Murder on Capitol Hill

by Margaret Truman

  “Hello, Jason,” she now said. “You look… well.”

  Eyebrows arched. “Actually I haven’t been feeling all that well, Lydia. I suspect I’m terminal.”

  “I’m very sorry to hear that,” she said with a straight face. Jason extended his hand to Foster-Sims, who seemed to examine it before shaking. “Let’s go,” he said to Lydia.

  She nodded. “Well, see you soon, Veronica, and my best to Cale.”

  “I’ll tell him if I ever see him. Being married to a United States senator is no bed of roses, or petunias for that matter… By the way, Lydia, you will be at Cale’s testimonial, won’t you?”

  “Of course.”

  “You, too, Clarence?”

  “I wouldn’t miss it.” Unless he could figure out an excuse, which he doubted.

  Lydia and Clarence went to a bar in the Hotel Madison where they ordered brandy—Hennessy for him, Rémy Martin for her. The bar was virtually empty as they settled into a corner booth, sipped from their snifters.

  Lydia broke the brief silence. “I felt sorry for Veronica tonight, Clarence.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I like her very much, always have. She’s been through so much, in spite of her money and marriage and success. I always sense a kind of sadness in her.”

  “I guess… but I find it hard to get too worked up about it.”

  She forgave him that. Beneath his gruff cynical hide was a warm, caring man with a will of iron, but a limited tolerance for fools and pompous asses, of which Washington had more than its share. He was also frighteningly no-nonsense about himself.

  Four years earlier he had decided that he’d wasted his life since the age of four playing the piano. He made up his mind never again to lift the lid of his Steinway, and had obviously stuck to it, no matter how drunk he might have been when making the pledge. But he’d been an inspired teacher, and many of his pupils had gone on to impressive careers. He’d simply decided that he didn’t have concert talent, and teaching others who had it was the best he could do. She respected, admired him, and maybe was a little in love with him. She wasn’t sure…

  A man at the bar openly admired her, which she told herself was standard operating procedure for most men at bars, especially after too many drinks. Still, she didn’t dismiss it. Lydia had just turned forty. She’d been married once, but that was when she was twenty-one. It had lasted two years. She’d met her husband in music school, where he was a promising string player.

  Actually, she rather liked the way she looked, realizing that she’d been blessed with good genes that provided a tall, supple, full female body that she kept in condition through a regular exercise regime—nothing fanatical, just consistent.

  Lydia and Clarence shared a Scottish heritage. Her bloodline went back to Inverness, his to the more southerly Edinburgh. No one ever doubted that he was a Scot, with his fair skin. She, on the other hand, was surprisingly dark, and was taken for Jewish or Italian at times. Her hair was a thick, black mane, and there was a duskiness to her complexion that came from the French ancestry in her family.

  She took another sip of her brandy. “Know what I’d like to do, Clarence? Hear some jazz.” She’d developed an interest in jazz years ago and had become an avid record collector. She’d tried to convince Veronica Caldwell that jazz was America’s only true art form and that it deserved time in the art center’s performing schedule, but Veronica was a slow convert. “Come on, Monty Alexander is playing at Blues Alley.”

  And so they went to the jazz club in Georgetown and took in a full set before he delivered her to the nearby brownstone she’d purchased four years earlier.

  “Coming in?” she asked.

  “Well, my back is acting up and—”

  “Oh shut up and get in here.”

  “Ah, modern woman.” And taking her in his arms, he added to himself, God bless ’em…

  Early the next morning, just before she showed him out, she extracted his promise to take her to Senator Caldwell’s testimonial party.

  Nodding unhappily, he kissed her, and said, “Well, they always told me everything has its price,” then escaped before she could beat him about the head and ears.

  Leaning against the closed door, she had to smile. It had been a very good night. With a good man. Life could be worse…

  ***

  The day of the big party proved out the truth of Lydia’s thought. It had been a long frustrating day at the office with a client who she almost felt like prosecuting instead of defending. A real hardhead who seemed determined to defeat himself… As she drove home she realized she’d barely have time to get ready before Clarence picked her up for the Caldwell party.

