Edge of Eternity (16 page)

“Sources.”

“What sources?”

“We can't reveal the identities of informants.”

“You can to the attorney general.”

“You're not the attorney general.”

“Do you know Levison's card number?”

“What?” Hugo was momentarily flustered.

“Communist Party members have a card, as you know. Each card has a number. What's Levison's card number?”

Hugo pretended to search for it. “I don't think that's in this file.”

“So you can't prove Levison is a Communist.”

“We don't need
proof,
” Hugo said, showing irritation. “We're not going to prosecute him. We're simply informing the attorney general of our suspicions, as is our duty.”

George's voice rose. “You're blackening Dr. King's name by claiming that a lawyer he consulted is a Communist—and you offer no evidence whatsoever?”

“You're right,” said Hugo, surprising George. “We need more evidence. That's why we'll be asking for a wiretap on Levison's phone.” The attorney general had to authorize wiretaps. “The file is for you.” He proffered it.

George did not take it. “If you wiretap Levison you'll be listening to some of Dr. King's calls.”

Hugo shrugged. “People who talk to Communists take the risk of being wiretapped. Anything wrong with that?”

George thought there
was
something wrong with that, in a free country, but he did not say so. “We don't know that Levison is a Communist.”

“So we need to find out.”

George took the file, stood up, and opened the door.

Hugo said: “Hoover will undoubtedly mention this next time he meets with Bobby. So don't try to keep it to yourself.”

That thought had crossed George's mind, but now he said: “Of course not.” It had been a bad idea anyway.

“So what will you do?”

“I'll tell Bobby,” George said. “He'll decide.” He left the room.

He went up in the elevator to the fifth floor. Several Justice Department officials were just coming out of Bobby's office. George looked in. As usual, Bobby had his jacket off, his shirtsleeves rolled, and his glasses on. He had evidently just finished a meeting. George checked his watch: he had a few minutes before his next meeting. He walked in.

Bobby greeted him warmly. “Hi, George, how are things with you?”

It had been like this ever since the day George had imagined Bobby was about to hit him. Bobby treated him like a bosom pal. George
wondered if that was a pattern. Maybe Bobby had to quarrel with someone before becoming close.

“Bad news,” George said.

“Sit down and tell me.”

George closed the door. “Hoover says he's found a Communist in Martin Luther King's circle.”

“Hoover is a troublemaking cocksucker,” said Bobby.

George was startled. Did Bobby mean that Hoover was queer? It seemed impossible. Maybe Bobby was just being insulting. “Name of Stanley Levison,” George said.

“Who is he?”

“A lawyer Dr. King has consulted about tax and other matters.”

“In Atlanta?”

“No, Levison is based in New York.”

“It doesn't sound like he's really close to King.”

“I don't believe he is.”

“But that hardly matters,” Bobby said wearily. “Hoover can always make it sound worse than it is.”

“The FBI says Levison is a Communist, but they won't tell me what evidence they have, though they might tell you.”

“I don't want to know anything about their sources of information.” Bobby held up his hands, palms outward, in a defensive gesture. “I'd be blamed for every goddamn leak forever after.”

“They don't even have Levison's party card number.”

“They don't fucking know,” Bobby said. “They're just guessing. But it makes no difference. People will believe it.”

“What are we going to do?”

“King has to break with Levison,” Bobby said decisively. “Otherwise Hoover will leak this, King will be damaged, and the whole civil rights mess will just get worse.”

George did not think of the civil rights campaign as a “mess,” but the Kennedy brothers did. However, that was not the point. Hoover's accusation was a threat that had to be dealt with, and Bobby was right: the simplest solution was for King to break with Levison. “But how are we going to get Dr. King to do that?” George asked.

Bobby said: “You're going to fly down to Atlanta and tell him to.”

George was daunted. Martin Luther King was famous for defying authority, and George knew from Verena that in private as well as in public King could not easily be talked into anything. But George hid his apprehension behind a calm veneer. “I'll call now and make an appointment.” He went to the door.

