by Allen Drury
“That’s all right,” he said. “I like work. I do thank you for calling, Chief. It was very gracious of you.”
“Not at all,” Duncan Elphinstone said. “Just between you and me, the White House doesn’t always send us such good material, although of course each of us in his own time thinks it does. It’s my pleasure to say a private but warm hello.”
“I do appreciate it,” Tay said. “You know I do.”
And that, he reflected as the Chief went off the line, was how a civilized human being treated another on the day of his personal triumph. He had received many calls during the afternoon—some twenty-five were waiting when Cathy Corning concluded her interview and left—and with the single exception of his wife, everyone had been genuinely happy for him. Her discontent weighed down the day, weighed down the evening, weighed down the house.
They were eating at home tonight. It would have been a silent meal except for Jane and Sarah Pomeroy, who dashed in just in time, flung hats and coats on a hall chair, took their places, flushed and laughing—perhaps a little too much so, he thought for a moment, but dismissed it. These two had known each other as long as they could remember, become best friends when both had been sent to Madeira School, now were inseparable and always in and out of each other’s house. He had hoped this might bring Mary more closely into his friendship for Sarah’s parents, but she had remained withdrawn and grudging. She and Sue-Ann “do not get along very well,” as she put it with no particular reason given; and she had made it clear years ago when she first met Moss that his irreverent banter and easygoing approach to life did not accord with what she considered a dignity “befitting his position.”
“Hell, Mary,” Moss had objected when she once said as much, “that’s an awfully old-fashioned way of looking at things.” He grinned with innocent and unconscious egotism. “I don’t have to worry about my ‘position.’ Pomeroys and Mossiters never have had to. We’ve always just been there, that’s all. As Grandfather Mossiter used to say, ‘As long as I don’t ride a horse up the state capitol steps with a naked prostitute across the saddle, I’ll get along all right.’ I believe one of our Revolutionary ancestors did that once. Must have been quite a sensation, but everybody’s been very well behaved since. So don’t worry about me. I’m doing fine.”
To this day, Tay thought, Mary always seemed to have that horse and naked prostitute on her mind when she looked at Moss: or perhaps it was just that he had—or certainly used to have when they first met—a direct and challenging sexuality that made her uncomfortable. He no longer had it now, or if he did, kept it under very good control: Sue-Ann, Tay suspected, saw to that with a firm and unwavering hand. Moss now was quite the dignified Justice, even though the irreverent humor constantly popped out. That wouldn’t change, and thank God for it. He suspected it would be fun working with him on the Court: he seemed to be an unquenchable spirit. His call earlier today had been the first Tay had received after talking to his parents.
“You see?” Moss had said cheerfully and without preliminary. “I told you. It was inevitable. The President decided there ought to be at least one Justice worthy of the Court, and here you are.”
“I hope I’m worthy of the Court,” he replied soberly.
Moss snorted.
“If you have any doubts about that—”
“You’re a high-powered group.”
“Yes, but human—human. We don’t like the country to suspect it, which is one reason we refrain from interviews and remain generally anonymous. But we have our quirks, as you’ll find out. I warn you, though—I may try to convert you to the conservative side. Too many damned liberals around this place.”
“That may take a little doing,” Tay said. “You haven’t succeeded in all these years. If it hasn’t happened by now, it isn’t going to.”
“Oh, you never know,” Moss said airily. “Circumstances alter cases, as they say. How’s Mary taking it?”
“I haven’t been able to reach her. I’ve put in a call, but she’s out at the moment. I imagine she won’t be too happy.”
“I swear,” Moss said with the candor of a very old friend. “She’s the only lawyer’s wife I know who probably won’t be happy when her husband goes on the Supreme Court. I’ll never understand your wife, Taylor. Never.”
“That makes two of us,” he said with a rueful humor. “How’s yours?”
“More understandable,” Moss said in a lighter tone. “Doing just fine, thanks. And Janie?”
“Oh, she’s fine,” Tay said, voice instantly warmer and less troubled. “She and Sarah seem to be running Madeira School together, as near as I can ascertain.”
