eBookFirst Edition (First Edition)
Related collections and offers
Overview
In Fred Hunter's National Nancys, Alex Reynolds and his lover Peter Livesay are dragooned into volunteering for a Chicago area progressive politician's campaign, which entails stuffing envelopes, answering the phones, and dealing with the daily bomb threats from a wide variety of wackos. But one of them was serious enough to actually do it, and now the office manager of the campaign appears to have been killed in the explosion.
But, of course, it couldn't be that simple. With the help of their reluctant CIA contacts, Alex and Peter (and Alex's reluctant mother) begin investigating the bombing and soon discover that something much bigger is at play and their own lives are now at stake.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781466881648 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | St. Martin's Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 09/16/2014 |
| Series: | Alex Reynolds Mysteries , #4 |
| Sold by: | Macmillan |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 240 |
| File size: | 277 KB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
National Nancys
By Fred Hunter
St. Martin's Press
Copyright © 2000 Fred HunterAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4668-8164-8
CHAPTER 1
I was not a political person. Despite the best efforts of some of my more militant friends, I managed to remain blissfully apolitical for the better part of my life. Of course, I'd always exercised my patriotic duty and voted, but I left the actual activism to Peter, my husband, figuring that one soapbox in the family was enough.
But it's hard to remain politically neutral when you know as many dykes as we do. Our friends Sheila and Jo were the ones who approached us about volunteering for Charles "Charlie" Clarke, who was one of the Democratic candidates for the senate seat that was being vacated by our retiring elder statesman. Clarke's classically liberal views and his open support of gay rights had made him the favorite son of the community, and galvanized their efforts on his behalf. It also solidified the gay-baiting radical right's opposition to him. Both sides viewed Clarke's run for office as a call to arms.
Sheila and Jo made it sound as if turning down the opportunity to serve Clarke would be about the same as telling Christ you didn't want to be a disciple.
"Do you have any idea how important it is to get involved?" Sheila had said passionately over dinner one night. "Do you have any idea how many setbacks queers have suffered over the past couple of years?"
I inwardly rolled my eyes. In recent days Sheila had become one of those people who use the word queer for political empowerment with an insistence that ends up making them sound like children who've just learned a dirty word.
"The Republicans want to take away all of our constitutional rights, and the Religious Reich think it's okay to kill us. We need people like Clarke in office. There's important work to be done!"
Peter had flashed his beautiful green eyes at me in a way that said, "See? I've been telling you that for years." At least he didn't say it out loud.
After a while my reluctance to get involved was overwhelmed by the Borgian pull of the entire gay community. Resistance was futile. I had to succumb. Which is why I found myself stuffing envelopes in the Chicago branch of Charlie Clarke's campaign headquarters.
The headquarters was located in a storefront on Lincoln Avenue just north of Fullerton. It was crammed with folding chairs and tables at which volunteers were engaged in a variety of menial tasks. The far end of the room was partitioned off as cubicles for our office manager and her assistant, and the back room had been turned into offices for the candidate and his campaign manager to use whenever they were in town.
It wasn't a heavily funded campaign, but it was sincere. The belief that kept us going was that once Clarke won the Democratic nomination in the primary (and we were given daily doses of blind assurance that he would), there would be an infusion of money into his campaign from the party, whether or not the party actually liked him. Many of them didn't. Clarke had a reputation for being straightforward, which could make even some members of his own party quake in their boots. But personal feelings aside, they would throw their support to their most bitter enemy rather than relinquish the seat to a Republican.
Peter volunteered when he could, but I was the one with "free time on his hands," as Sheila had so quaintly put it. She didn't know just how accurate she was. Since taking up our occasional work with the CIA, I'd let the business I'd built up as a freelance graphic artist dwindle down to one steady client, who I'd kept on more as a courtesy than anything else. But over the past year our CIA assignments had also evaporated. I wasn't hurting for money yet. I had a decent though not inexhaustible savings. And Mother always told me that I didn't have to worry, because through shrewd investments she had parlayed the considerable inheritance my late father had left her into an even more considerable nest egg. But I could feel my genitals receding at the idea of being in my thirties and supported by my mother. At that point, I felt like stuffing envelopes was about all I was good for.
"Here's some more," said Jody Linn-Hadden as she hoisted an enormous box of fliers onto the table where I was working.
Our office manager had been born Jody Linn, and had hyphenated herself after falling in love and forming a permanent partnership with her familiar, Mary Hadden. I've been told that meeting Mary had softened Jody, an idea that I find horrifying because I hadn't worked with Jody for an hour before I was thinking of her as the Rosa Kleb of local politics. Only Jody was bigger. She was a huge Teutonic woman with long blond hair she wore viciously twisted into two braids, then rolled up and pinned to each side of her head like a pair of unglazed cinnamon buns. She might not have physically resembled Kleb, but I still believed that if she clicked her heels together a blade would pop out of her shoe.
"You don't look happy," she said, her lips forming a disapproving triangle.
