(1964) The Man (21 page)

“That was awful, what happened down there in Hattiesburg. Was someone really blinded?”

“Yes, Simon was, poor bastard. Completely sightless, of all the rotten things. And Marvin’s sustained a skull fracture, but he’ll live. The other ten are okay, as okay as anyone can be in those stinking cell blocks.”

“When are they going to be let out?”

“Let out?” Hurley snorted bitterly. “They come up for sentencing in a day or two—”

“
They
come up for sentencing?” Leroy Poole shouted. “Je-sus, what did they do but peaceably picket in some Halloween costumes? What about the Grand Dragon who threw the—”

“Leroy, Leroy, you know better than that. Those folks can’t do anything wrong, just like we can’t do anything right. The charges against our boys are a mile long. Disturbing the peace, inciting a riot, assault and battery—you name it; whatever’s in the book is being thrown at them. Worst of all, a county judge named Everett Gage is going to be on the bench, reading the sentence. We’ve got the biography on him. Twice in ten years he let off proven lynchers. And they’ve built a special cemetery, in some swamp, just to hold the Negroes he’s sentenced to hard labor.”

“What are you going to do, Jeff?”

“I’m heading down to Little Rock in an hour, and if Judge Gage does what’s expected, I’ll probably set up a base of operations in Shreveport. Then, if necessary, some of us’ll do what has to be done.”

“You mean—?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

Leroy Poole was suddenly unnerved. “Jeff, one thing. You talk about the sentencing. Didn’t our boys plead Not Guilty?”

“Sure thing.”

“Well, what about the trial first?”

“I omitted it to save long-distance charges. Leroy, you’ve been away from your South too long.”

“Yeh.”

Hurley’s voice came on more forcefully. “There is one thing that does count, and that’s an appeal carried on our behalf by an important attorney. Something to stir up pressure, force them into second thoughts, into moderation. That’s primarily why I called you.”

“What can I do, Jeff?”

“I’ll tell you what I’ve done, and what you can do. You’ve heard of Nat Abrahams—?”

“The lawyer?”

“The one who got those Mexicans off in California, and did that great job for the NAACP in Ohio. I tried to get through to him in Chicago. He was gone. His associate, fellow named Hart, said he was on his way to Washington. I explained the urgency of our case, and asked where we could contact him in Washington. Hart said Nat Abrahams was turning down all criminal cases, was involved with something new in your city. Leroy, I’d like to—”

Poole interrupted, remembering what had been nagging at him as he listened. “Wait, Jeff, something just came to mind. This Nat Abrahams, he’s the one—when Dilman gave me the names of relatives and friends to interview, he named Nat Abrahams of Chicago as one of his best friends.”

Hurley whistled. “Great. Better than I hoped for. I was going to ask you to look up Abrahams when he arrives, make a special plea for him to intervene for us on the appeal. But this is better, much better. When are you seeing Dilman again?”

“Well, now that he’s become President—”

“See him.” It was a command, and Leroy Poole came to attention. “See him,” Hurley repeated, “and when you see him, make sure he knows what’s happened to the Turnerites down in Mississippi, what’s happened to
his
people. Tell him you’d like him to get his friend Nat Abrahams to give us a little help. Tell him we’re desperate, anything you like. We need Abrahams, and no matter how busy he is, I can’t see him saying no to the President of the United States.”

Poole was worried. “I can’t see Abrahams saying no to Dilman either, but I sure can see Dilman saying no to me. You should look at the notes of my talks with Dilman. He’s chicken. He’s a let’s-make-haste-slowly fink.”

“Did you ever feel him out on the Turnerites?”

“I sure did. He hemmed and hawed, weaseling all the way. It’s in my notes.”

Hurley’s tone had become fiercer. “Send me a copy of your notes on Dilman. Everything. In return, I’ll send you something today, some information that’ll maybe help you turn Dilman from a chicken to a bantam cock. Try your best, Leroy, any way you can. Get your man in the White House to deliver Abrahams to us. If you succeed, you’ve done a great service for us, and we’ve got a real fighting chance.”

“What if I can’t make it, Jeff?”

“Then we’re going all the way, like we agreed.”

“I—I’d hate that, Jeff.”

“You think I’d like it? But it’s that or nothing now. We’ve been knocked around long enough. Maybe it’s time we punch back hard.”

