The Means (17 page)

38

The president sits behind the desk in the Oval Office in his morning meeting with the usual group: Ron Stark, Susan Fitzgerald, Press Secretary Ted Knowles, and Senior White House Advisor Armando Gomez. They're joined by Gregory Grey who reports to Armando and is briefing the group on the latest polling information.

Mitchell doesn't know Grey's age but guesses it could be as young as late twenties. He seems like a smart kid. Grey covers the favorability polls on all the branches of government, then reports on the poll results across a dozen social, fiscal, and foreign policy issues.

Mason asks a few questions and makes suggestions for the design of questions in the next round of polling. Grey responds from behind a curtain of notes.

After the third of these responses, the president interrupts him. “Gregory. Is it Greg or Gregory?”

“Either, sir.”

“Fine. I need you to look me in the eye when you're talking to me. In some countries people don't look each other in the eye when they're talking to a superior. It's a cultural thing. Koreans. Maybe some families here are that way too. In this office we look each other in the eye. Whatever has you in the habit of not looking me in the eye, break it. I won't have someone work for me who won't look me in the eye.” Mason knows a person who deceives is more likely to suspect others of deceit, but he's not going to lay this at his own feet. He just can't tolerate a person who won't look right at him.

“I'm sorry, sir. I will.” His head is angled down and to the left but he raises his eyes just enough to make contact with the president.

“Thank you, Gregory. That's all for now.”

Gregory Grey stands and leaves through the back of the office into the main hall.

The odd exchange between the president and Gregory Grey leaves the room in an awkward silence. Stark senses the president veering toward a monologue and tries to get the group back on point. “The numbers look good, overall. Nothing alarming for us.”

Mitchell ignores Stark and turns to Armando. “How old is Grey?”

“I'll find out. Do you want me to replace him?”

The president pulls his right earlobe with his right thumb and forefinger. “No. You'd wind up with another kid who'd be the same way. He seems fine enough.”

“Okay.”

They all wait for the president to finish with his thoughts. The release of his earlobe signals this and he speaks again. “Do you realize that as a people, our capacity to survive in a postapocalyptic world is zero. As one issue, we're completely removed from the source of our food. I went to a pig roast last week and it was disgusting. The pig was split from its nose to its ass, legs flayed out to each side over a fire, eyes and mouth still intact. I wouldn't know how to do it. We eat hot dogs and don't think where they come from. Everybody goes nuts today if their social media goes down. Can you imagine actual survival? The human race was more robust during the Stone Age. They could survive and didn't even have unemployment. Someone had to get the nuts and berries, someone had to hunt the meat and fish, someone else had to build the homes and tidy up. People in cities now can't do anything for themselves but call for pizza. We're a race of wimps. We better pray for no bombs or asteroids. God knows what people will do if they can't hang around on the Internet all day.”

The president has a light schedule this morning. When he has important meetings he's well read and prepared, but he has blocked out this morning for brainstorming with his team. He wants to set a policy course for heading into the reelection campaign.

Nobody wants to touch the president's critique of the human race. They know it's better not to respond but to let him run out of steam like a toddler in a tantrum.

When nobody comments, Mitchell leans forward and taps his desk as though announcing that this view is now the accepted scientific theory. “Ron, Armando, let's take a walk.”

He stands and turns around to look out the window. When the president sits at his desk, to his right is the door outside to the Rose Garden. Just next to that is the door out to the secretaries which most people use. Straight ahead is the fireplace and to his left is the hallway down to his private study and dining room.

Mitchell opens the door to step out in fresh air and view the Rose Garden. Ron Stark, then Armando Gomez follow, closing the door behind them. “It's a macro issue I want to discuss with you two. We're kicking off the reelection bid and we need to decide how to tack, if we tack at all.”

Stark knows that when the president wants advice, he asks a question. When he wants to feel good about a decision he's already made, he starts talking. The president has succeeded in more funding for green energy jobs and for the Department of Education but failed in cutting tax breaks for big oil. There's been no bold, signature legislation from his administration but the country is healthy and the public approves of a slow and steady approach. “What are your thoughts?” asks Ron.