“Thank you, George,” Bobby said with evident relief. “It's so great to be able to rely on you.”

•   •   •

The day after she went swimming with the president, Maria picked up the phone and heard the voice of Dave Powers again. “There's a staff get-together at five thirty,” he said. “Would you like to come?”

Maria and her flatmates had plans to see Audrey Hepburn and the dishy George Peppard in
Breakfast at Tiffany's
. But junior White House staffers did not say no to Dave Powers. The girls would have to drool over Peppard without her. “Where do I go?” she said.

“Upstairs.”

“Upstairs?” That usually meant the president's private residence.

“I'll pick you up.” Dave hung up.

Maria immediately wished she had put on a more fancy outfit today. She was wearing a plaid pleated skirt and a plain white blouse with little gold-colored buttons. Her hairpiece was a simple bob, short in the back with long scimitars of hair either side of her chin, in the current fashion. She feared she looked like every other office girl in Washington.

She spoke to Nelly. “Have you been invited to a staff get-together this evening?”

“Not me,” said Nelly. “Where is it?”

“Upstairs.”

“Lucky you.”

At five fifteen, Maria went to the ladies' room to adjust her hair and makeup. She noticed that none of the other women were making any special effort, and she deduced that they had not been invited. Perhaps the get-together was for the newest recruits.

At five thirty, Nelly picked up her handbag to leave. “You take care of yourself, now,” she said to Maria.

“You, too.”

“No, I mean it,” said Nelly, and she walked out before Maria could ask what she meant by that.

Dave Powers appeared a minute later. He led her out of doors, along the West Colonnade, past the entrance to the pool, then back inside and up in an elevator.

The doors opened on a grand hallway with two chandeliers. The walls were painted a color between blue and green that Maria thought might be called
eau de nil
.
She hardly had time to take it in. “We're in the West Sitting Hall,” Dave said, and led her through an open doorway into an informal room with a scatter of comfortable couches and a large arched window facing the sunset.

The same two secretaries were here, Jenny and Jerry, but no one else. Maria sat down, wondering whether others were going to join them. On the coffee table was a tray with cocktail glasses and a jug. “Have a daiquiri,” Dave said, and poured it without waiting for her answer. Maria did not drink alcohol often, but she sipped it and liked it. She took a cheese puff from the tray of snacks. What was this all about?

“Will the First Lady be joining us?” she asked. “I'm longing to meet her.”

There was a moment of silence, making her feel as if she had said something tactless; then Dave said: “Jackie's gone to Glen Ora.”

Glen Ora was a farm in Middleburg, Virginia, where Jackie Kennedy kept horses and rode with the Orange County Hunt. It was about an hour from Washington.

Jenny said: “She's taken Caroline and John John.”

Caroline Kennedy was four and John John was one.

If I were married to him, Maria thought, I wouldn't leave him to ride my horse.

Suddenly he walked in, and they all stood up.

He looked tired and strained, but his smile was as warm as ever. He took off his jacket, threw it over the back of a chair, sat on the couch, leaned back, and put his feet on the coffee table.

Maria felt she had been admitted to the most exclusive social group in the world. She was in the president's home, having drinks and snacks while he put his feet up. Whatever else happened, she would always have the memory of this.

She drained her glass, and Dave topped it up.

Why was she thinking, Whatever else happened? There was something off here. She was just a researcher, hoping for an early promotion to assistant press officer. The atmosphere was relaxed, but she was not really among friends. None of these people knew anything about her. What was she doing here?

The president stood up and said: “Maria, would you like a tour of the residence?”

A tour of the residence? From the president himself? Who would say no?

“Of course.” She stood up. The daiquiri went to her head, and for a moment she felt dizzy, but it passed.

The president went through a side door, and she followed.

