The Inner Circle (13 page)

As my computer boots up, I grab the keyboard, all set to dig. In my pocket, my cell phone starts to ring. I know who it is. Right on time.

“Hey, Mom,” I answer without even having to look. Ever since her heart surgery, I’ve asked my mother to call me every morning—just so I know she’s okay. But as I put the phone to my ear, instead of my mom, I get…

“She’s fine,” my sister Sharon tells me. “Just tired.”

I have two sisters. Sharon’s the older one—and the one who, even when she went to the local community college, never stopped living with my mom. We used to call it Sharon’s weakness. Now it’s our whole family’s strength. She looks like my mom. She sounds like my mom. And these days, she spends most of her life dealing with all the health issues of my mom.

Every two weeks, I send part of my check home. But Sharon’s the one who gives her time.

“Ask her if she’s going to Jumbo’s,” I say, using my mom’s preferred lunch spot as my favorite code. If my mom’s eating lunch there, I know she’s feeling well.

“She is,” Sharon answers. “And she wants to know where you’re going Friday night,” she adds, throwing my mom’s favorite code right back. She doesn’t care where I’m going, or even
if
I’m going. She wants to know:
Do I have a date?
and more important,
Will I ever get over Iris?

“Will you please tell her I’m fine?” I plead.

“Beecher, how’s your seventy-year-old friend?”

“And you’re the one to talk? Besides, you’ve never even met Tot.”

“I’m sure he’s lovely—but I’m telling you, from experience: If you don’t change the way you’re living, that’s gonna be
you
one day. Old and lovely and all by yourself. Listen to me on this. Don’t hide in those Archives, Beecher. Live that life.”

“Is this me arguing with you, or arguing with Mom?”

Before she can answer, I glance to my right. There’s a solid red light on my desk phone. Voicemail message.

“I think I got you something, old boy,” Tot calls out from his cubicle.

“Shar, I gotta go. Kiss Mom for me.” As I hang up my cell, I’m already dialing into voicemail, putting in my PIN code.

While waiting for the message to play, I dial up caller ID on the keypad, study the little screen of my phone, and scroll down until I see the name of the person who left the last message.

Williams, Orlando.

My heart stops.

I read it again. Orlando.

My computer blinks awake. Tot yells something in the distance.

“
Message one was received at… 4:58 p.m.… yesterday.”

And in my ear, through the phone, I hear a familiar baritone voice—Orlando’s voice—and the final words of a dead man.

19

On a scale of one to ten,” Dr. Palmiotti asked, “would you say the pain is…?”

“It’s a four,” the President said.

“Just a four?”

“It
used to be
a four. Now it’s an eight,” Wallace said, pacing along the far left side of the doctor’s office and glancing out the wide window with the stunning view of the White House Rose Garden. “Approaching a nine.”

“A nine for what?” his sister Minnie asked, already concerned. The doctor was talking to the President, but it was Minnie, as she stood across from Palmiotti, who was being examined.

She held her right palm wide open as he poked each of her fingers with a sterilized pin, testing to see her reaction. Whenever she missed therapy for too long, sharp pains would recede and feel simply dull. “What’s wrong with him?” she asked, motioning to her brother.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Palmiotti promised.

“If he’s sick…”

“I’m not sick. Just some stupid back problems,” the President insisted. “And a really crappy night’s sleep.”

“Listen to me, I know they won’t say this on the front page of the paper, but you need to hear it, O: I have faith in you. Stewie has faith in you. Your wife and kids have faith in you. And millions of people out there do too. You know that, right?”

The President turned, looking at his sister, absorbing her words.

Palmiotti knew how much Minnie loved her brother. And how much Wallace loved her back. But that didn’t mean it was always best for him to have her around. By now, most of America had heard the story: How Minnie was born with the genetic disease known as Turner syndrome. How it affected only females, leaving them with a missing X chromosome. How 98 percent of people die from Turner syndrome, but Minnie lived—and she lived without any of the heart or kidney or cognitive problems that go along with it. In fact, the only thing that Minnie Wallace got from Turner syndrome was that she was—like a few of its victims—manly.

Broad chest. Low hairline. Short neck. With one X chromosome, she looked like Moe from the Three Stooges. Perez Hilton said if she were one of the Seven Dwarfs, she’d be Stumpy. Or Fatty. Or Dumpy. When it first got posted, the President tried to let it roll off. He issued a statement saying that the comment made him Grumpy. But Palmiotti knew the truth. Nothing hits harder than when someone hits home. For the President… for Minnie… the last time Palmiotti saw pain like that was the night of the accident that caused her stroke.

The worst part was, he saw the makings of a similar pain right now—and from the strained look on the President’s face, despite the little pep talk from his sister, that pain was just starting to swell.

“Minnie, go do your therapy,” Palmiotti ordered.

“I can do it right here. You have the squeeze balls—”

“Mimo, you’re not listening,” the President interrupted. “I need to see my doctor. By myself.”

Minnie cocked her head. She knew that tone. Grabbing her flamingo cane, she started heading for the door.

“Before I go…” she quickly added, “if you could speak at our Caregivers’ Conference—”

“Minnie…”

“Okay. Fine. Gabriel. I’ll talk to Gabriel,” she said. “But just promise me—all these back problems—you’re sure you’re okay?”

“Look at me,” Wallace said, flashing the insta-smile that won him 54 percent of the popular vote. “Look where I live… look at this life… what could I possibly be upset about?”

With her limp, it took Minnie nearly a minute to leave the office.

The President didn’t start speaking until she was gone.

