Bill Ford had concocted a tale of how Sam had visited the Laramie house many times over the years and had been trying to buy it during that period, having fallen in love with the property as well as the state and Wyomingites in general. Now Ford, out of friendship to Sam and loyalty to his party, had finally agreed to sell. Nobody paying attention was buying the story for a minute but—outside of Rachel Maddow or Chris Matthews—nobody was going to spend a lot of time disputing it. It wasn’t the first time a candidate had taken up residency in a district in order to run for Congress, although it might have been the first time a candidate had done it just five weeks before an election.

  Bill Ford had been up early and gone for a run on the narrow road than snaked through the barley fields. When Sam came downstairs he found coffee brewed in the kitchen and a note from Bill, saying where he had gone. Sam sat drinking the coffee for half an hour while reading about himself on his tablet. The house was quiet, eerily so, with only the sound of an occasional passing car to break the silence. There was a big screen TV in the high-ceilinged front room, positioned between the heads of a grizzly bear and a pronghorn antelope, but Sam couldn’t locate a remote to turn it on.

  When Bill came back, they had breakfast on a two-tiered deck at the back of the house, with the prairies stretching before them to the west, where the Grand Tetons could be seen under a hazy morning sky. A housekeeper who’d arrived at eight o’clock brought them eggs and ham and home-fried potatoes.

  Bill indicated Sam’s computer. “What are they saying?”

  Sam lifted a forkful of scrambled eggs. “I’m either the biggest opportunist since John D. Rockefeller or a savior, sent from above to save Wyoming from a great socialist plague.” He chewed the eggs before reaching for his coffee. “Sean Hannity says I’m a true American hero.”

  By the time breakfast was finished and the dishes cleared, a woman had arrived, walking around the outside of the house and climbing the steps as if she knew where she’d find the two men. Her name was Molly Esponda. She was maybe forty, tall and lanky, with dark hair and eyes. She wore a long skirt with cowboy boots, a white blouse. She was a native of Cheyenne, Bill Ford announced, and she was Sam’s campaign manager. Molly Esponda poured coffee for herself and as she did Bill Ford said he needed to make a call. He got up and walked into the house.

  “Well, this is exciting,” Molly said, looking over at Sam, holding the coffee cup in both hands, waiting for it to cool.

  “What is?” Sam asked. He was feeling chafed that the Fords had hired her without consulting him. How did they know that he himself didn’t have someone in mind? And who the hell was this cowgirl sitting across from him anyway?

  “Running for Congress,” Molly replied. “A brand-new campaign, a chance to get your message out. All that good stuff.”

  Sam shrugged. “Maybe you and I get excited about different things.”

  She smiled slightly and turned away. “Look at that morning sky.” She gestured toward the foothills in the distance. “I bet you don’t have a view like that in New York City.”

  “Expert on New York, are you?” Sam asked.

  “I wouldn’t say expert. I went to Columbia and worked in the city for a few years.”

  “Doing what?”

  “I worked for Giuliani’s office,” she said. “I modeled a little.”

  “How does either of those qualify you to be my campaign manager?”

  She had a drink, looking at him calmly over the cup as if she’d been expecting the question, or the attitude. Maybe both.

  “Like Bill said, I’m from here.” She leaned forward to place the cup on the table. “Given the circumstances of your candidacy, I think it was assumed you might not be up on the social intricacies or the history of the state. I can help with that. It might also be assumed that you don’t know a lot of people here. Key Republicans. I can help with that too.”

  “If I were you, I wouldn’t assume too much,” Sam told her. “I know more about my country than ninety-nine per cent of the people out there. And what I don’t know, I can learn pretty damn quick. We’re talking about a state with a population I could cram in a New York City block.” He glanced toward the house for a moment, thinking that Bill Ford’s phone call had been awfully convenient. Leaving the two of them alone. He turned back to her. “Here’s the thing. I don’t like being told what to do or where to go. Especially by someone who brags that she was a lingerie model or that she used to answer emails for that fucking lapdog Giuliani.”

