“Martini?” inquired Carlos.
“Need you ask?” Her roving glance fell on Tash. “So you’re one of us now. Welcome to the madhouse!”
“It seems a well-regulated madhouse.”
“Wait till the campaign starts.”
Vivian crossed the room to them. “Hilary, she will need a room for overnight.”
“All set. She’s to have the suite next to mine.”
“Mrs. Playfair,” said Tash. “If I may, I would like to explain about that letter.”
“Not now, if you please, Miss Perkins. Some other time.”
Tash was not used to flat rejection or a voice of ice. Why should Mrs. Playfair treat her as an enemy? What could be more natural than wanting to explain what had happened to a letter she had been trusted to mail?
Hilary was looking at Tash over the rim of her cocktail glass. “There are a lot of things I’ll have to explain to you. Maybe after luncheon. Damn this election! There’s no time for anything else. I can’t even work on my book.”
“What’s your book about?”
“The structure of society. After all, I am a social secretary.” Her laugh was as harsh as the grinding of gears. “It’s called In Defense of Snobbery.”
Tash blinked. “I gather you don’t agree that the word snob comes from sine nobilitas—without nobility?”
“I don’t care whether it does or not. I decided to write this book when I heard someone say that good grammar is snobbish, and—”
But Tash was no longer listening. The Governor had just come into the room.
Job Jackman was with him, and a small, plump woman, who was introduced as Mrs. Jackman and addressed by the others as Jo Beth.
Everyone present now was a member of Jeremy Playfair’s famous “Tennis Cabinet,” a close-knit group that worked and played with him: his own wife, the Jackmans, Mrs. Truance, and Miranda. The only one missing was Captain Wilkes, who commanded the state police guard at Leafy Way.
They moved to the adjoining breakfast room, where luncheon was usually served, as well as breakfast.
Tash discovered from a place card that she was on the Governor’s left. He was polite and even cordial to Tash when he remembered she was there, but most of the time his eyes were on his wife at the other end of the table. Once when he was speaking to Tash he said, “Miss . . . er . . .” and she had to supply the Perkins. She thought then: There will never be anything very personal about this relationship, and turned to the woman on her left.
Jo Beth Jackman was just about what one would expect Job’s wife to be: simple, serious, dressed carefully rather than smartly. She looked just about Job’s age, and Tash put them down as old high school sweethearts.
Jo Beth talked about her two sons, both in college, and showed their pictures to Tash. They looked like the kind of boys Tash would like to have herself some day.
“I miss them,” Jo Beth sighed. “I miss the life we used to live at our ranch out West. We’ve rented a sort of country place here, Fox Run, but it’s too suburban. The boys don’t like to spend their vacations there. They miss the horses and mountain trails and all that. So do I. I’m just not cut out for this sort of life.”
“I don’t suppose anybody is.”
“They are.” Jo Beth looked at Jeremy and then down the table at Vivian. “They are both perfect in their parts, and I think the Governor enjoys every minute of it. Sometimes I wonder about Vivian. She doesn’t take the slightest interest in social questions that interest Jeremy, yet, personally, she is compassionate. Her maid, Juana Fernandez, is a Barloventan immigrant who couldn’t get a job with anyone else. Total illiteracy and no English.”
“But Mrs. Playfair took her on?”
“Yes. I met Juana through settlement work. I told Vivian about her, and Vivian promptly offered her this job as personal maid to tide her over until she could learn English and go on to a better job. Few women would have done that.
“Why not?”
“Oh, I didn’t tell you? Juana’s face is monstrously scarred, the result of being questioned by secret police under the Roya regime. That face is a much greater handicap than lack of English or illiteracy. Employers, both men and women, took one look at it and said, ‘No.’ It was something they did not want to look at every day. Yet Vivian accepted it as part of her daily life. There is more to Vivian than most people think.”
Over coffee, the Governor got down to business with Tash.
“Let me give you a quick run-down on my personal prejudices in writing and speaking.
“I like everything short—speeches, paragraphs, sentences, and words. I like a frequent change of pace. Monotony will put any audience to sleep. I don’t like starting with a corny joke. Plunge in medias res like Horace.
“I like salt and pepper; wit, not clowning. Some people object that wit hurts. That’s why we should use it. Politics is a fight. The word ‘slogan’ means war cry. Anger can be useful if you use anger and don’t let it use you.
“Please avoid rhetoric. Say ‘Duluth,’ not ‘the zenith city of the unsalted seas.’ Say ‘a small group of dishonest bosses,’ not ‘a miniscule coterie of unscrupulous elitists.’ Don’t revive words that were decently buried generations ago, or invent new ones. Don’t say ‘peers’ when you mean ‘equals,’ or ‘confidentiality’ when you mean ‘trust’ or ‘privacy.’ And don’t use nouns as adjectives or verbs.”
Tash smiled. “So I can’t say everybody who lives in a structured society has a conflicted personality?”
“Not unless you want to lose all thrust, clout, and charisma. Any other questions?”
“Only one. What are these speeches going to be about?”
Jeremy laughed aloud. He was beginning to seem more aware of her as an individual now.
“A difficult question!” The laughter lines faded. “The campaign starts tonight. I’m announcing my candidacy for a second term at a men’s dinner for
