Invisible Touch

Invisible Touch

Chapter 19 ~ The Puzzle

In a small way, Ernie was relieved. At least now he understood what was going on. Now he knew why everyone around him was so sad in the future. But this was terrible, and now he needed to do something about it. But what? Ernie was anxious, he felt like he was going to throw up.

Ernie gave Kim all of the details of this latest dream.

"Oh my God," Kim said, tears in her eyes. "This is horrible, just -- there aren't even words, Ernie. What are we doing to do?"

"Let's look at what we know and what we don't know," Ernie said, trying to remain calm.

"The President is going to die," Kim said. "What else is there?"

"For starters, we can't..." he began. "I can't be sure that it was her husband's funeral she was attending. I could see the arm of someone standing next to her. Someone tall -- an adult, it had to be. It could have been the President himself. On the other hand, in a situation like this would the Vice President be standing next to the President's widow?"

"I suppose the only way to know for sure is to see the President's future," Kim suggested. "You told me once you had seen the future of someone who had passed away, right?"

"Yes, I have," Ernie replied.

Kim had gotten up from where she was sitting and moved to a nearby desk with a computer monitor sitting on it. She began typing.

"Got an idea?" Ernie asked.

"Why don't we see where the President is now. I mean, this whole thing may be moot, right?"

"That's true. We can't just walk up to the White House gate and knock on the bars," Ernie said.

"Excuse me," he said, pretending to speak to a Secret Service agent at the gate. "I would like to see the President. You see, I've had visions of the future, and I'd just like to make sure that he's going to be dying soon, so I can..."

"They're staying here," Kim said. "The White House web site doesn't say anything about the President's schedule, but the office of the First Lady has hers."

She clicked the mouse a few times and scanned the monitor for information.

"Here it is," Kim said. "'2 PM, Nashua, New Hampshire.' That was this event. And here's the dinner she was talking about. '7 PM, Bedford, New Hampshire.' I wonder if that was the dinner she was talking about."

"Dinner?" Ernie asked

"She said she was having dinner with her husband, remember?" Kim said. "I don't know if this is a dinner event at 7, but it does add up, doesn't it?"

"Yes, good thinking," Ernie said. "Hey, I've got an idea. Why don't you look at the State Party web site and see if they have anything about a Presidential visit."

Kim clicked and typed and clicked and waited. She typed and clicked some more. She scanned the page that came back and clicked something else.

"Well well well," she said. "Would you look at that. The state party is having their annual 'Founders Club' fundraiser tonight -- and can you guess the time? 7 PM at the Wayfarer Inn in Bedford. And would you like to guess who the special guest speaker is going to be?"

"The President," Ernie offered.

"'The President and First Lady,'" Kim read from the screen, "'will make remarks...'"

She clicked some more and read what she found.

"Hey," Kim said. "Did you know that Governor Thomas is getting married tomorrow?"

"No, I didn't know that," Ernie replied. "And what's that got to do with..."

"And did you know that her fianc&#eacute; grew up with President Jackson in Virginia?" Kim said.

"So what is the...?" Ernie began to ask.

"'Ephraim Jackson, President of the United States," Kim read, "'will play an unfamiliar role tomorrow -- that of second man. The President will be best man at the wedding of long time friend Edward Watkins tomorrow at the First Church in Goffstown. Watkins' bride is none other than Sally Thomas, the Governor of New Hampshire.'"

"OK," Ernie spoke. "So we know the President and First Lady are here in the state tonight and they're here in the state tomorrow. What we don't know is when this -- I assume we're talking about an assassination. We don't know when that is going to take place."

"Well, we'd better get to work, then," Kim said.

"But what can we do?" Ernie asked. "I know what we can't do, and that's call up the White House and say, 'Hello, the President is going to be assassinated, but we don't know how and we don't know when, but would you please give him the double special protection for a while?' They'll think we're loony. They'll lock us up."

Ernie held his head in his hands, deep in thought.

"If only I could tell when the funeral was," Ernie said, trying to recall the images he had seen earlier of the First Lady's future. "That might give us a better..."

"What about the President?" Kim said.

"What about him?" Ernie asked.

"What if you could touch the President," Kim suggested. "Maybe you could see his future and how the murder takes place, if that's what it is, and then..."

"Get your stuff, Kim," Ernie interrupted. "We have to go to the Mall."

"Ernie, this is no time for shopping," she replied.

"Well I'm not going to the Founders Club fundraiser dressed like this," he said.

"Aha!" she cried.

