“We don’t,” West agreed. “But we couldn’t be sure of that at first.”

“It’s hard for me to imagine he was sitting here while a woman was robbed and never saw a thing,” Hammer angrily remarked as she thought again of Bubba and Smudge and their broken conversation.

“Nobody ever sees a thing,” West said.

28

GOVERNOR MIKE FEUER was a tall, lanky man in his early sixties, with piercing eyes that burned with compassion and fierce truth. Republicans often compared him to Abraham Lincoln without a beard. Democrats called him The Führer.

“I understand completely. And of course I’m upset, too,” he was saying into a secure phone in the back of his bulletproof black limousine as he rode through downtown.

“Governor, have you seen it already yet?” Lelia Ehrhart’s voice came over a line that could not be tapped or picked up by cell phones, scanners or CB radios.

“No.”

“You must be able to.”

He sighed, glancing at his watch. Governor Feuer had ten meetings scheduled today. He was supposed to call at least six legislators who were fighting hard for and against House and Senate bills flowing through a typically turgid General Assembly.

He was supposed to be prepped for an interview with USA Today, sign a proclamation, meet with his cabinet, be briefed by the House Finance Subcommittee and hold two press conferences. It was his mother’s eighty-sixth birthday and he had yet to get around to sending flowers. His back was acting up again.

“If you could just have time to take to drive through and see it for yourself in person, Governor,” said Ehrhart. “I think you’ll be shocking, and if you aren’t taking a look today, it’s a risk because it has eventually to be removed at some point to be restored. It won’t do any good at the most if you are looking later, because by then it will be original again.”

“Then the damage must not be too extensive,” he reasonably replied as plainclothes Executive Protection Unit state police officers rode in unmarked Chevrolet Caprices in front of his limousine and behind it.

“It’s the action of it that matters, Governor,” she went on in her unique accent.

Governor Feuer imagined her on the floor as a child, laboring over building blocks that she could not quite get in the right order.

“The vile deliberation of it,” she was saying.

“Frankly, I’m more concerned with . . .”

“Please take a minutes. And I wasn’t intentioned to interrupt.”

She did mean to, but the governor let it pass because he was a secure, fair man. He believed in second chances. Lelia Ehrhart was entitled to one more this day before he hung up on her.

“Of course, the cemetery’s closed and won’t be opening to the public this minutes,” Ehrhart said. “But I’ll make sure it’s unlocked isn’t hooked for you to get in.”

The governor pressed the intercom button.

“Jed?”

“Yes, sir,” Jed replied from the other side of the glass partition, his attentive eyes in the rearview mirror.