A Vote for Murder (3 page)

My companions in the rear seat were Marsha Jane Grane, Bill Littlefield, author of best-selling histories of the Korean and Vietnam wars, and Nikki Farlow.

When I’d learned that George Sutherland and I would be in Washington at the same time, I summoned my courage and called Ms. Farlow to ask whether he could join us at the White House. I wasn’t surprised at her answer, although her tone took me aback. She dismissed the request as impossible, lecturing me about how difficult such arrangements were, and further explaining that with security concerns paramount in this age of terrorism, adding an “outsider” was out of the question. That George was a senior Scotland Yard inspector, intimately involved in combating terrorism in Great Britain, didn’t carry any weight. As I said, I didn’t expect my request to be honored, but had made it under the “nothing ventured, nothing gained” philosophy. I thanked Ms. Farlow for even considering it, and dropped the matter.

Therefore, I was pleasantly surprised the next day when she called me at home to say that although Inspector Sutherland would not be able to join me at the White House, Senator Nebel had invited him to the dinner party at his home that same night. I thanked her for the courtesy and contented myself with knowing that George would, at least, be able to enjoy that aspect of the evening.

“How long have you worked with the senator?” I asked Nikki—we were now on a first-name basis—during the drive, which took us across the Potomac River and in a northerly direction, parallel to the river; the Potomac is as much a Washington landmark as many of its most famous monuments.

“I joined him two years ago,” she said.

“You’ve always worked in government?” Littlefield asked.

“No,” she said. “I ran my own headhunting business until the senator offered me the job. I met him on a fund-raising trip he’d taken through the Midwest.”

“You’re from there?” I asked.

“Chicago,” she replied, simultaneously flipping through pages of handwritten notes on a yellow legal pad she’d removed from a briefcase. Not wanting to intrude on her official thoughts, I directed conversation to Littlefield, who’d had little to say up to that point. I’d asked him about his latest book, and he was telling me when the driver turned onto a narrow, tree-lined road that took us in the direction of the river. A minute later we followed the other limos onto a circular gravel driveway that swept in front of an imposing home on the banks of the Potomac. I was surprised at how large the house was, probably because my perception of where and how Nebel lived was shaped by my Cabot Cove experience. His home there was as modest as his campaign clothing promised.

But this was a mansion in every sense of the word. It appeared to be a structure that had been expanded numerous times, with wings jutting out in every direction without any apparent attempt to match architectural styles each time a new addition was constructed. The second floor, too, seemed to have been added at a different time, its Palladian windows in contrast to less expansive ones on the first level.

As I stepped from the limousine, I looked to my left to see a two-story garage with six bays. A silver Jaguar and a black Mercedes sat in front of it; two motorcycles were parked off to the side.

“Are those apartments over the garage?” I asked Ms. Farlow.

“Live-in household staff,” she replied.

A uniformed security guard holding a clipboard stood at the massive wooden doors leading from the driveway into the house, and we were asked to identify ourselves before being allowed to enter and checked off his list. Once inside, we were in a spacious foyer with a stone floor in which slabs of granite of various hues had been embedded. Large vases of freshly cut, colorful flowers sat on heavy furniture that hugged the walls. An elaborate brass chandelier, easily seven feet in diameter, cast soft light from above. Ms. Farlow asked us to follow her from the foyer down a long hallway to a huge room at the opposite side of the house. In contrast to what I’d seen so far, the room’s modernity was striking. Floor-to-ceiling windows provided a splendid view of the river, which was at least seventy-five feet down a steep slope from a wide brick terrace on the other side of the glass. A large plasma TV screen was on a wall near a conversation pit in a corner of the room. A massive stone fireplace dominated one wall; the brass handles on a set of antique fireplace tools glistened in light from recessed fixtures that dotted the high ceiling.

I went to the windows and gazed at the Potomac. A long, narrow, winding set of wooden stairs snaked from the terrace to a dock at the base where a nicely rigged, center-console fishing boat bobbed in the gentle wake of other passing craft.

“This is absolutely beautiful,” I said to no one in particular.

