Primary Colors (38 page)

"I know who you are. You're smart and honest and orderly. You have a bookcase filled with politics and thrillers. You have-what's this?" I started to laugh. She had a vertical display rack, the sort of thing you'd see in a poster store, with an array of old movie posters, hanging on the wall to the left of the bookcase.

"I couldn't make up my mind," she said. "I couldn't settle on just one movie. You walk in and see, The Sands of Iwo jima or Casablanca and say, 'Oh, she's one of those.' Of course, if you pinned me up against the wall and said, 'Choose one,' I'd have to go with Sullivan's Travels and
I've got it right . . . here." She flipped to Veronica Lake and Joel McRae, eternally romantic and cool, preternaturally American. "Great movie, good choice," I said. "Why not go with it?" "'Cause all of these are great. I bought 'em. I paid good money for them. They are originals. I wanted to be able to see them all. So what would your choice be, Henry--Rashomon?" She said this with a tinge of . . . something in her voice. I ignored it. She let me ignor
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t--until after we made love, upstairs, in her bedroom with the four televisions. I didn't notice the televisions until afterward, which said something about my state of mind and the intensity of my anticipation that night. I liked the bedroom, despite the televisions. She had it painted a dark Chinese red. There were four gold-framed Thomas Nast drawings on the wall. The bed was queen-size, with crisp, cheery blue-and-white checked sheets and pillowcases beneath a navy comforter. The lighting was soft, although there was a goosenecked brass reading lamp that arced in from the right side of the bed. I hadn't asked her about it, but I realized that she'd never lived with a man in that house.

"See, this is different from campaign sex," she said when I'd subsided. "There is a campaign going on out there--somewhere--but we're not part of it right now."

"And--?"

"Not fucking bad at all," she said, nuzzling her nose in my ear. But that wasn't quite true. I had sensed her holding back; bemused by my enthusiasm perhaps, or maybe something else.

"You want anything from downstairs, a Diet Coke?"

She returned, wearing a mohair shawl and nothing else. She tossed me the soda. It was strange, her casual nakedness: a new level of intimacy for us--we were always working our way through new levels, slowly and carefully, one at a time; we hadn't reached one yet we couldn't handle.

"So, why didn't you tell me about the McCollister girl?" she asked, trying to sound offhand.

"He told me not to tell anyone. He specifically mentioned you. I guess he figured that if you knew, Susan would."

She nodded. She didn't say anything.

"Look." I said. But couldn't figure out what to say next.

"So you went and scared Fat Willie into having his daughter get an amniocentesis. I don't get it."

"He figured Howard would scare her out of getting an amniocentesis-and that would make it go away."

"Brilliant," Daisy said. "He didn't understand that Fat Willie would do whatever his friend the governor asked?"

"So she went?" I asked.

"You haven't been following this, step by step?" she asked. "It's your baby-as it were."

"Willie came to me," I said.

"So that makes it-"

"Horrendous. You think I enjoyed it? I didn't want any part of it. I didn't want to think about it. I didn't think about it-I didn't even know she'd gone for the amnio."

"It was a late amnio, real late," she said. "It was too late to do a chorionic villus sampling-CVS. It's the latest thing, through the vagina, not the abdomen. They take pre-placental material. Might've been a little easier on the kid. But she's got herself a placenta now, feeding little Jackie McCollister or whoever it is. Anyway, we'll have a result in a couple of weeks."

"How do you know all this?"

"Susan put Libby on the case. She's practically moved in with the McCollisters."

"Of course," I said. "Look. That day with Howard-it was the worst thing I've ever done."

"But you did it."

"He insisted it wasn't his baby."

"And you believed him?"

