Of Kings and Demons (8 page)

2018, New Hampshire, United States

Walter Johnson, the Republican governor
of New Hampshire, was a homely character. Despite the frills of the
gubernatorial office, he preferred the simplicity of home. The friendly vibes
of his family Mansion at Manchester, where he grew up, were the perfect
nourishment for a spirit rent by incessant politicking and parochial
bargaining.

The Johnson family House did
not contain the opulence that one expected in a building that served as the
home of a governor but it occupied a special place in his heart. It was here Walter
welcomed his first grandchild. It was here he wrote the speech for the anti-drug
bill, and scored a major victory against the powerful pharmaceutical lobbies.

Walter was not a man of urban
environs. He loves the countryside, the rural greenery, and the simplicity of
that lifestyle. God-fearing and fiercely conservative, he was known for his
high regard for the family and education.

He was a New Hampshire boy, studied
in the state, and received his first degree from the University of New
Hampshire. Economics was in his blood, and he aspired to fill his father’s
shoes as an authority on the same subject. When Johnson senior took up the
deanship at Brown University, Walter was asked to undertake his postgraduate studies
at the same university.

However, as he courted his future
wife, who hailed from San Marino, California, he chose the sunshine state over
the Providence. He spent the next decade in California, raised a family,
climbed the hierarchy at the local university, and was eventually appointed
head of the economic advisory team of the Republican governor.

When he was thirty-five, Walter
was asked by his father to run for the congressional division, Fourth District.
The incumbent, Paul Fermont, had decided to retire at the age of seventy-four
and Johnson senior had been the chairman of the Fermont’s fundraising
committee.

After a tough campaign, Walter
won with 51.3 percent of the votes and stayed on for five terms, each
successive win achieved with growing majorities.

Then Walter took a gamble and decided
not to seek a sixth term. He took a respite and headed back to teaching at the
University. The boys were growing up, and he wanted time to take stock of his
life. However he was thrown onto the crossroads again when the party asked him
to join the gubernatorial race for the state.

He was fifty, healthy and eager
beaver. It was a gamble because the state had had a strong democratic incumbent
for four years. Walter could have chosen to do something easier, and more
rewarding, without braving the hustling.

However, audacity outweighed caution,
and Walter decided to throw the hat in the ring. It was his calling. It was
vintage Walter Johnson—always reaching for the impossible. As the voting
commenced, exits polls predicted that Walter Johnson would lose by six percentage
points. The incumbent governor, Sheila Canning, had a strong track record in
health and social pension reform and was a favourite amongst woman rights
groups and the minorities. It looked impossible to unseat her.

But the dogged Walter Johnson
created a political miracle and won by a four-point margin on the promises of jobs
security and economic growth. His personal charisma, down-to-earth persona and
moderate intellectualism won him support from both parties. His tough stand on
abortion and crime-fighting secured the undecideds.

Walter was reelected with clear
majority despite his tough reforms in state government. He increased healthcare
spending, cut wasteful welfare payments, and got half of the state employees on
healthcare insurance. Walter Johnson became synonymous with optimism,
possibility and real change for the better.

After eight years of leading
the state, he came to crossroads again. He was hungry and lost—hungry because
he needed fresh inspiration and lost because he felt he could no longer do
better in the coming year than he had in the previous eight years.

Back at home, he had a good
dinner and, after coffee with his wife, Walter Johnson rose to retire to his
study. Before he entered the room, his aide, Ken Parker, informed him that,
Robin Ballard, had arrived.

Walter cringed. Robin has been his
confidant and political comrade for his entire public life. The man has
engineered all his electoral successes and quite a help with fund-raising.

When Walter entered the study,
the man was on the couch by the fireplace. “Robin.”

“Walter,” Robin remained seated
so Walter took the opposite seat. He found Robin tired, face wrinkled and eye
puffed. Robin was eight years younger but looked older, and Walter knew why. He
had shouldered his worries, and everybody else’s, when they were on the
campaign trail.

 “You want something to eat?”
Walter asked.

“Guv’nor—” Robin said, but
before he could continue, Walter snapped. He knew the implication behind the
word
guv’nor
. Robin was leaning on him to make a big decision.

“You can just call me Walter. No
need for guv’nor. You have been doing that every day since last week!”

“You are thinking of
it
,
aren’t you?”

Walter chuckled like a child. “Robin,
you are such an asshole.”

“Will you consider running?”

“I don’t know.”

“If you haven’t been thinking
of it, why are we having this conversation?”

"You have gate-crashed.”

“You knew I would be here
tonight. If you aren’t happy, you can have me arrested,
guv’nor
!” Robin
held his hands up in feigned surrender.

 “No crap, Walter. I’m
serious.” Robin turned grave “Give me an answer.”

Walter shook his head. “I am
tired. It has been one hell of week, meetings, conventions, and a trip to
Congress.”

“No excuses, Walter. It’s a
dog’s life since the day you decided to run for public office.”

“Yes, I know but Robin, I was
only thirty-five then and after five terms, I was only forty-five! I am coming on
to sixty now.”

“Come on, Walter!” Robin jumped
to his feet. “Age is not an excuse. It is a badge for the dead or dying, and
you don’t belong to either group.”

“On my way to one of them…”

“Shut up.”

“I should remind you that I
have a heart condition since I was fifty-two.”

“We all will die, but it’s how
we die that matters. You want to run again as governor and then retire in five
or six years down the road or do those corporate advisory things?”

