Advise and Consent (31 page)

While Tommy Davis was thus congratulating himself on the course of events and pondering what else he might do to speed them forward, the junior Senator from Wyoming was reaching the end of his peroration on the Taylor Grazing Act in the Interior Committee. His views, stated with flamboyance and vigor, had not particularly impressed Stanley Danta, presiding in his quietly pleasant, even-tempered way in an otherwise almost empty committee room; and now as Fred Van Ackerman concluded and asked politely, “Are there any questions Mr. Chairman?” the senior
Senator from Connecticut gave his pleasant smile and shook his head.

“I don’t believe so, Senator,” he said, “and unless you have anything else to offer at this time, I think that will probably conclude the hearing for this morning. The committee will stand adjourned.” And then as the official reporter began putting away his stenotype machine and the few persons in the audience began moving out of the room, he came around the table to where Senator Van Ackerman was gathering his papers together and put a hand on his shoulder.

“Walk down the hall with me, Fred,” he suggested. “I want to hear about what you did in New York.”

The junior Senator from Wyoming looked up with a characteristic quick motion of his head and smiled in a pleased way.

“Sure thing, Stan,” he said, and Senator Danta, who despised the nickname, only looked the more friendly. “It was quite an evening.”

“So I hear,” Senator Danta said, slipping his arm through Fred Van Ackerman’s and leading him out the door. “I heard,” he added, as they walked slowly along together, “that you got quite an ovation.”

“You didn’t see it on television, then?” Senator Van Ackerman asked in a way that indicated he thought of course everybody had, and Stanley Danta smiled.

“I had to go to the Argentine Embassy to a party,” he said, “so I wasn’t in reach of a television set, I’m afraid. Tell me about it.”

“Well, I tell you, Stan,” Fred Van Ackerman said seriously, “you’ve no idea how hot people are for this idea of getting together with the Russians. I didn’t realize it myself, really, until I began making these speeches a couple of months ago. It’s taken hold like nobody’s business. I’ve got twenty invitations to speak in the next six weeks, and more coming in every day.”

“I remember it has been rather unexpected,” Senator Danta said, his kindly face showing nothing of what he was thinking about it. “As I recall, you didn’t really intend to speak on that subject at all the first time, did you?”

“No, sir,” Fred Van Ackerman said, “I didn’t. It just came out in the questioning and I sort of got carried away, I guess, and said something about how I would rather crawl to Moscow than die under a bomb, and by God, do you know, Stan, it brought down the house.”

“So you tried it again the next time—” Senator Danta suggested; his young companion looked at him with a pleased smile.

“I tested it, Stan,” he said. “I tried it out in just that way on three separate occasions after that, giving it a little more build-up each time, and before you know, within a week I was beginning to get anywhere from two hundred to three hundred letters a day about it.”

“So you decided you had a good thing going—” Senator Danta suggested again in his pleasantly tactful, encouraging way.

“And I’ve kept at it, and it’s been sensational,” Senator Van Ackerman said in a rather bemused tone; “just sensational!”

“It takes you, Fred,” Stanley Danta said in a tone he made admiring, “to find a good thing and stick with it.”

“When I go after something,” Senator Van Ackerman acknowledged, “I give it everything I’ve got.”

“Indeed you do,” Senator Danta agreed. “Indeed you do.”

And indeed, he reflected, Fred Van Ackerman had, from the first moment he had arrived in the Senate a year ago. There had been about him even then a certain animal force that his colleagues could sense, an almost disturbing note of caged unbalance that might flare up at anything. Once he had thought Orrin Knox had shut him off too abruptly in a debate; there had been a strange whining snarl in his voice as he protested the indignity, giving the Senate a troubling sense of being in the presence of a spring on the point of unwinding altogether. Orrin had not apologized, but he had sat down with a puzzled expression on his face, for the misunderstanding had been minor and nothing to warrant Fred Van Ackerman’s violence. And there had been other things, rumors and hints of double-dealings and dark underhandedness, verging on the criminal, in his surprise election at the age of thirty-three, a ruthless gambling spirit that kept breaking through. He wore a certain dark aspect, indefinable and somehow forbidding. No one yet had crossed him in any serious degree in the Senate, not knowing what this aspect might portend. His colleagues were still sizing him up; and now with this new interest of his in foreign affairs, it was beginning to appear that he might be going places. Just where, no one could say; but in recent days there had come the feeling that he was on his way. Senator Danta, like many another, was curious to find out the direction. The rally in New York seemed to furnish a possible clue, and he was determined to probe it as deeply as he could.

