Ashes - Fire In The Ashes Part 31

Lisa gulped. "You, I guess."

"That is something you'll have to decide for yourself, Lisa."

"I'll think on it, Miss Jerre. But ... something is troubling me. If Ben Raines is so powerful, how come you're still a prisoner here?"

"Haven't you ever heard about how G.o.ds move in mysterious ways?"

"My folks said there ain't no G.o.d in Heaven; and no Jesus Christ, neither. But I've heard that line you just said."

"Think about that, Lisa."

"Do I have to?"

"What do you think?"

"Seems like you're sure putting a lot on me, Miss Jerre?" Jerre's only reply was a cold look.

"Is there a shrine to Ben Raines, Miss Jerre?"

Jerre thought of Tri-States; of the twins. "In a way, yes, there is, Lisa. And it's beautiful."

The girl sucked in her breath. "I sure would like to see that someday."

Jerre took another step toward freedom. "You help me, Lisa, and I promise you you'll see it."

"I'd be scared!"

"No need to be."

"I'll think on it, Miss Jerre. And I won't tell n.o.body. Cross my heart."

Jerre wanted to weep at the teenager's ignorance. Instead, she put her hand on Lisa's arm. "I know I can count on you to do the right thing, Lisa." She smiled at her. "We'll talk again. Come back anytime."

"I'll sure do it, Miss Jerre."

Jerre watched them leave the house. They waved at the guards stationed around the home. Jerre turned her back to the window, gazing into the fireplace, blazing with fire and warmth.

"I don't know what I've started here, Ben," she murmured low. "It may mushroom all out of proportion.

But please forgive me if it does. I just want to get out and go home. I want my babies!"

Matt drove down the west side of the Mississippi River. He had skirted Dubuque, picked up Highway 67, and would cross into Illinois at the bridge at Savannah. He had a general idea where Hartline had made his headquarters. Matt stopped and looked at his map. He had drawn a crude circle in red.

The circle had Peoria almost in the dead center, the line running from Galesburg to Macomb to Springfield to Decatur, then northeast to Farmer City. Then it began a gentle curving north through Gibson City and Chatworth. At Chatworth, it curved northwest to Streator, running straight west for about fifty-five miles to just south of Kewanee. Then the line dipped southwest back to Galesburg.

On a much larger map, Matt had cut the area into quarters, each road in the quarter a different color. He would take them one at a time, just like pieces of a pie. He would find Jerre.

And he would kill Hartline.

About twenty-five miles north of Terre Haute, Indiana, Ike and his team, made up of ex-SEALs, ex-Green Berets, ex-Marine Force Recon, and ex-Rangers, said their good-byes and good luck.

"You all know what to do without me goin' over it again," Ike told the men. "For the next few months Hartline is somewhere within a ninety-mile radius of Peoria. Word we got is come next spring he'll be movin' up to Iowa to set up his HQ. We got to find him 'fore then. You boys take care."

They were gone in teams of three. They would circle the area and on the third day would move in simultaneously. The men drove ragged pickup trucks; but the engines were perfectly tuned and the rubber was new ... They looked like movers and drifters, aimlessly wandering the countryside.

They were anything but.

Captain Dan Gray halted his team at Quincy. "Killing Hartline would be gravy on the potatoes," he told them. "Just remember our primary objective is getting Jerre out. I have not been in contact with General Raines, but I have a gut feeling he's sent others in ahead of us. So be careful; we don't want to mistake any of them for Hartline's men, or be mistaken ourselves for Hartline's men. Let's go, boys and girls.

Good luck and G.o.d speed."

And Jerre stared out at the snowfall in a small town just ten miles from Pekin, Illinois.

She waited.

Four.

Roanna Hickman and Jane Moore sat talking in the NBC offices in Richmond. Other reporters and commentators sat quietly, listening. All of them had a hard decision to make. Unpleasant either way they went.

"Have you been back to see Sabra?" Roanna asked.

"I can't go back there; can't look at her," Jane replied. "It's ... I just want to cry."

"The doctors say she's going to be all right-in time."

"She'll never be back here," Roanna said bitterly. "Never. We all know that. But we're dancing around what we gathered to speak of. And it wasn't Sabra's mental health. Let's discuss our ... president," she softened the last word.

"Son of a b.i.t.c.h is not my president," a man spoke. "High-handed b.a.s.t.a.r.d is a dictator."

