The Assassins Gallery - [Dr Mikhal Lammeck 01]

by David L. Robbins

  On the canvas, Roosevelt’s face appeared complete. His upper torso was gathered beneath the shoulders of the dark cape, of which only the collar had been colored in. Shoumatoff had captured the President faithfully, but not generously. Oyster folds hung like crepe below his eyes. The eyes themselves bore a farseeing weariness. The whole of the painting, even unfinished, spoke of his illness and his struggle against the gravity of the grave.

  The President sat engrossed in the papers laid before him by his secretary. He wielded a fountain pen above one page and said to the room, “Here’s where I make a law.” Judith watched him scratch his name. Hassett set the paper aside for the signature to dry. Roosevelt signed several pages, then Hassett lapped each over a chair arm or seat back like white laundry. The secretary hung one sheet near enough for Judith to see the signature; the scrawl was weak and barely decipherable as “Franklin D. Roosevelt.”

  Shoumatoff went to the President to straighten the cape across his shoulders. She tried to engage him again in chat, to lure him back into pose. Hassett, who made no secret of his dislike for the painter or the quality of her work, harvested the disarray of signed papers. He reminded the President that Agent Reilly would be leaving soon for San Francisco to arrange the upcoming UN trip. Roosevelt asked him to tell Reilly to come up after lunch for final instructions. Hassett left the room. With the secretary gone, Roosevelt kept his attention on the remaining work stacked on the tables. He lifted his head a few times, not at the painter but only to smile at Mrs. Rutherfurd.

  Judith watched the room, silent as a shadow. Shoumatoff added touches to the portrait. The two cousins read and knit, nothing they could not set down in an instant for a laugh with Roosevelt or to tend to him somehow. Mrs. Rutherfurd, as quiet as Judith, asked for nothing but to be close by. The Filipino houseboy Joe came out of the kitchen to set the table for lunch. The President peered up to see Joe laying out the dishes.

  Roosevelt spoke Judith’s mind: “We have about fifteen more minutes.”

  She slipped from behind Shoumatoff, again keeping close to the wall and the fireplace. She entered the kitchen. Daisy Bonner had the oven door down, checking on fresh rolls that perfumed the small kitchen. Judith asked, “Miz Bonner, can I help?”

  “Can you cook, girl?”

  ”Yes, ma’am. Right well.”

  ”Alright. The President can’t eat much at any one sitting, so I been feeding him bits before and after. You whip him up a nice warm bowl of corn gruel, and that’ll settle his stomach for lunch. The bag of meal’s in the cabinet. Milk’s on the back porch in the icebox.”

  Bonner chopped vegetables for a salad. Judith paused to admire how the woman handled a knife, then fetched the milk and cornmeal. Setting a pot to heat on a burner, she mixed the gruel, stirring to keep the milk from skimming.

  Bonner did not watch Judith. In a minute, when the gruel had thickened, the cook lifted her nose.

  ”That smells nice,” she said. “What’d you add?”

  Judith ladled dollops of the mush into a bowl for the President.

  ”Almond extract.”

  The cook came close to sniff. She pointed a finger to dip it into the bowl and sample.

  Judith smacked the woman’s hand. “No, Miz Bonner. That’s for the President.”

  The cook straightened, surprised. Judith ignored her. She arranged the bowl on a simple wooden tray with a napkin and spoon. Entering the room, the President looked up from his papers. He made space on the table.

  Roosevelt flicked his eyes to Mrs. Rutherfurd. He cast her a smile that said I’m sorry, I have to eat this bland, pulpy mess. Mrs. Rutherfurd beamed in return, forgiving. Judith paused to let the two complete their final dialogue. She wanted to slip out of her body presenting the gruel to Franklin Roosevelt, just for a moment, to step invisibly beside Madame Shoumatoff. She would whisper, ”Pay attention, woman. Paint this moment.”

  Roosevelt blinked, away from Mrs. Rutherfurd. His face fell, resigned, as he watched the steaming bowl land on the table in front of him. He lifted his glance to Judith.

