At that, the meeting broke up and people began to drift out of the room. Oliver Wendell lingered. He put an arm around Callaway’s shoulder and walked him over to a corner. “Charlie,” he said, quietly, “you didn’t really expect me to support you did you?”
“No,” President Callaway admitted. “You reacted pretty much the way I thought you would. But I’m not giving up hope. In fact, I think you’ll come around in the end.”
Wendell laughed.
*
Marty Katz leaned back in his office chair, opened his desk-top humidor and selected a cigar almost the size of a crow bar. He lit it with an ancient silver-plated Ronson table lighter.
“You gotta do that, don’t you?” Eric Wang complained.
“Helps me think, Eric.”
“Makes it hard for me.”
“Well, as Mark Twain said, ‘If I cannot smoke in heaven, then I shall not go.”
Veronica sniffed the air with interest. “My father used to smoke cigars,” she said. “Mother always said it was a filthy habit.”
“She was right,” Wang put in.
“He almost stopped when Mother explained the Freudian implications,” Veronica said, smiling.
Katz was ready for this. “But Freud also said, ‘Sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar.”
Veronica and Wang exchanged glances. “Men,’ she explained.
Katz smiled and blew one his famously perfect smoke rings in Veronica’s direction.
“I hate to interrupt your self-indulgence, Marty,” Wang said, “but we got some business to take care of.”
“Oh yeah,” Katz said between puffs. “Anthony Zolli.”
“It’s beginning to look like he’s not kidding,” Veronica observed.
“It’s hard to believe he’d call a strike just to protest a meeting,” Wang said.
“Nevertheless,” said Katz.
“He feels threatened,” Veronica said. “It’s a power thing.”
“I agree,” Katz said. “He’s worried about an influx of non-union workers from the Confederacy.”
“Well, he has a point,” Veronica admitted.
“So what do we do?” Wang asked. “Is it a matter of money? Do we have to massage his ego?”
Katz put his feet up on his desk and took a deep drag. He released the smoke in a single, thick contrail, which eventually ran headlong into a window and diffused. “Offer him a post on the President’s Labor Advisory Board?”
“Marty, this guy thinks he’s another Jimmy Hoffa,” Veronica said. “Somehow, I don’t think a gold star on his report card will guarantee his good behavior.”
“Hmm,” Katz said, and he took another puff on his cigar.
“We could seize the union, issue a President proclamation,” Wang said.
Veronica considered that. “And just how would you explain that ridiculous overreaction?”
“National security,” Wang said promptly.
Katz sighed. “You’ve been playing too many video games, Eric.”
“I haven’t played a video game in fifteen years,” Wang retorted. “Or ten, at least.”
“We don’t seem to be solving our problem,” Veronica said.
Wang had another suggestion. “How about breaking the strike with the National Guard.”
“Zolli would just strike somewhere else,” Katz said. “We’d end up playing whack-a-mole.”
“If he’s worried about losing power,” Veronica “Maybe we can figure out a way to convince him it would be the other way around.”
“You mean that he’d gain from reunion?” Wang said, incredulous.
“He will, you know,” Veronica said. “We all will.”
“Yeah,” Wang said, “but that’s beside the point.”
“I could call him, ask nicely,” Katz said, half kidding.
“Yeah, that’d do it,” said Wang.
“Maybe invite him here.” This was Veronica’s suggestion.
Katz took another long drag on his cigar. “I have an idea,” he said.
*
Junior was running out of time. In the next day or two, Buddy Bourque would be addressing the nation, setting into motion a series of events that would inexorably lead to the end of the Confederacy. What’s worse, if anything could be, he’d be doing that from a platform provided by none other than Harlan Hurbuckle, Sr.—Junior’s dad: the altar of the Glass Church.
It was intolerable. It was worse than intolerable, it was unthinkable—that this loathsome traitor should destroy all that Junior knew and held dear, and that he should be aided in this despicable act by Junior’s own turncoat father, which, in posterity’s view, would forever tarnish him as well.
