The Golden Age

by Gore Vidal

  Since the Mrs. Auchincloss who lived not far from Laurel House was divorcing her husband, Caroline had, through the subtle intricacies of the various servants’ halls of Washington and neighboring Virginia, got her hands on the departing Mrs. A’s personal maid, who came, as did the mythical Emma Traxler, from Alsace-Lorraine. Marie-Louise was fifty and preferred French to English as well as a small flat at Wardman Park to an airy mansion ever vibrant with the sounds of slamming doors, of sobbing—often masculine—and of numerous shrieking children being constantly packed off in different directions. Did they ever get them all back? Caroline sometimes wondered but never dared ask Marie-Louise.

  Meanwhile, as Caroline worked on her grandfather’s memoir of the first national centennial, Marie-Louise was packing an overnight bag for her. The hotel was uncommonly silent. It was the last day of October and the end of what had proved to be an uncommonly anxious summer.

  A new letter from Timothy described the start of his film in London. “I’m afraid we’re either too early or too late for anything interesting here. Hitler was supposed to be in Moscow last week or next week or whenever. But wherever it is he is going to be, he won’t be scaling the white cliffs of Dover. The invasion has been called off but the bombs still keep falling, presumably to depress the people, who seem to be having a pretty riotous time, particularly during the blackouts when couples couple in every doorway. Rumors are that we are already in the war but no one can mention it, least of all your friend Harry Hopkins, who is regarded as the Archangel Gabriel in these parts, the source of trumpet blasts and dispenser of Lend-lease. But until Congress declares war, everyone here is in limbo. Last week, L. B. Mayer asked me to screen-test a local songbird called Vera Lynn. I have done so. In a diabetic coma …”

  Marie-Louise came into the living room from the hallway.

  “A Mr. Elliott Macrae, Madame.”

  Caroline was startled. “The front doorbell just rang?”

  “Yes. And I just answered it. I hope I didn’t …”

  “No. No. It’s just that I didn’t hear it ring. This means I am now quite deaf. Tell him to come in.”

  Caroline fixed her hair in a console mirror; rubbed straight eyebrows that had been plucked for so long that only the shadow—the merest essence of eyebrow—was left.

  Mr. Macrae was a short, bouncy gentleman. He had inherited from his father the old publishing house of E. P. Dutton in New York City. He had been preparing for some time the two books of Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler. “I was just passing through town …”

  “Quite all right.” Caroline motioned for Marie-Louise to bring coffee.

  Macrae sat down; opened a briefcase; withdrew a duplicate of the manuscript on Caroline’s desk. “We’ve been working simultaneously,” he said.

  “Well, perhaps.” Then Caroline thanked him for a book that he had recently published by Van Wyck Brooks. “If I were not so French I should dare to say he’s perfectly captured the United States of the eighteen-seventies.”

  “He returns the compliment about Mr. Schermerhorn’s work, and your editing. He plans to write a preface for us, about 1876, the centennial year.”

  “But not about the other book?”

  Macrae looked uncomfortable. “You know, Mrs. Sanford, I’m from Virginia originally.”

  “That must be nice for you.” Caroline had yet to find a way of striking the right note with the noteless.

  “Yes it is. Fact, I’m off to visit relatives this weekend. The problem is not the centennial year story.”

  “Even American schools must admit that the Republicans stole the election. My grandfather and my mother witnessed the whole thing.”

  “Oh, that’s perfectly all right. This is the age of debunking, you know.”

  “A valuable word, ‘debunking.’ A valuable activity, I should think. Of course, I’m basically so foreign.” Caroline realized that she was overdoing this particular number but she felt obliged to fill in notes—cadenzas—where he offered only resonant monotony. The dread Pearl of Alsace-Lorraine was suddenly beginning to fill up the Wardman Park Annex.

  “Have you heard of Dumas Malone?”

  “No. But I love the name. The wonderful juxtaposition and the possibilities. Goncourt O’Reilly, Maupassant Murphy.”

  “Yes.” Macrae had missed the point. “You know, Mr. Malone is—well, no, you couldn’t know—but he is writing a five-volume life of Thomas Jefferson which I hope to publish one day.”

