by Ross Thomas
In Washington that morning, in his two-story red brick home in Cleveland Park three blocks west of Connecticut Avenue, Sammy Hanks was listening on the telephone while someone in Chicago read him a transcript of Cubbin’s appearance on “Jake’s Night.”
“He said that, huh?” Hanks would say from time to time and smile delightedly. His five-year-old daughter, Marylin, came into the living room and stood watching her father gravely. “Come here, honey,” Hanks said and the little girl moved over to him, climbed into his lap, and put her arms around his neck.
“No, I wasn’t talking to you, Johnnie, I was talking to my kid. Keep on reading. You were where Cubbin says that he didn’t resign from the club because he could work from within or some such shit. Yeah. That’s it.”
Hanks went on listening to the reading of the transcript, holding the phone away from his mouth so that he could use it to make funny faces at his daughter who laughed and squealed and sometimes hid her eyes behind her hands. Marylin didn’t think her father was at all ugly.
Finally, Hanks said, “Well, hell, that’s nearly perfect, isn’t it? I mean it couldn’t have been any better unless old Don had taken a pratfall or something. And you say you’ve already got it run off?”
He listened for a moment, made another funny face at his daughter, and said, “Okay, now I want that to go out to every local special delivery. Yeah, I know special delivery’s not any faster than regular mail anymore, but it’s still more impressive so let’s do it. Okay?… Okay. Now I want you or somebody else in Chicago to write the letter that goes with it. I don’t want it to come from me. I don’t give a fuck what it sounds like or whether the grammar’s any good as long as it sounds hurt, you got me? Now whoever writes it is all sad and hurt because Cubbin didn’t help that black out and because he’s sucking up to the bosses, you know what I mean? Fine. You guys are really on the ball up there. I’m surprised…. Well, hell, Johnnie, I’m not that surprised. You did a good job and thanks for calling…. Yeah, I’ll talk to you later.”
Hanks hung up the phone and made another face at his daughter. “You’re funny, Daddy,” she said and giggled when he made another one.
“Didn’t you know, honey? I’m the funniest man in the world.”
It was not quite 9 A.M. in Cleveland, but A. Richard Gammage was already at his desk on the twenty-seventh floor of the Gammage Building which had a view of Lake Erie and downtown Cleveland and Gammage sometimes wondered which was the more depressing, the dying city or the dying lake.
He was the third A. Richard Gammage to head his company and he sometimes felt that his major contribution had been to change the firm’s name from The Gammage Manufacturing Company to Gammage International.
Gammage International manufactured various home and industrial equipment and A. Richard Gammage had little faith in any of it and even less interest. He felt that his products were no better or worse than those manufactured by his competitors and that they would all wear out at approximately the same time. He was always faintly surprised whenever Consumer Reports gave any of his household products an acceptable rating.
Gammage had first come to know Donald Cubbin well on one of those committees that are always being formed by the Federal Government in Washington. Cubbin had represented Labor and Gammage had represented Industry. They had hit it off together because neither was quite sure what the real purpose of the committee was, but only that its recommendations would be steadfastly ignored.
They had lunched a few times together in Washington after that because Cubbin could be a genuinely amusing companion, especially when he talked about other labor leaders and the early days of the CIO and the motion-picture industry and the peculiarities of various politicians. Gammage tried to remember whether they had ever talked about the contract that Cubbin’s union had with his industry and decided that they hadn’t, probably because neither of them was really interested in it and probably because both of them were equally bored with their jobs.
So after one of those lunches during which Cubbin had been particularly amusing, Gammage had felt that he would like to do something for him. Gammage seldom had been impulsively generous and he had rather enjoyed the feeling it gave him. He had asked Cubbin if he would like to become a member of the Federalists Club and Cubbin had made a small joke about it and Gammage had said that he would submit his name. He had, a week or so later, and he had been surprised and even a little mortified when Cubbin had been blackballed. He had been even more surprised by the letter that Cubbin had written him, that awful, begging letter that almost made Gammage squirm as he read it. With reluctance, Gammage had re-submitted Cubbin’s name after a suitable interval and after Cubbin had been accepted, Gammage had avoided the Federalists Club whenever he was in Washington.
“Well, that’s the story,” said the man who now sat across from Gammage’s desk.
“Cubbin’s letter is still in our files?” Gammage said.
“Yes.”
“How did Jake Jobbins get it?”
“I don’t know. It’s probably still in Cubbin’s file, too.”
“I see.”
The man who sat across from A. Richard Gammage was Nelson Hardisty, the company’s public relations director. Gammage looked at him and wondered whether Hardisty really thought that they were talking about something important. To Hardisty he said, “Well, what do we do?”
“It depends upon how the press reacts.”
“They will react, you think?”
“It’s a pretty hot story.”
“I fail to see how it could possibly interest anyone.”
“Politics,” Hardisty said, using the most knowing tone he could produce. “Union politics.”
“And you think I should have a statement prepared?”
“Well, that’s why I called you this morning—”
“Yes, at seven.”
