He hoped Bernie was listening, and was understanding the remark exactly the way he himself was taking it. The audience in the convention hall and throughout the country might think Nixon was imagining a North Vietnamese trick—maybe a prisoner release designed to help McGovern—but he knew, and Bernie would, too, that the president was talking about Castro’s money going to the DNC, the very thing they could have established if they’d had a little more time inside the offices before the cops showed up. Nixon was giving the burglars a signal that what they had attempted was important, and that, yes, they would be taken care of—even after the election.
As he listened to the televised cheering from Miami, he decided—once and for all, he told himself—that the commitment Colson had spoken of was real, and that Mr. Rivers’s complaints were no more than the insubordinate grousings of a messenger boy who didn’t know the real story.
That was what he wanted to believe. But the way his mind had been turning and working of late, he knew he might believe something quite different an hour from now.
“Dorothy!” Hunt called down the stairs, wanting to enjoy and prolong his certainty. He wished in fact that he had turned on one of his study’s several small tape recorders before Nixon had said what he said. But he remembered it word for word, and he needed to share it with his wife. He called her name once more and added, “Buenas noticias!”
Fred LaRue, sitting on a spare folding chair with his state delegation, read no special meaning into the Old Man’s warning about foreign interference in the election, but he did experience a moment of satisfaction over the presidential promise to keep appointing tough-on-crime judges—a pledge that surely wouldn’t hurt his own dealings with southerners on the Hill.
LaRue looked over at the big vertical state standard—MISSISSIPPI—and imagined Clarine Lander trying to seize its equivalent for the liberal insurgents at the Democrats’ Atlantic City gathering, back in ’64. He’d still been trying to get over Larrie that summer, when he went to his own first convention, all the way out in San Francisco. When Rocky came to the Cow Palace’s podium, all the mad-for-Goldwater delegates had had a ferocious go at their nemesis, screaming, “You lousy lover! You lousy lover!” to this fantastically rich governor who’d just divorced his wife to marry his mistress. LaRue had joined in the shouting, and even if his own yells were scarcely louder than another man’s murmurs, he’d been shocked to hear them come out of his mouth. What he felt toward Rockefeller wasn’t so much anger as identification and envy. By Mississippi standards, Fred LaRue was a very rich man, but he had not been able to spirit Larrie away from her own life and into his.
Tonight, eight years later, Rockefeller had actually put the Old Man’s name in nomination, making their long rivalry seem very far back indeed. Which made the time of Clarine Lander seem long ago, too. None of the men he was here in Miami with had been part of his life in the years when she drove all his thoughts.
Mardian, Dean, Magruder, and Colson—looking god-awful in his Bermuda shorts each afternoon—were all here, but at no point tonight had he spotted a one of them on the convention floor. Even by day, instead of being anywhere near the activities of the ethnic “heritage groups” and special-interest caucuses, they could be found by the pool at the Doral, ordering drinks and talking about the effort to keep a lid on Watergate.
They were now all pretty sure they’d done that. Magruder, after hours of coaching by Dean, had lied his way through a second grandjury appearance only last week, and two days later had gotten word that his name would not be among those being charged when the indictments came down, probably in the middle of September.
The agreed-upon story, that it had all been Liddy’s harebrained idea, and that no one else had any clue, seemed to be taking hold not only in the minds of the prosecutors but in the heads of half the guys peddling it from the White House and Committee to Re-Elect. The youngest of them, so eager for promotion, were lining up to testify to all kinds of stuff they knew nothing about; they just asked for a script. And once they recited it, they more or less believed it.
The night Magruder got his good news, the two of them had gotten plastered. Jeb, experiencing a sentimental moment, had looked him in the eye and said, “You know, Fred, we’re not covering up a burglary; we’re safeguarding world peace.” To which he himself could only reply, “Jebbie, you’re going to have one blue-ribbon motherfucker of a hangover in the morning.”
