Friday night, I worked late and the parking garage in my office building contained very few vehicles. Furthermore, as far as I could tell as I walked through it, it contained no people at all, not even any garage employees – I’d have to use my 24-hour access key to get out. Under those circumstances, the hair on the back of a fellow’s neck might stand up pretty straight if a voice in the shadows called out his name.
“Tom!”
Mine sure did.
“It’s me…”
I turned toward a voice I now recognized, that of a senior aide to Senator Larry Craig – an individual whom, at this point, both I and regular readers of this Web log know fairly well. “… Winslow,” he elaborated in a loud whisper, “over here!”
As he crept out of the shadows from behind a concrete pillar, my condition rapidly went from highly startled to extremely annoyed. “Jesus [expletive] Christ on a [expletive] crutch, Winslow,” I frankly declared, “you scared the living [expletive] out of me. What the [expletive] are you doing down here at this hour?”
Winslow hung his head sadly, a confused and lonesome midnight cowboy if there ever was one. As anybody who’s had a gay friend or two knows, they certainly aren’t that way because it makes life easier for them. Not that Winslow’s a friend, but I know for sure he’s gay, since he’s propositioned me more than once. For the record, however, Winslow’s a good person, and, each time, when I told him I’m straight, get lost, he did. On the other hand, Winslow is hardly the sharpest tool in the shed, and I knew that repeating a negative stimulus twice with such a cerebral cortex as his might not necessary result in what is generally recognized as bona fide learning. Yeah, I had plenty of time to think between my question and Winslow’s response, and as soon as I determined it was Winslow, I knew that I would. So his reply was eventual, to be sure – owners of the several remaining vehicles parked in the garage arrived and drove off while I waited. But, when it arrived, his response lacked nothing for all that, not in content or nor in sincerity, and I was glad I had held my peace while waiting to hear it. “He came back, Tom,” Winslow finally proclaimed, in an eerily quiet and uncharacteristic, choking, nay, dare I say it – inhuman tone, “can you believe that? After everything he did, everyone he ruined, everything he betrayed, all the good hearts he broke, all the innocent souls he tore up and everything that happened because of what he did, he came back anyway. He came back here.”
The acoustics of a truly gigantic underground concrete and rebar parking garage surpass the surreal. Perhaps an intercontinental ballistic missile silo in Nebraska can magnify silence more effectively, but I doubt there are many other places that could compare. And at half past twelve a.m., four blocks from the White House these days, believe me when I tell you, it’s mighty damn quiet; and after listening to poor Winslow’s lament, I’ll admit that I waited, savoring that silence, for a lot longer than I devoted to determining I was going to say “I assume you are referring to your employer?”
“I… He… You… ” Winslow searched both his brain and his viscera for verbal expression – words in some order or another to convey his agony to me, and came up with bupkis, casting his eyes downward, defeated. “Tom,” he began at last, “do you know what happened to that report you wrote?”
“Do you mean,” I asked, just to make sure, “the one that you hired me to prepare for Senator Craig? The one which was delivered via bicycle messenger to you in your office on Capitol Hill just a few hours before the senator called a press conference in Idaho to announce his intention to resign?”
“Yeah,” Winslow looked up from the floor, licking his lips nervously, “that one. Guess what happened to it.”
“Well,” I speculated, using the Ockham’s razor that I always keep in my coat pocket, “the simplest and most obvious theory would be that you sent the original to him by some sort of overnight air courier, and ran off some copies here from the CD image while it was in transit. Ergo, the original was delivered to his offices in Idaho the next day; and, subsequently, he read it.”
“Uh-huh,” Winslow mournfully confirmed, “and after that, the staff back in Idaho tells me, he showed it to his legal team. Then…” Winslow pulled up short, giving me a penetrating look, to boot. “Ah, hell, Tom, you know what he did after that – he turned right around and started fighting to stay in the Senate.”