  She raced into the house, tossed off her clothes, showered, dried herself and went to one of two closets where she chose a sleek, butterscotch evening dress that dipped at the bosom and was lower in the back. She applied lipstick only, pulled her hair back into a chignon and attached a single gold strand around her neck. The clock at her bedside said 6:15. Fifteen minutes. Good Housekeeping, Esquire and Newsweek had arrived in the mail and she scanned their covers. One of the blurbs on Good Housekeeping’s cover told readers that inside they could read an interview with “Washington’s First Lady of the Arts, Veronica Caldwell.”

  She was turning to the first page of the Caldwell interview as her door chimes sounded and she went to the door.

  “Hi, I was just about to read an interview with Veronica.”

  “Bring it with you,” he said. “Read it in the car. Then you’ll be loaded for knowledgeable chitchat.”

  “Oh, shut up,” she said, and smiled. But she did as he suggested and read the interview as Clarence drove them to the party.

  He found a parking space after circling the block twice, came around and opened the door for her.

  “By the way, you look lovely,” he said as they crossed the street and headed for the Senate Building.

  “Thank you, sir,” and she meant it. Loved it.

  “So what did the article have to say about Veronica?”

  “It talked about the center, her role as a senator’s wife and as a mother, her hopes for the future of the arts in America, you know, that sort of thing. The photographs are terrific.”

  “Terrific… Well, I hope we have better luck than the last time I went to a reception here… the host was drying out and a godawful nonalcoholic punch was served. I think it was a Kool-Aid base.”

  “I bet it was a short reception.”

  “Very short.”

  He stopped halfway up the steps, looked at her and repeated how well she looked. But in his head was the dream he’d had the previous night. Of course it was only a dream, but in it she’d died… They were at a party and all of a sudden it was a wake. He’d walked up to the coffin and there she was in a dress sort of like the one she was wearing now, a rose in her hands and a horribly tranquil expression on her face.

  He took her arm firmly and led her up the steps. What the hell, a bad dream was a bad dream… don’t impose it on Lydia, or take it seriously. He’d better stop snacking before bedtime…

  Lydia looked at him. “Is anything wrong, you look sort of strange.” She seemed to shiver beneath the white woolen shawl she wore over her shoulders, and Clarence felt it. Or was he the one?

  “No, don’t be silly, everything’s fine,” he said, “except it’s getting chilly.” He put his arm around her. “It’s the wind. We’ll be inside in a moment.”

  4

  Charles was putting his final touches on preparations for the Caldwell reception, working closely with Veronica Caldwell through her representative Jason DeFlaunce. Under ordinary circumstances, Charles disliked dealing with Senate wives; they were too quick to invoke proxy power of their husbands. In the case of the Caldwell party, though, he wished it had been Mrs. Caldwell rather than DeFlaunce he’d had to deal with. He found DeFlaunce obnoxious. But since the senator’s wife evidently had great faith in the man and had given him carte bla
nche as far as preparations were concerned, Charles had little choice but to grimace and bear it.

  The guest list contained 120 names. The decision was to keep it simple with an abundance of hors d’oeuvres and canapés.

  The center of attraction was a large ice carving in the shape of the senator’s home state of Virginia. Charles had suggested a sports figure, perhaps a football player about to throw a forward pass, but the idea had been vetoed, not surprisingly, by Jason. An ice carver well-known to Washington’s society set had been brought in to accomplish the sculpture and had done a remarkable job: it stood five feet, glistening beneath red and blue pin spots.

  On another table was a tall shrimp tree that Charles had personally built a year ago from a discarded silver service. He’d ordered fifty pounds of jumbo shrimp, ten per guest. Each of the four graduated levels of the tree was edged with shrimp and lemon wedges, and shrimp skewered with frilled toothpicks were heaped on each silver disk. The shrimp had been soaked in an imported beer and a herb-and-spice mixture prior to deveining and shelling, then sprinkled with lemon juice before being placed on the tree. A cocktail sauce was in a silver bowl at the tree’s summit.