“Our numbers are good right now. We're going to run a strong race. We could play it safe, move a bit to the center the way Clinton did coming into reelection. Or we could stand our ground.”

Stark says, “Our base is happy with the DOE work and the push on green energy. If we move to the center it would likely be something on tax policy. Reach a compromise with Warren. Make sure we have all the appearances of working closely, announce something jointly, show we can reach across the aisle.”

The president says, “We could do that. Or we could tell Warren to pound sand. Clinton moved to the middle because he had to. Our numbers are good. If we move to the middle, we risk losing good numbers, alienating our base. I could be a one-termer. The people elect a person, not a policy. Only a small percentage of the people even look closely enough to be on a policy level, except for fringe social issues, and these days there are too many advertising dollars spent to confuse people for actual policy to matter much. Right now I'm a person people like.”

Ron and Armando nod. They're looking over the gardens and hedges and a field of grass cut that morning. A breeze rolls over the earth.

“We're not moving right or left. We stay the course and we win in a landslide. You know I can campaign like hell.”

PART THREE

There are no accidents, all things have a deep and calculated purpose; sometimes the methods employed by Providence seem strange and incongruous but we have only to be patient and wait for the result: then we recognize that no others would have answered the purpose, and we are rebuked and humbled.

—Mark Twain, 1835–1910

FACT CHECK

39

Samantha spends twenty minutes on the Internet to find the reporter who covered the hit-and-run and the cop who led the investigation. She starts with the reporter, and he agrees to meet with her for lunch at the Yard House Restaurant in Palm Beach Gardens.

The Yard House is a barn-sized restaurant in a shopping complex developed a decade ago near Military Trail and PGA Boulevard. The inside is open and in the center is a massive square bar with six bartenders handling the siege from all sides. Drop from the ceiling into the center of the bar are 154 pipes, connecting it with 154 different types of keg beer from a back room. The bar pulls a mix of young professional happy hour goers and students from Florida Atlantic University.

At lunchtime it's mild enough and the food isn't bad. Samantha is early and waits in a booth until the hostess leads a man to her table.

He's in his sixties and dressed in sloppy denim. He looks like all the aging, male coastal Florida residents who found out too late that Jimmy Buffett is not a truth teller. Rick Henly had covered the hit-and-run for the
Miami Herald
. He's now semiretired and doing freelance pieces for the
Palm Beach Post
.

“Your party, miss,” says the hostess, and directs Rick to the other side of the booth.

Rick sits and picks up the menu but doesn't let the hostess leave. “Before you go, ma'am. Double Mount Gay and tonic. Lime.”

“I'll put the order in with your waitress. Thank you.”

“Thank you for coming, Mr. Henly,” says Samantha. She notices the fleshy face and watery eyes with loose lids. He's not drunk now but has been at some point every day.

“Why, thank you for having me, Ms. Davis.” He has a big smile. A drink on the way, pretty woman in front of him who will also pick up the tab. It's already his best day in years. “I hope you like the place.”

“They don't make them like this in New York City.”

“What we lack in style we make up for in square footage.”

She laughs. He seems like a nice guy.

Rick looks to the bar and sees an attractive, tan waitress pick up a tall glass with light-brown rum and a lime. She moves in and out of booths full of people dressed business casual and covers the thirty yards to their table. Rick looks her all the way in without saying anything. It's a mental tractor beam.

The waitress puts down the drink and Rick picks it up and orders a second one just before the glass gets to his mouth.

Samantha thinks as long as he stays conscious, more alcohol can only be a good thing for her cause. The waitress nods and takes Samantha's order for iced tea.

“Rick, I'd like to talk to you about the hit-and-run I mentioned to you on the phone, but let's go ahead and get settled in first.”

“Great.”

They make small talk and order food and Rick's on his fourth drink when Samantha returns to the case.

“I read the two articles you wrote in the
Herald
about the accident. Is there anything you can tell me about it that's not in the pieces?”

