Wisdom's Grave 01 - Sworn to the Night

by Craig Schaefer

  She avoided her reflection. She looked like a frilly tangerine in Richard’s favorite dress, some parts too loose, some too tight, the outfit making her feel like an unbalanced mess. The bright color was a spotlight calling everyone to stare at her ineptitude. Trying to distract herself, she focused on Alton’s entourage. He’d brought a handful of men to the party with him, some clearly working private security—they lingered at every doorway, silent and steely-eyed—and others were aides who occasionally cut into the senator’s conversations with messages and whispers.

  Then there was the odd one out: a tall, dark man in a tan linen suit, cut perfectly to his lanky physique. He hovered on the fringes, just like her, a silent phantom in the social swirl. He regarded his surroundings with an air of quiet amusement. Nessa circled the room, spotting him on the far side before losing sight of him in the crowd of partygoers.

  Then she turned and nearly bumped into him.

  He leaned against the wall, faintly smiling. His smile grew as he looked down at her.

  “Not your scene either, huh?” he asked in a slow, basso rumble.

  “Oh,” Nessa said, “I can’t complain.”

  “Sure you can. Everybody’s got the right to sing the blues.” He offered her his hand. “Webster Scratch, at your service. My friends call me Calypso.”

  His hand was smooth as silk, with a gentleman’s touch.

  “A pleasure, Mr. Scratch. You work with my father-in-law?”

  “Mm-hmm. Director of Campaign Communications, though I’m really more of an all-around troubleshooter. So, how do you feel about becoming part of the First Family?”

  Nessa gave him an appraising look. She pitched her voice a bit lower. “Do you really think Alton has a shot at the White House?”

  “I’m a rambler and a gambler, Mrs. Roth. Do you know the two keys to being a good gambler?”

  She shook her head.

  “Number one, never hitch your wagon to a losing horse. Number two, cheat.” He gave her a sly wink. “In all certitude, though, it’s a long road just to reach the primaries. But I think our boy Alton’s gonna go the distance. Time will out the truth, it always does.”

  One of the aides swooped in, cutting between them. He held out a small tablet for inspection. “Sir,” he said.

  As he offered up the tablet, the aide’s tailored sleeve slid back, baring a sigil tattooed on his wrist.

  It wasn’t the same as the one Marie had asked her to research, but easily a kissing cousin, all sharp angles and jagged loops, something primal and cold. Then it was gone, and the aide gone with it, leaving Calypso holding the tablet. His eyes darkened as he flicked the screen with his fingertip.

  “Mm-hmm,” he rumbled.

  “Something wrong?” Nessa asked.

  “No, ma’am, just a tiny bump in the road. If you’ll pardon me, I haven’t said hello to your husband yet.”

  * * *

  The alley behind the house was as pristine as the street out front, if lonelier and poorly lit. Richard was glad for both, for the moment. He needed a few minutes of peace to catch his breath. He felt like he was being strangled twice, once by the crowd, all grasping hands and need, and twice by his father’s thinly veiled disapproval.

  “Never fucking good enough,” he grumbled, fishing out a cigarette. It dangled in his lips as he flicked his lighter. It sputtered, failing to spark. Then again.

  A thin, dark hand dropped in front of his face. A silver lighter ignited, the sudden flame dazzling Richard’s eyes.

  “Allow me,” his unexpected guest said.

  Richard blinked, startled, then pursed his lips in an attempt to hide it. He put the tip of his cigarette to the flame until it sizzled then nodded his thanks.

  “Appreciate it. You’re…Mr. Scratch, right? You work with my dad.”

  The tall man smiled, but his eyes were chips of black ice.

  “We’re family. No need to stand on formalities. You can call me Calypso.”

  “Calypso.” Richard nodded, uncertain, and took a drag on his cigarette. “That a nickname or…”

  “Oh, I’ve got plenty of names. That’s just the one I like most right now. Names are like faces. Everybody’s got two or three of ’em.”

  Richard chuckled. “Pretty sure I only have one face.”

  “Do you now? Richard, you seem like a quick study. So I’m gonna lay some wisdom on your doorstep and trust you to pick it up. Your father is going to formally declare his intention to run for the presidency next month.”

