“They don’t let you in America if they think you’re gonna stay.”
“You got it all figured out,” Pami said, in admiration.
“It’s my way to dream,” the woman said. “Someday I’ll fly away from here. If I don’t fly on an airplane” — and she jabbed her thumb over her shoulder, pointing above the wall behind her — “I’ll fly that way. One how or another, someday I’ll fly. I like to dream about the good way.”
Pami sat leaning forward, sharp elbows on skinny legs, looking at the woman, thinking about the different ways to fly. She didn’t say anything. She felt calm. The bad dreams weren’t with her here, they were all down in the room.
The woman turned her head, looking toward the eastern horizon. “Daytime,” she said. “Same old daytime.”
Pami didn’t say anything.
10
The two-breakfast morning was bad for Congressman Stephen Schlurn, as he well knew, but how could he avoid it? There are only so many hours in the day, there’s a re-election every two years, and the primary job of any congressman is to keep in touch. It used to be a goal of hometown newspapers to mention every family in the area at least once a year, to keep alive the notion that this is your newspaper, which you should read all the time; a congressman’s task was similar, except there was the question of power added to the equation. Powerless families need not be stroked so often; the powerful need constant reassurance of their power.
Thus the two-breakfast morning, and often the two-or three-lunch mid-day, the two-dinner evening, and, during campaign time, horrid “ethnic” snacks as well, all day long. Jerry Seidelbaum, the congressman’s chief administrative assistant, kept a large supply of tablet-form Pepto-Bismol in his attaché case, but the damage was being done, nonetheless.
This morning’s first breakfast, at eight, was in a yellow-concrete-block-and-glaring-overhead-fluorescent-light Knights of Columbus hall, with an entire Little League’s coaching staff, the kind of local businessmen who volunteer their time and effort and money — good qualities, very good qualities — but only to what they think of as manly endeavors.
Congressman Schlurn found it hard as hell to be manly at eight in the morning, but that was the task, so his remarks were modified Harry Truman give-em-hell stuff, with some slightly off-color baseball jokes thrown in. The food was miserable dank scrambled eggs that looked like Little Orphan Annie’s hair and tasted like baby vomit, plus Vienna sausages that had been cremated for several days and white toast drowned in butter.
This way lies cardiac arrest. The congressman contented himself with just enough coffee to give him heartburn, smiled for an hour, and got out of there just as rapidly as he could.
In the car, with Lemuel the chauffeur up front and Schlurn and Jerry Seidelbaum in the roomy back, Schlurn moodily chewed Pepto-Bismol and listened as Jerry briefed him on breakfast number two: “The food should be better, anyway.”
“That doesn’t help. What I need is no food, possibly for a week.”
Jerry knew not to respond to Schlurn’s self-pity, but merely to march on: “Your host is Hodding Cabell Carson, president of Grayling University.”
“Ah, Grayling,” Schlurn said, smiling in a rare moment of honest pleasure. “They gave me an honorary degree once, didn’t they?”
“Twice. Nine years ago, and three years ago.”
“Lovely place. Ivied buildings, long walks in the quad. That’s where I should have gone.” In fact, Schlurn had gone to Queens College and City University in New York; his law degree was the sort that made Ivy Leaguers smile patronizingly. But a congressman didn’t get smiled at patronizingly, no matter what his collegiate background; one of the advantages, to make up for those scrambled eggs.
Jerry said, “In addition to Carson, there will be Tony Potter, chief executive officer of Unitronic Labs.”
“Defense?”
“Only peripherally. Blue-sky stuff, mostly, alternative energy sources.”
“Oh, God,” Schlurn said. “Windmills.”
“No, no, no, Steve, these aren’t Greenpeace people. They’re a wholly owned subsidiary of Anglo Dutch Oil.”
Which rang a bell. Schlurn said, “I’ve met Tony Potter. He’s a Brit.”
“Almost to excess,” Jerry commented.
“What’s our subject?”
“Dr. Marlon Philpott.”
Schlurn’s round pasty face wrinkled with thought. “Why do I know that name?”
“Scientist. Physicist. Testifies in Washington sometimes.”
“He teaches at Grayling, right?”
“He’s one of the jewels in their crown,” Jerry agreed. “He’s also funded by Unitronic.”
“Will he be there?”
“I don’t believe so.”
“Then what’s the purpose of our joyful gathering?”
“I imagine they’ll tell us,” Jerry said, “when we get there.”
Schlurn remembered Carson when he saw him again: the kind of vainglorious WASP who made his teeth ache, as though he’d bitten down on aluminum foil. Being, like all American WASPs, a fawning anglophile, Carson introduced Tony Potter as though he were the Second Coming at the very least. “From across the pond,” Carson said, showing his big horse teeth. “We’re happy he could make time this morning. Happy you both could.”
“We’ve met,” Tony Potter said. His handshake was firm without being aggressive. A big-boned but trim man in his mid-forties, with a pleasantly lumpy face and calmly self-confident eyes, he would have stood six foot four if he didn’t slouch so much, as though his spine were made of rubber. That the slouch itself was a form of condescension to the lesser orders was clear, but unimportant; Tony Potter was insignificant to the life and career of Stephen Schlurn. It was Hodding Cabell Carson who was important to Schlurn, unfortunately.
The fifth member of the group was Wilcox Harrison, Grayling’s provost, from the same background as Carson but less obnoxious. Introductions were completed and idle breaking-the-ice chitchat continued for a minute or two in Carson’s impressive office before Carson said, “Well, shall we go in to breakfast?”
“Lovely,” Tony Potter said, and smiled at Schlurn, saying, “My third of the morning, actually.”
“Only my second,” Schlurn said, warming to the man.
Carson, sounding a bit frosty, as though he didn’t like hearing about other suitors to his guests’ hands, said, “Well, I think you’ll find this the best of them. Shall we?”
They were about to file through the dark-paneled door when Carson’s secretary — a pretty girl — came in from the outer office with a small white slip of paper in her hand. “Congressman? Your Washington office called. Mr. Metz?”
Now what? Schlurn looked pleasant: “Yes?”
“He wanted me to give you this reminder.”
“Thank you.” Schlurn took the paper from the girl, who left as he turned it around and read, “Remember Green Meadow.” He frowned, and showed the note — it was on one of those “While You Were Out” forms — to Jerry, saying, “That’s not till Thursday, is it?”
“That’s right.” Jerry grinned. “A little panic in the office while the boss is away.”
Schlurn shook his head and tucked the note into his side jacket pocket, and they went on to the next-door dining room for breakfast.
Wonderfully fresh orange juice. Chilled sweet melon. Thin-sliced salmon and cream cheese with triangular toast tips. Velvety coffee. All in a room with portraits of former Grayling presidents on the walls, silent black servitors, and wonderful views of the campus out the windows. It was as though that Knights of Columbus hall and those scrambled eggs had never been.