George Jakes went to the opening of an exhibition of African American art in downtown Washington. He was not very interested in art, but a black congressman had to support such things. Most of his work as a congressman was more important.
President Reagan had enormously increased government spending on the military, but who was going to pay? Not the wealthy, who had received big a tax cut.
There was a joke that George often repeated. A reporter asked Reagan how he was going to reduce tax and increase spending at the same time. “I’m going to keep two sets of books,” was the answer.
In reality Reagan’s plan was to cut Social Security and Medicare. If he had his way, unemployed men and welfare mothers would lose out to finance the boom in the defense industry. The idea made George mad with rage. However, George and others in Congress were struggling to prevent this, and so far they had succeeded.
The upshot was a rise in government borrowing. Reagan had increased the deficit. All those shiny new weapons for the Pentagon would be paid for by future generations.
George took a glass of white wine from a tray held by a waiter and looked around the exhibits, then spoke briefly to a reporter. He did not have much time. Verena needed to go out tonight, to a Georgetown political dinner, so he would be in charge of their son, Jack, who was now four. They had a nanny—they had to, for they both had demanding jobs—but one of them was always on duty as backup in case the nanny should fail to show up.
He set his glass down untasted. Free wine was never worth drinking. He put on his coat and left. A cold rain had started, and he held the exhibition catalogue over his head as he hurried to his car. His elegant old Mercedes was long gone: a politician had to drive an American vehicle. He now had a silver Lincoln Town Car.
He got in, switched on the windshield wipers, and set off for Prince George’s County. He crossed the South Capitol Street Bridge and took Suitland Parkway east. He cursed when he saw how heavy the traffic was: he was going to be late.
When he got home, Verena’s red Jaguar stood in the driveway, nose out, ready to go. The car had been a present from her father on her fortieth birthday. George parked next to it and walked into the house, carrying a briefcase full of papers, his evening’s work.
Verena was in the hallway, looking spectacularly glamorous in a black cocktail dress and patent high-heeled pumps. She was as mad as a polecat. “You’re late!” she yelled.
“I’m really sorry,” George said. “The traffic on Suitland Parkway is crazy today.”
“This dinner party is really important to me—three members of Reagan’s cabinet will be there, and I’m going to be late!”
George understood her irritation. For a lobbyist, the chance to meet powerful people socially was priceless. “I’m here now,” he said.
“I am not the maid! When we make an arrangement you have to keep it!”
This tirade was not unusual. She often got angry and screamed at him. He always tried to take it calmly. “Is Nanny Tiffany here?”
“No, she’s not, she went home sick, that’s why I had to wait for you.”
“Where’s Jack?”
“Watching TV in the den.”
“Okay, I’ll go and sit with him now. You go on out.”
She made a furious noise and stalked off.
He kind of envied whoever was going to sit next to her at dinner. She was still the sexiest woman he had ever met. However, he now knew that being her long-distance lover, as he had for many years, was better than being her husband. In the old days they had had sex more times in a weekend than they did now in a month. Since they got married their frequent and furious rows, usually about child care, had eroded their affection for one another like a slow drip of strong vitriol. They lived together, they took care of their son, and they pursued their careers. Did they love one another? George no longer knew.
He went into the den. Jack was on the couch in front of the TV. The boy was George’s great consolation. He sat next to him and put his arm around his small shoulders. Jack snuggled up.
The show featured a group of high school pupils involved in some kind of adventure. “What are you watching?” George asked.
“Whiz Kids. It’s great.”
“What’s it about?”
“They catch crooks with their computers.”
One of the child geniuses was black, George noticed, and he thought: How the world turns.
• • •
“We’re really lucky to be invited to this dinner,” said Cam Dewar to his wife, Lidka, as their cab pulled up outside a grand mansion on R Street near the Georgetown Library. “I want us both to make a good impression.”
Lidka was scornful. “You are an important person in the secret police,” she said. “I think they need to impress you.”
Lidka did not understand how America worked. “The CIA is not the secret police,” Cam said. “And I’m not a very important person by the standards of these people.”
Cam was not exactly a nobody, all the same. Because of his past experience in the White House, he was now the CIA’s liaison man with the Reagan administration. He was thrilled to have the job.