“All right, Jeff.”

“First things first. Before you pitch the President, make sure Nat Abrahams is in Washington. Once you’re sure, you get in there with Dilman, because right now it’s either the lawyer way or the other way, one or the other, but whichever, it’s got to be fast. We’re going fast from here on in.”

Even an electric razor did not make the task of shaving easier on a swaying, speeding train. Ridding oneself of a thick stubble, while in rapid transit, required the steady hand of a surgeon and the concentration of a yogi. He possessed neither attribute this sulky gray morning. He blamed his unsure hand and his wandering mind on the stunning news that he had heard in Akron last night. He had been up half the night with it, following its implications along every dead-end tangent, and back again, and over again, and a few hours’ sleep had not alleviated the disturbance.

Grunting surrender, Nat Abrahams gave up.

Unplugging the cord, wrapping it around the electric razor, he considered the results of his shaving in the dim yellow mirror of the cramped, rattling compartment lavatory. A sadly uneven job, but then God had been there first, he decided wryly. No electric gadgetry could smooth the Maker’s work. Nor did Nat Abrahams really care much. The twin in the mirror with its shock of unruly brown hair, lined forehead, bushy eyebrows, sunken eyes, hooked nose between high cheekbones, amused mouth, prominent jaw, all gaunt, sallow, keen, had been faithful friend and partner through most of his quixotic idiocies and adventures for most of his years. The six-feet-and-one-inch twin—not only the face, but the lanky, ungainly, sinewy structure appended to it—had frightened off few clients (well, maybe a few fastidious ones), lost few juries, antagonized few judges. It had won him Sue. It had collaborated to gain him mighty pleasures and minor reputation. Who could ask for anything more?

He smiled with self-mockery. Who could ask for anything more? He could. He could ask for one thing more—money—money, and plenty of it. The unselfish need of it, after years of treating it as a time-wasting intruder, was the only thing on earth that could have put him on this rushing train from Chicago to Washington, D.C., in his busiest August yet. He had turned over his crowded calendar to Felix Hart, he had turned over the three children to their grandmother, he had dragged Sue away from her thousand wife-mother activities, to obtain what he had spent a lifetime ignoring: the pot of gold that had become a necessity at last. Nothing but necessity would have sent him careening forth on this questionable treasure hunt.

Nat Abrahams reached down, pulled up his suspenders, and snapped them over his shoulders. The suspenders, regarded by his opponents as a corny affectation, had become so much a part of him now that he was hardly aware of them. When he was aware, he was happy to remember that they were not and had never been an affectation. In his first year in law school he had purchased his first pair and worn them as a talisman, to help him attain and honor the kind of shingle he had always wanted: Lincoln, of Lincoln & Herndon, Counselors, or Darrow, of Darrow & Sissman, Attorneys-at-Law. He had deserved half of neither shingle, he was certain, but he was equally certain that the talisman had reminded him always to remember the ideals of Lincoln and Darrow.

Yet this morning the suspenders felt as tight and uncomfortable as a guilty conscience. Was the journey to Washington right for him? The cardiac specialist, his old friend Greenberg, had reiterated that there was no choice. “Nat, surely the American Bar Association does not disapprove of its members being well paid. So why all the Old Country guilts? Enough already. Your whole life you have lived by the Golden Rule, ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ So now it’s time to do unto yourself as you have done unto others. Survival, Nat, not at any price, no, but what Avery Emmich offers is not any price, but your price, your terms. Younger men with younger hearts will swing your broadsword to protect every minority, every civil liberty, so let go, let them. You have had your warning, one early coronary insufficiency. Not every man is so lucky. So do what I tell you and what Sue wants. Let go of the crusade. Go to Washington, sign the contract, make the fortune, and then come back and buy the farm. Live so your children can honor their father, not his tombstone. Go to Washington, Nat.”

The words rang in his ears, in duet with the train’s whistle. Well, if he was nothing else, he was obedient. Here he was, on the Capitol Limited, little more than one hour from Washington’s Union Station.

He left the lavatory and groped his way into the compartment bedroom, where only the tiny bed light over his upper berth and the slit of morning beneath the green shade provided visibility. He took down his vest, and then his suit coat, and pulled them on. Fixing the silver watch chain, he squinted to make out the time. Yes, one hour and five minutes more to Washington.

