CHAPTER FOUR

“There’s a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscure the truth.” Maya Angelou PPenelope was relieved that traffic was light on I-526. Known as the Mark Clark, it was named after the General who signed the ceasefi re agreement with North Korea in 1953, and who served as president of Th e Citadel from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s. The highway was a loop of interstate that skirted north of Charleston, allowing people traveling from Savannah to Myrtle Beach the opportunity to avoid the congestion of downtown. Without having to focus so much on her driving, Penelope allowed her mind to work overtime on the task at hand. She doubted Mark could have gotten it completely wrong; that would have been out of character. He checked, rechecked and verifi ed everything. He could have been misinformed, but he referred to his source as “unimpeachable.” Odd choice of words, even for Mark. As Penelope continued to work the angles over and over in her mind she noticed a huge green directional marker that read “I-26 Columbia”. “What the heck,” she muttered to herself. “What else do I have to do?” She turned on her right blinker, headed west on I-26, and had gone less than a mile when a foreboding sense that she was not alone in the car hit her like an unexpected chilly breeze. Penelope checked her rearview mirror to be sure there wasn’t an axe murderer in the backseat. It was empty. “Get a grip Penelope,” she said as she shook her head and refocused 27 The Fourth Awakening on her driving. “I have a good feeling about this. Senator Horn is going to be in his office and there is no one else in the car but me.” She checked her rearview mirror again, just to be sure. Not wanting to be on the road without some traveling money, Penelope exited at Ashley Phosphate and headed toward the Bank of America branch on Rivers Avenue. There were more cars lined up in the drive-through lane at the ATM than she had seen on the Interstate, so she wheeled her precious little hybrid car into a parking space at the front door of the branch. Since it was a Saturday morning and there were so many people waiting to use the ATM she thought the branch was probably closed, but it wasn’t. It turned out to be one of only a handful of Bank of America locations in Charleston with Saturday morning banking hours. . AAt the counter I absently reach for one of the two checkbooks in my purse as I try to shake the feeling that I am not alone. I can feel eyes on me, but turning around, no one is there. Still these odd pulls and tugs make my skin crawl. It was similar to a few minutes earlier in the car only much stronger. I write the check on autopilot as I struggle to understand the emotions and sensations that are sweeping over, around and through me. Maybe I am overwhelmed by being back in the game. Maybe I am losing my mind. . “May I help you?” the tall, athletic African-American teller said, as she smiled in Penelope’s direction. Penelope placed her check and driver’s license on the counter top. The teller examined the check, front and back, and compared the photograph on Penelope’s South Carolina driver’s license to her face. The picture was three years old and she had dropped nearly 15 pounds in the interim but it still looked enough like the person whose name was on the check to satisfy the teller. “Would you like that in large bills?” she asked in a surprisingly high voice that didn’t match her physique. It seemed like an odd question for a $300 withdrawal, but Penelope nodded that large bills would be fi ne. Penelope waited as the teller, for some reason, moved to a diff erent part of the bank. She again allowed her mind to wander. Th is assignment 28 Rod Pennington & Jeffery A. Martin had dredged up all of the old doubts that had kept her awake at night. Had it been too many years since she had done something like this? How could she compete with reporters who were younger than her children? Obviously this Walker character was involved in something shady or he wouldn’t be under arrest; he was wealthy and connected enough for very little to be out of his reach. Did she really want someone like him to even know her name? Pulling her cell phone from her purse, she dialed the last phone number she had for Senator Horn’s Columbia Offi ce. Not surprisingly, being a Saturday, it went straight to voice mail. “What in the world am I doing?” she thought to herself. “I’m planning on driving two hours to arrive unannounced at what would likely be an empty offi ce…” Her chain of thought was broken as the teller began counting $100 bills out on the counter. “Excuse me, what are you doing?” The teller looked a bit perplexed. “I’m sorry; I thought you said you wanted large bills.” Looking over the counter at the check Penelope had handed the teller she was stunned when she noticed the amount on the check was $3,000, not $300. “Where is your brain, Penelope?” she muttered to herself. Instead of making a scene or infl icting further embarrassment upon herself, she decided to redeposit the funds on Monday at her usual West Ashley branch. “I’m sorry, you’re right,” Penelope said with a self-conscious smile. Th e teller hesitated for a moment to be sure, then finished counting out the bills, stuffed them in a narrow white envelope and pushed them in her direction. After climbing behind the wheel of her