He had got over his disappointment with Reagan’s failure in Poland. He put that down to inexperience. Reagan had been president for less than a year when Solidarity was crushed.
In the back of Cam’s mind, a devil’s advocate said that a president ought to be smart enough and knowledgeable enough to make confident decisions from the moment he takes office. He recalled Nixon saying: “Reagan is a nice guy, but he doesn’t know what the Christ is going on in foreign policy.”
But Reagan’s heart was in the right place, that was the main thing. He was passionately anti-Communist.
Lidka said: “And your grandfather was a senator!”
That did not count for much either. Gus Dewar was in his nineties. After Grandmama died he had moved from Buffalo to San Francisco to be near Woody, Beep, and his great-grandson, John Lee. He was long retired from politics. Besides, he was a Democrat, and by Reaganite standards an extreme liberal.
Cam and Lidka walked up a short flight of steps to a red-brick house that looked like a small French château, with dormer windows in the slate roof and a white stone entrance topped by a small Greek pediment. This was the home of Frank and Marybell Lindeman, heavyweight donors to Reagan’s campaign funds and multimillion-dollar beneficiaries of his tax cut. Marybell was one of half a dozen women who dominated Washington social life. She entertained the men who ran America. That was why Cam felt lucky to be here.
Although the Lindemans were Republicans, Marybell’s dinners were cross-party affairs, and Cam was expecting to see senior men from both sides here tonight.
A butler took their coats. Looking around the grand hall, Lidka said: “Why do they have these terrible paintings?”
“It’s called Western art,” Cam said. “That’s a Remington—very valuable.”
“If I had all that money, I wouldn’t buy pictures of cowboys and Indians.”
“They’re making a point. The impressionists were not necessarily the best painters ever. American artists are just as good.”
“No, they’re not—everyone knows that.”
“Matter of opinion.”
Lidka shrugged: another mystery of American life.
The butler showed them into a wide drawing room. It looked like an eighteenth-century salon, with a Chinese dragon carpet and a scatter of spindly chairs upholstered in yellow silk. Cam realized they were the first guests to arrive. A moment later, Marybell appeared through another door. She was a statuesque woman with a mass of red hair that might or might not have been its natural color. She was wearing a necklace of what looked, to Cam, like unusually large diamonds. “How kind of you to come early!” she said.
Cam knew this was a reproof, but Lidka was oblivious. “I couldn’t wait to see your wonderful house,” she gushed.
“And how do you like living in America?” Marybell asked her. “Tell me, what is the best thing about this country, in your opinion?”
Lidka thought for a moment. “You have all these black people,” she said.
Cam suppressed a groan. What the hell was she saying?
Marybell was surprised into silence.
Lidka waved a hand to indicate the waiter holding a tray of champagne flutes, the maid bringing canapés, and the butler, all of whom were African American. “They do everything, like opening doors and serving drinks and sweeping the floor. In Poland we have no one to do that work—everyone has to do it themselves!”
Marybell looked a little frantic. Such talk was incorrect even in Reagan’s Washington. Then she looked over Lidka’s shoulder and saw another guest hovering. “Karim, darling!” she screeched. She embraced a handsome dark-skinned man in an immaculate pin-striped suit. “Meet Cam Dewar and his wife, Lidka. This is Karim Abdullah, from the Saudi embassy.”
Karim shook hands. “I’ve heard of you, Cam,” he said. “I work closely with some of your colleagues in Langley.”
Karim was letting Cam know he was in Saudi intelligence.
Karim turned to Lidka. She was looking startled. Cam knew why. She had not expected to see someone as dark as Karim at Marybell’s party.
However, Karim charmed her. “I have been told that Polish women are the most beautiful in the world,” he said. “But I didn’t believe it—until this moment.” He kissed her hand.
Lidka could take any amount of that sort of bullshit.
“I heard what you were saying about black people,” Karim said. “I agree with you. We have none in Saudi Arabia—so we have to import them from India!”
Cam could see that Lidka was bewildered by the fine distinctions of Karim’s racism. To him, Indians were black but Arabs were not. Fortunately, Lidka knew when to shut up and listen to a man.
More guests came in. Karim lowered his voice. “However,” he said conspiratorially, “we must be careful what we say—some of the guests may be liberals.”
