(1964) The Man

by Irving Wallace

  Her shoulders went up and down, and her fat arms shook. “Doin’ what, Mr. Dilman—Mr. President? I’m willin’, but doin’ what with all that fancy help around?”

  “Taking care of me, that’s what you can do, Crystal, as you always have done. Those servants you see are for other people—visitors, dignitaries, guests. I need someone who knows how to make my breakfast, and keep starch out of my collars, and where to put my bedroom slippers. Let’s make believe nothing has changed, Crystal, except our address. We’ll continue on the same basis, only I’ll try to arrange a raise. What do you say?”

  “I say yes, and how, bless the Lord!” Crystal exclaimed. “Maybe I’ll wind up writin’ a famous book about you, what the President is really like, and I’ll get rich and famous, too, and—”

  Dilman grinned. “I knew I could count on you.”

  He became aware of Diane Fuller watching, listening, from the velvet-draped table. He tried not to frown. Oddly enough, while Crystal belonged here, Diane did not. Her scrawny, deferential manner, her lack of poise, her unseemly loud dresses (the one this morning was orange polka dots on yellow), her bowlegs, her stutter and nervous mannerisms, made her less of an asset here than in his Senate office, where he could relegate her to the typewriter and file cabinets. Moreover, he did not want to bring in too many of his own color. That would create unpleasant talk. Still, there was Diane, waiting. Something must be done.

  “What about you, Diane?” he asked. “Would you like to stay on?”

  She spoke with difficulty. “Of-of course, S-senator. I have—haven’t no place else to go, and besides—”

  “Besides what?”

  “This is—is—is sure enough real exciting.”

  “All right. Now, it won’t be the same as before, I’m sorry to say. I’ve kept on T. C.’s personal secretary, because she’s familiar with the Executive Office routine and can guide me. However, they can always use another secretary in the East Wing downstairs. I’ll tell them I want you hired.”

  “I—I’d sure be grateful, S-s-senator.” Then she amended it hastily, “I mean—Mr. President.”

  Crystal had approached, taking in the entire room with the arch of her hand. “What do we do with all this stuff?”

  “You keep sorting it out so it is neat and so that you know where every item is,” said Dilman. “As soon as I find out which rooms I’ll be living in, we can start moving everything where it belongs. Don’t worry about it.” He consulted his wristwatch. “Matter of fact, I don’t have much time to look around. I’ll see if I can learn which is to be my bedroom.”

  He left the Rose Guest Room, lost his way a moment, then escaped the maze of rooms to find Beecher, the valet, patiently tarrying in the hall.

  “Sorry to keep you,” Dilman said. “Let’s start with a bedroom for tonight. What do you suggest?”

  “Well, there’s these guest bedrooms—”

  “No. Too fancy.”

  “That leaves two others on this floor that are used,” said the valet. “Way down there at the end is the one most used by other Presidents. It’s huge and has a good cedar closet and bathroom—why, even the bathtub has the Presidential eagle on it. It was T. C.’s bedroom before he—”

  “I’m not sure about that, either,” Dilman said. He did not repeat what had passed through his mind: that the electorate might unconsciously resent a minority black politician immediately sleeping in the bed where their popular T. C. had slept for two years and seven months, a Negro enjoying that bed while their choice slept in a coffin in the earth.

  “What else is there?” Dilman asked. “You mentioned another—”

  “Yes, sir, Mr. President. There’s the Lincoln Bedroom right over there.”

  “I thought it was a show piece. Has it ever been used in modern times?”

  “Often, Mr. President. Will you have a look?” Beecher started down the hall, with Dilman a half step behind him. Unexpectedly the valet veered to his left, opened a door, and waited for Dilman to go inside.

  Dilman almost entered, had meant to go right into the room, but something about it brought him to a stop, made him hang back. For the first time this morning, he had the feeling that he was neither visitor nor intruder. An accident of history had brought him to this place, and suddenly, in this room, he was a part of this place, engaged in its role, a part of its story. For the first time this morning, he felt that he belonged. It was his fancy, he told himself, yet the warmness of being wanted radiated beneath his flesh.