  “Goody,” he said.

  * * * *

  LAMMECK’S LEGS AND BACK throbbed after five hours on the road. His eyes and nerves felt frazzled from breaking the speed limit through two states, watching for cops behind every rural billboard and clump of brush. Finally pulling into Warm Springs, he had to urinate and the car needed gas. Stopping at a filling station, he told the attendant to top off the tank. In the Whites Only bathroom, the soles of his feet and the meat of his rump tingled from the memory of the long ride.

  Washing his hands, Lammeck took his first look of the day in a mirror. He was untucked and wrinkled, radiating urgency. He looked like Dag: tense. If Judith was with the President, the man was only alive at her discretion. Lammeck had no idea why she was restraining herself, but every second he delayed increased the danger. If he looked this rough when he arrived, he’d never get past the first tier of guards. He washed his face and hands, straightened his suit, shirt, and tie, and made himself walk back to the car instead of sprint. The attendant gave him instructions to the Little White House, just five minutes away.

  Lammeck did not speed out of town. He recalibrated himself, calming down. The .38 was fully loaded but he checked the magazine anyway. The feel of the pistol in his hands helped smooth his nerves. He slipped it in place near his armpit and patted it, the one thing he was confident of.

  Within minutes, Lammeck found the turn to Roosevelt’s wooded retreat. He checked his watch. A few minutes before one. The sky shone dazzling blue, birds twittered in the soft-leaved maples lining the entrance.

  Three dress Marines guarded a gate across the shady lane. Lammeck braked at the command of a white-gloved hand.

  “Afternoon, sir.”

  “Corporal. I’ve got an appointment with Secret Service Chief Reilly.” Lammeck produced the dog-eared letter from Mrs. Beach.

  The Marine perused the page. “This don’t mention any appointment, Dr. Lammeck, sir. And this letter’s over a month old.”

  Another Marine checked a clipboard. He shook his head at the corporal; Lammeck was not on their list of visitors.

  Lammeck opened his hand and gestured at the car. “Corporal, take a look at the dust on this thing. I drove all the way down here from D.C. yesterday and this morning. Chief Reilly is expecting me to be on time. And if you know the chief, you know I need to keep moving.”

  The soldiers exchanged glances.

  “I’m a special consultant to the Secret Service, fellas. And...” Lammeck peeled back his lapel to show them the Colt .38 in its harness, “...I’m carrying this. That’s all I can say.” He let go of the coat to conceal the gun quickly, importantly. “Now raise the gate, or Chief Reilly will put your heads on the stake next to mine.”

  The corporal considered Lammeck with an unsure wince. While he glared, another soldier lifted the gate. Lammeck saluted and drove through.

  The road wound a mile through dogwood, pine, and oak on sloping fields. Insects buzzed over sunny acres. Lammeck kept his foot light on the gas pedal. Another gate, this one guarded by Secret Service agents, crossed the road ahead. On the other side of that gate waited a classic damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t situation. He was going to surprise and piss off either Reilly or Judith. Pick one, he thought.

  Lammeck talked his way through this gate also. Again he displayed his paperwork and the pistol, letting the agents assume that only a prominent man would show up with both, and dusty D.C. plates to boot. Lammeck drove on, catching his breath, but he could do nothing about his hurried heartbeat when he saw, around a downhill bend, the Little White House.

  * * * *

  THE PRESIDENT PUT ONLY two spoonfuls in his mouth. Judith concealed her excitement behind Desiree’s servile mask. When Roosevelt swallowed the second time, Judith knew it was enough. She sensed the bonds of this man’s life break, and with them the life of Desiree. The two would die together.

  Judith took the tray to th
e kitchen. She meant to rinse out the bowl in the sink but Daisy Bonner, still pouting from the slap on her hand, ushered Judith out of her domain. “I’ll get that,” she said, pointing at the cooling gruel. Judith did not argue, figuring if the cook tasted it now, that was her fate. Judith left the tray on a sideboard where the cook ignored it. She slipped into the den to stand against the wall. The table was set for lunch. Madame Shoumatoff painted silently, unable to reengage the President. The knitting cousin Suckley focused on her needles and crimson yarn. At the table, the other cousin arranged a vase of cut dogwood blooms. Roosevelt glanced back and forth between piles of papers on two card tables within his reach. Only Mrs. Rutherfurd watched him. And Judith.