*              *              *

20

Beecher, it’s me…
” Orlando says in the message, his deep voice showing just a crack of flat Wisconsin accent.

My legs go numb, then my chest.

“Beecher, lookit this!” Tot yells behind me, though I swear to God, it sounds like he’s talking underwater.

“Tot, gimme one sec,” I call back.

My Lord. How can—? Orlando. That’s… Orlando…

“You need to see this, though,” Tot insists, shuffling toward me with a thick stack of paper held by a binder clip.

Still gripping the phone, I lean forward in my chair, lurching for the keypad and pounding the 3 button.
This isn’t… focus!… start over… just focus…

Beep.

“
Beecher, it’s me
,” Orlando begins again. He pauses a moment.

“Y’ever see this?” Tot interrupts, waving the pages.

“Tot, please… can it wait?”

I hit the 3 button again to buy some time. The phone’s not near my ear, but I still hear Orlando’s opening.
“Beecher, it’s me.”

“You want to know if that was George Washington’s dictionary or not?” Tot asks. “Just listen: When George Washington died, Mount Vernon made a list of every single item in his possession—every candlestick, every fork, every piece of art on his walls…”

I hit 3 again.
“Beecher, it’s me.”

“… and of course, every one of GW’s books,” Tot says, tossing me the copy of
Entick’s Dictionary
. It hits my desk with a dead thud.

“Okay… I get it, Tot.”

“The more you rush me, Beecher, the slower I’m gonna talk.”

“Okay, I’m sorry, just…
please
.” I press 3 again.
“Beecher, it’s me.”

“The point is,” Tot continues, “the only way to find out if this is really GW’s book is to first find out if he even owned a copy.”

I hit 3 again. “And?”

“According to this, he had one.” He points to the list.
One copy. Entick’s Dictionary.
“Though if this is even the same copy, that still doesn’t explain how it found its way here.”

“Or even
if
it found its way here,” I say. “For all we know, this isn’t even part of our collection.”

“Actually, that’s easy enough to find out.” Stepping toward my computer, Tot shoos me from my seat. “C’mon… Up!… Old man needs to sit,” he says as I hop aside, stretching the phone cord to its limits. He’s already clicking at the keyboard. Perfect. I turn my attention back to the phone…

“
Beecher, it’s me
,” Orlando begins again. He pauses a moment.
“Crap, I don’t have your cell phone.”
He pauses again, then his voice picks up speed.
“I need you to call me. What you did…”

What I did?

“
Just call me
,” he finishes.

I hit the button and replay it again.

“Crap, I don’t have your cell phone.”

He pauses after that. Is that panic? Is he panicking? Is he sick?

“Crap, I don’t have your cell phone.”

I listen closely, but I was wrong before. His voice isn’t picking up speed. It’s fast, but no faster than usual.

“I need you to call me. What you did…”

There it is. The only moment his voice strains. Just slightly on the word
did.
I hit the rewind button again.

“What you did…”

He means finding the dictionary.

“What you did…”

There’s definitely an emphasis on the last word.

“What you did…”

It’s just three syllables. Three dumb words. It’s no different than looking at a photo of a happy, grinning child and then being told he died in a brutal car accident. No matter what you want to see, all you see is… it’s not just loss or sadness. To hear these words… uttered by this—this—this—ghost…

“What you did…”

All I hear is blame.

“
Just call me
,” Orlando finally says at 4:58 p.m. yesterday.

As his voice fades, I feel my body churn, straining for its own equilibrium. It doesn’t come. I’m squeezing the phone so hard, streams of sweat run from my fist down the inside of my wrist, seeping into my watchband.

It’s not until I look down that I spot Tot arching his head toward me, studying me with his good eye. If he heard…

He stares right at me.

Of course he heard.

I wait for him to judge, to warn, to say that I need to get rid of Orlando’s message.

“You’re not alone in this, Beecher.”

“Actually, I kinda am,” I say as I hear a beep on the other line. I look down at caller ID, which reads
Security
. I don’t pick up. The last thing I need right now is Khazei quizzing me again about Orlando’s death. Instead, I forward Orlando’s message to my cell and delete it from voicemail.

Tot shakes his head. “I’m telling you, you’re not alone. You need to hear that.”

“That’s fine—and I appreciate when someone says something nice to me, Tot, but… I’m just… I don’t think I can do this.”

“Do what?”

“
This.
Any of this. Tracking old books that’re hidden for Presidents… playing Spy versus Spy… getting guilt and spooky messages from dead people…”

“Guilt? What’re you talking about?”

“Didn’t you hear Orlando’s message? When he said,
What you did
…—heart attack or murder—he might as well have added…
when you caused my death.
”

“You really think Orlando was calling you for some bitter scolding?”

“What else am I supposed to think?”

At his jawbone, just below his ear, Tot twirls a few stray hairs of his wizard beard between his thumb and pointer-finger while eyeing the gutted copy of
Entick’s Dictionary
. “Maybe he was amazed you found it. Maybe he just realized the consequences:
What you did…”
He lowers his voice to sound like Orlando:
“… you just uncovered something no one knew existed. President Wallace was… God knows what he was up to, but you found it, Beecher. You’re a hero.”

“A hero? For what? For spilling coffee? For trying to impress a girl from high school in the hopes of forgetting about my fiancée? I mean it, Tot. I woke up this morning with my feet sweating! Name one hero who has sweaty feet!”

I wait for him to answer—for him to pull some historian nonsense and tell me that Teddy Roosevelt was known for his sweaty feet, but instead Tot just sits there, still twirling his beard.