Them Hustlers Read online

  Gregory looked at Herb. "That's the story of my family. That's where we learned the voodoo magic. That's what you need to know about us. About me."

  Herb's mind was racing a mile a minute. "Hell of a story, Gregory. I knew parts" he admitted, "but your father wasn't one for talking about himself."

  Gregory laughed in agreement.

  "My turn now, right?” Herb asked.

  "Yeah. Your turn."

  "Okay, here's why I'm here. You follow politics?"

  "Sure."

  Herb then told Gregory as much of the story as fast as he could while the lawyer dug into his sandwich. How Phil walked into the Tarot Tales, how the card burned to the touch. How Tanya was working with the Louisiana politicians, how Bob Livingston was pushing to be Speaker of the House and use that for a run for the presidency. How Tucker used a voodoo priestess who had been active in winning over support from the other politicians for Livingston and running who knows what dirty campaign tricks. How Phil must have scared Tommy Tucker by calling off the marriage plans. Then he spoke of Tucker and his gang's fixation on power. Their determination to crush anyone standing in their way, and Herb’s fear of the consequences should their plans for the Speaker of the House fall through. Especially for Phil. "Everyone says Larry Flynt is gunning to expose the hypocrisies of the top Republicans, and that certainly could include Livingston."

  Herb finished his race through the last three months in just a couple of minutes. He left things out that no one knew. Not his wife or Phil. Like how one of Phil's harem girls had some of the juiciest dirt that Larry Flynt would want to pay for. And that her motivation was to win the heart of Phil. It was a tangled web and this wasn't the time to tell all.

  But there was one more point he wanted to make. "There may be something more here. I have this feeling I'm missing something. I need help." He looked squarely at Gregory. "I'm here for a good man named Philip Greene. Your father was a man who believed in good over evil. Who used black magic only when necessary. I know all that, and I think this is one of those times when good is being threatened. So I'm here to ask for help from your father through you."

  Herb fell back into the chair. That's what he had come for. If this kid was up to the task, maybe Phil could be protected and maybe all the loose ends that he sensed could be tied up. He waited for Gregory to respond. The attorney's face was passive, no hint of what he was thinking. The lawyer stood deliberately from his chair, took off his jacket and sat back down.

  Then he asked the damnedest question. "When you did that first reading for Phil, which card was too hot to touch?"

  Herb was prepared for a half dozen questions on Tommy Tucker and Tanya and Gigi and Phil and himself. But this? Why? Funny how there are moments in your life when clearly understood is that you are no longer in control. His effort to help Phil had just become one of those moments. Just like that.

  The fortune teller obediently closed his eyes, returning to that first reading. Felt again on his hand was the intense heat. He could see clearly the card. The Moon card.

  Gregory grimaced. "They never change their ways, that's for sure. A few good tricks, and that's it. Better than some, but white just the same."

  My God! Herb understood.

  The fortune teller leaned far over the desk. "You said you don't know the name of your descendent who escaped from Haiti to Louisiana."

  "That's right." Gregory wiped from his mouth the last of the chicken salad sandwich.

  "But I'm bettin' you know the name of the French slave owner in Haiti who broke his word over two hundred years ago and kept your family enslaved."

  "We do indeed." The lawyer was amused by Herb's comment. Maybe the old man had been listening, after all.

  "And now you are going to tell me that family name."

  "Yes I am. They were the Bienvenues." His lips puckered up as if the word itself was bitter to the taste.

  Herb almost dropped his container of coffee. "So Gigi Bienvenue, the voodoo priestess of Tommy Tucker, is a descendant of the family that once owned you?"

  Gregory nodded.

  Herb realized something else. "And your family taught the Bienvenue family what they know about voodoo. How else could a white family know the black magic so well?"

  "I'm impressed."

  "So you know what she knows and what she doesn't know. And you've been fighting them ever since you both arrived in Louisiana two hundred years ago?"

  "Kinda. We've been on a sort of truce since my father came of age in the 1970s. That's far too long. I'm not as kind a man as my father. A Bienvenue is born from evil. A Bienvenue is one who has never hesitated to use the forces of nature for personal gain. I want it to end here, Herb. That's why it's so important we work together and that's why I've been helping."

  Herb was taken aback. "You've been helping me?"

  "You don't think you've been fighting this alone, do you?" Gregory stood up. "You've been in danger."

  "Phil's the one in danger right...isn't he the one who they will go after?"

  Gregory nodded in agreement. "But you will be the first target. If I know the Bienvenue family it is you who they will attack first. I'll explain next time. You are tired, Mr. Fortune Teller. And you have a long drive home."

  "No, no, tell me now."

  Gregory wasn't sure how to explain right then and there a strategy of attack passed down through the generations. But the fly hovering over the sandwich leftovers would serve the needed purpose. "See that fly?"

  Herb nodded.

  "Kill it," ordered Gregory.

  "What?"

  "Kill it." Repeated the voodoo priest. "Quickly."

  Herb leaned over the desk and allowed his left open palm to hover over the fly and then, as if throwing a downward punch, slapped hard the desk and the sandwich crumbs. He then peered at the result. The fly had escaped.