  “I love it,” Jason said to Veronica as Charles applied the finishing touches.

  “It’s just magnificent,” she said. “Bravo to you and yours, Charles.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Caldwell. I hope the senator will be pleased.”

  The room had been divided with folding green screens to provide a better flow between beverage and food areas. One of Washington’s top society pianists arrived early and fastidiously wiped down every inch of a grand piano with a soft cloth he’d pulled from a Gucci attaché case in which he carried the sheet music to standard show tunes.

  As the first guests arrived Veronica excused herself from Jason and Charles to greet them. Lydia and Clarence were among the first, and after briefly chatting with their hostess they gravitated toward the nearest bar.

  “Okay, I’m ready to leave,” Clarence said after getting a brandy. It was his standard refrain immediately after arriving at just about any such soiree.

  “Look,” Lydia said, ignoring him and nodding toward the door. “I may be wrong but I think that’s Mark Adam Caldwell.”

  “So?”

  “So, Clarence, if it is, Veronica has pulled off a coup of sorts. Mark Adam is, after all, the wayward son, Peck’s bad boy, the black sheep of the Caldwell clan.”

  Clarence looked at the young man who’d entered the room. His first thoughts were that if he were a Caldwell son he’d been the product of Veronica Caldwell and a stranger, or Cale Caldwell and a stranger. Or… He looked nothing like the others in the family, had none of their unmistakable patrician features. Nor was he as tall as even his mother. He had a bull-like neck that barely provided separation between his head and wide, thick shoulders, the product of years of ritualistic weight lifting. Dark eyes set in small sockets were in constant motion, like tiny ball bearings swiveling about on a broad, fleshy face. His nose could have belonged to a professional prizefighter. His head was clean-shaven, and he wore an ill-fitting tan suit. The collar of his shirt dug into the folds of his neck, and his tie barely reached his distended belly.

  “I knew him,” Lydia said, “before he went off the deep end and joined that weird cult in Virginia.”

  “It was quite an embarrassment to his father, wasn’t it?”

  “It still is. Veronica says Cale’s never forgiven him. I’m amazed he’s here. I thought he’d been disowned.”

  “Maybe the mumbo jumbo has worn off. Prodigal son returns, asks forgiveness of his father. Will he forgive him?”

  Lydia shrugged. “Who knows… Veronica got him here, and I can only assume that Cale will be pleased to see him.”

  They watched Mark Caldwell go to a secluded corner of the room, lean against the wall and watch sourly as his mother greeted her guests.

  “Why don’t you go say something to him?” Clarence suggested. “He looks pretty miserable.”

  She did. “Mark Caldwell?” Lydia said as she approached him, hand out.

  He scrutinized her, she thought, like a cornered animal might a potential enemy.

  “I’m Lydia James. Remember me?”

  He obviously didn’t, but went through the motions of shaking her hand. A long awkward pause. Finally she said, “Quite a night for your father.”

  “I guess so. Excuse me, I want to get something.” He went quickly to one of the bars and ordered a Seven-Up.

  Lydia returned to Clarence. “That was quick,” he said.

  “He never was very talkative. Sort of nice, though. I hope he puts things together and gets out of that awful cult. It’s scary what they can do to a person who’s susceptible to control. You’d think after Jonestown and all the exposés, but they go on. My God, even the daughter of the senator who was killed there went and got herself a guru…”

  More guests arrived, some of whom joined Lydia and Clarence, but Lydia’s attention was focused on Mark Caldwell, who’d gone back to his corner. She felt sorry for him, wanted to break away and try again to put him at ease. She didn’t. Along with her sensitivity to his discomfort was an apprehension about Cale Caldwell’s entrance and his reaction to seeing the son he’d washed his hands of years ago.

  Moments later, the Senate Majority Leader came through the door looking every bit the part of a successful and powerful senator. His face, tanned the year round from a sunlamp in the Senate barbershop, provided a healthy, handsome scrim for a wide, dazzling smile. As usual, he was dressed immaculately in one of a dozen suits he kept in his office to change to for nighttime activities. He kissed his wife, slapped a Senate colleague on the back and waved to well-wishers across the room.

