The President's Palm Reader: A Washington Comedy

by Robert MacLean

  “I’ve got the speech, you want to see the speech? Everything but the last page. If we can get the last page the President can cancel the speech. Lewman?”

  “Wordsworth, we don’t do politics.”

  “This isn’t politics! It’s a national crisis! The last page is the punch, Lewman, and Rawlins is holding it. We need the last page.”

  “If it exists.”

  “Lewman, the Vice President doesn’t go on television and ad lib, it doesn’t happen! He doesn’t go on Larry King without a script!”

  “So what are you saying, Wordsworth?”

  “All right, where is it? It’s not in his house, right? He won’t leave it there. He’s not carrying it around because that puts it in his house when he’s sleeping. Right? It’s not in his car, it’s not in his plane. He doesn’t trust anybody else with it. So where is it? It’s in his office. In a safe, locked in a drawer, it’s there, Lewman.”

  “Good-bye, Wordsworth.”

  “Lewman, what do you want from me? I’m out here, I did the job, they’re taking over the country, there it is. We’re going back to the oriental modes, Lewman. King Shit and the grovellers, you know what I’m saying? What are you going to do about it?”

  “Well what we’re not going to do, Wordsworth, is break into the Vice President’s office and go through his desk. We don’t do break-ins.”

  “You don’t do break-ins.”

  “Break-ins are delicate, Wordsworth. Very bad press.”

  “I’ll try the CIA.”

  “Forget it. They don’t operate within the domestic confines.”

  It was a bluff anyway. If they had the Pentagon they had the CIA. The National Security Agency, Army Intelligence, Navy Intelligence, pick one and put your money down. Never knew who you were talking to.

  “Lewman, don’t you care about this?”

  “It’s a speech, Wordsworth, it’s politics.”

  I tried Recky. Got into my Isaac Hayes mode. “Hi, babe.”

  “Well saw my leg off!”

  “Want to come out and play?”

  “I can’t right now, I gotta go get my teeth Xeroxed.”

  “What about later?”

  “Listen, taterchip, I just gotta tell you that, I’m not easy in mah mahnd about this ay-dultrous affair of ours. You’re gone be surprised this is comin’ from my mouth, and you know I just think you’re the superest, and all what Reb said about playin’ on our team goes double for me but, we’re fixin’ to make the big move and I got to be a good little cowgirl and keep my calves together. For the time bein’.”

  “You know, I hope Reb isn’t going to say anything too heavy on Friday. You know, just, as a team member—I do consider myself on your team—I just hope, I mean it could hurt him! You think it would help if I took a look at the speech?”

  “Hey, popsicle, you just leave that to ol’ Reb. One thing ol’ Reb does know how to do and that’s play politics. I mean here we are, hon, how do you think we landed up here? It’s time for us to stop be-ratin’ the boy and start A-ratin’ him.”

  “I don’t know, I hope he’s not running into trouble.”

  “Don’t dig holes where there’s no X’s, hon, I’l1 talk to you.”

  I called Norman’s number, let it ring once and hung up; called, rang, hung up; called.

  “Hello?”

  “Norman,” I said.

  “Hello?”

  “Norman.”

  “Who is this?”

  “What are you doing, Norman.”

  “Working!”

  “For who, Norman?”

  “Who is this?”

  “What have you done, Norman?”

  “Nothing! Word?”

  “You’ve betrayed the President, Norman.”

  “No!”

  “You’ve betrayed Mrs. President.”

  “NO!” he cried. “ NO! I HAVEN’T!” He brought his mouth to the receiver, no doubt looking around wildly.

  “What do they want you to do, Norman.”

  He didn’t know. God help him, he didn’t know. He was only supposed to report to Reb whatever he heard at the White House. He only said he’d go along because he was afraid! Afraid! Reb had given him a lot of expletive-deleted stuff about getting in there and kicking ass, giving the country back its self-respect and he was afraid! He was just passing along a few minimal details until he could figure out which way this thing was going, was that so bad? He didn’t want to do it! He didn’t want Reb to be president!

