Born of some half-remembered superstition from Douglass Dilman’s childhood was his hope that the sun would shine on this momentous and decisive day of his life, and its appearance would be a lucky omen, melting the hard hearts of his enemies and reviving the spirits of his allies.
Nature was deaf and blind to human superstition.
There was no sun this late November day. Bellicose, brooding clouds, like threatening hosts of strife, gathered low in the bleak sky. The air was wintry, the temperature twenty degrees above zero, and the steady wind from the Potomac swept rawly over the high-strung capital city.
The headlines slashed across the newspapers on the table behind his Oval Office desk were as chilly and ominous as the weather: CRUCIAL IMPEACHMENT VOTE IN SENATE TODAY; PREVIEW POLL INDICATES “CONVICTION CERTAIN”… TENSION MOUNTS IN AFRICA; SECRECY ENVELOPS AMERICAN TROOP MOVEMENTS; U.S.S.R. MAINTAINS SILENCE… SAVAGE RACE RIOT BEFORE WHITE HOUSE CONTROLLED AS FLAMING CROSS BURNS ON PRESIDENT’S LAWN; WHITES AND NEGROES CLASH IN DOZEN CITIES.
Douglass Dilman tried to ignore the headlines as he came around his desk.
“All right, Tim,” he said. “Let’s get it over with.”
It was one minute to ten o’clock in the morning as Dilman left his office, preceded Flannery into his personal secretary’s cubicle, nodded absently to Miss Foster, and entered the Cabinet Room to make his brief news announcement to the twenty-five White House press regulars who had been invited.
For an instant he was unable to see in the glare of the television klieg lights, but he was nevertheless conscious of the camera lens and of critical eyes following him in his unsteady walk to the table in the center of the room and the open place from which his chair had been removed.
When his full vision was restored, and he was able to make out the familiar faces in the ring of correspondents, who were armed with their yellow pencils and blank notebooks, Dilman tried to discern the amount of hostility or friendliness that awaited him. There were friendly, interested expressions on an isolated few, but mainly the features of the correspondents revealed doubt, distrust, even antipathy. They were orderly and attentive, true, but their attentiveness was that offered by cynical reporters to a nine-day wonder they had come to interview-on the ninth day.
Dilman rattled the paper in his hand. “Good morning, gentlemen. At least, I hope it will be a good morning.”
There were no chuckles, no appreciation of his weak jest or concurrence with his sad wish. Three or four correspondents murmured their greetings, but otherwise the more than two dozen apathetic journalists remained silent and uncommitted to confraternity.
“I have a brief but important news announcement to make,” said Dilman. He read from the triple-spaced typed lines on the sheet of paper in his hand. “ ‘Precisely one hour ago Eastern Standard Time, so I am informed by the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the battle-ready battalions of a full division of the United States Army, motorized and equipped with the latest in rocketry weapons, landed safely, and without mishap, at strategic airfields in Baraza, and at similar sites in surrounding allied African countries which are members of the African Unity Pact. I can reveal only that fifteen thousand of our soldiers are there. For security reasons, I cannot be explicit about their exact locations. These brave and well-trained men represent an elite segment of our defense forces, popularly known as the Dragon Flies. They are under the field command of Major General C. Jarrett Rice. The military leaders of our combined African allies, in this defensive operation, will also be under the command of General Rice.’ ”
Dilman read ahead, to himself, and then looked up.
“ ‘I want to stress the nonaggressive nature of our intervention. The United States is a party to the AUP, pledged to come to the aid of any democratic African nation threatened by attack from an outside enemy. Baraza intelligence agents, as well as our own intelligence men, have supplied us with irrefutable evidence that native African Communists, trained, armed, and now led by Soviet Russian officers, are preparing to overthrow the democratically elected and constituted government of Baraza. The United States has informed the Premier of the U.S.S.R. of our obtaining this intelligence and, in unequivocal language, warned the Soviet Union that we shall honor our treaty with Baraza and the AUP, and intervene to protect our democratic neighbors wherever they are threatened. No formal reply has been received from Moscow. Since this is the case, since the Soviet buildup on the Barazan frontier continues unabated, and there have been unmistakable signs, noted through our Air Force reconnaissance flights, of heightening military activity in the last twenty-four hours, I have commanded our forces, under full cloak of security, to be transported from our shores to Africa. We are there now, and we are ready.
“ ‘I want to make it clear that no overt aggressive action will be undertaken by the troops of the United States or the AUP countries. They stand alert, to defend Baraza if it is struck. They will counter-attack only if the Barazan borders are invaded. If compelled to fight, the United States force will fight a conventional war with limited weapons, that is, without the use of nuclear warheads.
“ ‘Otherwise, all of our military establishment, here at home or dispersed around the world, is ready, as it has always been, for any eventuality. Our combat divisions, the air arm of SAC, the ICBM squadrons, our surface and undersea navy, have all been placed on strategic warning-not immediate tactical warning but the more conservative strategic warning.
“ ‘I repeat, the United States is ready for any eventuality. In my judgment, this is a historic necessity. As the first President of the United States, General George Washington, stated, “To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” And as he wrote, “If we are wise, let us prepare for the worst.”’ ”
He folded the sheet of paper, handed it to Flannery, and said, “End of statement. That is it for now, gentlemen.”
About to leave, he saw a hand shoot up. He hesitated. It was the respected and moderate correspondent of the United Press International. “Mr. President-please-your quarantine on all questions, the last week or two, has made our task difficult, if not impossible. In a crisis, the American public deserves at least-”
Flannery had edged forward. “Wait now, boys, we agreed-”
Dilman took his press secretary’s arm. “Never mind, Tim.” He nodded to the United Press International correspondent. “All right, your question, and four more, and that is it. If I have further news, you shall be informed of it promptly. The question?”
“According to Reuters, this morning, an informant in the British Embassy in Moscow has stated that Soviet Marshal Vladimir Borov was flown to Baraza last night to take charge. Can you confirm or deny this, sir?”
Dilman said, “It is possible, but speculative. I have received no official word to that effect.”
The New York Times correspondent asked, “Are the United States battalions being kept in their landing areas in Africa, or are they being transported inland to more strategic positions?”
“They are on the move to the frontier. If the Communists strike, we want to be in control of as much ground as possible.”
“Mr. President.” It was the Chicago Tribune correspondent speaking. “Is there any definite information on exactly when you expect the Communist rebels to invade?”
“There is no way of knowing for certain. Intelligence believes the Soviet timetable is set for late today or early tomorrow morning.”
The Associated Press correspondent asked, “If an actual clash takes place, and the Russian Premier then suggests a compromise over Baraza, have you considered any alternative or revised policy in regard to our position in Baraza and toward the Pact countries?”
“As long as I am President, there will be no compromise when it concerns defending democracy anywhere.”
“Mr. President,” a rasping voice called out. It was Reb Blaser, of the Miller newspapers. All eyes were upon him as he pushed forward, and Dilman waited, regarding him with distaste. “Mr. President,” said Blaser, “of course, the Senate will have something to say about what you have just announced. Are you aware that a sampling poll made of the Senate members last night, by the House managers, indicates that the sentiment stands eighty senators for your conviction, twenty for your acquittal, and therefore the Senate has thirteen more votes than the necessary two-thirds required to impeach you? Wouldn’t that-”
“Mr. Blaser,” said Dilman, “the main forces in my command are committed to defending democracy in Baraza, not in the United States Senate. I am here to discuss foreign affairs. Perhaps you might better ask your question of former Secretary of State Eaton, who seems to have become an expert on domestic affairs.” For the first time, there was laughter, and then Dilman added, “If you’ve ever gone to a prize-fight, you will know that the judges’ ballots are not counted before the first bell, but after the last bell-”
“Except when there’s a knockout!” Blaser shouted.
Dilman ignored him. “That is all, gentlemen.”
The United Press International correspondent intoned, “Thank you, Mr. President.”
Briskly, Dilman left the Cabinet Room, parted with Flannery at Miss Foster’s desk, and returned to his own desk in the privacy of the Oval Office.
He switched on the television set and dropped into his swivel chair, exhausted.
When the picture came on the screen, it showed Nat Abrahams, in the latter part of his summation of the defense case, earnestly addressing the senators.
“-absurd even to consider that the President violated the Constitution, disregarded the law, displayed contempt for your noble body, by his necessary removal of Secretary of State Eaton,” Abrahams was saying. “Learned senators and judges, as we have attempted to show the other three articles to be a maliciously woven fabric of falsehoods, let me now remind you that the more serious charges embodied in Article IV represent the autocratic, intemperate vengefulness of a small group of legislators. Let me hark back to 1868, when another President’s entire impeachment revolved around his right to override the Tenure of Office Act, ancestor of the New Succession Bill, which President Dilman challenged. Chief Justice Chase, who sat on the bench then, where Chief Justice Johnstone sits now, made the following sage remark, as applicable and important in these troubled times as it was in that day: ‘Acts of Congress,’ he warned, ‘not warranted by the Constitution, are not laws. In case a law believed by the President to be unwarranted by the Constitution is passed, notwithstanding his veto, it seems to me that it is his duty to execute it precisely as if he had held it to be constitutional, except in the case where it directly attacks and impairs the executive power confided to him by the instrument. In that case, it appears to me to be the clear duty of the President to disregard the law, so far at least as it may be necessary to bring the question of its constitutionality before the judiciary tribunals.’
“So spoke a Chief Justice, in the only other impeachment of an American President in our history. So speak I, on behalf of our President today. The issue is simple. President Dilman assumed office swearing to preserve, protect, defend the Constitution. How could he do so, how could he carry out his duties, if another branch of government, by means of a doubtful law, and from motivations not necessary to repeat, stripped him of his power to thus preserve, protect, defend? If the President has no longer the power to remove an adviser who is acting as President behind his back, an adviser ready to sell out democracy in Africa to the Soviet Union while the lawful President himself, determined to save that democracy, is rendered helpless, where, then, is left the executive branch, and where, then, is left the Constitution itself? Learned senators-”
The telephone behind him buzzed, and Dilman sat up, lowered the volume of the television set, and spun around to the console.
