Palace Council

by Stephen L Carter

  Eddie had never forgotten the cross around Margot’s neck. George Collier, the man who had searched his house, once worked for Margot’s father: reason enough to want a closer look at Margot’s husband, the future President. In Washington, Eddie was never able to penetrate the layers protecting the Senator from contact with the world. He had occasionally encountered him at White House functions or Georgetown cocktail parties, but questions were always deflected by an aide, or by Margot herself. Never had Eddie been able to speak to the Senator alone. He did not expect to do so in Harlem, either, but Harlem was at least not Washington. In Harlem, Eddie knew everyone. He would be on home ground. If there was one place where Eddie stood a chance of piercing the protective shield of young assistants and talking to Senator Frost one-on-one, that place would be Harlem. Eddie postponed a trip to Alabama, where he planned to interview a Negro preacher who had founded a new political party called the Black Panthers, and instead drove from Washington up to New York City to hear the Senator deliver the Palm Sunday address at Saint Philip’s Episcopal Church, on 134th Street, where, despite their move out to Mount Vernon, Aurelia and her children occasionally attended services, and Kevin Garland was a senior vestryman. Eddie wangled an invitation to the VIP-only reception afterward at the apartment the Garlands still kept at 409 Edgecombe for their visits to the city.

  Saint Philip’s was one of the oldest Episcopal churches in the darker nation. Eddie hated all churches, but found the Episcopal high-church tradition incomprehensible. The tinkling of the bells annoyed him, the clouds of incense choked him, and the secret code confused him: someone always seemed to be announcing that the lectors’ guild would meet in the undercroft, which should be entered via the narthex following the post-Eucharistic prayer in the nave. The vast sanctuary, with its high ornate ceiling, was packed, and a surprising number of the faces were white, everyone jostling to see the future President in the flesh. Eddie stood along with the others for the opening procession. The thurifer passed them, the crucifer guarded by two youngsters with candles, senior vestrymen with their staves of office (including Kevin), followed by the choir, another crucifer, more candles, the deacons, and then the Senator himself, followed by the rector. No sign of Margot. Eddie strained to find her in the first row of pews. He did not have a good angle of sight. He was squeezed into the back, hoping to remain unrecognized, so that he might observe without being observed. From the way the smiling woman across the aisle was nudging her husband, however, it seemed that his plan would fail.

  He continued searching for Margot. By craning his neck around an obstructing pillar, he thought he could make out the back of Margot’s head, but he could not be sure. A character in one of his novels had remarked that, from behind, all white women look alike. As Eddie stretched and squinted, a voice ordered him querulously to stop blocking the view. When he turned to apologize, the woman behind him widened her eyes. “Sorry, Mr. Wesley,” she said.

  “I beg your pardon,” he said, and smiled.

  “Room for one more?” said a man at his side, and Eddie found himself staring into the playful eyes of Gary Fatek, who was excusing his way down the pew.

  “What are you doing here?” Eddie whispered.

  “My family likes to scout future Presidents.”

  “To figure out how much it will cost to buy them?”

  “Or how much they’re going to cost us in taxes.” He lifted a finger, pointed to the hymnal. “Now, shut up and sing.”

  Because the congregation was singing: the processional hymn, not to be confused with the introit, although it always was. The words to the hymns always reminded him of the certitudes of Wesley Senior. Yet he did his best, because what remained of the Harlem he had known was on parade today. Aurelia was in the choir, along with Chamonix Bing, former wife of his old friend Charlie. One of the altar boys was Aurelia’s son, Locke. The Old Testament lesson was read by a DeForde. And when the time came for the sermon, it was Kevin Garland, resplendent in maroon robe, who stood up to introduce the guest of honor.

  Eddie watched the man who had won Aurelia. Never slim, Kevin had gained weight. He was not as barrel-chested as his late father, and he lacked entirely Matty’s air of being ready to buy you a drink or tangle with you in the alley, but growing prosperity had somehow worked in reverse, tempering the hauteur Eddie remembered from the old days. It was as if every dollar he earned left him calmer and more generous. Perhaps it even did: rumor spoke of the enormous sums Kevin and Aurelia gave to good causes. One of their good causes was evidently the career of Lanning Frost, whom they supported avidly, even though Lanning was a Democrat, and Kevin was very much the other thing.