  He was trying to piss her off and she wasn’t going for it. She sat smiling to herself, looking past him, toward the barn full of old cars, the relentless plains beyond.

  “Well?” he said after a moment. “Are you going to tell me why I need you?”

  “You obviously don’t.” She turned to him. “I was persuaded to take this on, and I have to say I was reluctant to do so. I have a busy consulting business back home and two teenagers to boot. Literally, sometimes. This was going to be a full-out, five-week commitment that I really didn’t need. I was doing it as a favor to the Fords. My impression of you was that you’re a fucking know-it-all egotist who doesn’t listen to anyone around him. But I thought it was an act. Apparently, it’s not. So I’ll just finish my coffee and head quite happily on back to Cheyenne.”

  Sam forced a laugh. “You’re awful touchy.”

  “No,” she said. “I’m a pragmatist. I had a husband who was a lot like you. Fool me once.” She stood up. “If you’re interested, I have your day’s itinerary drawn up. I’ll email it to Bill and he can give it to you before he leaves. He’s flying to Dallas this morning, in case you were under the impression he was going to babysit you personally for the next month or so. You’re not nearly as precious as you think. But I’m sure you’ll do fine out there all by yourself, independent man that you are.”

  She went down the steps and was gone. Sam had to follow her around the house to the driveway out front. When he got there, she was sitting behind the wheel of a white Yukon, typing something on her iPhone. Sending his itinerary, Sam guessed. Her window was down as he approached.

  “Slow down,” he said.

  “What do you want?”

  He paused. “I do need a campaign manager.” He was looking to save face now. Unfamiliar territory for him. “Come on. You were right, that was an act back there. A little test, to see if you had cojones.”

  “Sorry,” she said. “Ovaries.”

  “Whatever. I think we can work together. You’re obviously an intelligent woman. And if Bill Ford recommends you—”

  “Isn’t this the conversation we should have had from the get-go?”

  “You’re right. I don’t know why I was being an asshole.”

  “I’ve seen your show,” she said. “You are an asshole.”

  At ten o’clock that evening they were in the lounge of the Plains Hotel in Cheyenne. Molly sat, half listening, while Sam gave an interview to a reporter from the Dispatch. They’d been on the move all day, starting with a radio interview in Laramie, a lunchtime stop at the Elk Lodge and a photo op in a gun store. Then they’d driven to Cheyenne and spent the rest of the day doing media interviews there. Molly had cherry-picked the agenda; every venue was pro-Republican and NRA-friendly. Eventually Sam would have to be made marginally available to the other side but for the time being, fresh out of the gate, they were preaching to the choir. Like most TV talking heads these days, Sam was a celebrity of sorts and his presence was causing more commotion than Molly had anticipated. A young redneck in a pickup truck actually shouted “All bets are off!” as he walked down the street.

  Sam Jackson had never campaigned before and he had a lot to learn. Molly recognized right away the difficulties of teaching anything to a man who was convinced he already knew everything. Still, it was part of her job to try. When they stopped at the Elk Lodge in Laramie, Sam had refused the offer of lunch.

  “You can’t turn down food,” Molly told him afterward. They were driving through traffic. “You’re going to eat a lot of chicken-fried steak in the next five weeks. And beans and chili and beef jerky.”

  “The hell I am.”

  Pulling up to a red light, she gave him a look. “You’re perceived as an outsider. Refusing the local cuisine just reaffirms that image. So suck it up and eat whatever they offer you, at least a bite or two. Are you familiar with prairie oysters?”

  “They’re bull’s testicles.”

  “Correct.”

  “I’m not eating any testicles.”

  Molly hit the gas. “Suit yourself. If you don’t eat ’em though, the locals are going to say you don’t have ’em.”

