Edge of Eternity (56 page)

The troopers drove to the Gaston. There they opened the back door of the car and pushed George out. Holding his left wrist in his right hand, he limped back into the courtyard.

*  *  *

Later that Sunday morning George at last found a working taxi with a black driver and went to the airport, where he caught a flight to Washington. His left wrist hurt so badly that he could not use his arm, and kept his hand in his pocket for support. The wrist was swollen, and to ease the pain he took off his watch and unbuttoned his shirt cuff.

From a payphone at National Airport he called the Department of Justice and learned that there would be an emergency meeting at the White House at 6 p.m. The President was flying in from Camp David, and Burke Marshall had been helicoptered in from West Virginia. Bobby was on his way to Justice and urgently required a briefing and no, there was no time for George to go home and change his clothes.

Vowing to keep a clean shirt in his desk drawer from now on, George got a taxi to the Justice Department and went straight to Bobby’s office.

George insisted that his injuries were too trivial to require medical treatment, though he winced every time he tried to move his left arm. He summarized the night’s events for the Attorney General and a group of advisors including Marshall. For some reason Bobby’s huge black Newfoundland dog, Brumus, was there too.

‘The truce that was agreed with such difficulty this week is now in jeopardy,’ George told them in conclusion. ‘The bombings, and the brutality of the state troopers, have weakened the Negroes’ commitment to non-violence. On the other side, the riots threaten to undermine the position of the whites who negotiated with Martin Luther King. The enemies of integration, George Wallace and Bull Connor, hope that one side or both will renounce the agreement. Somehow we have to prevent that happening.’

‘Well, that’s pretty clear,’ said Bobby.

They all got into Bobby’s car, a Ford Galaxie 500. It was summer, and he had the top down. They drove the short distance to the White House. Brumus enjoyed the ride.

Several thousand demonstrators were outside the White House, noticeably a mixture of black and white, carrying placards that said:
SAVE THE SCHOOL CHILDREN OF BIRMINGHAM
.

President Kennedy was in the Oval Office, sitting in his favourite chair, a rocker, waiting for the group from Justice. With him was a powerful trio of military men: Bob McNamara, the whiz kid Secretary of Defense, plus the Army Secretary and the Army Chief of Staff.

This group had gathered here today, George realized, because the Negroes of Birmingham had started fires and thrown bottles last night. Such an emergency meeting had never been called during all the years of non-violent civil rights protest, even when the Ku Klux Klan bombed the homes of Negroes. Rioting brought results.

The military men were present to discuss sending the army into Birmingham. Bobby focussed as always on the political reality. ‘People are going to be calling for the President to take action,’ he said. ‘But here’s the problem. We can’t admit that we’re sending federal troops to control the state troopers – that would be the White House declaring war on the state of Alabama. So we’d have to say it was to control the rioters – and that would be the White House declaring war on Negroes.’

President Kennedy got it right away. ‘Once the white people have the protection of federal troops, they might just tear up the agreement they just made,’ he said.

In other words, George thought, the threat of Negro riots is keeping the agreement alive. He did not like this conclusion, but it was hard to escape.

Burke Marshall spoke up. He saw the agreement as his baby. ‘If that agreement blows up,’ he said wearily, ‘the Negroes will be, uh . . .’

The President finished his sentence. ‘Uncontrollable,’ he said.

Marshall added: ‘And not only in Birmingham.’

The room went quiet as they all contemplated the prospect of similar riots in other American cities.

President Kennedy said: ‘What is King doing today?’

George said: ‘Flying back to Birmingham.’ He had learned this just before leaving the Gaston. ‘By now, I have no doubt, he’s making the rounds of the big churches, urging people to go home peacefully after the service and stay indoors tonight.’

‘Will they do what he says?’

‘Yes, provided there are no further bombings, and the state troopers are brought under control.’

‘How can we guarantee that?’

‘Could you deploy US troops
near
Birmingham, but not actually
in
the city? That would demonstrate support for the agreement. Connor and Wallace would know that, if they misbehave, they will forfeit their power. But it would not give the whites the chance to renege on the deal.’