Winslow spit contemplatively on the floor as he composed his thoughts. Then, producing a small notebook, from which he slowly read aloud, Winslow got down to details. “That business where you said he should ‘conduct a pro… tracted and…’” Winslow grimaced as he struggled to do his best, “ah… ‘Buy-zan-tyne campaign’ to clear Senator Craig’s name before the Senate Ethics Committee; well, partner, they told me he ate that right up like a mustang with a bag of spring oats on his nose. Then, in Section 3.2, you suggested ‘emphasizing the considerable loss of influence that the State of Idaho would experience, with particular attention drawn to the potential loss of key Senate committee seats.’ They said Larry got so excited, he splayed his legs apart and started tapping both his feet. And then in Section 4.5, that stuff about playing the Senate Democrats all those different ways to get them to come up with reasons Larry ought to stay – I was told when he read that, he just ‘bout came in his pants. He said it was ‘the smartest, sneakiest, [expletive] Jew [expletive] [expletive] I ever [expletive] seen come out of [expletive] Washington.’ And they told me when he finished Section 6, Strategic Recommendations, he stood up and let out a whoop you could hear all the way in Utah and yelled ‘Hot [expletive] [expletive] and cold [expletive] [expletive]! This here [expletive] Tom Collins is exactly the kind of fancy-talking [expletive] quiche-eating [expletive] consultant [expletive] that’s [expletive] worth paying [expletive] piles of taxpayers’ [expletive] money for!’” Winslow shook his head sadly. “Where did you get that coyote-sly, rattlesnake-tongued, crow-evil mind of yours, anyhow, Tom Collins? Nine dogs do me at once and drop me out the bum-gut of a swayback mule if you didn’t twist everything around so damn beautiful, a preacher would give it a kiss and call it salvation. By the time you got done, resigning from the Senate looked like the stupidest thing that could ever have passed through Larry’s head. I don’t reckon Satan Himself could have done a better job of talking Eve into baking Adam an apple pie and then going down on him during dessert just to make sure he’d take a bite. You showed Larry a whole new way to deal with the biggest pile of [expletive] he ever stepped in. No way a hombre like him could have ever, in a month of Sundays, come up with something so… who’s that guy, the Italian feller, what wrote… dang, whatchamacallit… ‘Prince Charmin’,’ or something?”
“I believe the word you are searching for is ‘Machiavellian,’” I surmised, “and I will take that as a compliment.”
“Right – Mac… Macky… Macky-ah, yeah, that guy – who you said – him. Just like that guy; just plain [expletive] awesome.” Winslow gazed at me steadily for a portentously extended instant. “Maybe too [expletive] awesome.”
“Winslow,” I reminded him, “I’m sure you recall that you hired me to prepare a collection of strategy options and execution plans so Larry could stay in the Senate. What am I supposed to do, apologize for giving you an excellent, outstanding and versatile product that proved to be highly effective when used for its intended purpose?”
Winslow scuffed his shoe on the concrete. “No, I don’t reckon so.” He sighed deeply, then stared up at the ceiling quietly for a long moment. “I guess I should have held out longer.”
“You mean,” I whispered, “you went out and started on the networking and stuff for that gay country and western leather shop on U Street we discussed when you called me and asked what to do now that Larry was going to resign and leave you high and dry here in Washington?”
“Yeah,” Winslow admitted, hanging his head sheepishly.
“Well,” I demanded, “it’s not like I said you had to get started on it the next day or anything, is it?”
“Nope,” Winslow sighed, “but, damn, Tom, it just sounded like such a good idea – and turns out, it was a great idea, actually. And of course, nobody down at Larry’s Senate offices on Capitol Hill knows what I been doin’, nur nothin’ like that there, a’tall. But Larry’s been back pretty near a month now, and I’m scared [expletive] he might find out what I been up to.”
“So?”
Winslow gaped at me in shock. “What do you mean, ‘So?’ So if he finds out I’ve been cruising the DC metro gay bars looking for a business partner to start a gay country and western leather shop on U Street, well, then, that’s what I’ll end up having to do, because he’s gonna fire me for sure, whether he stays in the Senate or not.”
“What makes you so sure about that?”
“Huh?” Winslow tilted his head, staring at me, completely bewildered.
“Have you forgotten Section 5, Mitigation and Remediation Solutions? In particular, Section 5.3, Strategies to Restructure Public Perceptions?”
“Uh, yeah,” Winslow admitted with an embarrassed gulp that sent his ample laryngeal prominence on a boomerang tour of his throat, “I guess I have. What does it say?”
“In Section 5.3.4, Public Redefinition of Perceived Prejudices, subsection 5.3.4.6.1, Homosexuals in Service to Senator Craig, it says, among other things, that since continued displays of bigotry towards the gay community would be counterproductive to achievement of a favorable assessment by the Senate Ethics Committee, Senator Craig must proactively avoid censure of any and all homosexuals in his employ. Note well, Winslow, that it says ‘proactively’ there. It says that if Larry wants to keep his job in the Senate, he must ‘proactively avoid censure’ of his gay employees. In other words, if you went in Larry’s office and told him flat out that you’re gay, you’ve been cruising the bars, you’ve found a partner and the two of you are going to sell gay leather country and western fashions out of a boutique on U Street, Larry would pretend he didn’t even hear what you said.” I paused, letting that sink in, then continued. “As soon as he realized what you were talking about, he would probably put his hands over his ears and shake his head at you until you went away.”