  Hushed, he surveyed the Lincoln Bedroom. It was an old-fashioned and simple room, too calming, too reasoning, too good to permit here the invasion of violence and hate and fear. It had once been Lincoln’s Cabinet Room, he knew, and the plaque on the mantelpiece was a reminder that within these plain walls Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation, prohibiting slavery in the United States and giving four million human beings of Dilman’s race their freedom.

  Lincoln’s own bed, massive and grand, dominated the room.

  “What’s it made of?” Dilman asked.

  The valet came beside him, puzzled. “Pardon, Mr. President?”

  “His bed. What’s it made of?”

  “Oh. It’s solid rosewood, sir. Look at the beautiful carved headboard. That’s eight feet high above the bed. The bed itself is nine feet long.”

  “Not long enough,” said Dilman. “He was taller than that.”

  Dilman studied the velvet-covered tables and Victorian lamps on either side of the large bed. He studied the bureau and mirror, and the stained table on which rested one of the five copies of the Gettysburg Address written in the sixteenth President’s own hand. All these pieces had been purchased by Mrs. Lincoln, and everything in the room was probably Lincoln’s own, the painting of Andrew Jackson, the chairs in yellow and green Morris velvet, the desk, the Empire clock, everything. Even the figured rug gave Dilman comfort, a rug so much like the threadbare ones that had covered the floor of the hotel in which his mother had raised him to adulthood. Straight ahead, framed by the windows, was the spire of the Washington Monument once more.

  He walked deeper into the room, and on an ashtray lay a white book of matches with the imprint “The President’s House.”

  Over his shoulder he said to the valet, “You are certain this is a bedroom that’s been in ordinary use?”

  “Positive, Mr. President. Theodore Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge slept in that bed. Teddy Roosevelt’s children, six of them, often slept in it at once. F. D. R. had Colonel Louis Howe, his aide, sleep in it, and Margaret Truman slept in it, and so did Mamie Eisenhower’s mother, Mrs. Doud. President Kennedy and Mrs. Kennedy used this bedroom while their other one was being painted. Mrs. Jacqueline Kennedy, particularly, loved that bed. She liked to say it looked like ‘a cathedral.’ Later, whenever President Kennedy’s parents, former Ambassador Joseph Kennedy and Mrs. Rose Kennedy, visited, they were put up in this room. Lyndon Johnson’s relatives were here, and T. C.’s son Freddie always slept in the bed when he came here during school holidays.”

  “And Lincoln,” said Dilman.

  “Yes, Lincoln.”

  Dilman stared at the towering rosewood headboard and green-fringed white spread. No one on earth, he told himself, could object to his occupying the Lincoln Bedroom, and least of all Abe Lincoln of Illinois.

  “Very well, this is it,” he said curtly, and he went into the hall.

  When the valet had caught up with him, Dilman stopped, something on his mind.

  “Is there anything else, Mr. President?”

  “I was just wondering what room is accessible when I want to work at night.”

  “Well, sir, there’s the Lincoln Sitting Room on one side, and the Treaty Room on the other, but one more room beyond that is where T. C. and most of the Presidents have worked and relaxed at night.”

  “Which room?”

  “It’s been known by several names, including the Yellow Oval Room and the Executive study. May I show it to you?”
/>   Dilman strode in step with the valet across the parquet floor. “Is it a study?” Dilman asked.

  “It’s a catchall room, Mr. President. Right up until he left the country, T. C. used it for a living room, library, informal office. Dolley Madison did it up in yellow damask, and—you’ll see—most everything in it, the oval rug, the wallpaper, the covering on the two sofas, and some of the Louis XVI chairs are in bright yellow. T. C. would sit in a green leather padded captain’s chair at the green inlaid desk—behind one of the sofas—while the First Lady sat across from him and read. On balmy nights they’d go out on the Truman Balcony, stretch on the patio furniture, and have iced tea, and just talk and talk. When some head of state was visiting, they would receive him in this room, and then go with him down the grand staircase, across the way, to the White House Entrance Hall, where the Marine Band would play their ruffles and flourishes, and then they’d go on into the first-floor State Dining Room. . . . Here we are, Mr. President. The Yellow Oval Room.”