  “Yeah, I know. Dad told me—”

  “He’s going to get the party’s nod, he’s going to win the primary with minimal opposition, and then he’s going to win the electoral vote. In a landslide, in fact.”

  Richard forced a smile. He realized, as a trickle of gray smoke rose between their faces, that he hadn’t seen Calypso blink once.

  “Getting a little ahead of yourself, aren’t you?”

  Calypso shook his head.

  “No,” he told Richard, “I’m not. Some very important people are very heavily invested in your father’s success. And what we can’t have, what we absolutely cannot afford right now, is any hint of a scandal. That’d be bad for everyone. Do you dig what I’m saying?”

  His shoulders sagged. “Oh, God. Did Vanessa say something to you? Is she being weird? Look, I’ll talk to her—”

  “Your wife? She’s sweeter than a Georgia peach. No, I’m more concerned about you, son.”

  Richard took another drag. He turned his head and exhaled a thin plume of smoke, an excuse to tear away from Calypso’s gaze.

  “Me? What about me?”

  “I get it, you know. We’ve all got our little peccadilloes, our…extracurricular activities that some might find distasteful. But you and your playmates, well, you’re getting sloppy. And I can’t have sloppy, son. I won’t abide it.”

  Richard squirmed like a worm on a hook. “I…I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You know, Richard, while he has a hard time showing it, I know for a fact that your father loves you very much.” Calypso loomed over him. His smile vanished. “I don’t. And if you screw the pooch and sink your father’s career, there won’t be any place in this world or any other where you can hide from me. Clean up your act, son. Clean it up and keep it clean, because if I have to do it for you, well…you won’t be a happy man.”

  Richard froze, staring up at him. They stood there, eye to eye, the air between them electric. Then Calypso shrugged. The amused smile returned, his affable mask firmly back in place. He patted Richard’s shoulder.

  “Stay clean,” he said, “and you and me are copacetic, all the way to the White House. Great things ahead of you, young man. Great things indeed.”

  Calypso stepped back inside the house. Richard stared at his cigarette, dropped it, and snuffed it under his heel.

  * * *

  Nessa had been downgraded from hostess to messenger, courtesy of Richard’s father. She walked the upstairs halls, looking for Richard after he’d vanished from the party below. She heard his voice, a strained and muffled shout, from behind his closed office door.

  “No, I don’t know who the fuck he is, Scottie! Just some guy who works for my dad. That’s the point—”

  She raised an eyebrow. Leaning close, she put her ear an inch from the wood.

  “And I’m telling you,” Richard said, “he knows. Okay? The dude knows. No, I don’t know specifics. No, I didn’t fucking ask him. He was leaning on me, all right? I played dumb. It didn’t work. We need an emergency—yeah, okay, thank you.”

  Heavy footsteps on the other side of the door. Nessa scurried back a few feet, straightening her dress, freezing in place until the office door swung open. Then she walked past, pretending to be surprised when Richard loomed in the doorway.

  “Oh, Richard, there you are. Your father is looking for you. He’s downstairs.”

  Her husband looked like he’d aged a year since the last time she saw him. His face was
pale, with a five-o’clock shadow starting to sprout on his cheeks. He ran nervous fingers through his hair and smoothed it back.

  “Yeah, okay, I’ll…yeah.” He paused. “Hey, one thing. I’m gonna be heading out for a day or two tomorrow morning. Business trip.”

  Nessa shook her head. “You just got back. Where are you heading off to now?”

  “Business,” he said, stepping around her. “Jesus, Vanessa, just…don’t start with me, okay? I’m under a lot of stress right now. It’s hard enough dealing with my father without you adding your bullshit to the pile.”

  “I was just asking a question.”

  “Well don’t,” he snapped. “Can you just shut up and support me? For once? Is that too much to ask?”

  He stomped down the stairs, leaving her to bristle in silence.

  Nessa drifted to the bedroom. She couldn’t go right back to playing her role at the party. She tried to put her mask on, but it wouldn’t fit. Her reflection stared out at her from the mirror, this unhappy woman in her ridiculous orange dress, her pinned hair wilting.

