Crisis!

by James Gunn

  King shrugged. “What can one man do?"

  “But you have a chance to be nominated. To be President. Surely as President you could put your philosophy into action."

  King looked speculatively into the glass of scotch and ice cubes he held in his hand. “Do you realize how difficult it is to move the great hulk of government? Congress? The entrenched bureaucracies? The courts? One man doesn't have a chance to put anything into action. It's all he can do to move the behemoth an inch or two one way or another."

  “Surely there are ways.” Johnson said, “to cut through the red tape? Go around the behemoth?"

  King glanced at Johnson. “Can you keep a secret?"

  Johnson smiled. “That's what I'm best at."

  “Yes, of course,” King said, looking into the depths of his glass again as if it were a crystal ball. “There is a way. It would involve a radical change in our way of government at least for the duration of the crisis. A temporary delegation of authority to the executive. A temporary limitation on the authority of the courts."

  Johnson looked thoughtfully at King. “Wouldn't that be dangerous?"

  “Yes,” King agreed. He leaned back against the desk. “But not to act is dangerous, too. Maybe more dangerous. You have to trust the executive. His ability to operate the government like a well-run business. From the top. Making decisions. Delegating authority. Seeing his orders carried out or replacing the foolish and incompetent with those who will carry them out. There's precedent, you know. That's what we do in wartime. And we are in a kind of war. Maybe a condition more urgent than war."

  “What if it didn't work?” Johnson asked. “What if he failed?"

  “Would we be any worse off? But he wouldn't fail. Not if he's the right kind of person who knows what has to be done and how to do it.” King's face was animated; his voice was excited.

  “And what if he succeeded,” Johnson said, “but saw another problem ahead and another that needed his unusual abilities and his extraordinary powers? Would he want to give up his control of things? Just when events were moving in the right direction? Would we ever get democracy again?"

  Their voices seemed hushed in the big, soft room.

  “You've got to have confidence in your leaders,” King said. “George Washington could have been king; he refused even the trappings. Anyway, democracy doesn't exist in institutions but in people. As long as people believe in democracy it will continue. The danger is in their loss of faith. If it proves inadequate....” His voice trailed off into silence. “But that's all hypothetical,” he said finally.

  “You're turning down the nomination tomorrow?"

  King smiled slyly. “You'll have to wait and see. Like everyone else. Just because you're my personal assistant—I'm only teasing, Bill. I like you. You're easy to talk to. I bet people tell you things."

  “I guess they do."

  “Like talking to a priest,” King muttered. He studied Johnson's face. “Because you don't talk, and chances are you're going to forget."

  “'And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,'” Johnson said, “'slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?’”

  “You remember that, eh?"

  “Yes, sir. Will there be anything else?"

  “Not tonight,” King said wearily. He looked tired. “'What rough beast,'” he muttered, and turned his hands palm upward and studied them as if he expected to find stigmata.

  * * * *

  The library was crowded with people and television equipment. All the furniture had been removed from the room except the big desk and the chair behind it. The door to the hall and the door into King's bedroom stood open. People kept coming and going through the doorway into the hall, but nobody entered the bedroom where King and Jessica remained in conference.

  One of the members of the television crew was Robert Scott, his stony face rigid above the gray collar of the King International uniform. He was tinkering with the control panel when he looked up and saw Johnson. Johnson was walking toward Scott when King appeared in the bedroom door and said, “Bill, why don't you get these men some beer and soft drinks. This is hot work."

  “Yes, sir,” Johnson said, and members of the crew murmured their appreciation for King's thoughtfulness.

  Johnson motioned Scott to follow him as he passed. He led the way down the hallway to the stairs and down the stairs to the kitchen. He relayed the order for drinks to the kitchen crew and then walked quickly down the corridor to his room. As he entered he motioned to Scott for silence, walked to the elevator, opened the door, and gestured to Scott to join him. Scott's normally impassive features were curious, but he slipped in beside Johnson. Johnson pushed the bottom button.

  The ride was long. Finally the car stopped and the door opened. In front of them was a large, concrete room. At the far end was a corridor with doors opening off it on either side. The place had the feel of a bunker far below ground, but it had been maintained. The paved floor was not dusty. Air whispered through ceiling ducts. Automatic rifles racked against the wall were clean. Machine guns and mortars in rows upon the floor gleamed with oil. Boxes of ammunition and grenades were stacked neatly against the walls.

  “This is a god-damned arsenal!” Scott exclaimed.

  “Only part of it,” Johnson said. “The small arms are on the floor above. But that's not why I brought you here."

  “What are you doing here?” Scott asked, stepping out of the elevator, half-distracted by the sight of all the weapons.

  “That's not important either. But I got a job as personal assistant to King, just as you got a job with his communications section."

  “But you're in a perfect position to—How did you know that?"

  “About your job? Isn't it obvious?” Their voices echoed off the hard walls. “I guess. We've got to talk."

  “Talk fast. There are no cameras or bugs here. But our absence mustn't be noticed."

  “You know what King is up to, don't you?"