“Yes,” Moss said, his tone also filling with affection for his daughter. “They’re quite a pair. I understand Sarah’s spending the night with you tonight.”
“Yes,” he said, sounding troubled again. “Over Mary’s objection, but Janie and I overruled her.”
“Now why,” Moss demanded with annoyance, “would she object? It seems perfectly all right to me.”
“I don’t know,” he confessed. “I really don’t. It ‘upsets the household,’ she said.”
“I think she’d be very happy if she never saw the Pomeroys again,” Moss said, “and all we’ve ever tried to do is just be friends. Very puzzling. Well, anyway: delighted to have you with us on the Court, old buddy. Whoever would have thought, back at Harvard Law—?”
“Is that a serious question?” Tay inquired, amused. “We thought, didn’t we?”
“Hoped,” Moss conceded.
“Thought. Nothing modest about us in those days. Or have you forgotten?”
“I guess that’s right,” Moss agreed with a chuckle. “We thought then. We’ve hoped since. And now it’s all come true.”
“Yes,” Tay agreed, voice shaded with many things. “It’s all come true.”
“Well.” Moss broke the mood briskly. “One thing I did want to do, while I have you, was to see if you and Mary would like to come down to South Carolina with us next Friday and help me dedicate the Pomeroy Station atomic energy plant. The rest of the Court won’t go, because they agree with the Chief that it might look like endorsing a controversial subject that keeps coming before us, but I thought maybe since you’re just coming on, and will just barely have been confirmed by then, you might feel free. Just for old friendship and old time’s sake. I’d be very happy to have you, if you’d like.”
“Well—” he said, and hesitated, “I’d love to—nothing personal, you understand—but I think maybe—for the same reason—”
“Okay,” Moss said, sounding resigned but then brightening. “I understand. I just wanted company, that’s all. So Sue-Ann and I will go alone. Mary probably wouldn’t want to go anyway.”
“No,” Tay admitted, “probably not. However, just a thought: is Sarah going?”
“She wants to.”
“Fine. Take Janie. She’d get a thrill out of it.”
“Good idea. I’ll tell Sarah to ask her.”
“Perfect. Look, I have another call coming in, but I’ll see you soon, hear?”
“In chambers,” Moss said. “Hot damn! We’re going to have fun on the Court, old pal, even if you are a damned liberal!”
“And you a damned conservative,” Tay had said, hanging up with the warm feeling a visit with Moss always gave him.
“Daddy,” Janie inquired as she and Sarah settled down from the flurry of their entry, “will you have to wear your Supreme Court robes around the house?”
“That’s a ridiculous question,” Mary observed, ringing for Julia, their maid of ten years. “He will only wear them on the bench.”
“Well, I didn’t know,” Janie said. “I just wanted to be sure.”
“No doubt,” her mother said. “You girls are late for dinner.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Barbour,” Sarah said with her quick pretty smile. “It was my fault. I wanted to stop at one of the stores over on Wisconsin Avenue on the way home, so we had them drop us
off there.”
“And then walked?” Mary demanded. “You girls should never walk in Georgetown. You should never walk anywhere in this city. You’re old enough to know that.”
“It’s only four blocks,” Jane said defensively. “It’s still light enough.”
“Whether it’s light or not,” Mary said flatly, “I don’t want you doing it. It isn’t safe, no matter what time of day it is or where you are. Is that why you girls don’t really seem quite as confident as you’d apparently like us to believe? Did anything happen on the way home?”
They exchanged a swift glance but not swift enough to escape Mary.
“Well?” she demanded, voice suddenly harsh with concern. “Tell me this instant!”
“Well—” Janie began carefully.
“Yes?”
“There was this man,” Sarah admitted. “Behind a bush.”
“And?” Mary pursued, face white, as Tay too leaned forward, pulse accelerating.
“He didn’t do anything,” Janie protested.
“That’s right, Mrs. Barbour,” Sarah said. “He just looked!’
“How did he look?”
“He just looked,” Janie insisted; but Sarah added more candidly, “He didn’t look very nice.”
