Christopher Buckley - Supreme Courtship

Pepper reached for the phone and called the Marshall of the Court’s office. “I need a car. Right away.”

Crispus stirred from his own lugubrious meditations-in fact, he had been offering silent prayers for Mr. Clenndennynn; doubtless Silvio was phoning the Vatican in Rome and exhorting the Holy Father to convene the College of Cardinals and put them to collective flash-priority orisons.

“Hm? Where are you going?” Crispus said.

“To the hospital.”

This took a moment to sink in. “No,” he said, “you can’t do that.”

“Got to.”

“You can’t.”

“Shut up, Crispy.”

“Darling child-you’ll be crucified…”

“Screw that.”

“But-”

“I’ll call you from the hospital.”

“At least let your boyfriend know,” he called after her, but she was already out the door.

Twenty minutes later, Crispus, watching on the television in his own chambers, saw the commotion at the hospital’s entrance as her town car arrived, the swarm of media turning on it like a wave as she emerged and was shouldered through the horde by Court marshals.

“Justice Cartwright… Supreme Court Justice Pepper Cartwright has just arrived at the hospital… Justice Cartwright has arrived at George Washington Hospital where Graydon Clenndennynn is in critical condition following a heart attack during oral argument. That’s all we know at the moment, but it would appear that she has come to the bedside of the lawyer who just an hour ago was arguing the President’s case before the Supreme Court. Jeff, does that complicate matters any?

“Well, yes, it could. Judges and attorneys are proscribed-prohibited-from discussing a case outside of court. The term for it is ex parte discussion. While it’s obvious-at least I would think-that Justice Cartwright hasn’t come to the hospital to discuss Mitchell v. Vanderdamp with Clenndennynn, there is so much tension surrounding this case that her presence here could play into the hands of those who have been insisting that she recuse herself. So the short answer to your question would be, yes, it could be a complicating factor in an already hypercomplicated matter.”

Crispus closed his eyes and shook his head. Less than a minute later, his phone rang. It was the CJ.

“Jesus Christ, Crispus.”

“She’s your girlfriend, Dec, not mine.”

“Does she have any idea…”

“Declan. Why don’t you just breathe into a bag and calm down. She didn’t go down there to get his views on Coleman v. Miller, for God’s sake. She cares for the old goat.”

“That’s not the point!”

“Well, it’s going to have to be ‘the point.’ Look, he’s probably not even going to regain consciousness, so it’s moot.”

“Let’s hope he doesn’t.”

“A fine sentiment.”

“I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Steady hand on the tiller, Declan. Steady hand. Dec? Hello?”

PEPPER HAD REACHED THE ICU when her cell phone began twittering. She pulled it out and flipped it open when an intercepting nurse said, “You need to turn that off, ma’am.” She looked ready to pluck it out of Pepper’s hand before it could compromise life-sustaining telemetry.

JUSTICE’S CELL CALL FINISHES OFF GRAYDON CLENNDENNYNN- MURDER CHARGES BROUGHT

Pepper looked at the phone as she was pressing the OFF button and saw DEC.

She paused, then did a 180 and walked briskly to an area where cell phones were not considered lethal weapons.

“I’m at the hospital-”

“I know you’re at the hospital,” he said. “It’s on TV. You need to not be at the hospital.”

“Dec, for Pete’s sake, I didn’t come here to discuss the damn case with him.”

“I don’t care. I want you to leave the hospital now, Pep.”

People were staring at her. She said in a whisper, “He doesn’t have family. I’m just going to hold his hand is all.”

“No, no, no. That is not your role, Justice Cartwright. Now leave. And make sure everyone sees you leaving. I want to watch you leave on TV. Tell the reporters you didn’t talk to him, you just came to… talk to the doctors and see how he was doing.”

“Jesus, Dec. I don’t want him to die alone.”

“You’re not a hospice worker. You’re a Supreme Court justice.”

“And you’re a supreme jerk.” She pressed END and turned back to the ICU. Normally, visitors were not admitted, but apparently they made exceptions for the Supreme Court.

SHE’D BEEN BY HIS BED for a half hour, sitting, hovering, pacing. She counted the machines he was hooked up to and stopped at nine. From her conversations with the chief of cardiology, the head of the unit, and the head of the hospital, he was being well looked after, Mr. Clenndennynn. She grasped that the end was near for the old man. She pulled a rolling stool up to the bed and, finding a part of his hand that didn’t have an IV or O 2saturation sensor attached, held it.

She whispered to him, “Don’t you dare leave me alone with this mess you got me into.”

Suddenly, behind her there was a commotion and she became aware of men in suits with earpieces. She heard someone saying to her, in commanding terms, “Ma’am?” She looked up. There were several men, all large, grave-looking. One was saying to her, “Ma’am? You need to vacate the room.”

She ignored him and turned back to Clenndennynn.

“Ma’am.”

She heard her name being uttered, murmurs, then no more barking at her. A few moments later there was another commotion, louder, the room filled. She looked up and there was the President. He looked stricken and his eyes were red. Hayden Cork was there, too, looking pale and drawn. She stood. She and the President stared at each other awkwardly and then embraced. The imminence of death forces intimacy. Even Hayden Cork, who gave the impression of someone who’d gone unhugged even by his own mother, embraced her.

The President’s arrival at the hospital was duly reported. At the Supreme Court, Chief Justice Hardwether, watching on TV, muttered, “Oh, great.”

Graydon Clenndennynn died at 5:42 p.m. that afternoon. He regained consciousness briefly. He opened his eyes, took in Pepper, the President of the United States, the White House Chief of Staff, and smiled as if satisfied by this bedside concentration of eminence.

“Did we win?” he whispered. Poignant, as last words go, but in this instance, far from ideal. Pepper was trying to formulate some answer when the old man closed his eyes.

CARTWRIGHT DEATHBED VISIT TO CLENNDENNYNN CASTS PALL OVER CASE AMID CALLS FOR RECUSAL

It was one of the milder headlines of the days following.

The burial at Arlington took on the aspect of a state occasion. In attendance were the President, the entire cabinet (minus the obligatory nonattendee in case of sneak nuclear attack), and-Declan had insisted-all nine justices of the Supreme Court.

Dexter Mitchell was in conspicuous attendance. One TV commentator whispered that it reminded him of the funeral scene in The Godfather. Would Blyster Forkmorgan approach Hayden Cork as taps was sounding to arrange “a meet on neutral turf”?

Pepper had not spoken with Declan since Graydon’s death. It would be more accurate to say that Declan had not spoken to her. Crispus acted as go-between.

With the clock ticking toward Inauguration Day, there was no time for a cease-fire between the Mitchell and Vanderdamp camps. A replacement for Graydon Clenndennynn was engaged, Philip “Flip” Soyer, a much-garlanded appellate lawyer who had once practiced law with Graydon, a former Solicitor General universally acknowledged to be a Matterhorn of probity. His only public statement was to say that he saw no need to file a new brief and would endeavor to pick up where Mr. Clenndennynn had left off.