America America (9 page)

“Oh, all right,” said my father, getting up at last from the couch. “At least let me tie the condemned man’s noose for him.”

A
S THE SUN WAS SETTING
that night over Aberdeen West, the guests began to arrive, and by dark they’d overflowed the patio onto the lawn. Behind a long mahogany table Gil McKinstrey had set up the bar. Not long after the party had begun, I was unloading a case of champagne when a courtly-looking man walked up in front of me and ordered a rye whiskey on the rocks. His nod to Gil was courtly as well, and he wore a stiff black suit that gave him something of the demeanor of a priest; but when Gil handed him the rye whiskey he tossed it straight back, then put his hand out for another.

If I’d known who Morlin Chase was, of course, I’d have been too nervous to even stand that close to him. But I wouldn’t know about any of these men, really, until many years later. Not about Chase. Not about Henry Bonwiller. Not about half the figures I would come across that year, from Averell Harriman to Arthur Schlesinger, and not even about the Metarey family. I’ve thought about that summer for many years now, and there will always be parts of it I don’t understand. Chase, I discovered in college, was the son of a railroad baron himself, and he’d been as close to as many presidents as anyone in the history of American politics. But the governor’s election was still four years away.

That night my duties were to stock the liquor and the ice for two hundred guests and to collect dirty dishes and glasses, and although two other bar-backs from town were working as well, I barely had a moment to look at anybody. The first time I pushed open the swinging doors to the service kitchen, I was surprised to see a room the size of a tennis court, with a whole row of stoves and sinks dividing it up the middle and two spray hoses on runners that were being yanked back and forth by the maids preparing the dishes for the sterilizer. It was as busy as a tennis court, too, with maids and cooks hurrying across the floor. I stayed in a line between the door and the pantry.

As I was fetching a case of Scotch a few minutes later, I ran into Clara standing at the door by the sinks. She pointed to my tie.

“Oh—” I said, “do you like it?” I’d tucked it into my pants so that it wouldn’t dip in the glasses.

“Did I say that?”

“I guess you didn’t.”

“But I have to admit, it’s an interesting way to wear one.”

With the Scotch in my arms, I made my way down the narrow pantry. “Where’s Christian?” I asked when I reached her. “I haven’t seen her.”

She regarded me but didn’t answer. She was standing in my way. “Morlin Chase is just a sucker,” she said without moving. “Do you know that? This is all just a big act to flatter his family.”

“I don’t know anything about any of it,” I answered. I had to stop and lean the box against the jamb. “That’s the truth. I just need to get this over to Gil before he runs out.”

“That’s right,” she said finally, taking a step sideways so I could pass. “That
is
the truth. You don’t know anything about any of it.”

At the bar again, I put the bottles down on the floor. Morlin Chase was standing outside on the patio now, between two leaded ballroom windows that cast a yellow aura on him like a pair of stage lights. As he spoke he gestured around a circle of onlookers, which included Mr. and Mrs. Metarey. I could see that they were listening closely to him.

“You watching the show again?” Gil said.

“I’m waiting for orders.”

“Then here’s one,” he said, slapping a tray onto the bar and setting a tumbler on it. With a flick of the scoop he filled it with ice; then with a tilt of the wrist he measured it with bourbon. “This one,” he said, “is for that sorry bastard out there.”

I looked at him.

“The Hunchback of Times Square,” he said, out of the side of his mouth. He tilted his head toward the patio. “Mr. Metarey likes to keep his joints oiled. Trawbridge is his name. The real heavyweight in the crowd. Not Morlin Chase.” He thunked another tumbler on the tray and measured off a double whiskey. “And this one’s for Chase. Five bucks he’ll be standing near Trawbridge.”

On the patio, I zigzagged through the crowd with the tray of drinks, and only when I stopped behind Morlin Chase did I understand. Mr. Metarey had somehow disappeared already, but standing directly across the circle from Mrs. Metarey was a man whose back was bent almost double, his hands resting on a pair of canes nearly at the height of his shoulders. As I stood there, Morlin Chase addressed him, and he stiffened his arms with a trembling effort and looked up, like a man climbing a ladder out of a hole.

Saline is a suburb now, but it was a lumber and mining town then, and like all such towns we had more than our share of the injured. But still I couldn’t help staring. He wore a pair of oversized black spectacles and a dark red bow tie that had been knocked at an angle, and his unruly brown mustache hid his mouth; yet the thing that struck me was the great decency of his expression. I felt a kind of instant kinship with him, too—perhaps because I could see how diligently he was working for his place in the crowd.

As Mr. Chase scanned the group he kept pausing first on Mrs. Metarey and then on this man Trawbridge. And occasionally, in response, Mr. Trawbridge would give him a small nod; he gave the same one to me when I finally moved over to take his empty glass from the side table and set the full bourbon in its place. He had to shift one of his canes to pick it up.

All the while, Morlin Chase was holding court. Other guests were leaning in close to hear him, and I could see them smiling, but I could tell that they were looking at Trawbridge, too. So was Mrs. Metarey. After a time I moved over until I was holding my tray with the last drink on it right next to Mr. Chase, but even then he didn’t stop speaking. It was only after Trawbridge lifted his tremorous head and made a gesture over his spectacles that Mr. Chase finally reached out and without breaking rhythm exchanged his empty glass for the full one on my tray. Then he went on with what he was saying.

Later that night, as I was fetching ice for Gil McKinstrey, Christian appeared in the rear pantry. She sat down silently on the low bench next to the ice machine and curled her legs under her, the way she did sometimes. She watched me fill the pewter bucket.

