The Americans (9 page)

Gideon was a Republican, though not a fanatical one. In less than two decades, the party's foundationeaof crusading idealism had eroded. More and more, it was becoming the captive of private interests. He disliked many of its positions and practices, and wondered how much longer he could support its candidates in good conscience. Of course it was not only the Republicans with whom he found fault. There were plenty of trimmers among the Democrats, too. As a newspaper publisher-a professional malcontent-there were some days when he despised the whole damn population. He continued to be deeply concerned about the growing self-indulgence of the American people. Wealth was worshiped above all else. To many, admission to Society had become more important than eventual admission to Heaven. It seemed to him that the desire for personal comfort, the pursuit of prestige and the fulfillment of selfish ambition had replaced an earlier ideal of earning one's livelihood in some occupation which bettered the lot of mankind. As 1883 closed, he reluctantly concluded that the country's ruling passion was greed. Greed in the form of the patronage issue had all but split the Republican party in 1880, when Senator Conkling's so- called Stalwart wing had fought with the reform-minded Half-breed faction. The Half-breeds had succeeded in nominating and electing Garfield. The president's assassin had publicly identified himself as a Stalwart. That had dimmed the movement's star forever. The split in the Republican ranks was still very much in evidence, however. Early in 1884, Gideon began to hear rumors that at the convention the Republicans might finally turn to James Blaine. Twice before, Blaine had been denied the presidential nomination because of impropriety. Years ago, Blaine had been dubbed the Plumed Knight. But now the plume was dirty and broken. After the war, Blaine had been caught profiteering. He'd peddled his influence and his Congressional vote, and taken payment in cash, stocks and bonds. A bookkeeper named Mulligan had gotten hold of evidence in the form of a packet of letters. Blaine was able to recapture the letters, which he took to the floor of the House in a bold move to vindicate himself. After he'd read some of the letters aloud for the record, his fellow Congressmen had cheered and shouted for his vindication. But there was no doubt that he was guilty. And so, in '76 and again in '80, the Republicans had denied his bid for the nomination. Now one faction of the party was talking him up again. Another group, which included men such as Carl Schurz and Charles Francis Adams, Junior, was saying Blaine could never win-especially if the Democrats nominated the vigorous reform governor of New York, Stephen Grover Cleveland. Among some Republicans, sentiment for and against Blaine was even stronger than Gideon had suspected. He found this out during one of his regular visits to New York City during the winter. At a party function, he met numerous outspoken foes of the candidacy. But he met some fierce partisans, too, and got into a shouting match with one of them-a paunchy and garrulous real estate millionaire named Thurman Pennel. Fennel maintained that Blaine had merely done what dozens of other Congressmen of both parties had done before and since. The Plumed Knight's only crime had been to get caught, Pennel declared. Gideon considered that specious excuse the mark of a confused mind. He told Pennel he didn't believe in pardoning a murderer merely because an unknown number of other people in the world had committed the same crime and gotten away with it. From that point, their words grew hotter. He and Pennel almost exchanged blows before others dragged them apart and pushed Pennel out of the room with a demand that he sober up. For a few minutes, Gideon regretted what he'd done; it was the McAllister Incident all over again. Then he shrugged off the regret. He believed every word he'd said, and it didn't matter that some bloated plutocrat dis- liked him. It was too late for Gideon Kent to polish his reputation. Besides, a ruined reputation was often the price of choosing to tell the truth.

