Chapter Twenty-Three Coming together: A New Beginning

“Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.”

                                                                                                                                       - George Washington

Coming Together: A New Beginning

American Revival Headquarters

With events coming to a head in the election and the continuing unraveling of the War in Iraq, the get togethers at Headquarters were taking on a tone of urgency. Long discussions had gone on that ranged over every imaginable topic. Gladys’ long history in working with families, the outcome of her own experience with the injustice in law and the courts, had forced them to notice how the same behavioral strategies were applied in very different situations. The use of influence, deceit, coercion and violence in some combination were always present.

But the conversation on the night of September 30^th was focused on the election. Although they had seen that solutions do not come from government, still it was impossible to ignore the fact that government could screw up everything more thoroughly than any natural disaster.

There were two candidates, but no one anyone wanted to vote for. The lesser of two evils was still evil. Larry had gone over the facts, especially on the bizarre tangent into the very questionable military records of each candidate, and had found lots of opportunity for humor but little reason to think these virulent arguments could be put down to the credit of either side. Watching the Republican Convention had provided further shocks as the two young adult daughters of President Branch cheerfully equated irresponsibility with youth. Christopher was outraged; he had been doing volunteer work since he was twelve. His family had expected it; he expected nothing less than that of himself. The values that were exemplified by the Branch family were nothing less than the lowest common denominator for human behavior.

But they went right along with the behavior of the candidates.

Branch had been a drunken playboy who used family influence to ensure he was not put at risk; Jack Bradstreet had gone to Vietnam to create a record for himself because, even then, he planned a career in politics. He had simply never imagined it might or could be checked.

Both candidates belonged to the same fraternity in college. As the facts were assembled even Bernard, who had the most faith in politics generally and in the Democratic Party specifically, saw that this election provided no good solutions to the problems that confronted America.

Yet these were the men between whom Americans were forced to choose to occupy the Oval Office on Election Day, supposing that the Branch administration did not decide to put off the election – as they could, using their emergency powers. The possibility of an October Surprise still loomed. There was no question that it would come, just how bad it would be.

A rumor that the Vice President might step down, claiming a heart problem, and be replaced by Lawrence briefly cheered them. But it was a thin reed on which to hang.

America, its foreign policy, economic future, and history of individual freedoms, were at risk. As they looked at each other sitting on the terrace of Dave’s apartment in that autumn, it was hard to believe this could have happened in just a few years. But now, just a few short weeks out from Election Day with the conventions both consigned to the byte maps of the Internet and fading memory, the truth was unavoidable. America desperately needed solutions. More and more, Dave believed that the answers, though there, were invisible to them because they were distracted by the unfolding of the political process itself.

The football game aspect of events, with teams already in the field and playing for all they were worth, distracted you from considering the whole picture. The whole picture should include looking beyond the hype and identifying the means for solving the problems directly.

What if the answer evaded them because those solutions were not in the realm of politics at all?

The formerly leisure dialogue that had begun when Gladys and Sam had joined them had continued online and over the phone. By working with the AR, they had reached out for new focus and for a direction that worked.

In each other, right and left, those who gathered through American Revival recognized the beginning of new possibilities. But would they have time to create those alternatives? Did it matter who won the Election in November? Most of them were more afraid of Branch, but since the Branch Administration had installed the L.O.Y.A.L.T.Y. Act and there was no indication, even now, that a Bradstreet Administration would either stop the war in Iraq or rescind the changes made by the NeoCons in the Branch Administration. There was no reason to think a Bradstreet Administration would be any better, really.

Dave suggested they brainstorm some alternative scenarios in each case.

Well, said Christopher, they had more material for impeaching Branch so perhaps he was the better candidate. Everyone had looked stunned for a moment, and then erupted in whoops and laughter. Underlying the laughter, though, there continued a growing anxiety.

Larry began looking into how an impeachment could be carried out, given that the Vice President and Speaker of the House were also NeoCons and had colluded. They might be even more responsible for events than the President had been.

Gladys and Sam, who had gone home to New Zealand, had returned again and begun raising questions within their circles of acquaintance in the community of the United Nations. There were so many problems that needed work. The list seemed endless, although they broke down into a smaller number of categories.

