The Golden Age

by Gore Vidal

  Pew glanced at Tim; shuddered at what he saw—rubber Keds, a golf cap with visor. Then the train from New York arrived. Joe Pew and his friends made their way, slowly, past the Pathé news team, making certain that they were recognized.

  Ecstatic, Tim turned to his cameraman. “You got that?”

  “Yes, sir!” Tim turned to the soundman. “You got it?”

  “Every wonderful word, sir.”

  Tim gave a rebel yell. “Orson will cut his throat when he hears all that felt and leather.”

  Pew and his friends met several men who looked just like them while Willkie, wearing not felt but a straw hat and high-top black shoes in need of a polishing, leapt onto the siding. Davenport followed, adequately Pew-ish. Apparently a dozen journalists had accompanied the dark horse from New York to Philadelphia.

  Willkie stopped for the newsreel camera. A question was asked him which Tim could not hear. Then Willkie’s voice sounded clearly in the middle distance. “As of yesterday—Friday?—Dr. Gallup had me at twenty-nine percent …” He indicated the journalists from the train. “Everything I know they tell me. Fact,” he grinned into the camera, “if it weren’t for them, I wouldn’t be here. Left my wallet at home. They bought me my ticket. I guess I’m on the take now.”

  There was a confusion of voices. Then: “Dewey’s ahead, at forty-seven percent.”

  “So why is everyone saying that Senator Taft is the man for me to beat when he’s running third at eight percent? Anyway, it’s all in the hands of the people. Now you fellows go right ahead and ask me any damn thing in the world and I’ll answer it. Nothing is off the record, so shoot!”

  Tim was charmed by Willkie’s confidence in himself. Either he was uncommonly stupid or uncommonly shrewd or, most likely of all, an unnerving combination of the two. He held a dozen newspapers in his hands, each with his name in the headline. Every now and then he would look at a newspaper as if for inspiration. “How many delegates will I get on the first ballot? I haven’t the faintest idea. Russell.” He turned to Davenport. “Do you have any idea how many delegates we’ve got?”

  “Not really. Quite a few, I’d say.” This delighted the journalists, accustomed to solemn self-serving predictions and exaggerations.

  “This is a wide-open convention,” said Willkie. “I think we’ve seen to that. The country’s seen to that. I know. I’ve been out there, up and down the states. People want a change. People want their own convention, not something run by bosses.”

  By accident—or was it design!—Joe Pew, boss of Pennsylvania, came into view just back of Willkie, who turned and gave him a wide smile. “Now here’s Mr. Pew. I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting him but I know that face from photographs, and I look forward to his help come November.”

  A journalist shouted, “Who’s your candidate, Joe?”

  “Pennsylvania’s seventy-two delegates will be voting for that great American Senator Robert Alphonso Taft.” Pew moved on, felted head held high.

  Willkie spoke in a confidential voice to the newsreel cameraman. “That’s what he thinks now, but anyone who says he can deliver a certain number of delegates to a certain candidate at a certain time is just plain wrong.”

  On war or peace, Willkie was as adroit as the master in the White House. “England stands in imminent fear of being crushed and we should rally to her aid with everything short of war. Yes. France has fallen. But America, instead of being afraid today, should grow stronger and measure up to our true destiny!”

  There was a murmur of agreement from some of the journalists. Then: “What do you think about the President’s taking those two Republicans, Stimson and Knox, into his Cabinet, and the chairman of the Republican Party reads them out of your party?”

  Willkie laughed. “I don’t approve of anybody reading anybody out of any party. Let’s read everybody in, many as we can.”

  “Would you include Democrats in your Cabinet?”

  “I certainly would.”

  “Would you find a place for Mr. Roosevelt in your Cabinet?”

  “What a swell idea! Never let us forget that he was a great assistant secretary of the Navy in the Great War and if, God forbid, we’re ever in such a situation again, I promise—and this is a solemn commitment—to give Franklin his old job back. First-rate assistant secretaries of the Navy don’t just grow on trees, you know.”

  On a wave of laughter, Willkie and his escort entered the station, where he was spontaneously cheered.

