The Best Laid Plans (11 page)

Of course, in politics, luck and timing are everything. Being named Finance Minister at the end of the worst recession since the 1930s and at the start of the greatest economic boom since World War II, reflected the charmed political life he enjoyed. He was one lucky bastard. If I could persuade him to pick my lottery numbers, I would. One might argue, however, that he was unlucky in love. Rumours of serial philandering had never been confirmed, but with so much smoke, there must have been a flicker of flame there somewhere. At any rate, the point was rendered moot five years ago when his wife had died shortly before the last election. They had had no children.

Not to be crass, but the death of his wife gave him an immediate 15-point lift in the polls. The glossy, front-page photos of Cameron weeping over her grave looked a little too perfect, a little too contrived for my taste. Then again, I’ve grown bitter, suspicious, and cynical. Not long after the funeral, Petra Borschart was promoted from junior staffer in charge of the Minister’s dry cleaning to Chief of Staff. Given his national standing and seniority in Cabinet, he didn’t need to clear major ministerial-staffing changes with the Prime Minister’s Office as other ministers did. Now, the two were virtually inseparable. She had bought a house in Cumberland, spending Mondays through Thursdays on the Hill and Fridays in the constituency office. By all accounts, their alliance boosted his political fortunes. As the election gun sounded, Cameron was, without question, the most popular politician in the country, even more respected than the Prime Minister. I didn’t trust him. I didn’t like him. After talking to André Fontaine about Cameron, I decided I needed a shower and took one.

I checked in with Muriel several times each day – often just to hear her authoritative salutation. She had an outstanding phone manner. She gave great voice. If I told you she was the mother of
James Earl Jones, you’d believe me (that rumour would certainly set tongues a-wagging at the Riverfront Seniors’ Residence). She deployed “the voice” only on the phone. In person, she sounded as you might expect an 81-year-old woman named Muriel to sound. When I reached her, she’d had only one call – from André Fontaine the day before.

Thankfully, I didn’t really have many faculty responsibilities until the next term beyond some meetings and informing Professor Gannon of my research intentions. I’d always thought “publish or perish” was just a cliché. Alas, no. I made the 30-minute drive to campus to pick up the two Petes. They were waiting at our rendezvous point in all their sartorial splendour. I truly thought the police would be well within their authority to arrest them both for disturbing the peace just for standing on the corner, minding their own business.

Pete1 wore some kind of fishnet shirt sprinkled with holes. He sported purple paisley short-shorts over orange plaid boxers that extended to just above his knees. He wore a different pair of Doc Martens this time – black and white striped with the word
Shitkickers
in red, stenciled on both toes. Even though Labour Day had passed, he wore a white belt in stark contrast to his black lipstick. With no hat, his cue-ball cranium gave him a particularly menacing mien.

Pete2? Where to begin? His hair was now lime green at the tips and red to the roots. As for his hairstyle, he eschewed the classic punk’s longitudinal centre strip of spikes in favour of the modified lateral, double-ridge Mohawk. If you could take your eyes off his hair, you’d see a powder blue, frilly tuxedo shirt under pink, tie-dyed lederhosen. In a moving tribute to Canada, he wore Bauer Supreme hockey skates – minus the blades. I noticed no new piercings to speak of, though I confess, I wasn’t too diligent in my examination.

Let’s just say that Pete1 and Pete2 didn’t exactly look like two upstanding citizens committed to serving the public interest by working within the democratic system. In fact, had I not known
them, I’d have said they were on their way to a
coup d’état
or, at least, a sit-in. When I pulled up to the curb, they were both buried in their Applied Math 1J5 texts. When I asked what they were working on, they casually informed me they were applying the Frobenius method to solve differential equations. I never asked again.

As we pulled away, I noticed a makeshift banner, hanging from the top of the engineering building. Affixing it that high up on the front wall must have been a hair-raising stunt pulled by some intrepid engineering students. Far below on the ground, U of O maintenance workers were talking with considerable animation while unloading a ladder that was clearly too short for the job. Other passers-by stopped and stared. The banner, flapping in the wind, read:

Kick some Tory ass, Angus! Mech. Eng. rules!

