The Rake

by William F. Buckley

  “Yes indeed. But the senator’s attachment to his home state is pretty well recognized. After all, he was, for four years, North Dakota’s sole representative in the House.”

  Reuben spoke up. “Hal, enough. I will announce from Washington.”

  “I was thinking you’d make that decision. Now, on when to do it. Let’s go for next month, October. That puts us three months ahead of the Iowa caucuses. And it’s a good time of year to pick up money. I’ve got that campaign planned. We’ll want to shoot for $35 million to go through New Hampshire. If we win there, we’ll go for the heavy stuff, and we’ll get it. Susan, what’ve you got in the senator’s schedule that we care about for October?”

  “There’s a trip to Israel, third week.”

  “Don’t mess with that.”

  “And a few speeches. Miami, Notre Dame, Seattle. How about October 15?” She ticked the date and handed the calendar over to Reuben for approval. He stretched out his legs, leaned back on the sofa, and scrutinized the book.

  “Sounds okay. I hope between now and then Saddam Hussein doesn’t retire to a monastery, and the stock market doesn’t go haywire-up.”

  “All right,” Kaltenbach said, “October 15. Next item I’ve got to raise is Priscilla. I saw some complaints last winter about her…behavior…in Tallahassee.”

  Reuben froze. Then broke into a smile. “Oh, that’s right—she talked about entering the contest for the Orange Bowl.”

  “The what?”

  “The Orange Bowl.”

  Harold Kaltenbach was formal about all matters that touched on football. “Are you saying she thought the Orange Bowl was a beauty contest?”

  “I think she gave a couple of people that impression.”

  Susan said nothing. She too was inclined to smile. But this would not be right, not with Harold Kaltenbach, All-American 1950. They had touched now the only other subject he took as seriously as presidential politics.

  “The thing is,” Kaltenbach said, looking Reuben straight in the eye, “we can’t run the risk that she becomes a comic figure. She’ll have to be front and center on October 15. But she’ll obviously be okay at eleven A.M.—”

  “Maybe we should announce at ten A.M.?”

  Harold Kaltenbach frowned. He thought it right to remove jollity from this discussion. His voice was now even. Deadly even. Susan’s amusement, set down in her special shorthand, was entirely private.

  “We’ll be setting up critical dates in New Hampshire and Iowa. Some will be breakfast meetings. She can go to those.”

  Reuben wondered whether he should tell Harold that Priscilla hadn’t gotten up for breakfast in ten years. He decided against it. He’d just…put that problem off. Along with other problems.

  CHAPTER 41

  Winnipeg, Manitoba, September 1991

  Henry Griswold knocked on the door of the hotel suite. He was bearded and imposing, gray-haired, formal in deportment.

  Reuben quickly got down to business. It helped that the room was fusty Victorian. The curtains were full and ancient, the table was massive, and the sunlight was dimmed by the thick glass. Reuben cleared his throat. “Mr. Griswold, I wish that the business between us should remain entirely confidential. As you know, I am in politics, and have attained some prominence. For reasons I do not have to expand upon, what I am here to discuss with you is personal and is to remain personal. Is there any problem with that?”

  “None whatever, Senator.” Griswold’s voice had just enough animation to denote to Reuben that he was not speaking to a stuffed dummy. Griswold bent his head just a degree or two. Middle-class Canadian deference—it crossed Reuben’s mind—to a live United States senator.

  “On the matter of fees, in this envelope you will find $5,000. That is a deposit on your consultancy. I will get to you anything in excess of that which I eventually owe you.”

  “How am I to be in touch with you?” In Griswold’s hand a leather pad materialized, a gold pencil attached.

  “You have my private telephone number. If you wish to send a letter by post, here is how to do it.” He gave Jim Stannard’s address. “Just put ‘For Reuben’ on the envelope.”

  Griswold nodded and pocketed the envelope Reuben handed him. “How shall I make out a receipt?”

  “Don’t bother. I don’t feel I need to protect myself. At that level.”