  Tim picked up Willkie again at Broad and Chestnut Streets near City Hall. Willkie had got out of his car and was making a triumphal march along Broad Street. Tim had figured that Willkie’s unerring sense of drama would take him into the Willkie Club at Locust Street. So when Willkie entered the club, to be greeted by the sharp-featured Oren Root, Tim’s cameraman had a commanding view not only of Willkie at the door to the club but of the huge crowd that had fallen in behind him as he marched forward, waving to the crowd, and acknowledging a sudden proliferation of signs that declared: “We Want Willkie.” Plainly, Davenport and company were not as disorganized as they seemed.

  While the crew picked up crowd shots in the street, Tim followed Willkie into the gray stone Bellevue Stratford Hotel. This was the headquarters for the convention, and the lobby was crowded with delegates all eager, it appeared, to shake the candidate’s hand.

  By now Tim knew where to waylay the Man from Indiana. He slipped into the Hunt Room Bar. Amidst what looked to be a celebration of ye Olde England of fox-hunting in the shires, he joined Willkie at the bar; each ordered a scotch and soda.

  “Well, Brother Farrell, how’s it going?”

  “October first, according to L. B. Mayer. I’m also on the sixteenth floor of the Benjamin Franklin.”

  “Lucky to get a room. Russell thought as Taft has taken over a hundred rooms in the hotel and Dewey something like a hundred at some other hotel, we’d have only two rooms. I think he’s slightly overdoing the barefoot-boy-with-cheek act …”

  “But it’s working.”

  “Is it?” Willkie’s eyes never ceased looking about the bar as he smiled at this one, nodded to that one, all the while shaking proffered hands, and greeting strangers warmly. How he had stayed out of politics for so long was the real mystery.

  Tim was curious. “Don’t you think it’s working?”

  “The crowds tell me yes. But then I think about that old devil in the White House. There’s nothing he won’t do to win.”

  “Like declare war before November?”

  “He has the power to go to war already. All this talk about just giving the British the tools and they’ll do the job—that’s just bull.”

  Tim couldn’t entirely believe his ears. “But that’s what you say, too.”

  “Well?” Then an Indiana congressman named Halleck collected the candidate and they continued on their triumphant way to the Benjamin Franklin Hotel.

  As Tim emerged from the Bellevue Stratford, a large young man stopped him. “Mr. Farrell? I’m Peter Sanford.”

  For an instant Tim was at sea; mind concentrated on the similarities rather than the differences between Willkie and Roosevelt.

  “I’m Caroline’s nephew.”

  Tim recalled. “Sorry,” he said, adding the traditional “You’ve grown.”

  “I’m working for the Trib this summer. Getting experience, as Father says. Though I don’t know for what.”

  “So am I. This is my first convention, too. So I’m going through what—who—do you shoot?” Tim’s crew had already moved on to the Benjamin Franklin to film Taft, whom Tim had interviewed at Laurel House the previous winter. He was easily the most dedicated isolationist on offer; he was also the one that the press had picked to win the nomination on an early ballot.

  “I was just at the Walton. I saw Dewey.” Peter fell in step with Tim.

  “On what ballot did he say he’d win?”

  “Oh, he never talked about anything so intimate. He did assure us that the United States
is the greatest country in the world.”

  Tim chuckled. “Plainly a risk-taker. Where is Caroline?”

  “New York, I think. She’s helping Harry Hopkins fix up an apartment in the Essex House.”

  “Harry Hopkins?” Tim was impressed.

  “They are,” said Peter with a smile, “just good friends. She keeps him company, she says.”

  “While he keeps FDR company. Isn’t three a crowd?”

  A small elephant, wearing a ribbon that said “Taft for President,” crossed the street in front of them, giving much pleasure to pedestrians if not to drivers. “I think he’s asked her to marry him, and she’s said no. He assured her, my father says, that he wants to marry her only for her money.”

  “Caroline would like that.”

  “She likes him.”

  “Maybe she can get him to do an interview for me …”

  “No.” Peter sounded certain. “He’s the invisible man these days. When he doesn’t visit New York he lives in the White House. He and the President start the day together, plotting.”

