Chapter Thirteen

THEY were parked on East Executive and they could see through the shady oaks in the park, past the statue of Rochambeau to the White House.

“I don’ wanna,” protested Doughface in a monotone. “I don’t see no reason for doin’ it.”

Rita squared back in exasperation. “Jack, sometimes you can be very trying. Sometimes I think you’re—well—dumb!”

He sat up belligerently but she smiled and patted his hand and he lost track of the conversation for the moment. He remembered shortly. “I still don’ wanna. This put-together don’t look right to me.”

“Jack, do you want to spend the rest of your days in hiding?”

“Yeah, if nobody can find me.”

“But that’s impossible. If you got mad at somebody, the Army would be on the move again. You’d never be safe. You don’t know this world like I do. You weren’t blind for all the years I was. And blind, I saw much. People are rotten things, Jack. Rotten! Once everybody was my friend. Oh, yes they were. Everybody that was anybody knew me. Flowers and cards and invitations. And no dinner was complete unless I was there. And then it happened. Then I couldn’t see any more. I was awful to look at. And what did they do?”

Her lip curled with bitterness as she thought about it. Her voice was like flowing acid.

“They forgot me. They left me to shift for myself. The men that I had befriended left me alone because I wasn’t pretty any more. That was all they wanted from me. Beauty. And when it went, that was the end. You don’t know what it means to be kicked into the gutter when the roughest fabric you had known was silk. You don’t know what it means to try to fill a stomach used to scented wines with moldy bread crusts. Charity. I didn’t want charity. I didn’t want anything but the friendship which they had sworn they had for me. And everybody is like that, Jack. You know they are.

“Take this pal of yours, the doctor that made you that way. Did he stand up for you?”

“Well …” hesitated Jack. “No.”

“Sure he didn’t. He laid a trap and stopped you. He was trying to get you into the hands of the police. He was trying to stop you so that a man with a gun could shoot you before you saw him. You know that that’s true. Pellman gave you the double cross. Those soldiers were waiting all the time. You couldn’t trust Pellman and Pellman, from what you say, was the best friend you ever had. All right, add that up and what do you get?”

“I guess you’re right,” faltered Jack.

“You guess I’m right. You know I’m right. And I’ll tell you something else. When I was at the top I had friends. Do you know who they were, those fools that threw me aside and forgot me when I had nobody?”

“No,” said Doughface.

“No. No, nobody knows but me. The rest have all forgotten. They were kids, then, mewling around my dressing room door. They were down from Harvard and Yale and Princeton. And do you know where they are now?”

“No,” said Doughface.

“On the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States. In the Senate and House. In the cabinet. Oh yes they are. Lots of them. And those that aren’t own big factories and steamship lines. They’re the pick of the country.”

“Yeah, but …”

“And as long as they are up so high,” said Rita, casually regarding the polish on her beautiful nails, “they can be used and, being used, can suffer. You and I, Jack, are going to show them a thing or two.”

“But, geez,” said Doughface, “I ain’t got no idea about a gov’ment. I dunno nothin’ about it.”

“You don’t have to know. You’ve got me. You don’t even need to expose yourself. You’ve got a woman Friday.”

“A huh?”

“You’ve got somebody to front for you and that somebody is me. Now come on, get out of the car.”

She pushed him and he stumbled to the parking. The chauffeur looked anxiously for orders.

“Move one foot from here or say one word to anybody,” said Rita, “and this man will track you to the ends of the earth to kill you.”

“No’m,” chattered the chauffeur. “I ain’t gonna do nothin’. Honest. I just a poor …”

“Come on, Jack,” said Rita, taking his arm.

He was very unwilling. He felt somehow that he was in the midst of a torrential current that was carrying him on and on despite any feeble effort he could make to breast it and gain shore. He was panicky when he thought that maybe these guys would shoot before he could do anything.

Rita read that thought.

“Now listen, Jack, this is going to be easy. All you have to do is look and they’ll drop. They’re after your neck. These men are the government. They’re the ones responsible for all the police and soldiers in the country. If it weren’t for these men you’ll meet in a moment, you wouldn’t be worrying the way you are. And they’d shoot you on sight, any of them. Don’t give them a chance. I’ll be right behind you so don’t look back.”

“Y’think I ought to do this? Y’think I can do it?”

“Do I think you can?” laughed Rita. “Why, I should say so. Nobody had better stand up to you, Doughface Jack. You’re through being kicked around and starved and hunted. You’re through with haystacks and boxcars forever. You’re going to be the greatest man in the world and the only thing that’s stopping you is a few men in the White House.”

“Maybe I don’t want to be the greatest man.…”

“You want me, don’t you?” challenged Rita.

“Gosh,” said Jack.

“Then you want to be the greatest man in the world. Remember that you are about to meet the men that have been hounding you. If they get away, you’ll be killed. You must not let them get away.”

