The Court Page 5

  He knew they considered him a “political” partner, even though he carried an enormous burden of trial work. If anyone in the firm had need of a phone call or a contact, they came to see him. Usually, he could conjure up someone from the past who would be of service. If the firm hadn’t been so blue-blooded, with so many important clients, he would have been known as the “fixer.” But such a harsh term was eschewed in the hushed and dignified offices of Harley Dingell.

  Jerome Green’s face in the steel panel showed no hint of his origin or his educational beginnings. His was the regulation expression: no emotion, no passion, no humor, just the hint of a smile as if concealing the steel beneath. They all looked alike, dressed alike, and talked alike. It was as if the senior Washington lawyers—the big money men—were all produced by some magic machine, all clones, stamped out from some master mold.

  Green glanced at his watch. He hated being late and had found himself growing more intolerant of others who failed to keep appointments on time.

  “Hey, Jerry!” The voice was familiar, but the face, concealed behind a huge graying yellowish beard, was barely recognizable.

  Green grasped the outstretched hand. Amos Deering’s palm was warm and moist although his grip was firm. He was short and stout, and the beard made him look like an evil elf.

  “Goddamn all tourists, I couldn’t find a place to park.” Deering stepped back and appraised Green. “You look pretty good, for an old turkey. Gray as my grandma, but outside of that you’ve weathered well.”

  Green smiled. “When did you grow that thing?” He pointed to the beard.

  “A couple of years ago. I was teaching out at a college in Utah. At the time it was the only thing to do. Hell, if you didn’t have a beard you weren’t allowed into the faculty teas. Now everyone out there is clean shaven, but screw ’em, I don’t have to worry anymore.” Deering took Green’s arm and directed him toward the other side of the Mall. “I know you’re accustomed to finer things now, but how about having lunch in the cafeteria in the National Gallery of Art?”

  “That’s all right, but why there?”

  “The cafeteria’s strictly for the convenience of the tourists. We won’t run into any government people there, and we don’t have to worry about being seen together.”

  Green had no trouble matching Deering’s determined stride as they crossed the Mall. “Why should I worry in the first place?” Green said. “I’m an innocent man. Of course, Amos, I was never too sure about you.”

  “I’m still innocent,” Deering replied, but with no answering smile. “We’re all still innocent, right? Just a couple of old Reagan alumni getting together.”

  Green frowned. “You make us sound like players. As I recall, we were both rather minor functionaries in that administration.”

  “You became an Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services.”

  Green nodded, and a slow, almost sad smile played across his features. “But only for a few months, Amos. And it took me six years to work my way up to that.”

  “Bush kept you on.”

  “I was too far down the line for him to even care. Anyway, as you remember, I quit to go with Harley Dingell. I had a good offer and I took it.”

  Deering guided him up the steps into the magnificent art gallery. Only a few people occupied the vaulted interior and their footsteps seemed to echo in the silence.

  “C’mon, it’s down these stairs,” Deering spoke in a hushed voice.

  They entered the bustle of the basement cafeteria, selected their food, and took their trays to a far table. The large restaurant was only about a quarter full.

  “Not so bad, eh?” Deering said, as he set down his tray. “And this place has the best pecan pie in all Washington. I think that’s what I missed the most when I was away from Washington, pecan pie. I really didn’t miss the politics, the excitement, or the intrigue as much as I missed pecan pie. You can’t find this delicacy in Utah, believe me. Those Mormons don’t really enjoy the finer things in life except maybe procreation.”

  “Amos, now that you’re back in the seat of power, do you really enjoy it?”

  Deering swallowed a bite of sandwich and grinned. A bit of mustard remained on his beard near the corner of his mouth. “Are you asking me whether being Press Secretary at the White House beats being an associate professor of journalism in the beautiful golden West?”

  “Something like that.”

  Deering shook his head. “Listen, it was like being an exile out there. God knows there were plenty of politicians and politics on that campus. All professors have to be real hustlers just to survive. And you had to keep your eye on everything and everybody, just like here. But it was strictly the minor leagues. So what if you made full professor or became department head, that’s about as exciting as lettuce. I missed real politics so I handled the state of Utah for the man when he was running in the primaries. He lost, but by that time I had wormed my way into the inner circle.” He grinned. “I’m good at that, if you remember.”

  “I remember.”

  Deering took a forkful of pie and savored it for a moment before continuing. “Anyway, I came aboard his staff when he was nominated for vice president. And I stayed on after the election. When the president died, I took over and handled all the communication work during the transition for the man. I have the title “assistant” but that’s only until Harold Baker finds a job. I’m the real press secretary, Jerry. So I’m back, and at the top of the heap. Not bad, eh?”

  “If that’s what you wanted, I’m delighted.”

  Amos Deering wiped his stained beard with a paper napkin. “The President asked me to talk to you.” The statement was made in a conversational tone, although Deering dropped his voice to a near-whisper.

  “About what?”

  “He remembers you from before. He was impressed by your ability to get facts quickly.”

  “So?”

  “We need a little job done. It shouldn’t take more than a week or two. How about it?”

