The Man

by Irving Wallace

  “Mr. Manager, you are not interrogating me, you are lecturing me. And you are attempting to brainwash the Senate. Your assumptions are a tissue of lies, produced by your imagination, which you are attempting to stuff into the senators’ heads.”

  “Is that so? I am sure the able senators may see for facts what you prefer to see as a tissue of lies. Contrary to your reckless claim, the great Secretary of State was trying to preserve you in office, not usurp your office. If you yourself were not conscious of your inept bumbling of domestic and foreign affairs, and the national hostility this had engendered, Arthur Eaton was aware, as a dedicated patriot he was extremely aware, and devoted himself to protecting you from yourself, if only to preserve peace and the continuity of our government. If he withheld certain CIA documents from you, it was because he knew how dangerous they might be in your hands, how you might misuse the information because of your own unbalanced feelings about your race. Secretary Eaton’s reward for this act of patriotism was to be fired, illegally and lawlessly fired, by you. It is evident to one and all today, this very day, that Secretary Eaton was acting in the right in temporarily withholding from you certain hearsay information about Baraza. Because as we now see, once you had illegally removed your Secretary of State and learned what he tried to keep from you, you performed and are still performing as injudiciously and as dangerously as he had feared you would. You are ready to send American troops into Africa, are you not?”

  “Yes, I am. I have already informed the American public of that possibility.”

  “You are aware that Baraza has a population that is 100 per cent black?”

  “Yes, I am perfectly aware of that.”

  “Do you admit that, even if you alone think it should be done, you are ready to pour into the defense of this primitive African Nigra tract the peerless product of American manhood, to sacrifice rocketry battalions that are, by coincidence, 100 per cent white-skinned?”

  “Yes, that is true.”

  “Have you read the published accounts, only two hours ago released, that Premier Kasatkin spoke last night, in an address made in Leningrad, and said any American troops sent by you into Baraza would be regarded by the Soviet Union as an act of aggression? And that the Soviet Union would not stand for it?”

  “Yes, I have been informed of his speech. I have not read the newspaper accounts.”

  “Mr. President, are you prepared to risk the consequences of a worldwide nuclear war to protect something called Baraza?”

  “Every head of this nation, henceforth, will have to risk the possibility of nuclear war to protect both America’s freedom and democracy elsewhere.”

  “Or, in this case, to protect a patch of foreign jungle because its inhabitants are black, and you are black?”

  “I trust that is not a formal question. I would not demean myself by replying to it.”

  “We-ll, Mr. Witness, I am certain our honorable Secretary of State would be honest enough to reply to any question concerned with our life and our liberty. Nor would Secretary Eaton have countenanced the reckless and suicidal policy you are promoting. That is why I charge that you, knowing his feeling, and in defiance of law and the Senate, decided to thrust him aside. Tell me, Mr. Witness, do you consider yourself wiser than Arthur Eaton? Better versed in foreign affairs? More loving of your homeland than one whose ancestors came to these shores on the Mayflower and founded this republic to which your antecedents were later invited? No, there is no need to answer those questions. You need answer only this one: Do you feel that in recent weeks, and today, you have acted and are acting in the best interests of the United States, without being swayed by any outside pressures, without being influenced by any prejudices of any kind?”

  “Mr. Manager, no man on earth can say to you in naked honesty that he comes to a decision, arrives at a judgment, entirely devoid of prejudices. All men are possessed of certain prejudices, certain feelings, certain emotions toward every problem they face. These prejudices need not necessarily be harmful or bad. More often, they are good, and collaborate with intelligence and common sense. I have prejudices, strong prejudices, against tyranny, slavery, against arrogance, deceit, against vengefulness, demagoguery, against poverty, ignorance. I can only say to you that my understanding of the Presidency, its responsibilities, has grown inside me these last weeks, and perhaps I have grown with the office, grown in the knowledge of myself and of other men, grown in my vision of what our country and the world should be and can be. Today I am trying to act in the interests of every man, white or colored, who believes in a human being’s right to possess dignity, independence, equality among his fellow men. Today I am doing my best, doing what I believe to be best. I hope my decisions, and the results of these decisions, will be proved right. But no man, not even such a one as our recent Secretary of State, can always be right. We are both human beings. Human beings are fallible, they make mistakes-”

