There are two weekly newspapers on Martha’s Vineyard: the Vineyard Gazette and the Martha’s Vineyard Times. Both deal solely with island issues and neither makes much pretense of separating its editorial views from its news coverage. The papers are like dueling banjos, predictably taking opposing views on almost everything. The Gazette’s writings are politically correct, brimming with nostalgia for an idealized past, and touched with hauteur, while the populist Times relishes muckraking and has asked local pols so many embarrassing questions that sundry boards and town leaders will no longer speak to its representatives unless the questions are first submitted in writing.
I didn’t read either paper with hopes of discovering the truth, but merely to get a sense of the issues of the moment and a laugh from the political dissemblers and the more passionate letters to the editors. Between them, the Gazette and the Times gave strong evidence that Shaw was right when he defined a newspaper as a device unable to distinguish between a bicycle accident and the collapse of civilization.
But both papers agreed on one thing: the upcoming Celebration for Humanity was a very big deal.
It was August and the Celebration had been news all summer. And why not? It seemed that every celebrity, politician, and millionaire living on the island, along with countless others in New York, Hollywood, Washington, and from abroad, was involved, and every one of them would be wrapped in the American flag. It was to be an unprecedented event, bringing together the great and powerful from the entertainment business, Wall Street, religion, and government for one extraordinary weekend of song, speech, prayer, patriotism, and commitment to national and international peace, goodwill, and fearless resolve in the face of terrorism and evil axes.
The Celebration would be broadcast live on national and international radio and television, and taped for viewing by those unfortunate enough to have missed the original show and for the millions who undoubtedly would want to see it all again.
“I just don’t think I can stand the tension of it all,” yawned Zee, looking at the Gazette’s front page. “Less than a week to go, and the island’s problems are mounting. Not enough housing, not enough security, not enough tickets to the big event and some outrageous scalping of the ones there are.”
“How about we rent out this place for that weekend and use the money to go to Angkor Wat?” I asked. “I’ve wanted to see Angkor Wat ever since I was a little kid and my father let me read his copy of Halliburton’s Complete Book of Marvels. Our house isn’t much but it should be good for a few thousand dollars during the Celebration. People are desperate.”
“I don’t know if they’re that desperate,” said Zee, glancing around the kitchen, where she’d spread the paper on the table.
Maybe she was right. Home sweet home was an old hunting and fishing camp expanded by a couple of modern bedrooms that I’d tacked on since the kids were born. I’d been working in vain for years to fix a leak in the corner of the living room that dripped whenever a strong rain blew in from the east, and the balcony floor was beginning to get a little spongy in one place I’d soon have to fix.
“People will pay anything to stay on Martha’s Vineyard,” I said, yawning in turn, “and they’ll pay twice as much if they get to see a celebrity while they’re here. No wonder the scalpers are doing so well. Maybe we should at least sell our tickets. What do you think?”
“As you’ll recall, we don’t have tickets,” said Zee. “Somehow we got left off the VIP list again. I just can’t understand it. I see here, though, that Joe and Myra Callahan are among the invited guests. I imagine Cricket will be coming along, too.”
Years before, during one of then-president Joe Callahan’s several summer holidays on the Vineyard, our paths had briefly crossed, as the paths of commoners and aristocrats sometimes do, but the former president’s family and the Jacksons had since walked different roads.
“Maybe you should suck up to some of those Hollywood types who’ve been after you to become a movie star,” I said. “They can probably get us in.”
Zee, who had once been an extra in a motion picture filmed on our island, was still being pursued by its director, who considered her, rightly, I thought, to be one of those rare people who light up the screen. Zee, however, preferred to remain a nurse and to live on the Vineyard with our children and me.
“My once promising career as a film star is, I’m glad to say, a thing of the past,” said Zee. “According to this story, though, I actually do know some of the people who’ll be part of the show.”
“No doubt they’ll want you to perform.”
“If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve. We can stay at home like all the normal people in the world and watch the big show on our little TV.” She looked at her watch. “The kids should be home any time now. You know, it still feels weird to have them old enough to go play with other kids at a summer camp.”
It did seem that way. “Well, their friends come to play here sometimes, so it balances out.”
“It feels okay when other kids are here, but it doesn’t when ours are someplace else. Does that sound normal?”
“Maybe you should take a parenting class to find out.”
“No thanks. I have enough trouble being a parent with just you around. I don’t need to be in a class with ten other people who don’t know any more than I do. My mother says the secret is to be a grandparent, because by that time you finally know everything instead of always being a year or two behind.”