“But.. but…,” Winslow protested, “what about the folks back home in Idaho? Larry’s got to obey their morals, don’t he?”
“Says who?”
Winslow drew a long sagebrush face and pondered my question for a while. At last, he looked at me, shrugged and flashed a Big Sky cowboy smile. “Says nobody, I guess, partner.”
“Exactly.”
Then, suddenly, a dark shadow of doubt crossed Winslow’s countenance like the cloud of an approaching prairie tornado. “What about if the home folk in Idaho find out that Larry knew I was gay and he didn’t fire me?”
“Winslow,” I advised him, “take it from a fancy-talking [expletive] quiche-eating [expletive] consultant [expletive] expert master of smart, sneaky [expletive] Jew [expletive] [expletive] [expletive] Washington [expletive], it won’t matter a [expletive] [expletive] if they do.”
“Why not?”
“Because Larry Craig isn’t the senior Senator from Idaho anymore.”
“He isn’t?” The last traces of Winslow’s self-assurance disappeared as profound confusion renewed its visitation.
“Nope.”
“Then what in tarnation is he?”
“Your boss, Winslow, is a Senator from Nowhere. Since the moment he returned from Idaho to Capitol Hill, he has represented no one but himself; and he will never again represent anybody else.”
Contemplating this proposition, Winslow started to shake slightly, fighting to maintain his composure. “Damn it now, Tom, that there thought – that idea; that conception, dagnabbit, Tom; that there’s a considerable right mite scarier than him finding out I just bought half interest in a gay country and western leather shop on U Street.”
“Washington DC is nothing if not an extremely frightening place,” I observed. “Only a totally clueless person could exist here without realizing it.”
“Yeah,” Winslow nodded in affirmation, “I never knew why people said that ignorance is bliss until I got a load of what goes on around these parts. That Senator from Nowhere business – has it ever happened here before?”
“Well,” I said, turning history over quickly in my mind, “there was Joe McCarthy.”
“Who?”
“Once upon a time, Joe McCarthy was a United States senator from Wisconsin. Then he came back here to Washington once too often, and doing that turned him into a Senator from Nowhere.”
“Yeah?” Winslow squinted at me. “Did he bash gays, too?”
“No, back when McCarthy was in the Senate, nobody even mentioned that gay people existed. Just talking about them was considered obscene. McCarthy was a different kind of bigot – what they called a ‘Red-baiter.’ But I would have thought you knew about Joe McCarthy, Winslow, what with your boss being such a raging conservative.”
Winslow shrugged, clearly at a loss. “He never talks much about anybody before Ronald Reagan.”
“That,” I replied, “explains quite a bit, actually. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
Winslow blushed that ruddy trail-hand blush of his as he shyly said, “Well, yeah, Tom, you’ve known for a while how I feel about…”
“Besides that!” I interjected curtly.
“Ah, no,” Winslow sighed, “I guess maybe I just got a little paranoid, there, living in two worlds like that for a while…”
“Try living in five or six of them for a couple of decades,” I insincerely suggested, “and see what that does for you. Oh, by the way,” I continued as I opened the driver’s side door of my car, “how come you waited down here in the garage for me instead of just visiting my office?”
“I didn’t want any… records of the visit, Tom,” Winslow murmured quietly, casting his eyes around the garage. “I figured the added security would be worth the wait.”
“Right. Very tasteful trench coat,” I opined, tossing my briefcase onto the shotgun seat.
“Thanks,” Winslow smiled back, conspiratorially, “it’s a Burberry.”
“And a nice match with the fedora,” I offered, climbing in behind the steering wheel.
“The hat’s a Burberry, too! The guy at the shop recommended Burberry – he said it’s the preferred brand for serious clandestine missions the world over. I got them just for this meeting,” Winslow proudly confessed, burbling on even as I slammed the door. Then I started the engine, driving slowly away, watching a tiny, ever-shrinking Winslow in my rear view mirror – Winslow, sporting his new professional-grade Burberry trench coat and matching fedora, disappearing into an enormous, cavernous, Brobdignabian and now existentially empty parking garage. Winslow, fading, grinning like Andy Griffith and waving like Jed Clampett; there he stood, receding into the infinite and inscrutable parallax of distance; Winslow, the Cracker Who Came In From The Cold.