For reasons Junior did not try to comprehend, fate had given him the responsibility of preventing this catastrophe. It had also given him the opportunity to carry out the deed, since he would be sharing the platform with his father and Bourque at the critical moment. And now sitting on his rickety Formica dining room table were the means to do the job: eight sticks of dynamite, a palm-sized detonator and wires to connect them.
Time was when it would have taken considerable expertise to build a bomb. But because of the Internet, even a mechanically-challenged klutz like Harlan Hurbuckle Jr. could do the job without straining himself overmuch. It was just a matter of Googling up the proper diagrams. The whole process was even available on YouTube videos.
And so Junior sat there on a aged kitchen chair whose chrome tubing was peeling and whose vinyl upholstery was worn smooth, contemplating the task at hand and carefully lining up the tools he thought he might need: a Buck knife, a Philips-head screwdriver, a pliers, and a roll of black electrical tape.
Before he could actually build the bomb, he realized, he had to do some thinking. Did he want to bring down the whole church, or only a large part of it? Did he care whether or not he killed any of the innocent parishioners, or would his purpose be fully served merely by eliminating Buddy Bourque?
And when Bourque gave his speech to the Confederacy, who was likely to be up there on the platform with him? Of course, there’d be the Great Baptist Preacher, Harlan Hurbuckle, Sr., his father that is, standing beside his friend the President, supporting Bourque’s treason. Hurbuckle, Sr. would have to go too, and not just because he was backing Bourque. As far as Junior was concerned, his father had committed any number of other sins for which punishment was long overdue.
Maybe Kooter Barnes would also be on the platform. Well, one less windbag, that wouldn’t be any loss. On the other hand, Delphine might be there too, and Junior didn’t wish any harm to come to her. He’d had other kinds of dreams about Delphine, and as far as this enterprise was concerned, she was off limits.
So a couple of sticks of dynamite would do the job. All he had to do was tape them to his chest that morning, get between his father and Buddy Bourque, then squeeze the detonator. And that was a simple matter of making a fist. Three people would die, including himself.
It wasn’t that he wanted to die. He didn’t. But he was willing to give up his life on the chance that it could halt reunion. And he liked thinking of himself as a martyr. Of course, not everyone would think of him that way. Some would misunderstand him, call him crazy, question his motives—the NAU’s nigra President, for example.
But history would understand. History would see the result of his sacrifice. It would be clear to future generations of Confederate citizens, and, for that matter, to northerners. He would be seen as a savior, divinely directed. Junior would be remembered as holier than his father had ever hoped to be. He would be respected. He would be loved, even by those who did not immediately understand.
A single word flickered through his consciousness…failure. But the moment he became aware of it, he suppressed it. He squashed it. It was an impossibility. Without Bourque and without Harlan Hurbuckle, Sr., reunion could never happen. And here were the means to stop them.
Junior rolled up his sleeves and looked at the diagram he’d downloaded from the Internet. Then
he began his work.
*
“Give me two minutes, then send him in,” President Callaway said into his phone. He buttoned the top button of his shirt, tightened his tie and slipped on his jacket. An empty coffee mug sat on his desk. He picked it up, looked for some place to put it and eventually dropped it gently into his wastebasket. Then he straightened some piles of paper, centered his desk and sat up straight.
The door to the Oval Office opened and one of the White House’s efficient young interns ushered a man inside. “Mr. President,” she said. “This is Mr. Anthony Zolli.”
Zolli stood there, just inside the door, looking terminally uncomfortable in a polyester Lockett pinstripe suit, a white shirt, a nondescript striped tie and brown wing tips from another era. He craned his head around, eyes agape, as though he was a loin-clothed Maori in Westminster Abbey.
“Mr. Zolli,” President Callaway said, standing, hoping to catch Zolli’s attention. “Please come in and have a seat.”
