Nathaniel's Chorus. Gary Lightfoot

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      NATHANIEL’S

      CHORUS

      Φ Π Ψ

      It begins

      This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

      Published by Lightfoot Independent Press

      www.LightfootIndependentPress.com

      Nathaniel’s Chorus, Copyright © 2009 by Gary Lightfoot

      eBook release 2013

      ALL RIGHT RESERVED, including the right to reproduce this book or

      portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

      Cover design by Lightfoot Independent Films

      Writers Guild of America, East; Registration Number I206520

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2009908339

      ISBN-13: 978-0-9841893-2-8

      ISBN-10: 0-9841893-2-7

      Dedicated to the silent warriors who walk among us,

      I thank you.

      To the wife who always believes in me,

      I love you.

      To the daughters who laugh with me,

      I’m proud of you.

      To the brother who dreams with me,

      I admire you.

      To the mom who cared about me,

      I appreciate you.

      To the dad who played catch with me,

      I miss you.

      And to the baby brother who has gone ahead,

      I’ll be home soon.

       Special thanks to:

      Richard S. Castle, Colonel, USAF (Retired) Elizabeth (Betsy) Castle, your advice and reviews made this work possible. May God continue to bless you.

       John W. Hall, Cpt. USA Special Forces (Retired) your support and encouragement were essential. “de oppresso liber”

      Chapter 1

      The room was much quieter now, gone were the photographers and the reporters, the constant “clicking” of the cameras and the “whirl” of the tape recorders had been silenced. All that remained was the Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman and the Committee members as well as their personal aides, one of which had a rather unusual body odor about him. The other aides shuffled behind the Committee members in a vain attempt to gain distance and thereby, fresher air. Across from the Committee and directly in front of the Chairman a table had been placed made of the finest mahogany. The edges of the table had been worn through use with a ding here and there, but the surface of the table had been polished to a mirror finish and smelled of sliced oranges mixed with olive oil. All of which had been noticed by the accused, who sat in a high-backed wooden chair from the early colonial period. With every movement the accused made, a faint “squeak” would come from the chair. Sitting along side the accused was his lawyer and long time friend, Jeff Alexander. The two had met in college fighting over a girl, they couldn’t remember her name but they still recall how the fight ended. Hopefully their current fight would end the same, with neither of them in jail.

      The accused pulls his right hand from his pocket and places it next to the microphone. Grabbing the mike with his left hand and rapping on the base of the mike with his right, the session begins anew.

      “TAP-TAP-TAP”, “TAP”, “TAP”

      “Sir”, the Committee Chairman says with a syrupy southern gentleman’s drawl, “I can assure you, that you don’t need to do that; we can hear y’all just fine.”

      The accused, pleased with the way he had annoyed the Committee Chairman, smiles and shifts in his chair intentionally “squeaking”.

      Jeff leans over while covering the mike with his hand and whispers into his ear,

      “What do you think you’re doing? It’s not like you’re sending Morse code. Stop it, these guys aren’t kidding around!”

      The accused, leaning forward and removing Jeff’s hand from the mike, speaks in a clear and normal level,

      “Neither am I. I know they’ll understand.” He continues to squeak and tap.

      “Sir?” the Chairman asks, “Would y’all kindly state your name and position for the record?”

      The Committee Chairman, Reverend Jeremiah Branch, was a senior senator from Arkansas who had remained in public office for more than 20 years through secret alliances, the gift of public oratory and kissing too many backsides of power brokers on Capital Hill. Reverend Branch had initially been elected to office through a series of questionable events. During the last month of campaigning for his first public office, Reverend Branch’s opponent died when he suffered a massive heart attack during his normal morning jog. The media barely covered the story and it would have been missed had not a young investigative college reporter, raised the question on how an otherwise healthy marathon runner such as Branch’s opponent could have suffered a heart attack while jogging a few miles? An autopsy would later show that the runner had ingested insulin that had mysteriously been placed in the runner’s water bottle. No criminal investigation followed the discovery, but Reverend Branch was forced to accept insignificant supportive roles during his early terms in Washington and the young female reporter was reassigned to covering surfing competitions as a photographer. Today Reverend Branch was basking in his own personal glory. He had skillfully slithered through his political career by leeching himself to the coattails of better-known politicians and avoiding the limelight. Now he was in the spotlight, now the press was quoting “the Right Reverend Jeremiah Branch”, although no one really knew what church he was a reverend in, nor which religion Jeremiah Branch was a member of.

      “Sir,” slurps Branch in his rehearsed accent, “the Committee and I would like to honor the selected members of the media who have been granted permission to remain in my room, as well as all those wonderful people who are watching these auspicious proceedings through the cable news stations, by at least beginning this here trial.”

      Jeff quickly leans in toward the mike and says, “Sir, this is not a trial, only an investigation.”

      The accused continues to tap on the base of the mike and squeak in his chair,

      “Squeak-Squeak-Squeak”, “TAP-TAP”

      Reverend Branch, now obviously annoyed by both the accused as well as his lawyer, snaps back, “If you don’t control your client and make him behave, he will be the first freshman senator to not make it through his first year!” Reverend Branch, now proud of himself and wondering what he looked like on TV, smoothes his grey hair back behind his ears as he smirks, sits back in his chair and winks at the camera.

      Reverend Branch glares as the mike picks up Jeff’s whispers, “Thank God you’re not drinking out of a water bottle!”

      The remaining media erupts in laughter. Reverend Branch clinches his fist and says, “Counselor, you watch yourself.” Branch, again smoothes his hair back behind his ears, a subconscious habit he developed during the sixties when he wore his hair long, “Senator, I’m warning y’all . . .”

      The accused sits motionless for what appears to be several minutes, but when studied later would be exactly 12 seconds, he opens his right hand to reveal the object he was using to tap on the mike with, it is some sort of coin. He then, in one fluid movement, rolls his hand and makes the coin disappear. He places both hands,