(1964) The Man (111 page)

Abrahams appealed to the Chief Justice. “Your Honor, I believe this line of questioning is highly relevant. I am not interested in damaging the character of the witness, beyond bringing to light the factual evidence of her consistent instability, and therefore her lack of capacity for the position for which the President had hired her.”

“The President did hire her!” Miller shouted.

“Because he was misled as to her qualifications by Secretary of State Eaton, and for reasons that have a direct bearing on this case,” said Abrahams.

“Objection sustained,” announced the Chief Justice. “Mr. Manager Abrahams, henceforth confine yourself strictly to questions that will bring out testimony concerned with the charges in Article III.”

Abashed, Abrahams closed his folder, walked over and handed it to Tuttle, then returned to Sally Watson.

“Miss Watson, since Arthur Eaton was partly instrumental in helping you become the President’s social secretary, I am curious to know how long and how well you have known him.”

“How long? Always, I guess. He is a sort of friend of my father. I would see him at social functions.”

“And that acquaintance was enough for him to know your qualifications for the White House position?”

“Well, we often talked. I think he thought I was intelligent, and had social experience.”

“After the catastrophe in Frankfurt, you knew that Secretary Eaton was the next in line to succession to the Presidency, did you not?”

“I may have read it. I never gave it a thought.”

“You mean you never discussed this with Secretary Eaton, not even when you two were alone together?”

“We were never alone togeth—I mean, not actually—”

“Miss Watson, since you are under oath, and before you complete your recollection, I hasten to refresh your memory. We have evidence, entered into the record, to prove that you were seen dining with the Secretary of State outside Washington, and that, later, you were frequently a visitor to his Georgetown house after dark. Do you deny that?”

“I told you he was an old family friend. I saw him sometimes because he was nice to me, gave me advice at times when my father was busy. When I had a personal problem, I always ran to Mr. Eaton. That’s not unusual.”

“Did you know the Secretary of State was married?”

“Of course.”

“Was his wife ever present at these—these fatherly private meetings you had with him?”

“No. She was traveling.”

“Then, perhaps I am old-fashioned in suggesting your conduct
was
unusual.”

“You’re twisting it, that’s all. We were hardly ever alone. When we went out a few times, there were other people around. When I went to his house, there were sometimes other guests, well, the servants were there.”

“Did you know that the Secretary of State, who was your friend, and the President, who was your employer, were having important political differences?”

“No, I did not.”

“Since you spent so much time in the company of the President, in his private quarters, and in the evening, where confidential documents of state might be seen and phone calls overheard, did you ever hear anything—let us say, concerning our nation’s foreign affairs—that you repeated to Secretary Eaton?”

“No, I did not.”

“Miss Watson, about the night under discussion, the night the President allegedly made improper advances to you, you have stated that he was intoxicated. Were you?”

“No, I was not.”

“Yet you were seen, at the dinner for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, consuming champagne before and after the meal, and wine during it.”

“Wine does not make me drunk. It is a part of the meal.”

“And then, according to your testimony, you drank in the President’s bedroom?”

“He forced me to.”

“Forced you? How is that possible? He offered you a drink, if he did, and you accepted it. Is that what you mean?”

“I had to take it.”

“Miss Watson, you stated you were waiting in his bedroom before he arrived. How long?”

“I don’t know. Ten or fifteen minutes.”

“What did you do in his room?”

“Do? I—I smoked, and reread the papers he sent for, and kept thinking how I wished I wasn’t there.”

“The President had left his briefcase open in the room. It contained top-secret documents of such a nature as to have been useful to your friend Arthur Eaton. Did you even casually look at any of those documents?”

“Of course not! What do you think I am?”

“Then the President came in and pressed his attentions upon you, and because you resisted you were injured—is that still your story?”

“It is not my story, it is what happened.”

“Miss Watson, I have shown the photographs of the scratches and bruises on your chest and legs to three highly competent physicians. It is their opinion that while the wounds may indeed have been caused by another person, they may also, like the scar on your wrist, have been self-inflicted. Now—”

“That’s a filthy dirty lie!”