“Yes?”
The voice was Miss Foster’s. “Mr. President, I’m sorry, but there’s a new policeman at the north gate who insists on speaking to you directly. He says there is someone at the gate who claims to be a relative of yours and wants to see you. He wouldn’t tell me more.”
“A relative?”
“I told him you couldn’t be-”
“One moment, Miss Foster.” On impulse, he said, “Connect me with the gate.”
He waited, wondering.
A troubled male voice came on. “Mr. President-”
“Yes-yes-”
“I know I’m not supposed to disturb you, but the person insisted I contact you directly. I know there are crackpots and impostors every day, at least a half dozen daily coming around like this, but this one, she showed me an old beat-up snapshot of you, a photograph from her purse, signed by you, and she-”
“She?” said Dilman slowly.
“A young lady, Mr. President. She claims to be your daughter. I wouldn’t give her the time of day, you understand, because-how should I put it?-she looks white to me-but the newspapers did say you-you have a daughter like that-still, the identification cards in her wallet say her name is Dawson, Linda Dawson, which doesn’t make sense, except she says you might recognize that name even though it’s not her real name, but I thought I ought to-”
“What does she give for her real name?”
“She says her name is Mindy-yes, that’s right-Mindy Dilman, like it’s supposed to be, and she says for me to tell the President she’s better now, and she’s been away too long-”
For the first time in weeks, Dilman felt a real smile ease the muscles of his face.
“Mister,” Dilman interrupted, “I have an idea that young lady is neither a crackpot nor an impostor. You show her right in. You tell Mindy-her father is waiting for her. Now, hurry up! Don’t leave her standing around!”
In the paneled and book-lined library of their early English house in Georgetown, at ten minutes to eleven in the morning, Arthur Eaton and Kay Varney Eaton sat side by side on the couch, concentrating their attention upon Zeke Miller, who was gesticulating on the television screen as he approached the end of his closing address on behalf of the House managers before the United States Senate.
“And so, honorable senators,” Miller was saying, “since the able manager of the defense has chosen to bolster his concluding remarks with words borrowed from the impeachment proceedings of 1868, I feel that I can do no less upon behalf of the House indictment. Let me close my remarks in support of Article IV by referring to the wisdom of Representative Butler, as shown in the remarks made by him on that other historic occasion, and conclude by addressing to you the further remarks made by Representative Bingham before the Senate at that same trial.
“The words of Representative Butler, applicable to Article IV, are these: “This, then, is the plain and inevitable issue before the Senate and the American public-Has the President, under the Constitution, the more than kingly prerogative at will to remove from office and suspend from office indefinitely, all executive officers of the United States, either civil, military, or naval, at any and all times, and fill the vacancies with creatures of his own appointment, for his own purposes, without any restraint whatever, or possibility of restraint by the Senate or by Congress through laws duly enacted? The House of Representatives, in behalf of the people, joins this issue by affirming that the exercise of such powers is a high misdemeanor in office… Whoever, therefore, votes “not guilty” on these Articles votes to enchain our free institutions, and to prostrate them at the feet of any man who, being President, may choose to control them.’ Senators, remember this, remember and do not forget a word of history’s warning, when you consider your vote on Article IV charged against President Dilman.
“And remember, too, the considered wisdom of Representative Bingham in that other time, and remember and do not forget his patriotic beseeching when you stand up to be counted for all time in your judgment of one and all of the Articles of Impeachment. He said then, and I say now, ‘I ask you to consider that we stand this day pleading for the violated majesty of the law, by the graves of half a million of martyred hero-patriots, who made death beautiful by the sacrifice of themselves for their country, the Constitution and the laws, and who, by their sublime example, have taught us that all must obey the law; that none are above the law, that no man lives for himself alone, but each for all; that some must die that the state may live; that the citizen is at best but for today, while the Commonwealth is for all time; and that position, however high, patronage, however powerful, cannot be permitted to shelter crime to the peril of the republic.’
“Glorious words, these, which once ennobled this hallowed Chamber. They are timeless, yet were I to make them entirely pertinent to our cause today, I would paraphrase what that House manager had to say-let not the graves of thousands of martyred hero-patriots, sons of the mothers of America, be dug tomorrow and in days to come in the remote and distant jungles of primitive Africa to satisfy the whims of one ill-motivated, incompetent, intemperate, impermanent President-by-accident. Better that one man figuratively die so that the thousands who share our blood, and the state itself, to which we pledge our blood, shall survive and live. Gentlemen of the Senate-”
The library door had opened, and Governor Talley stuck his head in. “Arthur, the press is ready and assembled.”
“Wayne,” Kay Eaton said, “do you mind switching off the set?” As Talley hastily obeyed her, she turned to her husband. “That wretched Miller of yours is clever, no question. If I had any doubts, they’re gone. What do I wear when you’re sworn in, Arthur?”
Eaton had been cheerful, but a frown crossed his brow. “Don’t talk like that, Kay. Don’t let anyone hear you talk like that… Ready, Wayne? Come on, Kay. Let’s make it sweet and simple, and get them to the sandwiches and drinks.”
Eaton left the library and strode quickly into the packed living room, followed by his wife and his colleague. There were more than one hundred correspondents waiting, and many applauded as he waved jovially and took a position before the built-in bar, maneuvering his wife to one side of him, and drawing Talley to the other side.
“Hold it for some pictures!” a photographer yelled.
As the shutters clicked and bulbs exploded, Talley called out, “Remember the caption-‘T. C.’s Team Together Again!’ ”
More applause greeted this, and then, as reporters roughed the photographers to the sides of the room, Arthur Eaton held up his hand.
“First,” he said, “an apology for these cramped quarters. I’m afraid this is a do-it-yourself press conference, but since I’ve been locked out of the Department of State, it’s the best I can offer you!”
Eaton beamed at the laughter and cheers, and then he quieted the roomful of reporters, and his demeanor became serious.
“I have tried to avoid any communication with my friends of the press until the momentous matter before the bar of the Senate is settled today,” he said. “However, I have been so widely and persistently solicited by many of you to make some comment that I have, with reluctance, consented. Perhaps, after all, a few brief remarks are in order.”
“Hear! Hear!” someone shouted.
Again Eaton held up his hands for silence. Then, in his well-modulated voice, he resumed.
“I have been made increasingly aware of the fact, not that I have consciously ignored it or should do so, that under the law of the land, I am, as Secretary of State, next in line of succession to the Presidency. Although the person now in the office of the Presidency has not wished me in this position, has attempted to place himself above the law and exercise dictatorial powers to remove me, he has failed. The people of the United States would not have it, and the effect of their outrage was felt in Congress, which immediately condemned and rejected the President’s illegal behavior and reinstated me as the Secretary of State, as a member of the Cabinet, and as first in line of succession to the Presidency.”
Since he was speaking without notes, although he had considered with care what he would say, Arthur Eaton paused at length to determine what he should say next. Having organized his thoughts, he went on.
“Contrary to the propaganda mill of the White House, I have not desired wished for, or in any way actively sought, or do now seek, the Presidency. It was enough for me, these last years, exceeding my fondest dreams, to be our beloved T. C.’s Secretary of State and Cabinet adviser. I wish that were my position today. The eccentricities of life, so unpredictable, would not have it, the Lord’s will was done, and my mentor and our former President went to his premature death. When his successor, Senator Dilman, sought to retain my assistance, wishing, he then said, only guidance to carry out T. C.’s policies at home and abroad, I agreed to stay on. Like all of us, I was weighted down with grief, but I realized quickly that the welfare of our people, their government, came first, and grief must be subordinated to duty, and so I served.
“I will not discuss the events that have transpired since T. C.’s death. They have been fully and widely aired these last ten days from the floor of the United States Senate. Let me say, however, in complete earnestness, that although deeply concerned about the new President’s deviation from T. C.’s policies, and about certain deficiencies in his character and competence, I was reluctant to approve of his impeachment. When there was no longer a choice, when the impeachment became the desire of the American people, when I realized that it was my duty to stand with the people against one who would endanger the very life of this republic, only then did I submit to the inevitable and throw my full support behind the House of Representatives.
“I have no knowledge of what the outcome of the Senate’s vote will be this afternoon, and I have no opinion about it. If the members of the Senate choose to acquit and retain the President, I shall, of course, resign from my office, and devote all of my energies, as a private citizen and a personal friend who loved T. C., to opposing those White House actions that I feel are detrimental to the country at large. If the members of the Senate choose to convict and oust the President from his office, I can only say that I shall do my duty under the Constitution and God to serve as your President, and as T. C.’s President, with all my strength, with all of my heart and mind, and with every fiber of my being.
“I repeat, my friends, if serve I must, then serve I shall-yes, serve I shall, as everyone’s President, as President of no faction or factions but as President of the entire United States of America.
“Beyond that, there is little more I can say. I appreciate your attentiveness.”
Eaton was gratified by the spontaneous outbreak of handclapping, and he ventured a smile.
“Mr. Secretary,” the Atlanta Constitution correspondent called out, “do you mind a few questions?”
“Gentlemen, you know my position,” Eaton said. “It would be difficult to comment on a matter not yet settled by the Senate. Besides, every question keeps you longer away from Mrs. Eaton’s groaning board and that portable bar she’s stocked.”
There was pleased laughter, and Talley added, “Well, fellows, maybe a couple of quick questions if you don’t put him on the spot, you know. Okay, what was it, Jim?”
The Atlantan said, “Dilman seems to have rallied a good deal of last-minute Negro support. Everyone thinks that if he’s removed, racial rioting will reach a higher pitch. If that happens, do you have a plan for restoring peace to this country?”