“Who’s Trawbridge?” I finally said.

She looked out the small window to the patio, where the party was. “Oh,” she said. “Isn’t that sad? He’s an old friend of Daddy’s. From Yale, I think. He’s here because of what Daddy might do tonight.”

“What’s your dad going to do?”

She looked up again, and this time she kept her gaze on me as I worked; but she didn’t answer, and she didn’t really seem to be watching, either. I knocked a row of cubes off the dripper and scooped them into the bucket. The look on her face was half ebullience and half consternation, as though she were trying to remember some blissful thing that eluded her. “Okay,” she finally said, more sharply.

She rose and took my arm and pulled me down the side hall to the front doors of the house. They were partway open, and when we stepped behind them I could see Mr. Metarey standing by a car in the entrance circle. We stood like that in the foyer, her hand on my arm and her gaze focused out the crack in the door. I set down the ice bucket and looked up. Beyond her on the wall was a large oil painting of her grandfather, Eoghan Metarey, and I noticed for the first time that his eyes looked the way Christian’s own had a few moments before. Darkly shadowed yet with that curious energy. They also seemed, by a trick of technique, to be staring directly into my own. “I need to bring the ice to Gil,” I said.

“Do you see Daddy?” she said. “Go out there and stand near him.”

“What?”

She opened the door wider. “Go make yourself visible. Like you want to be useful.”

“I do want to be useful.”

“Then go out there.”

“I can’t, Christian.” I glanced behind us. In the ballroom I could see people gathered around the bar. Mrs. Metarey was among them again. “I’m working.”

She turned and looked at me that same way; then, so resolutely that I didn’t try to stop her, she took hold of my arm and pulled me onto the porch. In a moment we were down among the front walk hedges, making our way toward the garage. At the end of the turnaround Mr. Metarey was leaning into the backseat window. He didn’t look up. Christian kept tugging on my hand, and in the dark we crossed the driveway and ducked inside the feed gate of the horse barn, where Mrs. Metarey’s gelding, Breighton, looked up in the dim light. “Shhh,” Christian whispered, and patted him. He snorted softly and went back to eating. Then Christian crouched and brought the gate shut, and when she pulled again on my hand I squatted next to her, both of us looking out through the slats now. The car was a Cadillac, an Eldorado. Mr. Metarey still hadn’t looked up.

“Gil asked me to get more ice,” I whispered. “I just left the bucket in the front hall.”

“Oh, stop it about the ice—Gil can wait.”

In the dark the garage lamp cast a cone of pale illumination, and below it the inside of the car was obscured; but then the rear door opened and a man in a dark suit got out. He was even taller than Mr. Metarey, strong-featured and dominating even in the half-light, and I don’t know why I should have recognized Henry Bonwiller, but I did.

He stood surveying the scene around the side of the house, where the farthest-out clusters of guests were standing on the lawn in the flicker of the citronella torches. We were not more than twenty-five feet from them. He put his hand on Mr. Metarey’s shoulder and spoke into his ear.

“They’re deciding,” Christian whispered. She turned and looked at me, her eyes shining. “Senator Bonwiller’s deciding tonight if he’s going to run. I think he is. Look at him.”

“What about Morlin Chase?”

“I’m talking about president, Corey. President of the United States. Look at them. I think they’ve decided.”

Mr. Metarey was leaning forward now to speak, and as we watched him the light suddenly brightened on the gravel and a moment later Clara emerged from the house. She’d changed her clothes: I could see the black silhouette of a dress now. She looked both ways along the turnaround, then stepped down onto the walk. She was carrying the ice bucket.

“Shoot—” I said.

“Oh, don’t worry. My God, Corey—look!”

Mr. Metarey and Senator Bonwiller were patting each other across the shoulders now, and then they gripped hands. As they did, Clara crossed the drive and walked up next to them, and Mr. Metarey leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. He was smiling.

“They’re going to do it!” Christian whispered.

Henry Bonwiller took Clara’s hand then and leaned down to kiss her on the cheek as well. She set the bucket on the gravel.

“Oh, I knew it!” she said. “I knew it. Daddy’s going to do it! Corey Sifter, you’re looking at the—look, Corey! Look at what you’re seeing!”

Clara turned and craned her neck toward us.

“Shhh!” I said. “I really should be getting the ice.”

The two men turned then and started back toward the house, and when they were past us I stood, mostly to see what Clara was going to do with the bucket. But she just stayed there with it, watching her father and the Senator make their way around the willow to the party in back.

It was then, as I leaned into the slats of the feed gate to watch her, that a hand touched my neck; and when I turned I felt Christian’s lips. Her tongue tapped quickly against mine. Then she pulled back.

“Oh,” I said.

“I can’t believe we saw that together—” She leaned toward me again, and this time she pushed her tongue between my teeth.

I dropped to my knees and pulled her down next to me in Breighton’s bedding. Her mouth tasted of mint. Her hands were warm, and her hair smelled of the hay and something else. Roses, I think. Perfume. Hay and mint and perfume.

Her mouth lifted. “I like you in a tie,” she whispered. Then her lips moved to my neck. “You should wear one
every
day.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” I whispered back.

“Oh, Corey,” I heard, as we rolled sideways.

That’s when the light came on.

“Well, well—” said Clara, and a flashlight moved to Christian’s face. “Look who’s found the Easter egg.” Then it moved back to mine, and in a moment down to my shirtfront. “And look who’s gone and ruined his tie.”