As if to illustrate his point, a tall, athletic-looking man with thick fair hair came in. He looked like a movie star. It was Jasper Murray.
Cam was not pleased. He had hated Jasper since they were teenagers. Then Jasper had become an investigative reporter and had helped to bring President Nixon down. His book about Nixon, Tricky Dick, had been a bestseller and a successful movie. He had been relatively quiet during the Carter administration, but had returned to the attack as soon as Reagan took over. He was now one of the most popular figures on television, up there with Peter Jennings and Barbara Walters. Only last night his show, This Day, had devoted half an hour to the American-backed military dictatorship in El Salvador. Murray had repeated claims by human rights groups that government death squads there had murdered thirty thousand people.
The network that broadcast This Day was owned by Frank Lindeman, Marybell’s husband; so Jasper had probably felt unable to decline the invitation to dinner. The White House had put pressure on Frank to get rid of Jasper, but so far Frank had refused. Although he held a majority of shares, he had a board to answer to, and investors who could make trouble if he fired one of his biggest stars.
Marybell seemed to be anxiously waiting for something. Then one more guest arrived, rather late. She was a stunningly glamorous black woman lobbyist called Verena Marquand. Cam had not met her, but recognized her from photographs.
The butler announced dinner and they all moved through a double doorway to the dining room. The women made appreciative noises when they saw the long table decked with gleaming glassware and silver bowls of yellow hothouse roses. Cam saw that Lidka was wide-eyed. This outdid all the photographs in her home decorating magazines, he guessed. She had surely never seen or even imagined anything so lavish.
There were eighteen people around the table, but the conversation was immediately dominated by one person. She was Suzy Cannon, a vituperative gossip reporter. Half of what she wrote turned out to be untrue, but she had a jackal’s nose for weakness. She was conservative, but more interested in scandal than politics. Nothing was private to her. Cam prayed that Lidka would keep her mouth shut. Anything said tonight might appear in tomorrow’s newspaper.
But Suzy turned her gimlet eyes on Cam, to his surprise. “I believe you and Jasper know each other,” she said.
“Not really,” said Cam. “We met in London many years ago.”
“But I hear that you both fell in love with the same girl.”
How the hell did she know that? “I was fifteen, Suzy,” Cam said. “I probably fell in love with half the girls in London.”
Suzy turned to Jasper. “How about you? Do you remember this rivalry?”
Jasper had been deep in conversation with Verena Marquand, sitting next to him. Now he looked irritated. “If you’re planning to write an article about teenage romances that took place more than twenty years ago, and call it news, Suzy, all I can say is you must be sleeping with your editor.”
Everyone laughed: Suzy was in fact married to the news editor of her paper.
Cam noticed that Suzy’s laugh was forced, and her eyes glared hatred at Jasper. He recalled that Suzy as a young journalist had been fired from This Day after a series of wildly inaccurate reports.
Now she said: “You must have been interested to watch Jasper’s show on TV last night, Cam.”
Cam said: “Not interested so much as dismayed. The president and the CIA are trying to support the anti-Communist government in El Salvador.”
Suzy said: “And Jasper seems to be on the other side, doesn’t he?”
Jasper said: “I’m on the side of truth, Suzy. I know this is hard for you to grasp.” Cam noticed that no trace of his British accent remained.
Cam said: “I was sorry to see such propaganda on a major network.”
Jasper snapped: “How would you report on a government that murders thirty thousand of its own citizens?”
“We don’t accept that figure.”
“Then how many citizens of El Salvador do you think have been murdered by their government? Give us the CIA estimate.”
“You should have asked that before broadcasting your show.”
“No Central American government is perfect. You focus on the ones we support. I think you’re simply anti-American.”
Suzy smiled. “You’re British, aren’t you, Jasper?” she said with poisonous sweetness.
Jasper looked riled. “I became a U.S. citizen more than a decade ago. I’m so pro-American that I risked my damn life for this country. I spent two years in the United States Army—one of those in Vietnam. And I wasn’t sitting on my ass behind a desk in Saigon, either. I saw action, and I killed people. You’ve never done that, Suzy. And how about you, Cam? What did you do in Vietnam?”
“I wasn’t called up.”
“Then maybe you should just shut the fuck up.”
