Empire

dead or got married.” In a moment, Sandy was on the line. “What are you bothering us for, you office-seeking hanger-on?”

“I saw LaMonte on TV,” said Cessy. “I think he’s handling himself splendidly.”

“Of course he is. I tell him every word to say.”

“Listen, Sandy, my call is selfish, but I don’t want a job.”

“Too bad. Just the other day he said, ‘Whatever happened to that girl with no vowels? How can this office run without her?’ ”

“He did not.”

“But he would have, if I’d remembered to tell him to say it. Get on with your request, my dear. Remember that the President of the United States is not the Wizard of Oz. Chances are very good that you will not get your wish.”

“I did get married, Sandy. And my husband is Major Reuben Malich.”

It took a beat for Sandy to realize why she knew that name. “You’re saying you’re married to the Hero of the Tidal Basin?”

“The hero who is getting set up to take the fall for the assassination plot.”

“You know what, Cessy? I think LaMonte will want to talk to you himself.”

“No, I don’t want to bother him.”

“Your husband is the real thing, Cessy. Not that you aren’t, of course. But he’s a hero. Not just yesterday, but before. He’s the kind of soldier they make movies about.”

“I just don’t want the movie to be The Dreyfus Affair.”

“I don’t get to see any of the new movies.”

“It’s an old one. Jose Ferrer.”

“You’re thinking of I Accuse! From Zola’s famous article ‘J’Accuse.’ Jose Ferrer directed it, too. 1958.”

“Sandy, your memory astonishes me.”

“It’s not the memory, it’s the superb retrieval system. And I don’t think President Nielson wants your husband to spend years of his life fighting a false charge of treason, either. What number are you at?”

Cecily gave it to her.

Then the conversation was over. She flipped her phone closed.

“Just as I thought,” said Aunt Margaret. “The President himself is going to call back.”

“She thinks he might,” said Cecily. “But I think he won’t.”

“Then turn your phone off.”

“Okay, I think he might.”

“Are you going to tell him you switched parties?”

“I didn’t switch parties,” said Cecily. “I was a Democrat the whole time I worked for him.”

“But not much of a Democrat.”

“Moynihan worked for the Nixon White House and he was a Democrat.”

“A Democrat with a dark, dark stain on his tie.”

“I did a lot of good things with LaMonte. We got things done. Because he’s a practical politician. And I knew how to talk to liberals without sounding like a doctrinaire Republican so I could make friends with key aides on the other side of the aisle.”

“And then you gave it all up to have these beautiful babies,” said Margaret. “Including the one who currently has nothing on from the waist down.”

“I hope it’s J. P. you’re talking about.”

“Short? Smeary face and butt and hands?”

“That would be the one.” Cecily was out of her chair and in hot pursuit.

Aunt Margaret called after her. “Don’t let him sit down anywhere!”

“Too late!” Cecily called back.

By the time J. P. was bathed and dressed and the carpet more or less cleaned up from the fudgesicle that he had set down and sat upon, it had been forty-five minutes. Her cellphone chimed.

“Don’t you have a special ringtone for calls from the President?” asked Aunt Margaret.

“Hold please for the President,” said a voice on the line.

And then: “Cessy, I didn’t know that was your husband. I’ve watched that footage a half-dozen times and I think he and the other boy were splendid. Bartholomew Coleman, right? A captain. And your husband’s a major. Brilliant record in the war. They’re starting to tear at him already, aren’t they?”

So Sandy had briefed him.

“I really called just to tell you—oh, this is silly, I’m just wasting your time—Mr. President, he’s the—”

“LaMonte. Please. I’m not on Rushmore yet. There are forty guys ahead of me in line.”

“LaMonte, Reuben Malich is the real thing. A true patriot. Unlike me, he really is a Republican. He loved the President. This is tearing him apart.”

“I can imagine.”

“I’m not just a loyal wife talking here. I just wanted to make ure you knew that whatever they say about him, whatever evidence got planted to incriminate him, he did not do anything nrong. He fulfilled a legitimate assignment. He did not pass those plans on.”

“Oh, I’m quite sure of that,” said LaMonte.

“What I’m asking is—stand by him, sir. Please.”

“Let me tell you my dilemma,” said LaMonte. “I’m walking into a White House filled with people chosen by the late President. They’re used to regarding me as an obstacle to getting things done ecause they never understood that the Speaker isn’t boss of the house the way the President is boss of the White House. But these people have been part of the administration. And one of them—at least one of them—pinpointed the President so that somebody could kill him.”

“You’ve got trust issues. But my husband—”

“Don’t jump to conclusions, Cessy. I don’t have trust issues, I have a major world-class investigation going on around me here while I’m trying to transition into being President. Plus everybody’s crying, which is understandable but doesn’t help much. I need you here. I need somebody I can trust.”

“I’m a Democrat, remember?”

“I know, and I need someone who knows that language, it’s foreign to me.”

“LaMonte, I’m flattered, I’m honored, but I have a family.”

“I’ll pay you a huge salary. We raised all the White House salaries last session and I promise you, you can afford to live in Georgetown if you want to.”

“LaMonte. My parents already own a house in Georgetown, if I needed one. You can’t lure me with money. You can’t lure me at all. But as I said, I’m honored.”

“Money can’t seduce you? What about pleading? I can whimper and beg if you want. I learned how to do that in conference committees.”

“You can’t use me in the White House. My husband will be testifying before the congressional committee investigating the assassinations. And it won’t be pretty. The last thing you need is, ‘Major Malich, whose wife is an aide to President Nielson.’ There is such a thing as bad publicity.”

“Well, just for you, I’ll wave my wand and make that all go away.”

“If only,” said Cecily.

“You’ll see. We’re going to have a very harmonious administration.”

“Don’t count on much of a honeymoon.”

“Work for me, Cessy. Your husband won’t hurt us, he’ll help. He’s a hero. You’re the wife of a hero. Plus Sandy assures me you’re the only aide she ever liked.”

“She did not like me,” said Cecily. “Not till I left.”

She felt herself getting sucked into the vortex. She really did miss it. And to think of a White House in transition, under internal investigation, in desperate need of people who could concentrate, who could get things done—she knew she could do it. She had a knack for getting along with people. For isolating differences and making them seem small. She was good at the minutiae of making things happen in Washington. She wanted to say yes.