“I thought it was important, Mr. Gammage.”
“I’m sure you did.”
“I could draft a statement for you, if you like.”
“No, I think I’ll dictate it.”
“Yes, well, it might be good if you got to it right away.”
“I’ll dictate it to you now.”
“Well, if you want to make sure the wording’s—”
“It’s only two words,” Gammage said. “‘No comment.’ Can you remember that?”
Hardisty flushed. “Yes, I can remember that.”
“One more thing.”
“Yes.”
“I would like a carefully reasoned memo on my desk by five o’clock tomorrow on why our public relations department should be abolished.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes. Completely.”
“Well, I really don’t think that I’m the one—”
“By five o’clock tomorrow, Hardisty.”
“Am I being fired?”
“It depends on how good a job you do with that memo.”
“I don’t think—”
“That’s all, Hardisty.”
After he had gone, Gammage swung his chair around and looked out over the dying lake. I wonder why I did that, he thought. It must have been because I enjoyed it.
Four men who desperately wanted Donald Cubbin to be either defeated or reelected had gathered by chance at National Airport in Washington that Friday morning and by the same chance, they were all going to Chicago on the same United flight. Three of the men were white and one was black. The whites were Walter Penry and his principal associates, Peter Majury and Ted Lawson. The black was Marvin Harmes. The whites wanted Donald Cubbin reelected; the black wanted him defeated and none of them had too many scruples about how it should be done, although Harmes was still not quite sure just how an election is best stolen.
Still, Harmes thought, stealing an election’s probably just like stealing anything else, the main thing being, like always, don’t get caught. There had been a lot of elections stolen in Chicago, Harmes told himself, and you’ve phoned for an appointment wi
th the man who’s probably stolen more of them than anybody else and who’s agreed to see you this afternoon at three o’clock. So at three o’clock, Brother Harmes, you’re going to be calling on the nation’s top election stealer. You’re going to be calling on Indigo Boone.
The only one of the three whites to recognize Harmes was Peter Majury who, dressed as usual in his Afrika Korps trench coat, was slinking around the airport, trying to spot someone or something that should be noted and filed for possible future use. Majury always did this at airports just as he always tried to familiarize himself with anyone who someday might become an adversary or opponent. It was a task that kept him constantly busy, but he was diligent and he already had a comprehensive file on Marvin Harmes, both mental and on paper, which included such items as Harmes’s skill as a poker player (semipro, Majury had noted, but steadily improving).
Majury thought that it wasn’t particularly noteworthy that Harmes was flying to Chicago because that was his base and home. However, it might be interesting to learn what Harmes had been doing in Washington.
In the living room of the hotel suite that offered a view of Lafayette Park and, beyond that, of the White House, Coin Kensington was enjoying what he had described to his visitor as an “old-timey Kansas farm breakfast.” The breakfast consisted of steak and eggs and potatoes, but the steak was a three-inch-thick filet drenched with Béarnaise sauce, the four eggs were Benedict, and the potatoes were what the hotel chef called pommes de terre dauphinoise which meant that they were cooked in cream and butter and drenched with Gruyère. The toast was just ordinary toast and Kensington had ordered a “quart of coffee” to wash it all down. He had also asked his visitor to share the coffee, but nothing else.
Kensington’s visitor was a thirty-one-year-old man, conservatively dressed in one of the six look-alike suits that he had recently bought from Arthur Adler’s. He had a wide pale forehead, dark wavy hair, cunningly styled to look long, but not too long; a sharp nose, pink at its tip; a red, small mouth that somehow looked mean, but which may have been only firm; a bony chin that managed to appear ambitious; and dark, flickering eyes that seldom gave away anything he thought or felt except his impatience with those whom he regarded as slower witted than himself. He was flashing his impatient look at Old Man Kensington now and, of course, he was making a mistake. The thirty-one-year-old man’s name was Alfred Etheridge and not too many people called him Al because, first of all, he didn’t like it and secondly, he worked at the White House where he thought a certain amount of formality should be maintained. Old Man Kensington, not too much on formality and largely indifferent to White House protocol, had been calling him Al for the last ten minutes.
“Sure you won’t have some coffee, Al?” Kensington said.
“No, thank you, sir,” Etheridge said. He called everyone “sir” if they were over thirty-five and above him in the pecking order because he believed that it made them feel uncomfortably old. Etheridge’s ambition made him use a lot of little tricks like that.
“I didn’t know you folks over there were quite so concerned about old Don Cubbin’s reelection,” Kensington said around a mouthful of steak.
“I thought it was made quite clear how interested we were when you met with us last week.”
“Well, it’s too bad you don’t want him defeated.”
“Why?”
“Be easier, that’s why. All you’d have to do is have the President come out for him and he’d be bound to lose. Bound to.” Kensington almost choked on his own mirth.
“The President,” Etheridge said, bearing down hard on the word because it usually worked magic for him, “personally asked me to find out what your assessment of the situation is now.”
“You mean he called you into his office and asked you that?”
“I spoke to him over the phone,” Etheridge said, lying very well.