Sometimes, Carter thought, one more day at the processing plant would make him lose his sanity. Yet each night he forced himself to walk through the old, warped door at the employees' entrance, and hack and chop with the serrated knife until the sun came up again. He often played mental games to help pass the time. A fish which he decapitated was Eisler, or Phipps, or the Portugee who had ruined Eben Royce's lif every. At other times, he considered ways to escape the trap in which he found himself. He couldn't think of anyeat were realistic. The wagon was about two-thirds paid for, and he convinced himself that he didn't really have to think about his situation until the debt was completely erased. It was a convenient means of postponing the admission that he didn't know what the devil he was going to do with his life. He saw Royce occasionally-always from a distance. After that first time, he never approached him again. The men who frequented the taverns, most of them whole of body and mind, spoke sadly, even uneasily of the pathetic man who hobbled around the docks on his padded crutch. As for Helen Stavros, she was gone-back to Greece, Carter presumed. Sometimes he thought of taking a horse- car to Cambridge to see Willie Hearst, but he was too ashamed. The monotonous routine at the foot of the delivery chute did drive one thought deeper and deeper into his being. Somehow, somehow, he would find a way to be the one who gave the orders, instead of just another one of the millions who took them. He clung to that certainty, and by means of it, his sanity. He heard no further word of Ortega. The man might have stepped into a crevice in the earth and fallen to China. Then, after a particularly lively four-day stretch of roistering, he came to work one bitter whiter night nursing a ferocious headache and a queasy stomach and there, folded on the locker shelf, he found another note: were Dont think he wil forget - Frend of O. That did it. Carter could no longer control the spasms in his gut. He managed to lurch outside before he threw up what little his stomach contained. He closed his eyes, gulping the piercing whiter air that had dried his lips and cracked them open. He kept seeing Ortega's vicious eyes, and the fishook scar. He wished to God the Portugee would come back from wherever he was hiding, so they could get it over withand he could live in peace again, not forced to study every shadow and analyze every sound when he roamed the docks by night iv The Republican group which expressed aversion to Blaine included one New York State assemblyman of whom Gideon had been hearing good things lately- especially in his own newspaper. Theo Payne was a confirmed cynic, yet he'd been lavish in his praise of this particular assemblyman, whom his colleagues in Albany had dubbed the Young Reformer. The name was applied admiringly or sarcastically, depending on party affiliation or the amount of graft being taken by the speaker. There was no doubt the young man had made quite a mark during two terms in the state capital. Payne claimed he'd done well because he was rich, and therefore incorruptible. Gideon was anxious to meet him, and when he did, found him to possess an interesting and complex personality. backslash Of average height, the young man had blond hair parted in the middle, and English side whiskers. He wore his eyeglasses on a black silk cord. He was ruggedly built, yet affected a languid drawl. Perhaps he thought an aristocrat was supposed to talk that way, Gideon reflected. But his voice-quite high-pitched-was already disconcerting enough. At twenty-six, he had already written his first book, a study of naval operations in the War of 1812. Gideon quickly realized he was intelligent, but a bit priggish, too. Still, the young man didn't equivocate as so many politicians did: "I am a Republican through and through, Mr. Kent. Through and through! I shall support the party's candidate no matter who it turns out to be. But I cannot give any credence to those who say it must and will be Elaine. He's a tainted man. And contrary to what some drunken scoundrels like that Thurman Fennel claim, the Mulligan letters have not been forgotten. I shall expend every effort to block Mr. Elaine's nomination." "May we quote you on that in the Unionl" Gideon asked, reaching for the pad and pencil he always kept in a pocket. "By godfrey, indeed you may. You may also say this. Mr. Elaine is unacceptable because he is too intimately connected with the class represented by Mr. Gould-which is, in my opinion, the most dangerous of all classes. Far more dangerous than the so-called radicals-was Bright, unblinking eyes met Gideon's through heavy lenses. "I refer, sir, to the wealthy criminal class." Right after the war, Gideon had had a run-in with Mr. Jay Gould, the notorious financier. So the remarks he'd just heard helped him decide that he liked young Mr. Theodore Roosevelt of the West Fifty-seventh Street Roosevelts, Harvard, and New York's Twenty-first Congressional District. The two men corresponded during what turned out to be a tragic winter for Roosevelt, and they promised to meet again at the Republican convention. The Republicans convened in Chicago on the third of June. Gideon took a train from Boston, entering the convention city for the first time in seven years. He was astonished at how completely the downtown area had been rebuilt. Hardly a trace of the effects of the fire of 1871 remained. He had been caught in the midst of that fire, and there were many reasons why he could never forget it. Making love to Julia on the night the fire broke out was perhaps the most important. Chicago reminded him of Tom Courtleigh, too; Court- leigh who for years had tried to destroy him. It reminded him of his youngest brother, Jeremiah, whom everyone had thought lost in the war. Jeremiah had