by Allen Drury
Just as he reaches this flight of self-righteousness—and just as his innate Knox self-skepticism and sense of balance starts to come to his rescue to keep him from going entirely overboard in self-congratulation—the door to the bedroom opens and the other half of the famous Illinois team of “Orrin and Beth” comes in.
“I know that look,” Beth says with a chuckle. “You’re telling yourself that nobody, but nobody, has more answers to anything than Orrin Knox does.”
“Hank,” he says blandly, using the nickname he has used ever since she was Elizabeth Henry, fellow student at the University of Illinois, so many years ago, “it is the only possible mood in which to approach an acceptance speech. Particularly,” he adds, looking less cheerful, “when you don’t know whether your running mate is going to go along with you or not.”
“Do you really have doubts?” she asks, coming forward to the mirror and leaning forward to adjust the off-the-face white hat she has chosen to go with the sensible green dress and comfortable white pumps she is wearing for this auspicious occasion. Their eyes meet as he replies thoughtfully.
“I wouldn’t say I was entirely confident. Although he did promise me last night that he will absolutely, completely, unequivocally, cross-his-heart-and-hope-to-die repudiate NAWAC, the violent, the Communists and all their sleazy vicious doings.”
“The question,” she says with an equal thoughtfulness, sitting on the bed and studying the problem, “is whether they will repudiate him. And if they don’t, what they will do to you.”
“They will go along with me,” he says crisply, “as long as Ted is at my side.”
“And if he shouldn’t be—?” She gives him a quizzical look and he responds with one surprised and skeptical.
“Why won’t he?” he asks. “Knowing Ted Jason, I don’t believe he’s going to give up his position ‘one heartbeat away,’ etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. After all, if I’m not very successful in the next four years, I might not seek—or win—a second term. And he’s still young enough so that either way he’d be set to be the next nominee. He may make a few noises now and then just to show he’s still really a stout and independent fellow, but I suspect for the most part he’ll stick pretty close to stodgy old reactionary Orrin. Which, after all, is exactly what I want him to do. I need him. By the same token, he needs me. That’s why we’re together, and, I expect, are going to stay together.”
“I think you will intend to,” she agrees, still thoughtfully. He takes her up on it sharply.
“Then why won’t we?”
“You may not,” she says quietly, “be the only people involved, you know. Communists and the violent don’t always go away just because people say they should. Sometimes they have purposes more involved than we simple souls can believe.”
“But what would be the point in killing him, if that’s what you mean?”
“There wouldn’t be any point in killing him,” she agrees with a certain wry bluntness. “I agree with you, why should anybody kill him?”
“Hank,” he says calmly, “I am not going to start worrying at this late date about anyone killing me. I know some have wanted to, I know some still may; but the great majority are satisfied to have him on the ticket and in a position to become heir apparent—”
“He is the heir apparent,” she interrupts with a sudden sharpness of her own. “Watch out for yourself.”
“I won’t believe,” he says firmly, “that Ted Jason would be, or could be, party to any attempt on my life.”
“Any more than he was party to an attempt on Crystal’s,” she remarks quietly. “Nonetheless, it happened.”
“You and I,” he says with equal quietness, “have faced the possibility of assassination ever since I entered public life. It’s true, the chances are greater now, the occurrence being a thing that feeds on itself in a world of kooks and crazies—”
“Not always kooks,” she says, “and not always crazies. Sometimes very cold-blooded and very calculating people who know exactly what they’re doing. It seems to me you’re a sitting duck for someone like that.”
“So what would you have me do at this late date?” he demands. “Quit? Say, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean I want to be President, include me out, I’m going home’? Don’t be silly, Hank. You’re talking like a scared old lady now, not like the next behind-the-scenes President of the United States!”
