Henderson was also a northern Catholic conservative Democrat, in his mid-forties, nice-looking, with an attractive wife and two handsome if slightly robotic children, one of each gender, who never smoked dope or rode skateboards or got tattooed or visibly pierced-although a local talk show host had publicly alleged that Henderson's eighteen-year-old daughter had two clitorises. That, even if true, could hardly be held against Henderson. If the party should choose a southern Protestant liberal for president, and needed some balance on the ticket… well, who knew what might happen?
HENDERSON CAME IN in a rush, banging into Roux's office without knocking, trailed by the odor of Bay Rum and his executive assistant, who smelled like badly metabolized garlic. They were an odd couple, almost always together, the slender aristocrat and his Igor, Neil Mitford. Mitford was short, burly, dark-haired, badly dressed, and constantly worried. He looked like a bartender and, in his college days, had been a good one-he had a near-photographic memory for faces and names.
"Has Custer County called yet?" Henderson asked Roux, without preamble.
"Not yet. We're not officially in it," Roux said.
The governor turned to Lucas: "This is what you were hired for. Fix this. Get up there, let the regular BCA guys do their thing, let the sheriff do his thing, but I'm going to lean on you. All right?"
Lucas nodded. "Yes."
"Just so that everybody is on the same page," Mitford said. He'd picked up a crystal paperweight from one of Rose Marie's trophy shelves, and was tossing it in the air like a baseball. "This is a murder, not a lynching. We'll challenge the word lynching as soon as anybody says it."
"They're going to say it," Roux said from behind her desk.
"We know that," Henderson said. "But we need to kill it, the use of the word."
"Not a lynching," Mitford repeated. To Lucas: "The sooner we can find anything that supports that view, the better off we'll be. Any little shred. Get it through to me, and I'll spin it out to the TV folks."
"Gotta knock it down quick," Henderson said. "Can't let it grow."
Lucas nodded again. "I better take off," he said. "The quicker we get up there-"
"Go," said Henderson. "Knock it down, the word, then the crime."
Roux added, "I'll call you in the air, as soon as Custer County calls in. I'll get the BCA down here to coordinate you with the guys out of Bemidji."
"All right," Lucas said. "See ya."
And as Lucas was going out the door, Henderson called after him, "Great briefcase."
ON HIS WAY to Del's house, Lucas called Weather at the hospital, was told that she'd just gone down to the locker room. He left a message with her secretary: he'd call with a motel number when he was on the ground.
Del lived a mile east and north of Lucas, in a neighborhood of post-war ramblers and cottages, all modified and remodified so many times that the area had taken on some of the charm of an English village. Del was waiting under the eaves of his garage, wearing a parka and blue corduroy pants pulled down over nylon-and-plastic running shoes. He had a duffel bag slung over his shoulder.
"Running shoes?" Lucas asked, as Del climbed into the car.
"Got boots in the bag," Del grunted. He hadn't bothered to shave, but his breath was minty-fresh. He was nut-tough, smaller than Lucas, street-weathered, shifty, a guy who could pass as a junkie or as homeless or almost anything else that didn't involve a white collar. "Does Weather know about this?"
"Left a message. How about Cheryl?" Lucas asked. Del's wife was a nurse.
"Yeah, called her. She's working the first shift-I told her probably two or three days. What happened?"
"Interesting problem," Lucas said. He outlined what he knew about the hangings as they headed to Lucas's house to pack.
"A fuckin' lynching, and we gotta fix it. For our own sakes, along with everything else," Del said, when Lucas had finished.
"Not a lynching."
"Walks likes a lynching, quacks like a lynching… " They sat silently for a moment, watching the snow come down around a red light. Then, "Could be a good time, you know?"
LUCAS CHANGED CLOTHES and packed in ten minutes, stuffing underwear, jeans, a laptop, and a cell-phone charger into a black nylon bag. He said good-bye to the housekeeper; kissed the kid, who was taking a nap and who, with a beige blanket folded around him, looked a little like a submarine sandwich; and collected Del, who'd called a cab.
The cab driver got lost for a while, trying to find the entrance to the National Guard site at Minneapolis-St. Paul International. When they finally arrived, the pilot and copilot, who had become impatient, briskly packed them into the back of the chopper.
THE FLIGHT WAS uncomfortable: the old military chopper had been built for utility rather than comfort. Conversation was difficult, so they gave it up. Even thinking was hard, and eventually they huddled, nylon-and-fleece-clad lumps, on the bad canvas seats, closed up in the stink of hot oil and military creosote, heads down, fighting off incipient nausea.
After an eternity, the chopper beat got deeper and they felt the beginning of a turn. Del unbuckled, half-stood, looked forward and then patted Lucas on the shoulder and shouted, "There it is."
Lucas pressed his forehead to the icy plastic window of the National Guard helicopter and tried to look forward.
ATHOUSAND FEET below, the Red River plains of northern Minnesota stretched north and west, toward Canada and the Dakotas. Though it was January, and the temperature outside the chopper registered at six degrees below zero, the ground below them was only dappled with snow. The few roads resembled lines on a drafting pad, dead straight across the paper-flat farmscape.
To the southeast, along the route they'd just flown, the country had been rougher and the snow deeper. Dozens of frozen-over lakes and ponds had been strung like rosary beads on the snowmobile trails; jigsaw-puzzle farm fields, red barns, and vertical streams of chimney smoke had given the land a homier personality.
Straight east, out of the helicopter's right window, was a wilderness of peat bog punctuated by the hairy texture of trash willow. To the west, they could just see a shadowy hint of the line of the Red River, rolling north toward Winnipeg.
They'd overflown the hamlet of Broderick, in Custer County, and were now closing on a line of cop cars parked on what Lucas had been told was West Ditch Road. The roof racks were flashing on two of the cars. To the north of them, in one of the bigger patches of snow, they could see a stand of leafless trees.
The copilot leaned into the passenger compartment and shouted over the beat of the blades, "We're gonna put you down on the highway-they don't want the rotor blast blowing dirt over the crime scene. A state patrol car will come out to get you."
Lucas gave him a thumbs-up and the copilot pulled his head back into the cockpit. Del pulled off the Nikes, stuffed them in his duffel bag, and began lacing up high-topped hiking boots. Lucas looked at his watch: 11:15. The flight to Broderick had taken better than two hours. Minnesota was a tall state, and Custer County was about as far from St. Paul as it was possible to get, without crossing into North Dakota or Canada.
Now the pilot dropped the chopper in a circle, to look at the highway where they'd land. At the same time, a state patrol car, followed by a sheriff's car, rolled down the side road and, at the intersection, blocked the main highway north and south.
"Better button up tight," the copilot called back to them. "It's gonna be chilly."
The chopper put down on the tarmac between the two cop cars, and the copilot came back to slide the door. Lucas and Del climbed out into the downdraft of the rotors.