These included the revamping of the legal system, how the United Nations could become effective as a problem solving tool, and how to reform the political system. The latter included a revamping of how the much-needed social insurance any decent people want could be made available while avoiding the pitfalls of bureaucracy.

However, each conversation drew them back to the problem of terrorism and the Middle East. The thought of what was happening, had been happening for two generations, emphasized their powerlessness and increased their sense of urgency. It was impossible to ignore. Their country was in the grasp of another Vietnam, but this time it was far worse.

Dave had not been able to find Lindsey. Coop, when Dave talked to him, said he did not know; the messages left on the cell phone were never returned.

Charlotte, North Carolina

The first day of training had been grueling.

Lindsey was astonished to discover that her training would begin with learning to field strip, assemble, and load an M1 rifle. Lindsey had grown up in a family where everyone handled guns, so this in itself was not difficult, but Coop insisted she practice her aim and took her out into the countryside not just to shoot standing still, but to run and shoot.

Coop told her that court is like that. They are shooting at you from all directions and you need to be ready. She needed to know her rifle like she was going to know the books of law. Grimly, Lindsey did exactly what she was told. At the end of the day she was dirty and exhausted. That night she began reading Black’s Law Dictionary, her first law assignment. Coop had dropped in on the desk he had placed for her.

As soon as the book fell on her desk he began asking her questions about the meaning of words, demanding she be absolutely correct every time. Beginning with words she was likely to encounter right away in her own case over the next weeks he moved on to words that helped her see the structure of the law and its history and into the history of the English Common Law, statute, and case law, especially as it applied to libel and slander and the other charges made in her own case.

Lindsey felt as if she was drowning in law. Then, over the next month, it started to make sense.

When Coop told her that Dave was looking for her Lindsey had experienced a wash of pain.

“Do you love him?” Coop had asked with objectivity mixed with the compassion of a physician.

“I don’t know any more. I know I did.” Lindsey thought about the strange sweetness she had experienced with Dave. He had listened to her. She remembered how he had held her in the church that day after Nann’s funeral. If she had not been trapped in that hideous trap with Dicks, what would she have done? Now she would never know.

Coop shrugged. “He’s looking for you. Let me know if you want him to find you.”

She had nodded, saying nothing. Time enough for that later, if a later came.

On the second day she was there, she watched as Coop disemboweled the trailer where he had lived for three years. He had been mostly moved into the apartment when she arrived. Arriving there that first night, she had more lost consciousness than fallen to sleep. The next morning she realized that he had given her his own bedroom. He would sleep on the futon in the living room, he said.

Lindsey discovered that Coop was a strange combination of ruthlessness and kindness. You never knew which side of him you would see, but she would always appreciate having him appear by the driver’s door of the car that first night. He was her teacher, her mentor, but he was not her friend. To Coop, she was the case he had been waiting for, the one that would break through to the public.

The next afternoon, training stopped early and Coop drove them back over to the trailer park where they watched the local fire department use the remains of the structure to practice putting out fires. Lindsey had kept an eye on Bead for Coop while he helped the fire department. There was little left when they were finished.

Angelique was not there to watch. She had been arrested earlier that day for fraud, having attempted to bully one of the other tenants into giving up the heating unit Coop had installed in their unit, salvaged from his own.

Coop had gotten Angelique on film from the place next door, screaming at the old man. The class action lawsuit had been filed and Angelique was beginning to understand she was in trouble. Shrugging, Coop had told the tenants that she would be smart to settle, but he did not think she would. They all planned to be in court.

Training with Coop meant also helping others with their own suits, Lindsey discovered. She had been quick to understand the basic concepts, and after two weeks was able to help a gaunt, frightened woman she realized with a shock was no older than herself, obtain a restraining order.

Listening to the woman’s story brought back her own experiences with Dicks with tremendous force, and while showing the woman, her name was Victoria, how to fill out the paperwork and begin doing her own preliminary work, Lindsey experienced flash backs.