  “So, what can I do for you, Senator?”

  “Here is a summary of the relevant events. I was a student at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks. In October 1969, I learned that my girlfriend was pregnant. We discussed various options but did not come to a conclusion. Then in November she asked me to drive with her to her hometown, which is the village of Letellier, south from here about—”

  “I know the town. As a child my wife attended the convent school there.”

  That news was not happily greeted. Reuben was not in search of orthodoxy from his lawyer.

  “It turned out that her destination was the rectory of the Catholic church there. She introduced me to the priest who had baptized her twenty-one years before.”

  “This priest, is he alive?”

  “I don’t know. He was already elderly in 1969. Anyway, after reminiscing with him for a few minutes, my lady—she is called, was called, Henrietta Leborcier”—he waited while Griswold wrote on his notepad—“told the priest that she wished him to proceed to marry us. I remember protesting, in some way or other, but she was very determined and most anxious that her child—”

  “Your child?”

  “Yes, our child—should at birth have both a mother and a father.” He paused.

  Griswold sat in his armchair, motionless.

  “I simply have no memory of other details—I was pretty much overwhelmed by the whole thing. I do remember that we knelt for the priest’s blessing after exchanging vows, and then there was the church ledger, which she signed, and I signed—I think. I must have.”

  “On your return to your university, did you discuss your marriage?”

  “No. We agreed that we would not speak of it to anybody. My closest friend knew about the pregnancy, but not—or so at least I believe—about the marriage, or pseudo-marriage.

  “Anyway, Henrietta and I agreed that she would, at the end of the term, leave for Paris, where her father was a university professor. I would proceed to graduation at Grand Forks.”

  “And then?”

  “I came to my senses in the spring, and got word to her that I did not wish to continue our liaison.”

  “And the child?”

  “I was penniless, Mr. Griswold. Her father had a university position and, I thought, savings.”

  “Did you ever hear from her again?”

  “No. Not from that day to this.”

  “You proceeded with your life and your career?”

  “Yes. I went to Vietnam as a soldier. I was discharged in 1972 and went to law school at the University of Illinois. I did not finish. I had come to the attention of the North Dakota Democratic Party, and I was quickly drawn into politics.”

  “You married?”

  “Yes. In 1975. I was by then actively involved in politics, and the next year I was elected to Congress, as the sole member from North Dakota in the House of Representatives. North Dakota, like Wyoming and Montana and a couple of other states, gets two senators but only a single congressman.

  “When I married, our wedding was amply noticed in the press, in part because I was already being spoken of as a congressional candidate, in part because my wife had been Miss America two years earlier.”

  “Who else knew of your liaison with Ms. Leborcier?”

  “There were several classmates who knew us to be together a great deal at college. One of them, as I say, was an especially intimate friend. He and I are estranged, because he took offense at my breaking it off with…Henrietta. He is now a successful attorney in Grand Forks.”

  “Name?”

  “Eric Monsanto.”

  “I know the name.”


  “But even he—on this I am not absolutely certain. We had been in the habit of sharing our secrets but I didn’t want to tell even him of the marriage—alleged marriage.”

  “But he knew of the pregnancy?”

  “Yes. It happened, so to speak, under his auspices. He and his girlfriend, and Henrietta and I, spent the night at his father’s duck blind on Devil’s Lake. And it was Monsanto who passed on the news to Henrietta that I had decided to end the…courtship. I have no reason to believe that she ever told him that—in her opinion—we had actually been married.”

  “You wish to know how that…marriage, or whatever one calls it, appears in Manitoba records?”

  “Yes. Here is what, using my own resources, I have established. The church registry at Saint Anne’s in Letellier records that on November 18 Henrietta and I were ‘married.’”

  Griswold made another note.

  Reuben went on. “One point occurs to me, having to do with the civil authorities. I remember when I was really married, to Priscilla. We needed to apply for a marriage license a few days ahead of time. I certainly didn’t do that with Henrietta. Surely any marriage performed by a priest without a valid marriage license from the Province of Manitoba would have been illegal, and therefore null?”

