by Gore Vidal
“I suppose so. I’ll talk to Carvalho.” Blaise preferred to do business with businessmen and not with-but what was the Chief? A visionary? Hardly. More an innovator, entrepreneur, fact of nature.
“You do that. How’s the Washington paper?”
“My sister hangs on.”
“She can’t forever.”
“John McLean has said he’ll stake her if she ever needs money, to keep you out of town.”
Hearst’s thin mouth ceased to be a mouth; a thin fissure now split the white face. “I’ll buy the Post one day. To keep McLean out of town. He wants it. But old Wilkins won’t sell to him. He will to me.”
Blaise both admired and deplored the Chief’s certainty that, in time, he would have everything that he had ever wanted. “I’m looking at the Baltimore Examiner.”
“Not bad,” said Hearst. “Cheap. Potential for growth.” He echoed, unconsciously, Carvalho’s businessman’s talk. “They need it-or they could need it-in Washington.”
George announced Mr. Richard Croker, lord of Tammany and the Democratic equivalent of Senator Platt, with whom he was never too proud to do business. In fact, the Irish-born Croker regarded himself as nothing more than a simple businessman who, for a fee, would work with any other businessman. He controlled the politics of the city. He enjoyed the company and even the friendship of the magnates of the Democratic Party, particularly William C. Whitney. But then each kept stables, and raced horses. Croker had stud farms not only in New York State but in England. He was an impressive figure, all gray from hair and beard to expensive English tweeds.
Croker shook Hearst’s hand as languidly as Hearst shook his; then he shook Blaise’s hand vigorously. Blaise was somewhat awed by this street youth who had risen so high. He had begun as a henchman of the infamous Boss Tweed, in whose behalf he might or might not have murdered a man on a long-ago election day. The jury-twelve bad men and false-had been unable to make up its mind; and so he was allowed to go free; and rise. “I seen my opportunities,” he would say of his long career, “and I took ’em.” He took “clean graft,” money for city contracts. Dirty graft was the sort of thing that the police went in for, extorting protection money from saloon-keepers and prostitutes. Although Croker highly disapproved of dirty graft and never touched it himself, he had once said, almost plaintively, to Blaise, “We’ve got to put up with a certain amount. It’s only common justice. After all, the police see us doing all this good business, and then they see the Astors making all that money out of all those tenements, and breaking every law, which, Heaven forgive us, we let them do because we do business with the Four Hundred like everyone else who’s respectable, so how can I be too hard on an overworked police sergeant with ten children who asks for ten dollars a week from some saloon-keeper for a bit of protection?” Blaise had had several fascinating talks with Croker; and tended to admire him more than not. Croker was particularly fierce on the subject of the reformers. He now displayed his ferocity to Hearst and Blaise.
“I have never known such a bunch of hypocrites in my life.” He lit his cigar; puffed smoke at the Chief, who coughed, unnoticed by his guest. “The worst is Roosevelt, because he knows the game. He plays the game…”
“He takes money?” Blaise regretted his question, as two sets of pitying eyes were turned, briefly, on him.
Neither man bothered to answer so naive a question. “He acts, every day, as if he’s just discovered sin when his family and every other grand family in this city is supported by us, by the city, by the way we get around the laws he and his sort make, so a man can do business here, and do well here. Who is Platt?“ The deep voice rumbled stagily. The gray eyes turned on Blaise, who was wise enough to attempt no answer. “Platt’s Croker and Croker’s Platt, with a brogue and no education. But we do business the same way. We get out the vote of the quick and the dead and the immigrants, including the ones who think they’re living in Australia. Heaven help us! Well, I’ve no heart to tear the scales from their eyes, you can be sure.” Croker continued, comfortably, in this vein until the Chief signalled for him to stop.
“You know, Mr. Croker, whenever I want to know what the Republicans are up to, I ask you, and when I want to know about the Democrats, I ask Platt.“
Croker nodded; and nearly smiled. “You’ll get something close to the truth, going round the back way, you might say.”
The Chief nodded; and put his feet up on the back of the sphinx, a creature plainly puzzling to Croker. “What’s Platt doing about Roosevelt?”
