them organized, working together, sponsoring a small number of bills
containing more comprehensive legislation. He taught them what they
had to do to be more effective.
“So tell me exactly who were you going to testify against, then?”
“The politicians we paid off,” she said simply. “They did it just for
the money. It’s not like they gave a damn about children with dead
eyes living in Hepatitis Heaven. I saw it every day in their greedy
faces. They just expected a rich reward-thought it was their due.”
“Don’t you think you’re coming down a little heavy on these guys?”
“Why don’t you stop being so naive? How do you think people get
elected in this country? They get elected by the groups who organize
the voters, who shape citizens’ decisions on who and what to vote for.
And do you know who those groups are? They’re big business and special
interests, and the wealthy who fill the coffers of political candidates
every year. Do you really think ordinary people attend
five-thousand-dollar-a-plate dinners? And then do you really think
these groups give all that money out of the goodness of their
collective hearts? When the politicians get into office, you better
believe they’re expected to deliver.”
“So you’re saying all politicians in this country are corrupt. That
still doesn’t make what you did right.”
“No? What congressman from the state of Michigan would vote to do
anything to seriously hurt the automobile industry? How long do you
think she’d be in office? Or high-tech in California? Or farmers in
the Midwest? Or tobacco in the South? It’s like a self-fulfilling
prophecy in a way. Business and labor and other special interests have
a lot at stake. They’re focused, they have big dollars, they have PACs
and lobbyists blasting their messages to Washington nonstop. Big and
small business employ just about everybody. Those same people vote in
elections. They vote their pocketbooks. Voila’, there’s your big,
dark conspiracy of American politics. I see Danny as the first
visionary ever to outsmart greed and selfishness. “”But what about the
foreign aid? If this story came out, wouldn’t that kill the
pipeline?”
“That’s the thing! Can you imagine all the positive attention it would
get? The poorest countries on earth forced to bribe greedy American
politicians to get the help they so desperately needed because it was
unavailable any other way. You get stories like that in the media,
then maybe some real, substantive changes would be made.”
“That all sounds pretty far-fetched. I mean, come on.” “Maybe so, but
my options weren’t exactly flowing over. It’s real damn easy to
second-guess, Lee.”
Lee sat back as he mulled this over. “Okay, okay. Do you really think
Buchanan would try to kill you?”
“We were partners, friends. Actually, more than that. In many ways he
was like a father to me. I .. . I just don’t know. Maybe he found out
I went to the FBI. He would think I betrayed him. That could have
driven him over the edge.”
“There’s a major problem with the theory that Buchanan is behind all
this.”
She looked over at him curiously.
“I hadn’t reported back to Buchanan, remember? So unless he has
someone else working for him, he doesn’t know you’re dealing with the
FBI. And it takes time to set up a professional-caliber hit. You
can’t just call your local shooter and ask him to pop somebody for you
and charge it to your Visa.”
“But he might have known a hired killer already, and then he planned to
somehow set you up for the murder.”
Lee was shaking his head before she finished. “He would have had no
idea I would be there that night. And if you had been killed, he’d
have the problem of me finding out about it and maybe going to the
police with the result that everything gets traced back to him. Why
bring all that misery on himself? Think about it, Faith, if Buchanan
was planning to kill you, he would not have hired me.”
She slumped in a chair. “My God, what you’re saying makes perfect
sense.” Terror seeped into Faith’s eyes as she thought about what all