THE WORK HAD LEAKED, as the word always does. An aide brought the news to the candidate at his suite. The aide was controlling his face. The candidate was, too. He put a slight smile on his face, and asked the aide to leave him alone with the news for a while. He’d speak to the whole staff when the news was absolutely official.
The candidate (in lighter moods he liked to think of himself as “The Siberian Candidate,” or “The Muscovian Candidate”) went into his private bedroom and locked the door behind him. He felt more excited than he had since he was a boy, and had first started on this road. He had to cork his mouth with both hands to prevent unseemly squeals of joy from leaping out.
He could see the headlines now—VAN HORN ENDORSES BABINGTON. The press interviews. The photos—the endorser with his arm around the endorsee. Van Horn perhaps kissing Mrs. Babington. Speculation that the Governor might name Senator Van Horn to the second spot on the ticket, or to a senior Cabinet post when, as seemed likely, he was elected in November.
Well, the candidate thought, this is what I’ve been promised all along. A greased chute straight to the White House. And when I get there, oh, my friends, history is going to be made. Not the kind of history anybody knows about while it’s happening, of course. But future generations, the children of one just and happy socialist world, would know him as the man who devoted his life in secret labor to conquer the People’s greatest enemy—and that he did it without war.
Tonight was the major step. Tonight, Henry Van Horn’s destiny redeemed his crimes. You might say that poor Josephine Girolamo had died in fire so the man in this hotel room, in a city in the middle of a wheat field, could neutralize the only real obstacle to the glowing future he saw for the world. The candidate decided that one day, if it proved to be safe, he would cause some important building to be named after the girl as a memorial. There were already too many things named after the Van Horns.
There was a knock at the door.
“Yes?” the candidate said.
“Phone call for you, Congressman. It’s Governor Babington.”
The candidate grinned. He wanted to laugh out loud.
“Congressman Abweg?” the aide asked.
“Yes, Gary,” Congressman Stephen Abweg said. “I’m here. I’ll take the call out there.”
Abweg shrugged into his jacket, straightened his shoulders, and left the room.
“I suspect it’s about Senator Van Horn’s speech tonight, Congressman,” Gary said.
“Undoubtedly,” Abweg told him.
Congressman Abweg was very conscious of his posture and the look on his face as he walked to the phone. The press would be all over his staff once the story broke for sure; for all he knew, some of these people had already been talking. The Congressman had to make sure the reporters heard he took it all with confidence and dignity. That was important.
He picked up the phone and talked to Babington. The Governor hinted at a Vice-Presidential slot for Abweg if he withdrew from the race after tonight’s endorsement. Not in so many words, of course, and couched in terms of the “good of the Party.”
Abweg declined confidently, and with dignity. He said he would carry on with his campaign until the convention, and let the assembled multitude decide. He would have had to say that in any case, of course, and Babington must have known it.
Abweg decided that Babington had called merely to gloat.
Abweg walked back to his room with more confident dignity. He was thinking let the poor bastard enjoy it. It’s only going to last a day or so before it all comes crashing down on him.