“You say,” Bentley whispers. His big brown eyes are sleepy. Not only did I break my promise, but I forgot his nap, and I am feeding him too late. I am quite sure there must be good fathers in the world; if I could meet one, maybe he could show me how to do it right.
“I’m sorry,” I begin, marveling at how craven parenting has become in our strange new century. I do not recall my parents ever apologizing for failing to take me someplace I expected to go. Kimmer and I seem to do it all the time. So do most of our friends. “Sorry, sweetheart.”
“Dare Mommy,” he replies-perhaps a hope, perhaps a preference, perhaps a threat. “Mommy kiss. Dare you!”
My heart twists and my face burns, for he has learned how to use what few words he knows to skewer his guilt-ridden parents, but I am saved from having to answer my son’s riposte by the arrival of our cheeseburgers and lemonade. Bentley digs in eagerly, whatever he was trying to say quite forgotten, and, in my considerable relief, I take far too large a bite of my burger and begin at once to cough. Bentley laughs. Gazing at his smiling, ketchup- smeared face, I find myself wishing that Kimmer were here to see her son, to laugh along with us, the old Kimmer, the loving, gentle Kimmer, the witty Kimmer, the fun Kimmer, the Kimmer who still, now and then, wanders by for a visit; and, if my wife’s becoming Judge Madison will make it easier for that Kimmer to pop in, then it is my duty to do everything I can to help her achieve her goal. All the more reason not to let Marc and Lynda win.
Duty. So old-fashioned a word. Yet I know I must do my duty, not just to my wife but to my son. And to that increasingly arcane concept known as family.
I love my family.
Love is an activity, not a feeling-didn’t one of the great theologians say that? Or maybe it was the Judge, who never ceased to stress duty rather than choice as the foundation of a civilized morality. I do not remember who coined the phrase, but I am beginning to understand what it means. True love is not the helpless desire to possess the cherished object of one’s fervent affection; true love is the disciplined generosity we require of ourselves for the sake of another when we would rather be selfish; that, at least, is how I have taught myself to love my wife.
I wink at Bentley again and he grins back, chewing thoughtfully on a french fry. I unfold the Vineyard Gazette- and nearly choke again: PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR DROWNS AT MENEMSHA BEACH, the headline blares. Police Consider Death “Suspicious,” the next line informs us. Staring up at me from the right-hand side of the page is a very bad photograph of a man the newspaper identifies as one Colin Scott; but I knew him somewhat better as Special Agent McDermott.
PART II
TURTON DOUBLING
Turton doubling -In the composition of chess problems, a theme in which one White piece withdraws, allowing a second White piece to move in front of it, so that the two of them can attack the Black king together along the same line.
CHAPTER 18
“You know, he really was from South Carolina,” says Cassie Meadows. “And Scott really was his name.”
“Oh, so now they’re willing to tell us his name? Nice of them.”
“I’m not sure why they wouldn’t tell us before.”
“Well, now that he’s dead, they don’t have a choice, do they? I mean, his name was all over the papers up there.” It is Monday, four days since I opened the Gazette and saw the picture of Colin Scott, three days since I hopped the first ferry of the morning and rushed home to a frantic Kimmer. The three of us stood in the driveway hugging for so long I actually believed that my wife wanted a full explanation; but I was wrong. She was just happy, she said, to have her family back. The rest would have to wait. “I don’t get the idea the FBI is actually being all that helpful on this,” I tell Meadows bitterly.
“Mr. Corcoran thinks the Bureau is doing all it can.”
“I see,” I mutter, although I do not. I am standing in my study, gazing out the window as I love to, wishing the late November sky would clear sufficiently to spill a bit of sunshine on Hobby Road. I draw in a breath, let it out, concentrate on not placing blame. Yet. “So, if the FBI is being so helpful, have they explained what Scott was doing out in that boat?”
“Oh, he was keeping an eye on you, no question about that. He’d been following you for weeks, it sounds like.”
“Swell.”
Meadows laughs, but gently. “I don’t think you have to worry about him any more, Mr. Garland. If you see what I mean.”
I make a small sound of assent.
“The Bureau doesn’t think his friends had anything to do with it,” she continues, her tone conversational. She seems amused by the whole thing. “They were just fishing buddies from Charleston. One of them-let me check my notes-yep, ran a filling station. It seems Mr. Scott spun them some story about fishing in New England out of season, said he knew where they could get a boat… Anyway, they went to the Island with him. They told the police that Scott had been drinking, and when he fell overboard and they couldn’t find him, they kind of panicked. So they returned the boat and ran off.”
“But they came back.”
“Later, when they were a little less drunk. But I don’t think that was until after they saw the story in the paper.”
“So, did either one of them meet the description of… of Agent Foreman?”
“I’m afraid not.” She actually laughs. “His friends were both white.”
“Huh.” I remind myself of a tiny bit of wisdom from my own days of practicing law, that there are times when the story that sounds too good to be true is the story that is true.
Meadows is still disgorging facts. “So, anyway, the Bureau raided Scott’s office down in Charleston. And guess what? They found his diaries and some files, and it looks like he told you the truth. Somebody did hire him to recover papers that your father supposedly had in his possession when he died. Unfortunately, the diary doesn’t say who hired him to do it, or what the papers were exactly.”
“How convenient,” I mutter, suddenly quite lonely. Bentley is back at his preschool, Kimmer is back in San Francisco with Jerry Nathanson, and I have yet to venture back into the classroom. But for my wife’s possible judgeship, I would be tempted to take Dean Lynda up on her manipulative offer after all, and forgo a few more weeks. Of course, if Kimmer were not a candidate, the offer would never have been made.
“Hmmm?”
“If he wouldn’t trust the name of the client to paper…”
“Oh. Oh, I see.” Enthusiastic. “You’re thinking about Jack Ziegler, I guess.”
“That would be correct.”
“Well, Mr. Garland, you shouldn’t worry about Mr. Ziegler. Mr. Corcoran told me you would probably think Mr. Ziegler had something to do with… with hiring Mr. Scott. Mr. Corcoran asked me to tell you that he spoke to Mr. Ziegler, and that Mr. Ziegler denied hiring Mr. Scott, and Mr. Corcoran says he is inclined to believe him.” I almost smile at the way Meadows is tripping over the need to call everybody “Mr.,” but Uncle Mal runs a very old-fashioned
