Skeletons (14 page)

I began to speak, but Stanton cut me off.

"Let me finish if I might, Mr. President. There's more. The former leaders of the United States are not the only ones with designs on our territory. There are others, many of them extremely dangerous, in Europe, Asia, and what they now call the Soviet Union, comprising Russia and territories east. One of the ancient rulers of India has already slaughtered millions of Hindus. There are vast arsenals of weapons, some of them hideous in strength, poised for use or already used at various points around the globe. This is not a problem confined to the United States or even the Americas. And then of course there is the problem of the living . . ."

"What the Secretary is saying," Herndon said, "is that once we stabilize the `second lifers,' as we're calling them, there will of course be another fight with those who were already here. We know that as they are killed they become like us, which seems a relatively humane way of handling the problem. Coexistence is out of the question. You and I have already talked about this rage we seem to have against the living humans; apparently it is uncontrollable and we can only conclude there is a reason for it. They will not live with us; we cannot live with them. The only solution as we see it is to bring them over to us. This will be the war beyond the war. You seemed to realize all this already, when I talked to you."

"Yes . . ." I said, my heart sicker all the while.

"You do understand the urgency of this, don't you, Mr. President?" Stanton said.

I looked at him, at his manacled prisoner who stood mute beside him, gaze downward. One of the bones in his leg had been broken at one time, I saw.

"Yes, I understand. But unfortunately, I cannot help."

"Mr. President, this is impossible!" Stanton exploded. "Without you, there is no hope. Histories all over the world cite you, know what you did during the War Between the States. There is a man, Gandhi, who has tried to stop the bloodshed in India, who specifically mentioned you by name. He was cut down two days ago. You are known, you are someone who can be rallied behind. Mr. President," he said, overcome by emotion, "there is a train, waiting for you now, to take you to Washington. An aircraft would not be safe, we feel. Arrangements have been made with Lyndon Johnson to transfer power tomorrow, at noon. A former Supreme Court justice has been engaged. Television and radio will carry the proceedings around the world. You will declare that the United States of America is, as of noon tomorrow, a sovereign nation once more, and that, in fact, all nations are invited to join with it in a new, democratic order." There were tears in his eyes. "With you this can happen. Without you we have nothing."

A weight of sadness unlike any I had ever felt, even in the darkest days of the war, pressed down on me.

"Sirs," I said, taking my two friends, as well as the manacled stranger, in with my words. "I say no to you. I cannot, and will not, serve. Here is my reason. I have thought hard and long about this, and turned it every way, and searched the bottom of my heart. I have asked the Greater Power above for guidance, and felt I needed it, more than at any time in my existence. And this is my conclusion.

"Even if your cause is great, which it is, I cannot be part of it. Even though any man of conscience, on examining that organ of truth, would conclude that this is the only path to follow, I cannot walk it with you. The fault is my own.

"I have thought that my reluctance stemmed from my inability to subject Mary and my family to further pain. I believe I told you that the other day, Billy. The truth is that duty would, as always, come first. If duty throws a path at you, your legs have to carry you.

"But the truth of the matter is I don't have the legs for the job, and am not able to walk that path. I would be a cripple, and a burden to you.

"The first time I had the strength for the job. I remember what it did to me, and to my family. But now the strength is gone."

I nearly wept, then. "I would be no good to you, gentlemen, alive or dead. I am hollow inside. I no longer possess the will to send men to their deaths in any cause. Though I sense this trait of violence in my new existence and agree with Billy that it was bred into us for a reason and for our betterment, I could not make use of it myself. I am too tired. And what I could not use in myself, I could not expect others to use on my behalf."

I looked up at them. Billy had retreated to the door of the room and seemed to be guarding it. He looked at me intently. Stanton, in the meanwhile, was unlocking the manacles of the goateed man and now stood away from him. The man stared at me intently, with surprising malice.

"Mr. President," Stanton said, "this is John Wilkes Booth, the man who assassinated you on April fourteenth, 1865; by putting a bullet into the back of your skull at Ford's Theater. He's the man who caused you, and the nation, so much pain, who robbed you of your life and the United States of America of its chance to properly heal."

I stared at the man and suddenly knew him. The actor. Mary and I had seen him many times on the stage. Carl Sandburg had named him as my assassin; he had broken his leg jumping from my box to the stage after firing the fatal shot.

I saw red anger in front of my eyes and heard myself shout. This was the man who had tried to destroy the Union. I groped on my desk, came up with the heavy paperweight I had toyed with before, grasped it tightly. I saw nothing but absolute anger, and raised the paperweight over the cowering actor.

This—

Billy Herndon and Secretary Stanton were holding me. I was bent over double, and when I looked up, the door to the room had opened and Robert had entered.

"Is it over?" Robert asked.

"Yes. Your father will be fine," Billy said.

"Father," Robert said, "I have to tell you I knew—”

“It's all right," I said. "A man's got to know what he is—"

On the floor I spied the pile of dust the actor John Wilkes Booth had become; in the midst of it sat the bruised paperweight with the miniature White House caught inside, like a bug in amber.

I took hold of myself and straightened.

"It's in all of us," Billy Herndon said quietly. "And it's up to men like us to make sure the best possible world can come of it."

I put my hand on Billy's shoulder. "Yes," I said. "You're right, of course. I suppose sometimes a man can't, or won't, see the monkey he's got riding his own back. I had hoped . . ."