“He wants him out of the state fast. We all do. It’s not that he does anything. Don’t get me wrong. But he talks so much. He gets the rich folks all riled up on account of us, not that they don’t know better.”
“He’s a demagogue.” Blaise made his vital contribution.
Croker nodded. “You could call him that. Poor old Platt’s gone and broken a lot of ribs. He’s in plaster of paris up to here.” Croker indicated the place where his own neck was, assuming that he had such a feature, hidden back of gray beard, gray tweed. “He’s poorly, today. With a fever. But he’s made up his mind he won’t let Teddy run again for governor.”
“How does he stop him?” asked Blaise.
“Throw us the election is one way. Teddy didn’t do all that well first time around. It’s not like Platt and me haven’t arranged an election together before. But Platt’s got other plans this year. He wants McKinley to take Teddy on as vice-president.”
Hearst scratched his stomach, idly; gazed into the middle distance at a cow-headed Egyptian goddess, who stared back. “Dewey’s done for,” he told the goddess.
Croker laughed, an unpleasant sound. “That interview in the World did the trick.”
“I could have managed him.” Hearst shut his eyes. “I could’ve elected him president.”
“But you couldn’t have managed Mrs. Dewey, and that’s the truth.”
Like everyone else, Blaise had read, with wonder, the Admiral’s interview. After a bit of thought, the Admiral had declared his readiness to be president, an easy sort of job, he declared, where you simply did what Congress told you to do. Mrs. Dewey was given full credit for the resulting farce.
“No one,” said the Chief, opening one eye and keeping it firmly on Croker, “wants Teddy.”
“Since when does that matter? Platt wants him out of New York. The only way is to make him vice-president. Boss Quay in Pennsylvania-”
“Got thrown out of the Senate.”
“A bag-,” said Croker, enjoying each syllable, “a-telle. Who needs the Senate? But everyone needs Pennsylvania, and Matt Quay’s got that. New York and Pennsylvania will make Teddy vice-president.”
“Bosses.” Hearst’s tone was neutral; he had now widened both eyes in imitation of the cow-goddess.
“So what’s Mark Hanna? He’s boss of the whole Republican Party.”
“No.” Hearst was unexpected. „McKinley runs the show, and lets Hanna collect the loot, and take the blame. Teddy was in Washington last week, begging for the job, and Hanna said, no, never, and McKinley said, may the best man win. McKinley wants Allison.”
Blaise had yet to learn the entire roster of American statesmen. Vaguely, he was aware of an elderly Iowa senator named Allison, who, with serene fidelity, represented not Iowans but corporations in the Senate. “McKinley won’t get Allison,” said Croker. “Which means he don’t really want him.”
“Maybe that’s why he says he wants him.” The Chief, each day, sounded more like a politician than an editor. Blaise doubted the wisdom of this metamorphosis. Bright butterflies ought not to change into drab caterpillars. “Dolliver’s the man the White House boys like. Dawes wants him.”
“Dolliver.” Croker allowed the name to remain in that perpetual limbo from which those who might have been figures of the highest degree in the great republic fail to rise even to the surface, like iridescent scum, wrote Blaise in his head. He was beginning to get the knack of newspaper writing. Whatever phrase came first
and most shamefully to the mind of someone who read only newspapers was the one to be deployed in all its imprecise familiarity.
“Lodge supports Long. New England supports Long.” Hearst plucked at a single string of his banjo, and even the hardened Croker winced at the sound.
“Lodge works day and night-for Teddy.” Croker stared at the banjo as if it were a city judge whose price had doubled. “He has to be for Long. That’s the cover. The New England candidate, like Dolliver-not Allison-is the real Midwesterner. Now Root…”
“Yes, Root…” Hearst frowned. Blaise could follow only so far into the maze when politicians lapsed into their own curious vernacular, so similar to that of Paris thieves. Plainly, Root impressed each man. Plainly, Root was a non-starter.
“Who do we want, Mr. Hearst?” Croker was, finally, direct.
“Anyone but Teddy.” Hearst was as direct.
“That’s you, of course. Me, I’m like Platt. I want him out of New York. He’s tiresome to do business with.”
Hearst turned to Blaise. “I’ve fixed it. He says you’re the only gentleman we’ve got around here. So you can go down with him, in his car. Make all the notes you can every day and telephone them in and we’ll write it up.”