Marybell interrupted. “I think that’s enough about Jasper and Cam.” She turned to a congressman from New York sitting next to her. “I see that your city has banned discrimination against homosexuals. Are you in favor of that?”
The conversation turned to gay rights, and Cameron relaxed—too soon.
A question was asked about legislation in other countries, and Suzy said: “What’s the law in Poland, Lidka?”
“Poland is a Catholic country,” said Lidka. “We have no homosexuals there.” A moment of silence ensued, and she added: “Thank God.”
• • •
Jasper Murray left the Lindeman house at the same time as Verena Marquand. “Suzy Cannon is a real troublemaker,” he said as they went down the steps.
Verena laughed, showing white teeth in the lamplight. “That’s the truth.”
They reached the sidewalk. The taxi Jasper had ordered was nowhere in sight. He walked with Verena to her car. “Suzy’s got it in for me,” he said.
“She can’t do you much harm, can she? You’re such a big shot now.”
“On the contrary. There’s a serious campaign against me in Washington right now. It’s election year, and the administration doesn’t want television programs like the one I did last night.” He felt comfortable confiding in her. They had been thrown together the day they watched Martin Luther King die. That sense of intimacy had never really gone away.
Verena said: “I’m sure you can fight off a gossip attack.”
“I don’t know. My boss is an old rival called Sam Cakebread who has never liked me. And Frank Lindeman, who owns the network, would dearly love to get rid of me if he could find a pretext. Right now the board is afraid they’ll be accused of biasing the news if they fire me. But one mistake and I’m out.”
“You should be like Suzy, and marry the boss.”
“I would if I could.” He looked up and down the street. “I ordered a taxi for eleven o’clock, but I don’t see it. The show won’t pay for limousines.”
“Do you want a ride?”
“That’d be great.”
They got into her Jaguar.
She took off her high-heeled shoes and handed them to him. “Put these on the floor on your side, would you?” She drove in her stockings. Jasper felt a sexy frisson. He had always found Verena devastatingly alluring. He watched her as she pulled into the late-night traffic and accelerated down the street. She was a good driver, if a little too fast: no surprise there.
“There aren’t many people I trust,” he said. “I’m one of the most well-known people in America, and I feel more alone now than I ever have. But I trust you.”
“I feel the same. I have since that awful day in Memphis. I’ve never felt more terrifyingly vulnerable than the moment I heard that shot. You covered my head with your arms. A person doesn’t forget something like that.”
“I wish I’d found you before George did.”
She glanced over at him and smiled.
He was not sure what that meant.
They reached his building and she pulled up on the left side of the one-way street. “Thanks for the ride,” Jasper said. He got out. Leaning back into the car, he picked up her shoes from the floor and placed them on the passenger seat. “Great shoes,” he said. He slammed the door.
He walked around the car to the sidewalk and came to her window. She lowered the glass. “I forgot to kiss you good night,” he said. He leaned into the car and kissed her lips. She opened her mouth immediately. The kiss became passionate in an instant. Verena reached behind his neck and pulled his head inside the car. They kissed with frantic eagerness. Jasper reached into the car and pushed his hand up inside the skirt of her cocktail dress until he could cup the soft cotton-covered triangle between her legs. She moaned and thrust her hips upward against his grasp.
Breathless, he broke the kiss. “Come inside.”
“No.” She moved his hand away from her groin.
“Meet me tomorrow.”
She did not reply, but pushed him away until his head and shoulders were outside the car.
He said again: “Meet me tomorrow?”
She put the shift into gear. “Call me,” she said. Then she put her foot down and roared away.
• • •
George Jakes was not sure whether to believe Jasper Murray’s TV show. Even to George it seemed unlikely that President Reagan would support a government that murdered thousands of its own people. Then, four weeks later, The New York Times sensationally revealed that the head of El Salvador’s death squad, Colonel Nicolás Carranza, was a CIA agent receiving $90,000 a year from American taxpayers.
Voters were furious. They had thought that after Watergate the CIA had been whipped into line. But it was clearly out of control, paying a monster to commit mass murder.
In his study at home, George finished the papers in his briefcase a few minutes before ten. He screwed the cap back onto his fountain pen, but sat there a few more minutes, reflecting.