They talked it up and down for a while, and in the end that was what they decided to do.

George and a small sub-group moved to the Cabinet Room to draft a statement for the press. The President’s secretary typed it. Press conferences were usually held in Pierre Salinger’s office, but today there were too many reporters and television cameras for that room, and it was a warm summer evening, so the announcement was made in the Rose Garden. George watched President Kennedy step outside, stand in front of the world’s press, and say: ‘The Birmingham agreement was and is a just accord. The federal government will not permit it to be sabotaged by a few extremists on either side.’

Two steps forward, one step back, and two more forward, George thought; but we make progress.

23

Dave Williams had a plan for Saturday night. Three girls from his class at school were going to the Jump Club in Soho, and Dave and two other boys had said, casually, that they might meet the girls there. Linda Robertson was one of the girls. Dave thought she liked him. Most people thought he was thick, because he always came bottom of the class in exams, but Linda talked to him intelligently about politics, which he knew about because of his family.

Dave was going to wear a new shirt with startlingly long collar points. He was a good dancer – even his male friends conceded that he had a stylish way of doing the Twist. He thought he had a good chance of starting a romance with Linda.

Dave was fifteen but, to his intense annoyance, most girls of his age preferred older boys. He still winced when he remembered how, more than a year ago, he had followed the enchanting Beep Dewar, hoping to steal a kiss, and had found her locked in a passionate embrace with eighteen-year-old Jasper Murray.

On Saturday mornings the Williams children went to their father’s study to receive their weekly allowances. Evie, who was seventeen, was given a pound; Dave got ten shillings. Like Victorian paupers, they often had to listen to a sermon first. Today Evie was given her money and dismissed, but Dave was told to wait. When the door closed, his father, Lloyd, said: ‘Your exam results are very bad.’

Dave knew that. In ten years of schooling he had failed every written test he had ever taken. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. He did not want to get into an argument: he just wanted to take his money and go.

Dad was wearing a check shirt and a cardigan, his Saturday morning outfit. ‘But you’re not stupid,’ he said.

‘The teachers think I’m thick,’ Dave said.

‘I don’t believe that. You’re intelligent, but lazy.’

‘I’m not lazy.’

‘What are you, then?’

Dave did not have an answer. He was a slow reader but, worse than that, he always forgot what he had read as soon as he turned the page. He was a poor writer, too: when he wanted to put ‘bread’ his pen would write ‘beard’ and he would not notice the difference. His spelling was atrocious. ‘I got top marks in oral French and German,’ he said.

‘Which only proves you can do it when you try.’

It did not prove any such thing, but Dave did not know how to explain that.

Lloyd said: ‘I’ve thought long and hard about what to do, and your mother and I have talked about it endlessly.’

This sounded ominous to Dave. What was coming now?

‘You’re too old to be spanked, and anyway, we never had much faith in physical punishment.’

That was true. Most kids were smacked when they misbehaved, but Dave’s mother had not struck him for years; his father, never. What bothered Dave now, however, was the word ‘punishment’. Clearly he was in for it.

‘The only thing I can think of, to force you to concentrate on your studies, is to withdraw your allowance.’

Dave could not believe what he was hearing. ‘What do you mean, withdraw?’

‘I’m not giving you any more money until I see an improvement in your school work.’

Dave had not seen this coming. ‘But how am I supposed to get around London?’ And buy cigarettes, and get into the Jump Club? he thought in a panic.

‘You walk to school anyway. If you want to go anywhere else, you’ll have to do better in your lessons.’

‘I can’t live like that!’

‘You get fed for nothing, and you have a wardrobe full of clothes, so you won’t lack for much. Just remember that if you don’t study, you’ll never have the money to get around.’

Dave was outraged. His plan for this evening was ruined. He felt helpless and infantile. ‘So that’s it?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m wasting my time here, then.’

‘You’re listening to your father trying to guide you as best he can.’

‘Same bloody thing,’ Dave said, and he stamped out.

He took his leather jacket off the hook in the hall and left the house. It was a mild spring morning. What was he going to do? His plan for the day had been to meet some friends in Piccadilly Circus, stroll along Denmark Street looking at guitars, have a pint of beer in a pub, then come home and put on the shirt with the long collar points.

