Palace Council by Stephen L. Carter Page B

identified as Greek. Her balding father possessed the same round, peppy face as his daughter. Eddie recognized the name. He was Elliott Van Epp, a conservative Senator from a Midwestern farm state, often talked of as presidential timber. Eddie was trying to decide whether the realization was grounds for backing off or pressing forward when he noticed the gold cross snuggled tightly at the young woman’s fleshy throat. It was identical to the one he had found clutched in the hand of poor Philmont Castle, whose murder last year remained unsolved—and, mostly, forgotten.
    Margot was wearing the same cross.
    The same cross, upright this time, ornate workings unmistakable. Eddie’s keen eyes could even discern the start of the upside-down inscription he had been unable to read that night: “We shall,” the tiny words began once more. The rest was again lost to him, swirling around the back and into her sweater.
    Margot smiled. “What are you looking at, Mr. Wesley?”
    Caught. He softened. Just now, caught was not so bad. Aurelia was gone, and his other serial relationships had gone serially bad. It had been a long time. “What would you imagine me to be looking at?”
    â€œThe same thing most men look at, Mr. Wesley.”
    â€œCall me Eddie,” he said, smiling back.
    â€œAll right, Eddie, but before you get any ideas, I should tell you that I’m engaged.”
    â€œA fearful malady that afflicts most pretty girls sooner or later.” He bowed. “I’ve seen it before,” he added, ruefully.
    â€œHave you?”
    â€œOften. But I promise not to hold it against you.”
    Three nights later, Eddie sat in his bedroom, examining the cross close up. He twirled it between his fingers. He had little experience of serious jewelry, but the gold was shiny and soft, its weight in his palm a growing surprise. “We shall be free,” the inscription read, except that on the back the words were right side up, suggesting that the cross, when seen from the other side, was meant to be inverted. The four points of the cross were marked by narrow arrowheads, each with a line joining the legs, as if to form the letter “A.” Eddie perched on the windowsill trying to work out how this well-bred girl and a Wall Street lawyer came to own the same curiously designed gold cross, marked with the same upside-down legend. He recalled the letter from his father but could not accept the image of either Philmont Castle or Margot Van Epp as devil worshipers. Eddie suspected that he was missing something very obvious, and, being a man of action, woke her up to ask.
    â€œFrom my mother,” Margot said sleepily. In the darkness she was sweaty and inert. She had piously removed the cross prior to sex. “Come to bed.”
    â€œWhere did she get it?”
    â€œI think Italy. I don’t remember.”
    â€œItaly?”
    â€œBack before the war. I was a little girl.” She yawned. “My mother’s Italian. Half Italian. Now, put it down and come to bed.”
    â€œAre you a Catholic?”
    She considered the question for a while, eyes glazing a bit because she was still a little high. Finally, she shrugged pale, sloping shoulders. “Not really. We’re not really anything, except at election time.” A sharp grin. Her teeth, like her famous father’s, were huge. Margot was leaving town in a few days; when she returned, she would be a wife. “Then we’re everything.”
    Eddie pointed. “What do the words mean? Are they a quote from somewhere?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œAre they from the Bible?”
    â€œI told you, Eddie, I don’t know. Come back to bed.”
    â€œWhy are they upside down on the back?”
    â€œI don’t know.” Yawning again, Margot looked around the cramped space. “This is stupid,” she announced. “I shouldn’t be here.”
    Eddie was too focused to