Empire

“I’m trying to. That’s really why I’m here. Not that this isn’t,” he stared at Hearst’s alarmingly huge smile, “worth the trip. My sister’s more political than me. She’s here to write about the convention. She actually writes herself, you know.”

“Many of us,” said Brisbane, sourly, “do.”

On the Fourth of July, Hearst was nominated by a San Francisco politician, a friend of the late Senator George Hearst. Blaise sat with Caroline and John Sanford in the press gallery of the huge airless hall. A six-foot portrait of Hearst dominated the stage, while a Hearst band played first “America” and then, as a recognition of the South’s importance to the populist millionaire, “Dixie.” Although Thomas E. Watson was, that very day, being nominated for president by the Populist or People’s Party, he had brought a number of Democratic Southern politicians into Hearst’s organization.

After the nominating speeches for Hearst, the California delegation led a parade around the floor of the convention. Blaise was surprised at how genuinely popular the Chief had become. “Of course he has no chance,” said Caroline, rising from her wooden folding chair.

Blaise also stood up. “Why not?”

“His Illinois delegation wasn’t seated. So that’s fifty-four votes for Parker. And Bryan will never support him. Let’s go get some air. I am about to faint.”

For the delicate business at hand, Blaise had selected a river-boat. The owner had offered Blaise a suite when it was discovered that every hotel in the city was booked, and so he now had, all to himself, the wonders of the Delta Queen, a great Gothic wooden contraption with paddle-wheels of the sort celebrated in John Hay’s “Jim Bludso of the Prairie Bell.” The night was airless, damp, hot. The Delta Queen was moored to the levee near Market Street. At the gangplank, a single guard saluted Blaise casually; and bade them all welcome.

A steward received them on the first deck, and escorted them into an echoing mahogany bar, lit by a single bronze gas-lamp, beneath which sat, ominous in his cheerfulness, dreadful in his jovial smile, the pink-whiskered Mr. Houghteling. Blaise was relieved to find his ally in place. Now it was two to two. Before, he had felt outnumbered by Caroline and John-three rather than two to one, since Caroline had, in a sense, doubled herself through accomplishment while he had diminished himself by non-success. Mr. Houghteling rose, the dentured smile ghastly in the light from overhead. “Mrs. Sanford. Mr. Sanford. Mr. Sanford. At least one has no trouble with names…”

A figure stepped out of the shadows and said, “I’m Mr. Trimble-not Sanford.”

Blaise felt, again, outnumbered. But he greeted Trimble politely; then the five of them sat at a round table, and the steward brought them champagne with the compliments of the owner. Blaise noted a spittoon had been fastened to the deck beside each chair. How, he wondered, was it emptied? and what happened if one’s jet of tobacco juice changed its trajectory due to a lurch of the ship? He tried to recall the laws of physics that he had learned in school-and forgotten. Galileo on the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Spit on the deck. As Blaise thought, wildly, of spittoons, Sanford and Houghteling were covering the table with sheets of paper, and Caroline and Trimble were talking to each other in low collusive voices. Blaise knew that he should feel elated; instead, he was merely hot, tired, irritable. Sanford began, for the enemy. “You’ve had a chance to study the Tribune’s financial status…?”

“Yes.” Houghteling looked at Blaise, who looked at Caroline, who was staring now into her glass of champagne. He thought of that other champagne glass, of Del dead on a New Haven sidewalk. “Yes,” Mr. Houghteling repeated, “all is in order, according to my accountant. I’m afraid I can neither add nor subtract. But he’s been with me thirty years, and he does both very nicely, or so I’m told by those who know. He says all’s well, so-all’s well. Now,” Houghteling frowned and smiled simultaneously, “we are willing to pay for fifty percent of the shares…”

Caroline, not her lawyer-husband, spoke. “Forty-eight percent of the shares are up for sale, not fifty percent.”

Sweat rolled down Blaise’s left side, tickling him mercilessly. “We agreed to fifty-fifty, you and I.” He stared at Caroline, who stared back at him, in perfect innocence.

