A Shade of Difference (98 page)

“No. We won’t have taken it away.”

“Okay, then, I think I’ll see it through without props … Anyway,” he added with a defiant attempt at jauntiness, “I’m going to be so busy in the next few days that I won’t have time to think about it.”

“I hope so,” the doctor said, “but we’re here when you need us. Don’t forget that.”

“I won’t, and I’m grateful … By the way, could you put out a statement, just to stop the gossip for a while? Just say I’m having a routine checkup and will be back at the UN tomorrow for the debate on the Labaiya proposals. I’d appreciate that.”

“Right away,” the doctor said. He held out his hand. “Good luck.”

“I’d like a little, for a change,” Hal Fry said, and then added at once when he saw the doctor’s expression, “I’m sorry. I mustn’t make it hard for everybody else, just to try to make it easier for me … I’ll manage. Don’t worry.”

“All right,” the doctor said. “I’ll be in again later.”

For a time after he left, the senior Senator from West Virginia lay staring up at the empty white ceiling, not moving, scarcely thinking, scarcely conscious of his body and the terrible invader to which it was playing host. He lay thus for perhaps fifteen minutes, drained of thought, emotion, energy, feeling; and then, just as there was beginning to approach the edge of his consciousness the first terrifying intimation of exactly where he was and what he was suffering from, there mercifully came a knock on the door, a hand reached around and tossed in a hat, and a second later he saw the amicable countenance, tired but reasonably cheerful, of his colleague from Iowa.

“Hi, buddy,” Lafe said, recovering the hat, shucking it and his overcoat off onto the foot of the bed, and dropping into a chair. “How goes it?”

“Pretty good,” Hal said, stuffing a couple of pillows behind his head so he could half-sit up, managing a smile. “Why the hat thrown in ahead of you? Have you done anything you shouldn’t?”

“No. Except to phone Orrin and ask him to call and talk to us here.”

“You didn’t tell him—” Senator Fry began in angry alarm, but Lafe shook his head.

“He knows. You know Orrin. He doesn’t know exactly what it is, but he knows it’s damned serious. I expect he’s going to try to persuade you to resign and take a rest.”

“Rest for what?” Hal Fry asked dryly. “I haven’t got anything to rest for. Except—more rest.”

“Well, I thought that would be your position. You want to stay on the job, don’t you?”

“Wouldn’t you?”

Lafe smiled.

“I’m on your side. I was already, but I just wanted to know how you felt about it, now that—now.”

“I haven’t changed … You look tired. Have you had any sleep at all?”

Lafe yawned.

“Not much. I rode up on the plane with Terry, which was mildly interesting but not conducive to too much sleep. He’s very worried about that little riot back home.”

“I should think he should be. Is he going back?”

“I doubt if he will. He’s stubborn, like you. I got the idea he’s going to stick too, at least until the debate’s over.”

Senator Fry’s eyes darkened and an expression of grave sadness crossed his face, but he was not, as his colleague thought he might be, concerned about himself.

“I am so sorry about Seab,” he said softly. Lafe sighed and nodded.

“He wouldn’t give up, either. The world,” he added with a rather wan attempt at humor, “is full of a lot of stubborn people. But it was a great tragedy, for the Senate and for the country. Though some of the country may not realize it yet.”

“And Cullee. I sometimes think race is going to tear this nation apart.”

“Not unless we let it. Not unless we all give up and stop trying to be fair and kind to one another.”

“That’s part of the reason why I feel I have to keep going,” Senator Fry said. “It’s a contribution, I hope … Although I expect,” he said with a half-smile as the phone rang, “that I’ll be told differently.”

“You’ll be surprised, I think. He isn’t worried about that. He’s worried about you, personally. Orrin’s very generous, underneath the prickly exterior.”

Hal nodded and picked up the phone.

“I know … Hello? Yes, Orrin, how are you?”

“How are
you?”
the Secretary asked. “That’s what I want to know. Is Lafe with you?”

“Yes, he is. And I’m fine.”

‘That’s a lie,” Orrin Knox said flatly, “and I wish you’d stop telling it to me. What have they found?”

“Nothing that will prevent me from completing the job here.”

“Damn it, don’t play games with me. We can’t afford it, in days like these.”

“You can’t afford not to let me keep going, in days like these.”

“It’s cancer, isn’t it?” the Secretary demanded. “Is it terminal?”

