Suspect Red

by L. M. Elliott

  “Yeah, you want to borrow it?”

  Richard tried to stay cool. “Nah, I have a copy of it already.”

  Vladimir smiled with approval. “Don’t you love the way Holden just goes out on the town in New York City on his own?”

  “Yeah. And the way he talks to all the cabdrivers.”

  “Oh man, Salinger really gets those guys. That driver who’s so worked up when Holden asks if he knows what happens to the ducks over winter? Spot-on. Talking to a teed-off cabdriver is like sticking your head in a lion’s mouth. Ask a cabdriver an existential question like that and you’ll get your head taken off. Stick to the Knicks with cabbies, I say. Old Holden Caulfield. What a character.”

  Richard had no idea what existential meant. But he nodded. “Yeah, what a hoot.”

  “Soooooooooo, any fields of rye around here?”

  Richard laughed again. This was great! Someone he could really talk to!

  “Seriously, though, man, what’s there to do in this neighborhood?”

  Richard thought for a moment. “There are great bike paths in Rock Creek Park. We can get to the National Zoo on them.”

  “Too hot for that today.”

  “There’s a bakery and ice-cream counter not far from here.”

  “Hmmmm. Nah, just had lunch. Hey, is there a movie theater anywhere nearby?”

  “Yeah, the Uptown is a ten-minute walk, maybe fifteen, on Connecticut Avenue.”

  “Swell! There’s this new flick out called From Here to Eternity. It’s got Burt Lancaster and Frank Sinatra. Wait. You know who they are, right?” Vladimir grinned.

  Richard tensed. That was exactly the kind of question Jimmy would have asked, but it would have been all snarky. He realized with relief that this boy’s teasing was good-natured rather than snide. “Yeeeaaah.”

  “Righto! Let’s go check it out.” Vladimir was already racing down the stairs, shouting, “Mom! Hey, Mom, where are you?”

  Both mothers were still in the kitchen. Abigail was sitting on the floor in a snowdrift of crumpled newspapers, pulling out finely etched wineglasses from a box and handing them one at a time to Teresa.

  “We want to see a movie, Mom,” Vladimir announced.

  “Of course, miláček.” She pulled open a drawer, fished out her wallet, and handed him two dollars. “Treat Richard in thanks for all this gracious help his mother is lending me. We’ll be done with the kitchen in no time, thanks to Abby. Do you know where you’re going?”

  “Richard does.”

  “That okay with you, Mom?” Richard asked, dreading her answer. Usually Abigail wanted to know exactly what the movie was about and who was in it and if it had any bad language or inappropriate guy-girl stuff before she would decide yea or nay. It was so embarrassing. He plastered a plea on his face and prayed she saw it.

  Abigail took a deep breath. “Be home by dinner, honey.”

  “Thanks, Mom!” He grinned his gratitude, but still made sure he and his new friend escaped from the house before she could change her mind. As the boys trotted down the front porch stairs, Vladimir said, “You’re going to love this film. I hear there’s a really steamy scene between Lancaster and Deborah Kerr on the beach!”

  Wow, this guy is wild, thought Richard. Maybe high school wouldn’t be so bad after all.

  RICHARD shifted his weight back and forth on his feet. He, Abigail, and Don had been standing forever in the reception line at Senator Joseph McCarthy’s wedding. During the first twenty minutes, he’d been pretty entertained, speculating who in the crowd might be some kind of double agent. This was a party for the world’s chief Red-hunter, after all. The room was full of important people that commies would love to turn. Someone there was sure to be a Red up to no good.

  Richard’s fascination with conspiracy theories had been fueled by a book Vladimir lent him that so far was only published in England—Casino Royale by Ian Fleming. A friend from “across the pond” had shipped it over. “I know you like all that spy stuff,” Vlad had said as he tossed it to him. It was a crazy-good story about a British secret agent named James Bond.

  But Richard was bored now with searching all the tuxedoed men at the wedding party for a Le Chiffre–style bad guy or an M-like king of intelligence gathering. He glanced at his mom. She looked so happy to be in the Washington Club’s ornate ballroom. Evidently, she’d made her coming-out-to-society debut there when she was seventeen years old. Eons ago, she’d joked. She hadn’t known Don then. They’d met at a soda fountain right after that and fallen head over heels, despite her parents’ objections that Don was “just” a G-man.