“I am merely repeating expert—”

“A lie!”

“I am sorry to have so upset you, Miss Watson. You must remember there were two persons in that bedroom, not one—”

“You bet your life there were.”

“—and you have given the court one view of what took place, but there is quite another view held by the other person who was present. In any event, let’s leave behind us the scene of our disagreement. Let’s get you out of that savage bedroom. You escaped, as you have told us. Where did you go? What happened next?”

“I ran to my office in the East Wing, to the washroom, to stop the bleeding, and clean up. Then I went home.”

“You went home. A little while ago, when learned counsel for the House asked you what you did immediately afterward, you said you promptly told some friends high up in government what had happened to you. How did you tell them, by telephone or in person?”

“In—in person. I couldn’t go right home in my condition. Now I remember. I had to speak to someone. So I went to my friends.”

“Could one of your friends, perchance, have been the Honorable Secretary of State Arthur Eaton?”

“Yes. I thought of him first.”

“You went to his house in Georgetown to tell him?”

“Yes.”

“But he was merely one friend. You say you spoke to several friends. Perhaps, when you went to Secretary Eaton, he had gathered about him others to receive you. Who was there when you arrived?”

“Mr. Eaton, and—and Governor Talley and Senator Hankins were there, and also Representative Miller. They were horrified by the way I looked.”

“Did you tell them all what had happened to you?”

“Not right away. I told Mr. Eaton. I was afraid to tell Senator Hankins and Representative Miller, knowing how outraged they would be at how a nig—a—a Negro—had acted.”

“You mean you were afraid they would be more outraged that a Negro had, as you say, made improper advances than if he had been a Caucasian?”

“I don’t mean that exactly.”

“What do you mean, Miss Watson?”

“I mean, they were already mistrustful of Dilman—President Dilman—and I was scared this behavior of his—they are very touchy about nig—about such behavior toward young ladies where we come from—I was afraid this would overexcite them.”

“Did it, when you told them?”

“Yes.”

“After that, was impeachment of the President mentioned in your presence?”

“Yes.”

“Because of what you told them?”

“Because of other things. This was just one more offense to them.”

“And Secretary of State Eaton—how did he take it?”

“He was revolted by the President’s behavior, and angry, naturally. He was restrained, because that’s part of his background and training.”

“But Secretary Eaton was pleased?”

“What?”

“He was pleased when you produced a set of file cards with notes taken by you in the President’s private bedroom, notes made from a transcript of a top-secret meeting between the Director of the CIA and the President, notes that gave warning to Secretary Eaton that the President was aware of Secretary Eaton’s efforts to usurp the Presidential prerogatives of office?”

“You’re insane!”

“Our relative sanity is not the issue here, Miss Watson. I told you that only two persons know what occurred in the Lincoln Bedroom. One is yourself, and you have given us your view of it. The other is the President, and in due time I shall introduce an affidavit signed by him proving that your story is fabricated out of whole cloth, and that your real motive in stealing into that bedroom—”

“He’s a liar like you! He’s a dirty lying black—”

She halted abruptly, staring at Abrahams, then at everyone around her, gasping.

“Are you all right?” Abrahams asked.

“I won’t be insulted!”

“I don’t think you are in any condition to go on, and I do believe I’ve heard all I want to hear. Thank you, Miss Watson. As far as the defense is concerned, you may be dismissed.”

He turned his back on her and returned to the table. When he resumed his seat, he could see that she had a handkerchief to her eyes, and, assisted by the Sergeant at Arms, was stumbling, then half running from the Chamber.

In the third row of Senate desks, Abrahams could also see Senator Hoyt Watson, livid, white mane wagging, as his colleagues crowded about him.

Abrahams sighed. He had challenged an ego, and when he thought that he had demolished it, he had found the id in its place, the immortal id that could not be demolished.

He looked up to realize that Zeke Miller was standing before the bench, glaring at him. Then Miller directed himself to the magistrate on high. “Mr. Chief Justice, the House managers offer their final witness in the trial of impeachment against the President. I shall examine the Honorable Secretary of State of the United States, Arthur Eaton.”