"Is he?" Jane "Little Bit" Moore asked. "Seems to me it's taken him less than a month to do more than anyone else has accomplished in a decade since the bombings."

"And everything he's done has been accomplished by spitting on the const.i.tution," the man countered.

"Oh, f.u.c.k the const.i.tution!" Roanna lashed out, surprising no one. She had been a staunch supporter of Ben Raines since her return from the Smokies.

Several of her male colleagues wondered if Raines had gotten into her panties. Several other female colleagues wondered if she might have fallen in love with the Rebel general. The more objective of the group wondered if she saw something in the man they might have missed.

"G.o.dd.a.m.nit, Jim," Roanna continued, "he's making things work again. He's feeding the very young and the very old; he's opening factories and creating jobs; he's..."

"No one is denying any of that, Roanna," a black reporter said calmly. This reporter had survived the bombings of '88 and continued to go about his business of gathering news and reporting it, fairly and objectively. "There is no in-between with Ben Raines ... not among the people I've spoken with. It's either love or hate. But the point is: Do we-as reporters and commentators-condone what he is doing, in other words ignore the gross violations of the const.i.tution and the Bill of Rights, or do we report on those violations as we see them, without giving the man's credits equal time? I certainly don't agree with everything he's done and doing, but by G.o.d, he's got to be given some credit. And I, for one, intend to do just that."

"Len," a woman spoke. "Could the fact that he appointed a black VP have anything to do with your decision?"

She wilted under the man's steely, unwavering gaze. "I won't even dignify that with a reply, Camile. If you care to recall, sixty percent of those men and women he had hanged or will hang in the near future, are black."

She sat down, but another woman picked it up. "Len, that is another point that can't be ignored. He..."

"Ms. Daumier," Len's voice stopped her in midsentence. "Those people were murderers, rapists, terrorists-sc.u.m! They were not acting out of survival; not out of self-defense-they were behaving in a manner not even befitting a rabid dog! I, for one, do not care to return to the days of the '60s and '70s, when those types of people were slapped on the wrist and given sentences so light as to be ludicrous.

Now, I have had my say. I will report on the president's excessesand accomplishments. I am not being paid to editorialize or find fault. Good day." He walked out of the room.

"I could not believe my ears when the president of the United States said, day before yesterday, if a person is attempting to break into your home, be it tent or mansion, feel free to shoot his a.s.s off, because crime is not going to be tolerated in this nation." The reporter allowed his outrage to overcome his overt liberalism. "Jesus Christ!" he blurted. "The son of a b.i.t.c.h is no more than a savage himself."

"And you're as full of s.h.i.t as a Christmas goose!" Roanna told him.

"I beg your pardon!" the man's eyes widened.

Roanna got to her feet. "I said..."

"We all heard what you said," a man's voice stopped the dispute before it got out of hand. The president of network news had entered the room quietly, without being noticed. Robert Brighton was another of the survivors of the bombings of '88-a man in his early sixties. Brighton was another of the objective-type of reporters. He had once stated, publicly, that anyone who satisfied themselves solely with TV news, would probably grow up to be a half-wit.

"We didn't know you were flying in from Chicago, Mr. Brighton," a reporter said.

"I didn't fly in," Brighton said. "I drove. I wanted to see for myself some of the horrors our president has perpetrated-according to some of my news reporters, that is."

Several men and women began taking more careful note of their shoes, the ceiling, the walls, anything except the eyes of Robert Brighton.

"But, by golly, gang-guess what I saw?"

More shuffling of feet and averting of eyes.

"I saw smoke coming out of factory chimneys that have lain idle for almost twelve years. I saw men and women going to work for the first time in years. I saw men and women of Raines's Rebel army giving food and warm clothing and blankets to the elderly and to those with small children. I didn't see federal police-but I saw some of these new peace officers; talked with some of them. They seemed like pretty nice guys to me. Capable of handling themselves if need be, but also capable of using a large degree of common sense as well-something that has been lacking in our federal police for some years since the bombings."

"Mr. Brighton," a man got to his feet.

"Save yourself some grief, Harrelson," Brighton frosted him with a glance. "And shut your G.o.dd.a.m.ned mouth."

"I don't have to be treated in this manner," the man's face expressed his shock.

"Then carry your a.s.s to ABC or CBS or CNN-if they'll have you. Which I doubt. Now you people listen to me," Brighton said. "Listen well.

