Shoot the Lawyer Twice

by Michael Bowen

  A large crowd, many in Victorian dress, filled the open-air passageway on either side of the main entrance and clogged the doorway. Rep and Melissa paused about thirty feet away, on the street side of a graceful courtyard. After one look at the crush, Rep suggested skirting around the building to its Lake Michigan side. Melissa quickly agreed.

  They had made it more than halfway through haphazard greenery guarding the north side of the building, past a statue of either Hermes or Apollo, when they encountered a mini-copse still sheltered by abundant autumn foliage. At that point a glimpse of buttocks more gently rounded and delicately rendered than any sculptor could have managed startled them.

  Not as much, however, as Rep and Melissa startled the owner of the buttocks. She squealed in surprise at the twig-snaps announcing their approach. Leaping nimbly to her feet, she began without undue haste to pull up her jeans. Before Rep and Melissa could afford the lass some privacy by retreating toward the statue, Angstrom rolled out from under the busy young lady and serenely pulled up his zipper.

  “Don’t forget the blanket,” he said gaily to her as he walked away.

  He headed toward Rep and Melissa, spritzing his mouth from a tiny bottle of Listerine as he did so. He smiled broadly.

  “That Prius is amazing. The young lovelies can’t talk about anything except ‘driving green’ and ‘reduced carbon footprint.’ It’s a coed-magnet.”

  “Well,” Rep said as he watched the re-clad damsel make a spirited departure, “at least they’re exposing themselves to art.”

  “I hope you’re not too shocked.” Angstrom fell into step with them on their continued journey toward Villa Terrace’s east side. “I make it a point not to roll in the hay with anyone who’s taking one of my classes.”

  “It’s nice to have scruples,” Melissa said. “I trust your admirer isn’t the only UWM student who’s coming tonight. The point of having this evening’s program here instead of at the Pfister was to raise our visibility a bit by mixing undergraduates with the Brontë enthusiasts.”

  “Tereska Bleifert made it, along with at least a handful of other students. We should find out around ten o’clock or so whether combining college students and free wine is a good idea.”

  They rounded the corner, where the vista of a lushly planted garden rolling one-hundred steeply sloping yards toward Lincoln Memorial Drive and Lake Michigan presented itself. Melissa caught her breath.

  “Speaking of wine,” she said, “I’m definitely in the mood for some.”

  “Look for Dean Mignon. He is no doubt busily checking the vintages, in case the caterer’s selection is too plebian for his standards.”

  “If that’s what he’s up to then he must be somewhere in the middle of the patio over there,” Rep said, “because it looks like that’s where the wine is.”

  “Happy sipping,” Angstrom said. “But don’t drink too much before you try the funicular.”

  Angstrom pointed toward a pulley-operated cab at the south end of the terrace. Big enough for four or five people, it seemed intended for visitors who didn’t care to risk Villa Terrace’s formidable hill on foot—especially after three or four drinks. Rep noticed Amy Lee, Taylor Gates, and Jimmy and Valerie Clevenger standing beside it.

  Melissa tugged Rep toward the patio and a table draped in white linen with stemmed glasses of six different wines lined up in front of their respective bottles. A pinot noir with a rich, almost lustrous color drew her attention. She reached tentatively for a glass.

  “Are you a oenophile, professor?”

  Recognizing Mignon’s voice, she braced herself. She sensed that payback time for her insubordinate defense of ‘lesbian rule’ was rapidly approaching.

  “Not a savvy one. On a good day I can tell cabernet from merlot.”

  “Please allow me.” Mignon offered her an indulgent smile and approached the table like Tiger Woods at Augusta. Hands behind his back, leaning forward in an elegant bow, he carefully examined each row of glasses. He frowned in concentration. Neck muscles tensed under the strain of critical effort. Drawn by the performance, a loose semi-circle of people gathered. Mignon hovered in an agony of delicate judgment over a Bordeaux and a pinot grigio. After seven seconds of delicious suspense he selected the former.

  I’m being ribbed, Melissa thought. I’m supposed to sip the wine, say it’s superb, and then blush when he tells me that it’s Mogen David vintage last month. She decided that unless he laid the act on too thick she’d play along.