“I have T. C.’s plan, I have the people’s plan, the one the impeached President has derailed,” said Eaton. “I would advocate revival of the Minorities Rehabilitation Program as the one guaranteed way of restoring peace and prosperity to our people.”
“What about Baraza?” the Portland Oregonian man asked. “Would you pull out our troops and seek a summit meeting with Premier Kasatkin?”
“No comment,” said Eaton. Then he added, “My feelings about the reckless adventure in Africa, this playing hide-and-seek until we catch or are caught by a nuclear catastrophe, are too well known to bear repetition. President Dilman is Commander in Chief, as of now, and what he is doing represents how much he is willing to risk for what he believes, for whatever reasons, to be right. If I were Commander in Chief of our armed forces, I would indeed have a policy statement to make on Baraza and the Soviet Union. Right now, it would be premature and out of order.”
“Mr. Secretary, you are practically Commander in Chief right now,” Reb Blaser bellowed. “Last night’s straw vote has eighty senators going to vote against Dilman-thirteen more than required. Doesn’t that impress you?”
“Mr. Blaser, I can’t comment on that, you understand,” said Eaton.
“Let me just say this, fellows,” said Talley, taking a step forward. “Secretary Eaton is quite correct in keeping away from speculation. But the Party has taken its own informal poll of the senators who will vote. I can tell you, frankly, there will be no problem in getting two-thirds of the Senate to announce that the President is guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. Boys, tomorrow you’ll have a new look, a government of the people, for the people, and by the people, a government of all the people, again!”
There was smashing applause, and Eaton acknowledged it with a dip of his head. Linking his arm inside his wife’s arm, he called out, “Gentlemen, the press conference stands adjourned-and the stampede for the food and drinks begins. Again, thanks for you attentiveness, and now, follow us!”
And then Reb Blaser shouted, “Thank you, Mr. President!
Immediately, the room was filled with an uproar of laughter, handclapping, cheers, whistling, and Arthur Eaton, feeling as he guessed T. C. must have felt in those great climactic days before the election, led the stampede to the celebration.
At twenty minutes after twelve o’clock in the afternoon, the tray containing two small mixed green salads, two ham-and-cheese sandwiches on rye bread, one coffee and one hot tea had been delivered to the Oval Office of the White House from the Navy Mess below, and it now rested on the coffee table between the sofas.
Waiting for his friend, Douglass Dilman had just sat down to pick at the salad when Nat Abrahams came in, casting aside his hat, shedding his overcoat, massaging his chilled red cheeks.
“Brrr, what a day,” he said.
“You’re right, what a day,” said Dilman, watching Abrahams sit down across from him. “Nat, I didn’t see all of your closing address, but what I saw was great.”
“I’m afraid Miller’s was as good,” Abrahams said.
“Nevertheless, thanks.”
Abrahams appeared neither to have heard him nor to have any interest in the lunch before him.
Dilman inspected him. “What is it, Nat? You have something on your mind. I can tell.”
Abrahams gnawed his lower lip thoughtfully. “As a matter of fact, I have.”
“Shoot.”
He looked at Dilman squarely. “We’ve had an offer, Doug. Political horse trade, but an offer.”
“For what?”
“Senate votes in an hour and a half from now.”
“From whom?”
“Boss of the Party. Allan Noyes buttonholed me when I was leaving. Took me aside. Said there are nine on-the-fence Party senators who are more concerned about what your conviction will do to the Party tomorrow than about what you are up to today. They feel that if you are kept in office, in the long run there’d be less harm done to the Party. They’re considering that there’s only a year or so of the unexpired term to go, and they’d lose fewer votes in the next election this way than if you are publicly disgraced and kicked out.”
“Lose fewer votes? What votes?”
“Well, the Party has been taking samplings around the country. You’ve regained the sympathy of most of the Negro population, and of other minorities. The bloc of white liberals behind you has grown. Some independents here and there are shifting toward you. Noyes said it isn’t a big switch to your side right now, but an impeachment conviction might gain you more sympathy than ever, and lose Eaton a lot of votes when he came up for election.”
“Eaton’s election. Is that what the Party is worrying about?”
“Frankly, yes. And that’s the proposition. These nine senators put their heads together with Noyes, and here’s what they came up with. Instead of splitting over you this afternoon, or going against you, they’ve promised to vote for you under certain conditions.”
“All right, let’s have it, Nat. What’s the price?”
“If they swing an acquittal for you, then they want a public announcement from you tomorrow that you will neither seek reelection as the Party’s candidate nor allow yourself to be drafted as a candidate by a third party, and that you will come out in full support of Arthur Eaton or any other Party choice for the Presidential nomination next summer. That’s it. Agree to this, and you’ve got nine powerful votes for acquittal you might not otherwise have.”
Dilman squinted at Abrahams and put down his sandwich. “And I need those nine votes?”
“Wouldn’t hurt, you can use them,” said Abrahams casually.
“And they want my answer before two o’clock?”
“Before a quarter to two.”
“Nat, my answer is no. You tell them no.”
Abrahams did not seem at all surprised. He began to eat. “I don’t have to tell them no,” he said, between mouthfuls. “I’ve already told them.”
“You already told them no?” Dilman fell back, laughing and shaking his head. “You were that sure? What are you, my conscience?”
“Why, I’m your counselor, Mr. President.”
“My assistant gravedigger, you mean.” Suddenly Dilman sobered. “How badly did we need that deal, Nat, no soft-soaping? At the press conference today, Reb Blaser said the House managers took a straw poll, and while they need only sixty-seven votes to convict me, the poll says they have eighty. Any truth to that?”
“Exaggerated. Allan Noyes took his own poll. He’s hardheaded Party. No sleight-of-hand.”
“Well?”
“He comes up with seventy-four to convict. Seven more than they need.”
“What do you come up with, Nat?”
“How do I know? I look and listen. I hope.”
“Come on, Nat.”
“Okay. If it is sixty-seven for conviction, they win. If it is sixty-six for conviction, short of two-thirds by one, you win. Right now, wetting my finger and putting it into the wind, I’d say they have-there’s no way of knowing-but Tuttle and Hart believe they may have seventy votes.”
“In other words, they have what they need plus four?”
“Don’t think about it, Doug. It’s all guesswork. Let them vote and let’s see.”
“Oh, I’ll let them vote.”
“There are other things to think about… Hey, Edna Foster tells me Mindy is here. Is that true?”
Dilman found a way to smile. “Absolutely true. She’s hurt, she’s not well, I’m going to see that she gets help. But she’s back, yes. And beautiful beyond belief. She’s upstairs napping this minute.” He shook his head. “I only wish I had come to my senses sooner and forced Mindy to come here, permitted Wanda to, while I was still a tenant of the White House.”
“You’re still a tenant.”
“Yes. Only it’s beginning to feel like Leavenworth.”
The desk telephone rang. Dilman wiped his mouth with the paper napkin, then rose and hurried to the desk.
“Direct Pentagon hookup-I wonder what now-”
He could picture Secretary of Defense Steinbrenner ensconced behind the door with the placard reading “3-E-880,” busy at his nine-foot glass-topped desk. Except for the deceptively placid view from Steinbrenner’s four spacious windows, lulling one with the sight of the Pentagon lagoon below and the Jefferson Monument beyond, it was an office of intense action. Steinbrenner was on the direct White House line now, but he also had the gray telephone to all command posts open, and his military assistants busy at the easel on which they sketched and simplified tactical problems for him, as well as the strange wall clock depicting time zones in defense areas (“For Cincpac-Subtract 6”) constantly in view. So much might come through that office today.
Dilman picked up the telephone. “Yes, this is the President.”
“Mr. President, Steinbrenner here. I have just heard from General Rice in Baraza City. His aerial reconnaissance has delivered-no more than an hour old-film showing highly intensified Communist movement on the Barazan frontier, in fact, throughout the enemy perimeter. All equipment is being mobilized. There is no question but that they have decided to move. General Rice believes it a strategic necessity that our advance rocketry units, now positioned, hit first. He thinks an enormous advantage can be gained. I don’t feel empowered to make such a decision. He is standing by in Baraza City for the go-ahead. I’m ready to give it, but not on my own responsibility. I’m passing the buck, Mr. President. Do you want to give us the green light?”
Dilman’s palm was warm on the hand telephone. He thought of Harry Truman: the buck stops here, here in this Oval Office, not in the more ornate office of the Secretary of Defense.
It was a difficult decision to make. If he gave the word, the Dragon Flies would strike, perhaps topple the enemy in a lightning stroke, perhaps gain an advantage, perhaps save countless lives. Yet he would have committed the United States to an action of offense, not defense. He would have betrayed America’s entire historic philosophy of peace for a possible military advantage.
He hesitated, momentarily troubled by the man in the Pentagon with the command line and easel and zone clock and maps, and then he heeded his instinct.
“I don’t want to be the aggressor, no matter what is going on,” Dilman said. “You order the General to continue to keep a close watch on their movements, but only shoot when shot at.”
He heard Steinbrenner’s snort. “If that’s it, then I’ll pass it on. But if it is defense we’re thinking of, we’ve got to anticipate the worst, we’ve got to anticipate the conflict’s broadening, and the possibility of an attack by Russia. I feel it is important to consider putting our defense forces on second-strike standby alert.” There was a pause, and then Steinbrenner said, “Mr. President, what about going on DEFCON ONE?”