“Thank you,” Zolli managed to say. He walked toward the President’s desk with evident trepidation, his face set in what he intended to be an expression of great determination, a demonstration that he would not to succumb to the President’s vaunted charm and eloquence.
Callaway stood and reached down across his desk to shake the shorter man’s hand. He gestured toward a guest chair in front of the desk and Zolli plopped down into it. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Zolli.”
“Likewise I’m sure.”
“Thank you very much for taking time out of your busy schedule to come see me. As my Chief of Staff told you, I want to talk to you about a very important matter, on which I need your cooperation.”
“I see,” Zolli said, suspicious and not hiding it.
“May I call you Tony?”
Zolli shrugged. “Yeah, sure, why not. It’s my name.”
“Well, I want to talk to you about my meeting with President Bourque, Tony.”
“I wish y’would, Mr. President. The Truckers’ are very concerned about dat. We tink it wasn’t a very good idea.” He sounded truculent.
“So I gather, Tony.” Callaway said, unfazed. “A few days ago, I had a phone conversation with Mr. DuShain, from the New York Container Terminal. He told me you’re worried what might happen if we came to an agreement with the Confederacy and you had to deal with a huge influx of people looking for work, which, of course, I already knew.”
“Yeah,” Zolli said, “dat’s right.” He sounded surprised that the President understood. “An influx of uneducated Blacks. ‘Scuse me, sir, don’t mean nuttin’ by dat. But we’re worried about jobs and wages. We doan want no agreement.”
Callaway nodded sympathetically. “I want you to know we’ve given your needs and the needs of your union very serious consideration.”
Zolli smiled, at least with the lower part of his face. “Y’know, Mr. President, no disrespect, but in my bidness, that’s da kind of ting someone says just before he stabs the odda guy in da back.”
“No one’s going to be doing any stabbing today, Tony,” Callaway said, smiling.. “I’ve called you in because I think I’ve found a way for us both to have what we want.”
“Begging your pardon, Mr. President,” Zolli said. His fleshy face was creased with a sly smile, “but in my opinion, dat would be one neat trick. You some kinda magician?”
Callaway held up a hand. “Hear me out, Tony. That’s all I ask.”
“Sure, sure. Dint mean to interrupt.”
“I have a couple of surprises for you, Tony, but you’re going to have to keep them secret for awhile—a day or two. I have your word on that?”
Zolli couldn’t decide how to respond, wanting neither to seem submissive nor defiant.. “Mr. President, I…”
Callaway met Zolli’s eyes and held them. “Tony, before I continue, I must have your word that everything you hear in this conversation is between us and only us.”
Zolli finally realized what he had to say. “You want dat I should take an oath, Mr. President?”
Callaway chuckled. “No, Tony. That won’t be necessary. Your word will do. Do I have it?”
“Yes, sir. This conversation’s just between us.”
Callaway leaned back in his chair and found a stray paperclip on his desk. He picked it up and twisted it open. “You won’t have to keep the secret long, Tony. Just a few days and it’ll all be public knowledge.”
“Yes sir.” By this time, Zolli was starting to feel like a privileged confidant. He leaned forward, so he wouldn’t miss a single syllable.
“Okay,” Callaway said, “First of all, we are on the verge of a deal with the Confederacy. We’re going to try for reunion.” He smiled.
Zolli sat back, dumbfounded. “Reunion, y’say? Reunion? You mean, come back, come back, all is forgiven? You think the American people gonna put up with dat? With all due respect, Mr. President, I doan think so.”
“It’s not going to be the Confederacy as we know it, Tony. It’s going to follow all of our laws and customs. It’ll just make America bigger. And stronger. And eventually wealthier.”
“Y’can’t legislate morality, Mr. President, with all due respect.”
“You can’t legislate the way a person thinks, Tony,” Callaway admitted. “But you can legislate the way he acts. That’s why most people obey our laws against murder and running red lights. And when people get into the habit of acting right, before you know it, they’re thinking right too.”