A white-jacketed man of East Indian extraction, holding a tray on which filled champagne flutes rested, responded: “Madam?” he said.

“Yes, thank you,” I said, taking one of the glasses. His eyes locked with mine, large, very dark, expressive eyes. He walked to where others had gathered, offering champagne to them, too. From another corner of the room came a woman wearing a similar outfit. She passed a tray of hors d’oeuvres—crostini with herb-whipped goat cheese and pine nuts, wasabi-rubbed New Zealand lamb chops, crabmeat herb and phyllo cigars, and wild mushroom bruschetta with shaved Parmesan. By this time, the number of people in the room had swelled, and I assumed they were either friends of Nebel’s, or professional colleagues. I recognized from watching the House of Representatives on C-SPAN two members of that body, a congressman from Ohio whose fiery speeches on the floor of the House were well-known (and dismaying to some, I was sure), and a congresswoman whose base, I seemed to remember, was California, and who’d made headlines when she’d cast the deciding vote in favor of President Dimond’s most recent budget proposal.

“Lovely home, isn’t it?” Marsha Jane Grane said, coming up to my side at the window.

“Yes, it is. The views are spectacular.”

“Do you have views where you write?” she asked.

“My backyard,” I replied lightly. “Plenty of birds at my feeder.”

“I work in total solitude,” she said. “A view like this would keep me from concentrating. I have no windows in my writing room, only a desk, chair, and typewriter.”

That led to a discussion of working on a typewriter versus a computer, or writing in longhand. I divided my attention between Ms. Grane and the door to the room, looking for George Sutherland’s arrival. I was defending my choice of a computer, reluctantly at first, I admitted, and its word-processing capability, when George entered, escorted by the security guard who’d cleared us at the front door. Nikki Farlow had told me that a limousine would pick him up at his hotel and deliver him here, which it obviously had.

“Excuse me,” I told Marsha Jane. “A friend of mine has just arrived.”

“Jessica,” George said. “You look absolutely marvelous.”

“And so do you.”

By any objective standards, George Sutherland was a handsome man, with a distinguished air about him. In his sixties, he stood six feet, four inches tall and carried himself with easy confidence. His hair was brown with red tinges in it; a slightly larger patch of gray at each temple than when I’d last seen him added a promise of wisdom and distinction. Fine features were nicely arranged on his large, deeply lined face. His eyes, serious but with a constant promise of mirth and bemusement at what went on around him, were the green of Granny Smith apples. I’d come to learn that his favorite clothing consisted of tweed jackets with leather at the elbows, muted ties, sleeveless pullover sweaters, razor-creased tan pants, and highly polished brown boots that came up over the ankle. For this occasion, however, he’d chosen a nicely tailored blue pin-striped suit, white shirt, and red-and-blue regimental tie.

He kissed my cheek.

“How was the White House?” he asked.

“Pleasant, and impressive. The president was charming. He certainly knew a lot about us and our books.”

“A man on top of things,” he said, accepting an hors d’oeuvre from a replenished tray passed by a female household staff member.

“Champagne?” I asked, and looked for the man in the white jacket.

He leaned close and whispered, “Any chance of a malt whiskey?”

“Oh, I’m sure that can be arranged,” I said, motioning for the server passing the champagne, and asking him for a single malt Scotch. “Of course, madam,” he said.

“Is our host here?” George asked, taking in the room.

“I haven’t seen Senator Nebel since the White House,” I said. “Looks like things run smoothly without him.”

“Quite a house,” George said.

“To say the least.”

As if on cue, Warren Nebel entered the room and quickly made his way to each guest, patting an arm or shoulder, taking women’s hands and holding them while he spoke, his smile perpetual, making each person feel as though he or she were the only one there.
The consummate professional politician at work,
I thought.

“Ah, yes, Mrs. Fletcher’s special friend, all the way from jolly old London,” he said when I introduced him to George. “It’s truly a pleasure having you here, Inspector Sutherland. May I call you George?”

“Of course,” said George.

“And we’ll drop the ‘Senator this’ and ‘Senator that’ for the evening,” Nebel said.