He had some change in his pocket – enough for half a pint of beer. How could he get the money for admission to the Jump Club? Perhaps he could work. Who would employ him at short notice? Some of his friends had jobs on Saturday or Sunday, working in shops and restaurants that needed extra people at the weekend. He considered walking into a café and offering to wash up in the kitchen. It was worth a try. He turned his steps towards the West End.

Then he had another idea.

He had relatives who might employ him. His father’s sister, Millie, was in the fashion business, with three shops in affluent North London suburbs: Harrow, Golders Green, and Hampstead. She might give him a Saturday job, though he did not know how good he would be at selling frocks to ladies. Millie was married to a leather wholesaler, Abie Avery, and his warehouse in East London might be a better bet. But both Auntie Millie and Uncle Abie would probably check with Lloyd, who would tell them that Dave was supposed to be studying, not working. However, Millie and Abie had a son, Lenny, aged twenty-three, who was a small-time businessman and hustler. On Saturdays, Lenny operated a market stall in Aldgate, in the East End. He sold Chanel No. 5 and other expensive perfumes at ludicrously low prices. He whispered to his customers that they were stolen, but in fact they were simple fakes, cheap scent in expensive-looking bottles.

Lenny might give Dave a day’s work.

Dave had just enough money for the Tube fare. He turned into the nearest station and bought his ticket. If Lenny turned him down, he did not know how he was going to get back. He guessed he could walk a few miles if necessary.

The train took him underneath London from the affluent west to the working-class east. The market was already crowded with shoppers eager to buy at prices lower than those in the regular stores. Some of the goods
were
stolen, Dave guessed: electric kettles, shavers, irons, and radio sets slipped out of the back door of the factory. Others were surplus production sold off cheaply by the makers: records no one wanted, books that had failed to become bestsellers, ugly photo frames, ashtrays in the shape of seashells. But most were defective. There were boxes of stale chocolates, striped scarves with a flaw in the weave, piebald leather boots that had been unevenly dyed, china plates decorated with half a flower.

Lenny resembled his and Dave’s grandfather, the late Bernie Leckwith, with thick dark hair and brown eyes. Lenny’s hair was oiled and combed into an Elvis Presley pompadour. His greeting was warm. ‘Hello, young Dave! Want some scent for the girlfriend? Try Fleur Sauvage.’ He pronounced it ‘flewer savidge’. ‘Guaranteed to make her knickers fall down, yours for two shillings and sixpence.’

‘I need a job, Lenny,’ said Dave. ‘Can I work for you?’

‘Need a job? Your mother’s a millionaire, ain’t she?’ said Lenny evasively.

‘Dad cut off my allowance.’

‘Why did he do that?’

‘Because my school work is poor. So I’m broke. I just want to earn enough money to go out tonight.’

For the third time, Lenny replied with a question. ‘What am I, the Labour Exchange?’

‘Give me a chance. I bet I could sell perfume.’

Lenny turned to a customer. ‘You, Madam, have got very good taste. Yardley perfumes are the classiest on the market – yet that bottle in your hand is only three shillings, and I had to pay two-and-six to the bloke that stole it – I mean to say, supplied it to me.’

The woman giggled and bought the perfume.

‘I can’t pay you a wage,’ Lenny said to Dave. ‘But I tell you what I’ll do: I’ll give you ten per cent of everything you take.’

‘It’s a deal,’ said Dave, and he joined Lenny behind the display.

‘Keep the money in your pockets and we’ll settle up later.’ Lenny gave him a ‘float’ of a pound in coins to make change.

Dave picked up a bottle of Yardley, hesitated, smiled at a passing woman, and said: ‘The classiest perfume on the market.’

She smiled back and walked on.

He kept trying, imitating Lenny’s patter, and after a few minutes he sold a bottle of Joy by Patou for two-and-six. He soon knew all Lenny’s lines: ‘Not every woman has the flair to wear this one, but you . . . Only buy this if there’s a man you
really
want to please . . . Discontinued line, the Government banned this scent because it’s too sexy . . .’