  “Mr. President, forgive me for interrupting your most diverting political address. But your last remark is one I dare not overlook. Human beings, you humbly and disarmingly say, are apt to make mistakes. I suggest to you, sir, that today, in this perilous day and time, this nation cannot afford to retain in office that kind of human being, a leader, a Chief Executive, a President who is apt to make a mistake-for a mistake, one mistake born of prejudice or rashness, can today mean the total annihilation of all humanity. And I fear that it is such a mistake, perpetrated by our President, that we must face, and pray to rectify in these somber hours. Mr. President, you have led us to the brink of destruction. But we have come to our senses. You shall lead us no more… That is all, sir… Mr. Chief Justice, as far as the House managers are concerned, the witness may be dismissed.”

  Douglass Dilman stood up.

  He had not done well, he knew. Yet he was curiously relieved. For he had done what he had known from the first must be done: he had made the invisible Article V a part of the conscience of the court, and tomorrow he would be judged on it and nothing less.

  Stepping down from the witness stand, then crossing past the podium and the table of opposition managers, he could see a crowd of press photographers, along with witnesses and page boys, jammed before and around the doorway to the Senators’ Private Lobby through which he would reach the President’s Room of the Senate. Then, as he moved toward the milling mob, he recognized Wanda’s distressed face among those waiting for him.

  That moment, he knew that there was one act left undone that he now wished done. In seconds, they would surround him, begging him to pose, and he would agree, yes, he would agree, but not before insisting that Wanda pose side by side with him. To some, it might be a small thing, but to him, it was of dominant importance. Yes, he would call her to him, because she was so beautiful, because she was so courageous, but, above all, because he must let her know that today, perhaps, he had finally earned the right to stand in public by her side.

  Now, at eight forty-five in the evening, and for the first time since Dilman had become President, certainly for the first time in many weeks, Arthur Eaton felt in high spirits.

  Arms folded across his vest, the ankles of his outstretched legs crossed, he sat back in the soft armchair and continued to watch the drama ooze out of the trial on the brilliantly colored television screen near the built-in bar of his living room. Chewing on the stem of his empty silver cigarette holder, Eaton followed Nat Abrahams as he plodded through his examination of the last of the defense witnesses.

  For Eaton, the trial was all but ended. Except for a few bad moments in the afternoon, when his own name had been bandied about in the low exchange between Abrahams and Sally Watson, it had been a glorious and heady day. Even when President Dilman had unexpectedly taken the witness stand, no doubt denigrating himself further in the public esteem by his undignified self-pleading, and collaborated with his counsel on that defensive pap about Eaton attempting to usurp his powers, Eaton had not been dismayed. He had known that Zeke Miller would, when his turn came, demolish
the President, and Miller had succeeded in so doing. Much as Eaton had formerly disliked the Southern legislator, he had been forced, more and more, to admire him for his clever (if barbaric) forensics. In fact, Eaton had told himself while watching the House manager make mincemeat of the President, if Miller were not handicapped by his inherited racial intolerance, he might make, very well might make, an excellent Attorney General in the Cabinet of a new Administration.

  Eaton surmised that not only for himself, but possibly for the millions viewing the live spectacular on television, the dramatic climax of the trial had been the foolhardy exhibition of President Dilman on the witness stand. Why had he risked it? Had he expected, under his counsel’s soft guidance, to sway the Senate and public to his side by his posture of persecuted martyr? If so, he had failed miserably. Zeke Miller had shown him for what he was, for the entire nation to see, not martyr but satyr, not public official but pitiful fool. That had been the high point: Dilman’s fall.