No one on the House intelligence committee had known about Colonel Carranza, nor had any member of the equivalent Senate committee. Caught off guard, they were all embarrassed. They were supposed to supervise the CIA. People thought this mess was their fault. But what could they do if spooks lied to them?
He sighed and stood up. He left his study, turning out the light, and stepped into Jack’s room. The boy was fast asleep. When he saw his child like this, so peaceful, George felt as if his heart would burst. Jack’s soft skin was surprisingly dark, like Jacky’s, even though he had two white grandparents. Light-skinned people were still favored in the African American community, despite all the talk about black being beautiful. But Jack was beautiful to George. His head lay on his teddy bear at what looked like an uncomfortable angle. George slipped a hand under the boy’s head, feeling soft curls just like his own. He lifted Jack’s head a fraction, gently slid the bear out, then carefully rested the head back on the pillow. Jack slept on, oblivious.
George went to the kitchen and poured a glass of milk, then carried it into the bedroom. Verena was already in bed, wearing a nightdress, with a pile of magazines beside her, reading and watching TV at the same time. George drank the milk, then went into the bathroom and brushed his teeth.
They seemed to be getting on a little better. They rarely made love, these days, but Verena was more even-tempered. In fact she had not erupted for a month or so. She was working hard, often late into the evenings: perhaps she was happier when her job was more demanding.
George took off his shirt and lifted the lid of the laundry hamper. He was about to drop his shirt in when his eye was caught by Verena’s underwear. He saw a lacy black brassiere and matching panties. The set looked new, and he did not recall seeing it on her. If she was buying sexy underwear, why was she not letting him view it? She sure as hell was not shy about such things.
Looking more closely, he saw something even more strange: a blond hair.
He was possessed by a terrible fear. His stomach cramped. He picked the garments out of the hamper.
Carrying them into the bedroom, he said: “Tell me I’m crazy.”
“You’re crazy,” she said; then she saw what he had in his hand. “Are you going to do my laundry?” she quipped, but he could tell she was nervous.
“Lucky you.”
“Except that I haven’t seen it on you.”
“Unlucky you.”
“But someone has.”
“Sure. Dr. Bernstein.”
“Dr. Bernstein is bald. There’s a blond hair in your underpants.”
Her cappuccino skin went paler, but she remained defiant. “Well, Sherlock Holmes, what do you deduce from that?”
“That you had sex with a man with long blond hair.”
“Why does it have to be a man?”
“Because you like men.”
“I might like girls too. It’s the fashion. Everyone is bisexual now.”
George felt profoundly sad. “I note you’re not denying that you’re having an affair.”
“Well, George, ya got me.”
He shook his head incredulously. “Are you making light of this?”
“I guess I am.”
“So you admit it. Who are you fucking?”
“I’m not going to tell you, so don’t ask again.”
George was having more and more difficulty suppressing his anger. “You act as if you’ve done nothing wrong!”
“I’m not going to pretend. Yes, I’m seeing someone I like. I’m sorry to hurt your feelings.”
George was bewildered. “How did this happen so quickly?”
“It happened slowly. We’ve been married more than five years. The thrill is gone, like the song says.”
“What did I do wrong?”
“You married me.”
“When did you become so angry?”
“Am I angry? I thought I was just bored.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I’m not giving him up for the sake of a marriage that hardly exists any longer.”
“You know I can’t accept that.”
“So, leave. You’re not a prisoner.”
George sat down on her dressing-table stool and buried his face in his hands. He was swamped by a wave of intense emotion, and found himself suddenly taken back to childhood. He recalled the embarrassment of being the only boy in the class who did not have a father. He felt again the agonies of envy he had suffered when he saw other boys with their fathers, throwing a ball, fixing a punctured bicycle tire, buying a baseball bat, trying on shoes. He boiled anew with rage at the man who had, in his eyes, abandoned his mother and him, caring nothing for the woman who had given herself to him, nor for the child that had been born of their love. He wanted to scream, he wanted to punch Verena, he wanted to weep.
He managed to speak at last. “I’m not leaving Jack,” he said.
“Your choice,” said Verena. She switched off the TV, threw her magazines to the floor, turned out the bedside light, and lay down, facing away from him.
“Is that it?” George said amazedly. “Is that all you have to say?”