Abrahams’ eyes followed the tall, slender, faultlessly attired Secretary of State as he made his way to the raised dais. While Eaton ascended the podium and took the oath, Abrahams touched the arm of Walter T. Tuttle beside him.

“Walter,” Abrahams said in an undertone, “I can handle ordinary people, for better or worse, but I’m not sure I’d be any good at cross-examining someone who believes he wrote the Constitution. Think you can take him when the cross-examination comes?”

Tuttle glanced up at the witness stand, then said dryly, “Not sure anybody’s going to take him, Nat.”

“I suspect Miller will handle his last star witness on a loftier note,” said Abrahams. “He’ll evoke T. C. and Congressional dignity and the law of the land, and argue that Eaton was a symbol for all three, and in firing Eaton, our client sullied T. C.’s grave, spat on the Senate, and broke the Federal law. If that’s the gambit, I suggest we leave personal considerations out of the cross-examination. Equate the unconstitutionality of the New Succession Act with the proved unconstitutionality of the similar Tenure of Office Act back in 1868, and say it was slyly slipped through to keep Doug from performing as President and to keep Eaton serving as T. C.’s proxy in the White House, as evidenced by Eaton withholding CIA information from the President. I think that should be the note. That’s your cup of tea.”

“I think my cup of tea is weak, and so is theirs,” said Tuttle in a whisper. “I think it’s the stronger stuff everyone swallowed, or refused to, upon which the trial vote will depend. Legally, the Article supporting Eaton is the important one. Popularly, in fact, it will be the other Articles that will determine acquittal or conviction.”

Abrahams said, “I still say this technical stuff is your cup of tea. Want to handle it?”

“Gladly, even though the potion turns out to be hemlock.”

Exchanging smiles of agreement, Nat Abrahams and Walter Tuttle settled back to listen to Representative Zeke Miller begin his respectful examination of the closing witness, the man he was trying to make the new President of the United States.

For almost a half hour, Douglass Dilman had been gloomily sitting at his desk in the Oval Office, watching the spectacle on the portable television screen, watching and listening to Arthur Eaton grandly offer himself to the United States and the Senate as T. C.’s mind and conscience. Eaton had given the impression of being one who had done his utmost to save the country from a pretender, on T. C.’s behalf, in everyone’s best interests, but could do no more unless the nation took legal steps to oust the pretender and fill the vacancy with the one who alone was qualified to give the voters what they had wanted in the first place. His behavior was that of a person who fully realized he was giving a preview of what the next President would be like, and who displayed each patriotic and learned digression on domestic and foreign affairs like a model showing off a new garment the public might, and should, buy.

As Eaton’s underplayed performance, responding to Miller’s direction, came to a close, Douglass Dilman silently acknowledged its magnificence. For a while he stared out through the windows at the White House south lawn, with its stark elm and oak trees, and the long shadows of the late afternoon creeping across the expanse of brown-patched grass.

He was faintly depressed. Eaton’s poise and sophistication, his modulated eloquence, the ease with which he faced questions about farflung nations and their problems and America’s historic role in their future, his impeccable attire, above all his superior whiteness—these, and not his actual replies to the interrogation, were what depressed Dilman. The Secretary of State appeared to be the perfect archetype of a national leader, while he himself did not, and never would. If the Senate vote came down to a popularity vote, a vote for an image, then Eaton would be in this chair next week, and he himself would not see this view of the White House lawn again in his lifetime, except in tortured memory.

A familiar voice brought him back to the television screen. Abrahams’ colleague, and The Judge’s friend, the redoubtable Walter T. Tuttle, had begun his cross-examination of Eaton.

Tuttle’s stature in political history would match Eaton’s own. Tuttle’s tart sarcasm, his piercing inquiries, thrown from catapults built out of his wide knowledge of precedent and the country’s past, appeared to jolt the witness. Now and then Eaton’s invincible and arrogant confidence would give way to human uncertainty, and there were glimpses of a man no more a man than was Dilman or any other man. Did others see this, or was it only Dilman himself? Imperceptibly, his depression lifted.