"He knows his place?"
"At the foot of the table. They tell me, Governor, you might be back as a Secretary soon."
"Ho, ho, ho, Solicitor-General." The Governor advocated caution with a reproving shake of his finger. "You must have been eavesdropping on the Major or the Coach. I do know I'm up for an Under."
"The Ambassador certainly looks healthy again since he lost Vietnam, Chile, Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Pakistan, China, Africa, Thailand, and the Middle East, doesn't he?"
"He bounces back every time. The tougher the losses, the tougher he gets. Look at that vitality."
All turned with love to glance past Gold at the active old Ambassador, who, in a world of his own at the coffee wagon, was busily stuffing cakes into the pockets of his morning coat, striped trousers, and pearl-gray weskit.
Gold was stung again by their indifference. He would either have to forgo the society of such people or get
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used to stinging, and he knew already it was going to be the latter.
He was eager for the chance to excel and take charge when he heard Miss Plum suggest softly that all move inside the conference room and begin. In his briefcase were notes for an opening statement that would start with remarks from Montaigne and Erasmus and end with a likable summation from John Henry Cardinal Newman that would win him the enduring loyalty of the Roman Catholic episcopacy in America, provided he were never examined closely on abortion, transubstan-tiation, the Resurrection, or papal infallibility. Coach was named Permanent Temporary Chairman and the Governor said:
"Let's adjourn."
"Till when?" screamed Gold as the room cleared.
"You'll be informed, hon," Miss Plum crooned, placing a gentle hand on his neck. There was perfume in her breath and the scent of freshly soaped flesh floated from the low neckline of her dress. "It isn't necessary to work eight hours to get your thousand a day."
Gold could have fucked her right there. Sympathetically she guided him out through a darkened alcove lined with telephone booths, where she took his hand and curled her fingers ever so lightly toward the tips of his own. Gold drew Miss Plum inside a telephone booth and pressed her against his member.
"Not here," she said. "It's against the law."
"Then where?"
"Anywhere. Andrea's apartment."
"Oh, shit." Dejection superseded lust. "You know Andrea?"
"She tells me you're great."
"I'm not. Andrea doesn't know."
"She tells me you're powerful and domineering and rates you an A plus. Power turns me on."
"It's a known aphrodisiac. But power corrupts."
"Don't I know it."
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"I love you, Miss Plum."
"Felicity."
"But breathe that to a soul and I'll break your head."
Felicity Plum scheduled another session for the following day just to see him again that much sooner.
By then, Gold had learned in Washington that the CIA was recruiting mercenaries to fight in Africa. He learned this at breakfast from his morning newspaper when he read:
CIA DENIES RECRUITING
MERCENARIES TO FIGHT
IN AFRICA
In Congress all the preceding day, members of a coalition of right-wing Republicans and Democrats had been taking the floor to extol the CIA for recruiting mercenaries to fight in Africa.
Gold was stern in his determination not to be outdone again as he arrived with the others for the second meeting of the Commission with an expression of almost belligerent impudence. Even Miss Plum had a title now, he noticed; her title was Dear. Gold casually lifted a licentious hand to her shoulder and found hairy, cold, wrinkled flesh and fossilized bone. The old blind Judge had got there first.
They convened earlier than the preceding day. Coach gaveled the session to order and the Governor said:
"Let's quit. We've already spent more time on these problems than I think they deserve."
There tore from Gold a feline wail of protest. "No! Please! We haven't spent any!"
"And it's more than enough," said a quondam Attach6. "We've done as much as we're going to. Let's get out."
"We haven't done anything!"
"And in record time, too," clucked the Ambassador.
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"I was once on a Presidential Commission that took almost three years to do nothing, and here we've accomplished the same thing in only two meetings."
"We have computers now," said the Widow.
"I agree with the Governor," said the retired Naval Commander. "And I command we conclude the work of this Commission by unanimous consent."
"I agree with the Commander," said the Governor.
"All in favor say aye."
"I object," said Gold.
"One objection, the rest ayes," said Coach. "The motion is carried by unanimous consent. Can I drop you at the reception, Governor?"
"I'm going to the brunch."
"Then I'll see you at the lunch."
"I'm so glad it's over," chortled the Ambassador, "even though I'm sorry. I love the expense money so—" he made fists of his hands and tapped them together—"and all these free cakes."
"But we can do so much more," Gold pleaded. "We haven't even called any authorities."
"Gold." The Governor pronounced the name quietly and the others fell silent. "Everyone here is an authority." Even seated the Governor projected that extra impression of size that placed him head and shoulders above all the rest. "In about three minutes, we are going to leave this room. Any reporters outside will come to me first because I'm the most important one here and can emanate emanations of authority that have been commented upon the world over. I'm famous for them, dammit! I'm going to notify them that the business of this Commission is concluded and that we've done all we could under most difficult circumstances—that the people will understand when they read our report. Now if you want to tell them something else, you do that. But you will be giving insult to me and the rest of these fine people who have worked together with you cheek to jowl and hip to thigh, and you better believe right now that sooner or later I'll have your pecker in my pocket, along with all
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the other peckers I've collected in a successful political career that has been a surprise and a joy to my teachers, my family, and my friends. Now do you want to tell me I'm wrong?"