  “I have a heavy case load at Harley Dingell, I.…”

  Deering held up his hand. “C’mon, Jerry, I’m not asking you to quit your firm or anything like that. We know we can’t afford you. We just need a special job done.”

  “Isn’t that how Watergate started—somebody needed a special job done?”

  “Don’t get cute, Jerry, this is important.”

  “I can’t take off for two weeks, at least not right now.”

  Deering frowned. “Look, this is the President’s personal request.”

  Green toyed with his salad. “You make it sound like a royal command. Did I miss something in this morning’s Post or are we still a democracy?”

  Deering sat back. “What’s so damned important that you can’t give it up for two weeks?”

  Jerry Green instinctively obeyed the first rule of Washington’s game of negotiation: never tell the truth, at least not the complete truth. It would serve no purpose to tell Amos Deering that he was in trouble with the firm, that he had lost important litigation, and that if things turned out badly at the FTC he could be ushered out politely. Deering would only use the information against him. Candor could be misinterpreted and, therefore, had no place in the game.

  “I handle a lot of the governmental regulatory work for the firm. We both know why. As an administration official, I’m supposed to have clout. I’ve been away from government a long time and I’m not so sure that’s true anymore, but that remains my assignment. Believe me, it’s more than full time, Amos.”

  Deering nodded, and extracted a thin cigar from inside his coat. “We can’t afford to pay your regular fees, Jerry.” He kept his eyes on Green as he lit the cigar. “I understand you’re one of those five-hundred-dollar-an-hour guys now, right?”

  Green shrugged.

  Deering blew a ball of smoke toward the ceiling. “But we aren’t coming empty-handed either.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  Deering twirled the
cigar slowly in his fingers. “You’ll be appointed as Special Counsel to the President for those two weeks, Jerry. Actually, we’d like it to be for a couple of months, in name if not in fact, it looks better that way.”

  “Two weeks, two months, so what. As I told you, Amos, I’m busy.”

  The bearded man didn’t smile. His eyes no longer twinkled with good humor. “We’re both professionals, Jerry, so I won’t beat around the bush. You said your firm thought you had clout. Maybe you do, and maybe you don’t. But as a former special counsel to the incumbent president, no one in this town could possibly deny your political muscle. If you see what I mean?”

  “Amos, I’m surprised at you. You always played things straight before. Surely you aren’t saying that I can expect special preference?”

  “You know this town as well as I do. Hell, we don’t have to do a thing for you. The title will take care of that, Jerry. Everyone will just assume that you have a passkey to the White House. You won’t, but you’ll never get anybody to believe that.”

  Green nodded. It was true enough, and perhaps it was just the thing to restore his flagging reputation within the firm. “And if I took your bait, what do I have to do?”

  “We need a man investigated.”

  Green frowned. “You have the FBI, what the hell do you need me for?”

  “Justice Howell has had a stroke.”

  “Is that what happened? The news accounts didn’t disclose the illness, they just reported he was in intensive care.”

  Deering nodded. “We’re trying to control, at least for a, while, what gets out, but it’s a stroke.”

  “Bad?”

  “He’s in a coma. The doctors aren’t sure. He may die.”

  “That’s too bad,” Green said.

  “You bet your ass, that’s too bad. Howell was the Court’s swing man. That bitch who was appointed was supposed to be a conservative, but she switched to the liberals as soon as she was sworn in. So the Court went back to four against four, plus Howell. You know, you just can’t trust a woman. Anyway, the Court’s evenly divided and Howell was flopping back and forth as it suited him.”

  “I’m in the law business. I know what was happening.”

  “Right. Of course, Howell hadn’t been our first choice. You remember the chop job the Senate committee did on our first two nominees?”

  “The whole country remembers. Clarence Thomas all over again—twice.”

  Deery exhaled a long stream of smoke. “Okay, here’s the picture. We have to come up with another nominee, just in case. We have to be ready. There are several big cases coming up for decision and the President wants a man he knows he can count on. You understand? If anything happens to Howell, we’ll have to move fast. Congress will adjourn shortly and the Democrats will do everything they can to block any appointment, so we have to make sure we can come up with someone good.”

  “Go on,” Green said.

  “We wouldn’t be meeting here, you and I, unless we had some people in mind, right? You might even be in the running, Jerry, except you’re a Reagan graduate. They’d shoot your ass off in the committee on that basis alone.”

  “I can live with the disappointment.”

  Deering laughed. “Yeah. We have two men set up for consideration. We were ready to go with them last time, in case the committee cut up Howell. Now we have to take another look and decide which man stands the best chance of getting through those long knives up on Capitol Hill. And we have to know we aren’t getting a lemon.”

  “Who are they?”

  “You know one, at least by reputation: O’Malley of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.”

  Green nodded. “A sound lawyer and a good judge, at least from all I’ve heard.”

  “Yeah. But he’s a Catholic. That damn broad is a Catholic. It wouldn’t look good, at least under these circumstances, to appoint two Catholics in a row. Besides, O’Malley has handled some hot cases over the years. And you can be sure all the losers will troop into the Senate hearings to raise a howl. That’s the problem with nominating a sitting judge, he’s got a record, and unless the guy’s a wire walker he’s probably made some controversial decisions. Of course, O’Malley’s personal life is clean. He’s been in public life for a long time, so at least everything in that area is known, or so we hope.”