Again Dilman hesitated. The official order to set in operation DEFCON ONE would poise the entire United States, its military and civilian forces, on an all-out war alert. Dilman tried to visualize this alert: The screens of the DEW and BMEWS radar network would be under double surveillance, and fingers would creep closer to buttons that could order the North American Defense Command to activate 720 different Warning Points. The triple blockhouses stationed throughout the world would begin electronically elevating the fixed Minuteman ICBMs from their concrete casings. The secret trains carrying their mobile Minuteman missiles and squadrons would speed to preassigned positions. The Polaris submarines, each with twenty nuclear weapons, would rise from the ocean bottoms. Beneath the yellow clay of Nebraska, from the concrete command center of SAC, special world would send the B-70 jets and their hydrogen-bomb loads hurtling aloft in greater number. And just as his own Marine helicopter would be readied nearby to spirit him away to the subterranean second White House burrowed deep in a Virginia hillside, Dilman knew that fallout shelters across the nation would be manned for the ultimate signal of war imminent. There would be consternation, fear, even panic. Yet there would be preparedness.
A precautionary measure, this DEFCON ONE, Dilman thought, a drastic measure; perhaps a necessary one, as Steinbrenner was suggesting. Still, it was a hazardous choice. For, Dilman realized, DEFCON ONE could not go unnoticed by the world and the enemies of America in the world. Not many city blocks away, the Soviet Embassy would be informing Moscow of the highly charged activity-the canceling of all military leaves, the bustling in the Pentagon-and the Soviet radar units in the Arctic and on picket ships in the Atlantic would be reporting to Moscow the unusual movements of the United States surface and underseas fleets and its aircraft in the skies. How would the suspicious Kasatkin and his nervous Presidium react to this? Would they look upon this defensive preparation as a maneuver for aggression far beyond the provocation of the Dragon Flies in Africa? Would the concrete walls of Russian mountains then open wide to disgorge Soviet nuclear missiles-perhaps even the Gigaton Bomb that Kasatkin had so often boasted about-all building toward a forty-day assault that could snuff out the lives of 180 million of the United States’ 230 million people? Or were the Soviets doing all of this anyway, without the provocation of DEFCON ONE?
There was a pounding behind Dilman’s temples. His head ached. Then, suddenly, there was the relief of decision. The defensive value of DEFCON ONE was obliterated by the horrifying danger it invited-that of hastening the triggering of the first shot against the United States itself.
“No,” said Dilman, “too soon.”
The Secretary of Defense was worried. “They are on the move in Africa, Mr. President. Are you sure you want to hold back?”
He was sure. “For an hour, anyway, Secretary Steinbrenner. Stay in close touch with me.”
After he hung up, Dilman remained standing behind his desk. Shuffling the papers lying on his blotter to be signed, he told Nat Abrahams what was happening.
Before Abrahams could reply, there was a sharp knocking on the door leading to engagement secretary Lucas’ office, and then, without waiting for an invitation to enter, General Leo Jaskawich broke into the room.
Gone was the astronaut’s normally reassuring expression. Anxiety was written across his swarthy features.
“Sorry to bust in on you, Mr. President, but I think the fat’s in the fire,” Jaskawich blurted out. “Just heard from the Soviet Russian Embassy. They asked for an immediate appointment for Ambassador Leonid Rudenko, and before I could hang up and get to you, the southeast gate called in to say Rudenko’s car had just passed through. He’s coming straight in without an appointment. I guess there must be-”
“Looks like this is the showdown,” said Dilman.
“I can stall him,” said Jaskawich.
“To hell with protocol,” said Dilman. “Let’s get it over with. Get out to the South Portico, General, and bring him right in here.”
Jaskawich tugged down the brim of his officer’s cap and rushed past the President’s desk, and then through the French door.
Dilman was still on his feet behind his desk. He felt oddly calm, almost fatalistically calm. He saw Abrahams rise.
“Maybe I should get out of here,” Abrahams said.
“You stay where you are,” said Dilman. Abrahams nodded, and moved to the shabby Revels chair and sat. Dilman wet his lips with his tongue. “Well, they’re not only moving in Baraza,” he said, almost to himself, “they’re moving in Moscow, too. I guess it is one and the same.”
He looked off. He could see Jaskawich snappily leading the Russian Ambassador along the colonnaded walk, followed by two Secret Service men.
Jaskawich held open the screen door, and Ambassador Leonid Rudenko entered the Oval Office while the astronaut closed the French door and hung back in front of it.
Ambassador Rudenko was a small, muscular, middle-aged Russian with a perpetually glowering, unsmiling, pimpled face. He was the antithesis of the international diplomat. His English was exact and uncolloquial, his choice of words often sharp and uncivil, and he was famous for his use of a vituperative tongue in public.
He was unsmiling and gloomy this minute. He had removed his dark fedora as he advanced to the President’s desk, but he had not touched his maroon woolen scarf or mountainous overcoat. Under his arm he carried a wafer-thin attaché case.
“Mr. President Dilman,” he said, but did not offer his hand. “I requested my Embassy to telephone, but on the assumption that a matter of such urgency-”
“Never mind,” said Dilman. “Sit down.”
Dilman lowered himself into the high-backed leather swivel chair, but either Ambassador Rudenko had not heard him or was too preoccupied to accept hospitality, for he remained standing before the desk, pulling off his kidskin gloves, then unzipping his attaché case. He extracted three blue sheets of paper, laid his case on the desk, knocking over several pieces of miniature statuary, and then fixed his eyes on Dilman.
“Mr. President, I have received, as of twenty minutes ago, an urgent communiqué directly from Premier Nikolai Kasatkin in Moscow. I have been ordered to read it to you in person.”
“Go ahead,” said Dilman. His face was expressionless as he tensely waited.
Ambassador Rudenko cleared his throat and began to read the diplomatic note aloud.
“ ‘To the President of the United States, Douglass Dilman.
“ ‘Dear Mr. President. I have been in receipt of your note, communicated by your Ambassador, concerning the necessity of your intervention in Baraza. I did not reply at once, nor did I immediately discuss the matter with the Presidium, or anyone, except for one informal reference to it in a public speech, the contents of which represented my immediate reaction. I have continued to delay reply until I could investigate the Baraza problem, the African situation generally, through my advisers in the Kremlin and abroad, and until I could apply to it the full weight of my thought and judgment.
“ ‘Mr. President, now that the facts have been clarified for me, there is no doubt in my mind that you have been seriously misled by your militarist clique, pawns of a system that desires only to seize control of illiterate blacks in Africa and exploit them for capitalism. The so-called facts you have presented to me about the African Communist buildup on the Baraza frontiers, about the equipment and leadership supplied by the U.S.S.R., which you have received from your intelligence sources, are both faulty and vastly exaggerated. They were cleverly designed by your military and capitalist cabal to provoke you into a warlike act of aggression, and to frighten us into not responding to this aggression. It grieves me that you have fallen prey to advisers who would see colonialism continued, even at the risk of a worldwide catastrophe.’ ”
Ambassador Rudenko paused, peered more closely at the tightly spaced transcript, and then resumed reading.
“ ‘Mr. President, you have met me, and know me for one who will not be easily frightened. You know, too, the might of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, of our defensive strength, our unity of purpose, and our will for peace. What we seek for ourselves and every nation is peace, prosperity, and equality among all human beings. You know, too, that I believe the strongest secret weapon we possess is not our hydrogen bomb, but our Idea to free the world of the shackles of slavery and bondage, as we have freed our own people in little more than a half century. For our Idea to triumph, there must be a civilized and populated world to save. If there are only the embers and corpses of a civilization left, there is only a junk heap and a graveyard to save.
“ ‘All of this I had to consider and weigh, against our own national security, when you rashly moved a division of your armies into Africa in these last hours. Over a local and passive incident in Africa, you-a man of good will, I had believed, but a man at the mercy of advisers now persecuting you-have challenged the U.S.S.R. and brought the world to that minute that precedes eternal and total sleep, the sleep of death by suicide. Through dangerous aggression over a relatively unimportant and overvalued problem, you have challenged the U.S.S.R. to respond with like aggression, in the cause of self-defense, to respond thus, or to withhold its invincible arms and become the nation which, by its belief in an Idea, shall lead the way through nonviolence and good example to preserve humanity.
“ ‘While reaching my final decision, there came to my mind a curious recollection. I remembered the two little old ladies who walked in Versailles. They, so you told me, were possessed of the gift to see into the past. But for us, to see into the past is useless, for we no longer have much to learn from it, because in the past mankind never had the power to destroy itself. Then I held another recollection. I remembered two leaders of the world’s two foremost nations who also walked in Versailles. It occurred to me that perhaps they were gifted to look into the future. Would they see a barren earth come to an end through pride and madness? Or would they see, as one of them saw, as I saw in that clear vision hours ago, a world surviving and immortal, populated by independent nations coexisting as good neighbors in peace and harmony and mutual prosperity?
“ ‘This, Mr. President, is the world I saw ahead, and by my making the first step toward reaching it, I hope you shall see it, too.
“ ‘Therefore, I have dispatched Marshal Borov and his military staff to Africa, under instructions to carry out and facilitate, immediately, the complete disbandment and dispersal of native African Communist militia who respect our advice and who have been gathering at the Barazan frontier. I have ordered that any weaponry in their hands be surrendered or returned to the sources from which the arms were purchased. I have ordered that our Soviet technicians and educators, working with these native groups, be recalled at once to the Soviet Union. All of this activity, in the interests of peace, is taking place at this time, even as this note is being read to you.
“ ‘In return for our forward-looking act of peace, I request only that you display America’s similar desire for peace by responding in kind. I ask the immediate dispersal of African Unity Pact forces gathered in and around Baraza, and the immediate withdrawal of all United States military forces and equipment from Baraza.
“ ‘Mr. President, let us remain the two men we were at Versailles. Let us look into the future, the future of this day, all days to follow, and let us see only peace.
“ ‘With every good wish, I am, Yours, Nikolai Kasatkin, Premier, U.S.S.R.’ ”
Ambassador Rudenko had finished, and his words hung in the room. Then he placed the note on the President’s desk, and, busily, he closed his attaché case.