“And he wants my assessment?”
“Yes, sir, he does.”
“Well, that makes him more of a damn fool than I thought he was.”
“I take exception to that remark, sir,” Etheridge said and couldn’t help but feel that he sounded stuffy.
“I don’t mind,” Kensington said. “You sure you don’t want any coffee?”
“All I want is your assessment of Donald Cubbin’s chances.”
“Okay. Not good.”
“Why?”
“One, he’s drinking. Two, he made an ass out of himself on a Chicago TV program last night. You hear about that?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, you will. Let’s just say that it gave Sammy Hanks some pretty good ammunition, if he uses it right, and of course he will.”
“But your own assignment—”
“Assignment?” Kensington said, letting pure wonder creep into his tone.
“At the meeting that was held last week, you were given—”
“I wasn’t given anything, sonny. I wasn’t told to do anything. I mentioned that I might stir around and see if there were some folks who might be interested in helping Cubbin get reelected. Well, I’ve stirred around some.”
“I see,” Etheridge said.
“No you don’t.”
“Well, perhaps you could explain then.”
“Now, Al, I’d think it might be better if you didn’t know just what I’ve done.”
“I wonder if I might be the judge of that, sir.”
“You?”
“Yes, sir. Me.”
“Huh,” Kensington grunted.
“May I tell the President that you refused to give me your assessment of—”
“Don’t throw your weight around so much, Al. Using the President’s name like that don’t impress me any. What I’m trying to say is that if I tell you what I’ve done and you tell the President, and then later some smart-assed reporter asks him if he knows what I’ve done, and the President lies and says, no, he doesn’t know anything about it, but then they go and find out that he did know, well, he’s going to be embarrassed and I sure don’t want to do anything to embarrass the President of the United States, do you, Al?”
“I still think that perhaps I should be the judge of whether the information is given to the President, Mr. Kensington.”
“You do, huh?”
“Yes, sir, I do.”
“Since you work in the White House and all?”
“Yes, sir, I think it’s part of my job.”
“All right, sonny, suppose—let’s just suppose now— suppose I was to tell you that I rounded up about a dozen of the top executives of the companies that Cubbin’s union has a contract with—the contract that’s coming up for final negotiation next month—I mean it expires next month—and these company executives don’t want a strike and they don’t want to pay no thirty-percent increase in wages over the next three years plus a lot of fringe benefits that we don’t need to go into right here and now. You following me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, suppose I was to tell you that because they don’t want a strike and because they don’t want to pay any thirty-percent increase they agreed to get up a kitty for Don Cubbin—a $750,000 kitty to help him get reelected because they’re pretty sure that if he is reelected, they won’t have any strike or pay anywhere near a thirty-percent wage increase either. You’re a lawyer, aren’t you, Al?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, I’d have to—”
“Would you think that’s legal?”
“You’d have to look up the law?”
“Yes.”
“Well, let me ask you this, do you think it’s ethical—or would you have to look that up, too?”
“No, sir, I don’t think it’s ethical.”
“Well, let me go on. Let me tell you how I’d spend that $750,000, supposing I got it.”
“You?”
“That’s right, Al. Me. Nobody else. Supposing those company boys give me the money. Well, for all they’d know I could put it in my pocket and they’d never be any wiser.”
“I see.”
“I bet you do. Well, supposing I went and hired the sneakiest, lowdown, most unscrupulous bunch of operators you’ve ever heard of and told them that I’d pay them a hundred thousand dollars and give them another six hundred and fifty thousand to play around with if they’d do just one thing, and I wasn’t particular about how they did it, but all they had to do was get Cubbin reelected. Now supposing that before I hired this bunch—and I might even give you their name, because you seem to want to know everything—well, supposing that before I hired them, Cubbin’s chances against being elected were about sixty-forty. Now they’re about fifty-fifty. So that’s my assessment and report, Al, and now I’d like to ask this, what’re you going to do with it?”
Etheridge’s eyes blinked rapidly and his mind raced. “Well, I—”
Kensington decided to give him a little time. “Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you the name of that bunch of sharpies I just might have hired. It’s Walter Penry and Associates, Incorporated. Seeing as how you now know who they are, you might even say that they’re sort of working under White House instructions.”
He’s boxed me, Etheridge thought. If I tell them what he’s told me, they’ll be on my back for telling them something that they don’t think that the man needs to know. But if I don’t tell them, and something happens later, and they’re not set or prepared for it, then they’re going to want to know why I didn’t tell them. I’m going to lose either way. I want to get away from here, he decided. I want to get away from this slick, fat old man who’s so much smarter than I am, so goddamned much smarter.
Etheridge rose and said, “Well, thank you, Mr. Kensington, for seeing me.”
“What’re you gonna tell them, son?” the old man said softly, smiling only a little.
“I’ll make a report.”
“About what?”
“I’ll have to consider the various—”
“You’re gonna lose, whatever you tell them, you know that, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
Kensington nodded. “Well, that’s good—I mean it’s good that you know it. But there’s one thing I like about you, Al.”