  Davis pointed to the far end of the desk. "There it is." With a single graceful move he swung to the far side of the desk, just past Herb. With no hesitation he held both his hands above the stationary fly, as if about to clap. Then he did clap. Once.

  Herb watched as the fly, sensing danger, leapt up into the middle of the collapsing hands. The lawyer opened his hands and let the dead fly fall to his desk.

  Herb was impressed. "Never could kill them things."

  "Learn this from me. If you attack someone head-on they defend right back. But if you lure them elsewhere they come to you. If Tucker wants to silence Phil it is you who will be attacked first. Gigi won't want you being around to protect or counterattack."

  Gregory saw the fortune teller struggling to absorb all he had heard. "Go home. We've done enough for tonight. Let's talk tomorrow and I'll tell you what we do next."

  ~ ~ ~

  Part IV

  The Winners

  ~ ~ ~

  Chapter 24

  A phone rang but it seemed no one was home to answer.

  The ringing phone was of the kitchen model, meaning it had an attached answering machine. The unit was connected onto the wall next to the custom installed black double door refrigerator. Had the matching black phone not been mounted high on the wall it would have been difficult to pick out among the half-empty pizza boxes, Chinese take-out cartons and unopened wedding invitations that lay aimlessly about the faux granite countertop, spilling over onto the oven and into the sink. The leftover fast food clashed stylistically with the Italian pots and pans that decorated the kitchen’s brick walls.

  A third ring. A fourth and fifth ring. Still no movement in the kitchen. As of late it was only this phone that was answered. The last of the other two phones had been muted a week ago. So too the cell phone.

  The answering machine obediently clicked on. “Hi! We appreciate your calling and sorry we can’t answer right now. Try my cell if time critical or leave a message and I’ll be back at you pronto. ‘Bye.”

  Tanya listened halfheartedly from the living room sofa to the sound of her voice from a happier time. The recording had been ma
de when she had returned from the cruise with Phil. It was her first attempt ever at being part of a couple. Never in college, never with any previous boyfriend had she made the effort. But only a half-hearted effort. No names were given in the message; she was still hedging her bet on being half of a pair. And she had wanted the “try my cell” to be a subtle reminder to Phil that it was still her home.

  Yet again the voice of Tommy waffled out from the kitchen. “Darlin', I’m worried about you.” The politician tried the sales pitch on Tanya. “Look, we’ve earned two more years working together. What an election night! And the countdown to the big brass ring of power begins.” A remorseful tone drifted into the living room. “Tanya Lyn, what happened is behind us. Call me and let’s get going, we got business to take care of.”

  Dressed in her faded Johns Hopkins sweatshirt and gym paints, a noticeably thinner Tanya pushed herself up on one elbow, as if to get closer to Tommy. Tanya had missed the election night celebration, watching the returns pour in on Fox News instead. Everything unfolded as planned. Gingrich had stumbled. Livingston was ready. Tucker was re-elected. The White House was next.

  But at the moment the hyper-active lobbyist just didn't care and her lack of energy was a confused mystery.

  Usually, the power to make the right decision; to sway a reporter or help a community leader in trouble, or to have the street smarts to hire a thug and pay him from their slush pile of cash, all these capabilities made Tanya feel strong. Wanted.

  Even in college Tanya Lyn had been the “go-to-girl.” On the lacrosse team their senior year goalie found herself with an unwanted pregnancy. Intuitively, the girl had sought out Tanya. Tanya had arranged everything with a clinic up in Philadelphia, covered up by a fake job interview, and no one was the wiser. It had always been that way.

  The girls on the team, Tommy Tucker, all of her clients, thought Tanya was from Philadelphia. That was how she wanted it. She had told no one that she grew up dirt poor in Kentucky, in a small town outside of Lexington. A scholarship took her to Johns Hopkins, a huge step closer to Washington. And a boyfriend lobbyist got her to meet Tommy Tucker. She knew poverty and accepted early in her career to leave the glamorous jobs to those well connected. Her role was to mop up.

  This campaign was different. The whole confluence of events left her desperately tired. Tucker’s own meltdown didn’t help. With days to go before the election Tommy was being propped up on stimulates, put to sleep with tranquilizers. The man looked like hell, as if he had seen the ghost of Christmas futures, and it weren’t good.

  In sheer desperation and despite repeated promises that she was not needed until the next election cycle, Gigi was called on one more time. Not fully prepared, nor fully accommodating, the voodoo priestess nonetheless obediently invoked an incantation to make Phil lovesick for Tanya.

  The thinking from Tucker was that if Phil had good thoughts about Tanya he would not bring down her business, and Tucker’s world, by implicating what he had seen. “I don’t give a damn about the consulting and the cash and that stuff,” Tucker had lamented over the phone to Tanya. “It’s them girlie fetish parties that would make me the laughing stock of the voters.”

  But Gigi was having trouble focusing on Phil. At the University Club she seemed apathetic and almost indifferent to the crisis and made no promises. She went as far as to suggest that the Loa, or spirits, were less than pleased at being contacted so often. Something was troubling Gigi.

