James Bell - Deadlock

“Catch you at a bad time?” President Francis asked.

The worst. “No, Mr. President. Just enjoying a quiet evening at home.”

“Sorry to hear that, if you know what I mean.”

Levering could almost see him raising his eyebrows, Groucho Marx style.

“Reason I called,” Francis said. “You happy about Hollander?”

“Did you see the hearings?”

“Some.”

“What was your take?”

“Frankly, Sam, I got a little nervous. That stuff about being open to changing. What was that all about?”

Levering knocked back the rest of his booze. “Just horseradish to calm the conservatives. Being open to change means hey, I might even slide over to your side sometime. But she won’t slide.”

“You’re still sure about that?”

“John,” Levering said with mild reproof, “I’ve been in this game a long time.”

“All right,” the president said. “Just keep your eyes wide open. This is a delicate balance we got going here. I don’t want to lose the presidency over this.”

“That would be tragic, John.”

“I better keep my eye on you, too,” Francis said with a laugh.

You got that right, Levering thought.

After the call Sam Levering poured himself another drink, a stiff one, no ice. He killed it in less than a minute. He wanted sleep now, wanted the demons to quit for the night, and alcohol was the only way he knew to do that.

He was stumbling out of the library when he lost his balance. He fell, and as he did he reached out with his arms, flailing stupidly, grabbing for anything to prop him up. All he could reach were books, and they fell on top of him as he hit the carpet.

Cursing, he clambered to his feet and felt for the light switch. His vision was blurry, the room angling at strange degrees according to his pickled brain. He leaned over to the four volumes that had landed on him, cursing some more, and then he stopped cold.

One of the books was a crisp, black, leather-bound Bible. The one his son had sent to him years ago. He had not noticed it since. He’d just shoved it in the stacks and forgotten all about it.

Now it had jumped out at him, like an accusation.

He picked it up at once, ran his thumb over the leather cover, hefted it. It hefted back, the weight of its pages heavier than he remembered.

For a moment he thought he might cry.

Instead he grunted. Carrying this Tad-thing, he felt his way through the darkened house to the back door. He staggered outside into the stillness, down the steps, and onto the grass. He found the trash bin, opened the lid, dumped the Bible inside it.

Then he slammed the lid down with all his strength.

A little old woman who might have stepped out of a Frank Capra movie answered the door. “Hello, Millie,” Dorothy Bonassi said, as if eight years hadn’t passed since they’d seen each other. “Come in. Bill’s expecting you.”

The house was large, but not ostentatious. Books were everywhere. A grandfather clock tick-tocked in the large hall.

Dorothy Bonassi showed Millie through the kitchen and out the back door, which opened to a commodious verandah. It overlooked a green lawn, with a large dogwood in the middle.

At the bottom of the stairs, Millie saw a gardener fiddling with some dirt near the house. He wore a large sun hat and gloves, and worked a trowel like a pro.

Dorothy paused and shook her head. “Bill, did you forget she was coming?”

The gardener said in a familiar voice, “No, Mrs. Bonassi.” And then William T. Bonassi looked up from his garden and smiled. “Welcome, Millie. Nice to see you again.”

“I’ll just go and make some iced tea,” Dorothy said.

Bonassi took off his gardening gloves and offered his hand to Millie. His grip was firm and sure. Like the man himself, Millie thought. Here he was, eighty-nine years old, and looking as full of life as he did when he’d retired. She remembered his vibrancy from those days, his prodigious memory and his sense of humor.

“I’m getting ready for the fall planting,” Bonassi said. “Trying to bring in Black-eyed Susan this year. You know Black-eyed Susans?”

“I’m afraid not,” Millie said.

“ Rudbeckia fulgida . Nice, hardy flower, grows in sun or shade. What I like about them is they’re tough and easy to grow in almost all types of soil. Except soggy. Soggy soil isn’t good for the Susan.”

He looked at her as if expecting a response. “No,” she said with half a brain. “Soggy soil isn’t good.”

“Always thought the Susan was what a Supreme Court justice ought to be like.”

Millie cocked her head, seeing a little glint in the eyes of her former colleague.

Bonassi said, “Firm, ready for any weather. But not soggy in his philosophy. A soggy philosophy makes a soggy judge.”

Mrs. Bonassi played the perfect hostess, as Millie remembered her. In fact, she did not seem to Millie to have aged so much as… fulfill. That was an odd word, but the only one Millie could think of. Dorothy set the tea out on a silver tray on the verandah.

“I won’t say I wasn’t surprised when you called,” Bill Bonassi said. “We served, what, two years together?”

“Two, yes.”

“And I don’t remember that many conversations, outside the normal small talk. I do remember two words you used to say to me all the time, however.”

“Really? What were they?”

“ I disagree.” And then he laughed. Millie could not help but laugh a little, too. In this setting he seemed more like a favorite grandfather than an esteemed former justice.

“I must admit I was a little intimidated,” Millie said.

“By me?” Bonassi said.

“By Bill?” Dorothy said at the same time.

Millie nodded. “The Lion of the Court, after all.”

“Ah,” Bonassi waved his hand in the air. “Twaddle. Who makes up those names?”

“I do remember something about you,” Millie said. “Your faith. Bill, you never talked about your religion around us and I respected you for that. You didn’t want it to become the thing that defined you on the Court. And I – ”

“No, no,” Bonassi gently corrected. “On the contrary, my faith defines me in every way. But then again, everyone has faith.”

“How so?”

“Well, we have faith that there is such a thing as existence. And that we are rational creatures capable of finding answers. We have to make that leap of faith or there’s nothing to talk about, is there?”

“I suppose not,” Millie said with a slight laugh.

“Faith precedes knowledge. It makes knowledge possible.”

“But how did your faith influence you on the bench?”

Bonassi thought about the question, his fingertips touching in steeple fashion. “It certainly influenced my view of the basis of law. I believe the principles of justice to be real, not merely manmade ideas. May I inquire, dear Millie, why you are asking?”

Millie took in a deep breath. “I didn’t know who else to come to. I had an encounter with God – ” Does this sound stupid? “I mean, I have come to believe in a God. I hadn’t thought about him for a long time, but I’m thinking about him now and I’m pretty shaken up about it.”

Dorothy Bonassi immediately put an understanding hand on Millie’s arm. She said nothing, only smiled. “Tell us about it,” she said at last.

Millie did, starting from the accident all the way through to the moment on the plane when she felt like a door was opening for her.

When she finished, the Old Lion had a sparkle in his eyes. He seemed fifty years younger. “I didn’t embrace Christianity until I was out of law school. It threw me for a large loop, too. Changed the way I looked at the law, that is for certain.”