“I thought I’d drop in on the Leffingwell hearing,” he said. “Want to come along?”

“That’s a good idea,” Fred said. “I’d love to.”

“Tell me about COMFORT,” Stanley said as they turned down the corridor toward the Caucus Room. “Where did that all begin?”

“I don’t quite know,” Senator Van Ackerman said thoughtfully, “except that it seemed to start up pretty soon after my first speech. There’s a chapter in Chicago, you know, and one in San Francisco and one in Minneapolis, and of course in New York. I think it’s big New York money, basically. I’m not connected with it directly; I’ve never even been approached except on this rally last Thursday night. Now I’ve got invitations from Chicago and San Francisco too, on the basis of that. It’s the damnedest thing.”

“But you certainly aren’t going to turn down any chances?” Senator Danta suggested.

“Oh, hell, no,” Fred Van Ackerman said with a quick grin. “Why, this might make me President, boy!”

And he grinned even more broadly to show he didn’t mean it, which didn’t fool Senator Danta, who knew with some alarm that deep in his heart he did. But he smiled in his friendly way and made the expected rejoinder.

“I’ll bet it will,” he said pleasantly. “I’ll bet it will, at that,” adding to himself, over my dead body. “You don’t think the Russians are behind it, do you?” he asked innocently.

“I don’t know,” Fred Van Ackerman said slowly. “I don’t really think so. I think it’s mostly, as I say, big New York money. You know how they are about Causes, and this is just about the biggest Cause there is right now. Oh, if I thought it was a Commie outfit, Stan, I wouldn’t have anything to do with it. I think it’s just a genuine desire for peace. And if they want me to be their talker, why should I refuse? It gets me plenty of publicity,” he concluded with satisfaction.

“It certainly does,” Senator Danta conceded. “Well, here we are. Seems to be a crowd.”

“You can sit at the committee table and I’ll find a place somewhere,” Fred said.

“Oh, no,” Stanley Danta suggested casually, feeling in some obscure way that something important would come out of Fred’s reaction to the hearing, “well find a couple of seats together.”

As for Ellabelle Proctor at this moment, she wasn’t thinking any philosophical thoughts about liberal causes or worrying about any yak-yak between a couple of Senators she never heard of. All she was doing was what Mabel Anderson, after a consultation with the Senator, had told her to do: clean the attic and get rid of his old Air Force uniforms, still kicking around, like those of many another veteran, in the attic. If she found anything in the pockets, Mabel said, she was to leave it in the study with the Senator’s other papers; and having given these instructions the Senator’s lady had taken Pidge, five years old and looking temporarily quite sedate and angelic in her little blue coat and little blue hat, and gone to visit Beth Knox while Ellabelle got on with her dusty work. Just now she had found something, a small brown manila envelope, and faithful to her instructions she was taking it downstairs to place it on the pile of legislative bills and other papers on the Senator’s desk. After that she got herself a cup of coffee and went on about her work.

This was what Ellabelle Proctor did, perfectly logically from her point of view, however illogically it might seem to fit into the Big Picture in Washington, as Mr. Justice Davis read his papers and Senators Danta and Van Ackerman entered the Caucus Room.

“The Chair,” the Chair said, “is glad to welcome Senator Danta, a member of the full committee, and Senator Van Ackerman. The Chair thinks it might be a good opportunity to take a ten-minute recess while they are being seated.”

“I’m bursting,” Arly Richardson confided candidly. “How did you know?”

“I didn’t know,” Brigham Anderson said, “but I think everybody is getting too heated about this and it might be good to have a break. Run along and hurry back. You’re on next.”

“Right,” Senator Richardson said and arose with dignity to go to the nearest men’s room. Senator DeWilton joined him and they went out talking soberly while Senators, audience, and press stood and stretched.

“Stanley,” Brig said, “how are you this morning? Did you get over to the committee to hear Howie?”

“No, I didn’t,” Senator Danta said. “I had to preside at Interior and listen to Fred, here. Then we thought we’d come along and see your show.”

“Hi, Fred,” Senator Anderson said, shaking hands. “You had quite a show yourself in New York.”