  The white doors were wide-open, and Dilman went into the great golden chamber, slowed by its breadth and brightness, by its richness, impressed by the chandelier with its chains and crystals, the candelabra guarding the central window to the right, the Cézannes on the wall nearby.

  Dilman wheeled slowly, to take it all in, when suddenly his neck stiffened and he stepped back with surprise. He and the valet were not alone. There was another in the Yellow Oval Room.

  She was bent over the flat table desk behind the nearest sofa, opening and closing drawers, concentrating on her search. When she straightened, and sighed, Dilman could see that she was not as tall as she appeared to be, but held herself so regally that it gave her added stature. She was attired in an unadorned black afternoon dress, and lifted from her face and lying across her coiffured blond-gray hair was a mourning veil. Even as she turned at his movement, Dilman knew who it was he had stumbled upon.

  T. C.’s First Lady arranged her mourning ensemble. Her wide-set eyes betrayed nothing except recognition. Her high-cheeked, wellbred, fiftyish face did not change its expression, but retained its cool, phlegmatic sadness.

  Dilman felt his Adam’s apple drop and rise. He was too tongue-tied to know how to address her. He had met her fleetingly at T. C.’s annual dinners for the members of the Senate. He had seen her three times during the week of grief and burial. He had never exchanged more than an incoherent phrase with her. He could hardly recall her maiden name, only that her given name was Hesper, the renowned and admired Hesper who had been one of the few First Ladies to bring style and grace to the White House. He could not force himself to address her so quickly by mere proper name, like any ordinary citizen, although he knew that she was no longer First Lady, her title and eminence stolen from her by Fate. Yet, she was what she was, T. C.’s widow.

  He turned for the valet, as if for help, but realized that Beecher was retreating, readying to withdraw from the room.

  Dilman faced her. “Good morning. I’m sorry to walk in on you this way. I’d been told that you had left—”

  “The apology should be mine, not yours, Senator Dilman. I did, indeed, move out yesterday. It was kind of you to be so patient, to give me the entire week. But last night I remembered some of my husband’s personal correspondence I had overlooked.” She touched the table desk behind her. “It was in this desk, the one he always used late at night.”

  “I hope you found what you wanted,” said Dilman lamely. “Perhaps you wish to look around some more? I—I have other things I have to—”

  She lifted a gloved hand. “No, please, Senator.” She took up the packet of letters, bound by a rubber band. “I have everything now. I know this is your moving day, and I must not be underfoot. But, in a way, I’m pleased this happened, our meeting like this, away from the crowds, the misery.”

  “I don’t know if I’ve adequately extended my deep feeling of grief,” said Dilman, “or my condolences. I welcome the chance to repeat both. All of us are less, without T. C.”

  She was quietly observing him. “Thank you. You are very generous, Senator Dilman.”

  Dilman’s sensitivity had come closer to his skin, and now he was acutely conscious of her manner of addressing him. Despite her good breeding, her infallible manners, she was not addressing him as Mr. President. To her he had been a senator, and he was a senator still, and she would not recognize his accession. Or worse, she regarded him as an inferior, a Negro inferior, unworthy of replacing her husband as Chief Executive.

  But then Dilman rejected the motive of intended, or unconscious, insult. She was not demeaning him in any way. He was being ungenerous, overly susceptible to his own conviction of his inferiority, and he was better able to understand this suffering woman. She had come through the long, ambitious political years, with their gains and setbacks, clutching the hand of one mate. She had encouraged him, yearned and aspired with him, shared the ultimate victory with him. Overnight, at the height of reign and glory, his crown had been torn from him, his page in history ripped in half. She could not let herself lose both for him yet. For her, beneath her controlled sorrow, there was a refusal to accept unfair reality. For her, still, there could be only one President, one Mr. President, and that one her dearest, her own one. She would not let him be dethroned, not so soon, perhaps not ever. She would not be unfaithful to his love and their dreams. She would acknowledge no usurper.