Lindsey had first seen Victoria, standing on the doorstep of the apartment, her left eye swollen shut. Her two small children were clinging to her legs. Coop had sent her over. Later, he told her he wanted her to understand others had it tougher than she did.

Looking at Coop, Lindsey felt a wave of anger rising in her. She had never before really understood prejudice, but now she did. She had not discussed with Coop her own experiences. She knew that Coop hated what he called ‘whining.’

But because Coop knew her family was educated and had background and accomplishments, he had assumed that her own experiences with Dicks were less humiliating, less painful than those Victoria had experienced at the hands of her blue collar husband. She set him straight.

“Have you ever known a case where the abuser laughed with glee while he battered his victim into unconsciousness? Where he kicked her until she bled from every opening in her body?” Quietly, Coop said he had not.

“Well, now you have. I will work, I will do anything I have to for justice, not only for myself but because the system needs to be changed – but never, never let me see you demean what happened to me again.”

When Lindsey was finished speaking, she was shaking with rage. They never discussed it again.

The third week, Coop dropped another pile of law books on her desk and told her there would be more to come. The pile was higher than her head. Grimly, she started reading, first there and then on line.

Over those weeks Lindsey got to know Bead, too. The child was hungry for women in her life. Well, Lindsey was hungry for some normality and found it with the small girl who loved the way Lindsey decorated her new room and set up the used dressing table they found at a thrift store. Bead’s delight was as obvious as a puppy finding a butterfly.

The first weekend, Coop had his core group in for a meeting in the apartment and Lindsey met Helen and John Mitchell, Karen Le Bray, Nora Brannon and several others. They looked at her curiously. They had known Coop was looking for a high visibility case for a long while. This was it. If she did the job Coop hoped she could do, it would help them, too. Closing her eyes, Lindsey prayed for the strength to do what needed to be done. She had two more weeks until she would need to be ready.

This was the case that Coop needed to show Americans that it was possible to take back their courts. Lindsey could not afford to be less than perfect.

American Revival – New York

“Do you think she is still alive?” Dave asked Larry the question abruptly. He had been thinking about it for weeks now. Larry did not need to ask whom Dave was talking about. People all over the country were looking for Lindsey.

The original committee was having a quiet dinner together. Tomorrow night there would be a meeting of the full group, all of them that could make it to New York now. A consensus had been building through the dialogue going on in ‘Reviving Liberty’, on the list serve, and on the phone and through meetings, here or at other locations.

The tools made available through the United Nations had been languishing for a good long time now. They could all see that now America, and the world for that matter, needed a tangible example of what could be accomplished, and after deliberating they had decided to set a target and begin.

They had learned so much. They had so much to do.

As they had examined the means people used to skew and redirect outcomes, they all found examples from their own lives and in each of these cases covert behavior, graft, coercion and violence were variously used. Remembering their earlier conversations, they decided to call it the Hammer Effect for Armand Hammer, the most obvious example of how evil can win out. It seemed so right to recycle his memory this way. This was his proper legacy, not art, not philanthropy, but the ugliness and truth of his own life.

Larry and Dave had had a long conversation on the subject of design theory for human organizations, and Larry had some opinions backed up with data. Dave asked him to speak on the subject. When Dave asked, Fuzz Ball was draped across Larry’s shoulders. Sitting up abruptly, the cat slalomed down his back and onto the floor through the space on the back of the chair, impacting with a soft thud against the carpet. Rising immediately, Fuzz Ball stalked off towards the kitchen. Larry began speaking.

“Organizations are human tools, so the fact they were not creating the outcomes that were intended was a design error. Not surprising. All human inventions come about through trial and error, and this is especially true for the inventions of human culture. We know that the size of human communities through most of time has been small, maxing out at about 150 in the immediate extended family or sub tribe. That was the size that America’s Founders were thinking in terms of. The design of human organizations has changed radically over the last 200 years because of several factors. One, the size of the human communities has changed radically, always upwards, at least in the Western world. Because of that, the means used for modifying and mandating appropriate behavior began breaking down. Using economic tools applied to sociology you would say that the negative transaction costs for the Hammer Behaviors were artificially lowered by the changed environment.

