Gonzales heard him take a sip of water.
“Two terms. Not three. Not four. Eight years. That’s all. But look, we’re on the verge of a dynasty again. This Lamden-Taylor thing could take us another twelve years. Count along with me. Twelve more years between them. Sixteen in all. We had Taylor’s first four. Now Lamden-Taylor for four. Who says it won’t be a Taylor-Lamden or Lamden-Taylor switching off for the next eight after that?”
Strong didn’t bother to consider Lamden’s age, which made his argument highly unlikely. Nor did he suggest that perhaps they wouldn’t want to run. He had his agenda and he went for it.
“Did you vote for the repeal of the twenty-second Amendment? I sure didn’t. Nobody has.” He failed to mention that Ronald Reagan actually floated the idea during his term stating, “I have come to the conclusion that the twenty-second Amendment was a mistake. Shouldn’t the people have the right to vote for someone as many times as they want to vote for him?”
There was no response from the caller on the tape. Strong had dropped him well into his speech. But the host still acted as if he was there, appearing to talk one-to-one, but actually reaching millions of individuals.
“So you amend the Constitution. You rewrite the law of the land. You change it. You replace them with leaders we want, not ones who are the poster children of the military-industrial establishment.” A familiar rallying cry for Strong. “Go to our www.StrongNationRadio.com or www.ElliottStrong.com websites. All the e-mail addresses, phone numbers, and fax numbers are there. The White House. The Supreme Court, and each senator and congressman. All of them. You’re going to write them and call them, and tell them how you feel. By Monday morning they’ll get a real sense of what Americans are thinking. What we’re thinking. What we want.” Each phrase came quicker, with more passion, with greater authority. Strong wasn’t asking. He was commanding.
“You can do it!” He slammed his fist down hard. Punctuation. An exclamation point to his lecture.
“You can do it! You live in the greatest nation in the world. You live in America where your voice counts.” He pounded his fist again. “Let’s start acting like God-fearing Americans instead of some third-world peasants. We don’t have to take it anymore. We’ll be right back.”
A commercial for a foreign automaker came up.
Chapter 12
Aleksandr Dubroff looked like any of the other old men digging for mushrooms in the ankle-deep mud. A hint of his denim shirt was visible under his nearly worn out khaki vest. It’s not worth the money to buy another, he thought. After all, how many more years will I be at this? One, maybe two?
His vest, shirt, and worn corduroys were covered by a leather, fleece-lined coat, underneath it all, long johns. He wore his favorite beret, a ragged brown checkered gift from his wife, Mishka, from the last year of her life. The hat, like her memory, fortified him against the early morning chill.
None of his clothes gave away his status. Not that status mattered anymore.
Aleksandr Dubroff had long ago retired from the Politburo, the Central Committee of the now-defunct Soviet Union. At that time he was a good three inches taller than his 5’7″ frame today. He had been one of the elite, a man who set Soviet policy and ran the country. He left, not because he saw the end of Soviet life coming, but because his beloved Mishka needed him. They’d been married for just over forty-six years when doctors told him she would not see their next anniversary.
So Dubroff decided to spend every remaining minute with Mishka. They moved to their state-provided dacha, in the wooded Tver region, about a four-hour car ride outside of Moscow.
Despite Dubroff s diminished stature, he was still strong, a barrel-chested man with bushy, black-as-night eyebrows that jutted out a full half-inch, and a thick salt-and-pepper moustache to match. His face was lined with age, but red cheeks always projected a cheery manner. Over the years, too many people took that for a jovial, soft demeanor. They were wrong — some of them, in fact, dead wrong. As a retirement present to a trusted friend of the Party, Soviet Premier Nicolai Andropov renovated Dubroff’s dacha. That meant he and Mishka would enjoy electricity and a generator, hot running water, and an indoor bathroom. By neighbors’ standards, they’d live in the lap of luxury.
“All the comforts of home,” the Premier told him at his goodbye party. “You and your Mishka should be comfortable.”
Dubroff thought the rest. For as long as she has. But he said, “Thank you, Mr. Premier. I can’t begin to express our sincerest gratitude.”
“No, Sasha. We, the people of this great country, are grateful for your dedicated service. From your defense of Russia to your tireless work for the Party.”
Tireless work for the party said it all and said nothing. Some of the other Politburo members had known of Dubroff s earlier work. Others only heard the rumors. And others still, like Mishka and the other wives, were told to ignore the lies of the West. It was easy to do. Aleksandr “Sasha” Dubroff always looked so cheery.
Now most of his colleagues from the old days were gone. He even outlived the Soviet Union and its measly pension by decades. Had he not created his own savings in Dubai banks, he would have gone hungry years ago.
But now Sasha Dubroff foraged for mushrooms, anonymous to everyone around him. He picked his way through the wetlands, slicing away the dry branches above with his razor-sharp knife.
Every spring and fall, Dubroff returned to the marshes, but not because he really liked mushrooms. It was the hunt — like in the old days when he looked under different kinds of rocks. Here he found Beilee, Podberiozouik, Gorkoshkee, and Maslikyonok.
When he started, an old mushroomer — even older than him — said, “Only the Seeroyejhka — the fresh, edible ones. The pink, lilac, green, red, and maroon-cap mushrooms.”
“How will I know the poisonous ones?” Sasha asked. He knew a great deal about dispensing poisons, but he didn’t care to die consuming any himself.
The old man pointed to some intriguing looking mushrooms with his walking stick. “The ones that are most likely to catch your eye. The ones that you laugh at because they remind you of dicks and balls, or the ones that appear to be umbrellas for dolls. Look, but don’t touch.”
Dubroff explained he had just seen a woman carry those types away. The old man laughed. “Of course, of course. In the hands of someone with the knowledge, the poisons, once dried, can dull arthritis or migraines. But beware if you just add them to your greens. Your salad days will be over,” he joked.
In recent years, Dubroff, like the old man before him, instructed newcomers and tourists in the ways of the dig. Now, he was the old man with the walking stick, the lumbering pensioner who had a simple answer when strangers asked about his work. “Oh, a little of this. A little of that.” No one needed to know more.
“I have something.” The call was from the LAPD lab technician.