“I’m a bit deaf.” The old man smiled. Huge dentures moved about his mouth. “There’s your key. That’s what Teddy’s looking for. He doesn’t want people to think of him as Platt and Quay’s invention. But to be the candidate of the West…”
“A cowboy…?”
“A cowboy. A Rough Rider. Now he’s getting it together.”
“Can Hanna stop him?”
“Will McKinley stop him? That’s the question.”
“McKinley can keep him from being nominated?”
“McKinley can put him out to pasture for good-in the badlands. But will he?”
Monday morning Blaise was in the crowded hotel” lobby when Mark Hanna made his not-so-triumphant entrance. The once thick-set, rather doughy political manager, made famous by a thousand cartoons of which the wickedest were Hearst’s, was now a stooped haggard figure who walked with a noticeable limp. Behind him, to Blaise’s surprise, was Senator Lodge, Roosevelt’s closest friend, whose support of Secretary of the Navy Long was considered to be no more than a holding operation for an eleventh-hour strike by the Governor. The eleventh hour was now striking. Blaise tried-but failed-to get near Hanna. He caught Lodge’s eye; and received a courtly nod, no more. But then Lodge had always taken the firm line that if a gentleman were to work for Hearst either he was not a gentleman or the word was in need of redefining.
Blaise then retreated to the marble stairs to the mezzanine, where he knew Hanna would be quartered. The day was oppressingly hot; and the smell of the delegates overwhelming. Blaise felt like Coriolanus as, trying not to inhale, he climbed the stairs to the mezzanine, which was filled with huge portraits of McKinley trimmed with red, white and blue bunting. A large placard, over an exit door to a fire escape, announced, humorously, “Republican National Committee.”
James Thorne, a San Francisco Examiner reporter, took Blaise in hand. He was a young, thin, hard man, who did the actual work of the Washington bureau which Ambrose Bierce adorned, weaving his verbal wreaths, in prose and verse, of marvellous poison ivy. “Hanna’s using this room,” said Thorne. “Does he know you by sight?”
“I doubt it.”
“He knows me, so I’m keeping my hat down over my eyes. If I do get kicked out, you’ll take notes, won’t you, Mr. Sanford?”
“I think I probably can,” said Blaise. He was used by now to being treated as a feeble-minded rich boy.
Thorne and Blaise occupied two straight-backed chairs in front of a window. “That’s so the light will be in his eyes,” said Thorne. “He won’t be able to see us. I hope. One thing about a national convention. Nobody’s ever seen anybody before. So you can get away with a lot by just pretending you belong wherever you happen to be.”
Blaise did his best to look as if he belonged in front of an open window in a large room filled with gilt sofas and chairs. In the corner of the room there was-most important of all-a telephone booth. “It’s rigged up to the White House,” said Thorne.
Suddenly the room was filled with politicians, and Hanna was carefully placed in an armchair. He was, Blaise decided, not long for this world. Lodge was nowhere in sight.
One by one the state leaders were admitted to the presence. Hanna questioned each carefully; each questioned Hanna. Was it true that McKinley was taking no position?
Hanna’s response was always the same. He was in close touch with the President. The convention was open. Everyone hoped that the best man would win. Wherever Roosevelt was alluded to as a potential “best man,” Hanna would glower. Then he would speak of Dolliver, Allison, Long, Bliss: seasoned men, good Republicans, reliable. But after each delegation had come and gone, Hanna was more and more drained. He sweated; and the dull red eyes were glazed.
‘One of Hanna’s aides came out of the telephone booth. “No word, Senator.”
“In that case,” said a Roosevelt supporter from the West, whose name neither Thorne nor Blaise had heard, “the convention’s under your control, Senator.”
Hanna glared at the Westerner. “My control? No, it is not. Everyone’s doing what he damn well pleases.”
