who is helping us out. Later tonight, this source, who has intimate knowledge, will agree to go on the record to discuss your case. He is familiar with all the details-the initial criminal charges, the name change, the cosmetic surgery.'
I eyed him carefully to see if I was having any effect. I couldn't tell. Hutchins shook his glass some more and gazed back at me with a look that was tough to read.
Maybe I was just having a tough time with perspective. I was physically exhausted and mentally drained, and perhaps because of that, Katherine's image kept rolling through my mind. I thought of that ride to the hospital the year before. I thought of how she put her face against my shoulder and held my arm and kissed my hand and told me that she felt as if she were born to have children with me. She told me that even after we had our baby, I would always, always, be the most important person in her life, the one she cherished the most, and that I had damn well better feel the same way about her. And I did. I did.
Which is why ever since, the emptiness had been so overwhelming, the loneliness unbearable, even when I wasn't alone.
Then, sitting there in the Oval Office, I had another thought, as if Katherine had all but whispered it to me in this time of need.
'Sir, it's god-awful to have your wife and child die the way yours did,' I said. 'Unbearable.' I paused for a long moment, then added,
'I understand that all too well. I understand what it can do to your heart, to your mind, to your very sense of being. It can change everything, even if you don't realize that it's changing anything at all.'
That was followed by a long stretch of silence. He wasn't looking at me, but rather down at his glass, if, in fact, he was looking at anything at all.
I said, 'You don't need me to tell you how much of a monumental success you've become,' I said. 'And against all odds. I have a hunch you didn't turn to crime until after your wife and son died, when you didn't know what else to do. I have a feeling that their memory gave you an awful lot of support when you left crime behind and started your new life. I have a feeling that you miss them now in a way that only the two of us could ever really understand, that you'd like to be true to them, that you want to stop living this lie.'
He still stared down at his desk. I couldn't be positive, but I thought I saw a drop of water-a tear-roll off his face and splash into his glass.
I paused for effect more than anything else, took another deep breath, and said, 'Sir, tomorrow morning, I'm fairly certain I will have a story on the front page of the Boston Record explaining that your past is fictitious, that you are a rehabilitated felon.' I then added in an admittedly lame attempt at humor, 'At least I think you're rehabilitated.'
He didn't laugh.
Behind me, on the other side of the office, the burning logs in the fireplace snapped several times, sounding like gunshots, making me jump, but imperceptibly so, I hope. Darkness engulfed the room, the reflection of the desk lamps shining on the inside of the French doors and the tall windows. In front of me, Hutchins held the glass in his hand on the surface of the desk and shook it back and forth again, then lifted it to his mouth for another sip. He still hadn't met my eyes.
The quiet seemed interminable.
'I am Clayton Hutchins,' he said finally, looking up, his voice softer, his tone less resolute. 'The government says I'm Clayton Hutchins.
All my records say I'm Clayton Hutchins. I have a birth certificate.
I was home-schooled by parents who have since died. I worked on a farm, went to college later in life.'
I stayed silent. I saw that his cheeks were damp. I shook my head slowly in a sign of disappointed disbelief.
More silence. He took a deep breath, focused on some point beyond me, and said, 'It's one thing I always liked about you, Jack, one thing that always drew me to you. You know what it's like to have everything taken away from you by some arbitrary hand. You know what it's like to lose everything you've ever wanted, all of your hopes and all of your dreams and all of your expectations for the future, all in one incomprehensible act of a God who you could never, ever even pretend to understand. You know what it's like to live the rest of your days knowing you can never get it back, no matter who you are, even if you're the president of the United States. You know all that.'
I was riveted, fearful that even the slightest movement or noise would stop his inevitable confession.
He continued in a louder, firmer voice. 'I paid a steep price. I struck a deal. I traded in my entire life, or what was left of it.
You know what that's like, to give up your life? And now that I've turned myself around, now that I've made it on my own, you're going to hang all that around my neck and choke me to death, all over again?'
He pronounced those last three words by punching out every syllable.
'I deserve better,' he said. 'You know that.'
He paused, stared down at his glass, at the ice melting into the whisky, and added, far more softly, 'This wasn't part of any deal.'
I probably should have felt pity. But all I really felt was relief.
Sitting in the Oval Office on deadline on the night before the election with the president of the United States, I had him cold. I had my story. I even had my quotes, which I repeated in my mind several times to help commit them to memory.
'Sir, you may be right. It wasn't part of the deal you had with the government. But you had a deal with the American people, and that deal was to tell the truth, to let them know who you are, to be judged on the whole rather than just the past few years.'
His voice grew louder. 'I did tell them who I am, dammit. I am Clayton Hutchins. I made my money on my own, with no help from anyone.
For chrissakes, I gave up a lucrative life to be Clayton Hutchins. I succeeded. And now you're about to burn me with my own success?
Where's the fairness in that? Where's the fucking fairness in that?'
He pounded his fist on the desk as he asked these last questions. I remained silent, taking in this remarkable situation. Hutchins started up again, seething. 'You think I've been a bad president? You think all those people who are planning to vote for me tomorrow believe I'd make a bad president for the next four years? You think my policies aren't carefully thought out? You think I've been corrupt? No, goddammit. No.'
He took a long, final sip and slid the glass aimlessly across his desk as he reclined in his chair. 'Raj!' he yelled. The steward appeared silently in the doorway. 'Another Johnnie, please.'
'Sir,' I said. 'The voters have a right to know who they voted for.
They have a right to know your background, your experiences, the truths in your life, and the lies. All of that shapes who you are, and dictates how you'll act in the future as the country's leader, in times of good fortune and in times of crisis. The voters have the right to the truth.'
He shook his head dismissively. 'But I struck the deal with the government. I honored my part, they honored theirs.'
'Sir, with all due respect, the people are the government. Yes, it's a clich'e, but it also happens to be the truth. And the people have a right to know.'
And I believed this. Light, sunshine, is an amazing thing. It keeps a democracy vibrant by keeping the people informed. Informed people are usually wise people, or at least practical. Was there self-interest in this story? Of course. I'm in this business to break news, to tell people that which they don't already know, to place important facts in the rich dialogue of our nation. This wasn't about his sex life or some ancient two-bit misdemeanor. This struck at the very foundation of who our president is, and in this case, was.
He stood up and stared down at me from across the desk, then walked toward the French doors, slowly. He stopped and looked out into the Rose Garden, black but for a few spotlights shining on some chrysanthemums standing sentry against the autumn breezes. Then he walked slowly over to the fireplace and stood there for a moment, gazing at the unfinished portrait of George Washington hanging over the mantel. I sat in silence, following his movements, thinking of the office. I remembered hearing how Ronald Reagan, on his last morning as president, walked slowly from the residence to the West Wing and found it completely darkened and empty.