  The reporter sitting with them now was a hack who had worked for a number of papers across the state for thirty years or more, a typical second-rate newsman with his best days behind him, posing as an ink-stained wretch from the days of yore. Wrinkled suit, shirt washed too many times, hair plastered down. He was stretching the interview out because he was drinking vodka tonics and, as long as it was official business, Molly was buying. It was more of an ass-kissing session than an interview anyway, with the wretch constantly referring to things Sam had said on his TV show, things that had nothing to do with Wyoming or the election but were easy to find on Google, which demonstrated the extent of his research. It was obvious he’d never read any of Sam’s books, but then again, neither had Molly.

  Like a drunken uncle, the man overstayed his welcome. When he was finally gone, Molly ordered bourbon for herself, her first drink of the day. Sam had been into the scotch since they’d stopped for dinner around seven. His drinking was something Bill Ford had warned Molly about. If the man was going to booze, they couldn’t stop him but he needed to do it in private. Still, she was forced to admit that he’d handled himself well that day, not all that surprising for a man with a long career as an on-air personality who considered himself head and shoulders above the crowd anyway.

  One day down and thirty-something to go.

  “Esponda,” he said when they were alone at the table. “How did you end up in Wyoming?”

  “We’ve been here a long time,” she told him. “My family is Basque. We came here at the turn of the last century. Sheep ranchers.”

  “Basque.”

  “That’s right. Good thing we snuck in when we did. We showed up today, people like you would try to keep us out.”

  “I have no problem with Europeans coming here,” Sam told her.

  “See—that’s the type of thing you can’t say,” Molly said. “It suggests that you do have a problem with non-Europeans coming here. And that just leads you down a slippery slope.”

  “Maybe I do have a problem with certain people from certain countries coming here. As does our President.”

  “Yeah—and he gets hammered for it,” Molly reminded him. “Don’t hand the opposition arrows to shoot back at you.”

  Sam shrugged. “You say your family’s from Spain. So you’re what—Roman Catholic?”

  Sipping the bourbon, she nodded. She found she was somewhat fascinated by him, his narrow-minded confidence, his inability to focus on anything that didn’t reflect directly on him. He would make a good case study for somebody. Not her though; she wasn’t that fascinated.

  “You’re what this country needs,” he told her. “God-fearing people. Hard-working, honest. Raising sheep and planting crops and taking care of their families.”

  “We got rid of the sheep a few generations ago.”

  “My point is,” he went on, “we don’t encourage that anymore. Immigrants nowadays want to run corner stores and car washes. They don’t worship the way we do. They don’t respect us or our constitution. So why do we welcome them? It should be pretty simple—if you’re not going to make this country a better place, stay the fuck out.”

  “Quite a slogan,” she said. “I’m thinking we won’t put that one on a sign.”

  “You joke but you’d be surprised how many people would want one.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised in the least,” Molly said. “Look at what happened in 2016.”

  “You saying you didn’t vote for him? Staunch Republican that you are?”

  Molly finished her drink and stood. “I’m going to hit it. We have an early start in the morning.” She left him at the table with his drink, smiling as she walked away.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Jo loaded the truck Tuesday night. Henry was there to help but mostly he stood watching her while he made one last argument against what they were doing. He had been back and forth on the matter for a few days, ever since she told him her plan. Sometimes, when he was stoned or into the wine, he was four-square behind her, but then he would suddenly swing the other way and offer up dire predictions of where they would all end up if things went sour. Jo wasn’t listening. She’d made up her mind.

  She didn’t sleep well. She told herself not to think about it, that the hardest part had been in the deciding. Now, it was all about the execution. Second-guessing wasn’t going to help at this point.

  She left the farm when it was still dark, rolling the GMC out of the driveway under the promise of a hazy dawn. She took the county roads, keeping off the thruway and away from the toll booths. Entering the city, she crossed the river on the George Washington Bridge again. The sun was just showing as she drove into the market area. She parked in the same stall and walked over to pay for her spot.

  “Becoming a regular,” the red-haired woman said. Her eyes were bloodshot and she smelled of pot.

  “Maybe,” Jo replied.

  André the sausage maker was pulling in as she walked back to her stall. He greeted her like they had known each other for years. He wore the same blood-stained wife-beater as he had the previous time Jo had been there, a shirt that would have caused alarm had she not known what the man did for a living.

