Leon Uris - A God In Ruins

“I don’t think you get it,” Mal said.

“I think you’ve made preposterous demands. I won’t even show these to the President.”

“You intend to go through the motions of a debate reduced to no consequence and unleash your media barrage and turn the rest of the campaign into a fuck fest. Just skip the gutter and go straight down to the sewer. Okay, let’s play some sewer games.”

“I’d rather wait until Greer returns.”

“Sit still, Mr. Jefferson. Pucky Tomtree has been having an illicit affair with another man for over two years.”

Darnell’s mind ran a Pucky-check. If she had, she was extremely clever and careful. Would she? Little gossip bits had her with artists and writers, but that had been long ago, probably before Thornton. What seemed certain was that Maldonado would not try this if it wasn’t true.

“What are your intentions?” Darnel asked grimly.

“This campaign is not going into mud slinging. We demand a full, honest, open debate, without stunts. We demand decency in your advertising.”

Darnell had been scissored. He knew it. Yet Maldonado was not trying to shade his demands. Darnell had gotten to know Quinn with a lot of secondhand study. This was pure Quinn Patrick O’Connell, a sense of humility and honor that conveyed itself to the public.

“Who knows about this?”

“Greer learned about this first. She told the governor, myself and my daughter, who is Quinn’s wife. We are it.”

“The press?”

“Nada, nothing.”

“You are certain to be able to keep a lid on this till after the election, provided we remain in certain bounds?”

“I’m as sure as I can be about anything,” Mal said. “We’re dealing with three fine people. Greer doesn’t even know I’m confronting you. Quinn ordered us not to leak this at any cost. I’m taking it upon myself to offer it to you as a warning.”

“If I agree to carefully inspect our advertising and I agree to your debate conditions, will you give me the name of the gentleman?”

“Do you agree?” Mal asked.

“I agree, but how can O’Connell afford this gesture, a gesture that could deny him the presidency?”

“You just don’t get it, Mr. Jefferson.”

When Greer returned, Darnell watched the two very closely. Were they in cahoots, in a good-cop, bad-cop play, deliberately giving Mal time alone with Darnell so he could squash him while leaving her out? There was absolutely nothing in her demeanor to indicate she knew of Professor Maldonado’s revelation.

Through the next two hours of “negotiations,” Darnell began to “see” more and more merit to their proposal. He wondered out loud that it might even help Thornton. Two politicians facing each other honestly. Now, that’s a picture ... or an extended oxymoron.

Darnell won a few points in quibbling over this and that, and by early afternoon they broke camp to return to Midway Airport.

The final seal would be a simultaneous announcement with both candidates praising the honesty and openness of the debate.

Rae sat in the cockpit at the navigator’s desk, still directing the streams of information coming in.

The cockpit door was closed.

“You all right?” Greer asked.

“I feel very tired,” Mal answered.

“You told him while I was out of the room.”

“Yeah,” Mal sighed, “I nailed him.”

“That puts Quinn in a rotten position vis-a-vis the two of you.”

“I’ll save him the pain of having to fire me. I’m resigning.”

Greer patted his hand. “Maybe we see Quinn in too bright a light, Mal. Maybe he knew, in his heart of hearts, one of us intended to confront Jefferson about the Pucky affair. He’s that smart, you know.”

Rae came back with messages and gave them to Greer.

“Are you okay, Grandpa?” Rae asked.

“Just tired, honey.”

*

Quinn read the short note of resignation from Mal.

“This is terrible,” Quinn said.

“I got you the debate I think you need. So, don’t let’s rehash it.”

“I’m going to have to accept your resignation,” Quinn said, feeling a trembling wash over him.

“Yes, I know.”

“Mal. We are still family. We’re only humans. I wasn’t really all that surprised when you told me. Maybe I silently hung the bad deed on you. And you only did it to make the playing field level. I want to keep Rita and my personal rooms at your home. We are family, man!”

“Thanks, Quinn.”

NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY—FIFTH AVENUE OCTOBER 1 5, 2008

On this day the grand repository of human existence and thought was the focus of the nation. On this day illicit lovers could no longer rendezvous at the statues of the lions, for the building was isolated by police barricades.

Forty-second and Fortieth streets and Fifth Avenue held

bumper-to-bumper privileged parking.

In the rear of the great edifice, running to the Avenue of the Americas, stood Bryant Park, a pocket park. Twice a year the fashion establishment raised a tent and models slunk down the runway. Cheers for Karan and Klein.

Beneath Bryant Park the greatest of treasures—an eight story bunker held a trove indicating human existence on the planet, from cuneiform to Stone Age arrowheads, from the Gobi Desert to Newfoundland. All of it was here, awaiting visitors from space.

The tattered elegance of the kodak CELESTE BARTOS Forum had received a face-lift for the affair, her imposing glass dome shined to a glitter and four hundred temporary stadium seats installed.

The overflow of media had to cover the event piped back to the fujifilmjohn Jacob Astor Ballroom.

Carter Carpenter, a hallowed father figure of the American media, had been resurrected to moderate the affair.

It was to be a wide-open debate, with the moderator stepping in only to preserve civility.

A buzz of anticipation hummed upward as the clock moved for nine. Outside, last-minute tickets, drawn by lottery, were hustled for over five hundred dollars each.

“Ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats,” Carter Carpenter said authoritatively. Controlled applause greeted the governor and the president as they took to their rostrums.

For that instant Thornton Tomtree was glad he had let Darnell talk him into the venue. His lead over O’Connell had slipped from double digits to a single digit of nine percent.

Thornton, the stoic master of a great corporation, a gigantic figure, organized and in control, now showed an addition of tragedy—Lincolnesque. He had humanized himself, somewhat, since Four Corners, after slipping the mantle of blame and gaining sympathy for “taking responsibility, because it happened on my watch.”

On this night he’d be facing the gun issue as never before. He was ready.

Carter Carpenter explained the very liberal rules. “Mr. Tomtree will go first, as he won the flip of the coin.”

Tomtree’s opening statement said, in effect, “We are in midstream in

several ways, leaving an old century behind and healing from a

catastrophic event. We don’t change horses in midstream. Having

ascertained that Four Corners was a national tragedy which demanded of

every politician and every American, to accept his share of the blame

.. .

“... what are we being offered in my place? A popular rodeo-style candidate who, in fact, is probably more at ease branding cattle.”