“I sure did,” Senator Van Ackerman agreed expansively.

“I judge COMFORT is getting to be quite a force,” Senator Anderson observed.

“Not as much as it likes to think it is,” Fred Van Ackerman said. “But it’s growing. I wonder why, just at this particular time? People haven’t seemed to feel that way before—as organized about it, I mean. It kind of puzzles me, really.”

“Maybe that’s your doing, Fred,” Stanley Danta suggested. “Maybe Man has met Movement. Maybe it’s fate.”

“I don’t quite know what you mean by that,” Senator Van Ackerman said, “but maybe you’re right.”

“It gives you quite a sounding board, anyway,” Senator Anderson said. Senator Van Ackerman did not answer directly; instead his eyes swept the crowded room with an appraising look.

“I’m just wondering,” he said, “if this thing would fit in with it.”

Senator Danta started to speak and then thought better of it; his eyes flicked across those of Senator Anderson for just a second and when Senator Anderson spoke it was with a casual unconcern.

“Well, I don’t know, Fred,” he said. “It seems to me maybe this is rather beyond the scope of any movement such as that, which is probably only a temporary thing, anyway. You know how these things come and go.”

“I’m not sure,” Senator Van Ackerman said thoughtfully. “I just don’t know. It could be this is just the sort of thing they’d want to support.”

“No need for it,” Senator Anderson said comfortably. “It’s going through without any trouble.”

“Is it?” Fred Van Ackerman said skeptically. “It hasn’t looked that way so far.”

“Well, don’t let that fool you,” Brigham Anderson said in the same
relaxed tone. “You know how people talk around here and then when all’s said and done the vote comes through on schedule. This’ll be the same.”

“Maybe,” Senator Van Ackerman said doubtfully. “Do you think a speech from me would help?”

“Why don’t you save it until the debate comes on the floor, Fred?” Senator Danta suggested easily. “There’s the time to fire your ammunition if you think it’s needed.”

“Yeah,” Fred Van Ackerman said. “I guess.” And then in one of those quick apparent terminations of interest that his colleagues found characteristic and usually not very indicative of his true intentions, he turned away. “Well, shall we sit down, Stan?” he asked.

“Take a seat at the table if you like,” Senator Anderson suggested.

“Thanks,” Stanley Danta said, “but I may have to leave again soon. I’ve got some things to do in the office before the session starts.”

“Me too,” Fred said. “We’ll just sit along here in back and watch for a little while.”

“Good,” Brigham Anderson said. “Glad to have you
....
Well, John,” he said, turning to the Senator from Massachusetts who had remained seated impassively beside him, “about as we expected, hm?”

“Yes,” Senator Winthrop said. “I didn’t realize we’d start having show-downs quite this soon, but aside from that everything’s moving on schedule.”

“I’m not so sure it’s going the way I expected on the other side of the table, though,” Senator Anderson said with a thoughtful glance at the nominee, chatting animatedly in the midst of a clustering circle of reporters. “You’re right, and so is Orrin; and so is Seab, for that matter. He is being evasive. I wonder why.”

“That’s what Arly’s going to ask,” Senator Winthrop said dryly. “He’s going to ask the Why.”

“I may myself,” Senator Anderson said, “if it isn’t cleared up by the time it gets to me.”

“It won’t be,” Senator Winthrop said in a tone even drier. “This is the day for noble sentiments. It isn’t the day for getting to the guts of things.”

“We’ve gotten to the guts of several things, I think,” Senator Anderson said. “The public may not understand it, but it’s all here.”

“How much of that,” John Winthrop wondered with a nod toward the eagerly listening, eagerly laughing reporters, “will they give the public?”

“Yes,” Senator Anderson said thoughtfully. “I know.”

“—and then,” Bob Leffingwell was concluding his story, “I told him, ‘Well, Senator, if that’s the way you feel I guess we’ll have to put it in the stockpile.’”

There was a flattering explosion of laughter from the press, and with it the nominee shot a quick look at the chairman; a quietly triumphant look that distinctly said:
You see, I have them
. And have them he did, for even at that moment the teletypes down in the press room were chattering with a counter-suggestion from the news editors in the wire-service bureaus downtown. SUGGEST LEFFINGWELL BELIEFS AMERICA BETTER LEAD THAN OLD COOLEY CHARGES, the messages read. The nominee was in good shape after all.