The Butcher's Boy

4

“Gentlemen, we’re running this country like a goddamned poker game. The average man sees that he has nothing and somebody else has everything. He doesn’t make trouble because he’s optimistic enough to think that after the next hand he’ll have everything. Watch out for the day when he figures out that the chips aren’t changing hands the way they used to. And when he finds out that it’s because the fellow with the chips is playing by different rules, we’d better be ready with our bags packed. You talk about a tax revolt, hell, there’ll be a real revolt. See you next session, if there is one.”

“It’s the only game in town, Senator,” said the senator from Illinois, putting his arm on the old man’s shoulder and walking with him out of the committee hearing room. “Don’t worry. We’ll get a new tax bill passed next session. You put the fear of God into them.”

They were walking down the quiet private hallway that led back under the street to the Senate office building. No one was now within earshot. The old man continued, “Hell, Billy. You’re young yet. Boy senator from Illinois. But I may not even be alive next session. I’m seventy years old, you know. Six terms in the Senate. I’m not going to have a seventh, one way or the other, and when I go the chairmanship goes to—”

“I know, to Fairleigh. You watch seniority pretty closely if you don’t have any yourself. But don’t worry, Senator. Your tax bill is in the bag. Our esteemed colleagues aren’t even dragging their feet anymore. Too much mail from home.”

“I hope you’re right, Billy,” said the old man. “But I’d have felt a lot better about it if we could have gotten it all out on the floor this session. You know, I got a letter today from a woman who makes fifteen thousand dollars a year after twenty years working as a secretary. Her husband makes twenty-five thousand, so the first dollar she makes is taxed at forty-three percent. No tax shelters for them. By the time you figure state taxes, social security, and sales taxes that woman is losing over half her income. Maybe eight thousand dollars. Of the fifty richest people in my state, not one of them pays eight thousand a year in taxes. A lot of them don’t pay anything and never have. And the recent tax bills gave the rich the biggest subsidy yet. We’ve got to make some changes.”

“I know, Senator,” said the younger man, patting him on the shoulder. “I’ve been with you on this since I got here. It’s what got me elected. I said I’d try to work with you on income tax reforms that would help the average citizen, do whatever you wanted. They didn’t vote for me, they voted for you.”

“That’s bullshit. You got here because you were the best governor they’d had in twenty-five years. And you’ll get reelected because you’re the best senator for the last thirty. If something happens to me before we get this bill passed I’m counting on you to ramrod it. Remind a few people of what they promised us. You know who I mean.”

“Well, here’s my office,” said the senator from Illinois. “Don’t worry. We’ll both be here to remind them, and we probably won’t have to. Most of them will get an earful while they’re home for the break. I leave myself in two hours. First speaking date is tonight.”

“Oh, to be young again,” said the old man. “See you in a few weeks, Billy.” The younger man watched the older senator walk down the hallway toward his office. The familiar blue suit was hanging from the old man’s stooped shoulders, but the white head was still held erect. The Honorable McKinley R. Claremont, senior senator from the great state of Colorado. He wasn’t fooling anybody with that frail elderstatesman routine. Anybody who was interested could check his schedule and see he had a press conference set for eight fifteen tonight in the Denver airport.

“YOU’RE SURE ABOUT all this?” asked Brayer.

“Of course I’m sure,” said Elizabeth. “I’m sure of the facts, that is. I’m not sure about what interpretation to hang on them, because there aren’t enough of them. Veasy was carrying two hundred-pound sacks of nitrate fertilizer in his pickup truck. He must have bought them that day according to the Ventura police, because nobody saw them before that. Somebody apparently came along while he was in a union meeting and did something to the fertilizer so it would explode. And the FBI agent said that was perfectly possible for somebody who knew how.”

Brayer leaned back in his chair and tapped his pencil absently on the glass desk top. He stared off into space. Finally he turned to her and said, “I’m afraid I don’t know what to make of it either, but it’s sure not ordinary. Whoever did it was fast on his feet. He’d have to ad lib, if the fertilizer was only bought that day.”

“So what do we do now?” asked Elizabeth. “Does it warrant an investigation or not?”

“I’m not sure I know what warrants an investigation these days. We’re supposed to be keeping an eye on organized crime, not giving an Academy Award for the most imaginative performance by a murderer. Do you have any reason to believe this fellow Veasy might have had anything to do with the Mafia?”

“He didn’t have a record, if that’s what you mean, and his name didn’t come up when I had Padgett run the Who’s Who program on the computer. But who knows? Maybe he borrowed money, maybe he smuggled something for them—Ventura’s got a harbor. Maybe anything. It could even have had something to do with the union. We just don’t have anything to go on.”

“Except the fact that whoever snuffed him was clever about it.”

“Right,” said Elizabeth. “Clever enough to be a professional?”

“I don’t know. Maybe a world-class amateur, maybe a lunatic with beginner’s luck. But there’s always the chance it’s the real thing. Lunatics and beginners usually spend some time planning. They’re not up to working with what they find.”

“So you’re going to dispatch an investigator?”

“I’m not sure yet. I’m not even sure if I have anybody I can send right now. What was that FBI agent’s name, again?”

“Hart. Robert E. Hart. Extension 3023. Why?”

“I’ll see if I can con his boss into sending him. If he’s as good as the Treasury man said and I haven’t heard of him, he’s young enough and new enough to be eligible for legwork.” He picked up the phone, then looked at her expectantly.

“You mean I have to leave?” she asked.

“ ’Fraid so. It’s hard to lie, cheat, and steal in front of an audience. Close the door on your way out.”