“I do.” Jake waited.
“We’re the counterpressure against those things. People are constantly trying to bring us down, to shut us up. Bowe was one of those people. And he wasn’t fair about it—he wasn’t willing to take you on in open debate. He’d use any little piece of dirt he could find, real or imagined, to malign anyone on the other side of the question. He’d do anything . . . which was one reason we’d never do anything aimed at him. We’d never give him an excuse. Now this.” Goodman turned away and looked out his office window, toward the capitol. “Do you know Madison Bowe?”
“I’ve met her.”
“So have I,” Goodman said, grinning. “She’s quite the little package. Tits and ass and brains and, worst of all, professional camera training. Did you know she used to be a reporter here in Richmond? Pretty hot, too.”
“I saw something in her biography,” Jake said.
“And now, she’s your basic political nightmare, if you’re on the wrong end of things,” Goodman said. “If she’d married me, instead of Bowe, I’d be the president by now.” He laughed and turned back to his desk. Chatter done. “So what does Bill Danzig want? You’re doing what? An investigation? An inquiry?”
“A search,” Jake suggested. “Ordered by the president. Bowe is being used to hammer you and we’re getting the ricochets. It’s getting worse. We’ve got the convention coming up.”
“If there weren’t any ricochets, would they still be worried?” Goodman asked.
He was teasing, and Jake had to laugh. “Worried, but less worried,” he said.
“That’s what I figured. Danzig doesn’t take his eye off the ball,” Goodman said. “So, what specifically are you going to do?”
“I’m gonna find him—Lincoln Bowe—one way or another. I’m bringing in some FBI heavyweights. I may go to Homeland Security, the Secret Service, whatever. I’m going to squeeze. Some of your Watchmen, among other people.”
“Mmm.” Goodman peered at Jake for a moment, weighing him. Then, “We had nothing to do with the disappearance of Lincoln Bowe. You should convey that to the president.”
Jake said, “Are you talking for yourself, or the whole state of Virginia?”
Goodman was irritated. “For myself and the people around me. I obviously can’t speak for everybody.”
“Mrs. Bowe says the Watchmen are involved. And after the incident at her house . . .”
“That was a mistake made by a low-level Watchman, and he has been thoroughly counseled on his mistake,” Goodman said. “I’ve sent a letter of apology to Mrs. Bowe, with my personal guarantee that she can return to her farm with no fear of any interference. She has an absolute right to do that as an American. The Watchmen are not thugs, and we don’t tolerate any thuggishness.”
“You can understand her fear . . .”
“And perhaps you can understand ours, and why that poor dumbass Watchman did what he did,” Goodman said, now with some heat. “She has been throwing mud at us, just like her husband did. Calling us Nazis, telling people that we’re no better than the Klan. Slandering fine people who are only trying to heave this country up out of the mess that people like Lincoln Bowe got us into. Now, she’s trying to claim that we kidnapped her husband and probably killed him. It’s utter, errant nonsense.”
“Governor, nobody ever thought you would have given an order to get rid of Lincoln Bowe. You’re far too smart for that . . .”
“I’m too moral for that,” Goodman interjected.
“I’m absolutely willing to believe you,” Jake said. “But what if some Watchman somewhere decided that he’d had enough? Who thought he’d be doing you a favor? Like this guy who went to Mrs. Bowe’s house? Somebody who believes in direct action?”
Goodman: “You know John Patricia? The Watchman director?”
“I know who he is.”
“We’ve had him looking for exactly that. We’ve had him talking to our organizers at the county level and even at the town level. Looking for anything that might point to a Watchman involvement with Bowe. So far, nothing. So far, we’ve been chasing our tails.”
“So you’re looking.”
“We are looking and we will continue to look,” Goodman said.
“If you find anything, you will get in touch with me?” Jake asked.
“We will. Or the FBI, if that’s appropriate.”
They talked for another ten minutes, the governor adamant that Bowe’s disappearance must, in some way, have been brought about by Bowe himself—or maybe, though he didn’t believe it, was a routine crime gone bad, a robbery that turned into murder, with the body dumped in the woods.
“But that . . .” He shook his head. “I don’t believe that. These guys he drove away with . . . they sound like feds, to me. He didn’t do anything that’d get him picked up by some, you know, intelligence organization, did he? I mean, he was on the Senate Intelligence Committee, he’d know all kinds of weird stuff.”
“I don’t think so. Mrs. Bowe sort of agrees with you on this—she says the cause is close by. It’s no big international conspiracy.”
“She’s right,” Goodman said. “But she thinks I did it, and I think Bowe did it. He’s involved somehow. He engineered this, and it’s working.”
“You have no proof.”
“No. Of course not. If I had it, I’d be shoving it down their throats.” Goodman smiled again, quickly. “Even if I didn’t have it, but I was pretty sure about it, I’d stuff it down their throats. But I got nothin’.”
End of interview. They both stood up and Goodman reached out to shake hands again. “If you need anything, call Ralph. Any time of day or night,” Goodman said.
“Thanks,” Jake said, and moved toward the door.
Goodman asked to his back, “Would you do it again? The combat?”
Jake stopped and nodded. “Yes. I would.”
“Did you like it?” Goodman was grinning at him.
“Yes. Judging from your question, you did, too.”
“We’re a couple of unfashionable motherfuckers,” Goodman said, walking over to his desk. “Stay in touch, Jake.”
Goines gave him a private cell-phone number and left Jake at the elevators. Jake was almost out of the building when a woman’s voice called to him: “Mr. Winter.”
He looked to his left. The intern from Goodman’s office was standing in a side hallway. She held up a hand and folded her fingers toward herself. Jake stepped over. “Can I help you?”
She was a tall blonde, a southern belle, busty, long legs, pink tongue touching her puffy lips. Her skirt and blouse cost somebody a couple of hundred bucks each, he thought, and her silk vest looked like Hermès. “There’s a man named Carl V. Schmidt in a town called Scottsville,” she said. “He’s a Watchman. Goodman and Patricia and Goines are worried about him. They’re trying to find him and they can’t. They think he might have something to do with Lincoln Bowe.”
“Carl V. Schmidt.”
“That’s right. I printed out his name and address.” She handed him a slip of paper. “My name’s on there, too. You can call me at the house.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I don’t like Arlo,” she said. “He’s crazy. He wants to be president, and that wouldn’t be good. He also wants to sleep with me. Which he won’t get to do.”