not only petty but self-promotional, and that folks who loved their new Camry did not necessarily love the guy who’d sold it to them. The media advisers told Dick Artemus that the best thing he could do for his future political career was make voters
forget
he’d ever been a car salesman (not that the Democrats would ever let them forget). Take the high road, the media advisers told Dick Artemus. Act gubernatorial.

So Dick Artemus dutifully had programmed himself not to respond to the jokes and jabs about his past life, though it wasn’t easy. He was a proud fellow. Moreover, he believed he wouldn’t have made it to the governor’s mansion had it not been for all those hard sweaty Florida summers on automobile lots. That’s where you learned your people skills, Dick Artemus would tell his staff. That’s where you learned your sincerity and your flattery and your graciousness. That’s where you learned to smile until your cheeks cramped and your gums dried out.

Running for public office was a cakewalk, Dick Artemus liked to say, compared to moving 107 light pickups in one year (which he had done, single-handedly, in 1988). Even after winning the election, the new governor frequently found himself falling back on his proven Toyota-selling techniques when dealing with balky lobbyists, legislators and constituents. Wasn’t politics all about persuasion? And wasn’t that what Dick Artemus had been doing his entire adult life, persuading reluctant and suspicious people to overextend themselves?

While Dick Artemus felt unprepared for some facets of his job, he remained confident in his ability to sell anybody anything. (In interviews he insisted on describing himself as “a people person’s people person,” though the phrase induced muted groans from his staff.) The governor’s abiding faith in his own charms led to many private meetings at the mansion. One-on-one, he liked to say, that’s how I do business. And even his most cynical aides admitted that Dick Artemus was the best they’d ever seen, one-on-one. He could talk the fleas off a dog, they’d say. He could talk the buzzards off a shit wagon.

And talking was what Dick Artemus was doing now. Loosening his necktie, rolling up his cuffs, relaxing in a leather chair in his private study, the tall hardwood shelves lined with books he’d never cracked. Talking one-on-one to a black man wearing the stiff gray uniform of the state Highway Patrol. Sewn on one shoulder of the uniform was a patch depicting a ripe Florida orange, a pleasing sunburst of color to take a tourist’s mind off the $180 speeding ticket he was being written.

The black trooper sitting in the governor’s study had a strong handsome face and broad shoulders. He looked to be in his late forties or early fifties, wisps of silver visible in his short-cropped hair.

Dick Artemus said, “Well? Has it changed much since you worked here?” He was referring to the governor’s mansion.

“Not much,” the trooper said, with a polite smile.

“You’re a lieutenant now?”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s impressive,” said the governor. Both of them knew why: The Highway Patrol was not famous for promoting minorities.

“Your wife?”

“She’s fine, sir.”

“She was a trooper, too?”

“That’s right.”

“Never went back?”

“No, sir.”

Dick Artemus nodded to show his approval. “One in the family’s enough. It’s dangerous as hell out there on the road.”

As if the lieutenant needed reminding.

“Which is why I asked you to stop by, Jim”—as if the trooper had a choice—“for this private chat,” said the governor. “I’ve got a problem that needs to be handled quickly and quietly. A delicate situation involving a highly unstable individual—a nutcase, if I can be blunt—who’s on the loose out there . . .
somewhere
.” Dick Artemus motioned somberly toward the window.

The trooper’s expression never changed, but the governor sensed an onset of discomfort, a newfound wariness in the man’s gaze. Artemus picked up on it immediately; he’d encountered the same vibe a thousand times before, with customers at Dick’s Toyota Land, USA.

“What I’m about to tell you,” the governor said, leaning forward, “must remain in the strictest confidence.”

The trooper, whose name was Jim Tile, said, “Of course.”