  Griswold made a note: “So the first thing to find out is whether, at the Vital Statistics Agency in Winnipeg, there is any record of a marriage license having been issued, in November 1969, to…Leborcier and Castle.”

  “Yes.”

  Griswold looked up from his notepad. “If it does…if such a document exists…other than to advise you that it exists, what more would you seek, Senator?”

  “Its destruction, Mr. Griswold.”

  Reuben had thought this out. Perhaps Griswold would simply leave the room.

  But he didn’t.

  Bill Rode had done good work.

  CHAPTER 42

  Boulder, September 1991

  The postcard from Justin had brought on dismemberment in her emotional life, Henrietta acknowledged late at night, after trying for hours to fall asleep. That postcard had collapsed her self-hypnosis. Her son now knew who his father was, his very public father. On divulging it all to Amy, Henrietta had finally acquired at least a counselor. She thought, self-reproachfully, of all those years devoted to keeping her father and her aunt—and her growing boy—ignorant of the true story. Her father had died never knowing that he had a son-in-law who was not dead in Vietnam, but very much alive in Washington.

  Having turned now to Amy—motherly friend, professional superior, and warm companion—she felt all the more keenly the need for her company. Amy and Henri crossed paths many times a day in the great Chinook Library, where they both worked, but if Henri wanted uninterrupted time with Amy she needed to make special arrangements. Amy was always obliging. “We can have lunch, Henri, how’s that?…You’d rather not? After work then? Maybe at your place—John won’t be home till dinnertime…. So that’s simple: we’ll meet at your place. Is five-fifteen okay?”

  Henri brought Amy a cup of the strong Colombian coffee she liked, and then gave her the letter from Jean-Paul to read.

  In that letter Gallic indirectness was gone. Henri observed Amy struggling with the French and finally retrieved the letter from her. “Oh, Amy, let me translate. That first passage—Never mind. It just says how much he…loves me, and how…determined he is to ‘open the door to our happiness.’ He has been delayed returning from Paris, and he wants to stop off in Washington on his way here.”

  She leaned back in her chair and put the letter on her lap. Before she started reading, she said: “Amy, I don’t know how much of this you already know, since you were friends with both JP and Stephanie. Anyway, JP is a close friend of a…apparently a very tenacious lawyer called—let me get it right”—she turned her eyes down to the letter—“Harrison Ledyard. Their wives were first cousins. JP and his wife—I never knew Stephanie, but I know you did—JP and Stephanie had the Ledyard daughter living with them in Paris for an entire year. It’s that kind of family closeness.”

  Henri turned back to the letter and read slowly, giving it idiomatic translation: “I wish you to authorize me to retain the Ledyard…the firm of Ledyard…to pursue the matter of your marriage. ‘La question de ton mariage.’…Any investigation will require your authorization. When dear Stephanie died, I inherited some money and can easily pay whatever costs pile up, which will not be large because Harrison is like my brother. Dear dear Henri, I wish you to send a telegram to Harrison Ledyard, saying—it must be in English of course—saying: ‘This telegram authorizes the firm of Covington & Burling to represent me in matters which will be divulged to Harrison Ledyard by Professor Jean-Paul Lafayette.’ The telegram must be there when I arrive in Washington on September 20.” Henrietta put the letter to one side.

  “Amy, I need advice. Legal, yes. But also moral. I need to know whether I am free to remarry. After twenty-one years’ desertion. When I gave the impression that my husband was dead in Vietnam, obviously others thought I was free to remarry. Only I—no one else—knew that the man I married was alive. I hid it from Justin, but now, in just a few days, he has come to know it all.”

  “Henri, have you—”

  “And now I must decide—”

  “Henri! Stop talking for a minute! Now. Answer my questions.”

  Henri bent her head, a lock of hair falling over her cheek. She left it there.

  “My first question: have you heard anything from Justin about what he intends to do? He has some pretty hot information, at a time when Senator Castle is in the papers practically every day.”