There wasn't going to be time for bargain hunting at the outlet stores today. They headed straight for the Macy's at the Pheasant Lane mall. The store in Bedford would have been closer to the fundraiser, Kim knew, but it appeared on the map to be so close that the area would surely be swarming with security and media and party fat cats.

"I just thought of something," Ernie said.

"What's that, honey?" Kim asked.

"What if it," he couldn't say the word. "What if the murder happens tonight?"

"Well, then we'd better hurry," she said.

Kim parked the car and they rushed inside.

"We'll meet right here as soon as we're done," Ernie suggested, pointing to the floor as they walked.

"Dressed for tonight," Kim confirmed.

"Yup," Ernie replied.

Kim went straight for the fancy dresses. Ooh, this one was pretty. Size, she told herself. Size first, pretty second. Here was something that would be perfect. Where would she ever wear this again, she wondered. Doesn't matter, she reminded herself. She held it up to check the size and took it into the dressing room. It would be perfect.

The underwear department was nearby and Kim grabbed one of everything she would need to go with the dress. She headed for the register when the shoe department caught her eye. She had almost forgotten, and the shoes she was wearing would never work with the dress she was about to buy.

Oh, these were nice, she thought. She tried them on and they were just the right size. The price tag wasn't, though.

"Oh pretty pretty shoes," she spoke to them, "I could never buy you if this wasn't such an important emergency."

But it was, and she would have to. There just wasn't time to look for anything cheaper.

When Kim reached the checkout register, Ernie was already there. The cashier was busy scanning his items.

"Ma'am," Ernie's cashier said to Kim, pointing to another station, "she can take you right over there."

"Just put her things on my bill," Ernie offered.

"Oh thank you, sir," Kim joked, and batter her eyes at him. "That's awfully kind of you."

The cashier shook her head and hoped these two people knew each other. She totaled everything up and Ernie paid the bill.

"We're actually on our way to a function," Kim told the cashier. "Is there somewhere we can put these things on?"

"Oh, I see," she said. "The rest rooms are upstairs -- escalator is right over there," she added, pointing.

And she took out a pair of scissors from under her cash register.

"I'd be happy to remove all of the tags if you would like," she offered.

"Thank you," Ernie said. "That would be a big help."

It seemed like an eternity as Kim and Ernie watched the cashier snip each little plastic tag holder, one by one. Finally she was finished and they each took their things. Kim double checked her bag on the way up the escalator.

"I believe these are yours," she said, handing Ernie a pair of black socks.

"Why thank you, ma'am," he said with a smile.

They were dressed and back on the road in ten minutes. The fundraiser was two hours away, but they didn't want to take any chances. There was too much about this that was completely unknown.

"Touch me, Ernie," Kim said suddenly.

"Kim, this is no time," he giggled.

"I just had a thought," she replied. "Maybe my future will give you more information about what we're dealing with here."

He took Kim's right hand and kissed it.

"Me likey," she said.

He wanted to keep holding her hand, but didn't know if that would affect how long it took for the dream to begin. He kissed her hand again and reluctantly released it. He made himself comfortable in his seat and waited.

It didn't take long. Still blue, he saw -- her eyes, tears. And it was gone. Nothing new, Ernie thought. They would just have to stick to their plan.

They ended up parking at the Bedford Macy's, there was so much traffic and a huge crowd of people.

"What have I gotten myself into?" Ernie said. "Look at all these people."

"Don't worry," Kim said. "I'll be right there with you, and if anything happens... I don't know, Ernie. We'll just do our best."

There were banners all around. "Welcome President and First Lady Jackson" and "Four More Years" and "New Hampshire for Jackson." Kim spotted a large sign reading "Founders Club" and a smaller one below it saying "Tickets".

Ernie shuddered as he followed Kim through a sea of bodies. They reached the table where the ticket sign was standing.

"We don't have our tickets yet," Kim told a young volunteer at the table. The name tag stuck to her dress read "Heidi."

"What are your names?" the volunteer asked.

"Kim Wilson and Ernie Maxwell," Kim told her.

Heidi began flipping through the papers attached to a clipboard she picked up from the table.

"We won't be on your list," Kim said.

"Oh," Heidi said. "You haven't ordered your ticket yet?"

"No," Kim said. "We were just hoping to..."

"Let me check with someone," the volunteer offered. She went inside the building and was gone for a few minutes.

"Well, I'm sorry I have to give you the bad news," Heidi said when she returned. "The event is sold out and it's because of the fire code, we just can't have any more people in the building."