  Caroline did her best to look both fascinated and benign. “Well, Jesus’s life appeared in only four volumes. So why not Mr. Jefferson’s in five?”

  “I took the liberty of showing him your grandfather’s work on Aaron Burr. I hope you don’t mind?”

  “Why not? This seems to be my answer to everything today. You see how agreeable I am, as a writer?” Caroline noted happily that Macrae was starting to sweat.

  “The fact is, Mrs. Sanford, that Mr. Malone found your grandfather’s portrait of Jefferson—ah, well—the word he used was certainly extreme …”

  “ ‘Judicious’?”

  “No. ‘Treasonous.’ ”

  “What nation is my grandfather supposed to have betrayed?”

  “Well, his subject committed treason against the United States …”

  “That was Mr. Jefferson’s invention. Aaron Burr was found not guilty in a trial presided over by Chief Justice John Marshall. Surely, Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler’s personal knowledge of Burr, not to mention years of research, can now set things straight even with a patriotic Virginian.”

  Macrae shook his head, looking very miserable indeed. “Mr. Malone also objects to Burr’s observations that some of Jefferson’s slaves were his own children.”

  “Who doesn’t object? Of course, Mr. Jefferson should have freed them. But my grandfather thought he needed the money.”

  As Caroline spoke, Elliott Macrae seemed to be having trouble breathing. She paused. “Are you all right?”

  “Well. I … As I told you, I’m a Virginian and we can’t … that is, accept as fact that Mr. Jefferson ever had a child by a slave girl.”

  “I admit it was more like a brood. And why not? After all, he was disseminating his genius throughout what is thought of in some quarters as an inferior race.”

  “Mrs. Sanford, Mr. Jefferson was a gentleman! No gentleman could ever have had relations with a slave.”

  “If that is the case, Mr. Jefferson’s father-in-law was definitely no gentleman, since it was his black daughter, as my grandfather pointed out, who bore his son-in-law—the widower Jefferson—all those children.”

  “What he was is not the point. What Mr. Jefferson was means a lot to us … and we reject this story.”

  Caroline fixed him with a cold eye.

  “Mr. Macrae. When I first bought the Tribune, it was owned by an octoroon, I should guess, who was in direct descent of Jefferson, and, as if to prove his blood, he was every bit as bad a businessman as his famous ancestor.”

  Marie-Louise came in from the small dining room; she was carrying the overnight bag. “The White House car is waiting for you.”

  Caroline rose. “We shall all go down together.”

  The White House had suddenly concentrated Macrae. The red face paled. “You are going to see Mr. Roosevelt?”

  “He is an old friend, from my publisher days.”

  In the long walk from the front door of the Annex to the driver at the car door, Caroline made it clear that if Mr. Macrae was not happy publishing her book …

  She was greeted with a series of no’s, followed by a plaintive “I wish you’d reconsider, but, of course, if you must you must. I should warn you that you will get many, many outraged notices in the press.”

  “I certainly hope so. I can’t think of anything that my grandfather—wherever he is—and I would like better.” Caroline shook Macrae’s hand with undue warmth. “You must get Balzac O’Toole to review us.”

  Caroline found the presidential boat—“yacht” was
too elegant a word for the Potomac—completely comfortable, while the river from which it took its name was looking-glass-still as they headed toward Mount Vernon on the far side. The sun was beginning to set and the lights in the salon had been turned up as Filipino stewards in white jackets set out an elaborate curry dinner. The President had not yet emerged from his cabin; a half-dozen aides and assistants were either below or in the bow. For the moment, Caroline and Hopkins shared the cushions at the ship’s stern. The air off the water was hotter than the breeze from the ship’s wake, and Caroline, with her hand, tried to discern the dividing line. Hopkins looked more dead than asleep as he slouched alongside her. But, as always, he could see through what looked to be shut lids.

  “What are you doing?”

  “At this point,” Caroline’s outstretched hand was two feet above the stern, “the air from the river, very hot, starts to fall back and the evening air replaces it, like a layer of water. But then, the air is our ocean, isn’t it? I am partial to the natural sciences.”

