“I could have had that beam of light, Nola Payne,” Taney said. “I had the education: Greek, Latin, standards, tradition were all mine. I was in the right social class and had all of the breaks, but I met my match when Dred Scott came before me; he had something that I didn’t have. A slave as lowly as he was. I had such a contempt for the African. I said that he had no rights that a white man was bound to respect, and when he came into the courtroom, I couldn’t take my eyes off him. What dignity.
“O, if only they had had black studies in my time. If only I had become acquainted with Ivan Van Sertima, if only I could have spent some time at the feet of James Spady instead of in those schools where I was taught that the white man was the center of the universe and that women and blacks were put here to be their slaves. Scott had courage, but I made the wrong decision. A decision etched forever in the annals of law, and I am condemned to wander around the American hell discarded by history like the Spruce Goose, my name spoken with disgust. Bewarrreee, Nola Payne. Beewarreee. This Reverend Jones is a dangerous man, and the Conversion Bill is bad news. Why, if the Jews and blacks are thrown out of the country, it will become dull and phlegmatic, like Canada. And so I’m condemned to wander eternity, reciting my brother-in-law Francis Scott Key’s awful poetry. Would you like to hear the choruses that were omitted from ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’?”
“That won’t be necessary, Chief Justice Taney.” Nola turned to the voice that was standing at the threshold of the garden. There attired in priestly clothes was Nick.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Nicholas of Bara,” Nick said. “Chief Justice Taney is giving you good advice.”
“But they all said that Clift was making it up.”
“They were wrong.”
“It is you, isn’t it?” Nola said, now sitting up in her bed.
“It’s me. Clift was right. He did the right thing. You do the right thing, or you, too, will become like Taney. A man brought to disgrace by vanity.” Nola Payne began to sob. And when she awoke the next morning, the sun was so bright that it burnt through her eyes, and it was only eight a.m. It would be a beautiful Xmas day. She called the justices into special session. She rose and went into the bathroom and removed the pills from their cabinets and watched as they went down the toilet. She went into the library and took all of the whiskey out and poured it down the sink. She took a bath and thought for a long time. She knew what she had to do, after Roger Taney’s pitiful narration of his infamous role in the Dred Scott decision. She prepared her own breakfast and ate in the garden. She walked down the stairs and got into her limousine. Her chauffeur was shocked. This was the first time in five years that he didn’t have to help her down the stairs, as she was recovering from a drunken stupor. She arranged for a special session of the Court. She went to the Court and cast votes that would shake Jesse Hatch’s administration to its foundation. She wrote the majority opinions for the vote against the Conversion Bill and for overruling a lower court by handing the reins of power to Dean Clift, who had been wrongfully removed from office by the Hatch administration.
28
As soon as it was heard that Nola Payne had cast the vote, restoring Clift to the Presidency and striking down the Conversion Bill, anybody who had anything to do with the Hatch administration began making travel arrangements. By late afternoon, the White House was almost empty. Committees in both the House and the Senate began announcing investigations into the Terrible Twos — Operation Two Birds — the covert operation that had been begun in the Clift administration. Everybody was abandoning Reverend Jones and going over to Dean Clift. Jesse Hatch had gotten in touch with officials of the returning Clift administration to arrange for the best possible deal that he could get for his role in the Terrible Twos. He didn’t want to do all that much time in Leavenworth. Kingsley Scabb had contacted some of his friends about a lectureship on the role of the Vice President at one of the staid Eastern universities. Nola Payne was being cheered everywhere she went and was being mentioned as a possible candidate for Governor of California, a state that seemed to be created just for her. Reverend Jones was gulping down a lot of pills and drinking water. He turned on the other channel. There was James Way, the hard-boiled conservative columnist, inside his Georgetown home, with homeless people sitting at his table, and welfare children opening their presents underneath his tree. The local TV cameras cornered him in the kitchen, supervising the chefs who were roasting turkeys or roast beef and Yorkshire pudding for all of the surps who were lined up in front of his house. His neighbors had complained, but he paid them no mind. Excerpts from the column that had appeared in the Washington Sun earlier that day told the whole story. “I went to hell and back with Nicholas. He showed me Walter Winchell, who was there for insulting Josephine Baker, and Westbrook Peglar for saying nasty things about Eleanor Roosevelt…. You get nowhere in this world with a nasty temper, and by using invective…. You get nowhere in this world without compassion and mercy,” he had written. The live TV cameras were trained on him as he scooped some potatoes and placed them on the plate of a homeless surp. “Thank you,” the grateful man said. “I use to not be able to get through a column without citing at least three dead men from the canon, but now I’m thinking for myself. I’m tired of being Joe Bob Briggs with a Thesaurus, and I’ve decided to modify my wordy style. I’ve thrown away my Bartlett’s. I feel honest. I feel fresh. And I’m going to quit being the mean and petty little son of a bitch whose whole career was built on baiting black people,” Way told the interviewers at the conclusion of the meal. The homeless surps began to applaud James Way, the columnist. Tears began to stream down his cheeks like Niagara Falls. One of the homeless approached him and put his arms around him. He cried into the man’s chest, reminding one of the photo of Nixon crying into Ike’s chest, after his famous Checkers speech.
Reverend Jones was shaking his head in disgust. He turned the channel to C-Span. Some of the meanest Congressmen were taking turns recounting the supernatural experiences they’d had with Nick. Fighting each other over who was going to introduce subsidized housing for the poor, universal health care, free day care, scholarships for all students, etc. Nick was all over.
Everybody had deserted the White House. The doorbell rang. The Marines and the Guards had gone downtown to gawk at Dean Clift and his party, like everybody else. Reverend Jones called for the help. “Jane, Esther, get that door, on the double,” he shouted. There was no answer. He’d forgotten that it was Xmas Day. He had to go and answer it himself. He would have to do a lot for himself from now on.
His wife had called him that morning and told him that she was going to spend the holidays with her folks in Wisconsin, and not to expect her back. That Saint Nicholas had come to her in a dream and told her that she had too much talent to waste it on the same scene. That she could return to the University of Wisconsin, at Madison, and develop her gifts. She wanted to be in a place where, as a blonde, she could remain anonymous. She told him that she had dismissed the help, and if he wanted Xmas dinner, he could fix it himself.