William Johnstone - Fire in the Ashes

“Get off Raines’s back. Let the man put the nation back together again—he can do it. When it’s together once more, he’ll step down and hand the most disagreeable job in the world to some other sucker.”

Jane Moore stood up. “Am I to understand we are not to report on Ben Raines’s excesses, sir?”

“I didn’t say that, Bitty. I said get off the man’s back. I’ve just come from a meeting with the department heads of all the majors—we’ve agreed to give him a chance. Ben Raines, in case any of you missed the placement of the pronoun, and I want it to be very clear. And just to make it perfectly clear,” he looked at Roanna. “You’re in charge of this flag station.”

“I’ll step down when Sabra returns, Mr. Brighton,” Roanna replied, shock evident on her face at the promotion to Top Gun in the nation’s capital.

Brighton shook his head. “Sabra died an hour ago.”

“I want this to be the toughest tax bill to ever pass both Houses,” Ben said. “I have no doubt that when I leave the White House it will be repealed, but for my term in office, the tax laws will be as equitable as I can make them.”

“Senator Henson told me yesterday she doubted it will get out of committee,” an aide informed him.

Ben turned in his chair and fixed the man with a look that would freeze water in the middle of the Mojave in July. At noon. “You will personally inform Senator Henson that if this bill is not out of committee and on the floor by this time next week, I will personally go on radio and television and inform the middle and lower-income citizens of this nation that effective immediately, they may commence paying into IRS what they feel the government is worth. And if Congress doesn’t like it, I will station armed troops around every IRS office in this nation with orders to shoot any agent that attempts to harass any non-taxpaying citizen. Is that clear?”

The aide paled; looked appalled. “Mr. President, you can’t mean that!”

“Try me,” Ben said calmly, but his voice was charged with emotion.

“Yes, sir,” the aide replied weakly. “I will so inform Senator Henson.”

“Fine.” Ben turned to Steve Mailer, the new head of the Department of Education. “Are you going to be a harbinger of gloom and doom, too?”

“No,” the ex-college professor laughed his reply. “But I’m running into stiff opposition with your mandatory high school education plans.”

“I expected it. Steve, I hope I don’t have to convince you that education is the key that will turn the lock for survival in this nation.”

“You know you don’t, Mr. President. But you must know there are any number of… how do I put this… ?”

“…Hillbillies and rednecks who don’t want their kids exposed to much education. I am fully aware it all begins in the home, Steve. Because of that, the teachers that will staff our schools will have to be a special breed. Not only will they be teaching the three Rs, this time around they’ll be teaching fairness, ethics, honesty, ways to combat and ultimately eradicate all the deadly sins that have plagued this nation for so many years. I know that is in part why the NEA is opposed to me. I understand it, and whether they believe me or not, I sympathize with the teachers; they’ve never been asked to do anything like this before. How is the mail from parents running?”

“It’s really too soon to tell. But from what we have received so far, it pretty well reinforces what we have known all along: the higher the educational ladder attained, the more in favor of what you are proposing. The lower the educational rungs achieved… against it.”

“The teacher organizations, Steve—why are they really opposed to this plan?”

Steve shifted in his chair. An ex-teacher, part of his emotions stayed with his chosen field. But as a highly educated person, he knew the more education a being possessed, the less the chances of that person abusing the children; the less chances of crime; the more apt to stay away from the baser types of music and violent sports… and so much more. But, just as Ben knew, Steve knew, too, that education without a solid base of ethics supporting it all, without a framework of decency and fair play and honesty and a stiff moral base left a great deal lacking.

But was it, should it, be on the shoulders of teachers to instill those qualities into the hearts and minds of the young?

Steve had been appalled when he learned that back in the Tri-States, Ben had ordered children taken from their parents if the parents were teaching the young hatred or bigotry and values that went against the foundation of what the Tri-States was built upon.

But shock diminished, falling away from him gradually when he gave Ben Raines’s plan a deeper study. How could a nation ever do away with the deadly sins if parents continued to practice those sins at home?

Like father and mother, like son and daughter.

Steve was conscious of Ben watching him very closely, waiting for his reply.

“Because many of the teachers are afraid they’ll lose their jobs, Ben. They are afraid they will not come up to your expectations.”

Ben smiled. “But Steve, we haven’t even discussed guidelines. Aren’t they getting a little panicky for no reason?”

The teacher met the revolutionary’s eyes. “All right, Ben—you want to cut right through the grease to the meat. Okay. Many of them know they will lose their jobs. They are fully aware they cannot meet any standards set higher than the ones currently in practice. There it is.”

“That’s their problem. They can learn to adjust.”

“What if they are fine teachers but still somewhat, shall we say, immoral outside the classroom?”

“Get rid of them.”

“Ben…”

“No! I will not have drunks, womanizers, whores, bigots, playboys, or playgirls shaping the minds of this nation’s young people. Damn, Steve! Kids have to have someone they can look up to standing in front of that class. And I mean standing . Unless the teacher is handicapped and unable to stand.

“The teachers that will staff the public schools of this nation will be of the highest quality, and they will be very highly paid. And their personal lives will be exemplary. Religion has nothing to do with it. I don’t care if they are Christian or atheist. Religion is not going to be taught in the public schools.

“There is a very great difference in religion and ethics. Just do it, Steve. You said you could, I believe you, so do it. Steve, we can’t have a government based on common sense without the citizens of that nation openly practicing ethics and honesty and trust. If those qualities are not taught at home, then they must be taught in our schools.”

Steve gave a mighty sigh. “You are going to stir up a hornet’s nest, Ben.”

“Steve, I’ve been making waves for forty years. My daddy said I came out of the womb arguing with the doctor.”

Steve laughed. “I don’t doubt that, Ben. I really don’t.” He stood up. “All right, Ben. It sounds so easy the way you put it.”

“It’s going to be anything but easy, Steve. If it was easy it wouldn’t be worth a damn.”

The men shook hands and Steve left to do his task. The intercom buzzer sounded on Ben’s desk.

“A General Altamont to see you, sir.”

“Who?”

“Representative Altamont’s brother, sir.”

Ben was thoughtful for a moment. A sense of alarm sounded silently in his guts. “Susie? We’ll be rolling on this one.”

“Yes, sir.”

Which meant everything was to be taped.

Just before Captain Dan Gray slit the throat of one of Hartline’s mercenaries, the man gasped, “Just outside Pekin.”