“I am going back to teaching,
Robin,” Walter said.

“I hope you die while marking
assignments if you go back to teaching.”

“Wicked bastard. Teaching is a
noble vocation; my father did that for forty years,” the governor said.

“Politics is just as noble,
only much dirtier.”

Walter kept quiet. Serving his
country and community had been the best years of his life. Despite the acidic
grind of bipartisan politics, which sometimes grew too much to stomach, the
sweetness of achievement outweighed all else. The thought that he had made a
difference provided the motivation that kept him soldiering on.

“Run for president, Guv’nor
Johnson!” Robin forthright comments made him cringed.

Walter stood and folded his
arms and before Robin shot before he could speak

“Don’t use age again. McCain?
Ronald Reagan? You are still a young man, Walter.”

“McCain lost.”

“Look across America now. A
wavering Democratic White House administration, festering terrorism in Middle
East and South Asia, ballooning deficit, we need a strong president to hold
this nation together. There is despair and uncertainty everywhere.” Robin
continued, deaf to Walter’s cynicism.

Walter searched deep within for
a reason to overturn his arguments. Robin Ballard had such persuasive powers
that rendered him speechless. A senator who was his classmate at Princeton once
joked that if Robin was made Secretary of State, he could make the North and
South Koreans best of pals, and the Pakistanis and Indian troops would kiss and
make up in Kashmir. All jokes meant as compliments, but the point about the
man’s qualities had been made.

Walter strolled over to the
fireplace and looked at framed photographs. He saw the one he took of his
parents. He was only fifteen, and they had gone to Maine to fish. It was a
memorable trip and maybe that’s the reason why he and Robin were such good
friends. Robin was just like his father.

Walter’s silence nibbled at
Robin and his tone strengthened. Storming over to the governor, he said, “Walter!”

Walter turned to find a face of
grit. He had not seen that much energy in his friend since he first met him on
the congressional election campaign trail.

“The White House is not an
office that you choose to run for in a whimsical swing, or at the turn of a
dime, or whether it’s Sunday or not!” Robin waved his arms. “It is an office for
a special man, an office fit for a unique man of destiny.”

Walter paused “It is not just
about brains, it is about the heart. It is about that rendezvous with destiny.
It is about having someone special in that office. That someone will be you,
Walter.”

Walter Johnson turned to the
photographs again. “Maybe you should run instead? I can be your campaign
manager.”

“Only that I would lose.” Robin
protested.

“Ease up!” Walter retorted.

“Stop looking at your father.
He is dead. He had already told you what to do.”

“Did he?”

“He asked you to serve this
country.”

Walter was silent.

*

Republican Senator Victor
Palmer, senior senator of Florida, had every reason to feel good. He had just
won reelection to the Senate with an increased majority
and
then quickly added another feather to his cap with his election to the chair of
the Senate Subcommittee on Appropriations.

With the chairmanship, he was
effectively one of the most powerful men on the Hill and had considerable
leverage over spending allocations vis-à-vis relationships with foreign
countries.

Victor earned that position of
power without really having to fight for it. In fact, he was embarrassed that
it landed on his table by the merit of an unexpected death. The former chairman,
Republican Robby Pegasus, had been found dead from a massive heart attack,
sprawled on his work desk, by his secretary.

With the Republicans holding a
wafer-thin majority of two, a senior senator, who did not have too
‘controversial’ of a voting record, was preferred. Victor, who had been strong
on the gun-control issue, staunchly antiabortion and a budget hawk, was seen as
one of the candidates. He had co-sponsored four bills with Democrats and was seen
as an acceptable candidate to both parties. His seniority, four terms in the Senate,
sealed his appointment.

It seemed as if rays of nourishing
sunlight fell on every step that he took in his life and career. In no time,
Victor had turned into a focal point for the key relationships on Capitol Hill.
He coordinated the policy-making meetings and decision-making processes on
billions of dollars of spending. In the age of instability in the Middle East
and central Asia, escalating threats from Islamic terrorists and rogue states,
Victor Palmer was a sought-after man.

His schedule had been packed
with meetings, from lobbyists from defence industry to every important ally of
the United States. Fellow senators, junior congressmen, and key members of the
Democratic and Republican parties wanted a piece of him.

His wife, Dorothy, had
complained that she had lost her husband to another competitor. It was a joke
made partly in praise but mostly in sarcasm.

Victor had every reason to
believe his career can only get better, and bigger; there sun is beaming but
there is threat of storm though. On his horizon of clear blue skies, there was
one growing grey cloud.

Ironically, the problem was
nonpolitical and very personal. It had to do with an investment decision Victor
made five years earlier. He had taken a stake in an oil company, Maxi Oil, with
a few of his long-time associates. The founder of the company, Chris Bates, his
classmate at Princeton, had thought he could do much more with his savings, and
with oil prices buoyant again, at $90 per barrel, the industry seemed like a good
investment.

Chris Bates lived up to his
word and Maxi Oil was listed inside three years and Victor’s investments almost
doubled. The winds were taken out its sail in an unexpected event that happened
last year. Off the coast of Mexico, Maxi Oil moved a drilling platform to a
location that was miles away from its original spot. It would have caused
little fuss to relocate it, but it was set up in a protected region. The
relocation was messy and various environmental groups protested the mistake. An
environment-minded White House was forced to take a position and the federal
agency took Maxi Oil to court.