May, 2012
The lights above the dais were blinding to Zoe, a string of miniature suns staring back at her, exposing every imperfection in her face—her slightly offset ears, the mole at the crest of her left eyebrow, the freckles that dotted the fair skin around her nose—and reaching deeper still, as if to make public her thoughts. Having watched her father on the campaign trail first in his race for the Senate twelve years ago and now in his quest for the White House, Zoe knew that all politics were theater and that privacy had no place on the stage.
She closed her eyes against the glare and pictured her mother’s face—the way her smile had dimpled her cheeks and wrinkled the skin around her eyelids, the look of earnestness and secret pleasure that had turned skeptics into supporters across the globe. Catherine Sorenson-Fleming had been irresistible in life, a force of indefatigable optimism about the world that could be—a world in which the poor were not an afterthought. Africa was her great love affair, and she had passed it on to Zoe. It might as well have been written into her will as a bequest.
How would you have handled this, Mom? Zoe thought, wrestling with the dilemma before her. She remembered something her mother used to say: “Speak the truth, consequences be damned.” But that didn’t resolve the question. The truth was only part of the story.
Zoe opened her eyes and regarded Senator Paul Hartman, Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, who had taken his seat at the head of the dais beneath the great seal of the United States. Around him in the wood-paneled chamber aides scurried, brandishing sheaves of paper. Hartman placed a binder in front of him and glanced around the room until his eyes settled on Zoe. He smiled slightly, as if sharing an inside joke, and Zoe felt the ice inside her begin to crack. His kindness deepened her dilemma. He had no idea of the secret she carried, or the anger.
Senator Hartman was the reason she was here. He had read her article in the New Yorker and issued the invitation. She had been intrigued and skeptical at the same time.
“Is my father aware of this?” she had asked when they had first spoken on the phone.
“I haven’t shared my thoughts with him, no,” Hartman replied.
“What are the chances he’ll come to the hearing?”
“With the election so close, I’m not sure. But your presence could shift the balance.”
“In other words, the hearing is for show,” she said, testing his motives. “A political ploy in support of the President less than two months before the polls open.”
Hartman hesitated. “Was your article for show?”
The question caught her off guard. “I wrote it because it needed to be said.”
“Call me old-fashioned,” Hartman said, “but I feel the same way. As you put it, generosity itself is on the gallows.”
“And you think a Senate hearing will make a difference?”
“The public loves a good controversy. Whether you meant to or not, you created one. If we take advantage of it, people might actually learn something.”
It’s a gamble, Zoe thought, but it might just work—for him and for me.
“I’ve talked to Frieda Caraway,” he went on.
“Is she on your witness list?” Zoe asked. Caraway was an actress on Hollywood’s A-list and something of a legend in humanitarian circles. AIDS, trafficking, conflict minerals, Free Tibet, her causes were as numerous as her screen credits, yet only the most cynical questioned her intentions. Her grandparents had died at Auschwitz.
“Not yet,” Hartman said, “but I’m working on it.”
The Senator’s words had thrilled and terrified Zoe. The opportunity was too enticing to decline. “You get Frieda on a panel with a couple of experts from the development community, and I’ll be there.”
Hartman had chuckled as he hung up the phone. A week later he called her back with good news and a hearing date. He also passed along Frieda Caraway’s email address.
“She read your article, too,” he told her. “She can’t wait to meet you.”
“The nonprofit lawyer from Zambia or Jack Fleming’s daughter?”
Hartman laughed. “You have your mother’s tongue. She wants to meet the Zoe Fleming who took on the African justice system and changed the life of a girl with Down syndrome.”
Five weeks later, Zoe had boarded the South African flight from Johannesburg to Washington, D.C. It was the first time she had returned to the United States in three years.
A chorus of voices outside the hearing room made Zoe turn her head. As spectators gawked and cameramen angled for a shot, Frieda Caraway made her entrance, her security detail in tow. Like Zoe, the actress was dressed in a conservative pantsuit and an open-collared blouse, but Hollywood glittered in her diamonds—at least ten carats between her earrings and the pendant on her necklace.