News travelled fast. We drove to poll 31 in the southeast corner of the riding where a relatively new subdivision had sprung up since the last election. Lindsay had phoned me earlier in the day with a list of priority polls. Apparently, there was a vague rumour of a lone Liberal supporter living somewhere in the precincts of poll 31. Who needed marked voter lists when we had that kind of inside intelligence on the electorate? Such hearsay was all that was required to make poll 31 worthy of special attention. After all, if there were one Liberal, maybe there were two.

It was time to start the canvass. I hadn’t yet been able to finish and print the lone McLintock leaflet Angus had authorized, so we’d snagged a stack of general Liberal campaign brochures from the party’s national headquarters in Ottawa along with a few red T-shirts and thrown them in the back of the car for future use. I parked at the end of the subdivision, grabbed some brochures, put on a V
OTE
L
IBERAL
button and jumped out. I didn’t really feel comfortable, yet, suggesting that the two Petes dress a little more conventionally. I couldn’t afford to lose them from the campaign by offending them, so I gave them buttons and told them to stay behind me to watch how I handled the first few houses.

I climbed the steps to the front door while my canvassing duo watched from the lawn. I looked at the name on the mailbox, rang the bell, and offered the two Petes a glance of encouragement as I heard the sound of shuffling feet from within. It was then that I noticed that Pete2 had removed his lip ring and had installed in its place the V
OTE
L
IBERAL
button. It hung on his lip like a big, angry abscess. I felt queasy, but the door opened anyway.

“Hello, Ms. Fitzgerald, I’m Daniel Addison from the McLintock campaign. I hope we’re not interrupting dinner.” The older woman was still chewing so I barreled ahead before she could answer. “Angus McLintock is your Liberal candidate in Cumberland-Prescott. He’s very concerned with how Mr. Cameron has neglected the riding, and we were really hoping we could count on your support on October 14.”

The woman looked over my shoulder, as did I, and we both saw the two Petes smile and wave. Unfortunately, Ms. Fitzgerald was seeing them for the first time. She gave a little …
shriek
I guess is the right word, darted back inside, and slammed the door.

“Tory,” said Pete2 behind me.

Our encounters with the next six houses unfolded in a similar fashion. Well, the last one was a little bit different in that a Mr. Canning released his German shepherd, Adolf, to see that we vacated the property in a timely manner. Adolf hurtled out the door with lips curled and teeth bared. I was sprinting to the car to check for a pair of clean underwear when Pete2 knelt down and made soft, mewling sounds in the face of the charging canine. Instead of Adolf eating out of my leg, Pete2 soon had the dog eating out of his hand – awesome skill to have when you’re door-to-dooring in hostile territory. I wondered if Pete2’s talent might be effective on irate voters. We’d have to wait to find out. An Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) officer rolled up in her cruiser, took one look at my canvassing colleagues, and reached for her Taser. It took me 20 minutes and two phone calls to persuade the officer that we were legitimately engaged in the democratic
process. We were escorted back to the car and encouraged to take our leave.

I drove us to a far-flung corner of the subdivision, and spent 20 minutes persuading the two Petes to slip on the Liberal Party T-shirts to moderate the punk-rock fashion tirade they made. The shirts were long enough to obscure their anarchist outfits. With some nudging from Pete1, we convinced Pete2 to shoehorn his Mohawk under an old Molson ball cap I found under the front seat. Looking at Pete2, the new lid only modestly mitigated the fright factor. I failed to negotiate traditional footwear even though I had a couple of pairs of ratty running shoes in the back. The two Petes had their limits, and I respected that.

Eventually, they got the hang of canvassing and even identified one voter who was contemplating thinking about giving consideration to perhaps revisiting her support for Eric Cameron. (High-fives all around.) Whenever a voter would ask to meet Angus, the two Petes, with unanticipated thespian skill, would immediately crane their necks to look down the street in search of the elusive candidate. When they would fail to locate him, they would simply tell the voter that Angus must have gone into one of the neighbours’ houses for a chat but that they would try to get him back here soon. Believe it or not, Pete1 and Pete2 sold the story well, and the homeowners bought it.

