Speaking In Tongues

“No, young man. Now listen to me.” She’d looked toward the head of the table, to make sure her husband wasn’t listening. “If you laugh loud while planting corn it’s trouble. I mean, serious trouble. And it’s good to plant potatoes and onions in the dark of the moon and you better plant beans and corn in the light.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, Grams.”

“Does,” she’d responded. “Root crops grow below ground so you plant them in the dark of the moon. Cereals are above ground so you plant in the light.”

Tate admitted there was a certain logic there.

This was one of three or four simultaneous discussions going on around the di

“And,” Crams would continue, sca

“Sure is for the hogs,” Tate had offered.

The di

Now, because his ex-wife stood beside him, Tate was keenly aware that those Norman Rockwell times, which he’d hoped to duplicate in his own life, had never materialized.

The vestige of a familial South for Tate hadn’t survived long into his adulthood. He, Bett and Megan were no longer a family. Among the multitude of pretty and smart and well-rounded women he’d dated Tate Collier hadn’t found a single chance for family.

And so, as concerned as he now was about Megan, the return of these two into his life was fraught with pain.

It brought practical problems too. He was preparing for the biggest case he’d had in years. A corporation was petitioning Prince William County for permission to construct a historical theme park near the Bull Run Battlefield. Liberty Park was going to take on King’s Dominion and Six Flags. Tate was representing a group of residents who didn’t want the entertainment complex in their backyard even though the county had granted tentative approval. Last week Tate had won a temporary injunction halting the development for ninety days, which the developer immediately challenged. Next week, on Thursday, the Supreme Court in Richmond would hear the argument and rule whether or not to let the injunction stand. If it did, the delay alone might be enough to put the kibosh on the whole deal.

Overnight Tate Collier had become the most popular-and unpopular-person in Prince William County, depending on whether you opposed or supported the project. The developer of the park and the lenders funding it wanted him to curl up and blow away, of course. But there were hundreds of local businessmen, craftsmen, suppliers and residents who also stood to gain by the park’s approval and the ensuing migration of tourists. One editorial, lauding the project, called Tate “the devil’s advocate.” A phrase that certainly resonated in this fervent outpost of the Christian South.

Liberty Park ’s developer, Jack Sharpe, was one of the richest men in northern Virginia. He came from old money and could trace his Prince William ancestry back to pre-Civil War days. When Tate had brought the action for the injunction, Sharpe had hired a well-known local firm to defend. Tate had chopped Sharpe’s lawyers into little pieces-hardly even sporting-and the developer had fired them. For the argument in Richmond he’d gone straight to Washington, D.C., to hire a law firm that included two former attorneys general, one former vice president, and, possibly, a future president.

Tate and Ruth, his secretary-assistant-paralegal, had been working nonstop on the argument and motion papers for a week, and would continue to do so until, probably, midnight of the day before the argument.

So Bett’s reappearance in his life-and Megan’s disappearance from it-might have some serious professional repercussions.

Queasy, he thought again of that day when he and Bett had fought so bitterly-ten or eleven years ago. He’d never known the girl had overheard his outburst.

Your inconvenient child…

Why had fate brought them back into his life? Why now?

But however he wished otherwise, they were back. And there was nothing he could do about it.

Finally Tate asked his ex-wife, “Think we should call my mother?”

“No,” Bell said. “Let’s give it a few days. I don’t want to upset her u

“What about your sister?”

“Definitely not her.”

“Why not?” Tate wondered aloud. He knew Susan cared very much for Megan. More than most aunts would for a niece. In fact, she’d always seemed almost jealous that Bell had a daughter and she didn’t.

“Because we don’t have any answers yet,” Bett responded. Then, after a few moments, she sighed. “This isn’t like her.” She glanced at the letter in her hand. Then shoved it deep into her purse.

Tate studied his wife’s face. Tate Collier had inherited several talents from the Judge. The main gift was, of course, a way with words, and the other, far rarer, was the ability to see the future in someone’s face. Now he looked into his ex-wife’s remarkable violet eyes, saw them narrow, alight on his and move on, and he knew exactly what was going through her mind. Debate is not just about words, debate is about intuition too. The advocate who can see exactly where his adversary is headed will always have an advantage, whatever rhetorical flourishes the opponent has in his repertoire.

He didn’t like what he now saw.

Bett stepped determinedly off the porch and into the backyard, toward the west barn, where her car was parked. He followed and paused on the shaggy lawn, which was badly in need of a mowing. He stared intently at the white streak of the energetic Dalmatian, which had finally forsaken the bone and was zipping through the grass like a greyhound.

Tate glanced at the old barn, alien and yet very familiar. Then his eyes fell on the picnic bench that he and Bell had bought at one of the furniture stores along Route 28. They’d used it only once-for the gathering after the funeral fourteen years ago. He remembered the events with perfect clarity now. It seemed like last week.

He saw Bett looking at the bench too. Wondered what she was thinking.

That had been an unseasonably warm November-just as odd as this April’s oppressive heat. He pictured Bett standing on the bench to unhook a Japanese lantern from the dogwood after the last of the family and well-wishers had left or gone to bed.

Today; Tate paused beside this same tree, which was in its expansive, pink bloom.

“Are you busy now?” she asked. “Your practice?”

“ Lot of little things. Only one big case.” He nodded at the house, where a paralyzing stack of documents for the Liberty Park argument rested. When they were married the house had been littered with red-backed legal briefs, forty or fifty pages long. The Supreme Court of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Many of them were for death penalty cases Tate was prosecuting. Although he’d been the Fairfax County commonwealth's attorney Tate had often argued down in Richmond on behalf of other counties. “Have voice, will travel,” his staff had joked. His specialty had become special-circumstance murder cases-the official description of capital punishment cases.