  “There has to be more than this,” she murmured to the glass.

  She looked at her phone, sitting on the vanity. She knew one thing that would bring her smile back.

  We should celebrate your success today, she texted. Come have dinner with me tomorrow night.

  The response came less than half a minute later, as if Marie had been waiting for her. She almost certainly hadn’t, Nessa knew, but she liked the mental image.

  I’d like that. Where at?

  My home, Nessa replied. Husband is gone on business. Just the two of us.

  Twenty-Seven

  Richard left at seven in the morning. Nessa sent the maid home at noon, giving her the rest of the day off and a small wad of under-the-table cash to go shopping with. The brownstone was quiet.

  Storm clouds rolled in a little after one, painting the sky with mud-brown smears and turning the sunlight a sickly shade of yellow. Nessa didn’t mind. In the kitchen, as the first spatters of rain kissed the tall windows, she took stock of the pantry and the double-wide refrigerator. Plenty to work with. She laid out prep bowls and washed down the cutting board, bouncing with nervous energy.

  Richard had spent an ungodly amount of money wiring the entire house for sound, concealing Sonos speakers behind recessed grills in every room. They used them once a month, at most, and always his music. Nessa quirked a smile, pulled up the control app on her phone, and flitted through her personal collection. With a tap of a button, the kitchen filled with the slow, ominous strains of a gothic rock song. Bauhaus, performing “Bela Lugosi’s Dead.” The warbling guitar droned like an oboe being played underwater, the staccato, scratchy drums banging a counterpoint to the tapping of raindrops against the windows. Nessa basked in the music and poured herself a glass of cabernet.

  * * *

  “You’re going to see George tonight, aren’t you?” Janine asked. She clung to the futon like a cat about to pounce.

  It took Marie a second to remember who ‘George’ was. Right. The name she’d blurted out after coming home from dinner with Nessa.

  “Huh? Why would you say that?”

  “I dunno,” Janine said. “Because you’ve paced through the living room three times in the last half hour, wearing three different outfits? And you’re so nervous you’re vibrating?”

  Marie turned on her heel, stopping in mid-pace. She glanced down at herself. Her latest attempt was a casual floral top with a little ruffle at the waist and black skinny jeans. Simple, clean, noncommittal.

  “He—George,” Marie said, “found some more information for me. On the case.”

  “Ooh, of course. It’s all about the investigation. Are you going undercovers together?” Janine fake coughed into her hand. “I mean, undercover?”

  Marie winced. “Stop, just stop. It’s only dinner. Friends having dinner.”

  “Why are you refusing to admit you’re going on a date?”

  “Because it’s not a date!”

  She swept into her bedroom, rummaging through her drawers, second-guessing herself again and not sure why. Janine hovered in her doorway.

  “Okay,” Janine said, “first of all? Stop. You look great.”

  Marie sighed. “Really?”

  “Really. That top looks amazing on you and I want to steal it. And I probably will. Second of all? Let me do your makeup.”

  “I don’t want to look like I’m wearing makeup,” Marie said. “Really, it’s not that kind of thing.”

  Janine rolled her eyes. “Yeah. That’s why I said to let me do it, because you don’t know how. Hello? Veteran theater geek here. I have secret and arcane skills. C’mon, let me help.”

  Marie thought about it. She gave in slowly, her resistance crumbling like a sandcastle under a steady tide.

  “Okay, just…really light, okay?”

  Janine clapped her hands together. “I’ll get my brushes. You are going to look so hot.”

  “I’m not trying to look hot!” Marie called after her. “Absolute minimal hotness!”

  * * *

  By the time night fell, Nessa had taken to prowling the halls, fiddling with the music every five steps. From goth to classic rock to bouncy pop, the tunes changing as fast as her shifting mood. Her mind was a radio with a spinning dial. She remembered the first time she laid eyes on Marie and that feeling, like the ground was sliding out from under her feet. Anxiety and delight. It all surged back to her now as the clock counted down.

  She settled on a satellite station that played classical. Chamber music, soft, filling the house with the dark strains of a lonely violin.

