With his finger holding his reading place, Dr. Thom closed his book. “Guess I should let the patient use the bed.” He sat up on the bunk, swinging his legs over the side.
Fletch was rubbing the steam off the window.
Taking off his red-and-black checked hunting jacket, Governor Wheeler opened the stateroom door.
“How do,” he said to the two men using his stateroom.
“How many cups of coffee did you have, Caxton?” Dr. Thom asked.
“Just two. But they were black.” The candidate smiled as if he had gotten away with something.
“Don’t blame me if you jitter.”
“What am I supposed to do, ask for skim milk everywhere I go? Caffeine’s important to these guys.”
In the door behind the governor, Walsh said, “Vic Robbins drove himself off a bridge this morning in Pennsylvania. Dead.”
“Yeah?” The governor was putting his hunting jacket on a hanger, and the hanger back in the closet. “He was a real weasel. Have I made a statement?”
“Yup.”
“Sent a wreath?”
“Will as soon as we know where to send it. You’d better hit something big and hard in Winslow, or you’ll get zilch on the nightly news. The accident will make good, easy television film.”
“Yeah. Like what?”
“Phil and Paul are trying to come up with something.”
“What have they got so far?”
“Pentagon spending.”
“Hell, anything anybody says about that has smelled of hypocrisy since Eisenhower. And he saved his complaints for his farewell address. Get something with a little pizzazz.”
Dr. Thom said, “You want anything, Caxton?”
“Yeah. A brain transplant. Go away. Don’t come back until you can do one.”
Fletch tried to follow Dr. Thom through the stateroom door.
“Hang on, Fletch,” The Man Who said. “I think it’s time you and I got to know each other a little better.”
10
“Sounds like gangland, doesn’t it?” chuckled Governor Wheeler after the door was closed. “A member of the opposition gets knocked off and we’ve got a wreath ordered before we know where to send it.” He sat in the chair Fletch had just vacated and indicated Fletch should sit on the bed. “American politics is a bit of everything: sports, showmanship, camp meeting, and business negotiation.” He bent over and began taking off his boots. “Ask me some questions.”
“Ask anything?”
“Anything your heart desires. You know a man more from his questions than from his answers. Who said that?”
“You just did.”
“Let’s not make a note of it.”
“I’ve got a simple question.”
“Shoot.”
“Why do you want to be President of the United States?”
“I don’t, particularly.” The Man Who was changing his socks. “Mrs. Wheeler wants to be Mrs. President of the United States.” Smiling, he looked up at Fletch. “Why do you look so surprised? Most men try to do what their wives want them to, don’t they? I mean, after ten, fifteen years in the same business, most men would quit and go fishin’ if it weren’t for their wives driving them to the top. Don’t you think so?”
“I don’t know.”
“Never married?”
“Once or twice.”
“I see.” The governor, socks changed, shoes on, laces tied, sat back in the swivel chair. “Well, Mrs. Wheeler worked hard during the two congressional campaigns, and the three campaigns for the statehouse, and she worked hard in Washington and in the state capital. It’s her career, you see, as much as mine. For my part, I began to see, five or six years ago, that I might have a crack at the presidency, so I deliberately started sidling toward it, positioning myself for it. I’m a politician, and the top job in my career is the presidency. Why not go for it?”
“You mean, you have no deep convictions …”
The governor was smiling. “The American people don’t want anyone with deep convictions as President of the United States. People with deep convictions are dangerous. They’re incapable of the art of governing a democracy because they’re incapable of compromise. People with deep convictions put everyone who disagrees with them in prison. Then they blow the world up. You don’t want that, do you?”
“Maybe I don’t mean convictions that deep.”
“How deep?”
“Ideas …”
“Listen, Fletch, at best government is a well-run bureaucracy. The presidency is just a doorknob. The bureaucracy is the door. The doorknob is used to open or close the door, to position the door this way or that. But the door is still a door.”
“All this stuff about ‘highest office in the land’ …”
“Hell, the highest office in the land is behind a schoolteacher’s desk. Schoolteachers are the only people who get to make any real difference.”
“So why aren’t you a schoolteacher?”
“Didactic but not dogmatic is the rule for a good politician. Who said that?”
“No one yet. I’m still thinking about it.”
“The President of the United States should be a good administrator. I’m a good administrator. So are the other gentlemen running for the office, I expect.”
“And you don’t care who wins?”
“Not really. Mrs. Wheeler cares.” The Man Who laughed. “Your eyes keep popping when I say that.”
“I’m a little surprised.”
“You really wouldn’t want an ambitious person to be President, would you?”
“Depends on what one is ambitious for.”
“Naw. I’m just one of the boys. Got a job people expect me to do, and I’m doin’ it.”
“I think you’re pulling my leg.”
Again The Man Who laughed. “Maybe. Now is it my turn?”
“Sure. For what?”
“For asking a question.”
“Do I have any answers?”
“We established last night you’ve taken this job on the campaign to feed some ideas into it. Last night, going to sleep, I was wondering what ideas you have.”
“Really sticking it to me, aren’t you?”
“Sometimes you know a man by his answers.”
“Governor, I don’t think you want to hear Political Theory According to Irwin Maurice Fletcher, scribbler and poltroon.”
“I sure do. I want to hear everybody’s political theory. Sooner or later we might come across one that works.”
“Okay. Here goes.” Fletch took a deep breath.
Then said nothing.
The governor laughed. “Called your bluff, did I?”
“No, sir.”
“Talk to me. Don’t be so impressed. I’m just the one who happens to be running for office.”
“Okay.” Fletch hesitated.
