Authors: Irving Wallace
She folded the letter, embarrassed to have seen its private contents, but for the first time she thought of Dilman as a human being. Of those in the room, she knew Senator Dilman the least. This was because, since T. C. had been President, Dilman had been less frequently in the White House than the others. Only in the few days between the Vice-President’s death and the President’s departure for Frankfurt had Dilman appeared several times with the Majority Leader. But now this letter in Edna’s hand: it gave him a son, a son who was a problem, and it made him a father, not just another senator but a human being.
Noticing that Dilman had reappeared, and was making his way toward Selander and Wickland, Edna hurried to intercept him.
“Senator, I found this on the floor,” she said. “Apparently you dropped it. I’m sorry, I had to open it.”
Senator Dilman accepted the letter with the slightest smile. “It’s quite all right. Thank you.”
Edna turned in time to see Wayne Talley approaching Eaton. “Arthur, it’s past two in the afternoon in Frankfurt. T. C.’s probably gone back into the conference. Think there’s any point in waiting around like this?”
Eaton shrugged. He addressed not only Talley but everyone. “I think we have no choice but to wait. The President just may feel this is important enough to delay the conference. He may want to speak to us further.”
As if the deferment in resuming communications was a personal affront, General Fortney charged at the regular telephone once more. For the hundredth time, it seemed, he was calling the Signal Corps.
About to continue to her chair, and shorthand pad, Edna slowed down, listening hard. She thought that she had heard her own telephone ring in her office. She was listening, trying to make it out above Fortney’s voice, when she heard Representative Wickland, the person nearest to her open door, call to her, “Miss Foster, your phone.”
She darted past the Congressman into her office, slipped between the electric typewriter stand and the table holding the television set, and caught up the receiver in mid-ring.
“Hello,” she answered, “the President’s office.”
For a suspended moment she heard nothing more than the wavy, swooshing sound that indicates a long-distance call. Then a voice came on, a strange voice from far away, and it said, “Is this the White House? Who is this?”
“This is the President’s personal secretary, Miss Foster. May I ask who is calling?”
“Oh, Miss Foster—Miss Foster—” And suddenly Edna felt goose pimples on her arms and a chill across her back, for the disembodied voice was quavering and frantic. “Miss Foster—this is Zwinn—Ambassador Zwinn in Frankfurt—Miss Foster—” The voice seemed to be choked, and then it shouted out, “There’s been a terrible emergency—get me someone—Talley—get me Talley!”
With
emergency
, with
terrible emergency
, Edna found herself shivering, and the receiver in her right hand shaking.
“One second—one second, please—” She blinked at the open door to the Cabinet Room, and screamed out, “Governor Talley! Governor, come here, something terrible has happened!”
Talley burst through the door on the run, puzzled, curious, searching her face. She merely wagged her head, wordlessly, and shoved the receiver into his hands. As he took up the telephone, she backed away from the desk, and could see the room rapidly filling with the others, all looking from her to Talley, wonderingly.
“Who?” Talley was saying into the receiver. “Zwinn? Oh, Ambassador, I didn’t know—” His speech halted as abruptly as if his throat had been cut. He listened, and listened, and as he did so, his lips began to move, but dumbness remained, and his face turned grayer and grayer until it was finally ghost-white. At last he spoke. “Are you sure? Are you positive? The President?” And then listening, lifting his head from the mouthpiece to stare at Eaton and the others. “Yes, Ambassador,” he was saying again, “yes, I understand—I can’t believe it—yes, yes, I do believe you. I’ll tell them. We’ll get right back to you.”
Talley lowered the receiver onto the cradle, and stood rooted to the spot, a portrait of stunned disbelief.
Eaton came slowly toward him. “What the devil is wrong, Wayne? What has happened?”
Talley tried to speak, tried to form the words, mouthing them, then stuttering them out. “The Pres—President—the President is dead!”
“What?” Eaton grabbed Talley’s shoulder, roughly shaking him. “What in the hell are you saying? Who was that? What did he say?”
“Arthur, that was Ambassador Zwinn. Part of that building in Frankfurt collapsed—that goddam ancient Palace—the top caved in on two rooms, and one was T. C.’s study—where he was talking to us—that’s what happened, that’s what cut off the call, broke down everything—fell on him, all of them—killed him. The President’s dead, Arthur, dead.”