turned up in Chicago, as one of Courtleigh's bodyguards. He'd sacrificed himself in Courtleigh's office to save Gideon from being killed. This summer, Chicago produced another unexpected link with the past. Gazing up from the press area of the convention floor, Gideon thought he recognized a face in the gallery. He climbed the gallery stairs and sure enough, he was right. There sat Michael Boyle. The Irishman was in his early to mid fifties. With hardly a gray hair, Gideon thought enviously. Boyle had not yet seen him standing at the head of the stairs. Gideon pondered whether he ought to push on through the crowd and make his presence known. Michael Boyle was the man to whom Gideon's father had willed the one-third interest in the Kent fortune that would have gone to Gideon's brother Jeremiah. Jephtha had made the decision during the years in which everyone presumed Jeremiah was dead. Boyle had borrowed against some of the money which was to come to him at Jephtha's death. He'd used the loan to start a chain of general stores along the Union Pacific right-of-way. The stores had earned him his first million dollars. Gideon had always regarded Boyle as an opportunist who'd exploited his position as Amanda Kent's clerk and confidante in order to get some of the Kent money. Julia insisted the judgment was unfair. For someone who'd only met the Irishman a couple of times, she seemed curiously vehement in her defense of him. Still, perhaps he was guilty of misjudgment, Gideon thought now. Boyle hadn't squandered the fortune Jephtha had left him. On the contrary; he'd preserved and increased it. From his home in the Wyoming territorial capital, Cheyenne, he'd made fortunes of his own in retailing and in cattle. He'd also taken Kent as his legal middle name. He was evidently a Republican, something Gideon hadn't known before. The political tie overcame Gideon's habitual suspicion. He walked along the packed aisle to Michael's box. There he stopped, and extended his hand: "Boyle? Gideon Kent." Michael stood up, a graceful man with gold eyes. He wore an expensive coat of bottle-green velvet, fawn trousers and spotless linen. He was taller than Gideon by several inches. His handshake was firm: "Yes, I saw you down there on the floor. I was debating whether to make myself known." "I'm surprised you recognized me. We only met on that one occasion in New York." Michael nodded. "But I remember it quite distinctly. Hannah and I called on you at your mansion. You were about to sell it and move to Boston. You and your wife were extremely gracious. Besides, it isn't easy to forget a relative who's a public figure. Even in my part of the world, you're famous." Gideon shrugged to brush the compliment aside. "What brings you to Chicago?" "An attempt to get more favorable freight rates for the cattle we ship from our ranch. And of course this convention. I work for the Republican party in the territory." "Look, this place is damnably noisy. Why don't we have supper tonight? I'm at the new Palmer House." "So am I. Suite eight hundred." That rankled. Gideon had only booked a single room. "Shall we say eight o'clock in the dining room?" "Fine," Boyle said. "I'll look forward to it. We may have been on opposite sides in the late war, but we are members of the same family." Presumptuous bastard, Gideon thought. Then he silently chastised himself. Michael Boyle was fully entitled to think of himself as a Kent. Gideon's own father had decreed that. The trouble was, Gideon still hadn't completely accepted the decree. On the way back to the convention floor, he passed a man who gave him a venomous scowl. He'd gone another half dozen steps before he remembered who the man was. Thurman Pennel, the real estate millionaire from New York. Pennel clearly hadn't forgotten the quarrel about Blaine. The animosity didn't bother Gideon caret As a newspaperman, he was accustomed to being hated. I VI That evening in the crowded dining room of the Palmer House, Gideon and Michael engaged in a verbal sparring match for the first ten or fifteen minutes. They tested each other's political positions and explored each other's recent history, but superficially, and without great warmth. A certain unsmiling stiffness remained as the waiter brought the first course. When they were about halfway through the meal, a harried Theodore Roosevelt bustled in. He seemed to run everywhere, never walk. He was on his way to a table for one, a sheaf of papers in his hand. He paused to greet Gideon and be introduced to Michael. "You're welcome to join us, Theodore," Gideon said. The young man held out the papers, which were covered with names and figures. "Thank you, but I must do another analysis of delegate strength while I'm dining. This convention must choose a reform candidate such as Senator Edmunds of Vermont. Elaine isn't electable and neither is Chester Arthur." Gideon puffed his cigar. "I agree. If Elaine's the candi- bar date, the party won't have my support. Nor my paper's endorsement." "Oh?" Michael raised an eyebrow. "I think a man's duty-bound to stick with his party whether he approves of the candidate or not. Otherwise, how can a man consider 1 himself a true member of that party?" "Afraid I feel the same way, Mr. Boyle," Roosevelt said in that squeaking voice. "That's why I'm working so vigorously to see Elaine defeated. The Democrats will choose Grover Cleveland, I imagine. His reform record will be a powerful asset. It might even overcome the scandal connected with his personal life." "What scandal?" Michael wanted to know. Gideon answered. "There have been rumors that Cleveland fathered a bastard when he was in law school or shortly after he got out. It's never been proved. But I fear some of our party loyalists won't let that stop them from spreading the story." Michael scowled. "I don't like that land of tactic."