  All else that had followed before and after the dinner recess, and what Eaton could see now on the screen, was tiresome and technical and would change no votes. Tomorrow morning’s closing addresses by Miller and Abrahams, while they might provide some pyrotechnics, could do no more than underline and emphasize, and then summarize in capsule, the strongest contentions of both sides, all of which were already known. There was nothing left to feed into the Senate’s computing mind. The data had been fed. What was left, of interest, historic interest, was the answer that would be spewed out. When would the jurors vote? He remembered. They would vote tomorrow at two o’clock in the afternoon.

  Arthur Eaton wondered which suit he should wear tomorrow afternoon.

  The doorbell sounded, followed immediately by the heavy clanging of the antique brass front-door knocker.

  Eaton came out of the armchair, perplexed. He had expected no visitors tonight. And Kay, it could not be Kay. He had sent the car to the airport after her only twenty minutes ago, and besides, her flight from Miami was probably not in yet.

  Eaton opened the door, and then, to his amazement, he found himself staring at Sally Watson.

  “Well, President-elect-by-the-Senate, aren’t you going to let me in?” she asked.

  “I’m sorry, Sally. Of course, please do come in. I guess I was surprised. I thought you’d be busy, and-I was expecting someone else. I’m going to be tied up in a little while.”

  “Goody for you, my hero,” she said. “Well, I’m not tied up, only fit to be tied.”

  She went into the living room. Eaton closed the door and hastily followed her. She opened her leopard coat but did not remove it.

  Pirouetting on a spiked heel to confront him, she jerked her thumb toward the television set. “Licking your chops, Arthur?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Don’t be senile, Arthur.” She considered him. “I haven’t been made very welcome. I guess it has been as long as I thought.”

  Unhappily, he stepped toward her and kissed her lightly on the lips. Her breath was acrid with the fumes of whiskey, and he stepped back quickly, fighting to hide his reaction.

  “Don’t tell me, Arthur. Let me guess. Multiple choice. Is she drunk, or sorta drunk, or very drunk?” She tried to snap her fingers, but they missed. “Very drunk. Kee-rect!”

  “Sally, what’s going on with-?”

  She lifted her hand for silence. “Multiple choice number two. Is she drunk because she hasn’t seen or heard from him for eight days, or because he has broken three standing dates, or because he hasn’t answered six calls she made in forty-eight hours? Answer-not one but all, all, kee-rect! Fooled you, didn’t I?”

  “Sally, be reasonable. With this trial going on, every move I make is watched. Besides, I’ve been busy-”

  “I know, darling, busy and ill-what is the illness called?-oh yes, Presidential fever. That’s all that is ailing you, my hero.”

  “Well, what the devil is ailing you?”

  “Happy to tell you.” She walked farther into the room. “Am I allowed to take off my coat?”

  “Sally, I wish you could, but I am expecting company in a very short time.”

  “Okay. A drink, then.”

  He was reluctant to go to the bar. “Sally, don’t you think you’ve had enough?”

  “You bet I’ve had enough-enough of everything-so one more of anything won’t hurt.” As he reluctantly started for the bar, she added, “And shut off that damn television.”

  Eaton quickly complied. Then, as quickly, he poured a Scotch on ice for Sally, and a soft drink for himself.

  “Here you are, dear,” he said, handing her the Scotch.

  Accepting the drink in one hand, she tapped his glass with the other. “You used to do better than that, when you asked me to take off my coat and more.”

  “There is a conference tonight. I’ll have to have a clear head.”

  She drank at length, then she said, “All right.” She brooded over the glass, then she said suddenly, “Let’s have it out, Arthur. Are you trying to give me the brush, or what?”

  “Give you the brush?”

  “Are you trying to drop me? You know, you know, Galileo’s law or whoever it was. You hold something. You get tired holding it. You let go. It falls down and goes plop. You’re free of it.”

  “What a mind you have. Of course not, Sally. Don’t be silly. You know how I feel about you.”