An important moment for us, Daisy and me: "Not entirely," I said. "If I'd believed him entirely, it would've merely been awful-not the complete fucking horror that it has been. He did volunteer to have his blood taken, so I had to figure he was in the clear, and you know how dangerous it is to have something like this floating out there. The girl could tell a friend, the friend could tell another . . . and he could be absolutely innocent, and the whole campaign could come down. You think we could handle another scandal? Fuck. Not even a scandal. You think we could handle another denial? But still, there was-is-

something bugging me about this. Something in my gut: I don't believe he's absolutely innocent, y'know? And even if he is, in this case, I realized that I wouldn't put it past him--taking advantage of that girl. And you cannot imagine how ashamed I was. Howard did the heavy lifting--and a cold sonofabitch he was. But I was complicit. Willie came to me. He trusted me. And I guess, what it was, was--I had to give the governor the benefit of the doubt. I mean, if it's true that it's not his baby, then this had to be done, right?"

"And what will you think of him if it does turn out to be his baby?"

"I don't know. A lot less, I imagine. Daisy--" I sat up. "I don't understand how I think about this. I don't have a fucking clue. It's like--compartmentalized. There's the politician, the guy we've all invested in, and then there's this. How do you think about it?"

"I haven't, until recently--obviously," she said. "And then I was pissed."

"At him?"

"At you."

"I'm sorry," I said. But I found myself wondering: Was she pissed because I hadn't told her or because she hadn't been able to sense there was something important I wasn't telling her? The latter, I realized, was potentially more threatening. It meant there were things she might never know about me, ways she couldn't trust me, ways I could hurt her.

She was crying, quietly. I put my arm around her and pulled her toward me. She resisted, but she came.

We won Illinois and Michigan, but no one noticed. We hardly noticed. Other things happened that day. In Fort Lauderdale, Martha Harris--a sturdy cranberry-oat-bran muffin of a woman--held a press conference at the hospital where her husband remained in a coma. I was back in Mammoth Falls, at our headquarters. All activity stopped when Mrs. Harris came on the screen; she had the Stanton campaign's undivided attention.

"First of all, I want to thank the American public, all of you, for your remarkable outpouring of affection," she said. "I would especially like to thank the children of America-my husband, Senator Harris, was doing this for you, and, clearly, you understood that. The letters and drawings and everything we've gotten during the past week-I've read some of them to my husband. I think he can hear you . . ." Her voice broke now. "And I'm sure he is, as I am, more hopeful than ever about the future of our country. But hope is not enough. We need to do more."

And I thought about Richard: Right again. Here they come. "A great many of you have written asking us how we might keep the Harris movement alive," she said. "I think it's obvious, at this point, that my husband will not be able to continue his campaign for the presidency. But someone should. And so I have asked former governor Fred Picker of Florida, and he has agreed, to carry on for us-to continue to raise the issues." And now Freddy Picker moved somberly into the frame, head slightly bowed, hands clasped together in front of him. He was, finally, wearing a tie-blue-and-gold striped, it appeared. "And carry our message," Martha Harris continued, "all the way to the convention-and beyond, if possible. Both Lawrence and I learned to love Freddy Picker over the years, and especially over the past few weeks. He has been a devoted friend. He knows the meaning of honor. He understands what this country needs, and he will continue what we have begun, in an honorable way. And now," she said, tears suddenly spurting from both her eyes, "let me turn this campaign over to Governor Picker."

He was crying too. He brushed a tear from his right eye with the back of his hand, kissed Martha Harris lightly on the cheek, took a deep breath, stared down, as if in prayer, and then looked up, his fierce eyes quiet-different. There was a scattering of applause in the room. CNN had only one camera on scene, so it was hard to tell how many people-and reporters-were there, but it seemed pretty cramped. "I hope you'll excuse me," he said. "This is a very emotional time. I have a brief statement, and then I'll take a few questions-a very few, because, quite honestly, I haven't thought this through yet. Mrs. Harris approached me with this idea only yesterday. I was honored. I felt I couldn't possibly say no." He was staring directly into the CNN camera. I thought about the logistics of this: there were probably ten cameras facing him-and he had made sure to find the one that wa
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roadcasting this live, nationally. "And I will try my darndest to express the themes that Lawrence Harris has begun to lay out for the American people in a manner consistent with the spirit of his campaign. Today I've spoken with several of our parry leaders, and told them what Mrs. Harris has asked me to do--"

"Have you spoken with Governor Stanton?" a reporter interrupted. "No," he said. "But let me make this clear: I am not running against Jack Stanton. I ant running for Lawrence Harris."

