A Shade of Difference (23 page)

“We’ll work it out,” the Secretary said. He stopped on the doorstep. “Oh, one thing. I almost forgot. I have a message for you from our dinner guest this evening. I’ll quote him exactly. He said, ‘I wish him well. You can tell him I said so. Just say: “Seab Cooley said to say he wishes you well.”’ There, I think I’ve made it about as repetitious as he does.”

Again the Congressman looked genuinely pleased.

“That was very kind of him. You know,” he added thoughtfully, leaning against the doorjamb, “it’s a funny thing, and I expect you northerners wouldn’t understand it, but in a curious way I think that old man and I really quite like each other. We’ll never agree on my race, and no doubt he’s been guilty of a lot of bad things toward it, but—you tell him I said I wish him well, too. He’s one of the last of his kind, and, on its own terms, I expect it wasn’t such a bad kind, in lots of ways. You tell him what I said.”

“Maybe you should tell him yourself,” the Secretary suggested. His host dismissed it with a laugh.

“No. To quote my mother, God rest her soul, that wouldn’t be fittin’. It just wouldn’t be fittin’. I could do it, but he wouldn’t know how to take it. So you be our messenger, Mr. Secretary. We both trust you.”

Orrin Knox laughed.

“Good. And good night, Cullee. It’s a great relief to have your help.”

“Any time I can. Give my regards to Mrs. Knox.”

And so, the Secretary told himself with some satisfaction as he began the long drive back to Spring Valley, he had done about as much as he could do to appease little Mr. Self-importance from Gorotoland. He would call Hal or Lafe as soon as he got back to the house—both would be at the Turkish party at the Waldorf, and he could reach one or the other there—and get the word to the M’Bulu that he would have a formal luncheon with the Foreign Relations and Foreign Affairs Committees on Friday and then on Friday night be entertained at “Vagaries” by the Knoxes, the Munsons, and a lot of other highfalutin folk. These honors, together with the reception at the British Embassy, should be enough to calm him down. In fact, considering all the handicaps that had surrounded the matter, the Secretary congratulated himself as he swung up Massachusetts Avenue again that he had done about as good a job as anyone could do on such short notice of handling the problem presented to the United States by the M’Bulu of Mbuele. What he could not know, of course, was that the M’Bulu, dancing gaily with a lady delegate from Malaya at the Waldorf, wasn’t really anywhere near as concerned about this particular problem as he had chosen to sound all day long. Terrible Terry, although no one knew it but himself, had kept an eye on the news and now had another problem altogether in store for the United States.

9

For the better part of two hundred years, “Harmony” had stood on the Battery in Charleston with an air of calm and stately dignity that often belied the activities that went on inside. Behind the great white pillars in the great high-ceilinged rooms, some of war’s beginnings had been plotted and many of war’s bitter consequences had been felt. Proud men who debated conquering the North over brandy and cigars in the mansion’s oak-paneled living room had come home to that same room minus legs or arms or eyes and carrying in their hearts the bitter foreknowledge of the North’s cold unforgiveness. The passions and tempers of four proud families had swept in and out of the broad hallways and across the broad lawns, velvet-soft in the years of plenty, scraggly and weed-grown in the years of adversity, velvet again as prosperity slowly returned to a beaten but still unhumbled people. Original Ashtons had given way to Boyds; Boyds eventually yielding, after the war, to Middletons; Middletons, dwindled down at last to two ancient spinsters, giving over, after a later and yet more monstrous war that began in 1939, to Jasons. Yet even with these last, regarded as rich, intruding Yankees, fawned over to their faces and despised behind their backs by their soft-talking, professionally cordial Southern neighbors, “Harmony” had always managed, under all conditions, to maintain its dignity, its air of solid magnificence, its outward aspect of stately and serene gentility.

Until today.

Today, things were happening to “Harmony.”

The process had begun around 9 a.m. when three trucks filled with cameras and electronic equipment, each emblazoned with the name of a national network, had roared down the quietly gracious thoroughfare to turn abruptly into “Harmony’s” winding drive. Loud-spoken men had leaped to earth, their voices raucous in the golden morning, and for an hour or more there had been great noise and disturbance in the neighborhood.