In a small town everyone knows who the bad guys are. They shun or avoid them. They certainly do not extend them credit of any kind. They try to make sure their kids don’t marry their kids.

Second, people began using government to experiment in ways that had not been considered before. At approximately the same time, they began asserting ‘nonjudgmental standards for forming relationships. That was a disaster. It was like extending credit without doing a credit check.

We all remember the Civil Rights Movement of the 50s and 60s. That was based on securing the rights of individuals when those rights were being ignored because of race. That worked because it was the foundational idea of America that all people were equal under law. The Civil Rights Movement just installed in practice where the principle was being ignored.

But what happened next was very different. We began using legislation like a Christmas Wish list. Up until then, no one used legislation to install social policy that asserted that groups should be compensated or punished, just that they WERE equal under the law. Legislation was supposed to ensure justice, meaning that people got what they actually earned, not what they would have earned if circumstances had been different, say if they had been born with different abilities or to a different family.

Let’s take a case and I will show you what I mean.

O.K. Let’s say a woman gets married and had kids. Then, under no fault divorce law her husband notices she is getting a little long in the tooth. He dumps her. Since it is no fault law, he goes after the kids. Now, this guy hardly knows the kids because he has been working and chasing women, but to lower his support he asks for and gets half time custody. That is normal today. Now, he has hidden assets, too. The courts ignore that kind of thing. So, effectively, he is able to trade spouses and pay far less than he would have for the services of a maid over the period of years. And this maid gets no retirement, no benefits. Ironically, in the name of women’s rights, most feminists supported no-fault divorce law in the beginning.

This meant that legislation was open to manipulation in ways it had not been before in those areas that impinged on personal behavior.” Larry nodded towards Gladys. “That is why and how idiotic social engineering concepts like no fault divorce and no fault car insurance were put into effect.” Gladys uttered something between a moan and a laugh.

Larry continued. “And that is how things got so far out of kilter. When that started to happen those impacted, mostly women, looked for the means to counter the huge bite a bad law was taking out of their lives. By fighting back, they created strategies used and noticed by attorneys and other women to regain balance. But the use of those strategies was not limited to cases where injustice had been done originally. It became a long, ugly line of dominos with no justice at either end. It was a disaster.”

Gladys nodded, “And it still is today.”

Design errors fascinated Larry. In the context of human organizations they would be far more complex and so much more interesting. When the general discussion began, Larry went off to make peace with Fuzz Ball.

This discussion led them straight into a consideration of markets and the disciplines of economics. Today most everyone, right and left, saw the problems that collectivism had caused. But very few people had considered what needed to be done or had drawn the extrapolations as to what design modifications that indicated for government. The failings of government were systemic and inherent because any system without the potential for both positive and negative feedback could lead only to disaster. Americans could no longer expect justice.

The whole system was groaning with just this kind of problem, but of course the gravest problem facing the world was that of the present war in Iraq.

They now understood how the Non Governmental Organizations resources worked and could be made to work on an issue. Gladys had laid that out for them very clearly. But that was still just words. Could it be done, and could it be done in such a way that governments and the deadly interests of the greedy could be circumvented?

The right message was that when someone did the right thing, it should pay off; doing the wrong thing should cause liability. It sounded so simple. It seemed so impossible.

Curiously enough, when they looked at it that way, things they thought were impossible dissolved into the mist and things they had never thought about became obvious problems.

On October 11^th the Committee for Peace convened at the headquarters of the American Revival and set its agenda. Peace in the Middle East. Some of them groaned. It seemed impossible.

But as they lay out the steps, their skepticism diminished and their enthusiasm, and hope began to grow.

Using the means discussed by Gladys, it started to seem plausible.

The victims of violence in the Middle East were spread over a half century and over the face of the world. But if the rest of humanity could help them put this behind them and find hope, then peace was possible for everyone.

It was a simple plan and it was far cheaper than continuous war. Killing people is a very inefficient way of changing their minds.

Using the networking potentials of the United Nations they would make it possible for real victims to be compensated for their losses. The money would be donated. No funds from governments would be either solicited or accepted.

Victims would be required to provide documentation of their losses and their plan for remaking their lives and dreams.