Gold did not.
"Fm obliged to you for that," said the Governor. "Gold, you a Jew, ain't you?"
No hell could be worse, or with more finality seem eternal, than the instants Gold needed to reply to that deafening question. The cutting word was pronounced as though the letter y had sneaked in before the vowel, and Gold also took note of the Governor's declension into a cruder syntax. He prayed with passion for the voice of some Arthurian champion to supervene; his prayer was answered with the silence of a tomb.
"I'm Jewish, sir," he replied with a flippant dignity invented for the purpose, "if that's what you mean."
"What in hell else do you think I mean?"
"I was not," said Gold, "totally sure."
"It don't make a sparrow shit's worth of difference whether you are totally sure or are not totally sure, and the sooner you learn that fact the safer your pecker will be. Hey, boy!" The Governor abruptly moved his gaze to the black student at the foot of the conference table. "You a nigger, ain't you? You understand what I mean when I say you a nigger, don't you?"
The student squared his shoulders. "The ones I don't like are those Northern liberals who say one thing and mean another. I know where I stand with you and you know where you stand with me."
"Where do I stand with you?"
"Wherever you want to, Master."
The Governor redirected his attention to Gold with a patronizing sigh of impatience. "Now, Gold. Everybody here is a somebody, and I don't know why you're being so captious about who it is you are. He is the Spade, she is the Widow, I am the Governor, and you're the—"
"Doc
tor!" yelled Gold in time to ward off a crushing repetition of that denunciatory term. "The Doctor!"
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The Governor's manner was transformed into one of self-interest. "You an osteopath or something, Gold? A faith healer? A chiropractor?" He flexed his arm and massaged his shoulder. "I may have a pinch of bursitis that could use relief."
"I'd like him to examine my foot," said the Coach, unlacing his shoe, while the Judge waved wildly for Gold's attention and tapped his breastbone as though suffocating while fumbling with the buttons of his shirt as the Consul stuck his tongue out toward Gold with a cough and the Ambassador rose, bent his asshole to Gold, and began dropping his striped pants.
Gold's cries now were of terror mingled with desperation. "Of philosophy!" he yelped, slapping his brow. "I'm a Doctor of Philosophy! A professor. I'm a writer!"
"Then fuck my bursitis," said the Governor with an emanation of authority of the kind for which he was justly renowned and an air of expeditiousness for which he was also applauded universally. "You write the report. Can I drop you at the reception, Widow?"
"Thank you,v Governor, but I'm praying with the Bishop."
"Then the Envoy and I will see you at the ball park."
"What should I write?" Gold broke in helplessly.
"Anything you want," said the Governor, and the Ambassador cheered "Here! Hear!" "As long as it doesn't contain a single thing anyone here might take exception to." A look of mercy crept into his eyes and he spoke with benevolence. "Gold, a Jew always needs friends in Washington, because he doesn't really belong here. Don't argue—listen. You oblige me in this and I may help you get some."
Relief was Gold's first emotion and his fires of initiative were damped. "How would you like me to write the report, sir?" he asked.
"Make it short," the Governor advised, "and make it long. Make it clear and make it fuzzy. Make it short by coming right to each point. Then make it long by qualifying those points so that nobody can tell the
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qualifications from the points or ever figure out what we're talking about."
"I think I know," said Gold, "what you mean."
The Governor was mollified. "Let me give you five good rules of behavior I got from my momma the first time I left our dirt farm for the great big city of Austin. My momma, bless her heart, instructed me, 'Don't make personal remarks, never tell a hostess you enjoyed yourself, don't force anything mechanical, never kick anything inanimate, and don't fart around with the inevitable.' Now, Gold, it appeared that in disputing with me you were drawing very close to farting around with the inevitable. I hope I am mistak-en.
"It was certainly not my intention, sir," said Gold, "to fart around with the inevitable. Or to force anything mechanical. I will never kick anything inanimate."
The Governor placed his huge hand upon Gold's shoulder in a gesture of fraternal pardon. "Understand that nobody in this room ever wants to read our report. That's another reason you must make it too long to be published in total in that damned New York Times. Otherwise, some of these nosy journalists might be pestering us for years with questions we don't know the answers to about matters we have no interest in. Will I see you at cocktails, Mr. Special Prosecutor?"
"No, Governor. We're going straight to the banquet with the Comptroller and the Queer. Will you be at the ball?"
"The Mrs. and I will be detained at the orgy. But perhaps at the supper."
"If I'm able to get there. I'll be shooting the shit with the Adjutant and the Bailiff. Let's say hello to the Crook and goodbye to the Champ."