If Magruder knew how the burglary had actually come about, who ordered it, he’d never told him. And maybe, of course, he didn’t know. Not knowing the exact truth was another thing that made the lying easier; it created the possibility that some of what one told the investigators just might be true, like the stopped clock that’s right twice a day.
“I thought he was the best man for the job four years ago. I think he is the best man for the job today. And I am not going to change my mind tomorrow!”
The president had gotten to the point where he was talking about Agnew, and his jab at the Eagleton fiasco had everybody on their feet for what must be the twentieth time. LaRue was standing with them, but this mention of “the best man for the job” and the supposed constancy of Nixon’s affection made him think of the man who was no longer at the head of the Committee to Re-Elect, and nowhere to be found here in Miami.
He imagined that Mitchell was watching the speech on a couch in his apartment at the Watergate, where he and Martha were still marooned, though she’d begun looking at places for them back in New York. Martha never liked missing a shindig, and to be away from this one because her husband’s presence had been deemed too toxic would surely not be improving her mood.
Up on the podium Nixon gets ready to end the speech the way he ended his televised address in Russia three months back, quoting the diary of the twelve-year-old girl whose whole family was killed in the siege of Leningrad during the war:
“All are dead. Only Tanya is left.”
He waits for a second, at the pause marked in Rose’s typing. Then he goes on: “Let us think of Tanya, and of the other Tanyas, and their brothers and sisters everywhere in Russia, in China, as we proudly meet our responsibilities for leadership in the world …
Brezhnev told him that the diary passages had brought tears to his eyes when he heard Nixon read them. And right now Nixon wonders if the cameras are close enough in to see that his own eyes are damp. Whether this is from the words, or from another trace of gas that has gotten through the goddamned ventilation ducts, he honestly doesn’t know.
Chapter Nine
SEPTEMBER 15, 1972, 8:15 P.M.
POTOMAC RIVER, NEAR MOUNT VERNON, VIRGINIA, ABOARD THE SEQUOIA
“I talked to Connally this morning.”
Nixon’s words brought a sudden end to several moments of revery that Pat Buchanan and Alexander Haig had been enjoying in their cushioned chairs on the starboard side of the presidential yacht. The eyes of the two aides stopped following the Sequoia’s gentle wake and met the president’s gaze.
“I told him I don’t want Teddy Kennedy sweeping up the Democrats’ smithereens after November seventh. There’s plenty of opportunity to be found in defeat—nobody knows that better than I do—and I don’t want Kennedy looking like some elder statesman they should turn to in their time of need.”
Buchanan let loose his whinnying laugh. “It’d be a lot easier for Connally to influence the matter if he were really still a Democrat.”
Nixon was unamused by Connally’s still-ambiguous status. Disappointed even now at having to keep Agnew on the ticket, he wished that his former Treasury secretary were already fully inside the Republican tent. He thought him wasted running his “Democrats for Nixon” sideshow, even if that operation did succeed in humiliating the opposition every few days, whenever some big labor leader or old Johnson appointee agreed to put on a press conference for the purpose of declaring that no amount of party loyalty could make him vote for George McGovern. Connally now privately swore that LBJ himself—a non-person at hi
s party’s own convention—did intend to vote for his Republican successor.
The sudden darkening of the president’s mood was noted a few deck chairs away by Rose Woods. But she knew the boss had had too good a day for any grimness to last, and that he was pleased to have General Haig for company tonight instead of Kissinger. Henry’s deputy was brisk, funny, and given to quoting Shakespeare; older and less brass-knuckled than Buchanan, but just as full of pep. When the boss tried to relax, he didn’t need Henry underlining his every offhand insight with some guttural profundity or toadying compliment. Rose liked to do an imitation of Kissinger’s pompous low growl for the girls in the office; she’d talk about “decdonic shifts in de geobolidical bicture.” The shift she’d really like to see was Teutonic, a double whammy that would move Henry out of the White House and over to State and send Haldeman all the way back to California.