The Committee for Peace would ask nations to provide sanctuary. If they could not find peace and hope where they where, then maybe in other places they could. There were many nations on earth that would be happy to have new citizens with a funded business plan.

Larry estimated that reducing the number of people struggling with injustice would do several things. First, it would refocus the attention of those who were without hope, thus providing them with a positive direction. People always prefer real options and a better future for their families. It was that kind of hope that had created America in the first place. The Committee for Peace could make the hope of America available to every family and individual on Earth.

Having reduced the number of people without hope, then the population of those who were using this crisis for self aggrandizement or to create opportunities to accumulate power would be far less able to continue that behavioral strategy. It was the lack of hope that fostered violence.

Donating to make whole those whose rights had been violated would provide documentation of how that had happened. So, soon there would be no doubt and those responsible could be specifically named. And they would be. American Revival and the world should never tolerate any enabling of injustice, no matter who or why. Those responsible could then be shunned.

The requirements for documentation were stringent; the process would be dispassionate. Dave had already arranged to ask some of the wealthiest people in the world to donate. Some of them had made pledges.

Would it work? They believed it could because the world wanted peace so very much.

Lindsey in New York

The trip back to New York had been very different. Lindsey had flown this time. Coop had put her on a plane in Raleigh. Bead had come with them to say good-bye. Bead had held on to Lindsey’s hand tightly, not wanting to let go. Lindsey hugged her hard, holding her for a long moment. Though she promised to come back, they both knew that life is uncertain. Lindsey had friends in Charlotte now, and this time she knew they were truly her friends.

When they called her plane for boarding, Lindsey turned to say good bye to Coop. He was looking at her as if he was seeing a soldier going off to war.

“You’ll do the job. I know that, and you know it, too.” Over the last weeks Lindsey had come to know that Coop never praised anyone except Bead. But she knew praise from Coop when she heard it.

Smiling, Lindsey hugged him. “Thanks, Coop, and God bless you.”

Half way into the boarding door, she looked back. They were both still watching her.

A lot had happened.

The website with the material and evidence had proven to be an important component of their campaign for justice. It had attracted enormous attention from the media and the public. It was attacked, of course, as inappropriate. Women, Lindsey had been told over and over again, do not defend themselves. They must wait for others to do that. She and her mother were unfeminine, unladylike, unwomanly, a threat to America.

Each variation on this attempt to unarm her had less impact than the last.

Lindsey had been asked to appear on Prince Street Live, the most popular talk show in the country. It was the invitation to appear that had prompted her return to New York.

It had been tough. But she had endured it. She had been herself, serious about what she was doing, on point, and just a little funny. Laughter, she remembered chased away the fear.

She had also stood up in court, warding off their attempts to stop her. She remembered, as she stood before the Bar, that this was her court, not theirs.

Afterwards, she had just wanted to get out of there. Lance had come for her and they had cabbed back to his apartment where she was staying right now. He had turned off his phone. Too many hate calls to him from people who knew she might be there.

Almost as soon as they walked, in her cell phone rang. The voice was familiar but strange. It was Dave Elder. He wanted to talk. Breathing slowly to help her handle the pain, she listened. When the suit was settled and the money came, in Linden had made her promise to go to the doctor. But Lindsey did not want to go. The examination she had had in North Carolina was definitive. She did not want a heart transplant.

Dave asked her to meet him someplace. Reluctantly, she agreed.

Later that night, sitting in the Knickerbocker, a neighborhood restaurant near her old apartment on 9^th Avenue, she listened as he abased himself. It would have meant so much if someone, anyone had believed her before. If he had believed her then……Lindsey did not want to think about it. Trust was no longer easy or natural for her. These were words, and words could lie.

He had said he would do anything.

After a long pause, Lindsey asked him to do something for her. It was stupid, but she wanted to see if he would, and it was something she had wanted to do herself for years, a fantasy. She asked that he put flowers on a grave for her. Astonished, he agreed.