Dilman sat stunned, hands clenching the arms of his chair, trying to absorb what he had heard.
The telephone beside him was ringing. It was, he saw, the direct Pentagon line. He answered the telephone, listened to Steinbrenner’s excited exclamations, and then he spoke a few words and hung up.
Dilman came to his feet. “That was my Secretary of Defense. Premier Kasatkin’s notification of total withdrawal of Communist forces from the Barazan frontier has just been confirmed by President Amboko and by our Ambassador to the United Nations. The United Nations, I understand, is this afternoon flying a team to Baraza to supervise the Communist withdrawal. We have instructed our Ambassador Slater to inform the Security Council that we will pull out our own forces within twenty-four hours after your forces are gone. Your delegation has agreed to this.”
“Yes.”
“Very well, Ambassador Rudenko. This is a happy day for the world. Please inform Premier Kasatkin that I have heard his note, and that on behalf of my countrymen and all who believe in peace, I am relieved and delighted, and tell him-tell him it is my hope, too, and my belief, that enduring peace is possible, that we shall walk arm and arm into the future-into a world that shall remain immortal.”
“I shall convey your message, Mr. President. Thank you.”
“Thank you, Mr. Ambassador.”
Dilman saw Rudenko through the French door, watched him depart up the colonnaded walk with the now cheerful General Jaskawich, and then he swung around and bounded back into the Oval Office.
Nat Abrahams was waiting, beaming as Dilman was beaming. The two men embraced, pounding each other on the back in their excitement.
“We won! We won the big one!” Dilman chortled. “We’ve got to get Tim Flannery-got to tell the whole world!”
He had broken away to summon Flannery when he stopped, and slowly came around to face Abrahams again.
“The big one,” he murmured, with wonder. Then he said, “What about the small one, Nat? Will this make the difference in-in the Senate?”
“I can’t promise it’ll make the difference,” said Abrahams, suddenly solemn. “I can only promise you this-it’ll make it a contest, a real contest, for the first time.”
IT was a quarter after two o’clock in the afternoon, and although Chief Justice Johnstone’s reluctant gavel had sounded several times, the Senate had not yet been convened as a court of impeachment.
In all the days of the trial, Nat Abrahams had never once observed a scene in the Senate such as the one that spread before his eyes. Weakly, he smiled and shrugged at Tuttle, Priest, Hart, and received their nervous smiles in reply, and then, again, he tried to take in what was going on before him.
If the galleries had been filled every day, and filled to overflowing during the occasion the President had been on the witness stand, the galleries seemed bent and sagging with vociferous humanity on this afternoon of final judgment.
On the floor of the Chamber itself, few senators were at their mahogany desks. Most of them had spilled into the narrow aisles, clustering in groups, reading the bold headlines of the special editions of the Washington newspapers or listening to the steady chattering of commentators on their transistor radios, reading, listening, and then discussing the sensational news of President Dilman’s victory, of Soviet Russia’s backdown and retreat, of peace on earth once more.
Abrahams’ keen eyes tried to follow the activity of both sides, that of the senators who were known to be in the camp against the President, determined to convict and remove him, led by aging Senator Bruce Hankins, who was everywhere, and that of the senators who were known to be in the camp supporting the President, determined to acquit him, led by the spry former labor union executive, Chris Van Horn, senior senator from Dilman’s own state.
Had a single vote changed from guilty to not guilty, even one? Abrahams could not tell. The partisans were easy to read. The independents were independent still, and unreadable. Only one emotion in common was evident in all faces, all stances, all movement: intense excitement.
At last, in his carved chair on the rostrum high above, Chief Justice Johnstone slid forward and rapped his gavel down hard once, twice, three times on the oak board, and the sound reverberated throughout the Chamber and stilled it, and gradually the Senate members began to empty the aisles and return to their individual desks, with their personal decisions already made or soon to be made.
“All caucusing will come to an end, and the senators will resume their seats and be attentive,” the Chief Justice commanded. He waited for his order to be obeyed, and it was obeyed. Satisfied, in a louder voice he announced, “The Senate is now organized for the purpose of proceeding to the trial of the impeachment of Douglass Dilman, President of the United States. The Sergeant at Arms will make the proclamation.”
The Sergeant at Arms jumped to his feet. “Hear ye! Hear ye! All persons are commanded to keep silence on pain of imprisonment while the Senate of the United States is sitting for the trial of the Articles of Impeachment against Douglass Dilman, President of the United States.”
Abrahams saw a rangy figure rise behind his desk near the aisle. It was Van Horn, the vigorous outspoken senator from Dilman’s state. His arm was uplifted.
“Mr. Chief Justice, I move that the Senate proceed by voice vote to the consideration of the order that I submitted to the bench a short time ago, as to the reading of the Articles of Impeachment.”
The Chief Justice looked directly below him. “The Secretary of the Senate will read the order which Senator Van Horn proposes to take up.”
The Secretary of the Senate rose, and from a sheet of paper read aloud, “Ordered, that the Chief Justice, in directing the Secretary to read the four Articles of Impeachment, shall direct him to read the fourth Article first, and the question shall then be taken on that Article, and thereafter the other three successively as they stand.”
Senator Bruce Hankins, coughing and hacking, stood up. “Mr. Chief Justice, is this legal? Can the Articles be voted upon out of their original sequence?”
Senator Van Horn spoke quickly. “Mr. Chief Justice, I suggest the bench remind the able Senator that there is historical precedent for such procedure, as evidenced in the minutes of the Andrew Johnson impeachment, and other lesser impeachments in modern times. While I am aware that each and every one of the Articles is subject to a separate roll-call vote, it is also legal, and there is precedent for this, to select of the several Articles of Impeachment the one that is most important, and center a vote on that. If the respondent is found guilty on that one Article, he will be guilty and removed no matter what the vote on the others. If the respondent is found not guilty on that one Article, it is unlikely he will be found otherwise on the remaining and lesser Articles, which have considerably less support for conviction. On both sides of the aisle, and in both camps, I find sentiment agreeing that Article IV is the key indictment against the President. That is why I have moved that it be taken up at once, and have suggested a voice vote for or against.”
The Chief Justice rapped his gavel. “A voice vote will be taken on the motion. On the question of reversing the order, in the first instance, for voting on the Articles under consideration, how many of you say yea?”
A powerful, lusty chorus of voices rang out, “Yea!”
“How many of you say nay?”
Another chorus of voices, thin and scattered, shouted, “Nay!”
“The yeas have it,” announced Chief Justice Johnstone. “The motion as to altering the sequence of the Articles to be voted upon is carried.”
Senator Selander, the Majority Leader, was calling for recognition. When he had it, he said, “Mr. Chief Justice, I move that the Senate now proceed to vote upon the Articles according to the order of the Senate just adopted. I have submitted this motion in writing to the chair.”
“Very well,” said the Chief Justice, “the motion will be read.”
The Chief Clerk came to his feet, and he read the motion. Promptly, a voice vote was called for. The motion was unanimously agreed upon.
Twice now the robed magistrate’s gavel was heard, and when the Chamber was hushed, he announced, “By direction of the Senate, I hereby, as Chief Justice presiding over this court, admonish citizens and strangers in the galleries that absolute silence and perfect order must be maintained from this moment onward. Persons responsible for disturbance will be immediately arrested… Senators, in conformity with the order of the Senate, the chair will now proceed to take the final vote on Article IV, as directed by the rule. The Chief Clerk of the Senate will now read aloud Article IV.”
The Chief Clerk was already standing with the document containing the Articles of Impeachment in his quivering hand. He scanned the assembly, and then, with deliberation, enunciating every word of the language of indictment clearly, he began to read.
“Article IV. That said Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, at Washington, in the District of Columbia, unmindful of the high duties of his office, of his oath of office, and in violation of the Constitution of the United States, and contrary to the provisions of an act entitled ‘The New Succession Act Regulating the Line of Succession to the Presidency and the Tenure of Certain Civil Offices,’ without the advice and consent of the Senate of the United States, said Senate then and there being in session, and without authority of law, did, with intent to violate the Constitution of the United States, and the act aforesaid, remove from office as Secretary of State…”
From his corner of the President’s managers’ table, Nat Abrahams had been listening to the words of indictment long engraved on his mind. But now his attention wandered from the Chief Clerk to the faces of the five at the table across the way, the House managers, each expression intent and solemn, except that on the countenance of Zeke Miller, sitting back carelessly, lips curled in a self-satisfied smirk, as if relishing every dagger word of the indictment.
From Miller’s face, Abrahams’ attention moved out and across the faces hung over the Senate desks, some directed toward the reading, some turned downward as if contemplating what judgment they must pronounce in not many minutes.
At once, the suddenness of silence brought Abrahams up short. He realized the reading of the indictment, the crucial one, had concluded, and that everyone, everyone around the room, up high, down low, was staring at the dais. Abrahams looked up, too.
Chief Justice Johnstone had risen from his chair, his black robes flowing. Majestically, he surveyed those beneath him. In a husky voice, he uttered three words.
“Call the roll!”
The moment had come, the moment of hope and dread, and Abrahams was certain that his heart had temporarily ceased its beat.
He thought of the millions everywhere, in America, in Europe, in Asia, hypnotized before their television sets. He thought of Doug Dilman watching, and of all the ones that mattered in Doug’s life and his own life. The moment had come, and there was no hiding from it, no turning from it, no stopping it.
The Senate Chamber was deathly still.
No longer, it seemed, were all eyes focused upon the Chief Justice, who remained upright. All eyes were on the Chief Clerk, directly beneath him, who had risen with a scroll containing the names of the 100 senators present who would vote in alphabetical order.
“Mr. Alexander,” the Chief Clerk called out.
A pinch-faced, elderly man rose in his place at the rear bench.
“Mr. Senator Alexander, how say you?” the Chief Justice asked sternly. “Is the respondent, Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of a high misdemeanor, as charged in this Article?”