  And he certainly didn’t want W.T.! For those of you who are still wondering, W.T. was the Secretary who had harassed Norman. Ambisextrous, I guess you could call him. There was little in the observable world W.T. did not regard as a potential partner.

  And what was Norman getting out of it? The page boys who were skewered in the Senate cloakroom, at least they got recommended to the Naval Academy. What was in it for him?

  And suppose it got out!

  “Thursday’s Fruit Day, Noman.”

  “Norman,” I told him, “the way this thing goes depends on you.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s how it all comes down.”

  “How?”

  “You can help the President, Norman.”

  “Me?”

  “You can be the hero, Norman. Women will lie down with you.”

  He breathed wetly.

  “Reb’s giving a speech, Norman. There’s a page of it locked in his office. We need it.”

  “NO!” he screamed. “NO! I don’t DARE do anything like that! Not NOW!”

  “Norman, you’re not trying.”

  “No! I got you into the house and you TOLD! NO!”

  “There won’t be any more democracy, Norman. It’ll be your fault. Schoolchildren will be taught to hate you.”

  “NO! Word, NO!”

  “Walk through the fire, Norman. Give your life a little meaning.”

  “NO!”

  “Come on, you wimp!”

  “NO!”

  I walked around in Lafayette Park not looking back at anybody, waiting for Fes to get off work. We hadn’t been that close since the night the President went AWOL. Other agents had been implicated in subsequent outings and Fes had been more or less rehabilitated, but when the tape went missing everyone remembered how buddy-buddy we’d been and he’d lost face with the Service. If the President hadn’t put up a fuss he’d have been reassigned, and Fes loved the President. I was counting on that.

  When he entered the Square he crossed it deliberately, swinging his arms and tipping his head from side to side, upper lip tucked in behind the lower. He noticed his shoe was untied and knelt to do it up, his eyebrows meeting as he went through the steps. When he had a satisfactory bow he pulled the loops out even and, light with accomplishment, rose to move on.

  “Hi, Fes,” I said.

  He turned to me smiling and almost spoke. Then he remembered and pinched the smile off, lowered his eyes and walked on.

  “I got you this,” I said.

  I stood there holding a present out and he couldn’t just ignore me.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s a watch. I told you you were going to get that watch.”

  “A watch?”

  “It’s good for a hundred feet down. Got a big black dial, strap’s about yay wide, got your circles inside your circles, tells you the time in metric, tells you the seasons.” Everything but when your squeeze is getting her period, which is what you really need to know.

  He hesitated. Yearned towards it.

  “I’m sorry I got you in trouble, Fes. I didn’t mean to. I was just trying to perk up the President a little bit. And it wasn’t me who took the tape, so you were really right. You believe me?”

  He dropped his head, put his hands in his pockets. “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “I’d like to you have this. It’ll make my prediction come true.”

  He took it and held it for a moment, unwrapped it and admired it under the plastic dome, held it away
. People passing couldn’t believe we were doing a deal out in the open.

  “Go ahead, put it on.”

  He did up the buckles, made a fist and turned it, modelled it. We stood around feeling soppy.

  “You know,” I said, “the President needs us right now.”

  We forgot our own relative well-being for the moment and were sad.

  “Can you keep a secret?”

  “Sure, Word.”

  “This is absolutely a secret.”

  “I won’t tell.”

  “The Vice President’s got something in his office that’s bad, Fes. It’s a page from a speech he’s going to make and he’s going to say bad things about the President.”

  “Gee,” he said. Pain furrowed his forehead. For a moment neither of us spoke. He looked guiltily at his watch.

  “Too bad,” I said. “If only somebody could get in there and get the paper out the President would see what a bad speech it was and everything would be okay.”

  He shook his head. It was a hard one.

  “Hey!” I said, brightening. “I just realized!”

  “What?”

  “You’re a Secret Serviceman! You could do it!”

  “Do what?”

  “Get the paper! It’d be easy!”