"I am not a crook," said the Crook.
Gold was sorry it was over and missed them dearly. Working in concert, they had accomplished in just two meetings what had taken others as long as three years: nothing. He had served on his first Presidential Com-
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mission, and oh, the joy—the intoxicating ecstasy of being insulted and condescended to by people of established social position who ignored, abused, or despised him, the gratification in being admitted into such company as an insignificant status-seeker to be overlooked and snubbed, interrupted when he did try to speak and banished with such grace from each conversation he attempted to penetrate. They were occupied with brunches, lunches, and orgies at which his presence was not yet desired. They went to the ball park with Widows and Prelates and had good seats. How he envied their sense of belonging and their impervious stupidity.
"Invite a Jew to the White House (and You Make Him Your Slave)" was a snide attack on Lieberman he had planned writing after the latter's invitation to the White House for supporting a war. How close, as Ralph had discerned, Gold often came by whim, jealousy, and blind intuition to the fundamental truths of his world.
And how pleasing the custom of allowing people to wear like plumes the titles of the highest position they had held. If I were President, thought Gold—when I am President, he amended in fanciful contemplation— everyone will be appointed to some good government position one day and asked to resign the next, so that all in the land—regardless of race, occupation, family, creed, or financial station—can go through life called Ambassador, Judge, Major, or Secretary, instead of Esther, Rose, Irv, Victor, Julius or Sid.
Gold was jarred from his reverie by news from Miss Plum that four reporters had lingered outside in hopes of obtaining some truth from him.
They could hardly have been younger, and they came flocking about him for light like moths around a dark bulb. One was a tall pretty girl with a small face and straight blond hair who asked in a tone of nagging disrespect as querulous as any of which Gold had ever been the target just what he and the others were trying
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to pretend they'd accomplished. Gold decided to seduce her.
"Frankly, my dear, I don't know," he began in a practiced mode of disarming modesty, but could get no further. They had flown.
"That was terrible!" Miss Plum rebuked him severely in a panic that brought a strained ellipse of unsightly tension around her voluptuous mouth and beads of sweat to her cheeks and forehead. "You're never supposed to say that!"
"That was great!" cheered Ralph on the telephone before Gold could slink from the building in solitary disgrace. "Cables of your declaration are already out to our embassies in computerized code."
"What declaration?"
"Your motto is now a mainstay of official policy."
"What motto?"
"Your instinct is infallible, your words poetic, your modesty endearing. Bruce, you boggle my mind. Rush right over now to our next press briefing. An executive order has been issued to sneak you in."
"You are wonderful," cried Miss Plum, pressing close, but Gold no longer loved her and knew he would never wish to hold her against his member again.
He arrived for the White House press briefing not a moment too soon and found a place against the wall with an uninterrupted view of the lectern just as the Press Secretary said:
"I have an announcement to make. As you know, this President conducts an open Administration and is committed to total truth. In keeping with that policy, I have to announce that I have no announcement to make. Nothing's happened since yesterday."
There was a dumbfounded pause in the room before a veteran newsman up front asked, "Nothing?"
"That is correct. There is no news today."
"No news?"
"No news."
"Not a thing?"
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"Not a thing worth talking about."
"Is that just for Washington, Ron?" asked a voice at the side. "Or is that true of the rest of the country as well?"
"Just for Washington. We don't care about the rest of the country."
"You don't care about the rest of the country?"
"That is correct."
"Does that mean there'll be nothing in the newspapers about the President?"
"That's right. Unless you want to make a story out of that. Can we move along?"
"Your announcement leaves
me somewhat at a loss, Ron, so let me go back several years. Some time ago, Ron, the former head of the CIA, Richard Helms, appeared to have lied under oath to at least one Congressional committee. Yet he was allowed to remain as Ambassador to Iran instead of being indicted for this crime and brought to trial. Can you comment on that?"
"No. This Administration does not feel it appropriate to comment on matters that are under investigation."
"Are you saying," asked a woman quickly, "that the matter is under investigation?"
"I didn't say that."
"But isn't that the implication of what you did say?"
"I don't know."
At this reply a collective gasp of amazement filled the room and was followed by a tempest of excitement in which one voice at last rose above the rest.
"What was that?"
"I don't know."
"Could you say that again?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"I really don't know."
"Holy cow! Ron, Ron, would you mind repeating that one for the mike. I want to be absolutely sure I have it on tape."
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"Certainly. I don't know."
"Thank you, Ron. That was swell."
"Is that reply for attribution? Are you willing to let yourself be quoted on that?"
"I don't know."
"You mean you don't know whether you're willing to let yourself be quoted saying you don't know?"
"That is correct."
"Can we quote you on that one?"
"I don't know."
"Ron, is there anyone else in a position of authority in government, or anywhere else, who ever said, T don't know'?"
"I don't know. Those are the words of Dr. Bruce Gold, who teaches college in Brooklyn, New York, and may soon be coming to work for the Administration."
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