"I'm fine."
She clucked her tongue. "You obviously don't understand how important it is that we get Charlie Clarke elected. ..."
My brain reeled as Jody launched for the hundredth time into a tirade about the ills of the world and the solutions that Charlie Clarke had to offer. I'm sure she was using actual words, but my mind was registering only a hollow gurgle, like the sound of water swirling down the drain. I drifted back into focus when it sounded as if she was wrapping it up.
"... so everything, no matter how insignificant it seems to you, is important! If just one person doesn't get that flier, that may be the one vote that decides this election."
"Yes, sir!" I said, snapping a crisp salute.
Jody pulled back slightly and scowled. I thought she might bite me, but instead she just shook her head with disgust and walked away.
"Too intense for words, isn't she?" said David Leech, the blue-eyed nymphet who was working at the end of the table.
"I wish," I replied.
I spent the last hour answering phones, which I found only slightly less tedious than stuffing envelopes. It's hard to believe that irate phone calls could become boring, but they did.
"You tell that pansy-ass faggot-lover that if he gets elected, he's a dead man!" snarled one caller.
"I'll do that, sir," I said wearily. "And can I give him your name?"
Click.
"Can you tell me, what is Mr. Clarke's position on garbage cans?" asked another caller, this time an elderly woman.
"So far he has not positioned himself on garbage cans," I replied, casting aside the response sheet on which we were supposed to rely. "I'm sure the minute he gets into office, he'll be dealing with your garbage."
Click.
"I've got it! I've got it!" cried Shawn Stillman, one of the other volunteers. He jumped up on his chair, put his hand over the mouthpiece and merrily waved the receiver in the air. "It's today's bomb threat!"
The workers broke out in cheers and applauded. The office had been receiving bomb threats for the past month — some times three or four a day. To most of the volunteers it had almost become a game. We were thinking of holding an office pool, betting on who could rack up the most threats in one week.
"Hello? Hello?" Shawn said into the mouthpiece. "Aw, he hung up!" He jumped down from the chair and replaced the receiver.
Despite all the joking around about it, some of the volunteers were worried about the threats. There was fear behind their smiles. In my own present frame of mind I felt that after defeating evil foreign agents, crooked American agents, and crazed religious zealots, it would probably be fitting if I was blown to bits while stuffing envelopes.
"It's like I've told all of you before," Jody Linn-Hadden announced in her booming voice, "these threats are a badge of honor! A threat to Charlie Clarke and his campaign means that he's really making headway as we move toward the primary. We have victory in sight! We've got them scared and all they can do is come back at us with cheap threats!" She paused to punctuate this with a triumphant smile. "Now, pick up the pace, people! We still have a lot of work to do!"
She clapped her hands together twice, then went back to her cubicle. Shawn finished a whispered conversation with the volunteer to his left, then got up and followed Jody, casually brushing the sandy locks out of his eyes as he crossed the room. I'd never had much in the way of dealings with him, but he struck me as the type of person who believes the world is his Red Sea and it needs to part for him.
"What do they do about the threats?" asked David, who had wandered over to the bank of phones during the hubbub. He was a bit newer to The Cause than me and looked rightly confused by the celebration surrounding the phone call.
"They just log it and turn it over to the FBI."
His eyes widened. "That's all?"
I shrugged. "We're getting them every day. What more can we do? I'm sure they follow them up. It's easy enough for them to get phone records."
"But shouldn't somebody check the office for a bomb?"
"There's no bomb here," I said reassuringly.
"How do you know?"
"If there was, Jody would have sniffed it out."
He laughed without looking happy, then went back to his work before the commandant could catch him sloughing off.
By five-thirty I was no longer listening to the callers at all. While they droned on I was mentally singing:
Go down, Moses, way down to Egypt's land
Tell old Pharaoh, let my faggot go ...
Moses finally arrived in the form of Peter Livesay, my husband, lover, and at that moment my liberator. He had fallen into the habit of stopping in at campaign headquarters on his way home from Farrahut's, the men's clothing store at which he worked, and then we'd walk home together.
It's a testament to just how bored I was (and how much I adore him) that when he appeared in the doorway he seemed to be bathed in a bright white light and float toward me in slow motion like a blue-suited guardian angel.
"Are you ready to go?" he asked.
"I assume that's a rhetorical question," I said as I got up from the table and grabbed my jacket from the coat rack by the door. I didn't wait to put it on before going out onto the street.
"What's your hurry?"
"No hurry," I replied, slowing down. "I just feel like I've been locked in a cage all day."
"Come on. It can't be as bad as all that."
"That's easy for you to say. You've been helping young men in and out of their clothes. I've been listening to the huddled masses yearning to spew antigay bile."
"Well," he said with a heavy sigh, "it's all in a good cause."
"Oh, please! You're not going to start telling me what a worthy candidate Charlie Clarke is, are you?"
"Well, he is a worthy candidate."