“By ‘he’ you mean Colonel Roosevelt?”
Hearst stared at a splendid school-of-Tintoretto painting, the work, to Blaise’s eyes, of a student destined not to matriculate. Anyone could sell the Chief anything if it was Art. “You’re booked into the Walton Hotel, same floor as Teddy. You leave Friday. Pennsylvania Station. Noon. All your badges and so on are at the office. The convention don’t start till Tuesday, so Teddy’s getting a headstart. He’s going to be rushing around telling everyone how he’s not a candidate, too young to be put on the shelf, too poor for the job. You don’t have to take any of that nonsense down. Mr. Brisbane can write the usual Teddy interview in his sleep-in their sleep.” The Chief had finally made something close to a joke. The thin voice was asthmatic with uncontrollable laughter.
“As good as Weber and Fields,” beamed Croker, suddenly turning before their eyes into a dear wee leprechaun, straight from the Emerald Isle.
Blaise was less indulgent. “Where’s Hanna in all this?”
“He’s staying with rich friends in Haverford. He’ll be at the Walton by Saturday. But Charlie Dawes is the man to keep your eye on. He’s the one who’ll be talking on the telephone to McKinley in the White House. If Teddy starts to bore you, head for Dawes.” Blaise had a vague memory of a reddish-haired young man, said to be one of the President’s few intimates. “He’ll be with the Illinois delegation.” Hearst gave a few more instructions; then Blaise said farewell to Chief and Boss.
As Blaise left the room, he heard, once again, the sly sing-song voice of the leprechaun. “And then we’ll be needing a governor all our own, once Teddy’s gone to Washington, a fine famous sort of man, Mr. Hearst, with whom we can do business.”
“I’m for reform, Croker.”
“Who isn’t? As autumn leaves fall and the first Tuesday in November, that precious gift of our brave forebears who fell at Bunker Hill, comes round, and we elect a new governor of this state-a reforming governor-why not William Randolph Hearst?”
Unfortunately, George shut the door before Blaise could hear the Chief’s reply to the siren’s song.
2
THEODORE ROOSEVELT WELCOMED Blaise heartily into his rail-road car, a somewhat shabby affair for the governor of so great a state, with dirty antimacassars on dirty green armchairs; and filled, for the most part, with aides, journalist friends, and the upright remains of Senator Platt, who seemed to have been dead for some time. The face was pale blue, in nice contrast with the white whiskers, while the upper torso beneath the frock-coat was encased in plaster, giving the effect not only of death but of advanced rigor mortis as well.
“Delighted you could come!” For once Roosevelt did not make three or even two words of “delighted.” He seemed uncharacteristically subdued, even nervous. With a sudden shake, the train started. Blaise and Roosevelt fell together against Senator Platt’s chair. From the chair came a soft cry. Blaise looked down and saw two accusing eyes set in a livid face, glaring up at them.
“Senator. Forgive me-us. The train…” Roosevelt stuttered apologies.
“My pills.” The voice was of a man dying. The pills were brought by a porter. The Senator took them, and sleep-opium, not death-claimed the Republican boss.
“He’s in great pain,” said Roosevelt, with some satisfaction. Then he frowned. “But so am I.” He tapped one of his huge teeth on which Blaise always expected to see engraved “RIP.” “Agony. No time to have it pulled either, with so many speeches to give. Wouldn’t do. Must suffer. I am simply a delegate-at-large, you know. I am not a candidate for vice-president. Why won’t people believe me?”
Blaise restrained himself from saying, “Because you’re lying.”
Roosevelt read his silence correctly. “No, I’m not being coy,” he said. “It’s a complicated business. There’s one thing being a true choice of all the people, and quite another being forced over a convention by,” from force of habit, he struck left hand with right fist, “the bosses.”
The boss of New York heard this; opened his drugged eyes; sneered slightly beneath his white moustache; and resumed his drugged sleep.
“Well, you’ve got Platt and Quay behind you,” Blaise began.