Prius, Penelope shook her head. She wasn’t sure what was stranger, what had just happened or what she was actually planning to do. Her mind and emotions continued to churn for the two hours it took to drive from Charleston to the Columbia offi ce of Senator Clayton Horn. In Penelope Spence’s mind, politicians pretty much fell into four categories: True Believer, Corrupt, Ambitious, and Serious. Th e True Believers, whether from the left or the right end of the political spectrum, are the most interesting. They hold strong views which they defend loudly while being impervious to logic or counter arguments. They’re always a great source for quotes and fun to poke sticks at by asking loaded questions at press conferences. The most common are the Corrupt and Ambitious types. Th ey’re difficult to tell apart until an indictment is handed down. 29 The Fourth Awakening The rarest form of politician is the Serious. These are men and women who get involved in politics because they love their country and want to give something back. Unlike the rest, they know how to keep a secret. Senator Clayton Horn was a Serious politician. After four terms in the House of Representatives, the good people of South Carolina had seen fit to elect him five times to be their U.S. Senator, each with a larger majority. With more time on her hands as her kids started to troop off to college and no prospects of gainful employment in journalism on the horizon, she volunteered to help the senator in his last re-election campaign. To her surprise, instead of stuffing envelopes or making phone calls, he hired her to do opposition research. When the campaign ended, he kept her on as a part-time staffer doing background checks from her home in Charleston. Over time her duties expanded to include even more sensitive assignments, including research involving the senator’s role on the select Committee on Intelligence. Getting a Top Secret clearance took some time but was less odious than she had imagined, mostly because all she had done for the previous several decades was raise her family and serve on various charity boards. The required additional ‘codeword’ levels were another matter entirely. Thirty-six hours of labor for her first daughter had been a snap compared to that process. Horn had already announced that his last campaign would indeed be his last campaign. Penelope found herself being used less and less as the senator’s retirement date got closer and he groomed another senator to take his place on the select Committee. It had been over a year since Penelope had visited the senator’s office. While strongly hoping he would be there, she had no delusions that he would actually be in. The sign on the door indicated that his offi ce was closed on Saturday, which wasn’t a good omen. Bracing herself for the worse, she tried the knob on the door and found it unlocked. Inside was the familiar large room with a half dozen desks, each with stacks of file folders on the corners and computer monitors in the middle. Her previous visits had been during normal hours when the offi ce was a madhouse of activity. Now it was eerily still. Having heard the door open, a grey-haired woman popped her head out of her offi ce; Penelope recognized her immediately as Joan Inman, the senator’s long serving chief of staff . “I’m sorry, but we’re not open…” she stopped dead in mid-sentence, stared and blinked. “As I live and breathe,” she said with a not too thick 30 Rod Pennington & Jeffery A. Martin but nonetheless charming Southern accent. “Penelope Drayton Spence? Is that you?” “Hi, Joan!” Inman held Penelope at arm’s length and examined her from head to toe. “I swear; I hate you. You look better now than the last time I saw you. What has it been, a year?” “At least that…” “We were just talkin’ about you,” her Southern accent, like a pot of grits bubbling on the burner, was getting thicker by the second. “Clay! Clay! Look who’s come here for a visit!” Senator Clayton Horn stuck his head out of the office next to his chief of staff ’s to see what was causing the commotion. The senator looked much older and more tired than the last time she had seen him. Th ere was less hair on top and more lines on his face. He still had those gentle brown eyes that made you trust him instantly, but his skin appeared drawn and had a sallow, grayish cast. There had been rumors that he was in failing health, and seeing him fi rsthand confirmed them. Instead of being in a suit or blazer, the senator was wearing a golf shirt and Dockers. He always felt a responsibility to wear a coat and tie whenever he was doing government business, so he obviously hadn’t expected to see anyone today. Upon seeing Penelope, his eyes brightened and a huge smile broke across his face. He embraced her with arms that were more frail than she had remembered. “We were just talking about you!” “That’s what I told her, too.” “You are lucky to catch us,” the senator said with a warm smile. “We decided to stop by and pick up some stuff at the last minute.” “If you had been five minutes earlier or later, you’d have missed us completely,” Inman cooed. “That would have broken my heart.” “What can I do for you?” Horn asked. “I have a couple of questions for you. Then maybe a favor to ask.” “If there is anyone I owe a favor to it would be you.” Senator Horn motioned toward his office and then to one of the