Empire

motion. No one could. I was also stuck with the fact that once you start a war you have to have heroes. So you-of all people-came bustling along, and I told the editors, ‘All right. Build him up.’ So that’s how a second-rate New York politician, wandering around Kettle Hill, blind as a bat and just about as effective, got turned into a war hero. But you sure knew how to cash in. I’ll hand you that. Of all my inventions you certainly leapt off the page of the Journal, and into the White House. Not like poor dumb Dewey, who just stayed there in cold print until he ended up wrapped around the fish at Fulton’s Market.”

Hearst sat back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head. Eyes on the ceiling fan. “When I saw what my invention could do, I decided to get elected, too. I wanted to show how I could take on the people who own the country that I-yes, that I helped invent-and win. Well, I was obliged to pay the inventor’s price. I was-I am-resented and feared by the rich, who love you. I could never get money out of Standard Oil the way you could. So in the long-no, short-run it’s who pays the most who wins these silly elections. But you and your sort won’t hold on forever. The future’s with the common man, and there are a whole lot more of him than there are of you…”

“Or you.” Roosevelt stared at the painting of Lincoln on the opposite wall, the melancholy face looking at something outside the frame. “Well, Mr. Hearst, I was aware of your pretensions as a publisher, but I never realized that you are the sole inventor of us all.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t put it so grandly.” Hearst was mild. “I just make up this country pretty much as it happens to be at the moment. That’s hardly major work, though you should thank me, since you’re the principal beneficiary of what I’ve been doing.”

Roosevelt arranged several statute books on the table. “What do you know about me and Mr. Archbold?“

“Standard Oil helped finance your last campaign. Everyone knows that.”

“Have you any proof that I asked for the money?”

“The asking was done by Hanna, Quay, Penrose. You only hint.”

“Mr. Archbold is an old friend of mine.” Roosevelt started to say more; but then did not.

Hearst’s voice was dreamy. “I am going to drive many men from public life. I am also going to expose you as the hypocrite you are.”

Roosevelt’s smile was gone; the high color had returned to normal; the voice was matter-of-fact. “You will have an easy time with the Sibleys and Haskells. You will have an impossible time with me.”

“You fight the trusts?”

“As best I can.”

“Have you ever objected to Standard Oil’s numerous crimes against individuals, not to mention the public?”

“I have spoken out against them many times as malefactors of great wealth.”

“But what,” Hearst’s voice was soft, “have you done to bring Standard Oil to heel? You’ve been here six years. What have you done, except rant in public, and take their money in secret?”

“You will see.” Roosevelt was very calm indeed. “Next year, we bring suit against them in Indiana…”

“Next year!” Hearst slapped the table gleefully. “Who says this is not my country? I’ve forced you, of all people, to act against your own kind. Because of what I’ve revealed this year, you’ll do something next year. But you don’t ever really lead. You follow my lead, Roosevelt.” Hearst was on his feet, but Roosevelt, not to be outdone, had done his special Jack- in-the-box rapid leap to the perpendicular so that, technically, the President had risen first, as protocol required, ending the audience.

At the door to the Cabinet room, Hearst got his hand on the doorknob first. “You’re pretty safe, for now.”

“I wonder,” said Roosevelt, softly, “if you are.”

“It’s my story, isn’t it? This country. The author’s always safe. It’s his characters who better watch out. Of course, there are surprises. Here’s one. When you’re out of a job, and need money to feed that family of yours, I’ll hire you to write for me, the way Bryan does. I’ll pay you whatever you want.”

Roosevelt produced his most dazzling smile. “I may be a hypocrite, Mr. Hearst, but I’m not a scoundrel.”

“I know,” said Hearst, with mock sadness. “After all, I made you up, didn’t I?”

“Mr. Hearst,” said the President, “history invented me, not you.”

“Well, if you really want to be highfalutin, then at this time and in this place, I am history-or at least the creator of the record.”

“True history comes long after us. That’s when it will be decided whether or not we measured up, and our greatness-or its lack-will be defined.”

“True history,” said Hearst, with a smile that was, for once, almost charming, “is the final fiction. I thought even you knew that.” Then Hearst was gone, leaving the President alone in the Cabinet room, with its great table, leather armchairs, and the full-length painting of Abraham Lincoln, eyes fixed on some far distance beyond the viewer’s range, a prospect unknown and unknowable to the mere observer, at sea in present time.

Note

Although I keep the historical figures in Empire to the generally agreed-on facts, I have changed the time of Del Hay’s defenestration from mid-night to mid-day. While the final meeting between Theodore Roosevelt and William Randolph Hearst did take place within the context of the Archbold letters, no one knows what was actually said. I like to think that my dialogue captures, if nothing else, what each felt about the other.

G.V.

March 18, 1987

About The Author

GORE VIDAL wrote his first novel, Williwaw (1946), at the age of nineteen while overseas in World War II.

During four decades as a writer, Vidal has written novels, plays, short stories and essays. He has also been a political activist. As a Democratic candidate for Congress from upstate New York, he received the most votes of any Democrat in a half century. From 1970 to 1972 he was co-chairman of the People’s Party. In California’s 1982 Democratic primary for U.S. Senate, he polled a half million votes, and came in second in a field of nine.

In 1948 Vidal wrote the highly praised international best seller The City and the Pillar. This was followed by The Judgment of Paris and the prophetic Messiah. In the fifties Vidal wrote plays for live television and films for Metro-Goldwyn- Mayer. One of the television plays became the successful Broadway play Visit to a Small Planet (1957). Directly for the theater he wrote the prize-winning hit The Best Man (1960).

In 1964 Vidal returned to the novel. In succession, he created three remarkable works: Julian, Washington, D.C., Myra Breckinridge. Each was a number-one best seller in the United States and England. In 1973 Vidal published his most popular novel, Burr, as well as a volume of collected essays, Homage to Daniel Shays. In 1976 he published yet another number-one best seller, 1876, a part of his on-going American chronicle, which now consists of-in chronological order- Burr, Lincoln, 1876, Empire, and Washington, D.C.

In 1981 Vidal published Creation, “his best novel,” according to the New York