  “Again you have your brother’s truck.”

  Jo, unloading sweet potatoes, nodded.

  “Mine own brother would not lend me the time of day,” André said.

  Lily arrived an hour later, after Jo had already set up her produce on the tables and was making some sales. André, not moving anything to speak of, was hanging around Jo’s stall, making small talk. He had lots of questions about Jo’s farm and she occupied herself inventing answers for him. Lily had some new watercolors she wanted to show off. Jo and André praised them, more than was justified. Jo had the uneasy feeling of family.

  “I heard you had a big fire over your way,” Lily said.

  “Right.” Jo hesitated. “I never heard many details though.”

  “The barn burned to the ground,” Lily went on. “I thought you would have heard that. It was just north of Newton. Close to your place?”

  “Not really.”

  “I thought it would have been.”

  Jo was saved by a young woman looking for plum tomatoes for canning. She sold her a hamper full, and then went into the truck for more. When she came back, André was on his cellphone.

  “All right,” he said into the phone before putting it away. He turned to Jo and Lily. “You will both come to my house for supper. My aunt will cook for us.”

  “Oh, I can’t,” Jo said at once.

  “Of course you can,” he told her.

  “Not today,” Jo said. “I have something on.”

  “What is this something? It cannot be that important.”

  “Actually, it is,” she assured him.

  TWENTY-TWO

  They did the Fox morning show out of New York City at nine-thirty the next day, live from the network affiliate in Cheyenne. It was another lightweight interview. In four minutes, Sam managed to praise the Second Amendment, slam universal health care and even to slide in a few facts about Wyoming’s coal and grain production. He’d obviously been reading some of the stuff Molly had been sending to his laptop. When the pert and bubbly host of the show somewhat reluctantly brought up the outsider issue, Sam told her that nobody complained when a certain Illinois outsider landed in Washington back in 1860.

  “That’s going to be my response to that nonsense from now on,” he told Molly afterward. They were in her Yukon, heading for a lunch meeting with the head of the mineworkers’ union.

  “What is?”

  “That little twinkie tried to nail me on the carpetbagger shit and I told her that nobody complained when another Republican, a guy named Abraham Lincoln, parachuted into Washington in 1860.”

  They were stopped at a light. Molly looked over. “You do recall that when Lincoln arrived in Washington half the country seceded from the Union?”

  Sam was quiet for a long moment. “Fuck it. It’s a good line. Your average citizen isn’t sharp enough to pick up on that.”

  “We won’t be putting that on a sign either.”

  By five o’clock they were back in Cheyenne. Molly drove through the city to an older neighborhood on the south side: a green and leafy enclave of large, somewhat garish, homes built in the days when people were still getting rich in the cattle business.

  “What’s here?” Sam asked as she slowed the Yukon down, approaching a brick Tudor three-story with wide porches on all sides.

  “Rance Dunning is here.”

  “What’s he want from me?”

  “It’s what you want from him,” Molly said. “His endorsement.”

  “It has value?” Sam smirked. “I didn’t realize it was 1988.”

  Senator Dunning was waiting for them on the west porch, alone, sitting in a large wicker armchair in the sun. His famously craggy eyebrows were as white as his mane and he wore brown cotton pants and a University of Wyoming sweatshirt, sneakers on his feet. There was a cane leaning against the wall, within reach. He stood up to give Molly a hug before shaking Sam’s hand.

  “Sit,” he told them. “How was your day?”

  The old man kept his eyes on Sam as Molly provided a condensed version of their recent itinerary. Sam returned the look for a few moments then glanced around the property, at the cottonwoods and white pines protecting the place from the wind, the gardens alongside the winding drive. The flowers suggested a woman’s presence. It seemed to Sam that the old man’s wife had died several years ago. Maybe there was a new wife in the picture, maybe even a young trophy type. Dunning had to be in his eighties; he’d been gone from the Senate for more than a decade.

 

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