  He rewound and played it back. “Me?”

  “When nobody’s there!”

  He looked at me. “Word!” he said. “I can’t do that!”

  “Sure you can!”

  “That’d be—Why, I’d be—”

  “You’d be shooting on target, Fes.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Gettin’ them all in the oh—”

  “But—”

  “—for the President.”

  He looked down and considered this. He looked at the gift-wrapping. He looked at me.

  “I guess I can’t take this,” he said. He took off the watch and stuffed it into the box, handed it back.

  “Fes, he needs us.”

  “If youda just let me do my job I’da protected him!”

  “He’s going down, Fes. We’ve got to do this.”

  “Well I know what I have to do and that’s my job!” Quotation. Manual stuff. Coming in through the earpiece.

  “Fes,” I said, “you’re his only chance.”

  But he’d found his momentum and was already walking.

  I looked at the sky. Enough already! I’ve had the BUNS here!

  The sky, silent. Fes’s back, receding. In my hand, the stuffed watch.

  I wound up as hard as I could and threw it at him, rim-doinking it into a litter bin as he passed and he wheeled with his elbows up.

  “Go fuck your hand,” I told him.

  Okay, boy, his look said.

  “You drooler!”

  We left in different directions and some guys went over to the bin and poked around for the package.

  “Wordy, perhaps we don’t need the last page.”

  We were walking on Pennsylvania.

  “Without it,” I said, “the rest can be read as supportive. He might be going to bail him out. She won’t act without the last page. Nobody’ll talk to her without the last page.”

  “And you’re sure there is one.”

  “Look, I’ll give you he’s clever, but he’s not going on satellite television and talk off the cuff.”

  “You think he’s so clever?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “From your angle, I suppose. Forceful is more the word. He does show aggression.”

  “He’s a thug.”

  “Maybe you have to be a bit of a thug to do the job. To get it, anyway.”

  “We must have trained our little minds on different TV shows. These are the bad guys, Alberta!”

  “Oh, look at the cute doggie!”

  I bore with this.

  “Mrs. Rawlins wouldn’t help?”

  “She’s picking the fluff off the marriage.”

  “Caesar’s wife, I suppose. Once he’s emperor she’l1 be rooting for everyone’s truffle again. She’s so LCT.” (Low-class tart.)

  “I’m glad you’re not like that.”

  “I don’t let other men have me. Don’t worry, darling, she wouldn’t say yes anyway, she’d probably say absolutely and your erection would wilt. Did you try what’s-his-name?”

  “Norman. Too scared.”

  “And the agent won’t cooperate. Poor Wordy. None of these people are sufficiently evil. What about Niki?”

  “Stolkov?”

  “Where’s a pay phone?”

  “Wait a minute,” I said. She led me down a sidestreet from the Avenue. “Are you saying you want the SVR to burgle the Vice President’s office?”

  “Why not?”

  “And you’re going to arrange this?”

  “Darling, do try to keep up.”

  “It just doesn’t seem right.”

  “I think he’s sort of dishy.”

  After a couple of blocks we found a liquor store with a booth outside, the old kind with the folding door.

  “Do you have a quarter?”

  I stood there while she called America’s Former Enemy.

  “Niki? Yes! Oh, you are sweet. No, I can’t. No. Niki, darling, please, calm down. Niki, don’t say things like that, we’re not on the Steppes. You’ll be fine. Niki, if I asked you to do something for me would you do it?”

  She gave me a don’t-you-think-I’m-a-cunt look.

  “Tomorrow? Dinner with the Vice President?” She looked at me. “Yes, I know. Yes, the people seem to want him. No, of course you can’t stop history. Niki, I’d love to but I can’t, really. No, I do like you, I think I really do like you, but I don’t want to sleep with you. That’s good, darling. No, it was nothing, we’re out of vodka and caviar and I thought—No, you mustn’t! Would you? Oh you’re so wonderful. Niki I have to go. Da zvadanya, darling. Mm.” She hung up. “Perhaps he’s the wrong person to ask.”