  “You wrote Monday’s editorial, didn’t you?”

  Caroline had been wondering when—and if—Hopkins would notice her handiwork. “Yes. With help. I seem to have lost the knack. But Blaise sent me a good rewrite man.”

  “The Boss says the Tribune’s much improved since you came home.”

  “I’m not home.” But even as she spoke, she wondered where, if anywhere, was home now.

  “If you should want something from the Boss—a story first, anything—we’ll let you have it. He’s never forgotten you in that movie, Huns from Hell.”

  “Then tell him that the first thing I shall want is for him to forget Huns from Hell.” She suddenly got the scent of curry. “Dinner smells grand.”

  “The Filipinos feed him curry and between that and being on the water, he is as happy as a man conducting two wars can be.”

  “Two undeclared wars.”

  There was a silence. The stewards were giggling as they carried onto the deck a small table with familiar-looking bottles. Hopkins sat up. “The sovereign approaches. You know, I’m going into the Naval Hospital November fifth.”

  Caroline wondered if this was to be the end. At her age, friends, so hard to come by, were altogether too easily lost. “What do they say?”

  “Some repair work is needed. I’m having trouble walking. You’ll come see me?”

  “Of course.”

  “I’ve alerted my children.” At the end of the salon, two sailors appeared, carrying the President in the chair on rollers; then his physician rolled him out onto the stern, followed by a half-dozen men. Caroline recognized Judge Sam Rosenman, who, along with the playwright Robert Sherwood, wrote the President’s speeches under Hopkins’ alert eye. Caroline had once been allowed to watch the process, which reminded her of the young Hearst putting together a front page, inventing and disinventing news as he worked. Caroline once asked Hopkins, “You never disagree with the President, do you?”

  “I agree nine times out of ten. That’s because the tenth time I want him to agree with me.” Thus, the social worker traded with the emerging Augustus.

  “Caroline!” Roosevelt’s chair was now in place back of his bar. “I’ve brought Grace Tully so you won’t feel trapped at a stag party.” The President’s secretary had been for years “Missy” Le Hand’s assistant until, earlier in the summer, that paragon had suffered what was said to be a mild stroke and had gone on leave. Characteristically, Hopkins feared the worst and Roosevelt assumed the best. But then, as Eleanor had once confided to Caroline, “Franklin has taught himself optimism about everything. He still thinks he will walk one day. I wish,” she had added, wistfully, “I could be like that.”

  “You,” decreed the President, looking at Caroline, “will have the Roosevelt special martini.” As he mixed this lethal concoction, he was suddenly reminded of Huey Long, the assassinated Kingfish of Louisiana politics. A mysteriously motiveless doctor had shot down Huey in the state capitol at Baton Rouge just as he was about to contest the 1936 presidential election with Roosevelt. The Long family and their supporters were convinced that Roosevelt was behind the assassination. Since the mysterious doctor was himself promptly slaughtered by Huey’s bodyguards, it was unlikely that anyone would ever know why the doctor did what he did—if he did it.

  But Roosevelt had cheerier recollections. “I just saw an old newsreel of Huey. He’s back of the bar at the Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans. What a comedian that fellow was! He’s standing next to this colored waiter who makes, so Huey says, the world’s greatest Sazeracs. Huey then gives us the recipe while the bartender is shaking up this foamy drink. When he’s done, Huey says, “Now, George, you better let me check that one out. Got to make sure you haven’t lost your magic touch.” So Huey gulps it down and says, maybe just a dash more grenadine. Well, they just let the camera run and after four Sazeracs, old Huey was carried out, feet first.” Roosevelt laughed loudest of all, as he continued his bartender duties. Although the others seemed to prefer straight bourbon, their host made them Manhattans anyway. Then, labors done, he sat in the center of the stern between Caroline and Hopkins.

  “I thought T. V. Soong very eloquent today.”

  Roosevelt looked at Hopkins, who nodded: “I’ll get the ships to him as soon as I can.”

  “The poor Chinese are always overlooked.” Roosevelt turned to Caroline. A swaying overhead light made his features look unusually sharp. “I was tickled pink by that editorial of yours.”

