“I UNDERSTAND YOU AND YEHO HAD A TALK IN THE DESERT,” SAID Patchen to Christopher.
“Yes,” Christopher said.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you all that myself, but you left town before I had the chance.”
“That’s all right. The story had a certain added force, coming from him.”
Patchen coughed, as if covering some other sign of emotion. “I’ll bet it did,” he said, “but that wasn’t the reason the messenger was chosen. It’s nice of you to help us out, all things considered.”
“There were other considerations. Yeho explained the situation very clearly.”
They walked on through the autumn night with the Doberman scouting ahead along the murky tow path. In spite of the kidnapping of the third Beautiful Dreamer in Washington itself, the dog remained Patchen’s only visible protection from his enemies. A bolt of lightning rent the black sky far to the west, over the Appalachians.
“Rain in the suburbs late tonight, high pollen count tomorrow,” Patchen said. “Have you ever noticed how much people in this town talk about the weather?”
In Christopher’s experience they spoke of little else. He said, “I’ve noticed. Do you have a theory about that?”
“Funny you should ask. Yes, I do. It even has a metaphorical dimension. Shall I go on?”
Patchen was in a caustic mood.
“Go on,” Christopher said.
“It has to do with the fundamental nature of the place,” Patchen said. “You remember Sebastian’s eightieth birthday party up in New York—all those friends of his, stock market wheeler dealers, big-time lawyers, publishers, Hollywood producers, that man who owned a baseball team, captains of industry, doctors who were curing diseases by replacing people’s genes?”
“I remember. The baseball man told the O. G. he always wanted to be a spy.”
“What did the O. G. say?”
“His eyes lit up. Baseball! He said, ‘It’s never too late. Let us know if you want to start up a team in some interesting place and need a silent partner.’ The fellow thought he was kidding. Go on with your theory.”
“Well, looking around the table at all those New York faces,” Patchen said, “I realized that I was surrounded by people who lived by their wits, whose whole purpose in life was to make things happen. Whereas in Washington the entire purpose of being, the real function of government, is to prevent things from happening—war being the supreme example.”
Christopher chuckled. “The moral being that the weather is interesting because it can’t be prevented?”
“No, that’s the metaphor,” Patchen said. “The moral is more interesting. The Outfit’s purpose is to make things happen in an organism in which nothing is permitted to happen. That’s why it’s always being attacked by white corpuscles like Patrick Graham and White House assistants.”
“It’s a virus?” Christopher said.
“Worse, a conscience. ‘Out of darkness, truth.’ Well, let there be darkness.”
The thought seemed to cheer him tremendously; he had not spent a lifetime at the O. G.’s elbow without learning to love a joke on the opposition.
Christopher put a comradely hand on his friend’s paralyzed shoulder and felt him chuckling within himself. Even the Doberman, cocking its head and uttering a questioning whimper, seemed to detect the change in his master’s mood. Patchen thought the animal was merely bothered by the distant electrical storm.
“See?” he said. “In Weimar, even the dogs talk about the weather.”