by Allen Drury
“Nothing,” Bob Munson said firmly. “Not a thing, Harley.” But he had spoken without taking into account the fact that on one particular subject the Vice President, like all Vice Presidents, had developed a nervous instinct that was almost infallible.
“Is anything wrong with the President?” Harley asked tensely. Senator Munson dropped his papers and swung about in his chair to face him full on, a gesture that was not lost on the press gallery above.
“Nothing,” he said in a savage whisper between his teeth, “is wrong with the President. Now stop acting like a damned fool and get back to the Chair where you belong.”
“Well, I can’t help but worry, Bob,” Harley Hudson murmured apologetically. “I just can’t help but worry.”
“Take my word for it,” Senator Munson said in the same deliberate tone, “there is no reason for you to worry.” Then after these lies, necessary if Harley was not to go spinning right up through the ceiling out of sheer nervous tension, he decided instantaneously on the only diversion that would calm the Vice President down.
“I was talking to him about an hour ago,” he went on quietly, turning back and relaxing in his chair, “and he said to tell you that he wants you to work very closely with me on the Leffingwell nomination. All that’s wrong with him is that he feels you have been cold-shouldering him a little lately, and he’s somewhat hurt about it, that’s all.”
“I?” Harley Hudson said in an audible cry of amazement which he promptly reduced to an agonized whisper. “I? Why, Bob, I’ve done my level best to co-operate with him in every way. You know that, Bob.”
“Well, he gets ideas, you know,” Bob Munson said soothingly. “There’s so much pressure and tension in that office, sometimes a man overlooks his real friends a little. I’m sure it’s just a passing thing, and the way to wash it out altogether is for you to pitch in with me and get this thing through as fast as we can. Then he’ll know he was mistaken.”
“Anything you say, Bob,” the Vice President said humbly. “You know you can count on me all the way. You tell him so, too.”
“He’ll be pleased to hear it, Harley,” Senator Munson said comfortably. “Now why don’t you go back there and talk to Paul Hendershot? Calm the old boy down, put a good face on it—you know how to do it. Let me know what he says.”
“Sure thing, Bob,” Harley said in a relieved tone. “I’ll go talk to him right now.”
“Think up an excuse first,” Bob Munson advised, “otherwise he’ll be suspicious.”
“Sure, Bob,” Harley said. “I sure will.” Bob Munson clapped him on the back as he rose.
“Okay, Harley,” he said soothingly. “There’ll be plenty to keep you occupied on this one.”
“Good,” the Vice President said fervently. “Good.”
Senator Munson turned back to his desk with a sigh audible enough so that Warren Strickland stirred in his chair across the aisle. The Majority Leader looked at the Minority Leader and the Minority Leader winked. The Majority Leader grinned, shook his head, and winked back.
“Mr. Lytle!” the Clerk said in a tone full of reproof, for so far only eight Senators had answered the call and he was halfway down the list. “Mr. Mason!...Mr. McKee!...Mr. Monroe!...”
Remembering the national convention at which Harley had received the vice-presidential nomination—that convention from which so many subsequent tensions in the Senate had stemmed—Bob Munson reflected that the Vice President’s story was in some ways so standard and in some ways so startling that it probably represented pretty much the mean of American politics. A wealthy businessman in Michigan who had never taken much interest in public affairs, he had suddenly been catapulted into the race for Governor when the original nominee had died in mid-campaign. Harley in his florid, jowling, graying style was a handsome and well-preserved fifty-three at the time, fortunately possessed of the ability to make a reasonably forceful and commanding speech. He had gone through the tensions of the campaign in good shape, had been elected by a large vote, had managed to perform his duties without visible stumbling, and a year later had been boomed for the Presidency by Bob Munson and Roy Mulholland, who had joined forces in a complicated cross-ruff by which they hoped to hold the delegation in line for the present incumbent of the White House, then only an amiable and rather enigmatic Governor of California. Orrin Knox had been the Governor’s principal opponent, and for a while Harley, having sense enough to assess his own boom for what it was, had leaned very strongly toward Senator Knox in spite of his own Senators’ pressure for the Governor. Like all timid men, when he decided to become stubborn he had been fearsomely so, and it had been touch-and-go right up to the night of the balloting as to who would control the Michigan delegation. In a final showdown Harley had won and they had thought they were going for Orrin Knox. At some point during the evening, however—and Bob Munson never knew exactly what happened, for neither of them would tell him—there had been some sort of friction between Harley and Orrin, and that had done it; Harley had cast Michigan’s unanimous vote for the Governor. The minute his words were out, Senator Munson and Senator Mulholland had fought their way across the roaring hall to the California delegation and promptly gone to work. An hour later the news was out that Harley was the nominee’s choice for Vice President, a job to which he had been re-elected four years later, not so much because he had done anything notable but just because he had not gotten in anybody’s way, and so the President, not wanting to stir up any trouble in the new convention, had taken the customary easy way out and permitted him to run again.