  “I’m glad. I did it, of course, to curry favor with you.”

  “Naturally. You’re angling for a job with Eleanor in civilian defense and you think that if you play your cards right I’ll be able to make an appointment for you to see her. But I simply can’t promise to deliver her. She is inhumanly busy.”

  “I think I’ll let the civilians look to their own defense. No, I was really trying to do poor Harry justice. He gets only attacks. Yet he’s rearming the country and though it’s still a secret from the public, the New Deal’s winning. The Depression’s almost over.”

  “You are good, you know. I clipped your line about how Dr. Win-the-war has now taken the place of Dr. New Deal. It’s in my speech file and should we ever by some … ah, terrible misadventure be at war, you can count on me to plagiarize you, without credit, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  Everyone was now in festive mood and the conversation became general, which meant that the President would now start telling tall stories and indulging in what seemed like exciting candor until one realized that even as he was blurting out some dark secret he was carefully dismantling it as he continued to elaborate, with much head-tossing for emphasis.

  “We saw T. V. Soong today, Harry and I. Madame Chiang’s brother. I told him how we Roosevelts are old China hands. Why, as a child my mother lived in Hong Kong for several years. Loved it. Spoke perfect Mandarin.”

  When Eleanor had heard this familiar story yet again, she had said to Caroline, “Mrs. James never learned a word of Chinese, because they were afraid that she’d talk to the servants, the sort of thing I would have done but Sara Delano, never, ever.”

  The President was now in full flood. “Our Chinese connection goes back to the clipper ships. My grandfather, Warren Delano, made a fortune running opium to the poor Chinese.” There was an appreciative murmur at this. “The Republicans are still trying to find a way of using that one. Grandfather Delano went up to Swatow and Canton—this was 1829—and even up to Hang Kow. All the while he was doing what many red-blooded Americans were eager to do back then—make a million dollars. Then he came home, put everything into Western railroads, and in just eight years, he had lost every dollar!”

  The court laughed on cue. Harry’s eyes appeared to be shut. But he smiled.

  “Then in 1856 he went out to China again and stayed there all through the Civil War—with my mother—and made another million. This time he decided to be clever. He put everything into coal mines. And guess what
? They didn’t pay a dividend until two years after he died!”

  At dinner Caroline was placed on the President’s right, Hopkins to her right. The curry was elaborate and the President ate like what he was, a starving fugitive from Mrs. Nesbitt’s kitchen. Tomorrow he and Harry would go to Hyde Park for a few days. Then Harry would enter the Naval Hospital.… “How do you feel?” she asked as she helped him to chutney.

  “The way a clock must feel when you take out half its springs.”

  “I’m counting on you to live. For selfish reasons.”

  The large protuberant eyes turned toward her. “Why selfish?”

  “I’m old. I have few—if any—friends now. I need you to keep me interested.”

  “In what?”

  “Life.”

  “Life? I thought you’d say me.”

  “That’s because you’ve been psychoanalyzed so many times. You think too much of me—you. Think of keeping me interested. After the President, that should be easy for you and bliss for me.”

  “You two are somewhat alike.”

  “Because we look to you for reflection?”

  The President had now turned to Caroline. “Madam Publisher. Explain to me why the press has made so little fuss over the sinking of one of our destroyers today. One hundred and fifteen dead is the first report.”

  “I think it’s because we take it for granted that we’re already at war. You have given orders to shoot enemy vessels on sight. So this is no longer news—sensational news, that is.”

  “Not exactly. It’s true I can make war. But I cannot declare war.” He adjusted his pince-nez. “Only Congress can do that. Even so, I find it curious how little is being made of Germany’s crimes against us in the press. What are you waiting for?”

  “We’re waiting for Hitler to defeat Russia …”

  “You may have a long wait. The Russians are putting up a splendid defense at Leningrad. Then, very soon, it will be winter …”

  “General Winter takes to the field, as Napoleon said, and Holy Russia is saved!”

  The President covered his rice with shredded coconut. “You know, I have made it a rule never to try to influence a publisher.”