Eaton was ashen, but controlled. “Are you sure? Is it certain?”
“Dead,” whimpered Talley. “Killed instantly. Blocks, slabs of granite, fell down on him, crushed him. They have the body. Two Secret Service agents in the room, too. Dead, all dead. Oh, God—God, what a terrible, terrible thing—”
That moment, the corridor door was flung open, and Tim Flannery rushed in, crying out, “Have you heard? Associated Press just got the bulletin from Frankfurt. The President—” He halted, eyes going from one dazed face to the other, and then he knew that they had heard.
Eaton’s face was hidden in his palms, and then suddenly he looked up. “The President dead,” he said. “That means the Speaker of the House—Wayne, what about the Speaker? Earl MacPherson was in there—what about him?”
Talley did not seem to comprehend.
Eaton spoke louder. “Dammit, man, is MacPherson alive or dead?”
“Alive,” muttered Talley. “He—I don’t know—I think he’s in pretty good shape—nothing critical—they’ve got him over at the hospital, they’re working on him. This is the worst tragedy in our history. The worst. What’s going to happen to all of us?”
Eaton closed his eyes. “Us?” he repeated. “The roof just fell in on us, too.”
And when he opened his eyes, Edna Foster could tell, for the first time, that they were wet. It was hard to tell, because she was weeping, and she did not know if she would ever stop. . . .
Night had come to Washington, a city, like the nation, dumbed down in grief and mourning.
Night had come to the late President’s Oval Office, where those who had worked with him and for him, who had known him and loved him, who had depended upon him and needed him, now filled the sofas and armchairs, forlorn and disconsolate, stood in corners, heavyhearted and helpless, waiting for they knew not what.
Edna Foster, eyes swollen, lips still quivering, came into the office with the latest special editions of the evening newspapers, and wobbled through the cheerless room, passing out copies. All who had been in the Cabinet Room ten hours before were present here, but now there were also many others. Edna recognized Attorney General Clay Kemmler, Secretary of the Treasury Vernon Moody, CIA Director Montgomery Scott, Senator Hoyt Watson, Admiral Alfred Rivard, and at least a half-dozen more of equal standing. It seemed that every nook and cranny in the Oval Room was filled, except one, and that one, the vacant place tonight, was the late President’s high-backed, black leather armchair behind the Buchanan desk.
Having finished passing out the newspapers, Edna found that she was left with one copy. The group beside the French doors that led to the Rose Garden, the group consisting of Senator Selander, Representative Wickland, General Fortney, and Secretary of State Eaton, were reading the front page of the newspaper that Senator Selander held out for them. Or rather, Edna became aware, all were reading the front page except Eaton, whose attention was disengaged, whose attention was turned inward.
Edna lifted the newspaper in her hand and the mammoth headline, six inches high, assailed her:
T. C. DEAD IN FRANKFURT!
The second headline, almost as heavy, proclaimed: WORLD MOURNS ACCIDENTAL END OF U.S. PRESIDENT. The third headline, considerably smaller, read:
HOUSE SPEAKER MACPHERSON, PRESIDENTIAL SUCCESSOR, UNDERGOES SURGERY IN GERMAN HOSPITAL
.
She felt the sob grow in her lungs and throat, and suppressed it, and looked at the bottom half of the front page. The lead story, in boldface type, spilling across the width of four columns, began:
FRANKFURT AM MAIN
, August 26 (
AP
)—The shattered body of the President of the United States lay in death tonight in a private room of the ancient Frankfurt cathedral while the entire civilized world grieved over his sudden demise.
The President was killed instantly—his smashed gold wristwatch having been stopped at 1:32 in the afternoon (8:32
A.M.
EDT)—when a wing of the Alte Mainzer Palace collapsed and crashed down upon him. With difficulty, teams of West German police and firemen removed the corpse from the half ton of debris, mostly blocks of granite and crumbled brick, that showered down upon America’s head of state and three others in the historic old library from which the President was making a long-distance call to his advisers in the White House. Ironically, the President died in the ruins and rubble of one of the two 14th-century buildings of Frankfurt’s Old City spared by Allied bombers in World War II.
A German official, who did not wish to be named, stated angrily: “The Palace should have been condemned after the War. Not only was it 600 years old, but its structure had been weakened by the bombings, and never properly rebuilt and reinforced. This is a terrible tragedy, and America’s loss of one of its most popular and international-minded Chief Executives in modern times is no less our loss, too.”
