“With utmost reluctance, I ask that you authorize these necessary steps.” With that he sat down.
You can feel a crowd. They were made uneasy, but he did not carry them. The president of the Senate took the gavel and looked at the Senate majority leader; it had been programmed for him to propose the emergency resolution.
Something slipped. I don’t know whether the floor leader shook his head or signaled, but he did not take the floor. Meanwhile the delay was getting awkward and there were cries of, “Mister President!” and “Order!”
The Senate president passed over several others and gave the floor to a member of his own party. I recognized the man—Senator Gottlieb, a wheelhorse who would vote for his own lynching if it were on his party’s program. He started out by yielding to none in his respect for the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and, probably, the Grand Canyon. He pointed modestly to his own long and faithful service and spoke well of America’s place in history.
I thought he was beating the drum while the boys worked out a new shift—when I suddenly realized that his words were adding up to meaning: he was proposing to suspend the order of business and get on with the impeachment and trial of the President of the United States!
I think I tumbled to it as quickly as anyone; the senator had his proposal so decked out in ritualistic verbiage that it was a wonder that anyone noticed what he was actually saying. I looked at the Old Man.
The Old Man was looking at Mary.
She was looking back at him with an expression of extreme urgency.
The Old Man snatched a pad out of his pocket, scrawled something, wadded it up, and threw it down to Mary. She caught it, opened it, and read it—and passed it to the President.
He was sitting, relaxed and easy—as if one of his oldest friends were not at that moment tearing his name to shreds and, with it, the safety of the Republic. He put on his old-fashioned specs and read the note. He then glanced unhurriedly around at the Old Man and lifted his eyebrows. The Old Man nodded.
The President nudged the Senate president, who, at the President’s gesture, bent over him. The President and he exchanged whispers.
Gottlieb was still rumbling along about his deep sorrow, but that there came times when old friendship must give way to a higher duty and therefore— The Senate president banged his gavel. “If the senator please!”
Gottlieb looked startled and said, “I do not yield.”
“The senator is not asked to yield. At the request of the President of the United States, because of the importance of what you are saying, the senator is asked to come to the rostrum to speak.”
Gottlieb looked puzzled but there was nothing else he could do. He walked slowly toward the front of the house.
Mary’s chair blocked the little stairway up to the rostrum. Instead of getting quietly out of the way, she bumbled around, turning and picking up the chair, so that she got even more in the way. Gottlieb stopped and she brushed against him. He caught her arm, as much to steady himself as her. She spoke to him and he to her, but no one else could hear the words. Finally they got around each other and he went on to the front of the rostrum.
The Old Man was quivering like a dog in point. Mary looked up at him and nodded. The Old Man said, “Take him!”
I was over that rail in a flying leap, as if I had been wound up like a crossbow. I landed on Gottlieb’s shoulders.
I heard the Old Man shout, “Gloves, son! Gloves!” I did not stop for them. I split the senator’s jacket with my bare hands and I could see the slug pulsing under his shirt. I tore the shirt away and anybody could see it.
Six stereo cameras could not have recorded what happened in the next few seconds. I slugged Gottlieb back of the ear to stop his thrashing. Mary was sitting on his legs. The President was standing over me and pointing, while shouting, “There! There! Now you can all see.” The Senate president was standing stupefied, waggling his gavel.