Shadow of the Lions

by Christopher Swann

  I looked at Trip, who was waiting for my reply.

  “I had nothing to do with this,” I said.

  He held me in a long gaze. Just when it was becoming unbearable, he closed his eyes and sighed. “Okay,” he said. “Sorry. I just . . . I got freaked out. These are powerful men, and it looks like somebody got to them, and I—”

  “Hey, no,” I said. “I understand. Seriously. It’s all right. And I’m sorry I didn’t tell you what happened with Wat. It was a bust, actually.” I briefly outlined Wat’s story about the Chinese spies and Frank Davenport’s fears about losing the Pentagon contracts. As I was telling this to Trip, I was thinking about how I didn’t even have to make this part up—Wat Davenport had done that for me.

  My phone started ringing. “Hang on,” I said to Trip, fishing my phone out of my pocket. He shook his head and waved, and headed across the tent for the bar. I looked at the phone display, which showed an unfamiliar number with a Virginia area code. I answered. “Hello?”

  “Matthias?”

  “Abby,” I said. Oh shit. “Hi.”

  “What the hell is going on?” she demanded.

  The band chose this moment to begin playing “Brown Eyed Girl,” and I had to hold my free hand over my other ear and shout at Abby to hold on while I made my way to the exit. Outside the tent, I welcomed the cooler air and walked off a little ways, phone to my ear, a boxwood hedge on my left. The back of Stilwell Hall loomed before me. “Sorry,” I said into the phone. “I’m at Blackburne, my reunion. There’s a band—”

  “Do you know why my uncle killed himself?” she said.

  “I . . . Trip just told me, Trip Alexander, he—”

  “Does this have to do with Fritz?”

  I stopped walking. “Fritz . . . What?”

  “Does it have anything to do with Fritz?”

  I looked up at the sky. The sun had set a while ago and was just a dull crimson smear in the west, but above the sky was a deep indigo and the first stars were shining, cold and remote and beautiful.

  “Matthias?” Abby’s voice was insistent.

  You can’t tell anyone else, Fritz had said. No one. Not my sister, my mother, our friends, anyone.

  I drew a breath. “Abby, Fritz is gone,” I said. “Like you told me. He’s been gone for a long time.”

  Silence on the other end. “I don’t believe you,” she said.

  Jesus. Had her father told her something? Had he sought forgiveness by showing her the map tracing Fritz’s progress across the United States like some bizarre connect-the-dots puzzle? “You don’t believe that Fritz is gone?” I said.

  “My father came home last night and announced that he was resigning from NorthPoint, and then he locked himself in his office,” Abby said. I couldn’t tell if she was angry or on the verge of tears. Probably both. “He wouldn’t talk to me or Mother. Then my uncle came over and went right into my father’s office. I thought they were going to kill each other. The last time I heard them like this was just before Fritz . . . disappeared.” There was a hitch in her voice, and she paused for a moment before resuming, in control but brittle. “I listened outside the office door. My father said something about being exposed, and then—then Wat said Fritz’s name. I couldn’t hear the rest of it, but Wat stormed out a while later, didn’t even say good-bye. And today they found him dead. They’re saying he drove off the bridge on purpose, Matthias.” Her voice wavered under the threat of tears, but she still held them in. “Why would he do that? My father won’t say anything. Do you know? Wat always liked you, Matthias. He respected you. Did—did you talk to him, about Fritz?” Ragged breathing, a sniff. “Please.”

  I ground my teeth. Not telling Briggs or Trip the truth about Fritz had been simple; not telling Abby was something else entirely. Should I betray my friend, or the girl I once loved—still loved? My throat seemed to swell with the pressure of keeping this lie bottled up, another lie.

  “Matthias?”

  The Davenport family secret had festered and spread in the dark—it was sending out roots and tendrils like some nightmarish vine, clinging to everything and everyone involved, choking us all.

  “Matthias, please.”

  Don’t tell my sister.