  Eddie turned to look at Aurelia, sitting in the choir loft. She was beaming at her husband. The selfish part of Eddie had hoped for a look of irritation, boredom, reproach, anything to signal a crack in the façade. But she just kept smiling. Eddie tried to calm himself. There were other women. He had been with more than a few over the years. But he could not tear his eyes from the one he had wanted most. His father used to preach that jealousy and covetousness were at the root of every sin, and Eddie thought this very likely true. He all but trembled with pain and loss until Gary Fatek laid delicate fingers across his arm and, leaning close, whispered, “If you don’t stop, you won’t get any ice cream after”—a sentiment so incongruous and absurd that Eddie forgot himself, laughing so hard that the same woman who had ordered him to stop blocking the view now hissed at him to hush.

  Gary turned, gave a little bow, and said, solemnly, “He can’t help it, ma’am. It’s the incense. It makes him high.”

  (II)

  KEVIN was not an accomplished public speaker. He was nervous, and fussed with his glasses a lot as he read from the paper in front of him. He seemed not to realize that Lanning Frost needed no introducing. The buzz passing through the congregation would have told a wiser man to shut up and sit down, but Kevin droned on about the schools the Senator had attended and the offices to which he had been elected and the bills to which he had attached his name. When at last he was done, Kevin blinked in surprise, as if he expected to find another page. But his smile as he stood aside was delighted and smooth.

  It was Lanning Frost’s turn. He stood there, tall and trim, with sharp eyes and long pink cheeks that lent to his otherwise ordinary face a certain cheery authority, like your favorite grade-school teacher. He had brown hair lightly frosted, as if to match his name, and, at forty-three years old, as dynamic and articulate as you could wish, looked every inch the presidential timber that everyone described. Eddie wondered how much of the legend was true, if a man so phenomenally successful in so short a political career could possibly be as dim a bulb as David Yee and others insisted.

  Everyone heard the stories. Everyone heard the jokes. But just now nobody in the pews much cared. This was, after all, the Lanning Frost. The congregation rose and applauded, and he waved them back into their seats, reminding them in his warm, calmly commanding voice that this was the Lord’s day, not a time to be cheering a sinner like himself. The laughter rippling along the pews was the best evidence that he had scored already, and scored high. The Senator’s delivery was awkward but endearing, like a man who has memorized the big words for a quiz, never quite mastering them.

  “He’s quite an act,” murmured Gary.

  “Mmmm-hmmm.”

  “Erebeth says he’s a ninny.”

  “Erebeth says everybody’s a ninny.”

  Lanning tossed out a couple of obligatory jokes, mangling the funnier of the pair. But people laughed anyway, because this was a future President.

  “You know his wife, right?” said Gary.

  “Margot?”

  The Senator was smiling as he related a tale from his childhood, something about being caught cheating at a game in kindergarten. The congregation was chuckling when it was supposed to, even when Frost did not.

  “You’ve met her?”

  “Sure.”

  “Because there’s this story I
heard about her—”

  “Will you gentlemen please hush?”

  Again Gary turned. “My apologies, ma’am. You’ve heard of this new treatment for mental illness? Talk therapy? Well, that’s what he has. Someone has to talk to him every few minutes. It’s starting to wear me out, frankly. You can help if you like.”

  “Wait till she spreads that one,” whispered Eddie, moaning.

  “That’s right,” said Gary, eyes front.

  The rest of the Senator’s talk was what Eddie would have guessed: America a great country…by God’s grace the greatest nation the world has ever known…applause…facing unprecedented challenges both here and abroad…need for leadership of vision and firmness but leavened by compassion…keep working to build the Great Society…applause…win the battle over Communism…less applause…ease the transition from a wartime economy…tackle fundamental issues of poverty and racial injustice…applause…will not allow justice to be held hostage to a handful of violent racists defending a way of life that is indefensible…deafening applause…we will work together to ease the suffering of all…and so we shall be free…we shall be free!