"I see," Kim said.

"Yeah, I'm really sorry. You see those big speakers, they've got the sound system set up so that people outside can hear the speeches and everything."

The disappointed look on Kim's face was genuine. What were they going to do now?

"I know, it's not the same as being inside," Heidi said. "I'm really sorry."

"Well," Ernie said. "That's too bad -- I was really looking forward to eating that rubbery chicken."

Ernie took out his wallet and wrote a check to the State Party for two thousand dollars, the same amount the tickets would have cost.

"Our real reason for coming was to make sure the party got this," Ernie said. He handed his check to the volunteer.

"Thank you," she said. "That's very generous of you."

The volunteer was thinking about something, Kim could see. Finally Heidi leaned closer and spoke to both of them.

"I'll tell you something, though," Heidi said in a hushed voice. "See how all these people are crowded by these doors?"

"Yeah," Kim said.

"This area is going to be cleared soon for security," Heidi continued. "And once the President and Mrs. Jackson have come in, I'm sure the crowd will just come back here. But if you walk all the way around the building -- near the door by the kitchen there is another one of these loudspeakers over there, too -- that's where the rope line is going to be for the President and the First Lady to shake hands and say 'hi' to people. I can't promise anything, but if I were you, that's where I'd want to be."

"Thank you so much," Kim said.

There was still a chance, Ernie thought.

Kim and Ernie went to the other side of the building, to the spot where they had been directed by the helpful volunteer.

"I have a good feeling about this," Kim said. "If we'd gotten into the event, there was still no guarantee we would have gotten to shake hands with the President. If there's a chance -- any chance at all -- that you can do anything to fix this -- whatever it is, this is it."

"Yes," Ernie agreed. "You're right. We are much better off here."

"I'm so nervous," Kim said.

"Me, too," Ernie said. "Me, too."

There wasn't long to wait before the program started, and it came through the loudspeakers as a loud crackle and pop of static and feedback before the sound level was corrected and a voice welcomed us to the Founders Club's annual dinner.

"We are extremely pleased to have with us tonight two people who have done so much for this party, here and nationally. But the reason we are so proud of them, and so happy they have joined us, is because of what they have done for this country."

It sounded like an introduction, Kim thought. Was the President about to speak? Maybe he would speak and leave early, and then so could they.

"So enjoy your dinner," the voice continued. "We will have some speeches for dessert and our special guests will be the icing on the cake."

They could hear the laughter from inside.

"Well, I guess we just wait," Kim said.

"OK, I lied," Ernie said. "I wouldn't mind some of that rubber chicken right now."

Kim dug into her purse and pulled out a handful of power bars.

"I'll bet you didn't know," Kim said, "that Founders Club members at the 'Beloved Partner' level are entitled to receive a delicious snack and an outdoor standing spot near the loudspeakers."

Ernie laughed. "No, I had no idea."

It wasn't quite an hour before they heard the crackle of the sound system again, but there would still be a while to wait, they knew, before the President would speak. Then they would cross their fingers and toes, anything they could, and hope that the President came out this way.

The first speaker was a local leader of the youth organization within the party. He was a junior in high school, and had been a sixth grader at Elm Street Middle School in Nashua when then Governor Jackson had made his first visit to New Hampshire -- a visit to this boy's school. It sounded as if he had made quite an impression on the young man.

"People argued about war and the economy and a lot of other things," the boy said. "Governor Jackson talked about those things but wanted to bring the people together to solve problems. The New Hampshire primary was still a couple years away, but I decided right then that if I were old enough, I would vote for Ephraim Jackson."

There was applause when the speech was over. Next was a speech given by a town party chair from the North Country. She was followed by one of the members of the state committee, who spoke about Rose Jackson and all she had done as First Lady of her state and as First Lady of the United States.

Mrs. Jackson spoke briefly about her husband and how proud she was of him. She concluded with an introduction of him and it was his turn to speak.

"Finally," Ernie said.

"Shhh, I want to hear this," Kim said.

President Jackson thanked everyone for being there. It was a sellout crowd, he noted. It was a good thing he'd gone into politics and not singing, where he never could have filled a room, he joked.

