“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“No, I don’t expect you do.”
“Over here,” he said, leading them across the way into a second, quieter marquee, this one artificially cooled and full of elaborately set tables. He pulled out two chairs for them to sit.
“Why on earth did we come here?” she asked.
“You were invited, remember? By Glenda Holland.”
“Ah, yes. The woman who’s trying to pull the ladder up behind her. She thinks siding with me and the Historical Association will somehow absolve her of her wretched taste.”
“Why is that woman staring at us?”
“Which one?”
“That black woman over there,” Henry said. “In the beige dress.”
“I haven’t a clue,” Charlotte said.
Eventually, the woman approached. Apparently she’d heard Henry pronouncing on something or other down in the swamps of Florida.
Once she had left, Charlotte examined the place card in her hand. The number one was written on it in elaborate script. A very fine pen had been used to make such a mark, she thought, the ink strained through the nib to near perfection, not seeping at all into the crevices of the linen paper. A quick, sure stroke. You would have such place cards at a wedding. And tables like this. Eric’s family being Catholic, the ceremony would have been important to them. Who wouldn’t like it to look as it had for Henry that day he danced with Betsy on the parquet?
In what dim hollow of her mind, she wondered, had such fantasy never died?
Guests began filtering in for dinner. A bass drum sounded from the stage, followed by the heraldic notes of horns, as the assembled musicians struck up Fanfare for the Common Man.
“I’ve always rather liked this piece,” Henry said. “You remember Daddy used to love Copland.”
“I suppose he did.”
“With the record player in the window. Out on the porch. You remember.”
Late Sunday mornings with the newspaper and the breakfast tray and Charlotte in one of her blue cotton dresses and afterward their father would go back into his study and keep working. The never-ending work on behalf of the People. The work of justice conducted in the dependable medium of statute and brief.
The second burst of horns ceased, followed by a bar of silence and then again the low rumble of percussion.
“It’s just the right sort of optimism,” Henry said. “Confident without the swagger.”
“But isn’t it amazing,” she said, “what context does. The émigré Socialist homosexual cheering on the New Deal. And yet what becomes of Copland here? Pure bombast. Congratulations for pirates.”
“I’m just saying it’s a good bit of music.”
“Well, it’s certainly a simpler world if you can cabin things like that. One discreet experience after the next.”
“For Christ’s sake, can’t you give it a break? I didn’t have to come up here, you know. It’s not as if you enjoy my company.”
“Oh come on, Henry, there’s no need to revert. We’re not playing house. I say these things because I think you understand them and most people don’t. I’m sorry if it sounds like criticism. It’s just conversation, as far as I’m concerned. I know you want to help me. I appreciate that.”
“Then why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”
“How do you mean? We won. The law did what it’s supposed to do. I would think you’d take some satisfaction in that.”
“I don’t mean about the land.” He watched a few familiar faces — the head of State Street, the head of Credit Suisse — coming through the entrance of the tent with their wives. “How am I supposed to say this? You’re my sister.”
“Ah. I see. You think I’m losing my mind.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to. You meant it.”
“You’re barely eating,” he said. “And the way you talk to those animals of yours.”
“I knew it would come to that: the old lady and her pets. But the world’s bigger than you think, Henry. It always has been.”
“Meaning what?”
“Do you imagine Betsy is entirely dead?”
“Charlotte, please. Give the woman a little respect.”
“That’s precisely what I’m doing. I’m not talking about ghosts. I’m saying she’s not entirely gone. Not in you.”
“Of course not. I have memories like everyone else. But as they used to say in college, that’s ontologically trivial. Not to mention which, she’s got nothing to do with your dogs.”
“Well, there you are. You ask me what’s going on but you don’t actually want to know. Not unless you already understand it. There’s a lot of that going around at the moment — your kind of certainty.”
“Oh, come off it. Don’t try to make this about politics.”
“Like I said, it’s a much simpler world if you can separate things out like that. History’s a bit of a problem for you on that account, but then who am I to question the wisdom of the age? You’re no doubt efficient.”
Guests assigned to the table where the two of them had perched began arriving to take their seats, smiling cautiously in Charlotte and Henry’s direction.
“Come on,” she said. “Let’s get this over with. Where are we sitting?”
“Table one, apparently. I suppose they’ve put me with Holland.”
“Well then. Time to dine with your captors.”
As they walked toward the center of the room, Holland waved them over.
“Henry, I want you to meet Doug Fanning, head of foreign operations and special plans. He runs everything around here. Doug, this is Henry Graves, president of the New York Fed.”
For a moment the two of them beheld each other in disbelief, Henry watching his own shock reflected in Doug’s face, whose eyes had gone wide with amazement.
“Do you know each other?”
Before either could reply, Glenda appeared with Charlotte on her arm and proceeded to nudge Henry to one side.
“My husband is such an awful dunce. Of course they know each other, dear. Doug and Charlotte are neighbors. Don’t you listen to anything I say? Now,” she said, pulling out the chair beside Doug’s. “You’re right here, Charlotte. I’ve put the two of you side by side so you can have a good long talk. If you get to know him, you’ll see Mr. Fanning is an absolute sweetheart. And the fact is, Doug, that house of yours is a bit ugly. Nothing that a good hedge wouldn’t solve.”
Before Henry could intervene, Glenda grabbed him by the arm and led him around to the other side of the circle.
THROUGH THE salad course and the first glass of wine, Doug and Charlotte sat in silence, the volume of conversation around them growing steadily louder. Having got what he needed from Holland — verbal approval at least — Doug had tried to leave but Glenda had returned to drag him and Jeffrey into the yard.
How perfect, he thought now, how absolutely perfect that Charlotte Graves’s brother should be the president of the New York Fed, elected by a club of his colleagues, half from his alma mater no doubt. What could be more establishment? It made sense of her hubris — imagining herself a guardian of good order.
Before that courtroom charade, she had been an irritant. Now she was a problem. Judge Cushman’s order couldn’t be allowed to stand. Doug had already talked to Mikey about how to proceed. According to the public record, the Graves Society was a financial mess. They would attack the charity. If they could kick the struts out from under that, her argument would crumble. But they would need documentation faster than she would ever produce it.
“So!” she said, addressing herself to the silver-dipped roses at the center of the table just after their dinner plates had arrived. “Where is it you suppose you’ll go come September? A neighboring state, perhaps?”