This tale, no different in essentials from that of twenty men who had held the nation’s second office, had just those elements of fantasy and cold-blooded practicality that seem to go into many and many an American political success. A shift here, a shift there, a change of timing somewhere else, a fluke that happened or a fluke that didn’t, and Harley M. Hudson would not be Vice President of the United States. As it turned out, however, he was; no worse and no better than most selected by just the same process of fluke and no-fluke, but under present circumstances on a spot he half-sensed and wholly feared, in which he might presently be called upon to be considerably better than most, for his country’s sake. Bob Munson sighed heavily again, and this time did not wink at Warren Strickland. He would have to hold Harley’s hand as it had never been held before, if that happened. Indeed, the whole Congress would have to hold it, as best they could, if Harley was to make out in the way he would have to if he was to succeed.
“Mr. Parrish!” the clerk said, becoming steadily more aggrieved, for by now only about thirty Senators were on the floor, and a quorum was fifty-one, “Mr. Root!...Mr. Ryan!...Mr. Starr!...Mr. Sykes!...”
“That was a touching scene,” Stanley Danta observed, sliding into the chair vacated by the Vice President, the chair that was actually Seab Cooley’s as senior member and president pro tempore of the Senate. Seab had not yet come in to claim it this morning, and, “Where is he and what’s he up to?” was not the least of the Majority Leader’s worries at the moment.
“He’s worried about the nomination,” Bob Munson explained casually. Senator Danta smiled.
“He’s worried, period. I hope you reassured him.”
“Don’t I always?” Senator Munson asked. “Half my time is spent reassuring Harley. What do you hear?”
“I’ll be a good second-generation Yankee and answer a question with a question,” Senator Danta said. “What do you hear?”
“I haven’t had time to hear much,” Bob Munson confessed. “Michigan needed me this morning. I never got away from the office and made precious few calls.”
“Well, I,” said Stanley Danta, “have been a good boy. I’ve been checking, just the way you said. As of the moment I find five sure votes for Bob Leffingwell, sixteen doubtfuls, and seven opposed.”
“Who’s sure?” Bob Munson wanted to know. The sures, Stanley explained, were Murfee Andrews of Kentucky, Dick Althouse of Maryland, Cliff Boland of Mi
ssissippi, Powell Hanson of North Dakota—and Stanley Danta.
“That’s a handsome nest egg to start with,” Senator Munson remarked dryly. “What about Brig?”
“Brig,” Stanley Danta said, “is being elusive. I think he suspects, no doubt with reason, that you have designs on him if this thing gets into a real hassle. And of course he knows it’s going to.”
“I haven’t any designs on him,” Bob Munson said. “I just want him in line, that’s all. Of course if Tom August had to appoint a subcommittee to handle hearings, it would look good all around if Brig could chair it. But that’s not ‘designs.’”
“No?” Senator Danta smiled. “He can see you coming a mile away.”
“Hmph,” Senator Munson said.
“Mr. Wannamaker!...” the clerk said with an air of sadness as he came to the end with only forty Senators in the chamber, “Mr. Welch!...Mr. Whiteside!...Mr. Wilson!”
Senator Munson rose. He didn’t know where all his distinguished colleagues were, but he knew they would drift in sooner or later.
