So far he had not experienced even the smallest bit of physical pain, but something about the car just didn't feel right. Because his eyes got smeary with blood and then swelled shut pretty quickly, he had to figure out using other sensory inputs. But the upshot seemed to be that his Mercedes-Benz was upside-down now and he was hanging by the safety belt and the shoulder harness, his legs supported by the steering wheel, his knees poked uncomfortably by the turn-signal levers.
The phone was right there, he could find it by groping for it, he knew which button turned it on. Then all he had to do was dial 911. But he couldn't see the number buttons. He punched one of the presets, the one that dialed his home number. He would tell Elizabeth to call the NYPD. But it was now past eleven thirty and Elizabeth had turned off the ringer on the phone and gone to bed; all he got was his own answering machine.
He considered dictating a last message to the world. Elizabeth would find the light blinking on the machine tomorrow and listen to it; she would call the NYPD and they would at last find him, dead from boredom. They would play the tape at his memorial service. It would be dry, calm, witty, noble, and brave.
But he could always call back later and do that. So he hung up to consider his options. All the other presets were business numbers. No one would answer them at this time of the night. Dialing 911 was harder than it sounded, because the phone had too many buttons and they all felt the same. "You okay?" a voice said. A man's voice. "Hello?" Chase Merriam said.
"Shit, man, that was incredible," the man said. "I can't believe you alive. That is a bitchin' car, man!"
He couldn't seem to move his left arm, which was still dangling on the ground. He reached across the body with his right hand and stuck the phone out the window. "Would you please dial 911?"
"Sure," the man said. Chase Merriam heard him shuffling the phone around in his hands, figuring out which way was up, then he heard the three electronic beeps.
"Hello, Officer," the man said, "I would like to report a car crash in Fort Washington Park. Down by the river. This car jumped the guardrail on the highway and now it's upside down. And I think you better get here real quick, because this dude is stuck inside the car, and this is a real bad area. It's full of bad criminals man, people who would cut this guy's heart out for a dollar, and they are all gathering around the vehicle right now, like jackals around a wounded beast, waiting for the right moment to strike. Huh? No, I'm sorry, I won't give you my name. Okay. Bye."
"Thank you," Chase Merriam said.
"No problem,"
"That business about the jackals - that wasn't for real was it?"
"Shit man, where do you think you are? Cape May?" the man said. "We are, like, just a couple of blocks from the biggest homeless shelter in New York City. The only ones here are the people they wouldn't let into the shelter because we're too big and bad and scary."
"Take whatever you want," Chase Merriam said. "I don't care."
"Okay. We'll begin with the watch," the man said. He picked up Merriam's arm, which instantly began to hurt, and after a little bit of fiddling around, figured out how to detach the watch. "What kind of watch is this, anyway? Looks like some cheap piece of digital shit."
"It's a long story."
"Well, if a guy was going to look for your wallet-"
"Beats me," Chase Merriam said. "I have to assume it fell out."
The man reached in the window and patted Merriam down, finding no wallets in the usual places. "Does this thing have a dome light?" he asked.
"I believe a dome light is standard on the big Mercedes. It's probably broken."
"Yeah," the man said, crestfallen. "I guess I'll just have to grope around."
He picked up Merriam's left arm and moved it out of the way, gently and firmly. Then he lay down on his belly and crawled forward, shoving his arms, head, and shoulders in through the crumpled window frame, shoving Merriam back against the set, and began to feel around on the ceiling of the car, now the floor.
"Damn!" he said. "It ain't anywhere. You sure you had a wallet?"
"Positive. Maybe it was thrown out of the car."
"Shit!" the guy said. He crawled into the car even farther, all the way up to his waist, the bulk of his body pinning Merriam tightly back. To judge from his breath, it had been a few decades since this guy had laid hands on dental floss.
The insides of Chase Merriam's eyelids glowed a warm pinkish-orange color.
"Shit!" the guy said again, and began to thrash around wildly, trying to extricate himself from the car. In the process he did a little bit more damage to Chase Merriam, but by now it was all kind of superfluous. "They never come this fast!"
"Freeze!" shouted a nearby voice that could only belong to a cop. "You are under arrest!"
After that it was all footsteps. The man ran away. A cop followed him; they crashed into some brush and then receded into the distance. And then another set of footsteps approached the overturned car. Slowly, calmly.
"Nice car," the cop said. "Didn't know these babies were four-wheel-drive."
The debate would be starting in less than five minutes. In addition to the cavernous exhibition space where most of the Town Meeting was happening, McCormick Place had its own theater, which was currently filling up with audience members chosen at random from Ogle's ten thousand typical Americans.
Eleanor Richmond, sitting in a dressing room backstage, having her face fixed by a professional makeup artist, was startled to realize that she wasn't nervous at all.
That was strange because she was about to go on national television. She had been on national television quite a bit recently, but this time she was going to engage in verbal combat with three other people who were better at this kind of things than she was. Had she become so jaded that she didn't even care anymore?
Someone knocked on the door and pushed it open before Eleanor could tell them to get lost. It was Mary Catherine Cozzano. She slipped quickly into the room, glancing nervously behind her, and leaned back against the door, pushing it shut. She was carrying a bouquet of blue flowers.
"Sorry, I didn't want to be seen coming in here," she said. "People would say I was playing favorites."
"Did you get those from a boyfriend, or just some political weasel?" Eleanor said, eyeing the flowers. "They're nice."
"I got them from a florist," Mary Catherine said. "They're for you."
"Well, how nice! Thank you!"
"I got blue ones, to symbolize the truth," Mary Catherine said, "because you always tell the truth."
"Well, not always," Eleanor said, "but often enough to give people the willies."
"You look great," Mary Catherine said. "I hope you knock 'em dead."
Eleanor didn't figure out the real reason for her lack of nervousness until she went out and sat down on the set. She was the last one to get there. The other debaters were a white man; a somewhat Anglicized Hispanic man; and a middle-aged woman, blond and blue-eyed. And all of them were perfect. They were good-looking, with large, clear features that looked good on television. They were poised, coiffed, made-up, dressed, prepped. She felt like she had blundered into the Academy Awards.
She was here as a token. Nothing more. She didn't have a chance of becoming William A. Cozzano's vice-presidential candidate, even if she and Mary Catherine did have a mutual admiration society. That's why she wasn't nervous.