  To hell with Gigi and her black magic. Tanya Lyn Owens mustered the energy to clean up the mess. Taking her cue from Flynt’s own strategy, Tanya went ahead and hired a private investigator. In a short period of time the former FBI agent had the answers that had eluded Gigi.

  Phil was still in Annapolis, the agent dryly reported, “screwing non-stop.” The proprietor of the local Tarot shop was furnishing Phil the names and personal information on dozens of women, which Phil was using as a springboard for a pick-up marathon.

  Sitting wearyingly on her sofa, Tanya stoically received the news. It was exactly like her ex-boyfriend, beating the odds by getting laid with insider information. And his damn affinity for that fortune teller crap. Well, Tanya snorted, her sex machine bastard had found himself a fortune telling pimp. Unbelievable.

  But he had been good, admitted Tanya, not for the first time. Real good. She liked a strong man in bed. None of that fancy stuff, but a man with a real sex drive. That’s what she needed and just what Phil provided. If she wanted brains she would screw a professor. Damn him for leaving. Damn the bastard.

  The investigator furnished Tanya with the names of some of the women Phil had been sleeping with:

  * * *

  Connie Wong (a low-life congressional wanna-be lobbyist)

  Bonnie Christianson (a downtown mutual fund manager from Montana)

  Lucie Welcomme (a weekend boater from Annapolis)

  And Kathy van de Heuval (a tall blonde from a New York political family funding an oyster seeding program in the Chesapeake Bay).

  * * *

  Tanya didn’t know what to say. “Ten days?” was all she could muster. She wrinkled her nose. “Slept with all of them?”

  The agent nodded. Tanya ignored his smirking smile. She wondered about Connie and Bonnie and Lucie and Kathy. Did they know about each other? Tanya briefly wondered if the fortune teller was running an escort service. But Phil had zilch for money. So these girls were giving it away. How pitiful.

  An accompanying written report, stamped “client eyes only” noted that “Mr. Philip Greene, the subject under surveillance, has spent the night at his home with each of the observed woman."

  The agent felt the need to further justify his high surveillance fee by adding how “On two of the nights the subject entertained one woman in the late afternoon and another of the women for most of the night.”

  Phil’s success with women left the agent incredulous, and he felt the need to make this point clear to his client.

  “I don’t know what he’s slipping in the drinks, but since I’ve been watching only one has left the house a few hours after arriving. He gets ‘em. He keeps ‘em. He’s doing something right by these girls.”

  Tanya stared icily at the agent. “Enough of the awe, if you don’t mind. What about police records?” At least one must have filed a complaint against Phil. You can’t sleep with an assembly line of women and not run into trouble.

  The agent was prepared. “One of the first things I checked,” was the quick response. “He’s living with a state trooper, so it’s difficult, but from what I can see not a single complaint has been filed.”

  The agent again flashed his smirky smile. By now Tanya was finding all men more and more irritating. This one no exception. “I handle a fair number of angry congressional wife cases. And tracking down hidden spouse assets and low level blackmail. Run of the mill stuff compared to this guy. He’s a modern day Casanova.”

  “I’m not paying you to elevate this scumbag into some mythical figure.”

  “Sure, sure,” backpedaled the agent. “Just saying it’s unusual. That’s all.” What the agent was really thinking was that when this job was over he was heading straight back to Annapolis and buying Phil a drink.

  He wanted in on this, whatever it was.

  * * *

  *

  Who could blame Tommy Tucker or any politician leading the impeachment process for being at their wit's end? Incredulously, Larry Flynt was calling the political shots as much as Ken Starr in the great political drama of 1998. All during October word circulated among the political elite that a team of investigators hired by Flynt was sifting through the thousands of responses to his ad. Clandestine meetings had taken place between investigators and those snitchers deemed most credible. It was said a target list of politicians was being assembled. Two names whispered some. Names like Bob Barr for one. Ten names gossiped others.

  This was a list of names no politician wanted to be part of.

  CBS reported that poli
ticians of all stripes were running scared. The Associated Press detailed the frantic efforts by the GOP to tie the pornographer and his own witch hunt to White House operatives, either the Louisianan James Carville or even Hilary Clinton.

  The columnist Frank Rich of the New York Times later summed up the madness, writing that:

  But we may need Larry Flynt anyway -- not to expose any impeachment manager's sex life but simply because his very presence exposes the disingenuousness of everybody else, conservative and liberal, Republican and Democrat, press and public, who inhabits the epic Bosch canvas that is Monicagate.

  In the land of the pious hypocrite, the honest pornographer is king.

  It is almost too delicious to watch Mr. Flynt throw his high-minded colleagues in the news business into conniptions. Washington's bloviator-in-chief, David Broder, brooded on PBS about how ''the mainstream press'' now has its agenda set by “the bottom-feeders in our business”...yet he works for the paper (The Washington Post) that first popped the adultery question to a Presidential candidate (Gary Hart).....The other hypocrites unmasked by Mr. Flynt's pranks could fill a cabinet department. It's hard to stop laughing when Dick Morris, who sucked prostitutes' toes while on the White House payroll, decries the publisher for ''degrading American politics”.….