The grave was here in New York, at the Belmont, she said. It would only take a phone call. But it should be a lot of flowers; at least two dozen. Lindsey smiled. The deceased was large. Taking out a business card, she wrote the name of the deceased and the place on the back. Reading it, Dave looked at her and started to ask a question. Then he stopped and nodded. It would be done. Immediately. What kind of flowers did she want? After a long pause, Lindsey asked him to make it red and purple roses. Purple had been her favorite color when she was a little girl. Red is her favorite color now.

Picking up his cell phone, he placed a call to an all night florist and ordered $10,000.00 in red and purple roses to be placed on the grave of Ruffian, the thoroughbred who broke her leg in a match race there in 1975.

Lindsey cocked her head to one side and smiled when he named the amount, shaking her head. Her blond hair, which had been chopped short in back, fell slightly over her eyes and she looked at him through her bangs.

“It could have been fewer flowers,” she said, opening up a little, her expression lightening.

“No it couldn’t.” Dave looked at her.

“Lindsey, there is so much I am sorry for. I am an idiot. And there is something I want you to have.” He raised his hand as she opened her mouth, obviously to object. “No, I mean it.” He handed her a carved box, the one in which he kept the letters from Gramps. “Please read these. A lot has happened to me since we last talked. I don’t think I told you much about my grandfather – although you told me about yours.”

Now Lindsey was really listening.

“Gramps--that is what I called him-- was someone I did not get to know until after he died. But I was fortunate. He left me these and, really, the most important things he was were in these and in the letter he left me to read. I want you to read them, think about it and, maybe, if you can, give me another chance at being your friend. If you can do that maybe, and I will be honest with you, I want to be much more than your friend. I love you Lindsey. I always will.” Dave looked at the box in her hands.

Lindsey looked into Dave’s face intently. “Friendship matters more than romance. I would rather have a friend I can really trust than a lover any time.”

“Can you trust me, you think?”

“Yeah, I think I can.”

Dave laughed. “How long until your next court appearance?”

Lindsey raised her eye brows, slowly. “A week from yesterday.”

“Nearly forever. How would you like to go someplace? Separate rooms, no worries, someplace beautiful,” Dave reached out and touched her nose. “like you?”

Lindsey’s face relaxed into a long slow smile.

“When do we leave?”

“We already have.” Said Dave pulling out his cell phone.

The Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite was the Grande Dame of elegance. Nestled in a meadow their rooms looked out at Half Dome. The first two days they just walked round the Valley Floor, holding hands. It was autumn so the trees were molting their leaves like misty ripples of color carried away on the wind.

Starting from the Ahwahnee Lindsey and Dave walked to Bridal Veil Meadow and then over the Falls. Lindsey grabbed his hand and pulled him along the path towards the gently signing mist of water that began its fall nearly a mile above them. When they arrived there was no one around. It was cool with the first sharp bite of oncoming winter present in the curls and eddies of breeze. Laughing Lindsey pulled off her long sleeved shirt and walking pants and went in the rock edged pool, immersing herself in the water.

Dave waded in after her, carefully keeping his pants pulled up and dry.

Grinning, Lindsey splattered him with an arch of silver water that came off her hand like liquid bullets. They traced a line along Dave’s frame from his face to his belly. Diving onto the water Dave glided over to her, grabbing her up in his arms. She was wet and soggy, the water gleaming on her skin and accenting the curves of her body.

Then they were kissing and neither of them knew who had started it, just that it had been a wonderful waiting.

On the way back they walked along the trail that followed the course of the Valley Wall. Once it had been the main road into the Old Village. On the way they passed the Ship Stone, and off to the right Lindsey pointed out the Yosemite Chapel, pointing out where her grandfather had had his tent every year when he was growing up there at the family compound in Old Village.

She had told Dave the family history. They had walked out to Bridal Veil Meadow so she could show him where her grandfather had spent hours in the early morning timing the opening of wild flowers so that his father could build the first lapse-time camera to be used with plants in 1912. The first nature film ever made was the one he had done to save the wild flowers here in Yosemite. They had first shown it on the porch of the shop, the Studio of the Three Arrows, in the compound.

The Chapel was open. Dave picked up Lindsey’s hand and kissed the palm, gently, as if it were made of fine porcelain. They walked inside.