  Roosevelt’s cheeks seemed flushed around his tilted cigarette holder. He took the holder from his lips and set it in an ashtray. His head bobbed between the stacks of work, then fell forward. His hands fumbled at nothing in the air. Suckley set aside her knitting, rising from the sofa. She stepped close to Roosevelt and bent to look in his face.

  She asked, “Did you drop something?”

  Roosevelt raised his left hand to his temple. He pressed there with shaky gray fingers. The hand went down, then the right came up to cover the whole of his forehead. He did not look at his cousin, but gazed down and muttered. From her place against the wall, Judith barely made out what he said: “I have a terrific pain in the back of my head.”

  Judith cut her eyes to Mrs. Rutherfurd. The woman’s composed smile was gone. She leaned forward on the sofa, ready to act somehow. Cousin Suckley urged Roosevelt to lean back. The President settled against the cushion in his regal cape. Judith caught him glancing at Mrs. Rutherfurd straight ahead. Then his eyelids half closed, and Mrs. Rutherfurd rushed forward as he slumped.

  At her easel, Shoumatoff shouted, “Lucy, something’s wrong!” Beside the President, Suckley asked, “Franklin, are you alright?” Roosevelt’s mouth sank open. Mrs. Rutherfurd landed on her knees next to him. All she could offer was an open hand to his cheek. The Russian painter stood behind her unfinished painting and screamed.

  At the sound, Arthur the valet plunged out of the bedroom. Cook Bonner and houseboy Joe erupted from the kitchen. Quickly the six formed a huddle around Roosevelt. In a burst, Suckley explained what had happened. Lucy waved a kerchief dipped in camphor under the President’s nose to revive him, but to no effect. Arthur and Joe took action, linking hands under the President to lift him out of the chair. The wool cape wrapped him like a shroud. The Delano cousin took hold of his feet. He was slack in their arms. His breathing grated. When they carried the President past her, Judith saw only whites under his drooping lids.

  Mrs. Rutherfurd, Suckley, and the cook stood aside, fists in their mouths. Shoumatoff had seen enough. The Russian ran from the house, shouting at the agent outside, “Call a doctor!” Inside, Suckley took hold of herself. She darted to the phone, telling the Warm Springs operator, “Get a doctor up here, quick!” Mrs. Rutherfurd stared at the entrance to the President’s bedroom, balling her hands, white-faced.

  Shoumatoff hurried back into the cottage, bustling for her easel and paints. She gathered fast and carelessly, tucking the unfinished painting under her arm. She saw Mrs. Rutherfurd standing still.

  ”Lucy! Lucy, we have to go. Now!”

  Mrs. Rutherfurd seemed not to hear. “What?”

  “We have to go! I will call Nicholas at the hotel. Pack everything!”

  Mrs. Rutherfurd did not take her eyes from the wall behind which Roosevelt lay. Arthur, Joe, and cousin Delano were in there with him. They loved him, too. She moved toward the bedroom.

  With a gentle touch to her shoulder, Judith intercepted the woman. Mrs. Rutherfurd did not take her eyes from the doorway. She tried to walk past. Judith stiffened her hand.

  “Mrs. Rutherfurd, no.”

  At Judith’s voice, the woman’s fixation on the doorway broke.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You need to listen to your friend. You need to disappear.” Judith used none of her Negro accent, none of her deference. She squeezed once on the woman’s arm, then released it.

  “Disappear,” Judith repeated.

  Mrs. Rutherfurd gazed at her for a moment with the same sad acceptance with which the President had looked at the poisoned gruel.

  Shoumatoff, laden with her paints and canvas, called from the foyer. “Desiree! Come and pack!”