When it finally subsided, long black cables snaked from the trucks up “Harmony’s” stately steps and into “Harmony’s” stately halls, and at every vantage point in the mansion—in the living room, the parlor, the ballroom, and the banquet hall; on the verandas and here and there at strategic intervals about the lawn, television cameras now stood poised and ready to capture famous people and witness historic events. Operators and technicians lounged about, exchanging loud and irreverent conversations on the affairs of nations and of men as they drank coffee furnished by the crew of servants busily at work in “Harmony’s” kitchens, and it was obvious to everyone for blocks around that something of vast import was soon to take place.

Shortly after 11 a.m. this knowledge was strengthened by the arrival of two chartered buses labeled “JASON FOUNDATION—PRESS,” just in from Municipal Airport, where their occupants—reporters, correspondents, columnists, editors, and photographers—had been met by Jason—furnished transportation after their Jason-financed flights from New York, Washington, Chicago, Los Angeles, Denver, and other centers of publicity and communication. Again the soft morning air was troubled with the cries of old hands at the game greeting one another, the ribald comments of professionals surveying the sort of spectacle they had all seen so often before, the cynical, half-resentful jesting of men and women who knew they were being used but knew also that their profession made it impossible for them to escape being used. Another coffee line soon formed under the great oaks and the air was filled with gossip and speculation about the luncheon to come, its principal guest, its principal organizers, and the pertinence of it all to political events both foreign and domestic. So quietly that hardly anyone at “Harmony” noticed, shades were drawn on the windows of the two houses overlooking the old mansion and a deliberate hush descended on the Battery. Against it the noise and bustle in that one place, emphasized by the surrounding silence, appeared to take on the volume of a small but crowded midway at a circus. This was undoubtedly the intention of those who had drawn the shades, but the gesture was lost upon the people at “Harmony.” None of them paid any attention, and the rising tide of sound kept right on rising.

Promptly at noon the first of what soon became a steady procession of sleek black chauffeured Cadillacs came along the Battery, turned into the winding approach to the mansion, and discharged its passengers under the gleaming portico. From this car there emerged four people, Edward Jason, Governor of California; his sister, Señora Labaiya-Sofra; his brother-in-law, the Ambassador of Panama; and the guest of honor. Cameras whirred, flashbulbs popped, newsmen pressed forward.

“Governor, do you have any comment to make on the President’s treatment of His Royal Highness? Governor, would you care to comment on the United States attitude toward Africa? Governor, are you ready to announce your candidacy for President?”

To all of these, particularly the last, which brought general laughter in which he joined, the Governor of California gave his pleasant, statesmanlike smile and a friendly, “No comment, ladies and gentlemen. This is the M’Bulu’s day. Talk to him.”

“But, Governor,” the
San Francisco
Chronicle
said, “surely you have
some
comment to make on what has been happening in the last couple of days?”

“I’m going to make a little speech,” Edward Jason said, patting his breast pocket. His dark eyes sobered for a second, his deep tan looking beautifully impressive contrasted with his silver eyebrows and silver hair. His fine head came up in the challenging gesture he had adopted from another Governor of California who not so long ago had followed to its successful conclusion the road upon which he himself was now embarked. “Listen to the speech. I think it will make my position clear.”

“Your Highness, then. Has Your Highness received any communication from the United States Government since yesterday?”

Terrible Terry, his green and gold robes crowned today by a cap and tassel of brilliant purple that raised his total height to seven feet, gave his shrug and happy smile.

“Oh, I received something last night. Not a formal communication, you understand; but the distinguished delegate of the United States to the United Nations transmitted invitations to me from the Secretary of State. There will be a luncheon, I believe, on Friday. And a party Friday night after the British Embassy reception. A private party.”

“Will this satisfy you as a substitute for being entertained by the President, Your Royal Highness?”

Again the shrug and smile.

“Is a little stone a substitute for bread?” he asked, as they all laughed. “I think not. But, like the Governor—I too have a speech. Will you listen?”