"This is make-or-break time for our nation. Can you all understand that? Make or break! Yes, President Raines has and will do some things that will-if you all will permit the use of an outdated word-outrage your liberal minds. It's a hard time, people. The world is still staggering about, many nations still on their knees; it's doubtful if some of them will ever get to their feet.

"And you people are nit-picking. Nit-picking because a few are complaining while the majority is happy to be going back to work; happy that crime is dropping so rapidly the statisticians can't keep up with the decline; happy to have a pay check in their pockets; happy to bealive . And you people are whining and complaining-setting yourselves up as the conscience of the nation; the upholders and guardians of liberty and freedom.

"Get off Raines's back. Let the man put the nation back together again-he can do it. When it's together once more, he'll step down and hand the most disagreeable job in the world to some other sucker."

Jane Moore stood up. "Am I to understand we arenot to report on Ben Raines's excesses, sir?"

"I didn't say that, Bitty. I said get off the man's back. I've just come from a meeting with the department heads of all the majors-we've agreed to give him a chance. Ben Raines, in case any of you missed the placement of the p.r.o.noun, and I want it to be very clear. And just to make it perfectly clear," he looked at Roanna. "You're in charge of this flag station."

"I'll step down when Sabra returns, Mr. Brighton," Roanna replied, shock evident on her face at the promotion to Top Gun in the nation's capital.

Brighton shook his head. "Sabra died an hour ago."

"I want this to be the toughest tax bill to ever pa.s.s both Houses," Ben said. "I have no doubt that when I leave the White House it will be repealed, but for my term in office, the tax laws will be as equitable as I can make them."

"Senator Henson told me yesterday she doubted it will get out of committee," an aide informed him.

Ben turned in his chair and fixed the man with a look that would freeze water in the middle of the Mojave in July. At noon. "You will personally inform Senator Henson that if this bill is not out of committee and on the floor by this time next week, I will personally go on radio and television and inform the middle and lower-income citizens of this nation that effective immediately, they may commence paying into IRS what they feel the government is worth. And if Congress doesn't like it, I will station armed troops around every IRS office in this nation with orders to shoot any agent that attempts to hara.s.s any non-taxpaying citizen. Is that clear?"

The aide paled; looked appalled. "Mr. President, you can't mean that!"

"Try me," Ben said calmly, but his voice was charged with emotion.

"Yes, sir," the aide replied weakly. "I will so inform Senator Henson."

"Fine." Ben turned to Steve Mailer, the new head of the Department of Education. "Are you going to be a harbinger of gloom and doom, too?"

"No," the ex-college professor laughed his reply. "But I'm running into stiff opposition with your mandatory high school education plans."

"I expected it. Steve, I hope I don't have to convince you that education is the key that will turn the lock for survival in this nation."

"You know you don't, Mr. President. But you must know there are any number of ... how do I put this ... ?".

"...Hillbillies and rednecks who don't want their kids exposed to much education. I am fully aware it all begins in the home, Steve. Because of that, the teachers that will staff our schools will have to be a special breed. Not only will they be teaching the three Rs, this time around they'll be teaching fairness, ethics, honesty, ways to combat and ultimately eradicate all the deadly sins that have plagued this nation for so many years. I know that is in part why the NEA is opposed to me. I understand it, and whether they believe me or not, I sympathize with the teachers; they've never been asked to do anything like this before. How is the mail from parents running?"

"It's really too soon to tell. But from what we have received so far, it pretty well reinforces what we have known all along: the higher the educational ladder attained, the more in favor of what you are proposing.

The lower the educational rungs achieved ... against it."

"The teacher organizations, Steve-why are they really opposed to this plan?"

Steve shifted in his chair. An ex-teacher, part of his emotions stayed with his chosen field. But as a highly educated person, he knew the more education a being possessed, the less the chances of that person abusing the children; the less chances of crime; the more apt to stay away from the baser types of music and violent sports ... and so much more. But, just as Ben knew, Steve knew, too, that education without a solid base of ethics supporting it all, without a framework of decency and fair play and honesty and a stiff moral base left a great deal lacking.

But was it, should it, be on the shoulders of teachers to instill those qualities into the hearts and minds of the young?

Steve had been appalled when he learned that back in the Tri-States, Ben had ordered children taken from their parents if the parents were teaching the young hatred or bigotry and values that went against the foundation of what the Tri-States was built upon.

But shock diminished, falling away from him gradually when he gave Ben Raines's plan a deeper study.

How could a nation ever do away with the deadly sins if parents continued to practice those sins at home?