Eaton had made no effort to interrupt and refute what the President was saying. His poise had not wavered. He betrayed no hidden concern, beyond the evidence of his inhaling and exhaling of smoke, which came faster now.
“There can be two versions of the truth to every matter,” Eaton said at last. “I find that, for whatever real reasons you may have, you have chosen to believe a warped version of the truth, and have not been judicious enough to wait for my version. Shall I go on? I think I should. No one spied upon you, at least on my behalf, last night, or ever. If Miss Watson took it upon herself to prove to me, as an old friend concerned about your-your questionable behavior, that you were my enemy, it is not my offense or concern-any more than is my knowledge of your private behavior with female members of your staff and your unseemly activity and habits after hours.”
Dilman stiffened. “What in the devil does that mean?”
“It means, Mr. President, in matters not affecting the welfare of the state, I have no right to interfere with your personal life. However, I, too, carry a public trust, and in matters concerning the life or death of my country, where I feel you have performed or may perform to the national detriment, I believe that I have the right to pass judgment on you, and interfere patriotically to correct you. I will not deny that Governor Talley and I temporarily withheld a Central Intelligence document concerning Baraza. We did so, for the time being, because of our knowledge of your temperament and-if I may say so-prejudiced judgment. We evaluated the rumor of a Communist buildup around Baraza as being ill-founded, and of minor consequence. Yet we foresaw that, because of your affection for Amboko, your understandable affinity for the struggling tribal people of your own color in the new African nations, you might have overreacted and committed the United States to a course of action from which there could have been no retreat. You displayed your favoritism, with dire results, in ignoring our advice to disband the Turnerite Group immediately. You displayed your arrogance and rashness in ignoring the majority will, the interests of the country at large and the pledges of your Party, by vetoing the Minorities Rehabilitation Program. I could not stop these disasters that you perpetrated in domestic affairs. But when I saw that you might perform as improperly in foreign affairs, which are my primary responsibility, I felt it my duty to guide you, whether you wished it or not. My motive was not to usurp your powers, but to preserve the peace.”
Throughout the last, delivered as if by a prep-school headmaster to a gauche poor boy in on a scholarship, Douglass Dilman’s wrath had been leavened by wonder. How unbelievable, he had thought finally, that this man could really justify his actions to himself by this self-hypnosis, this distorted rationale that he alone knew what was best for America and what was not. Could Eaton not see that he was doing no more than asserting his feeling of superiority, ergo: no second-class black citizen was able to possess the same wisdom and objectivity toward other peoples that an expensively educated, well-bred, white Protestant possessed by birthright.
Dilman had not meant to debate with Eaton, only to be rid of him. Yet the Secretary of State’s last remarks could not go unchallenged before their interview ended.
“Mr. Eaton, did it ever occur to you that by your act of withholding information from me, in effect taking it upon yourself to bury a grave warning to the government, you might be endangering the country you want to protect? What if I had not found out what was going on, and no one else in the executive branch had? What if the Soviet buildup of native Communists about Baraza proved to be true, and continued while we slept, what do you think would happen then? There would be an overnight takeover of the Barazan government by the Soviets. Then we would be forced to honor the African Unity Pact under the worst of circumstances, to try to save an ally, many allies, even a continent, where circumstances would put us at a military disadvantage. Can’t you see that preventive treatment is less costly than desperation surgery?”
Eaton shook his head, smiling disagreeably. “Mr. President, forgive me, but you are more naive about foreign affairs than I even suspected. Do you honestly believe that T. C. or Congress or the Department of State or the Joint Chiefs of Staff ever intended, from the start, to honor the African Unity Pact to the letter? Yes, we ratified it to bolster the strength of our democratic friends in Africa-but only on paper, for diplomatic propaganda. No one, not ourselves, not the African states, not Soviet Russia, ever believed we would commit our armed forces to uphold that pact.” He shook his head more vigorously. “No, my good man. Only an unsophisticated and overemotional Afro-American-and I put this in the kindest way-could so misunderstand the intent and purpose of our foreign policy. Do you believe any of us, who have experience in these affairs, would ever risk a nuclear war with the Soviet Union over Baraza? It grieves me that you have to learn the facts of life and politics this late in the game. But better now than never. In any event, all this conversation is pointless, as you will shortly learn. In fact, your wish to see me on a personal matter this morning coincided with our Party’s wish that I see you on a personal matter, also. I’m afraid I am on a painful mission. If you are prepared to listen to-”
Dilman’s disgust, his loathing for this diplomat’s crawling sophistries, was now complete. “Mr. Eaton, I have nothing more to discuss with you. Consider this interview our final meeting, and consider it now terminated.” He placed his palms against the edge of his desk and rolled back his chair, and then, hands on his knees, he said, “I shall expect your resignation within an hour. Good day, sir.”
To his utter surprise, Arthur Eaton did not move, but remained complacently settled in the Revels chair, casually ejecting his cigarette butt into the standing tray. Without bothering to look at the President, Eaton said, “Your bravado is admirable, Dilman. But do you honestly feel you are in a position, this minute, to ask anyone in your government to resign?”
Dilman, about to rise, held to the arms of his chair. “Do I feel I’m in a position to-?” He paused, then said slowly, “I feel I’m in a position to do whatever I believe to be right.”
As he absently examined his silver cigarette holder, the Secretary of State spoke. “I have been assigned to tell you-I find it painful, but no less my duty-that you are the one who is no longer wanted in our government. For many hours now, all through last night, the leaders of the House of Representatives and the Senate and your Party have been meeting to weigh the evidence they have uncovered about you. They have agreed, unanimously, that you are dangerously incompetent, and consequently unsuited for the high office accidentally thrust upon you, and that your continuing services are a detriment to the future of the United States.”
Eaton stared at Dilman.
“They desire to impeach you for high crimes and misdemeanors in office. Because I feel that such a method of publicly disgracing you and removing you from the Presidency is abhorrent, I have prevailed upon them-it was not easy, but I prevailed upon them-to accept a more moderate means of disposing of you. They would prefer, and I would prefer, that you do what is necessary to be done as a gentleman would, do what you so childishly requested of me earlier, and that is, tender
He paused, then continued. “The plan is that in the next few weeks, you fall ill, become more and more confined to your White House bedroom, and as the months pass, your disability becomes permanent. As you recover from this disability, perhaps a severe coronary, to which we can arrange that a committee of physicians attests, those of us who have been your assistants will continue to conduct the business of the executive branch in your name. You will remain President in name only, of course, as were Woodrow Wilson and Eisenhower when they were invalided. You may sign the documents that require your signature, but you will leave the actual performance of your duties to your committee of successors in the Cabinet. I find this solution simple, orderly, completely sensible-and in the best interests of the country. In return, of course, you have our pledge that the Articles of Impeachment in our possession will never be made public against you. Well, now, Dilman, there you have it.”
Douglass Dilman had listened to this plan unfold as if helplessly caught up in a mad nightmare. And emerging from it now, finding himself face to face with an actual human being who had spoken these fantastic words as if they were ordinary words, he was for seconds too stunned by the reality to speak.
But then the full impact of what had occurred hit him, and he felt the blood rushing through him and felt the pounding beneath his chest and temples. The effrontery of the proposition, the degrading insult of it, at last transformed his shock into rage.
He stared at his black hands knotted together on the Buchanan desk, watched with fascination their trembling. Never in his entire life had he suffered such a monstrous attempt to humiliate him. As a Negro, he was a scarred