comfortable chairs directly across from his massive Carolina pine desk. After they had settled in, the senator’s voice softened. “I heard about you and your husband.” Penelope waved it off . “These things happen.” On the wall behind him were framed pictures of the senator with 31 The Fourth Awakening various other politicians, world leaders, and prominent South Carolinians. The one in the center of the maze was a much younger Clayton Horn, probably taken when he was still a congressman. He was in the Oval Office, shaking Ronald Reagan’s hand. Sharing the center spotlight of the photo array was a more recent picture of the senator with the Reverend Billy Graham. Penelope smiled when she noticed that she had made the wall of fame. Up in a corner near the top was a picture of the senator taken at the Rickman’s years earlier during a fund raising event. To the senator’s right were Josephine, not Joey, and her ex-husband; to his left were Penelope and Bill. They were all beaming and happy. What a diff erence time made. The top of his desk was reserved for pictures of his children, grandchildren, and an adorable infant with a pink ribbon on her bald head, who Penelope assumed was a great granddaughter. Joan Inman joined them and perched herself on the corner of the desk, continuing to beam. “So to what do I owe this visit?” “I’m working on a story.” “Good for you,” Joan said, almost clapping her hands. The senator, on the other hand, became much more serious as his grin melted into a smile. “What kind of story?” “I’m looking into the recent activities of Michael Walker.” Horn didn’t flinch. “I see.” “You previously had me do some background research on him but since then there are some rumors fl oating around.” “There are always stories circulating around Washington. I wouldn’t put too much stock in an unsubstantiated rumor.” “With your help,” Penelope said with a smile, “maybe we can put this one to rest quickly. How well do you know him?” “Mr. Walker is a very wealthy man and a generous political donor. I would suspect that everyone in Washington knows him, or would like to. Why do you ask?” The smile was completely gone. “Have you ever heard of the Hermes Project?” “Why do you ask?” Always answer a question you want to avoid by asking another question. Political Speak 101. 32 Rod Pennington & Jeffery A. Martin “You didn’t answer my question.” “Nor did you answer mine.” Penelope knew they could parry and thrust all day, but in the end the guy with nearly four decades in Washington wasn’t going to be tricked by any questions he didn’t want to answer. Penelope had a weak hand, and it wasn’t getting any stronger sitting across the table from someone like Horn. She had already shown her two best cards by mentioning Walker and the Hermes Project and Horn hadn’t even blinked. Now she only had one good card left, and it might be a joker if Mark’s information was wrong. At this point she had nothing to lose and decided to go all in. “I have been told, from what is considered an unimpeachable source, that Michael Walker was recently detained and transferred to the Charleston Consolidated Brig because of his association with the Hermes Project. I was there today and spoke to a Commander Durkin, who denied that he is being held in their facility.” A heavy silence settled over the room for a few moments. Senator Clayton Horn, never taking his eyes off of Penelope Spence finally said, “Joan, will you excuse us?” After 39 years of working together, the senator’s chief of staff knew exactly what the tone of the request meant. She immediately got up and closed the door behind her as she left the room. “An unimpeachable source,” he said, with a laugh. “This is all very interesting, Penelope. Where did you get this information?” She had obviously hit a nerve. Horn was the ranking Republican on the senate oversight committee that controlled the spending and kept an eye on all of America’s intelligence-gathering agencies. He and the other members of the committee had the authority to write whatever number of dollars they felt were needed into the annual federal budget for these agencies. Last year they had written $173 billion dollars on that line and it was approved by both chambers, without debate, and by unanimous consent. “You know I can’t tell you that. What do you know about the Hermes Project, Michael Walker and his being held incommunicado?” “Can we go off the record?” “I would prefer we stay on the record.” The senator rose from his chair and extended his right hand. “Th en it has been good to see you. As you know I’m not running for re-election so I guess we won’t be doing any more fundraisers.” Penelope knew exactly 33 The Fourth Awakening what the senator meant. He was grateful for her past generous support, but there were limits to his gratitude. Penelope didn’t move. The problem for Penelope was the senator now knew all of her cards, and she didn’t know anymore than when she walked in except that Mark Hatchet’s information had been correct. Th ere was a Hermes Project and wealthy industrialist Michael Walker was involved. Plus, Walker was probably in the Charleston Consolidated Brig. If she refused to go off the record now, with the brig denying they had him, the story might end here. “Okay,” Penelope said, her shoulders sagging slightly. She dropped her notepad and pen in her purse. “We’re off the record.”