“What manner of planet do we inhabit?” Randy said, rubbing his temples.

Chapter 33

Gideon Payne, candidate of the SPERM party, was grappling with a similar problem. His press secretary, an old Washington hand named Teeley, had raised the subject as delicately as he could: “We, uh, probably ought to figure out a position on the, uh, matter of”-cough-“Mrs. Payne?”

Gideon was beyond embarrassment on the point. He said, “You’re saying that the voters might want to know if it’s true that I killed Mother?”

Teeley shrugged. “Something…along those lines. Basically. Yeah.”

“Well,” Gideon said, making a steeple of his fingers. How he missed his watch. “How shall we address that dismal business?”

“Tragic accident,” Teeley said. “Painful subject. These things happen.…”

“Yes,” Gideon said. “Mothers go off cliffs all the time. Happens all the time. Well, it is tragic, certainly. Painful, no question. But there are people back in Payne County with mischievous tongues that wag, wag, wag all day in the noon sun. I’m surprised they don’t burn up. And when the national press goes a-calling on them, they will cluck and say, ‘Oh yes, he killed the poor old dear. Terrible affair. He left not long after, you know, head hung in shame.’” Gideon considered. “There does exist a medical record. A few weeks before the incident, her doctors had informed her that she had a tumor. A tumor of the brain. She didn’t have long to live.”

“So,” said Teeley, “she would have died anyway.”

Gideon said, “Um…I suppose that doesn’t quite solve the question of whether or not I sent her plunging to her death, does it? An unusual problem in a presidential campaign, I should think. Or have some of your other clients been under suspicion of murdering their mothers?”

“There was one whose uncle turned out to have been on Hitler’s staff during World War Two. Pretty high up, too. But no matricides that I can think of offhand.”

“Hm…Well, it may just be an intractable problem. We’ll just have to work around it. I have dedicated my entire career to the preservation of life. The unborn, the halt, the lame, the brain afflicted, the elderly. We’ll just have to run on that. There is the unfortunate Arthur Clumm business, but we’re paying off the families-I must say, most of them seem quite happy to have the money-so I shouldn’t think that will trouble us. It ought to be more of a problem for the Jepperson campaign, I should think. Ms. Devine on his staff was the inspiration for Mr. Clumm’s serial murdering. I do look forward to the debates.” He shrugged. “Perhaps some voters might even be attracted to someone who sent his mother off a cliff, though I don’t suppose we should adopt that as our platform. Now let’s have a look at those television spots your people have devised.”

In his office at the papal nunciature on Massachusetts Avenue, opposite the residence of the vice president, Monsignor Massimo Montefeltro was confronting his own incipient media problem.

When the Transitioning commission issued its “further study” report, the monsignor sighed with relief and offered a prayer of thanks to Our Lady of Prompt Succor. Now, with the issue losing steam, surely Rome would calm down and not demand that he go on television and denounce Transitioning, exposing him to further harassment from the Russian putanas and the gruesome enforcer Ivan the Terrible.

But then that idiot Jepperson leapt in and declared he was running for president, with Transitioning as its centerpiece. Porca miseria. Within hours, Cardinal Restempopo-Bandolini was on the phone again, demanding, “When will you unleash our attack on this abomination, Massimo? The holy father grows impatient.”

“Please tell the holy father I am a…gathering storm. The moment is not yet.”

This Vatican idea of threatening excommunication-did they really think it was the sixteenth century again? He could just imagine how well that would go down with Americans. Being bullied by a pope in Rome. And not even a particularly popular pope with Americans to begin with. It didn’t help that he was French.

Massimo seriously considered faking a heart attack. Certainly his high blood pressure didn’t need faking.

That fool Geedeon. It was all his fault. And now he was running for president. What a country, America. A lunatic asylum, without enough attendants or tranquilizers.

What to do? He looked up at the statue of Our Lady of Prompt Succor. She smiled back at him, as if to say, Massimo, Massimo, Massimo, be reasonable-not even I can get you out of this.

The phone rang. His blood pressure spiked. He had developed a morbid fear of telephones, something of a disability for the Vatican’s number two man in Washington, soon to be number one. Assuming he lived.

“Monsignor, it’s someone named Ivan calling. He won’t give a last name. He says he knows you. Do you want to speak to him?”

Monsignor Montefeltro suppressed a groan.

“Yes, yes.” He picked up. “What do you want? I gave you the money.”

“Am calling on behalf of charity organization.”

“What?”

“For orphans of war in Chechnya. Do you wish to make donation?”

“No,” said Monsignor Montefeltro. “I do not wish. I wish you to go to Chechnya.”

Silence. “Pity. It’s good cause. And Catholic Church is so rich. You have big office on Massachusetts Avenue.”

“How did you find me here?”

“I follow you to work!” Ivan the Terrible sounded pleased with himself.

“All right, all right. I will make a donation to this charity.”

“How much you give?”

“Ten dollars.”

Ivan made a noise not indicative of being impressed. “Ten thousand dollars, better.”

“I don’t have ten thousand dollars.”

“Catholic Church not have ten thousand dollars?” Ivan said. “Pah. You can sell gold Madonna or candlesticks. You pay gold before. Gold watch of your friend Gidyon Pine. Is same person as man on television who want to be president?”

Montefeltro no longer much cared about protecting Geedeon, since this calamity had been entirely of his making. So they’d made the connection at last. Montefeltro thought, Perhaps Our Lady of Prompt Succor did hear my prayer.

“Yes,” he said. “It’s the same. So why don’t you call him and ask for donation. Perhaps he will buy back the watch.”

“It’s good idea. You are clever priest.”

Free at last…

“But you should also be making donation. Poor orphans. They are so hungry.”

Frank Cohane had wanted an office in the West Wing. Bucky Trumble explained that not even he could arrange that. Under the law, campaign operatives could not occupy government buildings. “Under the law” was not a concept that particularly interested Frank Cohane, but Bucky mollified him with a White House pass so he could have the illusion of working in the White House. He also made sure that Frank got lots of “face time” with the president in the Oval. That would keep the bastard happy. That and an orgiastic night with Lisa in the Lincoln Bedroom. It was all they cared about, the big donors. They wanted to go back to their friends and say, “I screwed my brains out in the Lincoln Bedroom.”

In keeping with the deal that he had worked out with Frank, once Bucky had got him the finance chairman job, Frank handed over the tape of Bucky asking him to plant incriminating e-mails on Cass’s computer.

“How do I know this isn’t a copy?” Bucky said.

“You don’t.” Frank grinned.

There was media interest in Frank Cohane, in particular about him and his estranged daughter, who was working for another presidential candidate. Washington loves such polarities.

“Do you still regard her as morally repellent?” asked a reporter for the Post.