party and from the looks of the polling data, voters. Alternatively, the scandal had significantly intensified the motivation and enthusiasm of Democrats. For the past two weeks, the crowds for Governor Thomson had been growing larger and more enthusiastic by the day. But today, the crowds were in another world, loud, large, fired up and pissed off. Democrats were frothing at the mouth to go to the polls now. Dixon lit his cigar and let the smoke linger and float around him.
The scandal was having the opposite effect on the other side of the political spectrum. The crowds for the vice president on his last day of campaigning were small, unenthusiastic and you could just feel the pall that had fallen over the campaign. In an absolute rarity, the vice president cancelled his last two events, having thrown in the towel.
The media was in full attack mode and Republican candidates were avoiding the media at all costs. When more Democrats than Republicans are appearing on FOX News, you know people are running for cover. On top of that, all of the Super PAC advertising for the vice president had been pulled and was being applied towards saving representatives and senators down the ballot. The only question now was whether the victory for Governor Thomson would be a landslide or merely a wide victory margin.
The Judge knew the vice president and liked him personally. When the Judge was the attorney general, he’d worked extensively with the vice president, then chairing the Senate Judiciary Committee, and he found him a reasonable and honorable man. But the people you hire reflect on you and you’re responsible for them. The vice president hired Connolly. It didn’t matter that Connolly was forced on him as the supposed genius political mind of the party. The vice president could have said no. He didn’t. Wellesley was now paying the price for that decision.
The Watergate was in flames, once again at the center of a national scandal. The irony of the situation was not lost on Dixon or the governor who now joined him to take in the reporting.
“Once again a Republican’s political career is in ashes at the Watergate,” Governor Thomson remarked as he and his campaign chief took in the news footage around the complex. “Remind me to tell our staff that nobody should live there.”
The scene around the Watergate looked to be one of sheer chaos as smoke continued billowing out of the windows of the complex, the flashing lights of the fire trucks and other emergency vehicles illuminating the scene that was serving as the colorful background for reporting for all of the cable news channels now, the Washington Bureaus taking the unusual step of covering a fire. While Dixon and the governor knew that Connolly had perished, that part of the story was just now coming to light.
“Connolly got what he deserved,” Dixon remarked as he put the cigar between his lips and lit it, letting smoke billow out of him.
“You really think so?” the governor said evenly. “You think he deserved to die?”
Dixon shrugged. “He was already dead, shooting him in the head simply made it official.”
“Kinda harsh,” Thomson teased.
“Wow, you’re defending the guy who called you, and I quote: ‘A deranged liberal intent on taking your guns, your money and your liberty.’”
“We said some pretty nasty, perhaps hyperbolic things about the vice president as well.”
Dixon was nonplussed. “Politics is politics.” The Judge took another drag on his cigar and slowly let the smoke filter out of his mouth. “I never liked Heath but I knew him fairly well and have seen his type come and go for years. Politics was the man’s life, it was all he had. If he didn’t have another race to run, some other candidate to take on, some focus group to test, polling to take and negative advertising to run, he would have just wasted away. On top of that, he was simply a piece of shit. I won’t lose a wink of sleep over his death, not a one.”
“And I hear our people were on the scene of this chaos?”
“Our people?”
“Yeah, Wire and McRyan.”
The Judge laughed a hearty deep guttural laugh.
Governor Thomson didn’t get it. “What?”
“McRyan as one of us,” Dixon shook his head, chortling.
“I know, I know,” Thomson smiled. “He doesn’t work for us but he feels like he’s one of us, ya know. I like him and we sure as hell owe him and Wire. We owe them huge.”