  “Who do they think will be nominated here?”

  “Taft. The President’s made several bets.”

  “Caroline?”

  “She thinks it will be Willkie. She says they all laugh at her. But I think she knows something. She also knows someone who knows quite a lot.”

  “Ernest Cuneo?” Tim tried out the name but got no response.

  “No. Someone called Sam Pryor. He’s a committeeman from Connecticut. He’s sort of running the convention. He’s working for Willkie.”

  “Would he talk to me … to camera?”

  “Ask. He’s pretty busy right now. You see, he’s in charge of credentials. That’s who gets to sit on the floor of the convention hall and who gets to sit where in the galleries.”

  Tim stopped in front of the Benjamin Franklin, as did the small elephant, whose keeper led him inside. Tim hoped his team would get a shot of the elephant, preferably in a lift full of politicians. He turned to Peter. “How is it that someone who’s working for Willkie gets put in charge of seating?”

  “Well, the original chairman on arrangements …” Peter removed a notebook from his jacket pocket. “You see? I’m a real reporter.” He flicked through pages of notes. “A Mr. Ralph E. Williams, aged seventy. The chairman’s supposed to be neutral but everyone says he was for Taft. Anyway, at five-thirty p.m. May sixteenth, he rose to address his committee in a ballroom at the Bellevue Stratford. When he put his hand on the back of a chair, to support himself, the chair skittered away from him and he fell to the floor, dead. It was, I’ve been told, a very hot day and of course he was seventy years old. On the other hand he was believed to be in perfect health. Sam Pryor offered to take his place.” Peter put his notebook away. “These credentials, these tickets, are all kept in a locked room next to the party chairman’s office at the Bellevue. The room is guarded around the clock by Pinkerton detectives.”

  Jim was impressed by the blandness of Peter’s recital. “You’ve done quite a bit of sleuthing here. Why?”

  Peter smiled. “Wouldn’t you?”

  “No. But then I’m a movie director, not a politician. I can’t imagine anyone caring enough about these clowns—that goes for every politician in the country, including the Great White Father—to kill an elderly gentleman in order to get hold of a batch of tickets.”

  “Well, I’m neither a politician nor a movie director but I’m very much a product of the District of Columbia. I know how much all this matters not only to the people directly involved but to foreign countries, too.”

  “Like Germany?”

  “Yes. And like England.” Tim found Peter’s recital astonishingly cool. “The people out there in your hometowns are almost a hundred percent against our going into the war, but some politicians, including the Great White Father, are working to get us into the war before England folds. So, what is the life of one Ralph E. Williams as compared to the survival of the British Empire?”

  “ ‘He Died for His Credentials’?” Tim saw black humor, as always.

  “ ‘Credentials’ is too long a word to be in a title.” Peter matched blackness with blackness. “Why not ‘He Died for His Tickets’?”

  Tim suddenly realized that he had met Mr. Ralph E. Williams at Laurel House in September. He had said something about—or was it to?—Senator Taft. Tim turned to Peter. “You could have a great career as a scriptwriter, if you want it. And if you can stand Jack Warner. Because this story is right down his alley. Low-budget, of course. You know, the French are always praising the Rembrandt lighting of Warner Brothers films. They don’t know that that’s not Rembrandt, that’s Jack Warner rushing from stage to stage and turning off lights to cut costs. So how about Murder at the Bellevue Stratford.”

  They went into the lobby, where they were met by Tim’s cameraman, who said, “The name’s Blossom.”

  “Whose name?”

  “The pygmy elephant’s. We got a great shot of her with Senator Taft trying to shove her out of his bedroom.”

  3

  On Monday morning Peter Sanford presented his various press credentials at Gate 23 of Philadelphia’s convention hall only to find the dapper Sam Pryor already on the spot, talking to several Pinkerton men. When he saw Peter, he waved cheerily. “The press entrance is further along.”

  “What’s this one for?”

  “The people of the United States.” Pryor laughed. “Is your father coming?”

  Peter said, truthfully, that he did not know. As he walked from guarded gate to guarded gate, he felt the morning heat damply rise. Soon Philadelphia would be like a Turkish bath.