“What is a boss, finally, but someone led by the people?” This was a new variation. “They make judges and mayors and justices of the peace and-deals, yes. I know all that. But he,” Roosevelt lowered his voice and pointed to Platt, whose back was now to them, “didn’t want me for governor, and doesn’t want me for vice-president either, but the people push and push and so the bosses get out in front like… like?”
“Mirabeau.”
“Yes! The very man! When the mob was loose in the street, he said, I don’t know where they’re going but as their leader I must lead them, wherever it is, he said.”
“Or something like that,” Blaise murmured. But Roosevelt never heard what he did not want to hear. Blaise, however, forced him to explain why, if he was not a candidate, he should want to be in Philadelphia three days before the convention started; and Mark Hanna was out of town.
“Senator Lodge says I’m making a great mistake. He always says that, of course. No matter what anyone does.” Roosevelt swung a fat thigh over the arm of his chair. A waiter brought him tea. Blaise ordered coffee. Covertly, the other journalists watched Blaise, waiting for him to vacate the chair beside the Governor. But Roosevelt seemed to need the company of a gentleman at so delicate a moment in his history. Blaise got the impression that the Governor was not only nervous but undecided what to do. In effect, he was arriving at a convention controlled, in McKinley’s name, by his enemy Hanna. The Colonel was a national hero, but conventions were no respecters of popularity of the sort bestowed by a press so easily manipulated and its gullible readers.
Roosevelt acknowledged this. “I got the governorship on a hurrah, after Cuba. But how long can a hurrah last in politics?”
“With Admiral Dewey only a few months.”
“To have thrown all that away.” Roosevelt shook his head with wonder. “I captured one hill. He captured the world. Now they laugh at him, and that permanent victory arch of his is falling to pieces in Fifth Avenue. I just told the Mayor to tear it down. But he doesn’t-the Mayor-listen to me. Because I’m not a war hero any more. I’m just a hard-working governor, who’s taken on the trusts, the Whitneys, the insurance companies…” The Governor’s voice was now a high and, to Blaise, familiar drone. When there was a pause in the litany of brave achievement, Blaise surrendered his chair to the New York Sun, the Roosevelt paper.
Toward journey’s end, Platt opened his drug-dimmed eyes; saw Blaise; motioned for him to draw near. “Mr. Sanford, of the Roman Catholic Sanfords.” A smile’s shadow made hideous the corpse-like face. “How is Mr. Hearst?”
“Expanding, Senator.”
“In circulation? Weight? Politically? As chairman of all those clubs?”
“Into other cities. More newspapers.”
“Well, he knows papers.” Platt sat up even straighter and grimaced with pain.
“I wonder, sir, what you think of Senator Hanna’s support for Cornelius Bliss, as vice-president.”
“I think it shows what a damn fool Hanna is, and always has been.” Two marks of red, like thumb-imprints, appeared at the center of each ashen cheek. “What is Hanna but a stupid tradesman-a grocer? No, don’t quote me. Let me say it in the Senate first-or last. All Hanna knows how to do is raise money for McKinley. But he don’t know nothing about politics. Bliss, damn his eyes, is mine!” Twice, the religious Platt had sworn in Blaise’s presence. The opiates had had an effect; he was also feverish.
“Yours, sir?”
“Bliss is from New York. I am New York. Hanna is Ohio. How can he work for someone from my state?” Platt shut his eyes; and appeared to have fainted. The scarlet thumbprints faded to ash.
Roosevelt insisted that Blaise ride with him and his secretary in a carriage to the Walton. “You’ll be able to tell Mr. Hearst, firsthand, how I have not sought the nomination.” As Roosevelt spoke, he kept poking his head out the carriage window, smiling aimlessly at the crowds in Broad Street. But as no one expected a non-candidate to arrive so early, he was not, to his chagrin, noticed. The secretary sat between Blaise and the Governor, a round black box on his knees.
Blaise had never been in Philadelphia before. For him, the city was simply a stop on the railroad between Washington and New York. Curiously, he stared out the window, and thought that he was in some sort of Dutch or Rhineland city, all brick and neatness; but the people were unmistakably American. There were numerous Negroes, mostly poor; numerous whites, mostly well-to-do, in light summer clothes. Blaise, who was hatless, noted that almost every man wore a hard round straw hat to shield its owner from the near-tropical heat.