  The pianist immediately launched a medley of “man” songs—“Man of La Mancha,” “The Man I Love,” “My Man”… Guests pushed toward the door to greet the guest of honor. Lydia glanced over to where Mark Adam Caldwell stood, saw that he’d made no move toward the door, that his sullen expression hadn’t changed.

  Senator Caldwell made his way through clusters of people and now came up to Lydia and Clarence. “Hello, Lydia,” he said, kissing her on the cheek. “Mr. Foster-Sims, glad you could come.”

  Someone touched him on the back. He turned, and as he did he spotted his son for the first time. Although Lydia could not see his face because his back was to her, the tightening of his body was evident. His shoulders hunched up, veins at the side of his neck bulged. His wife came up to him with their other son, Cale, Jr., on her arm.

  Charles handed Caldwell a drink.

  “Thank you, Charles,” he said, never taking his eyes off Mark Adam. Veronica looked at Lydia, smiled, then said to her husband, “Well, go on and say hello. He’s here to pay tribute to you too. Please, just go over and shake his hand.”

  “Why is he here—?”

  “I just told you…”

  “I’m not sure I—”

  “Cale, it wasn’t easy for him to do it. Please, don’t drive him away again.”

  Lydia’s gesture was involuntary as she reached out and touched the senator’s arm. When he turned and looked at her, she nodded her head, trying to encourage him to do as Veronica asked.

  He took a deep breath, glanced at those around him, then slowly strode toward where his son stood.

  Few guests were unaware of what was occurring in the corner between father and son. Lydia, Clarence, Veronica and Cale, Jr., said nothing as they watched the hesitancy with which the senator offered his hand to Mark, and the apparently reluctant acceptance of it. The senator seemed to want to move closer, to close the gap between them, but it didn’t happen. They remained a few feet apart, hands clasped, their words inaudible to onlookers.

  The pianist, who’d stopped playing for a few minutes, started again, which prompted an increase in conversation. The air was soon filled with the mosquitolike drone of party badinage.

  “Shrimp?” Clarence asked Lydia.

  She sa
w that a small group gathered around the shrimp tree was systematically stripping it of its shellfish leaves. “We’d better dive in,” he said, “it’s going fast.” She nodded, gave a final look over her shoulder at Cale Caldwell and his son.

  One of those at the shrimp tree was WCAP talk-show host Quentin Hughes, who was known in Washington party circles for his bottomless appetite for freebies. He’d stacked his plate with shrimp, smothered them with cocktail sauce.

  “Hello, Quentin,” Lydia said coolly. She’d known Hughes a number of years, and twice had been a guest on his all-night radio interview and call-in show. She’d never particularly liked him—though she respected his professional talents—but could understand why a good many women did. He was very handsome, tall and erect, with good features and an intensity in his eyes that made people feel when he fixed his attention on them that they were the most important people in his life at that moment. This night he wore a double-breasted blue blazer that was nipped at the waist to show off his trim figure. His gray slacks were creased to a razor’s edge, and a pair of black Gucci loafers had been shined to an appropriately dull sheen. He could, on self-demand, produce charm from every pore, especially when the conquest of a female was in the wind. Women liked men like that, even if they weren’t good for them.

  He smiled at her now. “Oh, Lydia James, girl barrister. How are you?”

  She said just fine and introduced Clarence, who shook Hughes’s hand, and for a moment his smug facade faded. “Are you still on the air, Mr. Hughes?”

  Hughes smiled tightly, turned to Lydia. “You should come back on the show. You were a good guest, as I recall.”

  She shrugged. “Afraid I have nothing very exciting to talk about these days, nothing like when I was in criminal law. The world of FCC license applications is hardly the stuff exciting radio shows are made of.”

  “I take care of the excitement,” Hughes said as he crammed two shrimp into his mouth, sauce dripping to the floor.