“I dug up my old notebooks. I keep all the notes of my investigative pieces in a composition book. When the book is full, I date it and put it in this big trunk I have. Mementos, I guess. I found the date of this one and there's not a whole lot more than what was published.”

“What more is there?”

“Well, the thing that is more is that there really wasn't anything at all to go on. It happened on US One where there's a pretty wide shoulder to the highway. Guy on a bike in the shoulder gets hit. There's no dirt so there aren't any tire tracks to go on and there weren't any skid marks on the pavement either. They figured that meant the driver was drunk. A sober person would have hit the brakes.”

Samantha makes a note to call Rick a taxi after lunch.

“There was no automobile paint on the bike that could be identified. No glass or parts of anything to pick up that could lead anywhere. Just a mangled bicycle and a mangled body, but these things might as well have been airlifted in for all the evidence that was left around.”

“Is that unusual?”

“I don't think so. The cops didn't think so. Sometimes you get a skid mark, sometimes you don't. Sometimes you find pieces of things, sometimes you don't.”

“Did you get the sense they were looking hard for the pieces, or that they just wanted the case to go away?”

“I never saw anything to make me wonder that.” He works his drunken face into something thoughtful. He's genuinely reaching back. “They seemed to be working it real. I never had a whiff of anything like that so I guess it was real. Otherwise I might have picked up on something.”

Samantha nods. Rick drinks.

“Why do you ask, Ms. Davis?”

“I'm wondering if there's anything interesting about this case. Something like that would be interesting.”

“Yes, it would be. Why this case in particular?”

“It's unsolved. And it fits the time period for something else I'm looking at.”

Rick looks satisfied and his fifth drink arrives. “I love day drinking. It spreads out the hangover. Start now, then sign off around seven p. I start to feel a little crappy around eight, but by the morning things aren't half bad. If I'm out drinking until two a.m., come the morning I'm suicidal. Much rather be not half bad than suicidal.”

Words to live by. Truly. “I should be living in Florida,” says Samantha.

“No state income tax.” Rick toasts the air and drinks.

“Were there any rumors at all at the time about who might have been involved?”

“No, nothing.” Rick is surprised they're back on the topic of the case. “You think it was murder? Something deliberate?”

“Nothing like that. I'm sure it was an accident. I'm just wondering if there was any speculation at the time, even just neighborhood gossip.”

“Not that I know of. The whole thing was just a big nothing-burger, from a news perspective. The only newsworthiness of the follow-up report was that there was absolutely zero to report.”

Samantha nods. She wants to try one more thing and she wants to catch him off guard. “And Connor Marks?”

Rick is baffled. Drunk and baffled, and Samantha can see it is a real reaction. “I don't think I know any Connor Marks.”

*   *   *

Samantha meets the retired cop who had led the investigation of the hit-and-run. They spend an hour in a Starbucks and she confirms everything Rick Henly had told her.

An unsolved hit-and-run. No physical evidence, no eyewitnesses, no suspects. The case never moved forward an inch and has been cold ever since.

The cop is generous with his time, is calm, and is a fan of Samantha. There isn't any indication that the cop was ever pressured to leave the case unsolved. It's just a dead guy and nothing more to go on. Samantha has one more meeting.

40

It's noon, late September, and eighty-six degrees in Palm Beach. Samantha drives alone, east on Okeechobee Boulevard in a rented Toyota sedan. There's little traffic and it moves in a relaxed way. The population won't surge for the season until November.

Her lane bends left to merge into the bridge traffic going on to Palm Beach Island. The superyachts in the harbors by the bridge are an unnatural white and on a clear day are as hard as the sun to look at straight.

The bridge releases to Royal Palm Way, the massive trees lining the broad road that cuts across the island to the ocean on the other side. On her right are the beach cottage versions of major banks. Morgan, Goldman, Bessemer, all with a presence for the high-net-worth locals to drop in for retail business.