  “The Presidency?"

  “His name will be put in nomination at the upcoming Republican convention. If he doesn't get that, he'll be nominated by the Democrats.” He couldn't seem to get his eyes off the blue metal.

  “Or both."

  “Both?” Scott looked quickly at Johnson. “Yes, of course. Why didn't I think of that? He's got to be stopped."

  “Why?” Johnson asked simply.

  “People already are calling him King Arthur,” Scott said. “He's got all the economic power. What if he had the political power, too?"

  “Maybe he'd be a good President."

  “What are his plans? What are his principles? What does he stand for?"

  “Putting everybody back to work? Ending the Depression?"

  “Building a political base? Becoming unbeatably popular?"

  “But if he were—as you put it—stopped, wouldn't that end the recovery? Throw millions out of work again? Turn joy and hope into misery and despair?"

  “What good are jobs if you lose your freedom?” Scott asked.

  “What good is freedom without a job?"

  “The old free-enterprise-Marxist dilemma.” Scott looked straight at Johnson. “I don't know what the future holds, but I do know this: King isn't what he seems. He's rising to power as a man of vision, a philanthropist who cares more about his fellow man than mere worldly possessions. a kindly man who is at the same time a superb executive—exactly what anyone would want for a President. But look at this!” Scott waved his hand at the weapons and the boxes. “That's not what a philanthropist keeps in his cellar. Those are the possessions of a man who believes in force."

  “Or defense,” Johnson said. “You can't fault a man who strives for the best but prepares for the worst."

  “Mussolini made the Italian trains run on time and Hitler brought Germany out of its Depression. And they took us into a war that destroyed millions of people."

  “Some times it is better to suffer a little evil now to avoid a greater evil later on."

  �
�What about doing a little evil now to avoid a greater evil later on?"

  “That never works. You can't know you're going to avoid the greater evil. You can only do good by doing good."

  “What if someone had shot Mussolini in 1922 or Hitler in 1933?"

  “You're the political scientist. Wouldn't conditions have produced someone else? Maybe somebody worse after the drama of the assassination?"

  “Who can know these things?” Scott asked. Johnson sighed, but Scott went on, “King is the man of the hour. I don't think anybody can replace him."

  “What are you going to do?"

  Scott patted his waistband under his uniform jacket.

  “How did you get it in here past the guards and the metal detectors?” Johnson asked.

  “I hid it in the control panel,” Scott said, “and in all the confusion nobody searched too hard."

  “You mustn't do it. Nothing good will come of it."

  “How do you know?"

  “I know.” Johnson said it with complete confidence.

  Scott brushed it aside. “If you can't help, just stay out of my way. And if I fail maybe you'll have a better chance."

  “What if I told you he's going to ask people not to nominate him?"

  Scott looked at Johnson stunned. “Is that what he's going to do? My God! Why didn't I think of that? Just like Caesar, but Caesar turned down the crown three times. Once for King will be enough. They'll make him take it. This is all carefully planned, but all it takes is one well-placed bullet."

  “There's a better way,” Johnson said urgently.

  “What?"

  “There's always a better way."

  “Oh."

  “The only way King can truly be stopped,” Johnson said, “is if he stops himself. He must have a chance to reveal his true nature."

  “How could we do that?"

  “You,” Johnson said. “You must do it. Haven't there been occasions when people exposed more of themselves than they intended?” He stepped back into the elevator. Scott squeezed in beside him. Johnson pressed the second button from the top. “You'll think of something,” he said.

  He led the way out through his room and down the hallway to the stairs leading to the first floor. Scott stopped suddenly and felt his waist. He started trotting after Johnson. “My—” he started. “You've—"

  Johnson called back over his shoulder. “You'll think of something."

  * * * *

  King entered the room wearing a dark-gray business suit, a pale-blue shirt, and a dark-blue tie. It looked a bit like the King International uniform but expensive. His face was bronze under his neatly combed white hair. “Good morning, boys,” he called to the television crew. He went behind the big desk and talked to Jessica in a low voice, gesturing occasionally at the cameras.

  “Are you going to make an announcement, Mr. King?” one of the cameramen asked.

  King glanced up and smiled before going back to his low conversation. From his position in the doorway into King's bedroom, Johnson saw Scott move from the control panel as if in sudden decision, go to one of the cameras, and begin checking it.

  King concluded his conversation with Jessica and turned to the cameras. He blinked into the lights. “All right, gentlemen. Are you ready?"

  The director, a large, middle-aged man with an earphone and pencil microphone clamped to his head, said, “All ready, Mr. King."

  “This is live, right?” King said.

  “Yes, sir. When I give you the signal, the red light will come on under the camera we are using. It will be eleven A.M. here, two o'clock in New York where the networks will be taping for their evening news. But at least two of them are breaking into their regular programs to carry your statement live. How long will you be speaking, Mr. King?”

  “Just five minutes."

  Members of the crew glanced at each other as if questioning the trouble of setting up all this equipment for a five-minute speech.

  “You'll be sitting at your desk, right, Mr. King?” the director asked.

