television of perhaps thirteen inches (I haven’t seen a black-and-white television in years), which rests on a marble-top round table a few feet in front of her. Though she reached forward to turn down the volume knob as I walked in, the TV is, as Hank predicted, turned to C-SPAN.
She didn’t stand when Norene Davis announced my arrival—I had the impression it would be a good deal of trouble for her, but she also may have been making a point—and I approach her now, bending. “Dr. Wycomb, it’s been a long time,” I say in an overly loud and cheery way. I extend my hand, and when she doesn’t extend hers, I pat her forearm. “Your apartment is lovely.”
The hint of a smile crosses her lips. In a slow and quiet but perfectly audible voice, she says, “Alice, not all of us who are old are also deaf.”
Immediately, I feel a relieved recognition. With people who knew you before you were famous, you can tell within the first few seconds who you are to them now—whether they understand that you’re still you and that they can treat you as such, or whether you have been transformed in their eyes, requiring toadying and deference. I suppose it’s not surprising, given how much all humans are primed and influenced by one another, that these two types of behavior tend to be self-fulfilling. When old friends or acquaintances act as if I’m worthy of great respect, I tend to pull back (I’m uncomfortable, but no doubt it comes across as aloofness), which seems to reinforce their sense that they dare not relax around me the way they once did; but if they are relaxed from the start, I am, too. It’s obvious that to Gladys Wycomb, I am less the first lady of the United States than the granddaughter of Emilie Lindgren.
I gesture to a gold-leaf armchair. “May I sit?”
“I’m glad we finally got through to you,” Dr. Wycomb says. “Norene attempted to reach someone in your office repeatedly, but she kept being rebuffed. That’s when I thought for her to try Mr. Ucker.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Just how many people did Norene talk to? I wonder. And what did she say?
Again, that faint smile. “Mr. Ucker was quite interested once his people realized we weren’t batty.” She pauses. “Norene and I think Mr. Ucker resembles a troll.”
Hank is the most visible member of the administration besides Charlie and the vice president, and he therefore has both a cult following and legions of detractors. Seen by the public as a Svengali, Hank is credited with Charlie’s election and reelection, as well as with many of his most conservative policies. Knowing Hank as I do makes him less intriguing and mysterious than he must seem from a distance, but I don’t disagree with the view that Charlie probably wouldn’t be president if Hank hadn’t urged him to run for governor and engineered the subsequent campaigns. (Hank was delighted when Charlie became managing partner of the Brewers because at last Charlie had an identity apart from his family, a track record he could point to when voters in Wisconsin asked what he’d done for the state. The difference between Hank and Charlie was that Hank saw the job as an ideal stepping-stone, whereas Charlie saw it as an ideal job; without Hank’s prodding and ego pumping, I think Charlie would not have minded remaining in the role indefinitely.)
“Now, where did your henchmen go?” Dr. Wycomb asks. “Would they like a beverage?”
“They’re fine,” I say. Cal, my lead agent, insisted that three of them come to Chicago and that three more local agents meet us here; on our arrival at Dr. Wycomb’s building, Walter and the third fellow from Washington, Jose, did a walk-through before I entered. Now Jose and Cal are stationed in the hall, Walter is back by the Town Car at the curb ( Jessica sits inside the car), and the three local agents are patrolling the outside of the building.
I say, “Dr. Wycomb, when my grandmother and I came and stayed with you, it was the first time I’d been to a big city, and ever since then, I’ve had a place in my heart for Chicago.” As I say it, I have the unsettling realization that I must now be the age Dr. Wycomb was during that visit.
“I never thought of living anywhere else,” she says.
I hesitate, then I say, “Obviously, we both know why I’m here. I understand your concerns, I really do, and I want to make it clear that I respect your opinion. But for you to talk about my medical procedure with members of the media would be a serious mistake. I won’t pretend that it wouldn’t be damaging to me, but I strongly suspect it would be damaging to you, too.”
“If it’s damage you’re worried about, Alice, look around you.” Dr. Wycomb’s tone is abruptly different than it was when we were making small talk. “Your husband and the vice president should be tried as war criminals.” I’m about to respond when she continues, “I suppose the president’s excuse is that he was born a fool, but I’ve wondered for the last six years what yours is. I don’t know how you sleep at night.”
It’s not that I’m unaware people think this, but the sentiments are rarely expressed at such close range. Also, they don’t emerge from the mouths of people I know, or people so old.
I say, “Aren’t we both lucky to live in a country that allows the expression of this kind of criticism? Dr. Wycomb, it’s your right to disagree with any or all of the president’s choices, but please remember that his administration is a different entity from me personally.”
“How convenient.” She is looking straight ahead. “But the personal is political, or did you miss the women’s movement?” She turns her head so our eyes meet. “Many times, I’ve had the notion to write you a letter, and I’ve told myself, Gladys, it won’t make it to her. She’ll never see it. But I still thought you’d intervene. I kept waiting for evidence that you were reining him in and speaking as a voice of reason.”
“Not every conversation I have is public, Dr. Wycomb.”
“Are you telling me that you have confronted your husband?”
“I answer to my own conscience. That’s as much as I want to say.”
“And I answer to mine,” she says. “Lest you think I have misgivings about sharing your secret, my only regret is that I didn’t speak out years ago.”
We both are quiet, and I can hear another television—a soap opera, it sounds like—somewhere else in the apartment. Norene Davis, I saw when she let me in, has black hair pulled back in a low ponytail and is wearing scrubs with teddy bears.
“Who do you think will be hurt by overturning
?” Dr. Wycomb says. “Not women we know—they’ll go to their doctors like you came to me, very hush-hush but perfectly clean and professional. But the poor women, where do they go? Every doctor knows outlawing abortion doesn’t make it less common, it just makes it less safe. Before ’73, I had patients who found me after botched procedures. They’d show up with cases of sepsis and bacteremia that would give you nightmares, and these were
