The Governor's Lady (38 page)
Home for lunch, she heard the sound of canned laughter from the downstairs den. Mickey was in her wheelchair, Nolan Cutter and Nurse Dubose sitting on either side.
“What in God’s name are you people doing?”
Estelle said, “This channel’s running
Seinfeld
back to back all day.”
“Hush, Estelle,” Mickey commanded. “I can’t hear with you yammering. Cooper, go get some lunch.”
Nolan followed her to the dining room, where Mrs. Dinkins was setting a plate at her place—the head of the table now.
“Want some?” she asked Nolan.
“Mrs. Dinkins already fed me. Mrs. Dinkins, will you go home with me and do that every day? Marriage would not be out of the question.”
“Ha!” Mrs. Dinkins said, and prissed off.
He sat with Cooper while she ate.
“Nolan, you don’t have time to make house calls.”
“I was on the way home, taking the afternoon off. Just thought I’d stop by.”
“So, how is she?”
“If a cat has nine lives, she’s on her tenth. Fragile, but holding on. She’s got a purpose, and that’s better than any medicine I know. She says you’re her last political hurrah.”
Cooper laughed, then sobered. “She tells me things it would take me months to figure out, if ever. And then there’s …”
He waited, then finished for her: “The heart-and-soul thing.”
“Mother and I have been at odds a great long while.”
“What’s propping her up now is more about that than politics. Unfinished business. She has to deal with things now. I’ve been honest with her. It’s the only way I know how to be. She’s clinging by her fingernails, defying gravity. But she can’t do that much longer. With congestive
heart failure, you just keep losing ground until there’s no more to lose. It could happen anytime.”
Cooper pushed her plate aside. “We’re trying. We both have something to give.” She folded her napkin and stood. “One other thing: How the hell did she get downstairs?”
“I carried her. She weighs almost nothing.”
“I have people on the staff who can do that kind of thing, Nolan.”
“Look, there’s not much I can really do for her now. But I can do that. So bug off.”
They stopped outside the den. Mickey was asleep in her chair, Estelle still watching TV.
“All the other stuff,” he said, “is it going okay?”
She had an impulse to unburden—Pickett, Woodrow, the rest—but she stopped herself, seeing the fatigue lines on his face, how depleted he looked. An afternoon off—he needed that. He had enough on his mind without the weight of her business.
“I’m making it.”
“If you need to talk, to somebody who has nothing to offer but listening …”
She gave him a kiss on the cheek. “I know that. If I call crying—”
“I’ll be here with a shoulder and a handkerchief.”
She walked with him to the door, then went back to the den.
“Estelle,” she said, “don’t you want to go home and get some rest?”
“I’d rather stay, if you don’t mind.”
“Of course I don’t mind. You’re wonderful.”
Cooper sat back in a chair. A new episode was starting:
Seinfeld buys a cigar-store Indian to impress Winona, who is offended because she’s Native American. Kramer wants to write a coffee-table book about coffee tables
.
Her eyes popped open when the closing theme song came on. She felt guilty for a moment, but then thought,
To hell with it
.
“Tell me about Wheeler,” she said to Mickey. “I really don’t know much about him beyond the
Dispatch
.”
“Almost nobody does.”
“But you do. He had a wife, I know that.”
“Sara. It was a horror show,” Mickey said. “They married young, in the heat of the moment, and it wasn’t long after that he figured out she was the worst kind of violent, suicidal manic-depressive. She made Wheeler’s life a nightmare. But he stuck with her, kept her at home until he just couldn’t do it anymore. She tried a couple of times to kill him. He finally got commitment papers. She went to a state mental hospital, and last year she managed to commit suicide. Despite all reason, Wheeler blames himself.”
“He’s a driven man.”
“He escaped into his work. I met him when I started clerking in the legislature. I was fascinated with what he did, and how well he did it, and how much he knew about politics and politicians. We became friends. When I picked up some scuttlebutt about one thing or another, I’d sometimes pass it along. When Cleve and I married and I moved upstate, Wheeler and I stayed in touch. Neither of us ever tried to take advantage of what the other one knew. He’s always had a great interest in you, especially after you decided to go into the news business. You should appreciate who and what he is.”