  They were on their feet, pounding the pews, stamping their feet, Christian soldiers ready to march to the polling places.

  Eddie, stunned, rose only because Gary tugged on his arm.

  We shall be free.

  The words from the upside-down crucifix. The short hairs prickled on the back of Eddie’s neck.

  We shall be free.

  Maybe Lanning knew. Whatever Margot was up to that brought her the Cross of Saint Peter to wear around her neck, whatever her connection to the late Philmont Castle and the mysterious George Collier, maybe the Senator knew.

  Eddie looked around. Everyone was wild-eyed with enthusiasm. There was no denying the truth. The people in this church would in a few short years be joining with their fellow citizens across the country to elect Lanning Frost President of the United States.

  “I think I want to hear that story,” Eddie whispered to Gary as the cheering went on and on.

  (III)

  INSTEAD of going as planned to the invitation-only party at the Garlands’, Eddie followed Gary into his Bentley. Gary told the chauffeur to drive around a bit, then closed the glass. He noticed Eddie’s look.

  “Erebeth insists. She says if I’m going to run the trusts I have to look the part.” He laughed. “I’m not allowed to stay in the Village, either. Erebeth wants me to have a townhouse on Fifth for my salon, and a place on the water in Greenwich or somewhere for my big parties. I asked her, isn’t it better not to waste all that money. Erebeth told me being rich is not the same as being powerful. There are lots of millionaires who couldn’t get their alderman on the phone—that’s what Erebeth says. She says if you don’t have the parties nobody pays attention to you, and then you can’t get anything done. And believe me, Eddie, I’m going to get things done.”

  Eddie was still studying the car: the upholstery, the old-fashioned speaking tube, the walnut inlays, the diamond clock.

  “I believe you.”

  “You don’t approve.”

  “Let me put it this way. The rich have more power than the poor, and I’d rather it was you than Erebeth.”

  “But she admires the Negroes,” Gary drawled, and this time cracked only himself up.

  “Tell me about Margot,” Eddie said when his friend’s hilarity had died. It had been a year at least since the two men had spoken, and Eddie supposed he should be asking how Gary’s life was going, but the car, and his evident intention to yield to Erebeth, were information enough.

  “She’s having an affair,” said Gary.

  Eddie was scarcely interested. He had hoped for some gigantic revelation. “Is that so?”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “I see.”

  “In Harlem,” added Gary, savoring his little jest.

  Eddie perked up. “What?”

  “She’s in New York a lot. She’s on a couple of charitable boards. And, well, whenever she’s in town—this is what I hear—she comes up to Harlem.” Gary leaned close, as if the driver could otherwise listen through the closed panel or the tube. “Sneaks up to Harlem. Leaves her driver, changes her hair, takes two taxis.”

  “How could you possibly hear something like that?”

  “I know people who know people,” said Gary, piously, as if reciting his catechism. “And some of the people who know people owe favors to the Hillimans.” He laughed at himself. “Well, actually, just about everybody owes favors to the Hillimans.”

  “Erebeth,” breathed Eddie.

  “What about her?”

  Eddie shook his head. No point in telling Gary that the line was not that hard to trace. What he described sounded less like rumor and more like detailed surveillance—the sort of information that might show up in an FBI report. Hoover collected dirt on prominent people, and Lanning Frost, presidential timber, was as prominent as you could be without strolling into the Oval Office every morning. Erebeth Hilliman had contacted Hoover when Eddie was in trouble and made him call off the dogs. Presumably the pipeline still existed. The agents told Hoover, Hoover told Erebeth, Erebeth told Gary. Erebeth seemed to define power as getting people to take your calls. She wanted Gary to know that, too.

  “Tell me the rest of the story,” Eddie said.

  “Not much to tell. She comes up to Harlem in her disguises, she gets off on Edgecombe Avenue, she goes into a fancy building, she stays for hours, and, afterward, an unidentified Negro male helps her find a cab to head back downtown.”