The small structure was much as it had been when Lindsey’s grandfather had known it as a small child. It was there that Dave asked Lindsey to marry him and it was there they exchanged their vows. Neither believed they needed anyone but God to join them and they had waited long enough.

Half way back to the Ahwahnee it began to rain and they let the water first mist and them flow over them, smelling the first aromatic scents of dust remembering its origins.

They did not talk about anything but that night they made love and meant every word they did not speak.

It was perfection.

On the plane back Dave looked down at Lindsey napping, curled up in her seat, reaching over he curled his finger around an errant blond tendril of hair.

Slowly stretching and rousing Lindsey smiled up at him.

Pausing Dave asked,

“Why Ruffian and why roses?”

Sitting up Lindsey looked at him.

“Ruffian died trying. She died giving it everything that she had. Over the last three years I have rethought a lot of things. Once, I thought the world was a place where the truth was enough. I was wrong then. But I knew I did not want to continue to be wrong.”

She looked down for a moment.

“I watched the match race where Ruffian broke her leg. Then last year I found a video of the whole race and I watched in over and over again. She never gave up. She never accepted that her own body had defeated her.”

Lindsey looked at Dave.

“Sometimes that happens. We can try and know that our own weakness may defeat us. Ruffian reminds me we do it anyway. The only battles worth fighting are the ones we may lose.

Tomorrow I have to go in for the arbitration in the courthouse. I need to be strong for that.” Leaning towards him she brushed his face with her hand.

“Thanks for the flowers for Ruffian. Thank you for loving me so I could love you.” Dave pulled her into his arms and held her.

Lindsey was trembling when she walked into the courthouse. She was alone. Dave had driven with her to the courthouse but was not permitted into the arbitration.

As she turned and waved to him, standing there, so tall and handsome she thought about the unexpected gifts life brings. She thought about her new friends in North Carolina, about Coop and Bead. Life also brought amazing blessings.

Going into the arbitration alone was frightening, but she won. Every major defendant wanted desperately to settle.

Coop had been right. The defendants were caving in and beginning to point fingers at Tom Dicks. That was their best bet, of course. It was the cheapest, easiest thing to do. Dicks was no longer a useful tool. But in her heart Lindsey knew they had neither cared about the truth or about the impact of their actions. They had money and power enough to not care.

It had been that kind of divorcement from personal responsibility that had created the evils of today.

Americans are dying; families continued to be ripped apart. The foundations of America’s vision were crumbling. It had been bad for her and her mom, but while Lindsey was in Charlotte she had gotten to know John and Helen Mitchell well and their suffering and the suffering of their children was unimaginable.

They, she and the Mitchells, and all of them, were bound together by their suffering but even more by their refusal to run away or give up. America’s vision for individuals rights and freedom, those words so misused by the NeoCons, were their heritage and the heritage of all Americans.

They all had known that they would have to fight for that vision. There is no other possible response when you truly love, be it your family or a vision for a better world. The two are not different.

Lindsey had found in the Mitchells, in Karen, in the many people like them, the friendship, acceptance, and love that had so failed her in the Movement.

Now the Mitchells had gone to the FBI with their complaint. Lindsey had helped them learn to use the media so get their story out. This morning as she was leaving to come over there she had gotten a call from Helen telling her that the court had ruled that their children be returned to them immediately. She and John had been on their way to the foster homes to gather them in.

Lindsey had cried for joy. Local people throughout the networks they had forged were beginning to organize, inspired by the example of a pro se law suit that had prevailed.

Karen had e—mailed last night with a copy of the complaint she had filed against the U. S. Army and the Department of Social Service. She had begun passing out her flyer and it was being used by families. Getting to know Karen, another woman who had challenged the system had been another unexpected gift.

It was funny how things could happen so fast. Six months before she had been entirely alone except for her mother and now she was part of something wonderful that was growing every day. Local victims of abuse and corruption begin to organize to take out legislators and start law suits to hold bureaucrats accountable. They were taking back their lives.

She was proud to have had some small part in making it happen. Briefly, and with love, she thought of Dave, her husband and her friend.