“Well,” she says, smiling a little in response to his deliberately joshing tone, “it may have its humorous aspects, but even so—”
“And why are you so gloomy and apprehensive all of a sudden?” he asks, not knowing now that one day he will look back and wonder if she was the only one of the four about to meet at the Monument Grounds who felt that way. “I’ve been anointed by the Times, the Post, the networks, Walter Dobius, the Russians, the Chinese and the whole wide world—not very heartily, but they’ve done it. Ted Jason is going to keep me on the straight and narrow, the forces of imperialistic reaction have been put in check, God’s in His heaven and all’s right with the world. We’re going to be under the greatest security and protection the country’s ever seen, today, so we might as well relax and enjoy it. Anyway, Hank”—and though still joking a bit, he becomes more serious—“you’d better not keep on in this vein or you really will give me the heebie-jeebies. And I can’t afford to have them. Too much depends on how we launch this campaign. Plus the fact that it’s all out of character, for you. You don’t normally go off on this kind of tangent.”
“No,” she says, rising with a smile and sudden decisive air that brings him a feeling of genuine relief, for he has been more disturbed by her uneasiness than he has wanted her to know. “It isn’t, and I apologize for being gloomy. I know we’re protected, I know everything is going to be all right. I expect we’d better go down. They must be almost ready for us.”
“Of course,” he says, suddenly serious, a perverse but inescapable reaction now that she is abandoning the subject, “if you really have a hunch, Hank—”
“Nonsense,” she says firmly, linking her arm through his as they hear cars and motorcycles downstairs, a sudden bustle through the lower part of the house which indicates that it is time for them to go and keep their appointment with the country. “It was just a thought, and a foolish one at that. Come along, maximum leader. Your panting multitudes await.”
“I hope they’ll like what I have to say,” he replies, and abruptly he turns and takes her face between his hands.
“Thank you for everything, Hank,” he says softly. “For all the kindnesses, down all the years.”
She blushes, a rare thing for Beth Knox, looking suddenly very shy and, in some curious way that of course does not exist except in mind and memory, youthful and freshly beautiful again as she had been when they first began courting.
“It’s mutual, my dear,” she says. She returns his kiss youthfully, too, and then, with a little smile at herself for not resisting the urge to become practical again, “Be good today. They expect a lot from you, and you have a lot to give.”
“Hank,” he says with a sudden enthusiasm, almost boyish in his turn, “with you beside me, I can’t be anything else but good. We’ve got a great four years ahead of us. A great four years!”
“Well, we know one thing, anyway,” she says with a chuckle as the first sirens begin below. “It won’t be dull.”
So the hour of acceptance comes bright and hot and clear, and from all the corners of the two cities, all the corners of the nation, the great throng gathers on the Monument Grounds around the stark white obelisk to fatherly George. Krishna Khaleel, the Ambassador of India; Soviet Ambassador Vasily Tashikov and his agricultural/secret police attaché; British Ambassador Lord Maudulayne and Lady Kitty; French Ambassador Raoul Barre and Celestine; and almost all their colleagues of the diplomatic corps, are there. Somewhere in the enormous multitude that laughs and yells and chatters, shoves and pushes and jostles in amiable contest for position, are the brilliant, twisted young blac
k, LeGage Shelby, chairman of Defenders of Equality for You (DEFY); pompous, dough-faced Rufus Kleinfert, Knight Kommander of the Konference on Efforts to Encourage Patriotism (KEEP); and most of their fellow members of NAWAC. (Only Senator Van Ackerman is missing. Whispering now, he is in his fourteenth hour of filibuster against the Administration-backed Bill to Curb Further Acts Against the Public Order and Welfare.)
