T. Bunn - Drummer in the Dark

To Jackie’s astonishment, Carter said, “Maybe you should give Ms. Havilland a chance, Kay.”

The senator remained leaning over the bed. “Why should I?”

Carter gave a minute shrug. “Graham always said he’d take Esther’s hunches over a full-on staff analysis any day.” When the senator did not speak, he went on, “Just pray on it. I know that’s what Graham would tell you.”

Senator Trilling leaned closer to the head with the bright staring eyes. “Please get up and get well, Graham. I don’t think I can do this without you.”

“He’s just resting up for the big push,” Carter said, directing his words toward Esther, who had not moved from her place near the door. Carter folded his paper and reached for his shoes. “Just getting ready for the next battle on the floor.”

The senator turned and walked back into the living room, where she glared at Jackie, then enfolded Esther into another embrace. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

“These days everything I do seems either wrong or not enough.” Trilling walked to the door and left without another word.

Carter approached Esther. “I’ll see you at nine.”

“Yes. All right.”

He patted her arm, gave Jackie a swift nod, then let himself out. The room seemed to expand a fraction and take an easier breath. Esther sighed her way over to the sofa. “Please forgive us.”

Jackie moved over to the neighboring settee. “There’s nothing-”

“Graham was the first man I ever met who cared nothing for my money. Oh, he enjoyed it enough. But it had no hold over him. I was utterly fascinated by his indifference to wealth. I had spent a lifetime building barriers to keep out people who only pretended to care about me. Yet here was this man, dashing and fiery and full of ideas, who had no time for my airs or my reserve.”

Jackie listened, knowing the words were not really meant for her at all. The older woman was simply trying to knit the fabric of her world back together. Esther continued to direct her gaze and her words toward the empty fireplace. “Graham refused to permit me to hide away. He could be positively brutal in his impatience. What he saw in me, why he forced me to open up, what he expected to find. .” She turned so she could glance at the bed, seeing another time, another man. “I should have been more ready for this. I should have prepared myself better. Learned more. Become stronger.”

Jackie waited long enough for the silence to press down on them both, then asked, “What do you want me to do?”

“There’s a seminar at the University of Maryland tomorrow,” Esther replied. “I was supposed to represent Graham. Now I’ll have to be at the hospital. But somebody needs to go and observe the enemy’s movements.”

“You mean the congressman who was just here?”

“Wynn Bryant. Yes. A terrible man.”

“I’ll go,” Jackie said. “It’s no problem.”

But the offer only left Esther more sorrowful. “I’m counting the hours and watching the sand fall. And I’m helpless to do anything that matters. Everything my husband fought for is threatening to unravel, unless I can find someone to champion his cause.”

Saturday

Wynn arose late and took the day’s paper and several files downstairs with him. He ordered a full breakfast to make up for the dinner he had not eaten the night before. The Willard’s main dining room was a beaux arts masterpiece, the chamber’s sweeping scope magnified by rich colors and gold leaf. People came and went, waiters bustled in hushed efficiency, daylight traced a silent timeline across the carpeted floor and linen-draped tables. He reread the Jubilee Amendment file but found it impossible to understand. The file assumed a background knowledge that he simply did not possess. When the lunch crowd finally began to trickle in, Wynn went by the front desk to request a car, then returned upstairs to call his sister. He got the Saturday switchboard operator at the governor’s mansion, a recorded message on Sybel’s cellphone, and no answer at all on their private number. He returned downstairs to find a new Lincoln and driver waiting by the front doors.

At his request, the driver took the Rock Creek Parkway, where Wynn was surrounded by a mint green world and the fragrances of springtime and rushing waters. Along both sides of the highway, dogwoods and tulip poplars offered cloud puffs of childlike peace. Wynn rolled down his window and set his face to the breeze, but found himself unable to shut out Esther’s echoing tirade. His mind probed with the precision of a tongue moving across an aching tooth.

College Park was an aging middle-class town located out beyond the Goddard Space Center. The university itself was big and flat and sprawling, composed of redbrick buildings with white-pillared porticoes whose former gentility was sliding into urban seediness. As they drove through the university campus, Wynn used his cellphone again to try and raise his sister. Sybel was usually fastidious about remaining in touch. Wynn let the private upstairs phone ring at least a dozen times. Nothing. As they pulled up in front of the assembly building, Wynn called back to the main switchboard. The operator claimed to know nothing of Sybel’s movements and said only that Governor Wells had left strict instructions not to be disturbed. Wynn rose from the limo with yet another unanswered question for his collection.

He climbed the stairs and entered a large outer chamber filled with people and coffee-break clatter. If the gathering found anything incorrect in his arriving six hours late, they did not show it. As soon as Wynn gave his name, he was surrounded. Eager faces and outstretched hands pressed in from all sides.

A beefy man in a wrinkled suit finally pushed his way forward. “Congressman Bryant, did I get that name right? We only heard yesterday you’d be coming. Couldn’t believe it, to tell the truth. Reverend Dan Freedburg. Great to have you.”

Wynn allowed the guy to pump his hand, then spotted a blond woman cruising in close behind the pastor. It was the young lady from Esther’s living room. The wince gathered in his gut and rose slowly. But the woman did not speak. She merely stood there and watched.

“Really great you’d take the time to be here, especially your first week in office. But I guess we shouldn’t have expected anything less from Graham’s replacement. Only wish you had been elected earlier.” The pastor grabbed Wynn’s arm and turned back, saying to the crush, “Give us a little room, people. We’ll all have a chance to speak to the congressman soon enough.”

Wynn was distinctly aware of the blond woman trailing his movements. “Why earlier?”

“Because of his first stroke. The doctors warned him if he didn’t slow down he’d be done for. We begged him to resign. But he wouldn’t let the cause go. No surprise, I suppose. You know how Graham is.”

“No,” Wynn corrected. The blond woman was so close he could smell her, fresh soap and something natural. Lavender perhaps. “I don’t.”

That halted Freedburg. “Don’t what?”

“I hardly know Graham Hutchings,” Wynn said, determined to enter this without pretense of any kind. “And I know nothing about his cause.”

The pastor did not look surprised so much as stricken. Wynn went on, “Two White House staffers asked me to come today. I’m here to listen and to learn. If you’ll let me.”

The gathering gave off a single unified sound, somewhere between a sigh and a lament. “Then you don’t know anything,” the pastor said slowly, “about the Jubilee Amendment?”

“The name, nothing more.”

“So you’re not here to address us.”

“To be honest, I’d just as soon you not introduce me at all.” The pastor looked so wearied by his words, Wynn repeated, “Like I said, I’m here because I’m interested in learning more.”