Christopher Buckley - Boomsday

It was the consensus of those who watched the debate that the president did not acquit himself particularly well. Gideon Payne-of all people!-criticized the government’s tactics at the demonstration and demanded that the president intervene personally to lift the warrant on Cassandra Devine. The president, now drawn in, called Cass a “saboteur” and even hinted that she was an agent of North Korea. This last assertion drew laughter from the debate audience, which, under the debating rules, is not supposed to express emotion. All in all, the president looked, as one observer said afterward, as though he were about to pass a kidney stone. He did not linger after the debate for the usual faux display of onstage collegiality and chitchat with the relatives of his opponents. Meanwhile, Randy, who had conducted his interview from a trailer outside the hall, waded into Spin Alley, where he was mobbed by delighted reporters.

Three days later, Gideon Payne won the South Carolina primary. Randy came in second; Peacham, third. Randy’s strong showing was attributed to the state’s historical predilection for rebels.

Cass had her hair cut and dyed black at a salon and wrapped a scarf around her head. She bought a sleeping bag at an outdoors store, lifted a shopping cart from a supermarket, and became a bag lady, sleeping in parks and woods. A few days later, Terry dropped off, at a predesignated point, cash and a “clean” PDA of the kind used by intelligence agencies, called a “StealthBerry” (supplied by Randy’s guy Mike Speck; it was difficult to trace its transmissions geographically). Now she could communicate with her followers as well as certain members of the media. Her fugitive status had greatly enhanced her celebrity.

There is no opportunist like a politician. Randy, sensing a very good thing, plunged in. He denounced the government for driving “the woman I love” into hiding. Cass, listening to this on her SB, rolled her eyes. Randy further demanded the resignations of the “little tyrants in the White House”-this was assumed to be a reference to Bucky Trumble and Frank Cohane. As a final flourish, Randy boasted that he would happily render Cass aid and assistance-“if she asks for it,” which got him off the legal hook. Thumping the podium, Randy said, “If President Peacham wants to have me arrested, I say to him”-the audience braced for another expletive-“ you know where to find me! ” The line received tremendous applause and wide reportage. Everyone on the Jepperson campaign staff was happy to retire STFU.

The little and big tyrants in the White House now found themselves in a difficult if not downright intractable position. A warrant had been issued. If the warrant were withdrawn, it would look as if the government were caving in to popular pressure, for the second time, in the case of Cassandra Devine. A great many midnight hours were spent deliberating over this, at the very highest levels of government.

“Why don’t we just pardon her?” Bucky suggested.

“I can’t pardon her when she hasn’t been convicted of a damn crime, ” the president growled. His mood was worse than ever. Everywhere he went, he was asked, “When are you going to stop persecuting that poor young woman?”

Frank Cohane, the father of the poor young woman, was finding himself, too, beset by a hostile media.

“I’m not involved in any of that.” He grinned tightly. “I’m just trying to concentrate on helping to reelect a truly great president.”

Against Bucky’s counsel, he had accepted an invitation to go on Greet the Press.

“Is it true that you pressured the president to go after your own daughter?” Waddowes asked. Frank froze. If you’re trying to get yourself appointed secretary of the Treasury, this is not an ideal question. Frank tried to California-smile his way out of it but found himself confronted by a look of curdled contempt on the face of Glen Waddowes. Waddowes had good sources in the White House and was not known to ask frivolous questions.

“Uh…of course not,” Frank said. Should he mention that he had recently received a Stepfather of the Year award? “I…she’s…well, my Cass has always, ha ha, been an independent sort of person. Why, as a little girl, she used to-”

“Did you or did you not counsel the president to have her arrested?”

“Glen, the president hardly needs my advice on a question like that. I’m just a finance guy. Of course, I like to think that I’m a capable finance guy.”

Frank felt the cold stare of millions of viewers. The only correct answer to Waddowes’s question, really, was, Absolutely not, Glen, and give me the name of the swine who suggested that I did, in order that I may challenge him to a duel to the death.

A few days later, The Washington Post published a lengthy and rather well-sourced article entitled “The Dad from Hell?” There was a copious amount of biographical detail in it, including his having spent Cass’s Yale tuition money-and the mortgage on the family home-on his start-up. Cass recognized her mother’s unattributed quotes.

“That’s some finance chairman you found me,” the president said to Bucky the morning it came out. “Anything else I ought to know about him?”

Why, as a matter of fact, yes, Mr. President. He has a tape recording of me asking him to criminally implicate his innocent daughter in a serial murder scheme. Won’t that make our day when it comes to light?

Bucky did not utter these words aloud, though they did form in his mind.

Gideon was riding a wave. The cover of Newsweek showed a picture of him looking like a younger version of Colonel Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame, beaming beneath a headline: PRESIDENT FOR LIFE? Inside, Newsweek asked soberly, “His beliefs on the sanctity of human life are shared by many, but is the country ready to be led by an old-fashioned moralist who may or may not have killed his own mother?” It was all very heady, yet all Gideon could think about was his little Russian honey. He was obsessed. He called her ten, twelve times a day, just to hear her say, “Darrling Gidyon, I am wery wet for you. When you bring me more money?”

Though very new to the business of romance, Gideon was not naive enough to suppose that Olga’s apartment, decorated in a style that might be called “contemporary Russian prostitute,” was that of a woman who earned her living teaching second grade and spent her nights volunteering for the Red Cross. He grew jealous thinking of her other “wisitors.” He considered hiring a private detective to keep an eye on the comings and goings. During interviews with the media, while called upon to discuss his views on Social Security reform and stem cell research and the death penalty, he found himself daydreaming of Olga and her perfumy thighs.

On Super Tuesday, the day when voters in a large number of states cast their votes in the primaries, several facts became apparent.

The most glaring of these was that President Riley Peacham was in trouble-or, as it is called by savvy political observers, “deep doo-doo.” The second was that Senator Randolph K. Jepperson had taken serious chunks of flesh out of the president, and though he would not likely beat Peacham for the party’s nomination in August, he clearly had enough votes to run on his own as an independent. The third was that Gideon Payne had a hammerlock on the powerful evangelical Christian vote and was poised to do pretty much whatever (the hell) he wanted.

Peacham had managed to mitigate some of the furor over his administration’s handling of Cassandra Devine by having the attorney general issue a plea to Cass to turn herself in. If she did, the Justice Department promised “leniency and understanding.”