  “He had secrets, Abby,” I said. “Your uncle. They were awful, and he had to live with them.”

  “What do you—?”

  “I . . . Abby, I can’t explain. You’ll have to talk to your father.”

  Pause. Now, ridiculously, the band was playing “Gimme Some Loving” by the Spencer Davis Group.

  “Matthias—”

  I stared at my phone, a faint glow in the oncoming night, and then with my forefinger I pressed End, cutting off the call. I could only imagine Abby’s reaction right now, wherever she was. But she knew something wasn’t right. My hanging up on her would only confirm her suspicions. And so I’d kept my promise to Fritz while indirectly goading Abby toward the truth. Yet I hesitated in the dark outside of the tent. Was this how I was going to leave things with her? Some cryptic clues, a hang-up, and a vague hope that all would be well?

  “Fuck it,” I said aloud, and I opened up Facebook on my phone. Then I typed and sent Abby a message—Hamlet’s letter to Ophelia:

  Doubt thou the stars are fire,

  Doubt that the sun doth move,

  Doubt truth to be a liar,

  But never doubt I love.

  Then I shut off my phone and stuck it back in my pocket.

  I wandered back into the tent out of an essential need for light and company, and the first person I ran into was Diamond. Unable to help myself, I glanced down at his leg, but all I could see was a khaki pant leg with a bayonet-sharp crease. I looked up to see Diamond smiling. “Yeah, it’s still fake,” he said. “Wanna race?”

  “I need a drink first. And a head start. And a new Achilles.”

  Diamond held up two beers and then took one step back. “Two out of three ain’t bad.”

  The crowd around my classmates’ table had grown a bit, but Diamond managed to wrangle two empty seats next to Trip, who looked at me, concerned. “Everything okay?” he asked.

  “Abby called,” I said. “Her uncle.”

  Max Goren leaned forward. “Hey, I just heard about that—Trip was telling us.” He shook his head. “That poor family. I guess you never . . . heard anything else, about Fritz?”

  Others leaned in now, too, lured by the fateful name, the tragic story of our class. I hesitated. Then I shook my head. “No,” I said, glancing at Trip, who said nothing. “No, I didn’t.”

  A hush settled on us, each seeming to bow his head before the unlaid ghost. Then Trip raised his beer. “To Fritz Davenport,” he said, “wherever he may be. I wish he were here.”

  “To Fritz,” Diamond said.

  Two dozen drinks were raised up, mine included. “To Fritz,” we echoed, and we drank. It was a balm, an acknowledgment of a missing comrade. My eyes stung, and I was surprised to see one or two other classmates wipe a finger across their eyes, too.

  “So,” Roger Bloom said after a few moments, “are you writing anything new, Matthias?”

  Fletcher Dupree smiled. “Drug dealers, arrests, guess you have a lot to write about, huh?” he said.

  “Yeah, but not that,” I said. “I’ve got a new novel in mind.” It was true, inasmuch as I had just that moment thought of it.

  “No shit,” Max Goren said. “What’s it about?”

  “A cowboy,” I heard myself say. “Modern day, though, not the Wild West.”

  There were several ohs and hmms of polite acknowledgment. Fletcher, though, looked disappointed. “How did you pick that?” he asked. “You know a lot about cowboys?”

  I paused in my reply, letting the moment spin out. Someone coughed nervously. Slowly, Fletcher began to smile in anticipation. I grinned back at him. The hell with it. “Oh, I don’t know, Fletcher,” I said good-naturedly, looking him dead-on. “I’m a novelist. It interests me, and what I don’t know I’ll make up
as I go along. Good enough for you?”