  “We’re surrounded.”

  “It may not mean anything.”

  “What did he say when you said you liked him but you didn’t want to sleep with him?”

  “That he felt the same way.”

  “Best return you can make to that serve.”

  “Well he is a diplomat.”

  “So,” I said. “That’s it.”

  “We tried, Wordy.”

  “Nothing lasts forever, I guess.”

  “Washington can be so maddening.”

  “Back to the middle ages.”

  “Uh, excuse me,” said a black guy, “can you tell me where the Washington Monument is?”

  Alberta shrugged. “We don’t know,” I said.

  “No sweat, I’ll mug you here.”

  He produced a small arm, pushed me the rest of the way into the booth against Alberta and electric-shaved me with the muzzle. “Don’t fuckin’ move, you got it? You got it? You got it?” His face bent back with urgency, showing the teeth.

  “I got it,” I said.

  He dug the barrel at my nose while he squeezed my pockets and pulled the bills out. “Empty the purse!” he shrieked.

  She shook it out on the shelf.

  He looked at her skirt. “Come on, white stuff, what you got up there?” He was breathing in my face.

  “Well, really! Wordy!”

  “Um, could I ask a question?”

  “I’l1 blow your fuckin’ jaw all over this phone booth, shithead!”

  I swallowed to try to work my throat away from the gun. “I know but—Do you just mug? Or do you burgle?”

  He jerked me around by the tie knot and spoke through his teeth. “What is this, the fuckin’ precinct? Gimme the credit cards!”

  I almost smiled. “No, listen. I mean really. Do you know how to break and enter?”

  He looked at Alberta for clarification and narrowed his eyes at me. “I do the whole round, asshole!”

  “Ah,” I said. “How would you like to make some real money?”

  19.

  “Tonight, I wou
ld like to talk to you, not as the President, but as an ordinary citizen. As one of you. As a friend.

  “And I know that that is a hard, and a presumptuous thing to do. Presumptuous because I am not an ordinary citizen. As the President, I was elected to serve you, both those of you who voted for me and those of you who didn’t; even those of you who didn’t vote at all. Maybe you just couldn’t get interested, I don’t know, but that doesn’t matter. I am your servant, and to speak to you as an equal must therefore be presumptuous of me.

  “And it’s hard, because to do it I have to take off the public mask the President must wear. A mask of confidence and ability. A mask of superiority to all the problems we face as a nation.

  “And that’s not an easy mask to take off because you want me to wear it. You pay me to wear it!

  “And I—I want to wear it! I like it! I—I don’t know what to do without it, it’s—I’m supposed to wear it! I always wanted to wear it, I was looking forward to wearing it and—

  “Well, anyway, I’ve been hearing a lot of talk lately about throwing me out of my job, so—I mean, you don’t want me anymore, so—Maybe I should just take it off anyway and start getting used to not wearing it. Would you like that?

  “Good. I can’t hear you so it doesn’t matter. I’m speaking to you now without a prepared text, without—I don’t have any charts or anything, I’m just saying what’s in my heart. This is me now, speaking to you. Okay?

  “I don’t even know what I’m going to say next.

  “Heh heh.

  “See, certain senators have been calling on me to make a clean breast of things. They get out on the steps and tell me to let it all hang out—It’s as if I’m hiding something!

  “Well I’m not hiding anything! This is me, okay? This is straight me! You want me to take my clothes off, what do you want? What do you want from me?

  “See, that’s the question I always have to ask myself. What do they want from me? What do those greedy self-righteous enfranchised little toads want from me? What do they WANT?

  “No, okay, wait. Wait. Don’t get—You see these are the thoughts that pass through a President’s mind, do you like it? Because all you do is COMPLAIN! I TRY! I try! I give you my word, I try. It’s a big job. Some people say it’s too big for one man, one person, I don’t know, it’s, the whole thing is a struggle, I haven’t always thought I could do it, maybe I’m, maybe you should—I’m not perfect, I know that, I’m just—I’m not perfect! I—