Primary Storm (34 page)

Now we were at the polling station for the town, the uptown fire station for Tyler. Felix found a parking spot near the rear and said, "So I make it a point to vote, and I've not missed an election yet. All for Grandpa Mikey. In his memory."

"Good story," I said.

'Wasn't a story," he said back. "It's the real deal. So, go ahead and do your part, all right? I'll be waiting for you. And maybe later you'll tell me about that knee of yours."

"Okay," I said, stepping out, wincing as my right foot hit the ground and my banged-up knee flexed some. I walked across the plowed parking lot to the front of the fire station, where the town's uptown fire engine and ladder truck had been pulled out to make room in the equipment bay for the voting stations.

A mass of people were outside the door leading into the fire station, all of them holding signs or placards for their various candidates. There was nothing else on the ballot today save presidential candidates, and sample ballots were pasted up at the doors leading into the fire station. I spared them a quick glance as I hobbled up to the doorway.

On one ballot, there would be one name listed, that of the current president, who was running unopposed. And on the other ballot, besides a host of minor candidates, the list would include those names that I had become so familiar with these past months. Senator Jackson Hale, Senator Nash Pomeroy, Congressman Clive Wallace, and retired general Tucker Grayson. The volunteers were laughing and talking and were trying to make eye contact with us few voters as we trickled in, and they all stood behind orange tape, strung along some sawhorses on loan from the Tyler Highway Department.

Among the people were two Tyler police officers, making sure that the campaign workers kept their distance-New Hampshire is very strict on anyone hassling voters as they enter their polling stations-and one of them turned and said, "Hey, Lewis. What in hell happened to your leg?"

It was Detective Sergeant Diane Woods, of course, and I went over to her and said, "A slip and a fall. Nothing too serious. How are you?"

She was smiling. "Great. Voters are fine, the campaign folks are minding us and keeping behind the barrier, and I'm making some good detail time. Man, the money I made off these people this year ... Kara and I are going to have fun trying to spend it all."

"Glad to hear it," I said.

I was going to say something else but she gently grasped my upper arm. "Would love to chat with you some more, friend, but I have to at least pretend I'm working."

"Understood."

She said, "Anyway, it's good to see you. Lunch next week?"

"Sure," I said, and as I went into the fire station, I think Diane called out, asking me how Annie was, but I pretended not to hear her.

Inside was the low murmur of people working, of democracy in action. On a table to the left was a large blowup of two sample ballots, and overhead were two cardboard signs. A-N, one said, o-z, the other said, each with an arrow pointing in opposite directions. I got in the A-N line and moved forward, as the line went up to a table where three older women of a certain age sat, with large bound volumes before them. The supervisors of the checklist, making sure that only registered voters got to play at democracy today.

When I reached the table, one lady, wearing black-rimmed eyeglasses with a gold chain hanging from the stems, said, "Name?"

"Cole, Lewis Cole."

She opened up the book and with a ruler in hand went down the list of names. She stopped and looked up. "Address?"

"Mailing address is Box 919, Tyler. Physical address is Eight Atlantic Avenue, Tyler Beach."

She nodded and said, "Mr. Cole, you're listed here as an Independent. That means you can either have a Democrat or Republican ballot. Which do you want?"

I told her and she passed the ballot over and said, "Step over there, and one of the poll workers will assist you."

"Thanks," I said, and as I made my way out, she said, "By the way, I love your magazine columns."

I almost froze in my tracks. It had been many, many months since I had heard anything remotely like that.

"I'm glad you do," I said, and I meant every word of it.

In the equipment bay of the fire station, voting booths had been set up, made of a metal framework and covered with stiff canvas, the material being painted red, white, and blue. An older man of a certain age, wearing a VETERANS OF FOREIGN WARS cap, waved me along to an empty booth. I went in with my ballot. Before me was a metal counter that didn't seem too sturdy, and a pencil attached to the booth with a length of string and some tape.

I held the ballot on the counter, examined it, and in the space of five seconds made my mark.

I opened up the curtain and went down to the end of the equipment bay, where a large wooden box, almost the size of a steamer truck, had been placed on yet another table. The hinged box was locked and four or five sets of eyes watched me as I slipped my ballot inside an opening at the top.

There. I had voted. And in the simplicity that is Tyler, New Hampshire, the ballots would be hand-counted in front of election officials and representatives from all the campaigns, and the number of ballots would be matched against the registrar's tally of how many voters had come in. A simple arrangement, and one that didn't lead to conspiracy theories about manipulated electronic voting machines, or, God help us, hanging, pregnant, or swinging chads.

It was a method that had been used in Tyler for two hundred years --- that same old wooden box ---- and I hope it would still be in use two hundred years hence. I went back to the registrar's desk and ensured that my voter affiliation went back to Independent.

And then I took a last glance and listened to the soft murmurs of the people coming in and out of the fire station, the voters here in this small town, one of scores of small towns in my quirky home state, and it felt all right.

Even with the events of the past week, with what I had learned about Senator Hale and his wife, and what I had learned about me and Annie, and the oppo research guy for General Grayson and Felix's own work, and the signs and the phone calls and the mailings, it was all right. This is what counted. Free people coming in for a free election, in a small step to choose our next president. It was loud and unpredictable and vulgar in so many ways, but it ended up working, more often than not.

