by Garbo Norman
“Yes. Of course.” A long, deep breath fluttered over the tape. “All right. What’s this idea of yours about his wife?”
“I don’t especially like it. But as you said, time is running out. I’m going to make her a burglary and assault victim that will hurt her enough to put her in the hospital. Then I’ll arrange heavy news coverage to insure Richard’s knowing about it. He cares about that woman. I don’t think he’ll be able to resist seeing her under those conditions.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“It’ll take a few days to set up. I’ll be in touch if I have any news.”
There were several more moments of conversation before the phone connection was broken, but Burke only half-listened. When he heard them hang up, he turned off the tape and sat very still, staring at it. His stomach, still unsettled, sent new messages of dread. He had been right about Ludlow, but this knowledge only added to the infection. Tony had called him a threat, a walking timebomb, yet there had been no mention of why. And Ludlow’s appointment as Secretary of State was still not reason enough.
Then his mind went to Tony’s plans for Angela and he swore at himself for not thinking of her first. How self-absorbed could he get? Tony had said the thing would take a few days to set up, but it was hard to pinpoint the exact date on which the conversation had been recorded. Fortunately, it was near the beginning of the last reel. Which meant it had probably been taped within the past day or two. He checked the time. He would have to wait at least another two hours before Angela’s watcher left at midnight and it would be safe to go over there. His good friend, Tony. He had thought himself past reacting to these things, but suddenly felt threatened with a fine madness.
Raging, frustrated, unable to bear the best of his thoughts, feeling the panic of a trapped animal with hounds near to ripping his flesh, he turned on the tape once more. He speeded through the houseman’s argument with a cheating plumber, listened to another segment of the big hot pistol communing with his lil’ pink pussy, heard a long stretch of Susan Ludlow’s guilt-inspired efforts to exorcise her dead mother’s ghost, and accepted the small satisfactions of several more adulterous conversations conducted by Ludlow’s wife.
Then near the end of the reel the tape was again activated by a ringing telephone. “Yes?” said Ludlow.
“Hello, Tom.” It was a husky, male voice that sounded tired and, to Burke, vaguely familiar. “Sorry I couldn’t get back to you sooner, but it’s been one hell of a day.”
“I can imagine. I was just wondering whether the doctor had anything more to say.”
“He’s putting me into Walter Reed on Friday for some additional tests. It’ll just be overnight. The press release will call it a routine physical.”
Burke slowly straightened in his chair. He had just realized why the caller’s voice sounded familiar. It belonged to the president of the United States.
“You still feeling lousy?” said Ludlow.
“It’s really more tiredness than anything else. There’s no pain. It’s just that halfway through the day, my ass starts dragging”
‘Then leave the office earlier.”
“Know any more good jokes?”
“If you really want to, you can do it.”
“Bullshit. Wait till you’re in here. You’ll soon see what I mean. You sure you’re ready to stick your balls in the big ringer?”
“I’m not sure of anything right now,” said Ludlow.
“You suddenly sound like I feel. What’s the matter?”
“Nothing. It’s just that every once in a while I guess this Burke thing starts getting to me.”
“It’ll be taken care of. Forget it.”
“I wish I had your confidence.”
“When you’ve been in this office as long as I have, when you’ve seen what can be accomplished from this particular room, you’ll have my confidence.”
“We’re running out of time.”
“I told you to forget it. When did you become such a damned worrier?”
Ludlow grunted softly. “I suppose when you first told me I was going to be president.”
Burke reached out with his good arm and switched off the tape. He did not want to hear any more for now, not for at least another few minutes. He did not feel capable of accepting another word. It was enough to have learned that the president of the United States, with the full might of his office behind him, evidently headed the growing list of those who wanted him dead. Talk about overkill. This was in the same category as exterminating a roach with a nuclear warhead. But even more incredible at that moment was the fact that Tom Ludlow, in some as yet unexplained way, was apparently slated to become the next president of the White House.
Moving slowly, a sudden invalid, Burke pushed himself up and walked to the window. The Hudson flowed darkly, looking cold and dangerous far below. Downriver on the New Jersey shore among the piers and warehouses a huge electric sign etched its statement to the world in letters of fire: KELLY’S KATFOOD. Burke stared out at it. Search the night for help, dig for clues to your future in the surrounding blackness, and what did you come up with? KELLY’S KAT FOOD. Perfect. It was absolutely fitting. The electric oracle spoke with unforked tongue. Put your faith in KELLY’S KATFOOD, it declared, and your illusions would remain intact, would never be subject to betrayal. There were lessons to be learned here, but it was too late for him to learn them. He had already spent most of his life committed to loyalties and beliefs that could not stand up under hard examination. And he couldn’t blame Tony for that. Very early, his friend put him on warning. “Believe in nothing and no one. Believe only in the state. That’s the only thing we’re working for — the perpetuation of our form of government. Nothing else matters. Nothing else can stand up under investigation.” Well, he hadn’t taken the warning and Tony had been proven right. Nothing else could stand up under investigation. He had shown himself to be naive and sentimental and it had turned out to be fatal to a lot of people. Still even now he did not consider himself capable of acting otherwise.