  “I'll start seated and then get up, move to the front of the desk, and sit on the front edge, informally."

  “Got that, boys?” the director asked the cameramen. “We'll have the middle camera head on, the others cheated right and left. Just watch the red light, and—"

  “I know all that,” King said impatiently.

  “Yes, sir. It is now ten fifty-nine, if you want to get ready. I'll count down as we get to fifteen seconds."

  King sat down behind the desk and composed his face. He looked serious, concerned, sympathetic. It was the face on the billboards.

  “Fifteen seconds,” the director said. “Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. And you're on, Mr. King."

  King looked into the center camera. “Hello, friends,” he said. “I'm Arthur King and I'm speaking to you today from my home near Los Angeles.” He stood up and moved around the desk toward the front. He did it with the ease of an experienced actor, but it looked effortless and unstudied. “In a misguided effort to provide leadership in these troubled times, a few people have put my name forward as a possible candidate for President of the United States. I want you to know that I am not a candidate."

  Scott looked up from the control panel toward Johnson. “I am not a political person,” King went on, “in spite of the fact that my business activities often involve me in concerns and decisions that not only deal with the political process but often involve the same kind of give-and-take as legislation and the effective use of resources that is involved in administration."

  He leaned back against the edge of the desk and smiled modestly. “I am an industrialist, though I was born of working parents. I have worked all my life. I have also been blessed by good fortune. No one gets to the position I hold on merit alone. Now, through the worldwide branches of the enterprises I head, I find myself negotiating with prime ministers and heads of state of all kinds, the way I used to deal with supervisors and shop foremen and grocery clerks. And"—he leaned forward confidentially toward the camera and smiled—"I can tell you it isn't much different."

  He allowed himself a self-deprecating chuckle.

  “I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat. I have held no political office, and I want none. I have quite enough to do managing the businesses for which I am responsible—and seeing that our new employees, who now number more than ten million, are usefully occupied and paid on time."

  King smiled benignly.

  “I will not be so vain nor so insensible to the opinions of others as to say, as a famous general once said, ‘If nominated I will not run; if elected I will not serve.’ I do not expect to be nominated by either party, and I urge those who are mentioning my name not to do so, to turn to others who are better qualified by position and temperament and experience."

  He rested himself on the top of the desk and crossed his ankles.

  “I suppose there are conditions under which I would respond to a genuine draft, but they are so unlikely that even mentioning them would be tantamount to doing a Sherman. I allude to this only to let you all know that I do not place myself above the office or the needs of this nation or the world. It is simply that I cannot imagine—or imagine anyone believing for a moment—that I am the only person who can do what needs to be done."

  He stared into the camera lens sincerely for a long moment and then said, “Thank you, and may God be with you."

  He held his gaze on the lens until the red light went out, and then turned to Jessica who moved toward him with a quick, triumphant skip. His face changed to an expression almost sly, and he said, “If they believe that, they'd believe anything."

  It was said as a mutter to be heard only by Jessica, but the words seemed to boom out. They were followed by an awful moment of silence. Everyone looked at each other.

  “But the red light went out!” King said.

  The director's face had turned pale. “It must have malfunctioned."

  “The camera was still on,�
�� Scott said.

  “You mean that went out on the air?” King asked as if in pain.

  “I'm afraid so,” the director said. “Just a minute. I'll check."

  “Never mind,” King said. His face had become set and gray under its tan. He turned and went toward his bedroom door. His walk was unsteady as if he were drunk or had aged twenty years. Jessica trotted after him, attempting to clutch his arm, but he brushed her hand away and stopped her from following him.

  Johnson had moved from the doorway to the bar and quickly fixed King a drink. As he handed him the glass, the onetime man of the hour said to himself, “Gone. All gone. All in a second.” He drained the glass in one long swallow.

  Evangeline came through the doorway and stopped beside King. Her face was compassionate and loving in a way it had not been before. King's arm came out and brought her close to him in an unconscious gesture of need. “Vangy,” he said. “Thank God you're here."

  Then he saw his daughter standing in front of him, and he reached out with his other arm and hugged her close as well. “Angel,” he said huskily. “We've got to get to know each other, we three."

  “May the future be kind,” Johnson said.

  * * * *

  Johnson looked around his small room as if searching for something. Then he shook his head and went into the bathroom. Finally he opened the mirrored medicine cabinet door. On a shelf with hairspray, shampoo, eye shadow, and other cosmetics was a small, cylindrical metal case. Johnson removed the cap and screwed the base until a red, waxy material protruded from the top. He closed the cabinet door and began to write upon the mirror in small, precise letters.

  “Your name is Bill Johnson,” he wrote. “You have stopped a man from becoming a dictator and ending a great experiment in democracy, and you don't remember. You may find the newspapers filled with reports of what happened, but you will find no mention of the part you played.

  “For this there are several possible explanations....” After he had finished, he tossed the container into the wastebasket, turned off the light, and went to his bed. He lay down with his hands behind his head, staring up at the ceiling, and waited for the night.