“I’m going to sleep. I have a breakfast meeting.”
He stared at her. Had he ever known her?
Of course he had. In his heart he had understood that there were two Verenas: one a dedicated activist for civil rights, the other a party girl. He loved them both, and he had believed that with his help they could become one happy, well-adjusted person. And he had been wrong.
He remained there for several minutes, looking at her in the dim light from the streetlamp on the corner. I waited so long for you, he thought; all those years of long-distance love. Then, at last, you married me, and we had Jack, and I thought everything would be all right, forever.
At last he stood up. He took off his clothes and put on pajamas.
He could not bring himself to get into bed beside her.
There was a bed in the guest room, but it was not made up. He went to the hall and got his warmest coat from the closet. He went to the guest room and lay down with the coat over him.
But he did not sleep.
• • •
George had noticed, some time ago, that Verena sometimes wore clothes that did not suit her. She had a pretty flower-print dress that she put on when she wanted to seem like an innocent girl, though in fact it made her look ridiculous. She had a brown suit that drained her face of color, but she had paid so much for it that she was not willing to admit it was a mistake. She had a mustard-colored sweater that made her wonderful green eyes go muddy and dull.
Everyone did the same, George reckoned. He himself had three cream-colored shirts that he wished would fray at the collars soon so that he could throw them away. For all sorts of reasons, people wore clothes they hated.
But never when meeting a lover.
When Verena put on the black Armani suit with the turquoise blouse and the black coral necklace, she looked like a movie star, and she knew it.
She had to be going to see her paramour.
George felt so humiliated that it was like a gnawing pain in his stomach. He could not subject himself to this much longer. It made him feel like jumping off a bridge.
Verena left early, and said she would be home early, so George figured they were going to meet for lunch. He had breakfast with Jack, then left him with Nanny Tiffany. He went to his rooms in the Cannon House Office Building, near the Capitol, and canceled his appointments for the day.
At twelve noon, Verena’s red Jaguar was parked as usual in the lot near her downtown office. George waited down the block in his silver Lincoln, watching the exit. The red car appeared at half past twelve. He pulled into the traffic and followed her.
She crossed the Potomac and headed out into the Virginia countryside. As the traffic thinned he fell back. It would be embarrassing if she spotted him. He hoped she would not notice something as common as a silver Lincoln. He could not have done this in his distinctive old Mercedes.
A few minutes before one she pulled off the road at a country restaurant called the Worcester Sauce. George sped by, then U-turned a mile down the road and came back. He drove into the restaurant parking lot and took a slot from which he could see the Jaguar. Then he settled down to wait.
He brooded. He knew he was being stupid. He knew this could end in embarrassment or worse. He knew he should drive away.
But he had to know who his wife’s lover was.
They came out at three.
He could tell by the way Verena walked that she had had a glass or two of wine with her lunch. They came across the lot hand in hand, she giggling at something the man said, and hot fury boiled inside George.
The man was tall and broad, with thick fair hair, quite long.
As they came closer, George recognized Jasper Murray.
“You son of a bitch,” he said aloud.
Jasper had always had a yen for Verena, right from the first time they had met, at the Willard Hotel on the day of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech. But lots of men had a yen for Verena. George had never imagined that Jasper, of all of them, would be the betrayer.
They walked to the Jaguar and kissed.
George knew he should start his car and drive away. He had learned what he needed to know. There was nothing else to be done.
Verena’s mouth was open, George could see. She leaned into Jasper with her hips. Both had their eyes closed.
George got out of his car.
Jasper grasped Verena’s breast.
George slammed the car door and strode across the tarmac toward them.
Jasper was too absorbed in what he was doing but Verena heard the slam and opened her eyes. She saw George, pushed Jasper away, and screamed.
She was too late.
George reached back with his right arm then hit Jasper with a punch that had all the force of his back and shoulders in it. His fist connected with the left side of Jasper’s face. George felt the deeply satisfying squish of soft flesh, then, a split second later, the hardness of teeth and bones. Then pain blazed in his hand.
Jasper staggered backward and fell to the ground.
Verena yelled: “George! What have you done?” She knelt beside Jasper, careless of her stockings.
Jasper lifted himself on one elbow and felt his face. “Fucking animal,” he said to George.