“That’s a deal,” said George.

“And we can dispense with the Mrs. Fletcher, too,” I added.

“Right you are, Jessica,” said Nebel, disengaging and gliding on to the next guest.

George and I ended up in a knot of people, including the Librarian of Congress, Dr. Thomas Lester, who oversaw the library’s immense collections, which he proudly pointed out consisted of eighteen million books on more than five hundred miles of bookshelves, twelve million photographs, and almost fifty million manuscripts.

“Astounding,” George said, sipping his recently delivered Scotch. “I imagine you have a sizable problem with overdue books.”

Dr. Lester laughed heartily, exposing a full mouth of yellowed teeth. “Outright theft is more like it,” he said. “Excuse me. I see someone I need a word with.”

Another man in our group, Walter Grusin, said to me, “I’ve been hoping to catch some time with you, Mrs. Fletcher.”

“Oh?”

“I’m with the lobbying firm of McCrorry and Castle. You might have heard of us.”

“I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I haven’t.”

I took a stab at judging his age; no older than forty-five. He looked as though he could have been a college football star, solidly built, square faced, and sure of himself. “We represent Sterling Power.”

George looked quizzically at me.

“The company that wants to put a large nuclear generating plant near my home,” I said, both to acknowledge to Grusin that I understood, and to clue George in.

“You make it sound ominous,” Grusin said. “The senator must have gotten to you.”

“No,” I said, “but it’s the topic of considerable conversation in Cabot Cove, as you can imagine.”

“Are you a member of the citizen group opposing it?” he asked.

“A member? No. But I have good friends who are, and I’ve contributed to their cause.”

“I’d think a well-known author like you could find better things to do with her money,” he said.

I glanced at George, whose expression said he hadn’t appreciated the comment any more than I had.

“I’m not against nuclear power,” I said, “but there are legitimate questions about locating it there.”

“Perfect place for it,” Grusin said. “I’d appreciate spending some one-on-one time with you while you’re in D.C.”

“Are you lobbying me?” I smiled to lighten the question.

“You might say that,” he replied. “After all, I am a lobbyist.”

“I’m afraid my week is spoken for,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound too curt.

“Opponents to the plant see it from only one viewpoint, Mrs. Fletcher. I think that if you allow me to outline the alternative perception for you, you might change your mind. We could use someone of your reputation back in Maine to help us present a more accurate picture.”

The senator, accompanied by a young man, rejoined us, sparing me any further lobbying by Mr. Grusin. The young man looked like the senator, but lacked his spark. Nebel held a glass filled with ice cubes and liquor. “You haven’t met my son,” he said to George and me. “Jack Nebel, say hello to Jessica Fletcher and Inspector Sutherland.”

“It’s George,” George said, shaking Jack’s hand.

“Jessica is a famous writer,” said Nebel. “She lives near us in Cabot Cove.”

“I know,” his son replied. “I wrote a review of one of your books for my high school English class.”

“Must have been one of my earlier ones,” I said. He appeared to be in his early twenties, a handsome young man, slightly overweight, with a softness to his face and sadness in his large brown eyes. I remembered his mother once saying that she worried about him; he never seemed to find his place, drifting from job to job.

“And the inspector—George—is with Scotland Yard,” his father said.

Jack Nebel’s face brightened. “That must be an exciting place to work,” he said.

“It has its moments,” George said. “Most of the time it can be bloody dull.”

“Like most jobs,” Senator Nebel said. “People think being a senator is exciting, but I spend the majority of my days trying to stay awake.” He laughed at his comment. “But don’t tell that to the voters back home.”

“Your secret is safe with me,” I said.

Nebel nodded at Walter Grusin. “Don’t spend too much time with Walter, Jessica,” he said. “You’ll end up having a nuclear plant in your backyard.”

Grusin had been sober faced when speaking with me. His tone changed with the senator. He slapped Nebel on the back, grinned, and said, “Don’t shortchange your constituents, Senator. Have them suffer a blackout and they won’t forget it at the polls.”