At the time of the fatal accident, the President had served in office two years, seven months, and six days of his elected four-year term.
Among the first to offer condolences was Premier Nikolai Kasatkin, of the U.S.S.R., who had been meeting with the United States President this past week to work out important international differences. The official spokesman for the Soviet Union told the press: “The Roemer Conference may be considered suspended, not canceled. Some progress had been made. The points being discussed, however, still remain unresolved, and the talks must be resumed if the peace of the world is to be preserved. We anxiously await announcement of the late President’s successor to the leadership of the United States. As soon as that is made known, we hope to set a date for resumption of the meetings.”
Meanwhile, the eyes of the entire world were today focused on Frankfurt’s Hauptwache Hospital, where the President’s constitutional successor, Earl MacPherson, veteran Speaker of the House of Representatives, injured in the same accident, is undergoing spinal surgery. Three German surgeons, summoned from Munich, would make no prediction as to Speaker MacPherson’s chances, but United States Ambassador to Germany Paul F. Zwinn advised assembled reporters that there was every reason for “optimism.”
There was much more to the news story, and many more similar stories on the front page, but Edna Foster had no desire to read further. Casting the newspaper aside, she realized that Wayne Talley and Tim Flannery were whispering in the doorway to her office.
Now Talley was returning, heading for Arthur Eaton. “Stand by, Edna,” he said. Then, reaching Eaton, he said, “They have an open line to Frankfurt. No word on MacPherson yet. He’s been almost three hours in surgery. Tim spoke to Ambassador Zwinn briefly. The first phase of the operation was successful, but there’s still a way to go. But everyone is feeling better. They expect to swear MacPherson in, the minute he comes out of the anesthetic. I think Tim and I better draft a press release. There are more than a thousand accredited correspondents out there baying for news.”
“Go ahead,” said Eaton disinterestedly.
Talley hesitated. “I know how—how you still feel, Arthur. I know how close T. C. was to you. I can’t get used to it myself. I’m numb. Who would have ever dreamt that such a thing—”
“Go draft that release,” said Eaton curtly. Then he added, “Let me know the second you receive any flash on Mac.”
“Okay.”
Edna saw Talley signal her. “Edna,” he said, “Tim and I need you. I know it’s tough, but we have to dictate something about MacPherson succeeding T. C. as President.”
Sorrowfully, Edna Foster nodded her assent, hating this moment of surrender, of bitter truth, when her employer would be supplanted by another. She followed the Presidential aide into her small office, shut the door behind her, and observed that Tim Flannery had already drawn up two folding chairs. Since he and Talley were sitting, she went around the desk to take her accustomed place in the walnut swivel chair. She located her shorthand pad and several sharp pencils.
Flannery waved toward the pencils. “Don’t take anything yet, Edna. Wayne and I want to talk this out first.” Flannery had already handed the aide a sheaf of papers, which Talley was studying intently.
“Everything here?” Talley inquired, still reading.
“Everything,” said Flannery. “The boys on the Judiciary Committee pitched in, and also the justices gave us material, and for the background we had the Legislative Reference Service at the Library of Congress busy. You’ll find the Presidential Succession Acts of 1792, 1886, and 1947 in full, with pertinent sections marked out. Then there’s a lot of legal and background data, all severely condensed.”
“Isn’t it amazing how you go along and never think of anything like this,” said Talley. “You’d think I’d know most of this, but I don’t. I know eight Presidents died in office, before T. C., but I never knew this, that eight Vice-Presidents died in office, also.”
“Nine Vice-Presidents, counting poor Porter ten days ago.”
Talley looked up blankly. “Christ, I forgot all about him. Today seems to have blotted everything else out.”
Half listening, Edna doodled on her pad. Then, as Talley read on, she began to print the names of the nine Presidents, including T. C., who had died in office. She printed: William Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, Warren Harding, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, and then T. C. She counted. Eight. Who was the ninth? Then she remembered, and printed the name of William McKinley between Garfield and Harding. Next, she tried to think of the Vice-Presidents who had died in office. She could think of only Elbridge Gerry, Henry Wilson, Garret Hobart, and Porter, and not another. Finally she gave up. There was no use thinking about it. She felt ill.