Balance of Power

    This is what they've tried to do, the voice-over said, to make you forget.

    "I can't believe this," Lara murmured.

    As they watched, their own faces gradually morphed into a photograph from the wedding, Inez and Joan holding hands with Marie. The picture zoomed in on Marie in her frilly dress, bright-eyed with delight. Then, accompanied by the soft, repeated clicks of a camera, her face became that of David Walsh, then George Serrano, then Laura Blanchard. The picture froze on Laura, fresh-faced and blonde, a basketball trophy pressed to her cheek.

    This is Laura Blanchard, the voice-over said. One more life too important

to forget.

    The "Civil Justice Reform Act," the voice concluded with disdain. It's not reform, and it sure as shooting isn't justice. Tell your senator to help uphold the President's veto.

    Lara folded her arms, gazing at the carpet. "Where do they want to run it?"

    "Any state where we have a fighting chance to flip a senator, with the telephone number for each. I'm not sure I could stop Lenihan's people if I wanted to."

    With this admission of his helplessness, Kerry faced how much he was diminished—the forces of money and power on the left were overtaking him as surely as the vast resources of the SSA had overtaken Fasano. "We're approaching the time," he told Lara, "where politicians are bit players, and Presidents reduced to props."

    "Like my family is, you mean." She looked over at her husband. "Do you suppose Lenihan's still angling for a settlement?"

    The quietly caustic inquiry captured her own despair. After a moment, Kerry asked, "What do you want to do about this?"

    "Tell them to run it. We're well beyond worrying about our dignity, don't you think?" Her tone became hard. "I won't accept that my family died for nothing. We need to keep our votes in place, then pray for something better."

* * *

At seven that evening, the telephone in Sarah's office rang.

    She was still preparing for Callister's deposition, scribbling notes into her typed outline. By mutual consent, though Lenihan's was somewhat condescending, they had agreed that Sarah would stand a better chance of lulling Lexington's president into some misstep than a notorious trial lawyer who would set George Callister's teeth on edge. Immersed in the intricacies of her design, she put down her ballpoint with reluctance.

"Sarah?" the now familiar voice said. "It's Lara Kilcannon."

    Sarah hesitated, looking for a way to express her sympathy. "How are you?"

    The First Lady laughed softly. "Lousy," she answered. "Angry. Heartsick. Embarrassed. Feeling guilty about Mary and terrible for Kerry. Scared to death that I'll wind up being part of the reason our society keeps on killing people. All the emotions that make life worth living."

    Sarah was surprised—Lara's expression of her torment in black comedic terms made her seem at once more human, and more despairing, than the grieving but collected woman Sarah had first encountered. "I've been pretty worried myself," Sarah answered frankly. "For you, and about what could happen to this case."

    "You should be. Back here, things are slipping."

    "The Senate?"

    "Yes. The vote's set in three days, and as of now we're going to lose."

    "I've been so afraid of that." Sarah paused, sorting through her emotions. "Not just because of how hard we've tried, or even because of how Mary hung in with me when I didn't think she would. But because I know about the evidence.

    "We have depositions sealed in a lead-lined vault that would keep the Senate from overriding the President's veto. But I can't make them public because of Bond's order. In the guise of keeping us from indulging in selective leaks, Bond and the defense lawyers are perpetrating a cover-up."

    Lara was silent. "Can you take the depositions to the judge," she inquired at length, "and ask him to change his order?"

    "Even if he were inclined to change it—which he never will—it's too late. I'd have to file a motion, allow time for the defendants to respond, and then go before the judge. There's just no way to do that in three days." Sarah felt the frustration of explaining to a nonlawyer how indifferent a court could be to the ends of justice. "Besides, what can I say— that I want Bond to release the depositions in order to tilt the Senate? He knows all about the Senate and what it means. That's why he's hiding the files beneath the pious pose that the law should be above such things."

    "So there's nothing you can do," Lara persisted.

    At once, it struck Sarah that Lara's query involved more than a desperate hope, and that her openness with Sarah involved far more than venting. Bluntly, Sarah said, "No matter how I feel, I can't release the files. Unless my law license goes, as well."

"I understand," Lara said simply.