He bent to see if Sue was awake. Her back was to him. Her small, fragile face was buried in the pillow, and her short bob was a tangle. He listened to her inhale and exhale, and loved her now as he had for every moment of their eighteen years. She was so sound asleep, so far from turmoil, and he regretted having kept her awake last night with the news that he had heard in Akron.

He touched her bare shoulder. “Sue, darling—”

Her shoulder lifted, fell, and her head, eyes still shut, came around. “Mmm?”

“Time to wake up. We’re almost there.”

“Thanks.”

“Are you awake, Sue?”

“I’m fine.”

“You’ve got an hour to dress. If you make it fast, you can join me for breakfast. The diner’s two cars back. I’ll be there.”

“Okay.”

He straightened, flexed his shoulder muscles, picked up his attachè case, and went to the door.

“Nat—”

He halted, returned, to find her on an elbow, eyes wide-open, staring up at him.

“Nat, is it true, what you told me last night—or was I dreaming?”

“You weren’t dreaming, dear.”

“No,” she said slowly. “I was afraid of that. Poor Doug in the White House. I don’t mean just that he’s colored. It’s that he’s so—so sensitive and—and withdrawn. Nat, they’ll crucify him.”

Abrahams frowned. “He’s tougher than a lot of people think, and smarter, too.” He paused. “Maybe it’s the best thing that could have happened—I mean, to the country.”

“Do you really believe that?”

“Honey,” he said evasively, “I never know absolutely what I believe until I’ve had breakfast and a pipeful. You ask me then. Now, hurry up. I’ll see you in the diner.”

Once he was alone in the train corridor, wending his way between the compartments and windows, he tried to understand what he did believe. Stopping before the last window, he placed a palm against the glass pane, briefly conscious of the blur of green trees flashing past him, but soon inattentive to the scenery. His mind had gone back to the scene he had witnessed at the depot, during the time of their departure yesterday.

When he and Sue had boarded the Capitol Limited in Chicago ten minutes before it left at three-forty yesterday afternoon, they had already known of the President’s sudden death in Frankfurt. All through the depot, and outside the train, and in the train itself, Abrahams had seen in the expressions of passengers and porters the same evidences of disbelief and anguish that he had observed that other terrible time when President John F. Kennedy’s life had been extinguished by an assassin’s bullet in Dallas.

Pushing himself away from the window, Abrahams tried to sort out the different qualities of grief. He felt sure that the public had reacted to T. C.’s death in Frankfurt in very much the same fashion that they had reacted to President Kennedy’s death in Dallas, which was considerably different from public reaction to Franklin D. Roosevelt’s death in Warm Springs. T. C. had been almost as youthful as Kennedy, and as vigorous. Most people had regarded T. C. more as an older brother than as a father, because he had been their Chief Executive less than three years and they had not become totally dependent upon him. His sudden death had shaken them badly—that was evident everywhere yesterday—but what seemed to shake them more was the realization that invincible youth and strength, carrying hope and ambition, shielded by the indestructibility of success and power, could be brought down and stamped out so swiftly and easily. Thus, Abrahams guessed, public lamentation had taken on the form of disbelief. When Roosevelt died—and this, too, Abrahams remembered very well—the President had been an intimate part of people’s lives and experiences for so many years that the loss had been not only the loss of the ever present head of the family, but each man’s loss of a great segment of his personal life.

After their train left Chicago, Nat and Sue Abrahams had talked over the tragedy and its meaning at length, and pored over the latest newspapers, and then he had devoted himself to his work. While Abrahams had voted for T. C., supported him, he had felt no passionate involvement with him, and so he suffered no feeling of passionate loss. He had thought, as he worked over his notes for the Washington meeting with Gorden Oliver, Emmich’s lobbyist there, that MacPherson might do the job as well as T. C. had done. There would be no national trauma.

The rest of the short afternoon on the train had been lost to working, napping, reading, and desultory chatter about the children, the new position that was in the offing, the utopia that was possible after that. They had gone to the lounge for martinis, and then eaten too much dinner. Abrahams had seen Sue back to their compartment, where the berths were already made. She had told him that she was tired, and would read some more, and go to sleep early.