Senator Alexander’s reply was a shout. “Guilty!”
He sat down, satisfied with himself.
“Mr. Austin,” the Chief Clerk called out.
A dapper young politician in the second row stood up.
“Mr. Senator Austin, how say you?” the Chief Justice demanded to know. “Is the respondent, Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, guilty of not guilty of a high misdemeanor, as charged in this Article?”
Senator Austin hesitated, then answered, “Guilty.”
“Mr. Bennatt,” the Chief Clerk called out.
A twitching, stunted man leaped up from his desk near the center row.
“Mr. Senator Bennatt, how say you?” the Chief Justice inquired. “Is the respondent-”
“Not guilty, sir!” Senator Bennatt interrupted.
From the gallery came a nervous giggle, then laughter, and the Chief Justice suppressed his own smile, held his gavel poised, but did not use it.
“Mr. Bollinger,” the Chief Clerk called out.
“Mr. Senator Bollinger, how say you? Is the respondent, Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of a high misdemeanor, as charged in this Article?”
“Guilty.”
Abrahams’ heart was hammering again, as if to make up for its loss in suspension, and he stared down at his hands worriedly. Four of the one hundred had voted, and three of the four had judged the President as guilty. It was not promising. Abrahams could hear Senator Campbell being questioned, and now he heard the reply.
“Guilty.”
About to return his full attention to the rising, announcing, and sitting of senator jurors, Nat Abrahams found himself mildly distracted by the sounds of whispering beside or behind him. He glanced at Tuttle, then down the table at Priest and Hart, to learn if they were the ones conferring, but they were silent, mesmerized by the drama of the vote.
Perplexed, as the whispering continued, Abrahams quietly turned in his chair, and then saw the source of the sound that had distracted him. A network television camera, which he had not noticed before, had been set up on the ground floor level, near the rostrum, to capture the historic countdown in its glass eye. Nearby two men crouched, one tallying the voting on a pad, as the other, an announcer, whispered the totaled figures, and their significance, into a perforated microphone in his hand.
Abrahams tilted backward, cocking an ear toward the whispering announcer, trying to close out the individual senators rising with their votes in order to catch, if he could, the latest tabulation. He listened hard, heard parts of several sentences, and then became attuned to the television announcer’s low-keyed commentary and was able to hear him distinctly.
“The vote is going swiftly, as you can see on your screens,” the announcer was purring into the microphone. “We have-let me see-yes-thirty-five out of the one hundred senators have already declared themselves. Of this first thirty-five, the vote summary this moment is twenty-six against President Dilman, nine favoring President Dilman, meaning that the vote to convict is running well ahead of the two-thirds required to remove the President from his office. It is too early to tell if this is a trend, and we are unable to learn if there have been any surprise switches against or for, but the President is trailing, he is behind, and if this count continues, he will be removed. For the first time in American history, a President of the United States will be removed from office for high crimes and misdemeanors. We want to remind all of you it will require two-thirds of the one hundred present to vote guilty, if conviction is to be obtained. Two-thirds means sixty-seven Senate members must declare aloud that they believe President Dilman guilty-wait, one moment-what’s that, Kent?-yes, fine. Ladies and gentlemen, while I’ve been speaking to you, the voting has been going on, inexorably continuing, relentlessly driving to its climactic moment, and now my colleague with the tally sheet informs me-uniforms me that half of the votes are in-here, I have the halfway total in hand-the vote now stands, this minute it stands, thirty-four votes guilty, sixteen votes not guilty, out of fifty senators who have declared. It would appear-it appears that while the President is still running behind, his supporters have somewhat closed the gap, the voting has tightened considerably. If this ratio maintains, the prosecution will get its two-thirds by two votes to spare, at least, but since the earlier tabulation, it has narrowed down to a real life-and-death struggle-let’s see now, who’s that rising to vote?”
Abrahams sat up, tried to shut the smooth, glib, whispering voice from his hearing. It had begun to irritate him. Out on the floor before them, not only a human being’s future hung precariously in the balance, but the continuance of the checks and balances of America’s system of government as well as the integrity of the American public who prattled about equality and freedom. Yet an announcer, epitome of the best and worst, now the worst, in the brassy, competitive, public-relations American culture, was trying to report this critical historic event in the same manner he might a game, a sport, a horse race.
As if his mind refused to accept and suffer, hope living, hope dying, each excruciating vote being announced, Abrahams’ thoughts dwelt on the end result of what was occurring before his very eyes.
What would happen to this country if Douglass Dilman were convicted and ousted in these next minutes? What would be on the national conscience as the great country stirred awake tomorrow morning, sated by its Roman holiday, but knowing it had crucified a President not because he was an incompetent leader-the Dilman triumph in Baraza would be known to all by then-but because he was black and they were white? How would neighbor look upon neighbor, and how would they live as one people in their shame? And Doug, what would happen to Doug? Where would he go? What would he do? How could he live? Yet, on the other hand, if he were acquitted in the minutes to come, what would be the state of the Union then? And Doug’s future?
He heard the senators’ voices replying to the Chief Justice… “Guilty”… “Guilty”… “Not guilty.” He heard the watch on his vest chain ticking, ticking, ticking. He sought it, peered down at its hands. Twenty-three minutes had passed since the roll call began. Then he felt fingers tugging at his sleeve.
He glanced up. It was Tuttle, and Tuttle was sliding a slip of notepaper in front of him. It was a scrawled message from Hart:
“They have 60, we have 26-14 votes left. They need 7, we need 8. I’m dying. What do you think, Nat?”
He took up a pencil and wrote across the note, “I think I’m dying, too, but we’re not dead. Stop using your fingers for writing and keep them crossed!”
He sent the note back down the table, turned in his chair, and now gave his full attention to the final fourteen voters. But to his surprise, in the time it had taken for Hart to write the note, pass it on, for him to read it, and reply, ten more votes had been announced, and the eleventh was just being announced, and this he knew because he could hear the damnable announcer whispering into the microphone behind him.
“-Stonehill just voted not guilty, as expected,” the tightening voice behind him announced to the nation. “It now stands ninety-seven senators out of one hundred have cast their votes. The tabulation shows sixty-five guilty, and thirty-two not guilty. The prosecution requires two of the remaining three votes to impeach and convict the President of high crimes. The defense requires two of the remaining three votes to acquit and save the President of the United States… There seems to be a lull… The Chief Justice is checking with the Clerk to see what is left to be done… We can tell him what is left. Three votes to be announced, and the impeachers need two, and it looks like they may get them. Only Senators Thomas, Van Horn, and Watson remain on the roll uncounted. Thomas, from a border state, has been outspoken in his criticism of the President. Van Horn was a supporter of President Dilman’s intervention in Baraza from the outset, and with the flash of our victory there, it is unlikely he will do anything but continue to support the President. The third and last voter, the redoubtable Senator Hoyt Watson, whose own daughter was involved in the charges against Dilman, is a Southerner-a progressive Southerner, but a dyed-in-the-wool Southerner nevertheless-and so it appears that two of the three remaining votes will be guilty, giving the enemies of the President their sixty-seven required votes, their two-thirds, and unfolding before our eyes one of the most memorable occasions in history, the driving from office of the highest public official-”
The Chief Justice’s gavel fell.
Nat Abrahams shut his ears to the announcer, gritted his teeth, clenched his fists, and stared straight ahead. He knew that perspiration had gathered on his forehead and down his back. He knew his worn, worried heart was faltering again. He waited.
“Mr. Thomas.”
“Mr. Senator Thomas, how say you? Is the respondent, Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of a high misdemeanor, as charged in this Article?”
“Guilty!”
“Mr. Van Horn, how say you? Is the respondent, Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of-”
“Not guilty.”
Abrahams’ mind tabulated the count now: sixty-six guilty, thirty-three not guilty. One vote would convict Dilman; one vote would acquit Dilman. And there was but one vote and one voter left.
The one-hundredth Senate member in the room sat erect behind his mahogany desk, arms folded across the desk.
“Mr. Watson,” the Chief Clerk called out.
Abrahams watched him, throat and lungs near bursting, eyes strained wide, watched the old gentleman unfold from his seat, grip his birch cane, watched his white thatched head, wrinkled phlegmatic face, rise with his aged body.
Chief Justice Johnstone hesitated, perhaps himself slowed by the weight his question would place on the senior senator’s bent shoulders.
“Mr. Senator Watson, how say you? Is the respondent, Douglass Dilman, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of a high misdemeanor, as charged in this Article?”
Senator Hoyt Watson did not reply. It seemed an eternity as he stood there, cane in his knobby hand, gazing up silently at the bench.
Watson’s somber voice last night, in the privacy of the Oval Office, his words to Dilman last night, rang in Abrahams’ ears: “I cannot judge in your favor now, simply in knowing my daughter perjured herself and the House was misled… I must judge you tomorrow on your merits… if you acted as an American President or as a Negro President.” All of this Abrahams heard now. Then, he wondered, what did Senator Watson hear now? Did he hear the thousands jamming the streets of Baraza and every democratic city of Africa, cheering the American flag? Did he hear the ancient cacklings of beloved ancestors, good colonels with good slaves, and did he hear the chant of the million in his state, who had carried him on their cheers into the Senate for twenty-four years, made him the bright white shield of their purity and safety against the ignorant niggers trying to threaten their accommodations, education, prosperity?
What did Senator Hoyt Watson hear these fleeting, suspenseful seconds while the Senate, the House, the White House, the South, the United States, the wide world waited?
The Chief Justice, standing before his carved chair on high, bent forward, and as if to shake another old man from his reverie and have today’s history written and done with, he spoke.
“Mr. Senator Watson, how say you?” he repeated. “Is the President guilty or not guilty as charged in this Article?”
“Mr. Chief Justice, I vote the President not guilty of any high crimes or misdemeanors!”