  She looked really pretty right now, smiling softly and gazing up at the chandeliers. So Richard stifled himself from complaining about the wait.

  “Don, half the Senate’s here,” Abigail whispered. “And a lot of White House staffers.”

  Don nodded.

  She reached out to brush Richard’s hair into company-presentable place. With his crew cut, it was a pretty unnecessary gesture.

  “Mom! Stop embarrassing me.”

  Abigail giggled nervously. “Sorry, honey.” She patted his cheek. “You look very handsome, son.” Then, barely skipping a beat, she tugged on Don’s tuxedo sleeve and whispered, “Oh look, isn’t that the CIA director? I thought you told me that he doesn’t like McCarthy.”

  Don shot her a shhhhhhhh look even as he smiled fondly at her. He lowered his voice and leaned in toward them to answer. “He doesn’t. But people are too afraid of McCarthy to not come to something for him if invited. Even if they hate the guy.” Then he straightened and plastered on a party smile.

  Abigail peeped down the row. “Jean looks beautiful, don’t you think, Don? She always was, even when she was bitty and I babysat her.”

  “You’re the best-looking lady here tonight, honey.” Don kissed her on her blond curls.

  Geez, thought Richard, the two of them were so…What would Vladimir say? Schmaltzy. Richard liked how in love his parents were. But yeah, schmaltzy. That was the right word for it.

  Time to change the scenario.

  “Where’s Gin? Maybe I should go find her?” Richard asked hopefully. Abigail had allowed Ginny to wander the ballroom as long as she came back in time to thank the senator and his new wife when the family reached the end of the line—the perks of being younger. “She might feel kind of lost in all these grown-ups, you know,” Richard said. He sure would have been when he was her age.

  Don laughed. “She’s holding her own.” He nodded toward the vaulted windows, framed with ornate sconce chandeliers, where Ginny was chatting up Senator Kennedy’s new wife, Jackie.

  “How does she do that?” Richard murmured to himself. His little sister was definitely becoming a force to be reckoned with, and he wasn’t so sure how he felt about it. She was so weirdly smart and starting to monopolize their parents’ attention. Every once in a while he got a hot stab of jealousy about her. It felt awful—making him mad and sorry at the same time.

  Like now, as Don said, “That girl sure has pluck—just walking up to Jackie Kennedy like that.”

  Ever since Life magazine did a cover story about her, Jackie had become the darling of the country—young, eloquent, fashionable, and aristocratically gracious. The adults vying for her attention were looking pretty peeved at being upstaged by a nine-year-old. Finally, Ginny shook Jackie’s hand and skipped back to her family.

  “What in the world were you two talking about, sugarplum?” Don asked.

  “I was asking her advice about getting a job at a newspaper when I grow up,” Ginny said matter-of-factly. “You know, she used to be the Inquiring Camera Girl for the Washington Times-Herald. She was telling me how she just roved the city, taking pictures of people and asking them questions about the day’s issues for her column. And guess what, Mom? She interviewed Vice President Nixon and drew sketches of President Eisenhower’s inauguration and even covered Queen Elizabeth’s coronation! Isn’t that astonishing?”

  “You don’
t say!” answered Abigail. She smiled slightly with amusement before echoing, “Astonishing!”

  “It’s too bad she can’t do it anymore, now that’s she’s married,” said Ginny.

  “Maybe you need to take her place, then, until some lucky dog steals your heart. But now,” Don said, turning her to face forward, “to meet Senator McCarthy.”

  “Hey, Dad?” Richard tried to get into the conversation. “Wasn’t the senator a tail gunner during the war, like you?”

  Don grunted. “That’s what his campaign slogan said.”

  “Did you ever meet—”

  “Shhhh, honey,” Abigail interrupted. “We’re next.”

  There he was. The self-proclaimed man of the year, looking very uncomfortable in his formal morning coattails and striped pants. He had dark, thinning hair, greased back flat on his large round head, and black, cigar-thick eyebrows. Even as he joked, the senator’s meaty face seemed slightly sinister.

