The Last Debate (21 page)

She looked to her left at Mike Howley. She had to go through the eyes and around the faces of Barbara and Henry to get to Howley’s. Joan saw fear in those kids—even Henry—and she did not blame them. Joan’s reading was correct. Done, cooked, in the garbage, was what Barbara thought at that moment. Henry was wondering what it was going to be like picking peaches in the Valley the rest of his life.

But Joan read resolve and confidence in Howley’s face. It was just enough to pull her back to the fact that what was happening here was not up to Paul L. Greene. They—the four of them—had made a decision to take direct action to prevent this evil man David Donald Meredith from taking over the United States of America. They had decided the country would not be his. Nothing had changed.

Howley said to her and to the world: “As I said, Joan Naylor will ask the next series of questions. Joan?”

Joan said to Greene: “Are you saying hitting a teenage child in the stomach falls into the category of journalism of the leer, Governor?”

“I am saying what I said,” Greene said.

Joan, in a steady voice, said to Meredith: “Another woman, named Yolanda Dinkins, has made a statement concerning your wife—”

“Is nothing sacred to you people?” Meredith said. “Can you not leave my daughter and my wife out of this?”

“No, I am afraid we cannot,” Joan said. “Yolanda Dinkins, a former neighbor of yours and your wife’s in Charlotte, North Carolina, says in her statement that your wife, Madeline, came screaming and crying to her home one Sunday evening in 1986. She says your wife’s face was swollen and red around her left eye. When asked what happened, she said, and I quote: ‘David got mad at me.’ Do you have a response?”

Meredith bowed his head and closed his eyes. “Dear Father in heaven, forgive these four people of the detestable, arrogant press for the sins against God and the truth and the people and our democracy they are committing. Give the great people of this great country the strength and courage to see this for what it is—a blatant, arrogant attempt to thwart the will of the democratic majority, to wrest from the people their right to decide who shall lead their country and their spirit as president of the United States. In Your name I pray—we all pray. Amen.”

He looked up and at Joan. “That is my response, Mrs. Naylor, to your awfulness, to your sins.”

Greene raised his right hand. On television it appeared as if he was back in school. Call on me, please. I have the answer. I have something to say.

“Yes, Governor,” Joan said. You are called on.

“Lest anyone think otherwise from my earlier comments,” he said, “I want to say that spouse abuse, child abuse—abuse of one human being of any kind by another—is abhorrent. I condemn it with all of the energy and strength I can muster.”

In the control room Lilly clapped his hands and stomped his feet. “My hero,” he said. “Greene, Greene, he’s our man.…”

Turpin was hot again. “Mark my words, everyone in hearing distance of my voice, somebody is going to pay for this atrocity against humanity and decency. Television, journalism, this stupid debate commission, none of you will survive this. None of you. All of you are going to be made to pay by the new Meredith administration. Stand by and bend over, friends. Every single one of you. You had better pray that you have not cheated on your income taxes, harbored an illegal-alien maid, driven five miles over the speed limit, put an unstamped letter in a mailbox—”

“Now, is that any way for the manager of the campaign of God’s chosen candidate to speak?” Lilly said. “Surely, what is happening out there is God’s will? Can it be anything other than that? Doesn’t God will everything? Could this possibly mean God has switched sides? Or is nonpartisan? God, God, he’s our man, if he can’t do it, nobody can.”

Hammond detected a slight inclination toward mayhem in Turpin’s body language. It caused him to reflexively stand and face Turpin, as if he were a human shield. He would prevent Jack Turpin, professional campaign manager, from slaying, maiming, or otherwise hurting Brad Lilly, professional campaign manager.

Back out on the stage, Joan Naylor said: “Mr. Meredith, I have another statement here from a woman named Bonnie Kerr. She states that she worked for you as an assistant editor at the Take It Back Publishing Company. She says that in a state of rage over her inability to find a particular manuscript, you shoved her against a concrete wall. She badly bruised her back and cracked a bone in an elbow. Do you have a response, sir?”

Meredith said: “Have you absolutely no shame, no ethics? That is my response.”

Joan said: “I have a statement from a woman named Terri Anne Cloverdell. She states that you slugged her hard on her left arm after she failed to bring a book to you as quickly as you had asked. She worked as a desk assistant in the Take It Back Reference Library in Charlotte. Did that happen?”

Meredith only closed his eyes and shook his head. The camera was right on him. I was no longer able to read anything from his face. The peace and serenity were gone. That was certain. Nothing else was, though. Was he going to attack, to bolt, to blow? I could not tell.

Howley said: “Now back to Henry Ramirez for some questions. Henry?”

Henry said: “Another statement, Mr. Meredith. It is from René Jeanne Jarvis, who worked as cleaning woman at your home in Charlotte. She swore in this statement before a notary that she watched you—with her own eyes—slap your wife because she failed to have some laundry
and dry cleaning picked up. She thinks she remembers it was a dark blue suit you needed to wear that night at a meeting of your Take It Back Foundation board of trustees.”

