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Passages
As we headed back home, we entered the Delta concourse to slip into the Crown Room when we narrowly missed being flattened by a sweating, puffing, sprinting crowd of TV camera crews shouting questions at a jostled inner core of men as they moved swiftly along the concourse. The tallest guy in the very front of the brouhaha caught my attention because he seemed so normal in his appearance to be taking part in such a cacophony. His bland expression was complemented by his navy jacket, khaki pants, white shirt (pinpoint cotton, of course), and yellow- and navy-striped tie—the uniform, you might say. It was Jim who recognized him and the other men surrounding the object of the reporters’ fascination as FBI agents. The celebrity, if you could call him that, was a man in a short-sleeved shirt. That was about the only detail I was able to see in the few moments they rushed him past because he was bent over in an effort to keep the cameras from capturing his visage.
The way his arms were twisted behind his back in handcuffs and the fact that the men who flanked him gripped his arms just above the elbow made it appear as if he were being dragged along. Likely because I had more time to study him, it was the man in front who surfaced when I recalled the episode. The blaring lights of the cameras sparked on his silver framed glasses and cast a glow on his face. He looked proud in some way, a smirk rather than a smile touching his thin lips. I wrote everything I could remember about the scene while sitting in the Crown Room that day as Jim watched the hearings deciding Robert Bork’s Supreme-Court fate. Later I would scribble below the entry, “The criminal suspect killed the publisher. All of his life buried alive—first by manuscripts, then by dirt,” though I have no idea where I found the information or who that publisher was. It was the only time in my life I’d come so close to a murderer, or at least the only time I was aware of the fact that I had.
Our layover was long and the Bork proceedings bored me to tears so I pulled Sidney Sheldon’s Windmills of the Gods from my valise. I had only read a few pages when an unusual entourage spilled through the doorway. A very old gentleman with fine white hair and quarter-sized age spots on his face near his receding hairline was being pushed into the room in a wheelchair. His straw-colored woven hat—pushed to the back of his head—had a red and blue band that evoked well-heeled aristocrats retreating to the West Indies for the islands’ balmy breezes during the great fervor of colonization. As he stared at his bird-like legs, the silver-handled cane he held in his wrinkled hands quivered. He was followed by two policemen in full khaki uniforms who were carrying guns and radios, and a lady with a thick briefcase flanked by several men in dark blue pinstripe suits. The men seemed to be very protective of the gentleman—guarding the hallway when he went to the restroom and respectfully stepping aside when he was pushed back into the hallway.
The woman poured him a glass of tomato juice, which he took in his trembling hand. She held it for a beat after his fingers encircled the cup, releasing it only when a nod of his frail head signaled he could handle it on his own. I spied the entourage as often as I could without being obvious while I wove my way through Sheldon’s plot twists. As we boarded the plane for home, I thought about how his tale of espionage was the perfect echo for the day’s airport adventures. Could it be true that I would actually be home within a few hours? I wondered as I fastened the seat belt and leaned my head against the seat back, a feeling of deep relief coursing through me.
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