Monument to Murder - Margaret Truman [35]
An invitation to Mitzi’s parties at her Georgetown mansion was one of the most coveted in town.
But there were differences between dinner parties hosted by Mitzi Cardell and those staged by Perle Mesta. Perle had been a Democrat who liked Republicans and was an early supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment. Mitzi Cardell and her wealthy husband were staunch supporters of the right-wing Fletcher Jamison administration and had little tolerance for alternate viewpoints. Too, Perle Mesta’s parties were almost purely social; whatever political advantages resulted from having attended were incidental. Not so with the gatherings choreographed by Mitzi. They often had a motive behind the gaiety, gourmet food, and top-shelf liquor, and she built the guest lists around a political issue, bringing together Washington political power brokers with similar interests in the subject du jour.
The major difference between being a D.C. social hostess back in Mesta’s day and the society in which Mitzi Cardell functioned was the city itself. Washington’s bitter political partisanship had torn apart social niceties between Republicans and Democrats. No longer did rivals on the floor of the Senate or House of Representatives put aside their policy differences at the end of the day and get together at dinner parties, or sit down for a friendly game of poker. Mitzi’s guest lists had to be carefully vetted to ensure that like-minded people sat next to and across from one another. Elected officials raced to their home districts as often as possible, leaving behind bureaucrats, agency heads, and staffers to fill spots at her dinner table. It was a new, often dismal era in which Mitzi Cardell was forced to entertain, and she was well aware of it.
This unseasonably cool evening was no exception. The unstated topic was the law, and the guests represented various members of D.C.’s legal community. Among the dozen guests were Mackensie Smith and his wife, Annabel Lee Smith.
Smith had been one of the city’s most respected defense lawyers, his client list ranging from drug dealers to politicians whose greed had reached the criminal level. When his first wife and their only son were slaughtered one rainy night on the Beltway, victims of a drunk driver—and when the drunk driver received a minimum sentence—Mac’s zeal for the courtroom waned. He closed his practice and accepted a teaching position at George Washington University’s law school, where he imparted his legal wisdom and keenly honed cynicism to a new generation of attorneys. Although he no longer practiced law, he was much sought after as a consultant and had advised Mitzi Cardell on a few legal matters, his primary role having been to refer her to attorneys for whom he had respect and who he knew would do right by her.
Annabel, too, had been an attorney, a busy and successful matrimonial practitioner. She had not married, although the lineup of potential suitors was long. After eventually tiring of mediating between warring spouses, she decided it was time to abandon the law and pursue her private passion, pre-Columbian art. She, too, shuttered her law practice and opened a gallery in Georgetown.
Mac and Annabel knew each other professionally and had ended up at some social events together. He was well aware and appreciative of Annabel’s natural beauty, and his good looks and quiet, thoughtful demeanor hadn’t escaped her. She was tall and striking, with ivory skin and copper hair, her laugh infectious, slightly wicked. Mac was a man whose self-confidence never strayed over the line into egotism, as was the case with too many attorneys Annabel knew. They started dating, although Mac quipped that dating was too youthful a word for people their age—both were in their early fifties. Their courtship progressed to Mac’s marriage proposal, which Annabel eagerly accepted. They were married in the National Cathedral and set up blissful housekeeping in an apartment in the Watergate