Burke turned away from the window, went back to the tape, and switched on the machine once more.
“Not having second thoughts, are you?” he heard the president say.’
“You know me better than that. Sometimes I think I’ve been preparing for this all my life. Maybe I have, if you believe in fate, or destiny, or whatever.”
The president laughed softly. “What I believe about fate, Tom, is pretty much what you believe: that every now and then it has to be helped along with a shove in the right direction. My getting sick may have been pure fate. But all the rest… my deciding not to run for a second term, my keeping it quiet while I set you up in my place, my twisting the necessary arms to make certain there’s no slip-up at the convention this summer.’,. well …” He chuckled again. “I’d say that all comes under the heading of pure shove.”
“And I appreciate it.”
“You don’t have to appreciate a damned thing. You should know by now there’s nothing personal in. this for me.” The husky voice had turned dry, sardonic. “At times, I’m not even sure I like you. The only thing I really care about is that you’re the one man I know with enough strength, brains, background, and prominence to get elected to this office, and then run it the way it has to be run if we.‘re going to survive the chaos that threatens the world today. And perhaps most vital of all, you’re without either sentiment or conscience. Whatever has to be done for our survival, I know you’ll do — whether it be the wasting of a dozen enemy cities in a pre-emptive strike, or sacrificing a dozen of our own to save the rest: The nature of our world is such, that for a leader to indulge himself in sentiment or conscience is to abandon his people. History has proven itself to be totally amoral. It doesn’t know what a conscience is. Try running a country according to Sunday School principles, and you’ll soon be presiding over a catastrophe.”
For the first time, Ludlow himself laughed. “Do you think the people would elect me on that platform?�
�
“.The people are fools. Left to their own devices, they’d’ invariably elect all the wrong leaders for all the wrong reasons. Which happens to be one of the built-in hazards of our democratic process. Fortunately, they’re rarely left to their own devices. They’re usually conned, bullied, or mesmerized into performing at least an approximation of the proper action.”
The president coughed harshly, hackingly and it took him a moment to regain his breath. “Take yourself as an example,” he went on more quietly. “If you and Kreuger are correct in your estimate of the situation and our friend, Burke, did start screaming about your being a mass murderer the minute he learned you were about to run for the presidency, the good people of America would sooner lynch than elect you. Never realizing, of course, that the very qualities that made it possible for you to shoot those people for the good of the country are the same qualities that would make you a superb chief executive.”
“You make me want to stand up and cheer,” said Ludlow.
The president was coughing again. “Christ,” he gasped bitterly. “And there was a time I could talk for ten hours straight without even a goddamned sip of water.”
“You’ll feel better.”
“Sure.”
“I hear they’re doing remarkable things with chemotherapy-”
“I’ll still be dead in three years.”
“You never know about these things.”
“You don’t know. I know.”
“Listen,” said Ludlow. “You’re only president, not God.’* “You mean there’s a difference?”
They both laughed.
“I’ll speak with you tomorrow,” said the president. “And for God’s sake, stop worrying about Burke. I’m sure we’ll have him before we have to announce you.”
“And if we don’t?”
“Then we’ll stop him the minute he comes out of his hole to do his screaming. And finally he’ll have to come out to be heard.”
“Tony Kreuger has a theory about that,” said Ludlow. “He doesn’t believe Burke will do any screaming at all if he finds out I’ll be running for president.”’
“What do you mean?”
“Kreuger remembers Burke’s reaction to the episode in question eighteen years ago. He thinks he’d sooner kill me than see me president. He thinks he’d feel that strongly about it.”
“Your friend Burke sounds like an utter fanatic.”
“He’s a good, essentially moral man.”
“That’s exactly the stuff utter fanatics are made of,” said the president. “Do you want protection?”
“Hell, no! Not now, anyway. If we have to announce my candidacy before we get him, we’ll talk about it then.”
They hung up a moment later arid Burke switched off the tape. He felt battered as a shipwrecked sailor, yet somehow relaxed. Finally, it all made sense, and there was an odd sort of relief in simply that. Just knowing a reason was a special kind of luxury for him. They were right to want me dead, he thought with a feeling very akin to elation. Perfectly right. They had absolutely no choice in this.
He squinted at the silent reel of tape, seeing it as though it were far away, half-hidden in mist. Righteousness, he thought heavily. Everyone was always so damned sure of their righteousness — Tony, Ludlow, the president himself. And anyone who disagreed, anyone who dared think differently, was branded fool, traitor, or infidel. The murderers of the Crusades, the animals of the Inquisition, the slaughterers of how many legally sanctified tribunals were also sure of their righteousness… breaking bodies, pouring blood, untouched by anguish, always certain that theirs was the one true way, their solution the one bearing God’s holy image.
All right, he thought, and his brief elation was gone. At least I know it all.
Shortly after midnight he picked up a cab on Broadway and had the driver let him off two blocks from Angela’s apartment. The watcher was gone, but it was not until Burke was in the apartment and actually saw her that some part of the tension went out of him.