“You are sick people,” said Meredith. To the camera, he added: “I ask you, my fellow Americans, has there ever been anything like this in the political history of this country? Can this be America? Can this be our treasured democracy, where four self-righteous members of the press—unelected, unchosen by anyone—decide to lynch a candidate for president of the United States right here before the whole world on national television? Has there ever in all of our history ever been a more egregious abuse of power? Can this be America? Must we also take back our free press?”

“If I may,” said Paul L. Greene, not raising his hand or waiting to be called on. “What you say may be true. But it also may be true that this is the first time in history that a candidate for president of the United States is a man prone to violent outbreaks of force and harm to his fellow human beings. I believe that knowing this about a person is a legitimate issue in a presidential campaign. I really do. I see now that these four brave journalists deserve commendations and praise for their courage. I am sure it was not easy for them to do what they are doing here tonight. But they know, as the American people know, no country can be governed by a president who is going to emotionally explode at any moment and start throwing punches at his aides, his loved ones—anyone’s loved ones.”

A fast, intense cheer went up in the Virginia Room.

Meredith glared at Greene. “You are not even an irrelevant pimple on this dire and atrocious happening, Governor. I have nothing to say to you. Nothing at all.” He then turned his face again toward Mike Howley. “Are you through, Mr. Howley? Are you and your three co-conspirators through? Is this unsavory political assassination attempt finished?”

Howley said: “No, sir, we are not through. Barbara Manning has a question.” He looked to his right and nodded to Barbara.

She said to Meredith: “I have here the statements of three women who state they lived in the same freshman dormitory with your daughter Allison while all were students at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. That was six years ago, long before you entered politics—as a presidential
candidate, at least. All three of these women claim they were present in the room of your daughter when she told them you had, in her words, ‘a tendency to fly off the handle,’ end quote. And that when you did so you could, quote, ‘get pretty mean and violent.’ She showed them some scars on her back and claimed they were from leather-belt beatings you had administered. She said she had also seen you strike your mother, her aunt—your sister—and several other female relatives.”

All peace, all serenity, was now gone from Meredith’s face. I could feel an eruption coming—I really could. Meredith said nothing. Howley said to him: “I take it you have no comment on these three women’s story.”

“You may take what you wish, Mr. Howley,” said Meredith. He was only a few minutes—seconds, maybe—from exploding. I was sure of it.

“Henry Ramirez,” Howley said.

“Mr. Meredith,” said Henry, “there are nine other statements from women who claim they either experienced or heard about similar kinds of acts by you. In each case, as in the others, you are alleged to have committed an act of physical violence against someone, usually a woman or a child. And in each case that act of violence came in the midst of an angry fit. Why is it, by the way, that you only seem to hit women and children? Do you never blow your stack at a man?”

Meredith’s head was down as if in silent prayer. Not even his eyes could be seen.

Joan, without an introductory word from Howley, picked it up. “I have a statement from a woman who states she was involved in a minor traffic accident in a suburb of Asheville, North Carolina, in 1989. She says her foot slipped off the brake of her car in a rainstorm and she slammed into the rear of a car driven by you. She said she immediately jumped out of her car to express her apologies for what had happened and that you grabbed her by her yellow slicker raincoat, threw her against your car, and kicked her in the right shin. She said you then twirled her around and smashed her head into the rear window of your car. She swears it was you and says she can prove it was you because she kept a Xerox copy of the check she received from a law firm representing you. In exchange for silence and for not preferring charges, she got a check for eight thousand dollars. Did that happen, Mr. Meredith? She says it did.”

Meredith said nothing. He kept his head down.

Joan said: “I have another statement here from a woman named Isabelle Anne Mathews. She was working as a passenger service agent for USAir in Charlotte when you came to her gate to catch a flight to New York’s La Guardia Airport. She states you arrived a few minutes after the door had been closed, and the plane was about to leave the gangway—already retracted from the door of the plane. She says you demanded that she stop the plane so you could get aboard. When she refused, she claims you slammed your hard-edged leather briefcase against her legs. An airport security officer was called. You were detained but then released. Your comment, sir?”

Meredith still did not raise his head.

Joan said: “Here is a statement from a waitress in the restaurant at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in the Buckhead section of Atlanta. She claims you turned over a plate of food on the floor and stabbed the empty plate into her groin area because you said the food was not properly cooked. Your comment, sir?”

Meredith was still neither looking nor talking.

Joan was through. Mike Howley nodded to Henry Ramirez.

Henry said: “The question, in summary, Mr. Meredith, is would you care to confirm or deny or comment in any way to the American people at this time on the apparent fact that you have a tendency toward violent behavior—”

Henry did not finish the question because the force of the hatred and loathing that was in David Donald Meredith’s face and body stopped him. It leapt out of the television set like a crazed animal. Stand by. Here it comes.

Meredith said: “How dare you question me, you … Mister … whoever you are, wherever you came from.”

“Henry Ramirez is who I am, sir. My mother is named Luisa and she owns and operates her own café in Falfurrias, Texas. She and my father, who was a fruit picker, came to the United States from Mexico as illegal aliens forty-three years ago. They became American citizens and they are Americans. I, their son, am a native-born American who works for Continental Radio News. Now you know who I am and where I came from, sir.”

Meredith took the bait solidly in his mouth and hooked himself to political death.