“You’re overstating, Brad,” Dr. Holt said, “You’re still an important man, you’re still involved in party affairs, you make speeches, there isn’t the week goes by you aren’t interviewed by the press at least once. Think about the trouble I’ve had getting you to cut down on your activities. You aren’t exactly vegetating out here, Brad.”
“But I am. All of this stuff is makework, it doesn’t matter a damn. I want to be back in action. I don’t mean run for the Presidency again, though I’d have Grover Cleveland if I wanted a precedent there, but I do mean back in the arena. Back to my first elected position, Congressman from Pennsylvania. I was good at that job once before, there’s no reason I couldn’t be good at it again.”
Doubtfully, Orr said, “Well, there’s no question but that you’d win, Brad, I think even old George would vote for you himself. But I’m not sure it’s proper.”
Doctor Holt said, “I’m sure it isn’t. Brad, you haven’t lost your eloquence either, I do understand your feelings and I grant you what you’ve been doing the last few years isn’t as vital or as interesting as the Presidency, and it’s a hell of a position for an active man to be in. But whether you like it or not you are a former President of these United States, and that means certain avenues are closed to you.”
“Why?” Lockridge asked him.
“Because of the dignity of your former position. If you went from President to Congressman, you wouldn’t elevate the position of Congressman; you’d degrade the position of President.”
Lockridge nodded, smiling, and turned to Robert to say, “Well, Robert? What did John Quincy Adams have to say to that?”
Now Robert understood what his purpose was here today. It wasn’t advice Lockridge wanted from him, it was support. He wanted John Quincy Adams to fight his battle for him, through Robert.
He grinned, acknowledging Lockridge’s strategy, and said, “He said that no person could be degraded by serving the people as a representative in Congress. Or even as a selectman of his town.”
Dr. Holt said, “When was all this? Eighteen something?”
Robert told him, “1830 till 1848.”
Lockridge said, “Joe, what’s your real objection? Health? I’m more likely to have a stroke from exasperation sitting around here than from being down in Washington. Age? George Meecham is older than I am, and John Quincy Adams was an active member of the House when he died at the age of eighty-one. As for prestige, if I’m worthy of respect I’m worthy of it anywhere, even in the House of Representatives.”
“It isn’t prestige I’m talking about,” the doctor said. “It’s power and influence. Whatever you may think of your position now, Brad, it’s still more than that of a lowly member of the House.”
“But I wouldn’t be a lowly member of the House, would I? I’d be Bradford Lockridge in the House.”
“That wouldn’t matter,” Dr. Holt told him. “If you chose the position of Congressman from Pennsylvania, the political community would have to treat you as the Congressman from Pennsylvania. The whole world would. You’d end up reducing your power and influence from that of ex-President to that of Congressman. And no matter what you say, your power and influence at this moment are greater than that of all but a handful of Congressmen, and they’re the chairmen of the key committees.”
Lockridge frowned. “I’d have less voice? I don’t believe it.”
“You would,” the doctor insisted.
Lockridge turned to Robert again, saying, “Robert, correct me if I’m wrong. Historians generally agree, do they not, that John Quincy Adams’ eighteen years in Congress after his Presidency was the most productive part of his career?”
“Well, he had a troubled Presidency—”
“As did I,” Lockridge reminded him, a slight twist to his smile.
Robert nodded, and said, “It was his House career where he made his biggest contributions, that’s true. In his battle against the gag rules, for instance.”
“It won’t work,” Dr. Holt said. “I know you think now that any activity would be better than none, but I don’t believe you’re right. The House is a worthy place, but it’s small time, Brad, and you aren’t a small-time man. You’d chafe there a lot harder than you chafe here.”
Lockridge looked uncertain for a second, but then he smiled and shook his head, saying, “Some is better than none, Joe.”
“It’s well over a year before there’s another election,” the doctor said. “I ask you not to have a closed mind on this, Brad. Think it over very carefully.”
“Oh, I will, Joe, believe me. That’s what this lunch is all about, to get some more ideas on the subject.” He looked over at Orr. “What about you, Len? What do you think?”
“Well, I don’t know,” Orr said painfully. He obviously had no desire to disagree with the great Bradford Lockridge, but he just as obviously had reservations, “Maybe it is a small pond for you, Brad,” he said. The nickname sounded awkward when he said it. “Maybe you are too big for it.”
Lockridge said, “I don’t believe I am, Len. But even if it worked out that way, and two years later I decided not to stand for re-election, we shouldn’t have any trouble getting one of our own people to take my place.”
Orr looked more pained than ever. “I suppose not,” he said.
Lockridge studied him with growing impatience, and said, “What is it, Len? What’s stuck in your throat?”
“It’s nothing, Brad, only—” Orr’s face screwed with agony, and no more words came out.
“Only what,” Lockridge said.
“People,” Orr said slowly, “might not see it right, that’s all.”
“I don’t follow you. People might not see what right?”
“You wanting to be Congressman. They’re liable to say, Bradford Lockridge is a big important man, what does he want to piddle around with one little Congressional district for? They might think you were just having fun a little bit, not really serious about it.”
“Well, they’d find out after I was elected, wouldn’t they?” A steel edge had suddenly come into Lockridge’s voice; he hadn’t liked what Orr just said. Looking at him, Robert wondered why that objection had gotten to him. It wasn’t likely to be an accurate estimate of Lockridge’s intentions, he hadn’t been talking like a dilettante. Maybe it was just that while he didn’t mind people thinking he was too old or not dignified enough or too big a fish for the pond, he did mind if they thought he wasn’t serious.
Orr, meanwhile, was back-pedaling at top speed. “Oh, sure, Brad,” he was saying. “They’d find it out quick enough. It’s just before election I’m talking about, before you had a chance to show you really meant it.”
Lockridge’s stern expression altered to an equally stern smile. “You think I might not get elected?”
“Oh, no, you’d get elected, no question of that. But I have no doubt there’d be some dirty pool played on the other side of the fence. If I was running George Meecham’s campaign, I know just the kind of whispers I’d get started up. It wouldn’t do any good, my man would go down to defeat just the same, but it wouldn’t help you any.”