“Believe me, I do.”
She was on the way to the Capitol when Carter called. He had an edge to his voice that bordered on fright. “Mom, what’s going on with Plato?”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s gone. Just walked out, disappeared.”
“Maybe Dad sent him on an assignment.”
“No, I think Dad fired him. It’s really weird around here. There are all these new people. Everybody’s clammed up, including Dad. I asked him, but he said it’s nothing for me to be concerned about. He was pretty short with me. I thought maybe you’d know.”
“I’m as surprised as you are. Plato and Dad have been together from the beginning.”
“Would you ask Dad?”
She thought about it. “No,” she said. “I’m trying to keep Dad’s business at arm’s length. I’ve got plenty on my own plate.”
His voice was shaky. “I’d just like to know what’s up.”
“Are you okay? Do you need to come home, honey?”
“Not yet.”
“Okay. Call me if we need to talk, tonight for sure.”
“I will.” A moment, then he said, “I miss you.”
Purvis Redmond was waiting when she got to the office, a stack of documents in hand. He placed it on the desk in front of her and stood there fidgeting.
“What is all this?” she asked.
“Just routine stuff,” he said. “Appointments to boards and commissions, proclamations, executive orders, so forth.”
She picked up the top sheet and read it. “We’re appointing … who? Pearl Reddock to the Cosmetology Board? Who is Pearl Reddock, and why am I appointing her?”
“Pickett—”
“Purvis, when I appoint somebody to something, don’t you think I
ought to know who he or she is, and why I’m doing it?”
“It’s all been checked out,” he said, his voice going up an octave. “Thoroughly vetted. This is just leftover stuff.”
She went through the pile. At the bottom was a thick bound document that at a glance seemed to have something to do with real estate.
Cooper sat back in her chair. “All right, Purvis. I’m sure you’ve done your job, and I appreciate that.”
He looked relieved. He straightened, pulled a pen from his jacket pocket, and thrust it toward her.
“But,” she said, “it’s going to be my signature on these things, and that makes me responsible. Give me a one-paragraph description of each, what I’m doing and why.”
His face fell. “The big one there,” he said stiffly, “I’d appreciate your going ahead and signing that now.”
“Why?”
“It’s a land swap. A lot of negotiations have gone into putting it together.”
“What kind of swap?”
“The state is getting some prime land on the coast for a park, in return for a tract upstate that some folks want to turn into a resort development. It’s a straight exchange, no money involved. The governor signs off, then it goes to the legislature for approval.”
“As I said, I’ll look it over.”
“But—”
“Thank you, Purvis.”
He stood a moment longer, hands twitching. Then he put the pen back in his pocket. “Well, all right,” he said finally. “If you say so.”
“I do.”
When he was gone, she called Wheeler. “I’m sending you a thing about a real-estate transaction. Look it over, see what you think.”
Purvis Redmond was back the next morning with a couple of sheets of paper summarizing the proclamations and appointments he had handed her the day before. She read while he waited.
“They look fine, Purvis. Grace will get them back to you.”
“If, ah, you could go ahead and sign the real-estate thing …”
She glanced again through the briefing sheets. Nothing about the land swap. “You don’t have anything here about that.”
Purvis shifted his weight from foot to foot. “It’s like I told you, land on the coast for land in the upstate. It’s a good deal for everybody.” He paused, opened his mouth to form a word, then quickly closed it. She saw that he had almost spoken Pickett’s name. “We wouldn’t want the parties to get the idea there’s a problem.”
“The parties?”
“It’s all right there,” he said.
“All right,” she said after a moment, “I’ll get to it. Thank you, Purvis.”
She called Wheeler. “Have you had a chance to look over that business about the land deal?”
“Not yet.”
“Can you take a few minutes?”
“Is something wrong?”
“Purvis Redmond seems anxious about my signing off on it. Maybe he’s just being Purvis.”
“Do I hear the hum of a built-in bullshit detector?”
“Maybe.”
Mickey was settled in her wheelchair, swathed in a garish purple robe Nolan had brought, smelling of lilac water from the bath Estelle had given her, hair clean and tied back with a ribbon. She was reading a newspaper, turning the pages noisily, making an occasional mumbling comment.