Monica Morris had set up the meeting for Samantha. Monica said Reese Kinard is her longtime friend and confidant and met Mitchell Mason when Monica was still seeing him. Samantha and Reese agree to meet at the Brazilian Court.

Samantha turns right from Royal Palm Way to Australian Avenue. The built-in GPS of the rental directs her left from Australian, then she turns left into the semicircle drive of the Brazilian Court and stops for the valet.

Standing in the shade of the entrance is a woman in her midfifties in navy slacks and a cotton blouse. Her brown hair is pulled back and her face and posture look severe. Not aggressive, just unhappy. The only happy people in Florida are the ones who live there less than half the year.

It is a morbid idea to meet at the restaurant that served the drinks the night of the hit-and-run. It was Reese's idea but when Samantha steps from the car Reese says, “Let's not eat here. I hate this place.”

“Sure. Anywhere's fine.”

“Let's walk a little. It's not too roasting out yet.”

They walk Hibiscus to Worth Avenue and turn east toward the ocean. The homes in the blocks behind Worth are a walk to the beach and more modest and mixed among the shops and galleries. Worth Avenue is wide and lined with only stores. The reputation is the Rodeo Drive of the Southeast but Samantha decides there is better shopping in Greenwich, Connecticut. Except for the Ralph Lauren and Saks Fifth Avenue, most of it is odd and tacky. Maybe she'll have time after lunch to drive to the northern part of the island, where the spectacular homes are done with some taste.

Samantha would rather Reese open the topic of Mason and will be patient. “This is Ta-boo,” says Reese, pointing to a restaurant on their left. “It's not like it was in the old days but still a pretty good spot for a drink.”

The restaurant is dark wood on the outside. Samantha uses her hands as visors to block the glare and she looks through the glass window. It looks like the inside of a cruise ship. “There's a certain look and feel around here that you don't find many places.”

“It's not for everyone.” Reese says this with no edge as though she hasn't yet decided whether or not it's for herself. “Let's not stop here, though. Let's get a look at the water.”

They keep walking and half the stores are closed. One posts a sign that reads “Open when I feel like it, Closed at the same time. Welcome to the Off Season.”

“So you'd like to know about Mitchell Mason.”

“Did you meet him in person?”

“Three times over about two years.”

Samantha says, “Did you like him?”

“He was okay. I know what he was, what that relationship was. But so did he and he was honest about it. Monica may have hoped for more but she knew what it was too.”

“Was it an open relationship? Many people knew?”

“No, it was an affair and it was buttoned-up like affairs are. Mitchell was an important politician even then but nobody's as careful as they should be. Enough people knew. If you're looking for more confirmation I can point you to a few people. The manager at the Brazilian Court is still the same and I imagine he'd talk with you.”

“Okay.” Samantha thinks about pulling out a pad of paper and doesn't.

Worth Avenue dead-ends in a three-way intersection. The fourth side is a sidewalk with a few benches overlooking a drop-off, about a hundred yards of beach, then the ocean. The breeze is stronger and feels good. There's no shade anywhere.

“Let's sit there for a minute,” says Reese. Her body is better trained for the climate. Samantha is sweating but agrees.

They sit. “Did you see Monica or Mitchell the night of the accident?”

Samantha looks sideways at Reese and Reese looks out over the ocean. “I love the water. Always puts things right for me. And I love sailors. People who sail have a real perspective on the world and they're humble, humble people. If you spend enough time in a boat out on an ocean like that, you come to learn who the boss is. And it isn't us.”

Monica had mentioned that Reese is a psychologist. Reese seems the type that was so immersed in therapy in younger years that she decided it was a calling. A few breakthroughs for herself and she decided she would feel even better giving breakthroughs to others so she skipped medical school and went directly to psychology.

Samantha nods.

Reese says, “Some people have these fears of superstorms or famine or war. They buy some acres in upstate New York to build a bunker and grow vegetables. Me? I just make sure I always have a full tank of gasoline. Probably anybody that's seen a few Florida hurricanes does that.”

Samantha nods again.