Nat Abrahams fell back in his chair, limp with disbelief.
The galleries, the occupants of the floor, sat dumb, as if stunned into muteness by the fall of one giant mallet on their collective skulls.
A half dozen, then a dozen senators, foremost among them Hankins, were leaving their desks, surrounding Hoyt Watson, their irate heads bobbing, their angry arms waving, as Watson stood stonily in their midst, clutching his cane and listening.
From above, almost indistinctly now, Nat Abrahams could hear the Chief Justice intoning, “Upon this fourth Article, sixty-six senators vote ‘Guilty’ and thirty-four senators vote ‘Not Guilty.’ Two-thirds not having pronounced guilty, the President is, therefore, acquitted upon this Article!… Silence! Silence!… Mr. Senator Bruce Hankins, are you requesting the floor?”
“I am!” shouted Senator Hankins above the rising hubbub of excitement. He hobbled forward to the rostrum. “Mr. Chief Justice, I have conferred with the learned Senator Watson, and with the leadership among my honorable colleagues. It appears that all are adamant in their opinions, that no ‘Not Guilty’ votes will be changed during this day, and that continued voting on the remaining three lesser Articles will result in an even larger tally and judgment for acquittal. Therefore, setting aside my personal feelings, and out of respect for the judgment passed, concerned only with preserving what we can of the unity and well-being of our beloved country, I hereby move that the Senate, sitting as a court of impeachment, does now adjourn sine die-that is to say, permanently-permanently. I ask for yeas and nays on this motion.”
The Chief Justice gazed out over the churning Senate floor. “Who says yea?”
“Yea!” The concerted shout was thunderous and unanimous, and it went on and on, “Yea!… Yea!… Yea!”
The Chief Justice roared, “Unanimous! The Senate, sitting as a court of impeachment for the trial of Douglass Dilman, upon Articles of Impeachment presented by the House of Representatives, stands adjourned sine die! The President stands acquitted on all four Articles!”
Hardly anyone except Abrahams heard the Chief Justice, and not even Abrahams distinctly heard the last. For Tuttle, Hart, Priest, were climbing all over him, hugging him, choking him, pummeling him, and senators and press correspondents were all around, wringing his hand.
Beyond the circle of humanity pressing in on Abrahams, there was bedlam. The Senate had become a carnival of whooping, cheering, laughing revelers, whose celebrations drowned out the scattered boos and catcalls. Pandemonium engulfed the galleries and the floor, and spilled into the outer rooms.
Desperately, Abrahams tried to reach Senator Watson, to thank him, but it was impossible. Watson was caught in a crush of reporters and announcers. Abrahams heard someone yell, “Senator Watson, how could you repudiate your lifetime record to support Dilman? Why did you decide to vote not guilty?” And Watson, bewildered by the attention, replied firmly “Two reasons-two. First, like Edmund Ross who cast the decisive vote for Andy Johnson, I decided that the executive branch of the government was on trial, and if its occupant were drummed out in disgrace on such flimsy political evidence, our nation would no longer be a democracy but what Ross called ‘a partisan Congressional autocracy.’ And second, I decided even before President Dilman had proved his patriotism and intelligence by saving Baraza and Africa for us, that if I could cease judging him as a Negro person and judge him solely as a fellow human being, I could then judge his true merits as a President. I judged Douglass Dilman as a man, and found him worthy of the Presidency. Coming here, rising to announce my vote, I fully realized that he was guilty of nothing except the accident of his colored skin. So I voted not guilty, and I am proud to have done that, and I hope and pray each and every one of you is proud of yourself today. For President Dilman has shown us he is a man-and now, perhaps, the nation has shown him and the entire world that it, too, has reached maturity at last.”
Nat Abrahams felt soft arms encircling him, feminine hands touching his neck and cheeks, and there was Sue, aglow and laughing through her tears, pressed to him, kissing him, kissing him again and again.
Then, holding her close, he was leading her past the celebrating crowds toward the exit.
“Come on, Sue, I want to go to the White House and tell him-”
“Oh, darling, he knows, he knows.”
Abrahams smiled. “He knows he was acquitted of four Articles. I want to tell him he was acquitted of five.”
THE snow had begun to fall on New Year’s Eve, and it fell all the night, and now, on this bright, fresh morning of New Year’s Day, the capital city was blanketed in white.
The snow lay like a silvery imperial mantle on the dome of the United States Capitol, clung to the Corinthian marble columns of the United States Supreme Court, covered the flat roof of the Department of Justice. The frosted, pearly flakes sparkled from the cupola of the Jefferson Memorial, the branches of the dogwood trees surrounding the Lincoln Memorial, the five outside walls of the Pentagon Building, the iced surface of the Potomac River, the square mosque of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and the Stars and Stripes of the flag at full mast above the President’s House at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
From the broad center window of the Yellow Oval Room, on the residential second floor of the White House, President Douglass Dilman could make out, more clearly than ever before, the white marble shaft of the Washington Monument. It might have been a trick of the dazzling morning, but to Dilman the soaring monument seemed less distant than it had been four months ago, less distant and less intimidating.
The rising pitch of a television announcer’s voice, his exclamations and superlatives of appreciation as he described the colorful floats and elaborately dressed equestrian groups in the Tournament of Roses parade from distant Pasadena, California, this voice, mingled with the remarks and comments of the guests watching the spectacle on the television screen, brought Dilman’s attention away from the monument, from the snowy south lawn and frosted Truman Balcony, and concentrated it once more on the activity in the festive room.
The handful of friends whom Dilman had informally invited to drop by this morning to enjoy the Pasadena parade, and then the various football Bowl games, filled the sofas and the chairs drawn up before the immense television set that had been placed in front of the marble fireplace.
Affectionately, Dilman observed Julian and Mindy in their activity across the room from the others. His son was holding out the cups into which Beecher was ladling either eggnog or fruit punch from the deep cut-glass vessels on the sideboard. Mindy was busily assisting Crystal in arranging the tiny sandwiches being transferred from a tray to a large serving platter.
It pleased Dilman that his son, less antagonistic toward Trafford University and the world at large recently, was doing better in school, taking more pride in his learning, as if he had decided that education in itself might be the most effective weapon against racial discrimination.
It pleased Dilman, too, to gaze upon his daughter’s delicate profile and lissome gracefulness and follow her fawnlike movements. This late holiday morning, she was gay, but Dilman did not deceive himself about her condition. By now, he knew that she was not always this way, nor would she be so in the future, for Mindy’s moods were mercurial, and she was given quickly to apathy, self-confusion, and melancholia. Still, Dilman had been told that she might be better one day, after she had been worse. The eminent psychoanalyst she had begun to visit two weeks before had promised Dilman this. And lately she seemed to enjoy immensely lending a hand with some of her father’s personal correspondence. But neither her presence here today nor the psychoanalyst’s tempered optimism had fully convinced Dilman. After his consultation with the psychoanalyst, Dilman had wondered-as he wondered this moment-once you’ve been white, how can you ever be black again? Mindy was not his child alone. She was Aldora’s child, too. The psychoanalyst, with all his wisdom and insight, was not black, so he might not ask himself what Dilman asked: How long would it be before Mindy tried to escape once more, escape Aldora’s way or her own?
These considerations were too unsettling for the first day of the New Year, and Dilman turned his thoughts to the others in the Yellow Oval Room. Somehow, he liked to believe they had become a part of his family. There they sat at ease, most of them, in various postures of relaxation. There was Otto Beggs, able to cross his good leg over his bad leg but unable to hide entirely the pain he was enduring, pointing out to his wife and two sons a particularly gaudy floral float moving ponderously across the sunny screen. Beggs would begin his executive duties, as special agent in charge of the White House Secret Service Detail, the first of next week when the holidays were officially over. Near him there was Jed Stover, with his wife and grown daughter, his mind obviously on matters far removed from the Pasadena parade. Ten days earlier, the Senate had reluctantly approved Stover’s appointment as Secretary of State, and since then three new international crises had sprung up. Then, seated comfortably in a side chair, there was General Leo Jaskawich, sworn in as the President’s special assistant to replace Talley, puffing his cheroot and amusing himself by blowing smoke rings. Finally, there was Wanda, so delightful in repose, so intent on the screen as she absently drank her fruit punch.
Dilman had not had Wanda’s present ready for her at Christmas, and so he had given her a card, shaped and printed as a rain check, and on it he had written apologetically that her gift would be arriving any day now. It had been delivered yesterday, but he had not given it to her yet. He was saving it for the intimate holiday dinner tonight. She would not be surprised, he guessed. Although Sue Abrahams-who had helped him make the final selection, and had suggested the modifications-had insisted upon disguising the engagement ring by wrapping it in a gigantic box, Wanda would not be surprised. But she would be pleased, he hoped, as pleased about it (and about what it meant to them in more ways than one) as he was himself.
He looked forward to the small dinner tonight. By then, the festivities, the games, the resolutions, would be behind them all. Then there would be easy, relaxed companionship, Wanda and himself as hostess and host to The Judge and his Missus, to Admiral Oates and his sister, to the Stovers, to the Tuttles, and-he had almost forgotten-to Edna Foster and to Tim Flannery, if they had finished their work in time.
Then Dilman’s eyes came to rest on Sue and Nat Abrahams, side by side on the sofa, and their three youngsters at their feet, and his only regret was that they could not remain for the dinner tonight. But Dilman knew, with a pang of guilt, that he had detained Nat long enough. In the weeks since the trial, and then through Christmas, Nat had stayed on, had volunteered to do so, to help Dilman draft the radically revised version of the Minorities Rehabilitation Program, one which put as much emphasis on giving Negroes and other minority groups equality in education, accommodations, voting, as the old bill had given them in economic parity. The revised version was prepared, ready to be introduced by his supporters in Congress when the members of both Houses reconvened shortly. And now, at last, Nat Abrahams was free to go home to Chicago, to share the holiday weekend with Sue’s relatives and to return to the law offices that his partner, Felix Hart, had been manning alone.