“Orrin,” Senator Fry said, “I’m not going to tell you, and I don’t think the doctors will, and I don’t think Lafe will. Now, you’ve just got to trust me. I won’t push my strength past what it can bear. You have my word on that. Isn’t my word good enough for you?”

“Of course I can remove you from the delegation,” the Secretary remarked thoughtfully. “Or Harley can, rather.”

“Sure,” Senator Fry said with a sudden harsh bitterness, “and kill me right now. That would be great … Look,” he said, waving off Lafe as he started to reach for the receiver, “the President Pro Tem of the Senate is dead and a very fine young Congressman has been beaten up as a result of all this. And you want me to run away. What the hell do you think I am?”

“I think you’re a very brave man and a very fine public servant, but I don’t want you to do anything foolish with your health.”

“I said I won’t. Orrin, I
must
see this job through up here. It means—well, perhaps you know, perhaps you don’t. It may be”—his voice broke a little, but he hurried on—“the last thing I do for the country, and you’ve got to let me do it. Now, please, Orrin. Lafe will tell you.” And this time he did relinquish the phone to his colleague, who came on the line in a no-nonsense fashion.

“See here, Orrin, suppose you just let this situation rest up here, okay? We’re both keeping an eye on it, it’s all right, and we won’t do anything to endanger either the country or Hal. Now, lay off! Okay?”

“The President and I have got to know what the situation is,” Orrin said stubbornly. “That makes sense, doesn’t it? It isn’t so unreasonable, is it? Go ahead, tell me it is.”

“Of course it isn’t. But you’ve got to understand the—the feeling up here, too. All sorts of things are involved, past, present—future. I give you my considered judgment it would be fatal to insist, Orrin. But you go ahead if you want to. We can’t stop you.”

“Well,” the Secretary said, and paused. “How long?” he asked after a moment.

“Not very,” Lafe said. “That’s why—”

“All right. Put him back on.”

Lafe nodded to Hal and handed back the receiver.

“Hal,” the Secretary said, “I think you’re an idealistic, wide-eyed, romantic damned fool, but—I guess that’s how a lot of things get done in this world, by people like that. So—you go ahead. But I’m trusting you to watch your own health.”

“I will. And, Orrin—”

“Yes?”

“I thank you very much.”

“Who said I had any choice?” the Secretary asked with a return of humor. “I seemed to be facing an outright rebellion in the delegation. Hell of a thing to have happen at a time like this. How does it look up there right now?”

“Not bad,” Hal Fry said, responding gratefully in kind to his businesslike tone. “We’re in pretty good shape now that Congress has acted.”

“Well, keep me advised, step by step, will you? When will you be back over there?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

“But—” Orrin began, then stopped. “Okay. Have Lafe call me tonight if there’s anything I ought to know. If you need me up there, I’ll try to make it, but I’d prefer not to because of this visit from the President of Brazil. We’ve all got a lot to talk about down here. Don’t hesitate to call if you want me, though.”

“Right. We’ll try not to bother you.”

“Bother me all you like. It’s what I’m here for. And, Hal—for God’s sake, take care of yourself, will you?”

“I will. Good-by, Orrin, and thanks.”

“Okay.”

After the conversation ended there was a silence in the room for several minutes, broken finally by the Senator from West Virginia.

“Thank you, too. It was most kind.”

“No more than I’d expect from you in a similar situation,” Lafe said. He frowned. “Actually, things don’t look quite as good as we’d like, over there.”

“Oh?” Senator Fry asked in some alarm. “How so?”

“Well, Terry and Felix seemed very cheerful this morning, in the Lounge. And I had a strange little talk with the S.-G. Beware a wild majority, he said. What would you suppose that means?”

Hal Fry’s eyes widened.

“You don’t suppose they’d try—”

“If they thought they could get away with it, they’d try anything.”

“I’m coming back down with you right now,” Hal said abruptly, reaching for the bell cord by his bed and ringing it vigorously for the nurse. “Get my clothes out of the closet there, will you?”

“Now, wait a minute—” Lafe began, but his colleague brushed aside his protest impatiently.

“Come on, come on! We’ve got work to do.”

“Yes, sir,” Lafe said with a smile. “So we have.”