“So we did. So it is,” she said. “I will sell you forty-eight percent of the shares. I will keep forty-eight percent of the shares. That’s fifty-fifty. We-you and I-will own exactly the same amount, as agreed.”

“Who owns,” asked Mr. Houghteling, sinister smile in place but cordial scowl gone, “the remaining four percent of the shares?”

“Mr. Houghteling misled us!” Caroline was suspiciously charming. “He adds and subtracts with lightning speed…”

“I own four percent,” said Trimble, turning his pale blue Brisbane-approved eyes on Blaise. “Mrs. Sanford wanted to give me a bonus when the paper was in profit. I said I’d take the bonus in the form of stock.”

“It was my understanding…” Houghteling began.

“I thought it was all cut and dried.” Sanford was now, himself, triumphantly cut, dried, thought Blaise. “Sister would sell brother half her shares for one hundred fifty-six thousand dollars. That was the meaning of fifty- fifty…”

“That was not my understanding.” Blaise wondered if he should abandon the game right then and there.

Houghteling tapped his pile of papers. “There was no mention here, according to my accountant, of any owner other than Mrs. Sanford, the sole owner.”

“You will find the Trimble shares adverted to in section five of the financial audit.” Sanford sounded bored; yet it was his life that was at stake. Blaise found him almost as mysterious as Caroline, whose mystery was to be exactly what she seemed, someone intent on getting what she wanted without unduly distressing those whom she-victimized: he was now casting himself in the role of victim. Certainly, he had been subtly misled from the beginning. Caroline was nothing if not tricky.

“We,” said Mr. Houghteling, “have acted in good faith from the beginning.”

“I trust,” said Sanford, “that you are not suggesting that we have not?”

“I suggest exactly that, yes. My client understood-as did I-that he would become half-owner of the Tribune. Instead, he is, to put it bluntly, a minority shareholder, who can be outvoted by Mrs. Sanford and Mr. Trimble, should they choose to act as one.”

“Which they will always do.” Blaise got to his feet. “I see no reason to go on with this.” He looked at Caroline, who smiled and said nothing.

“I am sorry if there has been a misunderstanding.” Sanford did not sound, in the least, sorry.

“There always is,” said Caroline suddenly. “We specialize in misunderstandings. It is a family trait. What looks to be a one to one of us appears as a seven to the other.”

Blaise experienced a moment of almost perfect rage, a highly exciting flush of blood to the head, followed by a sudden weakness. He sat down heavily. Caroline acted as if nothing untoward had been said. “If you would rather not buy, I’ll go to Mr. Hearst, who will be a publisher again tomorrow, or to Mr. McLean.”

This was bluff. Blaise knew that the Chief had no available money (he had spent close to two million dollars in order to secure the nomination), while John R. McLean had already said no to Caroline. “I’ll buy forty-eight percent of the shares, at the agreed-on price.” Blaise heard his own voice as though it were someone else’s, far off, strange. But then this was the most important decision that he had ever made.

“I draw your attention, Mr. Houghteling, to the obligation of your client and my client,” John was dry, correct, “in the event of a future sale of these shares, to offer one another, first, the option to buy…”

“Yes, yes.” Houghteling presented Caroline with a sheet of paper; then he signalled to the steward. “Ask the captain or mate or whoever’s on duty to witness these signatures.”

In silence they waited beneath the bronze lamp, which swayed, ever so slightly, as the river’s current rocked the ship. Two men in uniform joined them. Caroline signed first. Blaise signed second. The ship’s officers signed. Then Houghteling signalled for more champagne; and Caroline said, “Where is my check?”

Houghteling laughed; and gave her Blaise’s check. Blaise studied Sanford’s face; but there was no reaction. The cause of Caroline’s embarrassment appeared at ease.

Trimble raised his glass. “To the Washington Tribune,” he said.

Solemnly they drank. Then Sanford and Houghteling put away their documents. The ship’s officers excused themselves, and Trimble said, “I don’t know about you publishers, but the editor has to go back to the convention