  Dilman knew what was required of him. He must reassure her. “I do want to add this—this one thing,” he said. “I consider myself a temporary tenant of this house. If it belongs to anyone, it still belongs to your husband and yourself. You earned your residence here. I have not. I am keenly aware of the fact. I want you to continue to feel it is your house. The doors will forever be open to you and your son.”

  “Yes,” she said absently. “Thank you again.”

  She paced a few steps, nervously, then moved to the yellow sofa nearest the fireplace and sat down, head bowed.

  Dilman’s uneasiness increased. He wanted to escape. “I—I think you deserve some privacy. I’ll go.”

  Her head came up, and she spoke as if she had not heard him. “You have a son, too, have you not, Senator? I can’t remember.”

  “Yes. A twenty-year-old boy at Trafford University. In fact, he’s coming down to see me today.”

  “It is wonderful, having a son. My own is at Andover.” Her eyes took in the room. “He so enjoyed coming here. He was so proud and thrilled. Like his father, he has a sense of history.”

  Dilman did not know how he could reply or comment. He wanted to move the conversation away from the White House. Because it was difficult speaking to her across the table desk, he walked around it and sat on the corner of the other sofa. “Have you made any plans yet? Will you stay on in Washington?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. Of course, Freddie will return to school. I believe I’ll settle in our Phoenix house. There’s so much, so very much, to be done. I want to go through T. C.’s papers. Princeton is preparing a special Presidential Wing to receive them. Then many fine scholars, historians, want to write biographies about my husband. I think they should. I think it’s my duty, difficult as it will be, to cooperate.” She paused. “By the way, Miss Laurel—she’s been our social secretary—Miss Laurel has consented to come along with me, to help handle the thousands of letters that have poured in, to help with the rest. I believe that you’ll have her resignation today. I hope you won’t mind?”

  “Not at all,” said Dilman hastily. “She belongs with you.”

  She was inspecting him once more. “You’re alone, I’m told. Who will run this place for you?”

  “I’m sure it will run itself.”

  “No. It needs someone. There is so much that goes on. It needs a woman. Find one—an experienced social secretary, at least.”

  “I—I’ll try to find someone,” he said. “I’m fortunate to have Miss Foster.”

  “She’ll be helpful, but she is limited. I might
add, I’ve requested her to empty my husband’s files, and put them in some kind of order, and send them to me—you know, for the biographers. I promise, she won’t take too much time away from you.”

  “Miss Foster and I will do anything to cooperate. I want to do whatever is possible to commemorate T. C.’s achievements and his leadership. No matter what, do not hesitate to call upon me.”

  She was staring at him. “There is one thing,” she said slowly, but said no more.

  “Please, anything—”

  She pulled herself erect. Her manner was more candid now, more firm and forthright. “Perhaps what I am about to say I should not say. Perhaps it is out of line. Do not misunderstand. I am not being presumptuous. I may be moved by private emotion, but I choose to think that what is giving me strength to speak out is my concern for the millions of Americans who voted for my husband, backed him, depended upon him.” She caught her breath, and then rushed on. “Nothing I can do from this day forward, no gathering of his letters and documents, no publication of his speeches and life, can be one-tenth as useful as what you can do, Senator Dilman. You alone can truly perpetuate T. C.’s memory and the ideals for which he gave his life. You, and no other, can serve his voters and the future generations who will be grateful for what he accomplished. You yourself can be his best memorial.”

  Her urgency troubled and bewildered Dilman, and the burden she was settling upon him made him wince inwardly. He did not speak, but waited, hoping that he was masking his dismay.

  She went on. “You will be sitting in the chair T. C. was to have sat in these next critical seventeen months. You will be holding the pen he was to have held when his proposals and legislations come to your desk. You will be implementing decisions on matters here and abroad, decisions he had already made but had had no opportunity to carry out. You will be surrounded by good and wise men, Governor Talley, Secretary Eaton, Attorney General Kemmler, General Fortney, whom T. C. appointed, counted upon, whose advice he would have continued heeding, but whose words he can hear no longer.”