The voice was muffled. Husky. Really husky. It sounded like a K.D. Lang album being played at slow speed. "You'd better get to the Bunker," it said.

"Excuse me?" I asked. "What time is it?"

"Two thirty A.M. Daylight savings time. You're only about an hour and a half from the Bunker. You'd better get there."

"Mark's basement? Why?"

"Somebody said something…stupid…at the bar tonight. It got him thinking."

I was soberly awoken. "Thinking? We could be in trouble…"

"You bet your sweet bippy," the voice said. The connection was broken.

I washed up, and popped in my car. Mark had a plan, and I had only an hour and a half to get up there and cut him off.

It was going to be very close.

All the way up the New York State Thruway, Deep Throat's last words stuck in my head. "You bet your sweet bippy." What kind of nostalgic throwback to Rowan and Martin's "Laugh In" was that? What did it mean? Was there a secret message in there? Bippy? Was it an anagram or something? Bippy sounds like Benni. Maybe it was Benni hiding his voice. No, this wasn't his style… Something was afoot, though, and I was in the dark.

The floodlights in the yard were on as I pulled up the steep drive. The drive was probably only a forty degree incline, but it always felt much more precipitous. Especially at night, when you could easily go over the edge into the neighbor's yard, thirty feet below. As a matter of fact, Mark had once placed some open gas cans in the back of his old Volvo and taken the drive at fifty miles per hour. We are all lucky that we didn't need to worry about the succession of powers at that stage of the game. Lord knows, if that happened today, Karl Moore would be a lead candidate in a matter of moments. Sad that I have to think like that, but that's the role of a political strategist… Mark was sitting on a lawn chair in the yard, playing the banjo loudly. Karl was lying on a chaise, trying to get some rest. If he was asleep at all, it was a miracle. "Tyler?" Mark asked, as I walked up the flagstone path to him.

"Hello, Mark," I said.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

I sat down on the steps leading up to his deck, and looked out past the light's radius into the darkened grove of trees behind his house. "I just got some sort of disturbing call," I said. "A deep throated character said that you had something cooking."

"Me?" he asked. "That's preposterous. I don't really have anything doing. Just working on some late night pickin'." Mark looked at his watch. "Jesus, you're a dedicated character - it's four in the fuckin' A.M. You drove all the way up here just based on a prank call?"

I smiled and scratched the back of my head. "Yeah. Pretty silly, huh? Must have been the Walrus funnin' me."

Mark smiled. "Wanna go to the Blue Colony Diner for an early breakfast?"

I nodded. "Yeah. I could use some of their mighty, mighty coffee right about now."

Mark opened up his banjo case. "Why don't you wake up Karl, and then we can drive over."

I climbed up the steps towards where Karl lay on the chaise. At the top of the steps I tripped over some suitcases. "What the fuck are these?" I asked.

"Huh?" Mark mumbled. "Oh, yeah, right… Ohhhh, maybe that's what Deep Throat was talking about." Mark nodded. "Yeah, I'm headed to California. Do you mind dropping me off at Bradley International? I've got an eight A.M. flight."

"What the fuck are you going to do in California?" I asked.

"I'm going to be elected Governor," Mark said, in a tone that seemed to suggest that it should be obvious.

"What?!?" I bellowed. Karl woke with a start. "That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard!"

Mark smiled. "If I had a nickel for every time you've said that to me over the years…"

"What happened?" asked Karl.

"This nimrod's going to California!" I said. "He thinks he'll beat out everyone on the field for Governor."

"How many folks could there be?" Mark asked.

"There are over three hundred registered candidates," I said.

Mark shook a hand at me and sputtered. "Pshaw! Most of them are tools like Gary Coleman and Father Guido Sarducci. There aren't any real political powerhouses like me on the ballot."

"You honestly think that you'll win. Don't you?" I asked.

"Hell, yeah," Mark said.

"What about Schwartzenegger?" I asked. "He's got millions of dollars in his war chest."

"Aw, nobody'll care about him by the time the election rolls around. We've got months to prepare."

"The elections in four weeks," I said.

"Did somebody say something about breakfast?" Karl asked.

We drove in silence, west along I-84. I didn't even turn the radio on. Karl reached once to press a dial, absentmindedly, and I slapped his hand out of the way. The Blue Colony loomed up large, off the highway. It's one of those grand New England diners. Not one of the cookie cutter ones, that actually have better food, that dot the New Jersey landscape, but a big tasteless smoky diner full of truckers eating biscuits and gravy. And at four-thirty on a Saturday morning, there were plenty of them.