  “No. I tried to phone him right after I got his card. He wasn’t in, but I left a message asking him please to say nothing until we met and discussed the matter.”

  “Did he reply?”

  “Yes. By postcard.” She reached to her desk, a tense smile on her face.

  She handed the postcard to Amy, who had no problem with the French on this one. It consisted of two words: “Maman, d’accord.” But then pasted on one half of the card was a news photo of Senator Reuben Castle. Printed below it was the legend: “President, Bigamists for Castle.”

  Henri sniffled. But she finally capitulated, and smiled along with Amy.

  And then she said, drying her tears with a tissue, “Before I met Jean-Paul, I never thought seriously about the question of annulment. I had always assumed that it was not possible. Obviously the marriage had been consummated. But now I’ve done some looking around in the library. The Vatican texts I found all agree that if one of the parties harbors an intention not to commit to a lifetime together, then the marriage never took place as a Christian union. It is therefore annullable. And Reuben couldn’t have intended a lifetime together, given what he did just a few months later.

  “On the legal question, I can’t deny Jean-Paul permission to conduct an investigation. Of course, I know enough to ease the work of his friend Harrison Ledyard. What do you think of this text? I drafted it before I telephoned you.” She passed the sheet of paper over.

  TO HARRISON LEDYARD. THIS AUTHORIZES YOU TO PURSUE SUCH INQUIRIES AS WILL BE OUTLINED TO YOU BY JEAN-PAUL LAFAYETTE ON THE UNDERSTANDING THAT NO REVELATIONS WILL BE MADE ABOUT MY PERSONAL LIFE WITHOUT MY EXPRESS PERMISSION.

  “I signed it, ‘Henriette Leborcier Durban.’ That, after all, is the name on my passport.”

  “You will telephone JP?”

  “Yes. When he reaches Washington. That will be next Friday. I will tell him everything I know.”

  “Have you decided how to proceed?”

  “Yes. I want very much to marry Jean-Paul.”

  “Well. If your fancy lawyer in Washington can’t arrange for that, you’ll just have to—”

  “Get a fancier lawyer!”

  They clasped each other’s hands.

  “Thanks, Amy. Thanks.”

  CHAPTER 43

  Washington/Manhattan, September 1991

  On Thursday,
early in the afternoon, Susan rang Reuben on the intercom. “It’s Jim Stannard. I know you want him put through when he calls.”

  “Yep.” He pressed the lighted button.

  “Reub, the guy you told me about in Canada has sent a special-delivery letter for you.”

  “You haven’t opened it, Jim?”

  “Of course not. But on the outside of the sealed envelope is a note. I’ll read it to you: ‘Sir: I think you will want to telephone me provided you receive this before two P.M. on September 26.’ September 26 is today. The note goes on, ‘In the envelope is material you will want on file. Yours, H. Griswold.’”

  “Shoot me the telephone number.”

  “204-349-9221.”

  “Thanks. I’ll send Susan for the envelope. Or maybe I’ll pick it up myself. I’ve got a joint committee meeting at four.”

  “Okay. If I wake up and read you own the Brooklyn Bridge, I want in on it.”

  Reuben dialed the number, and Henry Griswold was on the line. “I have important information, Senator. But the reason I had you telephone is that I am going to be in New York on business tonight and all day tomorrow, Friday. You could meet me in New York tomorrow, or, on Saturday, I could travel down to Washington and meet with you there.”

  Reuben opened his appointment book. “Does New York, six P.M. tomorrow, sound okay?”

  After a pause, “Yes. I expect to be back from the courthouse well before then.”

  “Where do we meet?”

  “I suggest the offices of Taggart Brothers—156 West 56th Street. That’s near Seventh Avenue.”

  “Ask for you by name?”

  “No. Get off at the twenty-third floor, turn right, go into the Taggart offices. I’ll be in room 2337.”

  He told Priscilla the next morning that he’d be away in New York on business later in the day, but might be back before bedtime.