George wanted Jasper to get up off the ground and hit back. He wanted more violence, more pain, more blood. He stared at Jasper for a long moment, seeing through a red mist. Then the fog cleared, and he realized Jasper was not going to get up and fight.
George turned around, went back to his car, and drove away.
When he got home, Jack was in his bedroom, playing with his collection of toy cars. George closed the door, so that Nanny Tiffany could not hear. He sat on the bed, which was covered by a counterpane that looked like a racing car. “I’ve got something very difficult to tell you,” he said.
“What happened to your hand?” Jack said. “It’s all red and puffed up.”
“I banged it on something. You have to listen to me.”
“Okay.”
This was going to be hard for a four-year-old to understand. “You know I’ll always love you,” George said. “Just like Grandma Jacky loves me, even though I’m not a little boy anymore.”
“Is Grandma coming today?”
“Maybe tomorrow.”
“She brings cookies.”
“Listen. Sometimes mommies and daddies stop loving each other. Did you know that?”
“Yeah. Pete Robbins’s daddy doesn’t love his mommy anymore.” Jack’s voice became solemn. “They got divorced.”
“I’m glad you understand that, because your mom and I don’t love each other anymore.”
George watched Jack’s face, trying to see whether he understood or not. The boy looked bewildered, as if something apparently impossible seemed to be happening. The look on his face wrenched George’s heart. He thought: How can I be doing something this cruel to the person I love most in the world?
How did I get here?
“You know I’ve been sleeping in the guest room.”
“Yeah.”
Here comes the hard part. “Well, I’m going to sleep at Grandma’s house tonight.”
“It’s because Mom and I don’t love each other.”
“Okay, then, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“I’m going to be sleeping at Grandma’s a lot from now on.”
Jack began to see that this would affect him. “Will you read my bedtime story?”
“Every night, if you like.” George vowed to keep this promise.
Jack was still working out the implications. “Will you make my warm milk for breakfast?”
“Sometimes. Or Mom will. Or Nanny Tiffany.”
Jack knew prevarication when he heard it. “I don’t know,” he said. “I think you better not sleep at Grandma’s.”
George ran out of courage. “Well, we’ll see,” he said. “Hey, how about some ice cream?”
“Yeah!”
It was the worst day of George’s life.
• • •
Driving from the Capitol homeward to Prince George’s County, George brooded on hostages. This year in Lebanon, four Americans and a Frenchman had been kidnapped. One of the Americans had been released, but the rest were languishing in some prison, unless they were already dead. George knew that one of the Americans was the CIA head of station in Beirut.
The kidnappers were almost certainly a militant Muslim group called Hezbollah, “the Party of God,” founded in response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. They had been bankrolled by Iran and trained by Iranian Revolutionary Guards. The United States regarded Hezbollah as an arm of the Iranian government, and classified Iran as a sponsor of terrorism, therefore a country that should not be allowed to buy weapons. George found that ironic, given that President Reagan was sponsoring terrorism in Nicaragua by funding the Contras, a brutal antigovernment group that carried out assassinations and kidnappings.
All the same, George was angry about what was happening in Lebanon. He wanted to send the marines into Beirut with all guns blazing. People should be taught the cost of abducting American citizens!
He felt this strongly, but he knew it was an infantile response. Just as the Israeli invasion had bred Hezbollah, so a violent American attack on Hezbollah would spawn more terrorism. Another generation of young Middle Eastern men would grow up swearing revenge upon America, the great Satan. George and all thinking people realized, when the blood cooled, that revenge was self-defeating. The only answer was to break the chain.
Which was easier said than done.
George was also aware that he had personally failed that test. He had punched Jasper Murray. Jasper was no wimp, but he had sensibly resisted the temptation to fight back. As a result the damage had been limited—no credit to George.
George was living with his mother again—at the age of forty-eight! Verena was still in the family home with little Jack. George presumed that Jasper spent nights there, but he did not know for sure. He was struggling to find a way to live with divorce—just like millions of other men and women.
It was Friday night, and he turned his mind to the weekend. He was on his way to Verena’s house. They had settled into a routine. George picked up Jack on Friday evening and took him to Grandma Jacky’s house for the weekend, then brought him back home on Monday morning. It was not how George had wanted to raise his child, but it was the best he could manage.
