Philipe turned toward me. “What do you think it is?” he asked. “A scandal?”
I shrugged.
“He’s being forced out. He doesn’t want to leave.”
I nodded. “I think so, too.”
He shook his head. “Weird.”
There was a commotion near the door. An excited buzz began in that section of the room and spread to the rest of the restaurant, and like a wave moving outward, heads turned toward the door. A phalanx of large tuxedoed men pushed the crowd back, and between the bodies I could see a familiar round head nodding to the assembled dinner guests.
Frank Sinatra.
He was in the open now, coming toward us, smiling and heartily shaking hands. Bob Hope was suddenly next to him, saying something, and Sinatra was laughing. He put a friendly arm around the comedian’s shoulder, then shouted an enthusiastic greeting to an elderly man seated at one of the upper tables. The man waved back, shouted something unintelligible in return.
“Sinatra,” Junior said, impressed. He looked excitedly toward Philipe. “Let’s nab him.”
“Wait a minute.” Philipe was still staring intently at the podium, where the mayor was being lectured by three imposing-looking men in their early to mid fifties.
“Sinatra!” Junior repeated.
“Yeah.” Philipe waved him away distractedly and stood, moving through the crowd toward the podium. Curious, I followed.
The three men gathered around the mayor were obviously very wealthy, obviously very powerful, and they were openly treating Horth as though he were a flunky, a servant. We could not hear what was being said, but the attitudes were obvious. The mayor was obsequious and subservient, the businessmen commanding and authoritative. No one save us was paying attention to them, and they knew it. This was a private scene being played out in public, and it had the feel of a commonplace occurrence. I felt sorry for Joe Horth and angry on his behalf.
Philipe moved closer, stepping almost right up to the podium. The mayor turned, saw him, saw me, and gave a small start. He instantly turned back toward the businessmen, pretending to give them his full and undivided attention.
“The bar!” Philipe shouted. “Meet us at the bar!”
The mayor gave no indication that he heard.
“We can help you! We’re Ignored, too!”
At that word, “Ignored,” Joe Horth whirled to face us. The expression on his face was unreadable. He was distraught, obviously, and agitated, but there was also hope and what looked like a wild sort of exhilaration mixed in there. He stared at us. We stared back. The three men, obviously sensing from the mayor’s behavior that something was amiss, looked into the crowd at us.
Philipe turned quickly, grabbed my shoulder, and pulled me back toward the bar. “Come on,” he said.
A moment later, we were with the others. “Sinatra’s up there at that big table,” Junior said, pointing. “Bob Hope’s with him and so’s some other famous guy but I can’t remember his name. I say we take ’em all.”
“We’re not taking anybody,” Philipe said.
“But I thought we wanted publicity.”
“We wanted publicity so we could draw attention to the plight of the Ignored, so we could help others like ourselves. Not so we could become famous. We were going to use the attention to throw a spotlight on a problem that, no pun intended, has been ignored until now. I don’t know if the rest of you picked up on this, but it’s obvious to me that our friend the mayor is being forced out of office by some high-profile money men because he’s Ignored. I guess they want someone in there who’s a little more charismatic, who can get more attention for them. What we have here is a chance to help someone who’s Ignored, to do some real good. What we have here is a chance to keep one of us in a position of power.”
I had not heard Philipe speak so idealistically for a long time, and a small thrill of excitement passed through me.
This was why I had become a terrorist.
“Joe Horth can do more good for the Ignored as mayor of Desert Palms than publicity from any kidnapped celebrity could. This is real progress. This is a real coup.”
I looked toward the podium. One of the businessmen had left. The other two were still lecturing the mayor. “Do you think he’s offed his boss yet?” I asked.
Philipe shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.” He watched Horth. “There’s something different about him. I’m not even sure he has to.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
I didn’t understand it, but I believed him.
It was nearly half an hour later that the mayor came walking up to us at the bar. He was nervous and sweating, and he kept looking behind him as if to make sure he wasn’t being followed. He was obviously surprised to see so many of us. He kept staring at Mary.
“Glad you could join us,” Philipe said, extending his hand.
Horth shook it. “Who… who are you guys?”
“We’re Ignored,” Philipe said. “Like you. We call ourselves Terrorists for the Common Man.”
“Terrorists?”
“And we’ve come to help you out.” He stood, and the rest of us did, too. “Come on. Let’s go back to our rooms. We have a lot to talk about. We have a lot to discuss. We have a lot to plan.”
Dazed, confused, the mayor nodded, and all fourteen of us walked unnoticed through the crowd, past the doormen, and outside into the cool night air.
Thirteen
As I had, as Junior had, as Paul had, as Tim had, Joe Horth fit in with us perfectly. We were instantly close. He knew us, we knew him, and although in the past that immediate camaraderie had always made me feel warm and good and nice, watching it work this time, being so acutely aware of it, gave me the creeps.
What were we?
It always came back to that.
We brought Joe to our motel, but he immediately suggested that we come with him to his house, and there was no argument. While the rest of us packed, gathered our stuff, Philipe talked to him about the terrorists, explained what we were about, what we hoped to accomplish. The mayor listened eagerly, enthusiastically, and he seemed genuinely excited by what Philipe had to say.
“We think we can help you,” Philipe told him.
“Help me?”
“Help you keep your job. And you, in turn, can help us. This could be the beginning of a true coalition. What we have here is the opportunity to give political power to a group that’s never even been recognized, much less catered to.”
The mayor shook his head. “You don’t understand. The only reason I have this job is because I’ll do what they say. And they know it. They want someone to follow their orders and be as unobtrusive as possible — ”
“Who’s ‘they’?” Steve asked.
“Why, our local business leaders and the desert’s most prominent and respected citizens.” Joe’s voice was sarcastic. “I dared to make a small decision on my own, without their approval, and that’s why I’m out.”
“We’ll see about that,” Philipe said.
“What exactly did you do?” I asked.
“I broke a tie on the city council and voted to approve funding for a new Softball diamond at Abbey Park. I was supposed to have tabled the discussion, held it off until the next meeting, and first asked them how I should vote.”
“No, you weren’t,” Philipe said. “You did the right thing. And now we’re here to back you up.”
“I have a meeting with them tomorrow,” Joe said. “Come to the meeting with me.”
“We will,” Philipe promised, and there was a hint of steel in his voice. “And we’ll see if we can’t get these guys to back down.”