Tweet

     I moved the brandy glass off the screen. "We're not quite done with the movies yet," I said. "You have trouble controlling your weight? Well, let me show you some pictures."
     First, an image of Welles from The Stranger, slender enough that you could even see his Adam's apple. "Here you are in 1946. You still look something like yourself. Now here's Touch of Evil, ten years later." A bloated hulk, unshaven and sweating. The photos cycled, a dismal progression of sagging jaws, puffy cheeks, a face turned from boyishly handsome to suet, a body from imposing size to an obese nightmare. I had film clips of him waddling across a room, of his jowls quivering as he orated in some bad mid-sixties European epic. Numerous clips of him seated on talk show sets, belly swelling past his knees, a cigar clutched between the fingers of his right hand, full beard failing to disguise his multiple chins.
     "By the end of your life you weigh somewhere between three hundred and four hundred pounds. No one knows for sure. Here's a photo of an actress named Angie Dickinson trying to sit on your lap. But you have no lap. See how she has to hold her arm around your neck to keep from sliding off. You can't breathe, you can't move, your back is in agony, your kidneys are failing. In the 1980s you get stuck in an automobile, which must be taken apart for you to be able to get out. You spend the last years of your life doing commercials for cheap wine that you are unable to drink because of your abysmal health."
     Welles stared at the images. "Turn it off," he whispered.

     "My, my. What kind of dumb cluck do your people think I am?" he inquired jovially.
     "Well, you'd certainly be one if you jumped at their offer without wanting to know more," I smiled back, resisting the urge to run like hell. "They don't want your money, Mr. Hearst. Leave all you want to your wife and your boys. Leave Marion more than enough to protect her. What my Company wants won't create any hardship for your hiers in any way. but--you're smart enough to understand this--there are plans being made now that won't bear fruit for another couple of centuries. Something you might not value much, tonight in 1933, might be a winning card in a game being played in the future. You see what I'm saying here?"
     "I might," said Hearst, hitching up the knees of his trousers and sitting down again. The little dog jumped back into his lap. Relieved that he was no longer looming over me, I pushed on:
     "Obviously we'd submit a draft of the conditions for your approval, though your lawyers couldn't be allowed to examine it--"
     "And I can see why." Hearst held up his big hand. "And that's all right. I think I'm still competent to look over a contract. But, Mr. Denham! You've just told me I've got something you're going to need very badly one day. Now, wouldn't you expect me to raise the price? And I'd have to have more information about your people. I'd have to see proof that any of your story, or Mr. Shaw's for that matter, is true."
     What had I said to myself, that this wasn't going to take long?

     So they nominate him. What else are they gonna do? John Nance garner? Who the hell ever heard of John Nance Garner? Outside of Texas, John Nance garner ain't worth a pitcher of warm spit. Hoover might even lick him. No. It's a moment of silence and a round of applause for Franklin D. (D for Delano) Roosevelt. And then it's Joe Steele. Joe Steele! Joe Steele!
     Joe Steele for President! John Nance Garner for Vice President!
     Hoover mostly stays in Washington. When he goes out, he campaigns on his record. Proves how far out of touch he is, don't it?
     Joe Steele's everywhere. Everywhere. Whistle-stops on the train. Car trips. Airplane trips, for crying out loud. In the newsreels. On the radio. Joe Steele and his Four-Year-Plan! Drummer can't shack up with a waitress wihtout Joe Steele peeking in the window and telling 'em both to vote for him.
     And if they're like everybody else, they do.

     She called her husband, and I made more coffee, and we got to talking about her kids--Vera, Chuck and Dave, or whichever ones are hers--I can't keep up. There's two daughters, Maureen and Celine, and five grandkids. Sorting them all out was my late wife's job. She's only been gone a year and a month and three days.
     We got off onto colleges, even though it would be some years before any of the grandkids needed one. The usual party schools came up. "I can see them at Sam Houston State in togas," I said.
     "I'm just real sure toga parties will come back," said Mo.
     Then I mentioned Kent State.
     "Kent State? Nothing ever happens there," she said.
     "Yeah, right," I said, "like the nothing that happened after Nixon invaded Cambodia. All the campuses in America shut down. They sent the Guard in. They shot four people down, just like they were at a carnival."
     She looked at me.
     "Nixon? What did Nixon have to do with anything?"
     "Well, he was the president. He wanted 'no wider war.' Then he sent the Army into Cambodia and Laos. It was before your time.
     "Daddy," she said, "I don't remember much American history. But Nixon was never president. I think he was vice president under one of those old guys--was it Eisenhower? Then he tried to be a senator. Then he wanted to be president, but someone whipped his ass at the convention. Where in that was he ever president? I know Eisenhower didn't die in office."