Chapter 7

Congressman Randolph K. Jepperson’s office overlooked a not very impressive slice of Capitol Hill vista. There were the usual unimportant but large trophies, flags, maps, and awards from organizations no one had heard of and the obligatory photographs of him taken during reception line photo opportunities: the standard Washington wallpaper of self-importance. Cass looked for a photo of him with the troops of Camp November. Sure enough, there it was, front and center, signed, “Get well soon.” There was also a photo of him with the Central American ex-wife of the rock star, taken on a beach. He was smiling; she looked upset. Perhaps room service that morning hadn’t been quick enough. Looming behind Randy’s desk chair was a large oil portrait by Rembrandt Peale of the ancestor who’d signed “the Dec.”

He greeted her warmly. She sat. He slid a piece of paper across the desk toward her. A check, made out to “ Yale University ” in the amount of a year’s full tuition ($33,000). He said that he’d write a new one every fall. “But I want good report cards,” he said, smiling widely.

There it was, in her lap, a rectangle of light blue, her ticket to a bright future.

“Well?” he said. “No oohs or ahs?”

“I’m all out of those. Look, I can’t accept this,” Cass said.

“Why on earth not? It’s not going to bankrupt me, I assure you.”

“To be honest, it feels kinda like a bribe.”

Randy looked at her. “Why would I be bribing you? What secret am I trying to protect?”

She put the check on the desk. “I haven’t talked to the media. And I’m not going to talk to the media. So,” she said, nudging the check toward him, “you don’t need to do this.”

“What do you take me for, Cass? Aside from an upper-class imbecile?” He looked hurt.

“Someone who wants to be president?” she said.

Randy smiled. “Well, you have me there. Uch…” He rolled up his pant leg, pulled off his plastic limb, and scratched. “Itches. Itches like sin.”

“Try not to scratch.”

“Thank you, Nurse Ratched. The pills only make it worse when they wear off.”

He’d lost weight. The doctors had him drinking eight-hundred-calorie chocolate milkshakes four times a day. His face was still red in places from bits of Humvee shrapnel. He looked like-someone who’d been blown up.

“I appreciate the gesture, but I can’t take your money,” Cass said. “But I will take a job.”

He looked up from his scratching. “Don’t you want to go to college? Rub it in Dad’s face?”

“I don’t care about him.”

“Wouldn’t blame you if you did.”

She glanced around the wood-paneled office, at the bookshelves. “This looks enough like college. Pay me thirty-three thousand in salary.”

“You’ll have to work your way up, you know.…?What’s so damn funny?” he said, scratching furiously.

“You telling me I’ll have to work my way up. Excuse me, but it’s just totally hilarious.”

“Yes,” Congressman Randy said, scratching, “I suppose it is.”

So several weeks later, Cass arrived in Washington, D.C., to start a new life with a new name: Cassandra Devine. When she went before the judge in Connecticut, she told him about her parents’ divorce and about the episode in Bosnia and said that she just needed to “reboot my hard drive.” He was sympathetic and granted the name change.

Once installed on Capitol Hill, she began where many a brilliant Washington career has been launched-answering constituent mail: “My Social Security check didn’t come…We need a stoplight…The highway people say they can put the new interstate ramp through my pig farm. Raising pigs is hard enough without the federal government sticking its nose in.…?I be writting with regards to my cusin who been in prison for allejedelly runing over the game wardin in his pickup.…?Don’t you see the Jews are taking over the country, and you’re just going to let that happen?…I am asking your support for a projected 500 megavolt wind farm in the Connecitcut River Valley.…?I read where they are thinking of closing the submarine base in Groton. Why can’t we put it here? The water is plenty deep enough.…” The warp and woof of American representative democracy. About twenty-five pounds of it, every day, in sacks, dumped on Cass’s desk.

Cass’s supervisor was a fifty-something woman named Lillian with lips that never unpursed. Her response to any levity was, “I don’t see what’s funny about that,” which had earned her the office nickname “Giggles.” She required that every letter from a constituent, no matter how unhinged or idiotic, be answered within three days, ensuring that Cass’s workday never ended until after eight o’clock. When Randy formally announced his Senate campaign, the volume of mail increased by two sacks, to fifty pounds per day. Cass now rarely got home until ten-thirty. At least it solved the problem of what to do about a social life. She had just enough energy left to microwave a Lean Cuisine bean burrito and read three pages of Ayn Rand before falling asleep.

One day, Cass had to take some papers over to the Senate campaign office, situated in the worst part of town, not so much to save money as to enhance Randy’s image as Champion of the Downtrodden.

She saw Randy and another man in the glassed-in corner conference office. She was putting the delivery package on the desk when Randy saw her and waved her in.

“Meet Terry Tucker,” he said. “Our communications evil genius. Highly overpaid evil genius.”

“Hello,” Cass said. Of course, she knew all about Terry Tucker. His title was communications director, but everyone seemed to take orders from him, including the chief of staff.

Terry smiled. “Ms. Cohane.”

“Devine,” Cass corrected him.

“In every way.”

“You must be in PR.”

“In every way.” Terry smiled. “Pleasure. I’ve heard all about you. We owe you.”

“What for?” Cass said.

“Our war hero here. You were present at the big bang that expanded our universe.”

“You oughtn’t to be quite so cynical,” Randy said. “She’s new in town, and young. She might actually have a few ideals left.”

Terry said to Cass, “We were just talking about the video I’m assembling for the ‘Salute to American Heroes’ dinner. The congressman is being honored for his heroism.” He turned to Randy. “Sorry, what was that you were saying about cynicism?”

“Wasn’t my idea,” Randy said.

“No, it was mine. That’s why you overpay me.”

“Good to meet you, sir,” Cass said.

Five minutes later, she was waiting for the elevator when she found Terry Tucker standing beside her.

“Got lunch plans?” he said.

“I have to get back to the office.”

“No, you don’t.”

“There’s this dragon lady I report to.”

“Giggles? Come on.” He smiled. “You look underpaid, underfed, and overworked. I can fix the middle part.”

It occurred to her, riding down in the elevator, that the last time a man had insisted that she share a meal, she’d ended up in a minefield.

Terry Tucker was in his late forties, more than twice her age. He was lean with dark hair and suspicious but not unfriendly eyes. He looked like someone who would tell you without hesitation something you didn’t want to hear but couldn’t disagree with. Cass had the radar of a pretty woman and could tell if someone was making a pass at her. He seemed oblivious to this aspect of her. His manner was that of an impatient older brother. Come on. She went.

He took her to a place on Pennsylvania Avenue named Carnivore, owned by a lawyer who had made $15 million from a class-action suit against the Salvation Army for dispensing sugar doughnuts to half a dozen diabetic disaster victims. It’s a great country.

“Have the four-pound lobster,” Terry said from behind a menu thick as Sheetrock and the size of an open newspaper. “It’s scary.”

“Four pounds? That’s not a lobster, it’s an ecosystem.”