“Mr. President,” he said, “I ask unanimous consent that further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with.”
“Without objection,” said Powell Hanson in the Chair, “it is so ordered.”
“Mr. President,” Bob Munson said, “I move that the Senate proceed to the consideration of the pending business, Calendar No. 1453, Senate bill 1086, a bill to amend the Federal Reserve Act.”
“Mr. President!” cried Murfee Andrews promptly from his side of the chamber, and, “Mr. President!” shouted Taylor Ryan loudly from his.
“The Senator from Kentucky,” Powell said, recognizing one of his own, and Murfee Andrews with a triumphant smile at his opponent launched into what was obviously to be a lengthy speech. Senator Munson sat down.
“Have you seen Orrin?” he asked. “Your beautiful daughter is due here in another five minutes to have lunch with me, and I thought maybe he would like to join us. You too, if you like, of course.”
“Thanks,” Stanley smiled. “I think I can make it. No, I haven’t seen Illinois’s most indignant son. Nor, for that matter, have I seen South Carolina’s. Do you suppose what I suppose?”
“Lord, I hope not,” said Senator Munson emphatically. “I hope not! That’s why I want to have lunch with him. Maybe I can head him off before Seab gets to him.”
Senator Danta gestured toward the side door.
“Lo, he comes,” he said, and indeed Orrin did, striding in with his bustling, purposeful air, a large briefcase in one hand, some books, some papers, a general manner of being able to solve the world’s problems completely, at once, in the most practical and sensible way that they could possibly be solved. Bob Munson turned around and gestured to Tom Trummell of Indiana, sitting a couple of rows back. Senator Trummell came forward in his gravely ponderous and humorless way, but with a pleasant smile, and took the Majority Leader’s chair. “Let’s go,” said Senator Munson to Senator Danta, and they beelined for Senator Knox.
“Well,” AP said to UPI as the three Senators went past the press table on their way in to the Senators’ private dining room, “I guess Orrin Knox must be putting his price pretty high.”
“Apparently,” UPI said, “he can name it.”
Inside the small, dark, crowded room with its hustle and bustle of Senators, their families and/or constituents, they found Crystal Danta already seated at a table in the corner chatting with Bessie Adams of Kansas, who was just finishing. Bessie looked up and smiled in her pleasantly grandmotherly way that never missed a trick, and the slightest glint of amusement came into her eyes.
“Bob,” she said, “Stanley—Orrin—what a distinguished gathering! I suppose you’re going to talk about the wedding. That’s what we’ve been talking about.”
“If I know my daughter,” Stanley Danta said with a smile, “and if I know the senior Senator from Kansas, the talk has ranged farther afield than that.” Senator Adams smiled blandly.
“We can’t imagine what you mean, Stanley,” she said. “It was mostly about the wedding, wasn’t it, Crystal?”
“Mostly,” Crystal agreed, “and anyway, the Senator didn’t give me the slightest hint of how she intends to vote on the nomination.”
“I didn’t expect she would have,” Senator Munson said. “I know Bessie.” And his tone for a second sounded so forlorn that Elizabeth Ames Adams burst out laughing.
“Poor Bob,” she said lightly. “Poor Bobby! He has so many problems, and I am one of them. But don’t despair, Robert. Right and justice will triumph in the end.”
“Thanks so much,” Bob Munson said with a reluctant smile. “I wish I were sure of that.”
“If you were more sure of what they are,” Senator Adams told him suavely, “then you might be more sure of whether they would. But I must run along and get back up to the floor.”
“Have you got an amendment to the Federal Reserve bill?” Orrin Knox asked with interest. Senator Adams shook her head.
“No, actually I’ve just got an editorial from the Topeka Capital on Bob Leffingwell that I want to put in the Record.”
“That was fast work,” Senator Danta said. “Did they wire it to you?”
“As a matter of fact,” said Senator Adams, “they did. That’s how important they think it is, out where I come from. Have a good lunch. I’ll see you all later.”
“So long, Bess,” Bob Munson said. “Don’t slip on any banana peels.”