  “Who’s the other candidate?”

  Deering drew deeply on his cigar, then flicked the ash into his dish. “Ah, that’s where the mystery comes in. He’s dean of a law school. He worked for the President when he was trying for the nomination. The President likes him. And those are pretty good cards for openers.”

  “What’s the problem then?”

  “In a way there isn’t any problem. He hasn’t decided any cases, so nobody is sore at him. He hasn’t taken any controversial public stands. He wrote a book on constitutional law, but it’s harmless; just a recap of a high school civics course, only in fancier language.” Deering sighed. “We had the FBI do the usual check. But you know how they do those things. They talk to a few coworkers, a neighbor or two, run his fingerprints, and that’s that. They don’t really dig down. The report says he’s great, but for all we know the guy might be a pervert or a spy. We really know very little about the real man.”

  “What do you want from me?”

  Deering again grew very serious. “Jerry, we want to know what makes this guy tick. We don’t want any surprises like that damn woman. The President wants to know what he can expect. And he thinks you’re the man who can do it. Anyway, it’ll give you a chance to go home again. You know, renew old acquaintances and all that.”

  Green was startled.

  “The guy’s name is Roy Pentecost. Dean of the law school at Michigan State University. Isn’t that where you come from, Lansing, Michigan?”

  Green nodded slowly, experiencing a rush of conflicting discomforting emotions. “Yes. The university is in East Lansing, but it’s all part of.…”

  “And it’s also the state capital, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “When can you leave?” Deering asked. “Time is of the essence.”

  Green didn’t reply at once. He felt a sense of panic. It was not unlike the sensation aboard a roller coaster as it chugged to a towering summit; that breathless moment when the car is about to scream down the plunging track. It was fear. But the advantages of the White House offer outweighed any reservations about returning home, no matter how strong. “I’ll have to check with the other partners. I have to get their approval. I’ll call you this afternoon.”

  Deering looked at his watch. “Oh, Christ, I have to run. Listen, Jerry, here’s my card. Call as soon as possible, okay? The President is really anxious about this.”

  Green looked at the card. “And if I pass this guy?”

  Deering grinned as he stood up. “He’ll probably end up on the Supreme Court.”

  “And his vote will probably decide the law, at least in many cases,” Green said, almost to himself.

  “Ah, just think of the power, Jerry. You’re going to be like the recording angel. It will be up to you whether this guy gets into heaven or not.”

  “And what kind of man he is will determine what kind of heaven it will be,” Green said, looking up.

  Deering laughed, then hurried out of the cafeteria. Green didn’t follow. He just sat quietly for a moment. He wasn’t thinking of the Supreme Court, or of the importance of what he had to do. He was thinking of Lansing. It was home, but he felt a terrible sense of dread.

  * * *

  “Hey, Ben, do you have time for a quick cup of coffee?” Floyd Grant stood in the doorway, looking around at the cluttered cubicle. Grant was the Chief Justice’s senior clerk. The Court staff always referred to him as “the messenger from God.”

  Ben Alexander looked up from his work. “I’m up to my armpits, Floyd. With my boss sick, I don’t know exactly what to key on, so I’m trying to do it all.”

  Floyd Grant eased past a stack of open law books
and cleared off a chair, carefully preserving the order of the papers he displaced. “Actually, I don’t think I could stand another cup of coffee. I’ve been appointed as a committee of one to talk to you. The coffee was merely a civilized excuse.”

  Alexander put down his pen and leaned back in his chair. “Shoot.”

  Grant grinned. “You’re new, Ben. You have to learn to horse around before you get to the point. It’s expected. We should talk about each other’s golf first, or racketball; maybe discuss our future plans. You see, we should talk about our families, old school chums, or anything but the thing in point. Finally, once these tribal preliminaries are over, it’s only then that we carefully start to approach the real issue. That’s how it’s done here in the Supreme Court.”

  Alexander shrugged. “Okay. I don’t have time for golf anymore. Anyway, I was never very good. When I leave here next year I hope to go with a big New York law firm as an associate. As a former Supreme Court clerk, I expect to make partner quickly. If all goes well, I should be a millionaire before I hit forty. I hope to meet and marry a beautiful girl whose father owns a giant conglomerate. If I don’t make it in the law business, I expect my father-in-law to take care of me. Does that sufficiently meet the qualifications for small talk?”

  “Any of it true?”

  “No. Except the golf. I’m a lousy golfer.”

  Grant nodded wisely. “As long as you avoid the truth, you’ll do very well here, Ben. You’ll fit into the big picture, as the Chief likes to say.”

  “Good. Now what’s up?” Alexander asked.

  “Racketball is my game,” Grant replied, smiling. “I plan to leave here and accept an associate professorship at Stanford. From there, God willing, I’ll end up one day back at Harvard. I will write Grant on Evidence and be quoted by every good law journal in the country. Predictably, I will teach thousands how to try a case without ever once stepping into a courtroom myself. And when you are divorced by that beautiful conglomerate heiress, I will marry her, and let her old man take care of me.”