"Does that mean you agree with every position he has taken in this campaign?"

"Most everything," he said. "There may be some differences in personal style, differences in emphasis--but I think Senator Harris was doing something important, and challenging, in this campaign, and I intend to carry that forward."

"Do you think you can win the nomination?"

"I'm not trying to win the nomination. I am just trying to continue what Senator Harris began, trying to give the American people an honest choice."

"But if you won the nomination--"

"It would be premature for me to discuss that, since I haven't given it a moment's thought. And that's why I think it'd be best to cut this session off right here. I've spent the night thinking about how I wanted to start this thing," he said, talking to CNN again, "about what gesture might convey the immense respect I have for Senator Harris, and the humility I feel at this moment, and the need for all of us to pull together as a country and give of ourselves. So I decided, since we're here in the hospital, that I'd just go down and donate a pint of blood."

There was a groan in Stanton headquarters, which had been stone silent to that point. And I must admit, I was shaking my head, too--and sort of half wondering who'd buzz me first: Richard, Daisy or the governor.

It was the governor.

"Jesus Christ, Henry. We should've thought of that," he said. "The blood thing."

We had a conference call that afternoon. It was a cumbersome thing-the governor and Susan at the Mansion; Howard, Lucille and me at headquarters; Richard, Leon and Daisy in Washington.

"All right," Stanton said. "What now?"

Silence.

"Good thing I've got all you geniuses on board," he said. "Okay, I'll go first: We start campaigning again immediately, Connecticut and New York. Howard, I want to see a New York schedule-and strategy-this time tomorrow. Beyond that, I'm stumped. How do we treat this guy? Do we ignore him? Debate him? Treat him like a candidate? I assume Harris has a ballot line in every state. Does he have full slates?"

"He's had some trouble slating. As for ballot lines, we could have knocked him off in New York," Howard said. "But you didn't want that."

"Right," Stanton said. "And one thing is absolutely certain at this point: we are not going to do anything that smacks of politics. We're gonna get the League of Women Voters' Seal of Approval for every last fucking thing we do. We're gonna be more high-minded than public television. But, within those parameters, we gotta be smart. Richard, how do we run against this guy without running against him?" "Well, first thing," Richard said. "You gotta expect he's gonna be the flavor of the week. And it's all gonna be golden. The TV stuff, the profiles. He'll be interviewed everywhere the next few days. We're gonna have to be patient and see what he does."

"Any guesses?"

Silence, then Daisy: "Well, obviously we have no idea how he's gonna campaign, how it's gonna look, but my gut says he's going to jettison a lot of Harris's excess baggage. He can't junk the Virgin Uses tax, but he can slim it down, de-emphasize it some. Same with the Social Security COLA. He seems smart. He may be tougher for us than Harris."

"What do we know about him?" Susan asked. "Where's his family? Why'd he quit being governor? Where's he been all our lives?" "He's divorced, isn't he?" Richard said.

"The point is, we don't know," Susan said. "We're going to need Libby to do a Nexus."

"Meanwhile," Stanton asked, "what do I say tonight--after I thank the people of Illinois and Michigan for this victory no one is gonna care about? No--wait a minute. I've got a better question: Howard, can he stop us? Let's assume the party takes the Donny O'Brien position: I get no help from them. We've got to make fifty percent plus one on our own. Can he stop us?"

"Yes," Howard said.

"Easily?"

"Yes."