Yes, it was not impossible that HRH might decide he was feeling worn out as the second term got under way. But what then? The man had no particular credentials and no interest in policy and no desire for social advancement, so there was no clear reward that Richard Nixon could give him—no judgeship, cabinet post, ambassador’s job. But maybe that wouldn’t matter. HRH was a strange enough bird that Rose could imagine him going right back to his ad agency in Los Angeles, as if nothing had happened since 1968.
She was happy about his absence tonight, the same way the boss was happy about Henry’s. She had allowed herself a third glass of white wine along with the Dover sole. The album with “Georgia on My Mind” was again softly playing. Ray Charles had been in the Oval Office for a photo op this morning, and the first time the song came on tonight Buchanan had predicted how friendly and massive the president’s reception would be when he and Pat campaigned next month in Atlanta.
Rose felt the breeze on her cheek and caught sight of some shoreline cyclists starting to pedal a bit harder, trying to make it home before dark. She didn’t want the day to end, and felt sorry that Mount Vernon’s familiar cupola had come into view.
The Sequoia offered its usual salute to the first president: Nixon always had a navy bugler play taps when they reached this point. But tonight he seemed surprised by the gesture, jumping in his seat when the first note sounded. When the sad little tune was over, he hurried to make a casual remark, trying to deflect attention from his startlement.
“Did you hear that bastard Shriver called me a ‘psychiatric case’?”
General Haig replied that the Democrats’ veep-replacement nominee was “something infinitely more pathetic.”
“What’s that?” asked Buchanan.
“A brother-in-law,” said Haig.
Buchanan whinnied again, and Rose suppressed a laugh, lest they know she was listening closely. The boss managed a smile and indicated that it was time to transfer to the little landing craft that would take them to the helicopter waiting on the Mount Vernon lawn. He disembarked with his arm around Julie, who’d been sitting by herself doing needlework.
When they reached the helicopter, Rose looked wistfully back at the Sequoia. She never knew when it might disappear; the president had decided it was outmoded and probably riddled with listening devices, despite numerous security sweeps. He’d recently told Dean—the administration’s new can-do white-haired boy—to acquire photos and blueprints of the best possible replacement yachts, and to investigate the regulations under which their current owners could legally be approached to make a public-spirited donation of them. As soon as the election was over, an open competition to do so would become its own little regatta, Rose imagined.
Aboard the helicopter, she strapped herself into a seat opposite the boss.
“Your cold doesn’t sound so bad,” she said.
Nixon pointed to Dr. Lukash a row away and said, loud enough for him to hear the compliment, “He knocked it right out of me.” Then, more softly, for only Rose to hear, he added, “I’m afraid Pat’s earache isn’t any better.”
You couldn’t say he really missed her, thought Rose. But even so, the first lady’s presence here tonight would have made him feel fully armored and more comfortable.
Nixon pointed to General Haig. “Al did some nice stroking of the Taiwanese ambassador when we had him in today. Poor bastards,” said the president. “But things are now the way they’ve got to be.”
“They haven’t got a Chinaman’s chance,” said the conservative Buchanan, with a laugh, though the Peking trip had tested the limits of his ideological flexibility.
“I’ll tell you the really important conversation I had today,” said Nixon. “A little talk with Haldeman and Dean. Now that these indictments have finally come down, we’re gonna get these goddamned Democrats. I promise you, once we’re past November seventh, we’re going to use the IRS against all of them, Edward Bennett Williams included.” When no one higher than the burglars was charged this afternoon, the Democrats’ civil suit had become the worst remaining Watergate annoyance.
“Mr. President,” said Buchanan, “what you’ve got to worry about is the real chilling effect of this whole scandal. If we let the Democrats criminalize what’s nothing but ordinary politics, the people on our side are going to be too scared to operate. They’re going to go around acting like the League of Women Voters.”
Nixon nodded. “Exactly right. The point is they should be finding out stuff like the connections between Larry O’Brien and Hughes. There are a lot better ways of doing that than breaking into the stupid committee headquarters, but damn it, we still ought to be pursuing that, even after November seventh if need be.”
“The information can be a gift to your successors,” said Buchanan. “A little something you put in the bank for them.”