“Not before I vote on Bob Leffingwell,” Senator Adams assured him pleasantly as she left.
“Hmph,” Senator Munson said.
“I think it’s very exciting,” Crystal Danta observed with a wicked little chuckle as they sat down and prepared to order. Senator Munson looked at her sternly.
“I’ve spanked you before, young lady,” he said, “and I might do it again.”
“Right here?” Crystal asked. “Oh, Uncle Bob, do.”
Orrin Knox laughed.
“That would be a sensation, wouldn’t it?” he observed. “Yes, Uncle Bob, do.”
“Order your lunch, everybody,” Bob Munson directed them. “It’s on me.”
Around the room as they did so his practiced eye fell on Bessie’s junior colleague, the careful and homespun Harold Kidd, eating with his wife; Donald W. Merrick of Colorado, looking as usual as though he hated the world—How do some people get elected? Bob Munson thought—Cecil Hathaway of Delaware, talking in his usual furious, shotgun fashion to George Keating of Nebraska, already well gone on his daily battle with the bottle; Charles W. McKee of North Dakota, handsome and vacant, with pudgy, pompous Bob Randall of New Jersey and white-haired, kindly Archibald Joslin of Vermont; Stonewall Jackson Phillips of Tennessee, looking competent and able and with that sort of closed-off efficiency that many young and ambitious men in politics develop, being courteous and attentive to peppery old Newell Albertson of West Virginia, who just happened to be chairman of Interstate Commerce Committee and violently opposed to an airlines bill that Stoney was quite anxious to have passed; Kenneth Hackett, lean and strange, talking to his self-possessed, noncommittal little colleague from Wisconsin, Magnus Hollingsworth; and portly, self-important Ben Mason of Rhode Island, hailing purse-lipped, eternally disapproving Walter Calloway of Utah to come join him and “these wonderful folks from Providence who’ve just dropped in to see me.”
All of these perceptive gentlemen, Bob Munson saw, were quite as interested in observing him and his intriguing party as he was in observing them; and after collecting a number of sidewise glances that slid rapidly over his table and visibly registered surprise and interest, he turned deliberately to his menu and gave the waiter his order. As he did so Orrin Knox gave a chuckle at his side.
“Everybody certainly wonders why we’re here, don’t they?” he asked in a teasing tone. Bob Munson contemplated several strategies in a split second and chose the only one that worked with Orrin, complete honesty.
“Oh, they know,” he sa
id blandly. “And so do we, don’t we?”
Senator Knox chuckled again.
“I dare say,” he said. Stanley Danta chuckled too.
“Bob has a devious plot in mind, Orrin,” he said cheerfully. “He just wants your vote.”
“Not only that,” Senator Munson said candidly. “I want your complete, one hundred per cent, all-out support.”
“Have I always had yours?” Senator Knox asked quietly, and Bob Munson recognized with annoyance that there was that God-damned convention again.
“Most times,” he said thoughtfully. “Yes, I think I can say most times.” Then he looked Orrin straight in the eye. “Haven’t you?” he asked bluntly.
Senator Knox laughed in an unamused way.
“When it suited your purpose, Bob,” he said tartly. “When it suited.”
“Isn’t that how we all support each other?” Senator Munson asked calmly. “You’re a realist, Orrin. That’s the only way anything ever gets done in the American government—when it suits the purposes of enough people.”
“Hmph,” said Senator Knox. Then he remarked casually, “I suppose Seab is mustering the troops against him already.”
“You ought to know,” Senator Munson said quickly, a shot in the dark, but he could see it had gone home, for Senator Knox started a little, then broke into a laugh.
“I should,” he admitted.
“I hope you didn’t sign anything,” Senator Danta said dryly.
“It was all verbal,” Orrin Knox said with a grin. “He wanted something in blood, but I wouldn’t give it to him.”
“Well, that’s good,” Bob Munson said. “I guess there’s still hope for our side, then.”
“Some,” Orrin Knox said seriously. “But I don’t like it. If I support him it’s going to be as an intellectual exercise and not because my heart is in it.”