had was none too clear. At least it would have meant somebody thought she was more than a hysterical woman who'd been spurned by her love object.
Somebody other than the man who called himself George Steele.
They walked toward the sliding robot doors to the humid outside. Sara had a car in the lot that she'd rented under an assumed name-now, of course, Atlanta's finest were falling all over themselves with eagerness to talk to her. Even if she'd had anything more to say to them, she had no illusions about their ability to protect her from that pale-eyed youth who hummed as he killed.
Polyakov shook his head. "The bad times are coming for wild cards in this country. Whatever we do here, that is true, I'm afraid. But it makes it that much more imperative we stop the madman Hartmann. You might have to take a more active role."
She stopped dead in the middle of the doors, which spasmed open and shut in mechanical frenzy. "No! I've already told you. I can't do that."
He took her by the arm and urged her out to the sidewalk. Diesel fumes and cabbies assailed them. They ignored both.
"Someone has to. Tachyon may not be able."
"Why not you? You're a killer ace, too. Why not use your power?"
He glanced around without moving his head. No one was nearby. "My. Our goal is to prevent World War III. How well would that end be served if an American presidential candidate was killed by a KGB ace?"
That was his goal. She turned and darted across the street, avoiding being run down more by luck than by design. He followed more cautiously.
He was puffing slightly when he caught up in the shortterm parking. "It was clever of you to check your answering machine."
He was trying to gentle her like he would a frightened animal. She didn't care. "Clever of you to leave a message saying where you were coming in and when." She opened the driver's door of the rose-gray rental Corolla and slid in.
"That's my business," he said as she leaned across to unlock his door. He opened the rear door and put his bag in back. "I'm a professional spy. I'm paid to think of such things."
"Being a spy is not so much different from being a journalist," she said. "Just ask General Westmoreland." She turned the key with a savage twist and started the car.
"My right and my privilege to stand here," said Jesse Jackson, "has been won-won in my lifetime-by the blood and the sweat of the innocent."
From Jack's point of view, the candidate's figure was tiny, dwarfed by the massive white podium, but his ringing orator's voice filled the air. Jack heard the restless delegates grow hushed, expectant. Everyone, whether they liked Jackson or not, knew this was going to be important.
"I stand as a testament to the struggles of those who have gone before; as a legacy for those who will come after; as a tribute to the endurance, the patience, the courage of our forefathers and mothers; as an assurance that their prayers are being answered, their work has not been in vain, and hope is eternal . ."
Those who have gone before. Jack thought about Earl, standing in his aviator's jacket on that platform, his baritone voice rolling out of the speakers. It should have been Earl there, he thought, and years ago.
"America is not one blanket, woven from one thread, one color, one cloth. When I was a child growing up in Greenville, South Carolina, and grandmama could not afford a blanket, she didn't complain, and we didn't freeze. Instead she took pieces of old cloth-patches-wool, silk, gaberdeen, crocker-sack-only patches, barely good enough to wipe off your shoes with. But they didn't stay that way very long. With sturdy hands and a strong cord, she sewed them together into a quilt, a thing of beauty and power and culture. Now, Democrats, we must build such a quilt."
"Farmers, you seek fair prices, and you are right-but you cannot stand alone, your patch isn't big enough. Workers, you fight for fair wages, you are right-but your patch of labor is not big enough. Jokers, you seek fair treatment, civil rights, a medical system sensitive to your needs-but your patch is not big enough ..."
Years ago, in voice and diction lessons courtesy of Louis B. Mayer, Jack had learned the tricks of the rhetorician. He knew why preachers like Jackson and Barnett used those long cadences, those rhythmic, crafted emphases ...