  “Yes, yes.” McCarthy was nodding as he shook the hand of the man ahead of Richard’s family. “We’re off to the Caribbean for a month. But I’ll swim back if I have to, if there’s trouble.” He clapped the guy on the back and the man staggered forward a little.

  “Oh, surely, dear, your committee can take care of things while we’re away.” His new wife smiled sweetly.

  McCarthy ignored her. “Make no mistake, we’re dealing with an epidemic. Even a day with our guard down is dangerous. Since the war ended and those lily-livered Democrats let Stalin take over Eastern Europe, the number of Communists in the world has multiplied four hundred times, I tell you—as fast as alley cats breed.” McCarthy was getting wound up, his famous baritone whine getting louder as he spoke. “Millions upon millions of people have become Reds in the last eight years. And they are just as sneaky and invasive and diseased in their thinking as feral fleabags.”

  McCarthy started bobbing his head up and down to emphasize certain hot-button words like he did on TV. “Communists call God a hoax! They kill all dissenters. They build bombs to obliterate us. And if those left-wingers—those East Coast boys born with silver spoons in their mouths—had their way, we’d invite them in for dinner and give them all our cream.”

  The man laughed and said, “Not while you’re around, Joe!”

  McCarthy shook the man’s hand enthusiastically, splashing him with the whiskey in his glass.

  But before he could say anything else, Mrs. McCarthy suggested the man be sure to try some of the shrimp cocktail as a way of easing him along. “Abby!” She brightened at seeing Richard’s mother.

  The women embraced as Don thanked the senator for having them.

  “Jean planned the whole thing.” McCarthy shrugged. “She keeps me straight. Damn near runs my senate office, too.” He smiled at Ginny. “And who is this little lady?”

  Richard’s skin kind of crawled as the senator leaned over to speak face-to-face with his little sister. But when he shook hands with the senator himself, Richard felt weirdly energized as McCarthy said, “I see a young patriot in front of me. A boy who will spot the enemy within. Am I right?”

  “Yes, sir!” Richard answered.

  “You come see me, son, if you ever want a summer internship. All right?”

  Don put his arm protectively around Richard’s shoulder. “Congratulations again, sir. I wish you and your missus much happiness. Let’s get some punch, Rich.”

  As they walked away, Richard looked up at his dad. Don’s face was a mask. “You don’t like the senator much, do you, Dad?”

  “I believe in the cause. I don’t believe in the man.”

  Don looked like he was about to add something when the band started playing.

  Abigail clasped her hand to her heart. “Oh, listen, Don. It’s that Tony Bennett song.”

  Take my hand, I’m a stranger in paradise, all lost in a wonderland….

  “How about a whirl on the dance floor, beautiful?”

  Abigail beamed.

  Sweeping her into his arms, Don waltzed them into the crowd of couples dancing cheek to cheek.

  “Oh, look, there’s Vice President Nixon!” Ginny pointed. “I’m going to go ask him what it was like to be interviewed by Jackie Kennedy!” She skipped away.

  Richard was left alone. Again.

  Arming himself with a plate of ham biscuits and some ginger-ale punch, Richard backed himself toward the gold brocade–papered wall. Boy, did he wish Vladimir were at the reception to hang out with.

  The two of them had been almost inseparable for the past few weeks. Besides waiting together for the city bus that dropped them near Wilson High School and finding each other in the cafeteria during lunch, Richard had shown Vladimir all the sights along the National Mall. Their favorite had been the Museum of Natural History and exhibits of fossils and dinosaur bones and stuffed game animals—some of them bagged by Teddy Roosevelt himself.

  Richard also had lent Vladimir his collection of Rudyard Kipling stories. “First, read The Man Who Would Be King,” Richard had said. “That’s the best.”

  In return, Vladimir had told Richard all about growing up in Czechoslovakia and then London during the war, and what being in New York City was like. He had such boss stuff—a lump of charred flak and a fragment of a Nazi bomber that he’d picked up out of the rubble of the Blitz, and hand-carved wooden toys and marionettes from Prague. He’d introduced Richard to the crazy snaking rips of jazz pianist Thelonious Monk and trumpeter Miles Davis. And, of course, the bittersweet melodies of saxophonist Charlie Parker. He talked about wanting to form his own jazz trio.

