Stephen Carter - Emperor of Ocean Park

“He was a great man, your father,” Jack Ziegler interrupts. “A very great man, a very good friend. But now that he is dead, well.. .” He trails off and raises his hand, palm upmost, and tilts it one way, then the other. “Now I would very much like to be of assistance to you.”

“To me?”

“Correct, Talcott. And to your family, naturally,” he adds softly, rubbing his temples. The skin is so loose it seems to move under his fingers. I imagine it tearing away to leave only an unhappy skull.

I glance over at the cars. Kimmer is impatient. So is Uncle Mal. I look down at my baby sister’s godfather once more. His help is the very last thing I want.

“Well, thank you, but I think we have everything under control.”

“But you will call? If you need anything, you will call? Especially if… an emergency should arise?”

I shrug. “Okay.”

“With your wife, for instance,” he continues. “I understand that she is going to become a judge. I think that is wonderful. I understand that she has always wanted this.”

“It isn’t certain yet,” I answer automatically, surprised that the secret has spread up into the Rocky Mountains, and also not wanting Jack Ziegler anywhere near her nomination. He has already spoiled one judicial career too many. “She isn’t the only candidate.”

“I know this.” The burning eyes are gleeful again. “I understand that a colleague of yours believes the job to be his for the taking. Some would call him the front-runner.”

I am thrown, once more, by the breadth of his knowledge; I choose not to wonder how he knows what he knows. I am glad that Kimmer is not within earshot.

“I suppose so. But, look, I have to-”

“Listen, Talcott. Are you listening?” He has drawn close to me again. “I do not think he has the staying power, this colleague of yours. It is my understanding that a fairly large skeleton is rattling around in his closet. And we all know what that means, eh?” He coughs violently. “Sooner or later, it is bound to tumble out.”

“What kind of skeleton?” I ask, sudden eagerness overwhelming my caution.

“I would not concern myself with such things if I were you. I would not share them with your lovely wife. I would wait patiently for the wheel to turn.”

I am mystified, but not precisely unhappy. If there is information that would kill off Marc Hadley’s chances, I can hardly wait for it to-what did he say?-tumble out. Even though Marc and I were once friends, I cannot resist a rising excitement. Perhaps America’s obsession with the use of scandal to disqualify nominees for the bench is absurd, but this is my wife we are talking about.

Still, what can Jack Ziegler possibly know about Marc Hadley that nobody else does?

“Thank you, Uncle Jack,” I say uncertainly.

“I am always happy to be of assistance to any of Oliver’s children.” His voice has assumed a curiously formal tone. I am chilled once more. Is the skeleton something that he has somehow created? Is a criminal maneuvering to help my wife attain her longed-for seat on the bench? I have to say something, and it is not easy to decide what.

“Uh, Uncle Jack, I… I’m grateful that you would think to help, but…”

His disintegrating eyebrows slowly rise. Otherwise his expression does not change. He knows what I am trying to say but has no intention of making it easy.

“Well, it’s just that I think Kimmer… Kimberly… wants to have the selection go forward so that, um, the better candidate wins. On the merits. She wouldn’t want anybody to… interfere.” And I am suddenly sure, as I say the difficult words, that what I am telling him is true. My smart, ambitious wife never wants to be beholden to anybody, for anything. When we were students, she made a name for herself around the building with her outspoken opposition to affirmative action, which she saw as just another way for white liberals to place black people in their debt.

Maybe she was right.

Uncle Jack, meanwhile, has his answer ready: “Oh, Talcott, Talcott, please have no fear on that account. I am not proposing to. .. interfere.” He chuckles lightly, then coughs. “I am only predicting what is to occur. I have information. I am not going to use it. Nor do you need to do so. Your colleague, your wife’s rival, has many, many enemies. One of them is certain to unlock the door and allow the skeleton to tumble out. The service I am doing for you is simply to let you know. Nothing more.”

I nod. Standing up to Jack Ziegler has drained me.

“And now it is your turn,” he continues. “I think perhaps you, Talcott, might be of assistance to me.”

I close my eyes briefly. What did I expect? He did not travel all this way to tell me that Marc Hadley’s candidacy is going to collapse, or to pay his last respects to my father. He came because he wants something.

“Talcott, you must listen to me. Listen with care. I must ask you one question.”

“Go ahead.” I want suddenly to be free of him. I want to share his odd news with Kimmer, even though he told me not to. I want her to kiss me happily, overjoyed that she seems to be on the verge of getting what she wants.

“Others will ask this of you, some with good motives, some with ill,” he explains unhelpfully in his mysterious accent. “Not all of them will be who they say they are, and not all of them will mean you well.”

I forgot Uncle Jack’s eerie, unfathomable certainty that all the world is conspiring, but he evidently has changed little from the days when he used to drop by the Vineyard house with gifts from foreign ports and complaints about the machinations of the Kennedys, whose irresolution, he used to say, cost us Cuba. None of the children knew what he was talking about, but we loved the passion of his stories.

“Okay,” I say.

“And so I must ask what they will ask,” he continues, the mad eyes sparkling.

“Well, fire away,” I sigh. Over by the limousine, Kimmer is glancing at her watch and raising her hand, beckoning, to urge me to hurry. Maybe she has another telephone meeting coming up. Maybe she, too, is scared of Jack Ziegler, whom she has never quite met. Maybe I need to get this over with. “But I really only have a few minutes to. ..”

“The arrangements, Talcott,” he interrupts in that wheezy whisper. “I must know everything about the arrangements.”

“The arrangements,” I repeat stupidly, aware that my sister is not as crazy as I have been hoping, and that my brother, sensing that something is going on but not sure what, has moved half a step closer to us, in the manner of a protector or a wary parent-very often the same thing.

“Yes, the arrangements.” The hot, joyful lunacy on his face sears my own. “What arrangements did your father make in the event of his death?”

“I’m not sure what you-”

“I believe you know precisely what I mean.” A hint of steel: here, for the first time, is the Jack Ziegler about whom everybody was reporting back in 1986.

“No, I don’t. Mariah told me you called and asked her the same thing. And I have to tell you what I told her. I don’t have the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

Uncle Jack shakes his sickly head impatiently. “Come, Talcott, we are not children, you and I. I have known you since you were born. I am your sister’s godfather, may she rest in peace.” A gesture toward the plot. “I was your father’s friend. You know what I am asking, I think, you know what it means, and you know why I inquire. I must know the arrangements.”

“I’m still not quite sure what you mean. I’m sorry.”

“Your father’s arrangements, Talcott.” He is exasperated. “Come. The arrangements he worked out with you in the event of his, ah, unexpected demise.”