According to Their Deeds

by Paul Robertson

“I wasn’t, actually. He called me, too. It was Norman Highberg that gave him my name, and probably yours.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Just an antiques dealer who was at the auction. You should meet him sometime, you’d get along famously. Mr. Cane was asking you about the woman and the desk?”

  “How would I know who she was? Do you think I know everybody in the country? If she’s fool enough to pay a hundred thousand for a desk, she shouldn’t be hard to find.”

  “It was intriguing,” Charles said.

  “It was a commotion and I hate commotions.”

  “You, Jacob? I don’t believe it.”

  “I don’t mind causing one myself; I just hate anyone else making one.”

  “I don’t believe that either. I bet you were as intrigued as I was.”

  “Then you might be even more if you saw what I did.”

  “What did you see?”

  Jacob chuckled. “When you’ve been around as long as I have, you learn to keep your eyes open.”

  “Then I would have a long time to go,” Charles said.

  “And you probably won’t make it anyway. So I’ll tell you what I saw. That chair you sat in?”

  “Yes. It was the only one open.”

  “It hadn’t been for long. There was a man in it, with long hair tied up. I don’t know why they let him in, the way he looked, except they let anyone in any more.”

  “What about him?”

  “He was bidding on the desk, too.”

  “But he’d left when I came in.”

  “Oh, you think so? You think you know everything, don’t you?”

  “Well—the chair was empty.”

  “He was still there. I saw him. He slid over to the side of the room, where you couldn’t see him, and he tried bidding a couple times. He gave up, though.”

  “I didn’t notice. You’re right, Jacob, there are still plenty of things I miss.”

  “At least you admit it. That means you might learn someday.”

  “And that’s all very intriguing, Jacob. I do wonder what it means.”

  “You wonder because you’re still young and foolish.”

  “Idealistic,” Charles said.

  “Same thing.”

  “And I’m fifty-five.”

  “That’s all? You look older than that.”

  “I only feel older. And you wonder, too, what it means, and you’re certainly not young or foolish. Did you tell Mr. Cane?”

  “Of course not. He didn’t ask, and I didn’t feel like telling him.”

  “Well thank you for telling me.”

  “I don’t know why I’d take the time.”

  “I won’t take any more of your time.”

  “I don’t have that much left.”

  “Then goodbye, Jacob. Talk to you later.”

  “If I live that long.”

  Charles set the phone down very gently. “It takes a special person.”

  “To be friends with Jacob Leatherman?” Dorothy asked.

  “To be Jacob Leatherman. It must require a tremendous amount of effort.”

  “Are you getting everything done?”

  “Getting what done?”

  “All those things you had to do,” Dorothy said.

  “The list is getting longer, and going to strange and stranger places.”

  “Where does it go next?”

  “Upstairs.”

  Up the steps from the office to the third floor, which was three doors facing a tiny landing. Charles knocked on the one that faced him.

  “What?” The door opened and Angelo was framed in its opening. He was not in his nice clothes. “Hey, boss.”

  “I have a question for you.”

  “What question?”

  But Charles had to stop and stare. “Why do I feel like I’m about to get knifed?”

  Something flickered deep in Angelo’s eyes—maybe humor, maybe not. “Hey, you know, boss, I don’t know why you feel some way, maybe it was something you ate.” His voice was sibilant and low, like a lullaby through his smiling white teeth that were not smiling.

  “I just hope you don’t scare my customers silly.”

  Two white wires attached his ears to his pocket. “Oh no, boss, I don’t ever scare those customers.” The smile stayed not smiling. “That wouldn’t be nice.”

  “No, it would not be nice, and I would hear about it. What are you listening to?”

  Even the tiny speakers made the air throb.

  “It’s just music.”

  “I hope you don’t go deaf. Anyway. Yesterday when you were waiting outside at the auction. Were you watching the door I came out of?”

  “I was watching for you.”

  “Did you see other people leaving?”

  “I saw people go in and go out.”

  “Lots of people?”

  Angelo shrugged. “Some people.”

  “Did you see a woman in a gray suit, with bright blond hair?”

  “Maybe I saw somebody who was that, I don’t know.”

  “What did she do?”

  “She walked away.”

  “That’s what I thought. There is someone looking for her.”

  Angelo leaned against the door frame and narrowed his eyes into even tighter slits.

  “She do something somebody doesn’t like?”

  “No. Nothing like that.”

  “So why does someone look for her?”

  “It’s business. It isn’t a street gang or a drug ring.”

  “That is business. Hey, boss, you be careful if you get into people looking for someone.”

  “I will be. But this is a different world than the street, Angelo.”

  He replied with two seconds of silence. “You want anything else?”

  “No, that was all.”

  “Whoever said that it was the Chinese who were inscrutable? I think Angelo is made of concrete.”

  Dorothy smiled, quite scrutably. “Did you find what you were looking for?”

  “Yes, which turned out to be nothing.”

  “And now what are you going to do?”

  He selected a catalog from his desk and leaned back in his chair. “I’m going to run my bookstore.”

  “Oh, how nice that you can spare us the time.”