The Chief Justice is there, his wife already upset because she can tell from the way Mr. Associate Justice Thomas Buckmaster Davis is bustling about near the platform that he must have some preferred assignment she doesn’t know about. Senate Majority Leader Robert Durham Munson of Michigan and his wife, Dolly, are there, along with Majority Whip Stanley Danta of Connecticut, Crystal Knox’s father, and more than half the Senate. From the House, Representative J. B. “Jawbone” Swarthman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and possible strong contender for the Speakership next year, and his wife, “Miss Bitty-Bug,” are rubbing elbows, not too comfortably, with California’s giant young black Congressman Cullee Hamilton and his soon-to-be wife, Sarah Johnson. More than two hundred of their fellow House members are also on hand. All the members of the National Committee have already taken their seats on the platform.
Television crews are everywhere, and through the crowd there are many television sets in place to bring the ceremonies to the farthest reaches. Police with walkie-talkies are also everywhere, moving constantly, efficiently, yet amicably, their presence giving rise to a few catcalls but otherwise no indication of hostility. At regularly spaced intervals groups of four soldiers stand back to back facing their countrymen, guns, bayonets and gas canisters ready. Around the flag-decked platform and the dignitaries’ circle at the foot of the Monument, a tight cordon of Marines stands guard. Overhead the ubiquitous helicopters whir and hover.
Yet somehow, despite these precautions, there seems to be something in the air that indicates they will not be needed. Press and police estimate more than four hundred thousand present on this day that belongs to Orrin Knox and Edward Jason, yet with no visible exceptions they seem to be almost on picnic, so happy and relaxed do they look and sound. Even NAWAC’s banners are good-natured, and this seems to put the final touches on it:
Orrin and Ted: the Unbeatables … Hey, hey, great day! Bad times, go away! … Ted and Irrin have got us Roarin’ … We’ll have peace tomorrow and no more Sorrow …
Presently from far off there comes the sound of sirens, hailed with a great roar of greeting and approval. The sleek black limousine from Spring Valley comes along Constitution Avenue in the center of its police motorcycle escort, turns into the Monument Grounds and proceeds slowly to the foot of the obelisk. Two minutes later, more sirens, another great roar; the sleek black limousine from Dumbarton Oaks in the center of its police motorcycle escort comes along Constitution Avenue, turns into the Monument Grounds, proceeds slowly to the foot of the obelisk.
Out of their cars step the nominee for President and the nominee for Vice President, and their wives, and for a moment, in the midst of a wave of sound that seems to blot out the world, they stare at one another with a questioning, uncertain, hesitant yet friendly look. Then Orrin steps forward and holds out his hand, and as the picture flashes on all the television sets, a silence falls.
“Ted,” he says, and his words thunder over the Monument Grounds, the nation, the world, “Beth and I are glad to see you.”
“Orrin,” the Governor replies, “our pleasure.”
Impulsively and with a completely natural friendliness, Ceil steps forward and kisses Beth and then Orrin. Beth gives her a warm hug and then turns to embrace Ted. The television cameras zoom in, the still photographers push and shout and scramble. A shout of happiness and approval goes up from all the vast concourse.
Orrin links his arm informally through Ted’s and leads the way to the platform, through the dignitaries’ circle where friends and colleagues, opponents and supporters, greet them with an eagerly smiling, unanimous cordiality.
“It seems to be a happy day,” Orrin says quietly, words no longer overheard as the police hold back the press. “I’m glad.”
“So am I,” Ted says. “I think we have a great responsibility.”
“We do,” Orrin agrees. “I’m going to make a conciliatory speech.”
“I too,” the Governor says. “I had thought of sending it over for your approval this morning, but—”
“Oh, no,” Orrin says quickly. He smiles. “I trust you.” The smile fades, he looks for a moment profoundly, almost sadly, serious. “We’ve got to trust each other, from now on.”
“Yes,” Ted says gravely. “We must. I think we can.”
Orrin gives him a shrewd sidelong glance as they reach the steps of the platform.
“I have no doubts,” he says quietly.
“They’re going to need our help,” Beth says to Ceil as they, too, reach the steps and start up after their husbands.
Ceil smiles, a sunny, happy smile.
“I think,” she says with a little laugh, “that you and I can manage.”