“Oh, yes,” someone assured him. “We’ll listen.” “We wouldn’t miss it for anything,” said someone else.

Amid more laughter, the official party turned and went in.

There followed in quick procession other distinguished guests, faithfully recorded by television and still cameras, evoking appropriate comments from the press as its members busily jotted down names and noted the degree of fame.

Herbert Jason, cousin of the Governor and Señora Labaiya, Nobel Prize-winning scientist and genius in the field of electronics, arrived with two elderly Jason aunts and the director of the Jason Foundation. Four members of the Senate and five from the House, all from northern or western states, followed in succeeding cars. Several editors from the smaller and more agitated journals came next, looking suitably self-important. Various members of the upper echelons of the metropolitan press: editors, editorialists, special writers, columnists; three or four book publishers of the desperately concerned variety—they too passed within the portals.

Following came some of the more famous leaders of a certain highly vocal sector of American intellectual thought, the headline-lovers who sign petitions and get up memorials, the profound thinkers who are to be found one week seeking “FAIR PLAY FOR DICTATOR X,” who has just shot ten thousand innocent victims, and the next urging “JUSTICE FOR MOE GINSBERG,” now waxing pale in Dannemora after having given atomic secrets to Russia and done his best to destroy his own country.

It was, in fact, a sort of Walpurgis Noon of all the professional phonies and intellectual flotsam of America, washed up on “Harmony’s” broad lawns, and given an extra twitter this day because the word was out that next week there would be a full-page “FAIR PLAY FOR GOROTOLAND” ad in the
New York
Times
and
everybody
but
everybody
would have his name on it.

Finally, quite late in the flow of arrivals, not appearing until almost a hundred guests had entered “Harmony,” came a trio that again brought press and cameras surging forward. In rather surprising conjunction the director of the President’s Commission on Administrative Reform, the chairman of DEFY, and the young colored Congressman from California arrived together to be faced with the usual onslaught of questions.

“Mr. Leffingwell, sir, do you have any comment to make on the President’s refusal to entertain the M’Bulu? Mr. Shelby, what do you think the United States can do to regain the ground we have lost at the UN? Congressman, do you think His Highness’ reception here will please the Negroes of America?”

“I have no comment,” Bob Leffingwell said easily. “I work for the President, you know.” They laughed appreciatively; he posed for pictures and vanished within. LeGage was a little more elaborate.

“Yes, I think the United States has lost ground,” he said slowly, “with the Africans and also with the Asian states. Through this thing with the M’Bulu and also, as always, because of domestic conditions here in this country. Speaking as a member of the United States delegation, I am happy to be here with His Highness. Speaking as chairman of DEFY, I would hope that the United States would continue to press forward vigorously to end segregation wherever and whenever it exists. Including,” he said after a significant pause that they leaped upon at once, “this city.”

“Does that mean DEFY is going to get into the school situation here, ’Gage?” the
Chicago
Defender
asked quickly. LeGage got the solemn self-important look that always made his ex-roommate want to kick him.

“I wouldn’t want to say anything at all on that,” he said with great emphasis. “Anything at all.”

“How about you, Congressman?” the
Defender
said. “How do you think the Negroes of America feel about the M’Bulu’s visit here to this city which is about to become the scene of another battle for human rights?”

“Quite a question,” Cullee observed. “I’ll ask you one. You’re a Negro: How do you feel?”

“It’s my business to ask the questions, Congressman,” the
Defender
said sharply. “It’s yours to answer.”

“I can’t speak for the Negroes of America.”

“Some of us would like to think you could, Congressman,”
Ebony
magazine told him, while the white press crowded closer, intrigued by this developing intramural argument.

“Well,” the Congressman said shortly, “I don’t. I don’t know how all the Negroes in America feel about it, any more than
you
know how all the Negroes of America feel about it. Speaking as a member of the Congress of the United States—one member—I hope the M’Bulu will have a pleasant and enjoyable visit and go home thinking well of us.”

“What do you think about the integration crisis here?” the
Afro-American
asked. Cullee gave him a long look and started to turn away.