Everyone laughed. Unlike Henry, Buchanan understood how to encourage the boss without flattery and fawning. “Billy Graham says you’re becoming a father figure, like Ike,” the speechwriter was now saying. “I got that from Haldeman—and told him I didn’t think you were that mean.” He winked at Rose just before the rotors started up and the nine-minute flight to the South Lawn got under way.
She recalled how nice it had been last month when Don Carnevale chartered that seaplane so the two of them could skip one of the convention’s afternoon sessions for a low, scenic excursion over the Florida Keys. Now, in the still-not-full darkness, as the helicopter flew parallel to the Roosevelt Bridge, Rose looked down at the monuments to Jefferson and Lincoln and wondered what would be standing there two or three generations from now commemorating Richard Nixon. He’d already earned a bridge, at the very least, she thought; and if the next four years turned out anything like the past six months, it was hardly foolish to think he might have his own marble temple on the Mall someday.
They landed at 8:52, and Rose could sense that the boss was itching to call Colson before he even had his seatbelt off. He put his arm around Julie for just a second while people made their goodbyes. As he departed, there were even a couple of hear-hears, acknowledgment that what Attorney General Kleindienst called the most thorough federal investigation of any crime since the JFK killing had reached its essential conclusion and they could get on with the business of crushing McGovern once and for all.
At 9:09 in the Lincoln Sitting Room, with his Irish setter at his feet, Nixon asked the White House operator to get hold of Colson.
“Well, we got through it,” the president said, as soon as his special counsel came on the line.
“Free and clear,” said Colson, laughing. “Just like Willy Loman.”
“Well,” said Nixon. “There are still those damned hearings in the House that Patman’s trying to hold.”
“Jerry Ford can put the kibosh on those. If every Republican refuses to participate, they won’t get off the ground.”
Nixon wished that Colson would somehow fess up to the whole thing without exactly fessing up—that is, admit he had set the burglary in motion; admit it clearly but obliquely, without burdening the president with explicit knowledge that would be dangerous
for him to have, information that might yet, someday, necessitate perjury, if only in some other far-off civil suit. What he wanted most was to know that Mitchell was not responsible, and that these investigations—if they turned out not to be really over—wouldn’t claim the friend to whom he owed so much. No, he supposed he didn’t truly believe that today’s chickenshit indictments would be the end of things, but he’d be able to sleep a little better if he knew Mitchell was in the clear.
“I was worried they’d get Magruder” was all he said for a moment.
Colson laughed. “Jeb will just be mad he wasn’t out on the Sequoia with you. He’s like a doll without batteries when he’s not wearing his White House cuff links.”
“You heard from your friend Hunt?” Nixon asked, casually.
“No, not a word,” said Colson, without specifying the time frame his answer was supposed to cover. If the president meant since the indictments came down this morning, or since last week, then the answer was true.
“Mitchell won’t be in town much longer,” said Nixon. “He’s alone right now, in fact. Martha’s gone up to New York to live in a hotel until this apartment she’s found is ready for them. And I suppose until they can get past whatever co-op board they’ve got to go through. Goddamned Fifth Avenue liberals! The man was the attorney general of the United States, for Christ’s sake.”
Colson said nothing.
“I’ll be seeing both of them—Martha, too—at this fundraiser in New York, week after next, after I’m back from Connally’s ranch. If she behaves herself at this thing, and the press gets some good pictures, sees she’s still on board, that’ll make things easier for everybody, especially John.”
“Your new buddy Ray Charles going to play for this fundraiser?”
Nixon had to remind himself that Colson couldn’t stand Mitchell. There was no way he’d be drawn into discussing him just to assuage the boss’s concern about his old friend. So the president decided to let it go, for tonight and forever. He would choose to believe that it really was over, and that—from the sheer force of his will, and the power of Dr. Peale’s positive thinking—it would stay over. He poured himself another finger of 100 Pipers, rattled the ice cubes in his glass, and sank into philosophy, as the music from the boat came back into his mind.
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