“This used to be a guest bedroom, but Mrs. Kennedy has converted it into a dining room,” he said. The room was papered with battle scenes from the American Revolution. The square table in the middle looked too small for the room, Maria thought, and the chandelier too big for the table. But mostly she thought: I'm alone with the president in the White House residence—me! Maria Summers!

He smiled and looked into her eyes. “What do you think?” he said, as if he could not make up his own mind until he had heard her opinion.

“I love it,” she said, wishing she could think of a more intelligent compliment.

“This way.” He led her back across the West Sitting Hall and through the opposite door. “This is Mrs. Kennedy's bedroom,” he said, and he closed the door behind them.

“It's beautiful,” Maria breathed.

Opposite the door were two long windows with light-blue drapes. To Maria's left was a fireplace with a couch placed on a rug patterned with the same blue. Over the mantel was a collection of framed drawings that looked tasteful and highbrow, just like Jackie. At the other end, the bedcovers and the canopy also matched, as did the cloth that covered the round occasional table in the corner. Maria had never seen a room like it, even in magazines.

But she was thinking: Why did he call it “Mrs. Kennedy's bedroom”?
Did he not sleep here? The big double bed was made up in two separate halves, and Maria recalled that the president had to have a hard mattress because of his back.

He led her to the window and they looked out. The evening light was soft over the South Lawn and the fountain where the Kennedy children sometimes paddled. “So beautiful,” Maria said.

He put a hand on her shoulder. It was the first time he had touched her, and she trembled a little with the thrill. She smelled his cologne, close enough now to pick up the rosemary and musk under the citrus. He looked at her with the faint smile that was so alluring. “This is a very private room,” he murmured.

She looked into his eyes. “Yes,” she whispered. She felt a deep sense of intimacy with him, as if she had known him all her life, as if she knew beyond doubt that she could trust and love him without limit. She had a momentary guilty thought about George Jakes. But George had not even asked her for a date. She put him out of her mind.

The president put his other hand on the opposite shoulder and gently pushed her back. When her legs touched the bed she sat down.

He pushed her farther back, until she had to lean on her elbows. Still gazing into her eyes, he began to undo her blouse. For a moment she felt ashamed of those cheap gold-colored buttons, here in this unspeakably elegant room. Then he put his hands on her breasts.

Suddenly she hated the nylon brassiere that came between his skin and hers. Swiftly she undid the rest of the buttons, slipped her blouse off, reached behind her back to undo her bra, and threw that aside too. He gazed adoringly at her breasts, then took them in his soft hands, stroking them gently at first, then grasping them firmly.

He reached under her plaid skirt and pulled down her panties. She wished she had remembered to trim her pubic hair, as Jenny and Jerry did.

He was breathing hard, and so was she. He unfastened his suit pants and dropped them, then he lay on top of her.

Was it always this quick? She did not know.

He entered her smoothly. Then, feeling resistance, he stopped. “Haven't you done this before?” he said with surprise.

“No.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes.” She was more than okay. She was happy, eager, yearning.

He pushed more gently. Something gave way, and she felt a sharp pain. She could not suppress a soft cry.

“Are you okay?” he repeated.

“Yes.” She did not want him to stop.

He continued with closed eyes. She studied his face, the look of concentration, the smile of pleasure. Then he gave a sigh of satisfaction, and it was over.

He stood upright and pulled up his pants.

Smiling, he said: “The bathroom is through there.” He pointed to a door in the corner, then did up his fly.

Suddenly Maria felt embarrassed, lying on the bed with her nakedness exposed to view. She stood up quickly. She grabbed her blouse and bra, stooped to pick up her panties, and ran into the bathroom.

She looked in the mirror and said: “What just happened?”

I lost my virginity, she thought. I had intercourse with a wonderful man. He happens to be the president of the United States. I enjoyed it.

She put her clothes on, then adjusted her makeup. Fortunately he had not mussed her hair.

This is Jackie's bathroom, she thought guiltily; and suddenly she wanted to leave.