"I know, I know, I've heard about it all day — again! Especially from Jody. That dyke is so damned political every time she opens her mouth I can feel my brain trickling out of my ear!"
Peter laid his hand gently on the small of my back. God, how I loved his touch.
"Honey, every day you sound more unhappy with this volunteer gig. If it's making you so miserable, why don't you just stop it?"
I produced my most dramatic, world-weary sigh. "Because getting Charlie Clarke elected is really important to myself and to my community."
He laughed. "You don't want people to know you actually believe that, do you?"
"I do believe it," I replied with a smile. "That's the trouble."
It was a nice walk down Fullerton to the town house we shared with my mother — or rather, that she shared with us, since she was the owner. When we got there, we found her setting the table for dinner.
"There are my darlings!" she said, sweeping over to us and giving us each a peck on the cheek. "How was your day?"
"Not half as good as yours, it seems," I said. This was a bit effusive, even for her. "Have you been in the cooking sherry?"
"Not at all!" she said as she breezed into the kitchen. Peter and I followed her. She was humming a tune as she stirred a pot of boiling potatoes.
"Mother, the table's only set for two."
"I know. I won't be joining you. I've got a date."
"You what?" The words popped out of my mouth before I was able to eliminate the tone of shock.
"You needn't sound so surprised," she said, shooting a comic squint at me over her shoulder. "Rumor has it that I'm not deformed."
"I didn't mean that. I just didn't know you were seeing anyone."
"I wasn't. I went downtown to shop today and I ran into him at Marshall Field's."
"At Field's?" said Peter. "Are you sure he's straight?"
"Don't be daft, darling," she replied. "I was in ladies' accessories, or whatever they call it nowadays. And there he was, completely up a tree, trying to choose a scarf to take home to his mother."
"How sweet," I intoned.
"Yes! Simon — that's his name, Simon — is from England! He was born in the north country, but he spent most of his life in London. He's here doing some sort of business. I helped him pick out a scarf, a nice deep blue one with a muted paisley print — it's really, really lovely — and he was so grateful for the help he asked me out to dinner." She turned back to the stove and resumed stirring the potatoes.
"Do you mean to tell me you allowed yourself to be picked up in a department store?"
"Yes!" she exclaimed with delight.
"And you're going out to dinner with him? Are you crazy? You hardly know anything about him! He could be an axe murderer!"
"Darling, he's British."
"So was Crippen!"
"Gawn!" she said, taking a playful swipe at the air. "Simon was a proper gentleman. He's ever so nice."
"Gawn?" I turned to Peter "I don't believe this! Ten minutes with another Englishman and she turns into Eliza Doolittle!"
"Well, I think it's great," said Peter. "But you didn't need to cook dinner for us. We could've fended for ourselves."
"Nonsense! I enjoy doing it. But if you wouldn't mind, I would appreciate it if you'd finish it up so I can get ready for my date. He should be here soon. Now, there's a lovely bit of beef in the oven, and it should come out in about twenty minutes. The potatoes will be done about the same time. There are salads in the refrigerator."
She bustled toward the doorway, pausing just long enough to pinch my cheek. "Do try not to look quite so much like a blowfish, dear."
With this she scurried through the house and up the stairs.
"Oh, this is great," I said once she was gone. "I spend all day being brow beaten by the Beast of Belsen, and Mother's dating Jack the Ripper."
"She's a level-headed woman. You don't have anything to worry about."
I looked at him as if he'd lost his mind. "This is my mother we're talking about, right? The woman who once set fire to a building that we were in to try to rescue us?"
He shrugged. "It worked."
I looked heavenward for help. "That was only one example of her little antics! Do you want to hear the whole list?"
Peter stared at me in silence. "Honey, what's wrong?"
"Nothing!"
"Of course there is. You know your mother can take care of herself. What's going on with you? You seem so unhappy lately. I don't mean just about your mother and this volunteer thing. There must be more to it."
There's something inherently comforting about being known too well. It brings a shorthand quality to your relationship that even at the worst of times can make you feel that everything will be all right. I suddenly felt like crying, and Peter must've sensed it, because he slipped his arms around me. I buried my face in his shoulder.
"I feel so worthless!"
"Why?" he said, stroking my hair.
"I've practically ruined my business. ..."
"No you haven't."
"Yes I have. And it's my own damn fault!"
"That's silly," he said quietly. "You could build it back up in a minute if you wanted to, and you know it. You're a damn good artist. That can't be all that's bothering you."
I swallowed. "We haven't heard from Nelson for months."
Agent Lawrence Nelson was our boss from the CIA on our occasional forays into the world of espionage.
"I see," Peter said with a smile in his voice. "You know, I'd hate to think you were this unhappy because it's been so long since our lives have been in danger."
I laughed halfheartedly. "You don't understand. You're gone all day. You have something to do. I'm just sitting around here like a worthless lump of nothing waiting for the phone to ring."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from National Nancys by Fred Hunter. Copyright © 2000 Fred Hunter. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.