  EVENING

  The sun traipsed across the sky; hours that had once been future became past. Charles rambled up from the basement to the office and looked in on his wife.

  “Is it time, Mrs. Beale?”

  “It is, Mr. Beale.”

  “I was hoping so. And I believe it has chanced to rain.”

  He held her jacket, standing close to her, and stayed close down the stairs.

  “Have we sold anything, Alice?”

  “A Madeleine L’Engle.”

  “Just now?”

  “Earlier.” Alice frowned. “I didn’t realize it was so late.”

  “Perhaps time has wrinkled a little. Have a good evening.”

  “Yes, sir. Good night, Mr. Beale, Mrs. Beale.”

  “Good night, Alice,” they both said, while Charles opened the door, and the umbrella, and they both walked out under it.

  Only April could have such gentle rain. The colors of the watercolor streets ran together from the slate roofs, down the dun and brick buildings, picked up the bright daubs of flower boxes and dark brilliant doors in every joyful hue that was respectable, spread across the footways in their own hard solid wet colors, and pooled into shining reflections in the streets. These were the old buildings’ hidden colors that only came out in the rain, the shades of their youth buried under the dulling of their years.

  “Do you remember . . . ?”

  They knew every square of the pavement, which ones held puddles, which ones had root-lifted corners.

  “Remember what?” Dorothy’s voice was as soft as the rain.

  “The open window.”

  “Of course I do.”

  The rain whispered.

  “The rain make
s me think of it,” Charles said. “I would take you back there.”

  “It wouldn’t be the same.”

  “It probably wasn’t even then.” They waited at a corner. The strolling water didn’t wait but passed on.

  “Sometimes I wonder if it really was the way I remember,” she said. “But I would rather have the memory whether or not it’s true.”

  “It is true. It’s not what actually happened, the memory we have of it is truer than that.”

  “It’s an irony, isn’t it, Charles? Edmund Burke and now Thomas Paine, together on the shelf.”

  “Perhaps you shouldn’t put them too close, Derek.”

  “No, side by side. Two men, two revolutions, and what different and radical reactions they had.”

  “ ‘Radical reaction.’ That’s a clever turn of phrase. Paine would have liked it.”

  “He had no humor, Charles. Radicals don’t. Burke did. One of many contrasts between them.”

  “They make a good contrast. Burke was such a strong voice in the British Parliament in favor of the American Revolution, but so strongly against the French.”

  “And Paine never saw a revolution he didn’t like, even when it almost cost him his own head.”

  “And I doubt, Derek, that you ever saw a revolution you did like.”

  “Never, except that they make good literature. I was reading Pasternak the other night.”

  “I agree that stable times are much more comfortable. But revolutions created the modern world.”

  “You sound like Jefferson, Charles. A little blood, now and then, to keep liberty fresh?”

  “Maybe just a bit of personal revolution, as a fresh start. Do you have anything in your life that you would want overthrown, Derek?”

  “A personal revolution? No. Besides, it’s not a revolution unless there’s blood.”

  WEDNESDAY

  MORNING

  “Mr. Beale, Ms. Liu will see you now.”

  “Thank you.” Just 7:48.

  The congresswoman liked flowers. They filled the waiting room in paintings and fresh-cut arrangements and pastel furniture.

  The outer office was filled with people, at least photographs of them. It was an impressive cult of personality. Hundreds covered the walls, most of them of her and star-struck constituents, and hundreds of thank-you cards.

  For surely the minuscule woman in the pictures celebrating the success of representative government service was the force driving the office and everyone in its fifty-yard vicinity. The face was a striking mix of features, Asian and African, which did not peacefully coexist but were proudly distinct.

  The pictures hardly captured the vibrant energy that met him full force as he entered the inner office. The room was a sherbet bowl of lime, raspberry, orange and lemon, but the real brightness glowed from the dazzling smile and glittering eyes fixed on him.

  Charles blinked.

  “Mr. Beale! I am so glad to meet you.”

  With both perfect dignity and thorough eagerness, Karen Liu strode forward from her desk toward him, her hand extended at about the level of his waist. He leaned a little down, bowing before the queen, to reach her.

  “Ms. Liu. I’m honored.”

  At this lower altitude he was chin to indomitable chin with her, and eye to mesmerizing eye.

  “I am, too,” she said. “Sit down.”

  Disobedience was unthinkable. He sat.

  She did also, and they reached a middle-ground compromise to their vertical differences. It was a sign of favor; she didn’t seem likely to compromise often.

  “You were a friend of Derek Bastien,” she said. “And that means you must be intriguing.”

  Charles was momentarily stunned.

  “Well, I’m not,” he said. “Not very.”

  She didn’t believe him. “You must be. How did you know Derek?”

  “I sold him books.” He was beginning to get his breath back.

  “Books. He had a lot of them.”

  Her eyes were disconcerting. He tried to concert.

  “Antique books.” He managed to meet her stare. “I have a shop in Alexandria. Derek was a customer.” He tried to be intriguing. “And a friend.”

  “He was my friend, too,” Karen Liu said. “And I was proud to be his friend.”