  She popped into the bedroom to check her reflection one last time. Black Dior dress, on. Silver earrings, in place. Something was missing. Her gaze drifted across the cluttered vanity. Her pill bottle sat on the edge, just where she’d left it.

  Did I— she thought. No. She’d changed last night, at Richard’s command, and went downstairs without taking her pills. Then this morning she’d been treated to an encore of his raging-prick routine from the night before, and he’d talked to her like she was a child while demanding three separate times to know if she’d dosed herself. She hadn’t, out of sheer irritation at that point, and then forgot about the pills altogether halfway through breakfast.

  She hadn’t been off the drugs for more than a day since she’d started her sessions with Dr. Neidermyer, not until tonight. And she felt…fine. Better than fine, really. She figured it was just the nervous excitement cutting through her usual brain fog, but she felt better than she had in ages. Nessa touched the bottle. She picked it up. Then she set it down again, unopened.

  Not the missing piece. In a burst of inspiration, she tugged open a narrow drawer and picked up a long-neglected tube of lipstick. Her favorite, a deep and elegant plum. She’d worn it once in front of Richard and he’d given her a half-hour lecture, telling her she looked like a moody teenager.

  That wasn’t what she saw in the mirror, though. Her dark eyes, high cheekbones, her black bangs artfully sweeping above one pert eyebrow. Her plum lips curled into an eager smile.

  “Surrender, Dorothy,” she said to her reflection.

  The doorbell rang. She bounced down the staircase, almost giddy. She paused to strike a studied pose, the graceful lady of the manor. Then she took a deep breath, opened the front door, and—

  “You’re soaked!” Nessa’s cool grace shattered and her hands fluttered, beckoning. “Come in, come in!”

  A springtime torrent kissed the street outside, wind-whipped showers coming down in rolling wet waves, almost horizontal. Even with her blue folding umbrella, Marie looked like a drowned rat. She stepped inside, fast, droplets of rain pooling on the welcome mat.

  “The bus stop looked closer last time, when it wasn’t storming out,” she said, her tone apologetic.

  Nessa plucked the umbrella from her hand, collapsed it, and jammed the sodden mess into a brass stand beside the door. “Come
with me. Bathroom. Let’s get you some warm fluffy towels.”

  * * *

  The towels were warm. And fluffy. Marie stared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror, beneath a softly humming art deco light sconce, and sighed. Most of Janine’s careful makeup work was a wash, literally; at least she’d salvaged what she could, and she didn’t look like a blurry raccoon. Her hair was a tangled mess, but then again, when wasn’t it? She rubbed it down with thick Egyptian cotton. Nessa’s bathroom was tiny but well equipped with spa towels and a heat lamp. The hard orange eye of the lamp chased away the cold of the streets.

  With the towels, Nessa had passed her a dress on a padded hanger. It was nightingale blue, with an empire waist and bell sleeves. One glance at the designer’s name on the tag and Marie realized it probably cost more than she made in a month.

  “Our sizes are fairly close and this runs a little long on me, so it should fit you nicely,” Nessa said.

  “Oh, no, you don’t have to—”

  “Marie,” Nessa said. “Your clothes are soaked. You’ll catch your death. Put the dress on.”

  “Do you have anything less…fancy?”

  Nessa tilted her head, studying her.

  “Dry off and change while I finish making dinner. When you join me in the dining room, you’ll be wearing this dress.”

  Marie had to admit, glancing at herself in the mirror and turning to the side, the dress looked all right on her. Damp but moderately dignified, she poked her head out into the hall.

  “Nessa?”

  “Up the hall,” Nessa called out. “Archway on your right.”

  Marie followed her voice, stepping into the dining room. Silver candelabras glowed on the long glass table, casting shifting shadows across the hardwood floor. The high-backed chairs, normally posed at opposite ends, had been shuffled closer together on the table’s left-hand side. Nessa positioned napkins and silverware, arranging everything just right, eyeing the layout like an artist. She glanced up and let out a nervous chuckle.

  “I hope the candles aren’t too much,” she said. “I never really get to cook for anyone, or set table arrangements myself. I wanted it to be nice. And…oh, look at you. Perfect. That’s my favorite color, you know. Well, besides black.”