"You're the only man who can take control of this," Stanton said. "You're the only man all of us, all around the world, can rally around."

I turned away from them, and looked out the window, and put my hands behind my back.

"Mr. President?" Stanton asked.

"God help me," I said. For a moment I was silent. Then I said, "Robert, send your mother in. I must tell her it's time to pack for Washington."

The memoirs of Peter Sun

When I awoke in my ditch, I thought myself alone. But I awakened to find myself surrounded by bodies. Not bodies, exactly—rather, piles of clothing powdered with dead dust.

As I watched, snugged into my cutout in the side of my ditch, another pile of clothing fell from above, to land a few feet from me. It was then I heard the rough sound of laughter, the intercourse of two voices.

'That one will no longer bother anyone. What is the next crime?"

The second voice, more businesslike, said, "Looting. Stealing from the people's
foodstores
."

"Very well." The first voice made a grunting sound. I heard a gasp, a third voice, and then the first, rough voice laughed.

"He went to atoms easily, didn't he, comrade?”

“Dispose of him," the second voice said, testily. "Very well."

Another pile of clothing, leaving a trail of dust, plopped down in the ditch.

"Next?" the rough voice said.

"Drunkenness. Hoarding."

"Very well."

The rough voice grunted; another pile of clothing came over to land in front of me.

Now there was a completely new voice above, a shrill scream. I heard what sounded like a struggle. The rough voice cursed, and then a fully clothed figure dropped into the ditch in front of me, fell to all fours, then rose. A skeleton's face looked straight into mine, startled. Its jaw dropped. Suddenly the figure, the vague ghostly outline of a woman's features shrouding its bone, looked up above and began to wave its arms.

"Comrades! Comrades! I've found—"

A rifle shot rang out, and the skeleton staggered back and then collapsed into dust.

The rough voice laughed. "She saved me the trouble of throwing her over the side."

"Continue," the businesslike voice said. `"The next is a political dissenter. He was caught uttering antiparty slogans."

"Tsk, tsk." The rough voice laughed, then grunted. "I think two shovel hits for this one, for his terrible crimes."

Another dusty pile of clothing dropped in front of me.

"How about two at once, we'll make the job go faster?" the rough voice above laughed again.

Two more piles of clothing came over.

A rock loosened by my foot tumbled to the ditch and made a sound.

"Did you hear something, comrade?" the rough voice asked above.

There was silence, during which I held my breath and lay perfectly still.

"Nothing," the businesslike voice said. "Continue.”

“Very well."

They went on for what seemed hours. Then, finally, the prissy, businesslike voice said, "We are finished.”

“All right."

I counted to sixty, and was about to allow myself to move when a massive skeleton dropped down into the ditch in front of me, bearing a shovel, and began to study the piles of clothing and the far wall. He moved down away to my right, then turned, poking at the clothing with his shovel, and began to make his way down to me.

I snugged as deeply into my cubbyhole as I could.

"What are you doing down there!"

The massive skeleton stopped not four feet to the right of where I stood. The skull looked up. "I heard something before."

"Don't be foolish! Get up here immediately!" the businesslike voice commanded.

The skeleton's hand tightened on the handle of the shovel, and I heard it mumble a curse.

"What was that?" the figure above said. "What did you say?"

"Nothing, comrade," the massive skeleton said sullenly. "I'm coming."

He began to climb the side of the ditch, his foot at one moment snugging right into the floor of my cubbyhole as I watched, but then, to my relief, climbing on.

In a few moments, in the midst of much berating talk by the businesslike voice, I heard the roar of a starting vehicle, which then went into gear and pulled away.

Again I counted to sixty, then rolled out of my hole.

Cautiously, I climbed up the slope and looked over the top.

The road bordering the ditch was empty, and just disappearing behind a distant hill was an army truck.

I rested my back against the slope of the ditch and breathed deeply of fresh air, looking back at the place I had inhabited.

After a few minutes I pulled myself out of the ditch and, marking my way east by the sun, began to walk.

It wasn't long before I determined that I would not be able to get far by daylight, at least not near the road, which was periodically awash with traffic, most of it coming from the direction of Moscow. I kept close to my companion ditch, and on more than one occasion had to fling myself into it to avoid detection as a convoy rolled. All of these military vehicles were manned by skeletons, I noted, a fact that I found very disturbing.

Finally, spying what looked like a village ahead, I made my way off the road and approached it through trees.

The sight of piles of white dust as I approached told me immediately that some sort of local battle had taken place here. A cluster of empty-looking houses led into a small town square. There, surrounding a fountain centered by a statue of Lenin, were huge piles of clothing. Russian weapons, most of them World War II vintage, lay scattered about, along with hoes and rakes and crude clubs. Someone had fought here, but who? Human or skeleton?

"They were good people," a voice said behind me, startling me as I stood gazing at the fountain.

I went into a defensive posture, but the old, human woman who confronted me only smiled. She held a broom close to her.

"You won't need your fists against me, young man. I've seen much worse than you in my time, if you can believe it. The Germans, the pogroms, the camps. In other guises I've seen it all before. Yesterday was all of it rolled into one."

I relaxed slightly, still wary, and mad at myself for my tired carelessness.

"Are you alone here?"

She pointed with her broom at the piles of clothing. "Except for them. There are three of mine in there, my foolish son, a daughter, a grandson."

"What happened?"

Walking slowly, she went past me and sat on the edge of the fountain, laying her broom down beside her. "We fought, like we always do. And like always, we lost."