He kissed and held her. “Miss me?”
“Mmm. Don’t ever leave me for that long again.” She pulled back to examine him. “You look awful”
“Thanks.”
“Didn’t you get any sleep at all?”
“Enough.”
She laughed. “That’s funny. I mean my saying you look awful. With that new face of yours, how can I really know how you look? Good or bad.”
“Does my face still bother you?”
“Yes. I can’t stand your looking so much younger than I.”
“Okay, we’ll have a job done on you top,” he said and heard a faint whisper of something unpleasant.
She put both hands to her face, fingers pulling the skin taut. “I could do with a little tightening.”
“Angela …”
The single word and the way he said it was enough to set sirens screaming. It changed her entire mood. “What is it? God, I’m stupid. Here I’ve been prattling like an idiot and haven’t even asked you what happened.” She looked at him. “You’ve found out something, haven’t you?”
“Yes. Pretty much the whole thing. I’ll tell you about it later. Right now I have to get you out of here, fast. Tony’s tired of waiting for me to discover you by myself. He’s going to put you in the hospital and give it to the media so I can’t miss it”
“What do you mean put me in the hospital?”
“Burglary… assault.;. probably a little nice, friendly rape thrown in for flavor.”
“Are you serious?” She shook her head impatiently. “What’s wrong with me? Of course you’re serious. When is all this supposed to happen?”
“I’m not sure. I could be anytime — tonight, tomorrow night, the night after that. But it’ll happen.”
She was already in motion. “What should I take?”
“Pack one bag.”
He followed her into the bedroom, pulled down a valise from a closet shelf for her, then watched as she filled it. She worked in silence, frowning a little in concentration, doing what had to be done quickly and efficiently. How beautifully she moves, he thought, and how well she has learned to accept things. No fuss, no wasted anger, no whining, no self-pity. Christ, I’m lucky. Then realizing how few would have considered him lucky at that moment, he laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Bent over the valise, she did not turn or miss a beat.
“I was just thinking what a cute ass you have.”
“A woman’s ass isn’t supposed to be funny. It’s supposed to be erotic.”
“Later it’ll be erotic.”
She took an armful of sweaters from a drawer, chose two for the valise and returned the rest “Will I ever be coming back here?”
“I don’t know.”
“Should I pack for hot or cold?”
‘ “For a while it’s not going to matter. You won’t be doing any moving around. Whatever else you’ll need later we’ll buy.”
“Are we rich?”
He smiled. “Money’s not going to be our problem.”
She threw some jeans in the bag. “Where are we going?”
“To my place. At least for now.”
“Will I be able to call my office?”
“You mean the guy with the moustache?”
“He deserves some word.”
“One short call.”
“What should I tell him?”
“Whatever you like.”
“Please, Richard, I suddenly can’t think” , “Just say you have to leave town for personal reasons. A family crisis of some sort. Illness. Whatever. Tell him you’re sorry to have to cut out without notice, and you have no idea whether you’ll even be back.” He was watching her eyes but could not tell what she was thinking. “How is he going to take that?”
“Miserably.”
“And what about you?”
“I’ve reached the point where the only thing that can make me miserable Is not being with you.”
“Well, we’ve sure come to th
is the hard way.” He kissed her. “Come on, let’s get out of here. This place is suddenly making me very nervous.”
He had her leave the house first and watched her walk west until she reached Park Avenue. Then he followed with her bag. He did not want to get into a taxi with her in this area in case they checked back later. But they did pick up a cab together on Broadway, left it on West End Avenue about four blocks from where he lived, and walked the rest of the way.
She gazed up at the faded elegance of the building on the corner of Riverside Drive and Eighty-fourth Street. “I’ve wondered where you lived. I like it. It has great dignity. And practically nothing has that anymore. Does it also have a view of the river?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then I love it.”
He went in alone to check the lobby and elevator, found them clear, then quickly brought her upstairs and into the apartment. With the door finally locked behind him, he closed his eyes and leaned back against it.
She looked at him anxiously. “You okay? Your arm bothering you?”
“You’re bothering me. It’s different than being alone. I was never this nervous about myself.”
She came close and her body pressed his. “Is that because you’re so crazy for me?”
“Damned right.”
“Isn’t that lovely,” she said and went to explore the apartment, hurrying from room to room like a child in search of hidden presents. He followed, watching her face with its changing expressions, feeling the joy of her presence.
“It’s insane,” she said, “but I’m almost glad Tony forced us into this.”
“Yes, wasn’t that nice of him? It pays to have friends in high places.”
In his studio now she stopped before her unfinished portrait still on the easel. Looking at it, she was obviously moved.
“I’m afraid it’s not very good.” he apologized, always a bit self-conscious about his painting where she was concerned. She was too perceptive about such things, understood too much. It made him feel stripped down in front of her. “I started it right after I saw you at the museum that second time. You weren’t happy that day and you sat for awhile in front of Rembrandt’s Old Woman. Do you remember?”