  When Mignon straightened and tendered the sedulously selected vintage to her, she wondered for an instant if she were wrong. His expression seemed so deeply solemn and at the same time so fatuously self-satisfied that she imagined he might actually be serious. When he spoke, though, his words banished all doubt, for he laid the schtick on with a trowel.

  “Try this one. It’s pert and saucy, with a rich hint of mischief.”

  Melissa paused for one beat before replying with rather more than a hint of mischief.

  “Do you want me to drink it or give it a spanking?”

  Titters ran through the crowd. A deep flush suffused Mignon’s ample forehead and the tops of his ears. He tried for a game smile, but it flashed weakly on and off, like a light bulb on the verge of burning out.

  A spasm of remorse jolted Melissa. Dear Lord, he WAS serious. I’ve hurt his feelings for the sake of a one-liner.

  “I appreciate your wit, professor,” Mignon stammered, “but I don’t think that one should make light of child abuse, even in jest.”

  Melissa flinched at the sheer silliness of the exaggeration. But Mignon needed a dignified exit, and she wasn’t going to deny it to him.

  “The intensity of your feelings about child abuse does you a great deal of credit, dean, and you’re quite right to remind us about that important issue.”

  Mignon beamed, unambiguously pleased with himself once again.

  “Will you be going inside soon?” he asked.

  “In about ten minutes. I need to make sure that the Power Points are properly loaded for the paper I’m supposed to present.”

  “The hymnals that Professor Angstrom appraised are on display in the Zuber Room. If you get a chance, you might take a look at them.”

  “I certainly shall.”

  ***

  “Your wife was awesome,” Bleifert said to Rep about fifteen minutes later, after Melissa had made her way inside. “Squelching that self-important wine-snob. It was priceless.”

  “Thank you. I’ll pass that on.”

  “I’m looking forward to the panel. I hope Professor Pennyworth doesn’t just read her friend’s paper but weighs in on the Q-and-A. That could be very entertaining.”

  “I wouldn’t count on any rhetorical pyrotechnics from Melissa. She enjoys good-spirited verbal jousting with people who can keep up, but she’s not a show-off. When she zings someone it’s usually in self-defense.”

  “Right. According to Livy, Rome conquered the world in self-defense.”

  Bleifert had all of Rep’s attention now. A half-smile played at her lips and her eyes glinted with an impertinence that might have gotten her ears boxed in Charlotte Brontë’s day. Rep was trying to decide whether the tease was playful or malicious when Bleifert’s eyes darted to her left.

  “Excuse me, I think I see a chance for a corporal work of mercy. Or maybe a venial sin, but either way I’ll feel good about it.”

  Rep followed her gaze to Valerie Clevenger about eight feet away, gazing with eloquent despair at an open purse and an empty pack of Dunhills. Bleifert took a pack of Marlboro Lights from her purse and flourished it in Clevenger’s direction.

  “Will these help?”

  “You have no idea how much they’ll help.” The older woman reached out two fingers to fish a cigarette from the pack.

  “You’d be doing me a huge favor if you took the whole pack,” Bleifert said. “I’ve decided to quit. Right now. Cold turkey.”

&nb
sp; “Smart girl. I hope you make it stick.” Clevenger put the pack in her own purse after taking a cigarette from it. “If you change your mind, don’t be shy about telling me.”

  She accepted a light that Bleifert offered from a jade-green Bic.

  “I won’t change my mind. I’m way overdue to stop. It started out as an affectation, turned into a habit, and it’s on its way to becoming an addiction.”

  “Good luck with it. I quit the day after my bar exam and stuck with it for twenty-five years. Then Jimmy was indicted, and look at me now.”

  “I hope that turns out to be a short-term thing for you,” Bleifert said. “I have to run inside now. I’m on the Power Point control board for the panel that starts in twenty minutes, so I have to get in there for a run-through.”

  “Any word on an appeal?” Rep asked Clevenger as Bleifert strode off.