  “Edgecombe Avenue? Is it 409 Edgecombe?”

  Gary laughed again. “No, Eddie. Get your mind out of the gutter. If she was having an affair with Kevin Garland, I don’t think he’d be unidentified. No, it’s in the 500 block.” They were heading into the park. Gary gazed out the window at what would soon be his front yard. “A tall man. Young. Very good-looking. Hey, that sounds like me, if I were only a Negro.” More laughter.

  Eddie considered. The only fancy building in the 500 block of Edgecombe was 555, the Roger Morris Apartments. Although he no longer lived in Harlem, he kept tabs on who was doing what, mainly through Torie Elden. He teased himself with possibilities, running through residents in his head. Lena Horne. Joe Louis. But he was postponing the inevitable. Eddie knew perfectly well what tall, good-looking, muscular young man lived at 555.

  Junie’s old heartthrob, Perry Mount. The golden boy, who had dated Sharon Martindale and demanded that Eddie stop searching for his sister.

  Margot knew Perry. Margot knew George Collier. Was it absurd to think that the two men might know each other?

  “I think, if your driver can manage it, I’d like to go to the party now.”

  “The party?”

  “For Lanning Frost.”

  “Can I come?”

  “Invitation only.”

  When Gary spoke, he sounded exactly like his aunt, and Eddie saw, for the first time, not his buddy but the heir. “I’m a Hilliman. I can get in anywhere.”

  “Half a Hilliman,” said Eddie, their old joke.

  But Gary never cracked a smile.

  (IV)

  IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE to move. Aurelia had told him that only forty people had been invited, but there must have been four or five times that number squeezed into the apartment to rub shoulders with Lyndon Johnson’s near-certain successor. A couple of security men watched uneasily. Lanning himself had his jacket off and was playing the piano, while Margot stood off to one side, as if bored by the proceedings, although the sharp green eyes darted constantly. The crowd around Lanning was singing, mostly Cole Porter. He played admirably. The guests made no secret of their adoration. The room was awash in liquor. Kevin Garland circulated, whispering in an ear here, shaking a hand there. Eddie guessed he was collecting commitments for the campaign war chest.

  “Thank you for coming,” said Aurelia, standing beside him. Eddie turned in surprise and, probably, delight. She gave him
a delicate hug. “And you brought Gary.”

  The millionaire grinned. “Actually, I brought Eddie.”

  “Oh,” said Aurie, confused.

  Eddie said nothing. He was, for a moment, afraid to speak. He had forgotten how she felt. Her warmth. Her scent.

  So Gary spoke for him. “We came to check out a nasty rumor.”

  The crack woke Eddie from his stupor. He rounded on his longtime friend. Had he always mistaken this naked cynicism for good humor, or had Gary changed under Erebeth’s influence? “Stop it,” he said.

  “What?”

  “You’re not funny, Gary. Go bother somebody else.”

  But the aplomb of the truly rich is unshakable. “No, thanks. I think I’ll stay and bother you.”

  Eddie turned his back. He took Aurelia by the arm, drew her off toward the front hall. People were shouting out songs for Lanning to play. A prosperous Caucasian was whispering in Margot’s ear. She kept nodding gravely.

  “What is it, Eddie? What’s wrong?” Aurelia inclined her head toward his, offered the old mischievous smile. “We can’t talk alone for more than a minute or two, or people will think—well, you know what they’ll think.”

  “I want to ask you a question,” he said.

  She drew her Virginia Slims from her purse, tapped one into her hand, slid it between her lips. Eddie took her lighter, did the honors.

  “So ask,” she said.

  “How well does Kevin know Perry Mount?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “What you told me about the testament—”

  Aurelia stiffened. She remembered Mona’s advice. And Kevin’s fears. “I meant what I said five years ago, Eddie. We’re never talking about that again. I wish I’d never opened my stupid mouth.”

  But Eddie, as she often used to say, could be a mule. “I think there’s a connection among the three of them. Perry, Kevin, and Philmont Castle.” He cast an eye back toward the parlor. “And Margot Frost. Maybe the Senator.”