"And I want to thank all of you who have spoken here tonight. Timmy, you probably know this, but not everyone does. That visit to Nashua in 2005 was my first visit to New Hampshire. I never was much of a skier. My wife does love to shop, though. When I came here five and a half years ago, this nation was so divided, so polarized. So many issues split the people apart from one another. And it was on purpose, too. It was a political strategy for fundraising and winning elections. It had nothing to do with leadership or America's place as a great neighbor in the community of the world. And it wasn't just the other party -- no, it was being done in this one, too. And I wasn't afraid to say so. The truth is always the right thing, right Jimmy? I remember after the assembly, Jimmy's teacher came up to me and asked if I were going to run for President. 'Can't a Governor of another small state come to New Hampshire without people thinking he's running for President?' I said to her. And I remember telling her how broken I felt the process was, that because I was willing to take on my own party, I could never win in the primaries. She told me what's important is in here. She said that all I needed to do was get up there and say what I felt deep inside and that the people would get the message. I've said this to Mrs. Emerson since then, but I'll say it again here tonight. Mrs. Emerson, you were right! It is the people who choose their leaders, not the big shots in the party. I hope I don't offend any of the big shots here in this room, and I don't mean to. Politics should be about leadership and service and dedication to a cause, not just about winners and losers. I rejected the cynical notion that the people needed to be divided and conquered. America is a great nation for so many, many reasons. In America, everybody can be a winner. Everybody can be a winner."

The applause could be heard through the walls of the building and was deafening over the loudspeakers.

"Everybody can be a winner," the President repeated again.

"I'll never forget a woman I met when I was a Mayor. I'd like to forget how long ago it was -- it makes me feel like an old man when they tell me how long ago this was. She and her husband had two small children and he had been working two jobs to pay the mortgage on the biggest house they could afford, and that wasn't much -- you might call it a fixer upper but it was in a neighborhood where nothing ever got fixed. They were right on the edge where an unexpected bill could easily break their budget. They had to hope that nobody in the family got sick, that they didn't have an accident in their car, because they couldn't afford insurance of any kind."

Kim and Ernie were glued to the President's words as he spoke.

"Well, there wasn't an accident, and nobody got sick. The husband was working overnight -- the second job was at a convenience store. One night the store was robbed and the man was shot and killed. The family was going to be thrown out of their house if she couldn't make the payments."

Tears began to fill Kim's eyes. She looked around and saw she wasn't the only one.

"And these weren't big payments, but now there was no family income. She came to me in my office -- we did that, back then, we let the people come and talk to their leaders. She told me she didn't want to take welfare, that welfare was for losers. I told her, 'there are no losers in America. We do what we have to and stay in the game.' And you know what she told me, she said, 'I want to be a winner, but I want to win on my own.' She told me she wanted to take responsibility for herself and her kids but she didn't have a job. She didn't have a job and she couldn't have a job because how could she afford to have someone take care of her kids. Well, we helped her be a winner. She didn't want to take a handout, but we found her child care she could afford once she had a job. And that was all she needed. She had a better job than her husband had, because she had her high school diploma, so she only needed one job. But she wanted better for herself and her kids. She had a neighbor who could take care of her kids at night and she went to school and got a degree. She is a winner. Everybody can be a winner."

The President went on to talk about neighbors that the woman had helped "because they weren't as fortunate as she was." He talked about the fundraisers she held to help people in the community in need, even though she was just as needy as they were. Ernie found himself in tears. Kim was so absorbed by the speech that she hadn't noticed that Ernie was on the ground beside her.

"Ernie, what's wrong?" she said.

He was kneeling on the ground, weeping. He had been so affected by the President's speech, so touched, he had suddenly found himself in a trance, his vision blurred.

A police officer came to see what was the matter.

"He's OK," Kim told him. "Sensitive guy -- he's just very emotional."

The officer nodded and left them alone. Kim stood by Ernie as he watched the vision he was having.

Ernie had seen yellow dreams of illness before, and gray visions of death. There were waves of both, clouds of a terrible, furious storm. He could see daylight, a man emerged from a black car. It was clearer now, and he recognized the man -- it was President Jackson. He was smiling as he entered a building. The building seemed familiar, but he didn't know why, the details were merely shadows. The President was walking through what seemed like a tunnel and then there was light and shiny -- but why pots and pans, what is this place? And suddenly a man with a moustache appeared, dressed all in white. The President went to shake his hand. In a flash, the man pulled a long, thin blade from his sleeve and stabbed it into the President's throat, down into his chest. Ernie saw the President fall to the ground as the image faded and turned black.

Ernie struggled to speak.

"Have to go," Ernie said weekly as he tried to get to his feet.

"The President just finished his speech," Kim told him. He'll be out here any minute.

"It's OK," Ernie told her. "There's no need for us to stay."

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