The wild, ecstatic roar breaks out again as they appear together on the platform, standing side by side, arms raised in greeting, framed by the flags against the backdrop of the gleaming white needle, soaring against the hot, bright sky.
“Mr. Secretary and Mrs. Knox! Governor and Mrs. Jason! Look this way, please! Can you look over here, please? Mr. Secretary—Governor—Mrs. Jason—Mrs. Knox—this way, please! Can you smile and wave again, please?”
Finally Orrin calls:
“Haven’t you got enough?”
And from somewhere in the jostling tumult below them, of heads, hands, flailing arms, contorted bodies and cameras held high, there comes a plea of such anguished supplication that they all laugh.
“Please, just once more, Mr. President! All together again, please!”
“The things we do for our country,” Orrin says with a mock despair as they all link arms and step forward once more.
“Yes,” Ceil says happily. “It sometimes seems as though—”
But what it sometimes seems to Ceil at that moment will never be known, for they are interrupted.
No one in the crowd hears anything, no one sees anything. For several moments the import of the sudden confusion on the platform does not penetrate.
It is so bright and hot and sunny.
It is such a happy day.
They cannot quite comprehend, in that bright, hot, sunny, awful instant, the dreadful thing that has occurred so swiftly and so silently before their eyes.
It is not clear then, nor perhaps will it ever be, exactly what those who planned it had intended. But whatever they had intended, by some possibly inadvertent and unintentional miscalculation, they have accomplished more.
A husband and wife—but they are not the same husband and wife—stare at one another for a terrible moment suspended in time and history. Then she begins to scream and he begins to utter a strange animal howl of agony and regret.
Their puny ululations are soon lost in the great rush of sound that engulfs the platform slippery with blood, the Monument Grounds sweltering under the steaming sky, the two cities, the nation, the horrified, watching, avid world.
Edward Jason, Beth Knox slain … vice presidential nominee, running mate’s wife assassinated in Washington … secretary Knox, Mrs. Jason narrowly escape death in mêlée at monument grounds … police hold fake photographer suspect … nation’s leaders join in mourning governor Jason and Mrs. Knox … party thrown into confusion by loss of candidate … congress in recess … world appalled by new violence in U.S.…
And the second day:
Jason, Mrs. Knox lie in state at capitol … state funeral for both to be held tomorrow … secretary Knox, Mrs. Jason “improving,” remain in seclusion … presidential election scene clouded … party heads confer on new running mate for knox … anti-war elements restive at chance secretary may pick pro-war candidate … President Abbott reco
nvenes national committee for day after tomorrow …
And the third day:
Governor Jason, mrs. Knox interred at Arlington in somber state funeral … secretary, Mrs. Jason unable to attend … president says national committee faces “supreme responsibility” in choosing new running mate for Knox … furious political battle expected as pro-, anti-war forces seek to claim second place on Knox ticket … secretary’s son says he “must and will” choose his running mate … world still stunned by horror of double assassination as U.S. politics roars into high gear …
And life and history, as they must, go on.
2
“Rarely,” wrote Walter Dobius with a grimness that showed in the heavy-handed way he pounded the keys of his electric typewriter at beautiful “Salubria” near Leesburg in the hot Virginia countryside, “has a nation prepared for joy been plunged so rapidly into mourning.
“Rarely have hopes for peace been raised so high, only to be dashed tragically and instantaneously to the ground.…”
America’s most distinguished political columnist, aware that the readers of his 436 client newspapers were waiting avidly for the definitive word on the tragically sudden change in the nation’s political geography, gnawed his thumb knuckle thoughtfully for a moment as he paused to look out the den window at “Salubria’s” rolling acres, now somnolent and exhausted in the steaming twilight of the day on which Edward M. Jason and Elizabeth Henry Knox had been laid to rest. Not only his countrymen but the world waited for Walter Dobius. It was an awesome responsibility and, as always, he was prepared to discharge it.