  “You worked with him, didn’t you?”

  Her stare shifted to distant horizons. “We accomplished so much. I could always count on his support at the Justice Department. What makes a book antique?” She suddenly returned.

  “A long time.”

  “How much do they cost?”

  “A lot.”

  She nodded. “Old and expensive. Derek must have loved them. And what can I do for you this morning?”

  He smiled, his watts to her megawatts. “I just decided that I’d like to meet some of Derek’s other friends. I hope I’m not wasting your time.”

  “No, you are not. He was a wonderful man, and we are all diminished by his loss.”

  Judging by her stature, the congresswoman had had many such losses. “I only talked with him occasionally,” Charles said. “A few times a year when he came to the shop, or I delivered a book to him.”

  “I talked with him every week. My staff worked with his staff every day.”

  “Is that unusual? That’s not the picture one usually gets of cooperation between Congress and the executive departments.”

  “It was unusual because Derek was unusual, and it has been quite different without him.”

  “Who took his place?”

  “I wouldn’t know.” A dark cloud suddenly obscured the sun. “We have been instructed that all communication will pass through the Deputy Assistant Attorney General personally from now on, and not his staff.” And the cloud became a thunderhead.

  “I’m so sorry.” Saying the wrong thing could bring torrential downpours, and Charles didn’t have an umbrella.

  “It is sorry. It is a disgrace for Mr. Borchard, who is an appointed official, to act this way.”

  “But tell me about yourself,” he said. “If you don’t mind. Derek spoke of you often.”

  Her smile flashed out like a lighthouse through the gloom, and the gloom went running for its life.

  “Mr. Beale, I am living the most wonderful life in the world.”

  Somehow, no less an answer would have been right. “Tell me how you got to Congress. It must not have been easy.”

  Every sentence brought out a different light source. Now it was a laser. “Nothing has ever been easy.”

  “But I think you don’t let that stop you. You must be quite a fighter.”

  “I have always fought, Mr. Beale. I fought my way into college, and into law school, and into every place I’ve ever been.”

  Charles had settled back into his chair. The conversation had turned into a stump speech, one that Karen Liu had given many times. But the passion was fresh and pungent.

  “I fought my way out of an alcoholic mother and a father who disappeared when I was two, and out of poverty and racism and bigotry and I will keep fighting for the people who are still in chains to poverty and racism and bigotry. That is what I have been doing, and that is what I will continue to do. You can read my biography, Mr. Beale, it’s on my website.”

  “I preferred to meet you first.”

  “Read it. Because when I looked at the world I lived in, the ghettos where I grew up, I had to do something about it. And I decided that here”—she waved her hand across the room—“here was the place to do it. And the people who were here weren’t doing anything. So I took them on, and I won.

  “And it was not easy. I had to fight an entrenched political machine that had everything, and I didn’t have anything, and they spent every dollar and played every dirty trick they could. But they couldn’t fight the people, and the people knew who was on their side, and I won that primary by three thousand votes. And I have repaid the faith that those voters placed in me, and fought for them.”

  There was a short
break for applause from the audience.

  “Ms. Liu,” Charles said, and it was far inferior to the wild cheers that should have filled the room. “I see why Derek thought so highly of you. I know how important money is in politics, and an entrenched machine will have a lot of it. Beating them by three thousand votes is amazing.”

  “Many people were amazed,” she said, and she was no longer on a platform speaking to thousands, but eye to eye with a single person.

  “And I am even more appreciative of your time when I realize what important work I’m keeping you from.” He shifted in his chair to stand, but the eyes did not release him.

  “I am never too busy for a friend.” She seemed to be waiting for him to say something else.

  “I’m honored to be considered one,” Charles said.

  “I would like to see your books. Did you say that Derek came to your store?” No smile, just intensity.

  “Yes, he did.”

  “Then I will, too.” She smiled and the conversation became friendly again. “I’m sure it’s fascinating.”

  “It is,” Charles said. “Yes, please come.”

  “And did you have any other business with Derek?” There was still an undercurrent of expectation and questioning.

  “No. That was all.”

  “Did he ever discuss his work with you?”

  “Not often. We usually discussed more philosophic subjects.”

  “Did that include John Borchard?” It was a very direct question.

  “Derek’s boss? No. I know just the little that Derek told me about him.”

  “I would be interested to know what Derek told you.” She smiled, and again the gloom dispersed. “And Derek told you about me? I hope that was always positive.”

  “Always.”

  “Well! I hope so, and I hope he meant it. And now it is time for me to keep moving along.”

  “Then thank you, Congresswoman. And I hope to see you at the shop sometime soon.”

  “You will! Nothing could keep me away!”

  “You really met with a congressperson?” Dorothy asked.

  “I did,” Charles said as he got himself into his chair. “Really.”

  “Is Liu oriental?”

  “Yes. She is both black and Chinese, and barely tall enough to be just one, let alone two. But she is energetic enough for three or four. We had a very nice talk.”

  “She must have had better things to do with her time.” She was skeptical, and disapproving, and amused. “What did you talk about?”