  Dutifully, Peter checked his notes. The hall could seat fifteen thousand people. The Philadelphia Orchestra would play for the delegates. The keynote address that evening would be given by Governor Harold Stassen of Minnesota. Then the next day, Tuesday, the only living former president, Herbert Hoover, would address the convention. Wednesday, the leading contenders would be put in nomination. Thursday, the balloting of the delegates from all the states would begin and the first candidate to get 501 votes would be the Republican nominee for president.

  Meetings were now being held all over Philadelphia as delegates called upon Taft and Willkie in their Benjamin Franklin headquarters; on Thomas E. Dewey at the Walton; and a few, presumably, on Senator Vandenberg at the Adelphia Hotel. For reasons so far mysterious to Peter some once promising candidates were now out of the running; Vandenberg was one. But the great man seemed not to mind, as he continued to receive admirers in his suite while bright young women handed out palmetto fans with the legend “Fan for Van” on them: the ever-increasing summer heat ensured a good deal of fanning on the part of the delegates, of whom very few would cast so much as a vote of gratitude for Vandenberg. When Peter had asked the Senator why he had gone into so few primaries, the round owl eyes looked up to heaven. “Imagine killing yourself for Vermont!”

  Peter saw glowworms as he stepped from bright sunlight into the dim arena with its huge upper-tier gallery that could seat as many people as the floor itself, according to his own dogged notes. The floor in front of the stage was marked off for the state delegations; each of the forty-eight states had a standard and beneath the state’s name an elephant with an American flag in its trunk. Alongside the standard, uncomfortable folding wooden chairs were ranked, one for each delegate—seventy-two chairs for Pennsylvania, a half-dozen for tiny Delaware.

  Peter circled the hall, notebook in hand. The large stage was dominated by a massive bronze eagle more suitable, Peter thought, for a Third Reich rally than for the rustic republic that gave such kindly shelter to the common man—a turkey would have been a cozier symbol. Certainly, more symbolic. From balconies to left and right of the stage the coats of arms of the states were hung, and red-white-and-blue bunting was draped everywhere. With full lighting, the effect would be cheerful but now, in the half-darkness, the effect was somewhat ominous, the circus out of season.<
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  Peter dutifully noted that Maine and Vermont, the only two states to vote for the Republican candidate Governor Alf Landon in 1936, were given places of honor in the first row, alongside huge Michigan and Indiana. Peter sat in a Maine chair and noticed that the hall smelled a bit like the Barnum and Bailey Circus before the animals—and the people—filled the tent. Dust. Old canvas.

  There was a surprising amount of activity on the floor and in the great upper tier. Numerous worried-looking police were conducting some sort of search which involved little more than marching about, looking worried. A number of members of the press were also wandering up and down, as Peter had been doing, getting the feel of the hall.

  Journalism was not to be Peter’s life, he decided. Blaise had always said that the Tribune would be his one day if he proved to be really interested. The “really interested” had always sounded a bit like a threat while the “proved” sounded as if he was on probation. Next year, at twenty, he would graduate from the University of Virginia; then, at twenty-one, the trust fund of his maternal grandmother would bring him untold wealth, thirty thousand dollars a year. Blaise had been furious when he saw the terms of the old lady’s will but Frederika had been pleased. “He won’t have to do anything he doesn’t want to do.”

  “Suppose he does nothing at all?” Characteristically the conversation was held in Peter’s presence, for maximum effect.

  “Oh, that would be wonderful, wouldn’t it?” Frederika’s joy was intermingled with the friendly malice that she always displayed toward her husband. “Aren’t too many people doing altogether too much nowadays? Imagine having a gentleman in the family.”

  “A wastrel!” Blaise was now red in the face.

  Peter was thrilled. “What exactly,” he had asked, “does the average wastrel do?”

  “He wastes money! Produces nothing!”

  “The money he wastes will be his, not yours, dear. And why should poor Peter produce anything at all? The world,” Frederika proclaimed in her best gracious hostess manner, “is already crowded with useless productions.”