CHAPTER II


GETTING THE DALLAS BLUES: Bitterly he ponders his choices. He can present his arguments and be humiliated or he can fail to present his arguments and be humiliated. He decides upon the former course and selects the guise of a rotund appointments secretary on whose appearance he has been able to do a fine mock-up through access to the secret files. As is his custom he is permitted to make direct entrance to the President’s quarters before nine where he finds the President in his nightshirt, ruffling his hair and looking unhappily out the window. “I don’t like this city,” the President says mildly enough. “Every time I come here I get the blues. Getting the Dallas blues,” the President adds pointlessly and turns, walks past the disguised Scop and toward a closet. “Now what shall I wear today?” he says, and begins to riffle clothing. “The blue? Or the black? Of course it doesn’t matter.”

“I would suggest that you leave at once,” Scop says.

“I think the black would be better. But then again I look most dashing in blue. It is very difficult to make these decisions because they make me feel like a frivolous person. But occasions of state are frivolous,” the President adds mildly, “we really must remem­ber that. At the heart this is a ceremonial position.” Humming he takes out the blue and ponders it at extension length. “I might as well,” he says. “And they’ll probably give me thathat at the breakfast but then again—blues for the blue, don’t you think that’s right?”

Abruptly Scop’s control breaks. More and more this has been happening to him; he has tried to slide his way into situations crosswise, moving laterally toward cautious alignment, reminding himself that results are best obtained through indirection but un­der the circumstances it is impossible to continue this way. Bit­terness seizes him. “Leave Dallas!” he shouts, “you must leave this town at once; it is absolutely disastrous for you to extend your stay. You must go, flee, the streets are choked with assassins, at this very moment—” and then he breaks off, tormented, stricken, he has broken the code of information. Whatever he had in mind he had never planned to do this. The President looks at him bleakly and then strokes the fabric of the blue suit, tosses it casually on the bed, parts his robe to reveal himself naked but for his underclothing; a strongly built man, his body reassembled leaving only residual effects from previous injuries. “That’s all well and good,” he says, “but we’ve got only half an hour to be downtown so we’d better hurry.”

Scop cries out but no one comes.