  She brought her long fingers to her crimson lips in a feigned pose of profound reflection. “I want to see if I can remember-how you feel about me, I mean. Ah yes, that last time in bed-when was it? Twelve nights ago? That was quite a session, wasn’t it?”

  Eaton wanted to squirm. There was something about her, her too blond hair, her too darkly shadowed eyes, her too powdered cheeks, her too red lips, something about her flippant and coarsened speech, and something left over from the way she had behaved on the witness stand; there was all that which seemed to cheapen her and make her less attractive than she had ever been.

  And now, her vulgar reference to their last time together. He wanted only to be done with her, to file her in his history as finished business, and be left alone to go on with life. But here she was, unfiled, and the vulgar question hung between them.

  “Yes,” he said, “I-I won’t ever forget that evening.”

  “How could you? I knew you wouldn’t. And I knew you hadn’t forgotten what you promised. You haven’t, have you?”

  He had forgotten. The Lord save him from women. They remembered everything, everything. How could they expect a man to remember what he said-men said anything, they were all Alexanders promising empires-under those circumstances? What in the devil had he said? He could guess, but he would not, aloud. He waited. She would tell him.

  “I’ve been waiting for you to call me, Arthur. I’ve been living for that call. What happened when you asked her? Will she give you the divorce, or will you have to go out to Reno and get it?”

  Divorce, he thought. That was it. He must have been out of his mind. If treaties were made in bed, he thought, women would own the world. What in the devil could he say to her now, to be rid of her? The diplomatic truth, that was best; that was his style, and none exceeded him at it.

  “Yes, of course, Sally, it has been on my mind, too, but you know, divorce is not that simple a matter,” he said pedantically. Almost instinctively, he was moving them away from the heated, irrational atmosphere of the bedroom into the cooler, logical surroundings of the civil courtroom. “You know my feelings about Kay, and you’ve known my feelings toward you, Sally. I have desired a divorce, and kept it no secret from you. However, I’ve suddenly come up against one hard mathematical fact of life. It takes two to accomplish a divorce, not one. I broached it to Kay on the telephone a few days ago, and she would not have it. She is adamant. Separation she will abide, but not a divorce. So all I can do, until I have definite grounds against her, is to work on her, wear her down, and trust that her own sense of decency-”

  S
ally’s pale face was cold. “She won’t give you a divorce? Or is that State Department Eatonese for-you’ve decided not to ask her?”

  “Sally, I did ask her. She doesn’t give a damn about me, but she likes the idea of being married-”

  “So do I, Arthur.”

  “-and now she likes it more than ever, since everything seems to be changing in my life. She’s been watching that impeachment trial like everyone else. She has a good idea they’ll drum Dilman out of office. If they do, she sees herself in the White House as First Lady. There’s no use trying to reason with her about a divorce at present, not while the result of the trial is still pending. In fact, well, I’ll be honest with you, because you must believe in me, Sally-the fact is, Kay has decided to come back to Washington. She’s on her way back right now-she’s, well, she is the person I’m expecting in a half hour. She wants to be here for the kill tomorrow.”

  Sally began to laugh, and then threw back her head and laughed hysterically, and it made Eaton uneasy to watch her. Then her laughter broke into a sob, and she choked to control it.

  “This is too much,” she cried out, “too, too much, the irony, to think it’s my fault, I’m responsible for creating my own Frankenstein monster-me-doing what I did-snooping, spying, going through hell, suffering that goddam insulting exposure in the Senate today-those questions, I wanted to die-die-and what was it all for? For you, so you could become President, and now never leave that old bag who wants to be First Lady.”

  “Sally, listen-”

  She was breathing like a wounded animal now, and her eyes were glazed and staring. “But you know what’s worse, Arthur? That you’re lying to me, you are lying. You used me, like you use everyone, and I couldn’t see it because I wanted to be used, because I thought there’d be something in it for me, too. I should have known. There’s nothing for me. It’s all you, everything’s for you.”