  There was an awkward moment or two, the tension coiled around us. Fletcher frowned, and then Diamond grinned and said, “Yippee ki-yay, motherfucker!” and everyone laughed, the world righted again. Then we all drank and proposed other toasts: to Blackburne, to Sam Hodges, to the lions. As we laughed and remembered, I thought of Kevin Kelly and his angry rant against the school, how Blackburne held out a false promise of success. But as I looked around at my classmates, I saw that each of them had made his own way—Trip to the Washington Post, Diamond to the Marines, Max to real estate. Even Fritz, I realized. And me, too. I had found my way back to this group, these guys I had thought were lost to me, only to find they had been here all along. I had avoided them for so long because I’d felt damaged, sullied, not deserving of a place at the table. But Fritz had felt that way, too, through no fault of his own. And no matter what we had done, or what had happened to us, our places at this table had been set long ago, waiting for us to return.

  I sat there among my classmates, my friends, and let their talk flow over me like clear water, this charmed circle of men with its missing brother who was not forgotten—who might yet be returned to us. Until then, we would go on, his absence a ghostly echo in our hearts that would cease when he appeared and we could welcome him back into the fold, letting the lion’s share of loss and grief slip away.

  Acknowledgments

  For the teachers who encouraged me and taught me the craft: Ted Blain at Woodberry Forest School; Marshall Boswell, Cathryn Hankla, Dabney Stuart, and Jim Warren at Washington and Lee University; Trudy Lewis, Michael Pritchett, and Carol Anshaw at the University of Missouri–Columbia; and Pam Durban, David Bottoms, and John Holman at Georgia State University;

  For the authors who read my early attempts at fiction and offered their time and wisdom: Peter Carey, Deborah Eisenberg, and Richard Ford;

  For my fellow students and writers who helped me get here: Scott Howe, Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon, Traci Lazenby, Mike Land, Pam Johnston, Bernadette Murphy McConville, Alison Umminger, and Tina May Hall;

  For the encouragement, advice, and friendship of Jonathan Evison, and for everyone in the Fiction Files;

  For Sarah Smith Chapman, for reading an early draft and making invaluable suggestions;

  For Mollie Glick, Joy Fowlkes, Emily Brown, Jane Steele, Peter Steinberg, and the rest of the amazing folks at Foundry Literary + Media;

  For the patience, talent, and eagle eye of my editor, Andra Miller, who took a chance on me, and to Betsy Gleick, Elisabeth Scharlatt, and everyone else at Algonquin Books for making a lifelong dream come true;

  For Patti Callahan Henry, Emily Giffin, Mira Jacob, David Liss, Amanda Kyle Williams, and Ed Tarkington, whose kindness is matched only by their talent:

  The only way I can thank you all and repay your generosity is to write true lines.

  Thanks also to David Simpson, for answering my questions about the legal system; to John Holman (again), Tom McHaney, and Josh Russell, who served as my dissertation committee and suffered through my first novel; to my parents, David and Nancy Swann, who never once asked me if I should think about doing something else other than writing; to my graduating class at Woodberry Forest School (hope you like the Easter eggs, fellas); to Holy Innocents’ Episcopal School—particularly the English faculty and the department chairs—for cheering me on and helping to support my writing habit; and to Ronit Wagman, Wes Miller, Laura Regan, Margee Durand, Andrew and Autumn Swann, and Croom and Meriwether Beatty.

  Above all, thanks to Kathy Ferrell-Swann, my first reader, editor, critic, cheerleader, and wife. I love you.

  Christopher Swann is chair of the English Department at Holy Innocents’ Episcopal School in Atlanta, where he has taught English for twenty-one years. He attended Woodberry Forest School, an all male boarding school in Virginia, for all four years of high school. He has a BA with honors from Washington and Lee University, an MA in English/creative writing from the University of Missouri Columbia, and a PhD in creative writing from Georgia State University. He now lives in Sandy Springs, Georgia, with his wife and two sons. (Author photo by Kathy Ferrell-Swann.)

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  Published by

  Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill

  Post Office Box 2225

  Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225

  a division of

  Workman Publishing

  225 Varick Street

  New York, New York 10014

  © 2017 by Christopher Swann.

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. While, as in all fiction, the literary perceptions and insights are based on experience, all names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  eISBN 978-1-61620-767-0