  “They filed the notice of appeal at four o’clock this afternoon. Finnegan must have spent night and day lobbying the Appellate Division in Washington to get authorization this quickly. He also filed a motion for expedited treatment.”

  “Are you going inside for the panel?”

  “I don’t think so. Our brief could be due as early as mid-November. I’m going to track down a client who’s on the Villa Terrace board, show the flag, and curl up with some case law.”

  “Happy hunting.”

  As Rep started toward the door, something on the patio near his feet caught his eye. He stooped to pick it up. It was a gilt-edged picture card, about four inches by two-and-a-half. What kids in Catholic schools used to call holy cards, as Melissa would later explain.

  Rep figured it had dropped from Bleifert’s purse when she pulled the cigarettes out for Clevenger. It depicted a haloed woman in a caramel colored nun’s habit, looking in rapturous ecstasy toward heaven, whence golden light streamed toward her.

  Rep turned the card over. Small printing on the back identified the woman as St. Teresa of Avila, but he didn’t pay much attention to that. Written down the length of the card in the kind of precise, Palmer Method penmanship that wins gold stars from parochial school teachers were six names. Three of them meant nothing to him, but three others stood out:

  René Mignon

  Harald Angstrom

  Melissa Seton Pennyworth

  Chapter 11

  Subliminal obsession, definitely. Rep glanced surreptitiously at his watch as the paper Melissa was presenting wound toward its studiously understated conclusion. Maybe vituperations against Romanism were common among right-thinking, mid-Victorian, establishment Brits, but the excerpts from Charlotte Brontë’s letters that flashed on the screen as Melissa clicked through her Power Points suggested a novelist who spent way more time stewing about stained glass and incense than a sturdy Protestant without her own issues would have.

  Just over a hundred people, by Rep’s count, offered surprisingly robust applause as Melissa finished. After a polite nod she took her seat next to Gates in a folding chair immediately to the right of the podium.

  A woman of matronly age but with the lean and hungry look of a moderator claimed Melissa’s place at the rostrum and planted herself there with oaken solidity. Rep groaned inwardly. This would not end soon. Some iron law of literary conferences apparently required that Gates and Mignon comment on the paper Melissa had just read. As neither could be expected to know much about the subject beyond what they’d just heard, they would have to find some way to link the topic to something they did know about.

  Gates managed this rather neatly, playing to the audience by comparing Charlotte Brontë with Dan Brown—to the clear advantage of the former. He noted that Brontë at least took responsibility for her opinions instead of putting them in the mouth of a fictional professor who had somehow managed to acquire tenure at Harvard without knowing enough about Renaissance Art to pass a high school AP exam. The Brontëphiles liked that. A lot.

  The challenge proved more daunting for Mignon. His intended theme was that popular culture and philosophic truth seldom intersect except by accident. This got him off on the wrong foot, because he had forgotten that Brontë herself was guilty of being popular. As he meandered through the religious explorations of T.S. Eliot, Tennessee Williams, and Madonna, a restless stirring ruffled the room. He affirmed that the Victorians lived in an Age of Doubt where religion was concerned, whereas we live in an Age of Indifference. He waited for the audience to acknowledge the point, while the audience waited for him to make one.

  The moderator finally euthanized Mignon’s efforts by inviting questions—for any of the panelists, she hastily added. The first went to Gates. So did the second and the third. When Angstrom finally raised his hand with a question for Mignon, the combination of glee and wariness in Mignon’s expression struck Rep as almost touching.

  “If Charlotte Brontë were writing fiction today, do you think she’d find a way to comment on the controversy over Pope Pius the Twelfth?”

  “I would certainly expect a reference or two to major religious leaders who remain silent in the face of epic moral crises,” Mignon said.

  “That’s a bit simplistic, isn’t it?” Gates demanded sharply.

  Swelling with the confidence of someone back on familiar turf, Mignon seemed to grow three inches in his chair.

  “The controversy over the pope’s wartime record will doubtless go on for decades. The effects of his actions, for good or ill, could be debated indefinitely. But the fact remains that, whatever he did or didn’t do, when Pope Pius the Twelfth faced the greatest moral crisis in the history of the human race, he didn’t speak out. Not a word.”