  Judith walked away. Before exiting the front door, she glanced back. Mrs. Rutherfurd had not moved, steps from the President.

  Judith paused in the foyer, to let Shoumatoff climb the slope and reach the guesthouse. Then she left the Little White House.

  In the driveway, a Secret Service agent sat in his car, speaking into a radiophone. Judith darted past him. She thrust her hands through her hair, making certain to run awkwardly. She dashed past the guesthouse, up the hill, away from the gate and into the woods, screaming, “The President’s dead!”

  * * * *

  LAMMECK PARKED IN THE drive, behind a dark federal car. Before he’d taken two strides toward the white cottage, he knew something was wrong.

  Out of one of the smaller guesthouses, a woman joggled down the hill. Judging from the flail of her arms, she was frantic. Behind her, a Cadillac waited, its trunk open. She hastened to another woman treading up the slope. Lammeck recognized this one: Lucy Rutherfurd. She walked unhurried, stunned. The frenzied woman gripped Lucy with both hands, gave her a shake, then headed for the front door of the Little White House. Lammeck reached under his coat for the pistol. He touched it, then took away his hand. This was not the place for an unknown man to be running with a firearm in his mitt. Lammeck broke into a run and beat the woman to the cottage door.

  He flung open the screen door. Leaping through the foyer, he landed in a larger room with a fireplace, a table set for lunch, other tables with documents spilling onto the floor, and two standing women chewing on their knuckles.

  He huffed at them, “Where’s the President?”

  One, the shorter and more frumpy of the two, pulled her hand from her mouth to mutely point. Lammeck dove for the doorway.

  He stopped at the threshold. The three people around the bed turned to see who had arrived. They didn’t know him, and Lammeck did not recognize them: a black man, a brown man, and a well-dressed older woman. The man on the bed, he knew.

  Franklin Roosevelt was being undressed by the black man. His shined shoes had been set carefully beneath the narrow bed, below his stocking feet. The downed President lay swathed in a great cape. His tie and shirt were undone. All three turned back to attending him, ignoring Lammeck. Lammeck looked at the ashen face, heard the labored breathing, and knew the President was good as dead.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  Lammeck whirled to face a big man, the agent who’d been in the car out front.

  “Lammeck. No time to explain, but I’m working with Reilly. Tell him I’m here. Come over here.”

  He stepped the agent away from the President’s bedroom. In the den, the woman who’d followed Lammeck into the house snatched down an easel, scooped up tubes of paint.

  “What’s your name, Agent?”

  “Beary.”

  “Alright, Beary, when did this happen?”

  “Just now. Maybe a minute ago.”

  “There was a maid who came with Mrs. Rutherfurd. Young girl, tall, brown skin.”

  Before Beary could answer, one of the women standing at the sofa, again the dowdy one, said, “Desiree.”

  “Desiree. Yeah, that’s her. Where is she?”

  Beary pointed outside, up the hill. “She ran off right before you pulled up. That way, into the trees.”

  “Beary, get on your horn right now! Tell everybody you can, Reilly, the Marines, state police, all of them to lock this place down. No one gets in or out.”

  Lammeck flew out the door, offering no explanation. He was sure Agent Beary would not take orders from a man he didn’t know. He’d hesitate, check with his boss
Reilly first. That would be all the room Judith needed.

  In the shady yard, Lucy Rutherfurd was still struggling up to the path to the guesthouse. Lammeck had no time to spend on her. Judith had run northeast. Lammeck tore after her.

  He put the .38 in his hand and ran. Lammeck was not built for pursuit, and the months in Washington had robbed him of his conditioning. He sucked air and pumped his arms as hard as he could, kicking up leaves, crashing through brush. Judith could breeze over this, he knew, and he had no chance to catch her. He ran on, fighting himself. The Colt swinging in his fist grew heavier.

  Lammeck plowed ahead. Dead foliage made the footing unreliable. He could not run in a straight line for all the tree trunks; dodging them sapped him even faster. His gait eroded until he came to a standstill, hands on his knees, bent and gasping. Then he saw something on the ground.