It was a popular notion among grandparents, I knew, and maybe even a correct one, but with luck it would be another twenty years or so before we could either confirm or deny.
Zee scanned the paper one last time and folded it. “Even for this fabled isle where fantasies unfurl like flags almost every day, this Celebration is an eye-catcher. We have as much media here as we did the first time Joe Callahan came down.”
During the Callahans’ first Vineyard visit, so many security people and media types had been around that every hotel room was full and the island sank about six inches into the sea from the weight of machines and humans. It only rose again when the presidential party flew back to Washington.
“The beginning of that first sentence was quite alliterative,” I said admiringly. “But you’re right. This is a notable gala even by local standards. I’m going to pour myself a martini and adjourn to the balcony. Would you care to join me?”
She would, so I got the Luksusowa out of the freezer and poured two glasses, adding two jalapeño-stuffed olives to each. I put these on a tray along with crackers and smoked bluefish pâté and went up to the balcony, where Zee was already seated. She was looking eastward over our gardens, over Sengekontacket Pond, over the barrier beach on its far side where families were even now packing up their beach gear and heading home, and over the blue waters of Nantucket Sound to where Cape Cod loomed on the distant horizon.
It was a view we never tired of. Just before dawn all winter long a coral ribbon stretched along the horizon between the dark blue band of ocean and the lighter one of brightening sky. And all year round, as the sun set and our house fell into evening shadows, the barrier beach glowed like a strand of gold before the earth turned and night came down.
Zee sipped her martini. “Not bad, Jefferson. You haven’t lost the magic touch.”
“The secret of the old family recipe shall never be revealed until my son has reached maturity, and then only to him.”
“Diana and I won’t be told how to open the bottle, I take it.” She handed me a cracker mounded with pâté.
“You know how women are. They just can’t keep secrets.”
“How true, how true. Certainly none of my women friends can keep herself from saying things about you that should be kept private.”
“Like what, for instance?”
“I’m sorry, but my lips are sealed. Besides, you don’t really want to know.”
“Are you saying you’re an exception to the women-can’t-keep-a-secret rule?”
Zee lifted her glass. “According to my friends, you’re the one who’s an exception to certain normal, civilized rules. Several of them, in fact. I’ll say no more.”
Out on the sound boats were white against the blue water as they headed for harbor. Above them the pale sky was bright and clear. Every shape and color on land and sea was sharply defined by the dry northeast breeze. It was a Babar day.
Behind us I heard the sound of a car coming down our long, sandy driveway and turned, expecting to see Madge or Frank Duncan bringing Diana and Joshua home from an afternoon at their nature studies camp.
But the car didn’t belong to the Duncans. It stopped in the yard and a man got out. I hadn’t seen him in quite a while. He waved and started toward the house.
“It’s Jake Spitz,” I said to Zee. It was refill time, so I picked up our empty glasses as I went downstairs with Zee at my heels.
Jake shook my hand and exchanged kisses with Zee, who stepped back and smiled up at him. “Still exercising regularly, I see. Maybe you can have a talk with my husband about the virtues of physical activity other than snoring and surf casting.”
“You both look fit as ever,” said Spitz. “How are the kids?”
“They’re out gallivanting with their friends. They’re fine.”
I was happy to see him. “How about a little something, Jake? We’re ready for seconds.”
He hesitated, then smiled and nodded. “Theoretically I’m on duty, but only for a little longer, so what the hell.”
“Spoken like a true American. How long have you been on the island, and what brings the FBI to our house?”
I fixed the drinks and the three of us went back up to the balcony.
“Watch that soft spot,” I said, gesturing. “I’ve got some rotten wood there that I have to replace. Your foot might go right through.”
“I’m used to rot,” said Spitz. “I work in Washington.”
We sat and looked at the view. “Mighty fine,” said Spitz. “I remember it well.”
“It’s a nice surprise to have you here to see it again,” I said.
Spitz sipped his drink and made an approving face. “Good. But I didn’t come here just to drink your vodka and sit on your balcony, much as I’m enjoying both. I’ve come to offer you a temp job.”
On Martha’s Vineyard, where prices are high and pay is low, a job is always worth considering. In my case, that was especially true since I had no steady income other than spotty profit from part ownership in a fishing boat and tiny disability pensions from the U.S. Army and the Boston PD, earned absorbing bits of enemy metal into my body during combat. I still carried a bullet next to my spine and small fragments of shrapnel in my legs.