  This wasn’t a laugh line by any stretch of the imagination, but laughter came and Mignon greeted it with a pleased smile. As the laughter grew the smile began a painful morph into puzzlement—a reaction shared by Melissa until she glanced over her shoulder at the Power Point screen.

  In fonts so perfectly matching the papers quoted that the excerpts looked like scanned photocopies, in letters enlarged to headline size, she read:

  New York Times

  March 14, 1940

  “Pope is Emphatic about Just Peace: Jews Rights Defended”

  New York Times

  October 1, 1942

  “A study of the words which Pope Pius XII had addressed since his accession…leaves no room for doubt. He condemns the worship of force and its concrete manifestation in the persecution of the Jewish race.”

  Canadian Jewish Chronicle

  September 4, 1942

  “Laval Spurns Pope: 25,000 Jews in France Arrested for Deportation”

  Gideon Hausner, Israeli Attorney General Opening Statement—Trial of Adolph Eichman

  “…the pope himself intervened personally in support of the Jews of Rome.”

  It took eight full seconds for Mignon to look reluctantly over his left shoulder, and six more for him to absorb the text. For an eyeblink blind fury contorted the face that he turned back to confront the audience—or, more accurately, to confront Angstrom, for he acted as if everyone else were invisible. Then, after less than a second, he mastered himself. Only a few flecks of white froth clinging pendulously to his lower lip evidenced the rage that Melissa read on his face as it turned.

  The moderator prudently reclaimed the floor and pronounced the panel concluded. As Melissa rose and gathered her papers, she caught sight of Angstrom making his way to the back of the room, where Bleifert was shutting down the Power Point equipment. They took a stab at exchanging high fives, and almost got it on the second try.

  So they’d set Mignon up. Baited him into a mistake—“not a word,” the kind of incautious absolute that academics are trained to avoid—and then slam-dunked him with a handful of in-your-face sound-bites. Melissa frowned. Verbal sparring is supposed to be mental stimulus, not blood sport.

  Thinking to offer Mignon some moral support, Melissa turned toward his chair. He was gone. And he had to have left in a very big hurry.

&nbs
p; Chapter 12

  “You’re serious?” Rep demanded. “You’re going to abandon this gala event full of people dressed like extras in a Merchant/Ivory film and drive to UWM to make sure Mignon isn’t about to kill himself?”

  “I feel guilty about abandoning you for forty-five minutes, if that helps.”

  “I can handle that. What I’m having trouble with is the idea that he might slit his wrists over getting one-upped in front of a hundred people at an event no journalist in the country except maybe the society reporter for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel will care about.”

  “I don’t think they’ve called themselves ‘society reporters’ since the Ford administration—and you ended that last sentence with a preposition.”

  “Guilty as charged. Please admire the spunky way I absorbed that rebuke without letting it crush my spirit.”

  “You have a very healthy ego.”

  “It’s hard to be humble when I’m married to you.”

  Melissa grinned.

  “That’s really my point. Mignon is vulnerable in a way that you and I aren’t. His career peaked when he got tenure fifteen years ago. He can’t get a scholarly paper published to save his life. This incident won’t make the papers, but there are plenty of academics here and by Monday morning they’ll have Mignon’s gaffe flying through cyberspace from one dot.edu to another.”

  “Scholars in this country apparently don’t have enough to do.”

  “That’s the problem. Graduate students hear cautionary tales about squelches like this one. ‘Did you know that sugar and sumac are the only English words beginning with su and pronounced as if they began with shu?’”

  “‘Sure.’ That’s George Bernard Shaw, isn’t it.”

  “Right. Or, ‘In English a double-negative is an affirmative and in some languages a double-negative is an enhanced negative, but we know of no language in which a double-affirmative is a negative.’”

  “What’s the comeback for that one?”

  “‘Yeah, yeah.’” Melissa smiled. “That actually happened at a philosophy symposium in the ’seventies. It ended a professor’s career. I’m worried that Mignon sees himself now as the butt of a story just like that.”