Sam Bourne - The Chosen One

The lawyer spoke up again. ‘I don’t think that should shut us up. Just because a few party hacks are closing this thing down to help their buddy Stephen Baker. If anything, it makes it worse.’

‘Just remember what I said,’ said the talk radio producer. ‘The guys who say the CIA took down the Twin Towers. Controlled explosions and all that. They make a lot of sense when they’re talking to themselves in rooms like this.’ A few murmurs of agreement, but no enthusiasm.

He ploughed on. ‘I’m not saying it’s off-limits. Hell, we’ll probably do it on the show this afternoon.’ Laughter. ‘But that’s radio. And sure it helps the impeachment effort. Right kind of mood music, no doubt. But it can’t be a strategy for the Movement.’

A few hands rose, but Nylind moved to wrap things up. He wanted to talk about the chairmanship of the Federal Reserve, sensing a vulnerability in Baker’s nomination.

Franklin looked at Cindy and signalled that they should leave.

In the cab back, he stared out of the window, eyeing the blue sky and the wisps of cloud. He wanted to ask the driver to turn off the god-awful foreign music he was playing – sounded Arab or something – but Cindy held him back. The last thing they needed was some row about racial insensitivity.

‘You know what I’m thinking, Cindy?’

‘What’s that, Senator?’

‘I’m thinking that it’s interesting that the Democrats down there in N’Awlins are closing ranks like this, shutting down the investigation. That means there’s something they don’t want the likes of you and me finding out. Like my mammy used to say, if you see a woman get out a broom, chances are there’s a pile of shit somewhere that needs cleaning up.’

‘Well put, Senator.’

‘It also means that this is the moment of maximum vulnerability for the White House. You know what they say: if you can’t kick a man when he’s down, when can you kick him?’

‘I like the sound of that, sir.’

‘Yup,’ Franklin said, gazing at the succession of grand neoclassical buildings that lined the road to Capitol Hill, as if Washington truly were the new Rome. ‘I think it’s time to put some serious pressure on Baker – and those who work for him.’

New Orleans, Thursday March 23, 09.12 CST

‘Good morning, Maggie. You are cordially invited to a funeral.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘A funeral!’

‘A funeral? Whose?’

‘Are you all right, Maggie? You seem a bit-’

‘Sorry. Didn’t get much sleep last night.’

Telegraph Tim looked wounded, shooting an involuntary glance across the breakfast room of the Monteleone Hotel at Francesco of Corriere della Serra : had the older man – Italian and experienced – succeeded with the lovely Miss Costello where he had failed?

Maggie read his face and sought to relieve his pain. ‘You know, that headache. Couldn’t sleep.’ The truth was, she had collapsed into bed shortly after two and, shattered by a day that had begun in Washington nearly twenty hours earlier, had slept deeply. ‘So what’s this funeral then?’

As she contemplated the scrambled eggs and cooked tomatoes of the breakfast buffet, Tim excitedly explained the morning’s developments.

Forbes appeared to have left no wife or children or family of any kind that could be tracked down. In most cities, that would be a bleak and lonely state of affairs. But not New Orleans. This city still had the Paupers’ Burial Society, a relic of the antebellum days of plantation owners doing good works. The white-suited tobacco growers may have been slave owners, but there was a little corner of their hearts where resided some good. Tim appeared to be quoting from the story he had already written for the newspaper.

‘They left a pot of money to be spent burying the poor. The fund is still there, still paying out.’

‘But Vic Forbes wasn’t a pauper.’ She had to stop herself saying she had seen his apartment.

‘That’s the beauty of it. It’s not just for the poor. It’s for anyone who dies alone within the city limits of New Orleans. If police can find no next of kin, the Paupers’ Burial Society step in.’

Maggie smiled. ‘Must be a pretty liberal bunch, given the way Forbes wound up.’

‘Apparently they don’t care. Anyway, it wasn’t their decision.’

‘No?’ Maggie said, choosing between grapefruit juice and orange.

‘No,’ said Tim, hovering behind her. He explained that while most cities would have wanted the Forbes episode to fade away as quickly as possible, the mayor and tourist board of New Orleans had, after Katrina, a what-the-hell attitude: they had nothing to lose. They reckoned there was a marketing opportunity to be had. With so many journalists in town, why not lay on a show? Prove to the outside world that the city hadn’t drowned, that it was still a place with party in its soul.

An hour later, Tim was bouncing from one foot to the other in his delight. He couldn’t believe his luck. This was what any editor in London wanted from a story out of New Orleans. ‘Liz,’ he said to Maggie, ‘truly, we have been blessed on this one. Sex, death, men in tights – and now this!’

Standing on the kerb, he swept his hand at the procession now getting underway on the street. Leading the way was a trio – clarinet, banjo and tuba – playing what began as a slow, mournful spiritual: ‘Nearer My God to Thee’. Behind them was a larger group, dressed the same way: black trousers and red shirts, bearing trombones, trumpets and saxophones, one man with a snare drum on a strap around his neck. These musicians were not yet playing, but moving in a stately fashion. The walk was slow, not quite a regular march, more a sort of graceful shuffling in time to the music coming from the front. Finally, behind them, came the hearse.

When they got close to the media huddle, a woman with a clipboard – a PR for the tourist board, Maggie guessed – had a quiet word and the march drew to a halt, though the music kept playing.

Now more men, all but one of them black, gathered around the hearse. After a minute of pulling and shoving, they emerged holding the silver casket. There were at least a dozen of them, clutching the rails on both sides of the coffin that served as handles. Why so many, Maggie wondered, used to no more than six pallbearers at any funeral she had been to. A moment later she understood.

The refrain kept playing, but the volume was rising. Instead of the clarinet carrying the tune alone, now there was loud brass support, another trumpet or sax joining every few bars. And, as if lifted by the music, those around the coffin made a sudden, swift move that produced a few gasps among the press pack, all but one of whom were white.

The pallbearers raised the coffin aloft, so that it was high above their heads. But they didn’t hold it still; instead they made it sway. Then they brought it down again, to waist level where, once again, they began shifting it from side to side, as if they were rocking a cradle. Whispering the explanation that had been passed along from the PR girl, a TV reporter standing behind explained to the woman next to him that this was another tradition of the jazz funeral: let the deceased dance one last time.

The procession headed down Bourbon Street, towards the cemetery. The TV guys hastily decoupled their cameras from their tripods and hoisted them onto their shoulders, while the reporters scrambled to catch up. Maggie, back in character as Liz Costello of the Irish Times , did the same, joining the growing crowd behind the coffin.

These people too were half-strolling, half-dancing to the music, some twirling parasols in the air, others holding a handkerchief aloft. An improbably wide white woman with little sense of rhythm beamed at Maggie. ‘This is the second line!’