“In what way?” Tay asked, trying to keep his voice calm.
“Oh,” Sarah said, blushing. “You know.”
“So then you ran,” Mary said, “and that’s why you were so out of breath when you came in. Right?”
“Well—” Janie began.
“Isn’t that right?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Sarah said in a subdued voice. “We didn’t say anything because we didn’t want you to get upset.”
“Upset?” Mary demanded with a scornful shaky laugh. “Upset? Now, why would any sensible parent get upset about an innocent little thing like that? Upset?” Her voice became cold and emphatic. “I don’t want you girls to walk in this city ever again, anywhere, do you understand me? I don’t care whether it’s six a.m., six p.m., or high noon, you are not to do it. Is that clear?” She swung suddenly to Tay with a harsh sarcasm. “Surely your father will support me in that?”
“Yes I will,” he replied emphatically: on this, at least, there was no disagreement. “You just must not do it, baby. It isn’t safe. I’m sure your father and mother have told you that too, Sarah.”
“Well!” Sarah said, recovering with a little flounce. “It’s safe enough in South Carolina.”
“I don’t believe you,” Mary said flatly. “Anyway, you are not to do it here, understand? If you do it again, you won’t be permitted to come over and play.”
“Oh, Mother,” Janie said. “We’re fifteen.”
“Not quite,” Mary said.
“Well, three months.”
“Yes, and you act like five instead of fifteen,” her mother said. Her voice rose decisively, her lips got their tight line. “We are not discussing it further. Those are the terms. Abide by them or forget it.”
Janie looked at Sarah and shrugged.
“We can stay at your house after this.”
“Janie!” Tay said. “Stop this right now. Your mother and I are agreed—”
“For once,” Janie said, looking stubbornly down at her plate.
There was silence for a moment, after which Sarah began to giggle, starting from sheer nervousness and swiftly going out of control. This made Janie giggle too, and in a moment they were laughing hysterically. He came very close to joining them but he could see that Mary was actually white and trembling with anger.
“Janie,” he said, forcing his voice to remain grave and steady, “one more crack from you about anything and you’re going straight to bed without your supper, fifteen or no fifteen, and I’m driving Sarah home. Now, you just decide, young lady. We’ll wait for you.”
And putting down his knife and fork, he did so while Mary, looking a little mollified, followed suit. The giggles subsided at once, to be succeeded by a heavy silence during which Julia, taking in the situation with the practiced glance of a mother of four, served dinner with briskness and dispatch and retired rapidly to the kitchen.
“I’m sorry,” Janie murmured finally. “I apologize, Mother.”
“I apologize, too, Mrs. Barbour,” Sarah echoed sweetly. “It was my fault, just like I said. We won’t do it again.”
“Very well,” Mary said. “I sincerely hope not. The world is bad, out there.” She shivered suddenly and stabbed at her food. Her husband quietly resumed eating and presently the girls, after giving one another a furtive sidelong glance, did the same. Silence ensued until Sarah gave a little sigh of repletion and looked up happily at Julia when she brought in dessert in response to Mary’s bell.
“Julia, you old lamb!” Sarah exclaimed. “You’re just the best cook. We don’t have any better down in South Carolina!”
Julia, who had planned to be stern because she too considered Sarah a rather flighty little thing, a bit mite big for her britches because of being a Pomeroy and a Mossiter and a Lacey all rolled into one, found herself dissolving into a pleased smile in spite of herself.
“Thank you, Miss Sarah,” she said. “It’s always a pleasure for me to cook for you. Even if”—she couldn’t resist with a glance at Mary that she knew would do her no harm—“we all were beginning to wonder where you were.”
“Now, Julia,” Sarah said, tone changing instantly. “Don’t you go getting sassy, now. We’ve been all over that and have moved on to other things. You behave yourself, now, you old scamp.”
“Miss Sarah,” Julia said, drawing herself up, voice trembling a little but holding her own. “I am not an old scamp, but I surely think you’re a young one. You can’t talk to me like that, miss. I’m not a slave of the Pomeroys! Or the Mossiters! Or the Laceys! Those days are gone forever!”