Near the exit at the rear of the fire station was Paula Quinn, reporter's notebook in hand, and I smiled at her as I approached.

"I thought all you nasty members of the fourth estate weren't allowed inside this sacred precinct," I said. _

"Maybe so, but I have pull with the town counsel, as you know. And I'm being very polite, asking a handful of typical voters what they thought of today's primary."

I waited and said, "Well?"

“Well, what?"

"Aren't you going to ask me anything?"

She laughed. "Didn't you hear what I said? I'm looking for a typical voter. You are anything but typical."

"Maybe so, but look who's talking. How's the Nash Pomeroy campaign treating you?"

"The death threats have subsided just a bit, but my word, I owe you a big thanks for that tip, Lewis. It's really worked out for me."

"How's that?"

"You name it --- CNN, NBC, Fox --- I've been on most of the cable and news channels talking about my story. Millions of people saw me, Lewis. Millions! And just this morning, I got a phone call from a publishing house in New York wanting to know if I can do a quickie book about the primary and its history. Is that fun or what? My very first book."

"Sounds like lots of fun, Paula. I hope it works out for you."

Another smile, a touch on my arm. "I owe you. Big-time."

"Just make sure I get an autographed copy, and we're even."

"Deal."

So I left the fire station and went out in the cold, where an earnest young man who wouldn't take no for an answer claimed to be working for the Voter Resource Group, or something like that, and forced an exit poll questionnaire in my hand. I didn't feel like arguing or fighting, so I took a few minutes to fill out the form on a table set up in the parking lot, and put it in a box to be counted, tabulated, and presented as a story during tonight's evening newscasts on the primary and exit polls, where various pundits would try to decipher the results and explain the Meaning of It All.

As I put the survey form in the box, I hoped other Tyler voters and voters in the rest of the state took my lead, for I told the poll takers that I was a gay woman, between fifty and sixty years of age, making less than ten thousand dollars a year, and that my most pressing concern this election year was deep sea fishing rights. Oh, and to wrap things up, I told them that I had voted for a dead man:

Gus Hall, head of the Communist party of the United States.

Democracy in action. Sometimes it ain't pretty, but it sure can be fun.

A few minutes later, I caught up with Felix, who was standing outside his borrowed Highlander. He was talking to two young women whose campaign signs were hanging by their sides, ignored and forgotten, while he chatted them up. They both had long hair --- one blond, the other brunet --- and he looked at me and said something to the young ladies, and they went back to their assigned tasks.

I got inside the Highlander and Felix joined me, and I said, "What is it with you?"

He laughed. "Just keeping my skills in shape. That's all."

He closed the door and started up the engine, and I said, "Hold on for a second, will you?"

"Sure,"

I looked at the voters coming out of the fire station, two or three at a time, and I thought about what it had been like inside. People voting, people coming together, people doing what was right, what had to be done ...

There. There it was.

Something small in the grand scheme of things, but something, if I was lucky, could be accomplished before the end of the day.

I turned to Felix. "Feel like keeping other skills in shape?"

"Depends. What do you have in mind?"

"I need to make something right. I'll need you, and I'll need somebody else."

"Who's this somebody else?"

"Someone you've met before."

"Oh," Felix said. "Does he know he's being volunteered?"

"No, but I don't think he cares."

"Where does he live?"

"Right now, in a cooler in a storage facility in Massachusetts." Felix's face was impassive and stayed that way for a bit, and then he grinned. "See? Always told you that a body could come in handy. What do you have in mind?"

"Head south and I'll tell you," I said. "And another thing. You're going to get a videotape in the mail, either today or tomorrow."

"I am, am I," he said, pulling out of the parking lot. "And what's that about?"

"I'll tell you that, too," I said. "Plus how I got my leg dinged up."

Felix said, "Damn, you better speak fast. It doesn't take that long to get to Salisbury."

"I'll do my best," I said, and then I began talking.

Several hours later my hands were sore, and my knee was throbbing like a son of a bitch, but I was back in the Lafayette House, and back in the office of Paul Jeter. He didn't look too happy to see me, and I knew that his displeasure was going to deepen in the next few seconds or so.

"Well?" he said. "I agreed to see you because you said you had something to tell me, something of great importance to the Lafayette House. Get on with it."

"Sure, but first I need to know something from you. What's happened to Stephanie Sussex?"

"Who?"

Oh, so he was in the mood to play games. "You know who she is. Your gift store manager."

"Our former gift store manager."

"Why is she your former gift store manager?"

"I would imagine that's none of your business."

"Probably. But as a friend, I would really like to know."

"And I would really like to know why you're here. Mind telling me?"

"All right, I will," I said. I took a cell phone out of my pocket and flipped it open, manipulated a button or two, and passed it over to him. He held the cell phone with distaste, like I had pulled it out of a sack of dung, and then his expression really went south when he looked at the cell phone, and then looked at me.

"What's the meaning of this?"

"Recognize the room?" I asked.

"Of course. It's one of our suites. And who is this ... man?"

I now held my cane in my hands, to have something to do with them, I guess, or to prevent my hands from shaking.

I said, "Who the man is doesn't really matter. What matters is the room that he's in. The room is registered to a Michael Marone. You and I both know that that name is a fake. The room actually belongs to a star Boston Celtics player. I don't have to say any more about that, now do I?"

Now his face was alternating between the paleness of shock and the redness of anger. It was an amazing thing to watch.