One of Hanna’s aides tried to stop him; but the fit was upon him. “I am not in control. I should be. But I’m not. McKinley won’t let me use the power of the presidency to defeat Roosevelt. He’s blind or afraid, or something. I’m finished. I’m out. I’m not running this campaign. I’m quitting as national chairman.” The tirade went on. Thorne and Blaise both made rapid notes.
A California delegate entered the room, unaware that he was interrupting Hanna’s definitive performance as King Lear. “Well, Senator, the whole West is now for Roosevelt…”
“Idiot!” Hanna bawled. The Californian reeled back as though struck. With the help of three men, Hanna staggered to his feet. “Don’t you fools realize that there would be only one man’s life between that madman and the presidency?”
At this propitious moment, the madman entered the room, clicking his teeth with what could have been joy or, Blaise thought more likely, a carnivore’s hunger. “Senator Hanna, dee-light-ed.”
Roosevelt seized the hand of the swaying Hanna. The room was now filled with Roosevelt supporters. “I’m sorry to cause so much commotion.” Roosevelt adjusted the Rough Rider’s hat. “I thought I’d just slip into town, as a humble delegate-at-large…”
Softly, Hanna screamed. But no one paid the slightest attention to him. At the eleventh hour the madman held center stage. “I had not realized how undecided everyone is…”
Hanna found his voice. “Undecided? We’re all decided. You’re not going to be the nominee. You come in here, dressed up like a cowboy, and try to stampede the convention, when Long and Dolliver are the true candidates.”
“Senator Lodge tells me that Mr. Long is not all that serious, and…”
“If I say he’s serious, Governor, he’s serious.”
“What does the President say?” Blaise admired this instinctive leap for the jugular.
“May the best man win. That’s what we all say. That’s what’s going to happen, too. All you’ve got, Governor, is Platt and Quay. Well, we can’t go into an election with Bryan with a candidate who’s the invention of the big-city machines. McKinley speaks for the heartland, not Boss Platt, not Boss Quay…”
“Not Boss Hanna?” asked a voice in the doorway.
“Boss? Me, a boss! I do like I’m told. Don’t go believing what you read in those Hearst papers. I follow orders, and I’ve got one from the President which I’m going to follow to the end. No deal with the big-city bosses. They may want you, Governor. But we don’t want nothing to do with them. Is that clear?”
Roosevelt was now very red in the face and breathing hard. “My support is from reform; from the West…”
“Platt and Quay. Platt and Quay!” Hanna drowned him out, and Blaise could tell that Roosevelt had been, momentarily, beaten back.
“Naturally, I stand where I’ve always stood.” Roosevelt’s hand touched the tooth which Blaise knew to be aching. “I would like renomination as governor of New York…”
“Make a statement to that effect. By four this afternoon, we’ll want it for the wire services.” Hanna had pulled himself together. “I’ll get the word to Platt, and the New York delegation. You may think you have the West, but we have the South, and Ohio.” Hanna was now in the doorway, surrounded by his revivified troops. “May the best man win!” he shouted at Roosevelt, who was staring at Blaise, and not seeing him, or anyone else. The teeth that had been clicking so ominously were now set close together. Behind the gold pince-nez the small dull blue eyes were unfocussed. What next? Blaise wondered.
The next day was Hanna’s. He was given an ovation when he appeared on the stage of the convention hall, a vast hot building set in West Philadelphia. Blaise was seated in the press section, with a good view of the state delegations below him. New York’s banner was close to the stage; but there was no hatted Rough Rider to be seen. The Governor had indeed done as he was told by Hanna; he had given a statement to the press that he would prefer to continue as governor. When asked to comment, Senator Platt had said that he was in such exquisite pain that he no longer cared who was elected what. According to Roosevelt’s secretary the Governor had made no move to woo the Southern delegates away from Hanna; instead, he was searching desperately for a dentist who could stop the pain in his tooth without removing it. The thought of a huge gap in those tombstone teeth was terrifying to all Roosevelt supporters.