That stab of happiness, of vindication and the imagined scent of roses mixed with the newly wet smell of dust was the last thing that filled her mind.

The Election

The election coverage filled the media. The American people watched. It was the national sport, the pageant of false promises that entertained, distracted and then destroyed. The protests and arrests from the Republican Convention lingered in people’s minds giving rise to an uneasy autumn, filled with unanswered questions.

Every day more American were dying and more and more Americans questioned why but they were only starting to ask now and for this election it was too late.

Humstead was elated. His bottom line strategy was working. Ignoring the polls in every state and county where they did not need to win he focused his attention on those places where the election could be won. In each place, in each precinct, there was more than one way to win. In some places they had the votes; in others the votes could be simulated. If you focused on winning how was not nearly as important as the bottom line.

Sitting at his desk he stared at the computer screen, assessing the numbers that could be gotten out from the reliable Evangelical churches, arranging to send out emissaries directly from the White House to goose the congregations that seemed marginal.

It had been a tough election period but now he felt increasingly confident of bringing in a win for the President. Easing his sagging body back in his chair he considered again the contingencies. The key states had been very thoroughly handled. The timing with the convention had been perfect. The assertion of authority had been masterful. Of course, he was fortunate that the Democrats had not been any better organized, but they never really were.

On the desk was a pile of letters, already opened for his attention. The one on top had been sent through from the attorney they had retained. It was a Pro Se interrogatory generated form the Smithson Lawsuit. Lindsey Smithson had died, but the law suit was not going to go away. Looking over the questions that ranged through the last twenty years and over the least comfortable parts of his life he started to tremble. Who ever had made up the questions knew too damn much about how they had done things.

The Smithsons had also found a way to use the L.O.Y.A.L.T.Y to breech force them to produce documents. Unprepared, they had been unable to avoid cooperating. .

They knew who connected to whom, how, why, and what the quid pro quo had been.

But it would not impact the vote Humstead made a note to review the process for pardons. Humstead never ignored the contingencies.

The only other cloud on the horizon was in the make up of the Congress, that was shifting more than he wanted to see happen. And, of course, there was this movement in the courts. He had also heard there was talk of impeachment, but that did not worry him. They had every office in the succession, so what could the whiners do?

It was late. He stretched clumsily as he rose from his seat. For those in power things would never change. Smiling smugly he turned out the light. It had been a great campaign all in all.

Humstead had accomplished his vision for America. He had used the institutions dedicated to freedom and responsibility to build an American monarchy. He was right about one thing: America would remember his name and what it stood for.

Springville, California

The First Church of the Nazarene was located at the corner of Ward and Lenard Roads in Springville. It was just across the road from the Springville School where Lindsey had gone to school as a child. In the springtime the hills in back of the school were a riot of green but now, in the autumn they were gold and dun. Springville was a small, modest town without a trace of a tourist industry. The single motel had just fifteen rooms that were rarely full.

Dave had enjoyed meeting the people who had known Lindsey as a child. Evidently, she had always been independently minded.

He remembered his brief trip up here soon after he had started doing the work Gramps had left for him. His world was so very different now.

The sanctuary was small and simple. This is where the family had held the memorial services for Lindsey’s grandma and grandpa. They had lived just a few houses down and across the street from here.

The service was to be small and private. Linden had flown back to New York to handle what needed doing and collect Lindsey’s ashes and these had already been interred in the cemetery where her Grandma and grandpa had been buried along with her Aunt Sylvia. Dave had made the call to Linden from the hospital. Linden had stayed at headquarters in his guest room. He knew how hard this must be for Lindsey’s mother. They had flown back to California together for the memorial service.

Dave sat down in the first row. The cover of the program for the service showed Lindsey as a girl here in Springville with her horse. She was grinning into the camera, eyes eruptions of laughter.

Dave listened as the small church filled up, closing his eyes and remembering Lindsey.

The altar was covered with red and purple roses and every time he inhaled he could smell them and it seemed almost as if she was touching him again.

It would be a long, long battle, he knew that. But it had been worth fighting and dying for before and it was worth nothing less now. He had his own hope now and that he could never lose.