“Yeah, I see watcha mean,” Tony said. He sounded as though he’d just been told elephants could fly.
“Laws work pretty well, even when they involve moral issues.”
“Maybe so,” Zolli said, meaning you sure haven’t convinced me. “But deyr gonna come north, Mr. President. Ya can’t deny dat. We’re in for a tidal wave of poor refugees, lookin’ for work, millions of ‘em, ready to take anythin’, even for practically no pay. Union busting pay. What are we gonna do with ‘em?”
“Ah. That’s the second surprise, Tony,” Callaway said, with just the slightest smile. “My people have been talking to a dozen of America’s largest manufacturers—you know who I’m talking about—and persuaded them that the South will be a new and lucrative market, if they develop it. They’ve seriously considering building manufacturing plants in the South, factories that will pay union wages.”
“You mean…”
“I’m talking about the car, airplane and electronics manufacturers, the heart of our industry, Tony. And my guess is that many other manufacturers will follow them.”
“You say deyv agreed to pay union wages, Mr. President?”
“Let’s just say they let us know they could be convinced, under the right circumstances. And all those new workers down south, well, wouldn’t be much of a surprise if they wanted to join unions, would it? Including the Truckers’’ Union.”
“Join unions,” Zolli said, contemplating the idea. “Join unions. Now that’s—whadda ya call it?—the horse of a different color. Hadn’t thought of that.”
Callaway watched with interest as Zolli struggled to calculate which was to his greater advantage—a series of long, divisive and very expensive strikes, mirror images of what was happening at the New York Container Terminal, or the picture his President had just painted, of a bigger, stronger and definitely richer Truckers’’ Union.
He decided to give the union leader one more nudge. “I think we’re going to see a massive industrialization of the South, taking nothing from the North, but serving new markets and providing new employment opportunities,” Callaway went on. “It’s going to give new life to the unions. It’ll mean tens of thousands of new members for the Truckers’. How does that sound to you, Tony?”
Zolli tried to come up with a fatal flaw in the President’s vision, but nothing occurred to him. “Hmmm. Doan sound so bad when you put it dat way.”
Callaway smiled. It was time to ask for the order. “I was hoping you’d feel that way, Tony. So I wonder if I could ask
a favor.”
“Yeah?” The suspicion returned. “A favor? Such as?”
“Your strike at the container terminal. I don’t think continuing it will be very useful to either of us,” Callaway said gently.
“Yes,” Zolli admitted. “I can see why ya might think dat.”
“So I wonder if you’d be willing to suspend it for a week or two, and cancel it altogether if what I’m telling you turns out to be true. Of course, you could still call a strike if things don’t work out the way I say they will, so you wouldn’t lose anything. The delay might serve us both, Tony. And America as well.”
Zolli put his chin on his fist and became a reasonable, if badly executed, imitation of The Thinker. Callaway did nothing to interrupt the silence. Finally, the labor leader looked up.
“Mr. President,” he said, “I’m an American before I’m a Trucker, and I see da sense of what you’re saying. If everything turns out the way ya say, we both get what we want, which surprises me considerably. So I’ll tell ya what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna put a hold on any furder union action, ya know, take a wait and see attitude. For da sake of my country and my union.”
“Well, I appreciate that, Tony,” Callaway said. “I think you’re making a very wise choice. History—and your union—will judge you well for it.”
Zolli came very close to blushing.
“You going to have trouble convincing your union officials to hold their fire?” Callaway asked. “I can make some calls if you think it’s necessary.”
“No, Mr. President. I can handle my people.”
“I thought you’d say that, Tony. Just remember, this is between us.”
“I gave my word, Mr. President.”
“And I thank you for it, Tony. You are a real American.”
The President stood, and Zolli, following his lead, did the same. The door opened and the intern appeared. “Thank you, Mr. President,” Zolli said, realizing the audience had come to an end. Then he left the room, trying to figure out what Callaway had done to him.
ReUNION: What if the Civil War had never happened? Page 38