The three of us sat at the counter, elbowing in between guys who ate hamburgers for breakfast and farted fourteen hours a day. We were right in front of the coffee urns. I would have been the happiest man alive, right then and there, if some apple-cheeked middle-aged buxom waitress had showed up, given me some straws to stick together, and told me to have at the coffee machines. Oh, and yes, ma'am, I would like an apple turnover. Instead, we got some cadaver who vaguely resembled one of the bounty hunters from The Empire Strikes Back, who screwed up our orders and only refilled my coffee once during the morning. The place wasn't even busy yet. Damn it.

A mirror stretched the length of the counter, positioned up above and looking down. Presumably, this was so that the more zaftig of the truckers could look up into the mirror and see the food that their obtrusive bellies were hiding. I used it to make eye contact with Mark, while we solemnly ate our meals.

"Christ," Mark said, "You're acting like I'm a dying man, headed off to meet his maker."

"Some do think of California like that," I said.

"I was hoping that you could come with, after a few days. Once I'm settled in and have the lay of the land. Y'know?"

"You're on your own on this one," I said.

"I sure am," muttered Mark. "You, Karl…fuck, no one's along for the ride."

"Yup," said Karl, pushing around the pancakes on his plate, trying to sop up the syrup.

"Pass the salt, Karl?" I asked.

Karl shoved it towards me, and I coated my fried eggs. "Mark," I said, in between mouthfuls, "what do you hope to accomplish in California?"

Mark returned my gaze in the mirror. "I intend to be elected Governor of California."

"You honestly think you have a chance?" I asked. "I mean, it didn't pan out so hot in New York."

Mark took a slug of coffee. "Well, that race was all wrong for me. I mean, look at New York, and its stuffy suits and ties… California's the polar opposite. It's all weirdness and madness. It's Mark Hugo country, if there's Mark Hugo country anywheres."

"But what about the dream of making the whole country Mark Hugo Country?" I asked. "You're just going to toss that away?"

"Fuck no," Mark said. "If I get elected to the Governorship, that just leaves me in an even better position. I'll have more leverage. I'll be on the national stage!"

"And that's where the money is," added Karl.

"What?" Mark snapped. "What did you just say?"

Karl looked up at us in the mirror. "It's where the money is. Does the President get bribes of suitcases of money for highway projects and shit? Fuck no, that's a Governor's baby. The big money's in the provinces, guys."

Mark started throttling Karl. Pancakes and bits of egg popped out of Karl's full mouth, as Mark shook and shook Karl's throat, trying to wring the life from it. I saw the truckers on either side of us get up, looking to join the fray.

"Cut it out!" I bellowed. "What the hell is wrong with you guys?!?"

"Something wrong, feller?" one of the truckers asked Mark.

Mark looked up, and then returned to his work. "Hell yeah. Could you punch him or kick him a little for me? That'd be a big help."

"What'd he do?" asked the trucker. "Sleep with your woman or something?"

"No!" Mark shouted. "He compared me to some Tammany Hall thug, or some Al D'Amato wannabe!"

"Oh," said the trucker, returning to his seat and his plate of eggs. "It's political. I don't do politics."

I was finally able to pry Mark off of Karl, with the promise of liquor in his next cup of coffee. Thankfully our slow waitress never refilled our cups again, and I was not forced to live to my word.

"Fine! Fine. Fine," Mark said, quickly calming down. "I'll stay here. Karl's comments may have been insulting, but they did help me keep my eye on the prize." Mark wiped some of Karl's half-chewed pancakes off of his shirt. "I take it that you'll need more breakfast?" Mark asked.

Karl nodded and wheezed. "You…you bet your sweet bippy," he said.

I looked up in the mirror, and caught a look at his bloodshot eyes. He returned my gaze with an exhausted, but knowing look. Yes, those eyes were tired, but there was a hint of the visceral, hard-hitting political genius that I knew was lurking in there. The intense burning of an old hunter. The fiery raving of a traveling preacher. The wisdom of somebody who knew lots but wasn't telling.

Karl Moore had saved the day, once again.

THE MARK HUGO ARCHIVE
The Article That Started it All - Mark's Gubernatorial Campaign Announcement.

Bad Night in The Bunker - Strategy Gone Awry.

Strike A Pose - Image Consultancy in the Post-Carville Era.

An All Time Low.

A Tape Transcript.

Mark's Gubernatorial Concession Speech.

The Beginnings of Mark's Presidential Campaign.

Angry Sports, Elmer Gantry, and Freedom Fries.

Orange Alert, Again.

Mermaid Parade Invitational.

American Idols.

The First Parade.

Independence Day.

Please email your support and suggestions to: tyler@greathoboes.com. Remember, vote early, and vote often!

Tyler M. Carey
Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, The Great Hoboes of New York
Apparent Campaign Manager, Mark Hugo for President '04 Campaign