  “Bummer you’re not a musician,” Vladimir had said, genuine disappointment in his tone. “But hey, you’re hip, you read.”

  No other boy had ever said that to Richard!

  That’s when Vladimir lent him Jack London’s The Call of the Wild, jokingly warning him to be careful with it. “Jack London was a socialist, you know.” He also told Richard about a bunch of new writers calling themselves the Beat Generation. And about one of Teresa’s closest friends, a woman writer named Jane something, from Brooklyn Heights, their old New York City neighborhood.

  “You know what?” Vladimir had said. “Jane’s written a play that’s premiering on Broadway in December. You should come with us.”

  Thinking back on all that, Richard got even antsier watching old people fox-trot or whatever the heck they were doing. He went back to daydreaming about Casino Royale and how 007 might act at a reception like this, full of bigwigs, all of them potential saboteurs or con men or traitors. He put down his plate, crossed his arms over his chest, and forced a swaggering stance. “Yeah,” Richard whispered to himself, nodding and mimicking the hero. “Bradley. Rich Bradley.”

  A tap on his shoulder shattered his suave. He whirled around. There stood Dottie. Dottie Anne Glover. The girl he had worshipped and followed behind like a puppy in third grade, the girl who played Laurey last year in their school’s production of Oklahoma!, the songbird every boy at Wilson High School would gladly do a thousand days of yard chores to have one date with. Just one.

  Immediately, a song he’d written about her when he was twelve years old started buzzing in his ear. It was a stupid takeoff on a Stephen Foster song his mother played on the piano, “Jeanie With the Light Brown Hair.” His lyrics were ridiculous: I dream of Dottie with the light golden hair, borne like a goddess, I do declare. I see her skipping rope in the school playground. Beautiful and sweet with a pretty face round. What a dork. No, what a schmuck.

  “Richard?”

  He felt his mouth drop open and forced himself to shut it. God, she was gorgeous. She was wearing a sky-blue satin dress, her strawberry blond bangs perfectly straight and neat under a matching blue flowered headband. Her blue eyes shone bright through the delicate, nose-length veil that all ladies’ cocktail hats had. Fascinators, his mother called them.

  “Lady’s choice?” Dottie’s dimples deepened as she smiled and held her hand out.

  “D-d-d-dance?” Richa
rd stammered. Dottie Anne Glover wanted to dance with him? Wow! Maybe he should pretend to be James Bond more often.

  “Yes, silly! We used to dance together at cotillion. Remember?”

  Constantly.

  His own hand suddenly very sweaty, Richard took hers, thankful she wore sky-blue gloves up to her elbow so she couldn’t tell.

  Step right; slide. Step back; slide. Step left; slide. Step forward; slide. Richard looked at his ridiculously big, brightly polished shoes as he led her in an awkward box, sort of in time to the music.

  “Richie, you can look up at me. I know you know how to do this.”

  Haltingly, Richard dared to gaze at her face. Her skin was creamy, her eyelashes like butterfly wings when she blinked. And her lips. Her lips looked like sweet red rose petals. An intoxicating scent of citrus and lilies floated around her as they moved.

  Richard felt his legs get wobbly as the singer crooned.

  See the marketplace in old Algiers. Send me photographs and souvenirs….

  “This song reminds me of that boy you’re hanging out with all the time now.”

  “Vladimir?”

  “Yes.” Dottie smiled. “I hear he’s been all over the world. I wonder if he’s seen the marketplace in Algiers. That’s in the Middle East, isn’t it?”

  “Ah, North Africa.”

  “Oh! Has he been there, too? One of my girlfriends told me she’d heard that he drove a sleigh through Siberia.”

  “What? No, he didn’t. He lived in Prague.”

  “Poland? Do you suppose he saw Mozart’s home? Oh, it’s all so romantic, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, I guess.” Mesmerized by her eyes, Richard decided to not correct her geography. Only girls like Ginny knew stuff like that anyway, he figured.

  “All the girls have been talking about him. Marilyn’s dad is a chief of staff on the Hill. I forget which congressman.” She paused for a moment, trying to remember the name. “It doesn’t matter. Anyway, Marilyn’s dad said that Vladimir’s dad is in the State Department. Is that right?”