He’d tried fishing around to see how much the emailer knew: Who is this? What do you think I know? The reply was almost immediate: What they’re doing to you, they’ve done to others. We can discuss this. And they had done it to others, John now clearly saw, while making a mockery of truth and public trust.
Whatever the sender knew, it meant John wasn’t the only one sitting on such explosive information. Someone besides him realized what was going on. Someone outside the inner circle of ministers and flunkies in the government, maybe even someone with a vested interest in bringing the government down. With the election, everybody was skating on thin ice. What better time to clear his name? That’s what his mysterious contact was hinting at. And he, John Badger Wilkens III, would gladly lend a helping hand.
From the start he’d tried to stay out of the rabble-rousing, to steer clear of the dirt and keep his hands clean. But the dirt had come to him. He’d thought it enough to act from pure motivations, but he’d been tainted by these shadowy intrigues. They were impossible to avoid. And, once he began to dig, it was inevitable that he would find something.
Nothing could have stopped him from looking once he had the idea. Because he had to know! How could he not? Nine hundred and fifty million! All that public funding down the drain! It still seemed impossible to believe, even when he’d seen the proof.
The final message came the afternoon he was suspended. It’s you or them. Deal with me or I go public, his secret sharer had warned.
None of the notes had been signed, but he had his suspicions. They had all heard rumours of a mysterious, behind-the-scenes manipulator who could make or break you. A Magus. He hadn’t believed in the Magus, but that had been naïve of him. It was just that much easier to do the dirty work if the world refused to believe in you.
When the problems surfaced, he’d thought of resigning to save face for the party, but now it was too late. They wanted a scapegoat. A martyr. He wasn’t going to let them off the hook without a fight. He’d just received the final email when the security guard entered with the assistant. That snivelling worm, that ankle-biting cur. John had typed in his private phone number and sent off the reply to his mysterious would-be saviour, then looked up into the faces of his executioners.
Twenty minutes later he was out of the office, his reputation in ruins.
But now it was his turn. He was going to tell his mysterious contact everything he knew in return for clearing his reputation. One thing was sure, he wasn’t going to have this pinned on him like some apparatchik run afoul of the Kremlin.
“Information for information,” he said aloud to the fog as he stumbled along. “You tell me what you know and I’ll fill in the blanks for you.” A deal was a deal. Whoever he was about to meet would surely agree that was only fair. “You want to know what I know, then you tell me what you know and how you know it.”
His breath swirled in the air, joining the wisps and curlicues of a diaphanous curtain. Lost in fog. That was the expression. He stopped and looked back. His home had disappeared in the whiteness. Thank goodness he’d sent Anne away. His cheeks burned with the memory of having to tell her that although he’d done nothing wrong, it might look otherwise until he could reveal a few simple truths. I will clear my name if it’s the last thing I do, he’d told her. Because the whole fucking mess would come out in the wash sooner or later. And then he would be vindicated.
He stumbled along, wondering who he was about to meet. He had his suspicions: it was likely to be one of those beastly reporters hanging around the assembly, sifting the dirt, looking for a juicy story. Whoever it was had found a good one and locked onto the likeliest target: John Badger Wilkens III. To his everlasting shame.
Why do you want to go into politics, Badger? his father had asked years ago. It’s a dirty business. Don’t you know that? John had simply shaken his head, thinking of ambition. Thinking of righting a few wrongs in the world. But to do that, you had to stay clean yourself. You’re too good for the rabble, Badger. Don’t besmirch yourself.
In his father’s day, politics meant that the big boys came in and assessed the scene, then hired the companies to mine for ore and, once that ore was found, they let the corporations bid on the right to extract it. Corporations owned by friends. Next they set hiring standards and got other friends to implement those standards into law and pay the workers, men too desperate for work and too ignorant of what safety meant to ever refuse a job. They came from all over the country, with their wives and children trailing behind. There were always accidents as they stripped the earth and polluted the environment till the vegetation died and the rivers ran rusty and someone cried foul, then safety standards were enacted and environmental laws set up to counteract the destruction until the day the ore itself ran out and the workers went elsewhere to start all over again, leaving behind ravaged landscapes and empty pockets for most, but swollen bank accounts for a privileged few, the company executives, who simply waited for the next big strike-it-rich opportunity.
And always there were secrets to be kept, names to be protected. Then more laws were enacted to shield those same men from legal repercussions as the whole thing went round and round again. It was not the men you saw, but the men you didn’t see who made the wheels turn in their tortured, squeaking revolutions.
That was what his father had warned him about: those men you didn’t see coming. The ones John had vowed never to become like or be outsmarted by. Ruthless and rapacious, they were adept at making up reasons to justify their selfishness. They were the ones who gave politics the bad name he now clearly saw it so richly deserved. And here it was happening all over again. To him.
It was a relief to know his father had died before finding out how true his words had been.
John stopped and peered into the fog, where everything seemed to disappear in a void. Houses, trees, cars. As if there was nothing left of the living world. His bootlace had come undone. He bent to retie it. At least his head felt clearer. Perhaps alcohol hadn’t been the best idea, but it had given him courage. Purpose.
He looked around. Nothing was familiar. He might have been at the ragtag end of the universe, some point of land far from the known regions. He staggered to a corner to read the sign: Heath Street. How on earth …? In the fog and in his drunken state he’d ended up on one of those little cul-de-sacs backing onto the ravine. The signs had been warning him: No Exit.
Three cars were parked along the curb, their outlines hulking like camels bedding down for the night. The first, a black Honda, butt-ended a grey Audi. You didn’t leave expensive cars on the road, even in this neighbourhood. The final car was white, a big utility vehicle of the sort that painters and repairmen drove. He thought he’d seen it once or twice in the lot at Queen’s Park. Maybe it would turn out to be someone from the security division wanting a private word. A moment of optimism came to him: they were conducting an internal investigation and needed his co-operation, having known all along he was innocent. Well, by god! He’d be glad to give it to them after the way he’d been treated.
A private place, the voice on the phone had said. Somewhere close to your home. And then the promise of discretion: Come alone. It’s just a talk. We won’t record anything. There’ll be no witnesses. At first John had hesitated. How did he know he could trust the other party? But then reason intervened. He’d done nothing wrong and had nothing to hide. What would it matter if they recorded every last word? It would only be to his benefit.
A fence loomed up out of nowhere. On his right, a pile of refuse threatened to topple over onto him. His life was a garbage heap! How fitting. His father had been right: politics was dirt, filth. And there was no one he could turn to except a mysterious emailer intent on discovering what he knew. Well, then. Let me tell you what I know, he would say.
The fog was thicker now, enveloping him with its ephemeral arms. He wanted to get on his knees and curl up in a ball beside