“Let me guess,” said Zee. “If you’re here on the island, Jake, it means that some Washington bigwigs are too, or soon will be, and that means the job has something to do with the Celebration for Humanity. Am I right?”
“It’s hard to pull the wool over your eyes, Mrs. Jackson.”
“Well, he’s not going to take the job,” said Zee firmly and with a hint of anger in her voice.
Spitz and I both looked at her. I opened my mouth but she spoke again before I could.
“My husband has collected a few new scars since you last saw him, Jake, and he’s promised not to do any more dangerous things. I’m holding him to it.”
“I don’t do dangerous things,” I said.
“Yes, you do, and Jake here has been involved in security as long as we’ve known him, so it’s pretty clear to me that he wants you to do something that might be dangerous! Well, you won’t!”
Spitz lifted his hands. “It’s nothing like that, Zee. Let me give you the details before you decide anything.”
Zee gave me a hard, wifely look, but nodded.
“Did you ever hear of a singer named Evangeline? Like in the poem by Longfellow?”
“Of course,” said Zee, perking up. “Everybody’s heard of Evangeline. She’s won all the Grammys in the world but she keeps her personal life totally private. Doesn’t she live in a castle in Scotland or something? Is she coming to the Celebration? Wow! I haven’t seen her name in the local papers.”
I could not share Zee’s enthusiasm, but even I had heard of Evangeline, although in general I’m not aware of any singers younger than Willie Nelson or Pavarotti. “What about her?” I asked.
Spitz took another short snort. “She’s coming to the Celebration, but not many people know that. She doesn’t want anything to do with reporters. She wants to stay out of sight, make a ‘surprise appearance’ onstage, then, when her bit is over, fly back home again. She needs a driver who can keep his mouth shut. We have a safe house for her and you’re my choice as her driver. She wants to see the island while she’s here, and you know it better than my agents. Also, you were a cop and you can wave a badge as well as the next guy if you need to.”
“My shield is pretty much out-of-date these days, Jake.”
“I can arrange to get you some official paper. She’ll have a Ford Explorer with those dark windows that keep people from seeing inside. And they say that she’s got half a dozen different wigs and getups to make herself look different if she wants to go someplace public, so about all you’ll have to do is drive her where she wants to go.
“There’s money in it,” he added, and mentioned a goodly figure.
“Can I get an autographed picture of her for Zee?”
Zee brightened. “That would be excellent!”
“I’m sure it can be arranged,” said Spitz, looking relieved. “Well, what do you say, Mrs. Jackson, ma’am?”
“All he has to do is drive Evangeline around the island?”
“And maybe get some take-out clams for her from The Bite, so she can taste the island’s finest fries alone on a beach somewhere.”
“And that’s all?”
“He might have to get her back into the car pretty fast if some fan spots her.”
“And that’s all?”
“That pretty much covers it.”
Zee was never one to miss a trick. “How’d the FBI get involved with Evangeline, Jake? You work for the government, not for people in the entertainment business. Are you sure there isn’t more to this job than you’re telling me?”
“There’s a simple explanation,” said Spitz, smiling at her. “Joe Callahan and his family, especially their daughter, Cricket, are big Evangeline fans. He may not be president anymore, but when he asked the bureau to help her out, we obliged. Well, what do you say, are you going to let your husband take the job?”
“Well, all right,” she said, smiling back. “But I want that autographed picture.”
“Consider it done.” Spitz glanced at his watch and took a final sip of his drink. “Come on down to the car with me, J.W., and I’ll give you a map that shows where Evangeline and her daughter are staying.”
I followed him to the car. He gave me the map, and then said quietly, “I’d like you to carry your pistol on this job.”
My eyebrows went up a bit.
“I doubt if you’ll need it,” he said, “but I think you should have it. Celebrities are targets for some people, and we don’t want anything happening to Evangeline.” He paused. “We’ve heard some whispers in the wind, but nothing we can be sure of. I didn’t mention this up on the balcony because I wouldn’t want Zee to be worried about you.”
“Tell me what you know,” I said.
“I just did,” said Spitz. “You still want the job? It’s only for these next few days.”
I hesitated.
“You’ll be doing me a favor,” he said. “I need somebody I can trust.”
I glanced back at the house, and at Zee, knowing Jake could be putting me in a difficult—yes, even a dangerous—position. But he was a friend. And I was intrigued.
“All right,” I said.