By the time I’d paid for burgers and beer and dropped the boys off at the punkhouse, it was after nine-thirty. You never canvass after nine o’clock at night. When I got back to the boathouse, the light was on in the workshop. Through the window, I saw our candidate’s legs, sticking straight up towards the ceiling, which situated his head somewhere underneath the dashboard of the cockpit that was slowly taking shape. I softly knuckled the door and entered. Angus was talking away, muffled by the cockpit’s close quarters, apparently explaining what he was doing as if a colleague were standing nearby. We were alone in the room. I was only able to catch snippets of his monologue:

“Goin’ to go with cable steeri … rather th … ually associated with hydraulic steerin’. What I wouldn’t give to have you here to see this la –”

Then, he paused, wiggled his legs a little, and released another of his cataclysmic farts, accompanied by a loud groan of satisfaction. The man had a gift. As I held my breath, I prayed he would only ever use his power for the forces of good. I knocked with authority on the plywood panel that I estimated would be just above his buried head. That was a mistake. I assumed he’d heard me come into the workshop, but the convulsion that toppled his upright legs onto the side decking and wedged his head under what I think was the steering column was a clear indication that I’d caught him somewhat off guard. When he’d extricated himself, he wasn’t exactly the picture of congeniality.

“Are you not familiar with the local custom of knockin’ on the door before enterin’?” Angus snorted.

“My apologies, Angus, but I assure you, I did knock before I came in. I was certain you’d heard me. In fact, I thought you were talking to me. Who were you talking to?”

“It’s none of yer concern, laddie. Now, hand me that spanner there, would you?”

I followed his extended index finger carefully, as I wouldn’t know a spanner from a drill press. I handed him the wrench, and he contorted himself again into the inverted vertical position. The legs of his work pants slid down his shins, revealing tartan knee socks, which in my mind, was taking one’s heritage a little too far. Moments later, he reappeared, face reddened from gravity’s effect on his circulation.

“We need to talk, Dr. Addison. I’m growin’ a wee bit concerned with this election of yours,” he started.

“What do you mean? It’s Day
I
, and we’ve only canvassed one-third of one poll and failed miserably to scare up anyone who even plans to vote Liberal. In fact, our crack canvassing crew was
threatened nine times and forcibly removed from three properties. I think we’re off to a good start,” I replied.

“Well, you may think so, but somethin’s afoot. The Board of Governors met today as well as the Faculty Association. Both bodies passed motions supportin’ my candidacy and wishin’ me well in the campaign. And then, a reporter from
The Fulcrum
cornered me at the bar in the Faculty Club and would not let me escape until I’d given her an interview. She is clearly going to write some fulsome puff piece on me for tomorrow’s paper.”

“What’s the big deal about a couple of meaningless support resolutions and a positive profile in the campus newspaper?” I asked, truly perplexed.

“I’ll tell you what the big deal is,” he said with palpable anxiety. “There’s far too much support gatherin’ behind me. What if it spreads like the plague across campus and busts through into the broader community? That simply cannae stand, and we must put a stop to it.”

Smiling at that precise moment was probably not the prudent thing to do. I couldn’t help it. I chose not to tell him about the banner on the engineering building. “Angus, calm down. It’s natural for your colleagues to want to express their support for a local hero who is stepping up to challenge the Cameron juggernaut. Did you think your candidacy would go unnoticed on campus?” I asked.

“You’re getting a right laugh out of all this, aren’t you? Well, it’s not your name that’s on everyone’s lips at the university now, is it?” Exasperation personified.

“No, but it’s my name in the course calendar next to English for Engineers, so whose fate seems worse to you?” I countered.

“Worse
. There are only two fates under discussion,” replied Angus.

“I said
worse
. I’m an English professor.”

“Sounded like
worst
to me, but I’ll take yer word for it,” he conceded. “I just don’t want the whole campus mobilizin’ around my
sham run for office. That wasn’t part of our deal,” he whined. “That story in
The Fulcrum
could really start to swing things my way.”

Looking at his angst-ridden face, I decided against bursting our laughing at such a ludicrous notion. I was standing close to the large doors and didn’t relish being tossed into the river, of which Angus seemed perfectly capable at that moment. I stifled my giggles.