“Mr. Stanley of New Zealand, please,” the young lady at the telephone desk said sternly into the microphone. “Madame Vinagradof of Romania, please call the Delegates’ Lounge … Mr. Haiutara of Japan, please …”

Seated already at one of the telephones along the wall of the Lounge, exchanging pleasantries with the Foreign Secretary in London, the British Ambassador wondered with some impatience who wanted him now via this cow-voiced female whose voice mooed so commandingly over the hubbub of the crowded Lounge. Whoever it was, he or she would have to wait a bit, for the voice from London was gradually abandoning pleasantries and getting down to the business in hand, namely how things were shaping up for the vote tomorrow on the Labaiya Amendment and, more importantly for Britain, on the basic resolution to demand immediate independence for Gorotoland.

As precisely as he could, Lord Maudulayne told him, though he considered it a damned difficult spot from which to telephone. Most delegates tried to confine their calls from the Lounge to relatively innocuous matters, since you never knew who might be tapping the wire or listening in at the main switchboard. Probably no one was, but it was something of an article of faith that somebody might be. Therefore calls like this were customarily made from one’s own headquarters in Manhattan. However, the Foreign Secretary had tracked him down here and so, to his best knowledge, he was giving him the information he sought.

Not that his best knowledge was very good, Claude Maudulayne was forced to admit, at least to himself, because he, like Felix Labaiya, found the world a haze of dusky incertitudes at the moment. The two-thirds requirement for the resolution might just—just—save passage of the demand for Gorotoland’s independence. As far as the Americans were concerned, he thought they were safe; or were they? He had the intimation, from his many conversations today with the Commonwealth and others of something moving under the surface of the waters, of vague, slippery, not-clear possibilities, and half-formed, half-hinted, half-organized projects.

“I don’t like the feel of it,” he said absently. “Something’s in the wind.”

“Eh?” said London blankly, and he realized that he had not been paying the slightest attention to his superior as the latter worried along.

“I
beg
your pardon,” he said hastily. “I didn’t mean for us; our situation is relatively clear. I meant for the Americans.”

“Are they going to take a pasting?” the Foreign Secretary asked with a suddenly much more cheerful interest that broke through his general gloom about Gorotoland.

“I don’t know,” Lord Maudulayne said thoughtfully. “On the surface it appears impossible, and yet—”

“Congress’ action has been very well received here. I thought possibly it might have been there.”

“Yes and no. There’s a very peculiar mood here, right now.”

“Isn’t there always? I thought it was chronic.”

“There are moments when it is more chronic than others,” Lord Maudulayne said. “Are we prepared to rescue the M’Bulu when the sky falls in upon him?”

“I suppose,” the Foreign Secretary said wearily. “I suppose. Although of course that, too, will cause a great uproar there. How does he seem this morning?”

“Disturbed and wary, but he tells me he’s going to stay until the debate ends. He seems confident of the outcome. Both outcomes.”

“Isn’t it nice that we’re here to depend upon?” the Foreign Secretary said. “How do you tolerate him?”

“Oh, in his own strange way,” Lord Maudulayne said, “he’s a rather likable fellow. There’s a curious innocence about it all, you know. I think fundamentally it’s a complete lack of any moral sense whatsoever—like a giant child running about the world in pretty clothes tossing hand grenades into other people’s open parlor windows.”

“One hundred and thirty-seventh in direct descent,” the Foreign Secretary said dryly. “That’s more than you and I can say. And of course he isn’t the only child that’s loose in the world these days.”

“How true.”

“Well: I shall not keep you further. I think it would be well if we refrained from the Kashmir debate this afternoon. It would only inflame matters tomorrow, I’m afraid.”

“My feeling exactly. I shall keep you advised.”

“Good man.”

“I see the two Senators coming in the Lounge, so—if you will forgive me—”

“Carry on.”

“Right-ho.”

There passed through Lord Maudulayne’s mind as he watched the slow progression of the two Americans along the Lounge, nodding here, smiling there, being intercepted by many outstretched hands and effusive greetings, the thought that the Senator from West Virginia, despite the rumors about his health, looked determined and relatively rested, while the junior Senator from Iowa appeared tired and strained and without some of his usual comfortable amicability. The British Ambassador was also rather amused by the hearty welcome they were receiving; it had its little ironies. The thought was put into words a second later as his colleague from France came to his side from the other end of the Lounge, carrying a cup of coffee.