He thought about what they would do. Tomorrow maybe they would go to the public library together and get some bedtime storybooks. Church on Sunday, of course.
He arrived at the ranch-style house that used to be his home. Verena’s car was not in the driveway: she was not home yet. George parked and went to the front door. From politeness he rang the bell, then let himself in with his key.
The house was quiet. “It’s only me,” he called out. There was no one in the kitchen. He found Jack sitting in front of the TV, alone. “Hi, buddy,” he said. He sat down and put his arm around Jack’s shoulders. “Where’s Nanny Tiffany?”
“She had to go home,” Jack said. “Mommy’s late.”
George controlled his anger. “So you’re on your own here?”
“Tiffany said it’s a mergency.”
“I don’t know.” Jack still could not reckon time.
George was furious. His son had been left alone in the house at the age of four. What was Verena thinking of?
He got up and looked around. Jack’s weekend case stood in the hall. George checked inside and saw everything necessary: pajamas, clean clothes, teddy bear. Nanny Tiffany had done that before she left to deal with what Jack called her mergency.
He went into the kitchen and wrote a note: “I found Jack alone in the house. Call me.”
Then he got Jack and went out to the car.
Jacky’s house was less than a mile away. When they arrived, Jacky gave Jack a glass of milk and a homemade cookie. He told her all about the cat next door, which came to visit and got a saucer of milk. Then Jacky looked at George and said: “All right, what’s eating you?”
“Step into the living room and I’ll tell you.” They moved to the next room, and George said: “Jack was on his own in the house.”
“Oh, that should not happen.”
“Damn right.”
She overlooked the bad language for once. “Any idea why?”
“Verena didn’t come home at the appointed time, and the nanny had to leave.”
At that moment they heard a squeal of tires outside. They both looked out of the window and saw Verena getting out of her red Jaguar and running up the path to the door.
George said: “I’m going to kill her.”
Jacky let her in. She ran to the kitchen and kissed Jack. “Oh, baby, are you okay?” she said tearfully.
“Yeah,” said Jack nonchalantly. “I had a cookie.”
“Grandma’s cookies are great, aren’t they?”
“You bet.”
George said: “Verena, you’d better come in here and explain yourself.”
She was panting and perspiring. For once she did not appear arrogantly in control. “I was only a few minutes late!” she cried. “I don’t know why that goddamn nanny ran out on me!”
“You can’t be late when you’re looking after Jack,” George said severely.
She resented that. “Oh, like you never were?”
“I never left him alone.”
“It’s very difficult on my own!”
“It’s your damn fault you’re on your own.”
Jacky said: “George, you’re in the wrong here.”
“Stay out of this, Mom.”
“No. It’s my house and my grandson, and I won’t stay out of anything.”
“I can’t overlook this, Mom! She did wrong.”
“If I’d never done anything wrong, I wouldn’t have you.”
“That’s nothing to do with it.”
“I’m just saying we all make mistakes, and sometimes things turn out all right anyway. So stop beating Verena up. It won’t do any good.”
Reluctantly, George saw that she was right. “But what are we going to do?”
Verena said: “I’m sorry, George, but I just can’t cope.” She started to cry.
Jacky said: “Well, now that we’ve stopped yelling, maybe we can start thinking. This nanny of yours is no good.”
Verena said: “You don’t know how difficult it is to get a nanny! And it’s worse for us than for most people. Everyone else hires illegal immigrants and pays them cash, but politicians have to have someone with a green card who pays taxes, so no one wants the job!”
“All right, calm down, I’m not blaming you,” Jacky said to Verena. “Maybe I can help.”
George and Verena stared at Jacky.
Jacky said: “I’m sixty-four, I’m about to retire, and I need something to do. I’ll be your backup. If your nanny lets you down, just bring Jack here. Leave him here overnight when you need to.”
“Boy,” said George, “that sounds like a solution to me.”
Verena said: “Jacky, that would be wonderful!”
“Don’t thank me, honey, I’m being selfish. I’ll get to see my grandson more.”
George said: “Are you sure it won’t be too much work, Mom?”
Jacky made a contemptuous noise. “When was the last time something was too much work for me?”
George smiled. “Never, I guess.”
And that settled it.