“No, I didn't see them that day. Monica called me the following morning around seven thirty. She was hysterical crying, talking about the accident, talking about the guilt of leaving the scene. She said Mitchell pressed her to leave it, that nothing could be done at the time and no good could come of it anyway. That morning he was saying that what was done was done, and that going back then would be worse than having stayed the night before.”

Reese's voice sounds robotic and has taken on a tone of duty. It sounds rehearsed to Samantha but then it would since Reese knew these questions were coming.

“Did you talk with Mitchell Mason after the accident?”

“No, never. I never saw him or talked with him again after that. Monica saw him only one more time. After that, only his aides had anything to do with her.”

“Does Mason know that Monica told you about the accident?”

“No, she says he doesn't know about that. He told her to tell no one, but she trusted him less after he told her to leave the scene that night. So she told me, but I believe her that she never let him know she told me.”

“I'm sorry. That's a lot to carry around.”

“I'm a psychologist. I carry people's stuff around for a living.”

Some pedestrians pass behind them. The sun is brutal. The surf is rough and only four people are within sight getting sun on the sand.

“You and Monica have stayed close all these years?”

“We have. She changed after Mason. Fundamental changes, but we've always been in close touch.” Reese looks mostly at the ocean and only a little at Samantha.

“Anything else you can tell me?”

Reese reaches for the pocketbook on the bench next to her but keeps her eyes up and unfocused the way a blind person would. She pulls out a photograph that had been loose in the pocketbook and hands it to Samantha.

Samantha holds it up. It's a younger Mitchell Mason with his arm around a younger Monica Morris and on his other side is a younger Reese Kinard. They're seated in a restaurant and the table is crowded with wine and glasses and plates of desserts. “May I borrow this?”

“Yes.”

“For a few weeks.” Samantha will get someone to test the authenticity of the photo.

“That's fine.”

“May I use it? If I do a piece, this may be useful. Do I have your permission to use it?”

“That's why I brought it.”

Reese seems resigned, like a person who is doing a bad thing but has given up hope there is anything better.

“Thank you, Reese. I'm sure this is very hard. I can only imagine.”

“What you don't know is that it's worse than what you're imagining.” Again Samantha sees a hopelessness in Reese that is a point beyond tears.

“I'm sorry.”

“You know that I'm a psychologist.”

“Yes.”

“Do you think humans are basically good or basically bad?”

“Depends on the human,” says Samantha.

“Do you think society is basically good or bad?”

“Depends on the society,” says Samantha.

“That's because the truth is that human nature is evil. The only societies that are good are those with a political system that holds human nature in check.”

Samantha doesn't say anything.

Reese says, “Carl Jung said that as a people we are now intimidated and endangered by the military techniques that are supposed to safeguard our physical, spiritual, and moral freedoms.” She says this in the voice people use for quotations. Then she says, “You can say the same of an aging democracy. Over time, people figure a way to make it dangerous to the point that it no longer safeguards us. Political systems evolve and it's human nature that forces the evolution. No political system can survive that for very long.”

*   *   *

Samantha is back in New York for two weeks. Reese's photo is real. She has scanned it and kept copies for her files, calls to arrange the return of the photo and ask some follow-up questions.

Reese's office is a partnership of practitioners, each with their own space and phone line that goes to shared reception.

“Reese Kinard, please.”

A female voice says, “Are you a patient?”

“No.”

“Friend or family?”

“Friend. Has something happened?”

“I'm sorry to inform you that Ms. Kinard passed away last week.”

Samantha is silent for a moment. “I just saw her. How did it happen?”

“I'm sorry, ma'am, I don't know any of the details.”

“She's young and healthy. I was just there. Was there some accident? Is there anything you can tell me?”

The woman clears her throat then talks in a whisper. “If you read the papers, and it's probably all on the Internet anyway so I'm not saying anything that hasn't already been said, it was a suicide. In her car, in her garage.”

“Oh, God.”

“I'm sorry, ma'am.” Silence for ten seconds. “Is there anything I can help you with?”