As he noticed the bulky morning newspaper on the sofa, Dilman’s mind went to the persons who were not here but had been so much a part of his life, for better, for worse, in recent months, and who were now less a part of his life, except as he read about them or heard about them. Hastily, Dilman’s mind revived news items, important, minor, of recent days.
Arthur Eaton was being boomed as the Party’s candidate in this year’s Presidential election, and his vociferous backers had entered his name in the first three state primary elections. But to the surprise of many, Governor Talley’s name had also been entered as a candidate in those primaries, and to the surprise of fewer people, Senator Hoyt Watson’s name had been resoundingly entered, too. For, although Watson had been dropped by his own state political machine, the curve of his national popularity (led by Southern liberals and independents) had risen, and the Party was now interested in testing his appeal outside the boundaries of the Mason-Dixon Line. In the Deep South, Representative Zeke Miller, basking in the afterwave of his impeachment trial publicity, was trying to organize and gain support of his idea for a powerful third political party, and there was money behind him, but it was too early to tell if there were also votes.
As for Dilman himself, the chairman of the Party, Allan Noyes, had telephoned the Oval Office repeatedly for an appointment “to talk things over”-meaning, no doubt, to find out in what manner Dilman could be useful to the Party without harming or obstructing it, and to learn his plans, and to determine what must be done with him in the future. But as Dilman had now shut out the past, he refused to peer into the future. He was entirely devoted to the present, to trying to be the kind of President he thought he was capable of being and the kind the nation needed. And so whenever Noyes had telephoned, Dilman had been too occupied to speak to him or arrange to see him.
There were other names Dilman knew, and they were often in other sections of the morning newspaper. On the society page it had been announced that Miss Sally Watson was off to Switzerland for a vacation. But Dilman had heard more, that it would be an extended stay in a renowned mental clinic in Zurich. On the book page it had been announced that Leroy Poole’s authoritative biography of the President was completed and would be published in the spring. But Dilman had heard more, that Poole had quickly brought the book to an end (making no secret of the fact that he was still Dilman’s foe) in order to obtain the necessary funds to work with Mrs. Gladys Hurley on an angry protest biography of the late Jefferson Hurley. On the feature page it had been announced in several columns-as rumor, not fact-that General Pitt Fortney, since his resignation as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, would become a member of the board of directors of an Oregon aircraft company, a newly acquired subsidiary of Eagles Industries Corporation. And occasionally, in the back sections of Miller’s newspaper, there was a minor story bearing the dateline “New Orleans” and the by-line “George Murdock.”
Suddenly Dilman, whose eyes had strayed to the clock on the fireplace mantel, realized how late it was in the morning. Holiday or no, half of his staff were at their desks in the West Wing offices downstairs, Edna Foster among them, and Dilman knew that there were at least four or five hours of paper work for him to do, too.
He walked over to the sofa where Nat Abrahams sat, and touched his shoulder. Immediately Abrahams, still flushed with the delight he took in his family, jumped to his feet and came around to join Dilman.
“Well, Nat,” Dilman said, “I’ve got to get down to the galleys and start rowing. I’m afraid this is good-bye until sometime next year-”
“Mind if I walk you to the office, Doug?”
They found their overcoats, pulled them on, then went together into the West Hall and started for the elevator.
“Nat,” Dilman said, “we’re old friends, and you know how inarticulate I am about my deeper feelings. I’ve tried to tell you, in my way, how much I appreciate what you’ve done for me, how grateful I am to you. I don’t know what would have happened without you.”
“Nothing different would have happened.”
“I choose to believe it would not have been the same. No other attorney on earth would have understood me well enough to perceive the real indictment, and been able to invent and throw that Article V at them. Anyway, Nat, what you must know, before taking off, is how conscious I am of the sacrifice you made-”
“Enough of that, Doug. I don’t wear a halo well. I’m the bare-headed type. What sacrifice? Three unhappy years, filled with self-reproach, with that inhuman corporation? Thank God, you brought me to my senses. You saved me those wasted years, Doug. You handed them back to me. I’m the one who should be grateful to you for what you gave me.”
They reached the elevator and waited. “You know what I mean, Nat,” Dilman said. “Maybe you kept the three years, but you lost the farm, additional security, a financial cushion, because of me.”
Entering the elevator, they started down to the ground floor. “Listen to me,” Abrahams said. “I lost nothing, nothing at all. Farms? There are a hundred more, always will be, and maybe better ones. Instead of having mine in three years, I’ll have it, and all the rest, in five or six years. Doug, you have no idea how many calls I’ve had, fat offers I’ve received, since that trial. Not only corporations, but labor unions, Manhattan law firms. Some of them sound even better and more corrupting than Eagles ever was. Eventually I may accept one, if I can find one that is clean behind the ears as well as solvent. No hurry this time. I’ll sit back and let them woo me. So, you see, Doug, what you think I did for you has done as much for me. And it did something else, besides.” He grinned shyly before leaving the elevator. “It put me right smack in the history books, a footnote to you. My children’s children, they’ll read about me. Now, tell me, what other neighborhood Jewish lawyer ever had a break like that? Don’t thank me, Doug. Let me thank you.”
Once they were in the ground-floor corridor, with the two Secret Service agents falling in a discreet distance behind them, Nat Abrahams spoke again.
“What about your future, Doug?”
“I don’t permit myself to think about it,” Dilman said. “I wake up, I work, I go to sleep. I’m trying to handle life a day at a time. That’s a big job, a big, strange, new job for a person who only recently found out he has the right to perform as a man and not just a colored man. It’s like starting afresh, second chance, with a new mind, new limbs, new nerve apparatus, new outlook. You have to get used to it before you can use all that health and strength.”
“Yes. I know,” said Abrahams. At the ground exit Abrahams stopped. “Whatever happens, Doug, I think it’s going to be better for you from now on.” He dug into his pocket and came out with a clipping. “Did you see this in the morning paper?”
“What is it?”
“The latest nationwide Public Opinion Poll taken on you. Listen.” He consulted the clipping. “When you came into office, 24 per cent of the people favored you, 61 per cent were against you, 15 per cent were undecided about you. Today, four months later-well, here it is-33 per cent of the people are in favor of you, 28 per cent against you, 39 per cent undecided.” He returned the clipping to his pocket. “The significant thing, Doug, is that right now, instead of the great percentage of people being against you, they’ve moved into the undecided column; they’ve left behind attitudes of strong resentment to move closer to you and say, in effect, ‘Okay-maybe-let’s wait and see-show us.’ Can you realize what that means, Doug?”
Dilman did not reply. The garden door had been opened for them, and Dilman went outside, with Abrahams following him, then going alongside him. The air was crisp, wholesome, bracing, and as they proceeded up the colonnaded walk, there was no sound other than the crackle of their footsteps on the snow-crusted cement.
Briefly, Dilman strode in silence, lost in thought, and at last he looked at his friend. “Strange, Nat, how whenever you’re not sure of the future, you go scampering back into the past. My mind just went back to when I was a kid, maybe seven or eight years old. There was a ditty all of us used to chant. Want to hear it?”
Abrahams nodded.
Dilman hesitated, then he recited:
Ef I wuz de President
Of dese United States,
I’d live on ’lasses candy
An’ swing on all de gates!
He shook his head. “Our most fanciful dream of heaven. Little did we realize there was no ’lasses candy, no swinging gates.’ ”
“Or realize that it was not a fanciful dream at all.”
Dilman glanced up sharply at his friend. “Not a dream?… Yes, I see. That’s true, isn’t it?”
“ ‘Ef I wuz de President.’ You became the President, Doug. You still are the President. That’s something, I think.”
“I suppose-yes, I suppose it is, ’lasses candy or not.”
“Because you’ve grown, Doug, and so has everyone around you-the entire country, it’s come of age, too,” said Abrahams. “The American people have finally learned what a great Kansas editor tried to teach them years ago, that-that liberty is the only thing you cannot have-unless you are willing to give it to others.”
Rounding the corner, Dilman stared out at the lustrous snow-covered garden and the glittering expanse of the White House south lawn. “You think it has been learned, Nat?”
“I believe so,” said Abrahams.
They had arrived at the French doors outside the Oval Office. They halted, facing one another.
“Let me put it this way,” Abrahams said. “The country may be uneasy today, but it is no longer ashamed or afraid, ashamed or afraid of you-or itself. The country’s learned to live with you, Doug, so now, at last, it can live with itself. It has a better conscience today. It feels right. That’s an awful good feeling, Doug… And that’s a huge step, the greatest this country’s made since the Emancipation Proclamation. Mr. Lincoln had long legs. But now, for the first time, we’ve found countless men with legs as long, and they’ve made the next step, the giant one. As a result, the country is closer to becoming one nation than it ever has been before-and by the time it becomes one nation, it may be ready, and qualified, to help make our world one world… Big words, Doug, but these are big times. None of us will ever be the same again-not you-not me-not anyone, anywhere. Thank God.”
A French door creaked behind them, and Edna Foster appeared. When she saw them, her worried features reflected immediate relief.
“Oh, there you are, Mr. President. I was calling everywhere,” she said. “There have been some messages-emergencies-low-grade, but nevertheless-”
“I’ll be right in, Miss Foster,” Dilman said, and then he turned back to his friend.
Nat Abrahams was smiling. “I think you belong inside.” He extended his hand. “Good luck, and a Happy New Year, Mr. President.”
Douglass Dilman clasped Abrahams’ hand firmly in his own. “Good luck, and a Happy New Year to you, Nat.”
After that, Dilman lingered outside briefly, watching Abrahams leave, and then, feeling assured and purposeful, feeling good, he entered his Oval Office to begin the day’s work.