Jack walked stiff-legged to keep his knees from buckling. But he was a little angry too to think that a few guys in a place like this could cause him all the trouble that he had been caused.

The gates were open as always and no one was on guard. The public was perfectly free to walk around this curving drive which led to the doors.

All was very peaceful. Cars hummed lazily along Pennsylvania Avenue behind them and a bored diplomat was getting out of his car in front.

Doughface was apprehensive about being recognized. His picture had been circulated in Washington because this very thing might happen. But he was fairly safe on that score. Rita had applied suntan powder, thus obliterating his most recognizable characteristic—his pasty white complexion.

Two Secret Service men were lounging in the doorway of the White House, on duty for this very purpose. They were young men, quick of eye and quicker on the draw.

Rita followed at a slow and casual pace. Doughface felt his knees knocking together.

The Secret Service men stood up straighter, as they did whenever they spotted a casual stroller approaching the driveway cover. Doughface walked along, trying to keep his teeth from chattering.

The Secret Service men saw Rita but still they were not certain. They glanced at each other as the visitors came even closer and then the shorter of the two reached casually into his coat pocket for the photographs.

“Jack!” said Rita tensely, “he’s going to draw and shoot!”

Doughface thought so too. He started with the shock—and the thing was done.

The two Secret Service men stumbled back against the doorway. They sagged slowly. The shorter was attempting feebly to draw and shout but the lightning had stunned him.

Doughface wanted to run but Rita was treading on his heels. He went swiftly up the steps and across the fallen men.

The reception room had many people in it. And they had seen the Secret Service men fall and were coming forward wonderingly.

A guard saw Doughface and the collapse of the Secret Service men gave him the tipoff. He grabbed for his gun just as Doughface got inside.

“Back!” yelled the guard to the others. “it’s him!”

In a wave of panic men dived for exits. But the offered weapon had done the thing once more. The guard collapsed, still fighting for a chance to aim the weapon. And then it was too late.

Three other guards went down like dominoes. The men and women in the room had taken too long to get out. They wouldn’t now. They were lying on the floor in grotesquely twisted attitudes.

It was all silent, it was almost calm. It was horrible.

Doughface wanted to run again. But Rita held him by the shoulders. A door opened in reply to the shout and two more Secret Service men rushed out, to stop as though running against an invisible wall and drop.

Doughface heard a sound to his right and whipped about. A guard was standing there with leveled gun. He fired a wild shot and then he went down.

Doughface dived for the inner chamber.

A secretary came halfway up from his desk and then fell face down across it. Three visitors leaped up and fell forward in limp heaps.

Another secretary came out of an inner office, papers in hand. He dropped and the sheets settled slowly over him.

“In there!” said Rita, shoving Doughface ahead toward a big door.

Doughface went forward.

The president had heard the first shout, the shot and then had seen his secretary drop. He knew what was coming. But he was no coward. He stood up, knuckles resting on his desktop, his face calm in its halo of gray hair.

Doughface came through the door and stopped.

“So you,” said the president, “are the tramp. Has it occurred to you that you will undoubtedly hang for these murders?”

The statement could not have been more ill chosen. Doughface could not help his own reaction to that statement.

The president of the United States sagged into his chair, his face as gray as his hair. He held on hard to the arms of his chair, fighting to keep erect, fighting with more will power than he had ever known he had possessed.

“Don’t kill him,” said Rita swiftly to Doughface.

Doughface pulled Rita inside and then banged the doors shut. He turned again. He began to realize fully the awful thing he had done and he could see no salvation for him now.

“Mr. President,” said Rita, “you are not dead and you will not die if you do as I say.”

Doughface thrust her aside, realizing fully what a spot he was in. “Geez, I dunno what I’m doin’! If I kill you they’ll hang me sure!”

“Leave him alone,” ordered Rita.

Doughface wouldn’t listen to her. “I ain’t done nothin’ until now that I thought up myself. Geez, Mr. President, you ain’t done nothin’ to me. If you’ll get me out of this jam …”

“Shut up,” said Rita.

But the trick was done. The president had had enough to bring him back to himself again.

“Young woman,” he began.

“Listen to me,” Rita interrupted. “You’re going to stay with us for safekeeping. They won’t bomb this place as long as they know you’re alive. They won’t try to kill me because they will know that Jack is somewhere near at hand. Now he’s going to bring your staff back to life and I’m going to start giving the orders around here.”

“Why?” said the president. “What could you possibly do …?”

“What could I do?” said Rita. “I can do plenty. There are a few men in high places, Mr. President, who are going to find out what I can do. If you want to live, shut up. A month ago Doughface Jack was nothing but a tramp. Today he’s a bigger and more powerful national figure than you. Try and laugh that one off, Mr. President. Jack, get to work.”