“That’s all right, Julia,” Tay said soothingly, thinking: my God, the Supreme Court will be a vacation after this. “Sarah didn’t mean it the way it sounded.”
“No, I didn’t, Julia,” Sarah said with a sudden change of mood and her sweetest smile. “You are an old lamb, and I do apologize if I sounded uppity. Nobody cooks better than you. Nobody! I do apologize.”
“It seems to me as though everybody is apologizing to everybody these days,” Janie said in a clear, detached voice; but before one parent or the other could respond, Julia fortunately decided to let it drop.
“Why, I do thank you again, Miss Sarah,” she said grandly. “Anytime!” And sailed out with her armload of dishes.
Both girls broke promptly into giggles again, and Tay could not suppress a glint of amusement they both saw and took encouragement from. Not Mary: she was definitely not amused.
“Girls,” she said sharply, “stop this time-wasting and finish your meal. I’m sure your father has a lot to do to get ready for the Court, Janie. And I’m sure you both have plenty of studying to do. So hurry it up.”
“Actually, Mrs. Barbour,” Sarah said, “we do have a lot to do and we are certainly going to do it. We have to get ahead in our work so that we can go on that trip.”
“Oh?” Mary said, and Tay could see her instinctively digging in her heels, which of course tightened him up also. They were apparently about to do battle over the girls, even though Mary did not for the moment know why. Evidently Sarah had conveyed the invitation. “What trip is that?”
“I have been invited,” Jane announced with some grandeur, “to attend a dedication.”
“Of what?” her mother demanded.
“Our atomic energy plant,” Sarah replied. “Well, not exactly ours, but it’s on land we used to own, I think. A long time ago. like before the Revolution, maybe.”
“And when will this ceremony be held?” Mary inquired, her tone producing the start of dismay on Janie’s face.
“Next Friday,” Sarah said cheerfully, unaware of storm signals. “It’s going to be at a place called Pomeroy Station, down home in South Carolina. My daddy’s going to give the dedication
speech, I guess. Or one of them. He was governor when they began it, and it’s named after us, so he’s got to be there. He said I could go, and I invited Janie.” She turned a comfortable smile upon Mary. “We’ll miss two days of school, so that’s why we have to study extra hard these next few days.”
“Jane,” her mother said coldly, “is not going to miss two days of school.”
“Oh, Mother!” Jane wailed, and Sarah echoed, “Oh, Mrs. Barbour!”
“Now, Mary,” he said in a tone he tried to keep reasonable. “I’m sure if the girls get ahead in their work—”
“Jane is not ahead in her work.”
“Three straight A’s and two B’s last time,” Janie said bitterly. “That’s all!”
“Nonetheless, young lady, you’ve been slipping a bit in the last few weeks. They tell me things at the school. I keep track.”
“Yes,” Janie said. “I’ll bet you do.”
“Indeed I do,” Mary said, unmoved. “You are my daughter, my only child, and I have a right to inquire how you are getting along. Too many extracurricular activities for you, young lady. You can’t afford any time off.”
“I can’t help it if I’m popular!” Janie said and Sarah said earnestly,
“She really is very popular, Mrs. Barbour. I sometimes think that old school would just collapse without Janie.”
“I doubt it,” her mother said dryly. “If you’re going to be so popular, young lady, you have got to keep up your grades along with it. This is no time to go skipping off to South Carolina. What your parents permit you to do, Sarah, is their affair. It was nice of you to try to include Janie, but I’m afraid she simply won’t have the time to go.”
“But I’m studying ahead,” Janie protested, on the verge of tears.
“Mary,” he said, as Julia popped in the door and hastily popped back out again, “be reasonable about this. If the girls get their work done ahead, I really don’t see any reason why—”
“We are spending a lot of money to send her to that school. Two of the things it is supposed to teach are character and discipline. If one keeps up one’s grades, that is one thing. If one begins to slip, that is another. Some people may permit their children to get by with sloppy work. I will not.”